Charm semileptonic decays at LHCb

In these proceedings, we explore the possible reach of the LHCb dataset in the area of charm semileptonic decays. Specifically, we give prospects for the measurement of $|V_{cs}|/|V_{cd}|$ using $\mathcal{B}(D^0\to K^-\mu^+\nu_\mu)/\mathcal{B}(D^0\to\pi^-\mu^+\nu_\mu)$ with Run I data. Preliminary projections show that the LHCb Run I dataset would give a relative statistical uncertainty of $\sim 0.2\%$ on this ratio. We also motivate the search for lepton non-universality in the charm sector.Comment: Proceedings of the 9th International Workshop on the CKM Unitarity Triangle, 28 November - 3 December 2016, Tata Institute for Fundamental Research (TIFR), Mumbai, India. 6 pages, 3 figure

Studies of Charm Mixing and CPV

LHCb has collected the world's largest sample of charmed hadrons. This sample is used to search for direct and indirect CP violation in charm and to measure $D^0$ mixing parameters. Preliminary measurements from several decay modes are presented, with complementary time-dependent and time-integrated analyses.Comment: Presented at The Meeting of the American Physical Society, Division of Particles and Fields,Santa Cruz, California, August 13-17, 201

Vernacular phrasal display : Towards the definition of a form

For many years, at the Missouri Folklore Society website we've maintained an archive titled "Colorful Language of the Rural Midwest, with special emphasis on Missouri and Missourians" (http://missourifolkloresociety.truman.edu/expressions.html). The header is descriptive, if inelegant. The collection began with my own list, accumulated over a number of years from my own family's oral history, with the nucleus of the collection consisting of speech-items collected from my famously profane grandmother. Although she lived nine-tenths of her life in Missouri, her native speech was primarily that of Western Kentucky, thus exemplifying the much-travelled nature that we will see to be common for such forms. Even within my own family, these speech-items were understood as a definable corpus that was meaningfully referred to as "grammaw's sayings."Issue title: Festschrift for John Miles Foley. This article belongs to a special issue of Oral Tradition published in honor of John Miles Foley's 65th birthday and 2011 retirement. The surprise Festschrift, guest-edited by Lori and Scott Garner entirely without his knowledge, celebrates John's tremendous impact on studies in oral tradition through a series of essays contributed by his students from the University of Missouri-Columbia (1979-present) and from NEH Summer Seminars that he has directed (1987-1996)

On DBI Textures with Generalized Hopf Fibration

In this letter we show numerical existence of O(4) Dirac-Born-Infeld (DBI) Textures living in (N +1) dimensional spacetime. These defects are characterized by $S^N\rightarrow S^3$ mapping, generalizing the well-known Hopf fibration into ?$\pi_N (S^3)$, for all N > 3. The nonlinear nature of DBI kinetic term provides stability against size perturbation and thus renders the defects having natural scale.Comment: Accepted for publication in Phys.Lett.

Application of high-throughput sequencing to whole rabies viral genome characterisation and its use for phylogenetic re-evaluation of a raccoon strain incursion into the province of Ontario

Raccoon rabies remains a serious public health problem throughout much of the eastern seaboard of North America due to the urban nature of the reservoir host and the many challenges inherent in multi-jurisdictional efforts to administer co-ordinated and comprehensive wildlife rabies control programmes. Better understanding of the mechanisms of spread of rabies virus can play a significant role in guiding such control efforts. To facilitate a detailed molecular epidemiological study of raccoon rabies virus movements across eastern North America, we developed a methodology to efficiently determine whole genome sequences of hundreds of viral samples. The workflow combines the generation of a limited number of overlapping amplicons covering the complete viral genome and use of high throughput sequencing technology. The value of this approach is demonstrated through a retrospective phylogenetic analysis of an outbreak of raccoon rabies which occurred in the province of Ontario between 1999 and 2005. As demonstrated by the number of single nucleotide polymorphisms detected, whole genome sequence data were far more effective than single gene sequences in discriminating between samples and this facilitated the generation of more robust and informative phylogenies that yielded insights into the spatio-temporal pattern of viral spread. With minor modification this approach could be applied to other rabies virus variants thereby facilitating greatly improved phylogenetic inference and thus better understanding of the spread of this serious zoonotic disease. Such information will inform the most appropriate strategies for rabies control in wildlife reservoirs

A Framework for Integrating Transportation Into Smart Cities

In recent years, economic, environmental, and political forces have quickly given rise to “Smart Cities” -- an array of strategies that can transform transportation in cities. Using a multi-method approach to research and develop a framework for smart cities, this study provides a framework that can be employed to: Understand what a smart city is and how to replicate smart city successes; The role of pilot projects, metrics, and evaluations to test, implement, and replicate strategies; and Understand the role of shared micromobility, big data, and other key issues impacting communities. This research provides recommendations for policy and professional practice as it relates to integrating transportation into smart cities