Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Why Geological Regions?, Daniela Flores, Olga Kosheleva, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

In most practical applications, we approximate the spatial dependence by smooth functions. The main exception is geosciences, where, to describe, e.g., how the density depends on depth and/or on spatial location, geophysicists divide the area into regions on each of which the corresponding quantity is approximately constant. In this paper, we provide a possible explanation for this difference.

Why Ovals In Eliciting Intervals?, Joshua Zamora, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

To elicit people's opinions, we usually ask them to mark their degree of satisfaction on a scale -- e.g., from 0 to 5 or from 0 to 10. Often, people are unsure about the exact degree: 7 or 8? To cover such situations, it is desirable to elicit not a single value but an interval of possible values. However, it turns out that most people are not comfortable with marking an interval. Empirically, it turned out that the best way to elicit an interval is to ask them to draw an oval whose intersection with the 0-to-10 line is the …

Why People Overestimate Small Probabilities?, David Amparan, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

It is a known empirical fact that people overestimate small probabilities. This fact seems to be inconsistent with the fact that we humans are the product of billions years of improving evolution -- and that we therefore perceive the world as accurately as possible. In this paper, we provide a possible explanation for this seeming contradiction.

Commonsense "And"-Operations, Javier Tellez, Wenbo Xie, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

In many practical situations, we need to estimate our degree of belief in a statement "A and B" when the only thing we know are the degrees of belief a and b in combined statements A and B. An algorithm for this estimation is known as an "and"-operation, or, for historical reasons, a t-norm. Usually, "and"-operations are selected in such a way that if one of the statements A or B is false, our degree of belief in "A and B" is 0. However, in practice, this is sometimes not the case: for example, an ideal faculty candidate must satisfy …

Fourier Transform And Other Quadratic Problems Under Interval Uncertainty, Oscar Galindo, Christopher Ibarra, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

In general, computing the range of a quadratic function on given intervals is NP-hard. Recently, a feasible algorithm was proposed for computing the range of a specific quadratic function -- square of the modulus of a Fourier coefficient. For this function, the rank of the quadratic form -- i.e., the number of nonzero eigenvalues -- is 2. In this paper, we show that this algorithm can be extended to all the cases when the rank of the quadratic form is bounded by a constant.

Why Residual Neural Networks, Sofia Holguin, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

In the traditional neural networks, the outputs of each layer serve as inputs to the next layer. It is known that in many cases, it is beneficial to also allow outputs from pre-previous etc. layers as inputs. Such networks are known as residual. In this paper, we provide a possible theoretical explanation for the empirical success of residual neural networks.

How To Gauge The Quality Of A Multi-Class Classification When Ground Truth Is Known With Uncertainty, Ricardo Mendez, Osagumwenro Osaretin, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

The usual formulas for gauging the quality of a classification method assume that we know the ground truth, i.e., that for several objects, we know for sure to which class they belong. In practice, we often only know this with some degree of certainty. In this paper, we explain how to take this uncertainty into account when gauging the quality of a classification method.

Kinematic Metric Spaces Under Interval Uncertainty: Towards An Adequate Definition, Vladik Kreinovich, Olga Kosheleva, Victor Selivanov

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

In the physical space, we define distance between the two points as the length of the shortest path connecting these points. Similarly, in space-time, for every pair of events for which the event a can causally effect the event b, we can define the longest proper time t(a,b) over all causal trajectories leading from a to b. The resulting function is known as kinematic metric. In practice, our information about all physical quantities -- including time -- comes from measurement, and measurements are never absolutely precise: the measurement result V is, in general, different from the actual (unknown) value v …

Why Rectified Linear Neurons: A Possible Interval-Based Explanation, Jonathan Contreras, Martine Ceberio, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

At present, the most efficient machine learning techniques are deep neural networks. In these networks, a signal repeatedly undergoes two types of transformations: linear combination of inputs, and a non-linear transformation of each value v -> s(v). Empirically, the function s(v) = max(v,0) -- known as the rectified linear function -- works the best. There are some partial explanations for this empirical success; however, none of these explanations is fully convincing. In this paper, we analyze this why-question from the viewpoint of uncertainty propagation. We show that reasonable uncertainty-related arguments lead to another possible explanation of why rectified linear functions …

How Probabilistic Methods For Data Fitting Deal With Interval Uncertainty: A More Realistic Analysis, Vladik Kreinovich, Sergey P. Shary

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

In our previous paper, we showed that a simplified probabilistic approach to interval uncertainty leads to the known notion of a united solution set. In this paper, we show that a more realistic probabilistic analysis of data fitting under interval uncertainty leads to another known notion -- the notion of a tolerable solution set. Thus, the notion of a tolerance solution set also has a clear probabilistic interpretation. Good news is that, in contrast to the united solution set whose computation is, in general, NP-hard, the tolerable solution set can be computed by a feasible algorithm.

Fuzzy Logic Beyond Traditional "And"- And "Or"-Operations, Vladik Kreinovich, Olga Kosheleva

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

In the traditional fuzzy logic, we can use "and"-operations (also known as t-norms) to estimate the expert's degree of confidence in a composite statement A&B based on his/her degrees of confidence d(A) and d(B) in the corresponding basic statements A and B. But what if we want to estimate the degree of confidence in A&B&C in situations when, in addition to the degrees of estimate d(A), d(B), and d(C) of the basic statements, we also know the expert's degrees of confidence in the pairs d(A&B), d(A&C), and d(B&C)? Traditional "and"-operations can provide such an estimate -- but only by ignoring …

Sustainably Feeding The World In The 21st Century, Ren Hua Ho, Husodo Angkosubroto, Oi Hian Lee

Perspectives@SMU

Managing investor expectation, exploiting low-hanging fruit, and farmer education will be key

Frames For Justice Consciousness, Colin M. Gray, Rua M. Williams, Paul Parsons, Austin L. Toombs, Abbee Westbrook

Computer Graphics Technology Open Educational Resources

We describe how UX design students become aware of citizen-engaged design work, and indicate the extent to which a progression toward social justice-focused design work might be possible in a single project cycle. Our study site is a sophomore-level UX design studio at a large Midwestern US university—part of a five-semester sequence in which students engage in a range of projects that address competence in user research, prototyping, and evaluation. The project cycle we focus on directly challenges the apolitical framing in most foundational UX methods literature, explicitly asking students to engage with issues of power disparities. We analyzed …

Triarylmethyl Cation-Catalyzed Three-Component Coupling For The Synthesis Of Unsymmetrical Bisindolylmethanes [Post-Print], William Patterson, Kelly Lucas, Vanessa Jones, Zhenghua Chen, Kevin Bardelski, Melissa Guarino-Hotz, Cheyenne S. Brindle

Faculty Scholarship

An efficient synthesis of unsymmetrical bisindolylmethanes has been accomplished using triarylmethyl cations to catalyze the reaction of N-arylimines with two different indoles. Optimization of the organocatalyst by tuning cation stability allows for excellent single addition selectivity when coupled with p-nitrophenyl imines. The optimal catalyst is commercially available, and the reaction minimizes waste and environmental impact by employing a one-to-one ratio of starting materials. The intermediates can be isolated or used in situ in a one-pot two-step reaction to generate unsymmetrical bisindolylmethanes in high yields. The reaction tolerates a broad range of imines with the highest yields observed for …

Theory Of Change, Center For Complexity

Horizon 2045

Horizon 2045 (H2045) is a 25-year initiative to end the nuclear weapons century.

We urgently need to manage the intertwined existential risks of the Anthropocene—the geological era that began with the 1945 Trinity Test and is characterized by humankind’s newfound capacity to destroy itself along with all life on the planet.

Recent research has shown that concerns about existential threats have become palpable, as has the desire to solve human-made problems and move to a brighter future. This offers an important opportunity: By considering nuclear weapons in the context of other dangers, we can dismantle conventional wisdom that nuclear weapons …

Microgrid Design And Component Replacement Analysis, Jose Trinidad Reyes

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This study focuses on developing specific methods that can be friendly applied to obtain efficient usage and maintenance of electricity production in a micro-grid used in a residence or stand-alone building to determine long-term component replacement strategies for aging components. After designing the best option to produce electricity by installing green energies such as photovoltaic panels and their proper devices such as inverters and batteries, this work has developed electric power reliability models to approximate the most efficient component replacement accurately. Due to the nature of the components of this study, repair time is not a substantial part of the …

Beluga Whale (Delphinapterus Leucas) Acoustic Foraging Behavior And Applications For Long Term Monitoring, Manuel Castellote, Aran Mooney, Russel Andrews, Stacy L. Deruiter

University Faculty Publications and Creative Works

Cook Inlet, Alaska, is home to an endangered and declining population of 279 belugas (Delphinapterus leucas). Recovery efforts highlight a paucity of basic ecological knowledge, impeding the correct assessment of threats and the development of recovery actions. In particular, information on diet and foraging habitat is very limited for this population. Passive acoustic monitoring has proven to be an efficient approach to monitor beluga distribution and seasonal occurrence. Identifying acoustic foraging behavior could help address the current gap in information on diet and foraging habitat. To address this conservation challenge, eight belugas from a comparative, healthy population in Bristol Bay, …

Seasonality Of Solute Flux And Water Source Chemistry In A Coastal Glacierized Watershed Undergoing Rapid Change: Wolverine Glacier Watershed, Alaska, Anna Bergstrom, Joshua C. Koch, Shad O'Neel, Emily Baker

Geosciences Faculty Publications and Presentations

As glaciers around the world rapidly lose mass, the tight coupling between glaciers and downstream ecosystems is resulting in widespread impacts on global hydrologic and biogeochemical cycling. However, a range of challenges make it difficult to conduct research in glacierized systems, and our knowledge of seasonally changing hydrologic processes and solute sources and signatures is limited. This in turn hampers our ability to make predictions on solute composition and flux. We conducted a broad water sampling campaign in order to understand the present-day partitioning of water sources and associated solutes in Alaska's Wolverine Glacier watershed. We established a relationship between …

Slope And Aspect Controls On Soil Climate: Field Documentation And Implications For Large-Scale Simulation Of Critical Zone Processes, Mark Seyfried, Gerald Flerchinger, Sage Bryden, Tim Link, Danny Marks, Jim Mcnamara

Geosciences Faculty Publications and Presentations

Soil climate, as quantified by soil temperature (T_S) and water content (θ), exerts important controls on critical zone processes. It may be sensitive to variations in local slope and aspect (SA), but this attribute remains poorly quantified at the local scale and unresolved in large-scale models. Estimation of SA effects on soil climate across multiple scales may facilitated using topographically modified, incoming clear-sky solar radiation (S_R,CS,T). We established six paired automated soil climate monitoring stations on opposing north-facing (NF) and south-facing (SF) slopes (4 yr) and collected spatial T_S and θ data within …

Effects Of Material Texture And Packing Density On The Interfacial Polarization Of Granular Soils, Hang Chen, Qifei Niu

Geosciences Faculty Publications and Presentations

Many electrical and electromagnetic (EM) methods operate at MHz frequencies, at which the interfacial polarization occurring at the solid-liquid interface in geologic materials may dominate the electrical signals. To correctly interpret electrical/EM measurements, it is therefore critical to understand how the interfacial polarization influences the effective electrical conductivity and permittivity spectra of geologic materials. We have used pore-scale simulation to study the role of material texture and packing in interfacial polarization in water-saturated granular soils. Synthetic samples with varying material textures and packing densities are prepared with the discrete element method. The effective electrical conductivity and permittivity spectra of these …

The U.S. Inland Creel And Angler Survey Catalog (Creelcat): Development, Applications, And Opportunities, Abigail J. Lynch, Nicholas A. Sievert, Holly S. Embke, Ashley M. Robertson, Bonnie J.E. Myers, Micheal S. Allen, Zachary S. Feiner, Frederick Hoogakker, Scott Knoche, Rebecca M. Krogman, Stephen R. Midway, Chelsey L. Nieman, Craig P. Paukert, Kevin L. Pope, Mark W. Rogers, Lyndsie S. Wszola, T. Douglas Beard

Nebraska Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit: Staff Publications

Inland recreational fishing, defined as primarily leisure-driven fishing in freshwaters, is a popular pastime in the USA. State natural resource agencies endeavor to provide high-quality and sustainable fishing opportunities for anglers. Managers often use creel and other angler survey data to inform state- and waterbody-level management efforts. Despite the broad implementation of angler surveys and their importance to fisheries management at state scales, regional and national coordination among these activities is minimal, limiting data applicability for larger-scale management practices and research. Here, we introduce the U.S. Inland Creel and Angler Survey Catalog (CreelCat), a first-of-its-kind, publicly available national database of …

Mgrre_Pureoilscouttickets_Williams_1_21127026550000, Mgrre

Legacy Scout Tickets from Pure Oil Company

No abstract provided.

Examination Of The Catalytic Role Of The Axial Cystine Ligand In The Co-Type Nitrile Hydratase From Pseudonocardia Thermophila Jcm 3095, Irene Anyango Ogutu, Martin St. Maurice, Brian Bennett, Richard C. Holz

Physics Faculty Research and Publications

The strictly conserved αSer162 residue in the Co-type nitrile hydratase from Pseudonocardia thermophila JCM 3095 (PtNHase), which forms a hydrogen bond to the axial αCys108-S atom, was mutated into an Ala residue. The αSer162Ala yielded two different protein species: one was the apoform (αSer^A) that exhibited no observable activity, and the second (αSer^B) contained its full complement of cobalt ions and was active with a k_cat value of 63 ± 3 s⁻¹ towards acrylonitrile at pH 7.5. The X-ray crystal structure of was determined at 1.85 Å resolution and contained no detectable …

Why Model Order Reduction, Salvador Robles, Martine Ceberio, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

Reasonably recently, a new efficient method appeared for solving complex non-linear differential equations (and systems of differential equations). In this method -- known as Model Order Reduction (MOR) -- we select several solutions, and approximate a general solution by a linear combination of the selected solutions. In this paper, we use the known explanation for efficiency of neural networks to explain the efficiency of MOR techniques.

Carbon Nano Based Materials And Their Composites For Gas Sensing Applications: Review, Mohamed Morsy

Nanotechnology Research Centre

No abstract provided.

Notmad: Estimating Bayesian Networks With Sample-Specific Structures And Parameters, Benjamin Lengerich, Caleb Ellington, Bryon Aragam, Eric P. Xing, Manolis Kellis

Machine Learning Faculty Publications

Context-specific Bayesian networks (i.e. directed acyclic graphs, DAGs) identify context-dependent relationships between variables, but the non-convexity induced by the acyclicity requirement makes it difficult to share information between context-specific estimators (e.g. with graph generator functions). For this reason, existing methods for inferring context-specific Bayesian networks have favored breaking datasets into subsamples, limiting statistical power and resolution, and preventing the use of multidimensional and latent contexts. To overcome this challenge, we propose NOTEARS-optimized Mixtures of Archetypal DAGs (NOTMAD). NOTMAD models context-specific Bayesian networks as the output of a function which learns to mix archetypal networks according to sample context. The archetypal …

Wildlife Responses To Livestock Guard Dogs And Domestic Sheep On Open Range, Daniel Kinka, Jeffrey T. Schultz, Julie K. Young

United States Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services: Staff Publications

Domestic sheep (Ovis aries) are an attractant to carnivores; however, sheep are often accompanied by humans and livestock guardian dogs (LGDs; Canis familiaris), which defend sheep from depredation. Sheep also compete directly with wildlife for grazing resources. Although practiced for millennia in much of the world outside North America, the effect that transhumance has on wildlife is poorly understood. To test the effect of sheep bands (sheep, humans, and LGDs) on wildlife, we modeled the detection probability of wild mammals relative to the presence of sheep bands in the Northwestern United States. Sheep band presence was associated …

Gdpr, Pipl & Lgpd: Privacy Regulations & Policies Across The Globe, Raymond H. Geistel

Cybersecurity Undergraduate Research Showcase

Several privacy laws around the world are adopting similar regulations to the GPDR; this has effects on privacy policies of companies providing services in across multiple countries & continents. While these regulations share many attributes, their differing requirements can make things difficult for companies regarding said policies. Automation could be a potential solution to both analyze and compare regulations from different nations & international organizations, analyze and monitor privacy policy adherence to said regulations.

Do Firms Respond To Peer Disclosures? Evidence From Clinical Trial Disclosures, Vedran Capkun, Yun Lou, Clemens A. Otto, Yin Wang

Research Collection School Of Accountancy

We examine whether a firm’s decision to disclose non-financial proprietary information depends on peer disclosures of similar information. Using a sample of 5,035 unique clinical trials by U.S. pharmaceutical firms over the 2007-2014 period, we find that the firm is less likely to disclose its own clinical trial results if peers have published clinical trial results pertaining to the same medical condition. Conditional on disclosing clinical trial results, the firm is also less likely to disclose the trial results on time when peers have disclosed their clinical trial results. Our cross-sectional tests suggest that proprietary costs of disclosure play an …

In Situ Determination Of Dry And Wet Snow Permittivity: Improving Equations For Low Frequency Radar Applications, Ryan Webb, Adrian Marziliano, Daniel Mcgrath, Randall Bonnell, Tate G. Meehan, Carrie Vuyovich, Hans-Peter Marshall

Geosciences Faculty Publications and Presentations

Extensive efforts have been made to observe the accumulation and melting of seasonal snow. However, making accurate observations of snow water equivalent (SWE) at global scales is challenging. Active radar systems show promise, provided the dielectric properties of the snowpack are accurately constrained. The dielectric constant (k) determines the velocity of a radar wave through snow, which is a critical component of time-of-flight radar techniques such as ground penetrating radar and interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR). However, equations used to estimate k have been validated only for specific conditions with limited in situ validation for seasonal snow applications. …