`The dragon breathes smoke': cigarette counterfeiting in the People's Republic of China

This article aims at providing an account of the social organization of the cigarette counterfeiting business in the People's Republic of China—a business that has been feeding the cigarette black markets around the globe. Specifically, we aim to exhibit the scale and nature of cigarette counterfeiting in mainland China, describe the practices and actors in the different phases of the trade, and examine the role of corruption and violence in the particular business. We argue that cigarette counterfeiting is one of the side effects of China's reform and ‘opening up’ policy, and a feature of the country's economic development process

Statistical and trend analysis of water quality and quantity data for the Strymon River in Greece

Strymon is a transboundary river of Greece, Bulgaria and Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) in southeastern Europe. Water quality parameters and the discharge have been monitored each month just 10 km downstream of the river’s entry into Greece. The data of nine water quality variables (T, ECw, DO, SO₄^2-, Na⁺+K⁺, Mg²⁺ , Ca²⁺, NO₃^&#8254;, TP) and the discharge for the period 1980-1997 were selected for this analysis. In this paper a) the time series of monthly values of water quality parameters and the discharge were analysed using statistical methods, b) the existence of trends and the evaluation of the best fitted models were performed and c) the relationships between concentration and loads of constituents both with the discharge were also examined. Boxplots for summarising the distribution of a data set were used. The &#967²-test and the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test were used to select the theoretical distribution which best fitted the data. Simple regression was used to examine the concentration-discharge and the load-discharge relationships. According to the correlation coefficient (r) values the relation between concentrations and discharge is weak (r< 0.592) while the relation between loads and discharge is very strong (r > 0.902). Trends were detected using the nonparametric Spearman’s criterion upon the data for the variables: Q, ECw, DO, SO₄^2-, Na⁺+K⁺ and NO₃^&#8254; on which temporal trend analysis was performed.</p> <p style='line-height: 20px;'><b>Keywords: </b>Strymon river, water quality, discharge, concentration, load, statistics, trend

Statistical and trend analysis of water quality and quantity data for the Strymon River in Greece

International audienceStrymon is a transboundary river of Greece, Bulgaria and Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) in southeastern Europe. Water quality parameters and the discharge have been monitored each month just 10 km downstream of the river's entry into Greece. The data of nine water quality variables (T, ECw, DO, SO42-, Na++K+, Mg2+ , Ca2+, NO3?, TP) and the discharge for the period 1980-1997 were selected for this analysis. In this paper a) the time series of monthly values of water quality parameters and the discharge were analysed using statistical methods, b) the existence of trends and the evaluation of the best fitted models were performed and c) the relationships between concentration and loads of constituents both with the discharge were also examined. Boxplots for summarising the distribution of a data set were used. The &#9672-test and the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test were used to select the theoretical distribution which best fitted the data. Simple regression was used to examine the concentration-discharge and the load-discharge relationships. According to the correlation coefficient (r) values the relation between concentrations and discharge is weak (r 0.902). Trends were detected using the nonparametric Spearman's criterion upon the data for the variables: Q, ECw, DO, SO42-, Na++K+ and NO3? on which temporal trend analysis was performed. Keywords: Strymon river, water quality, discharge, concentration, load, statistics, trend

Time--Evolving Statistics of Chaotic Orbits of Conservative Maps in the Context of the Central Limit Theorem

We study chaotic orbits of conservative low--dimensional maps and present numerical results showing that the probability density functions (pdfs) of the sum of $N$ iterates in the large $N$ limit exhibit very interesting time-evolving statistics. In some cases where the chaotic layers are thin and the (positive) maximal Lyapunov exponent is small, long--lasting quasi--stationary states (QSS) are found, whose pdfs appear to converge to $q$--Gaussians associated with nonextensive statistical mechanics. More generally, however, as $N$ increases, the pdfs describe a sequence of QSS that pass from a $q$--Gaussian to an exponential shape and ultimately tend to a true Gaussian, as orbits diffuse to larger chaotic domains and the phase space dynamics becomes more uniformly ergodic.Comment: 15 pages, 14 figures, accepted for publication as a Regular Paper in the International Journal of Bifurcation and Chaos, on Jun 21, 201

Unified approach to catastrophic events: from the normal state to geological or biological shock in terms of spectral fractal and nonlinear analysis

An important question in geophysics is whether earthquakes (EQs) can be anticipated prior to their occurrence. Pre-seismic electromagnetic (EM) emissions provide a promising window through which the dynamics of EQ preparation can be investigated. However, the existence of precursory features in pre-seismic EM emissions is still debatable: in principle, it is difficult to prove associations between events separated in time, such as EQs and their EM precursors. The scope of this paper is the investigation of the pre-seismic EM activity in terms of complexity. A basic reason for our interest in complexity is the striking similarity in behavior close to irreversible phase transitions among systems that are otherwise quite different in nature. Interestingly, theoretical studies (Hopfield, 1994; Herz and Hopfield 1995; Rundle et al., 1995; Corral et al., 1997) suggest that the EQ dynamics at the final stage and neural seizure dynamics should have many similar features and can be analyzed within similar mathematical frameworks. Motivated by this hypothesis, we evaluate the capability of linear and non-linear techniques to extract common features from brain electrical activities and pre-seismic EM emissions predictive of epileptic seizures and EQs respectively. The results suggest that a unified theory may exist for the ways in which firing neurons and opening cracks organize themselves to produce a large crisis, while the preparation of an epileptic shock or a large EQ can be studied in terms of ''Intermittent Criticality''

Scaling similarities of multiple fracturing of solid materials

It has recently reported that electromagnetic flashes of low-energy <IMG WIDTH='12' HEIGHT='29' ALIGN='MIDDLE' BORDER='0' src='http://www.nonlin-processes-geophys.net/11/137/2004/npg-11-137-img1.gif' ALT='$gamma$'>-rays emitted during multi-fracturing on a neutron star, and electromagnetic pulses emitted in the laboratory by a disordered material subjected to an increasing external load, share distinctive statistical properties with earthquakes, such as power-law energy distributions (Cheng et al., 1996; Kossobokov et al., 2000; Rabinovitch et al., 2001; Sornette and Helmstetter, 2002). The neutron starquakes may release strain energies up to <IMG WIDTH='32' HEIGHT='16' ALIGN='BOTTOM' BORDER='0' src='http://www.nonlin-processes-geophys.net/11/137/2004/npg-11-137-img2.gif' ALT='$10^{46}$'>erg, while, the fractures in laboratory samples release strain energies approximately a fraction of an erg. An earthquake fault region can build up strain energy up to approximately <IMG WIDTH='32' HEIGHT='16' ALIGN='BOTTOM' BORDER='0' src='http://www.nonlin-processes-geophys.net/11/137/2004/npg-11-137-img3.gif' ALT='$10^{26}$'>erg for the strongest earthquakes. Clear sequences of kilohertz-megahertz electromagnetic avalanches have been detected from a few days up to a few hours prior to recent destructive earthquakes in Greece. A question that arises effortlessly is if the pre-seismic electromagnetic fluctuations also share the same statistical properties. Our study justifies a positive answer. Our analysis also reveals 'symptoms' of a transition to the main rupture common with earthquake sequences and acoustic emission pulses observed during laboratory experiments (Maes et al., 1998)

Successful network inference from time-series data using Mutual Information Rate

This work uses an information-based methodology to infer the connectivity of complex systems from observed time-series data. We first derive analytically an expression for the Mutual Information Rate (MIR), namely, the amount of information exchanged per unit of time, that can be used to estimate the MIR between two finite-length low-resolution noisy time-series, and then apply it after a proper normalization for the identification of the connectivity structure of small networks of interacting dynamical systems. In particular, we show that our methodology successfully infers the connectivity for heterogeneous networks, different time-series lengths or coupling strengths, and even in the presence of additive noise. Finally, we show that our methodology based on MIR successfully infers the connectivity of networks composed of nodes with different time-scale dynamics, where inference based on Mutual Information fails

Fecal microbiota transplant rescues mice from human pathogen mediated sepsis by restoring systemic immunity.

Death due to sepsis remains a persistent threat to critically ill patients confined to the intensive care unit and is characterized by colonization with multi-drug-resistant healthcare-associated pathogens. Here we report that sepsis in mice caused by a defined four-member pathogen community isolated from a patient with lethal sepsis is associated with the systemic suppression of key elements of the host transcriptome required for pathogen clearance and decreased butyrate expression. More specifically, these pathogens directly suppress interferon regulatory factor 3. Fecal microbiota transplant (FMT) reverses the course of otherwise lethal sepsis by enhancing pathogen clearance via the restoration of host immunity in an interferon regulatory factor 3-dependent manner. This protective effect is linked to the expansion of butyrate-producing Bacteroidetes. Taken together these results suggest that fecal microbiota transplantation may be a treatment option in sepsis associated with immunosuppression