The Virtual Digital Forensics Lab - Expanding Law Enforcement Capabilities

Law enforcement is attempting to respond to the growing and complex need to examine all manner of digital evidence using stand-alone forensic workstations and limited storage solutions. Digital forensic investigators often find their cases stalled by cumbersome and inflexible technology limiting their effectiveness. The Virtual Digital Forensics Lab (VDFL) is a new concept that applies existing enterprise host, storage, and network virtualization technologies to current forensic investigative methods. This paper details the concept of the VDFL, the technology solutions it employs, and the flexibility it provides for digital forensic investigators. Keywords: Virtual Digital Forensics, digital forensic investigations, law enforcement, virtual lab, Digital Forensic

Clear Path 465

This presentation provides an update on the I-465/I-69 Interchange Modification and Added Travel Lanes Design Project in northeast Indianapolis. We will discuss the three final alternatives and the main considerations that led to the selection of the preferred alternative, and present the preferred alternative. Discussion includes the design philosophy, how each proposed ramp movement will improve traffic operations, and the overall project schedule

A Comprehensive Echinacea Germplasm Collection Located at the North Central Regional Plant Introduction Station, Ames, Iowa

Echinacea is a well-established, high-value crop, both as an ornamental and dietary supplement. A comprehensive collection of Echinacea germplasm is currently held at the USDA-ARS North Central Regional Plant Introduction Station (NCRPIS) in Ames, Iowa, and is available via seed distribution for research purposes . The NCRPIS\u27s mission includes: (1) The conservation of genetically diverse crop germplasm through collection and acquisition; (2) The conduct of germplasm-related research; and (3) The encouragement of the use of the germplasm collections and associated information for research, crop improvement, and product development. Representing all nine species collected throughout their respective North American geographic ranges, the Echinacea collect.ion includes 159 accessions (Table 1). Extensive morphological characterization data associated with t.he collection have been assembled and are available to researchers to aid in select.ion criteria. The collection has been used extensively for various research projects ranging from ornamental breeding studies for the horticulture trade to HPLC analysis of metabolites of interest to the phytopharmaceutical industry. Germplasm is collected and made available for distribution through a series of steps. Those steps include: (1) Acquisition and exploration; (2) Regeneration and evaluation; (3) Dormancy and germination stu dies; (4) Seed propagation in field cages with pollinating insects; (5) Harvesting, drying, cleaning, and processing seeds; (6) Long-term storage under cont.rolled conditions; and (7) Distribution for research purposes

A Bit Like Cash: Understanding Cash-For-Bitcoin Transactions Through Individual Vendors

As technology improves and economies become more globalized, the concept of currency has evolved. Bitcoin, a cryptographic digital currency, has been embraced as a secure and convenient type of money. Due to its security and privacy for the user, Bitcoin is a good tool for conducting criminal trades. The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) has regulations in place to make identification information of Bitcoin purchasers accessible to law enforcement, but enforcing these rules with cash-for-Bitcoin traders is difficult. This study surveyed cash-for-Bitcoin vendors in Oklahoma, Texas, Arkansas, Missouri, Kansas, Colorado, and New Mexico to determine personal demographic information, knowledge of and compliance with FinCEN regulations, and opinions regarding government control of currency and willingness to work with law enforcement among vendors

Tetramethylenedisulfotetramine alters Ca²⁺ dynamics in cultured hippocampal neurons: mitigation by NMDA receptor blockade and GABA(A) receptor-positive modulation.

Tetramethylenedisulfotetramine (TETS) is a potent convulsant that is considered a chemical threat agent. We characterized TETS as an activator of spontaneous Ca²⁺ oscillations and electrical burst discharges in mouse hippocampal neuronal cultures at 13-17 days in vitro using FLIPR Fluo-4 fluorescence measurements and extracellular microelectrode array recording. Acute exposure to TETS (≥ 2 µM) reversibly altered the pattern of spontaneous neuronal discharges, producing clustered burst firing and an overall increase in discharge frequency. TETS also dramatically affected Ca²⁺ dynamics causing an immediate but transient elevation of neuronal intracellular Ca²⁺ followed by decreased frequency of Ca²⁺ oscillations but greater peak amplitude. The effect on Ca²⁺ dynamics was similar to that elicited by picrotoxin and bicuculline, supporting the view that TETS acts by inhibiting type A gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA(A)) receptor function. The effect of TETS on Ca²⁺ dynamics requires activation of N-methyl-D-aspartic acid (NMDA) receptors, because the changes induced by TETS were prevented by MK-801 block of NMDA receptors, but not nifedipine block of L-type Ca²⁺ channels. Pretreatment with the GABA(A) receptor-positive modulators diazepam and allopregnanolone partially mitigated TETS-induced changes in Ca²⁺ dynamics. Moreover, low, minimally effective concentrations of diazepam (0.1 µM) and allopregnanolone (0.1 µM), when administered together, were highly effective in suppressing TETS-induced alterations in Ca²⁺ dynamics, suggesting that the combination of positive modulators of synaptic and extrasynaptic GABA(A) receptors may have therapeutic potential. These rapid throughput in vitro assays may assist in the identification of single agents or combinations that have utility in the treatment of TETS intoxication

Cross-Validated Decision Trees with Targeted Maximum Likelihood Estimation for Nonparametric Causal Mixtures Analysis

Exposure to mixtures of chemicals, such as drugs, pollutants, and nutrients, is common in real-world exposure or treatment scenarios. To understand the impact of these exposures on health outcomes, an interpretable and important approach is to estimate the causal effect of exposure regions that are most associated with a health outcome. This requires a statistical estimator that can identify these exposure regions and provide an unbiased estimate of a causal target parameter given the region. In this work, we present a methodology that uses decision trees to data-adaptively determine exposure regions and employs cross-validated targeted maximum likelihood estimation to unbiasedly estimate the average regional-exposure effect (ARE). This results in a plug-in estimator with an asymptotically normal distribution and minimum variance, from which confidence intervals can be derived. The methodology is implemented in the open-source software, CVtreeMLE, a package in R. Analysts put in a vector of exposures, covariates and an outcome and tables are given for regions in the exposures, such as lead > 2.1 & arsenic > 1.4, with an associated ARE which represents the mean outcome difference if all individuals were exposed to this region compared to if none were exposed to this region. CVtreeMLE enables researchers to discover interpretable exposure regions in mixed exposure scenarios and provides robust statistical inference for the impact of these regions. The resulting quantities offer interpretable thresholds that can inform public health policies, such as pollutant regulations, or aid in medical decision-making, such as identifying the most effective drug combinations

Genetic Diversity in Hypericum and AFLP Markers for Species-Specific Identification of H. perforatum L.

One of the top-selling medicinal products worldwide is Hypericum perforatum (St. John\u27s Wort). Despite its cosmopolitan distribution and utilization, little is known regarding the relationship of the bioactive compounds in H. perforatum to the plants from which they are purportedly derived. In this study, amplified fragment length polymorphism (AFLP) analysis of 56 Hypericum accessions, representing 11 species, was conducted to gain a better understanding of diversity within Hypericum species, especially within cultivated accessions of H. perforatum, and to establish a molecular methodology that will provide breeders and regulators with a simple, affordable, and accurate tool with which to identify purported H. perforatummaterial. Utilizing four primer combinations, a total of 298 polymorphic markers were generated, of which 17 were present in all H. perforatum accessions and 2 were specific to only H. perforatum. This study demonstrates that AFLP can be utilized not only to determine the relationships of closely related Hypericumaccessions, but as a tool to authenticate material in herbal remedies through the use of genetic fingerprinting

Intruder band mixing in an ab initio description of 12Be

The spectrum of 12Be exhibits exotic features, e.g., an intruder ground state and shape coexistence, normally associated with the breakdown of a shell closure. While previous phenomenological treatments indicated the ground state has substantial contributions from intruder configurations, it is only with advances in computational abilities and improved interactions that this intruder mixing is observed in ab initio no-core shell model (NCSM) predictions. In this work, we extract electromagnetic observables and symmetry decompositions from the NCSM wave functions to demonstrate that the low-lying positive parity spectrum can be explained in terms of mixing of rotational bands with very different intrinsic structure coexisting within the low-lying spectrum. These observed bands exhibit an approximate SU(3) symmetry and are qualitatively consistent with Elliott model predictions.Comment: 10 pages, 7 figure