Computers in Law and Society: Introduction

The following introduction by Robert Bigelow highlights several issues which have developed during the first quarter-century of the computer age, and which are discussed more fully in the remaining pages of this Symposium

Allochronic Speciation In Field Crickets, And A New Species, Acheta Veletis

Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/137466/1/evo03095.pd

Mechanical Faraday effect for orbital angular momentum-carrying beams

When linearly polarised light is transmitted through a spinning window, the plane of polarisation is rotated. This rotation arises through a phase change that is applied to the circularly polarised states corresponding to the spin angular momentum (SAM). Here we show an analogous effect for the orbital angular momentum (OAM), where a differential phase between the positive and negative modes (±ℓ) is observed as a rotation of the transmitted image. For normal materials, this rotation is on the order of a micro radian, but by using a slow-light medium, we show a rotation of a few degrees. We also note that, within the bounds of our experimental parameters, this rotation angle does not exceed the scale of the spatial features in the beam profile

A Conceptual Model for Predicting Areas with High Potential for Lake Trout Spawning Habitat in Yellowstone Lake

The presence of non-native lake trout (Salvelinus namaycush) has become a serious threat to native salmonid populations in many lakes throughout the West. Costly and time consuming suppression efforts have been undertaken by agencies in several of these systems with concern regarding their efficacy expressed by fisheries managers. Frequently, mature lake trout are interspersed with the native fishes, hindering removal efforts because of bycatch of fishes meant to be the beneficiary of suppression efforts. One method of improving suppression efforts that could reduce negative impacts on other species is to target areas where sexually mature lake trout congregate for spawning activities. Using theory that water movements within lakes influence habitat formation, parameters describing lake trout spawning habitat in published literature, and the capability of a GIS to mesh spatially-explicit geographical datasets, a conceptual lake trout spawning habitat model was developed for Yellowstone Lake. Important inputs to this model include detailed bathymetry of Yellowstone Lake, a sedimentation model that predicts erosion and deposition of particles within lake systems, and data on primary wind direction over the lake. The model predicts that 4.4 percent of the surface area of Yellowstone Lake has excellent potential, 8.9 percent has some potential, and 86.7 percent has no potential to contain lake trout spawning habitat. Additional data layers can be easily incorporated as new information becomes available on lake trout requirements for successful spawning. This model can be used to identify suitable spawning areas for monitoring and control, and has potential to be applied on other lakes experiencing lake trout invasion

Mechanistic Mode Connectivity

We study neural network loss landscapes through the lens of mode connectivity, the observation that minimizers of neural networks retrieved via training on a dataset are connected via simple paths of low loss. Specifically, we ask the following question: are minimizers that rely on different mechanisms for making their predictions connected via simple paths of low loss? We provide a definition of mechanistic similarity as shared invariances to input transformations and demonstrate that lack of linear connectivity between two models implies they use dissimilar mechanisms for making their predictions. Relevant to practice, this result helps us demonstrate that naive fine-tuning on a downstream dataset can fail to alter a model's mechanisms, e.g., fine-tuning can fail to eliminate a model's reliance on spurious attributes. Our analysis also motivates a method for targeted alteration of a model's mechanisms, named connectivity-based fine-tuning (CBFT), which we analyze using several synthetic datasets for the task of reducing a model's reliance on spurious attributes.Comment: Accepted at ICML, 202

Methodology of a reevaluation of cardiovascular outcomes in the RECORD trial: study design and conduct

Background In 2010, after regulatory review of rosiglitazone licensing, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) requested a reevaluation of cardiovascular end points in the RECORD trial.<p></p> Methods Automated screening of the original clinical trial database and manual case report form review were performed to identify all potential cardiovascular and noncardiovascular deaths, and nonfatal myocardial infarction (MI) and stroke events. Search techniques were used to find participants lost to follow-up, and sites were queried for additional source documents. Suspected events underwent blinded adjudication using both original RECORD end point definitions and new FDA end point definitions, before analysis by the Duke Clinical Research Institute.<p></p> Results The reevaluation effort included an additional 328 person-years of follow-up. Automated screening identified 396 suspected deaths, 2,052 suspected MIs, and 468 suspected strokes. Manual review of documents by Duke Clinical Research Institute clinical events classification (CEC) coordinators identified an additional 31 suspected deaths, 49 suspected MIs, and 28 suspected strokes. There were 127 CEC queries issued requesting additional information on suspected deaths; 43 were closed with no site response, 61 were closed with a response that no additional data were available, and additional data were received for 23. Seventy CEC queries were issued requesting additional information for suspected MI and stroke events; 31 were closed with no site response, 20 were closed with a response that no additional data were available, and 19 resulted in additional data.<p></p> Conclusions Comprehensive procedures were used for rigorous event reascertainment and readjudication in a previously completed open-label, global clinical trial. These procedures used in this unique situation were consistent with other common approaches in the field, were enhanced to address the FDA concerns about the original RECORD trial results, and could be considered by clinical trialists designing event readjudication protocols for drug development programs that have been completed.<p></p&gt