The nonlinear Bernstein-Schr\"odinger equation in Economics

In this paper we relate the Equilibrium Assignment Problem (EAP), which is underlying in several economics models, to a system of nonlinear equations that we call the "nonlinear Bernstein-Schr\"odinger system", which is well-known in the linear case, but whose nonlinear extension does not seem to have been studied. We apply this connection to derive an existence result for the EAP, and an efficient computational method.Comment: 8 pages, submitted to Lecture Notes in Computer Scienc

Scan mirror remote temperature sensing system and method

A remote temperature sensing system (10) for a scanning mirror (7). The system (10) includes a sensor which detects heat radiated by the mirror and provides a signal in response thereto. In the illustrative implementation, the system (10) includes a thermistor mounted within a housing. The housing is contoured to maximize the receipt of thermal energy thereby. A mounting assembly maintains the thermistor a predetermined nonzero distance from the scanning mirror (7). The invention includes a shroud (12) mounted on the mirror (7) for shielding the thermistor and a support tube connected to the thermistor housing on a first end and to a base on the second end thereof. The support tube is adapted to remain stationary within the shroud as the scanning mirror and the shroud rotate due to the scanning of the mirror. Wires are connected to the thermistor on a first end thereof and are wrapped around the support tube. The wires include a length of electrically conductive material having a resistivity which has a low sensitivity to temperature variations. The sensor output is processed in a conventional manner to provide an output indicative of the temperature of the mirror

Dynamics of axial separation in long rotating drums

We propose a continuum description for the axial separation of granular materials in a long rotating drum. The model, operating with two local variables, concentration difference and the dynamic angle of repose, describes both initial transient traveling wave dynamics and long-term segregation of the binary mixture. Segregation proceeds through ultra-slow logarithmic coarsening.Comment: 4 pages, 3 Postscript figures; submitted to PR

Unsupervised user behavior representation for fraud review detection with cold-start problem

© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2019. Detecting fraud review is becoming extremely important in order to provide reliable information in cyberspace, in which, however, handling cold-start problem is a critical and urgent challenge since the case of cold-start fraud review rarely provides sufficient information for further assessing its authenticity. Existing work on detecting cold-start cases relies on the limited contents of the review posted by the user and a traditional classifier to make the decision. However, simply modeling review is not reliable since reviews can be easily manipulated. Also, it is hard to obtain high-quality labeled data for training the classifier. In this paper, we tackle cold-start problems by (1) using a user’s behavior representation rather than review contents to measure authenticity, which further (2) consider user social relations with other existing users when posting reviews. The method is completely (3) unsupervised. Comprehensive experiments on Yelp data sets demonstrate our method significantly outperforms the state-of-the-art methods

Psychological Safety and Norm Clarity in Software Engineering Teams

In the software engineering industry today, companies primarily conduct their work in teams. To increase organizational productivity, it is thus crucial to know the factors that affect team effectiveness. Two team-related concepts that have gained prominence lately are psychological safety and team norms. Still, few studies exist that explore these in a software engineering context. Therefore, with the aim of extending the knowledge of these concepts, we examined if psychological safety and team norm clarity associate positively with software developers' self-assessed team performance and job satisfaction, two important elements of effectiveness. We collected industry survey data from practitioners (N = 217) in 38 development teams working for five different organizations. The result of multiple linear regression analyses indicates that both psychological safety and team norm clarity predict team members' self-assessed performance and job satisfaction. The findings also suggest that clarity of norms is a stronger (30\% and 71\% stronger, respectively) predictor than psychological safety. This research highlights the need to examine, in more detail, the relationship between social norms and software development. The findings of this study could serve as an empirical baseline for such, future work.Comment: Submitted to CHASE'201

Pairwise comparison matrices and the error-free property of the decision maker

Pairwise comparison is a popular assessment method either for deriving criteria-weights or for evaluating alternatives according to a given criterion. In real-world applications consistency of the comparisons rarely happens: intransitivity can occur. The aim of the paper is to discuss the relationship between the consistency of the decision maker—described with the error-free property—and the consistency of the pairwise comparison matrix (PCM). The concept of error-free matrix is used to demonstrate that consistency of the PCM is not a sufficient condition of the error-free property of the decision maker. Informed and uninformed decision makers are defined. In the first stage of an assessment method a consistent or near-consistent matrix should be achieved: detecting, measuring and improving consistency are part of any procedure with both types of decision makers. In the second stage additional information are needed to reveal the decision maker’s real preferences. Interactive questioning procedures are recommended to reach that goal

Beat length measurement in directional couplers by thermo-optic modulation

In integrated optical directional couplers formed by two parallel waveguides, we measure the difference Δβ = βeven - βodd between the propagation constants of the 'supermodes'. They are coupled locally by heating a fine spot on one of the guides. When the spot is scanned along the coupler the output power from one of the guides is found to vary periodically. The period of variation is the modal beat length λ = 2π/Δβ. We demonstrate this technique with directional couplers fabricated by K+-exchange in glass. Beat lengths in the range of 0.6 ... 2.2 mm are measured with an accuracy of ±0.3%.<br/

An initial animal proof-of-concept study for central administration of clozapine to schizophrenia patients

While clozapine is the acknowledged superior pharmacotherapeutic for the treatment of schizophrenia, the side effect profile, which includes potentially fatal complications, limits its usefulness. Central administration of clozapine directly into the brain could circumvent many of the side effect issues due to the dramatic reduction in dose and the limitation of the drug primarily to the CNS. The present study demonstrates that clozapine can be formulated as a stable solution at physiological pH, which does not have in vitro neurotoxic effects at concentrations which may be effective at treating symptoms. Acute central administration improved auditory gating deficits in a mouse model of schizophrenia-like deficits. Assessment of behavioral alterations in rats receiving chronic central infusions of clozapine via osmotic minipump was performed with the open field and elevated plus mazes. Neither paradigm revealed any detrimental effects of the infusion. While these data represent only an initial investigation, they none-the-less suggest that central administration of clozapine may be a viable alternate therapeutic approach for schizophrenia patients which may be effective in symptom reduction without causing behavioral or neurotoxic effects

Neutralizing antibody response during acute and chronic hepatitis C virus infection

Little is known about the role of Abs in determining the outcome of hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection. By using infectious retroviral pseudotypes bearing HCV glycoproteins, we measured neutralizing Ab (nAb) responses during acute and chronic HCV infection. In seven acutely infected health care workers, only two developed a nAb response that failed to associate with viral clearance. In contrast, the majority of chronically infected patients had nAbs. To determine the kinetics of strain-specific and crossreactive nAb emergence, we studied patient H, the source of the prototype genotype 1a H77 HCV strain. An early weak nAb response, specific for the autologous virus, was detected at seroconversion. However, neutralization of heterologous viruses was detected only between 33 and 111 weeks of infection. We also examined the development of nAbs in 10 chimpanzees infected with H77 clonal virus. No nAb responses were detected in three animals that cleared virus, whereas strain-specific nAbs were detected in six of the seven chronically infected animals after approximately 50 weeks of infection. The delayed appearance of high titer crossreactive nAbs in chronically infected patients suggests that selective mechanism(s) may operate to prevent the appearance of these Abs during acute infection. The long-term persistence of these nAbs in chronically infected patients may regulate viral replication