Operational Interpretation Research Articles

Diagnostic reproducibility of epinephrine drug challenge interpretation in suspected long QT syndrome

The epinephrine challenge has been proposed to improve the diagnosis of congenital long QT syndrome (LQTS). The aim of the study was to evaluate the diagnostic reliability of the epinephrine provocative test for LQTS diagnosis, taking into consideration intra- and interobserver variability in the interpretation of the test. A retrospective analysis of 79 consecutive epinephrine provocative tests was conducted. Epinephrine was administered following a standardized protocol at two doses: 0.05 and 0.10 µg kg-1 min-1 . Electrocardiograms were blindly read twice by three different operators at ≥1-week interval. QT and RR intervals were collected at rest and at each dose, as well as final operator interpretation of the test. There was a high interobserver reproducibility of corrected QT measurements with an intraclass correlation (ICC) of 0.74 (95% confidence interval, 0.66-0.80) but a low interobserver reproducibility on the final interpretation with a κ of 0.31. Intraobserver reproducibility of corrected QT was very good (ICC 0.93; 0.91-0.95), but still resulted in an only moderate intraobserver reproducibility in the final diagnosis (κ of 0.47). Perceived certainty of at least 1 reading by 2 operators (N = 62 tests) increased interobserver reproducibility compared with baseline (κ = 0.43). Inter- and intraobserver agreement in the interpretation of the epinephrine provocation test for LQTS is poor to modest. Complexity in interpretation varies from one case to the next. The low reliability of this test encourages a reconsideration of its importance in the clinical management of patients with suspected LQTS.

Boltzmann collision operator for the infinite range potential: A limit problem

The conventional Boltzmann collision operator for the infinite range inverse power law model was derived by Maxwell by adopting a collision kernel which is a limit of that for the finite range model by ignoring the glancing angles. Since the interpretation of collision operator for the infinite range potential through limit process to the one with finite range potential is natural in regard to the derivation of the Boltzmann equation. It is the purpose of this paper to clarify the physical meaning of the conventional collision operator for the infinite range inverse power law model through the study of the limiting process of the collision operator as the cutoff radius tends to infinity. We first estimate the extent in which the glancing angles can be ignored in the limiting process. Furthermore we prove that taking limit to collision operator with finite range potential directly will lead to the conventional one with algebraic convergence rate.

Inequivalent multipartite coherence classes and two operational coherence monotones

Quantum coherence has received significant attention in recent years, but its study is mostly conducted in single party settings. In this paper, we generalize important results in multipartite entanglement theory to their counterparts in quantum coherence theory. First, we give a necessary and sufficient condition for when two pure multipartite states are equivalent under local quantum incoherent operations and classical communication (LICC), i.e., two states can be deterministically transformed to each other under LICC operations. Next, we investigate and give the conditions in which such a transformation succeeds only stochastically. Different from entanglement case for two-qubit states, we find that the SLICC equivalence classes are infinite. Moreover, it's possible that there are some classes of states in multipartite entanglement can convert into each other, while, they cannot convert into each other in multipartite coherence. In order to show the difference among SLICC classes, we introduce two coherence monotones: accessible coherence and source coherence, following the logistics given in [\emph{Phys.~Rev.~Lett. 115,~150502 (2015)}]. These coherence monotones have a straightforward operational interpretation, namely, the accessible coherence characterizes the proficiency of a state to generate other states via quantum incoherent operations, while the source coherence characterizes the set of states that can be reached via quantum incoherent operations acting on the given state of interest.

All Sets of Incompatible Measurements give an Advantage in Quantum State Discrimination.

Some quantum measurements cannot be performed simultaneously; i.e., they are incompatible. Here we show that every set of incompatible measurements provides an advantage over compatible ones in a suitably chosen quantum state discrimination task. This is proven by showing that the robustness of incompatibility, a quantifier of how much noise a set of measurements tolerates before becoming compatible, has an operational interpretation as the advantage in an optimally chosen discrimination task. We also show that if we take a resource-theory perspective of measurement incompatibility, then the guessing probability in discrimination tasks of this type forms a complete set of monotones that completely characterize the partial order in the resource theory. Finally, we make use of previously known relations between measurement incompatibility and Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen steering to also relate the latter with quantum state discrimination.

Quantifying quantum non-Markovianity via max-relative entropy**Project supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 11671244) and the Research Funds for the Central Universities (Grant Nos. 2016TS060 and 2016CBY003).

We investigate the non-Markovian behavior in open quantum systems from an information-theoretic perspective. Our main tool is the max-relative entropy, which quantifies the maximum probability with which a state ρ can appear in a convex decomposition of a state σ. This operational interpretation provides a new view for the non-Markovian process. We also find that max-relative entropy can be the witness and measure of non-Markovian processes. As applications, some examples are also given and compared with other measures in this paper.

Fast diagnosis of sporotrichosis caused by Sporothrix globosa, Sporothrix schenckii, and Sporothrix brasiliensis based on multiplex real-time PCR.

The accurate diagnosis of sporotrichosis and identification at the species level are critical for public health and appropriate patient management. Compared with morphological identification methods, molecular diagnostic tests are rapid and have high sensitivity and standardized operating processes. Therefore, we designed a novel multiplex real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR) method based on the calmodulin (CAL) gene for the identification of clinically relevant Sporothrix species: S. globosa, S. schenckii s. str., and S. brasiliensis. We evaluated the assay with clinical and spiked samples and assessed its diagnostic performance by comparing the results to those of culture and species-specific PCR. Thirty-three DNA templates were used to detect assay specificity, and three plasmids were constructed to create a standard curve and determine the limits of detection (LODs). For nucleic acid detection, the sensitivity and specificity reached 100%. The LODs were 10 copies, 10 copies and 100 copies for S. globosa, S. schenckii s. str and S. brasiliensis, respectively. For the clinical samples, the positive detection rates by culture, species-specific PCR and the multiplex real-time PCR assay were 87.9% (29/33), 39.4% (13/33), and 93.9% (31/33), respectively. For the spiked samples, the positive detection rates were both 100% for S. schenckii s. str and S. brasiliensis. Based on the above results, compared with culture and other molecular diagnosis methods, the novel multiplex real-time PCR assay is effective, fast, accurate, and highly sensitive. It has a lower reaction cost and lower sample volume requirements, can detect co-infections, and allows for standardized operation and easier interpretation of results. In the future, this assay could be developed into a commercial kit for the diagnosis and identification of S. globosa, S. schenckii s. str, and S. brasiliensis.

Ultrasound Signal Processing Technique for Subcutaneous-Fat and Muscle Thicknesses Measurements

Accurate body-composition measurements are important for diagnosing health status. Devices used for body-composition measurement should be easily accessible for patient diagnosis whilst realizing high inter- and intra-operator accuracies for repetitive measurements. Dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) have been considered as a gold-standard method. However, these methods have disadvantages such as limited accessibility, high costs, and long scanning times. Ultrasound imaging is an alternative technique for body-composition measurement owing to its easy accessibility and convenience of use. Current ultrasound imaging techniques identify the interface between different tissue layers based on echogenicity changes observed in ultrasound images. Their measurement accuracies, therefore, depend on the ultrasound image quality and operator interpretation. Radio-frequency (RF) signals obtained directly from an ultrasound system ensure the reproducibility of measurements. However, RF signals contain substantial noise, and signal processing is fundamental in body-composition measurements. This study proposes an ultrasound signal processing technique to measure body composition. Backscattered RF signals in ex vivo swine-tissue samples were first acquired from an ultrasound system. Subsequently, interfaces of subcutaneous-fat, muscle, and bone were identified during RF signal processing. Next, subcutaneous-fat and muscle thicknesses were calculated based on the speed of sound through tissue. Lastly, the subcutaneous-fat and muscle thicknesses measured using ultrasound signals were validated using MRI scans. A strong linear correlation was observed between the proposed ultrasound method and MRI. Thickness correlations between ultrasound and MRI were observed to be 0.899 and 0.982 for subcutaneous-fat and muscle, respectively. The proposed technique, therefore, demonstrates clinical potential for body-composition measurements.

Independence of metrological operations: the relevance of datum systems in GD&T

Nowadays most of the technical drawings, to be complete, must contain information that allows a correct reading about its functionality, and simultaneously the correct interpretation for manufacturing and assembly operations: It is desirable that information allow a definition of manufacturing and assembly sequences to create conditions that lead to more probabilities to avoid production errors. With the increase of the use of geometrical tolerances, the inspection operations are essentially coordinate metrology. So, as to manufacturing and assembly, also to inspection is imperative the definition of a correct sequence of operations, which are dependent of adequate datum systems, to avoid “circular” references that may be a source of coupled operations. An important condition to produce parts with quality is using the same reference systems (datum system) to all operations in manufacturing, in assembly and in inspection. This is obtained in the design phase and this is possible with GD&T - which is a true engineering language – using the independence concept of Axiomatic Design. In this paper is presented a case that illustrates the application of the independence axiom as a contribute to an adequate application of GD&T, which points to a correct sequence of inspection operations.

О математической модели неизотермического ползущего течения жидкости через заданную область

Рассматривается математическая модель, описывающая стационарное ползущее течение неравномерно нагретой несжимаемой жидкости через ограниченную трехмерную область с локально-липшицевой границей. Выбранная модель представляет собой систему нелинейных дифференциальных уравнений в частных производных второго порядка со смешанными краевыми условиями: на участке протекания заданы давление, температура и касательная составляющая поля скоростей, а на твердых стенках сосуда используется условие прилипания и краевое условие типа Робена для температуры. Для данной краевой задачи вводится понятие слабого решения (пара «скорость-температура»), которое определяется как решение некоторой системы интегральных тождеств. Основной результат работы - теорема о существовании слабых решений в подпространстве декартова произведения двух соболевских пространств. Для доказательства этой теоремы дается операторная трактовка краевой задачи, выводятся априорные оценки решений и применяется теорема Лерэ-Шаудера о неподвижной точке вполне непрерывного отображения. Установлены энергетические равенства, которым удовлетворяют слабые решения.

Wehrl-entropy-based quantification of nonclassicality for single-mode quantum optical states

Nonclassical states of a quantized light are described in terms of Glauber–Sudarshan distribution, which is not a genuine classical probability distribution. Despite several attempts, defining a uniform measure of nonclassicality (NC) for the single-mode quantum states of light remains an open task. In our previous work Bose and Sanjay Kumar (2017 Phys. Rev. A 95 012330), we have shown that the existing well-known measures fail to quantify the NC of single-mode states that are generated under multiple NC-inducing operations. In this paper, we propose a new quantification of NC for the single-mode quantum states as the difference between the total Wehrl entropy of the state and the maximum Wehrl entropy arising due to its classical characteristics. The classical reference state is chosen at the same randomness, given by the von-Neumann entropy, as the state itself. We further suggest operational interpretation of the proposed measure in terms of phase-space sampling entropy, as well as potential to generate entanglement in the case of pure states. We obtain analytic expressions of NC for pure states and Gaussian mixed states. We show that, along with the states generated under single NC-inducing operations as well as the broader class of states that are generated under multiple NC-inducing operations, our quantification enumerates the NC consistently. However, the evaluation of NC for the non-Gaussian mixed states is subject to extensive numerical computation that lies beyond the scope of the current work. We finally conclude with certain open questions.

Quantum and non-signalling graph isomorphisms

We introduce the (G,H)-isomorphism game, a new two-player non-local game that classical players can win with certainty iff the graphs G and H are isomorphic. We then define quantum and non-signalling isomorphisms by considering perfect quantum and non-signalling strategies for this game. We prove that non-signalling isomorphism coincides with fractional isomorphism, giving the latter an operational interpretation. We show that quantum isomorphism is equivalent to the feasibility of two polynomial systems obtained by relaxing standard integer programs for graph isomorphism to Hermitian variables. Finally, we provide a reduction from linear binary constraint system games to isomorphism games. This reduction provides examples of quantum isomorphic graphs that are not isomorphic, implies that the tensor product and commuting operator frameworks result in different notions of quantum isomorphism, and proves that both relations are undecidable.

On Interpretational Questions for Quantum-Like Modeling of Social Lasing.

The recent years were characterized by increasing interest to applications of the quantum formalism outside physics, e.g., in psychology, decision-making, socio-political studies. To distinguish such approach from quantum physics, it is called quantum-like. It is applied to modeling socio-political processes on the basis of the social laser model describing stimulated amplification of social actions. The main aim of this paper is establishing the socio-psychological interpretations of the quantum notions playing the basic role in lasing modeling. By using the Copenhagen interpretation and the operational approach to the quantum formalism, we analyze the notion of the social energy. Quantum formalizations of such notions as a social atom, s-atom, and an information field are presented. The operational approach based on the creation and annihilation operators is used. We also introduce the notion of the social color of information excitations representing characteristics linked to lasing coherence of the type of collimation. The Bose–Einstein statistics of excitations is coupled with the bandwagon effect, one of the basic effects of social psychology. By using the operational interpretation of the social energy, we present the thermodynamical derivation of this quantum statistics. The crucial role of information overload generated by the modern mass-media is emphasized. In physics laser’s resonator, the optical cavity, plays the crucial role in amplification. We model the functioning of social laser’s resonator by “distilling” the physical scheme from connection with optics. As the mathematical basis, we use the master equation for the density operator for the quantum information field.

Bimonoidal Structure of Probability Monads

We give a conceptual treatment of the notion of joints, marginals, and independence in the setting of categorical probability. This is achieved by endowing the usual probability monads (like the Giry monad) with a monoidal and an opmonoidal structure, mutually compatible (i.e. a bimonoidal structure). If the underlying monoidal category is cartesian monoidal, a bimonoidal structure is given uniquely by a commutative strength. However, if the underlying monoidal category is not cartesian monoidal, a strength is not enough to guarantee all the desired properties of joints and marginals. A bimonoidal structure is then the correct requirement for the more general case.We explain the theory and the operational interpretation, with the help of the graphical calculus for monoidal categories. We give a definition of stochastic independence based on the bimonoidal structure, compatible with the intuition and with other approaches in the literature for cartesian monoidal categories. We then show as an example that the Kantorovich monad on the category of complete metric spaces is a bimonoidal monad for a non-cartesian monoidal structure.

Accuracy and reliability of bedside thoracic ultrasound in detecting pulmonary pathology in a heterogeneous pediatric intensive care unit population.

This study was designed to access sensitivity and specificity of detection of lung abnormalities by the ultrasound (US) done by PICU providers of varying levels of experience compared to CXR and to assess the inter-rater reliability in the interpretation of the USG findings. Up to three US examinations were performed on patients meeting eligibility criteria. US examinations were reported by the operator and remotely by an expert reader. Both operator and readers interpretation were correlated with CXR read by an independent pulmonologist. One hundred and thirty-five US examinations were performed on 91 patients over 9 months. Overall agreement between the operator and reader of the US was 0.53 (0.38-0.68). The agreement was highest with an expert-expert pair (0.75) and lowest with a novice-expert pair (0.27). Sensitivity and specificity of thoracic US to detect pulmonary abnormalities showed a high sensitivity by the operator (82.5%) compared to the reader (63.4%). Specificity was 25% and 42.8%, respectively. US was overall highly sensitive to detect pneumonia (96.4%) with a 100% PPV, but only modest for bronchiolitis. Lungs US is a rapid and sensitive bedside tool to assess lung consolidation in children in ICU. It, however, has low negative predictive values, and negative US examinations cannot rule out lung pathology.

The Conditional Common Information in Classical and Quantum Secret Key Distillation

In this paper, we consider two extensions of the Gacs–Korner common information to three variables, the conditional common information (cCI) and the coarse-grained conditional common information (ccCI). Both quantities are shown to be useful technical tools in the study of classical and quantum resource transformations. In particular, the ccCI is shown to have an operational interpretation as the optimal rate of secret key extraction from an eavesdropped classical source $p_{XYZ}$ when Alice ( $X$ ) and Bob ( $Y$ ) are unable to communicate but share common randomness with the eavesdropper Eve ( $Z$ ). Moving to the quantum setting, we consider two different ways of generating a tripartite quantum state from classical correlations $p_{XYZ}$ : 1) coherent encodings $\sum _{xyz}\sqrt {p_{xyz}} |xyz\rangle $ and 2) incoherent encodings $\sum _{xyz}p_{xyz} |xyz\rangle \langle xyz|$ . We study how well can Alice and Bob extract secret key from these quantum sources using quantum operations compared with the extraction of key from the underlying classical sources $p_{XYZ}$ using classical operations. While the power of quantum mechanics increases Alice and Bob’s ability to generate shared randomness, it also equips Eve with a greater arsenal of eavesdropping attacks. Therefore, it is not obvious who gains the greatest advantage for distilling secret key when replacing a classical source with a quantum one. We first demonstrate that the classical key rate of $p_{XYZ}$ is equivalent to the quantum key rate for an incoherent quantum encoding of the distribution. For coherent encodings, we next show that the classical and quantum rates are generally incomparable, and in fact, their difference can be arbitrarily large in either direction. Finally, we introduce a “zoo” of entangled tripartite states all characterized by the conditional common information of their encoded probability distributions. Remarkably, for these states almost all entanglement measures, such as Alice and Bob’s entanglement cost, squashed entanglement, and relative entropy of entanglement, can be sharply bounded or even exactly expressed in terms of the conditional common information. In the latter case, we thus present a rare instance in which the various entropic entanglement measures of a quantum state can be explicitly calculated.

Deconstruction and conditional erasure of quantum correlations

We define the deconstruction cost of a tripartite quantum state on systems $ABE$ as the minimum rate of noise needed to apply to the $AE$ systems, such that there is negligible disturbance to the marginal state on the $BE$ systems, while the system $A$ of the resulting state is locally recoverable from the $E$ system alone. We refer to such actions as deconstruction operations and protocols implementing them as state deconstruction protocols. State deconstruction generalizes Landauer erasure of a single-party quantum state as well the erasure of correlations of a two-party quantum state. We find that the deconstruction cost of a tripartite quantum state on systems $ABE$ is equal to its conditional quantum mutual information (CQMI) $I(A;B|E)$, thus giving the CQMI an operational interpretation in terms of a state deconstruction protocol. We also define a related task called conditional erasure, in which the goal is to apply noise to systems $AE$ in order to decouple system $A$ from systems $BE$, while causing negligible disturbance to the marginal state of systems $BE$. We find that the optimal rate of noise for conditional erasure is also equal to the CQMI $I(A;B|E)$. State deconstruction and conditional erasure lead to operational interpretations of the quantum discord and squashed entanglement, which are quantum correlation measures based on the CQMI. We find that the quantum discord is equal to the cost of simulating einselection, the process by which a quantum system interacts with an environment, resulting in selective loss of information in the system. The squashed entanglement is equal to half the minimum rate of noise needed for deconstruction/conditional erasure if Alice has available the best possible system $E$ to help in the deconstruction/conditional erasure task.

Mediacja a sądowy typ stosowania prawa. Kontekst „otwierania” procesów decyzyjnych

<p>Paper’s aim deals with the analysis of the features of mediation (treated as a way of solving the legal problems) in the light of properties of the judicial implementation of the law in the context of both the decisional process and the legal reasoning within the operational interpretation of the law. The mediation, being an instrument of the opening of the legal order should be treated as a separate subtype of application of law, differentiated from judicial and administrative types. The indication of the actors operating in it, type of their competence, initiation and the course of the process as well as a way of the building of the decision through the using of axiological and functional rules of legal interpretation and the way in which the decision is justified allow to create an image of the basic elements of mediation in their decisional perspective.</p>

Family of coherence measures and duality between quantum coherence and path distinguishability

Coherence measures and their operational interpretations lay the cornerstone of coherence theory. In this paper, we introduce a class of coherence measures with $\alpha$-affinity, say $\alpha$-affinity of coherence for $\alpha \in (0, 1)$. Furthermore, we obtain the analytic formulae for these coherence measures and study their corresponding convex roof extension. We provide an operational interpretation for $1/2$-affinity of coherence by showing that it is equal to the error probability to discrimination a set of pure states with the least square measurement. Employing this relationship we regain the optimal measurement for equiprobable quantum state discrimination. Moreover, we compare these coherence quantifiers, and establish a complementarity relation between $1/2$-affinity of coherence and path distinguishability for some special cases.

Geometric coherence and quantum state discrimination

The operational meaning of coherence measure lies at the very heart of the coherence theory. In this paper, we provide an operational interpretation for geometric coherence, by proving that the geometric coherence of a quantum state is equal to the minimum error probability to discriminate a set of pure states with von Neumann measurement. On the other hand, we also show that a task to ambiguously discriminate a set of linearly independent pure states can be regarded as a problem of calculating geometric coherence. That is, we reveal an equivalence relation between ambiguous quantum state discrimination and geometric coherence. Based on this equivalence, moreover, we improve the upper bound for geometric coherence and give the explicit expression of geometric coherence for a class of states. Besides, we establish a complementarity relation of geometric coherence and path distinguishability, with which the relationship between l1-norm of coherence and geometric coherence is obtained. Finally, with geometric coherence, we study multiple copies of quantum state discrimination and give an example to show how to discriminate two pure states.

Comparing coherence and entanglement under resource non-generating unitary transformations

Quantum coherence is a fundamental property of quantum systems that can be studied within the framework of a quantum resource theory. From this resource-theoretic approach, many similarities emerge between coherence and quantum entanglement, the latter being another prominent quantum resource. In this paper, we study the relationship between coherence and entanglement from the perspective of resource loss/gain by unitary dynamics. Specifically we consider how much coherence can be either generated or destroyed on a bipartite system when the action is restricted to local unitary (LU) operations. For pure states, we find that the relative entropy of entanglement and the robustness of entanglement provide tight lower bounds on the amount of coherence that can be destroyed by LUs, as measured by the relative entropy and measures of coherence, respectively. This provides new operational interpretations of the entanglement entropy and robustness of entanglement in pure states as the minimal amount of coherence that persists when the system is subjected to LU transformations. We then study the amount of bipartite pure entanglement that can be either maximized or minimized when the action is restricted to a global incoherent operation. For two-qubit pure states, maximum and minimum are shown in terms of coefficients of given state with incoherent basis. Finally we consider a generalized version of the recently introduced CCP of a quantum channel.