cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
The midpoint between dipole and parton showers

We present a new parton-shower algorithm. Borrowing from the basic ideas of dipole cascades, the evolution variable is judiciously chosen as the transverse momentum in the soft limit. This leads to a very simple analytic structure of the evolution. A weighting algorithm is implemented that allows one to consistently treat potentially negative values of the splitting functions and the parton distributions. We provide two independent, publicly available implementations for the two event generators Pythia and Sherpa.
Gradient climbing in formation via extremum seeking and passivity-based coordination rules

We consider a gradient climbing problem where the objective is to steer a group of vehicles to the extrema of an unknown scalar field distribution while keeping a prescribed formation. We address this problem by developing a scheme in which the leader performs extremum seeking for the minima or maxima of the field, and other vehicles follow according to passivity-based coordination rules. The extremum-seeking approach generates approximate gradients of the field locally by “dithering” sensor positions. We show that if there is sufficient time-scale separation between the fast dither and slow gradient motions of the leader vehicle, the followers only respond to the gradient motion, and filter out the dither component. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley and Sons Asia Pte Ltd and Chinese Automatic Control Society
Modeling protein-based 3-D memory in SPICE

The Simulation Program for Integrated Circuit Engineering (SPICE) has been used successfully for many years to aid semiconductor circuit design. SPICE represents circuits as networks of basic devices with interacting parameters (current, voltage, etc.), and then models these interactions as systems of partial differential equations. Biological systems are roughly similar, consisting of networks of interacting biochemical cycles whose resulting chemical concentrations can also be modeled by partial differential equations. In the present, we use SPICE to model an optically-accessed, protein-based, 3-D memory. Modeling the protein's photochemical effects in SPICE allows us to include, within the same model, the supporting electronics and optics needed to properly cycle the memory and interface it to the outside world.
Ultrastructure of the parotid gland of the nine-banded armadillo

The parotid gland of the nine-banded armadillo (Dasypus novemcinctus) was examined by electron microscopy. In general, the ultrastructural morphology of this gland appears similar to that described in other species. The most unusual feature of the gland is that the secretory granules of the acinar cells contain a wide variety of substructures. These substructures range from a single dense core within a homogeneous matrix to a more complex cord-like network extending throughout the granule. It is suggested that this diversity of substructures is indicative of a maturation process of the secretory granules. The intercalated ducts are secretory. The myoepithelial cells are numerous, extend throughout the gland, and are associated with the striated ducts.
A BIAS-REDUCED LOG-PERIODOGRAM REGRESSION ESTIMATOR FOR THE LONG-MEMORY PARAMETER

In this paper, we propose a simple bias-reduced log-periodogram regression estimator, dr of the long-memory parameter, d, that eliminates the first- and higher-order biases of the Geweke and Porter-Hudak (1983) (GPH) estimator. The bias-reduced estimator is the same as the GPH estimator except that one includes frequencies to the power 2k for k = 1, . . ., r, for some positive integer r, as additional regressors in the pseudo-regression model that yields the GPH estimator. The reduction in bias is obtained using assumptions on the spectrum only in a neighborhood of the zero frequency. Following the work of Robinson (1995b) and Hurvich, Deo, and Brodsky (1998), we establish the asymptotic bias, variance, and mean-squared error (MSE) of dr, determine the asymptotic MSE optimal choice of the number of frequencies, m, to include in the regression, and establish the asymptotic normality of dr. These results show that the bias of dr goes to zero at a faster rate than that of the GPH estimator when the normalized spectrum at zero is sufficiently smooth, but that its variance only is increased by a multiplicative constant. We show that the bias-reduced estimator dr attains the optimal rate of convergence for a class of spectral densities that includes those that are smooth of order s > 1 at zero when r > (s - 2)/2 and m is chosen appropriately. For s > 2, the GPH estimator does not attain this rate. The proof uses results of Giraitis, Robinson, and Samarov (1997). We specify a data-dependent plug-in method for selecting the number of frequencies m to minimize asymptotic MSE for a given value of r. Some Monte Carlo simulation results for stationary Gaussian ARFIMA(1, d, 1) and (2, d, 0) models show that the bias-reduced estimators perform well relative to the standard log-periodogram regression estimator.
Coh-Metrix Measures Text Characteristics at Multiple Levels of Language and Discourse.

AbstractCoh-Metrix analyzes texts on multiple measures of language and discourse that are aligned with multilevel theoretical frameworks of comprehension. Dozens of measures funnel into five major factors that systematically vary as a function of types of texts (e.g., narrative vs. informational) and grade level: narrativity, syntactic simplicity, word concreteness, referential cohesion, and deep (causal) cohesion. Texts are automatically scaled on these five factors with Coh-Metrix-TEA (Text Easability Assessor). This article reviews how these five factors account for text variations and reports analyses that augment Coh-Metrix in two ways. First, there is a composite measure called formality, which increases with low narrativity, syntactic complexity, word abstractness, and high cohesion. Second, the words are analyzed with Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count, an automated system that measures words in texts on dozens of psychological attributes. One next step in automated text analyses is a topics analys...
An integral-field spectroscopic strong lens survey

We present the observational results of a survey for strong gravitational lens systems consisting of extended emission-line galaxies lensed by intervening early-type galaxies, conducted using integral field units (IFUs) of the Magellan IMACS and Gemini GMOS-N spectrographs. These data are highly valuable for corroborating the lensing interpretation of Hubble Space Telescope imaging data. We show that in many cases, ground-based IFU spectroscopy is in fact competitive with space-based imaging for the measurement of the mass model parameters of the lensing galaxy. We demonstrate a novel technique of three-dimensional gravitational lens modeling for a single lens system with a resolved lensed rotation curve. We also describe the details of our custom IFU data analysis software, which performs optimal multi-fiber extraction, relative and absolute wavelength calibration to a few hundredths of a pixel RMS and nearly Poisson-limited sky subtraction.
Synthesis and Properties of a New Metal-Rich Nickel Antimonide Telluride or Selenide: Ni7-δSbX2 (δ ≈ 1.3; X = Se or Te)

The two isotypic compounds Ni5.66SbTe2 and Ni5.72SbSe2 have been synthesized by high-temperature reaction of the elements or by using a flux method. They were both characterized by single-crystal X-ray diffraction. Both compounds crystallize in space group I4/mmm with Z = 2. Ni5.66SbTe2 (Ni5.72SbSe2) has lattice parameters a = b = 3.7824(5) A and c = 19.244(4) A (a = b = 3.7021(5) A and c = 18.593(3) A). There is a high concentration of nickel vacancies (≈66%) on one of the three nickel sites (Wyckoff position 4e). Thermopower, thermal conductivity, resistivity, and magnetic susceptibility data for Ni5.66SbTe2 indicate nonmagnetic and metallic behavior.
AN IMPROVED METHOD FOR THE PREPARATION OF 2-(2′-AMINOARYL) OXAZOLINES FROM SUBSTITUTED ISATOIC ANHYDRIDES AND 2-CHLOROETHYLAMINE HYDROCHLORIDE

(2007). AN IMPROVED METHOD FOR THE PREPARATION OF 2-(2′-AMINOARYL) OXAZOLINES FROM SUBSTITUTED ISATOIC ANHYDRIDES AND 2-CHLOROETHYLAMINE HYDROCHLORIDE. Organic Preparations and Procedures International: Vol. 39, No. 1, pp. 93-96.
Toward a Reconstruction of Medical Morality

At the center of medical morality is the healing relationship. It is defined by three phenomena: the fact of illness, the act of profession, and the act of medicine. The first puts the patient in a vulnerable and dependent position; it results in an unequal relationship. The second implies a promise to help. The third involves those actions that will lead to a medically competent healing decision. But it must also be good for the patient in the fullest possible sense. The physician cannot fully heal without giving the patient an understanding of alternatives such that he or she can freely arrive--together with the physician--at a decision in keeping with his or her personal morality and values. In today's pluralistic society, universal agreement on moral issues between physicians and patients is no longer possible. Nevertheless, a reconstruction of professional ethics based on a new appreciation of what makes for a true healing relationship between patient and physician is both possible and necessary.
New iron(II) spin-crossover complexes with heterocyclic amine-derived ligands and STEPS experiments on photogenerated metastable high-spin states

Cationic complexes of the type [Fe(LNN)3]2+ and [Fe(LNNN)2]2+ have been isolated as Cl–, ClO4–, or BF4– salts, where LNN and LNNN represent bidentate and tridentate nitrogen-donor ligands respectively. The bidentate ligands were 2-(2′-pyridyl) benzimidazole (pybtim), 2-(2′-pyridyl)-N-methylbenzimidazole (mpybzim); 2-(2′-pyridyl) benzothiazole (pybzt), 2,2′-dipyridylamine (dpya), and the tridentates di(2-pyridylmethyl)amine (dpyma), 2,6-bis(benzimidazol-2′-yl)pyridine (bzimpy), 2,6-bis(N-methylbenzimidazol-2′-yl)pyridine (mbzimpy), and 2,6-bis(benzothiazol-2′-yl) pyridine (bztpy). Except for [Fe(dpya)3][ClO4]2, all these FeN6 chromophores exhibit strong absorption in the 550 nm region, which is assigned as a metal-to-ligand charge-transfer transition. Between 4 and 320 K, the iron(II) is in the low-spin form in the majority of these compounds; high-spin exceptions are [Fe(dpya)3][ClO4]2 and [Fe(mbzimpy)2]Cl2. Other complexes show evidence of the onset of a spin transition near 40 °C, while the salt [Fe(bztpy)2][ClO4]2·CHCl3 is a well defined spin-crossover system. The low-spin complex [Fe(bzimpy)2][ClO4]2 was excited by irradiation with visible light, and the generation and decay of the resulting high-spin form was observed under cryogenic conditions. In solution, [Fe(bzimpy)2]2+ acts as a weak diprotic acid and also exhibits quintet ⇌ singlet spin crossover (ΔH⊖=–42.7 kJ mol–1, ΔS⊖=–140.9 J K–1 mol–1). The complexes are all electrochemically oxidizable to their iron(III) forms in non-aqueous solution, but the dpyma, bztpy, pybtz, and dpya chelates thus formed are unstable. The iron(III) complex [Fe(H–2bzimpy)2]– containing the doubly deprotonated ligand was obtained as its low-spin triethylammonium salt. The high-spin chloro complexes [Fe(bzimpy)Cl3], [Fe(mbzimpy)Cl3], Fe(mbzimpy)Cl2, and the mixed-spin iron(II) complex salt [Fe(bzimpy)][FeCl4] were also isolated.
Particle motion in the stable region near the edge of a linear sum resonance stopband

This paper studies the particle motion when the tune is in the stable region close to the edge of linear sum resonance stopband. Results are found for the tune and the beta functions. Results are also found for the two solutions of the equations of motion. The results found are shown to be also valid for small accelerators where the large accelerator approximation may not be used.
Stereoselective oxidation of an eleven-membered heterocycle

Abstract Oxidation of macrocyclic phosphine oxide-dithioether 1 produces only the dl form of disulfoxide 2. This selectivity can be rationalized by comparing the crystal structures of starting material and product, and on the basis of VT NMR data, which suggest that the starting macrocycle is conformationally constrained in solution.
SLC final performance and lessons

The Stanford Linear Collider (SLC) was the first prototype of a new type of accelerator, the electron-positron linear collider. Many years of dedicated effort were required to understand the physics of this new technology and to develop the techniques for maximizing performance. Key issues were emittance dilution, stability, final beam optimization and background control. Precision, non-invasive diagnostics were required to measure and monitor the beams throughout the machine. Beam-based feedback systems were needed to stabilize energy, trajectory, intensity and the final beam size at the interaction point. variety of new tuning techniques were developed to correct for residual optical or alignment errors. The final focus system underwent a series of refinements in order to deliver sub-micron size beams. It also took many iterations to understand the sources of backgrounds and develop the methods to control them. The benefit from this accumulated experience was seen in the performance of the SLC during its final run in 1997-98. The luminosity increased by a factor of three to 3*10 30 and the 350,000 Z data sample delivered was nearly double that from all previous runs combined.
Ultrafast optical technologies for large-capacity TDM/WDM photonic networks

Research efforts of developing new generation optical communication technologies for the next few decades and beyond are described which enable well over Peta bit/s per fiber link capacity and Exa-class network throughput.
Spectrometer chopper for AHF and SSC low-energy transports

The study of a possible chopping system for the Advanced Hadron Facility (AHF) and the Superconducting Super Collider (SSC) is presented. A 200 MHz RFQ (radio-frequency quadrupole accelerator) may be preferable to lower-frequency structures for the injection linacs of the AHF and SSC. To achieve a pulse frequency of 50 MHz, a chopper must be developed to eliminate three out of four bunches at the tenth of a percent level. Conventional choppers suffer from risetime limitations due to the finite separation of the deflecting plates. One alternative is a spectrometer chopper which modulates the energy of each bunch and then separates the bunches with a spectrometer transport. Initial design studies are presented for this concept. >
Discovery of pathway biomarkers from coupled proteomics and systems biology methods.

Breast cancer is worldwide the second most common type of cancer after lung cancer. Plasma proteome profiling may have a higher chance to identify protein changes between plasma samples such as normal and breast cancer tissues. Breast cancer cell lines have long been used by researches as model system for identifying protein biomarkers. A comparison of the set of proteins which change in plasma with previously published findings from proteomic analysis of human breast cancer cell lines may identify with a higher confidence a subset of candidate protein biomarker.
Platinum-catalyzed hydrosilylations of internal alkynes: harnessing substituent effects to achieve high regioselectivity.

The regioselectivity of the presented effective hydrosilylations of internal alkynes is predominantly governed by electronic effects.
Simulating resilience in transaction-oriented networks

The power of networks manifests itself in a highly non-linear amplification of a number of effects, and their weakness---in propagation of cascading failures. The potential systemic risk effects can be either exacerbated or mitigated, depending on the resilience characteristics of the network. The goals of this paper are to study some characteristics of network amplification and resilience. We simulate random Erdos--Renyi networks and measure amplification by varying node capacity, transaction volume, and expected failure rates. We discover that network throughput scales almost quadratically with respect to the node capacity and that the effects of excessive network load and random and irreparable node faults are equivalent and almost perfectly anticor-related. This knowledge can be used by capacity planners to determine optimal reliability requirements that maximize the optimal operational regions.
ASSESSMENT OF THE RELIABILITY OF AI PROGRAMS

Reliability assessments of AI programs must consider not only possible program bugs which. remain in the program due to insufficient testing and debugging, but also faults due to intrinsic characteristics of AI programs that cannot be removed even after the program is fully debugged. This paper develops an analytical tool for assessing the reliability of AI programs. Possible intrinsic faults of AI programs are identified, and modifications to existing software reliability models for conventional programs are suggested. An example illustrating the effect of intrinsic faults of AI heuristics on the program reliability in a real-time situation is given. It is shown that under certain conditions the cost-based A* planning algorithm is less reliable than the node-based A* planning algorithm.
Dual-pilot tone calibration technique

Pilot-based calibration techniques are used to reduce the effects of multipath fading in mobile satellite receivers. One of the more recent of these techniques, namely the tone calibration technique (TCT), suggests transmitting double sideband modulation with the pilot tone located at the center of its spectrum where the amplitude and phase characteristics of the channel are most stable. To "make room" for the pilot in the presence of the Doppler shift, the equivalent low-pass data sidebands must be shaped so as to have zero response in the neighborhood of dc. Other techniques such as transparent tone-in-band (TTIB) similarly "notch out" a hole in the center of the data spectrum for location of the pilot. An alternate possibility which is at the same time much more bandwidth efficient than TCT is a dual-pilot tone calibration technique (DPTCT) that symmetrically locates a pair of pilots outside the data spectrum near the band edges of the channel. The operation and performance of DPTCT are analyzed, and its effectiveness is compared to that of the single tone TCT technique.
Contribution of Stellar Tidal Disruptions to the X- Ray Luminosity Function of Active Galaxies

The luminosity function of active galactic nuclei (AGNs) has been measured down to luminosities ~10^(42) ergs s^(-1) in the soft and hard X-rays. Some fraction of this activity is associated with the accretion of the material liberated by the tidal disruption of stars by massive black holes. We estimate the contribution to the X-ray luminosity function from the tidal disruption process. While the contribution depends on a number of poorly known parameters, it appears that it can account for the majority of X-ray-selected AGNs with soft or hard X-ray luminosities ≲10^(43)-10^(44) ergs s^(-1). If this is correct, a significant portion of the X-ray luminosity function of AGNs is comprised of sources powered by tidal disruption at the faint end, while the sources at the bright end are powered by nonstellar accretion. Black holes with masses ≲2 × 10^6 M_☉ could have acquired most of their present mass by an accretion of tidal debris. In view of the considerable theoretical uncertainty concerning the detailed shape of the light curves of tidal disruption events, we focus on power-law luminosity decay (as identified in candidate tidal disruption events), but we also discuss constant accretion rate models. We expect that the sources associated with thin-disk accretion of circularized tidal debris have peak luminosities of ≲10^(39)-10^(41) ergs s^(-1), below the luminosity range probed in present surveys.
Differentially private combinatorial optimization

Consider the following problem: given a metric space, some of whose points are "clients," select a set of at most k facility locations to minimize the average distance from the clients to their nearest facility. This is just the well-studied k-median problem, for which many approximation algorithms and hardness results are known. Note that the objective function encourages opening facilities in areas where there are many clients, and given a solution, it is often possible to get a good idea of where the clients are located. This raises the following quandary: what if the locations of the clients are sensitive information that we would like to keep private? Is it even possible to design good algorithms for this problem that preserve the privacy of the clients?In this paper, we initiate a systematic study of algorithms for discrete optimization problems in the framework of differential privacy (which formalizes the idea of protecting the privacy of individual input elements). We show that many such problems indeed have good approximation algorithms that preserve differential privacy; this is even in cases where it is impossible to preserve cryptographic definitions of privacy while computing any non-trivial approximation to even the value of an optimal solution, let alone the entire solution.Apart from the k-median problem, we consider the problems of vertex and set cover, min-cut, k-median, facility location, and Steiner tree, and give approximation algorithms and lower bounds for these problems. We also consider the recently introduced sub-modular maximization problem, "Combinatorial Public Projects" (CPP), shown by Papadimitriou et al. [28] to be inapproximable to subpolynomial multiplicative factors by any efficient and truthful algorithm. We give a differentially private (and hence approximately truthful) algorithm that achieves a logarithmic additive approximation.
On bidding with securities: Risk aversion and positive dependence ✩

DeMarzo et al. (2005) consider auctions in which bids are selected from a completely ordered family of securities whose values are tied to the resource being auctioned. The paper defines a notion of relative steepness of families of securities and shows that a steeper family provides greater expected revenue to the seller. Two assumptions are: the buyers are risk neutral; the random variables through which values and signals of the buyers are realized are affiliated. We show that this revenue ranking holds for the second price auction in the case of risk aversion. However, it does not hold if affiliation is relaxed to a less restrictive form of positive dependence, namely first order stochastic dominance (FOSD). We define the relative strong steepness of families of securities and show that it provides a necessary and sufficient condition for comparing two families in the FOSD case. All results extend to the English auction.
Acylative Dimerization of Tetrahydrofuran Catalyzed by Rare-Earth Triflates

Abstract Ytterbium, scandium, and lanthanum triflates catalyze the cleavage reactions of cyclic ethers to give various products. Most notable was the acylative cleavage of tetrahydrofuran with acetic anhydride catalyzed by Yb(triflate)3 to give the dimeric compound CH3CO2(CH2)4O(CH2)4OCOCH3 in 69% yield.
Robust and adaptive supervisory control of discrete event systems

Both robust and adaptive supervisory control in discrete-event systems are discussed. It is assumed that the system G to be controlled is not known exactly. It is only known either that it belongs to a set or that it has certain lower and upper bounds. The task of robust supervision is to synthesize a supervisor that realizes a given desired behavior for all possible G. A necessary and sufficient condition for the existence of such a robust supervisor is derived. Based on this condition, a robust supervisory control and observation problem of synthesizing a robust supervisor whose behavior is both legal and acceptable is solved. Adaptive supervision is discussed. As the system progresses, the information on occurrences of events may help to resolve or reduce uncertainties. >
Signal reconstruction in linear mixing systems with different error metrics

We consider the problem of reconstructing a signal from noisy measurements in linear mixing systems. The reconstruction performance is usually quantified by standard error metrics such as squared error, whereas we consider any additive error metric. Under the assumption that relaxed belief propagation (BP) can compute the posterior in the large system limit, we propose a simple, fast, and highly general algorithm that reconstructs the signal by minimizing the user-defined error metric. For two example metrics, we provide performance analysis and convincing numerical results. Finally, our algorithm can be adjusted to minimize the l ∞ error, which is not additive. Interestingly, l ∞ minimization only requires to apply a Wiener filter to the output of relaxed BP.
Surface Charge-Switching Polymeric Nanoparticles for Bacterial Cell Wall-Targeted Delivery of Antibiotics

Bacteria have shown a remarkable ability to overcome drug therapy if there is a failure to achieve sustained bactericidal concentration or if there is a reduction in activity in situ. The latter can be caused by localized acidity, a phenomenon that can occur as a result of the combined actions of bacterial metabolism and the host immune response. Nanoparticles (NP) have shown promise in treating bacterial infections, but a significant challenge has been to develop antibacterial NPs that may be suitable for systemic administration. Herein we develop drug-encapsulated, pH-responsive, surface charge-switching poly(d,l-lactic-co-glycolic acid)-b-poly(l-histidine)-b-poly(ethylene glycol) (PLGA-PLH-PEG) nanoparticles for treating bacterial infections. These NP drug carriers are designed to shield nontarget interactions at pH 7.4 but bind avidly to bacteria in acidity, delivering drugs and mitigating in part the loss of drug activity with declining pH. The mechanism involves pH-sensitive NP surface charge switch...
Automatic digitization of free-form curve by coordinate measuring machines

Abstract The digitization of mathematically unknown free-form curves is frequently required. Current industrial practice relies on the experience of an operator to determine the direction of a CMM probe's approaching vector and the number of samples to represent a complex curve. An automatic procedure is proposed to generate recursively the approaching vector direction as well as the sampling rate. Several techniques including a linear prediction, a polynomial prediction, and a spline interpolation method have been presented and compared. Experimental results show that the spline interpolation method provides the best digitization accuracy and requires the least number of sampling points.
k -Nearest Neighbor Classification over Semantically Secure Encrypted Relational Data

Data Mining has wide applications in many areas such as banking, medicine, scientific research and among government agencies. Classification is one of the commonly used tasks in data mining applications. For the past decade, due to the rise of various privacy issues, many theoretical and practical solutions to the classification problem have been proposed under different security models. However, with the recent popularity of cloud computing, users now have the opportunity to outsource their data, in encrypted form, as well as the data mining tasks to the cloud. Since the data on the cloud is in encrypted form, existing privacy-preserving classification techniques are not applicable. In this paper, we focus on solving the classification problem over encrypted data. In particular, we propose a secure $k$ -NN classifier over encrypted data in the cloud. The proposed protocol protects the confidentiality of data, privacy of user’s input query, and hides the data access patterns. To the best of our knowledge, our work is the first to develop a secure $k$ -NN classifier over encrypted data under the semi-honest model. Also, we empirically analyze the efficiency of our proposed protocol using a real-world dataset under different parameter settings.
Asymmetric synthesis and synthetic utility of 2,3-dihydro-4-pyridones

Nucleophilic addition of organometallics to chiral 1-acylpyridinium salts occurs with high diastereoselectivity to give N-acyl-2,3-dihydro-4-pyridones, which are useful building blocks for the asymmemc synthesis of various alkaloids. The synthetic utility of these heterocycles lies in the ease of preparation and substitution. Our recent efforts at exploring the scope of this chemistry and its application towards the enantioselective synthesis of various alkaloids are described.
Modeling bivariate longitudinal hormone profiles by hierarchical state space models

The hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis is crucial in coping with stress and maintaining homeostasis. Hormones produced by the HPA axis exhibit both complex univariate longitudinal profiles and complex relationships among different hormones. Consequently, modeling these multivariate longitudinal hormone profiles is a challenging task. In this article, we propose a bivariate hierarchical state space model, in which each hormone profile is modeled by a hierarchical state space model, with both population-average and subject-specific components. The bivariate model is constructed by concatenating the univariate models based on the hypothesized relationship. Because of the flexible framework of state space form, the resultant models not only can handle complex individual profiles, but also can incorporate complex relationships between two hormones, including both concurrent and feedback relationship. Estimation and inference are based on marginal likelihood and posterior means and variances. Computation...
Corporate Accountability Reporting and High-Profile Misconduct

ABSTRACT I investigate whether corporate accountability reporting helps protect firm value. Specifically, I examine (1) whether corporate accountability reporting helps firms prevent the occurrence of high-profile misconduct (e.g., bribery, kickbacks, discrimination), and (2) whether prior corporate accountability reporting reduces the negative stock price reaction when high-profile misconduct does occur. Using multiple methods to address self-selection, I find that, on average, firms that report on their corporate accountability activities are less likely to engage in high-profile misconduct, consistent with the reporting process helping firms to manage their operations better. Additionally, I find that when high-profile misconduct does occur, firms that have previously issued corporate accountability reports experience a less negative stock price reaction, consistent with corporate accountability reports influencing perceptions of managerial intent, which, in turn, influences expected punishments.
Random Access Channel with Retransmission Gain

This paper analyzes the maximum steady throughput and optimum media access control (MAC) of a random access system over channels with retransmission gain. The channel is defined by the packet detection probability of each user as a function of the numbers of packet transmissions and collisions. The maximum steady throughput and stability region for two-user channels are obtained in closed form. The conditions that the maximum throughput is reached with control-free MAC are obtained. The well-known results of the orthogonal and the ALOHA channels are shown to be special instances of our results. The throughputs of multiuser symmetric channels and the general multiuser asymmetric channel are further obtained. A practical random access CDMA channel exploiting retransmission diversity is analyzed based on the model. Numerical result confirms with the analytical results. It is conclude that retransmission gain can significantly increase throughput and expand stability region.
Electronic States of Nanocrystalline Carbon

Electron energy loss spectroscopy (EELS) has been used to investigate the electronic states of isolated, nanocrystalline carbon particles. Small carbon nanocrys-tals were prepared via sputter deposition onto SiO2 substrates, followed by annealing to 700C. The structure and size distribution of the particles have been characterized by Raman scattering, Auger electron spectroscopy and electron microscopy. EELS observations indicate that a semimetal to semiconductor transition occurs for particles smaller than lnm. In addition, hydrogen adsorption is found to significantly affect the electronic states of these particles, indicating that both finite size and dangling bond effects modify the properties of small carbon nanocrystallites.
Line facility location in weighted regions

In this paper, we present approximation algorithms for solving the line facility location problem in weighted regions. The weighted region setup is a more realistic model for many facility location problems that arise in practical applications. Our algorithms exploit an interesting property of the problem, that could possibly be used for solving other problems in weighted regions.
Optical orthogonal code-division multiple-access system .II. Multibits/sequence-period OOCDMA

For part I see ibid. vol.42, no.7, p.2470 (1994). In a recently proposed optical orthogonal code division multiple-access (OOCDMA) system, one bit of user's data is transmitted per sequence-period, and a threshold is employed for the final bit decision. In this paper, a system that can transmit multibits per sequence-period is introduced, and avalanche photodiode (APD) noise, thermal noise, and interference, are included. This system, derived by exploiting orthogonal properties of the OOCDMA code sequence and using a maximum search (instead of a threshold) in the final decision, is log/sub 2/ F times higher in throughput, where F is sequence-period. For example, four orders of magnitude are better in bit error probability at -56 dBW received laser power, with F=1000 chips, 10 "marks" in a sequence, and 10 users of 30 Mb/s data rate for one-bit/sequence-period and 270 Mb/s data rate for multibits/sequence-period system. Furthermore, an exact analysis is performed for the log/sub 2/F bits/sequence-period system with a hard-limiter placed before the receiver, and its performance is compared to the performance without hard-limiter, for the chip-synchronous case. The improvement from using a hard-limiter is significant in the log/sub 2/F bits/sequence-period OCCDMA system (while it is not in a one-bit/sequence-period OOCDMA system proposed in Part I). >
Evolution of thought on passive continental margins from the origin of geosynclinal theory (∼1860) to the present

Most of the current views on the evolution of passive margins have roots in ideas that were developed before 1930 in the context of continental drift and geosynclinal theory. These ideas include the concept of an Atlantic type of margin formed by rifting and continental drift; the presence of a thick sedimentary deposit beneath the continental shelves; and subsidence in response to such mechanisms as crustal thinning, igneous underplating, thermal contraction, flexure, and sediment loading. As large amounts of new surface and subsurface data were acquired from modern passive margins after World War II, owing to significant advances in technology for geological and geophysical exploration of the ocean basins, these early ideas were strengthened and modified. With the development of plate-tectonic theory, the origin of passive margins as rifted trailing edges of continents became widely accepted, and significant changes in thinking involved the role of passive margins and their implications for large horizontal displacements in the evolution of geosynclines. Within the past decade, a large number of geophysical models have been developed for passive margins that focus once again on the problem of the mechanisms of vertical movements of the Earth9s crust. At the same time, new developments in the acquisition and processing of data from ocean basins, especially deep-reflection data, have resulted in major new concepts about the deep structure of passive margins, including recognition of the importance of underplating and plutonic activity in the thinned rifted crust and the unexpected degree of faulting and formation of horizontal reflectors in the lower continental crust and subcrustal lithosphere.
Selective synthesis of functionalized, tertiary silanes by diastereoselective rearrangement-addition

Treatment of hydroxy-substituted silyl epoxides with Grignard reagents induces a 1,2-carbon shift to reveal α-silyl aldehydes, which are trapped by highly diastereoselective addition reactions of the Grignard reagent. The starting epoxides are readily accessible from propargylic alcohols by regio- and diastereoselective hydrosilylation and epoxidation reactions. In addition to providing functionalized tertiary silane products, the method is shown to offer a tertiary olefin synthesis through chemo- and diastereoselective Peterson elimination of the product tertiary silane diols.
Speckle nulling for exoplanet detection with space-based coronagraphic telescopes

To detect Earth-like planets in the visible with a coronagraphic telescope, two major noise sources have to be overcome: the photon noise of the diffracted star light, and the speckle noise due to the star light scattered by instrumental defects. Coronagraphs tackle only the photon noise contribution. In order to decrease the speckle noise below the planet level, an active control of the wave front is required. We have developed analytical methods to measure and correct the speckle noise behind a coronagraph with a deformable mirror. In this paper, we summarize these methods, present numerical simulations, and discuss preliminary experimental results obtained with the High-Contrast Imaging Testbed at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.© (2006) COPYRIGHT SPIE--The International Society for Optical Engineering. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.
COMPACT REPRESENTATIONS OF SIMPLICIAL MESHES IN TWO AND THREE DIMENSIONS

We describe data structures for representing simplicial meshes compactly while supporting online queries and updates efficiently. Our data structure requires about a factor of five less memory than the most efficient standard data structures for triangular or tetrahedral meshes, while efficiently supporting traversal among simplices, storing data on simplices, and insertion and deletion of simplices. Our implementation of the data structures uses about 5 bytes/triangle in two dimensions (2D) and 7.5 bytes/tetrahedron in three dimensions (3D). We use the data structures to implement 2D and 3D incremental algorithms for generating a Delaunay mesh. The 3D algorithm can generate 100 Million tetrahedra with 1 Gbyte of memory, including the space for the coordinates and all data used by the algorithm. The runtime of the algorithm is as fast as Shewchuk's Pyramid code, the most efficient we know of, and uses a factor of 3.5 less memory overall.
On wirelength estimations for row-based placement

Wirelength estimation in very large scale integration layout is fundamental to any predetailed routing estimate of timing or routability. In this paper, we develop efficient wirelength estimation techniques appropriate for wirelength estimation during top-down floorplanning and placement of cell-based designs. Our methods give accurate, linear-time approaches, typically with sublinear time complexity for dynamic updating of estimates (e.g., for annealing placement). Our techniques offer advantages not only for early on-line wirelength estimation during top-down placement, but also for a posteriori estimation of routed wirelength given a final placement. In developing these new estimators, we have made several contributions, including (1) insight into the contrast between region-based and bounding box-based rectilinear Steiner minimal tree (RStMT) estimation techniques; (2) empirical assessment of the correlations between pin placements of a multipin net that is contained in a block; and (3) new wirelength estimates that are functions of a block's complexity (number of cell instances) and aspect ratio.
Pre and post break parameter inference

This paper provides a method for conducting inference about the pre and post break value of a scalar parameter in GMM time series models with a single break at an unknown date. We show that treating the break date estimated by least squares as the true break date leads to substantially oversized tests and confidence intervals unless the break is large. We develop an alternative test that controls size uniformly and that is approximately efficient in a well defined sense.
On relative efficiency of quasi-MLE and GMM estimators of covariance structure models☆

Abstract Optimal GMM is known to dominate Gaussian QMLE in terms of asymptotic efficiency [Chamberlain, G., 1984. Panel data. In: Griliches, Z., Intriligator, M.D. (Eds.), Handbook of Econometrics, vol. II, pp. 1248–1313]. I derive a new condition under which QMLE is as efficient as GMM for a general class of covariance structure models. The condition trivially holds for normal data but also identifies non-normal cases for which Gaussian QMLE is efficient.
Practical CMOS microprocessor systems

Many have felt that complementary metal-oxide silicon (CMOS) has not yet become a practical semiconductor technology for microprocessor-based systems. Recent progress has made that impression obsolete. A selection of CMOS microprocessors is available at speeds matching N-channel metal-oxide silicon microprocessor units (NMOS MPUs). CMOS memories have also become broadly available in the last few years. The needed peripheral circuits are now appearing. A CMOS parallel interface peripheral provides 24 interface pins and is bus-compatible with practically all the new-generation CMOS microprocessors. The last element needed to assemble practical all-CMOS microprocessor systems are the small-scale integration/medium-scale integration (SSI/MSI) logic functions. Gates, decoders, latches, and flip-flops are typically needed to operate a bus structure of a multichip system.This report concentrates on the newest methods of achieving a full-performance all-CMOS microprocessor system. The focus is on the parallel interface peripheral and on using CMOS logic functions in practical bus connections.
Pediatric Bipolar Disorder

In the past decade, interest in and research on pediatric bipolar disorder (BD) has increased substantially. Prevalence rates of the disorder have doubled in outpatient settings, while twice as many research articles on pediatric BD were published in the past five years as in the prior decade. This review focuses on recent developments in the study of pediatric BD. We examine current research on the diagnostic boundaries of BD in youths, in particular the issues of episodicity and irritability, and provide assessment guidelines. We review data elucidating the pathophysiology of pediatric BD, with a focus on how these results may inform diagnosis. Finally, we discuss treatment approaches for pediatric BD, particularly psychotherapeutic interventions. Throughout the review, we pay particular attention to youths with severe chronic irritability, hyperarousal, and hyperreactivity, who reflect the population in whom the diagnosis of BD is most debated.
Total Synthesis of Nominal Diazonamides—Part 2: On the True Structure and Origin of Natural Isolates

In the preceding communication we described a fully synthetic pathway to the structure proposed for ( )-diazonamide A (1, Scheme 1).[1] This material is not identical to the natural product, which raises the obvious question: What is the true structure of diazonamide A? Herein we provide an answer. In addition, we report that defined synthetic entity 8 induces, with equal potency, a toxic phenotype in cell culture indistinguishable from that produced by natural ( )-diazonamide A. Spectroscopic data for the heterocyclic cores of diazonamides A and B are nearly identical.[2] So when the crystal structure of a p-bromobenzamide derivative of diazonamide B was reported as 3,[2a] the diazonamide A assignment Scheme 1. Initial diazonamide structure assignments.
You'll never get ahead in engineering if you can't make yourself understood

The engineering program at Clemson University (South Carolina) incorporates communication projects within the regular courses. Presentations on course assignments are regarded as “projects to be managed” just as technical problems are handled. The project stages are definition, planning, production, presentation, and post-analysis. A miniproposal is used to launch each project, giving the audience description, communication objectives, approach to the presentation, content outline, budget, and schedule.
Climate Change and Justice: A Non-Welfarist Treaty Negotiation Framework

AbstractObstacles to achieving a global climate treaty include disagreements about questions of justice raised by the UNFCCC's principle that countries should respond to climate change by taking cooperative action “in accordance with their common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities and their social and economic conditions”. Aiming to circumvent such disagreements, Climate Change Justice (2010) authors Eric Posner and David Weisbach argue against shaping treaty proposals according to requirements of either distributive or corrective justice. The USA's climate envoy, Todd Stern, takes a similar position. In this article I explain the practical and theoretical drawbacks of Posner & Weisbach's welfarist (utilitarian) perspective and propose an alternative. I show that their arguments fail to rule out John Rawls's non-utilitarian, political conception of international justice and human rights, the Law of Peoples. On this basis I develop a conception of climate justice that highlight...
On the Sum-Rate Loss of Quadratic Gaussian Multiterminal Source Coding

This work studies the sum-rate loss of quadratic Gaussian multiterminal source coding, i.e., the difference between the minimum sum-rates of distributed encoding and joint encoding (both with joint decoding) of correlated Gaussian sources subject to MSE distortion constraints on individual sources. It is shown that under the nondegraded assumption, i.e., all target distortions are simultaneously achievable by a Gaussian Berger-Tung scheme, the supremum of the sum-rate loss of distributed encoding over joint encoding of L jointly Gaussian sources increases almost linearly in the number of sources L, with an asymptotic slope of 0.1083 bit per sample per source as L goes to infinity. This result is obtained even though we currently do not have the full knowledge of the minimum sum-rate for the distributed encoding case. The main idea is to upper-bound the minimum sum-rate of multiterminal source coding by that achieved by parallel Gaussian test channels while lower-bounding the minimum sum-rate of joint encoding by a reverse water-filling solution to a relaxed joint encoding problem of the same set of Gaussian sources with a sum-distortion constraint (that equals the sum of the individual target distortions). We show that under the nondegraded assumption, the supremum difference between the upper bound for distributed encoding and the lower bound for joint encoding is achieved in the bi-eigen equal-variance with equal distortion case, in which both bounds are known to be tight.
Minimum-energy covariance controllers

Covariance control theory provides a parametrization of all controllers that assign a given state covariance matrix to the closed-loop system. Such controllers are not unique. In this note we obtain the analytic expressions for the covariance controllers that minimize the required control effort. These are solutions to a minimum-effort/guaranteed-performance design problem, in the sense that the required control effort is minimized subject to performance constraints guaranteed by a specified state covariance matrix assignment. In a different interpretation of the results, the solutions to a minimum-effort controller redesign problem are obtained. Both continuous-time and discrete-time results are presented.