Sisters Speak Out: The Lives and Needs of Prostituted Women in Chicago, A Research Study

In July 2000, the Center for Impact Research (CIR) began investigating prostitution in the Chicago metropolitan area. The first phase of the project established an estimate of the prevalence of prostitution activities, documenting that a minimum of 16,000 women and girls in the Chicago metropolitan area are engaged regularly in the prostitution industry. Due to violence, substance abuse, homelessness, and health problems, women often are unable to safely exit prostitution. The second phase of the project more closely examined the lives of women in prostitution, in order to better understand their needs for services and support.CIR trained 12 prostitution survivors to conduct in-depth interviews with women throughout the Chicago metropolitan area who were currently, or had recently been, involved in prostitution. In all, 222 women representing various segments of the prostitution industry were interviewed. While this was not a random sample, and is not representative of all women engaged in prostitution, we believe it is large enough to provide helpful information for understanding the lives of women in prostitution, and what can be done to assist them

Simultaneous Perturbation Algorithms for Batch Off-Policy Search

We propose novel policy search algorithms in the context of off-policy, batch mode reinforcement learning (RL) with continuous state and action spaces. Given a batch collection of trajectories, we perform off-line policy evaluation using an algorithm similar to that by [Fonteneau et al., 2010]. Using this Monte-Carlo like policy evaluator, we perform policy search in a class of parameterized policies. We propose both first order policy gradient and second order policy Newton algorithms. All our algorithms incorporate simultaneous perturbation estimates for the gradient as well as the Hessian of the cost-to-go vector, since the latter is unknown and only biased estimates are available. We demonstrate their practicality on a simple 1-dimensional continuous state space problem

Improving the Health Care of Foster Children Throughout the US: Texas, a Case Example

Children who have been exposed to the foster care system comprise a high-risk, vulnerable, and potentially medically complex population that has both poor health and poor access to health care. This review with Texas as a case example aims to describe the health and health care issues impacting children in foster care (CFCs), the state and federal level mechanisms to ensure appropriate funding for the health care of CFCs, and recent legislative efforts to improve the health and health care access for CFCs. The review discusses potential solutions in regards to improving the health of CFCs through four main domains: facilitating integration of care through delivery mechanisms such as the medical home; understanding the role of trauma and toxic stress and consequently the impact of trauma-informed care on the health of CFCs; improving mental health screening efforts and tools; and enhancing access to appropriate mental health care services

Stacking-sequence optimization for buckling of laminated plates by integer programming

Integer-programming formulations for the design of symmetric and balanced laminated plates under biaxial compression are presented. Both maximization of buckling load for a given total thickness and the minimization of total thickness subject to a buckling constraint are formulated. The design variables that define the stacking sequence of the laminate are zero-one integers. It is shown that the formulation results in a linear optimization problem that can be solved on readily available software. This is in contrast to the continuous case, where the design variables are the thicknesses of layers with specified ply orientations, and the optimization problem is nonlinear. Constraints on the stacking sequence such as a limit on the number of contiguous plies of the same orientation and limits on in-plane stiffnesses are easily accommodated. Examples are presented for graphite-epoxy plates under uniaxial and biaxial compression using a commercial software package based on the branch-and-bound algorithm

Decoding the matrix: Coincident membranes on the plane wave

At the core of nonperturbative theories of quantum gravity lies the holographic encoding of bulk data in large matrices. At present this mapping is poorly understood. The plane wave matrix model provides a laboratory for isolating aspects of this problem in a controlled setting. At large boosts, configurations of concentric membranes become superselection sectors, whose exact spectra are known. From the bulk point of view one expects product states of individual membranes to be contained within the full spectrum. However, for non-BPS states this inclusion relation is obscured by Gauss law constraints. Its validity rests on nontrivial relations in representation theory, which we identify and verify by explicit computation.Comment: 43 pages, 2 figure

Observations from the Balcony: Directions for Pediatric Health Disparities Research and Policy

In 2002, the Institute of Medicine released Unequal Treatment: Confronting Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Healthcare, a landmark monograph documenting health disparities in the U.S. health care system. Since the publication of Unequal Treatment, the field of pediatric health disparities research has advanced significantly with a proliferation of studies examining a wide array of topics concerning inequities in child health. Advances in health care policy and legislation have also added to a heightened discourse on pediatric health disparities. While there has been substantial activity in efforts to address pediatric health disparities, questions remain regarding whether these efforts have changed the trajectory of health equity among children. The aim of this paper is to examine the practical challenges of addressing pediatric health disparities in the dynamic context of global changes in health care research, policy, and legislation relevant to children. Using the Adaptive Leadership framework, this paper outlines a conceptual model for assessing the scope of progress made in addressing pediatric health disparities, diagnoses the continued adaptive challenges of pediatric health disparities, and provides an agenda for further work and future investment