Request-based gossiping without deadlocks

By the distributed averaging problem is meant the problem of computing the average value of a set of numbers possessed by the agents in a distributed network using only communication between neighboring agents. Gossiping is a well-known approach to the problem which seeks to iteratively arrive at a solution by allowing each agent to interchange information with at most one neighbor at each iterative step. Crafting a gossiping protocol which accomplishes this is challenging because gossiping is an inherently collaborative process which can lead to deadlocks unless careful precautions are taken to ensure that it does not. Many gossiping protocols are request-based which means simply that a gossip between two agents will occur whenever one of the two agents accepts a request to gossip placed by the other. In this paper, we present three deterministic request-based protocols. We show by example that the first can deadlock. The second is guaranteed to avoid deadlocks by exploiting the idea of local ordering together with the notion of an agent’s neighbor queue; the protocol requires the simplest queue updates, which provides an in-depth understanding of how local ordering and queue updates avoid deadlocks. It is shown that a third protocol which uses a slightly more complicated queue update rule can lead to significantly faster convergence; a worst case bound on convergence rate is provided.The work of Liu, Mou and Morse was supported by the US Air Force Office of Scientific Research and the National Science Foundation. The work of Anderson was supported by the Australian Research Council’s Discovery Project DP-110100538 and the National ICT AustraliaVNICTA. NICTA is funded by the Australian Government as represented by the Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy and the Australian Research Council through the ICT Centre of Excellence program. The work of Yu was supported by the Australian Research Council through a Queen Elizabeth II Fellowship and DP-110100538 and by the Overseas Expert Program of Shandong Province, China. The work of Anderson and Yu was also supported by the U.S. Air Force Research laboratory Grant FA2386-10-1-4102

Detecting Emerging Diseases in Farm Animals through Clinical Observations

Clinical observations will allow early detection of emerging diseases in animal to enhance response time and capabilities

Integrating complementary and alternative medicine into academic medical centers: Experience and perceptions of nine leading centers in North America

BACKGROUND: Patients across North America are using complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) with increasing frequency as part of their management of many different health conditions. The objective of this study was to develop a guide for academic health sciences centers that may wish to consider starting an integrative medicine program. METHODS: We queried North American leaders in the field of integrative medicine to identify initial sites. Key stakeholders at each of the initial sites visited were then asked to identify additional potential study sites (snowball sampling), until no new sites were identified. We conducted structured interviews to identify critical factors associated with success and failure in each of four domains: research, education, clinical care, and administration. During the interviews, field notes were recorded independently by at least two investigators. Team meetings were held after each visit to reach consensus on the information recorded and to ensure that it was as complete as possible. Content analysis techniques were used to identify key themes that emerged from the field notes. RESULTS: We identified ten leading North American integrative medical centers, and visited nine during 2002–2003. The centers visited suggested that the initiation of an integrative medicine program requires a significant initial outlay of funding and a motivated "champion". The centers had important information to share regarding credentialing, medico-legal issues and billing for clinical programs; identifying researchers and research projects for a successful research program; and strategies for implementing flexible educational initiatives and establishing a functional administrative structure. CONCLUSION: Important lessons can be learned from academic integrative programs already in existence. Such initiatives are timely and feasible in a variety of different ways and in a variety of settings

Combo Night 2011

UNF Music Flagship Program Presents Combo Night Featuring UNF Jazz Studies Students Wednesday, October 5, 2011 UNF Fine Arts Center - Choir Room, 140

Speciation and fate of trace metals in estuarine sediments under reduced and oxidized conditions, Seaplane Lagoon, Alameda Naval Air Station (USA)

We have identified important chemical reactions that control the fate of metal-contaminated estuarine sediments if they are left undisturbed (in situ) or if they are dredged. We combined information on the molecular bonding of metals in solids from X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS) with thermodynamic and kinetic driving forces obtained from dissolved metal concentrations to deduce the dominant reactions under reduced and oxidized conditions. We evaluated the in situ geochemistry of metals (cadmium, chromium, iron, lead, manganese and zinc) as a function of sediment depth (to 100 cm) from a 60 year record of contamination at the Alameda Naval Air Station, California. Results from XAS and thermodynamic modeling of porewaters show that cadmium and most of the zinc form stable sulfide phases, and that lead and chromium are associated with stable carbonate, phosphate, phyllosilicate, or oxide minerals. Therefore, there is minimal risk associated with the release of these trace metals from the deeper sediments contaminated prior to the Clean Water Act (1975) as long as reducing conditions are maintained. Increased concentrations of dissolved metals with depth were indicative of the formation of metal HS(- )complexes. The sediments also contain zinc, chromium, and manganese associated with detrital iron-rich phyllosilicates and/or oxides. These phases are recalcitrant at near-neutral pH and do not undergo reductive dissolution within the 60 year depositional history of sediments at this site. The fate of these metals during dredging was evaluated by comparing in situ geochemistry with that of sediments oxidized by seawater in laboratory experiments. Cadmium and zinc pose the greatest hazard from dredging because their sulfides were highly reactive in seawater. However, their dissolved concentrations under oxic conditions were limited eventually by sorption to or co-precipitation with an iron (oxy)hydroxide. About 50% of the reacted CdS and 80% of the reacted ZnS were bonded to an oxide-substrate at the end of the 90-day oxidation experiment. Lead and chromium pose a minimal hazard from dredging because they are bonded to relatively insoluble carbonate, phosphate, phyllosilicate, or oxide minerals that are stable in seawater. These results point out the specific chemical behavior of individual metals in estuarine sediments, and the need for direct confirmation of metal speciation in order to constrain predictive models that realistically assess the fate of metals in urban harbors and coastal sediments

Socializing One Health: an innovative strategy to investigate social and behavioral risks of emerging viral threats

In an effort to strengthen global capacity to prevent, detect, and control infectious diseases in animals and people, the United States Agency for International Development’s (USAID) Emerging Pandemic Threats (EPT) PREDICT project funded development of regional, national, and local One Health capacities for early disease detection, rapid response, disease control, and risk reduction. From the outset, the EPT approach was inclusive of social science research methods designed to understand the contexts and behaviors of communities living and working at human-animal-environment interfaces considered high-risk for virus emergence. Using qualitative and quantitative approaches, PREDICT behavioral research aimed to identify and assess a range of socio-cultural behaviors that could be influential in zoonotic disease emergence, amplification, and transmission. This broad approach to behavioral risk characterization enabled us to identify and characterize human activities that could be linked to the transmission dynamics of new and emerging viruses. This paper provides a discussion of implementation of a social science approach within a zoonotic surveillance framework. We conducted in-depth ethnographic interviews and focus groups to better understand the individual- and community-level knowledge, attitudes, and practices that potentially put participants at risk for zoonotic disease transmission from the animals they live and work with, across 6 interface domains. When we asked highly-exposed individuals (ie. bushmeat hunters, wildlife or guano farmers) about the risk they perceived in their occupational activities, most did not perceive it to be risky, whether because it was normalized by years (or generations) of doing such an activity, or due to lack of information about potential risks. Integrating the social sciences allows investigations of the specific human activities that are hypothesized to drive disease emergence, amplification, and transmission, in order to better substantiate behavioral disease drivers, along with the social dimensions of infection and transmission dynamics. Understanding these dynamics is critical to achieving health security--the protection from threats to health-- which requires investments in both collective and individual health security. Involving behavioral sciences into zoonotic disease surveillance allowed us to push toward fuller community integration and engagement and toward dialogue and implementation of recommendations for disease prevention and improved health security

Aboriginal People and Labour Relations

The original inhabitants of Canada (the Indian, Inuit and Metis peoples) now number approximately one million people. Although they represent only about 4% of the national population, they are a significant force in the Canadian economy. It is, thus, rather surprising to note the limited attention that aboriginal communities and aboriginal workers have received from the trade union movement.There is currently an active movement for the restoration of self-government and self-determination for aboriginal peoples in accordance with their own laws through a constitutionally mandated process and by way of direct negotiations with federal and provincial governments. Developments in this regard will clearly impact on labour relations. This essay attempts to provide a brief review of the present state of labour law as it relates to the aboriginal peoples of Canada, to serve as a foundation on which change may be built.Le nombre des indiens, Inuits et Métis, les premiers habitants du Canada, s’élèvent actuellement à environ un million. Bien qu’ils ne représentent qu’un peu moins de 4 % de la population du pays, ils jouent un rôle significatif dans l’économie canadienne. Il est donc étonnant de constater le peu d’intérêt que semble porter aux communautés et aux travailleurs autochtones le mouvement syndical.Il existe actuellement un fort mouvement qui, au moyen d’un processus constitutionnellement autorisé de négociations directes avec les gouvernements fédéral et provinciaux, cherche à rétablir le gouvernement autonome, l’autodétermination et les lois des peuples autochtones. Le résultat de ces négociations influera nécessairement sur les relations industrielles. Le présent chapitre fait le point sur les incidences du droit du travail sur les peuples autochtones du Canada et sur les changements à venir

The taxation exemption of Canadian Indians as governments and individuals: How does this compare with Australia and New Zealand?

This paper contributes to the emerging scholarship on the issue of Indigenous peoples and taxation, an area that has been neglected to date, through comparing the experiences in three nations. It argues that the use of legislation to exempt First Nations peoples from taxation in Canada in certain situations, and alternative approaches in New Zealand, provide models against which this nascent area can develop in Australia. The paper explores the Canadian approaches regarding Indian reserves, both exempting activities from mainstream tax regimes and accommodating taxation by Indian governments in their own right as well as the different strategy invoked in New Zealand. The more nuanced approaches to taxation of Indigenous peoples in both countries contrast with the Australian situation, where the focus in Indigenous rights has been on land rights, recognition of which has been subject to judicial inertia and political whim over the past decade. The concept of a ‘charitable’ organization is discussed as an alternative method for minimizing the tax burden: this approach has the further requirement that it must be in the public interest or the interest of an appreciable sector of the community. While charities also have limitations, they may be relied upon as a means of reducing tax liability for community benefit purposes such as economic development, health and education. </jats:p

Convergence of periodic gossiping algorithms

In deterministic gossiping, pairs of nodes in a network holding in general different values of a variable share information with each other and set the new value of the variable at each node to the average of the previous values. This occurs by cycling, sometimes periodically, through a designated sequence of nodes. There is an associated undirected graph, whose vertices are defined by the nodes and whose edges are defined by the node pairs which gossip over the cycle. Provided this graph is connected, deterministic gossiping asymptotically determines the average value of the initial values of the variables across all the nodes. The main result of the paper is to show that for the case when the graph is a tree, all periodic gossiping sequences including all edges of the tree just once actually have the same rate of convergence. The relation between convergence rate and topology of the tree is also considered

Convergence of Periodic Gossiping Algorithms

In deterministic gossiping, pairs of nodes in a network holding in general different values of a variable share information with each other and set the new value of the variable at each node to the average of the previous values. This occurs by cycling, sometimes periodically, through a designated sequence of nodes. There is an associated undirected graph, whose vertices are defined by the nodes and whose edges are defined by the node pairs which gossip over the cycle. Provided this graph is connected, deterministic gossiping asymptotically determines the average value of the initial values of the variables across all the nodes. The main result of the paper is to show that for the case when the graph is a tree, all periodic gossiping sequences including all edges of the tree just once actually have the same rate of convergence. The relation between convergence rate and topology of the tree is also considered