cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Topology of random clique complexes

In a seminal paper, Erdos and Renyi identified a sharp threshold for connectivity of the random graph G(n,p). In particular, they showed that if [email protected]?logn/n then G(n,p) is almost always connected, and if [email protected]?logn/n then G(n,p) is almost always disconnected, as n->~. The clique complexX(H) of a graph H is the simplicial complex with all complete subgraphs of H as its faces. In contrast to the zeroth homology group of X(H), which measures the number of connected components of H, the higher dimensional homology groups of X(H) do not correspond to monotone graph properties. There are nevertheless higher dimensional analogues of the Erdos-Renyi Theorem. We study here the higher homology groups of X(G(n,p)). For k>0 we show the following. If p=n^@a, with @a -1/(2k+1), then the kth homology group of X(G(n,p)) is almost always vanishing, and if -1/k<@a<-1/(k+1), then it is almost always nonvanishing. We also give estimates for the expected rank of homology, and exhibit explicit nontrivial classes in the nonvanishing regime. These estimates suggest that almost all d-dimensional clique complexes have only one nonvanishing dimension of homology, and we cannot rule out the possibility that they are homotopy equivalent to wedges of a spheres.
Laser pulse heating

Recently, interest has developed in pulsed heating effects on a copper surface. Pulsed heating is one of the limits on the gradient of a structure based linac. The heat generated by an intense RF pulse on the metal surface can result in hundreds of degrees of temperature rise at 1 GeV/m. After a certain number of cycles, the metal may crack due to thermal fatigue and the surface properties may deteriorate. In this article, we describe an experiment to use a high power laser to study the pulsed temperature rise on a metal surface.
Actual Share Reacquisitions in Open‐Market Repurchase Programs

Unlike Dutch auction repurchases and tender offers, open-market repurchase programs do not precommit firms to acquire a specified number of shares. In a sample of 450 programs from 1981 to 1990, firms on average acquire 74 to 82 percent of the shares announced as repurchase targets within three years of the repurchase announcement. We find that share repurchases are negatively related to prior stock price performance, suggesting that firms increase their purchasing depending on its degree of perceived undervaluation. In addition, repurchases are positively related to levels of cash flow, which is consistent with liquidity arguments.
Removal of erythropoietin from anaemia trauma practice guideline does not increase red blood cell transfusions and decreases hospital utilization costs.

Abstract Introduction We previously demonstrated that utilization of erythropoietin (r-EPO) did not significantly reduce blood utilization in trauma patients. We undertook this study to analyze blood utilization 1 year after r-EPO removal from our trauma service anaemia practice management guideline. Methods Electronic records of patients admitted to the trauma service were retrospectively reviewed for units of packed red blood cells (pRBCs) transfused and for units of r-EPO administered 12 months before the initiation of an anaemia practice guideline (PRE), 12 months during the use of an anaemia guideline (GUIDE), and 12 months following removal of r-EPO from the guideline (POST). Hospital acquisition cost was also reviewed for the respective time periods. Nominal data were analyzed using chi-squared or Fisher's exact tests, and interval data were compared using ANOVA followed by Tukey's test where appropriate. Results were considered significant for P Results Over the 3-year study period, 4881 patients were admitted to the trauma service and included in this study. The hospital length of stay, intensive care unit length of stay, and units of pRBC transfused were similar among all three groups. Group I (PRE) received a total of 228 doses of r-EPO at a cost of $102,600. Group II (GUIDE) received a total of 410 doses at a cost of $184,500. Group III (POST) received 28 doses of r-EPO at a cost of $12,600. Conclusion Removal of erythropoietin from our trauma service anaemia practice management guideline did not result in increased blood utilization. However, it yielded a hospital acquisition cost savings of $171,900.
Zeeman Spectroscopy of the Star Algebra

We solve the problem of finding all eigenvalues and eigenvectors of the Neumann matrix of the matter sector of open bosonic string field theory, including the zero modes, and switching on a background B-field. We give the discrete eigenvalues as roots of transcendental equations, and we give analytical expressions for all the eigenvectors.
Analysis and simulation of progressive adolescent scoliosis by biomechanical growth modulation

Scoliosis is thought to progress during growth because spinal deformity produces asymmetrical spinal loading, generating asymmetrical growth, etc. in a ‘vicious cycle.’ The aim of this study was to test quantitatively whether calculated loading asymmetry of a spine with scoliosis, together with measured bone growth sensitivity to altered compression, can explain the observed rate of scoliosis progression in the coronal plane during adolescent growth. The simulated spinal geometry represented a lumbar scoliosis of different initial magnitudes, averaged and scaled from measurements of 15 patients’ radiographs. Level-specific stresses acting on the vertebrae were estimated for each of 11 external loading directions (‘efforts’) from published values of spinal loading asymmetry. These calculations assumed a physiologically plausible muscle activation strategy. The rate of vertebral growth was obtained from published reports of growth of the spine. The distribution of growth across vertebrae was modulated according to published values of growth sensitivity to stress. Mechanically modulated growth of a spine having an initial 13° Cobb scoliosis at age 11 with the spine subjected to an unweighted combination of eleven loading conditions (different effort direction and magnitude) was predicted to progress during growth. The overall shape of the curve was retained. The averaged final lumbar spinal curve magnitude was 32° Cobb at age 16 years for the lower magnitude of effort (that produced compressive stress averaging 0.48 MPa at the curve apex) and it was 38° Cobb when the higher magnitudes of efforts (that produced compressive stress averaging 0.81 MPa at the apex). An initial curve of 26° progressed to 46° and 56°, respectively. The calculated stresses on growth plates were within the range of those measured by intradiscal pressures in typical daily activities. These analyses predicted that a substantial component of scoliosis progression during growth is biomechanically mediated. The rationale for conservative management of scoliosis during skeletal growth assumes a biomechanical mode of deformity progression (Hueter-Volkmann principle). The present study provides a quantitative basis for this previously qualitative hypothesis. The findings suggest that an important difference between progressive and non-progressive scoliosis might lie in the differing muscle activation strategies adopted by individuals, leading to the possibility of improved prognosis and conservative or less invasive interventions.
Adaptive Algorithms for Diagnosing Large-Scale Failures in Computer Networks

We propose a greedy algorithm, Cluster-MAX-COVERAGE (CMC), to efficiently diagnose large-scale clustered failures. We primarily address the challenge of determining faults with incomplete symptoms. CMC makes novel use of both positive and negative symptoms to output a hypothesis list with a low number of false negatives and false positives quickly. CMC requires reports from about half as many nodes as other existing algorithms to determine failures with 100 percent accuracy. Moreover, CMC accomplishes this gain significantly faster (sometimes by two orders of magnitude) than an algorithm that matches its accuracy. When there are fewer positive and negative symptoms at a reporting node, CMC performs much better than existing algorithms. We also propose an adaptive algorithm called Adaptive-MAX-COVERAGE (AMC) that performs efficiently during both independent and clustered failures. During a series of failures that include both independent and clustered, AMC results in a reduced number of false negatives and false positives.
Ultrahigh vacuum and the solid—gas interface

Abstract A brief account is given of the linkage between ultrahigh vacuum and the solid—gas interface. This linkage appears in (a) the creation of ultrahigh vacuum; (b) the measurement of ultrahigh vacuum; (c) the effects of the bombardment of surfaces by electrons, ions, and/or photons; (d) analytic tools utilizing molecules for the study of the solid—gas interface.
Fluid Mechanics of Deflagration-to-Detonation Transition in Porous Explosives and Propellants

The fluid mechanical processes which characterize a transition from deflagration to detonation in granular beds of solid propellant have not at present been sufficiently refined to allow accurate modeling of the phenomenon. In an attempt to improve this situation, this paper reports on the investigation of the basic mechanisms and consequences that arise from a set of assumptions for the governing and constitutive equations which take into account the two-phase nature of this problem. A qualitative description of the flow process is made, based on observations obtained from deflagration-to-detonation transition (DDT) experiments. From this, certain conclusions are reached as to the properties needed by propellants to exhibit a deflagration-t odetonation transition. The numerical integration scheme itself is examined in detail in order to further understand the consequences of its use. Also, two scenarios for DDT are presented which exhibit characteristics similar to those derived from experimental evidence. Conclusions as to the direction of future research are made based on the results obtained from the work which led to these two basic mechanisms for DDT.
Novel arylsulfonamides possessing sub-picomolar HIV protease activities and potent anti-HIV activity against wild-type and drug-resistant viral strains.

Abstract A novel series of P1′ chain-extended arylsufonamides was synthesiszed and evaluated for wild-type HIV protease inhibitory activity and in vitro antiviral activity against wild type virus and two protease inhibitor-resistant mutant viruses. All of the compounds showed dramatic increases in enzyme activity as compared to the currently marketed HIV protease inhibitors amprenavir, indinavir, and nelfinavir. In addition, significant improvements in antiviral potencies against wild type and the two mutant viruses were also realized.
On singularity confinement for the pentagram map

The pentagram map, introduced by R. Schwartz, is a birational map on the configuration space of polygons in the projective plane. We study the singularities of the iterates of the pentagram map. We show that a "typical" singularity disappears after a finite number of iterations, a confinement phenomenon first discovered by Schwartz. We provide a method to bypass such a singular patch by directly constructing the first subsequent iterate that is well-defined on the singular locus under consideration. The key ingredient of this construction is the notion of a decorated (twisted) polygon, and the extension of the pentagram map to the corresponding decorated configuration space.
Price Discovery in the U.S. Treasury Market: The Impact of Orderflow and Liquidity on the Yield Curve

We examine the role of price discovery in the U.S. Treasury market through the empirical relationship between orderflow, liquidity, and the yield curve. We find that orderflow imbalances (excess buying or selling pressure) can account for as much as 26 percent of the day-to-day variation in yields on days without major macroeconomic announcements. The effect of orderflow on yields is permanent and strongest when liquidity is low. All of the evidence points toward an important role of price discovery in understanding the behavior of the yield curve.
Pushing the hyperpolarizability to the limit

We use numerical optimization to find a one-dimensional potential energy function that yields the largest hyperpolarizability, which we find is within 30% of the fundamental limit. Our results reveal insights into the character of the potential energy functions and wave functions that lead to the largest hyperpolarizability. We suggest that donor-acceptor molecules with a conjugated bridge with many sites of reduced conjugation to impart conjugation modulation may be the best paradigm for making materials with huge hyperpolarizabilities that approach the fundamental limit.
Simulated and observed backscatter at P-, L-, and C-bands from ponderosa pine stands

The authors compared the output of the Santa Barbara microwave canopy backscatter model to polarimetric synthetic aperture radar (SAR) data for three ponderosa pine stands (ST-2, ST-11, and SP-2) with discontinuous tree canopies near Mt. Shasta, California, at P-band (0.68-m wavelength), L-band (0.235-m wavelength), and C-band (0.056-m wavelength). Given the SAR data calibration uncertainty, the model made good predictions of the P-HH, P-VV, L-HH, C-HH, and C-HV backscatter for the three stands, and the P-HV and L-HV backscatter for ST-2 and SP-2. The model underestimated C-VV for the three stands, and P-HV, L-HV, and L-VV backscatter for ST-11. The observed and modeled VV-HH phase differences were approximately=0 degrees for the three stands at C-band and L-band, and for SP-2 at P-band. At P-band, the observed and modeled VV-HH phase differences were at least -80 degrees for ST-2 and ST-11, which indicates that double-bounce scattering contributes to the total backscatter for the two stands. >
DRESSING TO IMPRESS: BELIEFS AND ATTITUDES REGARDING WORKPLACE ATTIRE

The purpose of this study was to examine individual differences in beliefs and attitudes regarding workplace attire including: the value placed on clothing, the impact of attire on workplace outcomes (e.g., promotions, raises), the effort and planning involved in dressing appropriately for work, how their clothing made them feel, and whether they used their attire to manage the impression of others in the workplace. Results from a sample of MBA students indicate that those who valued workplace attire used it to manage the impressions of others and believed that it positively impacts the way they feel about themselves and their workplace outcomes. Dressing to impress appeared to have particular utility for high self-monitors and those in management/executive positions. Women were found to be more interested in clothing and experienced more “appearance labor” when compared to men. Suggestions for future research are proposed.
A new synthesis of 2-nitroindoles

Abstract The C-2 lithiation of N -Boc- and N -(phenylsulfonyl)indoles ( 4 – 7 ) followed by reaction with dinitrogen tetroxide at low temperature affords the corresponding 2-nitroindoles 10 – 13 in 63–78% yields. Deprotection of the N -Boc-2-nitroindoles ( 10 , 11 ) with trifluoroacetic acid gives 2-nitroindole ( 3 ) and 3-methyl-2-nitroindole ( 14 ) in essentially quantitative yields.
Field emission current fluctuations from isolated carbon nanotubes

Field emission current fluctuations from single carbon nanotubes created by a chemical vapor deposition (CVD) process were studied using a field emission microscope equipped with a moveable Faraday cup. The aperture at the entrance to the cup defined the solid angle subtended and allowed conversion of current into angular intensity. A time record of current was constructed by sampling, from which the average current and standard deviation were calculated. Simultaneously, a power spectrum from 1 Hz to 1 kHz was acquired. Normalized comparisons of power spectral densities for nanotube, Schottky and thermal field emitters are presented. The effect of heating the nanotube emitter substrate on the current fluctuation is shown. A limit of ∼0.1 mA sr−1 was observed for angular intensity from carbon nanotubes. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Adding flavor to AdS/CFT

Coupling fundamental quarks to QCD in the dual string representation corresponds to adding the open string sector. Flavors therefore should be represented by space-time filling D-branes in the dual 5d closed string background. This requires several interesting properties of D-branes in AdS. D-branes have to be able to end in thin air in order to account for massive quarks, which only live in the UV region. They must come in distinct sets, representing the chiral global symmetry, with a bifundamental field playing the role of the chiral condensate. We show that these expectations are born out in several supersymmetric examples. To analyze most of these properties it is not necessary to go beyond the probe limit in which one neglects the backreaction of the flavor D-branes.
Diffusion processes in turbulent magnetic fields

We study of the effect of turbulence on diffusion processes within magnetized medium. While we exemplify our treatment with heat transfer processes, our results are quite general and are applicable to different processes, e.g. diffusion of heavy elements. Our treatment is also applicable to describing the diffusion of cosmic rays arising from magnetic field wandering. In particular, we find that when the energy injection velocity is smaller than the Alfven speed the heat transfer is partially suppressed, while in the opposite regime the effects of turbulence depend on the intensity of driving. In fact, the scale lA at which the turbulent velocity is equal the Alfven velocity is a new important parameter. When the electron mean free path λ is larger than lA, the stronger the the turbulence, the lower thermal conductivity by electrons is. The turbulent motions, however, induces their own advective transport, that can provide effective diffusivity. For clusters of galaxies, we find that the turbulence is the...
Acute Otitis Media Replacement and Recurrence in the Finnish Otitis Media Vaccine Trial

We reanalyzed the 7-valent pneumococcal conjugate vaccine trial FinOM for prevention of acute otitis media (AOM), with a focus on disease replacement due to other pathogens and AOM recurrence. We found evidence of replacement disease occurring early during the trial follow-up and little vaccine impact on recurrent overall AOM episodes.
A broadband, spectrally flat, high rep-rate frequency comb: Bandwidth scaling and flatness enhancement of phase modulated CW through cascaded four-wave mixing

We demonstrate a scheme to scale the bandwidth by several times while enhancing spectral flatness of frequency combs generated by intensity and phase modulation of CW lasers using cascaded four-wave mixing in highly nonlinear fiber.
Design by Directed Evolution

The stunning array of features and functions exhibited by proteins in nature should convince most scientists of the power of evolutionary design processes. Natural selection acting on populations over long periods of time has generated a vast number of proteins ideally suited to their biological functions. When we try to recruit these remarkable molecular machines for new tasksfrom serving as industrial catalysts to being used as additives for laundry detergentswe find that they are often not so well suited. (The chemist is not terribly impressed with a synthesis requiring a reactor the size of a football field simply because the enzyme functions in water and the substrate does not dissolve, nor is she pleased with a catalyst shut down by the products of its own reaction.) Evolution is usually the culprit: proteins are optimized, and often highly specialized, for specific biological tasks. Most protein reengineering efforts have been by so-called rational design. The filtering effect of scientific publication (successes get published, failures mostly do not) might lead one to believe that we can, with reasonable probability of success, identify and modify the amino acids responsible for key properties such as an enzyme's substrate preference, stability, or activity in a nonnatural environment. In reality, we are far from being able to do this reliably. This is true even for the relatively small number of enzymes for which considerable structural and mechanistic data are available. Admitting ineptitude in rational design, however, frees us to consider other approaches which are hardly irrational. An alternative and highly effective design strategy can be found by looking to the processes by which all these proteins came about in the first place. My research has been devoted to recreating in the laboratory the key processes of evolution and doing it in such a way that we can design scientifically interesting and technologically useful molecules. The challenge is to collapse the time scale for evolution from millions of years to months or even weeks.
Energy Efficiency: The New Holy Grail of Data Management Systems Research

Energy costs are quickly rising in large-scale data centers and are soon projected to overtake the cost of hardware. As a result, data center operators have recently started turning into using more energy-friendly hardware. Despite the growing body of research in power management techniques, there has been little work to date on energy efficiency from a data management software perspective. In this paper, we argue that hardware-only approaches are only part of the solution, and that data management software will be key in optimizing for energy efficiency. We discuss the problems arising from growing energy use in data centers and the trends that point to an increasing set of opportunities for software-level optimizations. Using two simple experiments, we illustrate the potential of such optimizations, and, motivated by these examples, we discuss general approaches for reducing energy waste. Lastly, we point out existing places within database systems that are promising for energy-efficiency optimizations and urge the data management systems community to shift focus from performance-oriented research to energy-efficient computing.
Comparison of esmolol and nitroprusside for acute post-cardiac surgical hypertension.

Abstract Because acute systemic hypertension early after cardiac surgery has been linked to catecholamine elevation, an open-label, randomized, crossover study was performed to compare the efficacy of esmolol, a new ultra-short-acting intravenous β-blocking agent, to nitroprusside, the standard therapy. Controlled drug infusions to maximal dosage (esmolol, 300 μg/kg/min, and nltroprusside, 10 μg/kg/min) were titrated to achieve at least a 15% reduction in systolic pressure. The blood pressure (BP) endpoint was achieved with esmolol (within 29 ± 14 minutes) in 18 of 20 patients (90%), compared with 19 of 20 (95%) with nitroprusside infusion (within 21 ± 15 minutes, difference not significant [NS]). Systolic BP decreased from 170 ± 13 to 136 ± 12 mm Hg (mean ± standard deviation) with esmolol and from 170 ± 13 to 141 ± 13 mm Hg with nitr roprusside infusion (both p
White Matter Abnormalities in Schizophrenia and Schizotypal Personality Disorder

Prior diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) studies examining schizotypal personality disorder (SPD) and schizophrenia, separately have shown that compared with healthy controls (HCs), patients show frontotemporal white matter (WM) abnormalities. This is the first DTI study to directly compare WM tract coherence with tractography and fractional anisotropy (FA) across the schizophrenia spectrum in a large sample of demographically matched HCs (n = 55), medication-naive SPD patients (n = 49), and unmedicated/never-medicated schizophrenia patients (n = 22) to determine whether (a) frontal-striatal-temporal WM tract abnormalities in schizophrenia are similar to, or distinct from those observed in SPD; and (b) WM tract abnormalities are associated with clinical symptom severity indicating a common underlying pathology across the spectrum. Compared with both the HC and SPD groups, schizophrenia patients showed WM abnormalities, as indexed by lower FA in the temporal lobe (inferior longitudinal fasciculus) and cingulum regions. SPD patients showed lower FA in the corpus callosum genu compared with the HC group, but this regional abnormality was more widespread in schizophrenia patients. Across the schizophrenia spectrum, greater WM disruptions were associated with greater symptom severity. Overall, frontal-striatal-temporal WM dysconnectivity is attenuated in SPD compared with schizophrenia patients and may mitigate the emergence of psychosis.
Flat Chains in Banach Spaces

We extend the notion of a flat chain with coefficients in a normed abelian group from Euclidean space to an arbitrary Banach space and prove a compactness result. We also remove the condition that a flat chain with arbitrary coefficients have finite mass in order for its support to exist.
Nitrogen pools and fluxes in grassland soils sequestering carbon

Carbon sequestration in agricultural, forest, and grassland soils has been promoted as a means by which substantial amounts of CO2 may be removed from the atmosphere, but few studies have evaluated the associated impacts on changes in soil N or net global warming potential (GWP). The purpose of this research was to (1) review the literature to examine how changes in grassland management that affect soil C also impact soil N, (2) assess the impact of different types of grassland management on changes in soil N and rates of change, and (3) evaluate changes in N2O fluxes from differently managed grassland ecosystems to assess net impacts on GWP. Soil C and N stocks either both increased or both decreased for most studies. Soil C and N sequestration were tightly linked, resulting in little change in C:N ratios with changes in management. Within grazing treatments N2O made a minor contribution to GWP (0.1–4%), but increases in N2O fluxes offset significant portions of C sequestration gains due to fertilization (10–125%) and conversion (average = 27%). Results from this work demonstrate that even when improved management practices result in considerable rates of C and N sequestration, changes in N2O fluxes can offset a substantial portion of gains by C sequestration. Even for cases in which C sequestration rates are not entirely offset by increases in N2O fluxes, small increases in N2O fluxes can substantially reduce C sequestration benefits. Conversely, reduction of N2O fluxes in grassland soils brought about by changes in management represents an opportunity to reduce the contribution of grasslands to net greenhouse gas forcing.
Chaos and the dynamics of biological populations

As first emphasized in the early 1970s, the nonlinearities that are inherent in simple models for the regulation of plant and animal populations can lead to chaotic dynamics. This review deals with a variety of instances where chaotic phenomena can arise, particularly in interactions between prey and predators (including hosts and pathogens, hosts and parasitic insects, and harvested populations). Some of the complications in disentangling deterministic chaos from environmental noise will be discussed. The combination of population biology with population genetics leads to an even richer assortment of nonlinear phenomena and to the suggestion that many genetic polymorphisms may vary cyclically or chaotically (rather than being steady, as usually is assumed implicitly). I argue that complex dynamics - including chaos - is likely to be pervasive in population biology and population genetics, even in seemingly simple situations. But superimposed environmental noise, in heterogeneous natural settings, will usually complicate the dynamics, making it unlikely that population data will exhibit elegant properties (such as universalities in period doubling) associated with the underlying maps. The existence of chaotic regimes of dynamical behaviour can, however, invalidate standard techniques for analysing population data to reveal density-dependent mechanisms; this, I believe, may currently be the most significant implication of dynamical chaos for population biology.
Irrational proofs for three theorems of Stanley

We give new proofs of three theorems of Stanley on generating functions for the integer points in rational cones. The first relates the rational generating function σv+K(x) := Σm∈(v+K)∩ZdXm, where K is a rational cone and v ∈Rd, with σ-v+K°(1/x). The second theorem asserts that the generating function 1+Σn≥1LP(n)tn of the Ehrhart quasi-polynomial LP(n) := #(nP∩Zd) of a rational polytope P can be written as a rational function vP(t)/(1-t)dimP+1 with nonnegative numerator vP. The third theorem asserts that if P ⊆ Q, then vP ≤ vQ. Our proofs are based on elementary counting afforded by irrational decompositions of rational polyhedra.
An easy proof of Jensen’s theorem on the uniqueness of infinity harmonic functions

We present a new, easy, and elementary proof of Jensen’s Theorem on the uniqueness of infinity harmonic functions. The idea is to pass to a finite difference equation by taking maximums and minimums over small balls.
Progress toward the Total Synthesis of Saudin: Development of a Tandem Stille-Oxa-Electrocyclization Reaction

A diastereoselective tandem Stille-oxa-electrocyclization reaction provides access to the core of the diterpenoid natural product saudin. Additionally, this new reaction sequence was extended to the convergent preparation of related polycyclic pyran systems.
HOME OXYGEN THERAPY

Home oxygen therapy has well-established benefits for patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and resting hypoxemia. The indications for therapy have been clearly defined in the United States by the Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA), and these guidelines have been accepted by most third-party payers. Controversies regarding the use of oxygen during sleep and exercise when daytime hypoxemia is not present have important therapeutic and financial implications. HCFA has recently proposed a substantial reduction in reimbursement for home oxygen which could have a major adverse effect if done on a global, across-the-board, basis. Some of the new technological developments in oxygen delivery systems are presented in this article.
Education, Income, and Support for Suicide Bombings: Evidence from Six Muslim Countries

The authors examine the effect of educational attainment and income on support for suicide bombing among Muslim publics in six predominantly Muslim countries that have experienced suicide bombings: Indonesia, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Pakistan, and Turkey. The authors make two contributions. First, they present a conceptual model, which has been lacking in the literature. Second, they consider attitudes toward two different targets of suicide bombings: civilians within the respondent’s country and Western military and political personnel in Iraq. The authors find that the effect of educational attainment and income on support for suicide bombings varies across countries and targets. The findings therefore draw attention to the difficulties of making generalizations about Muslim countries and the importance of distinguishing between targets of suicide bombings.
Meta-analysis of alcohol price and income elasticities – with corrections for publication bias

This paper contributes to the evidence-base on prices and alcohol use by presenting meta-analytic summaries of price and income elasticities for alcohol beverages. The analysis improves on previous meta-analyses by correcting for outliers and publication bias. Adjusting for outliers is important to avoid assigning too much weight to studies with very small standard errors or large effect sizes. Trimmed samples are used for this purpose. Correcting for publication bias is important to avoid giving too much weight to studies that reflect selection by investigators or others involved with publication processes. Cumulative meta-analysis is proposed as a method to avoid or reduce publication bias, resulting in more robust estimates. The literature search obtained 182 primary studies for aggregate alcohol consumption, which exceeds the database used in previous reviews and meta-analyses. For individual beverages, corrected price elasticities are smaller (less elastic) by 28-29 percent compared with consensus averages frequently used for alcohol beverages. The average price and income elasticities are: beer, -0.30 and 0.50; wine, -0.45 and 1.00; and spirits, -0.55 and 1.00. For total alcohol, the price elasticity is -0.50 and the income elasticity is 0.60. These new results imply that attempts to reduce alcohol consumption through price or tax increases will be less effective or more costly than previously claimed.
Rapid prototyping of interactive information systems

The User Software Engineering methodology is a set of techniques, supported by automated tools (Unified Support Environment), to support the specification and implementation of interactive information systems. The methodology advocates construction of a prototype of the user/program dialogue as an aid to the analysis process, and suggests the construction of a functional prototype as an aid to the specification. The USE tool RAPID (RApid Prototypes of Interactive Dialogues) supports the construction of prototypes and partial systems. RAPID builds upon two automated tools, the Transition Diagram Interpreter (TDI) and a relational database management system (Troll). This paper describes the role of prototypes in the USE methodology and the function and use of RAPID, TDI, and Troll.
Integrative negotiation in complex organizational agent systems

This paper introduces an integrative negotiation mechanism, which enables agents to choose any attitude from the extremes of self-interested and fully cooperative to those that are partially self-interested and partially cooperative. Experimental work verifies this mechanism and explores the question whether it always improves the social welfare to have an agent be completely cooperative. It is found that it is good for the organization to have agents being partially cooperative in their local negotiation with other agents rather than being fully cooperative, in order to deal more effectively with the uncertainty of not having a more informed view of the state of the entire agent organization.
Lynx: a high-resolution synthetic aperture radar

Lynx is a high resolution, synthetic aperture radar (SAR) that was designed and built by Sandia National Laboratories in collaboration with General Atomics (GA). The Lynx production weight is less than 120 lb. and has a slant range of 30 km moderate rain (4 mm/hr). It has operator selectable resolution and is capable of 0.1 m resolution in spotlight mode and 0.3 m resolution in stripmap mode. In ground moving target indicator mode, the minimum detectable velocity is 6 knots with a minimum target cross-section of 10 dBsm. In coherent change detection mode, Lynx makes registered, complex image comparisons either of 01 m resolution (minimum) spotlight images or of 0.3 m resolution (minimum) strip images. The Lynx user interface features a view manager that allows it to pan and zoom like a video camera.
Synthesis of 4-carboxy-4-pyridylpiperidines through palladium-catalyzed α-arylation of esters

A concise synthesis of 4-carboxy-4-pyridylpiperidines has been achieved. Key step is the palladium-catalyzed α-arylation of esters under basic conditions.
Implications for Climate-Change Policy of Research on Cooperation in Social Dilemmas

The problem of climate change seems to be a tragedy of the commons: despite the global benefits of reducing green-house gas emissions, no individual has any incentive to reduce his or her own emissions. Yet many people are making efforts to reduce emissions and putting pressure on businesses and governments to do the same. Although the size of these efforts is unclear, their very existence might seem puzzling. The efforts are consistent, however, with some theoretical and empirical evidence about the extent of cooperation in other social dilemmas. This evidence does not imply that greenhouse-gas emissions will be reduced to desirable levels, but it does suggest that the potential for voluntary cooperation should not be ignored. It also suggests that cooperation can be promoted by (i) allowing cooperators to punish defectors without withdrawing their own cooperation; (ii) publicly emphasizing the social benefits and extent of cooperation and the social norms that require it; and (iii) improving the quantity and timeliness of public information about cooperation and defection.
Experience and Evidence

I argue that perceptual experience provides us with both phenomenal and factive evidence. To a first approximation, we can understand phenomenal evidence as determined by how our environment sensorily seems to us when we are experiencing. To a first approximation, we can understand factive evidence as necessarily determined by the environment to which we are perceptually related such that the evidence is guaranteed to be an accurate guide to the environment. I argue that the rational source of both phenomenal and factive evidence lies in employing perceptual capacities that we have in virtue of being perceivers. In showing that both kinds of evidence have the same rational source, I provide a unified account of perceptual evidence and its rational source in perceptual experience.
New Paradigms for Constructing Symmetric Encryption Schemes Secure against Chosen-Ciphertext Attack

The paradigms currently used to realize symmetric encryption schemes secure against adaptive chosen ciphertext attack (CCA) try to make it infeasible for an attacker to forge "valid" ciphertexts. This is achieved by either encoding the plaintext with some redundancy before encrypting or by appending a MAC to the ciphertext. We suggest schemes which are provably secure against CCA, and yet every string is a "valid" ciphertext. Consequently, our schemes have a smaller ciphertext expansion than any other scheme known to be secure against CCA. Our most efficient scheme is based on a novel use of "variable-length" pseudo-random functions and can be efficiently implemented using block ciphers. We relate the difficulty of breaking our schemes to that of breaking the underlying primitives in a precise and quantitative way.
Nonregenerative MIMO Relaying With Optimal Transmit Antenna Selection

We derive optimal SNR-based transmit antenna selection rules at the source and relay for the nonregenerative half-duplex MIMO relay channel. While antenna selection is a suboptimal form of beamforming, it has the advantage that the optimization is tractable and can be implemented with only a few bits of feedback from the destination to the source and relay. We compare the bit error rate of optimal antenna selection at both the source and relay to other proposed beamforming techniques and propose methods for performing the necessary limited feedback.
Chile's Criminal Law Reform: Enhancing Defendants' Rights and Citizen Security

Many democratic governments in Latin America have implemented broad judicial reforms, some of which are aimed at making criminal law and legal institutions more transparent and modern. Although such reforms are important for democratic development, scholars debate whether the reforms result in more rights for defendants and whether they jeopardize citizens' perceptions about security. Using two original datasets and a fixed-effects model, this study shows that groundbreaking criminal law reforms in Chile have improved certain aspects of defendants' rights by decreasing the number of individuals in pretrial detention. Chileans' perceptions about crime and violence in regions where the reforms were implemented also have improved. Chile's success appears to be due to the government's commitment to the reforms, as well as to concerted and consistent efforts by the police to fight crime. These results have implications for other countries implementing similar significant reforms.
Social and personal determinants of workplace aggression: Evidence for the impact of perceived injustice and the Type A Behavior Pattern

Four hundred fifty-two employed persons rated the frequency with which they had been the victims of a wide range of aggressive actions at work. In addition, they also rated the frequency with which they themselves had aggressed against others in their workplaces. Three hypotheses were investigated: (1) covert forms of aggression, in which aggressors seek to conceal their identity from target persons, are significantly more frequent in workplaces than overt forms of aggression; (2) the greater the perceived injustice reported by employees, the greater their tendency to engage in workplace aggression; and (3) the higher individuals' scores on a measure of the Type A Behavior Pattern, the greater their reported frequency of engaging in various forms of workplace aggression, Results offered support for all three hypotheses. In addition, several demographic variables (participants' age and gender; the physical location of their workplaces) were also found to play a role in the occurrence of workplace aggression. Together, these findings were interpreted as underscoring the importance of establishing close conceptual links between research on workplace aggression andbasic research on human aggression.
New Directions in Corporate Governance

Corporate governance describes the structures, processes, and institutions within and around organizations that allocate power and resource control among participants. Law and economics scholars have developed a view of the public corporation as a nexus-of-contracts whose structure is driven by the requirements of financial markets, and thus features of the corporation and its surrounding institutions are theorized in terms of their function in directing corporations toward share price as a criterion of value. Working from this base, more recent research has studied historical and cross-national variation in governance institutions, producing highly varied interpretations of their sources and function. Sociological work, particularly within organization theory, has critiqued this functionalist view and provided alternative interpretations based on networks, power, and culture. The most promising contemporary work seeks to analyze governance in terms of the dynamics of institutions—where they originate, ho...
SUPERMARKETS AS A NATURAL OLIGOPOLY

This paper proposes and tests a model of supermarket competition based upon an endogenous fixed cost (EFC) framework (Sutton, J. Sunk Cost and Market Structure: Price Competition, Advertising, and the Evolution of Concentration. Cambridge: MIT Press, 1991.). The relevance of the EFC framework to supermarket competition stems from the industry's surprisingly uniform competitive structure: irrespective of the size of the local market, a small number of firms (between three and six) capture the majority of sales. As markets grow, local rivalry drives firms to expand their fixed investments, limiting the number of firms that can profitably enter even the largest markets. Although markets stay concentrated, competition remains fierce, reflecting the inherently rivalrous nature of the underlying competitive mechanism. The goal of this paper is to identify the strategic focus of this rivalry, namely the drive to provide an ever greater variety of consumer products, and to eliminate alternative explanations for the observed structure by highlighting the unique form of firm conduct that characterizes this industry. (JEL D21, D43, L11, L13, L22, L81)
A Coalescent Model for a Sweep of a Unique Standing Variant

The use of genetic polymorphism data to understand the dynamics of adaptation and identify the loci that are involved has become a major pursuit of modern evolutionary genetics. In addition to the classical “hard sweep” hitchhiking model, recent research has drawn attention to the fact that the dynamics of adaptation can play out in a variety of different ways and that the specific signatures left behind in population genetic data may depend somewhat strongly on these dynamics. One particular model for which a large number of empirical examples are already known is that in which a single derived mutation arises and drifts to some low frequency before an environmental change causes the allele to become beneficial and sweeps to fixation. Here, we pursue an analytical investigation of this model, bolstered and extended via simulation study. We use coalescent theory to develop an analytical approximation for the effect of a sweep from standing variation on the genealogy at the locus of the selected allele and sites tightly linked to it. We show that the distribution of haplotypes that the selected allele is present on at the time of the environmental change can be approximated by considering recombinant haplotypes as alleles in the infinite-alleles model. We show that this approximation can be leveraged to make accurate predictions regarding patterns of genetic polymorphism following such a sweep. We then use simulations to highlight which sources of haplotypic information are likely to be most useful in distinguishing this model from neutrality, as well as from other sweep models, such as the classic hard sweep and multiple-mutation soft sweeps. We find that in general, adaptation from a unique standing variant will likely be difficult to detect on the basis of genetic polymorphism data from a single population time point alone, and when it can be detected, it will be difficult to distinguish from other varieties of selective sweeps. Samples from multiple populations and/or time points have the potential to ease this difficulty.
Palladium(0)-catalyzed suzuki-miyaura cross-coupling reactions of potassium aryl- and heteroaryltrifluoroborates with alkenyl bromides.

Efficient palladium(0)-catalyzed Suzuki−Miyaura cross-couplings are described. The reactions involving potassium aryl- and heteroaryltrifluoroborates with alkenyl bromides can generally be carried out using ≤2 mol % of palladium catalyst and 3 equiv of base in toluene/H2O. When stereodefined alkenyl bromides are employed, the resulting styrene derivatives are accessed stereospecifically. A variety of functional groups are tolerated in both coupling partners.
On modifying model reference adaptive control schemes for performance improvement

The idea of improving the transient behavior in model reference adaptive control by using the estimation error to modify the underlying controller structure has attracted attention in the literature. In this note, we show that the modifications proposed so far can in fact all be derived as a linear feedback from the tracking error. Consequently, the improved performance obtained with such a scheme is solely due to a nonadaptive high gain feedback. >
Return to Work of Disability Insurance Beneficiaries Who Do and Do Not Access State Vocational Rehabilitation Agency Services

This study examines the relationship between services provided by state vocational rehabilitation agencies (SVRAs) and return-to-work outcomes of Social Security Disability Insurance (DI) beneficia...
Estimating Exchange Rate Equations Using Estimated Expectations

Thispapertakesasomewhatdifferentapproachfrommuchoftheliterature in estimating exchange rate equations. It assumes uncovered interest rate parity and models how expectations are formed. The rational expectations assumption is not imposed. Agents are assumed to base their expectations of future interest rates and prices, which are needed in the determination of the exchange rate, on predictions from a ten equation VAR model. The overall modelisestimatedbyFIMLundermodelconsistentexpectations. Themodel generally does better than the random walk model, and its properties are consistent with observed effects on exchange rates from surprise interest rate and price announcements. Also, the focus on expectations is consistent with the large observed short run variability of exchange rates.