Summer People

Poetry by Claire Christoff

House of the Setting Sun: New Orleans, Katrina, and The Role of Historic Preservation Laws in Emergency Circumstances

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, while various government bodies scrambled to address the myriad tragedies and emergencies that arose from the disaster, one critical question went largely unanswered and ignored: What was to become of the historic homes damaged in the storm and ensuing flood? Obviously this question was of secondary concern at the time—where human life and safety are imperiled, the primary focus of government officials should be on restoring order and ensuring their constituents are protected. Precisely because of the existence of more pressing issues in a time of emergency, therefore, it is important to have a prepared plan addressing how best to incorporate historic preservation law into recovery and rebuilding efforts. In many areas, and in New Orleans in particular, historic architecture and ambience play a large role in forming the identity of the community; if a community is rebuilt without its identity in mind, its residents will not truly be able to return home. In this paper I will discuss in more detail why a system for addressing historic preservation concerns in a time of emergency is necessary and what that system should entail. Part I includes a description of New Orleans, how the New Orleans historic preservation statute functions, and what the results were in historic districts affected by Hurricane Katrina. Part II is a brief description of other areas that have experienced large-scale disasters, with an exploration into how the various responses affected the goals of historic preservation. Part III details a proposed solution -- that emergency provisions be written into local historic preservation statutes to govern how the statute will function in a time of emergency, and what those provisions should look like. Although the typical procedure put in place by the historic preservation ordinance may not be feasible in a time of emergency, a modified or alternative version of that process would best protect the interests of preservation while allowing local government to sufficiently respond to the needs of the community

Bayesian mapping of brain regions using compound Markov random field priors

Human brain mapping, i.e. the detection of functional regions and their connections, has experienced enormous progress through the use of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). The massive spatio-temporal data sets generated by this imaging technique impose challenging problems for statistical analysis. Many approaches focus on adequate modeling of the temporal component. Spatial aspects are often considered only in a separate postprocessing step, if at all, or modeling is based on Gaussian random fields. A weakness of Gaussian spatial smoothing is possible underestimation of activation peaks or blurring of sharp transitions between activated and non-activated regions. In this paper we suggest Bayesian spatio-temporal models, where spatial adaptivity is improved through inhomogeneous or compound Markov random field priors. Inference is based on an approximate MCMC technique. Performance of our approach is investigated through a simulation study, including a comparison to models based on Gaussian as well as more robust spatial priors in terms of pixelwise and global MSEs. Finally we demonstrate its use by an application to fMRI data from a visual stimulation experiment for assessing activation in visual cortical areas

Dynamic models in fMRI

Most statistical methods for assessing activated voxels in fMRI experiments are based on correlation or regression analysis. In this context the main assumptions are that the baseline can be described by a few known basis-functions or variables and that the effect of the stimulus, i.e. the activation, stays constant over time. As these assumptions are in many cases neither necessary nor correct, a new dynamic approach that does not depend on those suppositions will be presented. This allows for simultaneous nonparametric estimation of the baseline as well as the time-varying effect of stimulation. This method of estimating the stimulus related areas of the brain furthermore provides the possibility of an analysis of the temporal and spatial development of the activation within an fMRI-experiment

Dry

Poetry by Claire Christoff

Sophomores

Poetry by Claire Christoff