Multilingual Animacy Classification by Sparse Logistic Regression

This paper presents results from three experiments on automatic animacy classification in Japanese and English. We present experiments that focus on solutions to the problem of reliably classifying a large set of infrequent items using a small number of automatically extracted features. We labeled a set of Japanese nouns as ±animate on the basis of reliable, surface-obvious morphological features, producing an accurately but sparsely labeled data set. To classify these nouns, and to achieve good generalization to other nouns for which we do not have labels, we used feature vectors based on frequency counts of verbargument relations that abstract away from item identity and into class-wide distributional tendencies of the feature set. Grouping items into suffix-based equivalence classes prior to classification increased data coverage and improved classification accuracy. For the items that occur at least once with our feature set, we obtained 95% classification accuracy. We used loanwords to transfer automatically acquired labels from English to classify items that are zerofrequency in the Japanese data set, giving increased precision on inanimate items and increased recall on animate items

Estimating annual soil carbon loss in agricultural peatland soils using a nitrogen budget approach.

Around the world, peatland degradation and soil subsidence is occurring where these soils have been converted to agriculture. Since initial drainage in the mid-1800s, continuous farming of such soils in the California Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta (the Delta) has led to subsidence of up to 8 meters in places, primarily due to soil organic matter (SOM) oxidation and physical compaction. Rice (Oryza sativa) production has been proposed as an alternative cropping system to limit SOM oxidation. Preliminary research on these soils revealed high N uptake by rice in N fertilizer omission plots, which we hypothesized was the result of SOM oxidation releasing N. Testing this hypothesis, we developed a novel N budgeting approach to assess annual soil C and N loss based on plant N uptake and fallow season N mineralization. Through field experiments examining N dynamics during growing season and winter fallow periods, a complete annual N budget was developed. Soil C loss was calculated from SOM-N mineralization using the soil C:N ratio. Surface water and crop residue were negligible in the total N uptake budget (3 - 4 % combined). Shallow groundwater contributed 24 - 33 %, likely representing subsurface SOM-N mineralization. Assuming 6 and 25 kg N ha-1 from atmospheric deposition and biological N2 fixation, respectively, our results suggest 77 - 81 % of plant N uptake (129 - 149 kg N ha-1) was supplied by SOM mineralization. Considering a range of N uptake efficiency from 50 - 70 %, estimated net C loss ranged from 1149 - 2473 kg C ha-1. These findings suggest that rice systems, as currently managed, reduce the rate of C loss from organic delta soils relative to other agricultural practices

Access Management Best Practices

Research has persistently demonstrated that adopting a systematic access management framework improves highway operations and bolsters safety. Many state transportation agencies have adopted formal access management programs to systematize the application of access management techniques, however, the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet (KYTC) been unable to institute such a program due to institutional, regulatory, and political constraints. Recognizing the benefits of judicious access management, the Cabinet asked researchers at the Kentucky Transportation Center (KTC) to identify access management best practices that are effective, can be easily implemented, and are compatible with existing statutes and regulations. After reviewing national-level and state-level guidance on access management, researchers devised an Access Management Toolbox which contains 14 commonly used access management techniques. Using a rating scale of 1 to 5, personnel at KYTC were then asked to rate each technique in terms of its effectiveness and ease of implementation (1 = ineffective and/or difficult to implement; 5 = highly effective and/or easy to adopt). Six techniques garnered scores of 4 or above for both effectiveness and implementation: 1) maintaining sight distance, 2) setting the maximum number of driveways per lot, 3) installing auxiliary turn lanes, 4) protecting the functional area of intersections, 5) adopting turn restrictions, and 6) conducting traffic impact studies. Consistently incorporating these access management techniques into permitting, planning, and design activities will result in the development of an efficient and safe highway system that equitably balances the needs of motorists and property owners

It's Just My History Isn't It? Understanding smart journaling practices

Smart journals are both an emerging class of lifelogging applications and novel digital possessions, which are used to create and curate a personal record of one's life. Through an in-depth interview study of analogue and digital journaling practices, and by drawing on a wide range of research around 'technologies of memory', we address fundamental questions about how people manage and value digital records of the past. Appreciating journaling as deeply idiographic, we map a broad range of user practices and motivations and use this understanding to ground four design considerations: recognizing the motivation to account for one's life; supporting the authoring of a unique perspective and finding a place for passive tracking as a chronicle. Finally, we argue that smart journals signal a maturing orientation to issues of digital archiving

The Lean Supply Chain Now Pilot Demonstration Project

Supplier Networks Working Grou

Tangles, relative character varieties, and holonomy perturbed traceless flat moduli spaces

We prove that the restriction map from the subspace of regular points of the holonomy perturbed SU(2) traceless flat moduli space of a tangle in a 3-manifold to the traceless flat moduli space of its boundary marked surface is a Lagrangian immersion. A key ingredient in our proof is the use of composition in the Weinstein category, combined with the fact that SU(2) holonomy perturbations in a cylinder induce Hamiltonian isotopies. In addition, we show that $(S^2,4)$, the 2-sphere with four marked points, is its own traceless flat SU(2) moduli space.Comment: 20 pages, 1 figure, comments welcom

Community Psychology and the Future of Healthcare

Healthcare reforms and market pressures are rapidly moving U.S. healthcare systems from volume to value, from traditional medicine to population health. In this environment, a new set of skills will be required for organizational success. We believe that community psychologists are uniquely positioned to contribute to these efforts. The purpose of this paper is to explore the relevant practice competencies in the evolving context of health care in the United States. The article summarizes some changes in the U.S. healthcare system, discusses key competencies needed for success and aligns them with competencies identified by community psychologists. Using examples from a large healthcare system in the eastern United States, this article highlights ways in which the healthcare system of the future can benefit from the principles and skills practiced by community psychologists

Community Psychology and the Future of Healthcare

Healthcare reforms and market pressures are rapidly moving U.S. healthcare systems from volume to value, from traditional medicine to population health. In this environment, a new set of skills will be required for organizational success. We believe that community psychologists are uniquely positioned to contribute to these efforts. The purpose of this paper is to explore the relevant practice competencies in the evolving context of health care in the United States. The article summarizes some changes in the U.S. healthcare system, discusses key competencies needed for success and aligns them with competencies identified by community psychologists. Using examples from a large healthcare system in the eastern United States, this article highlights ways in which the healthcare system of the future can benefit from the principles and skills practiced by community psychologists