Distributed Shared State with History Maintenance

Shared mutable state is challenging to maintain in a distributed environment. We develop a technique, based on the Operational Transform, that guides independent agents into producing consistent states through inconsistent but equivalent histories of operations. Our technique, history maintenance, extends and streamlines the Operational Transform for general distributed systems. We describe how to use history maintenance to create eventually-consistent, strongly-consistent, and hybrid systems whose correctness is easy to reason about

Impact ionization fronts in Si diodes: Numerical evidence of superfast propagation due to nonlocalized preionization

We present numerical evidence of a novel propagation mode for superfast impact ionization fronts in high-voltage Si $p^+$-$n$-$n^+$ structures. In nonlinear dynamics terms, this mode corresponds to a pulled front propagating into an unstable state in the regime of nonlocalized initial conditions. Before the front starts to travel, field-ehanced emission of electrons from deep-level impurities preionizes initially depleted $n$ base creating spatially nonuniform free carriers profile. Impact ionization takes place in the whole high-field region. We find two ionizing fronts that propagate in opposite directions with velocities up to 10 times higher than the saturated drift velocity.Comment: 3 pages, 4 figure

Theoretical Foundations Development of Vocational Pedagogical Education in the 1920s – Early 1930s

The work focuses on studying the theoretical foundations of vocational pedagogical education, developed by scientists, educational management employees, and practicing teachers in the 1920s – early 1930s. This is the stage of system formation of training teachers of particular professional disciplines and industrial training instructors (masters). The purpose of the study is to establish the most significant and conceptual theoretical provisions formulated on the problems of the organization and content of training special teaching staff in the historical period under study. The study results, generalization, and systematization of documents and materials found in archival and library funds related to the formation of a system for training special pedagogical personnel are presented. This study is significant not only for understanding the features of the genesis of the vocational and pedagogical education system as an independent industry in the Russian education system, which successfully developed up to the 2000s, but also for determining the prospects for its development in the new socio-economic and socio-cultural realities

Weather and Random Forest-based Load Profiling Approximation Models and Their Transferability across Climate Zones

This study is to provide predictive understanding of the associations of weather attributes with electricity load profiles across a variety of climate zones and seasons. Firstly, machine learning (ML) approaches were used to identify and quantify the impacts of various weather attributes on residential and commercial electricity demand and its components across the western United States. Performance and transferability of the developed ML models were then evaluated across different temperate zones (e.g., southern, middle, and northern US) and across coastal, mid-continent, and wet zones, with inputs of weather condition data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) at representative weather stations. The predictive models were developed based on the ranked and screened factors using the regression tree (RT) and random forest (RF) approaches, for five different scenarios (seasons)

Firefly Algorithm to Opmimal Distribution of Reactive Power Compensation Units

The issue of electric power grid mode of optimization is one of the basic directions in power engineering research. Currently, methods other than classical optimization methods based on various bio-heuristic algorithms are applied. The problems of reactive power optimization in a power grid using bio-heuristic algorithms are considered. These algorithms allow obtaining more efficient solutions as well as taking into account several criteria. The Firefly algorithm is adapted to optimize the placement of reactive power sources as well as to select their values. A key feature of the proposed modification of the Firefly algorithm is the solution for the multi-objective optimization problem. Algorithms based on a bio-heuristic process can find a neighborhood of global extreme, so a local gradient descent in the neighborhood is applied for a more accurate solution of the problem. Comparison of gradient descent, Firefly algorithm and Firefly algorithm with gradient descent is carried out

Scale-free network topology and multifractality in weighted planar stochastic lattice

We propose a weighted planar stochastic lattice (WPSL) formed by the random sequential partition of a plane into contiguous and non-overlapping blocks and find that it evolves following several non-trivial conservation laws, namely $\sum_i^N x_i^{n-1} y_i^{4/n-1}$ is independent of time $\forall \ n$, where $x_i$ and $y_i$ are the length and width of the $i$th block. Its dual on the other hand, obtained by replacing each block with a node at its center and common border between blocks with an edge joining the two vertices, emerges as a network with a power-law degree distribution $P(k)\sim k^{-\gamma}$ where $\gamma=5.66$ revealing scale-free coordination number disorder since $P(k)$ also describes the fraction of blocks having $k$ neighbours. To quantify the size disorder, we show that if the $i$th block is populated with $p_i\sim x_i^3$ then its distribution in the WPSL exhibits multifractality.Comment: 7 pages, 8 figures, To appear in New Journal of Physics (NJP

Response of Old Skeletal Muscle to 8 Weeks of Electrical Stimulation (Should We Change the Conventional Electrical Stimulation Protocol for Cardiomyoplasty?)

We hypothesized that the conditioned muscles of elderly organisms have different responses to electrical stimulation than that of young adult organisms. One-year-old sheep and eight-year-old elderly sheep were used for this investigation. Results. The latissimus dorsi muscle (LDM) of old sheep has less fatigue resistance than LDM of younger animals. In all animals, LDH-5 fractions decreased after eight weeks ES; LDH-1+2 fractions increased. After a two week delay, the data completely returned to baseline values in old adult animals. The percent area occupied by mitochondria in old sheep was less after ES than in younger animals. In all animals, the mitochondrial area increased after ES and reverted to baseline values after the delay. The number of nuclei and fibers considerably increased after ES. Conclusions. Young skeletal muscle obtains more plasticity than adult muscle during ES. Elderly skeletal muscle does not convert to a fatigue resistant state as completely as adult skeletal muscle during a conventional eight week ES protocol. It is necessary to change and prolong the ES protocol for elderly patients

Safety and Efficacy of Everolimus in Adult Patients with Neuroendocrine Tumors

Neuroendocrine tumors (NETs) consist of a diverse family of tumors which are derived from the neuroendocrine system. Most NETs are well or moderately differentiated tumors with a relatively indolent growth pattern. However, these tumors can cause significant clinical disease due to release of functional products that mediate the carcinoid syndrome and other diverse sequela. They also can grow progressively and cause symptoms from local invasion or distant metastasis. NETs are optimally treated with surgery and somatosatin analogs (SSA’s) to control symptoms but are relatively insensitive to systemic chemotherapy. As a result, patients with advanced unresectable NETs have a poor prognosis. In 2011, two targeted therapies, sunitinib and everolimus were approved in the subset of progressive pancreatic NETs (pNETs). Everolimus is an oral inhibitor of the growth stimulatory mTOR pathway. In Phase 2 trials in NETs and pNETs, everolimus was well tolerated and associated with some response and widespread disease stabilization. In follow-up, randomized Phase 3 trials, everolimus was compared to placebo. In the RADIANT-2 trial, everolimus and a somatostatin analog were used in patients with functional NETs and treatment was associated with an an improvement in progression-free survival (PFS). In the RADIANT-3 trial, patients with pNET were randomized to receive everolimus or placebo along with best supportive care. Everolimus was again associated with improvement in PFS compared to placebo and it has been approved by the FDA for patients with progressive pNET. Everolimus is associated with frequent low grade toxicity but is also notable for increased rates of infection as well as non-infectious pneumonitis. mTOR inhibition with everolimus represents a significant advance in the treatment of advanced neuroendocrine tumors