Search

Predicting drought severity is essential for drought management and early warning systems. Although numerous physical model-based and data-driven methods have been put forward for drought prediction, their abilities are largely constrained by data requirements and modeling complexity. There remains a challenging task to efficiently predict categorial drought, especially for the U.S. Drought Monitor (USDM). Aiming at this issue, multiple Markov chains for USDM-based categorial drought prediction are successfully proposed and evaluated in this paper. In particular, this study concentrated on how the Markov order, step size, and training set length affected prediction accuracy (PA). According to experiments from 2000 to 2021, it was found that the 1-step and first-order Markov models had the best accuracy in predicting droughts up to 4 weeks ahead. The PA steadily dropped with increasing step size, and the average accuracy at monthly scale was 88%. In terms of seasonal variability, summer (July-August) had the lowest PA while winter had the highest (January-February). In comparison with the western region, the PA in the eastern United States is 25% higher. Moreover, the length of the training set had an obvious impact on the PA of the model. The PA in 1-step prediction was 87% and 78% under 20- and 5-yr training sets, respectively. The results of the study showed that Markov models predicted categorical drought with high accuracy in the short term and showed different performances on time and space scales. Proper use of Markov models would help disaster managers and policy makers to put mitigation policies and measures into practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) represent a group of childhood neurodevelopmental disorders that affect 1 in 88 children in the US. Previous exome sequencing studies on family trios have implicated a role for rare, de-novo mutations in the pathogenesis of autism. Methods: To examine the utility of whole-genome sequencing to identify inherited disease candidate variants and genes, we sequenced two probands from a large pedigree, including two parents and eight children. We evaluated multiple analytical strategies to identify a prioritized list of candidate genes. Results: By assuming a recessive model of inheritance, we identified seven candidate genes shared by the two probands. We also evaluated a different analytical strategy that does not require the assumption of disease model, and identified a list of 59 candidate variants that may increase susceptibility to autism. Manual examination of this list identified ANK3 as the most likely candidate gene. Finally, we identified 33 prioritized non-coding variants such as those near SMG6 and COQ5, based on evolutionary constraint and experimental evidence from ENCODE. Although we were unable to confirm rigorously whether any of these genes indeed contribute to the disease, our analysis provides a prioritized shortlist for further validation studies. Conclusions: Our study represents one of the first whole-genome sequencing studies in autism leveraging a large family-based pedigree. These results provide for a discussion on the relative merits of finding de-novo mutations in sporadic cases versus finding inherited mutations in large pedigrees, in the context of neuropsychiatric and neurodevelopmental diseases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Prevalence of hypovitaminosis D from previous NHANES reports did not account for assay changes and drifts over time. Thus, published NHANES reports on vitamin D status for the U.S. population were likely either over- or underestimated. We investigated changes in vitamin D status in the U.S. using assay-adjusted serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D [25(OH)D] data from NHANES, 1988-1994 (n = 18,641) and three cycles of NHANES, 2001-2006 (n = 23,424). Changes in geometric mean serum 25(OH)D and prevalence estimates for various serum 25(OH)D cut points (<25, <30, <40, <50, and <75 nmol/L) were determined. From 1988-1994 to 2001-2006, geometric mean serum 25(OH)D significantly decreased by 9% in all participants, 12% in men, 14% in blacks, 16% in 12-to 1 5-y-old adolescents, 16% in 20- to 30-y-old adults, 13% in nonsupplement users, and 12% in persons with BMI >80th percentile (P < 0.001). From 1988-1 994 to 2001-2006, prevalence of serum 25(OH)D <30 nmol/L increased from 5 to 10% in all participants, from 3 to 8% in men, from 22 to 38% in blacks, from 3 to 8% in 12- to 15-y-old adolescents, from 5 to 12% in 20- to 30-y-old adults, from 6 to 14% in nonsupplement users, and from 8 to 17% in persons with BMI >80th percentile (P < 0.001). Previous NHANES reports overestimated the increase in prevalence of hypovitaminosis D. The recent decline in vitamin D status in the U.S. is more likely due to increased prevalence of obesity and other lifestyle changes but not to changes in milk consumption. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Prevalence of hypovitaminosis D from previous NHANES reports did not account for assay changes and drifts over time. Thus, published NHANES reports on vitamin D status for the U.S. population were likely either over- or underestimated. We investigated changes in vitamin D status in the U.S. using assay-adjusted serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D [25(OH)D] data from NHANES, 1988-1994 (n = 18,641) and three cycles of NHANES, 2001-2006 (n = 23,424). Changes in geometric mean serum 25(OH)D and prevalence estimates for various serum 25(OH)D cut points (<25, <30, <40, <50, and <75 nmol/L) were determined. From 1988-1994 to 2001-2006, geometric mean serum 25(OH)D significantly decreased by 9% in all participants, 12% in men, 14% in blacks, 16% in 12-to 1 5-y-old adolescents, 16% in 20- to 30-y-old adults, 13% in nonsupplement users, and 12% in persons with BMI >80th percentile (P < 0.001). From 1988-1 994 to 2001-2006, prevalence of serum 25(OH)D <30 nmol/L increased from 5 to 10% in all participants, from 3 to 8% in men, from 22 to 38% in blacks, from 3 to 8% in 12- to 15-y-old adolescents, from 5 to 12% in 20- to 30-y-old adults, from 6 to 14% in nonsupplement users, and from 8 to 17% in persons with BMI >80th percentile (P < 0.001). Previous NHANES reports overestimated the increase in prevalence of hypovitaminosis D. The recent decline in vitamin D status in the U.S. is more likely due to increased prevalence of obesity and other lifestyle changes but not to changes in milk consumption. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using a mixed methods approach, we explore the main narrative themes conveyed by the public, via microblogging platform Twitter, in regard to foreign interferences in the U.S. presidential elections of 2016 and 2020. Our findings show that rather than expressing serious concerns about foreign threats to the United States' democracy and its electoral process, the tweets reflected the political polarization that has come to characterize the American public. Rather than perceiving the interferences as a national security issue, the public appeared to selectively use the foreign threats to bolster their partisan positions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Superradiance and subradiance concerning enhanced and inhibited collective radiation of an ensemble of atoms have been a central topic in quantum optics. However, precise generation and control of these states remain challenging. Here we deterministically generate up to 10-qubit superradiant and 8-qubit subradiant states, each containing a single excitation, in a superconducting quantum circuit with multiple qubits interconnected by a cavity resonator. The √N-scaling enhancement of the coupling strength between the superradiant states and the cavity is validated. By applying an appropriate phase gate on each qubit, we are able to switch the single collective excitation between superradiant and subradiant states. While the subradiant states containing a single excitation are forbidden from emitting photons, we demonstrate that they can still absorb photons from the resonator. However, for an even number of qubits, a singlet state with half of the qubits being excited can neither emit nor absorb photons, which is verified with 4 qubits. This study is a step forward in coherent control of collective radiation and has promising applications in quantum information processing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most estimates in the literature for the economic cost of treating a diabetic foot ulcer (DFU) are from industrialized countries. There is also marked heterogeneity between the complexity of cases considered in the different studies. The goal of the present article was to estimate treatment costs and costs to patients in five different countries (Chile, China, India, Tanzania, and the United States) for two hypothetical, but well-defined, DFUs at the extreme ends of the complexity spectrum. A co-author, who is a treating physician in the relevant country, was asked to choose treatment plans that represented the typical application of local resources to the DFU. The outcomes were pre-defined as complete healing in case 1 and trans-tibial amputation in case 2, but the time course of treatment was determined by each investigator in a manner that would be typical for their clinic. The costs, in local currencies, for each course of treatment were estimated with the assistance of local hospital administrators. Typical reimbursement scenarios in each country were used to estimate the cost burden to the patient, which was then expressed as a percentage of the annual per capita purchasing power parity-adjusted gross domestic product. There were marked differences in the treatment plans between countries based on the availability of resources and the realities of local conditions. The costs of treatment for case 1 ranged from Int$102 to Int$3959 in Tanzania and in the United States, respectively. The cost for case 2 ranged from Int$3060 to Int$188,645 in Tanzania and in the United States, respectively. The cost burden to the patient varied from the equivalent of 6 days of average income in the United States for case 1 to 5.7 years of average annual income for case 2 in India. Although these findings do not take cost-effectiveness into account, they highlight the dramatic economic burden of a DFU for patients in some countries., (Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.)