5,282 research outputs found
Fit to Electroweak Precision Data
A brief review of electroweak precision data from LEP, SLC, the Tevatron, and
low energies is presented. The global fit to all data including the most recent
results on the masses of the top quark and the W boson reinforces the
preference for a relatively light Higgs boson. I will also give an outlook on
future developments at the Tevatron Run II, CEBAF, the LHC, and the ILC.Comment: 4 pages, presented at the 2006 Conference on the Intersections of
Particle and Nuclear Physics (CIPANP 2006), Rio Grande, Puerto Rico, May 30
-- June 3, 200
Investigating the Effects of Word Substitution Errors on Sentence Embeddings
A key initial step in several natural language processing (NLP) tasks
involves embedding phrases of text to vectors of real numbers that preserve
semantic meaning. To that end, several methods have been recently proposed with
impressive results on semantic similarity tasks. However, all of these
approaches assume that perfect transcripts are available when generating the
embeddings. While this is a reasonable assumption for analysis of written text,
it is limiting for analysis of transcribed text. In this paper we investigate
the effects of word substitution errors, such as those coming from automatic
speech recognition errors (ASR), on several state-of-the-art sentence embedding
methods. To do this, we propose a new simulator that allows the experimenter to
induce ASR-plausible word substitution errors in a corpus at a desired word
error rate. We use this simulator to evaluate the robustness of several
sentence embedding methods. Our results show that pre-trained neural sentence
encoders are both robust to ASR errors and perform well on textual similarity
tasks after errors are introduced. Meanwhile, unweighted averages of word
vectors perform well with perfect transcriptions, but their performance
degrades rapidly on textual similarity tasks for text with word substitution
errors.Comment: 4 Pages, 2 figures. Copyright IEEE 2019. Accepted and to appear in
the Proceedings of the 44th International Conference on Acoustics, Speech,
and Signal Processing 2019 (IEEE-ICASSP-2019), May 12-17 in Brighton, U.K.
Personal use of this material is permitted. However, permission to
reprint/republish this material must be obtained from the IEE
Constraints on Muon Decay Parameters from Neutrino Mass
We derive model-independent constraints on chirality-changing terms in the
muon decay Lagrangian using limits on neutrino mass. We consider all
dimension-six operators invariant under the gauge symmetry of the Standard
Model which contribute to either a Dirac neutrino mass or muon decay. Taking an
upper limit on neutrino mass of 1 eV, we derive limits on the contributions of
chirality-changing operators to the Michel parameters four orders of magnitude
tighter than the current experimental constraints. We also identify two
operators which, due to their flavor structure, are not constrained by neutrino
mass. If near-future experiments find contributions to muon decay from these
operators, it could indicate interesting flavor structure in physics beyond the
SM.Comment: 4 pages, contribution to the proceedings of CIPANP 2006 (May 30-June
3, 2006), Rio Grande, Puerto Ric
Improved quality of life in patients with refractory or recidivant ascites after insertion of transjugular intrahepatic portosystemic shunts
Background. We have recently shown that the transjugular intrahepatic portosystemic shunt (TIPS) is more effective than paracentesis in the treatment of cirrhotic patients with severe ascites and can prolong survival in selected patients. Although an improved quality of life (QOL) has been suggested in these patients after the TIPS procedure, so far there are no data available to substantiate this assumption. Therefore, the aim of this study was to determine the effect of TIPS on the QOL in cirrhotic patients with refractory or recidivant ascites. Methods: 21 cirrhotic patients who underwent TIPS for refractory or recidivant ascites were investigated. All patients were pretreated with repeated paracentesis for at least 1 year. Before the procedure and at 3 and 6 months during follow-up, the patients themselves rated QOL, fatigue and physical performance on a visual analogue scale (range 0-100). Furthermore, QOL was determined by the QOL index (range 0-10) according to Spitzer. Results: Patients' rating of the QOL on the visual analogue scale significantly increased from 35 +/- 25 (baseline) to 64 +/- 28 (3 months), and 66 +/- 24 (6 months; p = 0.02). Similarly, the QOL index significantly increased from 6.9 +/- 2.0 (baseline) to 8.3 +/- 2.1 (3 months), and 8.6 +/- 1.7 (6 months; p < 0.001). The increase of QOL was more pronounced in patients with complete response to TIPS. Conclusions: We demonstrate that TIPS for refractory or recidivant ascites improves the QOL in patients with cirrhosis. Our data indicates that this improvement is dependent on the response to therapy. Copyright (C) 2002 S. Karger AG, Basel
Cellular excitability and the regulation of functional neuronal identity: from gene expression to neuromodulation
The intrinsic properties of a neuron determine the translation of synaptic input to axonal output. It is this input– output relationship that is the heart of all nervous system activity. As such, the overall regulation of the intrinsic excitability of a neuron directly determines the output of that neuron at a given point in time, giving the cell a unique “functional identity.” To maintain this distinct functional output, neurons must adapt to changing patterns of synaptic excitation. These adaptations are essential to prevent neurons from either falling silent as synaptic excitation falls or becoming saturated as excitation increases. In the absence of stabilizing mechanisms, activity-dependent plasticity could drive neural activity to saturation or quiescence. Furthermore, as cells adapt to changing patterns of synaptic input, presumably the overall balance of intrinsic conductances of the cell must be maintained so that reliable output is achieved (Daoudal and Debanne, 2003; Turrigiano and Nelson, 2004; Frick and Johnston, 2005). Although these regulatory phenomena have been well documented, the molecular and physiological mechanisms involved are poorly understood
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