Learning Effective and Interpretable Semantic Models using Non-Negative Sparse Embedding

In this paper, we introduce an application of matrix factorization to produce corpus-derived, distributional
models of semantics that demonstrate cognitive plausibility. We find that word representations
learned by Non-Negative Sparse Embedding (NNSE), a variant of matrix factorization, are sparse,
effective, and highly interpretable. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first approach which
yields semantic representation of words satisfying these three desirable properties. Though extensive
experimental evaluations on multiple real-world tasks and datasets, we demonstrate the superiority
of semantic models learned by NNSE over other state-of-the-art baselines.

Rapid rise in Effective Sea-Level in southwest Bangladesh: Its causes and contemporary rates

Evidence is presented from three estuarine tide gauges located in the
Sundarban area of southwest Bangladesh of relative sea level rise
substantially in excess of the generally accepted rates from altimetry, as
well as previous tide-gauge analyses. It is proposed that the difference
arises from the use of relative mean sea level (RMSL) to characterise the
present and future coastal flood hazard, since RMSL can be misleading in
estuaries in which tidal range is changing. Three tide gauges, one located in
the uninhabited mangrove forested area (Sundarban) of southwest
Bangladesh, the others in the densely populated polder zone north of the
present Sundarban, show rates of increase in RMSL ranging from 2.8 mm
a-1 to 8.8 mm a-1. However, these trends in RMSL disguise the fact that high
water levels in the polder zone have been increasing at an average rate of
15.9 mm a-1 and a maximum of 17.2 mm a-1. In an area experiencing tidal
range amplification, RMSL will always underestimate the rise in high water
levels; consequently, as an alternative to RMSL, the use of trends in high
water maxima or ‘Effective Sea Level Rise’ (ESLR) is adopted as a more
strategic parameter to characterise the flooding hazard potential. The rate
of increase in ESLR is shown to be due to a combination of deltaic
subsidence, including sediment compaction, and eustatic sea level rise, but
principally as a result of increased tidal range in estuary channels recently
constricted by embankments. These increases in ESLR have been partially
offset by decreases in fresh water discharge in those estuaries connected
to the Ganges. The recognition of increases of the effective sea level in the
Bangladesh Sundarban, which are substantially greater than increases in
mean sea level, is of the utmost importance to flood management in this
low-lying and densely populated area.

Reparative Complementarity: Ensuring an Effective Remedy for Victims in the Reparation Regime of the International Criminal Court

This article examines the reparation regime of the International Criminal Court in light of its first reparation decision. Based on the reparation jurisprudence established in international law and human rights law to provide victims of international crimes an effective remedy, this article suggests that in order for the International Criminal Court to achieve this objective it needs to go beyond individual criminal responsibility due to its limitations. This article considers the role of reparative complementarity in ensuring an effective remedy to victims of international crimes as part of the reparation regime of the International Criminal Court.

Reconciling Children's Policy and Children's Rights: Barriers to Effective Government Delivery

Countries which have ratified the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, have committed to implementing its principles in law and policy. This article explores the challenges for securing children's rights through policy, drawing on a research project conducted for the Northern Ireland Commissioner for Children and Young People, which sought to identify barriers to effective government delivery for children and young people from the perspective of key stakeholders. The research concluded that, while some barriers (such as delay and availability of data) are not child-specific, they can be accentuated when children and young people are the main focus of policy development and more so when seeking to adopt a child rights-compliant approach to policy development and implementation. 

Estimation of fetal and effective dose for CT examinations

Doses from CT examinations are difficult to estimate. However, they are requested more frequently due to the increase in CT examinations. In particular, fetal dose estimations are frequently required for patients who have discovered, subsequent to the examination, that they were pregnant when the examination was conducted. A computer model has been developed to facilitate such dose calculations. This model combines empirical beam data with anatomical information. The model has been verified using thermoluminescent dosemeter (TLD) readings of internal and surface dose from both phantoms and patients, including intrauterine doses for patients undergoing afterloading gynaecological intracavitary treatment. Although only limited experimental data were available, the results indicate that the model accurately predicts uterine doses within acceptable errors. This approach has been validated for fetal dose estimation. The model was also used in a comparison with the nationally available CT dose data from the National Radiological Protection Board (NRPB). The two models were found to be in agreement for fetal dose estimations.

Is Early Warning Effective for the Improvement of Problem Solving and Project Performance?

Since the first launch of the new engineering contract (NEC) in 1993, early warning of problems has been widely recognized as an important approach of proactive management during a construction or engineering project. Is early warning really effective for the improvement of problem solving and project performance? This is a research question that still lacks a good answer. For this reason, an empirical investigation was made in the United Kingdom (U.K.) to answer the question. This study adopts a combination of literature review, expert interview, and questionnaire survey. Nearly 100 questionnaire responses were collected from the U.K. construction industry, based on which the use of early warning under different forms of contract is compared in this paper. Problem solving and project performance are further compared between the projects using early warning and the projects not using early warning. The comparison provides clear evidence for the significant effect of early warning on problem solving and project performance in terms of time, cost, and quality. Subsequently, an input-process-output model is developed in this paper to explore the relationship among early warning, problem solving, and project
performance. All these help construction researchers and practitioners to better understand the role of early warning in ensuring project success.

Effective cutting of a quantum spin chain by bond impurities

Spin chains are promising media for short-haul quantum communication. Their usefulness is manifested in all those situations where stationary information carriers are involved. In the majority of the communication schemes relying on quantum spin chains, the latter are assumed to be finite in length, with well-addressable end-chain spins. In this paper we propose that such a configuration could actually be achieved by a mechanism that is able to effectively cut a spin ring through the insertion of bond defects. We then show how suitable physical quantities can be identified as figures of merit for the effectiveness of the cut. We find that, even for modest strengths of the bond defect, a ring is effectively cut at the defect site. In turn, this has important effects on the amount of correlations shared by the spins across the resulting chain, which we study by means of a scattering-based mechanism of a clear physical interpretation. © 2013 American Physical Society.

Skin-reducing mastectomy and one-stage implant reconstruction with a myodermal flap: A safe and effective technique in risk-reducing and therapeutic mastectomy

Introduction: Immediate reconstruction following mastectomy for breast cancer has been shown to be oncologically safe and associated with improved psychosocial outcomes for patients. Bostwick described a technique for one-stage implant based reconstruction, combining skin-sparing mastectomy with concurrent reduction of the skin envelope. This report reviews the experience of a single centre using skin-reducing mastectomy and one-stage implant reconstruction in both early stage breast cancer and risk-reducing mastectomy, with specific reference to frequency of complications, implant loss and oncological outcomes.

Methods and results: A retrospective review was undertaken to identify women who had undergone skin-reducing mastectomy and one-stage implant reconstruction using a de-epithelialised dermal flap, between October 2008 and October 2012. One hundred and four consecutive mastectomies, with reconstruction, were performed by two surgeons on 64 patients. No complications were seen in 43.8% of patients. At three months, four implants were lost (3.8% of breast reconstructions, 6.3% of patients), due to either peri-implant infection or mastectomy skin flap necrosis. One patient required unplanned return to theatre for evacuation of a haematoma. Minor mastectomy skin flap necrosis was seen in 10 breasts (9.6% of reconstructed breasts) and superficial wound infection in 8 breasts (7.7% of reconstructed breasts). All of these complications were managed conservatively and none required operative intervention. At a median follow up of 35 months (4-53 months) there had been one episode of ipsilateral axillary nodal recurrence.

Conclusion: One-stage implant reconstruction using a myo-dermal flap technique following skin-reducing mastectomy is safe and should be considered in selected patients. Most complications are minor and will resolve with conservative management. Major complications such as implant failure or immediate reoperation, were relatively uncommon (6.3% patients, 3.8% of reconstructed breasts). Early follow-up suggests that oncological outcomes are satisfactory, but longer follow-up is required to substantiate this. (C) 2013 British Association of Plastic, Reconstructive and Aesthetic Surgeons. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Realizing Accelerated Cost-Effective Distributed RAID

The exponential growth in user and application data entails new means for providing fault tolerance and protection against data loss. High Performance Com- puting (HPC) storage systems, which are at the forefront of handling the data del- uge, typically employ hardware RAID at the backend. However, such solutions are costly, do not ensure end-to-end data integrity, and can become a bottleneck during data reconstruction. In this paper, we design an innovative solution to achieve a flex- ible, fault-tolerant, and high-performance RAID-6 solution for a parallel file system (PFS). Our system utilizes low-cost, strategically placed GPUs — both on the client and server sides — to accelerate parity computation. In contrast to hardware-based approaches, we provide full control over the size, length and location of a RAID array on a per file basis, end-to-end data integrity checking, and parallelization of RAID array reconstruction. We have deployed our system in conjunction with the widely-used Lustre PFS, and show that our approach is feasible and imposes ac- ceptable overhead.

Electron-impact excitation of FeII - Collision strengths and effective collision strengths for low-lying fine-structure forbidden transitions

Context. Absorption or emission lines of Fe II are observed in many astrophysical spectra and accurate atomic data are required to interpret these lines. The calculation of electron-impact excitation rates for transitions among even the lowest lying levels of Fe II is a formidable task for theoreticians.

Aims. In this paper, we present collision strengths and effective collision strengths for electron-impact excitation of Fe II for low-lying forbidden transitions among the lowest 16 fine-structure levels arising from the four LS states 3d(6)4s D-6(e), 3d(7) F-4(e), 3d(6)4s D-4(e), and 3d(7) P-4(e). The effective collision strengths are calculated for a wide range of electron temperatures of astrophysical importance from 30-100 000 K.

Methods. The parallel suite of Breit-Pauli codes are utilised to compute the collision cross sections for electron-impact excitation of Fe II and relativistic terms are included explicitly in both the target and the scattering approximation. 100 LS or 262-jj levels formed from the basis configurations 3d(6)4s, 3d(7), and 3d(6)4p were included in the wavefunction representation of the target, including all doublet, quartet, and sextet terms. Collision strengths for a total of 34191 individual transitions were computed.

Results. A detailed comparison is made with previous theoretical works and significant differences were found to occur in the effective collision strengths, particularly at low temperatures.

Medically unexplained symptoms: The need for effective communication and an integrated care strategy

Much is already known about medically unexplained symptoms (MUS) in terms of incidence, presentation and current treatment. What needs to be urgently addressed is a strategy for dealing with patients and their conditions, particularly when they do not fall neatly into medical frameworks or pathologies where the syndrome can be easily explained. This article will consider the provision of health and social care support for patients with MUS within an interprofessional education context. The author will contend that a sensitive and valued service for this large client group is dependent upon services without professional boundaries and practitioners with a clinical interest that can work together and agree an appropriate way forward in terms of care, support and strategic service provision. The article will support the idea that clear guidelines through the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence can offer clear clinical direction for practitioners working in primary and secondary care settings to work together interprofessionally to ensure a seamless and sensitive service for people with this condition.