Alien Registration- Mckinley, Charles W. (South Portland, Cumberland County)

https://digitalmaine.com/alien_docs/20137/thumbnail.jp

The Future of Capital Punishment in Florida: Analysis and Recommendations

The Supreme Court\u27s decision abolishing the death penalty, at least as it existed in most jurisdictions, hardly represents the final resolution of the controversy over capital punishment. Given substantial public sentiment which apparently favors capital punishment in some form-voiced, for example, in the results of the recent referendum in California-various legislative bodies will face the question of whether capital punishment can and should be legislatively reinstated. In December 1972 the State of Florida became the first jurisdiction to pass judgment on this question. The legislature enacted a bill allowing imposition of the death penalty in certain circumstances. The two articles which follow highlight the competing policy and legal considerations which face legislatures after Furman, and illustrate one state\u27s response to those considerations. The first article is a slightly revised version of a memorandum to the Florida Governor\u27s Committee to Study Capital Punishment, submitted by the Committee\u27s Legal Advisory Staff. It sketches the various possible legislative responses to Furman and recommends one. The second indicates other recommendations made to the legislators and comments on the ultimate legislative determination

Astrophysical Adaptation of Points, the Precision Optical Interferometer in Space

POINTS (Precision Optical INTerferometer in Space) would perform microarcsecond optical astrometric measurements from space, yielding submicroarcsecond astrometric results from the mission. It comprises a pair of independent Michelson stellar interferometers and a laser metrology system that measures both the critical starlight paths and the angle between the baselines. The instrument has two baselines of 2 m, each with two subapertures of 35 cm; by articulating the angle between the baselines, it observes targets separated by 87 to 93 deg. POINTS does global astrometry, i.e., it measures widely separated targets, which yields closure calibration, numerous bright reference stars, and absolute parallax. Simplicity, stability, and the mitigation of systematic error are the central design themes. The instrument has only three moving-part mechanisms, and only one of these must move with sub-milliradian precision; the other two can tolerate a precision of several tenths of a degree. Optical surfaces preceding the beamsplitter or its fold flat are interferometrically critical; on each side of the interferometer, there are only three such. Thus, light loss and wavefront distortion are minimized. POINTS represents a minimalistic design developed ab initio for space. Since it is intended for astrometry, and therefore does not require the u-v-plane coverage of an imaging, instrument, each interferometer need have only two subapertures. The design relies on articulation of the angle between the interferometers and body pointing to select targets; the observations are restricted to the 'instrument plane.' That plane, which is fixed in the pointed instrument, is defined by the sensitive direction for the two interferometers. Thus, there is no need for siderostats and moving delay lines, which would have added many precision mechanisms with rolling and sliding parts that would be required to function throughout the mission. Further, there is no need for a third interferometer, as is required when out-of-plane observations are made. An instrument for astrometry, unlike those for imaging, can be compact and yet scientifically productive. The POINTS instrument is compact and therefore requires no deployment of precision structures, has no low-frequency (i.e., under 100 Hz) vibration modes, and is relatively easy to control thermally. Because of its small size and mass, it is easily and quickly repointed between observations. Further, because of the low mass, it can be economically launched into high Earth orbit which, in conjunction with a solar shield, yields nearly unrestricted sky coverage and a stable thermal environment

Early versus Delayed Decompression for Traumatic Cervical Spinal Cord Injury: Results of the Surgical Timing in Acute Spinal Cord Injury Study (STASCIS)

BACKGROUND:There is convincing preclinical evidence that early decompression in the setting of spinal cord injury (SCI) improves neurologic outcomes. However, the effect of early surgical decompression in patients with acute SCI remains uncertain. Our objective was to evaluate the relative effectiveness of early (<24 hours after injury) versus late (≥ 24 hours after injury) decompressive surgery after traumatic cervical SCI. METHODS:We performed a multicenter, international, prospective cohort study (Surgical Timing In Acute Spinal Cord Injury Study: STASCIS) in adults aged 16-80 with cervical SCI. Enrolment occurred between 2002 and 2009 at 6 North American centers. The primary outcome was ordinal change in ASIA Impairment Scale (AIS) grade at 6 months follow-up. Secondary outcomes included assessments of complications rates and mortality. FINDINGS:A total of 313 patients with acute cervical SCI were enrolled. Of these, 182 underwent early surgery, at a mean of 14.2(± 5.4) hours, with the remaining 131 having late surgery, at a mean of 48.3(± 29.3) hours. Of the 222 patients with follow-up available at 6 months post injury, 19.8% of patients undergoing early surgery showed a ≥ 2 grade improvement in AIS compared to 8.8% in the late decompression group (OR = 2.57, 95% CI:1.11,5.97). In the multivariate analysis, adjusted for preoperative neurological status and steroid administration, the odds of at least a 2 grade AIS improvement were 2.8 times higher amongst those who underwent early surgery as compared to those who underwent late surgery (OR = 2.83, 95% CI:1.10,7.28). During the 30 day post injury period, there was 1 mortality in both of the surgical groups. Complications occurred in 24.2% of early surgery patients and 30.5% of late surgery patients (p = 0.21). CONCLUSION:Decompression prior to 24 hours after SCI can be performed safely and is associated with improved neurologic outcome, defined as at least a 2 grade AIS improvement at 6 months follow-up

Federated learning enables big data for rare cancer boundary detection.

Although machine learning (ML) has shown promise across disciplines, out-of-sample generalizability is concerning. This is currently addressed by sharing multi-site data, but such centralization is challenging/infeasible to scale due to various limitations. Federated ML (FL) provides an alternative paradigm for accurate and generalizable ML, by only sharing numerical model updates. Here we present the largest FL study to-date, involving data from 71 sites across 6 continents, to generate an automatic tumor boundary detector for the rare disease of glioblastoma, reporting the largest such dataset in the literature (n = 6, 314). We demonstrate a 33% delineation improvement for the surgically targetable tumor, and 23% for the complete tumor extent, over a publicly trained model. We anticipate our study to: 1) enable more healthcare studies informed by large diverse data, ensuring meaningful results for rare diseases and underrepresented populations, 2) facilitate further analyses for glioblastoma by releasing our consensus model, and 3) demonstrate the FL effectiveness at such scale and task-complexity as a paradigm shift for multi-site collaborations, alleviating the need for data-sharing

Author Correction: Federated learning enables big data for rare cancer boundary detection.

10.1038/s41467-023-36188-7NATURE COMMUNICATIONS14

Lancet

BACKGROUND: In 2015, the second cycle of the CONCORD programme established global surveillance of cancer survival as a metric of the effectiveness of health systems and to inform global policy on cancer control. CONCORD-3 updates the worldwide surveillance of cancer survival to 2014. METHODS: CONCORD-3 includes individual records for 37.5 million patients diagnosed with cancer during the 15-year period 2000-14. Data were provided by 322 population-based cancer registries in 71 countries and territories, 47 of which provided data with 100% population coverage. The study includes 18 cancers or groups of cancers: oesophagus, stomach, colon, rectum, liver, pancreas, lung, breast (women), cervix, ovary, prostate, and melanoma of the skin in adults, and brain tumours, leukaemias, and lymphomas in both adults and children. Standardised quality control procedures were applied; errors were rectified by the registry concerned. We estimated 5-year net survival. Estimates were age-standardised with the International Cancer Survival Standard weights. FINDINGS: For most cancers, 5-year net survival remains among the highest in the world in the USA and Canada, in Australia and New Zealand, and in Finland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden. For many cancers, Denmark is closing the survival gap with the other Nordic countries. Survival trends are generally increasing, even for some of the more lethal cancers: in some countries, survival has increased by up to 5% for cancers of the liver, pancreas, and lung. For women diagnosed during 2010-14, 5-year survival for breast cancer is now 89.5% in Australia and 90.2% in the USA, but international differences remain very wide, with levels as low as 66.1% in India. For gastrointestinal cancers, the highest levels of 5-year survival are seen in southeast Asia: in South Korea for cancers of the stomach (68.9%), colon (71.8%), and rectum (71.1%); in Japan for oesophageal cancer (36.0%); and in Taiwan for liver cancer (27.9%). By contrast, in the same world region, survival is generally lower than elsewhere for melanoma of the skin (59.9% in South Korea, 52.1% in Taiwan, and 49.6% in China), and for both lymphoid malignancies (52.5%, 50.5%, and 38.3%) and myeloid malignancies (45.9%, 33.4%, and 24.8%). For children diagnosed during 2010-14, 5-year survival for acute lymphoblastic leukaemia ranged from 49.8% in Ecuador to 95.2% in Finland. 5-year survival from brain tumours in children is higher than for adults but the global range is very wide (from 28.9% in Brazil to nearly 80% in Sweden and Denmark). INTERPRETATION: The CONCORD programme enables timely comparisons of the overall effectiveness of health systems in providing care for 18 cancers that collectively represent 75% of all cancers diagnosed worldwide every year. It contributes to the evidence base for global policy on cancer control. Since 2017, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development has used findings from the CONCORD programme as the official benchmark of cancer survival, among their indicators of the quality of health care in 48 countries worldwide. Governments must recognise population-based cancer registries as key policy tools that can be used to evaluate both the impact of cancer prevention strategies and the effectiveness of health systems for all patients diagnosed with cancer. FUNDING: American Cancer Society; Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; Swiss Re; Swiss Cancer Research foundation; Swiss Cancer League; Institut National du Cancer; La Ligue Contre le Cancer; Rossy Family Foundation; US National Cancer Institute; and the Susan G Komen Foundation

Path dependence and the stabilization of strategic premises: how the funeral industry buries itself

Several studies have shown that path-dependent organizations may pathologically reproduce their paths even in times of crisis. The unchallenged retention of underlying strategic premises seems to play a key role in this selfdestructive process. Whereas the previous literature largely assumes that organizational crises provide sufficient impetus for updating strategic premises, recent empirical studies have highlighted that path-dependent organizations may find this highly difficult. In the present study, I explore how path-dependent organizations stabilize strategic premises even in times of crisis. Drawing on a case study of the funeral industry, I theoretically distill four mechanisms that stabilize strategic premises in path-dependent organizations despite the fierce pressures of organizational crises. While these mechanisms constitute either reflexive modes of processing feedback or generative modes of producing market outcomes, they all inhibit a disconfirmation and, thus, an update of strategic premises. Furthermore, the study presents indicative evidence of how this unchallenged retention of strategic premises leads to the pathological reproduction of the path