Evidence Inference 2.0: More Data, Better Models

How do we most effectively treat a disease or condition? Ideally, we could consult a database of evidence gleaned from clinical trials to answer such questions. Unfortunately, no such database exists; clinical trial results are instead disseminated primarily via lengthy natural language articles. Perusing all such articles would be prohibitively time-consuming for healthcare practitioners; they instead tend to depend on manually compiled systematic reviews of medical literature to inform care. NLP may speed this process up, and eventually facilitate immediate consult of published evidence. The Evidence Inference dataset was recently released to facilitate research toward this end. This task entails inferring the comparative performance of two treatments, with respect to a given outcome, from a particular article (describing a clinical trial) and identifying supporting evidence. For instance: Does this article report that chemotherapy performed better than surgery for five-year survival rates of operable cancers? In this paper, we collect additional annotations to expand the Evidence Inference dataset by 25\%, provide stronger baseline models, systematically inspect the errors that these make, and probe dataset quality. We also release an abstract only (as opposed to full-texts) version of the task for rapid model prototyping. The updated corpus, documentation, and code for new baselines and evaluations are available at http://evidence-inference.ebm-nlp.com/.Comment: Accepted as workshop paper into BioNLP Updated results from SciBERT to Biomed RoBERT

Polarization of tightly focused laser beams

The polarization properties of monochromatic light beams are studied. In contrast to the idealization of an electromagnetic plane wave, finite beams which are everywhere linearly polarized in the same direction do not exist. Neither do beams which are everywhere circularly polarized in a fixed plane. It is also shown that transversely finite beams cannot be purely transverse in both their electric and magnetic vectors, and that their electromagnetic energy travels at less than c. The electric and magnetic fields in an electromagnetic beam have different polarization properties in general, but there exists a class of steady beams in which the electric and magnetic polarizations are the same (and in which energy density and energy flux are independent of time). Examples are given of exactly and approximately linearly polarized beams, and of approximately circularly polarized beams.Comment: 9 pages, 6 figure

Sensory aids for the blind: A challenging problem with lessons for the future

The two major objectives of sensory aids for the blind are to permit access to printed matter and to permit safe travel through the environment. The difficulties of designing technological means to achieve these objectives are in many respects unrelated to the concerns of the engineering laboratory. Social, economic, political, and logistic considerations all play a role. The "blind population" in the United States includes both the totally blind and those with a wide range of visual impairment. This population totals about 400 000 people in which the aged, the multiply handicapped, and those with significant residual vision predominate. Singly handicapped, working-aged people are the initial targets of the current sensory aids. Expansion of their range of usefulness to larger fractions of the blind population is expected to come later. About 800 agencies serve the blind population in the United States, and in 1967 they were responsible for an annual expenditure of 1 million. Nevertheless, several potentially useful prototype devices have been developed and are about to be evaluated in this country; at least one is of foreign origin. But if these devices are ever to have the opportunity of reaching the blind public, then mechanisms for evaluation, field trials, manufacture, and deployment must be set up. The field of currently active sensory-aids research programs is reviewed. Several programs are concerned with increasing the convenience and accessibility of braille by the application of computer technology. Nevertheless, despite the unquestionable value of these developments, the usefulness of braille is limited by its bulk, its cost, and the transcription time. To provide direct access to printed documents several devices are being developed that transform optical images from a printed page into auditory or tactile displays requiring motivation and training for effective use. These machines are termed "direct-translation" units and are designed for simplicity and low cost. Other systems utilize print recognition techniques to create a reading machine providing braille or speech as an output. These machines offer potentially faster reading rates and their use promises to be easier to learn than direct-translation machines, but at the penalty of complexity and high cost. Several mobility aids designed to augment the cane or guide dog have recently been developed. These are also described. The prospects of achieving direct input to the visual cortex are discussed. It is apparent that the cost of this research is likely to be extremely high in relation to the size of the blind population which might ultimately benefit. Somewhat more easily realizable is a visual substitution system involving stimulation of an area of the skin. Several systems are being developed but all suffer from limitations in image resolution. Finally, an examination of the organization of research and funding reveals that the U.S. program is small, poorly coordinated, and contains some seemingly unnecessary duplication of effort. Several obvious lessons emerge which, if heeded, could greatly improve the effectiveness of sensory-aids research by providing development, manufacture, evaluation, and deployment services within an integrated program

Electromagnetic wave scattering by a superconductor

The interaction between radiation and superconductors is explored in this paper. In particular, the calculation of a plane standing wave scattered by an infinite cylindrical superconductor is performed by solving the Helmholtz equation in cylindrical coordinates. Numerical results computed up to $\mathcal{O}(77)$ of Bessel functions are presented for different wavelengths showing the appearance of a diffraction pattern.Comment: 3 pages, 3 figure

Stigma related to targeted school-based mental health interventions:A systematic review of qualitative evidence

BackgroundSchool-based mental health services have been advocated to increase access to psychological support for children and adolescents. However, concerns have been raised about the potential stigma associated with selection of students and the visibility of school-based service contact.MethodsThis review assessed findings from qualitative studies to identify potential stigmatising effects of participation in targeted school-based mental health interventions for students attending primary- or secondary-level education. Eight articles (reflecting seven studies) were identified through electronic database searches (PsycInfo, EMBASE, Medline, CINAHL, ERIC), supplemented by citation and reference searches and expert consultations. Data were synthesised according to established guidelines for thematic synthesis.ResultsThree overarching themes were identified: “anticipated and experienced stigma”, “consequences of stigma” and “mitigating strategies”. These findings illustrate how pervasively stigma can compromise efforts to increase access to mental health care through targeted school-based provision, but also outline strategies endorsed by students for alleviating the risk and/or impact of stigma.LimitationsThese findings need to be considered in view of the relative scarcity of surveyed evidence. Furthermore, as all evidence came from high-income and Western countries, the applicability to other contexts is unclear.ConclusionsThis synthesis reflects the first overview of qualitative evidence regarding stigmatising experiences and concerns associated with students’ engagement with targeted school-based mental health interventions. The findings can inform efforts to mitigate stigma-related barriers to students’ engagement in targeted mental health support, and serve to guide future research in this area

Effect of atmospheric turbulence on propagation properties of optical vortices formed by using coherent laser beam arrays

In this paper, we consider the effect of the atmospheric turbulence on the propagation of optical vertex formed from the radial coherent laser beam array, with the initially well-defined phase distribution. The propagation formula of the radial coherent laser array passing through the turbulent atmosphere is analytically derived by using the extended Huygens-Fresnel diffraction integral. Based on the derived formula, the effect of the atmospheric turbulence on the propagation properties of such laser arrays has been studied in great detail. Our main results show that the atmospheric turbulence may result in the prohibition of the formation of the optical vortex or the disappearance of the formed optical vortex, which are very different from that in the free space. The formed optical vortex with the higher topological charge may propagate over a much longer distance in the moderate or weak turbulent atmosphere. After the sufficient long-distance atmospheric propagation, all the output beams (even with initially different phase distributions) finally lose the vortex property and gradually become the Gaussian-shaped beams, and in this case the output beams actually become incoherent light fields due to the decoherence effect of the turbulent atmosphere.Comment: 10 pages, 5 figure

Low dimensional ordering and fluctuations in methanol-β\beta-hydroquinone-clathrate studied by X-ray and neutron diffraction

Methanol-$\beta$-hydroquinone-clathrate has been established as a model system for dielectric ordering and fluctuations and is conceptually close to magnetic spin systems. In X-ray and neutron diffraction experiments, we investigated the ordered structure, the one-dimensional (1D) and the three-dimensional (3D) critical scattering in the paraelectric phase, and the temperature dependence of the lattice constants. Our results can be explained by microscopic models of the methanol pseudospin in the hydroquinone cage network, in consistency with previous dielectric investigations

2D and 3D cubic monocrystalline and polycrystalline materials: their stability and mechanical properties

We consider 2- and 3-dimensional cubic monocrystalline and polycrystalline materials. Expressions for Young's and shear moduli and Poisson's ratio are expressed in terms of eigenvalues of the stiffness tensor. Such a form is well suited for studying properties of these mechanical characteristics on sides of the stability triangles. For crystalline high-symmetry directions lines of vanishing Poisson's ratio are found. These lines demarcate regions of the stability triangle into areas of various auxeticity properties. The simplest model of polycrystalline 2D and 3D cubic materials is considered. In polycrystalline phases the region of complete auxetics is larger than for monocrystalline materials.Comment: 9 pages, 3 figures, in proceedings of the Tenth International School on Theoretical Physics, Symmetry and Structural Properties of Condensed Matter, Myczkowce 200