930 research outputs found
Conceptualizing throughput legitimacy: procedural mechanisms of accountability, transparency, inclusiveness and openness in EU governance
This symposium demonstrates the potential for throughput legitimacy as a concept for shedding empirical light on the strengths and weaknesses of multi-level governance, as well as challenging the concept theoretically. This article introduces the symposium by conceptualizing throughput legitimacy as an âumbrella conceptâ, encompassing a constellation
of normative criteria not necessarily empirically interrelated. It argues that in order to interrogate multi-level governance processes in all their complexity, it makes sense for us to develop normative standards that are not naĂŻve about the empirical realities of how power is exercised within multilevel governance, or how it may interact with legitimacy. We argue that while throughput legitimacy has its normative limits, it can be substantively useful for these purposes. While being no replacement for input and output legitimacy, throughput legitimacy offers distinctive normative criteriaâ accountability, transparency, inclusiveness and opennessâ and points towards substantive institutional reforms.Published versio
Smoothed Complexity Theory
Smoothed analysis is a new way of analyzing algorithms introduced by Spielman
and Teng (J. ACM, 2004). Classical methods like worst-case or average-case
analysis have accompanying complexity classes, like P and AvgP, respectively.
While worst-case or average-case analysis give us a means to talk about the
running time of a particular algorithm, complexity classes allows us to talk
about the inherent difficulty of problems.
Smoothed analysis is a hybrid of worst-case and average-case analysis and
compensates some of their drawbacks. Despite its success for the analysis of
single algorithms and problems, there is no embedding of smoothed analysis into
computational complexity theory, which is necessary to classify problems
according to their intrinsic difficulty.
We propose a framework for smoothed complexity theory, define the relevant
classes, and prove some first hardness results (of bounded halting and tiling)
and tractability results (binary optimization problems, graph coloring,
satisfiability). Furthermore, we discuss extensions and shortcomings of our
model and relate it to semi-random models.Comment: to be presented at MFCS 201
The early evolution of the H-free process
The H-free process, for some fixed graph H, is the random graph process
defined by starting with an empty graph on n vertices and then adding edges one
at a time, chosen uniformly at random subject to the constraint that no H
subgraph is formed. Let G be the random maximal H-free graph obtained at the
end of the process. When H is strictly 2-balanced, we show that for some c>0,
with high probability as , the minimum degree in G is at least
. This gives new lower bounds for
the Tur\'an numbers of certain bipartite graphs, such as the complete bipartite
graphs with . When H is a complete graph with we show that for some C>0, with high probability the independence number of
G is at most . This gives new lower bounds
for Ramsey numbers R(s,t) for fixed and t large. We also obtain new
bounds for the independence number of G for other graphs H, including the case
when H is a cycle. Our proofs use the differential equations method for random
graph processes to analyse the evolution of the process, and give further
information about the structure of the graphs obtained, including asymptotic
formulae for a broad class of subgraph extension variables.Comment: 36 page
Catches of Euxoa tritici in pheromone traps for Anarsia lineatella are due to the presence of (Z)-5-decenyl acetate as an impurity
Traps baited with the synthetic pheromone of Anarsia lineatella Zeller (Lepidoptera: Gelechiidae) frequently captured also Euxoa tritici L. males (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae) in field tests in Hungary. As (E)-monounsaturated compounds are uncommon among sex attractants or pheromone components of Noctuidae, it was hypothesized that the Euxoa catches may have been due to impurities of the (Z) isomer in synthetic (E)-5-decenyl acetate, which is the major component in the pheromone lure of A. lineatella. Traps baited with synthetic (Z)-5-decenyl acetate captured large numbers of E. tritici, and the compound showed a clear doseâresponse effect. Reanalysis of the synthetic batch of (E)-5-decenyl acetate used in preparation of the A. lineatella lure showed the presence of 10% of the (Z) isomer. Traps baited with synthetic (Z)-5-decenyl acetate can be used in the future for detection and monitoring purposes of E. tritici, a widely distributed pest of cereals and other field crops. The compound also showed attraction of Euxoa seliginis Duponche
Improved limit on the directly measured antiproton lifetime
Continuous monitoring of a cloud of antiprotons stored in a Penning trap for 405 days enables us to set an improved limit on the directly measured antiproton lifetime. From our measurements we extract a storage time of 3.15x108 equivalent antiproton-seconds, resulting in a lower lifetime limit of Tp > 10.2,a with a confidence level of 68%. This result improves the limit on charge-parity-time violation in antiproton decays based on direct observation by a factor of 7
A 16 Parts per Trillion Comparison of the Antiproton-to-Proton q/m Ratios
The Standard Model (SM) of particle physics is both incredibly successful and
glaringly incomplete. Among the questions left open is the striking imbalance
of matter and antimatter in the observable universe which inspires experiments
to compare the fundamental properties of matter/antimatter conjugates with high
precision. Our experiments deal with direct investigations of the fundamental
properties of protons and antiprotons, performing spectroscopy in advanced
cryogenic Penning-trap systems. For instance, we compared the proton/antiproton
magnetic moments with 1.5 ppb fractional precision, which improved upon
previous best measurements by a factor of >3000. Here we report on a new
comparison of the proton/antiproton charge-to-mass ratios with a fractional
uncertainty of 16ppt. Our result is based on the combination of four
independent long term studies, recorded in a total time span of 1.5 years. We
use different measurement methods and experimental setups incorporating
different systematic effects. The final result,
= ,
is consistent with the fundamental charge-parity-time (CPT) reversal
invariance, and improves the precision of our previous best measurement by a
factor of 4.3. The measurement tests the SM at an energy scale of
GeV (CL 0.68), and improves 10 coefficients of the
Standard Model Extension (SME). Our cyclotron-clock-study also constrains
hypothetical interactions mediating violations of the clock weak equivalence
principle (WEP) for antimatter to a level of , and enables the first differential test of the WEP
using antiprotons \cite{hughes1991constraints}. From this interpretation we
constrain the differential WEP-violating coefficient to
BASE-STEP: A transportable antiproton reservoir for fundamental interaction studies
Currently, the only worldwide source of low-energy antiprotons is the
AD/ELENA facility located at CERN. To date, all precision measurements on
single antiprotons have been conducted at this facility and provide stringent
tests of the fundamental interactions and their symmetries. However, the
magnetic field fluctuations from the facility operation limit the precision of
upcoming measurements. To overcome this limitation, we have designed the
transportable antiproton trap system BASE-STEP to relocate antiprotons to
laboratories with a calm magnetic environment. We anticipate that the
transportable antiproton trap will facilitate enhanced tests of CPT invariance
with antiprotons, and provide new experimental possibilities of using
transported antiprotons and other accelerator-produced exotic ions. We present
here the technical design of the transportable trap system. This includes the
transportable superconducting magnet, the cryogenic inlay consisting of the
trap stack and the detection systems, and the differential pumping section to
suppress the residual gas flow into the cryogenic trap chamber.Comment: To be submitted to Rev. Sci. Instrument
Excess Mortality Rate During Adulthood Among Danish Adoptees
BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: Adoption studies have been used to disentangle the influence of genes from shared familial environment on various traits and disease risks. However, both the factors leading to adoption and living as an adoptee may bias the studies with regard to the relative influence of genes and environment compared to the general population. The aim was to investigate whether the cohort of domestic adoptees used for these studies in Denmark is similar to the general population with respect to all-cause mortality and cause-specific mortality rates. METHODS: 13,111 adoptees born in Denmark in 1917, or later, and adopted in 1924 to 1947 were compared to all Danes from the same birth cohorts using standardized mortality ratios (SMR). The 12,729 adoptees alive in 1970 were similarly compared to all Danes using SMR as well as cause-specific SMR. RESULTS: The excess in all-cause mortality before age 65 years in adoptees was estimated to be 1.30 (95% CI 1.26-1.35). Significant excess mortality before age 65 years was also observed for infections, vascular deaths, cancer, alcohol-related deaths and suicide. Analyses including deaths after age 65 generally showed slightly less excess in mortality, but the excess was significant for all-cause mortality, cancer, alcohol-related deaths and suicides. CONCLUSION: Adoptees have an increased all-cause mortality compared to the general population. All major specific causes of death contributed, and the highest excess is seen for alcohol-related deaths
JOINT COMMITMENT, COERCION AND FREEDOM IN SCIENCE Conceptual Analysis and Case Studies
International audienceThis paper deals with the Ethics of group life in the sciences, if not directly with the policy of science that might evolve from it, and more precisely with the issue of democracy within scientific life
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Intracranial and subcortical volumes in adolescents with earlyâonset psychosis: A multisite megaâanalysis from the ENIGMA consortium
Earlyâonset psychosis disorders are serious mental disorders arising before the age of 18âyears. Here, we investigate the largest neuroimaging dataset, to date, of patients with earlyâonset psychosis and healthy controls for differences in intracranial and subcortical brain volumes. The sample included 263 patients with earlyâonset psychosis (mean age: 16.4â±â1.4âyears, mean illness duration: 1.5â±â1.4âyears, 39.2% female) and 359 healthy controls (mean age: 15.9â±â1.7âyears, 45.4% female) with magnetic resonance imaging data, pooled from 11 clinical cohorts. Patients were diagnosed with earlyâonset schizophrenia (n = 183), affective psychosis (n = 39), or other psychotic disorders (n = 41). We used linear mixedâeffects models to investigate differences in intracranial and subcortical volumes across the patient sample, diagnostic subgroup and antipsychotic medication, relative to controls. We observed significantly lower intracranial (Cohen's d = â0.39) and hippocampal (d = â0.25) volumes, and higher caudate (d = 0.25) and pallidum (d = 0.24) volumes in patients relative to controls. Intracranial volume was lower in both earlyâonset schizophrenia (d = â0.34) and affective psychosis (d = â0.42), and earlyâonset schizophrenia showed lower hippocampal (d = â0.24) and higher pallidum (d = 0.29) volumes. Patients who were currently treated with antipsychotic medication (n = 193) had significantly lower intracranial volume (d = â0.42). The findings demonstrate a similar pattern of brain alterations in earlyâonset psychosis as previously reported in adult psychosis, but with notably low intracranial volume. The low intracranial volume suggests disrupted neurodevelopment in adolescent earlyâonset psychosis
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