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Activity Number:
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35
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Type:
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Contributed
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Date/Time:
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Sunday, August 2, 2009 : 2:00 PM to 3:50 PM
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Sponsor:
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Section on Statistics and the Environment
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| Abstract - #304845 |
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Title:
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Application of Quadratic Entropy in Measuring Dinosaur Biodiversity
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Author(s):
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Yueqin Zhao*+ and Dayanand N. Naik
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Companies:
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Eastern Virginia Medical School and Old Dominion University
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Address:
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, , 23501,
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Keywords:
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biodiversity ; quadratic entropy ; equivalence ; pair wise comparisons
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Abstract:
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Was dinosaur extinction due to sudden bolide impact or was it gradual? Change in the biodiversity of dinosaur species over a period of time can be used to test these two theories. In this article, we construct confidence intervals for this change using Rao's quadratic entropy. Quadratic entropy generalizes many existing entropy functions and hence provides more flexibility in modeling practical problems. We propose a modified diversity index, which is the quadratic entropy adjusted by its maximum. Bootstrap method provides confidence intervals based on near pivotal quantities. Simulation results show that the confidence intervals constructed using the new index and the bootstrap method are better in terms of noncoverage probability and the width. A real data set on dinosaurs is used to illustrate the construction of the proposed confidence intervals.
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