On the Veldkamp Space of GQ(4, 2)

The Veldkamp space, in the sense of Buekenhout and Cohen, of the generalized quadrangle GQ(4, 2) is shown not to be a (partial) linear space by simply giving several examples of Veldkamp lines (V-lines) having two or even three Veldkamp points (V-points) in common. Alongside the ordinary V-lines of size five, one also finds V-lines of cardinality three and two. There, however, exists a subspace of the Veldkamp space isomorphic to PG(3, 4) having 45 perps and 40 plane ovoids as its 85 V-points, with its 357 V-lines being of four distinct types. A V-line of the first type consists of five perps on a common line (altogether 27 of them), the second type features three perps and two ovoids sharing a tricentric triad (240 members), whilst the third and fourth type each comprises a perp and four ovoids in the rosette centered at the (common) center of the perp (90). It is also pointed out that 160 non-plane ovoids (tripods) fall into two distinct orbits -- of sizes 40 and 120 -- with respect to the stabilizer group of a copy of GQ(2, 2); a tripod of the first/second orbit sharing with the GQ(2, 2) a tricentric/unicentric triad, respectively. Finally, three remarkable subconfigurations of V-lines represented by fans of ovoids through a fixed ovoid are examined in some detail.Comment: 6 pages, 7 figures; v2 - slightly polished, subsection on fans of ovoids and three figures adde

Finite Projective Spaces, Geometric Spreads of Lines and Multi-Qubits

Given a (2N - 1)-dimensional projective space over GF(2), PG(2N - 1, 2), and its geometric spread of lines, there exists a remarkable mapping of this space onto PG(N - 1, 4) where the lines of the spread correspond to the points and subspaces spanned by pairs of lines to the lines of PG(N - 1, 4). Under such mapping, a non-degenerate quadric surface of the former space has for its image a non-singular Hermitian variety in the latter space, this quadric being {\it hyperbolic} or {\it elliptic} in dependence on N being {\it even} or {\it odd}, respectively. We employ this property to show that generalized Pauli groups of N-qubits also form two distinct families according to the parity of N and to put the role of symmetric operators into a new perspective. The N=4 case is taken to illustrate the issue.Comment: 3 pages, no figures/tables; V2 - short introductory paragraph added; V3 - to appear in Int. J. Mod. Phys.

Midwest Evaluation of the Adult Functioning of Former Foster Youth

The Midwest Evaluation of the Adult Functioning of Former Foster Youth (Midwest Study) is a prospective study that has been following a sample of young people from Iowa, Wisconsin, and Illinois as they transition out of foster care into adulthood. It is a collaborative effort involving Chapin Hall at the University of Chicago; Partners for Our Children at the University of Washington, Seattle; the University of Wisconsin Survey Center; and the public child welfare agencies in Illinois, Iowa, and Wisconsin.The Midwest Study provides a comprehensive picture of how foster youth are faring during this transition since the Foster Care Independence Act of 1999 became law. Foster youth in Iowa, Wisconsin, and Illinois were eligible to participate in the study if they had entered care before their 16th birthday, were still in care at age 17, and had been removed from home for reasons other than delinquency. Baseline survey data were collected from 732 study participants when they were 17 or 18 years old. Study participants were re-interviewed at ages 19 (n = 603), 21 (n = 591), and 23 or 24 (n = 602). A fifth wave of survey data will be collected when study participants are 25 or 26 years old.Because many of the questions Midwest Study participants were also asked as part of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, it is possible to make comparisons between this sample of former foster youth and a nationally representative sample of young people in the general population. These comparisons indicate that young people who have aged out of foster care are faring poorly as a group relative to their peers across a variety of domains.The Midwest Study also presents a unique opportunity to compare the outcomes of young people from one state (i.e., Illinois) that allows foster youth to remain in care until their 21st birthday to the outcomes of young people from two other states (i.e., Iowa and Wisconsin) in which foster youth generally age out when they are 18 years old. The data suggest that extending foster care until age 21 may be associated with better outcomes, at least in some domains

Midwest Evaluation of the Adult Functioning of Former Foster Youth: outcomes at age 21

The Midwest Evaluation of the Adult Functioning of Former Foster Youth (Midwest Study) is a longitudinal study that has been following a sample of young people from Iowa, Wisconsin, and Illinois as they transition out of foster care into adulthood. It is a collaborative effort involving Chapin Hall at the University of Chicago; the University of Wisconsin Survey Center; and the public child welfare agencies in Illinois, Iowa, and Wisconsin. This report concentrates on the outcomes of 21 year old youth as they age out of the child welfare system and transition to adulthood

Scedosporium and Pseudallescheria low molecular weight metabolites revealed by database search

The potential of mMass software search tool with new compound libraries was demonstrated on metabolomics of Scedosporium prolificans, S. apiospermum and Pseudallescheria boydii sensu stricto. Cyclic peptides pseudacyclins, small molecular weight tyroscherin analogues and various lipids were annotated by open source mass spectometry tool utilising accurate matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionisation mass spectral data of intact fungal spores. Electrospray ionisation combined with tandem mass spectrometry was used for monohexosylceramide characterisation in fungal extracts

The Clumping Transition in Niche Competition: a Robust Critical Phenomenon

We show analytically and numerically that the appearance of lumps and gaps in the distribution of n competing species along a niche axis is a robust phenomenon whenever the finiteness of the niche space is taken into account. In this case depending if the niche width of the species $\sigma$ is above or below a threshold $\sigma_c$, which for large n coincides with 2/n, there are two different regimes. For $\sigma > sigma_c$ the lumpy pattern emerges directly from the dominant eigenvector of the competition matrix because its corresponding eigenvalue becomes negative. For $\sigma </- sigma_c$ the lumpy pattern disappears. Furthermore, this clumping transition exhibits critical slowing down as $\sigma$ is approached from above. We also find that the number of lumps of species vs. $\sigma$ displays a stair-step structure. The positions of these steps are distributed according to a power-law. It is thus straightforward to predict the number of groups that can be packed along a niche axis and it coincides with field measurements for a wide range of the model parameters.Comment: 16 pages, 7 figures; http://iopscience.iop.org/1742-5468/2010/05/P0500

Soil conservation and sustainable development goals(SDGs) achievement in Europe and central Asia: Which role for the European soil partnership?

Voluntary soil protection measures are not sufficient to achieve sustainable soil management at a global scale. Additionally, binding soil protection legislation at national and international levels has also proved to be insufficient for the effective protection of this almost non-renewable natural resource. The European Soil Partnership (ESP) and its sub-regional partnerships (Eurasian Sub-Regional Soil Partnership, Alpine Soil Partnership) were established in the context of FAO's Global Soil Partnership (GSP) with the mission to facilitate and contribute to the exchange of knowledge and technologies related to soils, to develop dialogue and to raise awareness for the need to establish a binding global agreement for sustainable soil management. The ESP has taken a role of an umbrella network covering countries in Europe and Central Asia. It aims to improve the dialogue in the whole region and has encouraged establishing goals that would promote sustainable soil management, taking into account various national and local approaches and priorities, as well as cultural specificities. The ESP first regional implementation plan for the 2017–2020 period was adopted and implemented along the five GSP pillars of action. Building on the experience of the last four years, this study demonstrates that establishing sub-regional and national partnerships is an additional step in a concrete sustainable soil management implementation process. It also suggests that a complementary approach between legal instruments and voluntary initiatives linked to the development of efficient communication and strong commitment is the key to success

Existential Contextuality and the Models of Meyer, Kent and Clifton

It is shown that the models recently proposed by Meyer, Kent and Clifton (MKC) exhibit a novel kind of contextuality, which we term existential contextuality. In this phenomenon it is not simply the pre-existing value but the actual existence of an observable which is context dependent. This result confirms the point made elsewhere, that the MKC models do not, as the authors claim, ``nullify'' the Kochen-Specker theorem. It may also be of some independent interest.Comment: Revtex, 7 pages, 1 figure. Replaced with published versio