Can UT Austin Play a Role in Cuba's Academic Future? And Vice Versa?

Latin American Studie

A Rare Phone Call from One President to Another

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Capitalism After Socialism in Cuba

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The Future of Cuba-Texas Relations

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Che Guevara’s Last Interview

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Importance of including small body spin effects in the modelling of intermediate mass-ratio inspirals. II Accurate parameter extraction of strong sources using higher-order spin effects

We improve the numerical kludge waveform model introduced in [1] in two ways. We extend the equations of motion for spinning black hole binaries derived by Saijo et al. [2] using spin-orbit and spin-spin couplings taken from perturbative and post-Newtonian (PN) calculations at the highest order available. We also include first-order conservative self-force corrections for spin-orbit and spin-spin couplings, which are derived by comparison to PN results. We generate the inspiral evolution using fluxes that include the most recent calculations of small body spin corrections, spin-spin and spin-orbit couplings and higher-order fits to solutions of the Teukolsky equation. Using a simplified version of this model in [1], we found that small body spin effects could be measured through gravitational wave observations from intermediate-mass ratio inspirals (IMRIs) with mass ratio eta ~ 0.001, when both binary components are rapidly rotating. In this paper we study in detail how the spin of the small/big body affects parameter measurement using a variety of mass and spin combinations for typical IMRIs sources. We find that for IMRI events of a moderately rotating intermediate mass black hole (IMBH) of ten thousand solar masses, and a rapidly rotating central supermassive black hole (SMBH) of one million solar masses, gravitational wave observations made with LISA at a fixed signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of 1000 will be able to determine the inspiralling IMBH mass, the central SMBH mass, the SMBH spin magnitude, and the IMBH spin magnitude to within fractional errors of ~0.001, 0.001, 0.0001, and 9%, respectively. LISA can also determine the location of the source in the sky and the SMBH spin orientation to within ~0.0001 steradians. We show that by including conservative corrections up to 2.5PN order, systematic errors no longer dominate over statistical errors for IMRIs with typical SNR ~1000.Comment: 21 pages, 7 figures. v2: three references added, edits in Sections II-V, including additional results in Section V to address comments by the referee. v3: mirrors version accepted to PR

A rank based social norms model of how people judge their levels of drunkenness whilst intoxicated

Background: A rank based social norms model predicts that drinkers’ judgements about their drinking will be based on the rank of their breath alcohol level amongst that of others in the immediate environment, rather than their actual breath alcohol level, with lower relative rank associated with greater feelings of safety. This study tested this hypothesis and examined how people judge their levels of drunkenness and the health consequences of their drinking whilst they are intoxicated in social drinking environments. Methods: Breath alcohol testing of 1,862 people (mean age = 26.96 years; 61.86 % male) in drinking environments. A subset (N = 400) also answered four questions asking about their perceptions of their drunkenness and the health consequences of their drinking (plus background measures). Results: Perceptions of drunkenness and the health consequences of drinking were regressed on: (a) breath alcohol level, (b) the rank of the breath alcohol level amongst that of others in the same environment, and (c) covariates. Only rank of breath alcohol level predicted perceptions: How drunk they felt (b 3.78, 95 % CI 1.69 5.87), how extreme they regarded their drinking that night (b 3.7, 95 % CI 1.3 6.20), how at risk their long-term health was due to their current level of drinking (b 4.1, 95 % CI 0.2 8.0) and how likely they felt they would experience liver cirrhosis (b 4.8. 95 % CI 0.7 8.8). People were more influenced by more sober others than by more drunk others. Conclusion: Whilst intoxicated and in drinking environments, people base judgements regarding their drinking on how their level of intoxication ranks relative to that of others of the same gender around them, not on their actual levels of intoxication. Thus, when in the company of others who are intoxicated, drinkers were found to be more likely to underestimate their own level of drinking, drunkenness and associated risks. The implications of these results, for example that increasing the numbers of sober people in night time environments could improve subjective assessments of drunkenness, are discussed

Endoscopy International Open

Background and study aim Magnetic imaging technology is of proven benefit to trainees in colonoscopy, but few studies have examined its benefits in experienced hands. There is evidence that colonoscopy is more difficult in women. We set out to investigate (i) associations between the looping configurations in the proximal and distal colon and (ii) differences in the looping prevalence between the sexes. We have examined their significance in terms of segmental intubation times and position changes required for the completion of colonoscopy. Patients and methods We analyzed 103 consecutive synchronized luminal and magnetic image videos of diagnostic colonoscopies with normal anatomy undertaken by a single experienced operator. Results Deep transverse loops and sigmoid N-loops were more common in females. A deep transverse loop was more likely to be present if a sigmoid alpha-loop or N-loop had formed previously. Patients with sigmoid N-loops were turned more frequently from left lateral to supine before the sigmoid-descending junction was reached, but there was no statistical correlation between completion time and looping pattern. Conclusions This study has reexamined the prevalence of the common looping patterns encountered during colonoscopy and has identified differences between the sexes. This finding may offer an explanation as to why colonoscopy has been shown to be more difficult in females. Although a deep transverse loop following a resolved sigmoid alpha loop was the most commonly encountered pattern, no statistical correlation between completion time and looping pattern could be shown. It is the first study to examine segmental completion times using a magnetic imager in expert hands