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Daily Archives: May 21, 2016

Microsoft Academic: intelligent bots at your service

Microsoft Research Blog: “Progress in AI research and applications is exploding, and that explosion extends to our own team working on academic services. Continuing our work supercharging Bing and Cortana, we are also applying new technologies to Microsoft Academic, which serves the research community. If you’re not familiar with Microsoft Academic, this online destination helps researchers connect with the papers, conferences, people, and ideas that are most relevant, using bots that read, understand, and deliver the scientific news and papers researchers need to further their work. Designed by and for researchers like myself, the site puts the broadest and deepest set of scientific information at your fingertips, with the ability to go beyond keywords to the contextual meaning of the content. Recently, we further enhanced the analytic content so users can see the latest research, news, and people, ranked by importance and credibility. Users can even drill down on the people, events, and institutions they care most about. Behind the scenes, we are taking advantage of the fact that machines do not require time to sleep or eat, and have superior memory to humans. We have trained our AI robots to read, classify, and tag every document published to the web in real time. The result is a massive collection of academic knowledge we call the Microsoft Academic Graph (MAG), which is growing at roughly 1 million articles per week. While one set of robots is busy gathering knowledge from the web, another set of robots is dedicated to analyzing citation behaviors and computing the relative importance of each node in the MAG so that users are always presented with information they need and want…”

Minimizing the Probability of Lifetime Drawdown Under Constant Consumption

Angoshtari, Bahman and Bayraktar, Erhan and Young, V.R., Minimizing the Probability of Lifetime Drawdown Under Constant Consumption (May 19, 2016). Insurance: Mathematics and Economics, Forthcoming. Available for download at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=2781963 “We assume that an individual invests in a financial market with one riskless and one risky asset, with the latter’s price following geometric Brownian… Continue Reading

GAO Reports – Managing for Results, Food Safety, Higher Education, IRS Internal Controls, Electromagnetic Risks, K-12 Education, National Drug Control Policy, Polar Weather Satellites

Managing for Results: OMB Improved Implementation of Cross-Agency Priority Goals, But Could Be More Transparent About Measuring Progress, GAO-16-509: Published: May 20, 2016. Publicly Released: May 20, 2016. Food Safety: FDA Coordinating with Stakeholders on New Rules but Challenges Remain and Greater Tribal Consultation Needed, GAO-16-425: Published: May 19, 2016. Publicly Released: May 19, 2016.… Continue Reading

GAO Report – Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting: U.S. Assistance to Combat This Harmful Practice Abroad Is Limited

Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting: U.S. Assistance to Combat This Harmful Practice Abroad Is Limited, GAO-16-485: Published: Apr 27, 2016. Publicly Released: May 19, 2016. “U.S. and United Nations (UN) studies since 2010 have identified a variety of factors contributing to the persistence of female genital mutilation/cutting (FGM/C). In many communities where FGM/C is prevalent, FGM/C is… Continue Reading

GAO Report – Information Technology: OMB and Agencies Need to Focus Continued Attention on Implementing Reform Law

Information Technology: OMB and Agencies Need to Focus Continued Attention on Implementing Reform Law,GAO-16-672T: Published: May 18, 2016. Publicly Released: May 18, 2016. “The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and agencies have taken steps to improve federal information technology (IT) through a series of initiatives; however, additional actions are needed. Consolidating data centers. In… Continue Reading

FDA modernizes Nutrition Facts label for packaged foods

[May 20, 2016], “the U.S. Food and Drug Administration took a major step in making sure consumers have updated nutritional information for most packaged foods sold in the United States, that will help people make informed decisions about the foods they eat and feed their families. Key Updates The new Nutrition Facts label will include… Continue Reading

FAA Releases Drone Registration Location Data

“The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) posted [May 18, 2016] a large database showing the city, state and zip code of each registered drone owner. Release of the database responds to a number of Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests submitted since the new unmanned aircraft registration system began operating on December 21, 2015. The FAA… Continue Reading