Digital Commons Network^™

Automated Algorithm For The Identification Of Artifacts In Mottled And Noisy Images, Onome Augustine Ugbeme, Eli S. Saber, Wencheng Wu, Kartheek Chandu

Articles

We describe a method for automatically classifying image-quality defects on printed documents. The proposed approach accepts a scanned image where the defect has been localized a priori and performs several appropriate image processing steps to reveal the region of interest. A mask is then created from the exposed region to identify bright outliers. Morphological reconstruction techniques are then applied to emphasize relevant local attributes. The classification of the defects is accomplished via a customized tree classifier that utilizes size or shape attributes at corresponding nodes to yield appropriate binary decisions. Applications of this process include automated/assisted diagnosis and repair of …

The Complexity Of Computing The Size Of An Interval, Lane A. Hemaspaandra, Christopher M. Homan, Sven Kosub, Klaus W. Wagner

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Given a p-order A over a universe of strings (i.e., a transitive, reflexive, antisymmetric relation such that if (x, y) ∈ A then |x| is polynomially bounded by |y|), an interval size function of A returns, for each string x in the universe, the number of strings in the interval between strings b(x) and t(x) (with respect to A), where b(x) and t(x) are functions that are polynomial-time computable in the length of x. By choosing sets of interval size functions based on feasibility requirements for their underlying p-orders, we obtain new characterizations of complexity classes. We prove that the …

Cosmological Constraints From The Sdss Luminous Red Galaxies, Max Tegmark, Daniel J. Eisenstein, Michael Strauss, David H. Weinberg, Michael R. Blanton, Joshua A. Frieman, Masataka Fukugita, James E. Gunn, Andrew J. S. Hamilton, Gillian R. Knapp, Robert C. Nichol, Jeremiah P. Ostriker, Nikhil Padmanabhan, Will J. Percival, David J. Schlegel, Donald P. Schneider, Roman Scoccimarro, Uroš Seljak, Hee-Jong Seo, Molly Swanson, Alexander S. Szalay, Michael S. Vogeley, Jaiyul Yoo, Idit Zehavi, Kevork Abazajian, Scott F. Anderson, James Annis, Neta A. Bahcall, Bruce Bassett, Andreas Berlind, John Brinkman, Tamás Budavari, Francisco Castander, Andrew Connolly, Istvan Csabai, Mamoru Doi, Douglas P. Finkbeiner, Bruce Gillespie, Karl Glazebrook, Gregory S. Hennessy, David W. Hogg, Željko Ivezić, Bhuvnesh Jain, David Johnston, Stephen Kent, Donald Q. Lamb, Brian C. Lee, Huan Lin, Jon Loveday, Robert H. Lupton, Jeffrey A. Munn, Kaike Pan, Changbom Park, John Peoples, Jeffrey R. Pier, Adrian Pope, Michael Richmond, Constance Rockosi, Ryan Scranton, Ravi K. Sheth, Albert Stebbins, Christopher Stoughton, István Szapudi, Douglas L. Tucker, Daniel E. Vanden Berk, Brian Yanny, Donald G. York

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We measure the large-scale real-space power spectrum P(k) using luminous red galaxies (LRGs) in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) and use this measurement to sharpen constraints on cosmological parameters from the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP). We employ a matrix-based power spectrum estimation method using Pseudo-Karhunen-Lo`eve eigenmodes, producing uncorrelated minimum-variance measurements in 20 k-bands of both the clustering power and its anisotropy due to redshift-space distortions, with narrow and well-behaved window functions in the range 0.01 h/Mpc < k < 0.2 h/Mpc. Results from the LRG and main galaxy samples are consistent, with the former providing higher signal-to-noise. Our results are robust to omitting angular and radial density fluctuations and are consistent between different parts of the sky. They provide a striking confirmation of the predicted large-scale CDM power spectrum. Combining only SDSS LRG and WMAP data places robust constraints on many cosmological parameters that complement prior analyses of multiple data sets. The LRGs provide independent cross-checks on m and the baryon fraction in good agreement with WMAP. Within the context of flat CDM models, our LRG measurements complementWMAP by sharpening the constraints on the matter density, the neutrino density and the tensor amplitude by about a factor of two, giving m = 0.24±0.02 (1 ), Pmν < 0.9 eV (95%) and r < 0.3 (95%). Baryon oscillations are clearly detected and provide a robust measurement of the comoving distance to the median survey redshift z = 0.35 independent of curvature and dark energy properties. Within the CDM framework, our power spectrum measurement improves the evidence for spatial flatness, sharpening the curvature constraint tot = 1.05±0.05 from WMAP alone to tot = 1.003±0.010. Assuming tot = 1, the equation of state parameter is constrained to w = −0.94±0.09, indicating the potential for more ambitious future LRG measurements to provide precision tests of the nature of dark energy. All these constraints are essentially independent of scales k > 0.1h/Mpc and associated nonlinear complications, yet agree well with more aggressive published analyses where nonlinear modeling is crucial.

The Acs Virgo Cluster Survey. Xiv. Analysis Of Color-Magnitude Relations In Globular Cluster Systems, Steffen Mieske, Andres Jordan, Patrick Cote

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We examine the correlation between globular cluster (GC) color and magnitude using HST/ACS imaging for a sample of 79 early-type galaxies (−21.7 < MB < −15.2 mag) with accurate surfacebrightness fluctuation distances from the ACS Virgo Cluster Survey. Using the KMM mixture modeling algorithm, we find a highly significant correlation, z ≡ d(g−z) dz = −0.037 ± 0.004, between color and magnitude for the subpopulation of blue GCs in the co-added GC color-magnitude diagram of the three brightest Virgo cluster galaxies (M49, M87 and M60). The sense of the correlation is such that brighter GCs are redder than their fainter counterparts. For the single GC systems of M87 and M60, we find similar correlations; M49 does not appear to show a significant trend. There is no correlation between (g − z) and Mz for GCs belonging to the red subpopulation. The correlation g ≡ d(g−z) dg for the blue subpopulation is much weaker than z. Using Monte Carlo simulations, we attribute this finding to the fact that the blue subpopulation in Mg extends to higher luminosities than does the red subpopulation, which biases the KMM fit results. The highly significant correlation between color and Mz, however, is a real effect: this conclusion is supported by biweight fits to the same color distributions. We identify two environmental dependencies which influence the derived color-magnitude relation: (1) the slope of the color-magnitude relation decreases in significance with decreasing galaxy luminosity, although it remains detectable over the full luminosity range of our sample; and (2) the slope is stronger for GC populations located at smaller galactocentric distances. These characteristics suggest that the observed trend is, at least partially, shaped by external agents. We examine several physical mechanisms that might give rise to the observed color-magnitude relation including: (1) presence of contaminants like super-clusters, stripped galactic nuclei, or ultra-compact dwarfs; (2) accretion of GCs from low-mass galaxies; (3) stochastic effects; (4) the capture of field stars by individual GCs; and (5) GC self-enrichment. Although none of these scenarios offers a fully satisfactory explanation of the observations, we conclude that self-enrichment and field-star capture, or a combination of these processes, offer the most promising means of explaining our observations.

Tass Mark Iv Photometric Survey Of The Northern Sky, Thomas Droege, Michael Richmond, Michael Sallman, Robert P. Creager

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The Amateur Sky Survey (TASS) is a loose confederation of amateur and professional astronomers. We describe the design and construction of our Mark IV systems, a set of wide-field telescopes with CCD cameras which take simultaneous images in the V and IC passbands. We explain our observational procedures and the pipeline which processes and reduces the images into lists of stellar positions and magnitudes. We have compiled a large database of measurements for stars in the northern celestial hemisphere with V -band magnitudes in the range 7 < V < 13. This paper describes data taken over the four-year period starting November, 2001. One of our results is a catalog of repeated measurements on the Johnson-Cousins system for over 4.3 million stars.

Civil Liberties V. National Security In The Law's Open Areas, Geoffrey R. Stone

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No abstract provided.

When The Walls Crash Down: Offer Services Where The Students Are, Julie Arendt, Mary K. Taylor

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No abstract provided.

Geometry Of Minimal Flows, William Basener

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Our main result is that a minimal flow on a compact manifold is either topologically conjugate to a Riemannian flow or every parametrization of φ is nowhere equicontinuous, defined as follows. A flow is Riemannian if given any points x, y ∈ M , the value of d(φt (x), φt (y)) is independent of t ∈ R . A flow is nowhere equicontinuous if there exists an

Upper Bounds On Parity-Violating Gamma-Ray Asymmetries In Compound Nuclei From Polarized Cold Neutron Capture, M. T. Gericke, J. D. Bowman, R. D. Carlini, T. E. Chupp, K. P. Coulter, M. Dabaghyan, M. Dawkins, D. Desai, S. J. Freedman, T. R. Gentile, R. C. Gillis, G. L. Greene, F. W. Hersman, T. Ino, Gordon L. Jones, M. Kandes, B. Lauss, M. Leuschner, W. R. Lozowski, R. Mahurin, M. Mason, Y. Masuda, G. S. Mitchell, S. Muto, H. Nann, S. A. Page, S. I. Penttila, W. D. Ramsay, S. Santra, P.-N. Seo, E. I. Sharapov, T. B. Smith, W. M. Snow, W. S. Wilburn, V. Yuan, H. Zhu

Articles

Parity-odd asymmetries in the electromagnetic decays of compound nuclei can sometimes be amplified above values expected from simple dimensional estimates by the complexity of compound nuclear states. Using a statistical approach, we estimate the root-mean-square of the distribution of expected parity-odd correlations (s) over right arrow (n)center dot(k) over right arrow (gamma), where (s) over right arrow (n) is the neutron spin and (k) over right arrow (gamma) is the momentum of the gamma, in the integrated gamma spectrum from the capture of cold polarized neutrons on Al, Cu, and In. We present measurements of the asymmetries in these and …

A Lost Soul In Search Of The Light : Francois Mauriac's ''Therese Desqueyroux'', Eamon Maher

Articles

Material reproduced by kind permission of Reality

Contribution Of Stellar Tidal Disruptions To The X-Ray Luminosity Function Of Active Galaxies, Miloš Milosavljević, David Merritt, Luis C. Ho

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The luminosity function of active galactic nuclei has been measured down to luminosities ∼ 1042 ergs s-1 in the soft and hard X-rays. Some fraction of this activity is associated with the accretion of the material liberated by the tidal disruption of stars by massive black holes. We estimate the contribution to the X-ray luminosity function from the tidal disruption process. While the contribution depends on a number poorly known parameters, it appears that it can account for the majority of X-ray selected AGN with soft or hard Xray luminosities . 1043 - 1044 ergs s-1. If this is correct, …

'How's My Driving?' For Everyone (And Everything?), Lior Strahilevitz

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This is an Article about using reputation-tracking technologies to displace criminal law enforcement and improve the tort system. The Article contains an extended application of this idea to the regulation of motorist behavior and examines the broader case for using technologies that aggregate dispersed information in various settings where reputational concerns do not adequately deter uncooperative behavior. The Article proposes a compulsory "How's My Driving?" program for all motor vehicles. Although more rigorous study is warranted, the initial data from voluntary "How's My Driving?" programs is quite promising, suggesting that the use of "How's My Driving?" placards on commercial trucks …

Maryland’S "Wal-Mart" Act: Policy And Preemption, Edward A. Zelinsky

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Maryland's Wal-Mart Act raises two fundamental questions: Is the Act legal? Does the Act represent sound policy?

With respect to the legality of the Maryland statute, I conclude that the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA) preempts the Maryland law. As a matter of policy, the Maryland statute is ill-conceived. The Maryland Act raises prices on Wal-Mart's predominantly low-income customers and, for the long run, will reduce Wal-Mart's employment.

In the final analysis, Maryland's Wal-Mart Act is a poorly-designed exercise in political symbolism, rather than a carefully-crafted response to the pressing problem of health care in America.

The Questioning Attitude: Questions About Derrida, Martin J. Stone

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No abstract provided.

Exploding The Class Action Agency Costs Myth: The Social Utility Of Entrepreneurial Lawyers, Myriam E. Gilles, Gary B. Friedman

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In this article, we challenge the traditional view that entrepreneurial plaintiffs' class action lawyers operating entirely according to their own economic self-interest serve no social utility, or worse yet, tremendous disutility. In seeking to counter this notion, we try to show that the agency costs problem long derided in class action practice is overblown: in the majority of small-claims class actions, there is no legitimate reason to care whether class members are being undercompensated (or compensated at all), nor any reason to worry that entrepreneurial lawyers are being overcompensated. Rather, we assert that the driving force behind class action practice …

The Transforming Power Of Grace, Eamon Maher

Articles

Material reproduced by kind permission of Reality

There Is No 2-(22,8,4) Block Design, Richard Bilous, Clement W.H. Lam, Larry H. Thiel, Ben P.C. Li, G.H. John Van Rees, Stanislaw P. Radziszowski, Wolfgang H. Holzmann, Hadi Kharaghani

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In this paper we show that a 2-(22, 8, 4) design does not exist. This result was obtained by a computer search.

Trends In The Globular Cluster Luminosity Function Of Early-Type Galaxies, Andrés Jordán, Dean E. Mclaughlin, Patrick Côté, David Merritt, Et Al.

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We present results from a study of the globular cluster luminosity function (GCLF) in a sample of 89 earlytype galaxies observed as part of the ACS Virgo Cluster Survey. Using a Gaussian parametrization of the GCLF, we find a highly significant correlation between the GCLF dispersion, , and the galaxy luminosity, MB,gal, in the sense that the GC systems in fainter galaxies have narrower luminosity functions. The GCLF dispersions in the Milky Way and M31 are fully consistent with this trend, implying that the correlation between sigma and galaxy luminosity is more fundamental than older suggestions that GCLF shape is …

Does The Six-Year Statute Of Limitations For Contract Claims By The Federal Government Apply To Administrative Proceedings?, Richard Henry Seamon

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No abstract provided.

The Law Of Other States, Eric A. Posner, Cass R. Sunstein

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The question of whether courts should consult the laws of "other states" has produced intense controversy. But in some ways, this practice is entirely routine; within the United States, state courts regularly consult the decisions of other state courts in deciding on the common law, the interpretation of statutory law, and even the meaning of state constitutions. A formal argument in defense of such consultation stems from the Condorcet Jury Theorem, which says that under certain conditions, a widespread belief accepted by a number of independent actors, is highly likely to be correct. It follows that if a large majority …

Icing Location Client, Seamus Rooney, Keith Gardiner, James Carswell

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The ICiNG (Innovative Cities for Next Generation) project is researching a multi-modal, multi-access model of e-Government. It develops the concept of a “thin-skinned City” that will be sensitive to both the citizen and the environment through the use of mobile devices, universal access gateways, social software and environmental sensors. Intelligent infrastructure will enable a Public Administration Services layer and a Communities layer. Communities will interact with the infrastructure to avail of ICiNG services created by the administration, and will also create their own information-based services.

Youth, Governance And The City: Towards A Critical Urban Sociology Of Youth Crime And Disorder Prevention, Matt Bowden

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This article considers the historical and spatial context for the emergence of youth crime and disorder prevention initiatives in Ireland. These initiatives have to be understood in the context of their relationship to the broader ‘urban question’ and in particular the relationship of the peripheral housing estate to the rest of society and the economic sphere. More recent changes in the nature of society and the emergence of a ‘liberal creed’ have resulted in greater use of surveillance technologies for offsetting the opportunities for crime to be committed. In this context, youth crime prevention initiatives must be seen as an …

The Demise Of Federal Takings Litigation, Stewart E. Sterk

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For more than twenty years the Supreme Court has held that a federal takings claim is not ripe until the claimant seeks compensation in state court. The Court's recent opinion in San Remo Hotel, L.P. v. City & County of San Francisco establishes that the federal full faith and credit statute applies to federal takings claims. The Court itself recognized that its decision limits the availability of a federal forum for takings claims. In fact, however, claim preclusion doctrine-not considered or discussed by the Court-may result in more stringent limits on federal court review of takings claims than the Court's …

Textual Case-Based Reasoning For Spam Filtering: A Comparison Of Feature-Based And Feature-Free Approaches, Sarah Jane Delany, Derek Bridge

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Spam filtering is a text classification task to which Case-Based Reasoning (CBR) has been successfully applied. We describe the ECUE system, which classifies emails using a feature-based form of textual CBR. Then, we describe an alternative way to compute the distances between cases in a feature-free fashion, using a distance measure based on text compression. This distance measure has the advantages of having no set-up costs and being resilient to concept drift. We report an empirical comparison, which shows the feature-free approach to be more accurate than the feature-based system. These results are fairly robust over different compression algorithms in …

Offshore Strategies In Global Political Economy: Small Islands And The Case Of The Eu And Oecd Harmful Tax Competition Initiatives, Richard Woodward

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This article investigates how recent attempts by the European Union (EU) and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) to clamp down on harmful tax competition will affect small island economies with offshore financial centres (OFCs). It argues that although there are legitimate concerns about the initiatives, the likelihood that small island OFCs will disappear is remote. A confluence of factors have forced the EU and OECD to dilute their original proposals to the extent that while some marginal OFCs may be driven out of existence, more sophisticated OFCs will be unharmed and may even benefit from this supposed …

Neighbor Billing And Network Neutrality, Gus Hurwitz

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This Article explains that the Internet is inherently non-neutral, and that this non-neutrality stems from the very architectural features that make the Internet a cost-effective means of communication. I argue that the ongoing network neutrality debate is better understood as being about the allocation of the costs of the Internet infrastructure. Instead of focusing on whether different parties are “neutrally” charged for Internet access, this Article focuses on how best to allocate these costs to maximize the value of the infrastructure. To this end, this Article proposes a model rule, “neighbor billing,” which is based in the economics of multi-sided …

In Vivo Mature Immunological Synapses Forming Smacs Mediate Clearance Of Virally Infected Astrocytes From The Brain, Carlos Barcia, Clare Thomas, James Curtin, Gwendalyn King, Kolja Wawrowsky, Marianela Candolfi, Weidong Xiong, Chunyan Liu, Kurt Kroeger, Olivier Boyer, Jerzy Kupiec-Weglinski, David Klatzmann, Maria Castro, Pedro Lowenstein

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The microanatomy of immune clearance of infected brain cells remains poorly understood. Immunological synapses are essential anatomical structures that channel information exchanges between T cell–antigen-presenting cells (APC) during the priming and effector phases of T cells' function, and during natural killer–target cell interactions. The hallmark of immunological synapses established by T cells is the formation of the supramolecular activation clusters (SMACs), in which adhesion molecules such as leukocyte function-associated antigen 1 segregate to the peripheral domain of the immunological synapse (p-SMAC), which surrounds the T cell receptor–rich or central SMAC (c-SMAC). The inability so far to detect SMAC formation in …

On The Autocorrelation Of Complex Envelope Of White Noise, R. Viswanathan

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About four decades ago, in an article in this transactions, Thomas Kailath pointed out that the autocorrelation of the complex envelope of white noise is not strictly an impulse function, even though when treated as an impulse in practical problems, it does lead to correct results. However, it is commonly assumed that by simply letting the bandwidth of a flat-bandlimited noise process to go to infinity, one obtains the result that the autocorrelation of the complex envelope of white noise equals an impulse function. In this correspondence, we show that 1) the limit operation has to be done carefully and …

Review: On Audio Culture, Christopher Delaurenti

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A review of the book Audio Culture edited by Christoph Cox and Daniel Warner.

Remoulding The Critical Junctures Approach, John Hogan

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This paper improves our understanding of critical junctures, a concept employed in historical institutionalism for exploring change. However, the concept lacks rigour, weakening our ability to define critical junctures. Of late, academics have utilized other mechanisms to identify change in historical institutionalism. Thus, it is within this context that the critical junctures approach is remoulded through the specification of standards, hence reducing uncertainty as to what constitutes a critical juncture. The remoulded approach is employed here in examining change in the Irish Congress of Trade Unions’ ~ICTU! influence over public policy in 1987.