32,924 research outputs found
Computational structureâbased drug design: Predicting target flexibility
The role of molecular modeling in drug design has experienced a significant revamp in the last decade. The increase in computational resources and molecular models, along with software developments, is finally introducing a competitive advantage in early phases of drug discovery. Medium and small companies with strong focus on computational chemistry are being created, some of them having introduced important leads in drug design pipelines. An important source for this success is the extraordinary development of faster and more efficient techniques for describing flexibility in threeâdimensional structural molecular modeling. At different levels, from docking techniques to atomistic molecular dynamics, conformational sampling between receptor and drug results in improved predictions, such as screening enrichment, discovery of transient cavities, etc. In this review article we perform an extensive analysis of these modeling techniques, dividing them into high and low throughput, and emphasizing in their application to drug design studies. We finalize the review with a section describing our Monte Carlo method, PELE, recently highlighted as an outstanding advance in an international blind competition and industrial benchmarks.We acknowledge the BSC-CRG-IRB Joint Research Program in Computational Biology. This work was supported by a grant
from the Spanish Government CTQ2016-79138-R.J.I. acknowledges support from SVP-2014-068797, awarded by the Spanish Government.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft
Signal-Jamming in a Sequential Auction
In a recurring auction early bids may reveal biddersâ types, which in turn affects bidding in later auctions. Bidders take this into account and may bid in a way that conceals their private information until the last auction is played. The present paper analyzes the equilibrium of a sequence of ?rst-price auctions assuming bidders have stable private values. We show that signal-jamming occurs and explore the dynamics of equilibrium prices.Auctions; Signaling; Price Competition
H-Alpha and Hard X-Ray Observations of a Two-Ribbon Flare Associated with a Filament Eruption
We perform a multi-wavelength study of a two-ribbon flare on 2002 September
29 and its associated filament eruption, observed simultaneously in the H-alpha
line by a ground-based imaging spectrograph and in hard X-rays by RHESSI. The
flare ribbons contain several H-alpha bright kernels that show different
evolutional behaviors. In particular, we find two kernels that may be the
footpoints of a loop. A single hard X-ray source appears to cover these two
kernels and to move across the magnetic neutral line. We explain this as a
result of the merging of two footpoint sources that show gradually asymmetric
emission owing to an asymmetric magnetic topology of the newly reconnected
loops. In one of the H-alpha kernels, we detect a continuum enhancement at the
visible wavelength. By checking its spatial and temporal relationship with the
hard X-ray emission, we ascribe it as being caused by electron beam
precipitation. In addition, we derive the line-of-sight velocity of the
filament plasma based on the Doppler shift of the filament-caused absorption in
the H-alpha blue wing. The filament shows rapid acceleration during the
impulsive phase. These observational features are in principal consistent with
the general scenario of the canonical two-ribbon flare model.Comment: 15 pages, 5 figures, accepted for publication in Ap
Metastability of Asymptotically Well-Behaved Potential Games
One of the main criticisms to game theory concerns the assumption of full
rationality. Logit dynamics is a decentralized algorithm in which a level of
irrationality (a.k.a. "noise") is introduced in players' behavior. In this
context, the solution concept of interest becomes the logit equilibrium, as
opposed to Nash equilibria. Logit equilibria are distributions over strategy
profiles that possess several nice properties, including existence and
uniqueness. However, there are games in which their computation may take time
exponential in the number of players. We therefore look at an approximate
version of logit equilibria, called metastable distributions, introduced by
Auletta et al. [SODA 2012]. These are distributions that remain stable (i.e.,
players do not go too far from it) for a super-polynomial number of steps
(rather than forever, as for logit equilibria). The hope is that these
distributions exist and can be reached quickly by logit dynamics.
We identify a class of potential games, called asymptotically well-behaved,
for which the behavior of the logit dynamics is not chaotic as the number of
players increases so to guarantee meaningful asymptotic results. We prove that
any such game admits distributions which are metastable no matter the level of
noise present in the system, and the starting profile of the dynamics. These
distributions can be quickly reached if the rationality level is not too big
when compared to the inverse of the maximum difference in potential. Our proofs
build on results which may be of independent interest, including some spectral
characterizations of the transition matrix defined by logit dynamics for
generic games and the relationship of several convergence measures for Markov
chains
A Survey on Multisensor Fusion and Consensus Filtering for Sensor Networks
Multisensor fusion and consensus filtering are two fascinating subjects in the research of sensor networks. In this survey, we will cover both classic results and recent advances developed in these two topics. First, we recall some important results in the development ofmultisensor fusion technology. Particularly, we pay great attention to the fusion with unknown correlations, which ubiquitously exist in most of distributed filtering problems. Next, we give a systematic review on several widely used consensus filtering approaches. Furthermore, some latest progress on multisensor fusion and consensus filtering is also presented. Finally,
conclusions are drawn and several potential future research directions are outlined.the Royal Society of the UK, the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grants 61329301, 61374039, 61304010, 11301118, and 61573246, the Hujiang Foundation of China under Grants C14002
and D15009, the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation of Germany, and the Innovation Fund Project for Graduate Student of Shanghai under Grant JWCXSL140
A blind deconvolution approach to recover effective connectivity brain networks from resting state fMRI data
A great improvement to the insight on brain function that we can get from
fMRI data can come from effective connectivity analysis, in which the flow of
information between even remote brain regions is inferred by the parameters of
a predictive dynamical model. As opposed to biologically inspired models, some
techniques as Granger causality (GC) are purely data-driven and rely on
statistical prediction and temporal precedence. While powerful and widely
applicable, this approach could suffer from two main limitations when applied
to BOLD fMRI data: confounding effect of hemodynamic response function (HRF)
and conditioning to a large number of variables in presence of short time
series. For task-related fMRI, neural population dynamics can be captured by
modeling signal dynamics with explicit exogenous inputs; for resting-state fMRI
on the other hand, the absence of explicit inputs makes this task more
difficult, unless relying on some specific prior physiological hypothesis. In
order to overcome these issues and to allow a more general approach, here we
present a simple and novel blind-deconvolution technique for BOLD-fMRI signal.
Coming to the second limitation, a fully multivariate conditioning with short
and noisy data leads to computational problems due to overfitting. Furthermore,
conceptual issues arise in presence of redundancy. We thus apply partial
conditioning to a limited subset of variables in the framework of information
theory, as recently proposed. Mixing these two improvements we compare the
differences between BOLD and deconvolved BOLD level effective networks and draw
some conclusions
Comparing the performance of brick and timber in residential buildings â The case of Australia
© 2017 Elsevier B.V. There is currently a limited use of timber products in residential development in Australia due to the dominance of heavy materials such as concrete, steel and brick. This dominant use of heavy materials is a reversal of the traditional material choice that was based predominantly on timber products. Technological advances and efficiencies drove the change to heavy materials to use in residential construction. The emerging issue with this reliance on heavy materials is the impact of their use on the environment. The carbon impact and problem of finite resource depletion associated with concrete, steel and bricks need to be addressed due to the increasing pressure from national and international requirements and legislations. The construction industry needs to reduce its negative impact on the environment and the renewable nature of timber presents a material solution to the problem. Timber from sustainably managed forests and plantations can be utilised as lumber or manufactured into engineered products for residential development. This paper examines the benefits of timber used in building envelopes when compared with conventional high-density materials such as brick and concrete when construction is designed with equivalent thermal performance. Multiple case studies were used to demonstrate the reduced life cycle energy and costs, and the time of construction benefits of timber when used as an alternative to heavy materials. Results revealed that Life cycle energy and time of construction showed noticeable differences between timber construction and heavy materials and cost showing marginal differences
Association Between Air Pollution and Low Birth Weight: A Community-Based Study
The relationship between maternal exposure to air pollution during periods of pregnancy (entire and specific periods) and birth weight was investigated in a well-defined cohort. Between 1988 and 1991, all pregnant women living in four residential areas of Beijing were registered and followed from early pregnancy until delivery. Information on individual mothers and infants was collected. Daily air pollution data were obtained independently. The sample for analysis included 74,671 first-parity live births were gestational age 37-44 weeks. Multiple linear regression and logistic regression were used to estimate the effects of air pollution on birth weight and low birth weight (< 2,500 g), adjusting for gestational age, residence, year of birth, maternal age, and infant gender. There was a significant exposure-response relationship between maternal exposures to sulfur dioxide (SO2) and total suspended particles (TSP) during the third trimester of pregnancy and infant birth weight. The adjusted odds ratio for low birth weight was 1.11 (95% CI, 1.06-1.16) for each 100 micrograms/m3 increase in SO2 and 1.10 (95% CI, 1.05-1.14) for each 100 micrograms/m3 increase in TSP. The estimated reduction in birth weight was 7.3 g and 6.9 g for each 100 micrograms/m3 increase in SO2 and in TSP, respectively. The birth weight distribution of the high-exposure group was more skewed toward the left tail (i.e., with higher proportion of births < 2,500 g) than that of the low-exposure group. Although the effects of other unmeasured risk factors cannot be excluded with certainty, our data suggests that TSP and SO2, or a more complex pollution mixture associated with these pollutants, contribute to an excess risk of low birth weight in the Beijing population.National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (ES05947, ES08337); National Institute of Child Health & Human Development (R01 HD32505); Department of Health and Human Services (MCJ-259501, HRSA 5 T32 PE10014
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