Computing the Margin of Victory in Preferential Parliamentary Elections

We show how to use automated computation of election margins to assess the number of votes that would need to change in order to alter a parliamentary outcome for single-member preferential electorates. In the context of increasing automation of Australian electoral processes, and accusations of deliberate interference in elections in Europe and the USA, this work forms the basis of a rigorous statistical audit of the parliamentary election outcome. Our example is the New South Wales Legislative Council election of 2015, but the same process could be used for any similar parliament for which data was available, such as the Australian House of Representatives given the proposed automatic scanning of ballots

Aspergillosis of the CNS in a pediatric liver transplant recipient: Case report and review

A 2-month-old infant who had undergone orthotopic liver transplantation at the age of 2 weeks for carbamoyl phosphate synthetase deficiency developed infection of the CNS due to Aspergillus fumigatus. The patient was successfully treated with administration of a combination of antifungal agents (including intraventricular amphotericin B), drainage of the parietal lobe abscess, and cessation of immunosuppression. An intraventricular catheter was used both to obtain ventricular fluid for microbiologic testing and to deliver amphotericin B during nearly 4 months of treatment. We review literature on aspergillosis in solid-organ transplant recipients, especially those in whom the disease involves the CNS, and discuss in particular clinical presentation, diagnosis, treatment, and outcome

Gravitational lensing effects on sub-millimetre galaxy counts

We study the effects on the number counts of sub-millimetre galaxies due to gravitational lensing. We explore the effects on the magnification cross section due to halo density profiles, ellipticity and cosmological parameter (the power-spectrum normalisation $\sigma_8$). We show that the ellipticity does not strongly affect the magnification cross section in gravitational lensing while the halo radial profiles do. Since the baryonic cooling effect is stronger in galaxies than clusters, galactic haloes are more concentrated. In light of this, a new scenario of two halo population model is explored where galaxies are modeled as a singular isothermal sphere profile and clusters as a Navarro, Frenk and White (NFW) profile. We find the transition mass between the two has modest effects on the lensing probability. The cosmological parameter $\sigma_8$ alters the abundance of haloes and therefore affects our results. Compared with other methods, our model is simpler and more realistic. The conclusions of previous works is confirm that gravitational lensing is a natural explanation for the number count excess at the bright end.Comment: 10 pages, 10 figures, accepted by MNRA

Target Localization Accuracy Gain in MIMO Radar Based Systems

This paper presents an analysis of target localization accuracy, attainable by the use of MIMO (Multiple-Input Multiple-Output) radar systems, configured with multiple transmit and receive sensors, widely distributed over a given area. The Cramer-Rao lower bound (CRLB) for target localization accuracy is developed for both coherent and non-coherent processing. Coherent processing requires a common phase reference for all transmit and receive sensors. The CRLB is shown to be inversely proportional to the signal effective bandwidth in the non-coherent case, but is approximately inversely proportional to the carrier frequency in the coherent case. We further prove that optimization over the sensors' positions lowers the CRLB by a factor equal to the product of the number of transmitting and receiving sensors. The best linear unbiased estimator (BLUE) is derived for the MIMO target localization problem. The BLUE's utility is in providing a closed form localization estimate that facilitates the analysis of the relations between sensors locations, target location, and localization accuracy. Geometric dilution of precision (GDOP) contours are used to map the relative performance accuracy for a given layout of radars over a given geographic area.Comment: 36 pages, 5 figures, submitted to IEEE Transaction on Information Theor

Tunable Hydrogen Storage in Magnesium - Transition Metal Compounds

Magnesium dihydride (\mgh) stores 7.7 weight % hydrogen, but it suffers from a high thermodynamic stability and slow (de)hydrogenation kinetics. Alloying Mg with lightweight transition metals (TM = Sc, Ti, V, Cr) aims at improving the thermodynamic and kinetic properties. We study the structure and stability of Mg$_x$TM$_{1-x}$H$_2$ compounds, $x=[0$-1], by first-principles calculations at the level of density functional theory. We find that the experimentally observed sharp decrease in hydrogenation rates for $x\gtrsim0.8$ correlates with a phase transition of Mg$_x$TM$_{1-x}$H$_2$ from a fluorite to a rutile phase. The stability of these compounds decreases along the series Sc, Ti, V, Cr. Varying the transition metal (TM) and the composition $x$, the formation enthalpy of Mg$_x$TM$_{1-x}$H$_2$ can be tuned over the substantial range 0-2 eV/f.u. Assuming however that the alloy Mg$_x$TM$_{1-x}$ does not decompose upon dehydrogenation, the enthalpy associated with reversible hydrogenation of compounds with a high magnesium content ($x=0.75$) is close to that of pure Mg.Comment: 8 pages, 5 figure

Characterization of an Inherited Neurologic Syndrome in Toyger Cats with Forebrain Commissural Malformations, Ventriculomegaly and Interhemispheric Cysts.

BackgroundIn children, frequent congenital malformations with concomitant agenesis of the corpus callosum are diagnosed by neuroimaging in association with other cerebral malformations, including interhemispheric cysts and ventriculomegaly. Similar studies providing full characterization of brain defects by in vivo magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), and correlations with the pertinent anatomic pathologic examinations are absent in veterinary medicine.Hypothesis/objectivesCongenital brain defects underlie the neurologic signs observed in Toyger cats selectively bred for a short ear phenotype.AnimalsUsing proper pedigree analysis and genetic evaluations, 20 related Oriental-derived crossbred Toyger cats were evaluated. Seven clinically healthy (carrier) cats and 13 clinically affected cats that had neurologic signs, short ear phenotype and concomitant complex brain anomalies were studied.MethodsComplete physical and neurologic examinations and MRI were performed in all clinically healthy and affected cats. Postmortem and histopathologic examinations were performed in 8 affected cats and 5 healthy cats.ResultsNeurologic and MRI investigations confirmed 13 clinically affected cats with structural brain abnormalities. Ventriculomegaly with frequent concomitant supratentorial interhemispheric, communicating ventricular type-1b cysts and multiple midline and callosal malformations were detected in all cats displaying neurologic signs. Genetic analysis confirmed autosomal recessive mode of inheritance with no chromosomal abnormalities.Conclusions and clinical importanceNeuroanatomic dissections and histopathology were helpful for evaluation of abnormalities in midline brain structures, and for the full characterization of cysts. However, MRI was more sensitive for detection of small cysts. In this feline model, MRI diagnosis had extremely good correlation with pathologic abnormalities noted in the subset of animals that were examined by both modalities

Performance of FEC codes over AWGN channel for efficient use in Polymer Optical Fiber links

Volume 1 Issue 7 (September 2013

THE COST OF QUALITY IN ENGINEERING

Volume 1 Issue 5 (July 2013

Super Landau-Ginzburg mirrors and algebraic cycles

We investigate the super Landau-Ginzburg mirrors of gauged linear sigma models which, in an appropriate low energy limit, reduce to nonlinear sigma models with Kaehler supermanifold target spaces of nonnegative super-first Chern class.Comment: 29 pages, 5 figures, uses edited version of jheppub.sty. Dedicated to our dear friend and coauthor Maximilian Kreuzer, who died November 26, 2010. v3: Modifications to the Introduction, Equations (4.2), (5.2), and (6.2), and Remark 8.2. v2: Theorem A.1 and Corollary A.1 corrected; corresponding changes made in Section 4. Minor change in Section 2. Minor changes in Section