Towards Regulatable AI Systems: Technical Gaps and Policy Opportunities

There is increasing attention being given to how to regulate AI systems. As governing bodies grapple with what values to encapsulate into regulation, we consider the technical half of the question: To what extent can AI experts vet an AI system for adherence to regulatory requirements? We investigate this question through two public sector procurement checklists, identifying what we can do now, what we should be able to do with technical innovation in AI, and what requirements necessitate a more interdisciplinary approach

Etiologic Diagnosis of Lower Respiratory Tract Bacterial Infections Using Sputum Samples and Quantitative Loop-Mediated Isothermal Amplification

Etiologic diagnoses of lower respiratory tract infections (LRTI) have been relying primarily on bacterial cultures that often fail to return useful results in time. Although DNA-based assays are more sensitive than bacterial cultures in detecting pathogens, the molecular results are often inconsistent and challenged by doubts on false positives, such as those due to system- and environment-derived contaminations. Here we report a nationwide cohort study on 2986 suspected LRTI patients across P. R. China. We compared the performance of a DNA-based assay qLAMP (quantitative Loop-mediated isothermal AMPlification) with that of standard bacterial cultures in detecting a panel of eight common respiratory bacterial pathogens from sputum samples. Our qLAMP assay detects the panel of pathogens in 1047(69.28%) patients from 1533 qualified patients at the end. We found that the bacterial titer quantified based on qLAMP is a predictor of probability that the bacterium in the sample can be detected in culture assay. The relatedness of the two assays fits a logistic regression curve. We used a piecewise linear function to define breakpoints where latent pathogen abruptly change its competitive relationship with others in the panel. These breakpoints, where pathogens start to propagate abnormally, are used as cutoffs to eliminate the influence of contaminations from normal flora. With help of the cutoffs derived from statistical analysis, we are able to identify causative pathogens in 750 (48.92%) patients from qualified patients. In conclusion, qLAMP is a reliable method in quantifying bacterial titer. Despite the fact that there are always latent bacteria contaminated in sputum samples, we can identify causative pathogens based on cutoffs derived from statistical analysis of competitive relationship

Neutrino Physics with JUNO

The Jiangmen Underground Neutrino Observatory (JUNO), a 20 kton multi-purposeunderground liquid scintillator detector, was proposed with the determinationof the neutrino mass hierarchy as a primary physics goal. It is also capable ofobserving neutrinos from terrestrial and extra-terrestrial sources, includingsupernova burst neutrinos, diffuse supernova neutrino background, geoneutrinos,atmospheric neutrinos, solar neutrinos, as well as exotic searches such asnucleon decays, dark matter, sterile neutrinos, etc. We present the physicsmotivations and the anticipated performance of the JUNO detector for variousproposed measurements. By detecting reactor antineutrinos from two power plantsat 53-km distance, JUNO will determine the neutrino mass hierarchy at a 3-4sigma significance with six years of running. The measurement of antineutrinospectrum will also lead to the precise determination of three out of the sixoscillation parameters to an accuracy of better than 1\%. Neutrino burst from atypical core-collapse supernova at 10 kpc would lead to ~5000inverse-beta-decay events and ~2000 all-flavor neutrino-proton elasticscattering events in JUNO. Detection of DSNB would provide valuable informationon the cosmic star-formation rate and the average core-collapsed neutrinoenergy spectrum. Geo-neutrinos can be detected in JUNO with a rate of ~400events per year, significantly improving the statistics of existing geoneutrinosamples. The JUNO detector is sensitive to several exotic searches, e.g. protondecay via the $p\to K^++\bar\nu$ decay channel. The JUNO detector will providea unique facility to address many outstanding crucial questions in particle andastrophysics. It holds the great potential for further advancing our quest tounderstanding the fundamental properties of neutrinos, one of the buildingblocks of our Universe

Software for the frontiers of quantum chemistry:An overview of developments in the Q-Chem 5 package

This article summarizes technical advances contained in the fifth major release of the Q-Chem quantum chemistry program package, covering developments since 2015. A comprehensive library of exchange–correlation functionals, along with a suite of correlated many-body methods, continues to be a hallmark of the Q-Chem software. The many-body methods include novel variants of both coupled-cluster and configuration-interaction approaches along with methods based on the algebraic diagrammatic construction and variational reduced density-matrix methods. Methods highlighted in Q-Chem 5 include a suite of tools for modeling core-level spectroscopy, methods for describing metastable resonances, methods for computing vibronic spectra, the nuclear–electronic orbital method, and several different energy decomposition analysis techniques. High-performance capabilities including multithreaded parallelism and support for calculations on graphics processing units are described. Q-Chem boasts a community of well over 100 active academic developers, and the continuing evolution of the software is supported by an “open teamware” model and an increasingly modular design

VIDEO GENERATION FROM KEYFRAMES

Bachelor'sBACHELOR OF SCIENCE (HONOURS

Fleets of commercial vehicles

Global warming has become a significant issue in the world today. Although several other gases contribute a more substantial proportion to global warming, carbon emissions are the hottest focus of global warming due to their large volume and prevalence in everyday life. The development of new energy vehicles has been given a significant boost to address and control the severe pollution problems associated with carbon emissions. In describing China’s 14th Five-Year Plan, the construction of an ecological civilization is proposed to be continuously improved. In particular, there are specific targets for the technological transformation of vehicles and the proportion of new energy vehicles and energy-efficient vehicles, which will contribute to a low-carbon development model and environmental protection. The purpose of this report is to compare the carbon emissions of three types of vehicles to estimate the effects of low-carbon technological transformation and promote technological progress in new energy vehicles while providing data to support the formulation of future relevant policies

Porous poly(vinylidene fluoride) (PVDF) membrane with 2D vermiculite nanosheets modification for non-aqueous redox flow batteries

Funding Information: The work was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China ( 21636007 ). Publisher Copyright: © 2022 Elsevier B.V.Lack of high-performance membrane seriously limits the performance of non-aqueous redox flow batteries (NARFBs). Here, a porous poly(vinylidene fluoride) (PVDF) membrane with 2D vermiculite nanosheets modification is proposed and prepared. The vermiculite nanosheets act as barriers to alleviate the crossover of active species. The hydrogen bonding between vermiculite and PVDF skeleton effectively mitigates the swelling rate and increases the mechanical strength of the membrane. The resultant battery constructed with the new porous membrane exhibits higher Coulombic efficiency (97.9% vs 84.6%) and large average discharge capacity (0.132 vs 0.088 Ah L−1) compared with the one with pristine PVDF membrane at 2 mA cm−2. The vermiculite nanosheets have little effect on the voltage efficiency (90.6% vs 92.7%).Peer reviewe

Two-dimensional vermiculite nanosheets-modified porous membrane for non-aqueous redox flow batteries

Funding Information: This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 21636007 ). Publisher Copyright: © 2021 Elsevier B.V. Copyright: Copyright 2021 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.The non-aqueous redox flow batteries (NARFBs) are promising for large-scale energy storage. However, the crossover contamination of active materials seriously imparts the performance. Here, two-dimensional (2D) vermiculite nanosheets modified Celgard porous membrane is prepared by the filtration method. The 2D vermiculite nanosheet layers stacked on the surface of Celgard membrane effectively reduce the crossover effect by sieving electrolytes and active materials through the nanoscale intercalation channels. Furthermore, the surface-governed transport behavior of the 2D vermiculite nanosheets is conducive to the exchange of supporting electrolyte. The resultant NARFB with the modified membrane exhibits higher Coulombic efficiency (95.3% vs. 87.6%) and larger discharge capacity (0.104 vs. 0.093 Ah L−1) without obvious impact on voltage efficiency (90.1% vs. 90.5%) at 2 mA cm−2. This work provides an efficient strategy to alleviate the crossover effect in NARFBs.Peer reviewe

Two-dimensional metal-organic framework nanosheets-modified porous separator for non-aqueous redox flow batteries

Non-aqueous redox flow batteries (NARFBs) are promising for large-scale energy storage. However, the lack of high performance membrane is still impeding their further development. Two-dimensional (2D) metal-organic framework (MOF) nanosheets-modified porous separators are prepared by the filtration method. The NARFBs constructed with the 2D MOF nanosheets-modified separator exhibit substantially higher Coulombic efficiency (91.0% vs 82.9%) without obvious compromise on voltage efficiency (93.7% vs 94.2%), and larger average discharge capacity (1.30 vs 0.86 Ah L−1) compared with the pristine Celgard separator at 4 mA cm−2. Such performance is originated from the unique microstructure of 2D-MOF nanosheets. The interlayer spaces assembled by the nanosheet layers enable the fast transport of supporting electrolyte but impede the crossover of active materials and impose limited effect on the separator resistance. This work provides a facile and efficient strategy to mitigating the crossover effect in NARFB.Peer reviewe