Order Restrictions Research Articles

Comparisons between Aquaponic and Conventional Hydroponic Crop Yields: A Meta-Analysis

Aquaponic is a relatively new system of farming, which has received much research attention due to its potential for sustainability. However, there is no consensus on comparability between crop yields obtained from aquaponics (AP) and conventional hydroponics (cHP). Meta-analysis was used to synthesize the literature on studies that compared crop yields of AP and cHP. Factors responsible for differences were also examined through subgroup analysis. A literature search was conducted in five databases with no time restriction in order to capture any publication on AP and cHP crop yield comparisons. The search was, however, limited to journal and conference articles published in English. Study characteristics and outcome measures of food crops were extracted. A natural log response ratio effect size measure was used to transform study outcomes. An unweighted meta-analysis was conducted through bootstrapping to calculate overall effect size and its confidence interval. Between-study heterogeneity (I2) was estimated using a random effects model. Subgroup and meta-regression were used to assess moderators, in an attempt to explain heterogeneity in the effect size. The results showed that although crop yield in AP was lower than conventional cHP, the difference was not statistically significant. However, drawing conclusions on the overall effect size must be done with caution due to the use of unweighted meta-analysis. There were statistically significant effects of aquatic organism, hydroponic system type, and nutrient supplementation used in the studies on crop yield comparisons. Nutrient supplementation, particularly, led to on average higher crop yield in AP relative to cHP. These findings are a vital information source for choosing factors to include in an AP study. These findings also synthesize the current trends in AP crop yields in comparison with cHP.

Higher Order Restrictions of the Immunoglobulin Repertoire in CLL: The Illustrative Case of Stereotyped Subsets #2 and #169

Stereotyped subset #2 (IGHV3-21/IGLV3-21) is the largest subset in CLL (~3% of all patients). Membership in subset #2 is clinically relevant since these patients experience an aggressive disease irrespective of the somatic hypermutation (SHM) status of the clonotypic immunoglobulin heavy variable (IGHV) gene. Low-throughput evidence suggests that stereotyped subset #169, a minor CLL subset (~0.2% of all CLL), resembles subset #2 at the immunogenetic level. More specifically: (i) the clonotypic heavy chain (HC) of subset #169 is encoded by the IGHV3-48 gene which is closely related to the IGHV3-21 gene; (ii) both subsets carry VH CDR3s comprising 9-amino acids (aa) with a conserved aspartic acid (D) at VH CDR3 position 3; (iii) both subsets bear light chains (LC) encoded by the IGLV3-21 gene with a restricted VL CDR3; and, (iv) both subsets have borderline SHM status. Here we comprehensively assessed the ontogenetic relationship between CLL subsets #2 and #169 by analyzing their immunogenetic signatures. Utilizing next-generation sequencing (NGS) we studied the HC and LC gene rearrangements of 6 subset #169 patients and 20 subset #2 cases. In brief, IGHV-IGHD-IGHJ and IGLV-IGLJ gene rearrangements were RT-PCR amplified using subgroup-specific leader primers as well as IGHJ and IGLC primers, respectively. Libraries were sequenced on the MiSeq Illumina instrument. IG sequence annotation was performed with IMGT/HighV-QUEST and metadata analysis conducted using an in-house, validated bioinformatics pipeline. Rearrangements with identical CDR3 aa sequences were herein defined as clonotypes, whereas clonotypes with different aa substitutions within the V-domain were defined as subclones. For the HC analysis of subset #169, we obtained 894,849 productive sequences (mean: 127,836, range: 87,509-208,019). On average, each analyzed sample carried 54 clonotypes (range: 44-68); the dominant clonotype had a mean frequency of 99.1% (range: 98.8-99.2%) and displayed considerable intraclonal heterogeneity with a mean of 2,641 subclones/sample (range: 1,566-6,533). For the LCs of subset #169, we obtained 2,096,728 productive sequences (mean: 299,533, range: 186,637-389,258). LCs carried a higher number of distinct clonotypes/sample compared to their partner HCs (mean: 148, range: 110-205); the dominant clonotype had a mean frequency of 98.1% (range: 97.2-98.6%). Intraclonal heterogeneity was also observed in the LCs, with a mean of 6,325 subclones/sample (range: 4,651-11,444), hence more pronounced than in their partner HCs. Viewing each of the cumulative VH and VL CDR3 sequence datasets as a single entity branching through diversification enabled the identification of common sequences. In particular, 2 VH clonotypes were present in 3/6 cases, while a single VL clonotype was present in all 6 cases, albeit at varying frequencies; interestingly, this VL CDR3 sequence was also detected in all subset #2 cases, underscoring the molecular similarities between the two subsets. Focusing on SHM, the following observations were made: (i) the frequent 3-nucleotide (AGT) deletion evidenced in the VH CDR2 of subset #2 (leading to the deletion of one of 5 consecutive serine residues) was also detected in all subset #169 cases at subclonal level (average: 6% per sample, range: 0.1-10.8%); of note, the 5-serine stretch is also present in the germline VH CDR2 of the IGHV3-48 gene; (ii) the R-to-G substitution at the VL-CL linker, a ubiquitous SHM in subset #2 and previously reported as critical for IG self-association leading to cell autonomous signaling in this subset, was present in all subset #169 samples as a clonal event with a mean frequency of 98.3%; and, finally, (iii) the S-to-G substitution at position 6 of the VL CDR3, present in all subset #2 cases (mean : 44.2% ,range: 6.3-87%), was also found in all #169 samples, representing a clonal event in 1 case (97.2% of all clonotypes) and a subclonal event in the remaining 5 cases (mean: 0.6%, range: 0.4-1.1%). In conclusion, the present high-throughput sequencing data cements the immunogenetic relatedness of CLL stereotyped subsets #2 and #169, further highlighting the role of antigen selection throughout their natural history. These findings also argue for a similar pathophysiology for these subsets that could also be reflected in a similar clonal behavior, with implications for risk stratification. Disclosures Sutton: Abbvie: Honoraria; Gilead: Honoraria; Janssen: Honoraria. Stamatopoulos:Abbvie: Honoraria, Research Funding; Janssen: Honoraria, Research Funding. Chatzidimitriou:Janssen: Honoraria.

968. Effect of Outpatient Antibiotic Ordering Restrictions on Antibiotic Prescribing Patterns at a State-wide VA Healthcare System

BackgroundApproximately 30% of antibiotics prescribed in the outpatient setting are inappropriate, mostly due to unnecessary prescriptions (Rx) for upper respiratory infections. Ordering restrictions is one approach to curtail inappropriate use. However, this approach may cause unintended consequences, such as increases in Rx of higher level antibiotics. This study evaluated the downstream effect of an azithromycin (AZM) ordering restriction.MethodsThis was a pre–post evaluation of the impact of an AZM removal (October 2017) on prescribing patterns of common outpatient antibiotics at the VA Maryland Healthcare System. AZM restriction was placed >10 years ago for concerns of emerging AZM resistance and overuse. During the study period, fluoroquinolone (FQ) use was scrutinized due to increasing toxicity risk. The proportion of several outpatient antibiotic Rx were compared between October 2017 and September 2018 (FY17) and October 2018 and September 30, 2018 (FY18) using χ 2 and logistic regression. FQ and AZM Rx were also stratified by location of prescribing clinic (urban vs. rural) and duration (≤14 days vs. >14 days).ResultsThere were 15,972 and 14,451 prescriptions in FY17 and FY18, respectively. AZM Rx increased from 1,247 (7%) Rx in FY17 to 1,734 (11%) in FY18 (P < 0.0001) with an OR of 1.8 (95% CI 1.65–1.94). There was a greater effect on shorter than longer duration (OR 1.9 vs. 1.3, P < 0.0001), but no significant effect difference for urban and rural clinics (OR 1.8 vs. 1.9, P = 0.6). Conversely, FQ Rx decreased from 2,414 (15%) in FY17 to 1,731 (11%) in FY18 (P < 0.0001) with an OR of 0.7 (95% CI 0.66–0.76). There was a greater effect on shorter than longer duration (0.6 vs. 1.2, P < 0.0001) and also a greater effect on urban than rural clinics (OR 0.6 vs. 0.97, P < 0.0001). Doxycycline, amoxicillin–clavulanate and trimethoprim–sulfamethoxazole did not change significantly.ConclusionRemoval of AZM restriction led to a significant decrease in FQ Rx, with greater effect in shorter duration and urban clinics, and an increase in AZM Rx, with greater effect in shorter duration, but no difference in clinic setting. Disparity of rural prescribers needs further exploration, as do other interventions outside of restrictive ordering, which needs periodic evaluation of risk and benefit if implemented. Disclosures All Authors: No reported Disclosures.

Inference for Weibull competing risks model with partially observed failure causes under generalized progressive hybrid censoring

In this paper, a competing risks model is studied when the latent failure times follow Weibull distribution. When the failure times are observed under generalized progressive hybrid censoring and the causes of failure are partially observed, the maximum likelihood estimators of the model parameters are established together with associated existence and uniqueness, and the approximate confidence intervals are constructed based on large sample theory. Bayes estimators and associated credible intervals are obtained under fairly general priors. Moreover, classical and Bayesian inferences are also discussed when there is an order restriction on the scale parameters of the Weibull distributions. Finally, a simulation study and a real data example are presented for illustration.

Observational constraints of a new unified dark fluid and the H0 tension

ABSTRACT Unified cosmological models have received a lot of attention in astrophysics community for explaining both the dark matter and dark energy evolution. The Chaplygin cosmologies, a well-known name in this group have been investigated matched with observations from different sources. Obviously, Chaplygin cosmologies have to obey restrictions in order to be consistent with the observational data. As a consequence, alternative unified models, differing from Chaplygin model, are of special interest. In the present work, we consider a specific example of such a unified cosmological model, that is quantified by only a single parameter μ, that can be considered as a minimal extension of the Λ-cold dark matter cosmology. We investigate its observational boundaries together with an analysis of the universe at large scale. Our study shows that at early time the model behaves like a dust, and as time evolves, it mimics a dark energy fluid depicting a clear transition from the early decelerating phase to the late cosmic accelerating phase. Finally, the model approaches the cosmological constant boundary in an asymptotic manner. We remark that for the present unified model, the estimations of H0 are slightly higher than its local estimation and thus alleviating the H0 tension.

The Asturian language and the evolution of Romance clausal structure

Abstract Over the past few years, the comprehensive study of syntactic variation across both the Germanic and the Romance branches of languages in relation to the unmarked word order pattern has meant a more in-depth knowledge of the nature of the verb-second phenomenon – an extremely intricate typological concept because of the complex factors that give rise to such a word order restriction. The aim of this paper is to investigate word order phenomena in the Asturian language (Romance, Western Iberian: Spain) from a comparative perspective1 by examining the word order patterns found in a number of documents written over the course of two centuries, with a view to determining what constitutes the unmarked word order and gaining a better understanding of its core syntax. Such a study has entailed collating research on the verb-first, verb-second and subject-verb-object orders. Finally, it aims to shed more light on the evolutionary development of the Romance languages.

On the Design of Experiments with Ordered Treatments

SummaryThere are many situations where one expects an ordering among K ⩾ 2 experimental groups or treatments. Although there is a large body of literature dealing with the analysis under order restrictions, surprisingly, very little work has been done in the context of the design of experiments. Here, a principled approach to the design of experiments with ordered treatments is provided. In particular we propose two classes of designs which are optimal for testing different types of hypotheses. The theoretical findings are supplemented with thorough numerical experimentation and a concrete data example. It is shown that there is a substantial gain in power, or alternatively a reduction in the required sample size, when an experiment is both designed and analysed by using methods which account for order restrictions.

Exploring Sleep Quality, Spiritual Health, and Related Factors in Nurses in the Intensive Care Unit

Nurses in intensive care units (ICUs) care for critically ill and dying patients. The stressful nature of the work performed by these nurses may affect their spiritual health and sleep quality. The purpose of this correlational study was to explore the sleep quality, spiritual health, and related factors in a sample of ICU nurses. A cross-sectional correlational design with stratified random sampling was applied. A total of 170 clinical nurses were recruited from the ICUs of a medical center in northern Taiwan. A demographic characteristics questionnaire, the spiritual health scale-short form, and the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) were used for data collection. The average PSQI score was 7.07, with 62.9% of the participants reporting poor sleep quality. A significantly negative correlation was identified between the spiritual-health-scale item "connections to others" and the PSQI. "Connections to others", "chronic diseases", and "menstrual cycle discomfort" were the important predictive factors of sleep quality in the ICU nurses in this study. The findings of this study support nurses engaging in regular exercise that is both low-intensity and not subject to time or space restrictions in order to help prevent chronic diseases and relieve dysmenorrhea. Furthermore, education and training related to spiritual health should be incorporated into the whole-person education curriculum in order to enhance spiritual status and improve sleep quality.

News by any other name: community radio journalism in India

Abstract Community radio journalism is a cultural resource that offers a voice to local communities and works to democratise media landscapes. Despite its indisputable value, community radio journalism in India faces a unique set of challenges: the foremost being that, officially, it does not exist. According to government policy, community radio stations are prohibited from broadcasting any news and current affairs content. The situation is further complicated by the presence of a development discourse underpinning the entire rationale for the sector. Instead of serving their listeners, community radio stations are beholden to a nebulous ‘development’ agenda. Under such circumstances, it is unsurprising that community radio journalism in India is relatively unexplored in the literature. This paper aims to address this gap by exploring how community radio practitioners in India source content and work around their restrictions in order to provide their listeners with relevant information and news.

Modern high-rise architecture in terms of historical development of Ryazan

Introduction. Preservation of historical and cultural environment is one of the most important tasks nowadays. Nevertheless, a developing city requires the development of architectural and urban environment, which contributes to the emerging of modern objects in historical areas of the city, often discordant. The primary parameter that determines the degree of discordance is the excess of the average height of the building, as well as architectural and stylistic parameters, placement in the structure of the city, etc. The problem of general increase in number of storeys in historical core of the city requires studies, analysis and definition of some restrictions in order to preserve the integrity and authenticity of the historical and cultural environment. Materials and methods. The work is based on the study of contemporary foreign and domestic solution experience of the problem of modern architecture in the conditions of historical construction image. The initial data for the studies were the materials of the current Project of zones of protection of objects of cultural heritage of Ryazan, and project materials developed in 2017. On the basis of field survey and the analysis of photographic images of buildings in the development, the nature and complexity of the architectural composition. Results. In accordance with the current Project of protection zones the most typical examples of multi-storey buildings in the historical context were identified, a characteristic and an assessment of the degree of their discordance were given. Conclusions. The study was aimed to solve the problem of preserving the integrity and authenticity of the historical and cultural environment in the construction of modern multi-storey buildings. The emerging of new buildings in historical core is necessary and inevitable, so, some architectural and urban planning techniques were revealed to reduce the degree of discordance

Complete Solution for Linear Programming Problem in two Variables and One Restriction

Abstract In this work we consider an elementary linear programming problem with one restriction in order to be returned the set of solutions. For this, we include the corresponding source code.

Veto power and power-sharing: insights from Burundi (2000–2018)

ABSTRACTVeto power is a key institutional pillar of consociational power-sharing. However, the literature is divided on its impact for institutional functionality. While the founding father of consociational theory, Arend Lijphart, expects veto rights to be exercised sparingly by segmental elites, more recent scholarship emphasizes the need for restrictions (in terms of veto players, veto issues, veto points and procedure) in order to avoid abusive and disruptive veto practice. Burundi’s transition from ethnic conflict to ethnic pacification was strongly based on the use of military and political power-sharing, including consociationalism. This article examines the design of veto rights and their practice in Burundi over the past two decades. The analysis confirms that the institutional design of veto power matters, but it counters the hypothesis that a too enabling veto design induces the abuse of veto rights and disrupts consociational functionality. The Burundi case-study shows that the impact and “shelf-life” of veto rights are best understood by taking into consideration the intersection of veto power with other power-sharing institutions and practices, both formal and informal.

Novel multilevel techniques for convergence acceleration in the solution of systems of equations arising from RBF-FD meshless discretizations

The present paper develops two new techniques, namely additive correction multicloud (ACMC) and smoothed restriction multicloud (SRMC), for the efficient solution of systems of equations arising from Radial Basis Function-generated Finite Difference (RBF-FD) meshless discretizations of partial differential equations (PDEs). RBF-FD meshless methods employ arbitrary distributed nodes, without the need to generate a mesh, for the numerical solution of PDEs. The proposed techniques are specifically designed for the RBF-FD data structure and employ simple restriction and interpolation strategies in order to obtain a hierarchy of coarse-level node distributions and the corresponding correction equations.Both techniques are kept as simple as possible in terms of code implementation, which is an important feature of meshless methods. The techniques are verified on 2D and 3D Poisson equations, defined on non-trivial domains , showing very high benefits in terms of both time consumption and work to convergence when comparing the present techniques to the most common solver approaches. These benefits make the RBF-FD approach competitive with standard grid-based approaches when the number of nodes is very high, allowing large size problems to be tackled by the RBF-FD method.

Estimation of parameters in the tree order restriction by a randomized decision

ABSTRACTFor estimating the smallest location parameter in the location family of distributions which are constrained by the tree ordering for , the restricted maximum likelihood estimator diverges to as and therefore fails to dominate the corresponding unrestricted estimator in terms of the bias and hence the mean squared error (MSE). In this article, we propose a new procedure for the estimation of the location parameters based on a randomized decision. The proposed randomized estimator of is improved via the smooth approach to construct the better estimator which remains bounded and decreases the growth rate of its bias and MSE. We show in the case of normal distributions that the MSE of the proposed estimator of is less than that of the corresponding unrestricted estimator. By using a simulation study, the performance of the improved estimators is compared with that of the other restricted estimators in terms of three criteria (bias, MSE and coverage probability). The results show that the proposed estimator of is substantially better than that of the alternative estimators. Unlike the other procedures, the proposed method for estimating performs well.

Objective Bayesian comparison of order-constrained models in contingency tables

In social and biomedical sciences, testing in contingency tables often involves order restrictions on cell probabilities parameters. We develop objective Bayes methods for order-constrained testing and model comparison when observations arise under product binomial or multinomial sampling. Specifically, we consider tests for monotone order of the parameters against equality of all parameters. Our strategy combines in a unified way both the intrinsic prior methodology and the encompassing prior approach in order to compute Bayes factors and posterior model probabilities. Performance of our method is evaluated on several simulation studies and real datasets.

Analytical synthesis of elliptic voltage‐mode even/odd‐ n th‐order filter structures using DDCCs, FDCCIIs, and grounded capacitors and resistors

Despite the recent publication of the analytical synthesis of voltage-mode even/odd- n th-order differential difference current conveyor (DDCC) and fully differential current conveyor II (FDCCII)-grounded resistor and capacitor universal Butterworth/Chebyshev filter structures, an elliptic voltage-mode even/odd- n th-order DDCC and FDCCII-based filter structure is yet to be presented in the literature. Under the restriction of a finite order, the elliptic filter is better at meeting the stringent cut-off rate of a very narrow transition band as compared to other kinds of filters, thus making the synthesis of such an elliptic filter to be extremely useful. In this study, one even- n th-order and two odd- n th-order elliptic filter structures are analytically synthesised using DDCCs and FDCCIIs. The feasibility of such structures is validated through H-spice simulations on the proposed elliptic third-order low-pass and elliptic fourth-order low-pass, high-pass, band-pass, and band-reject filters.

A random decision for testing of the homogeneity of normal means against the tree order alternative

Consider the problem of testing the homogeneity of k + 1 normal means under the tree order restriction. In this paper, we propose new multiple comparisons procedures for testing of the tree order constraint. New test procedures with the corresponding simultaneous confidence intervals are motivated by some new estimation methods which are constructed based on a random decision and the Bayesian approach. Also, these procedures are developed for two-sided tree order alternatives. We compare the performance of the proposed methods with some existing test procedures, such as likelihood ratio test and some multiple comparisons tests for the tree order constraint. In some cases, the gains in power due to the proposed procedures can be substantial. The results for two sided alternative are similar to the one-sided hypotheses and two new procedures perform well for almost every configuration. We illustrate the efficiency of the proposed methods by analyzing of the two bioassay numerical examples.

How real are adjective order constraints? Multiple prenominal adjectives at the grammatical interfaces

AbstractAdjective order restrictions on attributive adjectives (AORs) have been subject to debate in modern linguistic research for a long time. Most generally, the question whether AORs can be located in grammar as such in rule-based fashion is still unsettled. In the current paper, we largely argue against this view and claim that several of the core data to be explained are preferences based on norms rather than rules. A pragmatic explanation is offered to account for marked or apparently ungrammatical examples. First, we demarcate AORs in the narrow sense against data based on truth-conditional differences, show the sole hard constraint to be found in a distinction between object- and kind-modification, and introduce several of the factors argued to drive AORs in the literature. A large-scale corpus study on German AAN-phrases shows a hierarchy of relative adjectives preceding absolute ones to reliably predict preferences, while temporariness and weight do not. We then illustrate that norm-based preferences can be overwritten via discourse linking and implement markedness in out-of-the-blue contexts pragmatically based on the M-principle. Speculating that AORs in the narrow sense have their origins in more general cognitive principles, our findings support approaches that locate the better part of AORs outside the realm of core grammar.

Estimation of normal means in the tree order model by the weighting methods

Consider k + 1 independent normal populations with the tree order restriction on the mean parameters. For the tree order model, the restricted estimator of control group parameter is dominated by the unrestricted estimator when the number of treatment groups is large. We discuss two techniques for reducing of mean squared error via to the two weighting methods which are dissimilarity and conditional Bayesian criteria. Based on the bias and mean squared error criteria, the performance of the proposed estimators is compared with the alternative estimators in order to search for a better estimator. Although the superior estimator that uniformly dominates the others does not exist in general, but the proposed estimators dominate the corresponding unrestricted estimator and compete very well with the other alternative estimators introduced by the authors.

Bayesian Estimation of Common Scale Parameter of Two Exponential Populations with Order Restricted Locations

SYNOPTIC ABSTRACTThe problem of estimating the common scale parameter of two exponential populations is considered when it is known a priori that the location parameters follow a certain ordering. The loss function is taken as quadratic or a weighted squared error. Assuming order restrictions on the location parameters, we propose Bayes estimators (exact expressions have been obtained) using a vague prior as well as a conditional inverse gamma prior. The proposed estimators are compared with the estimators obtained by Madi and Leonard (1996). It has been noticed from our numerical study that the proposed Bayes estimators outperform the existing estimators when it is known a priori that the location parameters are ordered. The percentage of relative risk improvements have been tabulated for illustration purposes.