ROYALE: A Framework for Universally Composable Card Games with Financial Rewards and Penalties Enforcement

While many tailor made card game protocols are known, the vast majority of those suffer from three main issues: lack of mechanisms for distributing financial rewards and punishing cheaters, lack of composability guarantees and little flexibility, focusing on the specific game of poker. Even though folklore holds that poker protocols can be used to play any card game, this conjecture remains unproven and, in fact, does not hold for a number of protocols (including recent results). We both tackle the problem of constructing protocols for general card games and initiate a treatment of such protocols in the Universal Composability (UC) framework, introducing an ideal functionality that captures general card games constructed from a set of core card operations. Based on this formalism, we introduce Royale, the first UC-secure general card games which supports financial rewards/penalties enforcement. We remark that Royale also yields the first UC-secure poker protocol. Interestingly, Royale performs better than most previous works (that do not have composability guarantees), which we highlight through a detailed concrete complexity analysis and benchmarks from a prototype implementation

Person-centred care and HIV: challenges and solutions

Person-centred consultations (PCCs) are fundamental to effective healthcare communication, and its use is embedded within key clinical guidance. There are three aspects to PCC: use of the best available research evidence, clinical expertise of the clinician and the patient's circumstances, goals, values and wishes. Balancing theses three aspects in the context of HIV prevention and management can be challenging, and we use three case examples to highlight these

Instantaneous Decentralized Poker

We present efficient protocols for amortized secure multiparty computation with penalties and secure cash distribution, of which poker is a prime example. Our protocols have an initial phase where the parties interact with a cryptocurrency network, that then enables them to interact only among themselves over the course of playing many poker games in which money changes hands. The high efficiency of our protocols is achieved by harnessing the power of stateful contracts. Compared to the limited expressive power of Bitcoin scripts, stateful contracts enable richer forms of interaction between standard secure computation and a cryptocurrency. We formalize the stateful contract model and the security notions that our protocols accomplish, and provide proofs using the simulation paradigm. Moreover, we provide a reference implementation in Ethereum/Solidity for the stateful contracts that our protocols are based on. We also adopt our off-chain cash distribution protocols to the special case of stateful duplex micropayment channels, which are of independent interest. In comparison to Bitcoin based payment channels, our duplex channel implementation is more efficient and has additional features

Psychometric precision in phenotype definition is a useful step in molecular genetic investigation of psychiatric disorders.

Affective disorders are highly heritable, but few genetic risk variants have been consistently replicated in molecular genetic association studies. The common method of defining psychiatric phenotypes in molecular genetic research is either a summation of symptom scores or binary threshold score representing the risk of diagnosis. Psychometric latent variable methods can improve the precision of psychiatric phenotypes, especially when the data structure is not straightforward. Using data from the British 1946 birth cohort, we compared summary scores with psychometric modeling based on the General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-28) scale for affective symptoms in an association analysis of 27 candidate genes (249 single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs)). The psychometric method utilized a bi-factor model that partitioned the phenotype variances into five orthogonal latent variable factors, in accordance with the multidimensional data structure of the GHQ-28 involving somatic, social, anxiety and depression domains. Results showed that, compared with the summation approach, the affective symptoms defined by the bi-factor psychometric model had a higher number of associated SNPs of larger effect sizes. These results suggest that psychometrically defined mental health phenotypes can reflect the dimensions of complex phenotypes better than summation scores, and therefore offer a useful approach in genetic association investigations.This work was supported by the Wellcome Trust [088869/Z/09/Z to M.R., P.B.J., D.G, and T. J. C,]; Medical Research Council [MC_UU_12019/1 and MC_UU_12019/3 to A.W, D.G., M.R]. Dr. Barnett is an employee of Cambridge Cognition, Ltd. This work forms part of the NIHR CLAHRC EoE that PBJ directs and the NIHR Cambridge Biomedical Research Centre.This is the author accepted manuscript. It is currently under an indefinite embargo pending publication by NPG

A Dynamic Knowledge Management Framework for the High Value Manufacturing Industry

Dynamic Knowledge Management (KM) is a combination of cultural and technological factors, including the cultural factors of people and their motivations, technological factors of content and infrastructure and, where these both come together, interface factors. In this paper a Dynamic KM framework is described in the context of employees being motivated to create profit for their company through product development in high value manufacturing. It is reported how the framework was discussed during a meeting of the collaborating company’s (BAE Systems) project stakeholders. Participants agreed the framework would have most benefit at the start of the product lifecycle before key decisions were made. The framework has been designed to support organisational learning and to reward employees that improve the position of the company in the market place

Normal levels of p27Xic1 are necessary for somite segmentation and determining pronephric organ size

The Xenopus laevis cyclin dependent kinase inhibitor p27Xic1 has been shown to be involved in exit from the cell cycle and differentiation of cells into a quiescent state in the nervous system, muscle tissue, heart and retina. We show that p27Xic1 is expressed in the developing kidney in the nephrostomal regions. Using over-expression and morpholino oligonucleotide (MO) knock-down approaches we show normal levels of p27Xic1 regulate pronephros organ size by regulating cell cycle exit. Knock-down of p27Xic1 expression using a MO prevented myogenesis, as previously reported; an effect that subsequently inhibits pronephrogenesis. Furthermore, we show that normal levels of p27Xic1 are required for somite segmentation also through its cell cycle control function. Finally, we provide evidence to suggest correct paraxial mesoderm segmentation is not necessary for pronephric induction in the intermediate mesoderm. These results indicate novel developmental roles for p27Xic1, and reveal its differentiation function is not universally utilised in all developing tissues

A specific case in the classification of woods by FTIR and chemometric: discrimination of Fagales from Malpighiales

Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopic data was used to classify wood samples from nine species within the Fagales and Malpighiales using a range of multivariate statistical methods. Taxonomic classification of the family Fagaceae and Betulaceae from Angiosperm Phylogenetic System Classification (APG II System) was successfully performed using supervised pattern recognition techniques. A methodology for wood sample discrimination was developed using both sapwood and heartwood samples. Ten and eight biomarkers emerged from the dataset to discriminate order and family, respectively. In the species studied FTIR in combination with multivariate analysis highlighted significant chemical differences in hemicelluloses, cellulose and guaiacyl (lignin) and shows promise as a suitable approach for wood sample classification

Trapped in the prison of the mind: notions of climate-induced (im)mobility decision-making and wellbeing from an urban informal settlement in Bangladesh

The concept of Trapped Populations has until date mainly referred to people ‘trapped’ in environmentally high-risk rural areas due to economic constraints. This article attempts to widen our understanding of the concept by investigating climate-induced socio-psychological immobility and its link to Internally Displaced People’s (IDPs) wellbeing in a slum of Dhaka. People migrated here due to environmental changes back on Bhola Island and named the settlement Bhola Slum after their home. In this way, many found themselves ‘immobile’ after having been mobile—unable to move back home, and unable to move to other parts of Dhaka, Bangladesh, or beyond. The analysis incorporates the emotional and psychosocial aspects of the diverse immobility states. Mind and emotion are vital to better understand people’s (im)mobility decision-making and wellbeing status. The study applies an innovative and interdisciplinary methodological approach combining Q-methodology and discourse analysis (DA). This mixed-method illustrates a replicable approach to capture the complex state of climate-induced (im)mobility and its interlinkages to people’s wellbeing. People reported facing non-economic losses due to the move, such as identity, honour, sense of belonging and mental health. These psychosocial processes helped explain why some people ended up ‘trapped’ or immobile. The psychosocial constraints paralysed them mentally, as well as geographically. More empirical evidence on how climate change influences people’s wellbeing and mental health will be important to provide us with insights in how to best support vulnerable people having faced climatic impacts, and build more sustainable climate policy frameworks

Impact of socioeconomic deprivation on rate and cause of death in severe mental illness

Background: Socioeconomic status has important associations with disease-specific mortality in the general population. Although individuals with Severe Mental Illnesses (SMI) experience significant premature mortality, the relationship between socioeconomic status and mortality in this group remains under investigated.<p></p> Aims: To assess the impact of socioeconomic status on rate and cause of death in individuals with SMI (schizophrenia and bipolar disorder) relative to the local (Glasgow) and wider (Scottish) populations.<p></p> Methods: Cause and age of death during 2006-2010 inclusive for individuals with schizophrenia or bipolar disorder registered on the Glasgow Psychosis Clinical Information System (PsyCIS) were obtained by linkage to the Scottish General Register Office (GRO). Rate and cause of death by socioeconomic status, measured by Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation (SIMD), were compared to the Glasgow and Scottish populations.<p></p> Results: Death rates were higher in people with SMI across all socioeconomic quintiles compared to the Glasgow and Scottish populations, and persisted when suicide was excluded. Differences were largest in the most deprived quintile (794.6 per 10,000 population vs. 274.7 and 252.4 for Glasgow and Scotland respectively). Cause of death varied by socioeconomic status. For those living in the most deprived quintile, higher drug-related deaths occurred in those with SMI compared to local Glasgow and wider Scottish population rates (12.3% vs. 5.9%, p = <0.001 and 5.1% p = 0.002 respectively). A lower proportion of deaths due to cancer in those with SMI living in the most deprived quintile were also observed, relative to the local Glasgow and wider Scottish populations (12.3% vs. 25.1% p = 0.013 and 26.3% p = <0.001). The proportion of suicides was significantly higher in those with SMI living in the more affluent quintiles relative to Glasgow and Scotland (54.6% vs. 5.8%, p = <0.001 and 5.5%, p = <0.001). Discussion and conclusions: Excess mortality in those with SMI occurred across all socioeconomic quintiles compared to the Glasgow and Scottish populations but was most marked in the most deprived quintiles when suicide was excluded as a cause of death. Further work assessing the impact of socioeconomic status on specific causes of premature mortality in SMI is needed

Latest Results from the Heidelberg-Moscow Double Beta Decay Experiment

New results for the double beta decay of 76Ge are presented. They are extracted from Data obtained with the HEIDELBERG-MOSCOW, which operates five enriched 76Ge detectors in an extreme low-level environment in the GRAN SASSO. The two neutrino accompanied double beta decay is evaluated for the first time for all five detectors with a statistical significance of 47.7 kg y resulting in a half life of (T_(1/2))^(2nu) = [1.55 +- 0.01 (stat) (+0.19) (-0.15) (syst)] x 10^(21) years. The lower limit on the half-life of the 0nu beta-beta decay obtained with pulse shape analysis is (T_(1/2))^(0_nu) > 1.9 x 10^(25) [3.1 x 10^(25)] years with 90% C.L. (68% C.L.) (with 35.5 kg y). This results in an upper limit of the effective Majorana neutrino mass of 0.35 eV (0.27 eV). No evidence for a Majoron emitting decay mode or for the neutrinoless mode is observed.Comment: 14 pages, revtex, 6 figures, Talk was presented at third International Conference ' Dark Matter in Astro and Particle Physics' - DARK2000, to be publ. in Proc. of DARK2000, Springer (2000). Please look into our HEIDELBERG Non-Accelerator Particle Physics group home page: http://www.mpi-hd.mpg.de/non_acc