Changes of personal network composition and inter-group ties from 1987 to 2005 in Hungary

The following paper presents the changes and stability of assortative mixing, and inter-group ties in Hungary from 1987 to 2005. The demographic categories under investigation are age, sex, and education. The analysis has a special focus on the rearrangement of the context of tie formation, and the inequality of receiving choices into personal networks along social categories. The most substantial change during the period, is the strong decrease in gender homophily, and some strengthening of intergenerationalties. Both of these findings are in line with the observation that personal networks are recruited more often among the members of the nuclear-family. This latter phenomenon is probably due to the shrinking network size. However, this set of finding is prone to the methodological criticism formulated in the US context, that these observations are in fact the result of the interviewer effect. Finally, the study found stable patterns of educational network prestige, and describes the changes of social capital attached to categories of gender and age

Genetic Determinants of Dyslipidemia

Dyslipidemia is a chronic deviation from normal blood lipid levels that can lead to atherosclerosis and other cardiovascular diseases; dyslipidemia and its sequelae are caused by the complex interplay of genetic and environmental factors. Although circulating concentrations of total cholesterol (TC), triglycerides (TG), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) and high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) have a strong genetic underpinning, not much is known about the genetic factors that affect long-term deteriorations in lipid concentrations. Through the work described in this thesis I sought to identify novel genetic loci associated with long-term lipid level changes and identify gene × environment interactions influencing blood lipid and lipoprotein concentrations.In Papers I and II, large European prospective cohort studies with long-term follow-up were analyzed. The Gene–Lifestyle Interactions and Complex Traits Involved in Elevated Disease Risk (GLACIER) Study (N=3,495) was analyzed in the discovery phase of these studies. The MDC, PIVUS, ULSAM and MRC Ely studies (Nmax=8,263) were utilized as replication cohorts. In Paper III, Scandinavian adults from the GLACIER, MDC, Inter99 and Health 2006 Studies were meta-analyzed (Nmax=18,190). In Paper IV, analyses were conducted in the Diabetes Prevention Program (DPP) (N=2,993) multi-ethnic randomized clinical trial. Participants from the GLACIER Study and DPP, the two discovery studies intensively used in this thesis, were genotyped with the Illumina CardioMetaboChip array.In Paper I, TC- and TG-specific genetic risk scores (GRSs) were robustly associated with TC- and TG level changes, respectively. Three genomic loci, APOE, TRIB1 and APOA1 were associated with either TC- or TG changes and were replicated in subsequent analyses. In Paper II, in addition to the findings of Paper I, seven further loci were associated with TC- or TG changes. Of these, variants at CAPN3, HPR and SIX5 showed suggestive evidence for association with coronary artery disease. In Paper III, a robust sex-heterogeneous interaction between the TG-related GRS and body mass index was observed for circulating blood TG levels. In Paper IV, an interaction between the large HDL particle-associated GRS and the lifestyle intervention for large HDL particle concentrations was observed.In conclusion, this thesis work shows genetic associations for long-term lipid changes and demonstrates examples of gene × environment interactions that influence blood lipid concentrations

On Renyi entropies characterizing the shape and the extension of the phase space representation of quantum wave functions in disordered systems

We discuss some properties of the generalized entropies, called Renyi entropies and their application to the case of continuous distributions. In particular it is shown that these measures of complexity can be divergent, however, their differences are free from these divergences thus enabling them to be good candidates for the description of the extension and the shape of continuous distributions. We apply this formalism to the projection of wave functions onto the coherent state basis, i.e. to the Husimi representation. We also show how the localization properties of the Husimi distribution on average can be reconstructed from its marginal distributions that are calculated in position and momentum space in the case when the phase space has no structure, i.e. no classical limit can be defined. Numerical simulations on a one dimensional disordered system corroborate our expectations.Comment: 8 pages with 2 embedded eps figures, RevTex4, AmsMath included, submitted to PR

LAPACK-Based Software for Subspace Identification

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A Lloyd-model generalization: Conductance fluctuations in one-dimensional disordered systems

We perform a detailed numerical study of the conductance $G$ through one-dimensional (1D) tight-binding wires with on-site disorder. The random configurations of the on-site energies $\epsilon$ of the tight-binding Hamiltonian are characterized by long-tailed distributions: For large $\epsilon$, $P(\epsilon)\sim 1/\epsilon^{1+\alpha}$ with $\alpha\in(0,2)$. Our model serves as a generalization of 1D Lloyd's model, which corresponds to $\alpha=1$. First, we verify that the ensemble average $\left\langle -\ln G\right\rangle$ is proportional to the length of the wire $L$ for all values of $\alpha$, providing the localization length $\xi$ from $\left\langle-\ln G\right\rangle=2L/\xi$. Then, we show that the probability distribution function $P(G)$ is fully determined by the exponent $\alpha$ and $\left\langle-\ln G\right\rangle$. In contrast to 1D wires with standard white-noise disorder, our wire model exhibits bimodal distributions of the conductance with peaks at $G=0$ and $1$. In addition, we show that $P(\ln G)$ is proportional to $G^\beta$, for $G\to 0$, with $\beta\le\alpha/2$, in agreement to previous studies.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figure

Guidelines for fabrication of hybrid microcircuits

Document is summary of approaches that may be taken in designing hybrid microcircuits similar to those for aerospace application

Interstitial lung disease in connective tissue diseases: evolving concepts of pathogenesis and management

Interstitial lung disease (ILD) is a challenging clinical entity associated with multiple connective tissue diseases, and is a significant cause of morbidity and mortality. Effective therapies for connective tissue disease-associated interstitial lung disease (CTD-ILD) are still lacking. Multidisciplinary clinics dedicated to the early diagnosis and improved management of patients with CTD-ILD are now being established. There is rapid progress in understanding and identifying the effector cells, the proinflammatory and profibrotic mediators, and the pathways involved in the pathogenesis of CTD-ILD. Serum biomarkers may provide new insights as risk factors for pulmonary fibrosis and as measures of disease progression. Despite these recent advances, the management of patients with CTD-ILD remains suboptimal. Further studies are therefore urgently needed to better understand these conditions, and to develop effective therapeutic interventions