Alien Registration- Belisle, Marie J. (Lewiston, Androscoggin County)

https://digitalmaine.com/alien_docs/29990/thumbnail.jp

Alien Registration- Belisle, Antonin J. (Lewiston, Androscoggin County)

https://digitalmaine.com/alien_docs/29988/thumbnail.jp

Windings of spherically symmetric random walks via Brownian embedding

Let X1, X2, X3,... be a sequence of i.i.d. 2-valued random variables with a spherically symmetric distribution. Let (Sn; n[ges]0) be its sequence of partial sums and let ([phi](n); n[ges]0) be its winding sequence. Assuming only a mild moment condit show, via Brownian embedding, that 2[phi](n)/log n converges in distribution to a standard hyperbolic secant distribution.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/29105/1/0000143.pd

Windings of planar random walks

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/26921/1/0000487.pd

Odd central moments of unimodal distributions

We present a simple geometric condition under which all existing odd central moments of a unimodal distribution are non-negative. The criterion applies to both the absolutely continuous case and the lattice case. In the lattice case, the result proves and generalizes a conjecture of Frame, Gilliland and Hsing. In the absolutely continuous case, the result provides a new proof of results of Hannan and Pitman, Runnenburg, and MacGillivray. The main idea is a new decomposition result for unimodal distributions.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/29183/1/0000236.pd

Bayesian change-point analyses in ecology

• Ecological and biological processes can change from one state to another once a threshold has been crossed in space or time. Threshold responses to incremental changes in underlying variables can characterize diverse processes from climate change to the desertification of arid lands from overgrazing. • Simultaneously estimating the location of thresholds and associated ecological parameters can be difficult: ecological data are often \u27noisy\u27, which can make the identification of the locations of ecological thresholds challenging. • We illustrate this problem using two ecological examples and apply a class of statistical models well-suited to addressing this problem. We first consider the case of estimating allometric relationships between tree diameter and height when the trees have distinctly different growth modes across life-history stages. We next estimate the effects of canopy gaps and dense understory vegetation on tree recruitment in transects that transverse both canopy and gap conditions. • The Bayesian change-point models that we present estimate both threshold locations and the slope or level of ecological quantities of interest, while incorporating uncertainty in the change-point location into these estimates. This class of models is suitable for problems with multiple thresholds and can account for spatial or temporal autocorrelation. © The Authors (2007)

Metabolic Differentiation of Early Lyme Disease from Southern Tick-associated Rash Illness (STARI)

Lyme disease, the most commonly reported vector-borne disease in the United States, results from infection with Borrelia burgdorferi. Early clinical diagnosis of this disease is largely based on the presence of an erythematous skin lesion for individuals in high-risk regions. This, however, can be confused with other illnesses including southern tick-associated rash illness (STARI), an illness that lacks a defined etiological agent or laboratory diagnostic test, and is coprevalent with Lyme disease in portions of the eastern United States. By applying an unbiased metabolomics approach with sera retrospectively obtained from well-characterized patients, we defined biochemical and diagnostic differences between early Lyme disease and STARI. Specifically, a metabolic biosignature consisting of 261 molecular features (MFs) revealed that altered N-acyl ethanolamine and primary fatty acid amide metabolism discriminated early Lyme disease from STARI. Development of classification models with the 261-MF biosignature and testing against validation samples differentiated early Lyme disease from STARI with an accuracy of 85 to 98%. These findings revealed metabolic dissimilarity between early Lyme disease and STARI, and provide a powerful and new approach to inform patient management by objectively distinguishing early Lyme disease from an illness with nearly identical symptoms

Elasticity model of a supercoiled DNA molecule

Within a simple elastic theory, we study the elongation versus force characteristics of a supercoiled DNA molecule at thermal equilibrium in the regime of small supercoiling. The partition function is mapped to the path integral representation for a quantum charged particle in the field of a magnetic monopole with unquantized charge. We show that the theory is singular in the continuum limit and must be regularised at an intermediate length scale. We find good agreement with existing experimental data, and point out how to measure the twist rigidity accurately.Comment: Latex, 4 pages. The figure contains new experimental data, giving a new determination of the twist rigidit

Isolation and Expression of a Gene Cluster Responsible for Biosynthesis of the Glycopeptidolipid Antigens of \u3cem\u3eMicobacterium avium\u3c/em\u3e

Bacteria within the Mycobacterium avium complex are prominent in the environment and are a source of serious disseminated infections in patients with AIDS. Serovars of the M. avium complex are distinguished from all other mycobacteria and from one another by the presence of highly antigenic glycolipids, the glycopeptidolipids, on their surfaces. A genomic library of DNA from serovar 2 of the M. avium complex was constructed in the Escherichia coli-Mycobacterium shuttle cosmid, pYUB18, and used to clone and express in Mycobacterium smegmatis the genes responsible for the biosynthesis of the oligosaccharide segment of the M. avium serovar 2-specific glycopeptidolipid. The responsible gene cluster was mapped to a 22- to 27-kb functional region of the M. avium genome. The recombinant glycolipid was also isolated by high-pressure liquid chromatography and chemically characterized, by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry and fast atom bombardment-mass spectrometry, to demonstrate that the lipopeptide core originated in M. smegmatis, whereas the oligosaccharide segment arose from the cloned M. avium genes. This first-time demonstration of the cloning and expression, in a nonpathogenic mycobacterium, of the genes encoding complex cell wall glycoconjugates from a pathogenic mycobacterium presents a new approach for studying the role of such products in disease processes