County-Specific Net Migration by Five-Year Age Groups, Hispanic Origin, Race and Sex 2000-2010

This report documents the methodology used to prepare county-level, net migration estimates by five-year age cohorts and sex, and by race and Hispanic origin, for the intercensal period from 2000 to 2010. The estimates were prepared using a vital statistics version of the forward cohort residual method (Siegel and Hamilton 1952) following the techniques used to prepare the 1990 to 2000 net migration estimates (Voss, McNiven, Johnson, Hammer, and Fuguitt 2004) as described in detail below. These numbers (and the net migration rates derivable from them) extend the set of decennial estimates of net migration that have been produced following each decennial census beginning with 1960 (net migration for the 1950s: Bowles and Tarver, 1965; 1960s: Bowles, Beale and Lee, 1975; 1970s: White, Mueser and Tierney, 1987; 1980s: Fuguitt, Beale, and Voss 2010; and 1990s: Voss, McNiven, Hammer, Johnson and Fuguitt, 2004)

Differential Privacy and the Accuracy of County-Level Net Migration Estimates

Each decade since the 1950s, demographers have generated high-quality net migration estimates by age, sex, and race for US counties using decennial census data as starting and ending populations. The estimates have been downloaded tens of thousands of times and widely used for planning, diverse applications, and research. Census 2020 should allow the series to extend through the 2010–2020 decade. The accuracy of new estimates, however, could be challenged by differentially private (DP) disclosure avoidance techniques in Census 2020 data products. This research brief estimates the impact of DP implementation on the accuracy of county-level net migration estimates. Using differentially private Census 2010 demonstration data, we construct a hypothetical set of DP migration estimates for 2000–2010 and compare them to published estimates, using common accuracy metrics and spatial analysis. Findings show that based on demonstration data released in 2020, net migration estimates by five-year age groups would only be accurate enough for use in about half of counties. Inaccuracies are larger in counties with populations less than 50,000, among age groups 65 and over, and among Hispanics. These problems are not fully resolved by grouping into broader age groups. Moreover, errors tend to cluster spatially in some regions of the country. Ultimately, the ability to generate accurate net migration estimates at the same level of detail as in the past will depend on the Census Bureau’s allocation of the privacy loss budget

Exploring a New Population of Compact Objects: X-ray and IR Observations of the Galactic Centre

I describe the IR and X-ray observational campaign we have undertaken for the purpose of determining the nature of the faint discrete X-ray source population discovered by Chandra in the Galactic Center (GC). Data obtained for this project includes a deep Chandra survey of the Galactic Bulge; deep, high resolution IR imaging from VLT/ISAAC, CTIO/ISPI, and the UKIDSS Galactic Plane Survey (GPS); and IR spectroscopy from VLT/ISAAC and IRTF/SpeX. By cross-correlating the GC X-ray imaging from Chandra with our IR surveys, we identify candidate counterparts to the X-ray sources via astrometry. Using a detailed IR extinction map, we are deriving magnitudes and colors for all the candidates. Having thus established a target list, we will use the multi-object IR spectrograph FLAMINGOS-2 on Gemini-South to carry out a spectroscopic survey of the candidate counterparts, to search for emission line signatures which are a hallmark of accreting binaries. By determining the nature of these X-ray sources, this FLAMINGOS-2 Galactic Center Survey will have a dramatic impact on our knowledge of the Galactic accreting binary population.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures, to appear in the Proceedings of The Second Kolkata Conference on Observational Evidence for Black Holes in the Universe'', ed. S. Charkrabarti, Kolkata, India; AIP Conf. Serie

A Scale-Separated Dynamic Mode Decomposition From Observations of the Ionospheric Electron Density Profile

We present a method for modeling a time series of ionospheric electron density profiles using modal decompositions. Our method is based on the Dynamic Mode Decomposition (DMD), which provides a means of determining spatiotemporal modes from measurements alone. DMD-derived models can be easily updated as new data is recorded and do not require any physics to inform the dynamics. However, in the case of ionospheric profiles, we find a wide range of oscillations, including some far above the diurnal frequency. Therefore, we propose nontrivial extensions to DMD using multiresolution analysis (MRA) via wavelet decompositions. We call this method the Scale-Separated Dynamic Mode Decomposition (SSDMD) since the MRA isolates fluctuations at different scales within the time series into separated components. We show that this method provides a stable reconstruction of the mean plasma density and can be used to predict the state of the vertical profile at future time steps. We demonstrate the SSDMD method on data sets covering periods of high and low solar activity.Comment: 26 pages, 16 figure

Time, monetary and other costs of participation in family-based child weight management interventions: qualitative and systematic review evidence.

BACKGROUND: Childhood overweight and obesity have health and economic impacts on individuals and the wider society. Families participating in weight management programmes may foresee or experience monetary and other costs which deter them from signing up to or completing programmes. This is recognised in the health economics literature, though within this sparse body of work, costs to families are often narrowly defined and not fully accounted for. A societal perspective incorporating a broader array of costs may provide a more accurate picture. This paper brings together a review of the health economics literature on the costs to families attending child weight management programmes with qualitative data from families participating in a programme to manage child overweight and obesity. METHODS: A search identified economic evaluation studies of lifestyle interventions in childhood obesity. The qualitative work drew on interviews with families who attended a weight management intervention in three UK regions. RESULTS: We identified four cost-effectiveness analyses that include information on costs to families. These were categorised as direct (e.g. monetary) and indirect (e.g. time) costs. Our analysis of qualitative data demonstrated that, for families who attended the programme, costs were associated both with participation on the scheme and with maintaining a healthy lifestyle afterwards. Respondents reported three kinds of cost: time-related, social/emotional and monetary. CONCLUSION: Societal approaches to measuring cost-effectiveness provide a framework for assessing the monetary and non-monetary costs borne by participants attending treatment programmes. From this perspective, all costs should be considered in any analysis of cost-effectiveness. Our data suggest that family costs are important, and may act as a barrier to the uptake, completion and maintenance of behaviours to reduce child obesity. These findings have implications for the development and implementation of child weight initiatives in particular, in relation to reducing inequalities in health

Spatial variation in poverty-generating processes: Child poverty in the United States

This study builds on research demonstrating that sub-regions within the United States have different processes that abet poverty and that child poverty is spatially differentiated. We focus on the social attributes of the local area to assess what the geographic place represents in terms of social characteristics, namely racial/ethnic composition and economic structure, and to resolve apparent inconsistencies in poverty research. Using spatial regime and spatial error regression techniques to analyze county census data, we examine spatial differentiation in the relationships that generate child poverty. Our approach addresses the conceptual and technical aspects of spatial inequality. Results show that local-area processes are at play with implications for more nuanced theoretical models and anti-poverty policies that consider systematic differences in factors contributing to child poverty according to the racial/ethnic and economic contexts

Early conscious prone positioning in patients with COVID-19 receiving continuous positive airway pressure: A retrospective analysis

The global pandemic of COVID-19 has challenged the management of hypoxaemic respiratory failure and strained intensive care unit resources. While prone positioning (PP) is an established therapy in mechanically ventilated patients with acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), its role in conscious patients is less well defined. We retrospectively reviewed our experience of implementing early PP in a cohort of 24 patients with acute hypoxaemic respiratory failure due to COVID-19 who required support with continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP). The use of PP alongside CPAP significantly increased both the ROX index and arterial oxygen pressure:fractional inspired oxygen (PaO 2:FiO 2) ratio from baseline values (ROX index: 7.0±2.5 baseline vs 11.4±3.7 CPAP+PP,

Design-for-Testing for Improved Remanufacturability

By definition, a remanufactured product must perform to the same (or higher) level as the original product, and must therefore be issued a warranty of the same (or longer) duration. However, many components of remanufactured products will have been subjected to regular stresses in their first cycle of use and may exhibit unseen signs of damage at a microstructural level. This may not affect the remanufactured product’s performance initially but could cause it to fail before its renewed warranty expires. To combat this, we propose that the integrity of individual components is assessed non-destructively before storage. However, lack of remanufacture specific tools and techniques; particularly non-destructive tools, are major hindrances. Furthermore, ease of non-destructive testing (NDT) is not currently a consideration in the design of components; components with complex geometries may therefore be difficult to test. This paper presents, for the first time, a framework for including NDT suitability as a design criterion at the outset in the component’s lifecycle, where the geometry and surface accessibility of the component are optimised for future assessment. Ensuring that components can be easily inspected would not only allow increased confidence in the structural integrity of remanufactured products, but it would also extend the range of products suitable for remanufacturing. This paper serves as a proof of concept, examining simple inspection scenarios in order to demonstrate how the shape of components and data acquisition geometries can adversely affect the coverage of ultrasonic NDT