Goddard X-ray astronomy contributions to the IAU/COSPAR (1982)

The relation of X-ray flux to both the continuum flux in the optical and radio bands, and to the line emission properties of these objects were studied. The Einstein Observatory, because of increased sensitivity and improved angular resolution, increased substantially the number of known X-ray emitting active galactic nuclei. The Einstein imaging instruments detected morphology in AGN X-ray emission, in particular from jetlike structures in Cen-A, M87, and 3C273. The improved energy resolution and sensitivity of the spectrometers onboard the Observatory provide information on the geometry and ionization structure of the region responsible for the broad optical emission lines in a few AGN's. This information, combined with theoretical modeling and IUE and optical observations, allows the construction of a moderately detailed picture of the broad line region in these objects

Reconciliation of object interaction models

This paper presents Reconciliation+, a tool-supported method which identifies overlaps between models of different object interactions expressed as UML sequence and/or collaboration diagrams, checks whether the overlapping elements of these models satisfy specific consistency rules, and guides developers in handling these inconsistencies. The method also keeps track of the decisions made and the actions taken in the process of managing inconsistencies

Comparison of the COBE FIRAS and DIRBE Calibrations

We compare the independent FIRAS and DIRBE observations from the COBE in the wavelength range 100-300 microns. This cross calibration provides checks of both data sets. The results show that the data sets are consistent within the estimated gain and offset uncertainties of the two instruments. They show the possibility of improving the gain and offset determination of DIRBE at 140 and 240 microns.Comment: Accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journal 11 pages, plus 3 figures in separate postscript files. Figure 3 has three part

First Astronomical Use of Multiplexed Transition Edge Bolometers

We present performance results based on the first astronomical use of multiplexed superconducting bolometers. The Fabry-Perot Interferometer Bolometer Research Experiment (FIBRE) is a broadband submillimeter spectrometer that achieved first light in June 2001 at the Caltech Submillimeter Observatory (CSO). FIBRE'S detectors are superconducting transition edge sensor (TES) bolometers read out by a SQUID multiplexer. The Fabry-Perot uses a low resolution grating to order sort the incoming light. A linear bolometer array consisting of 16 elements detects this dispersed light, capturing 5 orders simultaneously from one position on the sky. With tuning of the Fabry-Perot over one free spectral range, a spectrum covering Δλ/λ= 1/7 at a resolution of δλ/λ ≈ 1/1200 can be acquired. This spectral resolution is sufficient to resolve Doppler-broadened line emission from external galaxies. FIBRE operates in the 350 µm and 450 µm bands. These bands cover line emission from the important star formation tracers neutral carbon [Cl] and carbon monoxide (CO). We have verified that the multiplexed bolometers are photon noise limited even with the low power present in moderate resolution spectrometry

Quit Methods Used by US Adult Cigarette Smokers, 2014–2016

To quantify the prevalence of 10 quit methods commonly used by adult cigarette smokers, we used data from a nationally representative longitudinal (2014-2016) online survey of US adult cigarette smokers (n = 15,943). Overall, 74.7% of adult current cigarette smokers used multiple quit methods during their most recent quit attempt. Giving up cigarettes all at once (65.3%) and reducing the number of cigarettes smoked (62.0%) were the most prevalent methods. Substituting some cigarettes with e-cigarettes was used by a greater percentage of smokers than the nicotine patch, nicotine gum, or other cessation aids approved by the US Food and Drug Administration. Further research into the effectiveness of e-cigarettes as a cessation aid is warranted

Joint Learning of Intrinsic Images and Semantic Segmentation

Semantic segmentation of outdoor scenes is problematic when there are variations in imaging conditions. It is known that albedo (reflectance) is invariant to all kinds of illumination effects. Thus, using reflectance images for semantic segmentation task can be favorable. Additionally, not only segmentation may benefit from reflectance, but also segmentation may be useful for reflectance computation. Therefore, in this paper, the tasks of semantic segmentation and intrinsic image decomposition are considered as a combined process by exploring their mutual relationship in a joint fashion. To that end, we propose a supervised end-to-end CNN architecture to jointly learn intrinsic image decomposition and semantic segmentation. We analyze the gains of addressing those two problems jointly. Moreover, new cascade CNN architectures for intrinsic-for-segmentation and segmentation-for-intrinsic are proposed as single tasks. Furthermore, a dataset of 35K synthetic images of natural environments is created with corresponding albedo and shading (intrinsics), as well as semantic labels (segmentation) assigned to each object/scene. The experiments show that joint learning of intrinsic image decomposition and semantic segmentation is beneficial for both tasks for natural scenes. Dataset and models are available at: https://ivi.fnwi.uva.nl/cv/intrinsegComment: ECCV 201

A reliability-based approach for influence maximization using the evidence theory

The influence maximization is the problem of finding a set of social network users, called influencers, that can trigger a large cascade of propagation. Influencers are very beneficial to make a marketing campaign goes viral through social networks for example. In this paper, we propose an influence measure that combines many influence indicators. Besides, we consider the reliability of each influence indicator and we present a distance-based process that allows to estimate the reliability of each indicator. The proposed measure is defined under the framework of the theory of belief functions. Furthermore, the reliability-based influence measure is used with an influence maximization model to select a set of users that are able to maximize the influence in the network. Finally, we present a set of experiments on a dataset collected from Twitter. These experiments show the performance of the proposed solution in detecting social influencers with good quality.Comment: 14 pages, 8 figures, DaWak 2017 conferenc

Texture of fermion mass matrices in partially unified theories

We investigate the texture of fermion mass matrices in theories with partial unification (for example $SU(2)_L\times SU(2)_R\times SU(4)_c$) at a scale $\sim 10^{12}$ GeV. Starting with the low energy values of the masses and the mixing angles, we find only two viable textures with atmost four texture zeros. One of these corresponds to a somewhat modified Fritzsch textures. A theoretical derivataion of these textures leads to new interesting relations among the masses and the mixing angles.Comment: 10 pages(Latex

Redox activity and chemical speciation of size fractioned PM in the communities of the Los Angeles ? Long Beach Harbor

International audienceIn this study, two different types of assays were used to quantitatively measure the redox activity of PM and to examine its intrinsic toxicity: 1) in vitro exposure to rat alveolar macrophage (AM) cells using dichlorofluorescin diacetate (DCFH-DA) as the fluorescent probe (macrophage ROS assay), and: 2) consumption of dithiothreitol (DTT) in a cell-free system (DTT assay). Coarse (PM10?2.5), accumulation (PM2.5?0.25), and quasi-ultrafine (quasi-UF, PM0.25) mode particles were collected weekly at five sampling sites in the Los Angeles-Long Beach Harbor and at one site near the University of Southern California campus (urban site). All PM samples were analyzed for organic (total and water-soluble) and elemental carbon, organic species, inorganic ions, and total and water-soluble elements. Quasi-UF mode particles showed the highest redox activity at all Long Beach sites (on both a per-mass and per-air volume basis). A significant association (R2=0.61) was observed between the two assays, indicating that macrophage ROS and DTT levels are affected at least partially by similar PM species. Relatively small variation was observed for the DTT measurements across all size fractions and sites, whereas macrophage ROS levels showed more significant ranges across the three different particle size modes and throughout the sites (coefficients of variation, or CVs, were 0.35, 0.24 and 0.53 for quasi-UF, accumulation, and coarse mode particles, respectively). Association between the PM constituents and the redox activity was further investigated using multiple linear regression models. The results showed that OC was the most important component influencing the DTT activity of PM samples. The variability of macrophage ROS was explained by changes in OC concentrations and water-soluble vanadium (probably originating from ship emissions ? bunker oil combustion). The multiple regression models were used to predict the average diurnal macrophage ROS and DTT levels as a function of the OC concentration at one of the sampling sites

Observation of a multimode plasma response and its relationship to density pumpout and edge-localized mode suppression

Density pumpout and edge-localized mode (ELM) suppression by applied n=2 magnetic fields in low-collisionality DIII-D plasmas are shown to be correlated with the magnitude of the plasma response driven on the high-field side (HFS) of the magnetic axis but not the low-field side (LFS) midplane. These distinct responses are a direct measurement of a multimodal magnetic plasma response, with each structure preferentially excited by a different n=2 applied spectrum and preferentially detected on the LFS or HFS. Ideal and resistive magneto-hydrodynamic (MHD) calculations find that the LFS measurement is primarily sensitive to the excitation of stable kink modes, while the HFS measurement is primarily sensitive to resonant currents (whether fully shielding or partially penetrated). The resonant currents are themselves strongly modified by kink excitation, with the optimal applied field pitch for pumpout and ELM suppression significantly differing from equilibrium field alignment.This material is based upon work supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of Fusion Energy Sciences, using the DIII-D National Fusion Facility, a DOE Office of Science user facility, under Awards No. DE-FC02-04ER54698, No. DE-AC02-09CH11466, No. DE-FG02-04ER54761, No. DE-AC05-06OR23100, No. DE-SC0001961, and No. DE-AC05-00OR22725. S. R. H. was supported by AINSE and ANSTO