Automatic frequency assignment for cellular telephones using constraint satisfaction techniques

We study the problem of automatic frequency assignment for cellular telephone systems. The frequency assignment problem is viewed as the problem to minimize the unsatisfied soft constraints in a constraint satisfaction problem (CSP) over a finite domain of frequencies involving co-channel, adjacent channel, and co-site constraints. The soft constraints are automatically derived from signal strength prediction data. The CSP is solved using a generalized graph coloring algorithm. Graph-theoretical results play a crucial role in making the problem tractable. Performance results from a real-world frequency assignment problem are presented. We develop the generalized graph coloring algorithm by stepwise refinement, starting from DSATUR and augmenting it with local propagation, constraint lifting, intelligent backtracking, redundancy avoidance, and iterative deepening

An Approach to Dizziness

Dizziness is a vague and ubiquitous symptom which frequently frustrates and perplexes the clinician. Dizziness in the broad sense implies any unpleasant sensation of disturbed relationship to surrounding objects. A number of synonyms such as faintness, light-headedness, giddiness, and swaying, although descriptive, are often no more specific. Problems in diagnosis, therefore, are due not only to the ambiguity of the term but also to the wide spectrum of disorders in which dizziness may be a prominent symptom. Although disorders of the vestibular system usually receive primary attention, it should be kept in mind that many neurologic, cardiovascular, psychiatric, and other disorders are not infrequently associated with dizziness. The term vertigo, on the other hand, is specific and may be distinguished from other forms of dizziness in that it implies a definite rotational sensation or illusion of motion. Although it is often impossible to make a differentiation between vertigo and other types of dizziness in the individual patient, the distinction is important as vertigo specifically reflects dysfunction in the vestibular system. The purpose of this paper is to review the anatomy and physiology of the vestibular system, to discuss the most common clinically significant causes of dizziness, and finally, to consider the practical office evaluation of the dizzy patient

A Diagnostic Approach to Acute Headache

Headache is one of the most common symptomatic ailments encountered by the physician. According to one estimate, headache constitutes the major complaint in more than 50% of patients seen in office practice. This figure refers to patients with chronic recurring headache, many of whom are seen electively when they are asymptomatic, and may not accurately reflect the frequency with which patients present, during the acute phase, complaining of head pain. The term acute headache refers to those episodes of cephalgia which lead the patient to seek immediate medical care

Barn i krise som følge av samlivsbrudd : barnehagepersonalets erfaringer

Norsk: Studiens hensikt er å belyse hvordan barnehagepersonalet kan bidra til lindring hos barn i krise som følge av samlivsbrudd. Selv om de fleste barn takler foreldrenes samlivsbrudd på en hensiktsmessig måte, opplever enkelte barn samlivsbruddet som en krise. Studien ønsker å sette fokus på, at økt innsikt kan føre til bedre forutsetninger for helsefremmende og forebyggende arbeid hos barn som opplever en vanskelig situasjon. Temaet belyses ved å beskrive, utforske og dele erfaringer blant barnehagepersonalet i praksisfeltet. Studien har et deskriptiv design, og er eksplorativ i den forstand at barnehagepersonalets direkte erfaringer med barn i krise som følge av samlivsbrudd, er lite beskrevet tidligere. Den bygger på fire fokusgruppeintervju med personalet fra ulike barnehager. Studien har en kvalitativ innholdsanalyse. Funnene viser at barn i krise opplever en atferdsendring som påvirker barnets hverdag og barnets miljø i barnehagen. I denne sammenheng har personalet i barnehagene en betydningsfull rolle i forhold til å se barnets atferdsendringer og gi adekvat hjelp og støtte for å forebygge fremtidige psykiske vansker. Studien viser at personalet savner kunnskaper knyttet til å identifisere en krise tidligst mulig. For å bidra til ytterligere lindring søker personalet bedre innsikt i hva man skal se etter hos barnet, forstå det man ser og hvordan møte barnet på en hensiktsmessig måte.English: The aim of this study is to focus on how day-care staff can improve the situation for children experiencing a crisis when their parents are getting divorced. Most children handle a divorce in a adequate way, but some children are going through a cirisis when faced with this difficult situation. The study examines how a heightened awareness of and insight into this phenomenon can improve the children`s physical and mental health. The purpose of this study will be to describe and explore the experiences among day-care staff. Day-care staff dealing with children undergoing a crisis like this is not a much exploited field of investigation. This study has thus both a descreptive and explorative design. The result are based on four focus group interviews with day-care staff from different day-care centers. The study has followed a qualitative content analysis. The results show that childen in crisis experience a change of behaviour which influence their everyday life and their environment in the day-care center. In this context the day-care staff plays an importent part in observing these changes and giving the child adequat help and support. The main concern is to prevent the child from developing mental health problems in the future. The study found that the staff in day-care centres has little experience and knowledge when it comes to identifying crisis at an early stage. In order to help the child they need to gain a more accurate and deeper intuitive understanding of what to look for, how to interpret the child`s signals and how to meet the child in an appropriate way

What Work? Quasi-Experiments in Cybersecurity Policy Interventions

Given the significance policymakers place on cybersecurity, how effective has a decade of policy interventions been at reducing social costs? This paper uses the limited regulations implemented by State and United States government agencies as quasi-experiments. This work measures regulatory efficacy by compiling mandatory state-level data breach reports to create novel breach incident data sets. A reduction in breach frequency serves as the kind of measurable outcome that regulators would intend cybersecurity policy interventions to address. To this end, I evaluate four cybersecurity regulations: the Massachusetts Data Security Law, the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act (HITECH Act), Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Section 5 enforcements against Wyndham Hotels, and the New York Department of Financial Services (NY DFS) cybersecurity regulations. I assessed each regulatory intervention as a quasi-experiment, employing segmented time-series regressions to evaluate the relative change in reported data breaches. These quasi-experiments controlled for policy implementation phases and reporting requirements. As these policies have overlapping aims (creating information security programs), we can infer whether this meta-regulatory approach, the encouragement of self-regulation by industry with corresponding civil penalties, has been an effective regulatory strategy. An effectively regulatory system would sufficiently motivate the targeted population to improve their cyber posture, such that there was a reduction in breach reporting. Ultimately, three of the cases discussed did not show an impact. However, analysis of the NY DFS regulation suggests a meaningful decrease of approximately 27 breaches in the following year. Comparing these regulations shows differences in scope, content, and penalties that may explain this disparate level of impact. Next, the efficacy of NY DFS regulations is placed in context with a discussion of potential savings and the duration of the effect. While demonstrating that cybersecurity regulations can meaningfully reduce breaches, this work suggests that this effect is neither generalizable across diverse contexts nor a satisfactory solution to the complex and pervasive issues associated with identity theft, fraud, and cybercrime. Overall, these findings suggest potential promise in this methodology for the policy evaluation of data security laws and regulations. Policymakers could improve these assessments by standardizing the reporting of mandatory breach notification data so that policy efficacy can be better measured. Because of its similarity to the NY DFS regulations, this finding may also provide preliminary empirical evidence for the Insurance Data Security Model Law propagated by the National Association of Insurance Commissioners. Drawing on this methodology, this model legislation and other data security and privacy regulatory interventions should now be the subject for future research. The first step for policymakers seeking to design rules to protect citizen's privacy and security is knowing what works?Ph.D

Ethnographic Advocacy Against the Death Penalty

This article develops the concept of “ethnographic advocacy” to make sense of the humanizing, open‐ended knowledge practices involved in the defense of criminal defendants charged with capital murder. Drawing from anthropological fieldwork with well‐respected figures in the American capital defense bar, as well as my own professional experience as an investigator specializing in death penalty sentencing mitigation, I argue that effective advocacy for life occurs through qualitative knowledge practices that share notable methodological affinities with contemporary anthropological ethnography. The article concludes with a preliminary exploration of what the concept of ethnographic advocacy might reveal about academic anthropology\u27s own advocative engagements

Evaluating risk effects of industrial features on woodland caribou habitat selection in west central Alberta using agent-based modelling

AbstractAlberta woodland caribou (Rangifer tarandus) are classified as threatened in Canada, and a local population in the west-central region, the Little Smoky herd, is at immediate risk of extirpation due, in part, to anthropogenic activities such as oil, gas, and forestry that have altered the ecosystem dynamics. To investigate these impacts, we have developed a spatially explicit, agent-based model (ABM) to simulate winter habitat selection and use of woodland caribou, and to determine the relative impacts of different industrial features on caribou habitat-selection strategies. The ABM model is composed of cognitive caribou agents possessing memory and decision-making heuristics that act to optimize tradeoffs between energy acquisition and disturbance. A set of environmental data layers was used to develop a virtual grid representing the landscape over which caribou move. This grid contained forage-availability, energy-content, and predation-risk values. The model was calibrated using GPS data from caribou radio collars (n = 13) deployed over six months from 2004 to 2005, representing caribou winter activities. Additional simulations were conducted on caribou habitat-selection strategies by assigning industrial features (i.e., roads, seismic lines, pipelines, well sites, cutblocks and burns) different levels of disturbance depending on their type, age, and density. Differences in disturbance effects between industry features were confirmed by verifying which resultant simulations of caribou movement patterns most closely match actual caribou distributions and other patterns extracted from the GPS data. The results elucidate the degree to which caribou perceive different industry features as disturbance, and the differential energetic costs associated with each, thus offering insight into why caribou are choosing the habitats they use, and consequently, the level and type of industry most likely to affect their bioenergetics and fitness

Green exercise as a workplace intervention to reduce job stress: results from a pilot study

Stress and mental fatigue are major health threats to employees in office-based occupations. Physical activity is widely used as a stress-management intervention for employees. Moreover, experiences in contact with nature have been shown to provide stress-reduction and restoration from mental fatigue. OBJECTIVES:In a pilot study designed as a randomized controlled trial we investigated the impact of a green-exercise intervention on psychological and physiological indicators of stress in municipality employees. METHODS:Fourteen employees (7 females and 7 males, 49±8 yrs) volunteered in an exercise-based intervention in workplace either outdoors in a green/nature area or in an indoor exercise-setting. The intervention consisted of an information meeting and two exercise sessions, each including a biking bout and a circuit-strength sequence using elastic rubber bands (45-minutes, at about 55% of HR reserve, overall). Main outcomes were perceived environmental potential for restoration, affective state, blood pressure (BP) and cortisol awakening response (CAR AUCG and CAR AUCI) and cortisol levels in serum. Measurements were taken at baseline and in concomitance with the exercise sessions. Furthermore, affective state and self-reported physical activity levels were measured over a 10-weeks follow-up period. RESULTS:Compared with the indoor group, the nature group reported higher environmental potential for restoration (p <  0.001) and Positive Affect (p <  0.01), along with improved CAR AUCI (p = 0.04) and, marginally, diastolic BP (p = 0.05). The nature group also reported higher ratings of Positive Affect at follow-up (p = 0.02). Differences at post-exercise were not found for any of the other components of affective state, systolic BP, CAR AUCG and cortisol levels measured in serum. CONCLUSIONS:Green-exercise at the workplace could be a profitable way to manage stress and induce restoration among employees. Further studies on larger samples are needed in order to improve the generalizability of the results