Common tongue: The impact of language on economic performance

This paper investigates the impact of language on economic performance. I use the 1956 reorganization of Indian states on linguistic lines as a natural experiment to estimate the impact of speaking the majority language on educational and occupational outcomes. I find that districts that spoke the majority language of the state during colonial times enjoy persistent economic benefits, as evidenced by higher educational achievement and employment in communication intensive sectors. After reorganization, historically minority language districts experience greater growth in educational achievement, indicating that reassignment could reverse the impact of history.Language, Communication costs, Education, Occupational choice, Reorganization of Indian states

CMB anisotropy power spectrum using linear combinations of WMAP maps

In recent years the goal of estimating different cosmological parameters precisely has set new challenges in the effort to accurately measure the angular power spectrum of CMB. This has required removal of foreground contamination as well as detector noise bias with reliability and precision. Recently, a novel {\em model-independent} method for the estimation of CMB angular power spectrum solely from multi-frequency observations has been proposed and implemented on the first year WMAP data by Saha et al. 2006. All previous estimates of power spectrum of CMB are based upon foreground templates using data sets from different experiments. However our methodology demonstrates that {\em CMB angular spectrum can be reliably estimated with precision from a self contained analysis of the WMAP data}. In this work we provide a detailed description of this method. We also study and identify the biases present in our power spectrum estimate. We apply our methodoly to extract the power spectrum from the WMAP 1 year and 3 year data.Comment: 38 pages, 17 figure

Parallel Seismic Ray Tracing

Seismic ray tracing is a common method for understanding and modeling seismic wave propagation. The wavefront construction (WFC) method handles wavefronts instead of individual rays, thereby providing a mechanism to control ray density on the wavefront. In this thesis we present the design and implementation of a parallel wavefront construction algorithm (pWFC) for seismic ray tracing. The proposed parallel algo- rithm is developed using the stapl library for parallel C++ code.We present the idea of modeling ray tubes with an additional ray in the center to facilitate parallelism. The parallel wavefront construction algorithm is applied to wide range of models such as simple synthetic models that enable us to study various aspects of the method while others are intended to be representative of basic geological features such as salt domes. We also present a theoretical model to understand the performance of the pWFC algorithm. We evaluate the performance of the proposed parallel wavefront construction algorithm on an IBM Power 5 cluster. We study the effect of using different mesh types, varying the position of source and their number etc. The method is shown to provide good scalable performance for different models. Load balancing is also shown to be the major factor hindering the performance of the algorithm. We provide two load balancing algorithms to solve the load imbalance problem. These algorithms will be developed as an extension of the current work

Aarogyasri programme: public health insurance and community networks

The burden of non-communicable, tertiary diseases in India is increasing as its population of prosperous and aged people increases. Private health insurance is largely limited to upper middle class patients, while publicly financed health insurance has failed to attract lower-income patients. New evidence from the Aarogyasri Programme in the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh, suggests that community networks may provide an important channel to disseminate information and encourage take up of public health insurance

Genetic Algorithm as a General Approach to Time Tabling Problem

Optimization of Time Table has traditionally and for long been done manually, based on experience of its human solver. Various optimization techniques have been developed for solving specific cases of this problem but no general solution or approach exists as of now. In this paper we present a GA based approach that can be generalized to most of these problems. Timetable for Department of Mechanical Engineering, IIT Guwahati has been solved using this approach as a case study and subsequent results and modifications have been presented in this paper. Keywords: Genetic Algorithm, Time Table proble

A study of lactate and pyruvate levels as reliable indicator of impaired tissue perfusion

Background: Inadequate tissue perfusion leads to raised plasma lactate and pyruvate levels in human body due to anaerobic oxidation in state of stock. Till date, lactate and pyruvate levels have not been extensively used as an indicator for the detection of severity of stock and its outcome. Aims and Objective: This study is an attempt to co-relate Lactate and Pyruvate levels as reliable indicator of severity of impaired tissue perfusion and its outcome in shock patients.Methods: This is a retrospective analysis of a prospective study in which 172 patients were studied in different groups and randomization was done on first come first enrolment basis after having informed consent from the patient or attendants or both. The data collection and storage was done on pre-formed working Performa sheets. Results were analyzed by applying Students –‘t’ test.Results: It was found that Plasma lactate and pyruvate levels are excellent and reliable indicators of impaired tissue perfusion.Conclusions: The study concluded that an early rise in plasma lactate and pyruvate levels is seen in chock patients. Detection of these biochemical parameters value can be taken as a reliable prognostic indicator, which can influence the outcome in the management of shock

Role of fine needle aspiration cytology in bone lesions

Background: FNAC is considered an important procedure in the diagnosis of bone tumors because of its high accuracy. In our study FNA was performed in patients to study the role of FNAC in the diagnosis of bone tumors and to evaluate its usefulness as a diagnostic modality.Methods: Fine needle aspiration was performed on 54 patients whose age ranged between 5 – 75 years with a male to female ratio 1.84 :1 presented with various bone lesions. The bone lesions included 42 (78%) primary lesions, 5 (9.3%) metastatic deposits and 7 (12. 7%) malignancy of related structures involving the bone.Results: 47 biopsy specimens were available for cytohistological correlation and cytological findings of 45 cases correlated with histopathology. The overall diagnostic accuracy was 95.92%, with 100% sensitivity and specificity. The predictive values of positive as well as negative test were 100%.Conclusions: Thus FNA was found to be a safe and an extremely useful, rapid method in the preliminary diagnosis of bone lesions

Membrane transfer process for the creation of low-noise solid state nanopore devices

Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Mechanical Engineering, 2011.Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.Includes bibliographical references (p. 81-83).Nanopore sensors are an emerging technology whereby the modulation of a current trace upon passage of the analyte through the nanopore is used to infer the properties of the analyte. This technology is particularly attractive because it is label-free, rapid, and intrinsically single molecule. However, the ability to infer molecular properties with nanometer precision, either in size or sequencing, is obscured by noise in the measurement. The precision of this inference can be significantly improved by reducing noise and by performing multiple measurements on the same molecule. Solid state nanopores, made in free standing membranes, however, have traditionally exhibited high levels of capacitive noise at 100 kHz bandwidths, as well as poor confinement of the electric field around the nanopore. In this thesis, a novel device concept is designed for creating solid state nanopores whereby the free standing membrane is transferred over a PDMS microchannel. By eliminating the silicon wafer backing, capacitive noise is dramatically reduced. Furthermore, the microchannel confines the electric field outside the nanopore, thereby enhancing the ability to perform multiple measurements.by Tarun Jain.S.M