One-Step Estimator Paths for Concave Regularization

The statistics literature of the past 15 years has established many favorable properties for sparse diminishing-bias regularization: techniques that can roughly be understood as providing estimation under penalty functions spanning the range of concavity between ?₀ and ?₁ norms. However, lasso ?₁-regularized estimation remains the standard tool for industrial Big Data applications because of its minimal computational cost and the presence of easy-to-apply rules for penalty selection. In response, this article proposes a simple new algorithm framework that requires no more computation than a lasso path: the path of one-step estimators (POSE) does ?₁ penalized regression estimation on a grid of decreasing penalties, but adapts coefficient-specific weights to decrease as a function of the coefficient estimated in the previous path step. This provides sparse diminishing-bias regularization at no extra cost over the fastest lasso algorithms. Moreover, our gamma lasso implementation of POSE is accompanied by a reliable heuristic for the fit degrees of freedom, so that standard information criteria can be applied in penalty selection. We also provide novel results on the distance between weighted-?₁ and ?₀ penalized predictors; this allows us to build intuition about POSE and other diminishing-bias regularization schemes. The methods and results are illustrated in extensive simulations and in application of logistic regression to evaluating the performance of hockey players. Supplementary materials for this article are available online.     

Riemannian geometry of irrotational vortex acoustics

We consider acoustic propagation in an irrotational vortex, using the technical machinery of differential geometry to investigate the "acoustic geometry" that is probed by the sound waves. The acoustic space-time curvature of a constant circulation hydrodynamical vortex leads to deflection of phonons at appreciable distances from the vortex core. The scattering angle for phonon rays is shown to be quadratic in the small quantity Gamma/2pi(cb), where Gamma is the vortex circulation, c the speed of sound, and b the impact parameter.     

Structure of adamantan-1-ammonium 1-adamantanecarboxylate

Adamantan-1-ammonium 1-adamantanecarboxylate, C₂₁H₃₃NO₂ (I) is a novel dispiro-type compound. Aminoadamantane derivatives, in which the spiro carbon atoms are part of heterocyclic rings, are of potential interest as biological active substances and antiviral agents. Complex (I) crystallizes in the centrosymmetric space group C2/c (No. 15) with eight molecules in the unit cell with a = 25.227(4), b = 6.527(1), c = 22.489(4) Å, and = 90.75(1)°. The two spiro units are a 1-adamantylammonium cation and a 1-adamantane carbonyloxy anion. The complex units are stabilized by a network of intermolecular carbonyloxy-to-amine hydrogen bonding and van der Waals cohesive forces. Germane bond lengths are: C—N = 1.479(9) and C—O (mean) = 1.25(2) Å.     

Semiconductor nanowires for subwavelength photonics integration

This article focuses on one-dimensional (1D) semiconductor subwavelength optical elements and assesses their potential use as active and passive components in photonic devices. An updated overview of their optical properties, including spontaneous emission, ultrafast carrier dynamics, cavity resonance feedback (lasing), photodetection, and waveguiding, is provided. The ability to physically manipulate these structures on surfaces to form simple networks and assemblies is the first step toward integrating chemically synthesized nanomaterials into photonic circuitry. These high index semiconductor nanowires are capable of efficiently guiding light through liquid media, suggesting a role for such materials in microfluidics-based biosensing applications.     

Characterizing and monitoring respiratory aerosols by light scattering

The elastic-scattering intensity pattern from a single particle as a function of spherical coordinate angles theta and phi provides detailed information on the pattern's morphology. By use of an ellipsoidal reflector and a CCD camera, a single-laser-shot intensity pattern from a large angular range (theta from 90 degrees to 168 degrees and phi from 0 degrees to 360 degrees) was detected from a single aerosol (e.g., a Bacillus subtilisspore, a 1-microm-diameter polystyrene latex sphere, or a cluster of either of these) flowing through the reflectors focal volume at 5 m/s. Noticeable difference in the large-angle-range two-dimensional angular optical scattering (LATAOS) suggest that the LATAOS pattern could be useful in differentiating and classifying life-threatening aerosols from normal background aerosols.     

Raman and infrared spectroscopy of the manganese arsenate mineral allactite

The mineral allactite [Mn(7)(AsO(4))(2)(OH)(8)] is a basic manganese arsenate which is highly pleochroic. The use of the 633 nm excitation line enables quality spectra of to be obtained irrespective of the crystal orientation. The mineral is characterised by a set of sharp bands in the 770-885 cm(-1) region. Intense and sharp Raman bands are observed at 883, 858, 834, 827, 808 and 779 cm(-1). Collecting the spectral data at 77K enabled better band separation with narrower bandwidths. The observation of multiple AsO(4) stretching bands indicates the non-equivalence of the arsenate anions in the allactite structure. In comparison the infrared spectrum shows a broad spectral profile with a series of difficult to define overlapping bands. The low wavenumber region sets of bands which are assigned to the nu(2) modes (361 and 359 cm(-1)), the nu(4) modes (471, 452 and 422 cm(-1)), AsO stretching vibrations at 331 and 324 cm(-1), and bands at 289 and 271 cm(-1) which may be ascribed to MnO stretching modes. The observation of multiple bands shows the loss of symmetry of the AsO(4) units and the non-equivalence of these units in the allactite structure. The study shows that highly pleochroic minerals can be studied by Raman spectroscopy.