Suicide ideation of individuals in online social networks

Suicide explains the largest number of death tolls among Japanese adolescents in their twenties and thirties. Suicide is also a major cause of death for adolescents in many other countries. Although social isolation has been implicated to influence the tendency to suicidal behavior, the impact of social isolation on suicide in the context of explicit social networks of individuals is scarcely explored. To address this question, we examined a large data set obtained from a social networking service dominant in Japan. The social network is composed of a set of friendship ties between pairs of users created by mutual endorsement. We carried out the logistic regression to identify users' characteristics, both related and unrelated to social networks, which contribute to suicide ideation. We defined suicide ideation of a user as the membership to at least one active user-defined community related to suicide. We found that the number of communities to which a user belongs to, the intransitivity (i.e., paucity of triangles including the user), and the fraction of suicidal neighbors in the social network, contributed the most to suicide ideation in this order. Other characteristics including the age and gender contributed little to suicide ideation. We also found qualitatively the same results for depressive symptoms.Comment: 4 figures, 9 table

Wide-angle elastic scattering and color randomization

Baryon-baryon elastic scattering is considered in the independent scattering (Landshoff) mechanism. It is suggested that for scattering at moderate energies, direct and interchange quark channels contribute with equal color coefficients because the quark color is randomized by soft gluon exchange during the hadronization stage. With this assumption, it is shown that the ratio of cross sections $R_{\overline{p} p/ p p}$ at CM angle $\theta = 90^0$ decreases from a high energy value of R_{\pbar p / pp} \approx 1/2.7, down to R_{\pbar p / pp} \approx 1/28, compatible with experimental data at moderate energies. This sizable fall in the ratio seems to be characteristic of the Landshoff mechanism, in which changes at the quark level have a strong effect precisely because the hadronic process occurs via multiple quark scatterings. The effect of color randomization on the angular distribution of proton-proton elastic scattering and the cross section ratio $R_{np/pp}$ is also discussed.Comment: 18 pages, latex2e, 4 uuencoded figures, include

Advanced Trip Generation/Attraction Models

In this paper, advanced trip generation/attraction models are proposed. A multiple linear regression (MLR) model has been created from zonal data. These models are compared to each other by analyzing their hypothesis and the required adjustments. Additionally, advanced generation/attraction models considering spatial correlation are proposed, and their improvements with reference to previous models not considering spatial correlation are analyzed. A global spatial correlation model that conducts a joint review of every unit in the sample to determine whether the spatial units are randomly distributed or in accordance with a certain pattern is specified. To consider cluster situations in a given area, a local spatial correlation model aimed to measure the spatial autocorrelation to place each observation is defined. The models are applied to the Santander metropolitan area (in Spain) in order to obtain advanced generation/attraction models in that city. For Santander, the models considering spatial dependence among observations have better results than the MLR models.This work was made possible thanks to a grant from the Spanish Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad with additional financing from FEDER funds to the project TRA2012-3765

Analysis of a Large Sample of Neutrino-Induced Muons with the ArgoNeuT Detector

ArgoNeuT, or Argon Neutrino Test, is a 170 liter liquid argon time projection chamber designed to collect neutrino interactions from the NuMI beam at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory. ArgoNeuT operated in the NuMI low-energy beam line directly upstream of the MINOS Near Detector from September 2009 to February 2010, during which thousands of neutrino and antineutrino events were collected. The MINOS Near Detector was used to measure muons downstream of ArgoNeuT. Though ArgoNeuT is primarily an R&D project, the data collected provide a unique opportunity to measure neutrino cross sections in the 0.1-10 GeV energy range. Fully reconstructing the muon from these interactions is imperative for these measurements. This paper focuses on the complete kinematic reconstruction of neutrino-induced through-going muons tracks. Analysis of this high statistics sample of minimum ionizing tracks demonstrates the reliability of the geometric and calorimetric reconstruction in the ArgoNeuT detector

The ArgoNeuT Detector in the NuMI Low-Energy beam line at Fermilab

The ArgoNeuT liquid argon time projection chamber has collected thousands of neutrino and antineutrino events during an extended run period in the NuMI beam-line at Fermilab. This paper focuses on the main aspects of the detector layout and related technical features, including the cryogenic equipment, time projection chamber, read-out electronics, and off-line data treatment. The detector commissioning phase, physics run, and first neutrino event displays are also reported. The characterization of the main working parameters of the detector during data-taking, the ionization electron drift velocity and lifetime in liquid argon, as obtained from through-going muon data complete the present report.Comment: 43 pages, 27 figures, 5 tables - update referenc