Setting up tunneling conditions by means of Bohmian mechanics

Usually tunneling is established after imposing some matching conditions on the (time-independent) wave function and its first derivative at the boundaries of a barrier. Here an alternative scheme is proposed to determine tunneling and estimate transmission probabilities in time-dependent problems, which takes advantage of the trajectory picture provided by Bohmian mechanics. From this theory a general functional expression for the transmission probability in terms of the system initial state can be reached. This expression is used here to analyze tunneling properties and estimate transmissions in the case of initial Gaussian wave packets colliding with ramp-like barriers.Comment: 18 pages, 4 figure

Selection of Ordinally Scaled Independent Variables

Ordinal categorial variables are a common case in regression modeling. Although the case of ordinal response variables has been well investigated, less work has been done concerning ordinal predictors. This article deals with the selection of ordinally scaled independent variables in the classical linear model, where the ordinal structure is taken into account by use of a difference penalty on adjacent dummy coefficients. It is shown how the Group Lasso can be used for the selection of ordinal predictors, and an alternative blockwise Boosting procedure is proposed. Emphasis is placed on the application of the presented methods to the (Comprehensive) ICF Core Set for chronic widespread pain. The paper is a preprint of an article accepted for publication in the Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series C (Applied Statistics). Please use the journal version for citation

Providing Disadvantaged Workers with Skills to Succeed in the Labor Market

Millions of Americans cannot obtain jobs that pay enough to lift them out of poverty. For many, the principal barrier to obtaining these good jobs is their lack of specialized occupational skills increasingly sought by employers. Research has shown that vocational training can be effective in boosting the earnings of disadvantaged adult workers. This proposal argues that, by helping workers acquire the skills that employers demand, vocational training could be wielded as an effective anti-poverty tool.This paper outlines why Congress should increase funding for vocational training for disadvantaged adult workers. Specifically, we argue that Congress should increase funding for the Workforce Investment Act (WIA) Adult program. We also argue, however, that Congress, and the state and local workforce investment boards that administer the WIA Adult program, should explore ways to improve the vocational training that is available to adult disadvantaged workers

The synergistic effect of chlorotoxin-mApoE in boosting drug-loaded liposomes across the BBB

We designed liposomes dually functionalized with ApoE-derived peptide (mApoE) and chlorotoxin (ClTx) to improve their blood-brain barrier (BBB) crossing. Our results demonstrated the synergistic activity of ClTx-mApoE in boosting doxorubicin-loaded liposomes across the BBB, keeping the anti-tumour activity of the drug loaded: mApoE acts promoting cellular uptake, while ClTx promotes exocytosis of liposomes