6,740 research outputs found
Comparison of techniques for handling missing covariate data within prognostic modelling studies: a simulation study
Background: There is no consensus on the most appropriate approach to handle missing covariate data within prognostic modelling studies. Therefore a simulation study was performed to assess the effects of different missing data techniques on the performance of a prognostic model.
Methods: Datasets were generated to resemble the skewed distributions seen in a motivating breast cancer example. Multivariate missing data were imposed on four covariates using four different mechanisms; missing completely at random (MCAR), missing at random (MAR), missing not at random (MNAR) and a combination of all three mechanisms. Five amounts of incomplete cases from 5% to 75% were considered. Complete case analysis (CC), single imputation (SI) and five multiple imputation (MI) techniques available within the R statistical software were investigated: a) data augmentation (DA) approach assuming a multivariate normal distribution, b) DA assuming a general location model, c) regression switching imputation, d) regression switching with predictive mean matching (MICE-PMM) and e) flexible additive imputation models. A Cox proportional hazards model was fitted and appropriate estimates for the regression coefficients and model performance measures were obtained.
Results: Performing a CC analysis produced unbiased regression estimates, but inflated standard errors, which affected the significance of the covariates in the model with 25% or more missingness. Using SI, underestimated the variability; resulting in poor coverage even with 10% missingness. Of the MI approaches, applying MICE-PMM produced, in general, the least biased estimates and better coverage for the incomplete covariates and better model performance for all mechanisms. However, this MI approach still produced biased regression coefficient estimates for the incomplete skewed continuous covariates when 50% or more cases had missing data imposed with a MCAR, MAR or combined mechanism. When the missingness depended on the incomplete covariates, i.e. MNAR, estimates were biased with more than 10% incomplete cases for all MI approaches.
Conclusion: The results from this simulation study suggest that performing MICE-PMM may be the preferred MI approach provided that less than 50% of the cases have missing data and the missing data are not MNAR
The Crystallography of Strange Quark Matter
Cold three-flavor quark matter at large (but not asymptotically large)
densities may exist as a crystalline color superconductor. We explore this
possibility by calculating the gap parameter Delta and free energy Omega(Delta)
for possible crystal structures within a Ginzburg-Landau approximation,
evaluating Omega(Delta) to order Delta^6. We develop a qualitative
understanding of what makes a crystal structure stable, and find two structures
with particularly large values of Delta and the condensation energy, within a
factor of two of those for the CFL phase known to characterize QCD at
asymptotically large densities. The robustness of these phases results in their
being favored over wide ranges of density and though it also implies that the
Ginzburg-Landau approximation is not quantitatively reliable, previous work
suggests that it can be trusted for qualitative comparisons between crystal
structures. We close with a look ahead at the calculations that remain to be
done in order to make contact with observed pulsar glitches and neutron star
cooling.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figures. Contribution to the proceedings of Strangeness in
Quark Matter 2006, UCLA. Talk given by Rishi Sharm
Quantifying barriers to monovalent anion transport in narrow non-polar pores
The transport of anionic drinking water contaminants (fluoride, chloride, nitrate and nitrite) through narrow pores ranging in effective radius from 2.5 to 6.5 Å was systematically evaluated using molecular dynamics simulations to elucidate the magnitud
The Ginzburg-Landau Free Energy Functional of Color Superconductivity at Weak Coupling
We derive the Ginzburg-Landau free energy functional of color
superconductivity in terms of the thermal diagrams of QCD in its perturbative
region. The zero mode of the quadratic term coefficient yields the same
transition temperature, including the pre-exponential factor, as the one
obtained previously from the Fredholm determinant of the two quark scattering
amplitude. All coefficients of the free energy can be made identical to those
of a BCS model by setting the Fermi velocity of the latter equal to the speed
of light. We also calculate the induced symmetric color condensate near
and find that it scales as the cubic power of the dominant antisymmetric color
component. We show that in the presence of an inhomogeneity and a nonzero gauge
potential, while the color-flavor locked condensate dominates in the bulk, the
unlocked condensate, the octet, emerges as a result of a simultaneous
color-flavor rotation in the core region of a vortex filament or at the
junction of super and normal phases.Comment: 32 pages, Plain Tex, 3 figure
Non-Relativistic Gravitation: From Newton to Einstein and Back
We present an improvement to the Classical Effective Theory approach to the
non-relativistic or Post-Newtonian approximation of General Relativity. The
"potential metric field" is decomposed through a temporal Kaluza-Klein ansatz
into three NRG-fields: a scalar identified with the Newtonian potential, a
3-vector corresponding to the gravito-magnetic vector potential and a 3-tensor.
The derivation of the Einstein-Infeld-Hoffmann Lagrangian simplifies such that
each term corresponds to a single Feynman diagram providing a clear physical
interpretation. Spin interactions are dominated by the exchange of the
gravito-magnetic field. Leading correction diagrams corresponding to the 3PN
correction to the spin-spin interaction and the 2.5PN correction to the
spin-orbit interaction are presented.Comment: 10 pages, 3 figures. v2: published version. v3: Added a computation
of Einstein-Infeld-Hoffmann in higher dimensions within our improved ClEFT
which partially confirms and partially corrects a previous computation. See
notes added at end of introductio
Transient absorption and reshaping of ultrafast XUV light by laser-dressed helium
We present a theoretical study of transient absorption and reshaping of
extreme ultraviolet (XUV) pulses by helium atoms dressed with a moderately
strong infrared (IR) laser field. We formulate the atomic response using both
the frequency-dependent absorption cross section and a time-frequency approach
based on the time-dependent dipole induced by the light fields. The latter
approach can be used in cases when an ultrafast dressing pulse induces
transient effects, and/or when the atom exchanges energy with multiple
frequency components of the XUV field. We first characterize the dressed atom
response by calculating the frequency-dependent absorption cross section for
XUV energies between 20 and 24 eV for several dressing wavelengths between 400
and 2000 nm and intensities up to 10^12 W/cm^2. We find that for dressing
wavelengths near 1600 nm, there is an Autler-Townes splitting of the 1s ---> 2p
transition that can potentially lead to transparency for absorption of XUV
light tuned to this transition. We study the effect of this XUV transparency in
a macroscopic helium gas by incorporating the time-frequency approach into a
solution of the coupled Maxwell-Schr\"odinger equations. We find rich temporal
reshaping dynamics when a 61 fs XUV pulse resonant with the 1s ---> 2p
transition propagates through a helium gas dressed by an 11 fs, 1600 nm laser
pulse.Comment: 13 pages, 8 figures, 1 table, RevTeX4, revise
Renormalized Wick expansion for a modified PQCD
The renormalization scheme for the Wick expansion of a modified version of
the perturbative QCD introduced in previous works is discussed. Massless QCD is
considered, by implementing the usual multiplicative scaling of the gluon and
quark wave functions and vertices. However, also massive quark and gluon
counter-terms are allowed in this mass less theory since the condensates are
expected to generate masses. A natural set of expansion parameters of the
physical quantities is introduced: the coupling itself and to masses and
associated to quarks and gluons respectively. This procedure allows to
implement a dimensional transmutation effect through these new mass scales. A
general expression for the new generating functional in terms of the mass
parameters and is obtained in terms of integrals over arbitrary but
constant gluon or quark fields in each case. Further, the one loop potential,
is evaluated in more detail in the case when only the quark condensate is
retained. This lowest order result again indicates the dynamical generation of
quark condensates in the vacuum.Comment: 13 pages, one figur
Singlet VA \tilde V correlator within the instanton vacuum model
The correlator of singlet axial-vector and vector currents in the external
electromagnetic field is studied within the instanton liquid model of QCD
vacuum. In the chiral limit we calculate the longitudinal w_L^0 and transversal
w_T^0 with respect to axial-vector index invariant amplitudes at arbitrary
momentum transfer q. It is demonstrated how the anomalous longitudinal part of
the correlator is renormalized at low momenta due to the presence of the U_A(1)
anomaly.Comment: 9 pages, 4 figure
Integrability and Transcendentality
We derive the two-loop Bethe ansatz for the sl(2) twist operator sector of
N=4 gauge theory directly from the field theory. We then analyze a recently
proposed perturbative asymptotic all-loop Bethe ansatz in the limit of large
spacetime spin at large but finite twist, and find a novel all-loop scaling
function. This function obeys the Kotikov-Lipatov transcendentality principle
and does not depend on the twist. Under the assumption that one may extrapolate
back to leading twist, our result yields an all-loop prediction for the
large-spin anomalous dimensions of twist-two operators. The latter also appears
as an undetermined function in a recent conjecture of Bern, Dixon and Smirnov
for the all-loop structure of the maximally helicity violating (MHV) n-point
gluon amplitudes of N=4 gauge theory. This potentially establishes a direct
link between the worldsheet and the spacetime S-matrix approach. A further
assumption for the validity of our prediction is that perturbative BMN
(Berenstein-Maldacena-Nastase) scaling does not break down at four loops, or
beyond. We also discuss how the result gets modified if BMN scaling does break
down. Finally, we show that our result qualitatively agrees at strong coupling
with a prediction of string theory.Comment: 45 pages LaTeX, 3 postscript figures. v2: Chapter on BMN scaling and
transcendentality added. v3: version accepted for publication in JSTA
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