An optimal choice of proper kinematical variables is one of the main steps in using neural networks (NN) in high energy physics. Our method of the variable selection is based on the analysis of a structure of Feynman diagrams (singularities and spin correlations) contributing to the signal and background processes. An application of this method to the Higgs boson search at the Tevatron leads to...

Most studies on seasonal influenza A/H3N2 virus adaptation have focused on the main antigenic gene, hemagglutinin. However, there is increasing evidence that the genome-wide genetic background of novel antigenic variants can influence these variants' emergence probabilities and impact their patterns of dominance in the population. This suggests that non-antigenic genes may be important in shapi...

Exposure of the germ cells of living organisms to X-rays or to radium has so far proved to be the only reliable method for artificially inducing mutations, as shown by MULLER and others. In nature, organisms or groups of organisms carrying “favorable” mutations are supposed to be chosen for survival by the sorting action of natural selection, and MULLER and MOTT-SMITH (1930) have concluded that...

Within the framework of our cotton breeding program, we are using molecular markers to improve the efficiency of the introgression of fiber quality traits into a favorable genetic background. This effort relies on i) the development of a saturated genetic map of the cotton genome, ii) the identification of fiber quality QTLs, and iii) the marker-assisted introgression of favorable genomic regio...

What determines the genetic contribution that an individual makes to future generations? With biparental reproduction, each individual leaves a "pedigree" of descendants, determined by the biparental relationships in the population. The pedigree of an individual constrains the lines of descent of each of its genes. An individual's reproductive value is the expected number of copies of each of i...