724 research outputs found
The Multidimensional Study of Viral Campaigns as Branching Processes
Viral campaigns on the Internet may follow variety of models, depending on
the content, incentives, personal attitudes of sender and recipient to the
content and other factors. Due to the fact that the knowledge of the campaign
specifics is essential for the campaign managers, researchers are constantly
evaluating models and real-world data. The goal of this article is to present
the new knowledge obtained from studying two viral campaigns that took place in
a virtual world which followed the branching process. The results show that it
is possible to reduce the time needed to estimate the model parameters of the
campaign and, moreover, some important aspects of time-generations relationship
are presented.Comment: In proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Social
Informatics, SocInfo 201
Regioselectivity of Lipase-Catalysed Deacetylation of Methyl 2,3,5-tri-OAcetyl-α, ÎČ-D-Furanosides in Ionic Liquid
Ionic liquids (ILs) were assayed as reaction medium for the enzymatic deacetylation of three methyl 2,3,5-tri-O-acetyl-a,b-D-furanosides and the obtained results show the influence of the IL and the furanose structure on the regioselectivity of hydrolyses catalysed by the tested lipases. In a reaction medium consisting of a 1:1 mixture of 30 mM phosphate buffer (pH 7) and 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium hexafluorophosphate ([BMIM][PF6]), Candida rugosa lipase catalysed the formation of methyl 2,3-di-O-acetyl-a,b-D-arabinofuranoside in 77 %, while in a 9:1 mixture of the same buffer and 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium tetrafluoroborate ([BMIM][BF4]), methyl 2,3-di-O-acetyl-a,b-D-ribofuranoside was obtained in 62 %.Fil: Gudino, Esteban D.. Universidad Nacional de Quilmes. Departamento de Ciencia y TecnologĂa. Ărea QuĂmica. Laboratorio de Biotransformaciones; ArgentinaFil: Iribarren, Adolfo Marcelo. Universidad Nacional de Quilmes. Departamento de Ciencia y TecnologĂa. Ărea QuĂmica. Laboratorio de Biotransformaciones; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones CientĂficas y TĂ©cnicas; ArgentinaFil: Iglesias, Luis Emilio. Universidad Nacional de Quilmes. Departamento de Ciencia y TecnologĂa. Ărea QuĂmica. Laboratorio de Biotransformaciones; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones CientĂficas y TĂ©cnicas; Argentin
The impact of SHS exposure on health status and exacerbations among patients with COPD
Secondhand smoke (SHS) is a major contributor to indoor air pollution. Because it contains respiratory irritants, it may adversely influence the clinical course of persons with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). We used data from nonsmoking members of the FLOW cohort of COPD (n = 809) to elucidate the impact of SHS exposure on health status and exacerbations (requiring emergency department visits or hospitalization). SHS exposure was measured by a validated survey instrument (hours of exposure during the past week). Physical health status was measured by the SF-12 Physical Component Summary Score and disease-specific health-related quality of life (HRQL) by the Airways Questionnaire 20-R. Health care utilization for COPD was determined from Kaiser Permanente Northern California computerized databases. Compared to no SHS exposure, higher level SHS exposure was associated with poorer physical health status (mean score decrement â1.78 points; 95% confidence interval [CI] â3.48 to â0.074 points) after controlling for potential confounders. Higher level SHS exposure was also related to poorer disease-specific HRQL (mean score increment 0.63; 95% CI 0.016 to 1.25) and less distance walked during the Six-Minute Walk test (mean decrement â50 feet; 95% CI â102 to 1.9). Both lower level and higher level SHS exposure was related to increased risk of emergency department (ED) visits (hazard ratio [HR] 1.40; 95% CI 0.96 to 2.05 and HR 1.41; 95% CI 0.94 to 2.13). Lower level and higher level SHS exposure were associated with a greater risk of hospital-based care for COPD, which was a composite endpoint of either ED visits or hospitalizations for COPD (HR 1.52; 95% CI 1.06 to 2.18 and HR 1.40; 95% CI 0.94 to 2.10, respectively). In conclusion, SHS was associated with poorer health status and a greater risk of COPD exacerbation. COPD patients may comprise a vulnerable population for the health effects of SHS
Electronic structure of crystalline binary and ternary Cd-Te-O compounds
The electronic structure of crystalline CdTe, CdO, -TeO,
CdTeO and CdTeO is studied by means of first principles
calculations. The band structure, total and partial density of states, and
charge densities are presented. For -TeO and CdTeO, Density
Functional Theory within the Local Density Approximation (LDA) correctly
describes the insulating character of these compounds. In the first four
compounds, LDA underestimates the optical bandgap by roughly 1 eV. Based on
this trend, we predict an optical bandgap of 1.7 eV for CdTeO. This
material shows an isolated conduction band with a low effective mass, thus
explaining its semiconducting character observed recently. In all these oxides,
the top valence bands are formed mainly from the O 2p electrons. On the other
hand, the binding energy of the Cd 4d band, relative to the valence band
maximum, in the ternary compounds is smaller than in CdTe and CdO.Comment: 13 pages, 15 figures, 2 tables. Accepted in Phys Rev
Young Galaxy Candidates in the Hubble Frontier Fields - III. MACSJ0717.5+3745
In this paper we present the results of our search for and study of galaxy candidates behind the third Frontier Fields (FF) cluster,
MACSJ0717.5+3745, and its parallel field, combining data from Hubble and
Spitzer. We select 39 candidates using the Lyman Break technique, for which the
clear non-detection in optical make the extreme mid- interlopers hypothesis
unlikely. We also take benefit from samples selected using
previous Frontier Fields datasets of Abell 2744 and MACS0416 to improve the
constraints on the properties of very high-redshift objects. We compute the
redshift and the physical properties, such emission lines properties, star
formation rate, reddening, and stellar mass for all Frontier Fields objects
from their spectral energy distribution using templates including nebular
emission lines. We study the relationship between several physical properties
and confirm the trend already observed in previous surveys for evolution of
star formation rate with galaxy mass, and between the size and the UV
luminosity of our candidates. The analysis of the evolution of the UV
Luminosity Function with redshift seems more compatible with an evolution of
density. Moreover, no robust 8.5 object is selected behind the cluster
field, and few 9 candidates have been selected in the two previous
datasets from this legacy survey, suggesting a strong evolution in the number
density of galaxies between 8 and 9. Thanks to the use of the lensing
cluster, we study the evolution of the star formation rate density produced by
galaxies with L0.03L, and confirm the strong decrease observed
between 8 and 9.Comment: 21 pages - Accepted for publication in ApJ - v2: small correction
Random Walks on Stochastic Temporal Networks
In the study of dynamical processes on networks, there has been intense focus
on network structure -- i.e., the arrangement of edges and their associated
weights -- but the effects of the temporal patterns of edges remains poorly
understood. In this chapter, we develop a mathematical framework for random
walks on temporal networks using an approach that provides a compromise between
abstract but unrealistic models and data-driven but non-mathematical
approaches. To do this, we introduce a stochastic model for temporal networks
in which we summarize the temporal and structural organization of a system
using a matrix of waiting-time distributions. We show that random walks on
stochastic temporal networks can be described exactly by an
integro-differential master equation and derive an analytical expression for
its asymptotic steady state. We also discuss how our work might be useful to
help build centrality measures for temporal networks.Comment: Chapter in Temporal Networks (Petter Holme and Jari Saramaki
editors). Springer. Berlin, Heidelberg 2013. The book chapter contains minor
corrections and modifications. This chapter is based on arXiv:1112.3324,
which contains additional calculations and numerical simulation
Characterization of wood-laden flows in rivers
Inorganic sediment is not the only solidâfraction component of river flows; flows may also carry significant amounts of large organic material (i.e., large wood), but the characteristics of these woodâladen flows (WLF) are not well understood yet. With the aim to shed light on these relatively unexamined phenomena, we collected home videos showing natural flows with wood as the main solid component. Analyses of these videos as well as the watersheds and streams where the videos were recorded allowed us to define for the first time WLF, describe the main characteristics of these flows and broaden the definition of wood transport regimes (adding a new regime called here hypercongested wood transport). According to our results, WLF may occur repeatedly, in a large range of catchment sizes, generally in steep, highly confined single thread channels in mountain areas. WLF are typically highly unsteady and the log motion is nonâuniform, as described for other inorganic sedimentâladen flows (e.g., debris flows). The conceptual integration of wood into our understanding of flow phenomena is illustrated by a novel classification defining the transition from clear water to hypercongested, wood and sedimentâladen flows, according to the composition of the mixture (sediment, wood, and water). We define the relevant metrics for the quantification and modelling of WLF, including an exhaustive discussion of different modelling approaches (i.e., Voellmy, Bingham and Manning) and provide a first attempt to simulate WLF. We draw attention to WLF phenomena to encourage further field, theoretical, and experimental investigations that may contribute to a better understanding of flows river basins, leading to more accurate predictions, and better hazard mitigation and management strategies
Timing interactions in social simulations: The voter model
The recent availability of huge high resolution datasets on human activities
has revealed the heavy-tailed nature of the interevent time distributions. In
social simulations of interacting agents the standard approach has been to use
Poisson processes to update the state of the agents, which gives rise to very
homogeneous activity patterns with a well defined characteristic interevent
time. As a paradigmatic opinion model we investigate the voter model and review
the standard update rules and propose two new update rules which are able to
account for heterogeneous activity patterns. For the new update rules each node
gets updated with a probability that depends on the time since the last event
of the node, where an event can be an update attempt (exogenous update) or a
change of state (endogenous update). We find that both update rules can give
rise to power law interevent time distributions, although the endogenous one
more robustly. Apart from that for the exogenous update rule and the standard
update rules the voter model does not reach consensus in the infinite size
limit, while for the endogenous update there exist a coarsening process that
drives the system toward consensus configurations.Comment: Book Chapter, 23 pages, 9 figures, 5 table
Dynamics in online social networks
An increasing number of today's social interactions occurs using online
social media as communication channels. Some online social networks have become
extremely popular in the last decade. They differ among themselves in the
character of the service they provide to online users. For instance, Facebook
can be seen mainly as a platform for keeping in touch with close friends and
relatives, Twitter is used to propagate and receive news, LinkedIn facilitates
the maintenance of professional contacts, Flickr gathers amateurs and
professionals of photography, etc. Albeit different, all these online platforms
share an ingredient that pervades all their applications. There exists an
underlying social network that allows their users to keep in touch with each
other and helps to engage them in common activities or interactions leading to
a better fulfillment of the service's purposes. This is the reason why these
platforms share a good number of functionalities, e.g., personal communication
channels, broadcasted status updates, easy one-step information sharing, news
feeds exposing broadcasted content, etc. As a result, online social networks
are an interesting field to study an online social behavior that seems to be
generic among the different online services. Since at the bottom of these
services lays a network of declared relations and the basic interactions in
these platforms tend to be pairwise, a natural methodology for studying these
systems is provided by network science. In this chapter we describe some of the
results of research studies on the structure, dynamics and social activity in
online social networks. We present them in the interdisciplinary context of
network science, sociological studies and computer science.Comment: 17 pages, 4 figures, book chapte
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