Mythbusting the Common Cold and Flu

As we have created vaccines for many contagious pathogens in the last 100 years, the flu and cold still lack a “cure.” There are many things people do to try to get over the cold and flu from homeopathic remedies to the flu vaccine. While nothing can prevent the cold or flu, there are ways we can mitigate our chances of getting these viruses. By doing what we can to avoid getting these illnesses, we are also helping prevent the spread of the viruses to others. In the end, this is our best course of action until a vaccine that fully prevents these viruses from infecting us is found

An Analysis of Boosted Regression Trees to Predict the Strength Properties of Wood Composites

The forest products industry is a significant contributor to the U.S. economy contributing six percent of the total U.S. manufacturing gross domestic product (GDP), placing it on par with the U.S. automotive and plastics industries. Sustaining business competitiveness by reducing costs and maintaining product quality will be essential in the long term for this industry. Improved production efficiency and business competitiveness is the primary rationale for this work. A challenge facing this industry is to develop better knowledge of the complex nature of process variables and their relationship with final product quality attributes. Quantifying better the relationships between process variables (e.g., press temperature) and final product quality attributes plus predicting the strength properties of final products are the goals of this study. Destructive lab tests are taken at one to two hour intervals to estimate internal bond (IB) tensile strength and modulus of rupture (MOR) strength properties. Significant amounts of production occur between destructive test samples. In the absence of a real-time model that predicts strength properties, operators may run higher than necessary feedstock input targets (e.g., weight, resin, etc.). Improved prediction of strength properties using boosted regression tree (BRT) models may reduce the costs associated with rework (i.e., remanufactured panels due to poor strength properties), reduce feedstocks costs (e.g., resin and wood), reduce energy usage, and improve wood utilization from the valuable forest resource. Real-time, temporal process data sets were obtained from a U.S. particleboard manufacturer. In this thesis, BRT models were developed to predict the continuous response variables MOR and IB from a pool of possible continuous predictor variables. BRT model comparisons were done using the root mean squared error for prediction (RMSEP) and the RMSEP relative to the mean of the response variable as a percent (RMSEP%) for the validation data set(s). Overall, for MOR, RMSEP values ranged from 0.99 to 1.443 MPa, and RMSEP% values ranged from 7.9% to 11.6%. Overall, for IB, RMSEP values ranged from 0.074 to 0.108 MPa, and RMSEP% values ranged from 12.7% to 18.6%

A False START: The Role of Ballistic Missile Defense in US-Russian Relations

In response to Iranian nuclear ambition the US and NATO have enacted a collective security initiative that will install Ballistic Missile Defense (BMD) technology throughout Europe. However, during an otherwise cooperative period in US-Russian relations (e.g., the Obama administration’s “Reset” and the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty or START), NATO’s posture in Eastern Europe has compelled Russia to likewise reinforce its defenses and develop measures to incapacitate opposing BMD systems. This research analyzes the political impacts of BMD on US-Russian relations, focusing particularly on NATO’s European Phased Adaptive Approach (EPAA) program--described above

The relationship of U.S. and Canadian Cull Cow Prices to lean beef prices: A DAG Analysis

Demand and Price Analysis,

GeoTechnical Investigations for the Dalton Highway Innovation Project As A Case Study of the Ice-Rich Syngenetic Permafrost

INE/AUTC 11.1

Feasibility of Peltier Chips as Thermoelectric Generators on Heatsinks

As the demand of computer processing grows, the burden placed on CPUs will increase as well. Computing systems produce heat, which is attracted to a metal heatsink where it is dissipated out of the system by a fan. Liquid cooling can be more effective, but is more expensive and increases the risk of damaging leaks. Peltier chips, electronic components which transfer heat into electricity, can be used in an effort to reclaim and reuse some of this waste heat. This experiment tested twelve heatsinks of various designs to maximize the effect of the Peltier chip. Variations in designs of the heatsinks allowed for inspection of designs which are not commonly seen in computer heatsinks to evaluate previously untested heatsink designs for use with Peltier chips. Coupled with collected data, this allowed for inspection of both quantitative and qualitative factors which govern the magnitude of the output voltage from the Peltier chip. In addition, five configurations of the heatsink, Peltier chip, and fan were tested, searching for arrangements that yield higher voltages at the lowest possible temperatures. Data showed that while voltages can be increased by various methods, the same methods have costs which render their widespread use unrealistic. Heatsinks should be redesigned to accommodate Peltier chips and avoid wasted energy. Improvements in heatsink designs were proposed which may help increase the output voltage

Rough Cilicia Archaeological Survey: Report of the 2011 Season, Part Two

The 2011 season of the Rough Cilicia Archaeological Survey Project was conducted between July 21 and August 12 2011. During the 2011 season of the Rough Cilicia Archaeological Survey, pedestrian survey was secondary to the main task of obtaining pollen and carbon samples from geormorphic trenches in the Taseli Plateau. If time allowed, the team walked limited transects in the vicinity of the trenches themselves. Toward the end of our stay at Gökgözlük Yayla we devoted one full day of pedestrian survey in the vicinity of Sugözü Yayla where sherd scatters had been observed in 2007, when the team excavated a geomorphic trench at that location. In addition, the team obtained information about uninvestigated sites known to local inhabitants and devoted a few days to attempts to locate these. In all, some nine transects were inspected during the highland survey. We identified one pre-ceramic lithic production site near Trench 5 at Günnercik Yayla (RC 1101), house remains at Beobaşı Yayla (RC 1103), evidence of settlements at Sugözü Yayla (RC 1102) and Armutlar Mevkii (near Çile, RC 1104), and a monumental village site at Çoruş in the valley of the Geceler River behind Gazipaşa (RC 1105). We also re-inspected the lithic production center at Sivritaş Tepe in the Bickici Highland (RC 0802) and the amphora kiln sites near Syedra (Yeşil Öz River mouth), the Delice River, the Bickici River, and Antiochia ad Cragum. We collected total of 209 ceramic and stone artifacts that were deposited at the Alanya Museum

Automatically Bounding the Taylor Remainder Series: Tighter Bounds and New Applications

We present a new algorithm for automatically bounding the Taylor remainder series. In the special case of a scalar function $f: \mathbb{R} \to \mathbb{R}$, our algorithm takes as input a reference point $x_0$, trust region $[a, b]$, and integer $k \ge 1$, and returns an interval $I$ such that $f(x) - \sum_{i=0}^{k-1} \frac {1} {i!} f^{(i)}(x_0) (x - x_0)^i \in I (x - x_0)^k$ for all $x \in [a, b]$. As in automatic differentiation, the function $f$ is provided to the algorithm in symbolic form, and must be composed of known atomic functions. At a high level, our algorithm has two steps. First, for a variety of commonly-used elementary functions (e.g., $\exp$, $\log$), we use recently-developed theory to derive sharp polynomial upper and lower bounds on the Taylor remainder series. We then recursively combine the bounds for the elementary functions using an interval arithmetic variant of Taylor-mode automatic differentiation. Our algorithm can make efficient use of machine learning hardware accelerators, and we provide an open source implementation in JAX. We then turn our attention to applications. Most notably, in a companion paper we use our new machinery to create the first universal majorization-minimization optimization algorithms: algorithms that iteratively minimize an arbitrary loss using a majorizer that is derived automatically, rather than by hand. We also show that our automatically-derived bounds can be used for verified global optimization and numerical integration, and to prove sharper versions of Jensen's inequality.Comment: Previous version has been split into 3 articles: arXiv:2308.00679, arXiv:2308.00190, and this articl

How many people will carry on working from home? The answer will determine the future of central London

The instruction to work from home has had far-reaching effects on the UK capital. Tony Travers (LSE) sets out the challenges facing the centre of London, and Matthew Dillon and Laetitia Lucy (Arup) say it needs to become a sustainable, healthy and green urban centre, with a bigger residential population