Simulating the Role of Stellar Rotation in the Spectroscopic Effects of Differential Limb Magnification

Finite-source effects of gravitationally microlensed stars have been well discussed in the literature, but the role that stellar rotation plays has been neglected. A differential magnification map applied to a differentially Doppler-shifted surface alters the profiles of absorption lines, compromising their ordinarily symmetric nature. Herein, we assess the degree to which this finite-source effect of differential limb magnification (DLM), in combination with stellar rotation, alters spectroscopically derived stellar properties. To achieve this, we simulated a grid of high-magnification microlensing events using synthetic spectra. Our analysis shows that rotation of the source generates differences in the measured equivalent widths of absorption lines supplementary to DLM alone, but only of the order of a few percent. Using the wings of H alpha from the same simulated data, we confirmed the result of Johnson et al. (2010) that DLM alters measurements of effective temperature by < 100 K for dwarf stars, while showing rotation to bear no additional effect.Comment: Accepted for publication in PASA, 7 pages, 5 figures, 1 tabl

Functional programming languages for verification tools: experiences with ML and Haskell

We compare Haskell with ML as programming languages for verification tools, based on our experience developing TRUTH in Haskell and the Edinburgh Concurrency Workbench (CWB) in ML. We discuss not only technical language features but also the &quot;worlds&quot; of the languages, for example, the availability of tools and libraries

Perception and Barriers to Indoor Air Quality and Perceived Impact on Respiratory Health: An Assessment in Rural Honduras

Objective. The aim of this study was to identify household-specific factors associated with respiratory symptoms and to study the perceived impact of indoor air pollution (IAP) as a health issue. Methods. An IRB-approved, voluntary, anonymous 23-item survey was conducted in Spanish at a medical outreach clinic in June 2012 and at the homes of survey respondents (N = 79). Comparative analyses were performed to investigate relationships between specific house characteristics and respiratory complaints. Results. Seventy-nine surveys were completed. Respiratory symptoms were frequently reported by survey respondents: 42% stated that smoke in their household caused them to have watery eyes, 42% reported household members with coughs within the past two weeks, and 25% stated that there were currently household members experiencing difficulty in breathing. Stove location and kitchen roof construction material were significantly associated with frequency of respiratory symptoms. The vast majority used firewood as their major fuel type. Most respondents indicated that neither indoor air quality was a problem nor did it affect their daily life. Conclusions. Respiratory complaints are common in Yoro, Honduras. Stove location and kitchen roof construction material were significantly associated with frequency of respiratory symptoms; this may have implications for efforts to improve respiratory health in the region

Patterns in Illinois Educational School Data

We examine Illinois educational data from standardized exams and analyze primary factors affecting the achievement of public school students. We focus on the simplest possible models: representation of data through visualizations and regressions on single variables. Exam scores are shown to depend on school type, location, and poverty concentration. For most schools in Illinois, student test scores decline linearly with poverty concentration. However Chicago must be treated separately. Selective schools in Chicago, as well as some traditional and charter schools, deviate from this pattern based on poverty. For any poverty level, Chicago schools perform better than those in the rest of Illinois. Selective programs for gifted students show high performance at each grade level, most notably at the high school level, when compared to other Illinois school types. The case of Chicago charter schools is more complex. In the last six years, their students' scores overtook those of students in traditional Chicago high schools.Comment: 9 pages, 6 figure

Growth in young children with homozygous sickle cell disease

Imperial Users onl

Australia in the vernacular: Poetic explorations

As Australian society continues to evolve, so is the idea of a collective culture changing in ways that provoke a questioning of traditional values, tropes and symbols. This thesis will explore and analyse some of the changes in the ways poetic art might imagine what Australian identity and culture look like: through a creative component comprising a small collection of my own poetry and a dissertation that offers a reading of a small selection of poems by Australian poet Les Murray. The creative component will seek to capture glimpses of the ordinary aspects of contemporary Australian society, and to show how poetry has the potential to transcend exclusionary viewpoints in order to re-imagine Australian diversity. The dissertation will explore how Murray, who both interpreted and translated familiar images of Australian landscapes, nature, culture, and people, pieces together a mosaic written in the Australian vernacular—for him the key to understanding Australian identity. While Murray’s poetry has been criticised for its restrictive views of Australian culture, his harnessing of the vernacular offers the possibility for an expansive poetic rendering of national life in all its difference. Overall, the thesis aims to offer the reader an imaginative series of poetic and critical reflections on elements of Australia’s complexity as a changing nation

Use of Thrust Vectors in Support of the CyberCraft Initiative

The CyberCraft Initiative is designing a framework for command and control of future Air Force Cyber-weapon systems, that autonomously operate and defend the Air Force networks and information systems to provide Cyberspace Superiority in support of the defense of the United States. The fundamental research question of the CyberCraft Initiative is What is required for a commander to trust a CyberCraft to autonomously defend military information systems? The Trust Vector model is one method of integrating trust into the CyberCraft fleet. Trust Vectors define trust and distrust between agents based on three components; current and historical data, intrinsic knowledge of the remote agent\u27s abilities, and recommendations from other agents. This research finds that the Trust Vector model can be modified to integrate trust into the CyberCraft Initiative. Several expansions to the model are proposed, including applying the Trust Vector model to an asynchronous paradigm for data transactions. This research also determines the limits of the utility of historical data for the Trust Vector model

On the Analysis of DNA Methylation

Recent genome-wide studies lend support to the idea that the patterns of DNA methylation are in some way related either causally or as a readout of cell-type specific protein binding. We lay the groundwork for a framework to test whether the pattern of DNA methylation levels in a cell combined with protein binding models is sufficient to completely describe the location of the component of proteins binding to its genome in an assayed context. There is only one method, whole-genome bisulfite sequencing, WGBS, available to study DNA methylation genome-wide at such high resolution, however its accuracy has not been determined on the scale of individual binding locations. We address this with a two-fold approach. First, we developed an alternative high-resolution, whole-genome assay using a combination of an enrichment-based and a restriction-enzyme-based assay of methylation, methylCRF. While both assays are considered inferior to WGBS, by using two distinct assays, this method has the advantage that each assay in part cancels out the biases of the other. Additionally, this method is up to 15 times lower in cost than WGBS. By formulating the estimation of methylation from the two methods as a structured prediction problem using a conditional random field, this work will also address the general problem of incorporating data of varying qualities -a common characteristic of biological data- for the purpose of prediction. We show that methylCRF is concordant with WGBS within the range of two WGBS methylomes. Due to the lower cost, we were able to analyze at high-resolution, methylation across more cell-types than previously possible and estimate that 28% of CpGs, in regions comprising 11% of the genome, show variable methylation and are enriched in regulatory regions. Secondly, we show that WGBS has inherent resulution limitations in a read count dependent manner and that the identification of unmethylated regions is highly affected by GC-bias in the underlying protocol suggesting simple estimate procedures may not be sufficient for high-resolution analysis. To address this, we propose a novel approach to DNA methylation analysis using change point detection instead of estimating methylation level directly. However, we show that current change-point detection methods are not robust to methylation signal, we therefore explore how to extend current non-parametric methods to simultaneously find change-points as well as characteristic methylation levels. We believe this framework may have the power to examine the connection between changes in methylation and transcription factor binding in the context of cell-type specific behaviors

Missional Renewal in a Large and Established Suburban Western Church

This thesis addresses the topic of missional renewal at Clovercrest Baptist Church (CBC), specifically focusing on participating in the mission of God through simple, memorable, and reproducible missional practices. The identified problem is a lack of process or framework for enhancing participation in God’s mission and churchwide missional renewal at CBC, a large suburban Western church. The purpose of this project intervention is to develop a resource guide of missional practices that facilitate participation in the mission of God at CBC towards missional renewal. This intervention is guided by the theological foundation that God is a God of mission. He initiates relationship and restoration with humanity, desiring to reconcile all people to himself. God saves and then sends his people on his mission of restoration and renewal. The early church is an example of this, as is the present-day Majority World church. These two contexts were used to identify and explore missional practices for the project intervention team to discern. I used purposive sampling, the maximum variant approach, in recruiting the project intervention team, and the project totaled ten sessions. The project team participated in discussion-based sessions where their contributions through comments, stories, and feedback assisted in developing the missional resource guide. Sessions consisted of lectio divina, prayer, communal discernment, teaching on missional practices, small group exercises, larger group feedback and discussion, homework tasks, weekly reporting, an open-ended group interview, and a group evaluation. I conclude that (1) God has a mission and calls his followers to participate, (2) developing missional practices that are simple, memorable, and reproducible is essential in living out the mission of God, (3) integrating missional practices into one’s daily life, one’s habitus, through supported accountable relationships is vital in living out God’s mission, (4) being led and empowered by the Holy Spirit is central in living out God’s mission, through discernment and obedience, (5) barriers of engagement and contextualization in missional practices for everyday followers of Jesus require further investigation, and (6) this resource guide has applicability beyond CBC into the wider Western church