Title
Topic
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‘Detection of ChatGPT Fake Science With the xFakeSci Learning Algorithm’
“Generative AI tools exemplified by ChatGPT are becoming a new reality. This study is motivated by the premise that “AI generated content may exhibit a distinctive behavior that can be separated from scientific articles”. In this study, we show how articles can be generated using means of prompt engineering for various diseases and conditions. We then show how we tested this premise in two phases and prove its validity.” Find the paper and full list of authors in Nature Scientific Reports.
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“Many of the organs in our body are built of tubes. … Critical components of these tubular systems are contractile valves and sphincters. … However, tiny valves composed of a just few cells can somehow also perform these functions. In the reproductive system of the nematode C. elegans there is a donut-shaped valve that opens and closes hundreds of times to allow eggs to pass from where they are fertilized to the uterus. The team … will characterize the inner structure of the valve cell with light and electron microscopy and use genetic perturbations to discover the molecular mechanisms that…
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‘Nonlinear Optical Responses in Multiorbital Topological Superconductors’
“We theoretically study first- and second-order optical responses in a transition-metal dichalcogenide monolayer with distinct trivial, nodal, and time-reversal invariant topological superconducting (TRITOPS) phases. We show that the second-order dc response, also known as the photogalvanic response, contains signatures for differentiating these phases while the first-order optical response does not. We find that the high-frequency photogalvanic response is insensitive to the phase of the system, while the low-frequency response exhibits features distinguishing the three phases.” Find the paper and full list of authors in Physical Review B.
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‘A Computational Account of Transsaccadic Attentional Allocation Based on Visual Gain Fields’
“Saccadic eye movements are the primary means by which people gather information about the environment. An average fixation duration is a fraction of a second in natural viewing conditions. … How the brain maintains perceptual stability across these interruptions remains a mystery. Here, we combined a unique psychophysical protocol with bespoke analytical tools to investigate such active vision with greater spatial and temporal resolution than ever before. We show that the visual system can compute a visual object’s real-world position in the earliest stages of processing, thereby allowing precise object tracking across saccades.” Find the paper and authors list in…
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Sayre receives ACS grant
“Photocatalyzed C−N cross coupling creates pharmaceutical and agricultural chemicals using the energy of light. This project aims to improve the efficiency of photocatalyzed C−N cross coupling by enhancing light absorption and exploiting reaction mechanisms.”
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Klein receives Robert Wood Johnson Foundation grant to expand criminal court data
“Criminal municipal courts in the US are standalone courts that operate under the purview of municipalities and cities, as opposed to state judiciaries. They are largely thought to be the ‘lowest’ tier of the criminal legal system. … The general public has little sense of the volume of cases being tried in the system, the amount of money collected by municipalities through fines and fees, and even the number of courts in a given state. In this grant, we take a system-wide approach in collecting, digitizing, and visualizing longitudinal data on every criminal municipal court in every state where they…
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Di Pierro receives NSF grant for computational genetics
“Genomes fold into distinct architectures that reflect both the cell’s phase and type, with the spatial organization of genes playing a crucial role in facilitating physical interactions among genetic regulatory elements. These interactions are essential for gene regulation within organisms and tissues. This project aims to develop innovative theoretical and computational tools to model the mechanics of chromatin at the gene level, enabling the study of how various genetic factors influence the three-dimensional structure of genes.”
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‘Improved Data Acquisition Settings on … Mass Spectrometers for Proteomic Analysis of Limited Samples’
“Deep proteomic profiling of complex biological and medical samples available at low nanogram and subnanogram levels is still challenging. Thorough optimization of settings, parameters, and conditions in nanoflow liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (MS)-based proteomic profiling is crucial for generating informative data using amount-limited samples. This study demonstrates that by adjusting selected instrument parameters, … and minimally altering the conditions for resuspending or storing the sample in solvents of different compositions, up to 15-fold more thorough proteomic profiling can be achieved compared to conventionally used settings.” Find the paper and full list of authors in the Journal of Proteome Research.
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Egido receives NSF funding to study electric vehicle infrastructure
“The project integrates theory and methods from computational social science, urban resilience, behavioral science, and complex systems to address a pressing societal need — the equitable, resilient, and sustainable deployment of Electric Vehicles Charging Stations (EVCSs). The results of this project will enable agencies and businesses to evaluate hypothetical deployment scenarios of EVCSs , promoting a multi-dimensional approach to infrastructure design.”
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Monaghan Lab receives NIH funding to research retinoic acid in axolotls
“This study aims to investigate the mechanisms by which retinoic acid modifies chromatin architecture and gene expression to establish the proximodistal (shoulder to digit) axis in the salamander forelimb during regeneration. Utilizing methods in nucleic acid sequencing, in situ visualization, and genome editing, the investigators explore the molecular underpinnings of retinoic acid’s influence on positional identity in regenerating limb cells. The results of this study will deepen our understanding of the fundamental pathways promoting complex tissue regeneration, potentiating novel therapeutic targets in humans, whose regenerative capacity is largely restricted to the digit tip.”
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Brenhouse made president-elect of International Society for Developmental Psychobiology
Heather Brenhouse, professor of psychology at Northeastern University, “directs the Developmental Neuropsychobiology Lab. She has served on the ISDP Governing Board since 2022, and has been honored to help further the organization’s mission of encouraging and disseminating science related to perinatal development, childhood and adolescence — all critically important for a comprehensive understanding of the brain and behavior. She has also served on the Women’s Task Force as a member of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ACNP), and is a member of the Society for Behavioral Neuroendocrinology (SBN).”
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‘Machine Learning for Prediction of Protein Function and Elucidation of Enzyme Function and Control’
“Our machine learning methodology, partial order optimum likelihood (POOL) is used to predict biochemically active amino acids in the three-dimensional structures of proteins. Computed electrostatic and chemical properties of individual amino acids serve as input features. Our most recent applications of POOL are described. From predicted local sites of biochemical activity, the biochemical functions of structural genomics proteins of unknown function are predicted by local structure matching of predicted spatial arrays of active amino acids with those of proteins of known function.” Find the paper and full list of authors in Biophysical Journal.
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‘Giant Effective Magnetic Moments of Chiral Phonons From Orbit-Lattice Coupling’
“Circularly polarized lattice vibrations carry angular momentum and lead to magnetic responses in applied magnetic fields or when resonantly driven with ultrashort laser pulses. Recent measurements have found responses that are orders of magnitude larger than those calculated in prior theoretical studies. Here, we present a microscopic model for the effective magnetic moments of chiral phonons in magnetic materials that can reproduce the experimentally measured magnitudes and that allows us to make quantitative predictions for materials with giant magnetic responses using microscopic parameters.” Find the paper and full list of authors in Physical Review B.
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‘From Universal Owners to Owners of the Universe? How the Big Three are Reshaping Corporate Governance’
“The prominent ownership position of the Big Three asset management firms (i.e., BlackRock, Vanguard, and State Street Global Advisors) in many leading companies around the world has sparked a lively debate regarding whether their concentration of power is beneficial or detrimental for corporate governance (CG). We conduct a comprehensive literature review of extant empirical research examining the link between the Big Three and CG dimensions.” Find the paper and full list of authors in S&P Global Market Intelligence.
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Egido receives NSF funding to study healthy food choices within urban planning
“In this project, the investigators study the causal relationship between the urban areas we visit frequently and healthy food choices using massive datasets of human mobility in cities. The results will offer broader impacts on a range of future issues in public health, urban planning, and transportation management.”
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‘Intrinsic symmetry-protected topological mixed state from modulated symmetries and hierarchical structure of boundary anomaly’
“We introduce a class of intrinsic symmetry-protected topological mixed state (mSPT) in open quantum systems that feature modulated symmetries, such as dipole and subsystem symmetries. Intriguingly, these mSPT phases cannot be realized as the ground states of a gapped Hamiltonian under thermal equilibrium. The microscopic form of the density matrix characterizing these intrinsic mixed-state SPT ensembles is constructed using solvable coupled-wire models that incorporate quenched disorder or quantum channels. A detailed comparison of the hierarchical structure of boundary anomalies in both pure and mixed states is presented.” Find the paper and full list of authors in Physical Review B.
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‘Effective Theory Building and Manifold Learning’
“Manifold learning and effective model building are generally viewed as fundamentally different types of procedure. After all, in one we build a simplified model of the data, in the other, we construct a simplified model of the another model. Nonetheless, I argue that certain kinds of high-dimensional effective model building, and effective field theory construction in quantum field theory, can be viewed as special cases of manifold learning. I argue that this helps to shed light on all of these techniques.”
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“Recent genome-wide association studies have identified a missense variant p.A165T in mitochondrial amidoxime-reducing component 1 (mARC1) that is strongly associated with protection from all-cause cirrhosis and improved prognosis in nonalcoholic steatohepatitis. The precise mechanism of this protective effect is unknown. … To investigate the mechanism, we have generated a knock-in mutant mARC1 A165T and a catalytically dead mutant C273A (as a control) in human hepatoma HepG2 cells, enabling characterization of protein subcellular distribution, stability, and biochemical functions of the mARC1 mutant protein expressed from its endogenous locus.” Find the paper and full list of authors in Journal of Biological Chemistry.
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‘SoK: Technical Implementation and Human Impact of Internet Privacy Regulations’
“Growing recognition of the potential for exploitation of personal data and of the shortcomings of prior privacy regimes has led to the passage of a multitude of new privacy regulations. Some… have been the focus of large bodies of research by the computer science community, while others have received less attention. In this work, we analyze a set of 24 privacy laws and data protection regulations drawn from around the world… and develop a taxonomy of rights granted and obligations imposed by these laws.” Find the paper and list of authors in the 2024 IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy proceedings.
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An ‘intellectual mixtape’ on hip-hop: ‘That’s the Joint!’
Murray Forman, professor in the College of Arts, Media and Design, has co-edited the third edition of “That’s the Joint!: The Hip-Hop Studies Reader,” which originally released in 2004. “This intellectual mixtape,” according to the publisher’s webpage, brings together 46 readings across a variety of key topics, including “the history of hip-hop, authenticity debates, gender, the globalization of hip-hop,” and much more. The editors have also included critical introductions to place each piece in context. Forman co-edited the volume with Mark Anthony Neal and Regina N. Bradley.
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Helping managers help you by ‘Creating an Environment for Successful Projects’
“Creating an Environment for Successful Projects,” by Randall Englund, lecturer in Northeastern University’s College of Professional Studies, and Robert J. Graham, aims to make organizations as “project-friendly” as possible. Now in its third edition, “For over twenty years,” according to the publisher’s webpage, this volume “has been a staple for upper managers who want to help projects succeed.” In some ways helping upper managers get out of the way of their own organization, this book helps managers empower their teams “and shows how to develop project management as an organizational practice.”
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In ever-more digitalized world, we all need a ‘Handbook of Social Computing’
This new handbook, co-edited by Francesca Grippa in Northeastern’s College of Professional Studies, responds “to the increasingly blurred boundaries between humans and technology,” according to the publisher’s webpage. Geared toward practitioners across disciplines, from computer scientists and social network analysts to sociologists, this volume “illustrates the diverse ways in which digital technologies can be used to analyze social behavior, recognize individual and group interaction patterns and improve daily life.”
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Excelling in law school exams may be exercise in ‘Getting to Maybe’
Originally published in 1999, professor of law Jeremy R. Paul’s “Getting to Maybe: How To Excel on Law School Exams” — co-written with Richard Michael Fischl — has been released in a second edition. “What sets it apart from its competitors is its frank recognition that law exams test legal reasoning,” according to the publisher’s copy, “and that legal reasoning cannot be reduced to any simple ‘check the boxes’ template.” Rather than relying on binary right-or-wrong answers, “Getting to Maybe” prepares students to argue their points, “mobilizing persuasive arguments on multiple sides of legal problems.”