forqs: Forward-in-time Simulation of Recombination, Quantitative Traits, and Selection

forqs is a forward-in-time simulation of recombination, quantitative traits, and selection. It was designed to investigate haplotype patterns resulting from scenarios where substantial evolutionary change has taken place in a small number of generations due to recombination and/or selection on polygenic quantitative traits. forqs is implemented as a command- line C++ program. Source code and binary executables for Linux, OSX, and Windows are freely available under a permissive BSD license.Comment: preprint include Supplementary Information. https://bitbucket.org/dkessner/forq

Politics in forgotten governments: the partisan composition of county legislatures and county fiscal policies

County governments are a crucial component of the fabric of American democracy. Yet there has been almost no previous research on the policy effects of the partisan composition of county governments. Most counties in the United States have small legislatures, usually called commissions or councils, that set their budgets and other policies. In this study, we examine whether counties with Democratic legislators spend more than counties with Republican ones. We assemble an original data set of 10,708 elections in approximately 298 medium and large counties over the past 25 years. Based on a regression discontinuity design, we find that electing a Democratic legislator rather than a Republican one leads the average county to increase spending by about 5%. Overall, our findings contribute to a growing literature on the policy consequences of partisan control of state and local government. They show that the partisan selection of county legislators has important policy effects in county governments.Accepted manuscrip

Concentrated burdens: how self-interest and partisanship shape opinion on opioid treatment policy

When does self-interest influence public opinion on contentious public policies? The bulk of theory in political science suggests that self-interest is only a minor force in public opinion. Using nationally representative survey data, we show how financial and spatial self-interest and partisanship all shape public opinion on opioid treatment policy. We find that a majority of respondents support a redistributive funding model for treatment programs, while treatment funded by taxation based on a community’s overdose rate is less popular. Moreover, financial self-interest cross-pressures lower-income Republicans, closing the partisan gap in support by more than half. We also experimentally test how the spatial burden of siting treatment clinics alters policy preferences. People across the political spectrum are less supportive when construction of a clinic is proposed closer to their home. These results highlight how partisanship and self-interest interact in shaping preferences on public policy with concentrated burdens.Accepted manuscrip

A Tool for Analysis of Cooperative Games

Kooperativní hry nejčastěji modelují systémy reálného světa, ve kterých jde o spolupráci nebo o společné rozhodnutí. Zkoumaným systémem může být taková drobnost, jakou je spor o košili, ale i závažný problém jako tvorba volebního systému, alokace nákladů znečištění životního prostředí nebo ochrana hospodářské soutěže. Grafický program, který je součástí této práce, je schopen výpočtu nejznámějších forem řešení a vybraných charakteristik zkoumaných kooperativních her.Cooperative games are most frequently used to simulate systems of the real world in which deal with cooperation and mutual agreement. Systems under investigation can be as simple as dispute over a shirt but investigated problems can be as crucial as designing of an electoral system, pollution cost allocation or protection of market competition as well. This thesis includes a graphical application capable of computation of some well-known solution types and selection of properties in cooperative games context.

Remote Sensing of Surface Visibility from Space: A Look at the United States East Coast

While important for the management of air quality, human health and transportation, surface visibility data currently are only available through ground-based measurements, such as the Automated Surface Observing System (ASOS), and therefore lack spatial coverage. In analogy to the recent work of using satellite-based aerosol optical depth (AOD) to derive surface dry aerosol mass concentration at continental-to-global scale for cloud-free conditions, this study evaluates the potential of AOD retrieved from the MODerate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) for deriving surface visibility. For this purpose of evaluation, the truncated and discrete visibility data from daily weather reports are not suitable and the ASOS-measured one-minute raw surface extinction coefficient (bext) values have to be used. Consequently, a method for quality control on the bext data is first developed to eliminate frequent problems such as extraneous points, poor calibration, and bad formatting, after which reliable bext data are obtained to estimate the surface visibility that can be considered as ground truth. Subsequent analysis of the AOD and bext relationship on the East Coast of the United States reveals their average linear correlation coefficient (R) of 0.61 for all 12 (2000-2011) years of data at 32 ASOS stations, with the highest R value in summer and the lowest in winter. Incorporating the Goddard Earth Observing System, Version 5 (GEOS-5) modeled vertical profile of aerosols into the derivation of visibility from AOD is evaluated for five different methods that are commonly used in the estimate of dry aerosol mass from AOD. For three years of available GEOS-5 data, scaling the modeled surface bext with the ratio between MODIS AOD and the modeled AOD is found to produce the best overall estimate of surface visibility that correlates with ASOS-based visibility with an R of 0.72 and a small negative bias of -0.03 km-1. This study is among the first to demonstrate the use of the MODIS aerosol product over land to derive surface visibility. Advisor: Jun Wan

Federal Court Interpretations of the Real Party in Interest Rule in Cases of Subrogation

I. Introduction II. Complete Payment by the Insurer III. Partial Payment by the Insurer IV. Payment in the Form of Loan V. Workmen’s Compensation Payments VI. Conclusio

Federal Court Interpretations of the Real Party in Interest Rule in Cases of Subrogation

I. Introduction II. Complete Payment by the Insurer III. Partial Payment by the Insurer IV. Payment in the Form of Loan V. Workmen’s Compensation Payments VI. Conclusio

Persuading the enemy: estimating the persuasive effects of partisan media with the preference-incorporating choice and assignment design

Does media choice cause polarization, or merely reflect it? We investigate a critical aspect of this puzzle: how partisan media contribute to attitude polarization among different groups of media consumers. We implement a new experimental design, called the Preference-Incorporating Choice and Assignment (PICA) design, that incorporates both free choice and forced exposure. We estimate jointly the degree of polarization caused by selective exposure and the persuasive effect of partisan media. Our design also enables us to conduct sensitivity analyses accounting for discrepancies between stated preferences and actual choice, a potential source of bias ignored in previous studies using similar designs. We find that partisan media can polarize both its regular consumers and inadvertent audiences who would otherwise not consume it, but ideologically-opposing media potentially also can ameliorate existing polarization between consumers. Taken together, these results deepen our understanding of when and how media polarize individuals.Accepted manuscrip