Attractiveness Compensates for Low Status Background in the Prediction of Educational Attainment

People who are perceived as good looking or as having a pleasant personality enjoy many advantages, including higher educational attainment. This study examines (1) whether associations between physical/personality attractiveness and educational attainment vary by parental socioeconomic resources and (2) whether parental socioeconomic resources predict these forms of attractiveness. Based on the theory of resource substitution with structural amplification, we hypothesized that both types of attractiveness would have a stronger association with educational attainment for people from disadvantaged backgrounds (resource substitution), but also that people from disadvantaged backgrounds would be less likely to be perceived as attractive (amplification)

SU(3) breaking in hyperon transition vector form factors

We present a calculation of the SU(3)-breaking corrections to the hyperon transition vector form factors to $\mathcal{O}(p^4)$ in heavy baryon chiral perturbation theory with finite-range regularisation. Both octet and decuplet degrees of freedom are included. We formulate a chiral expansion at the kinematic point $Q^2=-(M_{B_1}-M_{B_2})^2$, which can be conveniently accessed in lattice QCD. The two unknown low-energy constants at this point are constrained by lattice QCD simulation results for the $\Sigma^-\rightarrow n$ and $\Xi^0\rightarrow \Sigma^+$ transition form factors. Hence we determine lattice-informed values of $f_1$ at the physical point. This work constitutes progress towards the precise determination of $|V_{us}|$ from hyperon semileptonic decays

Socioeconomic inequalities in early adulthood disrupt the immune transcriptomic landscape via upstream regulators

Disparities in socio-economic status (SES) predict many immune system-related diseases, and previous research documents relationships between SES and the immune cell transcriptome. Drawing on a bioinformatically-informed network approach, we situate these findings in a broader molecular framework by examining the upstream regulators of SES-associated transcriptional alterations. Data come from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health), a nationally representative sample of 4543 adults in the United States. Results reveal a network—of differentially expressed genes, transcription factors, and protein neighbors of transcription factors—that shows widespread SES-related dysregulation of the immune system. Mediational models suggest that body mass index (BMI) plays a key role in accounting for many of these associations. Overall, the results reveal the central role of upstream regulators in socioeconomic differences in the molecular basis of immunity, which propagate to increase risk of chronic health conditions in later-life

Photometry and spectroscopy of faint candidate spectrophotometric standard DA white dwarfs

We present precise photometry and spectroscopy for 23 candidate spectrophotometric standard white dwarfs. The selected stars are distributed in the Northern hemisphere and around the celestial equators and are all fainter than r ~ 16.5 mag. This network of stars, when established as standards, together with the three Hubble Space Telescope primary CALSPEC white dwarfs, will provide a set of spectrophotometric standards to directly calibrate data products to better than 1%. These new faint standard white dwarfs will have enough signal-to-noise ratio in future deep photometric surveys and facilities to be measured accurately while still avoiding saturation in such surveys. They will also fall within the dynamic range of large telescopes and their instruments for the foreseeable future. This paper discusses the provenance of the observational data for our candidate standard stars. The comparison with models, reconciliation with reddening, and the consequent derivation of the full spectral energy density distributions for each of them is reserved for a subsequent paper.Comment: 31 pages, 17 figures, 10 tables, ApJ in press (accepted on December 23rd, 2018

Soil Electrical Conductivity Classification: A Basis For Site-Specific Management In Semiarid Cropping Systems

Site specific management (SSM) has the potential to improve both economic and ecological outcomes in agriculture. Effective SSM requires strong and temporally consistent relationships between identified management zones, underlying soil physical, chemical and biological parameters defining yield potential, and crop yield. In a farm-scale (250 ha) experiment in semiarid northeastern Colorado, each of eight 31-ha fields was individually mapped for soil apparent electrical conductivity (ECa) and classified into four management zones (ranges of ECa). Soil analyses revealed a strong negative relationship between ECa zones and soil parameters associated with innate fertility (P ≤ 0.06). The objective of the present study was to further evaluate ECa as a basis for SSM by examining its relationship to actual yield using two years of yield maps for winter wheat (Triticurn aestivum L.) and corn (Zea mays L.). Within field wheat yields were strongly related to ECa, particularly when regressing mean wheat yields within ECa classes against mean ECa within ECa classes (r2 = 0.95 to 0.99). Yield response curves revealed a boundary line of maximum yield that decreased with increasing EC . In this semiarid dryland system, ECa-based management zones can be used in the SSM of wheat for: (1) yield goal determination, (2) soil sampling to assess residual fertilizer concentrations and soil attributes affecting herbicide efficacy, and (3) prescription maps for metering fertilizer, pesticide and seed inputs. Inconsistent relationships were found between ECa and corn yields indicating that, while soil factors controlled wheat yields, corn yields were more influenced by weather

Stringy K-theory and the Chern character

For a finite group G acting on a smooth projective variety X, we construct two new G-equivariant rings: first the stringy K-theory of X, and second the stringy cohomology of X. For a smooth Deligne-Mumford stack Y we also construct a new ring called the full orbifold K-theory of Y. For a global quotient Y=[X/G], the ring of G-invariants of the stringy K-theory of X is a subalgebra of the full orbifold K-theory of the the stack Y and is linearly isomorphic to the ``orbifold K-theory'' of Adem-Ruan (and hence Atiyah-Segal), but carries a different, ``quantum,'' product, which respects the natural group grading. We prove there is a ring isomorphism, the stringy Chern character, from stringy K-theory to stringy cohomology, and a ring homomorphism from full orbifold K-theory to Chen-Ruan orbifold cohomology. These Chern characters satisfy Grothendieck-Riemann-Roch for etale maps. We prove that stringy cohomology is isomorphic to Fantechi and Goettsche's construction. Since our constructions do not use complex curves, stable maps, admissible covers, or moduli spaces, our results simplify the definitions of Fantechi-Goettsche's ring, of Chen-Ruan's orbifold cohomology, and of Abramovich-Graber-Vistoli's orbifold Chow. We conclude by showing that a K-theoretic version of Ruan's Hyper-Kaehler Resolution Conjecture holds for symmetric products. Our results hold both in the algebro-geometric category and in the topological category for equivariant almost complex manifolds.Comment: Exposition improved and additional details provided. To appear in Inventiones Mathematica