Amplitude ansatz analysis of the decay B0->K*0μ+μ-

The LHCb experiment at CERN has produced many intriguing results in b->sll and b->clν decays, which point to potential contributions from New Physics. This thesis describes an analysis of B0->K*0μ+μ- where the decay amplitudes are measured as functions of q2, the dimuon invariant mass squared. Measuring the angular distribution of this decay results in a plethora of observables that can be used to constrain the type of New Physics contributions. Owing to the number of parameterisations of the Standard Model and other models which can describe New Physics effects, Legendre polynomial ansatzes are used to describe the variation with q 2 in order to be as model-independent as possible. A selection strategy for B0->K*0μ+μ- is outlined, resulting in low levels of misidentified and combinatorial background. Pseudoexperiment studies are performed in order to develop the analysis strategy and further understand the symmetries of the angular distribution and the fit. Blinded results from 9 fb−1 of data collected by the LHCb detector at the LHC at CERN are shown, where the fit is performed in the region 1.25 < q2 < 8 GeV2/c4 . The fit is performed with four-parameter ansatzes for the P-wave and one-parameter ansatzes for the S-wave. Pseudoexperiment studies are performed from the data fit. The data fit quality is determined to be good, with p-value = 70%. Where the Hessian is not a good description of the uncertainties, fits to the log-likelihood profiles are performed with bifurcated parabolas to extract the uncertainties, resulting in good-quality statistical coverage.Open Acces

Does ‘Scientists believe…’ imply ‘All scientists believe...’? Individual differences in the interpretation of generic news headlines

Media headlines reporting scientific research frequently include generic phrases such as “Scientists believe x” or “Experts think y”. These phrases capture attention and succinctly communicate science to the public. However, by generically attributing beliefs to ‘Scientists’, ‘Experts’ or ‘Researchers’ the degree of scientific consensus must be inferred by the reader or listener (do all scientists believe x, most scientists, or just a few?). Our data revealed that decontextualized generic phrases such as “Scientists say…” imply consensus among a majority of relevant experts (53.8% in Study 1 and 60.7-61.8% in Study 2). There was little variation in the degree of consensus implied by different generic phrases, but wide variation between different participants. These ratings of decontextualized phrases will inevitably be labile and prone to change with the addition of context, but under controlled conditions people interpret generic consensus statements in very different ways. We tested the novel hypothesis that individual differences in consensus estimates occur because generic phrases encourage an intuitive overgeneralization (e.g., Scientists believe = All scientists believe) that some people revise downwards on reflection (e.g., Scientists believe = Some scientists believe). Two pre-registered studies failed to support this hypothesis. There was no significant relationship between reflective thinking and consensus estimates (Study 1) and enforced reflection did not cause estimates to be revised downwards (Study 2). Those reporting scientific research should be aware that generically attributing beliefs to ‘Scientists’ or ‘Researchers’ is ambiguous and inappropriate when there is no clear consensus among relevant experts

Environmental Hazard of Excess Dunder on Agricultural Land

The use of high biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) organic waste on farming land offers two resource recovery opportunities, first nutrient for plant production and secondly organic matter for soil health. One such waste, dunder from yeast production was tested for its impact on irrigated lucerne hay production. A randomised complete block trial with five treatments (0, 8, 24, 48, 96 L dunder m-2)and three replications was used to test the impact of dunder on total dry matter production. The trial showed that the lower rates of 8 and 24 L m-2 of dunder was not significantly different to the control (0) while the high rates of 48 and 96 L m-2 significantly reduced total dry matter. This was significant as it identified limits to dunder application rate. However, more importantly, the trial showed that site characteristics and agronomic management had greater impact than the dunder alone on the plant production. In this trial a sodium hazard not related to the dunder significantly added to the reduction of dry matter. The results show that the assessment of dunder and other similar wastes for land application must include both the direct and indirect site related consequences of application to agricultural land

Moments of the critical values of families of elliptic curves, with applications

We make conjectures on the moments of the central values of the family of all elliptic curves and on the moments of the first derivative of the central values of a large family of positive rank curves. In both cases the order of magnitude is the same as that of the moments of the central values of an orthogonal family of L-functions. Notably, we predict that the critical values of all rank 1 elliptic curves is logarithmically larger than the rank 1 curves in the positive rank family. Furthermore, as arithmetical applications we make a conjecture on the distribution of a_p's amongst all rank 2 elliptic curves, and also show how the Riemann hypothesis can be deduced from sufficient knowledge of the first moment of the positive rank family (based on an idea of Iwaniec).Comment: 24 page

Assessment of Waste for Use on Agricultural Land

The disposal of waste to agricultural land requires a systematic and transparent assessment procedure to ensure environmental and production sustainability. A hybrid model of risk assessment used in the general risk, environmental management and the mining industries was developed and tested using the waste from a yeast factory. The model is systematic and cybernetic and develops a succession of decisions that have the capacity to focus the environmental and agronomic considerations down to individual crops, land and management systems. The process directly links environmental risk assessment and development of management plans to agronomic development of the use waste products

When 'Scientists say' coffee is good for you one day and bad for you the next: Do generic attributions to ‘Scientists’ and ‘Experts’ amplify perceived conflict?

News consumers are frequently exposed to seemingly conflicting claims about the risks or benefits of activities such as eating meat and drinking coffee, which can lead to confusion and backlash against expert advice. One factor that may artificially inflate perceived conflict is the tendency for news headlines to generically attribute such claims to ‘Scientists’, ‘Experts’ or ‘Researchers’. This can create the perception that scientific consensus frequently changes, with ‘experts’ saying one thing one day (e.g., “Fasting diet could regenerate pancreas and reverse diabetes, researchers say”) and another the next (“Fasting diets may raise risk of diabetes, researchers warn”). We predicted that hedging news headlines with the qualifier ‘some’ (e.g., ...some researchers say) would reduce perceived contradiction and backlash by triggering the scalar inference “some but not all…”. We presented participants with a series of conflicting headlines or non-conflicting headlines about health and nutrition. These were presented in either their original generic format (e.g., Researchers say...) or in a qualified format (e.g., Some researchers say…). Those that saw conflicting headlines felt they were more contradictory, more confusing and resulted in us knowing less about how to be healthy than those who saw the non-conflicting headlines (Experiment 1, N=294). In Experiment 2 (N=400), the same conflict manipulation had no effect on more general beliefs about nutrition or the development of science. When our conflict manipulation did affect beliefs (Experiment 1) the effect of conflict was not moderated by headline format. Our results suggest that replacing generic consensus claims (e.g., Researchers say...) with qualified consensus claims (e.g., Some researchers say…) does not reduce the perceived contradiction and confusion that are typically associated with conflicting news reports