Using Open Data Initiatives to Enhance Police-Community Relations

It comes as no surprise that there are sections of the population who do not trust the police in their community. This has played out on a large scale recently over high profile use of force incidents that resulted in the deaths of civilians during interactions with police officers. Communities that felt the most distrust of police experienced civil unrest over these incidents and perpetuated the cycle as police had to step in and maintain order. What those sections of the community want is a means to have their voices heard and an open and honest line of communication with police. One suggested means of achieving that end is open data initiatives. Open data initiatives will make police policy, data on use of force incidents, and arrest and search data readily available to the public. Police agencies should participate in open data initiatives, as this is a first step to start to build trust within and positively impact relations between a department and their community. Building that trust and opening those lines of communication will allow a police agency to be more effective and enhance the safety of both the officers and the citizens. The recent push for open data initiatives has also come with resources agencies can use to get this process started. These range from funding to easy access to established data portals. Given the benefits that are possible and the resources that are available to make the process easier, police agencies must take advantage of the opportunity to become transparent organizations that meet the needs of all sections of their communities

Jazzin\u27 the Blues Away / music by Dick Heinrich; words by Jeff Branen

Cover: drawings of Caucasian males performing music; Publisher: Stasny Music Co. (New York)https://egrove.olemiss.edu/sharris_c/1144/thumbnail.jp

Multimethod Evaluation of the VA’s Peer-to-Peer Toolkit for Patient-Centered Medical Home Implementation

BACKGROUND: Effective implementation of the patient-centered medical home (PCMH) in primary care practices requires training and other resources, such as online toolkits, to share strategies and materials. The Veterans Health Administration (VA) developed an online Toolkit of user-sourced tools to support teams implementing its Patient Aligned Care Team (PACT) medical home model. OBJECTIVE: To present findings from an evaluation of the PACT Toolkit, including use, variation across facilities, effect of social marketing, and factors influencing use. INNOVATION: The Toolkit is an online repository of ready-to-use tools created by VA clinic staff that physicians, nurses, and other team members may share, download, and adopt in order to more effectively implement PCMH principles and improve local performance on VA metrics. DESIGN: Multimethod evaluation using: (1) website usage analytics, (2) an online survey of the PACT community of practice’s use of the Toolkit, and (3) key informant interviews. PARTICIPANTS: Survey respondents were PACT team members and coaches (n=544) at 136 VA facilities. Interview respondents were Toolkit users and nonusers (n=32). MEASURES: For survey data, multivariable logistic models were used to predict Toolkit awareness and use. Interviews and open-text survey comments were coded using a “common themes” framework. The Consolidated Framework for Implementation Research (CFIR) guided data collection and analyses. KEY RESULTS: The Toolkit was used by 6,745 staff in the first 19 months of availability. Among members of the target audience, 80% had heard of the Toolkit, and of those, 70% had visited the website. Tools had been implemented at 65% of facilities. Qualitative findings revealed a range of user perspectives from enthusiastic support to lack of sufficient time to browse the Toolkit. CONCLUSIONS: An online Toolkit to support PCMH implementation was used at VA facilities nationwide. Other complex health care organizations may benefit from adopting similar online peer-to-peer resource libraries.Keywords: evaluation, implementation research, primary care redesign, patient-centered care, quality improvemen

The Angular Correlation Function of Galaxies from Early SDSS Data

The Sloan Digital Sky Survey is one of the first multicolor photometric and spectroscopic surveys designed to measure the statistical properties of galaxies within the local Universe. In this Letter we present some of the initial results on the angular 2-point correlation function measured from the early SDSS galaxy data. The form of the correlation function, over the magnitude interval 18<r*<22, is shown to be consistent with results from existing wide-field, photographic-based surveys and narrower CCD galaxy surveys. On scales between 1 arcminute and 1 degree the correlation function is well described by a power-law with an exponent of ~ -0.7. The amplitude of the correlation function, within this angular interval, decreases with fainter magnitudes in good agreement with analyses from existing galaxy surveys. There is a characteristic break in the correlation function on scales of approximately 1-2 degrees. On small scales, < 1', the SDSS correlation function does not appear to be consistent with the power-law form fitted to the 1'< theta <0.5 deg data. With a data set that is less than 2% of the full SDSS survey area, we have obtained high precision measurements of the power-law angular correlation function on angular scales 1' < theta < 1 deg, which are robust to systematic uncertainties. Because of the limited area and the highly correlated nature of the error covariance matrix, these initial results do not yet provide a definitive characterization of departures from the power-law form at smaller and larger angles. In the near future, however, the area of the SDSS imaging survey will be sufficient to allow detailed analysis of the small and large scale regimes, measurements of higher-order correlations, and studies of angular clustering as a function of redshift and galaxy type

Analysis of Systematic Effects and Statistical Uncertainties in Angular Clustering of Galaxies from Early SDSS Data

The angular distribution of galaxies encodes a wealth of information about large scale structure. Ultimately, the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) will record the angular positions of order 10^8 galaxies in five bands, adding significantly to the cosmological constraints. This is the first in a series of papers analyzing a rectangular stripe 2.5x90 degrees from early SDSS data. We present the angular correlation function for galaxies in four separate magnitude bins on angular scales ranging from 0.003 degrees to 15 degrees. Much of the focus of this paper is on potential systematic effects. We show that the final galaxy catalog -- with the mask accounting for regions of poor seeing, reddening, bright stars, etc. -- is free from external and internal systematic effects for galaxies brighter than r* = 22. Our estimator of the angular correlation function includes the effects of the integral constraint and the mask. The full covariance matrix of errors in these estimates is derived using mock catalogs with further estimates using a number of other methods.Comment: 64 pages, 31 figures, new version to match that accepted by Ap

The Mycobacterium tuberculosis Phagosome Is a HLA-I Processing Competent Organelle

Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) resides in a long-lived phagosomal compartment that resists maturation. The manner by which Mtb antigens are processed and presented on MHC Class I molecules is poorly understood. Using human dendritic cells and IFN-γ release by CD8+ T cell clones, we examined the processing and presentation pathway for two Mtb–derived antigens, each presented by a distinct HLA-I allele (HLA-Ia versus HLA-Ib). Presentation of both antigens is blocked by the retrotranslocation inhibitor exotoxin A. Inhibitor studies demonstrate that, after reaching the cytosol, both antigens require proteasomal degradation and TAP transport, but differ in the requirement for ER–golgi egress and new protein synthesis. Specifically, presentation by HLA-B8 but not HLA-E requires newly synthesized HLA-I and transport through the ER–golgi. Phenotypic analysis of the Mtb phagosome by flow organellometry revealed the presence of Class I and loading accessory molecules, including TAP and PDI. Furthermore, loaded HLA-I:peptide complexes are present within the Mtb phagosome, with a pronounced bias towards HLA-E:peptide complexes. In addition, protein analysis also reveals that HLA-E is enriched within the Mtb phagosome compared to HLA-A2. Together, these data suggest that the phagosome, through acquisition of ER–localized machinery and as a site of HLA-I loading, plays a vital role in the presentation of Mtb–derived antigens, similar to that described for presentation of latex bead-associated antigens. This is, to our knowledge, the first description of this presentation pathway for an intracellular pathogen. Moreover, these data suggest that HLA-E may play a unique role in the presentation of phagosomal antigens

Immunity to HIV-1 Is Influenced by Continued Natural Exposure to Exogenous Virus

Unprotected sexual intercourse between individuals who are both infected with HIV-1 can lead to exposure to their partner's virus, and potentially to super-infection. However, the immunological consequences of continued exposure to HIV-1 by individuals already infected, has to our knowledge never been reported. We measured T cell responses in 49 HIV-1 infected individuals who were on antiretroviral therapy with suppressed viral loads. All the individuals were in a long-term sexual partnership with another HIV-1 infected individual, who was either also on HAART and suppressing their viral loads, or viremic (>9000 copies/ml). T cell responses to HIV-1 epitopes were measured directly ex-vivo by the IFN-γ enzyme linked immuno-spot assay and by cytokine flow cytometry. Sexual exposure data was generated from questionnaires given to both individuals within each partnership. Individuals who continued to have regular sexual contact with a HIV-1 infected viremic partner had significantly higher frequencies of HIV-1-specific T cell responses, compared to individuals with aviremic partners. Strikingly, the magnitude of the HIV-1-specific T cell response correlated strongly with the level and route of exposure. Responses consisted of both CD4+ and CD8+ T cell subsets. Longitudinally, decreases in exposure were mirrored by a lower T cell response. However, no evidence for systemic super-infection was found in any of the individuals. Continued sexual exposure to exogenous HIV-1 was associated with increased HIV-1-specific T cell responses, in the absence of systemic super-infection, and correlated with the level and type of exposure

The 2MASS Redshift Survey - Description and Data Release

We present the results of the 2MASS Redshift Survey (2MRS), a ten-year project to map the full three-dimensional distribution of galaxies in the nearby Universe. The 2 Micron All-Sky Survey (2MASS) was completed in 2003 and its final data products, including an extended source catalog (XSC), are available on-line. The 2MASS XSC contains nearly a million galaxies with Ks <= 13.5 mag and is essentially complete and mostly unaffected by interstellar extinction and stellar confusion down to a galactic latitude of |b|=5 deg for bright galaxies. Near-infrared wavelengths are sensitive to the old stellar populations that dominate galaxy masses, making 2MASS an excellent starting point to study the distribution of matter in the nearby Universe. We selected a sample of 44,599 2MASS galaxies with Ks =5 deg (>= 8 deg towards the Galactic bulge) as the input catalog for our survey. We obtained spectroscopic observations for 11,000 galaxies and used previously-obtained velocities for the remainder of the sample to generate a redshift catalog that is 97.6% complete to well-defined limits and covers 91% of the sky. This provides an unprecedented census of galaxy (baryonic mass) concentrations within 300 Mpc. Earlier versions of our survey have been used in a number of publications that have studied the bulk motion of the Local Group, mapped the density and peculiar velocity fields out to 50 Mpc, detected galaxy groups, and estimated the values of several cosmological parameters. Additionally, we present morphological types for a nearly-complete sub-sample of 20,860 galaxies with Ks = 10 deg.Comment: Accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series. The 2MRS catalogs and a version of the paper with higher-resolution figures can be found at http://tdc-www.harvard.edu/2mrs