New Hampshire: Baseline Report - State Level Field Network Study of the Implementation of the Affordable Care Act

This report is part of a series of 21 state and regional studies examining the rollout of the ACA. The national network -- with 36 states and 61 researchers -- is led by the Rockefeller Institute of Government, the public policy research arm of the State University of New York, the Brookings Institution, and the Fels Institute of Government at the University of Pennsylvania.New Hampshire's experience with implementing the ACA in 2013 and 2014 underscores the state's "wait and see" approach to health care reform. Since the passage of the ACA in March 2010, a wide range of national polls demonstrated that the public remains fundamentally split about the law and its effects; unlike other major health care reforms (e.g., the Medicare Modernization Act of 2003) the public has not warmed to the ACA over time. The stability of public attitudes towards the ACA is striking; despite month-to-month variations, surveys by the Kaiser Family Foundation, Gallup, and other major polling organizations reveal that public views of the ACA have changed little over the past four years. This ongoing partisan and policy divide is evident in the Granite State, as Republicans continue to oppose the ACA, while Democrats embrace reform -- on New Hampshire's terms

From Baking a Cake to Solving the Schrodinger Equation

The primary emphasis of this study has been to explain how modifying a cake recipe by changing either the dimensions of the cake or the amount of cake batter alters the baking time. Restricting our consideration to the genoise, one of the basic cakes of classic French cuisine, we have obtained a semi-empirical formula for its baking time as a function of oven temperature, initial temperature of the cake batter, and dimensions of the unbaked cake. The formula, which is based on the Diffusion equation, has three adjustable parameters whose values are estimated from data obtained by baking genoises in cylindrical pans of various diameters. The resulting formula for the baking time exhibits the scaling behavior typical of diffusion processes, i.e. the baking time is proportional to the (characteristic length scale)^2 of the cake. It also takes account of evaporation of moisture at the top surface of the cake, which appears to be a dominant factor affecting the baking time of a cake. In solving this problem we have obtained solutions of the Diffusion equation which are interpreted naturally and straightforwardly in the context of heat transfer; however, when interpreted in the context of the Schrodinger equation, they are somewhat peculiar. The solutions describe a system whose mass assumes different values in two different regions of space. Furthermore, the solutions exhibit characteristics similar to the evanescent modes associated with light waves propagating in a wave guide. When we consider the Schrodinger equation as a non-relativistic limit of the Klein-Gordon equation so that it includes a mass term, these are no longer solutions.Comment: 23 pages, 10 Postscript figure

Limited post-operative narcotic use in elective laparoscopic cholecystectomy

Purpose: To limit narcotics use Cochrane review: multiple studies have shown postoperative pain can be managed with non-narcotic meds with good outcome Less medication related side effects:N/V, constipation, disorientation Prevents substance addiction/abusehttps://jdc.jefferson.edu/patientsafetyposters/1069/thumbnail.jp

Panel analysis of home prices in the primary and secondary market in 17 largest cities in Poland

We analyse the determinants of house prices in the primary and secondary market of 17 largest cities in Poland during the 2002-2013 period. We find that prices are driven by economic fundamentals, such as income growth or rise in employment. Prices in the secondary market react to increases in the loan availability, that was driven by low interest rates resulting from FX denominated housing loans that were granted since 2006. This finding does not hold for the primary market, which is to a large extent financed with cash. We confirm empirically that the house appreciation in the past period has a strong effect on the current price, which confirms herding behaviour in the housing market. Another finding is that the secondary market has a stronger effect on the primary market than the other way around. This means that housing demand is satisfied in the first place from the secondary market, and if prices rise, potential buyers go to the primary market. Finally, we find that price increases in Warsaw spill over to the local markets of 16 regional cities. This finding is consistent with the contagion theory in the real estate market, according to which price increases in the centre lead to price increases in the periphery

Absolute Magnitudes and Colors of RR Lyrae stars in DECam Passbands from Photometry of the Globular Cluster M5

We characterize the absolute magnitudes and colors of RR Lyrae stars in the globular cluster M5 in the ugriz filter system of the Dark Energy Camera (DECam). We provide empirical Period-Luminosity (P-L) relationships in all 5 bands based on 47 RR Lyrae stars of the type ab and 14 stars of the type c. The P-L relationships were found to be better constrained for the fundamental mode RR Lyrae stars in the riz passbands, with dispersion of 0.03, 0.02 and 0.02 magnitudes, respectively. The dispersion of the color at minimum light was found to be small, supporting the use of this parameter as a means to obtain accurate interstellar extinctions along the line of sight up to the distance of the RR Lyrae star. We found a trend of color at minimum light with pulsational period that, if taken into account, brings the dispersion in color at minimum light to < 0.016 magnitudes for the (r-i), (i-z), and (r-z) colors. These calibrations will be very useful for using RR Lyrae stars from DECam observations as both standard candles for distance determinations and color standards for reddening measurements.Comment: Accepted for publication in A

The FABSPACE 2.0 Project For Geodata-Driven Innovation

Now that the Galileo and Copernicus satellite programmes are entering their operational phase, innovation possibilities in the field of satellite data driven applications are getting wider. Thanks to these two massive investments in technology, European and worldwide companies are starting to benefit from increasing, regular and cheaper (not to say free of charge) data flows, which could lead to the development of new and innovative applications and services in an incredibly vast range of markets, including non-space markets. The exploitation of satellite data, as well as open data (from public authorities in particular) has the potential to generate a lot of innovative solutions. In this context the FabSpace 2.0 project aims at putting the Universities at the front line for the take-off of Earth Observation based applications in Europe and worldwide. This can be pursued by hosting and animating open places dedicated to space and geodata-driven innovation where young developers from the civil society, experienced developers from industry or academic and research institutes, public administrations as well as civil organizations can meet, work together and co-create new tools and business models. They can create an ecosystem fitting (and developed according to) the particularities of geodata-driven innovation, in particular for the emergence of Space data downstream services. In this innovative environment, innovation is driven by the needs of users through the involvement of civil society in the innovation process and in the definition of new challenges. Moreover the actors making innovation will be anonymous civilians (students and researchers in particular) and will thus be at the same time developers and end-users of the applications they develop. That is why the FabSpace 2.0 project is expected to improve the capacity of Universities to generate more innovations and generate positive socio-economic impacts. All partner universities are centers of excellence in research in the field of geomatics and space based information. They are not only offering a highly-qualified human capital likely to generate innovation, but also providing open access to data generated within previous research works. Thus the FabSpace 2.0 project can be a particularly relevant opportunity for research teams to make a step forward towards Science 2.0

Foreign Direct Investment and Foreign Portfolio Investment in the contemporary globalized world: should they be still treated separately?

Foreign direct investment (FDI) and foreign portfolio investment (FPI) have been long considered as distinct and independent forms of international capital flows, but in the globalized world there are reasons to treat them as interconnected phenomena. This paper analyzes the mutual relationship between FDI and FPI and attempts to answer the question whether they complement or substitute for each other from a foreign investor’s point of view. Firstly, the paper describes the main characteristics of FDI and FPI in terms of a trade-off between their volatility and profitability. Secondly, it provides a literature review on the determinants of these two types of foreign investment. Finally, we analyse the long-run and short-run relationships between FDI and FPI running VECM regressions on data for Poland. Our research suggests that these two forms of foreign investment are substitutes. To be more specific, in economically stable periods FDI tends to dominate over FPI, but during insecurity and economic distress, both in source and host countries, FPI starts to gain importance

Detection and Discrimination of Injected Network Faults

Abstract Although the present work does in fact employ training data, it does so in the interest of calibrating the results Six hundred faults were induced by injection into five live obtained from an experimental detection and diagnostic campus networks at Carnegie Mellon University in order system designed specifically to accommodate noisy, to determine whether or not particular network faults nonstationary, nonspecific domains. The system have unique signatures as determined by out-of-band generalizes by virtue of its log analysis capabilities; all monitoring instrumentation. If unique signatures span monitored data and events are recorded in log files. networks, then the monitoring instrumentation can be These files are processed by the system, resulting in used to diagnose network faults, or distinguish among testable and reproducible detections and diagnoses of fault classes, without human intervention, using anomalous conditions. Any monitored process or machine-generated diagnostic decision rules. This device can be used to populate the logs with data. would be especially useful in large, unmanned systems in which the occurrence of novel or unanticipated faults The specific objective of the present work is to conduct could be catastrophic. Results indicate that significant a designed experiment to test the detection and diagaccuracy in automated detection and discrimination nosis capabilities of a system for handling faults in local among fault types can be obtained using anomaly sigarea networks. Networks were selected as a test natures as described here. domain because their operating characteristics include nonlinear, nonstationary dynamic behavior. The experiment uses automated injection techniques to induc

Glutamate, aspartate and nucleotide transporters in the SLC17 family form four main phylogenetic clusters: evolution and tissue expression

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The SLC17 family of transporters transports the amino acids: glutamate and aspartate, and, as shown recently, also nucleotides. Vesicular glutamate transporters are found in distinct species, such as <it>C. elegans</it>, but the evolutionary origin of most of the genes in this family has been obscure.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Our phylogenetic analysis shows that the SLC17 family consists of four main phylogenetic clades which were all present before the divergence of the insect lineage. One of these clades has not been previously described and it is not found in vertebrates. The clade containing Slc17a9 had the most restricted evolutionary history with only one member in most species. We detected expression of Slc17a1-17a4 only in the peripheral tissues but not in the CNS, while Slc17a5- Slc17a9 are highly expressed in both the CNS and periphery.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>The <it>in situ </it>hybridization studies on vesicular nucleotide transporter revealed high expression throughout the cerebral cortex, certain areas in the hippocampus and in specific nuclei of the hypothalamus and thalamus. Some of the regions with high expression, such as the medial habenula and the dentate gyrus of the hippocampus, are important sites for purinergic neurotransmission. Noteworthy, other areas relying on purine-mediated signaling, such as the molecular layer of the dentate gyrus and the periaqueductal gray, lack or have a very low expression of Slc17a9, suggesting that there could be another nucleotide transporter in these regions.</p