Late Precontact Settlement on the Northern Seward Peninsula Coast: Results of Recent Fieldwork

Changing Arctic settlement patterns are associated with shifts in socioeconomic organization and interaction at both the inter- and intraregional levels; analysis of Arctic settlement patterns can inform research on the emergence and spread of Arctic maritime adaptations. Changes in late precontact settlement patterns in Northwest Alaska suggest significant shifts in subsistence and/or social organization, but the patterns themselves are not well understood. Prior research around Kotzebue Sound suggests three possible scenarios: (1) population decrease and dispersion from settlement centers after 550 cal bp, (2) population stability and dispersion after 550 cal bp, and (3) different settlement patterns in the northern and southern areas of Kotzebue Sound. We analyze site distribution and radiocarbon data from new research on the northern Seward Peninsula coast to address questions about local late precontact settlement patterns. Our results point to denser late precontact occupation of this region than previously understood, suggesting either population stability and dispersion after 550 cal bp or the development of differential settlement patterns around the Kotzebue Sound region. This research provides new information about late precontact settlement patterns in Northwest Alaska and contributes to the broader debate about the changing nature of Arctic maritime adaptations during the dynamic late Holocene period. Results also indicate that people in this region were well integrated into both Kotzebue Sound and more distant socioeconomic systems despite potential reduction or change in interaction spheres during the late precontact period

Large violation of Bell inequalities with low entanglement

In this paper we obtain violations of general bipartite Bell inequalities of order $\frac{\sqrt{n}}{\log n}$ with $n$ inputs, $n$ outputs and $n$-dimensional Hilbert spaces. Moreover, we construct explicitly, up to a random choice of signs, all the elements involved in such violations: the coefficients of the Bell inequalities, POVMs measurements and quantum states. Analyzing this construction we find that, even though entanglement is necessary to obtain violation of Bell inequalities, the Entropy of entanglement of the underlying state is essentially irrelevant in obtaining large violation. We also indicate why the maximally entangled state is a rather poor candidate in producing large violations with arbitrary coefficients. However, we also show that for Bell inequalities with positive coefficients (in particular, games) the maximally entangled state achieves the largest violation up to a logarithmic factor.Comment: Reference [16] added. Some typos correcte

Resonance energy transfer: The unified theory revisited

Resonanceenergy transfer (RET) is the principal mechanism for the intermolecular or intramolecular redistribution of electronic energy following molecular excitation. In terms of fundamental quantum interactions, the process is properly described in terms of a virtual photon transit between the pre-excited donor and a lower energy (usually ground-state) acceptor. The detailed quantum amplitude for RET is calculated by molecular quantum electrodynamical techniques with the observable, the transfer rate, derived via application of the Fermi golden rule. In the treatment reported here, recently devised state-sequence techniques and a novel calculational protocol is applied to RET and shown to circumvent problems associated with the usual method. The second-rank tensor describing virtual photon behavior evolves from a Green’s function solution to the Helmholtz equation, and special functions are employed to realize the coupling tensor. The method is used to derive a new result for energy transfer systems sensitive to both magnetic- and electric-dipole transitions. The ensuing result is compared to that of pure electric-dipole–electric-dipole coupling and is analyzed with regard to acceptable transfer separations. Systems are proposed where the electric-dipole–magnetic-dipole term is the leading contribution to the overall rate

Joint system quantum descriptions arising from local quantumness

Bipartite correlations generated by non-signalling physical systems that admit a finite-dimensional local quantum description cannot exceed the quantum limits, i.e., they can always be interpreted as distant measurements of a bipartite quantum state. Here we consider the effect of dropping the assumption of finite dimensionality. Remarkably, we find that the same result holds provided that we relax the tensor structure of space-like separated measurements to mere commutativity. We argue why an extension of this result to tensor representations seems unlikely

Development of the N400 for Word Learning in the First 2 Years of Life: A Systematic Review

The N400 ERP component is a direct neural index of word meaning. Studies show that the N400 component is already present in early infancy, albeit often delayed. Many researchers capitalize on this finding, using the N400 component to better understand how early language acquisition unfolds. However, variability in how researchers quantify the N400 makes it difficult to set clear predictions or build theory. Not much is known about how the N400 component develops in the first 2 years of life in terms of its latency and topographical distributions, nor do we know how task parameters affect its appearance. In the current paper we carry out a systematic review, comparing over 30 studies that report the N400 component as a proxy of semantic processing elicited in infants between 0 and 24 months old who listened to linguistic stimuli. Our main finding is that there is large heterogeneity across semantic-priming studies in reported characteristics of the N400, both with respect to latency and to distributions. With age, the onset of the N400 insignificantly decreases, while its offset slightly increases. We also examined whether the N400 appears different for recently-acquired novel words vs. existing words: both situations reveal heterogeneity across studies. Finally, we inspected whether the N400 was modulated differently with studies using a between-subject design. In infants with more proficient language skills the N400 was more often present or showed itself here with earlier latency, compared to their peers; but no consistent patterns were observed for distribution characteristics of the N400. One limitation of the current review is that we compared studies that widely differed in choice of EEG recordings, pre-processing steps and quantification of the N400, all of which could affect the characteristics of the infant N400. The field is still missing research that systematically tests development of the N400 using the same paradigm across infancy

Generation and Handling of Hard Drive Duplicates as Piece of Evidence

An important area in digital forensics is images of hard disks. The correct production of the images as well as the integrity and authenticity of each hard disk image is essential for the probative force of the image to be used at court. Integrity and authenticity are under suspicion as digital evidence is stored and used by software based systems. Modifications to digital objects are hard or even impossible to track and can occur even accidentally. Even worse, vulnerabilities occur for all current computing systems. Therefore, it is difficult to guarantee a secure environment for forensic investigations. But intended deletions of dedicated data of disk images are often required because of legal issues in many countries. This article provides a technical framework on the protection of the probative force of hard disk images by ensuring the integrity and authenticity using state of the art technology. It combines hardware-based security, cryptographic hash functions and digital signatures to achieve a continuous protection of the image together with a reliable documentation of the status of the device that was used for image creation. The framework presented allows to detect modifications and to pinpoint the exact area of the modification to the digital evidence protecting the probative force of the evidence at a whole. In addition, it also supports the deletion of parts of images without invalidating the retained data blocks. Keywords: digital evidence, probative force hard disk image, verifiable deletion of image data, trusted imaging softwar

Long time, large scale limit of the Wigner transform for a system of linear oscillators in one dimension

We consider the long time, large scale behavior of the Wigner transform W_\eps(t,x,k) of the wave function corresponding to a discrete wave equation on a 1-d integer lattice, with a weak multiplicative noise. This model has been introduced in Basile, Bernardin, and Olla to describe a system of interacting linear oscillators with a weak noise that conserves locally the kinetic energy and the momentum. The kinetic limit for the Wigner transform has been shown in Basile, Olla, and Spohn. In the present paper we prove that in the unpinned case there exists $\gamma_0>0$ such that for any $\gamma\in(0,\gamma_0]$ the weak limit of W_\eps(t/\eps^{3/2\gamma},x/\eps^{\gamma},k), as \eps\ll1, satisfies a one dimensional fractional heat equation $\partial_t W(t,x)=-\hat c(-\partial_x^2)^{3/4}W(t,x)$ with $\hat c>0$. In the pinned case an analogous result can be claimed for W_\eps(t/\eps^{2\gamma},x/\eps^{\gamma},k) but the limit satisfies then the usual heat equation

Motor Performance as Risk Factor for Lower Extremity Injuries in Children

Purpose: Physical activity related injuries in children constitute a costly public health matter. The influence of motor performance on injury risk is unclear. The purpose was to examine if motor performance was a risk factor of traumatic and overuse lower extremity injuries in a normal population of children. Methods: This study included 1244 participants from 8 to 14-years-old at baseline, all participating in "the Childhood Health, Activity and Motor Performance School Study Denmark". The follow-up period was up to 15 months. The motor performance tests were static balance, single leg hop for distance, core stability tests, vertical jump, shuttle run, and a cardiorespiratory fitness test. Lower extremity injuries were registered by clinicians by weekly questionnaires and classified according to the ICD-10 system. Results: Poor balance increased risk for traumatic injury in the foot region (IRR=1.09-1.15), and good performance in single leg hop for distance protected against traumatic knee injuries (IRR=0.66-0.68). Good performance in core stability tests and vertical jump increased the risk for traumatic injuries in the foot region (IRR=1.12-1.16). Poor balance increased the risk for overuse injuries in the foot region (IRR=1.65), as did good performance in core stability tests and shuttle run, especially for knee injuries (IRR=1.07-1.18). Conclusions: Poor balance (sway) performance was a consistent predictor of traumatic injuries, in particular for traumatic ankle injuries. Good motor performance (core stability, vertical jump, shuttle run) was positively associated with traumatic and overuse injuries, and negatively (single leg hop) associated with traumatic injuries, indicating different influence on injury risk. Previous injury was a confounder affecting the effect size and the significance. More studies are needed to consolidate the findings, to clarify the influence of different performance tests on different types of injuries and to examine the influence of behaviour in relation to injury ris