SPEEDY: An Eclipse-based IDE for invariant inference

SPEEDY is an Eclipse-based IDE for exploring techniques that assist users in generating correct specifications, particularly including invariant inference algorithms and tools. It integrates with several back-end tools that propose invariants and will incorporate published algorithms for inferring object and loop invariants. Though the architecture is language-neutral, current SPEEDY targets C programs. Building and using SPEEDY has confirmed earlier experience demonstrating the importance of showing and editing specifications in the IDEs that developers customarily use, automating as much of the production and checking of specifications as possible, and showing counterexample information directly in the source code editing environment. As in previous work, automation of specification checking is provided by back-end SMT solvers. However, reducing the effort demanded of software developers using formal methods also requires a GUI design that guides users in writing, reviewing, and correcting specifications and automates specification inference.Comment: In Proceedings F-IDE 2014, arXiv:1404.578

Management of invasive Allee species

In this study, we use a discrete, two-patch population model of an Allee species to examine different methods in managing invasions. We first analytically examine the model to show the presence of the strong Allee effect, and then we numerically explore the model to test the effectiveness of different management strategies. As expected invasion is facilitated by lower Allee thresholds, greater carrying capacities and greater proportions of dispersers. These effects are interacting, however, and moderated by population growth rate. Using the gypsy moth as an example species, we demonstrate that the effectiveness of different invasion management strategies is context-dependent, combining complementary methods may be preferable, and the preferred strategy may differ geographically. Specifically, we find methods for restricting movement to be more effective in areas of contiguous habitat and high Allee thresholds, where methods involving mating disruptions and raising Allee thresholds are more effective in areas of high habitat fragmentation

The Kahler Structure of Supersymmetric Holographic RG Flows

We study the metrics on the families of moduli spaces arising from probing with a brane the ten and eleven dimensional supergravity solutions corresponding to renormalisation group flows of supersymmetric large n gauge theory. In comparing the geometry to the physics of the dual gauge theory, it is important to identify appropriate coordinates, and starting with the case of SU(n) gauge theories flowing from N=4 to N=1 via a mass term, we demonstrate that the metric is Kahler, and solve for the Kahler potential everywhere along the flow. We show that the asymptotic form of the Kahler potential, and hence the peculiar conical form of the metric, follows from special properties of the gauge theory. Furthermore, we find the analogous Kahler structure for the N=4 preserving Coulomb branch flows, and for an N=2 flow. In addition, we establish similar properties for two eleven dimensional flow geometries recently presented in the literature, one of which has a deformation of the conifold as its moduli space. In all of these cases, we notice that the Kahler potential appears to satisfy a simple universal differential equation. We prove that this equation arises for all purely Coulomb branch flows dual to both ten and eleven dimensional geometries, and conjecture that the equation holds much more generally.Comment: 26 pages. Late

One evidence base; three stories: do opioids relieve chronic breathlessness?

Published by the BMJ Publishing Group Limited. For permission to use (where not already granted under a licence) please go to http://www.bmj.com/company/products-services/rights-and-licensing/. The efficacy of low-dose systemic opioids for chronic breathlessness was questioned by the recent Cochrane review by Barnes et al We examined the reasons for this conflicting finding and re-evaluated the efficacy of systemic opioids. Compared with previous meta-analyses, Barnes et al reported a smaller effect and lower precision, but did not account for matched data of crossover trials (11/12 included trials) and added a risk-of-bias criterion (sample size). When re-analysed to account for crossover data, opioids decreased breathlessness (standardised mean differences -0.32; -0.18 to -0.47; I2=44.8%) representing a clinically meaningful reduction of 0.8 points (0-10 numerical rating scale), consistent across meta-analyses

The Importance of Doctrinal Teaching in Holiness Camp Meetings

Interest in this research began during the summer of 1974 with the author\u27s involvement in a doctrine class for teenagers. The class was part of the program of the Jennings Lodge Summer Assembly Camp of the Evangelical Church of North America. Each general class had already been established, but no curriculum had been chosen. Thus it was necessary to improvise until improvement could be made. Therefore, this project began as an attempt to provide doctrinal material for teaching teens foundations of faith in the summer camp setting. It includes research into the needs of youth, as well as methods through which they can be reached. It contains ten separate but related lessons of doctrinal material. It is designed to support traditional evangelistic pulpit ministry of holiness camp meetings. The problem simply stated is that of research into the needs of teens in order to develop a doctrinal study on their level which would be both supportive and effective in the holiness camp meeting setting

"A call for some coordinated effort by APC and ACPE:" A Response to Tartaglia's Proposal on Chaplaincy Education

Johnson affirms the position that Tartaglia takes in his lead article of the Forum