Contextual Support of Environmental Protection

Environmental regulation is often viewed as conflicting with economic needs. This paper examines under what personal and contextual economic conditions individuals support increased environmental protection efforts. Data from the 2017 World Values Survey is analyzed to determine the probability that an individual will prioritize environmental protection over economic growth at varying levels of household income with a comparison between the context of an economically secure country and an economically insecure country. The results indicate that, across all income levels, individuals in economically secure countries are more likely to prioritize the environment than those in economically insecure countries. In a comparison of individuals within economically secure countries, the results do not support a change in an individual\u27s likelihood of prioritizing environmental protection based on household income level

Markov chain models of calcium puffs and sparks

Localized cytosolic Ca2+ elevations known as puffs and sparks are important regulators of cellular function that arise due to the cooperative activity of Ca2+-regulated inositol 1,4,5-trisphosphate receptors (IP3Rs) or ryanodine receptors (RyRs) co-localized at Ca2+ release sites on the surface of the endoplasmic reticulum or sarcoplasmic reticulum. Theoretical studies have demonstrated that the cooperative gating of a cluster of Ca2+-regulated Ca 2+ channels modeled as a continuous-time discrete-state Markov chain may result in dynamics reminiscent of Ca2+ puffs and sparks. In such simulations, individual Ca2+-release channels are coupled via a mathematical representation of the local [Ca2+] and exhibit stochastic Ca2+ excitability where channels open and close in a concerted fashion. This dissertation uses Markov chain models of Ca 2+ release sites to advance our understanding of the biophysics connecting the microscopic parameters of IP3R and RyR gating to the collective phenomenon of puffs and sparks.;The dynamics of puffs and sparks exhibited by release site models that include both Ca2+ coupling and nearest-neighbor allosteric coupling are studied. Allosteric interactions are included in a manner that promotes the synchronous gating of channels by stabilizing neighboring closed-closed and/or open-open channel pairs. When the strength of Ca2+-mediated channel coupling is systematically varied, simulations that include allosteric interactions often exhibit more robust Ca2+ puffs and sparks. Interestingly, the changes in puff/spark duration, inter-event interval, and frequency observed upon the random removal of allosteric couplings that stabilize closed-closed channel pairs are qualitatively different than the changes observed when open-open channel pairs, or both open-open and closed-closed channel pairs are stabilized. The validity of a computationally efficient mean-field reduction applicable to the dynamics of a cluster of Ca2+-release Ca2+ channels coupled via the local [Ca2+] and allosteric interactions is also investigated.;Markov chain models of Ca2+ release sites composed of channels that are both activated and inactivated by Ca2+ are used to clarify the role of Ca2+ inactivation in the generation and termination of puffs and sparks. It is found that when the average fraction of inactivated channels is significant, puffs and sparks are often less sensitive to variations in the number of channels at release sites and the strength of Ca2+ coupling. While excessively fast Ca2+ inactivation can preclude puffs and sparks moderately fast Ca2+ inactivation often leads to time-irreversible puff/sparks whose termination is facilitated by the recruitment of inactivated channels throughout the duration of the puff/spark event. On the other hand, Ca2+ inactivation may be an important negative feedback mechanism even when its time constant is much greater than the duration of puffs and sparks. In fact, slow Ca 2+ inactivation can lead to release sites with a substantial fraction of inactivated channels that exhibit nearly time-reversible puffs and sparks that terminate without additional recruitment of inactivated channels

Synchronization dynamics modulates stride-to-stride fluctuations when walking to an invariant but not to a fractal-like stimulus

Walking with different types of cueing/stimulus (i.e. auditory, visual) has been shown to alter gait variability, thus emerging as an innovative therapeutical tool to restore abnormal gait variability in clinical populations. However, the majority of the research in this area has focused on auditory stimuli while visual stimuli are an understudied alternative that needs more attention, particularly due to the natural dependence on vision during walking. Furthermore, the time differences between the occurrences of the walking steps and the sensory cues, also known as asynchronies, have also received minimal attention, even though the ability to synchronize with different stimuli is of great importance. This study investigated how synchronizing to visual stimuli with different temporal structures could affect gait variability and the respective asynchronies. Participants performed four 15-min walking trials around an indoor track while wearing insole footswitches for the following conditions: a) self-paced walking, and b) walking with glasses that instructed the subjects to step in sync with a virtual moving bar. The stepping occurences of the moving bar were presented in three different ways b1) non-variable, b2) variable and b3) random. Stride times and asynchronies were determined, and the mean values along with the fractal scaling (an indicator of the complexity) in their time series, were calculated. The fractal scaling of the stride times was unaltered when participants walked with the variable stimulus as compared to the self-paced walking condition; while fractal scaling was significantly decreased during the non-variable and random conditions, indicating a loss of complexity for these two conditions. No differences were observed in the means or the fractal scaling of the asynchronies. The correlation analysis between stride times and asynchronies revealed a strong relationship for the non-variable condition but a weak relationship for both variable and random conditions. Taken together, the present study results supports the idea of an existing internal timekeeper that exhibits complexity. We have shown that this complex pattern is similar regardless of the stimulus condition, suggesting that the system’s complexity is likely to be expressed at the task performance level – asyncrhonies – when walking to a stimulus. Thus, future research in sensoriomotor gait synchronization should focus and further explore the role of the asynchronies, as it may be of clinical significance

Ensemble Sales Forecasting Study in Semiconductor Industry

Sales forecasting plays a prominent role in business planning and business strategy. The value and importance of advance information is a cornerstone of planning activity, and a well-set forecast goal can guide sale-force more efficiently. In this paper CPU sales forecasting of Intel Corporation, a multinational semiconductor industry, was considered. Past sale, future booking, exchange rates, Gross domestic product (GDP) forecasting, seasonality and other indicators were innovatively incorporated into the quantitative modeling. Benefit from the recent advances in computation power and software development, millions of models built upon multiple regressions, time series analysis, random forest and boosting tree were executed in parallel. The models with smaller validation errors were selected to form the ensemble model. To better capture the distinct characteristics, forecasting models were implemented at lead time and lines of business level. The moving windows validation process automatically selected the models which closely represent current market condition. The weekly cadence forecasting schema allowed the model to response effectively to market fluctuation. Generic variable importance analysis was also developed to increase the model interpretability. Rather than assuming fixed distribution, this non-parametric permutation variable importance analysis provided a general framework across methods to evaluate the variable importance. This variable importance framework can further extend to classification problem by modifying the mean absolute percentage error(MAPE) into misclassify error. Please find the demo code at : https://github.com/qx0731/ensemble_forecast_methodsComment: 14 pages, Industrial Conference on Data Mining 2017 (ICDM 2017

The Cardiorespiratory Response of Qigong Performed at Different Intensities

Please click the pdf icon to download the abstract

Phase transition curves for mesoscopic superconducting samples

We compute the phase transition curves for mesoscopic superconductors. Special emphasis is given to the limiting shape of the curve when the magnetic flux is large. We derive an asymptotic formula for the ground state of the Schr\"odinger equation in the presence of large applied flux. The expansion is shown to be sensitive to the smoothness of the domain. The theoretical results are compared to recent experiments.Comment: 8 pages, 1 figur

Pennsylvania Folklife Vol. 37, No. 2

• The Junior Republic Movement in Pennsylvania: Youth Care in Grove City and Redington • Brechloch, or Rapp\u27s Harmony Society and the Production of Flax, Hemp, and Linen in Pennsylvania and Indiana • Some Neglected Swiss Literature on the Forebay Bank Barn • Hoping for the Best, Yet Fearing the Worst : An Overview of Civil War Medical Care Until the Battle of Gettysburg • Aldes un Neieshttps://digitalcommons.ursinus.edu/pafolklifemag/1118/thumbnail.jp

An Introduction to the SMARTRISK Heroes Program: Positive Social Marketing for Adolescent Injury Prevention

This article provides background on the SMARTRISK Heroes Program, a mobile stage production that introduces young people to the prevalence of unintentional injury for their age group and presents them with a series of strategies that will reduce the likelihood that they will be unintentionally injured or killed. The program logic is consistent with theoretical work from the area of health promotion including the Protection Motivation Theory and the Transtheoretical Model of Stages of Change. The SMARTRISK Heroes Program has been the subject of a number of past evaluations that are briefly described. The program logic model was included in this article. Additional information on the program and its evaluations can be found at http://www.smartrisk.ca by selecting SMARTRISK Heroes, under the “Youth Tab.