A Cultural Resources Survey for Medina Electric Cooperative, Inc., in Uvalde, Medina, and Frio Counties, Texas

The Center for Archaeological Research (CAR), The University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA), under contract with Alexander Utility Engineering, Inc., (letter dated May 5, 1980), conducted an archaeological survey for the Medina Electric Cooperative, Inc. Although the CAR was contracted in May 1980, at the request of Medina Electric Cooperative, Inc., the actual survey was not carried out until February 25-March 1, 1981. The survey, which was conducted in three neighboring south Texas counties (Fig. 1), was concentrated along proposed electrical distribution lines at D1Hanis in Medina County, north of Uvalde in Uvalde County, and southwest of Pearsall in Frio County. General supervision of the project was provided by Dr. Thomas R. Hester, Director, and Jack D. Eaton, Associate Director, of the CAR-UTSA. The project was carried out by Augustine and Elizabeth Frkuska, Center staff archaeologists

Super-Resolution Imaging by Arrays of High-Index Spheres Embedded in Transparent Matrices

We fabricated thin-films made from polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) with embedded high-index (n~1.9-2.2) microspheres for super-resolution imaging applications. To control the position of microspheres, such films can be translated along the surface of the nanoplasmonic structure to be imaged. Microsphere-assisted imaging, through these matrices, provided lateral resolution of ~{\lambda}/7 in nanoplasmonic dimer arrays with an illuminating wavelength {\lambda}=405 nm. Such thin films can be used as contact optical components to boost the resolution capability of conventional microscopes.Comment: 3 pages, 3 figures, IEEE proceeding of NAECON June 24-27 (2014

An Initial Archaeological Assessment of John James Park, City of San Antonio, Texas

In January, 1977, the City of San Antonio Department of Parks and Recreation (Ronald L. Darner, Director) and the Center for Archaeological Research, The University of Texas at San Antonio (Thomas R. Hester, Director), entered into a contract for the archaeological assessment of John James Park. The park property (Fig. 1), is located just north of Fort Sam Houston, and the eastern boundary fronts on Salado Creek, a major tributary of the San Antonio River. The field survey was carried out under the general supervision of Dr. Thomas R. Hester and Mr. Jack D. Eaton, with the field crew consisting of Elizabeth Cantu Frkuska, Augustine J. Frkuska and Fred Valdez, Jr. The goal of this initial survey was to provide an assessment of archaeological or historical resources that might be present within the confines of the park, and, if such resources were found, to record and evaluate them

Archaeological Test Excavations at 41MV57: The Seco Mines Project, Maverick County, Texas

In mid-February, 1977, an archaeological field team from the Center for Archaeological Research, The University of Texas at San Antonio, conducted investigations at prehistoric site 41 MV 57 in Maverick County, Texas. The site is located along a tributary of Seco Creek and is to be modified by the installation of a sewage collection system (the Seco Mines Project)

Composite-pulse magnetometry with a solid-state quantum sensor

The sensitivity of quantum magnetometers is challenged by control errors and, especially in the solid-state, by their short coherence times. Refocusing techniques can overcome these limitations and improve the sensitivity to periodic fields, but they come at the cost of reduced bandwidth and cannot be applied to sense static (DC) or aperiodic fields. Here we experimentally demonstrate that continuous driving of the sensor spin by a composite pulse known as rotary-echo (RE) yields a flexible magnetometry scheme, mitigating both driving power imperfections and decoherence. A suitable choice of RE parameters compensates for different scenarios of noise strength and origin. The method can be applied to nanoscale sensing in variable environments or to realize noise spectroscopy. In a room-temperature implementation based on a single electronic spin in diamond, composite-pulse magnetometry provides a tunable trade-off between sensitivities in the microT/sqrt(Hz) range, comparable to those obtained with Ramsey spectroscopy, and coherence times approaching T1

Health services research in the public healthcare system in Hong Kong: An analysis of over 1 million antihypertensive prescriptions between 2004-2007 as an example of the potential and pitfalls of using routinely collected electronic patient data

<b>Objectives</b> Increasing use is being made of routinely collected electronic patient data in health services research. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the potential usefulness of a comprehensive database used routinely in the public healthcare system in Hong Kong, using antihypertensive drug prescriptions in primary care as an example.<p></p> <b>Methods</b> Data on antihypertensive drug prescriptions were retrieved from the electronic Clinical Management System (e-CMS) of all primary care clinics run by the Health Authority (HA) in the New Territory East (NTE) cluster of Hong Kong between January 2004 and June 2007. Information was also retrieved on patients’ demographic and socioeconomic characteristics, visit type (new or follow-up), and relevant diseases (International Classification of Primary Care, ICPC codes). <p></p> <b>Results</b> 1,096,282 visit episodes were accessed, representing 93,450 patients. Patients’ demographic and socio-economic details were recorded in all cases. Prescription details for anti-hypertensive drugs were missing in only 18 patients (0.02%). However, ICPC-code was missing for 36,409 patients (39%). Significant independent predictors of whether disease codes were applied included patient age > 70 years (OR 2.18), female gender (OR 1.20), district of residence (range of ORs in more rural districts; 0.32-0.41), type of clinic (OR in Family Medicine Specialist Clinics; 1.45) and type of visit (OR follow-up visit; 2.39). <p></p> In the 57,041 patients with an ICPC-code, uncomplicated hypertension (ICPC K86) was recorded in 45,859 patients (82.1%). The characteristics of these patients were very similar to those of the non-coded group, suggesting that most non-coded patients on antihypertensive drugs are likely to have uncomplicated hypertension. <p></p> <b>Conclusion</b> The e-CMS database of the HA in Hong Kong varies in quality in terms of recorded information. Potential future health services research using demographic and prescription information is highly feasible but for disease-specific research dependant on ICPC codes some caution is warranted. In the case of uncomplicated hypertension, future research on pharmaco-epidemiology (such as prescription patterns) and clinical issues (such as side-effects of medications on metabolic parameters) seems feasible given the large size of the data set and the comparability of coded and non-coded patients

Sporormiella as a tool for detecting the presence of large herbivores in the Neotropics

The reliability of using the abundance of Sporormiella spores as a proxy for the presence and abundance of megaherbivores was tested in southern Brazil. Mud-water interface samples from nine lakes, in which cattle-use was categorized as high, medium, or low, were assayed for Sporormiella representation. The sampling design allowed an analysis of both the influence of the number of animals using the shoreline and the distance of the sampling site from the nearest shoreline. Sporormiella was found to be a reliable proxy for the presence of large livestock. The concentration and abundance of spores declined from the edge of the lake toward the center, with the strongest response being in sites with high livestock use. Consistent with prior studies in temperate regions, we find that Sporormiella spores are a useful proxy to study the extinction of Pleistocene megafauna or the arrival of European livestock in Neotropical landscapes

Distributed MST Computation in the Sleeping Model: Awake-Optimal Algorithms and Lower Bounds

We study the distributed minimum spanning tree (MST) problem, a fundamental problem in distributed computing. It is well-known that distributed MST can be solved in $\tilde{O}(D+\sqrt{n})$ rounds in the standard CONGEST model (where $n$ is the network size and $D$ is the network diameter) and this is essentially the best possible round complexity (up to logarithmic factors). However, in resource-constrained networks such as ad hoc wireless and sensor networks, nodes spending so much time can lead to significant spending of resources such as energy. Motivated by the above consideration, we study distributed algorithms for MST under the \emph{sleeping model} [Chatterjee et al., PODC 2020], a model for design and analysis of resource-efficient distributed algorithms. In the sleeping model, a node can be in one of two modes in any round -- \emph{sleeping} or \emph{awake} (unlike the traditional model where nodes are always awake). Only the rounds in which a node is \emph{awake} are counted, while \emph{sleeping} rounds are ignored. A node spends resources only in the awake rounds and hence the main goal is to minimize the \emph{awake complexity} of a distributed algorithm, the worst-case number of rounds any node is awake. We present deterministic and randomized distributed MST algorithms that have an \emph{optimal} awake complexity of $O(\log n)$ time with a matching lower bound. We also show that our randomized awake-optimal algorithm has essentially the best possible round complexity by presenting a lower bound of $\tilde{\Omega}(n)$ on the product of the awake and round complexity of any distributed algorithm (including randomized) that outputs an MST, where $\tilde{\Omega}$ hides a $1/(\text{polylog } n)$ factor.Comment: 28 pages, 1 table, 5 figures, abstract modified to fit arXiv constraint