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Scientific information has become a centralr ationalef or environmental regulation, and scientific uncertainty is viewed as a major obstacle in developing, justifying, and enforcing environmental laws and policies. In the context of environmental regulation, scientific information may be analyzed as subject to both supply and demand. A regulatory system that supplies more scientific information than it demands can operate effectively to impose protective regulation. By contrast, a system that demands more information than it supplies will face a data gap and will fail to accomplish its protective goals. The data gap can be addressed by applying regulatory techniques that increase the supply of data by providing more information (\u27filling the gap) or that reduce the demand by permitting regulation to proceed despite uncertainty and incomplete information ( bridging the gap). Environmental law is also structured by the divide between pollution control and chemical regulation on the one hand, and resource management on the other. In addressing the data gap, therefore, it is necessary to distinguish not only between supply and demand, but also between chemical and conservation issues. The existence of a data gap between the scientific information necessary for effective environmental regulation and the information available to regulators and the public presents an opportunity to study the causes and extent of the differences in the chemical and conservation regulatory systems. Missing Information: The Scientific Data Gap in Conservation and Chemical Regulation, Symposium held on March 24, 2006 at Indiana University School of Law- Bloomington

The unroofing history of the funeral mountains metamorphic core complex, California

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Earth, Atmospheric, and Planetary Sciences, 1994.Two maps in pocket following text.Includes bibliographical references (p. 231-234).by James David Robert Applegate.Ph.D

Large Ensemble Modeling of the Last Deglacial Retreat of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet: Comparison of Simple and Advanced Statistical Techniques

A 3-D hybrid ice-sheet model is applied to the last deglacial retreat of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet over the last  ∼  20 000 yr. A large ensemble of 625 model runs is used to calibrate the model to modern and geologic data, including reconstructed grounding lines, relative sea-level records, elevation–age data and uplift rates, with an aggregate score computed for each run that measures overall model–data misfit. Two types of statistical methods are used to analyze the large-ensemble results: simple averaging weighted by the aggregate score, and more advanced Bayesian techniques involving Gaussian process-based emulation and calibration, and Markov chain Monte Carlo. The analyses provide sea-level-rise envelopes with well-defined parametric uncertainty bounds, but the simple averaging method only provides robust results with full-factorial parameter sampling in the large ensemble. Results for best-fit parameter ranges and envelopes of equivalent sea-level rise with the simple averaging method agree well with the more advanced techniques. Best-fit parameter ranges confirm earlier values expected from prior model tuning, including large basal sliding coefficients on modern ocean beds

Cosmology and Astrophysics from Relaxed Galaxy Clusters II: Cosmological Constraints

We present cosmological constraints from measurements of the gas mass fraction, $f_{gas}$, for massive, dynamically relaxed galaxy clusters. Our data set consists of Chandra observations of 40 such clusters, identified in a comprehensive search of the Chandra archive, as well as high-quality weak gravitational lensing data for a subset of these clusters. Incorporating a robust gravitational lensing calibration of the X-ray mass estimates, and restricting our measurements to the most self-similar and accurately measured regions of clusters, significantly reduces systematic uncertainties compared to previous work. Our data for the first time constrain the intrinsic scatter in $f_{gas}$, $(7.4\pm2.3)$% in a spherical shell at radii 0.8-1.2 $r_{2500}$, consistent with the expected variation in gas depletion and non-thermal pressure for relaxed clusters. From the lowest-redshift data in our sample we obtain a constraint on a combination of the Hubble parameter and cosmic baryon fraction, $h^{3/2}\Omega_b/\Omega_m=0.089\pm0.012$, that is insensitive to the nature of dark energy. Combined with standard priors on $h$ and $\Omega_b h^2$, this provides a tight constraint on the cosmic matter density, $\Omega_m=0.27\pm0.04$, which is similarly insensitive to dark energy. Using the entire cluster sample, extending to $z>1$, we obtain consistent results for $\Omega_m$ and interesting constraints on dark energy: $\Omega_\Lambda=0.65^{+0.17}_{-0.22}$ for non-flat $\Lambda$CDM models, and $w=-0.98\pm0.26$ for flat constant-$w$ models. Our results are both competitive and consistent with those from recent CMB, SNIa and BAO data. We present constraints on models of evolving dark energy from the combination of $f_{gas}$ data with these external data sets, and comment on the possibilities for improved $f_{gas}$ constraints using current and next-generation X-ray observatories and lensing data. (Abridged)Comment: 25 pages, 14 figures, 8 tables. Accepted by MNRAS. Code and data can be downloaded from http://www.slac.stanford.edu/~amantz/work/fgas14/ . v2: minor fix to table 1, updated bibliograph

Are Urban Parents Familiar With Ways to be Involved in a Child\u27s Education?

The purpose of the research was to ascertain if parents of students who attend school in an urban setting could identify ways to be involved in a child\u27s education at home and at school. The research was conducted over an eight week period. The subjects of the research were adults from various parts of the country. However, it should be noted that out of the twenty urban parents that took part in the research, the vast majority of them resided in the Rochester, New York area. The research was collected through interviewing the participants. The interviews were conducted over the phone or in person, depending upon the wishes of the participant. The results of the research collected show that most urban parents know how to be involved in a child\u27s education at home and at school. However, it is important to point out that although most parents were only able to identify one to three ways to be involved in a child\u27s education at home or at school. One of the suggestions for implications for future research include establishing a sound criterion that would gauge not only the quantity of answers given by parents, but also the quality of answers. Another suggestion would be to obtain a more random sample of urban parents, perhaps one that doesn\u27t have a large percentage of its parents in a centralized location in and around the city of Rochester

3-Year Comparison of Drug-Eluting Versus Bare-Metal Stents

ObjectivesThe aim of this study was to compare 3-year cumulative outcomes to landmark second- and third-year outcomes with the routine use of drug-eluting stents (DES) (>75% “off-label”) with a comparable group treated with bare-metal stents (BMS).BackgroundLong-term safety concerns after “off-label” DES use persist, despite recent 2-year data showing comparable safety to BMS use.MethodsClinical outcomes (nonfatal myocardial infarction, all-cause mortality) were assessed in 1,147 consecutive patients who received a BMS in the year before the introduction of DES at Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center and 1,246 consecutive patients that received a DES after it became our routine choice with equivalent complete 3-year follow-up.ResultsStents were used for “off-label” indications in 80% of DES patients. At 3 years, the hazard ratio for DES compared with BMS for cumulative target vessel revascularization was 0.65 (95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.51 to 0.82), nonfatal myocardial infarction or death was 0.85 (95% CI: 0.71 to 1.03), and all-cause mortality 0.80 (95% CI: 0.64 to 1.01). The DES clinical benefits occurred entirely within the first year, with similar rates of these clinical end points in the second and third year. The cumulative hazard ratio of stent thrombosis DES compared with BMS was 1.07 (95% CI: 0.57 to 2.01), with similar rates of stent thrombosis in the third year (p = 0.70).ConclusionsThe routine clinical use of DES for “off-label” indications was associated with lower clinical end points at 3 years than treatment with BMS in a comparable group of patients, with similar cumulative rates of stent thrombosis. There was no evidence of late “catch-up” of adverse DES events

Revisiting the proposed planetary system orbiting the eclipsing polar HU Aquarii

It has recently been proposed, on the basis of eclipse-timing data, that the eclipsing polar cataclysmic variable HU Aquarii is host to at least two giant planets. However, that result has been called into question based upon the dynamical stability of the proposed planets. In this work, we present a detailed re-analysis of all eclipse timing data available for the HU Aquarii system, making use of standard techniques used to fit orbits to radial-velocity data. We find that the eclipse timings can be used to obtain a two-planet solution that does not require the presence of additional bodies within the system. We then perform a highly detailed dynamical analysis of the proposed planetary system. We show that the improved orbital parameters we have derived correspond to planets that are dynamically unstable on unfeasibly short timescales (of order 10^4 years or less). Given these results, we discuss briefly how the observed signal might in fact be the result of the intrinsic properties of the eclipsing polar, rather than being evidence of dynamically improbable planets. Taken in concert, our results highlight the need for caution in interpreting such timing variations as being planetary in nature.Comment: Accepted for publication in MNRA