pinecone/core-2020-05-10-deduplication huggingface dataset:
Towards improving the framework for probabilistic forecast evaluation

The evaluation of forecast performance plays a central role both in the interpretation and use of forecast systems and in their development. Different evaluation measures (scores) are available, often quantifying different characteristics of forecast performance. The properties of several proper scores for probabilistic forecast evaluation are contrasted and then used to interpret decadal probability hindcasts of global mean temperature. The Continuous Ranked Probability Score (CRPS), Proper Linear (PL) score, and IJ Good’s logarithmic score (also referred to as Ignorance) are compared; although information from all three may be useful, the logarithmic score has an immediate interpretation and is not insensitive to forecast busts. Neither CRPS nor PL is local; this is shown to produce counter intuitive evaluations by CRPS. Benchmark forecasts from empirical models like Dynamic Climatology place the scores in context. Comparing scores for forecast systems based on physical models (in this case HadCM3, from the CMIP5 decadal archive) against such benchmarks is more informative than internal comparison systems based on similar physical simulation models with each other. It is shown that a forecast system based on HadCM3 out performs Dynamic Climatology in decadal global mean temperature hindcasts; Dynamic Climatology previously outperformed a forecast system based upon HadGEM2 and reasons for these results are suggested. Forecasts of aggregate data (5-year means of global mean temperature) are, of course, narrower than forecasts of annual averages due to the suppression of variance; while the average “distance” between the forecasts and a target may be expected to decrease, little if any discernible improvement in probabilistic skill is achieved
Luminescence from two-dimensional electron gases in InAlN/GaN heterostructures with different In content

The luminescence properties of InxAl1−xN/GaN heterostructures are investigated systematically as a function of the In content (x = 0.067 − 0.208). The recombination between electrons confined in the two-dimensional electron gas and free holes in the GaN template is identified and analyzed. We find a systematic shift of the recombination with increasing In content from about 80 meV to only few meV below the GaN exciton emission. These results are compared with model calculations and can be attributed to the changing band profile and originating from the polarization gradient between InAlN and GaN
Using aequorin probes to measure Ca2+ in intracellular organelles

Producción CientíficaAequorins are excellent tools for measuring intra-organellar Ca2+ and assessing its role in physiological and pathological functions. Here we review targeting strategies to express aequorins in various organelles. We address critical topics such as probe affinity tuning as well as normalization and calibration of the signal. We also focus on bioluminescent Ca2+ imaging in nucleus or mitochondria of living cells. Finally, recent advances with a new chimeric GFP-aequorin protein (GAP), which can be used either as luminescent or fluorescent Ca2+ probe, are presented. GAP is robustly expressed in transgenic flies and mice, where it has proven to be a suitable Ca2+ indicator for monitoring physiological Ca2+ signaling ex vivo and in vivo.Ministerio de Economía, Industria y Competitividad (Project BFU2014-53469P)Instituto de Salud Carlos III (TerCel, RD16/0011/0003
A note on B-stability of splitting methods

An important requirement of numerical methods for the integration of nonlinear stiff initial value problems is B-stability. In many applications it is also convenient to use splitting methods to take advantage of the special structure of the differential operator that defines the model. The purpose of this paper is to provide a necessary and sufficient condition for the B-stability of additive Runge–Kutta methods. We also present a family of B-stable fractional step Runge–Kutta methods.http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00791-003-0108-
On the practical use of weld improvement methods

Many laboratory studies have shown the beneficial effects of weld improvement methods on the fatigue strength of welded details. However, no structural codes systematically include weld improvement methods in detail classification. The purpose of this paper is to discuss the possibilities of using these methods in practice on either new or existing structures. This paper provides the reader with practical rules for designing and computing the fatigue strength of improved welded joints. A computation method based on the concept of effective stress range is introduced to model the effects of peening improvement methods on fatigue strength. For the most popular improvement methods, the fatigue strength of improved details can be deduced from the extensive existing database of full-scale test results. However, for non-classified details, or when fabrication and improvement processes require validation, testing of the improved details is the only method available to guarantee the fatigue strength of a particular detail. In this paper a recent application of validation through testing in the case of longitudinal attachments is described.http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/pse.4
Global-scale climate impact functions: the relationship between climate forcing and impact

Although there is a strong policy interest in the impacts of climate change corresponding to different degrees of climate change, there is so far little consistent empirical evidence of the relationship between climate forcing and impact. This is because the vast majority of impact assessments use emissions-based scenarios with associated socio-economic assumptions, and it is not feasible to infer impacts at other temperature changes by interpolation. This paper presents an assessment of the global-scale impacts of climate change in 2050 corresponding to defined increases in global mean temperature, using spatially-explicit impacts models representing impacts in the water resources, river flooding, coastal, agriculture, ecosystem and built environment sectors. Pattern-scaling is used to construct climate scenarios associated with specific changes in global mean surface temperature, and a relationship between temperature and sea level used to construct sea level rise scenarios. Climate scenarios are constructed from 21 climate models to give an indication of the uncertainty between forcing and response. The analysis shows that there is considerable uncertainty in the impacts associated with a given increase in global mean temperature, due largely to uncertainty in the projected regional change in precipitation. This has important policy implications. There is evidence for some sectors of a non-linear relationship between global mean temperature change and impact, due to the changing relative importance of temperature and precipitation change. In the socio-economic sectors considered here, the relationships are reasonably consistent between socio-economic scenarios if impacts are expressed in proportional terms, but there can be large differences in absolute terms. There are a number of caveats with the approach, including the use of pattern-scaling to construct scenarios, the use of one impacts model per sector, and the sensitivity of the shape of the relationships between forcing and response to the definition of the impact indicator
Azimuthal Angle Correlations for Higgs Boson plus Multi-Jet Events

At lowest order in perturbation theory, the scattering matrix element for
Higgs boson production in association with dijets displays a strong correlation
in the azimuthal angle between the dijets, induced by the CP-properties of the
Higgs Boson coupling. However, the phase space cuts necessary for a clean
extraction of the CP-properties simultaneously induce large corrections from
emissions of hard radiation and thus formation of extra jets. The current study
concerns the generalization of CP-studies using the azimuthal angle between
dijets beyond tree-level and to events with more than just two jets. By
analyzing the High Energy Limit of hard scattering matrix elements we arrive at
a set of cuts optimized to enhance the correlation, while maintaining a large
cross section, and an observable, which is very stable against higher order
corrections. We contrast the description of Higgs boson production in
association with jets at different levels: for tree-level hjj and hjjj matrix
elements, for hjj matrix elements plus parton shower, and in a recent all-order
framework, which converges to the full, all-order perturbative result in the
limit of large invariant mass between all produced particles.Comment: 23 page
Replication of Functional Serotonin Receptor Type 3A and B Variants in Bipolar Affective Disorder: A European Multicenter Study

Serotonin type 3 receptors (\(5-HT_3\)) are involved in learning, cognition and emotion, and have been implicated in various psychiatric phenotypes. However, their contribution to the pathomechanism of these disorders remains elusive. Three single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in the \(HTR3A\) and \(HTR3B\) genes (rs1062613, rs1176744 and rs3831455) have been associated with bipolar affective disorder (BPAD) in pilot studies, and all of them are of functional relevance. We performed a European multicenter study to confirm previous results and provide further evidence for the relevance of these SNPs to the etiology of neuropsychiatric disorders. This involved analysis of the distribution of the three SNPs among 1804 BPAD cases and 2407 healthy controls. A meta-analysis revealed a pooled odds ratio of 0.881 (P=0.009, 95% confidence intervals=0.802–0.968) for the non-synonymous functional SNP \(HTR3B\) p.Y129S (rs1176744), thereby confirming previous findings. In line with this, the three genome-wide association study samples BOMA (Bonn-Mannheim)-BPAD, WTCCC (Wellcome Trust Case Control Consortium)-BPAD and GAIN (Genetic Association Information Network)-BPAD, including >3500 patients and 5200 controls in total, showed an overrepresentation of the p.Y129 in patients. Remarkably, the meta-analysis revealed a P-value of 0.048 (OR=0.934, fixed effect model). We also performed expression analyses to gain further insights into the distribution of \(HTR3A\) and \(HTR3B\) mRNA in the human brain. \(HTR3A\) and \(HTR3B\) were detected in all investigated brain tissues with the exception of the cerebellum, and large differences in the A:B subunit ratio were observed. Interestingly, expression of the B subunit was most prominent in the brain stem, amygdalae and frontal cortex, regions of relevance to psychiatric disorders. In conclusion, the present study provides further evidence for the presence of impaired \(5-HT_3\) receptor function in BPAD
Statistical assessment of multiaxial HCF criteria at the grain scale

Multiaxial high cycle fatigue modeling of materials is an issue that concerns many industrial domains (automotive, aerospace, nuclear, etc.) and in which many progress still remains to be achieved. Several approaches exist in the literature: invariants, energy, integral and critical plane approaches all of them having their advantages and drawbacks. These different formulations are usually based on mechanical quantities at the micro or mesoscales using localization schemes and strong assumptions to propose simple analytical forms. This study aims to revisit these formulations using a numerical approach based on crystal plasticity modeling coupled with explicit description of microstructure (morphology and texture) and proposes a statistical procedure for the analyses of numerical results in the HCF context. This work has three steps: First, 2.5D periodic digital microstructures based on a random grain sizes distribution are generated. Second, multiaxial cyclic loading conditions corresponding
to the fatigue strength at 106 cycles are applied to these microstructures. Third, the mesoscopic Fatigue Indicator Parameters (FIPs), formulated from the different criteria existing in the literature, are identified using the finite element calculations of the mechanical fields. These mesoscopic FIP show the limits of the original criteria when it comes to applying them at the grain scale.
A statistical method based on extreme value probability is used to redefine the thresholds of these criteria. These new thresholds contain the sensitivity of the HCF behavior to microstructure attributes.
Finally, the biaxiality and phase shift effects are discussed at the grain scale and the loading paths of some critical grains are analyzed.Financial support of this research by Arts et Métiers Paristech is gratefully acknowledged
Perceived parental reactions to coming out, attachment, and romantic relationship views

Coming out as lesbian, gay, or bisexual (LGB) to one’s parents can be a challenging experience and may lead to acceptance or rejection. Attachment theory can help predict parents’ reactions to coming out and consequences for romantic attachment. In a crosssectional study of 309 LGB individuals, we found that those who perceived their mother as accepting in childhood were more likely to have come out to her. Moreover, parents perceived as accepting and independence-encouraging in childhood were reported to react more positively to their child’s sexual orientation. Mothers’ positive reactions were associated with lower romantic attachment anxiety for men. The links between parent-child relationship quality and optimism and trust in romantic relationships were mediated by romantic attachment patterns. Findings support the contention that LGB pair bonds are attachment relationships, and underline the importance of prior parent-child relationships for predicting LGB individuals’ experience of coming out and romantic relationships
Fast human activity recognition in lifelogging

This paper addresses the problem of fast Human Activity Recognition (HAR) in visual lifelogging. We identify the importance of visual features related to HAR and we specifically evaluate the HAR discrimination potential of Colour Histograms and Histogram of Oriented Gradients. In our evaluation we show that colour can be a low-cost and effective means of low-cost HAR when performing single-user classification. It is also noted that, while much more efficient, global image descriptors perform as well or better than local descriptors in our HAR experiments. We believe that both of these findings are due to the fact that a user’s lifelog is rich in reoccurring scenes and environments
Using educational analytics to improve test performance

Learning analytics are being used in many educational applications in order to help students and Faculty. In our work we use predictive analytics, using student behaviour to predict the likely performance of end of semester final grades with a system we call PredictED. The main contribution of our approach is that our intervention automatically emailed students on a regular basis, with our prediction for the outcome of their exam performance. We targeted first year, first semester University students who often struggle with making the transition into University life where they are given much more responsibility for things like attending class, completing assignments, etc. The form of student behaviour that we used is students’ levels and types of engagement with the University’s Virtual Learning Environment (VLE), Moodle. We mined the Moodle access log files for a range of parameters based on temporal as well as content access, and use machine learning techniques to predict likely pass/fail, on a weekly basis throughout the semester using logs and outcomes from previous years as training material. We chose ten first-year modules with reasonably high failure rates, large enrolments and stability of module content across the years to implement an early warning system on. From these modules 1,558 students were registered for one of these modules. They were offered the chance to opt into receiving weekly email alerts warning them about their likely outcome. Of these 75% or 1,181 students opted into this service. Pre-intervention there were no differences between participants and non-participants on a number of measures related to previous academic record. However, post- intervention the first-attempt final grade performance yielded nearly 3% improvement (58.4% to 61.2%) on average for those who opted in. This tells us that providing weekly guidance and personalised feedback to vulnerable first year students, automatically generated from monitoring of their online behaviour, has a significant positive effect on their exam performance
A novel scanning lens instrument for evaluating Fresnel lens performance: equipment development and initial results

A system dedicated to the optical transmittance characterization of Fresnel lenses has been developed at \ud
NREL, in collaboration with the UPM. The system quantifies the optical efficiency of the lens by generating a  performance map. The shape of the focused spot may also be analyzed to understand change in the lens performance. The primary instrument components (lasers and CCD detector) have been characterized to confirm their capability for  performing optical transmittance measurements. Measurements performed on SoG and PMMA lenses subject to a  variety of indoor conditions (e.g., UV and damp heat) identified differences in the optical efficiency of the evaluated \ud
lenses, demonstrating the ability of the Scanning Lens Instrument (SLI) to distinguish between the aged lenses
Deep reactive ion etching of auxetic structures: present capabilities and challenges

Auxetic materials (or metamaterials) have negative Poisson ratios (NPR) and display the unexpected properties of lateral expansion when stretched, and equal and opposing densification when compressed. Such auxetic materials are being used more frequently in the development of novel products, especially in the fields of intelligent expandable actuators, shape-morphing structures, and minimally invasive implantable devices. Although several micromanufacturing technologies have already been applied to the development of auxetic materials and devices,\ud
additional precision is needed to take full advantage of their special mechanical properties. In this study, we present a very promising approach for the development of auxetic materials and devices based on the use of deep reactive ion etching (DRIE). The process stands out for its\ud
precision and its potential applications to mass production. To our knowledge, it represents the first time this technology has been applied to the manufacture of auxetic materials with nanometric details. We take into account the present capabilities and challenges linked to the use of DRIE in the development of auxetic materials and auxetic-based devices
Identifying geographic clusters: A network analytic approach

In recent years there has been a growing interest in the role of networks and clusters in the global economy. Despite being a popular research topic in economics, sociology and urban studies, geographical clustering of human activity has often been studied by means of predetermined geographical units, such as administrative divisions and metropolitan areas. This approach is intrinsically time invariant and it does not allow one to differentiate between different activities. Our goal in this paper is to present a new methodology for identifying clusters, that can be applied to different empirical settings. We use a graph approach based on k-shell decomposition to analyze world biomedical research clusters based on PubMed scientific publications. We identify research institutions and locate their activities in geographical clusters. Leading areas of scientific production and their top performing research institutions are consistently identified at different geographic scales
Longitudinal photocurrent spectroscopy of a single GaAs/AlGaAs v-groove quantum wire

Modulation-doped GaAs v-groove quantum wires (QWRs) have been fabricated with novel electrical contacts made to two-dimensional electron-gas (2DEG) reservoirs. Here, we present longitudinal photocurrent (photoconductivity/PC) spectroscopy measurements of a single QWR. We clearly observe conductance in the ground-state one-dimensional subbands; in addition, a highly temperature-dependent response is seen from other structures within the v-groove. The latter phenomenon is attributed to the effects of structural topography and localization on carrier relaxation. The results of power-dependent PC measurements suggest that the QWR behaves as a series of weakly interacting localized states, at low temperatures
Quantum local quench, AdS/BCFT and Yo-Yo string

We propose a holographic model for local quench in 1 + 1 dimensional Conformal Field Theory (CFT). The local quench is produced by joining two identical CFT’s on semi-infinite lines. When these theories have a zero boundary entropy, we use the AdS/Boundary CFT proposal to describe this process in terms of bulk physics. Boundaries of the original CFT’s are extended in AdS as dynamical surfaces. In our holographic picture these surfaces detach from the boundary and form a closed folded string which can propagate in the bulk. The dynamics of this string is governed by the tensionless Yo-Yo string solution and its subsequent evolution determines the time dependence after quench. We use this model to calculate holographic Entanglement Entropy (EE) of an interval as a function of time. We propose how the falling string deforms Ryu-Takayanagi’s curves. Using the deformed curves we calculate EE and find complete agreement with field theory results
Bulk equations of motion from CFT correlators

To O 1 / N $$ \mathcal{O}\left(1/N\right) $$ we derive, purely from CFT data, the bulk equations of motion for interacting scalar fields and for scalars coupled to gauge fields and gravity. We first uplift CFT operators to mimic local AdS fields by imposing bulk microcausality. This requires adding an infinite tower of smeared higher-dimension double-trace operators to the CFT definition of a bulk field, with coefficients that we explicitly compute. By summing the contribution of the higher-dimension operators we derive the equations of motion satisfied by these uplifted CFT operators and show that we precisely recover the expected bulk equations of motion. We exhibit the freedom in the CFT construction which corresponds to bulk field redefinitions
Conical nanopore membranes: solvent shaping of nanopores

We have undertaken a systematic investigation of the influence of ethanol on
the shape of conical pores produced by the track-etch technique in
poly(ethylene terephthalate) films. We have found that the cone angle of the
conical nanopore generated is dependent on the amount of ethanol present in
an alkaline etching solution. By varying the percentage of ethanol in the etch
solution, precise control over the geometry of the conical nanopore and
nanomaterials templated within these pores can be attained. We prove this by
plating gold nanocones within the various conical nanopores prepared,
dissolving the membrane to liberate the nanocones, and imaging the
nanocones using scanning electron microscopy. The results of these
investigations are reported here