Phenolphthalein-containing laxative use in relation to adenomatous colorectal polyps in three studies.

Phenolphthalein, the active ingredient in many laxatives, was recently found to be a carcinogen in animal models. Human data suggest a laxative-colon cancer association, but few data specifically address the effects of phenolthalein-containing laxatives. We examined use of phenolphtalein-containing laxatives in relation to occurrence of adenomatous colorectal polyps in data from three case-control studies. The study conducted in Los Angeles, California (1991-1993), and the two studies conducted in North Carolina (1988-1990 and 1992-1995) altogether included 866 cases and 1,066 controls. The prevalence of using phenolphthalein-containing laxatives at least once a week in the recent past, however, was less than 5% among these subjects. The multivariate-adjusted odds ratios associated with recent use of phenolphthalein-containing laxatives once a week or more were 1.8 -95% confidence interval (CI), 0.5-6.2] in Los Angeles, 1.0 (CI, 0.4-2.2) in North Carolina (1988-1990), and 1.1 (CI, 0.2-5.7) in North Carolina (1992-1995). For use of other types of laxatives, the corresponding odds ratios were 1.3 (CI, 0.9-1.9) in Los Angeles, 1.0 (CI, 0.5-1.7) in North Carolina (1988-1990), and 0.9 (CI, 0.4-1.8) in North Carolina (1992-1995). Although the low prevalence of frequent use made for relatively wide confidence intervals, overall these data suggest that use of phenolphthalein-containing laxatives does not increase risk of adenomatous colorectal polyps

Publishing Music Similarity Features on the Semantic Web.

We describe the process of collecting, organising and publishing a large set of music similarity features produced by the SoundBite [10] playlist generator tool. These data can be a valuable asset in the development and evaluation of new Music Information Retrieval algorithms. They can also be used in Web-based music search and retrieval applications. For this reason, we make a database of features available on the Semantic Web via a SPARQL end-point, which can be used in Linked Data services. We provide examples of using the data in a research tool, as well as in a simple web application which responds to audio queries and finds a set of similar tracks in our database

Local sublattice symmetry breaking for graphene with a centrosymmetric deformation

We calculate the local density of states (LDOS) for an infinite graphene sheet with a single centrosymmetric out-of-plane deformation, in order to investigate measurable strain signatures on graphene. We focus on the regime of small deformations and show that the strain-induced pseudomagnetic field induces an imbalance of the LDOS between the two triangular graphene sublattices in the region of the deformation. Real-space imaging reveals a characteristic sixfold symmetry pattern where the sublattice symmetry is broken within each fold, consistent with experimental and tight-binding observations. The open geometry we study allows us to make use of the usual continuum model of graphene and to obtain results independent of boundary conditions. We provide an analytic perturbative expression for the contrast between the LDOS of each sublattice, showing a scaling law as a function of the amplitude and width of the deformation. We confirm our results by a numerically exact iterative scattering matrix method

Growth-related profiles of remanent flux in bulk melt-textured YBaCuO crystal magnetized by pulsed fields

We have studied the remanent magnetic flux distribution in bulk melt-textured YBa2Cu3O7 (YBCO) crystals after their magnetization in quasi-static and pulsed magnetic fields up to 6T. It has been shown that, provided that the magnetic pulse is sharp enough and its amplitude much exceeds the twice penetration magnetic field, the pulse magnetization technique becomes extremely sensitive to the sample inhomogeneities. Using this method with appropriate parameters of the magnetic pulse, we have particularly demonstrated that the growth of YBCO crystals in the growth sectors (GSs) responds for a macroscopic arrangement of weaks links -- they mostly appear inside of GSs, but not along the GS boundaries.Comment: 8 pages in LaTeX2e, 5 figures. Revised version, submitted to Supercond. Sci. Techno

Complex systems management competency for technology modernization

Industrial technology modernization requires solutions to the problems of the complex systems evolution. Entities involved in the process of modernization lack unified centralized control and act as standalone businesses, while stakeholders in the processes pursue their own, all too often conflicting interests. Having to operate amid severe external uncertainty, these standalone businesses act as isolated agents, with their make-up changing at different periods, yet the success of technology modernization depends on their coordinated action. It is critical for the success of the system evolution to have enough highly qualified personnel with expertise and competencies, engineering and economic ones in the first place, that match the complexity of the systems being managed. The article analyzes the tasks that pop up throughout the course of modernization. The analysis is used as a basis for defining engineering and economic competencies and for substantiating their significance as a key resource of the industrial systems of the future. This assumption finds a confirmation in a summary of appropriate global trends done by the authors. Systems engineering is used as a case of the application of the competencies as part of methodologies that were created in response to challenges associated with the growing complexity of technological and organizational systems. The study also gives examples of the need for engineering and economic competencies arising in the course of technology modernization in the electric power industry. © 2017 WIT Press.ACKNOWLEDGEMENT The work was supported by Act 211 of the Government of the Russian Federation, contract № 02.A03.21.0006

Approaches in Intelligent Music Production

Music production technology has made few advancements over the past few decades. State-of-the-art approaches are based on traditional studio paradigms with new developments primarily focusing on digital modelling of analog equipment. Intelligent music production (IMP) is the approach of introducing some level of artificial intelligence into the space of music production, which has the ability to change the field considerably. There are a multitude of methods that intelligent systems can employ to analyse, interact with, and modify audio. Some systems interact and collaborate with human mix engineers, while others are purely black box autonomous systems, which are uninterpretable and challenging to work with. This article outlines a number of key decisions that need to be considered while producing an intelligent music production system, and identifies some of the assumptions and constraints of each of the various approaches. One of the key aspects to consider in any IMP system is how an individual will interact with the system, and to what extent they can consistently use any IMP tools. The other key aspects are how the target or goal of the system is created and defined, and the manner in which the system directly interacts with audio. The potential for IMP systems to produce new and interesting approaches for analysing and manipulating audio, both for the intended application and creative misappropriation, is considerable

Enhanced Local Moment Formation in a Chiral Luttinger Liquid

We derive here a stability condition for a local moment in the presence of an interacting sea of conduction electrons. The conduction electrons are modeled as a Luttinger liquid in which chirality and spin are coupled. We show that an Anderson-U defect in such an interacting system can be transformed onto a nearly-Fermi liquid problem. We find that correlations among the conduction electrons stabilize the local moment phase. A Schrieffer-Wolff transformation is then performed which results in an anisotropic exchange interaction indicative of the Kondo effect in a Luttinger liquid. The ground-state properties of this model are then equivalent to those of the Kondo model in a Luttinger liquid.Comment: 11 pages, no figure

Understanding Terrorist Organizations with a Dynamic Model

Terrorist organizations change over time because of processes such as recruitment and training as well as counter-terrorism (CT) measures, but the effects of these processes are typically studied qualitatively and in separation from each other. Seeking a more quantitative and integrated understanding, we constructed a simple dynamic model where equations describe how these processes change an organization's membership. Analysis of the model yields a number of intuitive as well as novel findings. Most importantly it becomes possible to predict whether counter-terrorism measures would be sufficient to defeat the organization. Furthermore, we can prove in general that an organization would collapse if its strength and its pool of foot soldiers decline simultaneously. In contrast, a simultaneous decline in its strength and its pool of leaders is often insufficient and short-termed. These results and other like them demonstrate the great potential of dynamic models for informing terrorism scholarship and counter-terrorism policy making.Comment: To appear as Springer Lecture Notes in Computer Science v2: vectorized 4 figures, fixed two typos, more detailed bibliograph

Factors of research groups’ productivity: The case of the Ural Federal University

Relevance. One of the main goals of state university support programs in Russia is to increase the number of scientific publications. In 2021, Project 5-100 was replaced by the program PRIORITY 2030 (Strategic Academic Leadership Program). The new program increased the significance of the factors affecting the number of publications in universities and the issue of the optimal allocation of funding among research groups.Research objective. This study examines the factors that affect the productivity of research groups at the university. Unlike the majority of other studies on this topic, this study analyzes scientific productivity at the level of research groups.Data and methods. The study was possible due to the availability of data for 79 research groups at the Ural Federal University for the period from 2014 to 2020. The total number of articles and the number of articles in journals with an impact factor of more than two were used as indicators of research groups’ performance. To determine the factors influencing these indicators, we used econometric models for panel data. We used two separate samples: for social sciences and humanities and for other sciences.Results. We identified the following factors affecting the performance of research groups: the number of participants, the age of the research group, the supervisor’s scientific age, and the amount of funding (the possibility of obtaining more funds or being denied funds). The most interesting result is the following: the supervisor's scientific age and increased funding have a negative impact on the group’s performance. The article provides possible explanations for these results.Conclusion. Since the purpose of creating and funding research groups is primarily to increase their productivity, the results may be in favor of younger supervisors. University managers may also be interested in the ambiguous impact of increased funding: we suppose that research groups are more motivated not by the actual funding but by the prospective amount they may get