Issue Brief: Latinos and Immigration

This issue brief discusses immigration and Latino population growth in the United States as they relate to the naturalization process for Latino immigrants. The Pew Hispanic Center states that language, financial, and administrative barriers are the main reasons for legal residents neglecting to seek citizenship. The main components of the brief address the naturalization process and why Mexican immigrants are the largest group of immigrants who live in the United States illegally

Women/Gender Issues, Protest Politics

This issue will focus on the various social movements and political protests women have created and supported in order to eradicate the alarming amount of social, economic, and political inequalities they have endured since the inception of this nation. It will examine the political and social impact of Feminism and how it has become a useful agent in promoting gender equality. Finally, this brief will concentrate on contemporary Women/Gender inequalities such as gender discrimination in the workforce and how women are retaliating to these types of inequalities

Asymptotic Analysis of Buffered Calcium Diffusion near a Point Source

The domain calcium (Ca2+) concentration near an open Ca2+ channel can be mod- eled as buffered diffusion from a point source. The concentration profiles can be well approximated by hemispherically symmetric steady-state solutions to a system of reaction-diffusion equations. After nondimensionalizing these equations and scaling space so that both reaction terms and the source amplitude are 0(1), we identify two dimensionless parameters, Cc and Eb, that correspond to the diffusion coefficients of dimensionless Ca2+ and buffer, respectively. Using perturbation methods, we derive approximations for the Ca2+ and buffer profiles in three asymptotic limits: (1) an excess buffer approximation (EBA), where the mobility of buffer exceeds that of Ca2+ (Eb \u3e Ec) and the fast diffusion of buffer toward the Ca2+ channel prevents buffer saturation (cf. Neher [Calcium Electrogenesis and Neuronal Functioning, Exp. Brain Res. 14, Springer-Verlag, Berlin, 1986, pp. 80-96]); (2) a rapid buffer approximation (RBA), where the diffusive time-scale for Ca2+ and buffer are comparable, but slow compared to reaction (ec \u3c\u3c 1, Eb reaction (ec \u3c\u3c 1, Eb reaction (ec \u3c\u3c 1, E

Orientational Disorder in Sodium Cadmium Trifluoride Trihydrate, NaCdF3·3H2O

Attempts to synthesize the hypothetical anhydrous fluoroperovskite NaCdF3, which has been predicted to be stable, resulted instead in a hydrated fluoride of nominal composition NaCdF3·3H2O. It decomposes to sodium fluoride, cadmium fluoride, and water at 60 °C. Its structure has been determined by single-crystal X-ray diffraction. Na0.92(2)Cd1.08F3.08·2.92H2O crystallizes in the cubic space group with a = 8.2369(4) Å and Z = 4. The structure is based on the NaSbF6-type (an ordered variant of the ReO3-type) and features tilted sodium- and cadmium-centred octahedra that are linked by shared vertices to form a three-dimensional network. Substitutional disorder occurs on the nonmetal site, which is occupied by both F and O atoms, and on one of the metal sites, which is occupied by 92% Na and 8% Cd. A four-fold orientational disorder of the tilted octahedra is manifested as partial occupancy (25%) of the nonmetal site. A scheme to synthesize the anhydrous fluoride is presented

Fragment screening reveals salicylic hydroxamic acid as an inhibitor of <em>Trypanosoma brucei</em> GPI GlcNAc-PI de-N-acetylase

The zinc-metalloenzyme GlcNAc-PI de-N-acetylase is essential for the biosynthesis of mature GPI anchors and has been genetically validated in the bloodstream form of Trypanosoma brucei, which causes African sleeping sickness. We screened a focused library of zinc-binding fragments and identified salicylic hydroxamic acid as a GlcNAc-PI de-N-acetylase inhibitor with high ligand efficiency. This is the first small molecule inhibitor reported for the trypanosome GPI pathway. Investigating the structure activity relationship revealed that hydroxamic acid and 2-OH are essential for potency, and that substitution is tolerated at the 4- and 5-positions

Middle Eastern Americans and Socioeconomic Class in American Politics

The Middle-Eastern American's experience in the US underwent a dramatic shift after the terrorist attacks of September 11th

Importance Sampling for Reinforcement Learning with Multiple Objectives

This thesis considers three complications that arise from applying reinforcement learning to a real-world application. In the process of using reinforcement learning to build an adaptive electronic market-maker, we find the sparsity of data, the partial observability of the domain, and the multiple objectives of the agent to cause serious problems for existing reinforcement learning algorithms. We employ importance sampling (likelihood ratios) to achieve good performance in partially observable Markov decision processes with few data. Our importance sampling estimator requires no knowledge about the environment and places few restrictions on the method of collecting data. It can be used efficiently with reactive controllers, finite-state controllers, or policies with function approximation. We present theoretical analyses of the estimator and incorporate it into a reinforcement learning algorithm. Additionally, this method provides a complete return surface which can be used to balance multiple objectives dynamically. We demonstrate the need for multiple goals in a variety of applications and natural solutions based on our sampling method. The thesis concludes with example results from employing our algorithm to the domain of automated electronic market-making