13,240 research outputs found
Recommended from our members
The Safety Net as a Network
The lack of a coherent understanding of what is meant by the American safety net made it difficult to have a meaningful discourse on the current condition. This paper proposes an alternative formulation of the social safety net based in network theory to overcome the shortcomings of the previous literature. The first part of the paper describes this approach, attempting to develop an alternative understanding of the safety net grounded in the actions of anti-poverty actors. Next is a list of propositions for measuring five dimensions of a safety net: the frame, structure, positions, influences, and the context. Three policy implications are derived from this new paradigm. First, shifting the level of analysis to network level allows policy makers to broaden the scope of the modern social safety net. Second, quantifying the interaction among actors reveals interdependency, which in turn redefines the power and influence of each actor within the network. Finally, the modern safety net could demonstrate a core-periphery structure. It calls for a new way of thinking about resource distribution and decision making channels of such unique structure.LBJ School of Public Affair
Cleaning up the catalogue
The London School of Economics wanted to remove cataloguing inconsistencies but the scale of the task was huge, and outsourcing to a specialist bibliographic services company proved only a partial solution. Helen Williams explains why manual and automated processes were needed
Recommended from our members
A schema for cryptographic keys generation using hybrid biometrics
Biometric identifiers refer to unique physical properties or behavioural attributes of individuals. Some of the well known biometric identifiers are voice, finger prints, retina or iris, facial structure etc. In our daily interaction with others directly or indirectly, we implicitly use biometrics to know, distinguish and trust people. Biometric identifiers represent the concept of "who a person is" by gathering vital characteristics that don't correspond to any other person. The human brain to some extent is able to ascertain disparities or variation in certain physical attributes and yet verify the authenticity of a person. But this is difficult to be implemented in electronic systems due to the intense requirements of artificial decision making and hard-coded logic.
This paper examines the possibility of using a combination of biometric attributes to overcome common problems in having a single biometric scheme for authentication. It also investigates possible schemes and features to deal with variations in Biometric attributes. The material presented is related to ongoing research by the Computer Communications Research Group at Leeds Metropolitan University. We use this paper as a starting step and as a plan for advanced research. It offers ideas and proposition for implementing hybrid biometrics in conjunction with cryptography. This is work in progress and is in a very preliminary stage
Outgroup, alignment and modelling improvements indicate that two TNFSF13-like genes existed in the vertebrate ancestor
Peer reviewedPublisher PD
Phylogenetic analysis accounting for age-dependent death and sampling with applications to epidemics
The reconstruction of phylogenetic trees based on viral genetic sequence data
sequentially sampled from an epidemic provides estimates of the past
transmission dynamics, by fitting epidemiological models to these trees. To our
knowledge, none of the epidemiological models currently used in phylogenetics
can account for recovery rates and sampling rates dependent on the time elapsed
since transmission.
Here we introduce an epidemiological model where infectives leave the
epidemic, either by recovery or sampling, after some random time which may
follow an arbitrary distribution.
We derive an expression for the likelihood of the phylogenetic tree of
sampled infectives under our general epidemiological model. The analytic
concept developed in this paper will facilitate inference of past
epidemiological dynamics and provide an analytical framework for performing
very efficient simulations of phylogenetic trees under our model. The main idea
of our analytic study is that the non-Markovian epidemiological model giving
rise to phylogenetic trees growing vertically as time goes by, can be
represented by a Markovian "coalescent point process" growing horizontally by
the sequential addition of pairs of coalescence and sampling times.
As examples, we discuss two special cases of our general model, namely an
application to influenza and an application to HIV. Though phrased in
epidemiological terms, our framework can also be used for instance to fit
macroevolutionary models to phylogenies of extant and extinct species,
accounting for general species lifetime distributions.Comment: 30 pages, 2 figure
Catching crabs: a case study in local-scale English conservation
Wells-next-the-Sea and Cromer in Norfolk (England) both rely upon their local
crab populations, since crabbing (gillying) is a major part of their tourist
industry. Compared to a control site with no crabbing, crabs from Wells harbour
and Cromer pier were found to have nearly six times the amount of limb damage.
Crabs caught by the general public had more injuries than crabs caught in
controlled conditions, suggesting the buckets in which the crabs were kept were
to blame. Since there is much evidence that such injuries have negative impacts
on the survival and reproductive success of the shore crab, this is taken as
evidence of non-lethal injury from humans having a population-level effect on
these animals. Questionnaire data demonstrated a public lack of awareness and
want for information, which was then used to obtain funding to produce a
leaflet campaign informing the public of how to crab responsibly. All data
collected is available online at http://dx.doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.979288
An analysis of imagery in listening to orchestral music in grades six and seven
Thesis (M.A.)--Boston Universit
Consumers’ Desire for GM Labels: Is the Devil in the Details?
Consumer/Household Economics, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety,
Social Assistance Programs and Outcomes: Food Assistance in the Context of Welfare Reform
Food assistance programs play an important role in meeting the basic needs of low-income households. We consider the complex interactions among food stamps, labor force participation, and food insecurity status of low-income households under different program designs and economic conditions. The analysis uses data from the Survey of Program Dynamics to jointly estimate the role of participation in the Food Stamp Program (FSP), labor market participation and well-being, measured as food security, through the use of a simultaneous equation model. The results of our research suggest that food insecurity has a positive effect on FSP participation while labor force participation reduces FSP participation. Furthermore, FSP participation is more responsive to changes in the program benefits than to changes in nonlabor income. The linkages among food program participation, labor force participation, and well-being, measured in terms of food insecurity, are complex. The structural approach provides evidence that, among low-income households, program parameters affect FSP participation but no evidence that the food assistance reduces food insecurity.
- …