cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Cooperative activation of cyclobutanones and olefins leads to bridged ring systems by a catalytic [4 + 2] coupling

Although widely used to form bridged ring systems, certain intramolecular Diels–Alder reactions are hampered by the strain inherent in forming an sp2-carbon at a bridgehead position. Now, an alternative strategy has been described to access these bridged ring systems through the C–C activation and coupling of cyclobutanones with olefins.
Small-X Physics, High Parton Densities and Parton Saturation in QCD

Partons are defined as the quanta in a Fock space description of a hadron. Gluon saturation is described in the Weizsacker-Williams approximation for a large nucleus. The elements of DGLAP and BFKL evolution are given with the BFKL equation derived in a large-Nc dipole formalism. A more general discussion of saturation is given in terms of a dipole scattering on a nucleon or nucleus.
MIMO Z-interference channels: Capacity under strong and noisy interference

The capacity regions of multiple-input multiple-output Gaussian Z-interference channels are established for the very strong interference and aligned strong interference cases. The sum-rate capacity of such channels is established under noisy interference. These results generalize known results for scalar Gaussian Z-interference channels.
A Little Bit of Sugar Helps the Pill Go Down: Resilience, Peace, and Family Planning; Comment on “The Pill Is Mightier Than the Sword”

The article by Potts et al, "The Pill is Mightier than the Sword," points out that family planning has an important role to play in building peace by increasing women's empowerment and their agency, ultimately helping peacebuilding efforts. Evidence has demonstrated that family planning programs are cost effective, produce quick results, help women and couples meet their desired fertility levels, and produce a multitude of benefits around economic productivity, community engagement, conservation, resilience, and peacebuilding. In order for policy audiences from a variety of sectors, including conflict and peacebuilding, to appreciate these benefits, it is important to find common ground and articulate co-benefits that will help them appreciate and value the role of family planning, as it were, give them sugar to help the pill go down. This commentary examines how resilience, peacebuilding and family planning efforts need to focus on co-benefits in order to build on the successful interventions and opportunities that Potts et al highlight.
Where brain, body, and world collide

The brain fascinates because it is the biological organ of mindfulness itself. It is the inner engine that drives intelligent behavior. Such a depiction provides a worthy antidote to the once-popular vision of the mind as somehow lying outside the natural order. However, it is a vision with a price. For it has concentrated much theoretical attention on an uncomfortably restricted space; the space of the inner neural machine, divorced from the wider world which then enters the story only via the hygienic gateways of perception and action. Recent work in neuroscience, robotics and psychology casts doubt on the effectiveness of such a shrunken perspective. Instead, it stresses the unexpected intimacy of brain, body and world and invites us to attend to the structure and dynamics of extended adaptive systems - ones involving a much wider variety of factors and forces. Whilst it needs to be handled with some caution, I believe there is much to be learnt from this broader vision. The mind itself, if such a vision is correct, is best understood as the activity of an essentially situated brain: a brain at home in its proper bodily, cultural and environmental niche.
NEEDS: Nuclear Energy Electrical Demand Simulation

A computer model is presented called NEEDS--an acronym for Nuclear Energy Electrical Demand Simulation--which can simulate the nuclear sector of the United States electric power economy. The code can forecast the impact of various nuclear reactor growth patterns over the next fifty years in terms of economics, resource utilization, and the requirements for a supporting fuel-cycle industry. NEEDS was developed for the Office of Energy Research and Development Policy of the National Science Foundation as a tool to help evaluate alternative fission reactor development strategies involving advanced reactor concepts, including advanced high-temperature gas-cooled reactor (HTGR) systems, the gas- cooled fast reactor (GCFR), the molten-salt breeder reactor (MSBR), the light- water breeder reactor (LWBR), and the heavy-water reactor (HWR). The objectives of the study were to calculate the impacts, benefits, and requirements of various nuclear growth patterns and to determine the sensitivity of these measures to input parameters which are dominating, uncertain, or subject to wide variations. (auth)
Distributed Volt/VAr control by PV inverters

A major technical obstacle for rooftop photovoltaics (PV) integration into existing distribution systems is the voltage rise due to the reverse power flow from the distributed PV sources. This paper describes the implementation of a voltage control loop within PV inverters that maintains the voltage within acceptable bounds by absorbing or supplying reactive power. In principle, this can be considered to be a form of distributed Volt/VAr control, which is conventionally performed by coordinated control of capacitor banks and transformer tap changers. Comprehensive simulation studies on detailed feeder models are used to demonstrate that the proposed control scheme will mitigate voltage rises.
Facile preparation and synthetic applications of LiCH2C(CF3)2OLi

Abstract Bromohydrin BrCH 2 C(CF 3 ) 2 OH readily reacts with two equivalents of n -BuLi at −78 °C to produce the corresponding dilithium derivative LiCH 2 C(CF 3 ) 2 OLi in high yield. This dilithiated derivative reacts selectively, acting as a C-nucleophile, with a variety of electrophiles such as R 2 PCl, carbonyl compounds, and epoxides, to give electron-deficient phosphines R 2 PCH 2 C(CF 3 ) 2 OH, 1,3- and 1,4-diols, correspondingly.
Synthesis and characterization of the new uranium yttrium oxysulfide UY4O3S5

Red needles of UY{sub 4}O{sub 3}S{sub 5} have been synthesized by the solid-state reaction at 1273 K of UOS and Y{sub 2}S{sub 3} with Sb{sub 2}S{sub 3} as a flux. UY{sub 4}O{sub 3}S{sub 5} adopts a three-dimensional structure that contains five crystallographically unique heavy-atom positions. U and Y atoms disorder on one eight-coordinate metal position bonded to four O atoms and four S atoms and two seven-coordinate metal positions bonded to three O atoms and four S atoms. Another eight-coordinate metal position with two O and six S atoms and one six-coordinate metal position with six S atoms are exclusively occupied by Y atoms. UY{sub 4}O{sub 3}S{sub 5} is a modified Curie-Weiss paramagnet between 1.8 and 300 K. Its effective magnetic moment is estimated to be 3.3(2) mu{sub B}. UY{sub 4}O{sub 3}S{sub 5} has a band gap of 1.95 eV. The electrical resistivity along the [010] direction of a single crystal shows Arrhenius-type thermal activation with an activation energy of 0.2 eV. - Graphical abstract: View of the crystal structure of UY4O3S5.
Changes in the Wage Structure and Earnings Inequality

Abstract This chapter presents a framework for understanding changes in the wage structure and overall earnings inequality. The framework emphasizes the role of supply and demand factors and the interaction of market forces and labor market institutions. Recent changes in the US wage structure are analyzed in detail to highlight crucial measurement issues that arise in studying wage structure changes and to illustrate the operation of the supply-demand-institution framework. The roles of skill-biased technological change, globalization forces, changes in demographics and relative skill supplies, industry labor rents, unions, and the minimum wage in the evolution of the US wage structure are examined. Recent wage structure changes are placed in a longer-term historical perspective, and differences and similarities in wage structure changes among OECD nations are assessed. © 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.
Development and Testing of the ILC Marx Modulator

Summary form only given. Construction of the ILC 'Reference Design' Marx Modulator is complete, and testing is currently underway at SLAC. The Reference Design modulator prototype is oil-free, air-cooled, and capable of delivering 120kV, 140A pulses at a rate of 5Hz. Total energy per pulse is 23,500 joules. Projected efficiency is greater than 96%. The Reference Design Marx modulator employs a stack of 12kV Marx modules that generate 120kV output pulses directly from a 12kV input supply voltage. This direct switching eliminates the requirement for a massive transformer and reduces the capacitor bank size by more than a factor of four, yielding a considerably cheaper and more compact mechanical solution. Advantages of the Marx design include higher efficiency, smaller physical size, and a modular architecture that provides greater reliability and cost-effective PC board-level integration. This paper outlines the ILC Marx Modulator Development Program currently underway at SLAC. The paper presents detailed mechanical and electrical design diagrams, 3D field simulations, and operational test results for the full-scale Reference Design modulator prototype.
Computer-controlled polishing of telescope mirror segments

A method of reducing the cost of large optical telescopes is the use of a segmented primary mirror. The computer-controlled polisher approach is ideally suited to the fabrication of telescope mirror segments. Since the process achieves controlled material removal by regulating the tool motion, there is no need for any surface symmetry. Recent experiments have demonstrated the ability of this process to figure mirror segments.
How Johnson Fought the War on Poverty: The Economics and Politics of Funding at the Office of Economic Opportunity

This article presents a quantitative analysis of the geographic distribution of spending through the 1964 Economic Opportunity Act (EOA). Using newly assembled state- and county-level data, the results show that the Johnson administration directed funding in ways consistent with the War on Poverty's rhetoric of fighting poverty and racial discrimination: poorer areas and those with a greater share of nonwhite residents received systematically more funding. In contrast to New Deal spending, political variables explain very little of the variation in EOA funding. The smaller role of politics may help explain the strong backlash against the War on Poverty's programs.
Algorithms for quad-double precision floating point arithmetic

A quad-double number is an unevaluated sum of four IEEE double precision numbers, capable of representing at least 212 bits of significand. We present the algorithms for various arithmetic operations (including the four basic operations and various algebraic and transcendental operations) on quad-double numbers. The performance of the algorithms, implemented in C++, is also presented.
Geometric shock-capturing eno schemes for subpixel interpolation, computation and curve evolution

Abstract Subpixel methods that locate curves and their singularities, and that accurately measure geometric quantities, such as orientation and curvature, are of significant importance in computer vision and graphics. Such methods often use local surface fits or structural models for a local neighborhood of the curve to obtain the interpolated curve. Whereas their performance is good in smooth regions of the curve, it is typically poor in the vicinity of singularities. Similarly, the computation of geometric quantities is often regularized to deal with noise present in discrete data. However, in the process, discontinuities are blurred over, leading to poor estimates at them and in their vicinity. In this paper we propose a geometric interpolation technique to overcome these limitations by locating curves and obtaining geometric estimates while (1) not blurring across discontinuities and (2) explicitly and accurately placing them. The essential idea is to avoid the propagation of information across singularities. This is accomplished by a one-sided smoothing technique, where information is propagated from the direction of the side with the “smoother” neighborhood. When both sides are nonsmooth, the two existing discontinuities are relieved by placing a single discontinuity, or shock. The placement of shocks is guided by geometric continuity constraints, resulting in subpixel interpolation with accurate geometric estimates. Since the technique was originally motivated by curve evolution applications, we demonstrate its usefulness in capturing not only smooth evolving curves, but also ones with orientation discontinuities. In particular, the technique is shown to be far better than traditional methods when multiple or entire curves are present in a very small neighborhood.
Stable maps and Quot schemes

In this paper we study the relationship between two different compactifications of the space of vector bundle quotients of an arbitrary vector bundle on a curve. One is Grothendieck's Quot scheme, while the other is a moduli space of stable maps to the relative Grassmannian. We establish an essentially optimal upper bound on the dimension of the two compactifications. Based on that, we prove that for an arbitrary vector bundle, the Quot schemes of quotients of large degree are irreducible and generically smooth. We precisely describe all the vector bundles for which the same thing holds in the case of the moduli spaces of stable maps. We show that there are in general no natural morphisms between the two compactifications. Finally, as an application, we obtain new cases of a conjecture on effective base point freeness for pluritheta linear series on moduli spaces of vector bundles.
Effect of Nylon-66 nano-fiber interleaving on impact damage resistance of epoxy/carbon fiber composite laminates

Sixteen -ply quasi -isotropic composite laminates of plain and interleaved AS4/3501 -6 composite laminates clamped all around were impact tested to assess the improvement in impact resistance of composite laminate that has been interleaved by electrospun Nylon 66 nanofabric. The impact velocit y, force, and energy were ranged from 2.0 to 4 m/s, 900 to 2,100 N and 0.46 to 1.8 J, respectively. Based on this preliminary study, results showed that ; polymer nanofabric interleaving marginally increased the laminate thickness, by less than about 2%. This change will unlikely to cause significant loss of inplane stiffness and strength of the composite compare to the particle toughened/interleaved comp osites, polymer nanofabric interleaving increased the threshold impact force (the force to cause initiation of impact damage) by about 60%, reduced the rate of impact damage growth rate to one -half with impact height and reduced impact damage growth rate f rom 0.115 mm2/N to 0.105 mm2/N with impact force, this work focused on low energy impact (maximum energy used was 1.72 J). It will be interesting to study how nanofabric interleaved laminate behaves during medium and high energy impacts events, and finall y, the concept has merit for more detailed study to optimizing and to multifunctionalize fiber reinforced composite laminates .
Water Cycling between Ocean and Mantle: Super-Earths Need Not Be Waterworlds

Large terrestrial planets are expected to have muted topography and deep oceans, implying that most super-Earths should be entirely covered in water, so-called waterworlds. This is important because waterworlds lack a silicate weathering thermostat so their climate is predicted to be less stable than that of planets with exposed continents. In other words, the continuously habitable zone for waterworlds is much narrower than for Earth-like planets. A planet's water is partitioned, however, between a surface reservoir, the ocean, and an interior reservoir, the mantle. Plate tectonics transports water between these reservoirs on geological timescales. Degassing of melt at mid-ocean ridges and serpentinization of oceanic crust depend negatively and positively on seafloor pressure, respectively, providing a stabilizing feedback on long-term ocean volume. Motivated by Earth's approximately steady-state deep water cycle, we develop a two-box model of the hydrosphere and derive steady-state solutions to the water partitioning on terrestrial planets. Critically, hydrostatic seafloor pressure is proportional to surface gravity, so super-Earths with a deep water cycle will tend to store more water in the mantle. We conclude that a tectonically active terrestrial planet of any mass can maintain exposed continents if its water mass fraction is less than ~0.2%, dramatically increasing the odds that super-Earths are habitable. The greatest source of uncertainty in our study is Earth's current mantle water inventory: the greater its value, the more robust planets are to inundation. Lastly, we discuss how future missions can test our hypothesis by mapping the oceans and continents of massive terrestrial planets.
Genetic variation in CYP4A11 and blood pressure response to mineralocorticoid receptor antagonism or ENaC inhibition: an exploratory pilot study in African Americans.

Abstract An rs3890011 variant of CYP4A11 , which is in linkage disequilibrium with the loss-of-function variant rs1126742, is associated with hypertension in humans. In mice, Cyp4a deficiency results in salt-sensitive hypertension through activation of ENaC. We tested the hypothesis that the rs3890011 variant is associated with blood pressure response to drugs acting via the ENaC pathway. African Americans with volume-dependent, resistant hypertension were randomized to treatment with placebo, spironolactone, amiloride, or combination. Blood pressure responses were analyzed by CYP4A11 genotypes. Rs3890011 (GG:GC:CC = 20:35:28) and rs1126742 (TT:TC:CC = 45:31:7) were in linkage disequilibrium ( D' = 1, r = 0.561). Expected small number of rs1126742 CC homozygotes precluded analysis of the effect of this genotype on treatment responses. Spironolactone reduced blood pressure in rs3890011 GG and GC individuals, but not in CC homozygotes ( P = .002), whereas amiloride reduced blood pressure similarly in all rs3890011 genotypes. The antihypertensive effects of spironolactone and amiloride were comparable in GG and GC participants, but only amiloride reduced pressure in CC homozygotes (−6.3 ± 7.3/−3.2 ± 4.0 vs. +6.8 ± 7.9/+4.8 ± 8.6 mm Hg, P CYP4A11 rs3890011 C allele, blood pressure is resistant to mineralocorticoid receptor antagonism, but sensitive to ENaC inhibition, consistent with ENaC activation. Studies in a larger population are needed to replicate these findings.
Product Quality and the Demand for Food: The Case of Urban China

A Quadratic Almost Ideal Demand System is used to examine the structure of food demand for a sample of urban Chinese households. The dual choice of product quality and quantity is accounted for in the econometric model via the inclusion of simultaneously estimated unit-value equations.
The necessity of torsion in gravity

It is shown that torsion is required for a complete theory of gravitation, and that without it, the equations of gravitation violate fundamental laws. In the first case, we are reminded that, in the absence of external forces, the correct conservation law of total angular momentum arises only if torsion, whose origin is intrinsic spin, is included into gravitation. The second case considers the “mass reversal” transformation. It has been known that under a global chiral transformation and “mass to negative mass” transformation, the Dirac equation is invariant. But global transformations violate special relativity, so this transformation must be made local. It is shown that the torsion is the gauge field for this local invariance.
Trade Prices and the Global Trade Collapse of 2008-2009

The paper documents the behavior of trade prices during the Great Trade Collapse of 2008–09 using transaction-level data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. First, the paper finds that differentiated manufactures exhibited marked stability in their trade prices during the large decline in their trade volumes. Prices of nondifferentiated manufactures, by contrast, declined sharply. Second, while the trade collapse was much steeper among differentiated durable manufacturers than among nondurables, prices in both categories barely changed. Third, the frequency and magnitude of price adjustments at the product level changed with the onset of the crisis, consistent with a state-dependent view of price adjustment. The quantitative magnitudes of the changes, however, were not pronounced enough to affect aggregate prices. The paper's findings present a challenge for theories of the trade collapse based on cost shocks specific to traded goods that work through prices.
Proofs without syntax

Proofs are traditionally syntactic, inductively generated objects. This paper presents an abstract mathematical formulation of propositional calcu lus (propositional logic) in which proofs are combinatorial (graph-theoretic), rather than syntactic. It defines a combinatorial proof of a proposition 0 as a graph homomorphism h : C ? G((f>), where G((j>) is a graph associated with and C is a coloured graph. The main theorem is soundness and completeness: (f) is true if and only if there exists a combinatorial proof h : C ?? G(<p).
A Resolution-Reconfigurable 5-to-10-Bit 0.4-to-1 V Power Scalable SAR ADC for Sensor Applications

A power-scalable SAR ADC for sensor applications is presented. The ADC features a reconfigurable 5-to-10-bit DAC whose power scales exponentially with resolution. At low resolutions where noise and linearity requirements are reduced, supply voltage scaling is leveraged to further reduce the energy-per-conversion. The ADC operates up to 2 MS/s at 1 V and 5 kS/s at 0.4 V, and its power scales linearly with sample rate down to leakage levels of 53 nW at 1 V and 4 nW at 0.4 V. Leakage power-gating during a SLEEP mode in between conversions reduces total power by up to 14% at sample rates below 1 kS/s. Prototyped in a low-power 65 nm CMOS process, the ADC in 10-bit mode achieves an INL and DNL of 0.57 LSB and 0.58 LSB respectively at 0.6 V, and the Nyquist SNDR and SFDR are 55 dB and 69 dB respectively at 0.55 V and 20 kS/s. The ADC achieves an optimal FOM of 22.4 fJ/conversion-step at 0.55 V in 10-bit mode. The combined techniques of DAC resolution and voltage scaling maximize efficiency at low resolutions, resulting in an FOM that increases by only 7x over the 5-bit scaling range, improving upon a 32x degradation that would otherwise arise from truncation of bits from an ADC of fixed resolution and voltage.
THE RR LYRAE DISTANCE TO THE DRACO DWARF SPHEROIDAL GALAXY

We present the first CCD variability study of the Draco dwarf spheroidal galaxy. The data were obtained with the Fred Lawrence Whipple Observatory 1.2 m telescope on 22 nights, over a period of 10 months, covering a 22' × 22' field centered at α = 17h19m575, δ = 57°50'05'' (J2000.0). The analysis of the BVI images produced 163 variable stars, 146 of which were RR Lyrae: 123 RRab, 16 RRc, 6 RRd, and one RR12. The other variables include a SX Phe star, four anomalous Cepheids, and a field eclipsing binary. Using the short distance scale statistical parallax calibration of Gould & Popowski and 94 RRab stars from our field, we obtain a distance modulus of (m - M)0 = 19.40 ± 0.02 (stat) ± 0.15 (syst) mag for Draco, corresponding to a distance of 75.8 ± 0.7 (stat) ± 5.4 (syst) kpc. By comparing the spread in magnitudes of RRab stars in B, V, and I, we find no evidence for internal dust in the Draco dwarf spheroidal galaxy. The catalog of all variables, as well as their photometry and finding charts, is available electronically via anonymous ftp and the World Wide Web. The complete set of the CCD frames is available upon request.
Fluorous electrophilic scavengers for solution-phase parallel synthesis

Abstract A fluorous isatoic anhydride and isocyanate are synthesized and used as scavengers for amines in solution-phase parallel synthesis of urea, thiourea, and β-hydroxyamine analogs. The resulting fluorous derivatives are readily separated from the reaction mixture by solid-phase extractions (SPE) over Fluoro Flash ™ cartridges to give products with good purity. The SPE cartridges can be reused.
ROAD EXPANSION, URBAN GROWTH, AND INDUCED TRAVEL: A PATH ANALYSIS

Abstract Claims that roadway investments spur new travel, known as induced demand, and thus fail to relieve traffic congestion have thwarted road development in the United States. Past studies point to a significant induced demand effect. This research employs a path model to causally sort out the links between freeway investments and traffic increases, using data for 24 California freeway projects across 15 years. Traffic increases are explained in terms of both faster travel speeds and land use shifts that occur in response to adding freeway lanes. While the path model confirms the presence of induced travel in both the short and longer run, estimated elasticities are lower than those of earlier studies. This research also reveals significant “induced growth” and “induced investment” effects—real estate development gravitates to improved freeways, and traffic increases spawn road investments over time. Travel-forecasting models are needed that account for these dynamics.
Inferring privacy information from social networks

Since privacy information can be inferred via social relations, the privacy confidentiality problem becomes increasingly challenging as online social network services are more popular. Using a Bayesian network approach to model the causal relations among people in social networks, we study the impact of prior probability, influence strength, and society openness to the inference accuracy on a real online social network. Our experimental results reveal that personal attributes can be inferred with high accuracy especially when people are connected with strong relationships. Further, even in a society where most people hide their attributes, it is still possible to infer privacy information.
Inductively Coupled Plasma Etching of III-Nitrides in Cl 2 /Xe, Cl 2 /Ar and Cl 2 /He

The role of additive noble gases He, Ar and Xe to Cl2-based Inductively Coupled Plasmas for etching of GaN, AlN and InN were examined. The etch rates were a strong function of chlorine concentration, rf chuck power and ICP source power. The highest etch rates for InN were obtained with Cl2/Xe, while the highest rates for AlN and GaN were obtained with Cl2/He. Efficient breaking of the III-nitrogen bond is crucial for attaining high etch rates. The InN etching was dominated by physical sputtering, in contrast to GaN and AlN. In the latter cases, the etch rates were limited by initial breaking of the III-nitrogen bond. Maximum selectivities of ∼ 80 for InN to GaN and InN to AlN were obtained.
What Counts As Knowledge? A Reflection on Race, Social Science, and the Law

In the years since the U.S. Supreme Court handed down Brown v. Board of Education (1954), most discussions of the case have focused on whether it was effective in promoting lasting equality of opportunity in the public schools. Although this profoundly important question dominates retrospectives on Brown, another unresolved controversy relates to whether the ruling has altered in any fundamental way the role of social science evidence in constitutional litigation. More than 50 years later, substantial disagreement persists about whether this kind of research has played or should play any important role in the jurisprudence of race. Today, social scientists face increasing doubts about their neutrality and objectivity, struggle to be heard in a marketplace of ideas increasingly flooded with information of questionable quality, and encounter growing resistance to the notion that expertise provides a proper foundation for legal decisionmaking. For those who still believe that social science has a role to play in advancing racial justice, the strategy used in Brown can no longer be taken for granted. The time is ripe to reassess what counts as knowledge so that social science is not increasingly marginalized in courts of law.
On the complexity of computing the logarithm and square root functions on a complex domain

The problems of computing single-valued, analytic branches of the logarithm and square root functions on a bounded, simply connected domain S are studied. If the boundary @?S of S is a polynomial-time computable Jordan curve, the complexity of these problems can be characterized by counting classes #P, MP (or MidBitP), and @?P: The logarithm problem is polynomial-time solvable if and only if FP=#P. For the square root problem, it has been shown to have the upper bound P^M^P and lower bound P^@?^P. That is, if P=MP then the square root problem is polynomial-time solvable, and if P @?P then the square root problem is not polynomial-time solvable.
Substrate specificity for catalysis of phosphodiester cleavage by a dinuclear Zn(II) complex.

The 2.4 kcal mol−1 greater stabilization of the transition state for cleavage of the minimal substrate HpPNP compared to the nucleoside substrate UpPNP by the efficient dinuclear metal ion catalyst Zn2(L2O) provides evidence that access to the cationic core of Zn2(L2O) is sterically blocked for the bulkier nucleoside substrates, a flaw that will need to be dealt with in later generations of metal ion catalysts of RNA cleavage.
Dehn filling in relatively hyperbolic groups

We introduce a number of new tools for the study of relatively hyperbolic groups. First, given a relatively hyperbolic group G, we construct a nice combinatorial Gromov hyperbolic model space acted on properly by G, which reflects the relative hyperbolicity of G in many natural ways. Second, we construct two useful bicombings on this space. The first of these, preferred paths, is combinatorial in nature and allows us to define the second, a relatively hyperbolic version of a construction of Mineyev. As an application, we prove a group-theoretic analog of the Gromov-Thurston 2π Theorem in the context of relatively hyperbolic groups.
Critical Role of Inelastic Interactions in Quantitative Electron Microscopy

A semiquantitative correlation between experimental observations and theoretical prediction in electron microscopy is achieved. Experiments conducted on amorphous silicon in the convergent beam electron diffraction mode provide measurements of the reduction of the central-disk intensity. In addition to elastic scattering the effects of multiple inelastic scattering of the probe electrons were incorporated into the theory describing beam propagation through the specimen. With incorporation of the dominant plasmon scattering a better than 10% match of the theory with experiment is observed indicating the critical role of multiple inelastic scattering in quantitative electron diffraction and imaging.
A method for the asymmetric hydrosilylation of N-aryl imines.

The asymmetric reduction of N-aryl imines to yield chiral amines with enantiomeric excesses above 90% was achieved. Ethylenebis(η5-tetrahydroindenyl)titanium difluoride ((EBTHI)TiF2, 1) was employed as the precatalyst with polymethylhydrosiloxane (PMHS) as the stoichiometric reducing agent. A variety of N-aryl imines derived from nonaromatic ketones were reduced with high ee.
Behavior and Biology: The Basic Sciences for AHA Action Presented at the 70th Scientific Sessions of the American Heart Association November 9, 1997 Orlando, Florida

It is a privilege and an honor to speak with the scientific community about the need to integrate the behavioral and social sciences with the biomedical sciences and how this relates to the mission of the American Heart Association. My observations and thoughts are influenced by my experiences as a nurse researcher and behavioral scientist at Johns Hopkins, where I have been involved in a research program on high blood pressure control in urban black communities. Tremendous advances in biology are providing new knowledge about genetics, physiology, pathophysiology, and disease, creating exciting opportunities for clinical research. From the laboratory this research evolves into new applications for diagnosis, therapy, and prevention in humans. At the same time, important advances in behavioral science, clinical outcomes, and healthcare delivery have provided needed knowledge about prevention and treatment. This research transitions from the healthcare setting into the community. Individuals’ lifestyles significantly impact their health, with unhealthy habits accounting for about 54%1 of known contributions to heart disease. Behavioral and biological interventions can reduce morbidity, disability, and death due to heart disease and stroke. They can improve quality of life and influence the behavior of policy makers in their decisions, health professionals in their practice, and people in their daily lives. However, there is a gap between the efficacy of interventions in studies and their effectiveness in practice, a gap between potential and reality, intention and action, and information and behavior. This gap illustrates the urgent need to more fully integrate the social and behavioral sciences with the biomedical sciences. Three questions arise: Despite extensive studies of strategies to prevent and treat risk factors for heart disease and stroke, current evidence documents …
A Simple Inducement Scheme to Overcome Adoption Externalities

Potential customers of network commodities face coordination problems due to adoption externalities that give rise to multiple, Pareto-ranked equilibria. We investigate the extent to which the coordination problem can be resolved by inducement schemes when agents’ preferences are private information. Specifically, we show that all symmetric “cut-off strategy” profiles (agents adopt if and only if their type is below a threshold) constitute the set of profiles that can be implemented as a unique equilibrium under an inducement scheme. We derive the ex ante cost of implementing each such profile. Furthermore, we fully characterize the set of inducement schemes that I) implement each such profile and ii) have the following simple form: each scheme specifies a fixed fee that every adopter pays, and a fixed gross subsidy/prize to be randomly allocated to (or evenly split among) the adopters. We discuss the implications of these findings on the design of optimal schemes for different network organizers, namely, private entrepreneurs and public entities.
On-chip hotplate for temperature control of CMOS SAW resonators

Due to the sensitivity of the piezoelectric layer in surface acoustic wave (SAW) resonators to temperature, a method of achieving device stability as a function of temperature is required. This work presents the design, modeling and characterization of integrated dual-serpentine polysilicon resistors as a method of temperature control for CMOS SAW resonators. The design employs the oven control temperature stabilization scheme where the devicepsilas temperature is elevated to higher than Tmax to maintain constant device temperature. The efficiency of the polysilicon resistor as a heating element was verified through a 1-D partial differential equation model, 3-D CoventorWarereg finite element simulations and measurements using Compixreg thermal camera. To verify that the on-chip hotplate is effective as a temperature control method, both DC and RF measurements of the heater together with the resonator were conducted. Experimental results have indicated that the TCF of the CMOS SAW resonator of -97.2 ppm/degC has been reduced to -23.19 ppm/degC when heated to 56degC.
Least Expected Time Paths in Stochastic, Time-Varying Transportation Networks

We consider stochastic, time-varying transportation networks, where the arc weights (arc travel times) are random variables with probability distribution functions that vary with time. Efficient procedures are widely available for determining least time paths in deterministic networks. In stochastic but time-invariant networks, least expected time paths can be determined by setting each random arc weight to its expected value and solving an equivalent deterministic problem. This paper addresses the problem of determining least expected time paths in stochastic, time-varying networks. Two procedures are presented. The first procedure determines the a priori least expected time paths from all origins to a single destination for each departure time in the peak period. The second procedure determines lower bounds on the expected times of these a priori least expected time paths. This procedure determines an exact solution for the problem where the driver is permitted to react to revealed travel times on traveled links en route, i.e., in a time-adaptive route choice framework. Modifications to each of these procedures for determining least expected cost (where cost is not necessarily travel time) paths and lower bounds on the expected costs of these paths are given. Extensive numerical tests are conducted to illustrate the algorithms' computational performance as well as the properties of the solution.
Sparsest cut on bounded treewidth graphs: algorithms and hardness results

We give a 2-approximation algorithm for the non-uniform Sparsest Cut problem that runs in time nO(k), where k is the treewidth of the graph. This improves on the previous 22k-approximation in time poly(n) 2O(k) due to Chlamtac et al. [18].To complement this algorithm, we show the following hardness results: If the non-uniform Sparsest Cut has a ρ-approximation for series-parallel graphs (where ρ ≥ 1), then the MaxCut problem has an algorithm with approximation factor arbitrarily close to 1/ρ. Hence, even for such restricted graphs (which have treewidth 2), the Sparsest Cut problem is NP-hard to approximate better than 17/16 - e for e > 0; assuming the Unique Games Conjecture the hardness becomes 1/αGW - e. For graphs with large (but constant) treewidth, we show a hardness result of 2 - e assuming the Unique Games Conjecture.Our algorithm rounds a linear program based on (a subset of) the Sherali-Adams lift of the standard Sparsest Cut LP. We show that even for treewidth-2 graphs, the LP has an integrality gap close to 2 even after polynomially many rounds of Sherali-Adams. Hence our approach cannot be improved even on such restricted graphs without using a stronger relaxation.
The Mukai pairing—II: the Hochschild-Kostant-Rosenberg isomorphism

Abstract We continue the study of the Hochschild structure of a smooth space that we began in our previous paper, examining implications of the Hochschild–Kostant–Rosenberg theorem. The main contributions of the present paper are: • we introduce a generalization of the usual notions of Mukai vector and Mukai pairing on differential forms that applies to arbitrary manifolds; • we give a proof of the fact that the natural Chern character map K 0 ( X ) → HH 0 ( X ) becomes, after the HKR isomorphism, the usual one K 0 ( X ) → ⊕ H i ( X , Ω X i ) ; and • we present a conjecture that relates the Hochschild and harmonic structures of a smooth space, similar in spirit to the Tsygan formality conjecture.
Higher Criticism statistic: detecting and identifying non-Gaussianity in the WMAP first-year data

Higher criticism is a recently developed statistic for the detection of non-Gaussianity. It was proposed by Donoho & Jin, who showed it to be effective at resolving a very subtle testing problem: whether n normal means are all zero versus the alternative that a small fraction is non-zero. Higher Criticism is also useful in the detection of the non-Gaussian convolution component of cosmic strings in the cosmic microwave background (CMB) (see Jin et al.). In this paper, we study how well the anisotropies of the CMB fit with the homogeneous and isotropic Gaussian distribution predicted by the standard inflationary model. We find that Higher Criticism is useful for two purposes. First, Higher Criticism has competitive detection power, and non-Gaussianity is detected at the level of 99 per cent in the first-year Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) data. We generated 5000 Monte Carlo Gaussian simulations of the CMB maps. By applying the Higher Criticism statistic to all of these maps in wavelet space, we constructed confidence regions of Higher Criticism at levels of 68, 95 and 99 per cent. We find that the Higher Criticism value of the WMAP data is outside the 99 per cent confidence region at a wavelet scale of 5 ◦ (99.46 per cent of Higher Criticism values based on simulated maps are below the values for WMAP). Secondly, Higher Criticism offers a way to locate a small portion of data that accounts for the non-Gaussianity. This property is not immediately available for other statistical tests such as the widely used excess kurtosis test. Using Higher Criticism, we have successfully identified a ring of pixels centred at l ≈ 209 ◦ , b ≈− 57 ◦ , which seems to account for the observed detection of non-Gaussianity at the wavelet scale of 5 ◦ . After removal of the ring from the WMAP data set, no more prominent deviation from Gaussianity was found. Note that the detection was achieved in wavelet space first. Secondly, it is always possible that a fraction of pixels within the ring might deviate from Gaussianity even if they do not appear to be above the 99 per cent confidence level in wavelet space. The location of the ring coincides with the cold spot detected by Vielva et al. and Cruz et al.
DOES THE CERTAINTY OF ARREST REDUCE DOMESTIC VIOLENCE? EVIDENCE FROM MANDATORY AND RECOMMENDED ARREST LAWS

Domestic violence remains a major public policy concern despite two decades of policy intervention. To eliminate police inaction in response to domestic violence, many states have passed mandatory arrest laws, which require the police to arrest abusers when a domestic violence incident is reported. Using the FBI Supplementary Homicide Reports, I find that mandatory arrest laws actually increased intimate partner homicides. I discuss two potential mechanisms for this increase in homicides: decreased reporting by victims and increased reprisal by abusers. I investigate validity of these hypotheses by examining the effect of mandatory arrest laws on different sub-groups and by analyzing family homicides where the victim is less often responsible for reporting. There appears to be consistent evidence for the reporting mechanisms. For family homicides, mandatory arrest laws appear to reduce the number of homicides. This study therefore provides evidence that these laws may have perverse effects on intimate partner violence, harming the very people they seek to help.
Slippage Effects of the Conservation Reserve Program

Each year, billions of dollars of public funds are expended to purchase conservation easements on farmland. One unintended impact of these programs is that they may bring non-cropland into crop production. Such a slippage effect can be caused by increased output prices and by substitution effects. This article shows that for each one hundred acres of cropland retired under the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) in the central United States, twenty acres of non-cropland were converted to cropland, offsetting 9% and 14% of CRP water and wind erosion reduction benefits, respectively. Implications of these results for the design of conservation programs are discussed. Copyright 2000, Oxford University Press.
Visual influences on interactive speech alignment.

Speech alignment describes the unconscious tendency to produce speech that shares characteristics with perceived speech (eg Goldinger, 1998 Psychological Review105 251 – 279). In the present study we evaluated whether seeing a talker enhances alignment over just hearing a talker. Pairs of participants performed an interactive search task which required them to repeatedly utter a series of keywords. Half of the pairs performed the task while hearing each other, while the other half could see and hear each other. Alignment was assessed by naive judges rating the similarity of interlocutors' keywords recorded before, during, and after the interactive task. Results showed that interlocutors aligned more when able to see one another suggesting that visual information enhances speech alignment.
CT Perfusion in Acute Stroke

As new treatments are developed for stroke, the potential clinical applications of CT perfusion (CTP) imaging in the diagnosis, triage, and therapeutic monitoring of these diseases are certain to increase. Technical advances in scanner hardware and software should no doubt continue to increase the speed, coverage, and resolution of CTP imaging. CTP offers the promise of efficient use of imaging resources and, potentially, of decreased morbidity. Most importantly, current CT technology already permits the incorporation of CTP as part of an all-in-one acute stroke examination to answer the four fundamental questions of stroke triage quickly and accurately, further increasing the contribution of imaging to the diagnosis and treatment of acute stroke.
Oculometric Assessment of Dynamic Visual Processing

Eye movements are the most frequent (∼3/s), shortest-latency (∼150-250 ms), and biomechanically simplest (one joint, no inertial complexities) voluntary motor behavior in primates, providing a model system to assess sensorimotor disturbances arising from trauma, fatigue, aging, or disease states. We have developed a 15-min behavioral tracking protocol consisting of randomized Rashbass (1961) step-ramp radial target motion to assess several aspects of the behavioral response to visual motion, including pursuit initiation, steady-state tracking, direction tuning, and speed tuning. We show how oculomotor data can be converted into direction- and speed-tuning oculometric functions, with large increases in efficiency over traditional button-press psychophysics. We also show how the latter two can be converted into standard visual psychometric thresholds. To assess our paradigm, we first tested for the psychometric criterion of repeatability, and report that our metrics are reliable across repeated sessions. Second, we tested for the psychometric criterion of validity, and report that our metrics show the anticipated changes as the motion stimulus degrades due to spatiotemporal undersampling. Third, we documented the distribution of these metrics across a population of 41 normal observers to provide a thorough quantitative picture of normal human ocular tracking performance, with practice and expectation effects minimized. Our method computes 10 metrics that quantify various aspects of the eye-movement response during a simple 15-min clinical test, which could be used as a screening or assessment tool for disorders affecting sensorimotor processing, including degenerative retinal disease; developmental, neurological or psychiatric disorders; strokes; and traumatic brain injury.
GAME THEORY AND EMOTIONS

To illustrate the rational-choice modeling of emotions, a game-theoretic model of frustration, in which players respond in anger to their lack of control, is developed. Of the 57 distinct 2 × 2 strict ordinal conflict games, 12 turn out to be “frustration games,” in four of which “threat power,” based on the theory of moves, offers relief to the frustrated player. Aristophanes’ play, Lysistrata, in which the frustrated women induce the men to stop fighting by abstaining from sex, illustrates the exercise of this power. Shakespeare’s Macbeth, in which Lady Macbeth, furious at her husband’s vacillation, incites him to murder King Duncan, illustrates the choice of “nonmyopic equilibria” in six “self-frustration games.” In both cases, the players, who start out at inferior states, initially move to still worse states, exploding in anger to effect better outcomes. Conditions are given for the rationality of such moves.