Global atmospheric circulation statistics: Four year averages

Four year averages of the monthly mean global structure of the general circulation of the atmosphere are presented in the form of latitude-altitude, time-altitude, and time-latitude cross sections. The numerical values are given in tables. Basic parameters utilized include daily global maps of temperature and geopotential height for 18 pressure levels between 1000 and 0.4 mb for the period December 1, 1978 through November 30, 1982 supplied by NOAA/NMC. Geopotential heights and geostrophic winds are constructed using hydrostatic and geostrophic formulae. Meridional and vertical velocities are calculated using thermodynamic and continuity equations. Fields presented in this report are zonally averaged temperature, zonal, meridional, and vertical winds, and amplitude of the planetary waves in geopotential height with zonal wave numbers 1-3. The northward fluxes of sensible heat and eastward momentum by the standing and transient eddies along with their wavenumber decomposition and Eliassen-Palm flux propagation vectors and divergences by the standing and transient eddies along with their wavenumber decomposition are also given. Large interhemispheric differences and year-to-year variations are found to originate in the changes in the planetary wave activity

Troposphere-stratosphere (surface-55 km) monthly general circulation statistics for the Northern Hemisphere-four year averages

This report presents four year averages of monthly mean Northern Hemisphere general circulation statistics for the period from 1 December 1978 through 30 November 1982. Computations start with daily maps of temperature for 18 pressure levels between 1000 and 0.4 mb that were supplied by NOAA/NMC. Geopotential height and geostrophic wind are constructed using the hydrostatic and geostrophic formulae. Fields presented in this report are zonally averaged temperature, mean zonal wind, and amplitude and phase of the planetary waves in geopotential height with zonal wavenumbers 1-3. The northward fluxes of heat and eastward momentum by the standing and transient eddies along with their wavenumber decomposition and Eliassen-Palm flux propagation vectors and divergences by the standing and transient eddies along with their wavenumber decomposition are also given. Large annual and interannual variations are found in each quantity especially in the stratosphere in accordance with the changes in the planetary wave activity. The results are shown both in graphic and tabular form

A simple scheme to improve the efficiency of referenda

This paper proposes a simple scheme designed to elicit and reward intensity of preferences in referenda: voters faced with a number of binary proposals are given one regular vote for each proposal plus an additional number of bonus votes to cast as desired. Decisions are taken according to the majority of votes cast. In our base case, where there is no systematic difference between proposals' supporters and opponents, there is always a positive number of bonus votes such that ex ante utility is increased by the scheme, relative to simple majority voting. When the distributions of valuations of supporters and opponents differ, the improvement in efficiency is guaranteed if the distributions can be ranked according to first order stochastic dominance. If they are, however, the existence of welfare gains is independent of the exact number of bonus votes

Strongly Coupled Quark Gluon Plasma (SCQGP)

We propose that the reason for the non-ideal behavior seen in lattice simulation of quark gluon plasma (QGP) and relativistic heavy ion collisions (URHICs) experiments is that the QGP near T_c and above is strongly coupled plasma (SCP), i.e., strongly coupled quark gluon plasma (SCQGP). It is remarkable that the widely used equation of state (EoS) of SCP in QED (quantum electrodynamics) very nicely fits lattice results on all QGP systems, with proper modifications to include color degrees of freedom and running coupling constant. Results on pressure in pure gauge, 2-flavors and 3-flavors QGP, are all can be explained by treating QGP as SCQGP as demonstated here.Energy density and speed of sound are also presented for all three systems. We further extend the model to systems with finite quark mass and a reasonably good fit to lattice results are obtained for (2+1)-flavors and 4-flavors QGP. Hence it is the first unified model, namely SCQGP, to explain the non-ideal QGP seen in lattice simulations with just two system dependent parameters.Comment: Revised with corrections and new results, Latex file (11 pages), postscript file of 7 figure

Protecting Minorities in Binary Elections

Democratic systems are built, with good reason, on majoritarian principles, but their legitimacy requires the protection of strongly held minority preferences. The challenge is to do so while treating every voter equally and preserving aggregate welfare. One possible solution is storable votes: granting each voter a budget of votes to cast as desired over multiple decisions. During the 2006 student elections at Columbia University, we tested a simple version of this idea: voters were asked to rank the importance of the different contests and to choose where to cast a single extra "bonus vote," had one been available. We used these responses to construct distributions of intensities and electoral outcomes, both without and with the bonus vote. Bootstrapping techniques provided estimates of the probable impact of the bonus vote. The bonus vote performs well: when minority preferences are particularly intense, the minority wins at least one of the contests with 15.30 percent probability; and, when the minority wins, aggregate welfare increases with 85.95 percent probability. When majority and minority preferences are equally intense, the effect of the bonus vote is smaller and more variable but on balance still positive

Sequential bilateral central retinal vein occlusions in a cystic fibrosis patient with hyperhomocysteinemia and hypergamma-globulinemia

PURPOSE: To report a case of sequential bilateral central retinal vein occlusions in a cystic fibrosis patient with hyperhomocysteinemia and hypergamma-globulinemia over 6 years of follow up. METHODS: Observational case report of one patient. RESULTS: A 31 year-old male with a history of cystic fibrosis presented with a central retinal vein occlusion (CRVO) in his left eye, followed by a CRVO in his right eye 4 years later. His medical workup was significant for elevated levels of homocysteine and gamma-globulins, which coincided with initiation of intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIG) proceeding his second CRVO. CONCLUSIONS: We describe a case of sequential bilateral central retinal vein occlusions in a cystic fibrosis patient with hyperhomocysteinemia and hypergamma-globulinemia over 6 years of follow up and discuss the important role of these risk factors in retinal venous occlusive disease

Detection of trend changes in time series using Bayesian inference

Change points in time series are perceived as isolated singularities where two regular trends of a given signal do not match. The detection of such transitions is of fundamental interest for the understanding of the system's internal dynamics. In practice observational noise makes it difficult to detect such change points in time series. In this work we elaborate a Bayesian method to estimate the location of the singularities and to produce some confidence intervals. We validate the ability and sensitivity of our inference method by estimating change points of synthetic data sets. As an application we use our algorithm to analyze the annual flow volume of the Nile River at Aswan from 1871 to 1970, where we confirm a well-established significant transition point within the time series.Comment: 9 pages, 12 figures, submitte

An experimental study of storable votes

The storable votes mechanism is a method of voting for committees that meet periodically to consider a series of binary decisions. Each member is allocated a fixed budget of votes to be cast as desired over the multiple decisions. Voters are induced to spend more votes on those decisions that matter to them most, shifting the ex ante probability of winning away from decisions they value less and towards decisions they value more, typically generating welfare gains over standard majority voting with non-storable votes. The equilibrium strategies have a very intuitive feature-the number of votes cast must be monotonic in the voter's intensity of preferences-but are otherwise difficult to calculate, raising questions of practical implementation. In our experiments, realized efficiency levels were remarkably close to theoretical equilibrium predictions, while subjects adopted monotonic but off-equilibrium strategies. We are lead to conclude that concerns about the complexity of the game may have limited practical relevance

THERMAL RADIATION FROM MAGNETIZED NEUTRON STARS: A look at the Surface of a Neutron Star.

Surface thermal emission has been detected by ROSAT from four nearby young neutron stars. Assuming black body emission, the significant pulsations of the observed light curves can be interpreted as due to large surface temperature differences produced by the effect of the crustal magnetic field on the flow of heat from the hot interior toward the cooler surface. However, the energy dependence of the modulation observed in Geminga is incompatible with blackbody emission: this effect will give us a strong constraint on models of the neutron star surface.Comment: 10 pages. tar-compressed and uuencoded postcript file. talk given at the `Jubilee Gamow Seminar', St. Petersburg, Sept. 1994

Protecting Minorities in Large Binary Elections: A Test of Storable Votes Using Field Data

The legitimacy of democratic systems requires the protection of minority preferences while ideally treating every voter equally. During the 2006 student elections at Columbia University, we asked voters to rank the importance of different contests and to choose where to cast a single extra "bonus vote," had one been available — a simple version of Storable Votes. We then constructed distributions of intensities and electoral outcomes and estimated the probable impact of the bonus vote through bootstrapping techniques. The bonus vote performs well: when minority preferences are particularly intense, the minority wins at least one contest with 15-30 percent probability; when the minority wins, aggregate welfare increases with 85-95 percent probability. The paper makes two contributions: it tests the performance of storable votes in a setting where preferences were not controlled, and it suggests the use of bootstrapping techniques when appropriate replications of the data cannot be obtained