Anomalous Dimensions and Non-Gaussianity

We analyze the signatures of inflationary models that are coupled to strongly interacting field theories, a basic class of multifield models also motivated by their role in providing dynamically small scales. Near the squeezed limit of the bispectrum, we find a simple scaling behavior determined by operator dimensions, which are constrained by the appropriate unitarity bounds. Specifically, we analyze two simple and calculable classes of examples: conformal field theories (CFTs), and large-N CFTs deformed by relevant time-dependent double-trace operators. Together these two classes of examples exhibit a wide range of scalings and shapes of the bispectrum, including nearly equilateral, orthogonal and local non-Gaussianity in different regimes. Along the way, we compare and contrast the shape and amplitude with previous results on weakly coupled fields coupled to inflation. This signature provides a precision test for strongly coupled sectors coupled to inflation via irrelevant operators suppressed by a high mass scale up to 1000 times the inflationary Hubble scale.Comment: 40 pages, 10 figure

Security of data science and data science for security

In this chapter, we present a brief overview of important topics regarding the connection of data science and security. In the first part, we focus on the security of data science and discuss a selection of security aspects that data scientists should consider to make their services and products more secure. In the second part about security for data science, we switch sides and present some applications where data science plays a critical role in pushing the state-of-the-art in securing information systems. This includes a detailed look at the potential and challenges of applying machine learning to the problem of detecting obfuscated JavaScripts

Impacts of organic and conventional crop management on diversity and activity of free-living nitrogen fixing bacteria and total bacteria are subsidiary to temporal effects

A three year field study (2007-2009) of the diversity and numbers of the total and metabolically active free-living diazotophic bacteria and total bacterial communities in organic and conventionally managed agricultural soil was conducted at the Nafferton Factorial Systems Comparison (NFSC) study, in northeast England. The result demonstrated that there was no consistent effect of either organic or conventional soil management across the three years on the diversity or quantity of either diazotrophic or total bacterial communities. However, ordination analyses carried out on data from each individual year showed that factors associated with the different fertility management measures including availability of nitrogen species, organic carbon and pH, did exert significant effects on the structure of both diazotrophic and total bacterial communities. It appeared that the dominant drivers of qualitative and quantitative changes in both communities were annual and seasonal effects. Moreover, regression analyses showed activity of both communities was significantly affected by soil temperature and climatic conditions. The diazotrophic community showed no significant change in diversity across the three years, however, the total bacterial community significantly increased in diversity year on year. Diversity was always greatest during March for both diazotrophic and total bacterial communities. Quantitative analyses using qPCR of each community indicated that metabolically active diazotrophs were highest in year 1 but the population significantly declined in year 2 before recovering somewhat in the final year. The total bacterial population in contrast increased significantly each year. Seasonal effects were less consistent in this quantitative study

SUPPA2:fast, accurate, and uncertainty-aware differential splicing analysis across multiple conditions

Supplementary methods. (PDF 315 kb

A New (Old), Invasive Ant in the Hardwood Forests of Eastern North America and Its Potentially Widespread Impacts

Biological invasions represent a serious threat for the conservation of biodiversity in many ecosystems. While many social insect species and in particular ant species have been introduced outside their native ranges, few species have been successful at invading temperate forests. In this study, we document for the first time the relationship between the abundance of the introduced ant, Pachycondyla chinensis, in mature forests of North Carolina and the composition, abundance and diversity of native ant species using both a matched pair approach and generalized linear models. Where present, P. chinensis was more abundant than all native species combined. The diversity and abundance of native ants in general and many individual species were negatively associated with the presence and abundance of P. chinensis. These patterns held regardless of our statistical approach and across spatial scales. Interestingly, while the majority of ant species was strongly and negatively correlated with the abundance and presence of P. chinensis, a small subset of ant species larger than P. chinensis was either as abundant or even more abundant in invaded than in uninvaded sites. The large geographic range of this ant species combined with its apparent impact on native species make it likely to have cascading consequences on eastern forests in years to come, effects mediated by the specifics of its life history which is very different from those of other invasive ants. The apparent ecological impacts of P. chinensis are in addition to public health concerns associated with this species due to its sometimes, deadly sting

Cold winter temperatures condition the egg-hatching dynamics of a grape disease vector

The leafhopper Scaphoideus titanus is the vector of a major phytoplasma grapevine disease, Flavescence dorée. The vector’s distribution is in Eastern and Northern Europe, and its population dynamics varies as a function of vineyard latitude. We tested the hypothesis that hatching dynamics are cued by cold temperatures observed in winter. We exposed eggs from a natural population to simulated “cold” and “mild” winters and varied the exposure time at 5 °C from 0 to 63 days. We show that temperature cooling mainly affected the onset of hatching and is negatively correlated to the cold time exposure. The majority of hatchings occurred more quickly in cold rather than in mild winter simulated conditions, but there was no significant difference between the duration of hatching of eggs whatever the cold time exposure. In agreement with the Northern American origin of the vector, the diapause termination and thus the timing regulation of egg hatching require cold winters