cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
THE MONOBLOCK CUP: TRIED AND TRUE

There are many types of articulating surfaces in uncemented acetabular cups. Most of the designs currently available are modular, with the shell snapping into a locking mechanism of some type. An Elliptical Monoblock design has been available for 15 years and was originally made of titanium with a factory assembled compression molded polyethylene liner. Porous tantalum (trabecular metal) was used as the shell material in a subsequent more recent design and in this design the polyethylene is actually molded directly into the tantalum framework. Monoblock acetabular components do not allow particulate access to the ilium via screw holes and require no surgeon assembled locking mechanism which may increase backside wear and metallic debris. There are no holes in the socket because of the monoblock construct. Because of this absence of screw holes there is an inability to visualise the floor of the acetabulum and perfect coaptation between the shell and the acetabular floor may not occur. The presence of dome gaps of greater than 1.5mm have been noted in 5% of these components but these have not compromised implant stability and in a review of over 600 cups there has been no change in implant position. The Elliptical shape of the cup makes the mouth of the acetabular component 2mm greater than the dome so that an exceptionally strong acetabular rim fit results. Results will be reported from two major institutional series with a minimum 10-year follow-up (range 10–15 years). No pelvic osteolysis was not seen in any patient in either series. In the HSS series of 250 cases with minimum 10 year follow up there were 4 revisions for instability but none for mechanical failure. There were three femoral revisions for loosening but the cup was intact and not revised in these patients. Utilising the Livermore measurement method polyethylene wear averages 0.8mm per year (0.6mm-1.3mm) and there have been no revisions for wear. Radiographic evaluation demonstrates stable bony interface in all patients. In a Mayo series of prospectively randomised patients also at minimum 10 years there was no lysis and only one case of aseptic loosening in a beaded titanium cup. At minimum 10-year follow up two similar elliptical monoblock cementless acetabular component designs with compression molded polyethylene have confirmed the theoretical advantages of this design concept and demonstrate long term results that have been excellent to date.
Cost-effectiveness of clustered unit vs. unclustered nurse floating

This study evaluated costs and staffing balance outcomes comparing unrestricted unit floating (UUF) with cluster [by related patient population or technical requirements] unit floating (CUF) practices. Researchers used a computer simulation model with data from a 400 bed VA hospital. Literature suggested a high nurse turnover rate associated with dissatisfaction engendered by forced floating to unfamiliar units. Direct wage cost differences were negligible when UUF and CUF floating patterns were compared, so absolute costs were not the defining issue. UUF staffing patterns produced significantly fewer understaffed shifts (by nursing hours) than CUF floating permitted. The essential quality of care trade-off is between the UUF pattern that provided sufficient nursing hours of care vs. the CUF pattern that provided less absolute availability in hours of nursing care, but a better oriented staff. The author suggests seeking staff input when deciding which of these two floating patterns would be most acceptable in a particular institution.
An Optimization Approach to Locally-Biased Graph Algorithms

Locally-biased graph algorithms are algorithms that attempt to find local or small-scale structure in a large data graph. In some cases, this can be accomplished by adding some sort of locality constraint and calling a traditional graph algorithm; but more interesting are locally-biased graph algorithms that compute answers by running a procedure that does not even look at most of the input graph. This corresponds more closely to what practitioners from various data science domains do, but it does not correspond well with the way that algorithmic and statistical theory is typically formulated. Recent work from several research communities has focused on developing locally-biased graph algorithms that come with strong complementary algorithmic and statistical theory and that are useful in practice in downstream data science applications. We provide a review and overview of this work, highlighting commonalities between seemingly different approaches, and highlighting promising directions for future work.
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? emph{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 emph{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, facility location, and Steiner tree, and give approximation algorithms and lower bounds for these problems. We also consider the recently introduced submodular maximization problem, ``Combinatorial Public Projects'' (CPP), shown by Papadimitriou et al. cite{PSS08} to be inapproximable to subpolynomial multiplicative factors by any efficient and emph{truthful} algorithm. We give a differentially private (and hence approximately truthful) algorithm that achieves a logarithmic additive approximation. Joint work with Anupam Gupta, Katrina Ligett, Frank McSherry and Aaron Roth.
Wythoffian Skeletal Polyhedra in Ordinary Space, I

Skeletal polyhedra are discrete structures made up of finite, flat or skew, or infinite, helical or zigzag, polygons as faces, with two faces on each edge and a circular vertex-figure at each vertex. When a variant of Wythoff's construction is applied to the 48 regular skeletal polyhedra (Grunbaum---Dress polyhedra) in ordinary space, new highly symmetric skeletal polyhedra arise as "truncations" of the original polyhedra. These Wythoffians are vertex-transitive and often feature vertex configurations with an attractive mix of different face shapes. The present paper describes the blueprint for the construction and treats the Wythoffians for distinguished classes of regular polyhedra. The Wythoffians for the remaining classes of regular polyhedra will be discussed in Part II, by the second author. We also examine when the construction produces uniform skeletal polyhedra.
First mass measurements with the NIST-4 watt balance

In the past four years, we have constructed a new watt balance at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), with the goal to realize the unit of mass after the redefinition of the International System of Units, expected to occur in 2018. The new watt balance has been operational since the fall of 2015 and we describe our first measurements with it.
Mobile Communication Signatures of Unemployment

The mapping of populations socio-economic well-being is highly constrained by the logistics of censuses and surveys. Consequently, spatially detailed changes across scales of days, weeks, or months, or even year to year, are difficult to assess; thus the speed of which policies can be designed and evaluated is limited. However, recent studies have shown the value of mobile phone data as an enabling methodology for demographic modeling and measurement. In this work, we investigate whether indicators extracted from mobile phone usage can reveal information about the socio-economical status of microregions such as districts (i.e., average spatial resolution \({<}2.7\) km). For this we examine anonymized mobile phone metadata combined with beneficiaries records from unemployment benefit program. We find that aggregated activity, social, and mobility patterns strongly correlate with unemployment. Furthermore, we construct a simple model to produce accurate reconstruction of district level unemployment from their mobile communication patterns alone. Our results suggest that reliable and cost-effective economical indicators could be built based on passively collected and anonymized mobile phone data. With similar data being collected every day by telecommunication services across the world, survey-based methods of measuring community socioeconomic status could potentially be augmented or replaced by such passive sensing methods in the future.
Learning Temporal Transformations from Time-Lapse Videos

Based on life-long observations of physical, chemical, and biologic phenomena in the natural world, humans can often easily picture in their minds what an object will look like in the future. But, what about computers? In this paper, we learn computational models of object transformations from time-lapse videos. In particular, we explore the use of generative models to create depictions of objects at future times. These models explore several different prediction tasks: generating a future state given a single depiction of an object, generating a future state given two depictions of an object at different times, and generating future states recursively in a recurrent framework. We provide both qualitative and quantitative evaluations of the generated results, and also conduct a human evaluation to compare variations of our models.
Climate Change Interactions with Agriculture, Forestry Sequestration, and Food Security

Climate change can negatively affect crop productivity decreasing food production in many regions across the world. Literature suggests forest carbon sequestration (FCS) is a good alternative to mitigate climate change due to its ability to sequester carbon at low cost. Nevertheless, FCS subsidies have not been addressed together with impacts on food security and climate change reduced crop yields. In our multidisciplinary work, we collected the crop yield shocks from global circulation—crop modeling. We also developed a new version of a computable general equilibrium model for the economic analysis. Thus, we evaluate the global economic impacts of using carbon taxes and FCS to achieve 50% emission reductions. We find that implementing an aggressive FCS incentive can cause substantial increases in food prices because of land competition between forest and crop production. Without climate induced yield reductions, FCS is attractive, but not with the yield reductions. With the climate induced yield shocks, food price increases are huge—so large that it is clear this approach could not be adopted in the real world. The results cry out for investment in agricultural research on climate adaptation. Our findings suggest economic well-being falls more without mitigation than with 50% emission reductions.
Profitable Task Allocation in Mobile Cloud Computing

We propose a game theoretic framework for task allocation in mobile cloud computing that corresponds to offloading of compute tasks to a group of nearby mobile devices. Specifically, in our framework, a distributor node holds a multidimensional auction for allocating the tasks of a job among nearby mobile nodes based on their computational capabilities and also the cost of computation at these nodes, with the goal of reducing the overall job completion time. Our proposed auction also has the desired incentive compatibility property that ensures that mobile devices truthfully reveal their capabilities and costs and that those devices benefit from the task allocation. To deal with node mobility, we perform multiple auctions over adaptive time intervals. We develop a heuristic approach to dynamically find the best time intervals between auctions to minimize unnecessary auctions and the accompanying overheads. We evaluate our framework and methods using both real world and synthetic mobility traces. Our evaluation results show that our game theoretic framework improves the job completion time by a factor of 2-5 in comparison to the time taken for executing the job locally, while minimizing the number of auctions and the accompanying overheads. Our approach is also profitable for the nearby nodes that execute the distributor's tasks with these nodes receiving a compensation higher than their actual costs.
Temperature rise in objects due to optical focused beam through atmospheric turbulence near ground and ocean surface

When an optical beam is propagated through the atmosphere and is incident on an object, power is transmitted and transferred into the object causing a temperature rise. In clear air, the statistical characteristics of the optical beam transmitted to the object surface are influenced primarily by the effect of atmospheric turbulence which can be significant near the ground or ocean surface. This paper uses a statistical model to quantify the expected power transfer through turbulent atmosphere and provides guidance toward the threshold of thermal blooming for the considered scenarios. For metals, the absorbed power in the object is calculated using a Drude model for dielectric constant and published physical constants. For non-metals, published optical absorptance values are used. For both metals and non-metals the bulk thermal characteristics are used in a thermal diffusion model to determine the net temperature rise at the object surface due to the incident optical beam. These results of the study are presented in graphical form and are of particular interest to operators of high power laser systems operating over large distances through the atmosphere. Numerical examples include a mid-infrared CO2 laser (λ = 10.6 μm) with: aperture size of 5cm, varied pulse duration, and propagation distance of 0.5 km incident on 0.1mm copper, 10mm polyimide, 1mm water , and 10mm glass/resin composite targets. To assess the effect of near ground/ocean laser propagation we compare turbulent (of varying degrees) and non-turbulent atmosphere.
Unraveling Unlawful Command Influence

Military commanders are not just officers leading soldiers into battle. In the military justice system, they also serve quasi-prosecutorial roles and decide what charges to bring and whether to accept a plea. With this responsibility comes the potential for misconduct, no different than with civilian prosecutors. Commanders too can improperly coerce witnesses or withhold favorable evidence. Enter the “unlawful command influence” doctrine, the military’s response to combating this misconduct. While routinely associated with civilian prosecutorial misconduct, the military standard turns out to be very different and seems to better protect against improper influence than its civilian counterpart. What accounts for this difference, given that both standards are designed to ensure a fair and impartial trial? This Article is the first to raise this varying treatment and explore potential explanations. It ultimately teases out the concepts of “systemic integrity” and “individual autonomy” from the respective stories. The military’s focus on procedural protections and concern for the appearance of impropriety reveals a value for systemic integrity, whereas the civilian  Associate Professor, DePaul University College of Law. A.B., Dartmouth College; M.Phil., University of Cambridge; J.D., Harvard University. I would like to thank Dmitry Bam, Jack Chin, Ryan Doerfler, Eugene Fidell, Adam Gershowitz, Priya Gupta, Meredith Harbach, Tara Helfman, Eric Johnson, Janine Kim, Rhet Larson, Phil Lee, Michael O’Hear, Matt Parlow, Kyndra Rotunda, David Schlueter, Nicholas Stephanopoulos, Deb Tuerkheimer, and Ryan Vogel for their feedback on earlier drafts. This paper was presented at the Marquette Law School Junior Scholars Workshop, the Chicago Junior Faculty Workshop, CrimFest at Cardozo Law School, and the DePaul Faculty Workshop. Washington University Open Scholarship 1402 WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY LAW REVIEW [VOL. 93:1401 emphasis on defendant choice and finality of proceedings reveals a value for individual autonomy. This is not simply an academic exercise. These concepts can help frame current controversies surrounding prosecutorial and commander discretion. On the civilian side, scholars and judges alike have widely criticized courts for not doing enough to combat prosecutorial misconduct. On the military side, legislators have railed against commanders for their lack of prosecution of sexual assault crimes. Recognizing which value—individual autonomy or systemic integrity— underlies these practices can better assist necessary reforms.
Longevity studies in the CDF II silicon detector

The CDF Run II silicon detector is the largest operating detector of its kind in High Energy Physics, collecting pp¯ collision data at the Fermilab Tevatron since 2001. It provides precision tracking and vertexing which played a critical role in the B s mixing discovery and is essential to the ongoing Higgs Boson search and many other physics analyses carried out at CDF. Due to the prolonged Tevatron Run II program the detector faces unforeseen challenges while operating well beyond its design parameters. Of particular concern is the radiation aging of the silicon sensors which are expected to acquire ∼10 fb−1 data, far above their design integrated luminosity of 2–3 fb−1. In this paper we discuss the impact of radiation damage to the sensors, their effect on the physics performance and expectations for future operations of the two inner layers, which have already inverted.
Coupling of exciton-polaritons in low-Q coupled microcavities beyond the rotating wave approximation

We demonstrate coupling between two ultrastrong exciton-photon coupled low-Q organic microcavities at room temperature. We propose a modified coupled oscillator model to explain the broken degeneracy of Rabi splittings in the ultrastrong coupling regime.
Public Laws and Private Lawmakers

The Obama Administration’s “Clean Power Plan” for addressing industrial carbon emissions is controversial as a matter of environmental policy. It also has important constitutional implications. The rule was initially crafted not by officers or employees of the Environmental Protection Agency, but by two private lawyers and a scientist with industry ties. Private parties operate extra-constitutionally, and no existing legal doctrine tethers constitutional scrutiny to the nature of the power delegated to them. The nondelegation doctrine applies to delegations by Congress—not to agencies’ subdelegations of legislative power to private parties. The other doctrinal lens for reviewing rulemaking by entities other than Congress—Chevron U.S.A. v. National Resources Defense Council, Inc. and its progeny—is equally blind to subdelegations of policymaking authority to parties that function beyond the boundaries of the Constitution. This Article takes up the issue of private rulemaking, and argues that its inescapable constitutional implications warrant a stronger nondelegation doctrine and a more nuanced approach to Chevron that emphasizes public accountability, legitimacy, transparency, and rational decision-making over notions of agency prerogative.  Associate Professor of Law, University of Baltimore School of Law. B.A., Cornell; J.D., University of Michigan. Thanks to Michele Gilman and Dionne Koller for comments on prior drafts of this Article, and to Adeen Postar, Laura Gagne, Maria Iliadis, and Christian Noble for valuable research assistance. Washington University Open Scholarship 616 WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY LAW REVIEW [VOL. 93:615
Automated assessment of non-native learner essays: Investigating the role of linguistic features

Automatic essay scoring (AES) refers to the process of scoring free text responses to given prompts, considering human grader scores as the gold standard. Writing such essays is an essential component of many language and aptitude exams. Hence, AES became an active and established area of research, and there are many proprietary systems used in real life applications today. However, not much is known about which specific linguistic features are useful for prediction and how much of this is consistent across datasets. This article addresses that by exploring the role of various linguistic features in automatic essay scoring using two publicly available datasets of non-native English essays written in test taking scenarios. The linguistic properties are modeled by encoding lexical, syntactic, discourse and error types of learner language in the feature set. Predictive models are then developed using these features on both datasets and the most predictive features are compared. While the results show that the feature set used results in good predictive models with both datasets, the question ”what are the most predictive features?” has a different answer for each dataset.
Domestic Policies as Strategic Measures in Multinational Markets

This paper studies the role of privatization and subsidization policies as trade strategies in a single multinational market where private and public firms of different nationalities interact. It finds out when a country subsidizes its industry the rival country would have the incentive to retaliate by adopting a subsidization regime to prevent a free riders’ situation from happening when it moves to liberalize the market. However this step does not eliminate the free rider problem governments are facing in this market when they privatize their public firms unilaterally.
Strategic incentives when supplying to rivals with an application to vertical firm structure

Abstract We consider a vertically integrated input monopolist supplying to a differentiated downstream rival. With linear input pricing, at the margin the firm unambiguously wants the rival to expand—unlike standard oligopoly with no supply relationship—for either Cournot or Bertrand competition. With a two-part tariff for the input, the same result holds if downstream choices are strategic complements, but is reversed for Cournot with strategic substitutes. We analyze vertical delegation as one mechanism for inducing expansion or contraction by the rival/customer.
Image restoration by short space spectral subtraction

A new image restoration system that is applicable to the problem of restoring an image degraded by blurring and additive noise is presented in this paper. The system is developed by attempting to estimate more accurately the frequency response of typical image restoration filters available in the literature. The resulting system combined with its short space implementation is computationally simple and appears to compare quite well in performance with other restoration techniques. Some examples are given to illustrate the performance of the new image restoration system.
Iron Partitioning between Ferropericlase and Bridgmanite in the Earth's Lower Mantle

Earth's lower mantle is generally believed to be seismically and chemically homogeneous because most of the key seismic parameters can be explained using a simplified mineralogical model at expected press-temperature conditions. However, recent high-resolution tomographic images have revealed seismic and chemical stratification in the middle-to-lower parts of the lower mantle. Thus far, the mechanism for the compositional stratification and seismic inhomogeneity, especially their relationship with the speciation of iron in the lower mantle, remains poorly understood. We have built a complete and integrated thermodynamic model of iron and aluminum chemistry for lower mantle conditions, and from this model has emerged a stratified picture of the valence, spin and composition profile in the lower mantle. Within this picture the lower mantle has an upper region with Fe3+ enriched bridgmanite with high-spin ferropericlase and metallic Fe, and a lower region with low-spin, iron-enriched ferropericlase coexisting with iron-depleted bridgmanite and almost no metallic Fe. The transition between the regions occurs at a depth of around 1600km and is driven by the spin transition in ferropericlase, which significantly changes the iron partitioning and speciation to one that favors Fe2+ in ferropericlase and suppresses Fe3+ and metallic iron formation These changes lead to lowered bulk sound velocity by 3-4% around the mid-lower mantle and enhanced density by ~1% toward the lowermost mantle. The predicted chemically and seismically stratified lower mantle differs dramatically from the traditional homogeneous model.
Can Price-Level Targeting Reduce Exchange Rate Volatility?

Previous studies have shown that, under certain conditions, a central bank can achieve a better trade-off between inflation and output volatility by replacing its inflation target with a price-level target. This article studies whether a Taylor rule that targets the price level instead of the inflation rate can reduce nominal and real exchange rate volatility without compromising the goals of inflation and output stability. The results indicate that supply shocks cause less nominal and real exchange rate volatility under price-level targeting. However, in the case of demand shocks the results depend on the persistence of the shocks.
DC-Assisted Bipolar Switched Reluctance Machine

In this paper, a sinusoidal excited four-phase switched reluctance machine (SRM) with modified dc-assisted windings is presented. The proposed four-phase SRM configuration with modified dc windings has a reduced number of controllable phases and power converter devices. The dc winding configuration is modified from its traditional form by taking advantage of the machine's inherent 90° phase shift between adjacent phases to achieve the desired simplification in the drive. Different power electronic converters for the proposed winding configuration have also been investigated. The proposed concepts are then verified through finite element analysis and an experimental prototype.
Some Comments on the Nature of Universal Properties in Low-Temperature Glasses

Abstract We discuss the recent theory of Burin and Kagan that attempts to explain the existence of universal low temperature properties in amorphous solids. We suggest a realistic experimental scenario that could be used to test the theory. We comment on the results of an experiment that has already been performed in the proposed geometry.
Global Shocks and their Impact on the Tanzanian Economy

Plummeting commodity prices, China's economic slowdown and rebalancing, and global financial market turbulence have recently raised concerns about their effects on African economies. This paper investigates whether, and to what extent, these intertwined shocks spillover into the Tanzanian economy. The author finds that a 1 percentage point (ppts) drop in China's investment growth is associated with a decline in Tanzania's export growth of roughly 0.60 ppts. A 1 percent fall in commodity prices leads to 0.65 percent lower exports value. The results suggest that a hard landing of the Chinese economy to its 'new normal' would doubtless send shock waves through the Tanzanian economy by further driving down commodity demand and prices as well as lowering development finance. In contrast, financial market volatility has a fairly negligible impact on economic growth. The main results stand up well to a wide-array of robustness checks.
Household expenditures on dietary supplements sold for weight loss, muscle building, and sexual function: Disproportionate burden by gender and income.

Abstract Dietary supplements sold for weight loss (WL), muscle building (MB), and sexual function (SF) are not medically recommended. They have been shown to be ineffective in many cases and pose serious health risks to consumers due to adulteration with banned substances, prescription pharmaceuticals, and other dangerous chemicals. Yet no prior research has investigated how these products may disproportionately burden individuals and families by gender and socioeconomic position across households. We investigated household (HH) cost burden of dietary supplements sold for WL, MB, and SF in a cross-sectional study using data from 60,538 U.S. households (HH) in 2012 Nielsen/IRi National Consumer Panel, calculating annual HH expenditures on WL, MB, and SF supplements and expenditures as proportions of total annual HH income. We examined sociodemographic patterns in HH expenditures using Wald tests of mean differences across subgroups. Among HH with any expenditures on WL, MB, or SF supplements, annual HH first and ninth expenditure deciles were, respectively: WL $5.99, $145.36; MB $6.99, $141.93; and SF $4.98, $88.52. Conditional on any purchases of the products, female-male-headed HH spent more on WL supplements and male-headed HH spend more on MB and SF supplements compared to other HH types ( p -values p -values p -values
Analysis of Antarctic glacigenic sediment provenance through geochemical and petrologic applications

Abstract The number of provenance studies of glacigenic sediments in Antarctica has increased dramatically over the past decade, providing an enhanced understanding of ice sheet history and dynamics, along with the broader geologic history. Such data have been used to assess glacial erosion patterns at the catchment scale, flow path reconstructions over a wide range of scales, and ice sheet fluctuations indicated by iceberg rafted debris in circumantarctic glacial marine sediments. It is notable that even though most of the bedrock of the continent is ice covered and inaccessible, provenance data can provide such valuable information about Antarctic ice and can even be used to infer buried rock types along with their geo- and thermochronologic history. Glacigenic sediments provide a broader array of provenance analysis opportunities than any other sediment type because of their wide range of grain sizes, and in this paper we review methods and examples from all size fractions that have been applied to the Antarctic glacigenic sedimentary record. Interpretations of these records must take careful consideration of the choice of analytical methods, uneven patterns of erosion, and spatial variability in sediment transport and rock types, which all may lead to a preferential identification of different elements of sources in the provenance analyses. Because of this, we advocate a multi-proxy approach and highlight studies that demonstrate the value of selecting complementary provenance methods.
PALEOCLIMATE RECONSTRUCTION | Approaches

Understanding past climate dynamics first requires reconstructing climate history in order to evaluate the important processes that shaped Earth's history – and that may shape the future. Here, approaches used to reconstruct paleoclimates are introduced. The approaches rely on Earth processes that are controlled by climate, and the evidence left by these processes that acts as a stand-in, or proxy, for actual measurements of past conditions. Proxies range from landscape features (e.g., glacial moraines, dry lake beds and abandoned shorelines, inactive and vegetated dunes) to carefully calibrated measurements of biotic and geochemical phenomena (e.g., tree-ring widths, glacial ice isotopic values). The interpretations range from simple qualitative inferences to elegant quantitative estimates. The understanding of climate processes is further aided by computer models of the climate system, and comparisons of maps of proxy data and model output. Sections of this article consider the wide range of paleoclimate proxies, qualitative and quantitative paleoclimate reconstruction methods, and the important step of synthesizing and mapping paleoclimate data, as well as comparisons with climate model output.
Light charged Higgs in the NMSSM

We review motivation for a light charged Higgs scenario that occurs in a class of models with a light CP-odd Higgs boson. If the light CP-odd Higgs is doublet-like the charged Higgs is typically lighter than the top quark and it dominantly decays into $W^\pm A$ with $B(H^+ \to W^+ A) > 70%$. We summarize experimental constraints from direct searches and discuss search strategies based on subleading decay modes of the CP-odd Higgs. A search for $t \to H^+ b, \;\;\;\; H^+ \to W^+ A, \;\;\;\; A \to \mu^+ \mu^- $ could provide an evidence for the charged Higgs or a discovery already with 1 fb$^{-1}$ of data at the LHC.
Transition from turbulent to coherent flows in confined three-dimensional active fluids

Transport of fluid through a pipe is essential for the operation of macroscale machines and microfluidic devices. Conventional fluids only flow in response to external pressure. We demonstrate that an active isotropic fluid, composed of microtubules and molecular motors, autonomously flows through meter-long three-dimensional channels. We establish control over the magnitude, velocity profile, and direction of the self-organized flows and correlate these to the structure of the extensile microtubule bundles. The inherently three-dimensional transition from bulk-turbulent to confined-coherent flows occurs concomitantly with a transition in the bundle orientational order near the surface and is controlled by a scale-invariant criterion related to the channel profile. The nonequilibrium transition of confined isotropic active fluids can be used to engineer self-organized soft machines.
Moral alchemy: How love changes norms

We discuss a process by which non-moral concerns (that is concerns agreed to be non-moral within a particular cultural context) can take on moral content. We refer to this phenomenon as moral alchemy and suggest that it arises because moral obligations of care entail recursively valuing loved ones' values, thus allowing propositions with no moral weight in themselves to become morally charged. Within this framework, we predict that when people believe a loved one cares about a behavior more than they do themselves, the moral imperative to care about the loved one's interests will raise the value of that behavior, such that people will be more likely to infer that third parties will see the behavior as wrong (Experiment 1) and the behavior itself as more morally important (Experiment 2) than when the same behaviors are considered outside the context of a caring relationship. The current study confirmed these predictions.
The linearization of belief propagation on pairwise markov random fields

Belief Propagation (BP) is a widely used approximation for exact probabilistic inference in graphical models, such as Markov Random Fields (MRFs). In graphs with cycles, however, no exact convergence guarantees for BP are known, in general. For the case when all edges in the MRF carry the same symmetric, doubly stochastic potential, recent works have proposed to approximate BP by linearizing the update equations around default values, which was shown to work well for the problem of node classification. The present paper generalizes all prior work and derives an approach that approximates loopy BP on any pairwise MRF with the problem of solving a linear equation system. This approach combines exact convergence guarantees and a fast matrix implementation with the ability to model heterogenous networks. Experiments on synthetic graphs with planted edge potentials show that the linearization has comparable labeling accuracy as BP for graphs with weak potentials, while speeding-up inference by orders of magnitude.
CEO ability and firm performance: Stock market and job market reactions

Does the stock market and job market evaluate a CEO based on the performance of his/her previous employer? We answer this question by examining a sample of 48 CEOs who voluntarily resigned from old firms to obtain similar positions with new firms. Using a sample of CEOs that voluntarily resigned from S&P 500 firms during 2004–2012, we find that the stock market’s reactions to announcements of them resigning from old firms and being hired by new firms depend on how well the old firms had performed. The market is able to differentiate a “better” CEO from a “good” one by reacting more negatively when the former resigns and more positively when the former is hired by a new firm. Long-term performances of the firms that hire these executives are consistent with market expectations: the firms that hire the better-performing group are rewarded with significantly better long-term returns than the firms that hire the good-performing executives. It appears that the job market is at par with the stock market— the better group finds jobs much faster than the good group. We also find that better CEOs are more likely than good ones to have a Master’s (or higher) degree.
Large multi-unit auctions with a large bidder ☆

Abstract We compare equilibrium bidding in uniform-price and discriminatory auctions when a single large bidder (i.e., with multi-unit demand) competes against many small bidders, each with single-unit demands. We show that the large bidder prefers the discriminatory auction over the uniform-price auction, and we provide general conditions under which small bidders have the reverse preference. We use examples to show that the efficiency and revenue rankings of the two auctions are ambiguous.
A Real-Time Framework for Task Assignment in Hyperlocal Spatial Crowdsourcing

Spatial Crowdsourcing (SC) is a novel platform that engages individuals in the act of collecting various types of spatial data. This method of data collection can significantly reduce cost and turnover time and is particularly useful in urban environmental sensing, where traditional means fail to provide fine-grained field data. In this study, we introduce hyperlocal spatial crowdsourcing, where all workers who are located within the spatiotemporal vicinity of a task are eligible to perform the task (e.g., reporting the precipitation level at their area and time). In this setting, there is often a budget constraint, either for every time period or for the entire campaign, on the number of workers to activate to perform tasks. The challenge is thus to maximize the number of assigned tasks under the budget constraint despite the dynamic arrivals of workers and tasks. We introduce a taxonomy of several problem variants, such as budget-per-time-period vs. budget-per-campaign and binary-utility vs. distance-based-utility. We study the hardness of the task assignment problem in the offline setting and propose online heuristics which exploit the spatial and temporal knowledge acquired over time. Our experiments are conducted with spatial crowdsourcing workloads generated by the SCAWG tool, and extensive results show the effectiveness and efficiency of our proposed solutions.
Outer Architecture of Kepler-11: Constraints from Coplanarity

The outer architectures of Kepler's compact systems of multiple transiting planets remain poorly constrained and few of these systems have lower bounds on the orbital distance of any massive outer planets. We infer a minimum orbital distance and upper limits on the inclination of a hypothetical Jovian-mass planet orbiting exterior to the six transiting planets at Kepler-11. Our constraints are derived from dynamical models together with observations provided by the Kepler mission. Firstly, the lack of transit timing variations (TTV) in the outermost transiting planet Kepler-11 g imply that the system does not contain a Jovian mass perturber within 2 AU from the star. Secondly, we test under what initial conditions a Jovian-mass planet moderately inclined from the transiting planets would make their co-transiting configuration unlikely. The transiting planets are secularly coupled and exhibit small mutual inclinations over long time-scales, although the outermost transiting planet, Kepler-11 g is weakly coupled to the inner five. We rule out a Jovian-mass planet on a 3 degree inclination within 3.0 AU, and higher inclinations out to further orbital distances, unless an undetected planet exists orbiting in the dynamical gap between Kepler-11 f and Kepler-11 g. Our constraints depend little on whether we assume the six transiting planets of Kepler-11 were initially perfectly co-planar or whether a minimum initial mutual inclination between the transiting planets is adopted based on the measured impact parameters of the transiting planets.
Learning, logic, and probability: a unified view

AI systems must be able to learn, reason logically, and handle uncertainty. While much research has focused on each of these goals individually, only recently have we begun to attempt to achieve all three at once. In this talk I will describe Markov logic, a representation that combines first-order logic and probabilistic graphical models, and algorithms for learning and inference in it. A knowledge base in Markov logic is a set of weighted first-order formulas, viewed as templates for features of Markov networks. The weights and probabilistic semantics make it easy to combine knowledge from a multitude of noisy, inconsistent sources, reason across imperfectly matched ontologies, etc. Inference in Markov logic is performed by weighted satisfiability testing, Markov chain Monte Carlo, and (where appropriate) specialized engines. Formulas can be refined using inductive logic programming techniques, and weights can be learned either generatively (using pseudo-likelihood) or discriminatively (using a voted perceptron). Markov logic has been successfully applied to problems in entity resolution, social network modeling, information extraction and others, and is the basis of the open-source Alchemy system. (Joint work with Stanley Kok, Hoifung Poon, Matt Richardson and Parag Singla.)
Gibbs Measures Over Locally Tree-Like Graphs and Percolative Entropy Over Infinite Regular Trees

Consider a statistical physical model on the d-regular infinite tree \(T_{d}\) described by a set of interactions \(\Phi \). Let \(\{G_{n}\}\) be a sequence of finite graphs with vertex sets \(V_n\) that locally converge to \(T_{d}\). From \(\Phi \) one can construct a sequence of corresponding models on the graphs \(G_n\). Let \(\{\mu _n\}\) be the resulting Gibbs measures. Here we assume that \(\{\mu _{n}\}\) converges to some limiting Gibbs measure \(\mu \) on \(T_{d}\) in the local weak\(^*\) sense, and study the consequences of this convergence for the specific entropies \(|V_n|^{-1}H(\mu _n)\). We show that the limit supremum of \(|V_n|^{-1}H(\mu _n)\) is bounded above by the percolative entropy \(H_{\textit{perc}}(\mu )\), a function of \(\mu \) itself, and that \(|V_n|^{-1}H(\mu _n)\) actually converges to \(H_{\textit{perc}}(\mu )\) in case \(\Phi \) exhibits strong spatial mixing on \(T_d\). When it is known to exist, the limit of \(|V_n|^{-1}H(\mu _n)\) is most commonly shown to be given by the Bethe ansatz. Percolative entropy gives a different formula, and we do not know how to connect it to the Bethe ansatz directly. We discuss a few examples of well-known models for which the latter result holds in the high temperature regime.
Traffic calming and neighborhood livability: Evidence from housing prices in Portland

Abstract This paper examines the impact of traffic calming on the livability of urban residential streets. Using geo-referenced data on the installation of 1187 calming devices in Portland (OR), I test whether the interventions locally affect housing prices during succeeding years. I provide reduced-form evidence that city dwellers pay significant premiums to limit their exposure to motor vehicles, but obtain mixed results regarding the overall price impacts of calming devices. My estimates suggest that only the most effective traffic calming measures have a detectable impact on housing prices. The implied traffic flow elasticity is −0.07: projects decreasing traffic by 16% raise home values on treated streets by 1%.
Resection planning for robotic acoustic neuroma surgery

Acoustic neuroma surgery is a procedure in which a benign mass is removed from the internal auditory canal (IAC). Currently, this surgical procedure requires manual drilling of the temporal bone followed by exposure and removal of the acoustic neuroma. This procedure is physically and mentally taxing to the surgeon. Our group is working on the development of an acoustic neuroma surgery robot (ANSR) to perform the initial drilling procedure. Planning the ANSR’s drilling region using preoperative CT requires expertise and takes about 35 min. We propose an approach for automatically producing a resection plan for the ANSR that would avoid damage to sensitive ear structures and require minimal editing by the surgeon. We first compute an atlas-based segmentation of the mastoid section of the temporal bone, refine it based on the position of anatomical landmarks, and apply a safety margin to the result to produce the automatic resection plan. In experiments with CTs from nine subjects, our automated process resulted in a resection plan that was verified to be safe in every case. Approximately 2 min were required in each case for the surgeon to verify and edit the plan to permit functional access to the IAC. We measured a mean Dice coefficient of 0.99 and surface error of 0.08 mm between the final and automatically proposed plans. These preliminary results indicate that our approach is a viable method for resection planning for the ANSR and drastically reduces the surgeon’s planning effort.
Independent Single-input-single Output Control Schemes for Dual Composition Control of Binary Distillation Columns

Abstract The steady-state interaction measure of dual composition control schemes for binary distillation columns is examined under the assumptions of constant relative volatility and constant molar overflow. An exhaustive enumeration is made of the control schemes that use column flows or their ratios as manipulated variables and product compositions as the controlled variables. Using a redundancy criterion, it is shown that 34 classes of dual composition control schemes have independent values for the interaction measure. This number reduces to 17 when the feed is a saturated liquid or gas. For high purity columns, the interaction measure of the above 34 control schemes approaches the values for the (L, V), (D, V), and (L3) control schemes. In this case none of the control schemes has a desirable interaction measure.
Signed quorum systems

With n servers that independently fail with probability of p < 0.5, it is well known that the majority quorum system achieves the best availability among all quorum systems. However, even this optimal construction requires (n + 1)/2 functioning servers out of n. Furthermore, the number of probes needed to acquire a quorum is also lower bounded by (n + 1)/2.Motivated by the need for a highly available and low probe complexity quorum system in the Intemet, this paper proposes signed quorum systems (SQS) that can be available as long as any O(1) servers are available, and simultaneously have O(1) probe complexity. SQS provides probabilistic intersection guarantees and exploits the property of independent mismatches in today's Internet. Such key property has been validated previously under multiple Internet measurement traces. This paper then extensively studies the availability, probe complexity, and load of SQS, derives lower bounds for all three metrics, and constructs matching upper bounds. We show that in addition to the qualitatively superior availability and probe complexity, SQS also decouples availability from load and probe complexity, so that optimal availability can be achieved under most probe complexity and load values.