Ten Economic Facts About Crime and Incarceration in the United States

Crime and high rates of incarceration impose tremendous costs on society, with lasting negative effects on individuals, families, and communities. Rates of crime in the United States have been falling steadily, but still constitute a serious economic and social challenge. At the same time, the incarceration rate in the United States is so high -- more than 700 out of every 100,000 people are incarcerated -- that both crime scholars and policymakers alike question whether, for nonviolent criminals in particular, the social costs of incarceration exceed the social benefits

CMS search plans and sensitivity to new physics with dijets

CMS will use dijets to search for physics beyond the standard model during early LHC running. The inclusive jet cross section as a function of jet transverse momentum, with 10 inverse picobarns of integrated luminosity, is sensitive to contact interactions beyond the reach of the Tevatron. The dijet mass distribution will be used to search for dijet resonances coming from new particles, for example an excited quark. Additional sensitivity to the existence of contact interactions or dijet resonances can be obtained by comparing dijet rates in two distinct pseudorapidity regions.Comment: 10 pages, 4 figures, accepted for publication in J. Phys. G: Nucl. Part. Phy

The Measure-theoretic Identity Underlying Transient Fluctuation Theorems

We prove a measure-theoretic identity that underlies all transient fluctuation theorems (TFTs) for entropy production and dissipated work in inhomogeneous deterministic and stochastic processes, including those of Evans and Searles, Crooks, and Seifert. The identity is used to deduce a tautological physical interpretation of TFTs in terms of the arrow of time, and its generality reveals that the self-inverse nature of the various trajectory and process transformations historically relied upon to prove TFTs, while necessary for these theorems from a physical standpoint, is not necessary from a mathematical one. The moment generating functions of thermodynamic variables appearing in the identity are shown to converge in general only in a vertical strip in the complex plane, with the consequence that a TFT that holds over arbitrary timescales may fail to give rise to an asymptotic fluctuation theorem for any possible speed of the corresponding large deviation principle. The case of strongly biased birth-death chains is presented to illustrate this phenomenon. We also discuss insights obtained from our measure-theoretic formalism into the results of Saha et. al. on the breakdown of TFTs for driven Brownian particles

New experiments and a model-driven approach for interpreting Middle Stone Age Lithic Point Function using the Edge Damage Distribution Method

The Middle Stone Age (MSA) is associated with early evidence for symbolic material culture and complex technological innovations. However, one of the most visible aspects of MSA technologies are unretouched triangular stone points that appear in the archaeological record as early as 500,000 years ago in Africa and persist throughout the MSA. How these tools were being used and discarded across a changing Pleistocene landscape can provide insight into how MSA populations prioritized technological and foraging decisions. Creating inferential links between experimental and archaeological tool use helps to establish prehistoric tool function, but is complicated by the overlaying of post-depositional damage onto behaviorally worn tools. Taphonomic damage patterning can provide insight into site formation history, but may preclude behavioral interpretations of tool function. Here, multiple experimental processes that form edge damage on unretouched lithic points from taphonomic and behavioral processes are presented. These provide experimental distributions of wear on tool edges from known processes that are then quantitatively compared to the archaeological patterning of stone point edge damage from three MSA lithic assemblages--Kathu Pan 1, Pinnacle Point Cave 13B, and Die Kelders Cave 1. By using a model-fitting approach, the results presented here provide evidence for variable MSA behavioral strategies of stone point utilization on the landscape consistent with armature tips at KP1, and cutting tools at PP13B and DK1, as well as damage contributions from post-depositional sources across assemblages. This study provides a method with which landscape-scale questions of early modern human tool-use and site-use can be addressed

Plasma Leptin Levels and Incidence of Heart Failure, Cardiovascular Disease, and Total Mortality in Elderly Individuals

OBJECTIVE: Obesity predisposes individuals to congestive heart failure (CHF) and cardiovascular disease (CVD). Leptin regulates energy homeostasis, is elevated in obesity, and influences ventricular and vascular remodeling. We tested the hypothesis that leptin levels are associated with greater risk of CHF, CVD, and mortality in elderly individuals. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS: We evaluated 818 elderly (mean age 79 years, 62% women) Framingham Study participants attending a routine examination at which plasma leptin was assayed. RESULTS: Leptin levels were higher in women and strongly correlated with BMI (P < 0.0001). On follow-up (mean 8.0 years), 129 (of 775 free of CHF) participants developed CHF, 187 (of 532 free of CVD) experienced a first CVD event, and 391 individuals died. In multivariable Cox regression models adjusting for established risk factors, log-leptin was positively associated with incidence of CHF and CVD (hazard ratio [HR] per SD increment 1.26 [95% CI 1.03–1.55] and 1.28 [1.09–1.50], respectively). Additional adjustment for BMI nullified the association with CHF (0.97 [0.75–1.24]) but only modestly attenuated the relation to CVD incidence (1.23 [1.00–1.51], P = 0.052). We observed a nonlinear, U-shaped relation between log-leptin and mortality (P = 0.005 for quadratic term) with greater risk of death evident at both low and high leptin levels. CONCLUSIONS: In our moderate-sized community-based elderly sample, higher circulating leptin levels were associated with a greater risk of CHF and CVD, but leptin did not provide incremental prognostic information beyond BMI. Additional investigations are warranted to elucidate the U-shaped relation of leptin to mortality.National Institutes of Health's National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (N01-HC25195, N01-HV28178, K24-HL04334, R01-DK080739

Degenerate dispersive equations arising in the study of magma dynamics

An outstanding problem in Earth science is understanding the method of transport of magma in the Earth's mantle. Models for this process, transport in a viscously deformable porous media, give rise to scalar degenerate, dispersive, nonlinear wave equations. We establish a general local well-posedness for a physical class of data (roughly $H^1$) via fixed point methods. The strategy requires positive lower bounds on the solution. This is extended to global existence for a subset of possible nonlinearities by making use of certain conservation laws associated with the equations. Furthermore, we construct a Lyapunov energy functional, which is locally convex about the uniform state, and prove (global in time) nonlinear dynamic stability of the uniform state for any choice of nonlinearity. We compare the dynamics to that of other problems and discuss open questions concerning a larger range of nonlinearities, for which we conjecture global existence.Comment: 27 Pages, 7 figures are not present in this version. See http://www.columbia.edu/~grs2103/ for a PDF with figures. Submitted to Nonlinearit

Obscured clusters. II. GLIMPSE-C02 - A new metal rich globular cluster in the Milky Way

The estimated total number of Milky Way globulars is 160+-20. The question of whether there are any more undiscovered globular clusters in the Milky Way is particularly relevant with advances in near and mid-IR instrumentation. This investigation is a part of a long-term project to search the inner Milky Way for hidden star clusters and to study them in detail. GLIMPSE-C02 (G02) is one of these objects, situated near the Galactic plane (l=14.129deg, b=-0.644deg). Our analysis is based on SOFI/NTT JHKs imaging and low resolution (R~1400) spectroscopy of three bright cluster red giants in the K atmospheric window. We derived the metal abundance by analysis of these spectra and from the slope of the RGB. The cluster is deeply embedded in dust and undergoes a mean reddening of Av~24.8+-3 mag. The distance to the object is D=4.6+-0.7kpc. The metal abundance of G02 is [Fe/H](H96)=-0.33+-0.14 and [Fe/H](CG)=-0.16+-0.12 using different scales. The best fit to the radial surface brightness profile with a single-mass King's model yields a core radius rc=0.70 arcmin (0.9pc), tidal radius rt=15 arcmin (20pc), and central oncentration c=1.33. We demonstrate that G02 is new Milky Way globular cluster, among the most metal rich globular clusters in the Galaxy. The object is physically located at the inner edge of the thin disk and the transition region with the bulge, and also falls in the zone of the "missing" globulars toward the central region of the Milky Way.Comment: 5 pages, 6 figures, accepted for publication in Astronomy and Astrophysic

Speaking out about gender imbalance in invited speakers improves diversity.

Omissions of qualified women scientists from major meeting programs continue to occur despite a surge in articles indicating persistent gender-discriminatory practices in hiring and promotion, and calls for gender balance in conference organizing committees

Innovative Test Operations to Support Orion and Future Human Rated Missions

This paper describes how the Orion program is implementing new and innovative test approaches and strategies in an evolving development environment. The early flight test spacecraft are evolving in design maturity and complexity requiring significant changes in the ground test operations for each mission. The testing approach for EM-2 is planned to validate innovative Orion production acceptance testing methods to support human exploration missions in the future. Manufacturing and testing at Kennedy Space Center in the Neil Armstrong Operations and Checkout facility will provide a seamless transition directly to the launch site avoiding transportation and checkout of the spacecraft from other locations