The Lyot Project Direct Imaging Survey of Substellar Companions: Statistical Analysis and Information from Nondetections

The Lyot project used an optimized Lyot coronagraph with Extreme Adaptive Optics at the 3.63m Advanced Electro-Optical System telescope (AEOS) to observe 86 stars from 2004 to 2007. In this paper we give an overview of the survey results and a statistical analysis of the observed nondetections around 58 of our targets to place constraints on the population of substellar companions to nearby stars. The observations did not detect any companion in the substellar regime. Since null results can be as important as detections, we analyzed each observation to determine the characteristics of the companions that can be ruled out. For this purpose we use a Monte Carlo approach to produce artificial companions, and determine their detectability by comparison with the sensitivity curve for each star. All the non-detection results are combined using a Bayesian approach and we provide upper limits on the population of giant exoplanets and brown dwarfs for this sample of stars. Our nondetections confirm the rarity of brown dwarfs around solar-like stars and we constrain the frequency of massive substellar companions (M>40Mjup) at orbital separation between and 10 and 50 AU to be <20%.Comment: 32 pages, 11 figures, 2 tables. Published in the Astrophysical Journa

Symbiotic modeling: Linguistic Anthropology and the promise of chiasmus

Reflexive observations and observations of reflexivity: such agendas are by now standard practice in anthropology. Dynamic feedback loops between self and other, cause and effect, represented and representamen may no longer seem surprising; but, in spite of our enhanced awareness, little deliberate attention is devoted to modeling or grounding such phenomena. Attending to both linguistic and extra-linguistic modalities of chiasmus (the X figure), a group of anthropologists has recently embraced this challenge. Applied to contemporary problems in linguistic anthropology, chiasmus functions to highlight and enhance relationships of interdependence or symbiosis between contraries, including anthropology’s four fields, the nature of human being and facets of being human

Project overview and update on WEAVE: the next generation wide-field spectroscopy facility for the William Herschel Telescope

We present an overview of and status report on the WEAVE next-generation spectroscopy facility for the William Herschel Telescope (WHT). WEAVE principally targets optical ground-based follow up of upcoming ground-based (LOFAR) and space-based (Gaia) surveys. WEAVE is a multi-object and multi-IFU facility utilizing a new 2-degree prime focus field of view at the WHT, with a buffered pick-and-place positioner system hosting 1000 multi-object (MOS) fibres, 20 integral field units, or a single large IFU for each observation. The fibres are fed to a single spectrograph, with a pair of 8k(spectral) x 6k (spatial) pixel cameras, located within the WHT GHRIL enclosure on the telescope Nasmyth platform, supporting observations at R~5000 over the full 370-1000nm wavelength range in a single exposure, or a high resolution mode with limited coverage in each arm at R~20000. The project is now in the final design and early procurement phase, with commissioning at the telescope expected in 2017.Comment: 11 pages, 11 Figures, Summary of a presentation to Astronomical Telescopes and Instrumentation 201

Ovarian cancer metastasis: The role of ULK1 in downstream signaling in mitochondrial plasticity

Under the direction of Dr. Eva Schmelz, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA Coordinated by Dr. Mary Jane Carmichael Ovarian cancer is the deadliest gynecological cancer in women, reported as the fifth leading cause of cancer related deaths in women. With a survival rate of less than 30%, it is a genetically and histologically heterogenous disease and the most aggressive serous ovarian cancer is now thought to originate in the epithelial cells of the fallopian tubes. Ovarian cells exfoliate from their primary tumors and are disseminated throughout peritoneal cavity. Previous studies from our lab show that cancer progression and hypoxic conditions promote reversible changes in mitochondrial morphology in mouse cells and human cell lines that provide the capacity to adapt to the changing tumor microenvironment. Mitochondrial plasticity and mitophagy have been linked as critical events for the survival of disseminating metastases. Ulk1 is a kinase crucial for the activation of autophagy in cells upon exposure to cellular stress like nutrient deprivation or hypoxia. In this study we use mouse models of ovarian cancer progression that represent benign (MOSE-E,) cells, slow-developing (MOSE-L) and fast-developing disease (MOSE-LTICv) to study the impact of mitophagy on cancer cell survival. We aim to generate ULK1 defective ovarian and fallopian tube cell lines to discriminate between the impact of loss of function of ULK1 in cancer cells vs whole body for in vitro and in vivo studies

Effect of breakfast cereal type on portion size and nutritional implications

Objective: The present study aimed to assess the effect of different types of breakfast cereal on portion size and the nutritional implications of potential under or overserving. Design: A cross-sectional analysis was performed using one BC from the 7 established BC manufacturing methods (flaking [F], gun puffed [GP], oven puffed [OP], extruded gun puffed [EGP], shredded wholegrain [SW], biscuit formed [BF], and granola). Participants were asked to pour cereal as if they were serving themselves (freepour). Difference between the freepour and recommended serving size (RSS) were calculated (DFR). The Friedman test followed by Dunn’s multiple comparison test was used to test for a significant differences between cereal categories. Setting: City of Chester, North West of the UK Participants: Adults (n=169; n=110 female, 32±18 years) Results: Freepour values were greater than RSS for all categories of BC. Median values for denser cereals such as SW, granola and oats were significantly (P&lt;0.001) greater than all other categories with granola having the highest median freepour value of 95 g. Median (and range of) DFR weight values for granola were significantly higher than other BCs (50.0 g [-24.0-267.0g], P&lt;0.001). BCs with the lowest median DFRs were F1 (7.0 g [-20-63.0g]), GP (6.0 g [-26.0-69.0g]), EGP (6.0 g [-26.0-56.0g]), OP (5.0 g [-27.0-53.0g]), and BF (0.0 g [-28.2-56.4g]). Conclusions: The degree of overserving may be related to the type of BC with denser cereals more readily overserved. Encouraging manufacturers to reformulate cereals and improving their nutritional properties may have benefit in reducing excess energy intake

Generalisation in named entity recognition: A quantitative analysis

Named Entity Recognition (NER) is a key NLP task, which is all the more challenging on Web and user-generated content with their diverse and continuously changing language. This paper aims to quantify how this diversity impacts state-of-the-art NER methods, by measuring named entity (NE) and context variability, feature sparsity, and their effects on precision and recall. In particular, our findings indicate that NER approaches struggle to generalise in diverse genres with limited training data. Unseen NEs, in particular, play an important role, which have a higher incidence in diverse genres such as social media than in more regular genres such as newswire. Coupled with a higher incidence of unseen features more generally and the lack of large training corpora, this leads to significantly lower F1 scores for diverse genres as compared to more regular ones. We also find that leading systems rely heavily on surface forms found in training data, having problems generalising beyond these, and offer explanations for this observation

Prospective pathways to depressive symptoms and disordered eating in adolescence: A 7-year longitudinal cohort study

Eating pathology and depressive symptoms increase during adolescence, yet predictive pathways remain predominantly unexplored, despite their implications for prevention. The present study aimed to identify shared risk factors for eating pathology and depressive symptoms by evaluating an adapted Dual-Pathway Model of disordered eating, which postulated that higher BMI would predict disordered eating and depressive symptoms via pathways between body dissatisfaction, later BMI, depressive symptoms, and visible indicators of puberty (breast development for girls, height for boys). The participants were 8,915 children (49% girls) from the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children, a population-based cohort study of British children, who were assessed at different intervals between the age of 7 to 14 years. Path analyses revealed that, for girls, childhood BMI exerted indirect effects on disordered eating via body dissatisfaction, depressive symptoms, and more advanced breast development, with indirect pathways identified to depressive symptoms via earlier depressive symptoms and more advanced breast development. For boys, childhood BMI had indirect effects on disordered eating via later BMI and body dissatisfaction, while only earlier depressive symptoms were found to have an independent and direct effect on adolescent depressive symptoms. This study reveals shared and independent risk factors for eating pathology and depressive symptoms in adolescence and suggests targets for preventative interventions, including higher BMI, body dissatisfaction, and depressive symptoms, in addition to advanced breast development, for girls

Integrating new approaches to atrial fibrillation management: the 6th AFNET/EHRA Consensus Conference.

There are major challenges ahead for clinicians treating patients with atrial fibrillation (AF). The population with AF is expected to expand considerably and yet, apart from anticoagulation, therapies used in AF have not been shown to consistently impact on mortality or reduce adverse cardiovascular events. New approaches to AF management, including the use of novel technologies and structured, integrated care, have the potential to enhance clinical phenotyping or result in better treatment selection and stratified therapy. Here, we report the outcomes of the 6th Consensus Conference of the Atrial Fibrillation Network (AFNET) and the European Heart Rhythm Association (EHRA), held at the European Society of Cardiology Heart House in Sophia Antipolis, France, 17-19 January 2017. Sixty-two global specialists in AF and 13 industry partners met to develop innovative solutions based on new approaches to screening and diagnosis, enhancing integration of AF care, developing clinical pathways for treating complex patients, improving stroke prevention strategies, and better patient selection for heart rate and rhythm control. Ultimately, these approaches can lead to better outcomes for patients with AF

AI Cards: Towards an Applied Framework for Machine-Readable AI and Risk Documentation Inspired by the EU AI Act

With the upcoming enforcement of the EU AI Act, documentation of high-risk AI systems and their risk management information will become a legal requirement playing a pivotal role in demonstration of compliance. Despite its importance, there is a lack of standards and guidelines to assist with drawing up AI and risk documentation aligned with the AI Act. This paper aims to address this gap by providing an in-depth analysis of the AI Act's provisions regarding technical documentation, wherein we particularly focus on AI risk management. On the basis of this analysis, we propose AI Cards as a novel holistic framework for representing a given intended use of an AI system by encompassing information regarding technical specifications, context of use, and risk management, both in human- and machine-readable formats. While the human-readable representation of AI Cards provides AI stakeholders with a transparent and comprehensible overview of the AI use case, its machine-readable specification leverages on state of the art Semantic Web technologies to embody the interoperability needed for exchanging documentation within the AI value chain. This brings the flexibility required for reflecting changes applied to the AI system and its context, provides the scalability needed to accommodate potential amendments to legal requirements, and enables development of automated tools to assist with legal compliance and conformity assessment tasks. To solidify the benefits, we provide an exemplar AI Card for an AI-based student proctoring system and further discuss its potential applications within and beyond the context of the AI Act