Enabling Spatial Search and Geovisualization in Archonnex

This presentation, prepared for the Association of American Geographers Annual Meeting 2019 in Washington, D.C., discussed an ICPSR pilot project to enable spatial search and geovisualization functions in the Archonnex system. The emergence of spatial data infrastructures has promoted scientific research in diverse disciplines. However, the use of spatial information in social science communities is still limited. A key issue is the lack of spatial search and geovisualization functions in the social science archives. This is largely due to the heterogeneity of social science datasets, which makes it challenging to extract and curate spatial metadata efficiently and accurately. This work provides an initial attempt to develop a semi-automatic workflow to enable the curation and search of spatial metadata in social science data archives. The spatial data are extracted and loaded into a spatial database and published in an OGC-compliant map server. The candidate spatial metadata is extracted from the source data, which are subsequently validated and corrected by curators in a web-based map editor. The spatial metadata is then indexed in a search engine and integrated into the search and exploration UI for end users. The goal of this project is to enable the spatial search and geovisualization functions in ICPSR's Digital Asset Management System (DAMS) - Archonnex. The integration of spatial information in Archonnex opens the door to various types of spatial analysis on the social science datasets, which could greatly promote the use of spatial methods in social science research.https://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/148153/1/Enabling Spatial Search and Geovisualization in Archonnex.pdfDescription of Enabling Spatial Search and Geovisualization in Archonnex.pdf : Presentatio

Integrating Spatial Data Linkage and Analysis Services in a Geoportal for China Urban Research

Many geoportals are now evolving into online analytical environments, where large amounts of data and various analysis methods are integrated. These spatiotemporal data are often distributed in different databases and exist in heterogeneous forms, even when they refer to the same geospatial entities. Besides, existing open standards lack sufficient expression of the attribute semantics. Client applications or other services thus have to deal with unrelated preprocessing tasks, such as data transformation and attribute annotation, leading to potential inconsistencies. Furthermore, to build informative interfaces that guide users to quickly understand the analysis methods, an analysis service needs to explicitly model the method parameters, which are often interrelated and have rich auxiliary information. This work presents the design of the spatial data linkage and analysis services in a geoportal for China urban research. The spatial data linkage service aggregates multisource heterogeneous data into linked layers with flexible attribute mapping, providing client applications and services with a unified access as if querying a big table. The spatial analysis service incorporates parameter hierarchy and grouping by extending the standard WPS service, and data‐dependent validation in computation components. This platform can help researchers efficiently explore and analyze spatiotemporal data online.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/110740/1/tgis12084.pd

Widespread occurrences of variably crystalline C-13-depleted graphitic carbon in banded iron formations

Almost all evidence for the oldest traces of life on Earth rely on particles of graphitic carbon preserved in rocks of sedimentary protolith. Yet, the source of carbon in such ancient graphite is debated, as it could possibly be non-biological and/or non-indigenous in origin. Here we describe the co-occurrence of poorly crystalline and crystalline varieties of graphitic carbon with apatite in ten different and variably metamorphosed banded iron formations (BIF) ranging in age from 1,800 to >3,800 Myr. In Neoarchean to Palaeoproterozoic BIF subjected to low-grade metamorphism, C-13-depleted graphitic carbon occurs as inclusions in apatite, and carbonate and arguably represents the remineralisation of syngenetic biomass. In BIF subjected to high-grade metamorphism, C-13-depleted graphite co-occurs with poorly crystalline graphite (PCG), as well as apatite, carbonate, pyrite, amphibole and greenalite. Retrograde minerals such as greenalite, and veins cross-cutting magnetite layers contain PCG. Crystalline graphite can occur with apatite and orthopyroxene, and sometimes it has PCG coatings. Crystalline graphite is interpreted to represent the metamorphosed product of syngenetic organic carbon deposited in BIF, while poorly crystalline graphite was precipitated from C-O-H fluids partially sourced from the syngenetic carbon, along with fluid-deposited apatite and carbonate. The isotopic signature of the graphitic carbon and the distribution of fluid-deposited graphite in highly metamorphosed BIF is consistent with carbon in the fluids being derived from the thermal cracking of syngenetic biomass deposited in BIF, but, extraneous sources of carbon cannot be ruled out as a source for PCG. The results here show that apatite + graphite is a common mineral assemblage in metamorphosed BIF. The mode of formation of this assemblage is, however, variable, which has important implications for the timing of life's emergence on Earth. (C) 2019 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.Peer reviewe

A global portrait of expressed mental health signals towards COVID-19 in social media space

Globally, the COVID-19 pandemic has induced a mental health crisis. Social media data offer a unique oppor- tunity to track the mental health signals of a given population and quantify their negativity towards COVID-19. To date, however, we know little about how negative sentiments differ across countries and how these relate to the shifting policy landscape experienced through the pandemic. Using 2.1 billion individual-level geotagged tweets posted between 1 February 2020 and 31 March 2021, we track, monitor and map the shifts in negativity across 217 countries and unpack its relationship with COVID-19 policies. Findings reveal that there are important geographic, demographic, and socioeconomic disparities of negativity across continents, different levels of a nation’s income, population density, and the level of COVID-19 infection. Countries with more stringent policies were associated with lower levels of negativity, a relationship that weakened in later phases of the pandemic. This study provides the first global and multilingual evaluation of the public’s real-time mental health signals to COVID-19 at a large spatial and temporal scale. We offer an empirical framework to monitor mental health signals globally, helping international authorizations, including the United Nations and World Health Organi- zation, to design smart country-specific mental health initiatives in response to the ongoing pandemic and future public emergencies

Social media mining under the COVID-19 context: Progress, challenges, and opportunities

Social media platforms allow users worldwide to create and share information, forging vast sensing networks that allow information on certain topics to be collected, stored, mined, and analyzed in a rapid manner. During the COVID-19 pandemic, extensive social media mining efforts have been undertaken to tackle COVID-19 challenges from various perspectives. This review summarizes the progress of social media data mining studies in the COVID-19 contexts and categorizes them into six major domains, including early warning and detection, human mobility monitoring, communication and information conveying, public attitudes and emotions, infodemic and misinformation, and hatred and violence. We further document essential features of publicly available COVID-19 related social media data archives that will benefit research communities in conducting replicable and repro�ducible studies. In addition, we discuss seven challenges in social media analytics associated with their potential impacts on derived COVID-19 findings, followed by our visions for the possible paths forward in regard to social media-based COVID-19 investigations. This review serves as a valuable reference that recaps social media mining efforts in COVID-19 related studies and provides future directions along which the information harnessed from social media can be used to address public health emergencies

Left-right asymmetry for pion and kaon production in the semi-inclusive deep inelastic scattering process

We analyze the left-right asymmetry in the semi-inclusive deep inelastic scattering (SIDIS) process without introducing any weighting functions. With the current theoretical understanding, we find that the Sivers effect plays a key role in our analysis. We use the latest parametrization of the Sivers and fragmentation functions to reanalyze the $\pi^\pm$ production process and find that the results are sensitive to the parametrization. We also extend our calculation on the $K^{\pm}$ production, which can help us know more about the Sivers distribution of the sea quarks and the unfavored fragmentation processes. HERMES kinematics with a proton target, COMPASS kinematics with a proton, deuteron, and neutron target (the information on the neutron target can be effectively extracted from the $^3$He target), and JLab kinematics (both 6 GeV and 12 GeV) with a proton and neutron target are considered in our paper.Comment: 7 latex pages, 11 figures, final version for publication, with references update

In-vivo transfection of pcDNA3.1-IGFBP7 inhibits melanoma growth in mice through apoptosis induction and VEGF downexpression

BACKGROUND: Genome-wide RNA interference screening study revealed that loss of expression of insulin-like growth factor binding protein 7 (IGFBP7) is a critical step in development of a malignant melanoma (MM), and this secreted protein plays a central role in apoptosis of MM. In this study we constructed pcDNA3.1-IGFBP7 to obtain high expression of IGBPF7 and to inhibit the growth of MM in C57BL/6J mice. METHODS: pcDNA3.1-IGFBP7 was transfected into B16-F10 cell, the expression of IGFBP7 was detected by RT-PCR and western blot. The proliferations and apoptosis rates of transfected and control cells were measured by CCK8 and FCM, respectively. The tumorigenicity and tumor growth in both pcDNA3.1-IGFBP7 group and control groups were studied in C57BL/6J mice model. IGFBP7, caspase-3, and VEGF expressions in tumor tissue were measured by immunohistochemistry. Apoptosis of tumors were detected by TUNEL. RESULTS: We demonstrated this plasmid inhibited proliferation of B16-F10 melanoma cells efficiently in vivo, exploiting the high expression of IGFBP7. More importantly, in-vivo transfection of pcDNA3.1-IGFBP7 inhibited MM growth in C57BL/6J mice. The inhibition of MM growth was proved owing to apoptosis and reduced expression of VEGF induced by pcDNA3.1-IGFBP7. CONCLUSIONS: These results suggest a potential new clinical strategy for MM gene treatment

CVM studies on the atomic ordering in complex perovskite alloys

The atomic ordering in complex perovskite alloys is investigated by the cluster variation method (CVM). For the 1/3\{111\}-type ordered structure, the order-disorder phase transition is the first order, and the order parameter of the 1:2 complex perovskite reaches its maximum near x=0.25. For the 1/2\{111\}-type ordered structure, the ordering transition is the second order. Phase diagrams for both ordered structures are obtained. The order-disorder line obeys the linear law.Comment: 10 pages, 6 figure

The canonical Gamma-Ray Bursts and their "precursors"

The fireshell model for Gamma-Ray Bursts (GRBs) naturally leads to a canonical GRB composed of a proper-GRB (P-GRB) and an afterglow. P-GRBs, introduced by us in 2001, are sometimes considered "precursors" of the main GRB event in the current literature. We show in this paper how the fireshell model leads to the understanding of the structure of GRBs, with precise estimates of the time sequence and intensities of the P-GRB and the of the afterglow. It leads as well to a natural classification of the canonical GRBs which overcomes the traditional one in short and long GRBs.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures, Proceedings of the 2008 Nanjing GRB conferenc