Re-embedding economic and social constitutionalism: Normative Perspectives for the E

This chapter proposes a social re-embedding of European constitutionalism by offering a coherent interpretation of EU constitutional principles as contained in the initial articles of the Treaties and the EU’s economic and social constitution as developed by the Court of Justice. It starts from the assumption that European integration is not merely an inter-state endeavour, but also a process that affects social and economic actors, in other words societies all over Europe. It may well ultimately engender a European society – if we are prepared to conceive of a poly-centric society, consisting of diverse components from a wide range of regions, social actors and cultures. Proceeding from the assumption that constitutionalism can be a relevant notion for such a holistic approach to European integration, the chapter develops elements of European constitutionalism relating to socio-economic reality. As national constitutional law, European constitutional law is presented as necessarily incomplete. European constitutionalism will thus have to offer modes of adapting open norms to an ever changing and developing societal reality. The chapter outlines a framework for such constitutionalism which, at the same time, offers opportunities for reconciling the social and economic dimensions in the European integration project through a re-configured notion of constitutionalism.

Latanoprost for open-angle glaucoma (UKGTS): a randomised, multicentre, placebo-controlled trial

Background
Treatments for open-angle glaucoma aim to prevent vision loss through lowering of intraocular pressure, but to our knowledge no placebo-controlled trials have assessed visual function preservation, and the observation periods of previous (unmasked) trials have typically been at least 5 years. We assessed vision preservation in patients given latanoprost compared with those given placebo.

Methods
In this randomised, triple-masked, placebo-controlled trial, we enrolled patients with newly diagnosed open-angle glaucoma at ten UK centres (tertiary referral centres, teaching hospitals, and district general hospitals). Eligible patients were randomly allocated (1:1) with a website-generated randomisation schedule, stratified by centre and with a permuted block design, to receive either latanoprost 0·005% (intervention group) or placebo (control group) eye drops. Drops were administered from identical bottles, once a day, to both eyes. The primary outcome was time to visual field deterioration within 24 months. Analyses were done in all individuals with follow-up data. The Data and Safety Monitoring Committee (DSMC) recommended stopping the trial on Jan 6, 2011 (last patient visit July, 2011), after an interim analysis, and suggested a change in primary outcome from the difference in proportions of patients with incident progression between groups to time to visual field deterioration within 24 months. This trial is registered, number ISRCTN96423140.

Findings
We enrolled 516 individuals between Dec 1, 2006, and March 16, 2010. Baseline mean intraocular pressure was 19·6 mm Hg (SD 4·6) in 258 patients in the latanoprost group and 20·1 mm Hg (4·8) in 258 controls. At 24 months, mean reduction in intraocular pressure was 3·8 mm Hg (4·0) in 231 patients assessed in the latanoprost group and 0·9 mm Hg (3·8) in 230 patients assessed in the placebo group. Visual field preservation was significantly longer in the latanoprost group than in the placebo group: adjusted hazard ratio (HR) 0·44 (95% CI 0·28–0·69; p=0·0003). We noted 18 serious adverse events, none attributable to the study drug.

Interpretation
This is the first randomised placebo-controlled trial to show preservation of the visual field with an intraocular-pressure-lowering drug in patients with open-angle glaucoma. The study design enabled significant differences in vision to be assessed in a relatively short observation period

Transitionless quantum driving in open quantum systems

We extend the concept of superadiabatic dynamics, or transitionless quantum driving, to quantum open systems whose evolution is governed by a master equation in the Lindblad form. We provide the general framework needed to determine the control strategy required to achieve superadiabaticity. We apply our formalism to two examples consisting of a two-level system coupled to environments with time-dependent bath operators. 

The Well-Aligned Orbit of Wasp-84b: Evidence for Disk Migration of a Hot Jupiter

We report the sky-projected orbital obliquity (spin–orbit angle) of WASP-84 b, a 0.69MJup planet in an 8.52 day orbit around a G9V/K0V star, to be λ = −0.3 ± 1.7°. We obtain a true obliquity of ψ = 17.3 ± 7.7° from a measurement of the inclination of the stellar spin axis with respect to the sky plane. Due to the young age and the weak tidal forcing of the system, we suggest that the orbit of WASP-84b is unlikely to have both realigned and circularized from the misaligned and/or eccentric orbit likely to have arisen from high-eccentricity migration. Therefore we conclude that the planet probably migrated via interaction with the protoplanetary disk. This would make it the first “hot Jupiter” (P d < 10 ) to have been shown to have migrated via this pathway. Further, we argue that the distribution of obliquities for planets orbiting cool stars (Teff < 6250 K) suggests that high-eccentricity migration is an important pathway for the formation of short-orbit, giant planets.

Improving parameter learning of Bayesian nets from incomplete data

This paper addresses the estimation of parameters of a Bayesian network from incomplete data. The task is usually tackled by running the Expectation-Maximization (EM) algorithm several times in order to obtain a high log-likelihood estimate. We argue that choosing the maximum log-likelihood estimate (as well as the maximum penalized log-likelihood and the maximum a posteriori estimate) has severe drawbacks, being affected both by overfitting and model uncertainty. Two ideas are discussed to overcome these issues: a maximum entropy approach and a Bayesian model averaging approach. Both ideas can be easily applied on top of EM, while the entropy idea can be also implemented in a more sophisticated way, through a dedicated non-linear solver. A vast set of experiments shows that these ideas produce significantly better estimates and inferences than the traditional and widely used maximum (penalized) log-likelihood and maximum a posteriori estimates. In particular, if EM is adopted as optimization engine, the model averaging approach is the best performing one; its performance is matched by the entropy approach when implemented using the non-linear solver. The results suggest that the applicability of these ideas is immediate (they are easy to implement and to integrate in currently available inference engines) and that they constitute a better way to learn Bayesian network parameters.

On the alignment of debris discs and their host stars' rotation axis - implications for spin-orbit misalignment in exoplanetary systems

It has been widely thought that measuring the misalignment angle between the orbital plane of a transiting exoplanet and the spin of its host star was a good discriminator between different migration processes for hot-Jupiters. Specifically, well-aligned hot-Jupiter systems (as measured by the Rossiter-McLaughlin effect) were thought to have formed via migration through interaction with a viscous disc, while misaligned systems were thought to have undergone a more violent dynamical history. These conclusions were based on the assumption that the planet-forming disc was well-aligned with the host star. Recent work by a number of authors has challenged this assumption by proposing mechanisms that act to drive the star-disc interaction out of alignment during the pre-main-sequence phase. We have estimated the stellar rotation axis of a sample of stars which host spatially resolved debris discs. Comparison of our derived stellar rotation axis inclination angles with the geometrically measured debris-disc inclinations shows no evidence for a misalignment between the two.

The inclusion of open-ended questions on quantitative surveys of children: Dealing with unanticipated responses relating to child abuse and neglect

Web surveys have been shown to be a viable, and relatively inexpensive, method of data collection with children. For this reason, the Kids’ Life and Times (KLT) was developed as an annual online survey of 10 and 11 year old children. Each year, approximately 4,000 children participate in the survey. Throughout the six years that KLT has been running, a range of questions has been asked that are both policy-relevant and important to the lives of children. Given the method employed by the survey, no extremely sensitive questions that might cause the children distress are included. The majority of questions on KLT are closed yielding quantitative data that are analysed statistically; however, one regular open-ended question is included at the end of KLT each year so that the children can suggest questions that they think should be asked on the survey the following year. While most of the responses are innocuous, each year a small minority of children suggest questions on child abuse and neglect. This paper reports the responses to this question and reflects on how researchers can, and should, deal with this issue from both a methodological and an ethical perspective.

Molecular pedigree reconstruction and estimation of evolutionary parameters in a wild Atlantic salmon river system with incomplete sampling: a power analysis

Background: Pedigree reconstruction using genetic analysis provides a useful means to estimate fundamental population biology parameters relating to population demography, trait heritability and individual fitness when combined with other sources of data. However, there remain limitations to pedigree reconstruction in wild populations, particularly in systems where parent-offspring relationships cannot be directly observed, there is incomplete sampling of individuals, or molecular parentage inference relies on low quality DNA from archived material. While much can still be inferred from incomplete or sparse pedigrees, it is crucial to evaluate the quality and power of available genetic information a priori to testing specific biological hypotheses. Here, we used microsatellite markers to reconstruct a multi-generation pedigree of wild Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar L.) using archived scale samples collected with a total trapping system within a river over a 10 year period. Using a simulation-based approach, we determined the optimal microsatellite marker number for accurate parentage assignment, and evaluated the power of the resulting partial pedigree to investigate important evolutionary and quantitative genetic characteristics of salmon in the system.

Results: We show that at least 20 microsatellites (ave. 12 alleles/locus) are required to maximise parentage assignment and to improve the power to estimate reproductive success and heritability in this study system. We also show that 1.5 fold differences can be detected between groups simulated to have differing reproductive success, and that it is possible to detect moderate heritability values for continuous traits (h(2) similar to 0.40) with more than 80% power when using 28 moderately to highly polymorphic markers.

Conclusion: The methodologies and work flow described provide a robust approach for evaluating archived samples for pedigree-based research, even where only a proportion of the total population is sampled. The results demonstrate the feasibility of pedigree-based studies to address challenging ecological and evolutionary questions in free-living populations, where genealogies can be traced only using molecular tools, and that significant increases in pedigree assignment power can be achieved by using higher numbers of markers.

The early exploitation of Southeast Asian mangroves:Bone technology from caves and open sites

This paper focuses on the contribution that the study of bone technology is making to the understanding of early tropical subsistence in Southeast Asia. Newly completed research suggests that during the period from the terminal Pleistocene to mid Holocene, bone tools may have featured prominently in coastal subsistence. There are indications that this technology may have had a particular association with hunting and gathering in the mangrove forests that proliferated along many coasts during this period. The study of these tools thus represents a rare chance to examine prehistoric extractive technologies, which are generally agreed to have been predominantly made on organic, nonpreserving media. The evidence presented also suggests that prehistoric foragers from this region possessed a good working understanding of the mechanical properties of bone and used bone implements where conditions and needs suited the parameters of this material. © 2005 by the University of Hawai'i Press.