Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Lesker Pvd75 E-Beam/Thermal Evaporator (Pvd-02) Standard Operating Procedure, David S. Barth, Jason A. Röhr

Standard Operating Procedures

Standard Operating Procedure for the Lesker PVD75 E-beam/Thermal Evaporator (PVD-02) located at the Quattrone Nanofabrication Facility within the Singh Center for Nanotechnology at the University of Pennsylvania

Guaranteed Conformance Of Neurosymbolic Models To Natural Constraints, Kaustubh Sridhar, Souradeep Dutta, James Weimer, Insup Lee

Departmental Papers (CIS)

Deep neural networks have emerged as the workhorse for a large section of robotics and control applications, especially as models for dynamical systems. Such data-driven models are in turn used for designing and verifying autonomous systems. This is particularly useful in modeling medical systems where data can be leveraged to individualize treatment. In safety-critical applications, it is important that the data-driven model is conformant to established knowledge from the natural sciences. Such knowledge is often available or can often be distilled into a (possibly black-box) model M. For instance, the unicycle model for an F1 racing car. In this light, …

Collation Model For Ljs 64: [Illustrations To Georg Von Peurbach's Novae Theoricae Planetarum]., Dot Porter

Collation Models

Diagrams, many with moving parts, designed to accompany the work Theoricae novae planetarum by 15th-century Austrian astronomer Georg von Peurbach, who taught at the universities in Padua and Ferrara. The diagrams demonstrate increasingly complex planetary motion. An early 17th-century inscription on the first flyleaf refers to an edition of Peurbach published in Venice in 1616.

Collation Model For Ms. Codex 761: [Cosmographies]., Dot Porter

Collation Models

Four ancient Greek cosmographies in Latin translation: Plato's Timaeus translated and with a commentary by Calcidius, Aristotle's De mundo translated by Ioannes Argyropoulos, Philo's De incorruptione mundi probably translated by Lilius Tifernas, and Cleomedes's De mundo translated by Carolus Valgulius.

How Occam’S Razor Guides Human Inference, Eugenio Piasini, Shuze Liu, Pratik Chaudhari, Vijay Balasubramanian, Joshua I. Gold

Department of Physics Papers

Occam’s razor is the principle stating that, all else being equal, simpler explanations for a set of observations are preferred over more complex ones. This idea is central to multiple formal theories of statistical model selection and is posited to play a role in human perception and decision-making, but a general, quantitative account of the specific nature and impact of complexity on human decision-making is still missing. Here we use preregistered experiments to show that, when faced with uncertain evidence, human subjects bias their decisions in favor of simpler explanations in a way that can be quantified precisely using the …

Physics 516: Electromagnetic Phenomena (Spring 2023), Philip C. Nelson

Department of Physics Papers

These course notes are made publicly available in the hope that they will be useful. All reports of errata will be gratefully received. I will also be glad to hear from anyone who reads them, whether or not you find errors: pcn@upenn.edu.

Exploring With Sticky Mittens: Reinforcement Learning With Expert Interventions Via Option Templates, Souradeep Dutta, Kaustubh Sridhar, Osbert Bastani, Edgar Dobriban, James Weimer, Julia Parish-Morris

Departmental Papers (CIS)

Long horizon robot learning tasks with sparse rewards pose a significant challenge for current reinforcement learning algorithms. A key feature enabling humans to learn challenging control tasks is that they often receive expert intervention that enables them to understand the high-level structure of the task before mastering low-level control actions. We propose a framework for leveraging expert intervention to solve long-horizon reinforcement learning tasks. We consider option templates, which are specifications encoding a potential option that can be trained using reinforcement learning. We formulate expert intervention as allowing the agent to execute option templates before learning an implementation. This …

Collation Model For Ljs 232: Trattato Delle Proportioni Et Proportionalità, Dot Porter

Collation Models

Treatise by Benedetto Varchi on proportion as the basis for rithmomachia, a mathematical game played on a chessboard with pieces that each have a shape and a number; a dialogue written by Carlo di Ruberto Strozzi, in which Cosimo Rucellai, who introduced the game to Benedetto Varchi, teaches the rules to Strozzi and Jacopo di Piero Vettori; and other notes on the game. Later unrelated notes and pen trials on leaves before and after main texts. Damage and bleed-through due to oxidation on many leaves.

Collation Model For Ljs 361: [Astronomical And Astrological Tables]., Dot Porter

Collation Models

Opening and closing sections of astronomical and astrological tables on either side of a remnant of commentaries on gospel and epistle readings. The opening section (f. 2r-9r) includes tables for calculating the day of the week for any day from 1204 to 1512; the Sunday letter from 1204 to 1736; the golden letter from 1215 to 1728; movable feasts; time variation according to latitude and longitude; the conjunction of the sun and moon from January to September from 1327 to 1367; and the hours of day and night in any day of the year, as well as lists of human …

Explorer 14 Magnetron Sputterer (Pvd-05) Standard Operating Procedure, Mohsen Azadi, Jason Alexander Röhr

Standard Operating Procedures

Standard Operating Procedure for the Explorer 14 Magnetron Sputterer (PVD-05) located at the Quattrone Nanofabrication Facility within the Singh Center for Nanotechnology at the University of Pennsylvania

Lesker Pvd75 E-Beam Evaporator (Pvd-04) Standard Operating Procedure, David J. Jones, Jason A. Röhr

Standard Operating Procedures

Standard Operating Procedure for the Lesker PVD75 E-beam Evaporator (PVD-04) located at the Quattrone Nanofabrication Facility within the Singh Center for Nanotechnology at the University of Pennsylvania

Collation Model For Ljs 27: Algorismus., Dot Porter

Collation Models

Pedagogical treatise on commercial and practical arithmetic, with extensive use of arabic numerals and problems illustrated with scenes from daily life.

Collation Model For Ljs 300: [Calendarium And Ephemerides], Dot Porter

Collation Models

Manuscript copy of the Calendarium and Ephemerides as published by Regiomontanus in 1474. The Calendarium, for 1475-1530, gives information on lunar and solar eclipses, the length of days, and the signs of the zodiac and planets. Also includes a table of time corrections (f. 11v) for cities in reference to a longitude of approximately 10 degrees east (thus making no correction for Braunschweig, Nuremberg, Ulm, or Milan). The Ephemerides, consisting only of tables updated to begin in 1480 and ending in 1506, provides positions for the sun, moon, and planets for each day of each year. The beginning of each …

Collation Model For Ljs 490: [Astronomical Compendium], Dot Porter

Collation Models

Collection of astronomical and astrological texts. Includes tables of solar declination (f. 13r), fixed stars (f. 22r), elevation of the pole star in various cities (f. 26r), new and full moons (f. 83r-84v), sightings and transits or eclipses of Venus and Mercury (f. 87r), and the position of the sun in the ecliptic (f. 87v); treatises on instruments, such as the astrolabe (f. 17r-22r, 29r-33v, 43r-49r, 50r-50v), the sundial (f. 23r-25v), the quadrant (f. 27r-28v, 78v), the Jacob's staff (baculus, f. 45r-49r, 79r, 91r), and the chilinder or traveler's dial (f. 77r-78v); treatises on other scientific subjects, such as practical …

It’S Art About Water Treatment! An Interview With Mallory Chaput, The Artist Inspiring Future Water Leaders-One Artwork At A Time, Swati Hegde

wH2O: The Journal of Gender and Water

This article throws a spotlight on Mallory Chaput, an artist inspiring future water leaders to take up water careers. Through her coloring pages, paintings, and comics about the water treatment, Mallory is helping children re-imagine the water sector. Originally a landscaper, Mallory developed a profound interest in water and wastewater treatment and learned about it by visiting plants, talking to professionals, and studying engineering books. This article is a transcript of an interview with Mallory, featuring her background, her imaginative creations and her future goals.

Where There Are No Sewers: The Toilet Cleaners Of Lucknow, Sharada Prasad, Isha Ray

wH2O: The Journal of Gender and Water

Enormous progress has been made in the global effort to provide safe and affordable toilets for the world’s poorest citizens since World Toilet Day was first declared in 2001. Significant strides have been made in “reinventing” toilet designs for low-income, water-short, un-sewered urban zones; celebrities such as Bill Gates and Matt Damon have brought this once-taboo topic into the open; and the Prime Minister of India – the country with the highest number of people still practicing open defecation – has publicly declared that his country needs toilets over temples.

Well over 2 billion people today lack access to basic …

El Agua Es Oro: A Human Centered Solution For The City Of Cochabamba, Bolivia, Natalia Mendoza, Camilia Olmedo

wH2O: The Journal of Gender and Water

The purpose of El Agua Es Oro (The Water is Gold) is to satisfy social needs, specifically for women living in peri-urban areas, with a more advanced efficiency. El Agua Es Oro creates an added value for people’s well-being by maximizing socio-environmental context and not just focusing on for-profit economics. Nevertheless, it is noteworthy to generate economic resources to sustain the impact that the organization seeks to achieve. El Agua Es Oro is a social enterprise based on the application of social innovation with the methodology and tools of a people-centered design, focusing on teenage girls and women. The foundations …

Climate Change, Differential Impacts On Women And Gender Mainstreaming: A Case Study Of East Rapti Watershed, Nepal, Anupama Ray

wH2O: The Journal of Gender and Water

Women and water share a great deal of nexus in several ways. However, women have still minimal control over the management of water resources, making them more vulnerable to climate change. This paper assesses how climate change impacts differently across different women groups using an intersectionality lens, thereby exploring the situation of gender mainstreaming in water sector in three communities, namely, Karaiya, Basauli, and Dadagaun in Khairahani Municipality located in the East Rapti watershed, Nepal. In this perception- based study, we conducted three key informant interviews and household interviews with 45 women of different castes, ages, communities, education levels, and …

Gender In The Water Industry One Man Of Transgender Experience’S Story, Ari Copeland

wH2O: The Journal of Gender and Water

is a complex topic Most people often confuse gender and sex; Most folks don’t realize that there are at least 57 genders and gender is a spectrum Some people within our workplace and the water industry don’t identify as a man or a woman, and/or their gender is more fluid (gender-expansive. In our day-to-day interactions with others, we often assume someone’s gender based on their appearance, mannerisms, and other social cues that vary depending on the culture Additionally, assuming everyone fits into the gender binary (just men and women is often-times a barrier to being inclusive and making people feel …

Exploring Sustainable Degrowth-Based Adaptation To Climate Change-Aggravated Water Insecurity In Parts Of Rural India: A Gender Relations Approach, Nairita Roy Chaudhuri

wH2O: The Journal of Gender and Water

This article reviews the theoretical concept of ‘sustainable adaptation’ to climate change and water scarcity using a gender-relations approach by answering the following questions: i) What is a sustainable adaptation to climate change? ii) Based on a literature review, how does gender interact with climate change adaptation to water scarcity and droughts in rural India? (iii) How do the concepts of sustainable adaptation, degrowth, and gender relations interact on the ground, pertaining to water justice?

The paper argues that climate change adaptation and development goals can harmonize only if they rectify root causes of vulnerabilities. For adaptation actions to yield …

Discovering Reduced-Order Dynamical Models From Data, William Qian, Pratik A. Chaudhari

Technical Reports (ESE)

This work explores theoretical and computational principles for data-driven discovery of reduced-order models of physical phenomena. We begin by describing the theoretical underpinnings of multi-parameter models through the lens of information geometry. We then explore the behavior of paradigmatic models in statistical physics, including the diffusion equation and the Ising model. In particular, we explore how coarse-graining a system affects the local and global geometry of a “model manifold” which is the set of all models that could be fit using data from the system. We emphasize connections of this idea to ideas in machine learning. Finally, we employ coarse-graining …

Women And Water: Lessons Learned From A Humanitarian Intervention At Igusi Clinic, Matabeleland, Zimbabwe, Rachel C. Svetanoff, Ifeoma Ilobodo

wH2O: The Journal of Gender and Water

This article highlights the disproportionate impact of water scarcity on women and girls in Matabeleland, Zimbabwe. We emphasize one Zimbabwean woman's efforts to implement a sustainable water solution for a community of 20,000 citizens. Lumbie Mlambo, Founder and President of the nonprofit JB Dondolo, Inc., took action following reports that people in the community her father was aiding were falling ill, mothers could not carry their pregnancy to full terms, and infant mortality rates were rising. Before Lumbie's intervention, the only water available was contaminated by polluted soil. Moreover, the climate change-induced droughts and floods made the potable water hard …

Policy Actions To Improve Economic And Environmental Outcomes Of Poultry Litter Management In Delmarva, Justin Fulton Maroccia

Master of Environmental Studies Capstone Projects

On the Delmarva Peninsula, poultry production reigns supreme as the most dominant industry of this region’s agricultural sector. This industry generates massive economic output for Delmarva agriculture, as well as a large amount of poultry litter (i.e., feces and bedding). Poultry litter is a valuable soil amendment used as an agricultural nutrient source. Historic land application of nutrient-rich poultry litter has led to high soil phosphorus levels in many areas of the Delmarva Peninsula, which has motivated a push to move litter out of the region to avoid negative environmental impacts of overapplication. However, there is also cropland without phosphorus …

Functioning Industrial Symbiosis Model Application To Organic Waste: A Case Study Of A Paper Mill Company In Cochambamba, Bolivia, Natalia Mendoza Abujder

Master of Environmental Studies Capstone Projects

Wastewater treatment plants across the world can transform themselves from energy consumers into energy producers and not only convert their operations into a circular economy, but also reduce their disposal and energy costs, ultimately benefitting their triple bottom line. This field study and research created a model specific to a paper mill company in Cochabamba, Bolivia, Copelme S.A., to investigate if its waste streams can be converted into a value stream and if its organic sludge waste can be transformed into energy. The model included an analysis of the application of an Up-Flow Anaerobic Sludge Blanket (UASB) reactor on the …

Environmental Impacts Of Increased Circularity In Bicycle Sharing Service, Yansong Li

Master of Environmental Studies Capstone Projects

Although bike-sharing services have gained tremendous popularity in China by presenting themselves as champions of sustainable urban transportation and an example of a sharing economy, the lack of a sufficient recycling and maintenance process has been pointed to as one of the main contributors to its environmental impact and has called the sustainability of bike-sharing into question. The adoption of a circular economic model for this service is proposed to remediate these impacts. This Life Cycle Assessment study will estimate the effects of a circular economy model adoption through increased recycling rates and recycling efficiency of bike-sharing services. The results …

Global Superstardom: Applying A Multinational And Quantitative Approach To Explain The Success Of The Korean Pop Music Industry, Daniel Y. Shen

Joseph Wharton Scholars

Korean pop music (K-pop) has exploded in popularity around the world, first spreading to neighboring countries before successfully expanding into countries with greater cultural distances, challenging conventional wisdom. This thesis explains the factors that drive K-pop’s unique success in the United States. By applying qualitative models like CAGE and Mode of Entry models from multinational management, this study finds that K-pop firms have relied on strategic partnerships to distribute music and mitigate cultural and administrative risks, but future goals of owning digital platforms and exporting the K-pop business model will require a stronger presence.

This study also extracts sonic features …

Deep Basis Fitting For Depth Completion, Chao Qu

Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations

Recovering depth information from a single image is a challenging task.It is a fundamentally ill-posed problem since there exists an infinite number of scene geometries that could give rise to a given image. However, knowing the depths for a few pixels can significantly constrain the set of solutions. Recovering a plausible depth map from an image with sparse depth measurements is referred to as image-guided depth completion and is the focus of this thesis.

We first developed a novel approach called Deep Basis Fitting (DBF) that builds upon the strengths of modern deep learning techniques and classical optimization algorithms which …

Geometry Of Gradient Flows For Analytic Combinatorics, Stephen Gillen

Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations

Analytic combinatorics in several variables (ACSV) analyzes the asymptotic growth of generating function coefficients in a direction r. It uses Morse theory on the pole variety V := {H = 0} ⊆ (C∗)d to deform the torus T in the multivariate Cauchy Integral Formula via the downward gradient flow for the log-linear function h = hr = − ∑ rj log |zj|, giving a homology decomposition of T into cycles around critical points of h on V . The deformation can flow to infinity at finite height when the height function is not a proper map. This happens only in …

Estimation And Inference For Convex Functions And Computational Efficiency In High Dimensional Statistics, Ran Chen

Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations

Optimization and statistics are intrinsically intertwined with each other. Optimization has been the ends of some statistical problems, like estimation and inference for the minimizer and the minimum of convex functions, and the means for other statistical problems, like computational concerns in high dimensional statistics. In this dissertation, we consider both optimization-related problems.Estimation and inference for the minimizer and minimum of convex functions have been longstanding problems with wide application in economics and health care. But existing approaches are insufficient due to their asymptotic nature and/or incapability of characterizing function-specific difficulty. We investigate the problems under non-asymptotic frameworks that characterize …

Synthesis And Reactivity Of Flexible Dicopper Bis(Pyridyldiimine) Macrocyclic Complexes, Sam Brooks

Publicly Accessible Penn Dissertations

Methanol is a viable fuel source and a common feedstock in the chemical industry. Currently, much of the methanol produced by industry is derived from natural gas (methane). Yet, the one-step selective oxidation of methane to methanol remains challenging due to the potential formation of overoxidation products (CO2, H2O, etc.). Within the past 20 years, the reactive Cu2(II,II)-µ-O site within Cu(II)-ZSM-5 has been shown capable of the selective oxidation of methane to methanol through a hydrogen atom transfer (HAT)/radical rebound mechanism. The proximity of the metals and geometric constraints may allow for the copper centers to work in concert when …