Model-agnostic Fits for Understanding Information Seeking Patterns in Humans

In decision making tasks under uncertainty, humans display characteristic biases in seeking, integrating, and acting upon information relevant to the task. Here, we reexamine data from previous carefully designed experiments, collected at scale, that measured and catalogued these biases in aggregate form. We design deep learning models that replicate these biases in aggregate, while also capturing individual variation in behavior. A key finding of our work is that paucity of data collected from each individual subject can be overcome by sampling large numbers of subjects from the population, while still capturing individual differences. In addition, we can predict human behavior with high accuracy without making any assumptions about task goals, reward structure, or individual biases, thus providing a model-agnostic fit to human behavior in the task. Such an approach can sidestep potential limitations in modeler-specified inductive biases, and has implications for computational modeling of human cognitive function in general, and of human-AI interfaces in particular.Comment: 8 pages, 9 figures. AAAI 202

Ecological balance of Iron ore mines land in Chhattisgarh by using vesicular arbuscular mycorrhiza fungi.

The State of Chhattisgarh is situated in the Mid Eastern India, bounded between North latitude 170 46' to 240 06' and East Longitude 800 15' to 84025' and the states is geologically one of the most important terrains in the Indian shield comprising of litho logical sequence ranging in age from Archaean to Recent. Bountiful nature has bestowed Chhattisgarh with vast reserves of all important minerals. Chhattisgarh state has rich sources of mineral resource especially iron and coal. Open cast mining is the dominant form of mining. The immediate effect of open cast mining is the removal of soil and vegetation cover.  The extent of damage depends on location of mining site, scale of operation, mining methods, degree of mechanization etc. The effects of mining activity as well as mining waste causes such as soil erosion, air and water pollution, toxicity, geo-environmental disasters, loss of biodiversity, and ultimately loss of economic wealth. This research paper presenting the how Vesicular Arbuscular Mycorrhiza fungi used for ecological balances. VAM fungi are types of endomycorrhizae and used as biofertilizer for revegetation of mining destroyed sites especially iron ore mines in Chhattisgarh. Mycorrhizae associate plants shows more root and shoot height, fresh and dry biomass weight, high content of soluble protein and low rate of mortality when planting in actual mining sites

Techniques for Stock Market Prediction: A Review

Stock market forecasting has long been viewed as a vital real-life topic in economics world. There are many challenges in stock market prediction systems such as the Efficient Market Hypothesis (EMH), Nonlinearity, complex, diverse datasets, and parameter optimization. A stock's value on the stock market fluctuates due to many factors like previous trends of the stock, the current news, twitter feeds, any online customer feedbacks etc. In this paper, the literature is critically analysed on approaches used for stock market prediction in terms of stock datasets, features used, evaluation metrics used, statistical, machine learning and deep learning techniques along with the directions for the future. The focus of this review is on trend and value prediction for stocks. Overall, 68 research papers have been considered for review from years 1998-2023. From the review, Indian stock market datasets are found to be most frequently used datasets. Evaluation metrics used commonly are accuracy and Mean Absolute Percentage Error. ARIMA is reported as the most used frequently statistical technique for stick market prediction. Long-Short Term Memory and Support Vector Machine are the commonly used algorithms in stock market prediction. The advantages and disadvantages of frequently used evaluation metrics, machine learning, deep learning and statistical approaches are also included in this survey

Investigation of Negative Refractive Index in Reciprocal Chiral Materials

It is well known that there exist both natural materials (such as milk or sugar solution) possessing chiral (or handed) properties, as well as an increasing list of man-made materials (such as sodium bromate) that exhibit chirality. One of the principal properties of chirality is that light of any arbitrary polarization, when propagating through a chiral material, splits up into two circular polarizations propagating in different directions. In the past decade or longer, researchers have investigated electromagnetic transverse (plane) wave propagation across a non-chiral/chiral interface, and determined the electromagnetic Fresnel coefficients for such propagation. Traditionally, such coefficients are derived under the assumption that the transmitted circular polarizations in the chiral material have wave numbers that are numerically positive, and nominally point in the direction of electromagnetic energy flow. However, it turns out that the actual solution for the wavenumbers obtained from applying Maxwell\u27s equations to an unbounded, isotropic chiral material yields four possible values dependent upon the chirality parameter. In this paper, we examine the emergence of these wavenumbers, and thereafter explore the conditions necessary for the resulting field solutions to have counter-propagating energy flow and wave vector. Such conditions, if feasible, represent an environment leading to an effectively negative refractive index being generated within the chiral material. Accordingly, propagation within a chiral medium through the mechanism of negative refractive indices may be studied in order to better understand the corresponding optical properties of such materials vis-a-vis transmission of an electromagnetic wave into and out of such a region. The results obtained may be applied to compare negative index chiral materials with the broader emerging field of negative index metamaterials, and explore possible applications

Minimal cross-recombination between wild-type and loxP511 sites in vivo facilitates truncating both ends of large DNA inserts in pBACe3.6 and related vectors

Contrary to several earlier reports, we find that cross-recombination between wild-type and the mutant loxP511 sites is <0.5% of that between two wild-type sites if Cre protein is expressed by phage P1 during an infection. The finding enabled us to develop a procedure to truncate DNA progressively from both ends of large genomic inserts flanked by these two loxP sites in pBACe3.6 and related vectors with transposons carrying either a wild-type or a loxP511 sequence. Newly constructed loxP511 transposons contained either a kanamycin resistance gene or no marker. Insert DNA ends in deletions were sequenced with primers unique to each transposon-end remaining after the respective recombination. End-sequencing 223 deletions confirmed that the low level of cross-recombination, observed between those sites during the P1 transductions, does not complicate the procedure: truncations from the unintended end of genomic inserts did not occur. Multiple BACs pooled together could also be processed in a single tube to make end-deletions. This deletion technology, utilizing the very minimal cross-recombination between the mutant and wild-type loxP sites of most BAC clones in the public domain and a heterologous one inserted as a transposon, should facilitate functionally mapping long-range gene regulatory sequences and help to isolate genes with defined functional boundaries in numerous projects including those of therapeutic interest

Generating libraries of iTol2-end insertions at BAC ends using loxP and lox511 Tn10 transposons

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Bacterial Artificial Chromosomes (BACs) have been widely used as transgenes in vertebrate model systems such as mice and zebrafish, for a variety of studies. BAC transgenesis has been a powerful tool to study the function of the genome, and gene regulation by distal <it>cis-</it>regulatory elements. Recently, BAC transgenesis in both mice and zebrafish was further facilitated by development of the transposon-mediated method using the Tol2 element. Tol2 ends, in the inverted orientation and flanking a 1 kb spacer DNA (iTol2), were introduced into the BAC DNA within the bacterial host using recombination of homologous sequences. Here we describe experiments designed to determine if a simpler and more flexible system could modify BACs so that they would be suitable for transgenesis into zebrafish or mouse embryos using the Tol2 transposase.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>A new technique was developed to introduce recognition sequences for the Tol2 transposase into BACs in <it>E. coli </it>using the Tn10 transposon vector system. We constructed pTnloxP-iTol2kan and pTnlox511-iTol2kan to introduce the loxP or lox511 site and iTol2 cassette, containing the Tol2 cis-sequences in the inverted orientation, into BACs that have loxP and lox511 sites flanking genomic DNA inserts by Tn10-mediated transposition. The procedure enables rapid generation of a large collection of BACs ready for transgenesis with the iTol2 cassette at the new end of a progressively truncated genomic insert via lox-Cre recombination. The iTol2 ends are efficiently recognized by the Tol2 transposase, and the BACs readily integrate into zebrafish chromosomes.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>The new technology described here can rapidly introduce iTol2 ends at a BAC end of choice, and simultaneously generate a large collection of BACs with progressive deletions of the genomic DNA from that end in a single experiment. This procedure should be applicable to a wider variety of BACs containing lox sites flanking the genomic DNA insert, including those with sequence repeats. The libraries of iTol2 inserted BACs with truncations from an end should facilitate studies on the impact of distal <it>cis</it>-regulatory sequences on gene function, as well as standard BAC transgenesis with precisely trimmed genes in zebrafish or mouse embryos using Tol2 transposition.</p

When and how is corporate social responsibility profitable?

Firms in various markets such as health care, financial services, software, consumer goods, etc. spend a significant amount of money on corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities. The literature suggests that consumers take into consideration firms' CSR activities when making purchase decisions, noting that and doing so either increases their purchase intention or makes them willing to pay higher prices for the firms' products and services. Unfortunately, notwithstanding its strategic benefits, the empirical findings regarding the impact of CSR on firms' financials are mixed. In this paper we explore when and why investing in CSR can have positive or negative impact on a firm's profitability. In doing so, we model two types of CSR (i.e., company ability relevant CSR (CSR-CA) and company ability irrelevant CSR (CSR-NCA)). We allow firms to choose which one to pursue if they decide to invest in CSR, and we incorporate the indirect effect of CSR through expectancy disconfirmation on consumers' utility, which has been ignored by the extant literature. Our analysis reveals the conditions under which it is optimal to invest in CSR and of what type. Then, we extend our analysis by investigating how the increase in consumers' appreciation of CSR and increase in consumers' sensitivity to evaluative context affect firms' optimal CSR strategies

Replacing the wild type loxP site in BACs from the public domain with lox66 using a lox66 transposon

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Chromatin adjoining the site of integration of a transgene affects expression and renders comparisons of closely related transgenes, such as those derived from a BAC deletion series retrofitted with enhancer-traps, unreliable. Gene targeting to a pre-determined site on the chromosome is likely to alleviate the problem.</p> <p>Findings</p> <p>A general procedure to replace the <it>loxP </it>site located at one end of genomic DNA inserts in BACs with <it>lox66 </it>is described. Truncating insert DNA from the <it>loxP </it>end with a Tn10 transposon carrying a <it>lox66 </it>site simultaneously substitutes the <it>loxP </it>with a <it>lox66 </it>sequence. The replacement occurs with high stringency, and the procedure should be applicable to all BACs in the public domain. Cre recombination of <it>loxP </it>with <it>lox66 </it>or <it>lox71 </it>was found to be as efficient as another <it>loxP </it>site during phage P1 transduction of small plasmids containing those sites. However the end-deletion of insert DNA in BACs using a <it>lox66 </it>transposon occurred at no more than 20% the efficiency observed with a <it>loxP </it>transposon. Differences in the ability of Cre protein available at different stages of the P1 life cycle to recombine identical versus non-identical <it>lox</it>-sites is likely responsible for this discrepancy. A possible mechanism to explain these findings is discussed.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>The <it>loxP/lox66 </it>replacement procedure should allow targeting BACs to a pre-positioned <it>lox71 </it>site in zebrafish chromosomes; a system where homologous recombination-mediated "knock-in" technology is unavailable.</p

Impact of Store Ambience on Impulse Purchasing of Apparel Consumers

The aim of this research was to identify the impact of store ambience on apparel consumer impulse purchase behaviour. In this paper, the influence of window display (WD), promotional offers (PO), store layout (SL), back­ground music (BM) and fragrance of store (FOS) on consumer impulsive buying behaviour (IBB) for apparel was evaluated. The study was performed among 210 consumers in Delhi (NCR), at the DLF Mall of India, using a questionnaire developed based on existing literature. The research data was analysed using the factor analysis, and correlation and linear regression tests. According to the research findings, store features such as window display, promotional offers and fragrance have a significant effect on impulse purchase behaviour. The current study makes some suggestions for retailers to improve the ambience of their stores in order to boost impulse buying among apparel buyers