AUGUR: Forecasting the Emergence of New Research Topics

Being able to rapidly recognise new research trends is strategic for many stakeholders, including universities, institutional funding bodies, academic publishers and companies. The literature presents several approaches to identifying the emergence of new research topics, which rely on the assumption that the topic is already exhibiting a certain degree of popularity and consistently referred to by a community of researchers. However, detecting the emergence of a new research area at an embryonic stage, i.e., before the topic has been consistently labelled by a community of researchers and associated with a number of publications, is still an open challenge. We address this issue by introducing Augur, a novel approach to the early detection of research topics. Augur analyses the diachronic relationships between research areas and is able to detect clusters of topics that exhibit dynamics correlated with the emergence of new research topics. Here we also present the Advanced Clique Percolation Method (ACPM), a new community detection algorithm developed specifically for supporting this task. Augur was evaluated on a gold standard of 1,408 debutant topics in the 2000-2011 interval and outperformed four alternative approaches in terms of both precision and recall

Preparing Students to Solve Challenges Related to a Changing Climate

The National Academy of Engineering has identified restoring and improving urban infrastructure as one of the grand challenges for engineering. Urban coastal communities are particularly at risk as their infrastructure is experiencing frequent inundation related to climate change impacts. Rising sea levels in coastal communities create backflow into stormwater systems and deplete capacity. In addition, the increase in rainfall intensity, duration, and frequency related to climate change create additional challenges for aging infrastructure systems. To prepare students to solve these challenges, the Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEE) and Civil Engineering Technology (CET) programs at Old Dominion University (ODU) are introducing a new minor titled Engineering Solutions for Climate Adaptation and Resilience. This minor ensures that graduates understand how climate is changing, how it will impact society, and what solutions can be adopted to mitigate the impacts of climate change. The minor will incorporate two new classes, Managing the Climate Crisis, which will provide an understanding of climate science, the impacts, the associated hazards, and what solutions can be adopted to mitigate the impacts of climate change, and Adaptation to Sea Level Rise, which will explore solutions at the community and individual property scale to mitigate stormwater impacts related to climate change. The approach balances theory with practical engineering and technology solutions which can be adopted to mitigate the impacts of climate change related to stormwater in coastal communities. The minor is supported by existing courses in both curriculums related to sustainability, pollution prevention and green engineering, hydrology and hydraulics, and coastal engineering. This paper describes the need for the minor, the minor requirements, the methodology for establishing what coursework the minor requires, and the minor\u27s availability to students. Furthermore, the learning objectives and course outlines for the two proposed courses that will be developed to support the minor will be thoroughly discussed. The new minor is part of a broader research, engagement, and education initiative at ODU to support adaptation and resilience for coastal communities

Simultaneous Embeddings with Few Bends and Crossings

A simultaneous embedding with fixed edges (SEFE) of two planar graphs $R$ and $B$ is a pair of plane drawings of $R$ and $B$ that coincide when restricted to the common vertices and edges of $R$ and $B$. We show that whenever $R$ and $B$ admit a SEFE, they also admit a SEFE in which every edge is a polygonal curve with few bends and every pair of edges has few crossings. Specifically: (1) if $R$ and $B$ are trees then one bend per edge and four crossings per edge pair suffice (and one bend per edge is sometimes necessary), (2) if $R$ is a planar graph and $B$ is a tree then six bends per edge and eight crossings per edge pair suffice, and (3) if $R$ and $B$ are planar graphs then six bends per edge and sixteen crossings per edge pair suffice. Our results improve on a paper by Grilli et al. (GD'14), which proves that nine bends per edge suffice, and on a paper by Chan et al. (GD'14), which proves that twenty-four crossings per edge pair suffice.Comment: Full version of the paper "Simultaneous Embeddings with Few Bends and Crossings" accepted at GD '1

Screening Non-Saccharomyces Yeasts as Low Ethanol Producing Starter Cultures

Non-Saccharomyces yeasts are known for their low fermentation rate in comparison to Saccharomyces cerevisiae.  In this study, non-Saccharomyces yeasts were inoculated into Chenin blanc grape must and fermented under aerobic and anaerobic conditions.  Saccharomycodes ludwigii displayed a strain-dependent fermentation rate, which yielded between 5.2% and 9.9% ethanol concentration under both conditions, albeit with residual sugar.  Aerobic conditions favoured the production of reduced ethanol which was between 5.8% and 9.7% for non-Saccharomyces yeasts in comparison to S. cerevisiae (10%).  This trend was observed for Wickerhamomyces anomalus, Stamerella bacillaris (Candida zemplinina), Metshnikowia pulcherrima, Cyberlindnera saturnus, Wickerhamomyces subpelliculosus and Cyberlindnera jadinii.  The laboratory-scale wines prepared with the aforementioned yeasts yielded ripe fruit and floral aroma attributes while other non-Saccharomyces yeasts resulted in wines with spicy, acidic and solvent aroma notes

Evaluation of Toxicity, Bioavailability and Speciation of Lead, Zinc and Cadmium in Mine/Mill Wastewaters

The toxicity of common compounds of lead, cadmium and zinc was evaluated in waters similar to that found in the world\u27s largest lead producing area in Missouri. Static, acute toxicity tests were performed using fathead minnows (Pimephales promelas) and water fleas (Daphnia magna) respectively. Test organisms were subjected to varying amounts of sulfide, carbonate, chloride and sulfate salts of lead, zinc and cadmium mixed in hard, alkaline waters typical to this region. Median lethal concentrations were calculated using nominal versus measured metal concentrations. Measured metal concentrations included four different metal fractionation (extraction/filtration) techniques at different pH levels which included dissolved , available , easily dissolved and total metals. Most consistent correlations between mortality and metal concentrations were found with the Total or Nominal values. The Easily Dissolved metals which corresponded to acid soluble criteria did not effectively represent toxicity and bioavailability of metals. A metal speciation model, MINTEQA2, was used to predict the concentrations of the dissolved metal species at the pH levels commonly seen in the toxicity test vessels. MINTEQ model results suggested that analysis of metals in aqueous environment is better understood when examining speciation characteristics and would likewise be a better mechanism to develop site-specific water quality criteria for metals

ToF-SIMS depth profiling analysis of the uptake of Ba2+ and Co2+ ions by natural kaolinite clay

The sorption behavior of Ba2+ and Co2+ ions on a natural clay sample rich in kaolinite was studied using time-of-flight secondary ion mass spectrometry (ToF-SIMS). Depth profiling at 10-Å steps was performed up to a 70-Å matrix depth of the clay prior to and following sorption. The results showed that Co2+ is sorbed in slightly larger quantities than Ba2+, with significant numbers of ions fixed on the outermost surface of the clay. Depletion of the ions K+, Mg 2+, and Ca2+ from the clay lattice was observed to accompany enrichment with Co2+ and Ba2+ ions. The data obtained using X-ray powder diffraction (XRPD) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM) indicated insignificant structural and morphological changes in the lattice of the clay upon sorption of both Ba2+ and Co2+ ions. Analysis using energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDS) showed that the average atomic percentage (±S.D.) of Ba and Co on kaolinite surface were 0.49±0.11 and 0.61±0.19, respectively, indicating a limited uptake capacity of natural kaolinite for both ions. © 2004 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved

TOF-SIMS study of Cs+ sorption on natural kaolinite

The sorption of Cs+ on natural kaolinite has been studied using time-of-flight secondary ion mass spectrometry (TOF-SIMS). Depth profiling up to 70 Å was performed to study the change in the amount of sorbed Cs+ as a function of depth in the kaolinite matrix. Quantitative determination of the amounts of primary cations in the kaolinite structure before and after sorption of Cs+ ions was carried out to identify which cations are possibly taking part in the sorption process. The experimental results showed that large amounts of Cs+ are sorbed onto the surface of kaolinite and that sorption decreases sharply over the first 10-Å depth. The fact that kaolinite surface was negatively charged under the operating pH indicates that physisorption has an important contribution to the sorption process. The results also showed that Na+, K+, Li+, Ca2+, Mg2+ and Fe3+ were involved in the sorption process with Cs+ and that the total decrease in the amounts of these cations is close to the amount of sorbed Cs+, suggesting that ion exchange is the dominant sorption mechanism. Copyright (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved

Surface spectroscopic studies of Cs+, and Ba2+ sorption on chlorite-illite mixed clay

The sorption behavior of Cs+, and Ba2+ on natural clay was investigated using ToF-SIMS, XPS, and XRD. The natural clay was composed mainly of chlorite and illite in addition to quartz and calcite. Depth profiling up to 70 Å was performed at 10 Å steps utilizing ToF-SIMS to study the amount of sorbed Cs+ and Ba2+ as a function of depth in the clay matrix. The results suggest that Cs+ and Ba2+ ions were sorbed primarily by ion exchange coupled with hydrolytic sorption. According to ToF-SIMS and XPS results, the total sorbed amount of Ba2+ was larger than that of Cs+. Quantitative determination of the primary cations within the analyzed clay before and after sorption indicated that for Ba2+ sorption, Ca2+, Mg2+ and for Cs+ sorption Ca2+, K+ were the major exchanging ions. The XRD spectra of Ba-sorbed clay contained new peaks that were identified as BaCO3

Adverse Childhood Life Events and Postpartum Psychosis in Bipolar Disorder

Background Women with bipolar disorder are at increased risk of postpartum psychosis. Adverse childhood life events have been associated with depression in the postpartum period, but have been little studied in relation to postpartum psychosis. In this study we investigated whether adverse childhood life events are associated with postpartum psychosis in a large sample of women with bipolar I disorder. Methods Participants were 432 parous women with DSM-IV bipolar I disorder recruited into the Bipolar Disorder Research Network (www.BDRN.org). Diagnoses and lifetime psychopathology, including perinatal episodes, were obtained via a semi-structured interview (Schedules for Clinical Assessment in Neuropsychiatry; Wing et al., 1990) and case-notes. Adverse childhood life events were assessed via self-report and case-notes, and compared between women with postpartum psychosis (n=208) and those without a lifetime history of perinatal mood episodes (n=224). Results There was no significant difference in the rate of any adverse childhood life event, including childhood sexual abuse, or in the total number of adverse childhood life events between women who experienced postpartum psychosis and those without a lifetime history of perinatal mood episodes, even after controlling for demographic and clinical differences between the groups. Limitations Adverse childhood life events were assessed in adulthood and therefore may be subject to recall errors. Conclusions We found no evidence for an association between adverse childhood life events and the occurrence of postpartum psychosis. Our data suggest that, unlike postpartum depression, childhood adversity does not play a significant role in the triggering of postpartum psychosis in women with bipolar disorder

DADA: Degree-Aware Algorithms for Network-Based Disease Gene Prioritization

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>High-throughput molecular interaction data have been used effectively to prioritize candidate genes that are linked to a disease, based on the observation that the products of genes associated with similar diseases are likely to interact with each other heavily in a network of protein-protein interactions (PPIs). An important challenge for these applications, however, is the incomplete and noisy nature of PPI data. Information flow based methods alleviate these problems to a certain extent, by considering indirect interactions and multiplicity of paths.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We demonstrate that existing methods are likely to favor highly connected genes, making prioritization sensitive to the skewed degree distribution of PPI networks, as well as ascertainment bias in available interaction and disease association data. Motivated by this observation, we propose several statistical adjustment methods to account for the degree distribution of known disease and candidate genes, using a PPI network with associated confidence scores for interactions. We show that the proposed methods can detect loosely connected disease genes that are missed by existing approaches, however, this improvement might come at the price of more false negatives for highly connected genes. Consequently, we develop a suite called D<smcaps>A</smcaps>D<smcaps>A</smcaps>, which includes different uniform prioritization methods that effectively integrate existing approaches with the proposed statistical adjustment strategies. Comprehensive experimental results on the Online Mendelian Inheritance in Man (OMIM) database show that D<smcaps>A</smcaps>D<smcaps>A</smcaps> outperforms existing methods in prioritizing candidate disease genes.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>These results demonstrate the importance of employing accurate statistical models and associated adjustment methods in network-based disease gene prioritization, as well as other network-based functional inference applications. D<smcaps>A</smcaps>D<smcaps>A</smcaps> is implemented in Matlab and is freely available at <url>http://compbio.case.edu/dada/</url>.</p