cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Cosmology with Decaying Vacuum Energy

Abstract Motivated by recent attempts to solve the cosmological constant problem, we examine the observational consequences of a vacuum energy which decays in time. In both radiation and matter dominated eras, the ratio of the vacuum to the total energy density of the universe must be small. Although the vacuum cannot provide the “missing mass” required to close the universe today, its presence earlier in the history of the universe could have important consequences. Element abundances from primordial nucleosynthesis require the ratio x = ϱ vac /( ϱ vac + ϱ rad ) ⩽ 0.1 of neutrino (or equivalent light) species to exceed N ν > 4, a case ruled out in the standard cosmological model. If the vacuum decays into low energy photons, the lack of observed spectral distortions in the microwave background gives tighter bounds, x −4 . In the matter-dominated era, the presence of a vacuum term may allow more time for growth of protogalactic perturbations.
Synthesis and structural characterization of a molecular plutonium(IV) compound constructed from dimeric building blocks

Single crystals of Na8Pu2(O2)2(CO3)6·12H2O, exhibiting bridging μ2,η2-O2 ligands in unprecedented Pu(IV) dimeric units, were obtained at ambient temperature from an aqueous Pu(IV) peroxide carbonate solution.
Ten years of the Workforce Investment Act (WIA): Interpreting the research on WIA and related programs

Synthesizes what we know empirically about the WIA program and discusses lessons for WIA reauthorization.
The Tricyclo[9.3.1.03,8]pentadecane Ring System. A Short Synthesis of the C‐Aromatic Taxane Skeleton

The complete manuscript of this communication appears in: Angew. Chem. Suppl. 1983, 564. DOI:10.1002/anie.198305640
Comparison of primary oxidants for water-oxidation catalysis

In this tutorial review, we compare chemical oxidants for driving water-oxidation catalysts, focusing on the advantages and disadvantages of each oxidant.
Factors Associated with Asthma Self-Management in African American Adolescents.

Few studies have focused on asthma self-management in African American adolescents, a group with high rates of the disease. This study examined factors associated with asthma self-management in 133 African Americans aged 14–16 years including gender, asthma impairment, prior asthma education, cognitive and emotional illness representations. Twenty-five percent of the variance in asthma self-management was explained by having attended an asthma education program, perceiving more asthma consequences (illness consequences), and reporting greater understanding of asthma as an illness (illness coherence). Findings suggest that these variables may be important targets of interventions to improve asthma self-management in African American middle adolescents.
Optimism in games with non-probabilistic uncertainty

The paper studies one-shot two-player games with non-Bayesian uncertainty. The players have an attitude that ranges from optimism to pessimism in the face of uncertainty. Given the attitudes, each player forms a belief about the set of possible strategies of the other player. If these beliefs are consistent, one says that they form an uncertainty equilibrium. One then considers a two-phase game where the players first choose their attitude and then play the resulting game. The paper illustrates these notions with a number of games where the approach provides a new insight into the plausible strategies of the players.
QUANTIFYING THE RURAL-URBAN GRADIENT IN LATIN AMERICA AND THE CARIBBEAN

This paper addresses the deceptively simple question: what is the rural population of Latin America and the Caribbean? It argues that rurality is a gradient, not a dichotomy, and nominates two dimensions to that gradient: population density, and remoteness from large metropolitan areas. It uses geographically referenced population data (from the Gridded Population of the World, version 3) to tabulate the distribution of populations in Latin America, and in individual countries, by population density and by remoteness. It finds that the popular perception of Latin America as a 75% urban continent is misleading. Official census criteria, though inconsistent between countries, tend to classify as ‘urban’ small settlements of less than 2000 people. Many of these settlements are however embedded in an agriculturally based countryside. The paper finds that about 13% of LAC populations live at ultra-low densities, of less than 20 per square kilometer. Essentially all these people are more than an hour distant from a large city, and more than half live more than four hours distant. A quarter of LAC population is estimated to live at densities below 50, again essentially all of them more than an hour distant from a large city. Almost half (46%) of LAC lives at population densities below 150 (a conventional threshold for urban areas), and more than 90% of this group is at least an hour distant from a city; about a third of them (18% of LAC total) are more than four hours’ distant from a large city.
Rhetoric versus Reality: The Best and Worst of Aid Agency Practices

Summary. — Foreign aid critics, supporters, recipients, and donors have produced eloquent rhetoric on the need for better aid practices—has this translated into reality? This paper attempts to monitor the best and worst of aid practices among bilateral, multilateral, and UN agencies. We create aid practice measures based on aid transparency, specialization, selectivity, ineffective aid channels, and overhead costs. We rate donor agencies from best to worst on aid practices. We find that the UK does well among bilateral agencies, the US is below average, and Scandinavian donors do surprisingly poorly. The biggest difference is between the UN agencies, who mostly rank in the bottom half of donors, and everyone else. Average performance of all agencies on transparency, fragmentation, and selectivity is still very poor. The paper also assesses trends in best practices over time—we find modest improvement in transparency and more in moving away from ineffective channels. However, we find no evidence of improvements (and partial evidence of worsening) in specialization, fragmentation, and selectivity, despite escalating rhetoric to the contrary. 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Model-driven optimization of opportunistic routing

Opportunistic routing aims to improve wireless performance by exploiting communication opportunities arising by chance. A key challenge in opportunistic routing is how to achieve good, predictable performance despite the incidental nature of such communication opportunities and the complicated effects of wireless interference in IEEE 802.11 networks. To address the challenge, we develop a model-driven optimization framework to jointly optimize opportunistic routes and rate limits for both unicast and multicast traffic. A distinctive feature of our framework is that the performance derived from optimization can be achieved in a real IEEE 802.11 network. Our framework consists of three key components: 1) a model for capturing the interference among IEEE 802.11 broadcast transmissions; 2) a novel algorithm for accurately optimizing different performance objectives; and 3) effective techniques for mapping the resulting solutions to practical routing configurations. Extensive simulations and testbed experiments show that our approach significantly out-performs state-of-the-art shortest-path routing and opportunistic routing protocols. Moreover, the difference between the achieved performance and our model estimation is typically within 20%. Evaluation in dynamic and uncontrolled environments further shows that our approach is robust against inaccuracy introduced by a dynamic network and it also consistently outperforms the existing schemes. These results clearly demonstrate the effectiveness and accuracy of our approach.
N-Fluorobis[(perfluoroalkyl)sulfonyl]imides. Efficient reagents for the fluorination of 1,3-dicarbonyl derivatives

Abstract Fluorination of 1,3-dicarbonyl derivatives with N-fluorobis [(perfluoroalkyl)sulfonyl]imides, (CF3SO2)2NF (1), results in the formation of 2-fluoro- or 2,2-difluoro-1,3-dicarbonyl analogs, depending on the reaction conditions. High yields are obtained for a variety of structural types. In the case of 1,3-dicarbonyl derivatives with low enol content, only the sodium enolates react with 1. Thus 1 has been demonstrated to be perhaps the best fluorinating reagent for the fluorination of 1,3-dicarbonyl derivatives. All of the 2-fluoro- 1,3-dicarbonyl products exist predominantly as keto tautomers.
Investing in Preschool Programs

early childhood education programs constitute worthy social investments in the human capital of children. We begin with a short overview of existing early childhuman capital of children. We begin with a short overview of existing early childhood education programs, and then summarize results from a substantial body of hood education programs, and then summarize results from a substantial body of methodologically sound evaluations of the impacts of early childhood education. We methodologically sound evaluations of the impacts of early childhood education. We fithat the evidence supports few unqualifi ed conclusions. Many early childhood fi nd that the evidence supports few unqualifi ed conclusions. Many early childhood
Looking to understand: the coupling between speakers' and listeners' eye movements and its relationship to discourse comprehension.

We investigated the coupling between a speaker’s and a listener’s eye movements. Some participants talked extemporaneously about a television show whose cast members they were viewing on a screen in front of them. Later, other participants listened to these monologues while viewing the same screen. Eye movements were recorded for all speakers and listeners. According to cross-recurrence analysis, a listener’s eye movements most closely matched a speaker’s eye movements at a delay of 2 sec. Indeed, the more closely a listener’s eye movements were coupled with a speaker’s, the better the listener did on a comprehension test. In a second experiment, low-level visual cues were used to manipulate the listeners’ eye movements, and these, in turn, influenced their latencies to comprehension questions. Just as eye movements reflect the mental state of an individual, the coupling between a speaker’s and a listener’s eye movements reflects the success of their communication.
Privacy implications of health information seeking on the web

A revealing picture of how personal health information searches become the property of private corporations.
Phonetic Symbolism and Brand Name Preference

Two experiments investigated the effects of phonetic symbolism on brand name preference. Participants indicated preference for fictitious brand names for particular products (or for products with particular attributes) from word pairs that differed only on vowel sound (e.g., front vs. back vowels, or vowel sounds associated with positive vs. negative concepts). Participants preferred brand names more when the attributes connoted by the vowel sounds (e.g., small, sharp) were positive for a product category (e.g., convertible, knife), but they preferred the same names less when the attributes connoted were negative for a product category (e.g., sport utility vehicle, hammer). However, words with negative vowel sounds were least preferred regardless of product category or attribute.
The Mystery Deepens: Spitzer Observations of Cool White Dwarfs

We present 4.5 and 8 μm photometric observations of 18 cool white dwarfs obtained with the Spitzer Space Telescope. Our observations demonstrate that four white dwarfs with T_eff < 6000 K show slightly depressed mid-infrared fluxes relative to white dwarf models. In addition, another white dwarf with a peculiar optical and near-infrared spectral energy distribution (LHS 1126) is found to display significant flux deficits in Spitzer observations. These mid-infrared flux deficits are not predicted by the current white dwarf models including collision-induced absorption due to molecular hydrogen. We postulate that either the collision-induced absorption calculations are incomplete or there are other unrecognized physical processes occurring in cool white dwarf atmospheres. The spectral energy distribution of LHS 1126 surprisingly fits a Rayleigh-Jeans spectrum in the infrared, mimicking a hot white dwarf with effective temperature well in excess of 10^5 K. This implies that the source of this flux deficit is probably not molecular absorption but some other process.
Velo-cardio-facial syndrome

Abstract Velo-cardio-facial syndrome (VCFS) is the most common contiguous gene deletion syndrome in humans, caused by a microdeletion from chromosome 22 at the q11.2 locus. Moreover, it is one of the most common multiple anomaly syndromes associated with congenital heart disease and is certainly the most common syndrome causing conotruncal heart anomalies. The population prevalence of this syndrome is probably increasing because of the advances in the diagnosis and treatment of congenital heart malformations. Presenting symptoms are highly variable because VCFS is often the trigger for a number of developmental malformation sequences, including DiGeorge sequence, Robin sequence, and Potter sequence. Because of the variability of the phenotypic expression of VCFS, the disorder has been delineated in several sets of literature from different areas of specialization, and from publications in the U.S., Eastern Europe, and Japan. The result has been nosologic differences with various names for the same disorder caused by a 22q11.2 deletion, including VCFS, Shprintzen syndrome, DiGeorge syndrome, Sedlackova syndrome, Cayler syndrome, and conotruncal anomalies face syndrome. All of these labels represent exactly the same syndrome. Understanding the cause of the various phenotypes associated with VCFS is dependent on careful studies of genotype to phenoype matching. The deleted region in most cases of VCFS encompasses 3 million base pairs of DNA and 30 genes. The challenge is therefore to determine if the broad spectrum of anomalies are caused by one major gene, most or all of the deleted genes, or the interaction between the genes in the deleted region and other genes elsewhere in the genome. There is some evidence for each of these hypotheses. The ability to complete phenotype to genotype matching is enhanced by the recognition of more cases and the careful study of phenotypic expression. Towards this end, screening of cases with congenital heart disease is imperative and guidelines for screening are discussed.
Optimal k-support coverage paths in wireless sensor networks

Coverage is a fundamental problem in wireless sensor networks since sensors may be spread in arbitrary manner. In this paper, we addressed the k-support coverage problem. Most of the existing works assume that the coverage degree is 1, i.e. every point in a certain path falls within the sensing range of at least one sensor node. In this work, we focus on the case when we require that every point on the path is covered by at least k sensors, while optimizing certain objectives. We give an optimal polynomial-time algorithm and prove that the time complexity of our algorithm is O(k2n2). To the best of our knowledge, this is the first polynomial time algorithm finding an optimum k-coverage path in sensor networks with general sensing radius and general k.
Transitive statistical sensor error characterization and calibration

Calibration is the process of identifying and correcting for the systematic bias component of the error in the sensor measurements. On-line and in-field sensor measurement calibration is particularly crucial since manual calibration is expensive and sometimes infeasible. We have developed an on-line and in-field error modeling technique, which is a generalization of the calibration problem, that relies on a small number of inaccurate sensors with known error distributions to develop error models for the deployed in-field sensors. We demonstrate the applicability of our transitive error modeling technique and evaluate its performance in various scenarios by conducting experiments using traces of the light intensity measurements recorded by in-field deployed light sensors. In addition, statistical validation and evaluation methods such as resubstitution are used in order to establish the interval of confidence
A genetic algorithm with memory for optimal design of laminated sandwich composite panels

Abstract This paper is concerned with augmenting genetic algorithms (GAs) to include memory for continuous variables, and applying this to stacking sequence design of laminated sandwich composite panels that involves both discrete variables and a continuous design variable. The term “memory” implies preserving data from previously analyzed designs. A balanced binary tree with nodes corresponding to discrete designs renders efficient access to the memory. For those discrete designs that occur frequently, an evolving database of continuous variable values is used to construct a spline approximation to the fitness as a function of the single continuous variable. The approximation is then used to decide when to retrieve the fitness function value from the spline and when to do an exact analysis to add a new data point for the spline. With the spline approximation in place, it is also possible to use the best solution of the approximation as a local improvement during the optimization process. The demonstration problem chosen is the stacking sequence optimization of a sandwich plate with composite face sheets for weight minimization subject to strength and buckling constraints. Comparisons are made between the cases with and without the binary tree and spline interpolation added to a standard GA. Reduced computational cost and increased performance index of a GA with these changes are demonstrated.
On improving the computational efficiency of digital lightwave link simulation

Monte Carlo simulation can be used to estimate the bit error rate (BER) in digital lightwave communication links. However, when the link includes an avalanche photodetector (APD) receiver and is operating at a low BER, Monte Carlo simulation requires excessive execution time unless assumptions are made about the APD statistics. Techniques are presented that reduce the computational resources required to estimate the BER for these systems by two orders of magnitude. The speed-up is achieved by developing anew, more efficient random number generation algorithm for APD shot noise and by applying a tail extrapolation technique to the conditional distributions at the sample-and-decide input in the receiver. Receiver thermal noise is handled analytically. Accurate BER estimates for an NRZ direct-detection system are obtained in approximately 1.5 CPU hours on a VAXstation II using a combination of these techniques. >
The Experience of Emotion

Experiences of emotion are content-rich events that emerge at the level of psychological description, but must be causally constituted by neurobiological processes. This chapter outlines an emerging scientific agenda for understanding what these experiences feel like and how they arise. We review the available answers to what is felt (i.e., the content that makes up an experience of emotion) and how neurobiological processes instantiate these properties of experience. These answers are then integrated into a broad framework that describes, in psychological terms, how the experience of emotion emerges from more basic processes. We then discuss the role of such experiences in the economy of the mind and behavior.
The Rise of Large Farms in Land Abundant Countries: Do They Have a Future?

Increased levels and volatility of food prices has led to a surge of interest in large-scale agriculture and land acquisition. This creates challenges for policy makers aiming to establish a policy environment conducive to an agrarian structure to contribute to broad-based development in the long term. Based on a historical review of episodes of growth of large farms and their impact, this paper identifies factors underlying the dominance of owner-operated farm structures and ways in which these may change with development. The amount of land that could potentially be available for expansion and the level of productivity in exploiting available land resources are used to establish a country-level typology. The authors highlight that an assessment of the advantages of large operations, together with information on endowments, can provide input into strategy formulation at the country level. A review of recent cases of land acquisition reinforces the importance of the policy framework in determining outcomes. It suggests that transparency and contract enforcement, recognition of local land rights and ways in which they can be exercised, attention to employment effects and technical viability, and mechanisms to re-allocate land from unsuccessful ventures to more productive entrepreneurs are key areas warranting the attention of policy makers.
Effects of Reynolds Number and Flapping Kinematics on Hovering Aerodynamics

Motivated by our interest in micro and biological air vehicles, Navier-Stokes simulations for fluid flow around a hovering elliptic airfoil have been conducted to investigate the effects of Reynolds number, reduced frequency, and flapping kinematics on the flow structure and aerodynamics. The Reynolds number investigated ranges from 75 to 1700, and the reduced frequency from 0.36 to 2.0. Two flapping modes are studied, namely, the "water-treading" hovering mode, and the normal hovering mode. Although the delayed-stall mechanism is found to be responsible for generating the maximum lift peaks in both hovering modes, the wake-capturing mechanism is identified only in the normal hovering mode. In addition to the strong role played by the kinematics, the Reynolds number's role has also been clearly identified. In the low Reynolds number regime, 0(100), the viscosity dissipates the vortex structures quickly and leads to essentially symmetric flow structure and aerodynamics force between the forward stroke and backward strokes. At higher Reynolds numbers (300 and larger), the history effect is influential, resulting in distinctly asymmetric phenomena between the forward and backward strokes.
Wet Laws, Drinking Establishments and Violent Crime

Drawing on countyâ€ level data from Kansas for the period 1977â€“2011, we examine whether plausibly exogenous increases in the number of establishments licensed to sell alcohol by the drink are related to violent crime. During this period, 86 out of 105 counties in Kansas voted to legalise the sale of alcohol to the general public for onâ€ premises consumption. Using legalisation as an instrument, we show that a 10% increase in drinking establishments is associated with a 3â€“5% increase in violent crime. The estimated relationship between drinking establishments and property crime is also positive, although smaller in magnitude.
Innovation capacity and economic development: China and India

Decomposing the GDP growth from 1981 to 2004, this paper finds that innovation capacity has contributed significantly to the economic growth of China and India, especially in the 1990 s. Outputs of the national innovation system, measured by patents and high-tech/service exports, demonstrate the considerable progress China and India have made in innovation capacity. The enhanced innovation capacity of China and India is primarily due to their heavy investment in the inputs of innovation system, i.e., R&D expenditure and R&D personnel, in recent decades. This paper emphasizes the role that the governments have played in promoting innovation capacity and their contribution to economic development. Both governments have transformed their national innovation systems through linking the science sector with the business sector, providing incentives for innovation activities, and balancing import of technology and indigenous R&D effort. Using case studies of domestic biotech firms in China and India, this paper also offers micro-level insights on innovation capacity and economic development: (1) innovation capacity has become essential for domestic firms’ market success and (2) global institutional factors and national government policies on innovation have considerable influence on the choice of innovation at the firm level, i.e., to conduct indigenous R&D or to import foreign technology.
Nanobeam photonic crystal cavity quantum dot laser.

The lasing behavior of one dimensional GaAs nanobeam cavities with embedded InAs quantum dots is studied at room temperature. Lasing is observed throughout the quantum dot PL spectrum, and the wavelength dependence of the threshold is calculated. We study the cavity lasers under both 780 nm and 980 nm pump, finding thresholds as low as 0.3 μW and 19 μW for the two pump wavelengths, respectively. Finally, the nanobeam cavity laser wavelengths are tuned by up to 7 nm by employing a fiber taper in near proximity to the cavities. The fiber taper is used both to efficiently pump the cavity and collect the cavity emission.
Outer billiards with contraction: regular polygons

We study outer billiards with contraction outside regular polygons. For regular n-gons with n = 3;4;5;6;8, and 12, we show that as the contraction rate approaches 1, dynamics of the system converges, in a certain sense, to that of the usual outer billiards map. These are precisely the values of n 3 with [Q(e 2i=n ) : Q] 2. Then we discuss how such convergence may fail in the case of n = 7.
Simulated likelihood estimation of diffusions with an application to exchange rate dynamics in incomplete markets

Abstract We present an econometric method for estimating the parameters of a diffusion model from discretely sampled data. The estimator is transparent, adaptive, and inherits the asymptotic properties of the generally unattainable maximum likelihood estimator. We use this method to estimate a new continuous-time model of the joint dynamics of interest rates in two countries and the exchange rate between the two currencies. The model allows financial markets to be incomplete and specifies the degree of incompleteness as a stochastic process. Our empirical results offer several new insights into the dynamics of exchange rates.
Some Details On The Gopakumar-Vafa and Ooguri-Vafa Formulas

The Gopakumar-Vafa (GV) formula expresses certain couplings that arise in Type IIA compactication to four dimensions on a Calabi-Yau manifold in terms of a counting of BPS states in M-theory. The couplings in question have applications to topological strings and supersymmetric black holes. In this paper, we reconsider the GV formula, taking a close look at the Schwinger-like computation that was suggested in the original GV work. The goal is to understand the background that must be used in this computation, the role played by the extended supersymmetry of this background, and how the computation gives a holomorphic result though supercially depending only on particle masses. We also examine in a similar way the Ooguri-Vafa (OV) formula, which is an extension of the GV formula to include D4-branes.
When Evidence is Not Enough: Findings from a Randomized Evaluation of Evidence-Based Literacy Instruction (EBLI)

Abstract This paper reports the results of an experimental evaluation of Evidence-Based Literacy Instruction (EBLI). Developed over 15 years ago, EBLI aims to provide teachers with instructional strategies to improve reading accuracy, fluency and comprehension. Sixty-three teachers in grades 2–5 in seven Michigan charter schools were randomly assigned within school-grade blocks to receive EBLI training or a business-as-usual control condition. Comparing students in treatment and control classrooms during the 2014–15 school year, we find no significant impact on reading performance. Teacher survey responses and interviews with program staff suggest that several implementation challenges may have played a role in the null findings.
Excess ionization and soft X-ray emission from cooling flow clusters

X-ray spectroscopy of cooling flow clusters reveal an unexpected deficit of soft X-ray emission lines from gas at ∼1/3 of the ambient plasma temperature, across a wide range of X-ray luminosities and virial temperatures. We propose excess ionization from either a population of suprathermal electrons or photoionization by X-ray continuum emission from hot gas or a central active galactic nucleus as a means of decoupling the thermal state of the gas from its emission line spectrum. As they generally become important at some fixed fraction of the cluster gas temperature, such mechanisms could in principle explain both the universality and the temperature dependence of the emission line suppression, properties which none of the present-day models based on gas heating can explain. Ultimately these models cannot explain the observations; however, they have attractive and robust features which could be useful in elucidating a final solution to the soft X-ray deficit.
Progress in adsorption-based CO2 capture by metal–organic frameworks

Metal–organic frameworks (MOFs) have recently attracted intense research interest because of their permanent porous structures, large surface areas, and potential applications as novel adsorbents. The recent progress in adsorption-based CO2 capture by MOFs is reviewed and summarized in this critical review. CO2 adsorption in MOFs has been divided into two sections, adsorption at high pressures and selective adsorption at approximate atmospheric pressures. Keys to CO2 adsorption in MOFs at high pressures and low pressures are summarized to be pore volumes of MOFs, and heats of adsorption, respectively. Many MOFs have high CO2 selectivities over N2 and CH4. Water effects on CO2 adsorption in MOFs are presented and compared with benchmark zeolites. In addition, strategies appeared in the literature to enhance CO2 adsorption capacities and/or selectivities in MOFs have been summarized into three main categories, catenation and interpenetration, chemical bonding enhancement, and electrostatic force involvement. Besides the advantages, two main challenges of using MOFs in CO2 capture, the cost of synthesis and the stability toward water vapor, have been analyzed and possible solutions and path forward have been proposed to address the two challenges as well (150 references).
Learning From Compressed Observations

The problem of statistical learning is to construct a predictor of a random variable Y as a function of a related random variable X on the basis of an i.i.d. training sample from the joint distribution of (X, Y). Allowable predictors are drawn from some specified class, and the goal is to approach asymptotically the performance (expected loss) of the best predictor in the class. We consider the setting in which one has perfect observation of the X-part of the sample, while the Y-part has to be communicated at some finite bit rate. The encoding of the Y-values is allowed to depend on the X-values. Under suitable regularity conditions on the admissible predictors, the underlying family of probability distributions and the loss function, we give an information-theoretic characterization of achievable predictor performance in terms of conditional distortion-rate functions. The ideas are illustrated on the example of nonparametric regression in Gaussian noise.
The rough-wall turbulent boundary layer from the hydraulically smooth to the fully rough regime

Turbulence measurements for rough-wall boundary layers are presented and compared to those for a smooth wall. The rough-wall experiments were made on a three-dimensional rough surface geometrically similar to the honed pipe roughness used by Shockling, Allen & Smits (J. Fluid Mech. vol. 564, 2006, p. 267). The present work covers a wide Reynolds-number range (Re θ = 2180–27 100), spanning the hydraulically smooth to the fully rough flow regimes for a single surface, while maintaining a roughness height that is a small fraction of the boundary-layer thickness. In this investigation, the root-mean-square roughness height was at least three orders of magnitude smaller than the boundary-layer thickness, and the Karman number (δ+), typifying the ratio of the largest to the smallest turbulent scales in the flow, was as high as 10100. The mean velocity profiles for the rough and smooth walls show remarkable similarity in the outer layer using velocity-defect scaling. The Reynolds stresses and higher-order turbulence statistics also show excellent agreement in the outer layer. The results lend strong support to the concept of outer layer similarity for rough walls in which there is a large separation between the roughness length scale and the largest turbulence scales in the flow.
Superstring field theory in the democratic picture

We present a new open superstring field theory, whose string fields carry an arbitrary picture number and reside in the large Hilbert space. The redundancy related to picture number is resolved by treating picture changing as a gauge transformation. A mid-point insertion is imperative for this formalism. We find that this mid-point insertion must include all multi-picture changing operators. It is also proven that this insertion as well as all the multi-picture changing operators are zero weight conformal primaries. This new theory solves the problems with the Ramond sector shared by other RNS string field theories, while naturally unifying the NS and Ramond string fields. When partially gauge fixed, it reduces in the NS sector to the modified cubic superstring field theory. Hence, it shares all the good properties of this theory, e.g., it has analytical vacuum and marginal deformation solutions. Treating the redundant gauge symmetry using the BV formalism is straightforward and results in a cubic action with a single string field, whose quantum numbers are unconstrained. The generalization to an arbitrary brane system is simple and includes the standard ChanPaton factors and the most general string field consistent with the brane system.
Semantic Integration Of Embedded Systems Design Data In An Industrial Setting

Companies with complex, safety-critical products --- aircraft, power plants, automobiles, satellites, and spacecraft --- increasingly use computer-based models to design, analyze, and simulate the product. While model-based development has numerous, well documented benefits, the current practice has spawned significant new problems: large quantities of model data are locked in tool-proprietary representations, preventing efficient processes, limiting the choice of best-of-breed tools, and engendering inconsistent data. The paper describes an applied research prototype whose goal is to demonstrate effective data sharing between processes and tools used in designing commercial airplane systems. The prototype makes use of selected data interchange standards and repository technology to interchange data across two engineering specialty areas --- functional analysis and reliability analysis. The underlying issue described in this paper is the resolution of semantic heterogeneity of multi-disciplinary systems design data.
Surface charge properties of kaolinite

The surface charge components of 2 Georgia kaolinites of differing degrees of crystallinity (KGa-1 and KGa-2) were determined using procedures based on charge balance concepts. Permanent structural charge density (tr0) was determined by measuring the surface excess of Cs, which is highly selective to permanent charge sites. The values of cr0 determined were -6.3 -~ 0.1 and -13.6 --- 0.5 mmol kg -~ for kaolinites KGa-1 and KGa-2, respectively. The net proton surface charge density (trn) was determined as a function of pH by potentiometric titration in 0.01 mol dm -3 LiC1. Correction from apparent to absolute values of cr n was made by accounting for A1 release during dissolution, background ion adsorption and charge balance. Lithium and C1 adsorption accounted for the remainder of the surface charge components. Changes in surface charge properties with time were measured after mixing times of 1, 3 and 15 h. the latter representing "'equilibrium". Time-dependenl behavior is believed to be caused by mineral dissolution followed by readsorption or precipitation of A1 on the mineral surface. Both the point of zero net charge (p.z.n.c.) and the point of zero net proton charge (p.z.n.p.c.) changed with mixing time, generally increasing. The "'equilibrium" p.z.n.c, values were approximately 3.6 for KGa-1 and 3.5 for KGa-2, whereas the corresponding p.z.n.p.c, values were about 5.0 and 5.4. The p.z.n.c, results were in good agreement with previous studies, but the values of p.z.n.p.c, were higher than most other values reported for specimen kaolinite.
Group mutual exclusion in linear time and space

We present two algorithms for the Group Mutual Exclusion (GME) Problem that satisfy the properties of Mutual Exclusion, Starvation Freedom, Bounded Exit, Concurrent Entry and First Come First Served. Both our algorithms use only simple read and write instructions, have O(N) Shared Space complexity and O(N) Remote Memory Reference (RMR) complexity in the Cache Coherency (CC) model. Our first algorithm is developed by generalizing the well-known Lamport's Bakery Algorithm for the classical mutual exclusion problem, while preserving its simplicity and elegance. However, it uses unbounded shared registers. Our second algorithm uses only bounded registers and is developed by generalizing Taubenfeld's Black and White Bakery Algorithm to solve the classical mutual exclusion problem using only bounded shared registers. We show that contrary to common perception our algorithms are the first to achieve these properties with these combination of complexities.
Combating Stress and Burnout in Surgical Practice: A Review

Surgeons train for many years and work long hours, often dealing with stressful situations. As a result, some surgeons may experience burnout, which in some cases may lead to depression and/or drug dependency. Identifying and effectively managing causes of stress as well as determining the optimal work-life balance is critical for obtaining personal and professional career satisfaction. This article explores causes of surgeon burnout and reviews results from the American College of Surgeons Burnout Survey. Strategies for personal and professional growth, wellness and renewal are also discussed.
Does physical protection of soil organic matter attenuate temperature sensitivity

Global climate change may induce accelerated soil organic matter (SOM) decomposition through increased soil temperature, and thus impact the C balance in soils. We hypothesized that compartmentalization of substrates and decomposers in the soil matrix would decrease SOM sensitivity to temperature. We tested our hypothesis with three short-term laboratory incubations with differing physical protection treatments conducted at different temperatures. Overall, CO 2 efflux increased with temperature, but responses among physical protection treatments were not consistently different. Similar respiration quotient (Q 10 ) values across physical protection treatments did not support our original hypothesis that the largest Q 10 values would be observed in the treatment with the least physical protection. Compartmentalization of substrates and decomposers is known to reduce the decomposability of otherwise labile material, but the hypothesized attenuation of temperature sensitivity was not detected, and thus the sensitivity is probably driven by the thermodynamics of biochemical reactions as expressed by Arrhenius-type equations.
Mixing Qualitative and Quantitative Research in Developmental Science: Uses and Methodological Choices

Multiple methods are vital to understanding development as a dynamic, transactional process. This article focuses on the ways in which quantitative and qualitative methodologies can be combined to enrich developmental science and the study of human development, focusing on the practical questions of "when" and "how." Research situations that may be especially suited to mixing qualitative and quantitative approaches are described. The authors also discuss potential choices for using mixed quantitative- qualitative approaches in study design, sampling, construction of measures or interview protocols, collaborations, and data analysis relevant to developmental science. Finally, they discuss some common pitfalls that occur in mixing these methods and include suggestions for surmounting them.
Coloring of trees with minimum sum of colors

The chromatic sum of a graph is the smallest sum of colors among all proper colorings with natural numbers. The strength is the minimum number of colors needed to achieve the chromatic sum. We construct for each positive integer k a tree with strength k that has maximum degree only 2k - 2. The result is best possible. © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. J Graph Theory 32: 354–358, 1999
Effects of Galaxy Formation on Thermodynamics of the Intracluster Medium

We present detailed comparisons of the intracluster medium (ICM) in cosmological Eulerian cluster simulations with deep Chandra observations of nearby relaxed clusters. To assess the impact of galaxy formation, we compare two sets of simulations, one performed in the nonradiative regime and another with radiative cooling and several physical processes critical to various aspects of galaxy formation: star formation, metal enrichment, and stellar feedback. We show that the observed ICM properties outside cluster cores are well reproduced in the simulations that include cooling and star formation, while the nonradiative simulations predict an overall shape of the ICM profiles inconsistent with observations. In particular, we find that the ICM entropy in our runs with cooling is enhanced to the observed levels at radii as large as half of the virial radius. We also find that outside cluster cores entropy scaling with the mean ICM temperature in both simulations and Chandra observations is consistent with being self-similar within current error bars. We find that the pressure profiles of simulated clusters are also close to self-similar and exhibit little cluster-to-cluster scatter. We provide analytic fitting formulae for the pressure profiles of the simulated and observed clusters. The X-ray observable mass relations for our simulated sample agree with the Chandra measurements to ≈10%-20% in normalization. We show that this systematic difference could be caused by the subsonic gas motions, unaccounted for in X-ray hydrostatic mass estimates. The much improved agreement of simulations and observations in the ICM profiles and scaling relations is encouraging, and the existence of tight relations of X-ray observables, such as YX, and total cluster mass and the simple redshift evolution of these relations hold promise for the use of clusters as cosmological probes. However, the disagreement between the predicted and observed fractions of cluster baryons in stars remains a major puzzle.
ABC: A simple geographic forwarding scheme capable of bypassing routing holes in sensor networks

In this paper, to achieve fast and energy-efficient message delivery in multi-hop wireless sensor networks, we propose ABC, a simple geographic forwarding scheme capable of bypassing routing holes. ABC is a lightweight and reliable routing protocol in that nodes do not need to set up or maintain routing or neighbor tables; instead, ABC achieves lightweight routing via its ''Angled relaying'' mechanism and uses the ''Backoff time and relay Cancellation'' mechanism to reduce contention and the number of retransmissions. One of the main features of ABC is a message based implicit ACK mechanism where a relayed message is used as an implicit ACK to a previous sender, avoiding an explicit RTS/CTS. Another main feature of ABC is its on-demand routing hole bypassing mechanism based on reactive boundary recognition. In this paper we provide an extensive analysis of ABC in terms of average hop count and average delay per hop. Simulation results also show that ABC outperforms other protocols in terms of average delay and number of transmissions per message delivery.
Effective three-body interactions of neutral bosons in optical lattices

We show that there are effective three- and higher-body interactions generated by the two-body collisions of atoms confined in the lowest vibrational states of a three-dimensional (3D) optical lattice. The collapse and revival dynamics of approximate coherent states loaded into a lattice are a particularly sensitive probe of these higher-body interactions; the visibility of interference fringes depend on both two-, three- and higher-body energy scales, and these produce an initial dephasing that can help explain the surprisingly rapid decay of revivals seen in experiments. If inhomogeneities in the lattice system are sufficiently reduced, longer timescale partial and nearly full revivals will be visible. Using Feshbach resonances or control of the lattice potential it is possible to tune the effective higher-body interactions and simulate effective field theories in optical lattices.
Adaptive Subgradient Methods for Online Learning and Stochastic Optimization

We present a new family of subgradient methods that dynamically incorporate knowledge of the geometry of the data observed in earlier iterations to perform more informative gradient-based learning. Metaphorically, the adaptation allows us to find needles in haystacks in the form of very predictive but rarely seen features. Our paradigm stems from recent advances in stochastic optimization and online learning which employ proximal functions to control the gradient steps of the algorithm. We describe and analyze an apparatus for adaptively modifying the proximal function, which significantly simplifies setting a learning rate and results in regret guarantees that are provably as good as the best proximal function that can be chosen in hindsight. We give several efficient algorithms for empirical risk minimization problems with common and important regularization functions and domain constraints. We experimentally study our theoretical analysis and show that adaptive subgradient methods outperform state-of-the-art, yet non-adaptive, subgradient algorithms.
Pattern-Based Context-Free Grammars for Machine Translation

This paper proposes the use of "patternbased" context-free grammars as a basis for building machine translation (MT) systems, which are now being adopted as personal tools by a broad range of users in the cyberspace society. We discuss major requirements for such tools, including easy customization for diverse domains, the efficiency of the translation algorithm, and scalability (incremental improvement in translation quality through user interaction), and describe how our approach meets these requirements.
Has Work-Sharing Worked in Germany?

industry-by-industry basis, in an attempt to raise employment. Whether this ‘‘work-sharing’’ works is theoretically ambiguous. I exploit the cross-industry variation in standard hours reductions to examine their impact on actual hours worked, wages, and employment. Analysis of industry-level data suggests that ‘‘work-sharing’’ may have reduced employment in the period 1984‐1994. Using individual data from the German Socio-Economic Panel, I substantiate the union claim of ‘‘full wage compensation:’’ the hourly wage rose enough to offset the decline in actual hours worked.
A parallel color algorithm for segmenting images of 3-D scenes

Summary form only given, as follows. A parallel color algorithm for image segmentation is presented. From an input color image, the algorithm labels each pixel in the image according to the corresponding material in the scene. This segmentation is useful for many visual tasks, including inspection and object recognition. It is shown that color information is necessary to generate this kind of segmentation for a 3-D scene. The segmentation algorithm is based on a detailed analysis of the physics underlying color image formation and can be applied to images of a wide range of materials. Image texture is dealt with in a natural way. An initial edge detection on the intensity image is used to guide the color segmentation process. The algorithm is inherently parallel and can be effectively mapped onto high-performance parallel hardware. Results generated by the algorithm on several images are presented. >