Close-Coupling and Distorted-Wave Calculations for Electron-Impact Excitation of the (5p⁵6p) States of Xenon

We report on a series of calculations for electron-impact excitation of the (5p56p) states in xenon from the ground state (5p6)1S0 . As in previous calculations for other noble-gas targets, we find strong evidence of channel coupling for all incident energies considered (between threshold and 200 eV ). Although qualitative agreement with the experimental results of Fons and Lin [Phys. Rev. A 58, 4603 (1998)] is achieved, severe quantitative discrepancies of sometimes more than a factor of 2 remain

Hierarchical Optimal Control of a Turning Process - Linearization Approach

Machining process control technologies are currently not well integrated into machine tool controllers and, thus, servomechanism dynamics are often ignored when designing and implementing process controllers. In this paper, a hierarchical controller is developed that simultaneously regulates the servomechanism positions and cutting forces in a lathing operation. The force process and servomechanism system are separated into high and low levels, respectively, in the hierarchy. The high level goal is to maintain a constant cutting force to maximize productivity while not violating a spindle power constraint. This goal is systematically propagated to the lower level and combined with the low level goal to track the reference position. Since there are only control signals at the lower level, in this case the motor voltages, a single controller is designed at the bottom level that will meet both the high level and low level goals. Simulations are conducted to validate the developed methodology

Racial Disparities in the Genetic Landscape of Lung Cancer

Lung cancer has the highest cancer-related mortality worldwide and in the United States. Reduced tobacco consumption and advancement in therapies have led to a modest decline in lung cancer death rates over the past two decades; the overall survival rate is still disappointing.  Moreover, race-associated disparities are also observed, especially in the clinical outcomes. While differences in socioeconomic status and lifestyle could be significant contributing factors, differences in the genetic landscape of lung cancer among different racial groups have also been reported.  In this review, we shed light on the genetic heterogeneity of lung cancer and race-associated differences in genetic alterations to build a framework for future studies to understand the biological basis of lung cancer disparities

Minibatching Offers Improved Generalization Performance for Second Order Optimizers

Training deep neural networks (DNNs) used in modern machine learning is computationally expensive. Machine learning scientists, therefore, rely on stochastic first-order methods for training, coupled with significant hand-tuning, to obtain good performance. To better understand performance variability of different stochastic algorithms, including second-order methods, we conduct an empirical study that treats performance as a response variable across multiple training sessions of the same model. Using 2-factor Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) with interactions, we show that batch size used during training has a statistically significant effect on the peak accuracy of the methods, and that full batch largely performed the worst. In addition, we found that second-order optimizers (SOOs) generally exhibited significantly lower variance at specific batch sizes, suggesting they may require less hyperparameter tuning, leading to a reduced overall time to solution for model training.Comment: 14 pages, 6 figures, 5 table

Urinary Biomarkers: Mitigating Diagnostic Delays of Bladder Cancer in the COVID-19 era

© 2020, Springer Nature Limited. This is the accepted manuscript version of an article which has been published in final form at https://doi.org/10.1038/s41585-020-00419-zThe COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in a substantial increase in waiting times for cystoscopies, prompting concerns of delayed diagnoses and substandard surveillance of bladder cancer. Expanding the role of urinary biomarkers in diagnostic and surveillance pathways could be a strategy to address this problem, and several novel biomarkers have shown promise for this purpose.Peer reviewe

New Rotation Periods in the Pleiades: Interpreting Activity Indicators

We present results of photometric monitoring campaigns of G, K and M dwarfs in the Pleiades carried out in 1994, 1995 and 1996. We have determined rotation periods for 18 stars in this cluster. In this paper, we examine the validity of using observables such as X-ray activity and amplitude of photometric variations as indicators of angular momentum loss. We report the discovery of cool, slow rotators with high amplitudes of variation. This contradicts previous conclusions about the use of amplitudes as an alternate diagnostic of the saturation of angular momentum loss. We show that the X-ray data can be used as observational indicators of mass-dependent saturation in the angular momentum loss proposed on theoretical grounds

State of Working India 2021: One Year of Covid-19

This report documents the impact of one year of Covid-19 in India, on jobs, incomes, inequality, and poverty. It also examines the effectiveness of policy measures that have thus far been undertaken to offer relief and support. Finally, it offers some policy suggestions for the near and medium-term future.When the pandemic hit, the Indian economy was already in the most prolonged slowdown in recent decades. On top of this, there were legacy problems such as a slow rate of job creation and lack of political commitment to improving working conditions which trapped a large section of the workforce without access to any employment security or social protection.Our analysis shows that the pandemic has further increased informality and led to a severe decline in earnings for the majority of workers resulting in a sudden increase in poverty. Women and younger workers have been disproportionately affected. Households have coped by reducing food intake, borrowing, and selling assets. Government relief has helped avoid the most severe forms of distress, but the reach of support measures is incomplete, leaving out some of the most vulnerable workers and households. We find that additional government support is urgently needed now for two reasons - compensating for the losses sustained during the first year and anticipating the impact of the second wave

New rotation periods in the Pleiades: Interpreting activity indicators

We present results of photometric monitoring campaigns of G, K and M dwarfs in the Pleiades carried out in 1994, 1995 and 1996. We have determined rotation periods for 18 stars in this cluster. In this paper, we examine the validity of using observables such as X-ray activity and amplitude of photometric variations as indicators of angular momentum loss. We report the discovery of cool, slow rotators with high amplitudes of variation. This contradicts previous conclusions about the use of amplitudes as an alternate diagnostic of the saturation of angular momentum loss. We show that the X-ray data can be used as observational indicators of mass-dependent saturation in the angular momentum loss proposed on theoretical grounds.Comment: 24 pages, LaTex (AASTeX); includes 8 postscript figures and 4 Latex tables. To appear in ApJ, Feb. 1, 1998. Postscript version of preprint can be obtained from http://casa.colorado.edu/~anitak/pubs.htm