Dynamic Belief Elicitation

Who initiates contraception before, at the time or after first sexual intercourse and how does timing of initiation affect future sexual and reproductive health (SRH) outcomes? Earlier initiation was associated with current utilization of more effective contraception, but had no impact on future unintended pregnancy, abortion or sexually transmitted infection rates, while later initiation was linked to higher rates of unintended pregnancies and abortions. Contraceptive behaviour at first intercourse is associated with later SRH outcomes. Data were drawn from the FECOND study, the last national SRH study in France, conducted in 2010-2011 by phone among 8645 individuals aged 15-49 years. Analysis was performed among 1552 women under the age of 30 years who were sexually experienced and had used contraception at some point. We used logistic regression models to identify factors associated with timing of contraception initiation relative to first intercourse (earlier, at the time and later) and its predictive value on future sexual and reproductive outcomes. Timing of contraceptive initiation across all three categories (earlier, at the time and later initiators) was dependent on women's age at the time of the survey, country of birth, education level, ease of discussing sex with mother and age of first sex. Using at the time initiators as a reference, later initiators had higher odds of unintended pregnancy [odds ratio (OR) = 1.8] and abortion (OR = 1.9), while earlier initiators were more likely to be using more effective contraception at the time of the survey (OR = 1.8). The exclusion of sexually inexperienced women, a quarter of which had ever used the pill, may have reduced the scope of our analysis on the relevance of contraceptive initiation for non-contraceptive benefits. The promotion of early initiation of contraception may contribute to long-term use of more effective methods of contraception. The FECOND study was supported by a grant from the French Ministry of Health, a grant from the French National Agency of Research (#ANR-08-BLAN-0286-01; PIs N. Bajos, C Moreau) and funding from the National Institute of Health and Medical Research (INSERM) and the National Institute for Demographic Research (INED). None of the authors have a conflict of interest.

Based on a structured statistical assessment of the implementation outcomes of European Union maize breeding programs, particularly regarding their efforts to enhance the adaptive potential of modern maize genotypes, a set of generalizations and conclusions on the effectiveness of these programs has been formulated. The network of national institutions and genetic-breeding centers across Europe has been analyzed and characterized. These institutions focus on targeted maize breeding using local landraces or base populations, applying mono- or multi-trait selection for resistance to key stress factors that significantly limit the yield potential of Europe’s high-intensity maize hybrids. The content of breeding programs from leading European seed companies –such as KWS, Limagrain, Syngenta, Corteva Agriscience, MAS Seeds, and Euralis (Lidea brand) – has been summarized and reviewed. These programs were specifically assessed regarding the incorporation of current and projected climate change impacts across Europe, with attention to scaling these strategies to other regions. Key traits emphasized included drought and cold tolerance, heat and osmotic stress resistance, and comprehensive tolerance to the most damaging diseases and pests. Over a 45-year evaluation period, the incremental improvements in resistance traits of developed maize hybrids were systematized, focusing on their responses to climatic variability during the growing season, soil fertility requirements, lodging resistance, and resistance to phytophagous pests and phytopathogens. This analysis considered the close relationship between the intensity of stress factors affecting plant growth and development, the realization of bioproductivity, and the dynamics of regional climatic regimes (temperature, water availability, etc.). As a final outcome, the most successful European-bred genotypes in terms of climatic adaptability and abiotic stress resistance were identified. These genotypes have gained recognition both in Europe and globally and are also suitable for cultivation in Ukraine.

In the previous chapter, one-period models were investigated. In Chapter 9 we will turn to a more general setting allowing for economic activity to take place also at intermediate dates between today and the investment horizonT.Before taking that step, however, we will need to introduce some additional material on probability theory. This material deals with the way in which the outcome of a random experiment manifests itself to us or, more precisely, with the level of detail in which information on the outcome of a random experiment is revealed to us. This is particularly important when modelling the fact that with the passage of time we learn more and more about the world we live in. This is also the natural setting in which to introduce the notion of independence, one of the central concepts in probability theory.

Security is rarely a static notion. What is considered to be confidential or untrusted data varies over time according to changing events and states. The static verification of secure information flow has been a popular theme in recent programming language research, but information flow policies considered are based on multilevel security which presents a static view of security levels. In this paper we introduce a very simple mechanism for specifying dynamic information flow policies, flow locks, which specify conditions under which data may be read by a certain actor. The interface between the policy and the code is via instructions which open and close flow locks. We present a type and effect system for an ML-like language with references which permits the completely static verification of flow lock policies, and prove that the system satisfies a semantic security property generalising noninterference. We show that this simple mechanism can represent a number of recently proposed information flow paradigms for declassification.

Introduction: Recent studies have shown that mean platelet volume (MPV) could be used as a biomarker of current disease activity in inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), including both Crohn's disease (CD) and ulcerative colitis (UC). To date, studies evaluating MPV as a biomarker for future disease outcomes are limited. The objectives of this study were to first determine the association between MPV and need for surgery retrospectively, and secondly, to prospectively evaluate if MPV could be used as a prognostic biomarker for outcomes in patients with UC following ileal pouch-anal anastomosis (IPAA). Methods: This study evaluated patients from 1970 to 2015 at Cedars-Sinai IBD Center. Patients included in the retrospective portion of the study were those recruited to our IBD biorepository with more than 3 MPVs available. MPV data was evaluated at any time during their disease course. Patients included in the prospective portion of the study were those with UC and who underwent IPAA performed by a single surgeon. MPV data was collected before surgery. One investigator followed patients prospectively after the final stage of their IPAA. Pouchoscopies were performed every three months during the first post-operative year as part of routine surveillance. Final outcome and time to pouch specific complications (defined as months from closure of ileostomy) were recorded. Standard statistical analyses were performed to assess associations between outcome and MPV including age, gender, and ethnicity as covariates. Results: For the retrospective portion of the study, 113 patients who had any IBD-related surgery were compared to 880 patients who did not. Table 1 shows associations between MPV and need for surgery in CD, UC, and IBD overall. 215 patients were included in the prospective part of the study. Average MPV before surgery was 7.37 fL +/- 0.87 fL (normal 9.4-12.3). Table 2 shows the average MPV before surgery for each pouch-specific complication compared to patients with a normal pouch (n=109), which had an average MPV of 7.34 (0.85). The subsequent development of chronic pouchitis (table 2) and average time to development of Crohn's disease (p=0.02) were significantly associated with MPV before surgery.Table: Table. Significant Associations between MPV and Need for SurgeryTable: Table. Logistic Regression for MPV vs. Final Outcome following IPAAConclusion: Our data demonstrated that an inexpensive and commonly used lab parameter, MPV, is associated with need for surgery and, in a prospective cohort, with the development of chronic pouchitis after IPAA. Additional studies will be needed to replicate and extend these findings.

Investigation of the performance of the self-centering steel plate shear wall considering stress relaxation in pre-stressed cables

In the measurement-based model of quantum computing, a one-way quantum computer consisting of many qubits can be immersed in a common environment as a simple decoherence mechanism. This paper studies the dynamics of entanglement witness for 3-qubit cluster states in the common environment. The result shows that environment can induce an interesting feature in the time evolution of the entanglement witness: i.e., the periodical collapse and revival of the entanglement dynamics.

A model is developed to explain the effect of national context on risk-related decisions. An essential feature of risk-related decisions is substantial uncertainty, or inadequate information, as well as significant consequences regarding future outcomes. We argue that differences in information flows and consequences across national institutional environments affect the perceived uncertainty of decision situations. For this reason, the institutional environment in which managers reside should play a fundamental and systematic role in influencing their perceptions of risk. We test our model on managers from two environments that contrast in terms of information and consequences related to risk, a free-market economy (the U.S.) and a centrally planned economy (the Czech Republic in 1992). Our results indicate that the institutional environment does indeed play a strong and systematic role in explaining managers’ risk-related decisions. Thus, national environment appears to be an important contextual condition to which the propensity to take risks is sensitive.

Intermittency acceleration of water droplet population dynamics inside the interfacial layer between cloudy and clear air environments

The paper considers an approach to the construction of fuzzy structured numerical sets based on the formation of a fuzzy original of a special type with subsequent replication on the number axis. The constructive principle of fuzzy original formalization is to define a fuzzy triangular number with the appropriate support. A variant of the formation of fuzzy numerical sets, formalizing the "fast" and "slow" passage of time, is proposed. The developed technique allows us to propose a solution to the problem associated with the formalization of the subjective perception of the time reference in processes involving a person, to obtain results and evaluate the impact of fuzzy description and taking into account the dynamics of the time reference on the solution of various optimization problems. A general approach to the formation and solution of fuzzy linear optimization problems is considered, the transition from fuzzy to parametric formulation in the Bellman-Zade form is described. Examples of the use of fuzzy flow of time for different statements of tasks that arise when determining the order of the set of tasks within a given time interval with or without additional restrictions on the execution process are considered. An approach is proposed for the correction of the initial time distribution plans, taking into account different rates of time counting. A mathematical model of the fuzzy traveling salesman problem is formulated as a problem of finding a route to visit a given number of cities without repetitions with a minimum travel time with time parameters specified as right fuzzy numbers, the support value in which depends on various external conditions and factors. The results of calculations of solutions of fuzzy optimization problems are obtained. The influence of the speed of the passage of time on the solution of the considered optimization problems is determined.

IntroductionRare genetic neurodevelopmental disorders and intellectual disability (ID), collectively called genetic ID (GID), can profoundly impact daily functioning and overall well-being of affected individuals. To improve our understanding of the impact of GID and advancing both care and research, measuring relevant patient reported outcomes (PROs) is crucial. Currently, various PROs are measured for GID. Given the shared comorbidities across disorders, we aim to develop a generic core PRO set for children and adults with GID.Methods and resultsDeveloping the generic core PRO set entails the following steps: 1) providing an overview of potentially relevant PROs by scoping reviews and qualitative research; 2) integrating and conceptualizing these PROs (i.e., describing the content of the PROs in detail) into a pilot generic core PRO set; and 3) prioritizing relevant PROs by a European Delphi survey and consensus meetings.ConclusionsThis protocol presents the steps for developing a generic core PRO set for children and adults with GID. The next step involves selecting suitable patient reported outcome measures (PROMs) to adequately measure these PROs: the generic core PROM set. This generic core PROM set needs validation in the GID population, and eventually implementation in care and research, facilitating the aggregation and analysis of PRO data and guaranteeing continuous integration of the patient perspective in both care and research.

The extensive recent research in protocols development for wireless networks must be complemented with simple yet efficient prototyping and evaluation mechanism. MiNT-2 is a miniaturized multi-hop wireless network testbed that addresses this challenge by combining the benefits of existing protocol evaluations strategies: simulations and custom built large scale wireless network testbeds. A key component of MiNT-2 is the ability of testbed nodes to move around in the testbed space, whether to reconfigure the network topology or to emulate node mobility patterns. Consequently, we need to devise accurate mechanisms for node localization - the ability of a node to be aware of its exact location in the testbed space. This paper presents the details of the current RFID-based node localization mechanism in MiNT-2. We describe the sources of inaccuracy encountered when using RFID tags due to the error margin associated with the reading range of tags. We then present the implementation and evaluation of two approaches which can be combined to improve the overall accuracy of the RFID-based localization system. Through our experimental evaluation, we show that the proposed approaches improve the accuracy of RFID-based localization mechanisms by up to 58.22% for dense deployment of RFID tags. Though described in the context of the MiNT-2 testbed, our localization techniques are also applicable in more general settings where accurate and inexpensive positioning of mobile nodes is important.

Semantic image segmentation is a problem of simultaneous segmentation and recognition of an input image into regions and their associated categorical labels, such as person, car or cow. A popular way to achieve this goal is to assign a label to every pixel in the input image and impose simple structural constraints on the output label space. Efficient approximation algorithms for solving this labelling problem such as α-expansion have, at best, linear runtime complexity with respect to the number of labels, making them practical only when working in a specific domain that has few classes-of-interest. However when working in a more general setting where the number of classes could easily reach tens of thousands, sub-linear complexity is desired. In this paper we propose meeting this requirement by performing cascaded inference that wraps around the α-expansion algorithm. The cascade both divides the large label set into smaller more manageable ones by way of a hierarchy, and dynamically subdivides the image into smaller and smaller regions during inference. We test our method on the SUN09 dataset with 107 accurately hand labelled classes.

In theory, remote attestation is a powerful primitive for building distributed systems atop untrusting peers. Unfortunately, the canonical attestation framework defined by the Trusted Computing Group is insufficient to express rich contextual relationships between client-side software components. Thus, attestors and verifiers must rely on ad-hoc mechanisms to handle real-world attestation challenges like attestors that load executables in nondeterministic orders, or verifiers that require attestors to track dynamic information flows between attestor-side components.In this paper, we survey these practical attestation challenges. We then describe a new attestation framework, named Cobweb, which handles these challenges. The key insight is that real-world attestation is a graph problem. An attestation message is a graph in which each vertex is a software component, and has one or more labels, e.g., the hash value of the component, or the raw file data, or a signature over that data. Each edge in an attestation graph is a contextual relationship, like the passage of time, or a parent/child fork() relationship, or a sender/receiver IPC relationship. Cobweb's verifier-side policies are graph predicates which analyze contextual relationships. Experiments with real, complex software stacks demonstrate that Cobweb's abstractions are generic and can support a variety of real-world policies.

Quantitative information flow measurement techniques have been proven to be successful in detecting leakage of confidential information from programs. Modern approaches are based on formal methods, relying on program analysis to produce a SAT formula representing the program’s behavior, and model counting to measure the possible information flow. However, while program analysis scales to large codebases like the OpenSSL project, the formulas produced are too complex for analysis with precise model counting. In this paper we use the approximate model counter ApproxMC2 to quantify information flow. We show that ApproxMC2 is able to provide a large performance increase for a very small loss of precision, allowing the analysis of SAT formulas produced from complex code. We call the resulting technique ApproxFlow and test it on a large set of benchmarks against the state of the art. Finally, we show that ApproxFlow can evaluate the leakage incurred by the Heartbleed OpenSSL bug, contrarily to the state of the art.