The Aaron Diamond Foundation AIDS Research in New York City

Case study examines a foundation that spent down its $200 million endowment over 10 years on programs in medical research, minority education, and culture in New York City

Analysis and Optimization of Deep Counterfactual Value Networks

Recently a strong poker-playing algorithm called DeepStack was published, which is able to find an approximate Nash equilibrium during gameplay by using heuristic values of future states predicted by deep neural networks. This paper analyzes new ways of encoding the inputs and outputs of DeepStack's deep counterfactual value networks based on traditional abstraction techniques, as well as an unabstracted encoding, which was able to increase the network's accuracy.Comment: Long version of publication appearing at KI 2018: The 41st German Conference on Artificial Intelligence (http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-00111-7_26). Corrected typo in titl

The effect of in vivo PBDE treatment on hepatic phosphoenolpyruvate carboxykinase (PEPCK) enzyme kinetics in male Wistar rats

Polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) are synthetic flame-retardant chemicals that enter the environment and mammalian body and may disrupt glucose metabolism. This study investigated the effect of PBDEs on a key gluconeogenic enzyme, phosphoenolpyruvate carboxykinase (PEPCK). Forty-eight male Wistar rats were gavaged with corn oil or corn oil containing 14 mg/kg DE-71 for 3, 14 or 28 days (N = 8 per group). At each time point, fasting plasma glucose, insulin and C-peptide were measured and liver PEPCK enzyme activity was assayed. PBDEs significantly decreased PEPCK Vmax (mumol/min/g liver weight) at 3 days by 26%; this reduction persisted through 28 days. PBDEs also reduced total PEPCK activity (mumol/min/liver) by 18% (3 days) to 41% (28 days). Fasting plasma glucose levels remained unaffected by PBDE treatment. Findings demonstrate that PBDEs reduce hepatic PEPCK Vmax as early as three days of treatment; the implications for this reduction in glucose homeostasis remain to be determined

Examining Contextual Differences in Participant Characteristics and During-Program Occurrences with Drug Court Program Completion

The study purpose was to compare individuals participating in rural and urban drug courts to examine factors associated with program completion. Secondary data (participant assessment; drug court Management Information System) as well as conviction information from a statewide database were examined for a sample of drug court participants (N = 534). Based on multivariate analysis, for rural participants, two variables were significantly associated with increased program completion: age and outpatient treatment. Conversely, for rural participants, the number of felony/misdemeanor convictions before drug court and receiving an incarceration sanction during drug court were associated with program non-completion. For urban participants, gender and age were associated with increased odds of completion, whereas marital status, education, and past 30-day cocaine use were associated with program non-completion. Findings suggest contextual differences in participant characteristics and during-program occurrences, which ultimately influenced program completion. Understanding contextual factors has important implications for program planning and implementation

Design and fabrication of a mid infra-red photonic crystal defect laser in indium antimonide

This paper presents 2D FDTD modelling and prototype fabrication of a mid-infrared photonic crystal defect laser. The device is fabricated using a two stage Focused Ion Beam process which results in improved hole profiles

Acoustoelectric Current in Graphene Nanoribbons

This is the final version of the article. Available from Springer Nature via the DOI in this record.Surface acoustic waves (SAWs) propagating on piezoelectric substrates offer a convenient, contactless approach to probing the electronic properties of low-dimensional charge carrier systems such as graphene nanoribbons (GNRs). SAWs can also be used to transport and manipulate charge for applications such as metrology and quantum information. In this work, we investigate the acoustoelectric effect in GNRs, and show that an acoustoelectric current can be generated in GNRs with physical widths as small as 200 nm at room temperature. The positive current in the direction of the SAWs, which corresponds to the transportation of holes, exhibits a linear dependence on SAW intensity and frequency. This is consistent with the description of the interaction between the charge carriers in the GNRs and the piezoelectric fields associated with the SAWs being described by a relatively simple classical relaxation model. Somewhat counter-intuitively, as the GNR width is decreased, the measured acoustoelectric current increases. This is thought to be caused by an increase of the carrier mobility due to increased doping arising from damage to the GNR edges.G.R.N. acknowledges the support of the UK Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council through a Fellowship in Frontier Manufacturing (Grant no. EP/J018651/1)

Acoustoelectric photoresponse of graphene nanoribbons

This is the final version of the article. Available from the publisher via the DOI in this record.The acoustoelectric current in graphene nanoribbons, with widths ranging between 350 nm and 600 nm, has been investigated as a function of illumination. For all nanoribbon widths, the acoustoelectric current was observed to decrease on illumination, in contrast to the increase in acoustoelectric current measured in unpatterned graphene sheet devices. This is thought to be due to the higher initial conductivities of the nanoribbons compared to unpatterned devices.GRN acknowledges the support of the UK Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council through a Fellowship in Frontier Manufacturing (Grant No. EP/J018651/1)