The Power-Sharing Event Dataset (PSED): a new dataset on the promises and practices of power-sharing in post-conflict countries

Past research on the relationship between power-sharing arrangements and the recurrence of civil conflict has primarily analyzed the promises of power-sharing stipulated in peace agreements. What happens afterwards, however, has not yet been sufficiently explored. This represents a major research gap, as the actual practices of power-sharing in post-conflict countries are likely to be influential in the possibility of civil conflict recurring. To address this shortcoming, we present a new global dataset on the promises and practices of power-sharing between the government of a state and former rebels in post-conflict countries. The collected data captures if, when and how power-sharing institutions have been promised and/or put into place, and whether they have subsequently been modified or abolished. The dataset encompasses every peace agreement signed after the cessation of a civil conflict in the years between 1989 and 2006, and covers a five-year period after the signature of each of these agreements (unless violence recurred earlier). The unit of analysis is the government–rebel dyad during the post-conflict period and data is recorded in an event data format. A first analysis of the Power-Sharing Event Dataset (PSED) reveals that the effects of the promises of power-sharing on civil conflict recurrence follow a different logic than the effects of their practices. This finding emphasizes the necessity for in-depth analyses of post-conflict situations for which the PSED provides the necessary data

Two-neutron knockout from neutron-deficient 34^{34}Ar, 30^{30}S, and 26^{26}Si

Two-neutron knockout reactions from nuclei in the proximity of the proton dripline have been studied using intermediate-energy beams of neutron-deficient $^{34}$Ar, $^{30}$S, and $^{26}$Si. The inclusive cross sections, and also the partial cross sections for the population of individual bound final states of the $^{32}$Ar, $^{28}$S and $^{24}$Si knockout residues, have been determined using the combination of particle and $\gamma$-ray spectroscopy. Similar to the two-proton knockout mechanism on the neutron-rich side of the nuclear chart, these two-neutron removal reactions from already neutron-deficient nuclei are also shown to be consistent with a direct reaction mechanism.Comment: Phys. Rev. C, rapid communication, in pres

Worm Grunting, Fiddling, and Charming—Humans Unknowingly Mimic a Predator to Harvest Bait

Background: For generations many families in and around Florida’s Apalachicola National Forest have supported themselves by collecting the large endemic earthworms (Diplocardia mississippiensis). This is accomplished by vibrating a wooden stake driven into the soil, a practice called ‘‘worm grunting’’. In response to the vibrations, worms emerge to the surface where thousands can be gathered in a few hours. Why do these earthworms suddenly exit their burrows in response to vibrations, exposing themselves to predation? Principal Findings: Here it is shown that a population of eastern American moles (Scalopus aquaticus) inhabits the area where worms are collected and that earthworms have a pronounced escape response from moles consisting of rapidly exiting their burrows to flee across the soil surface. Recordings of vibrations generated by bait collectors and moles suggest that ‘‘worm grunters’ ’ unknowingly mimic digging moles. An alternative possibility, that worms interpret vibrations as rain and surface to avoid drowning is not supported. Conclusions: Previous investigations have revealed that both wood turtles and herring gulls vibrate the ground to elicit earthworm escapes, indicating that a range of predators may exploit the predator-prey relationship between earthworms and moles. In addition to revealing a novel escape response that may be widespread among soil fauna, the results sho

Pathway analysis comparison using Crohn's disease genome wide association studies

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The use of biological annotation such as genes and pathways in the analysis of gene expression data has aided the identification of genes for follow-up studies and suggested functional information to uncharacterized genes. Several studies have applied similar methods to genome wide association studies and identified a number of disease related pathways. However, many questions remain on how to best approach this problem, such as whether there is a need to obtain a score to summarize association evidence at the gene level, and whether a pathway, dominated by just a few highly significant genes, is of interest.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>We evaluated the performance of two pathway-based methods (Random Set, and Binomial approximation to the hypergeometric test) based on their applications to three data sets of Crohn's disease. We consider both the disease status as a phenotype as well as the residuals after conditioning on IL23R, a known Crohn's related gene, as a phenotype.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Our results show that Random Set method has the most power to identify disease related pathways. We confirm previously reported disease related pathways and provide evidence for IL-2 Receptor Beta Chain in T cell Activation and IL-9 signaling as Crohn's disease associated pathways.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Our results highlight the need to apply powerful gene score methods prior to pathway enrichment tests, and that controlling for genes that attain genome wide significance enable further biological insight.</p

The structural and content aspects of abstracts versus bodies of full text journal articles are different

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>An increase in work on the full text of journal articles and the growth of PubMedCentral have the opportunity to create a major paradigm shift in how biomedical text mining is done. However, until now there has been no comprehensive characterization of how the bodies of full text journal articles differ from the abstracts that until now have been the subject of most biomedical text mining research.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We examined the structural and linguistic aspects of abstracts and bodies of full text articles, the performance of text mining tools on both, and the distribution of a variety of semantic classes of named entities between them. We found marked structural differences, with longer sentences in the article bodies and much heavier use of parenthesized material in the bodies than in the abstracts. We found content differences with respect to linguistic features. Three out of four of the linguistic features that we examined were statistically significantly differently distributed between the two genres. We also found content differences with respect to the distribution of semantic features. There were significantly different densities per thousand words for three out of four semantic classes, and clear differences in the extent to which they appeared in the two genres. With respect to the performance of text mining tools, we found that a mutation finder performed equally well in both genres, but that a wide variety of gene mention systems performed much worse on article bodies than they did on abstracts. POS tagging was also more accurate in abstracts than in article bodies.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Aspects of structure and content differ markedly between article abstracts and article bodies. A number of these differences may pose problems as the text mining field moves more into the area of processing full-text articles. However, these differences also present a number of opportunities for the extraction of data types, particularly that found in parenthesized text, that is present in article bodies but not in article abstracts.</p

Contrast Enhanced Micro-Computed Tomography Resolves the 3-Dimensional Morphology of the Cardiac Conduction System in Mammalian Hearts

The general anatomy of the cardiac conduction system (CCS) has been known for 100 years, but its complex and irregular three-dimensional (3D) geometry is not so well understood. This is largely because the conducting tissue is not distinct from the surrounding tissue by dissection. The best descriptions of its anatomy come from studies based on serial sectioning of samples taken from the appropriate areas of the heart. Low X-ray attenuation has formerly ruled out micro-computed tomography (micro-CT) as a modality to resolve internal structures of soft tissue, but incorporation of iodine, which has a high molecular weight, into those tissues enhances the differential attenuation of X-rays and allows visualisation of fine detail in embryos and skeletal muscle. Here, with the use of a iodine based contrast agent (I2KI), we present contrast enhanced micro-CT images of cardiac tissue from rat and rabbit in which the three major subdivisions of the CCS can be differentiated from the surrounding contractile myocardium and visualised in 3D. Structures identified include the sinoatrial node (SAN) and the atrioventricular conduction axis: the penetrating bundle, His bundle, the bundle branches and the Purkinje network. Although the current findings are consistent with existing anatomical representations, the representations shown here offer superior resolution and are the first 3D representations of the CCS within a single intact mammalian heart

Co-optation & Clientelism: Nested Distributive Politics in China’s Single-Party Dictatorship

What explains the persistent growth of public employment in reform-era China despite repeated and forceful downsizing campaigns? Why do some provinces retain more public employees and experience higher rates of bureaucratic expansion than others? Among electoral regimes, the creation and distribution of public jobs is typically attributed to the politics of vote buying and multi-party competition. Electoral factors, however, cannot explain the patterns observed in China’s single-party dictatorship. This study highlights two nested factors that influence public employment in China: party co-optation and personal clientelism. As a collective body, the ruling party seeks to co-opt restive ethnic minorities by expanding cadre recruitment in hinterland provinces. Within the party, individual elites seek to expand their own networks of power by appointing clients to office. The central government’s professed objective of streamlining bureaucracy is in conflict with the party’s co-optation goal and individual elites’ clientelist interest. As a result, the size of public employment has inflated during the reform period despite top-down mandates to downsize bureaucracy.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/116599/1/Ang, Cooptation & Clientelism, posted 2016-01.pdfDescription of Ang, Cooptation & Clientelism, posted 2016-01.pdf : First Onlin

Host plant range of a fruit fly community (Diptera: Tephritidae): Does fruit composition influence larval performance?

Background: Phytophagous insects differ in their degree of specialisation on host plants, and range from strictly monophagous species that can develop on only one host plant to extremely polyphagous species that can develop on hundreds of plant species in many families. Nutritional compounds in host fruits affect several larval traits that may be related to adult fitness. In this study, we determined the relationship between fruit nutrient composition and the degree of host specialisation of seven of the eight tephritid species present in La Réunion; these species are known to have very different host ranges in natura. In the laboratory, larval survival, larval developmental time, and pupal weight were assessed on 22 fruit species occurring in La Réunion. In addition, data on fruit nutritional composition were obtained from existing databases. Results: For each tephritid, the three larval traits were significantly affected by fruit species and the effects of fruits on larval traits differed among tephritids. As expected, the polyphagous species Bactrocera zonata, Ceratitis catoirii, C. rosa, and C. capitata were able to survive on a larger range of fruits than the oligophagous species Zeugodacus cucurbitae, Dacus demmerezi, and Neoceratitis cyanescens. Pupal weight was positively correlated with larval survival and was negatively correlated with developmental time for polyphagous species. Canonical correspondence analysis of the relationship between fruit nutrient composition and tephritid survival showed that polyphagous species survived better than oligophagous ones in fruits containing higher concentrations of carbohydrate, fibre, and lipid. Conclusion: Nutrient composition of host fruit at least partly explains the suitability of host fruits for larvae. Completed with female preferences experiments these results will increase our understanding of factors affecting tephritid host range. (Résumé d'auteur

Taking it personally: the effect of ethnic attachment on preferences for regionalism

This article presents three related findings on regional decentralization. We use an original dataset collected in Uganda to establish, for the first time in a developing country context, that individuals have meaningful preferences over the degree of regional decentralization they desire, ranging from centralism to secessionism. Second, multilevel models suggest that a small share of this variation is explained at the district and ethnic group levels. The preference for regional decentralization monotonically increases with an ethnic group or a district’s average ethnic attachment. However, the relationship with an ethnic group or district’s income is U-shaped: both the richest and the poorest groups desire more regionalism, reconciling interest-based and identity-based explanations for regionalism. Finally, we show that higher individual ethnic attachment increases preferences for regionalism using fixed effects and a new matching method