Boundary detection in disease mapping studies

In disease mapping, the aim is to estimate the spatial pattern in disease risk over an extended geographical region, so that areas with elevated risks can be identified. A Bayesian hierarchical approach is typically used to produce such maps, which models the risk surface with a set of spatially smooth random effects. However, in complex urban settings there are likely to be boundaries in the risk surface, which separate populations that are geographically adjacent but have very different risk profiles. Therefore this paper proposes an approach for detecting such risk boundaries, and tests its effectiveness by simulation. Finally, the model is applied to lung cancer incidence data in Greater Glasgow, Scotland, between 2001 and 2005

Complaint and grievance mechanisms in international law: one piece of the accountability jigsaw?

In the rules and principles that guide and regulate international organisations, there has been a gradual, yet noticeable, transformation from a model premised upon a narrow conception of inter-governmentalism and formal legalism to one that is increasingly receptive to broader constitutional notions, including ideals such as enhancing legitimacy and promoting good governance.1 In this process, concepts such as accountability, transparency, public participation and due administration have become prevalent both in the rhetoric and everyday reality of international organisations. This article focuses upon one element of this wider discourse, namely the increased adoption within the international community of complaint and grievance mechanisms that operate outside the traditional legal framework

Engineering the Cambrian explosion: the earliest bioturbators as ecosystem engineers

By applying modern biological criteria to trace fossil types and assessing burrow morphology, complexity, depth, potential burrow function and the likelihood of bioirrigation, we assign ecosystem engineering impact (EEI) values to the key ichnotaxa in the lowermost Cambrian (Fortunian). Surface traces such as Monomorphichnus have minimal impact on sediment properties and have very low EEI values; quasi-infaunal traces of organisms that were surficial modifiers or biodiffusors, such as Planolites, have moderate EEI values; and deeper infaunal, gallery biodiffusive or upward-conveying/downward-conveying traces, such as Teichichnus and Gyrolithes, have the highest EEI values. The key Cambrian ichnotaxon Treptichnus pedum has a moderate to high EEI value, depending on its functional interpretation. Most of the major functional groups of modern bioturbators are found to have evolved during the earliest Cambrian, including burrow types that are highly likely to have been bioirrigated. In fine-grained (or microbially bound) sedimentary environments, trace-makers of bioirrigated burrows would have had a particularly significant impact, generating advective fluid flow within the sediment for the first time, in marked contrast with the otherwise diffusive porewater systems of the Proterozoic. This innovation is likely to have created significant ecospace and engineered fundamentally new infaunal environments for macrobiotic and microbiotic organisms alike

Above and below the water: Social/ecological transformation in northwest Newfoundland

Marine fisheries and fishing societies develop around the resources provided by a particular ecosystem. As they exploit these resources, fisheries transform the ecosystem, which pushes fishery and society to adapt in turn. This process is illustrated by fisheries, ecological and social data tracking dramatic changes on Newfoundland\u27s Northern Peninsula and its adjacent marine ecosystem, the northern Gulf of St. Lawrence. There a longstanding fishery for cod and other groundfish collapsed in the 1990s, and was replaced by fisheries targeting invertebrates. The new invertebrate fisheries have different socioeconomic characteristics than the former groundfish fisheries. The shift in target species reflects deep ecological changes that were underway at least a decade before official recognition of the crisis. Our analysis of biological data reveals that the main ecological changes occurred during “the glory years” of the 1980s, when Newfoundland\u27s domestic fisheries were at their peak. Overfishing and interactions with adverse climatic conditions drove the changes. As the ecosystem transformed, human population declined due to outmigration, and social indicators show signs of distress. Accounts by outport residents paint a generational picture of social change

The Narrow and Shallow Bite of Romer and the Eminent Rationality of Dual-Gender Marriage: A (Partial) Response to Professor Koppelman

In this response to Professor Koppelman, Professor Duncan takes issue with the assertions Koppelman makes in Romer v. Evans and Invidious Intent. Though Duncan agrees with Koppelman\u27s summary of the rule of Romer and the ongoing effects of Bowers v. Hardwick, he rejects Koppelman\u27s claims that laws that discriminate against gays will always be constitutionally doubtful because they disadvantage an unpopular class. Duncan claims that Koppelman has tried, without success or authority, to fill in the missing pages left in Romer by the Supreme Court. Finally, he argues that traditional marriage laws are valid and will survive under Romer and rational basis analysis

Climate Change, Markets, and Technology

Environmental Economics and Policy, Resource /Energy Economics and Policy, Q15, Q25, Q38,

The Clearest Command of the Establishment Clause: Denominational Preferences, Religious Liberty, and Public Scholarships That Classify Religions

The purpose of this article is to analyze the Supreme Court\u27s doctrine prohibiting denominational preferences with a view toward mapping out the boundaries of the doctrine in light of its animating principle of free religious competition. I will then attempt to apply the clearest command of the Establishment Clause to the facts of a recent free exercise decision of the Court, Locke v. Davey. Although the Court in Davey rejected a free exercise challenge to a state scholarship program that denied funding to students pursuing college degrees in devotional theology, I will suggest that this exclusion creates a denominational preference that appears to violate the Establishment Clause and the teachings of Larson. Indeed, I will argue that Larson applies with particular force in cases in which religious lines are drawn by funding laws in which the benefit if applied uniformly to all religions would comply with the Establishment Clause