Exploring the Function of the Anti-communist Ideology and Identity in the Vietnamese American Diasporic Community

Anti-communist ideology in the Vietnamese American community is increasingly perceived as a destabilizing force. This article argues that when the anti-communist ideology is analyzed across time, persistence and change are part and parcel of the anti-communist identity. So that the anti-communist identity can be organized for other purposes or reproduced to reflect the concerns and needs of the growing and diverse members of the community. Moreover, it is argued that the concept of social capital may prove to be more analytical in delineating the effects of the anti-communist ideology

Preparation of GHZ states via Grover's quantum searching algorithm

In this paper we propose an approach to prepare GHZ states of an arbitrary multi-particle system in terms of Grover's fast quantum searching algorithm. This approach can be regarded as an extension of the Grover's algorithm to find one or more items in an unsorted database.Comment: 9 pages, Email address: [email protected]

The networked micro-decision context: A new lens on transformative urban governance

Recent large-scale societal disruptions, from the COVID-19 pandemic to intensifying wildfires and weather events, reveal the importance of transforming governance systems so they can address complex, transboundary, and rapidly evolving crises. Yet current knowledge of the decision-making dynamics that yield transformative governance remains scant. Studies typically focus on the aggregate outputs of government decisions, while overlooking their micro-level underpinnings. This is a key oversight because drivers of policy change, such as learning or competition, are prosecuted by people rather than organizations. We respond to this knowledge gap by introducing a new analytical lens for understanding policymaking, aimed at uncovering how characteristics of decision-makers and the structure of their relationships affect their likelihood of effectuating transformative policy responses. This perspective emphasizes the need for a more dynamic and relational view on urban governance in the context of transformation

Towards adopting Zero Interest Loan (ZIL) and Profit and Loss Sharing (PLS) principle in Islamic microfinance: the case of Amanah Ikhtiar Malaysia

Microfinance institutions evolved to alleviate poverty by providing micro-credit to the poor. There have been few poverty alleviation success stories from institutions such as Amanah Ikhtiar Malaysia (AIM). For the majority however, there is no solid evidence to support the positive impacts of microfinance institutions on the poor (Kono and Takahashi, 2010; as cited by Aliyu, 2012). One factor that hinders the positive impact of microfinance institutions on the poor is the inherent nature of the microcredit scheme which charges fixed and high interest rate due to high administrative cost (IRTI, 2007, as cited by Aliyu, 2012). Islamic microfinance evolved to provide alternative to the interest based conventional microfinance. However, the financing modes being used by the Islamic micro-finance institutions (IMFIs) are mostly debt based, which have resemblance to the interest based conventional modes. IMFs shun away from using the PLS scheme, which they consider risky. Theoretically, it is argued that PLS mobilizes factors of production, encourages risk sharing and ensures distributive equity in income and wealth. There is hardly any literature that has shown that PLS is workable in a pristine environment of zero interest. Furthermore, there is hardly any studies that have discussed on the feasibility of financing the poor using a combination of PLS and zero interest financing (ZIF). This study will experiment on the feasibility of providing small financing using a combination of PLS and ZIF to empower the working poor. The research incorporates literature survey, field study and business model applications in its methodology to achieve the desired objectives. The results of this pioneering project are expected to promote the local socio-economic welfare of the poor and provide opportunities in applied areas for future research. © 2013 The IIUM Institute of Islamic Banking and Finance. Keywords: Poverty; Islamic microfinance; Amanah Ikhtiar Malaysia; Equity-based financing; Interest-free financing

Evidence for Transgenerational Transmission of Epigenetic Tumor Susceptibility in Drosophila

Transgenerational epigenetic inheritance results from incomplete erasure of parental epigenetic marks during epigenetic reprogramming at fertilization. The significance of this phenomenon, and the mechanism by which it occurs, remains obscure. Here, we show that genetic mutations in Drosophila may cause epigenetic alterations that, when inherited, influence tumor susceptibility of the offspring. We found that many of the mutations that affected tumorigenesis induced by a hyperactive JAK kinase, HopTum-l, also modified the tumor phenotype epigenetically, such that the modification persisted even in the offspring that did not inherit the modifier mutation. We analyzed mutations of the transcription repressor Krüppel (Kr), which is one of the hopTum-l enhancers known to affect ftz transcription. We demonstrate that the Kr mutation causes increased DNA methylation in the ftz promoter region, and that the aberrant ftz transcription and promoter methylation are both transgenerationally heritable if HopTum-l is present in the oocyte. These results suggest that genetic mutations may alter epigenetic markings in the form of DNA methylation, which are normally erased early in the next generation, and that JAK overactivation disrupts epigenetic reprogramming and allows inheritance of epimutations that influence tumorigenesis in future generations

On the stability of standing waves of Klein-Gordon equations in a semiclassical regime

We investigate the orbital stability and instability of standing waves for two classes of Klein-Gordon equations in the semi-classical regime.Comment: 9 page

Enhancing Symbolic Execution of Heap-based Programs with Separation Logic for Test Input Generation

Symbolic execution is a well established method for test input generation. Despite of having achieved tremendous success over numerical domains, existing symbolic execution techniques for heap-based programs are limited due to the lack of a succinct and precise description for symbolic values over unbounded heaps. In this work, we present a new symbolic execution method for heap-based programs based on separation logic. The essence of our proposal is context-sensitive lazy initialization, a novel approach for efficient test input generation. Our approach differs from existing approaches in two ways. Firstly, our approach is based on separation logic, which allows us to precisely capture preconditions of heap-based programs so that we avoid generating invalid test inputs. Secondly, we generate only fully initialized test inputs, which are more useful in practice compared to those partially initialized test inputs generated by the state-of-the-art tools. We have implemented our approach as a tool, called Java StarFinder, and evaluated it on a set of programs with complex heap inputs. The results show that our approach significantly reduces the number of invalid test inputs and improves the test coverage

A comparison of transgenic rodent mutation and in vivo comet assay responses for 91 chemicals.

A database of 91 chemicals with published data from both transgenic rodent mutation (TGR) and rodent comet assays has been compiled. The objective was to compare the sensitivity of the two assays for detecting genotoxicity. Critical aspects of study design and results were tabulated for each dataset. There were fewer datasets from rats than mice, particularly for the TGR assay, and therefore, results from both species were combined for further analysis. TGR and comet responses were compared in liver and bone marrow (the most commonly studied tissues), and in stomach and colon evaluated either separately or in combination with other GI tract segments. Overall positive, negative, or equivocal test results were assessed for each chemical across the tissues examined in the TGR and comet assays using two approaches: 1) overall calls based on weight of evidence (WoE) and expert judgement, and 2) curation of the data based on a priori acceptability criteria prior to deriving final tissue specific calls. Since the database contains a high prevalence of positive results, overall agreement between the assays was determined using statistics adjusted for prevalence (using AC1 and PABAK). These coefficients showed fair or moderate to good agreement for liver and the GI tract (predominantly stomach and colon data) using WoE, reduced agreement for stomach and colon evaluated separately using data curation, and poor or no agreement for bone marrow using both the WoE and data curation approaches. Confidence in these results is higher for liver than for the other tissues, for which there were less data. Our analysis finds that comet and TGR generally identify the same compounds (mainly potent mutagens) as genotoxic in liver, stomach and colon, but not in bone marrow. However, the current database content precluded drawing assay concordance conclusions for weak mutagens and non-DNA reactive chemicals