Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Inconsistencies Between Pangean Reconstructions And Basic Climate Controls, Clinton Rowe, David B. Loope, Robert J. Oglesby, Rob Van Der Voo, Charles E. Broadwater

Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences: Faculty Publications

The supercontinent Pangea dominated our planet from the Permian into the Jurassic. Paleomagnetic reconstructions have been used to estimate the latitudinal position of Pangea during this 100-million-year period. Atmospheric circulation, recorded by eolian sandstones in the southwestern United States, shows a broad sweep of northeasterly winds over their northernmost extent, curving to become northwesterly in the south. This evidence is consistent with paleomagnetic reconstructions of the region straddling the equator in the Early Permian but is at odds with its northward movement to about 20°N by the Early Jurassic. At least one of the following scenarios must be true: the …

Persistent Near-Bottom Aggregations Of Mesopelagic Animals Along The North Carolina And Virginia Continental Slopes, John V. Gartner Jr., Kenneth J. Sulak, Steve W. Ross, Ann Marie Necaise

United States Geological Survey: Staff Publications

Submersible observations during four missions over the North Carolina and Virginia continental slopes (184–900 m) documented the occurrence of large aggregations of mesopelagic Wshes and macronektonic invertebrates near or on the bottom. Aggregated mesopelagics formed a layer up to tens of meters deep positioned from a few centimeters to 20 m, usually <10 >m, above the substrate. Aggregations were numerically dominated by microvores, notably the myctophid Wsh Ceratoscopelus maderensis and the penaeid shrimp Sergestes arcticus. Consistently present but in relatively lower numbers, were mesopelagic predators, including the paralepidids Notolepis rissoi and Lestidium atlanticum, the eel Nemichthys scolopaceus, the …

Bioluminescence In A Complex Coastal Environment: 1. Temporal Dynamics Of Nighttime Water-Leaving Radiance, Mark A. Moline, Matthew J. Oliver, Curtis D. Mobley, Lydia Sundman, Thomas J. Bensky, Trisha Bergmann, W. Paul Bissett, James Case, Erika H. Raymond, Oscar M.E. Schofield

Mark A. Moline

Nighttime water-leaving radiance is a function of the depth-dependent distribution of both the in situ bioluminescence emissions and the absorption and scattering properties of the water. The vertical distributions of these parameters were used as inputs for a modified one-dimensional radiative transfer model to solve for spectral bioluminescence water-leaving radiance from prescribed depths of the water column. Variation in the water-leaving radiance was consistent with local episodic physical forcing events, with tidal forcing, terrestrial runoff, particulate accumulation, and biological responses influencing the shorter timescale dynamics. There was a >90 nm shift in the peak water-leaving radiance from blue (~474 nm) …

Bioluminescence In A Complex Coastal Environment: 1. Temporal Dynamics Of Nighttime Water-Leaving Radiance, Mark A. Moline, Matthew J. Oliver, Curtis D. Mobley, Lydia Sundman, Thomas J. Bensky, Trisha Bergmann, W. Paul Bissett, James Case, Erika H. Raymond, Oscar M.E. Schofield

Thomas Bensky

Nighttime water-leaving radiance is a function of the depth-dependent distribution of both the in situ bioluminescence emissions and the absorption and scattering properties of the water. The vertical distributions of these parameters were used as inputs for a modified one-dimensional radiative transfer model to solve for spectral bioluminescence water-leaving radiance from prescribed depths of the water column. Variation in the water-leaving radiance was consistent with local episodic physical forcing events, with tidal forcing, terrestrial runoff, particulate accumulation, and biological responses influencing the shorter timescale dynamics. There was a >90 nm shift in the peak water-leaving radiance from blue (~474 nm) …

[Accepted Article Manuscript Version (Postprint)] The Social Implications Of Enjoyment Of Different Types Of Music, Movies, And Television Programming, Alice Hall

Communication and Media Faculty Works

This study investigated how information about an individual’s enjoyment of various genres of music, film, and TV programming could influence an observer’s expectations of that individual. An online survey of young adults found that the influence of information about another person’s genre preferences varied across genres. Enjoyment of some genres, including jazz music, film comedies, and television comedies, tended to raise expectations of the individual, whereas enjoyment of others, including heavy metal music, anime films, and television soap operas, tended to lower them. The implications of the findings are discussed in relation to uses and gratifications perspectives as well as …

Bioluminescence In A Complex Coastal Environment: 1. Temporal Dynamics Of Nighttime Water-Leaving Radiance, Mark A. Moline, Matthew J. Oliver, Curtis D. Mobley, Lydia Sundman, Thomas J. Bensky, Trisha Bergmann, W. Paul Bissett, James Case, Erika H. Raymond, Oscar M.E. Schofield

Physics

Nighttime water-leaving radiance is a function of the depth-dependent distribution of both the in situ bioluminescence emissions and the absorption and scattering properties of the water. The vertical distributions of these parameters were used as inputs for a modified one-dimensional radiative transfer model to solve for spectral bioluminescence water-leaving radiance from prescribed depths of the water column. Variation in the water-leaving radiance was consistent with local episodic physical forcing events, with tidal forcing, terrestrial runoff, particulate accumulation, and biological responses influencing the shorter timescale dynamics. There was a >90 nm shift in the peak water-leaving radiance from blue (~474 nm) …

The Social Implications Of Enjoyment Of Different Types Of Music, Movies, And Television Programming, Alice Hall

Alice Hall

Decomposition Of Regression Estimators To Explore The Influence Of "Unmeasured" Time-Varying Confounders, Yun Lu, Scott L. Zeger

Johns Hopkins University, Dept. of Biostatistics Working Papers

In environmental epidemiology, exposure X and health outcome Y vary in space and time. We present a method to diagnose the possible influence of unmeasured confounders U on the estimated effect of X on Y and to propose several approaches to robust estimation. The idea is to use space and time as proxy measures for the unmeasured factors U. We start with the time series case where X and Y are continuous variables at equally-spaced times and assume a linear model. We define matching estimator b(u)s that correspond to pairs of observations with specific lag u. Controlling for a smooth …

Microchip Liquid Chromatography And Capillary Electrophoresis Separations In Multilayer Microdevices, Hernan Vicente Fuentes

Theses and Dissertations

In this dissertation, several microfabricated devices are introduced to develop new applications in the area of chemical analysis. Electrochemical micropumps, chip-based liquid chromatography systems and multilayer capillary electrophoresis microdevices with crossover channels were fabricated using various substrates such as poly(dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS), glass, and poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA). I have demonstrated pressure-driven pumping of liquids in microfabricated channels using electrochemical actuation. PDMS-based micropumps were integrated easily with channel-containing PMMA substrates. Flow rates on the order of ~10 µL/min were achieved using low voltages (10 V). The potential of electrolysis-based pumping in microchannels was further evaluated for pressure driven microchip liquid chromatography (LC). …

Editing Tips For The Busy Attorney, Ariana R. Levinson

Ariana R. Levinson

No abstract provided.

Matching Kasteleyn Cities For Spin Glass Ground States, Alan Middleton, Creighton K. Thomas

Physics - All Scholarship

As spin glass materials have extremely slow dynamics, devious numerical methods are needed to study low-temperature states. A simple and fast optimization version of the classical Kasteleyn treatment of the Ising model is described and applied to two-dimensional Ising spin glasses. The algorithm combines the Pfaffian and matching approaches to directly strip droplet excitations from an excited state. Extended ground states in Ising spin glasses on a torus, which are optimized over all boundary conditions, are used to compute precise values for ground state energy densities.

Scalable And Adaptive Metadata Management In Ultra Large-Scale File Systems, Yu Hua, Yifeng Zhu, Hong Jiang

CSE Technical Reports

This paper presents a scalable and adaptive decentralized metadata lookup scheme for ultra large-scale file systems (≥ Petabytes or even Exabytes). Our scheme logically organizes metadata servers (MDS) into a multi-layered query hierarchy and exploits grouped Bloom filters to efficiently route metadata requests to desired MDSs through the hierarchy. This metadata lookup scheme can be executed at the network or memory speed, without being bounded by the performance of slow disks. An effective workload balance algorithm is also developed in this paper for server reconfigurations. This scheme is evaluated through extensive trace-driven simulations and prototype implementation in Linux. Experimental results …

Weight, Mortality, Years Of Healthy Life, And Active Life Expectancy In Older Adults, Paula Diehr

Paula Diehr

OBJECTIVES: To determine whether weight categories predict subsequent mortality and morbidity in older adults. DESIGN: Multistate life tables, using data from the Cardiovascular Health Study, a longitudinal population-based cohort of older adults. SETTING: Data were provided by community-dwelling seniors in four U.S. counties: Forsyth County, North Carolina; Sacramento County, California; Washington County, Maryland; and Allegheny County, Pennsylvania. PARTICIPANTS: Five thousand eight hundred eighty-eight adults aged 65 and older at baseline. MEASUREMENTS: The age- and sex-specific probabilities of transition from one health state to another and from one weight category to another were estimated. From these probabilities, future life expectancy, years …

Supporting Annotated Relations, M. Y. Eltabakh, M. Ouzzani, Walid G. Aref, Ahmed K. Elmagarmid, Y. Laura-Silva

Department of Computer Science Technical Reports

No abstract provided.

A Delayed Option Pricing Formula (Mittag-Leffler Institute Workshop), Salah-Eldin A. Mohammed

Miscellaneous (presentations, translations, interviews, etc)

No abstract provided.

Retreating To Advance Women Geoscience Faculty, Suzanne O'Connell, Mary Anne Holmes

Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences: Faculty Publications

Seventeen women geoscientists from New England, New York, and New Jersey assembled for a writing retreat at Boston College's Connors Family Retreat and Conference Center, set on 80 pastoral acres on the outskirts of Boston. Funded through the National Science Foundation ADVANCE program, the retreat had two objectives: to facilitate writing and to develop a supportive community. It succeeded on both accounts. Although new to science, retreats of this sort have long been a highly sought after experience for writers in other disciplines. The potential benefits for scientists, in particular, women scientists, are great. Writing is a cornerstone of our …

Measurement Of The Tt̅ Production Cross Section In Pp̅ Collisions At √S = 1.96 Tev Using Kinematic Characteristics Of Lepton + Jets Events, V. M. Abazov, Kenneth A. Bloom, Gregory R. Snow, D0 Collaboration

Kenneth Bloom Publications

We present a measurement of the top quark pair production cross section in pp̅ collisions at √s = 1.96 TeV utilizing 425 pb^-1 of data collected with the D0 detector at the Fermilab Tevatron Collider. We consider the final state of the top quark pair containing one high-p_T electron or muon and at least four jets. We exploit specific kinematic features of tt̅ events to extract the cross section. For a top quark mass of 175 GeV, we measure σ _tt̅ = 6.4_-1.2^+1.3(stat) ± 0.7(syst) ± 0.4(lum) pb, in good agreement with the …

Effects Of Dependency Injection On Maintainability, Ekaterina Razina, David S. Janzen

Computer Science and Software Engineering

Software maintenance consumes around 70% of the software life cycle. Improving software maintainability could save software developers significant time and money. This paper examines whether the pattern of dependency injection significantly reduces dependencies of modules in a piece of software, therefore making the software more maintainable. This hypothesis is tested with 20 sets of open source projects from sourceforge.net, where each set contains one project that uses the pattern of dependency injection and one similar project that does not use the pattern. The extent of the dependency injection use in each project is measured by a new Number of DIs …

An Architectural Approach To Improving The Availability Of Parity-Based Raid Systems, Lei Tian, Hong Jiang, Dan Feng, Qin Xin, Sai Huang

CSE Technical Reports

In this paper, we propose an architectural approach, Supplementary Partial Parity (SPP), to addressing the availability issue of parity encoded RAID systems. SPP exploits free storage space and idle time to generate and update a set of partial parity units that cover a subset of disks (or data stripe units) during failure-free and idle/lightly-loaded periods, thus supplementing the existing full parity units for improved availability. By applying the exclusive OR operations appropriately among partial parity, full parity and data units, SPP can reconstruct the data on the failed disks with a fraction of the original overhead that is proportional to …

Amp: An Affinity-Based Metadata Prefetching Scheme In Large-Scale Distributed Storage Systems, Lin Li, Xuemin Li, Hong Jiang, Yifeng Zhu

CSE Technical Reports

Prefetching is an effective technique for improving file access performance, which can reduce access latency for I/O systems. In distributed storage system, prefetching for metadata files is critical for the overall system performance. In this paper, an Affinity-based Metadata Prefetching (APM) scheme is proposed for metadata servers in large-scale distributed storage systems to provide aggressive metadata prefetching. Through mining useful information about metadata assesses from past history, AMP can discover metadata file affinities accurately and intelligently for prefetching. Compared with LRU and some of the latest file prefetching algorithms such as NEXUS and C-miner, trace-driven simulations show that AMP can …

Enhancing The Multicast Performance Of Structured P2p Overlay In Supporting Massively Multiplayer Online Games, Xinbo Jiang, Farzad Safaei, P. Boustead

Faculty of Informatics - Papers (Archive)

Scribe is a scalable application level multicast infrastructure. We have developed two techniques to improve the performance of Scribe in terms of latency and bandwidth distribution. The first technique identifies that the final hop of Scribe traffic path is largely selected without any proximity consideration and incurs the longest distance traveled. To overcome this, we introduce Proximity Neighbor Selection (PNS) into the final hop for latency improvement. The second technique builds a hierarchical two-level overlay. While PNS can be applied at both levels for latency performance, the bandwidth stress required by applications can now be distributed among the nodes in …

Supporting Views In Data Stream Management System, Thanaa M. Ghanem, Walid G. Aref, Ahmed K. Elmagarmid, Per-Ake Larson

Department of Computer Science Technical Reports

No abstract provided.

A Set Of Phosphatase-Inert “Molecular Rulers” To Probe For Bivalent Mannose 6-Phosphate Ligand-Receptor Interactions, Xiang Fei, Christopher M. Connelly, Richard G. Macdonald, David B. Berkowitz

David Berkowitz Publications

A set of bivalent mannose 6-phosphonate “molecular rulers” has been synthesized to examine ligand binding to the M6P/IGF2R. The set is estimated to span a P-P distance range of 16-26 Å (MMFF energy minimization on the hydrated phosphonates). Key synthetic transformations include sugar triflate displacement for phosphonate installation and Grubbs I cross-metathesis to achieve bivalency. Relative binding affinities were tested by radioligand displacement assays versus PMP-BSA (pentamannose phosphate-bovine serum albumin). These compounds exhibit slightly higher binding affinities for the receptor (IC₅₀’s = 3.7-5 &#;M) than the parent, monomeric mannose 6-phosphonate ligand and M6P itself (IC₅₀ = 11.5 …

Microfluidic Electro-Osmotic Flow Pumps, John Mason Edwards

Theses and Dissertations

The need for miniaturized, portable devices to separate and detect unknown compounds has greatly multiplied, leading to an increased interest in microfluidics. Total integration of the detector and pump are necessary to decrease the overall size of the microfluidic device. Using previously developed thin film technologies, an electroosmotic flow (EOF) pump was incorporated in a microfluidic liquid chromatography device. An EOF pump was chosen because of its simple design and small size. EOF pumps fabricated on silicon and glass substrates were evaluated. The experimental flow rates were 0.19-2.30 microliters/minute for 40-400 V. The theoretical pump efficiency was calculated along with …

Modeling T Tauri Winds From He I Λ10830 Profiles, John Kwan, Suzan Edwards, William Fischer

Astronomy: Faculty Publications

The high opacity of He I λ10830 makes it an exceptionally sensitive probe of the inner wind geometry of accreting T Tauri stars. In this line, blueshifted absorption below the continuum results from simple scattering of stellar photons, a situation that is readily modeled without definite knowledge of the physical conditions and recourse to multilevel radiative transfer. We present theoretical line profiles for scattering in two possible wind geometries, a disk wind and a wind emerging radially from the star, and compare them to observed He I λ10830 profiles from a survey of classical T Tauri stars. The comparison indicates …

An Approach To Mapping Of Shallow Petroleum Reservoirs Using Integrated Conventional 3d And Shallow P- And Sh-Wave Seismic Reflection Methods At Teapot Dome Field In Casper, Wyoming, Anita Onohuome Okojie-Ayoro

Theses and Dissertations

Using the famous Teapot Dome oil field in Casper, Wyoming, USA as a test case, we demonstrate how high-resolution compressional (P) and horizontally polarized shear (SH) wave seismic reflection surveys can overcome the limitations of conventional 3D seismic data in resolving small-scale structures in the very shallow subsurface (< 100-200 m (~328-656 ft)). We accomplish this by using small CMP intervals (5 ft and 2.5 ft, respectively) and a higher frequency source. The integration of the two high-resolution seismic methods enhances the detection and mapping of fine-scale deformation and stratigraphic features at shallow depth that cannot be imaged by conventional seismic methods. Further, when these two high-resolution seismic methods are integrated with 3D data, correlated drill hole logs, and outcrop mapping and trenching, a clearer picture of both very shallow reservoirs and the relationship between deep and shallow faults can be observed. For example, we show that the Shannon reservoir, which is the shallowest petroleum reservoir at Teapot Dome (depth to the top of this interval ranging from 76-198 m (250-650 ft)) can only be imaged properly with high-resolution seismic methods. Further, northeast-striking faults are identified in shallow sections within Teapot Dome. The strike of these faults is approximately orthogonal to the hinge of Teapot Dome. These faults are interpreted as fold accommodation faults. Vertical displacements across these faults range from 10 to 40 m (~33 to 131 ft), which could potentially partition the Shannon reservoir. The integration of 3D and high-resolution P-wave seismic interpretation helped us determine that some of the northeast-striking faults relate to deeper faults. This indicates that some deeper faults that are orthogonal to the fold hinge cut through the shallow Shannon reservoir. Such an observation would be important for understanding the effect on fluid communication between the deep and shallow reservoirs via these faults. Furthermore, the high-resolution seismic data provide a means to better constrain the location of faults mapped from drill hole logs. Relocation of theses faults may require re-evaluation of well locations as some attic oil may have not been drained in some Shannon blocks by present well locations. Therefore our study demonstrates how conventional 3D seismic data require additional seismic acquisition at smaller scales in order to image deformation in shallow reservoirs. Such imaging becomes critical in cases of shallow reservoirs where it is important to define potential problems associated with compartmentalization of primary production, hazard mitigation, enhanced oil recovery, or carbon sequestration.

A Summer Time Series Of Particulate Carbon In The Air And Snow At Summit, Greenland, Gayle S.W. Hagler, M Bergin, Eugene A. Smith, Jack E. Dibb

Earth Sciences

Carbonaceous particulate matter is ubiquitous in the lower atmosphere, produced by natural and anthropogenic sources and transported to distant regions, including the pristine and climate-sensitive Greenland Ice Sheet. During the summer of 2006, ambient particulate carbonaceous compounds were characterized on the Greenland Ice Sheet, including the measurement of particulate organic (OC) and elemental (EC) carbon, particulate water-soluble organic carbon (WSOC), particulate absorption coefficient (σ_ap), and particle size-resolved number concentration (PM_0.1–1.0). Additionally, parallel ∼50-day time series of water-soluble organic carbon (WSOC), water-insoluble organic carbon (WIOC), and elemental carbon (EC) were quantified at time increments of 4–24 …

Energy-Constrained Recharge, Assimilation, And Fractional Crystallization (Ec-Raxfc): A Visual Basic Computer Code For Calculating Trace Element And Isotope Variations Of Opensystem Magmatic Systems, Wendy A. Bohrson, Frank J. Spera

All Faculty Scholarship for the College of the Sciences

Volcanic and plutonic rocks provide abundant evidence for complex processes that occur in magma storage and transport systems. The fingerprint of these processes, which include fractional crystallization, assimilation, and magma recharge, is captured in petrologic and geochemical characteristics of suites of cogenetic rocks. Quantitatively evaluating the relative contributions of each process requires integration of mass, species, and energy constraints, applied in a self-consistent way. The energy-constrained model Energy-Constrained Recharge, Assimilation, and Fractional Crystallization (EC-RaxFC) tracks the trace element and isotopic evolution of a magmatic system (melt + solids) undergoing simultaneous fractional crystallization, recharge, and assimilation. Mass, thermal, and compositional (trace …

Supercurrent Survival Under A Rosen-Zener Quench Of Hard-Core Bosons, I. Klich, Courtney Lannert, G. Refael

Physics: Faculty Publications

We study the survival of supercurrents in a system of impenetrable bosons on a lattice, subject to a quantum quench from its critical superfluid phase to an insulating phase. We show that the evolution of the current when the quench follows a Rosen-Zener profile is exactly solvable. This allows us to analyze a quench of arbitrary rate, from a sudden destruction of the superfluid to a slow opening of a gap. The decay and oscillations of the current are analytically derived and studied numerically along with the momentum distribution after the quench. In the case of small supercurrent boosts ν, …

Myricetin Inhibits Escherichia Coli Dnab Helicase But Not Primase, Mark A. Griep, Sheldon Blood, Marilynn A. Larson, Scott A. Koepsell, Steven H. Hinrichs

Mark Griep Publications

Primase and DnaB helicase play central roles during DNA replication initiation and elongation. Both enzymes are drug targets because they are essential, persistent among bacterial genomes, and have different sequences than their eukaryotic equivalents. Myricetin is a ubiquitous natural product in plants that is known to inhibit a variety of DNA polymerases, RNA polymerases, reverse transcriptases, and telomerases in addition being able to inhibit kinases and helicases. We have shown that myricetin inhibits Escherichia coli DnaB helicase according to a mechanism dominated by noncompetitive behavior with a K_i of 10.0 ± 0.5 μM. At physiological ATP concentration, myricetin inhibits …