Tiny Corpus Applications with Transformation-Based Error-Driven Learning : Evaluations of Automatic Grammar Induction and Partial Parsing of SaiSiyat

This paper reports a preliminary result on automatic grammar induction based on the framework of Brill and Markus (1992) and binary-branching syntactic parsing of Esperanto and SaiSiyat (a Formosan language). Automatic grammar induction requires large corpus and is found implausible to process endangered minor languages. Syntactic parsing, on the contrary, needs merely tiny corpus and works along with corpora segmented by intonation-unit which results in high accuracy

Healthsouth Corporation: The First Case Against A Company Under The Sarbanes-Oxley Act

HealthSouth Corporation, one of the nation’s largest healthcare providers, was the first company charged under the provisions of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act.  HealthSouth’s CEO, Richard Scrushy, and 16 of its executives were indicted for allegedly using a sophisticated scheme to overstate the company’s earnings by as much as $2.7 billion between 1986 and 2002.  Fifteen of the sixteen indicted executives pleaded guilty and another was convicted by jurors.  After five months of court hearing, Scrushy was acquitted of all criminal charges.  However, he remains a defendant in 40 cases filed by former HealthSouth investors and creditors.   This case is based on court materials and other publicly available information and has been used in several undergraduate and MBA courses.  The case and the accompanying teaching notes have proven to be an effective tool in teaching students the Sarbanes-Oxley Act and in helping students become more ethically conscious

Taxation In Germany And Romania

Taxation is a symbol of national sovereignty and a central part of a country’s overall economic policy, helping finance public spending and redistribute wealth. Furthermore, for international business executives, taxation is an important consideration in investment decisions. This paper discusses the taxation in two European Union (EU) member countries, Germany and Romania. These two countries are selected because of their different stages of economic development and their unique characteristics in taxation

DEVELOPING AN ONLINE CORPUS OF FORMOSAN LANGUAGES

Information technologies have now matured to the point of enabling researchers to create a repository of language resources, especially for those languages facing the crisis of endangerment. The development of an online platform of corpora, made possible by recent advances in data storage, character-encoding and web technology, has profound consequences for the accessibility, quantity, quality and interoperability of linguistic field data. This is of particular significance for Formosan languages in Taiwan, many of which are on the verge of extinction. As a response to the recognition of this burgeoning problem, the key objectives of the establishment of the NTU Corpus of Formosan Languages aim to document and thus preserve valuable linguistic data, as well as relevant ethnological and cultural information. This paper will introduce some of the theoretical bases behind this initiative, as well as the procedures, transcription conventions, database normalization, in-house system and three special features in the creation of this corpus

Rates of Mutation and Host Transmission for an Escherichia coli Clone over 3 Years

Although over 50 complete Escherichia coli/Shigella genome sequences are available, it is only for closely related strains, for example the O55:H7 and O157:H7 clones of E. coli, that we can assign differences to individual evolutionary events along specific lineages. Here we sequence the genomes of 14 isolates of a uropathogenic E. coli clone that persisted for 3 years within a household, including a dog, causing a urinary tract infection (UTI) in the dog after 2 years. The 20 mutations observed fit a single tree that allows us to estimate the mutation rate to be about 1.1 per genome per year, with minimal evidence for adaptive change, including in relation to the UTI episode. The host data also imply at least 6 host transfer events over the 3 years, with 2 lineages present over much of that period. To our knowledge, these are the first direct measurements for a clone in a well-defined host community that includes rates of mutation and host transmission. There is a concentration of non-synonymous mutations associated with 2 transfers to the dog, suggesting some selection pressure from the change of host. However, there are no changes to which we can attribute the UTI event in the dog, which suggests that this occurrence after 2 years of the clone being in the household may have been due to chance, or some unknown change in the host or environment. The ability of a UTI strain to persist for 2 years and also to transfer readily within a household has implications for epidemiology, diagnosis, and clinical intervention

The economic losses of power quality disturbance, different perspectives of cost models

An assessment of the economic impact of power quality disturbances can be performed from the perspective of either electricity customers or power grid owners, depending on the consequences considered by either side. Examples of economic losses due to power quality issues for power grid owners may include compensation and loss of customer royalties, while for electricity customers, the losses may come from damaged products, disrupted industrial process and loss of revenue. In this thesis, the economic losses due to power quality issues are mainly discussed from the customer-oriented perspective. To assess the customer-oriented economic losses of a power system, a cost model is required to describe the characteristics of economic losses in mathematical terms. Some cost models for power quality disturbances are already in existence. Many of these models represent economic losses due to a single factor. However, in this thesis, the following two additional points are included: (a) Power quality disturbances always have a short term economic impact on customers, which is not covered in most cost models; (b) Economic losses due to power quality disturbances are actually determined by multiple factors rather than a single factor. The cost models developed in this thesis take the effects of multiple factors into account. This thesis has developed a set of new cost models to evaluate the multiple-factor-dependent potential economic losses due to power quality disturbances. These proposed cost models are specifically designed to calculate short term economic losses while considering customer and time varying impact factors. A time varying coefficient to quantify the effects of time of occurrence for different types of power quality disturbance is also proposed. With the use of the time varying coefficient, the differences in economic losses at different times of occurrence can be accurately represented. In this thesis, all of the proposed cost models are demonstrated individually in different power quality disturbance scenarios and a simple distribution system is used to illustrate the applications of these proposed cost models in a system. The results show the valid applications as well as the advantages of the proposed short term cost models.An assessment of the economic impact of power quality disturbances can be performed from the perspective of either electricity customers or power grid owners, depending on the consequences considered by either side. Examples of economic losses due to power quality issues for power grid owners may include compensation and loss of customer royalties, while for electricity customers, the losses may come from damaged products, disrupted industrial process and loss of revenue. In this thesis, the economic losses due to power quality issues are mainly discussed from the customer-oriented perspective. To assess the customer-oriented economic losses of a power system, a cost model is required to describe the characteristics of economic losses in mathematical terms. Some cost models for power quality disturbances are already in existence. Many of these models represent economic losses due to a single factor. However, in this thesis, the following two additional points are included: (a) Power quality disturbances always have a short term economic impact on customers, which is not covered in most cost models; (b) Economic losses due to power quality disturbances are actually determined by multiple factors rather than a single factor. The cost models developed in this thesis take the effects of multiple factors into account. This thesis has developed a set of new cost models to evaluate the multiple-factor-dependent potential economic losses due to power quality disturbances. These proposed cost models are specifically designed to calculate short term economic losses while considering customer and time varying impact factors. A time varying coefficient to quantify the effects of time of occurrence for different types of power quality disturbance is also proposed. With the use of the time varying coefficient, the differences in economic losses at different times of occurrence can be accurately represented. In this thesis, all of the proposed cost models are demonstrated individually in different power quality disturbance scenarios and a simple distribution system is used to illustrate the applications of these proposed cost models in a system. The results show the valid applications as well as the advantages of the proposed short term cost models

A review of the genus Aalatettix with the description of a new species from China (Orthoptera: Tetrigidae)

Zheng, Zhemin, Lin, Liliang (2015): A review of the genus Aalatettix with the description of a new species from China (Orthoptera: Tetrigidae). Zootaxa 3986 (4): 488-492, DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.3986.4.

Aalatettix Zheng & Mao 2002

<i>Aalatettix</i> Zheng & Mao, 2002 <p> <i>Aalatettix</i> Zheng & Mao, 2002. Journal of Shaanxi Normal University, 30(1): 93. Zheng, 2005. Fauna of Tetrigoidea from Western China, 346.</p> <p> Deng, Zheng and Wei, 2007, Fauna of Tetrigoidea from Yunnan and Guangxi, 312. Type species: <i>Aalatettix longipulvillus</i> Zheng & Mao, 2002</p> <p> <b>Diagnosis.</b> Body small. Vertex slightly protruding before anterior margin of eyes, with median carina, width of vertex 1.6–2.8 times of width of an eye; frontal ridge straight before lateral ocelli in profile, slightly protuberant between antennae; longitudinal furrow of frontal ridge narrow. Antennae filiform, inserted between lower margins of eyes. Pronotum ridgelike; anterior margin obtuse, apex of hind process narrowly rounded or with a concave in the middle; posterior margin of lateral lobes of pronotum with 2 concaves, the winged one extremely shallow, apex of posterior angles rounded. Wings absent or extremely degenerated, covered by pronotum. First segment of posterior tarsi longer than the third.</p>Published as part of <i>Zheng, Zhemin & Lin, Liliang, 2015, A review of the genus Aalatettix with the description of a new species from China (Orthoptera: Tetrigidae), pp. 488-492 in Zootaxa 3986 (4)</i> on page 488, DOI: 10.11646/zootaxa.3986.4.8, <a href="http://zenodo.org/record/233828">http://zenodo.org/record/233828</a&gt

Aalatettix

Key to species in the genus <i>Aalatettix</i> <p>1 Width of vertex 2.0–2.8 times of an eye; apex of hind process of pronotum with a triangular concave..................... 2</p> <p>- Width of vertex 1.6–1.7 times of the width of an eye; apex of hind process of pronotum narrow rounded................ 4</p> <p> 2 Width of vertex 2.8 times of an eye; vertex and frontal ridge forming an obtuse rounded angle in profile; upper margin of pronotum arched before shoulders but undulated behind that; anterior margin of pronotum almost straight; hind process of pronotum reaching apex of hind femur; lower margin of mid femur undulated <i>... A. lativertex</i> Zheng</p> <p>- Width of vertex 2.0 times of an eye; vertex and frontal ridge forming a right or obtuse angle in profile; upper margin of pronotum straight or extremely arc-shape protuberant; anterior margin of pronotum obtuse protruded; hind process of pronotum reaching two-thirds or three-fourths of hind femur; lower margin of mid femur straight............... 3</p> <p> 3 Vertex and frontal ridge forming a right angle in profile; upper margin of pronotum almost straight; lateral keels of prozona parallel; with a pair of short longitudinal keels between shoulders................ <i>A. longipulvillus</i> Zheng & Mao</p> <p> - Vertex and frontal ridge forming blunt circle in profile; upper margin of pronotum extremely arc-shape protuberant; lateral keels of prozona contracted backward; without a pair of short longitudinal keels between shoulders............... <i>..................................................................................................................................... A. gibbosa</i> Zheng, Cao & Chen</p> <p>4 Upper margin of pronotum extremely arc-shape protuberant in profile; vertex and frontal ridge forming blunt circle or rounded in profile.....................................................................................................................................................5</p> <p>- Upper margin of pronotum almost straight or arched before shoulders but straight behind that in profile; vertex and frontal ridge forming blunt circle or rectangle in profile..............................................................................................6</p> <p> 5 Anterior margin of vertex arc-shape; frontal ridge slightly concave before lateral ocelli; antennae located between lower margin of eyes, 14 segmented, length of a segment in the middle 4 times as its width; hind process of pronotum reaching four-fifths of hind femur; three pulvilli of the first segment of hind tarsi gradually larger in turn; hind tibia black brown............................................................................................... <i>A. cangshanensis</i> Zheng, Lin & Zhang</p> <p> - Anterior margin of vertex straight; frontal ridge distinctly concave before lateral ocelli; antennae located below lower margin of eyes, 16 segmented, length of a segment in the middle 2.5 times as its width; hind process of pronotum reaching almost apex of hind femur; 3rd pulvillus of the first segment of hind tarsi extremely large, 1st pulvillus smaller, 2nd pulvillus extremely small; hind tibia black, with two light rings in the middle <i>..... A. nyalamensis</i> <b>sp. nov.</b></p> <p> 6 Vertex and frontal ridge forming a right angle in profile; longitudinal furrow of frontal ridge as wide as the first segment of antennae; upper margin of pronotum arched before shoulders but straight behind that in profile; hind process of pronotum reaching two-thirds of hind femur <i>...................................................... A. leshanensis</i> Zheng, Cao & Chen</p> <p> - Vertex and frontal ridge forming rounded in profile; longitudinal furrow of frontal ridge wider than the first segment of antennae; upper margin of pronotum almost straight in profile; hind process of pronotum reaching four-fifths of hind femu <i>................................................................................................................................ A. hupinshanensis</i> Zheng</p>Published as part of <i>Zheng, Zhemin & Lin, Liliang, 2015, A review of the genus Aalatettix with the description of a new species from China (Orthoptera: Tetrigidae), pp. 488-492 in Zootaxa 3986 (4)</i> on page 489, DOI: 10.11646/zootaxa.3986.4.8, <a href="http://zenodo.org/record/233828">http://zenodo.org/record/233828</a&gt