bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Paternally Inherited Submicroscopic Duplication at 11p15.5 Implicates Insulin-like Growth Factor II in Overgrowth and Wilms' Tumorigenesis
Authors: Algar Elizabeth M. , St. Heaps Luke , Darmanian Artur , Dagar Vinod , Prawitt Dirk , Peters Greg B. , Collins Felicity
Published: February 2007

Loss of imprinting at insulin-like growth factor II (IGFII), in association with H19 silencing, has been described previously in a subgroup of Beckwith-Wiedemann syndrome (BWS) patients who have an elevated risk for Wilms' tumor. An equivalent somatic mutation occurs in sporadic Wilms' tumor. We describe a family with overgrowth in three generations and Wilms' tumor in two generations, with paternal inheritance of a cis-duplication at 11p15.5 spanning the BWS IC1 region and including H19, IGFII, INS, and TH. The duplicated region was below the limit of detection by high-resolution karyotyping and fluorescence in situ hybridization, has a predicted minimum size of 400 kb, and was confirmed by genotyping and gene-dosage analysis on a CytoChip comparative genomic hybridization bacterial artificial chromosome array. IGFII is the only known paternally expressed oncogene mapping within the duplicated region and our findings directly implicate IGFII in Wilms' tumorigenesis and add to the mutation spectrum that increases the effective dose of IGFII. Furthermore, this study raises the possibility that sporadic cases of overgrowth and Wilms' tumor, presenting with apparent gain of methylation at IC1, may be explained by submicroscopic paternal duplications. This finding has important implications for determining the transmission risk in these disorders. [Cancer Res 2007;67(5):2360–5]
Genetic Variation at the CYP19A1 Locus Predicts Circulating Estrogen Levels but not Breast Cancer Risk in Postmenopausal Women
Authors: Haiman Christopher A. , Dossus Laure , Setiawan V. Wendy , Stram Daniel O. , Dunning Alison M. , Thomas Gilles , Thun Michael J. , Albanes Demetrius , Altshuler David , Ardanaz Eva , Boeing Heiner , Buring Julie , Burtt Noël , Calle Eugenia E. , Chanock Stephen , Clavel-Chapelon Françoise , Colditz Graham A. , Cox David G. , Feigelson Heather Spencer , Hankinson Susan E. , Hayes Richard B. , Henderson Brian E. , Hirschhorn Joel N. , Hoover Robert , Hunter David J. , Kaaks Rudolf , Kolonel Laurence N. , Le Marchand Loïc , Lenner Per , Lund Eiliv , Panico Salvatore , Peeters Petra H. , Pike Malcolm C. , Riboli Elio , Tjonneland Anne , Travis Ruth , Trichopoulos Dimitrios , Wacholder Sholom , Ziegler Regina G.
Published: February 2007

The CYP19A1 gene encodes the enzyme aromatase, which is responsible for the final step in the biosynthesis of estrogens. In this study, we used a systematic two-step approach that included gene resequencing and a haplotype-based analysis to comprehensively survey common genetic variation across the CYP19A1 locus in relation to circulating postmenopausal steroid hormone levels and breast cancer risk. This study was conducted among 5,356 invasive breast cancer cases and 7,129 controls comprised primarily of White women of European descent drawn from five large prospective cohorts within the National Cancer Institute Breast and Prostate Cancer Cohort Consortium. A high-density single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) map of 103 common SNPs (≥5% frequency) was used to identify the linkage disequilibrium and haplotype patterns across the CYP19A1 locus, and 19 haplotype-tagging SNPs were selected to provide high predictability of the common haplotype patterns. We found haplotype-tagging SNPs and common haplotypes spanning the coding and proximal 5′ region of CYP19A1 to be significantly associated with a 10% to 20% increase in endogenous estrogen levels in postmenopausal women [effect per copy of the two-SNP haplotype rs749292-rs727479 (A-A) versus noncarriers; P = 4.4 × 10−15]. No significant associations were observed, however, with these SNPs or common haplotypes and breast cancer risk. Thus, although genetic variation in CYP19A1 produces measurable differences in estrogen levels among postmenopausal women, the magnitude of the change was insufficient to contribute detectably to breast cancer. [Cancer Res 2007;67(5):1893–7]
Activity and Regulation of Na
+
-HCO
3
−
Cotransporter in Immortalized Spontaneously Hypertensive Rat and Wistar–Kyoto Rat Proximal Tubular Epithelial Cells
Authors: Pedrosa Rui , Gonçalves Nuno , Hopfer Ulrich , Jose Pedro A. , Soares-da-Silva Patrício
Published: February 2007

The present study evaluates the presence and functional proprieties of the Na
+
-HCO
3
−
cotransporter (NBC) in immortalized renal proximal tubular epithelial cells from spontaneously hypertensive (SHR) and normotensive Wistar–Kyoto (WKY) rats. The expected size and nucleotide sequence of a 1031-bp fragment corresponding to type 1 NBC (NBC1) was identified in both cell lines. The expression of the NBC1 transcript was lower (
P
<0.05) in SHR than in WKY cells. After intracellular acidification and in the presence of amiloride (1 mmol/L), the addition of sodium (115 mmol/L) in the absence of chloride resulted in rapid intracellular pH recovery that was higher in WKY than in SHR cells. This was an Na
+
- and HCO
3
−
-dependent process in both cell lines. 4,4′-Diisothiocyanatodihydrostilbene-2,2′-disulphonic acid inhibited NBC activity in both WKY and SHR cells; the inhibitory effect was, however, more pronounced in WKY than in SHR cells. Forskolin (10 μmol/L) and dibutyryl cAMP (0.5 mmol/L) did not alter NBC activity. Acidosis induced by a 24-hour treatment with NH4
+
(20 mmol/L) increased NBC activity to a greater extent in SHR than in WKY cells, without changes in intracellular pH and cell viability. Treatment with acetazolamide (300 μmol/L) for 24 hours did not change NBC activity in both cell lines. In contrast to NBC, Na
+
-K
+
ATPase activity and expression were higher in SHR than in WKY cells. It is concluded that SHR cells are endowed with lower NBC activity than WKY cells, but the former is more resistant to 4,4′-diisothiocyanatodihydrostilbene-2,2′-disulphonic acid and responds better to acidosis.
Merit-Based College Scholarships and Car Sales
Authors: Cornwell Christopher , Mustard David B.
Published: February 2007

Since the early 1990s, state governments have distributed billions of dollars in financial aid through merit-based college scholarships, most of which have no means tests. The model for most of these programs is Georgia's Helping Outstanding Pupils Educationally (HOPE) scholarship. Given the high correlation between precollege academic achievement and family income, the program characteristics raise the question: to what extent are HOPE disbursements simply rent payments to households otherwise inclined to send their children to college? This article addresses the rent question by examining the effect of HOPE on automobile consumption. The relatively swift passage of the lottery law and establishment of the program created an unanticipated windfall large enough to encourage the financing of consumer durables purchases, such as automobiles, out of household savings targeted for college. First, we compare car registrations in Georgia with those in sets of control group states before and after HOPE. We do not find a statistically significant overall HOPE effect, but allowing the HOPE coefficient to vary by year reveals statistically significant percentage increases in registered vehicles in 1994 and 1995, when the program's income cap was raised and then removed. Next, we examine the relationship between car registrations and HOPE recipients by county. Our results indicate that the number of HOPE recipients attending degree-granting institutions increases car registrations in counties above the 75th percentile in per capita income; there is no evidence of a relationship in counties below the 25th per capita income percentile.
Characterization of the Global Hydrologic Cycle from a Back-Trajectory Analysis of Atmospheric Water Vapor
Authors: Dirmeyer Paul A. , Brubaker Kaye L.
Published: February 2007

Regional precipitation recycling may constitute a feedback mechanism affecting soil moisture memory and the persistence of anomalously dry or wet states. Bulk methods, which estimate recycling based on time-averaged variables, have been applied on a global basis, but these methods may underestimate recycling by neglecting the effects of correlated transients. A back-trajectory method identifies the evaporative sources of vapor contributing to precipitation events by tracing air motion backward in time through the analysis grid of a data-assimilating numerical model. The back-trajectory method has been applied to several large regions; in this paper it is extended to all global land areas for 1979–2003. Meteorological information (wind vectors, humidity, surface pressure, and evaporation) are taken from the NCEP–Department of Energy (DOE) reanalysis, and a hybrid 3-hourly precipitation dataset is produced to establish the termini of the trajectories. The effect of grid size on the recycling fraction is removed using an empirical power-law relationship; this allows comparison among any land areas on a latitude–longitude grid. Recycling ratios are computed on a monthly basis for a 25-yr period. The annual and seasonal averages are consistent with previous estimates in terms of spatial patterns, but the trajectory method generally gives higher estimates of recycling than a bulk method, using compatible spatial scales. High northern latitude regions show the largest amplitude in the annual cycle of recycling, with maxima in late spring/early summer. Amplitudes in arid regions are small in absolute terms, but large relative to their mean values. Regions with strong interannual variability in recycling do not correspond directly to regions with strong intra-annual variability. The average recycling ratio at a spatial scale of 105 km2 for all land areas of the globe is 4.5%; on a global basis, recycling shows a weak positive trend over the 25 yr, driven largely by increases at high northern latitudes.
Climatological Analyses of Thunderstorms and Flash Floods in the Baltimore Metropolitan Region
Authors: Ntelekos Alexandros A. , Smith James A. , Krajewski Witold F.
Published: February 2007

The climatology of thunderstorms and flash floods in the Baltimore, Maryland, metropolitan region is examined through analyses of cloud-to-ground (CG) lightning observations from the National Lightning Detection Network (NLDN) and discharge observations from 11 U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) stream gauging stations. A point process framework is used for analyses of CG lightning strikes and the occurrences of flash floods. Analyses of lightning strikes as a space–time point process focus on the mean intensity function, from which the seasonal, diurnal, and spatial variation in mean lightning frequency are examined. Important elements of the spatial variation of mean lightning frequency are 1) initiation of thunderstorms along the Blue Ridge, 2) large variability of lightning frequency around the urban cores of Baltimore and Washington D.C., and 3) decreased lightning frequency over the Chesapeake Bay and Atlantic Ocean. Lightning frequency has a sharp seasonal maximum around mid-July, and the diurnal cycle of lightning frequency peaks between 2100 and 2200 UTC with a frequency that is more than an order of magnitude larger than the minimum frequency at 1200 UTC. The seasonal and diurnal variation of flash flood occurrence in urban streams of Baltimore mimics the seasonal and diurnal variation of lightning. The peak of the diurnal frequency of flash floods in Moores Run, a 9.1-km2 urban watershed in Baltimore City, occurs at 2200 UTC. Analyses of the lightning and flood peak data also show a close link between the occurrence of major thunderstorms systems and flash flooding on a regional scale.
The TRMM Multisatellite Precipitation Analysis (TMPA): Quasi-Global, Multiyear, Combined-Sensor Precipitation Estimates at Fine Scales
Authors: Huffman George J. , Bolvin David T. , Nelkin Eric J. , Wolff David B. , Adler Robert F. , Gu Guojun , Hong Yang , Bowman Kenneth P. , Stocker Erich F.
Published: February 2007

The Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) Multisatellite Precipitation Analysis (TMPA) provides a calibration-based sequential scheme for combining precipitation estimates from multiple satellites, as well as gauge analyses where feasible, at fine scales (0.25° × 0.25° and 3 hourly). TMPA is available both after and in real time, based on calibration by the TRMM Combined Instrument and TRMM Microwave Imager precipitation products, respectively. Only the after-real-time product incorporates gauge data at the present. The dataset covers the latitude band 50°N–S for the period from 1998 to the delayed present. Early validation results are as follows: the TMPA provides reasonable performance at monthly scales, although it is shown to have precipitation rate–dependent low bias due to lack of sensitivity to low precipitation rates over ocean in one of the input products [based on Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit-B (AMSU-B)]. At finer scales the TMPA is successful at approximately reproducing the surface observation–based histogram of precipitation, as well as reasonably detecting large daily events. The TMPA, however, has lower skill in correctly specifying moderate and light event amounts on short time intervals, in common with other finescale estimators. Examples are provided of a flood event and diurnal cycle determination.
What Do Older Women and Men Want?
Authors: Russell Cherry
Published: February 2007

Issues of gender have always been at the heart of the sociology of ageing but their construction has undergone a remarkable transformation over the past half century. From an initial focus on retirement (for men) as the defining characteristic of the ‘problem of old age’, the demographic feminization of the aged population has more recently been mirrored in sociological research by a focus on the circumstances and experiences of the numerically larger group of older women. Researchers with an interest in older women, particularly those who approach the issue from a feminist perspective, have concluded that ageing is a gendered phenomenon that has special meanings for women. Some recent commentators have drawn attention to the ‘invisibility’ of older men, though relatively little systematic research has been conducted on any aspect of their lives. While it is well known that women live longer and are more likely to use formal care services than men, other more subtle differences in their experiences of ageing have been less well documented and their implications remain largely unexamined. This article draws on findings from qualitative research to explore gender differences in the ‘lived experience’ of growing old.
Older Women and ‘Frailty’
Authors: Grenier Amanda , Hanley Jill
Published: February 2007

The concept of ‘frailty’, as used within public health and social services, represents a powerful practice where cultural constructions, the global economic rationale of cost restriction and the biomedical focus on ageing collide as inscriptions on the bodies of older women. This article draws on complex forms of resistance witnessed within three separate studies: narrative interviews on ‘frailty’, semi-structured interviews and participant observation in community organizations with older women in Montreal and Boston. Findings reveal how older women exercise resistance in complex ways, both consciously subverting and coopting the notion of ‘frailty’ on an individual and collective level. Such resistance demonstrates the tensions between undermining dominant notions of ageing, and fulfilling prescribed gendered and age-based assumptions about older women and their bodies. The intersections and forms of older women’s resistance challenge social constructs, social expectations and what is recognized as resistance.
Situating ‘Home’ at the Nexus of the Public and Private Spheres
Authors: Martin-Matthews Anne
Published: February 2007

This article examines the provision of in-home health and social support services to elderly clients in the context of home as the site of care. It considers gender in the provision of home support services by a marginalized group of employed women; in the experiences of elderly clients receiving services in the private sphere of the ‘home’; in the relationships between old people, family member(s) and home support workers; and in the gendered use of space within the household in care work. Informed by a self-reflexive, autobiographical perspective, the researcher’s experiences as a daughter in a family receiving home care prompted the re-examination of qualitative panel data from 150 home care workers and 155 elderly clients. It examines issues of territory and boundary, control and cooperation, the symbolic significance of home and the negotiating of contingent relationships when public services are provided in the private sphere of home.
Gender, Ageing and the ‘New Social Settlement’
Authors: Lewis Jane
Published: February 2007

The article documents a shift in the assumptions underpinning welfare state change in Europe, towards an ‘adult worker family model’ in the context of dramatic family and labour market changes. This set of assumptions, in which all adult men and women are presumed to be active in the labour market and increasingly self-supporting, amounts to a new ‘social settlement’. The article suggests that, given the existing gendered division of paid and unpaid work, the lack of attention on the part of policy-makers to the issue of care and care work means that women are unlikely to become fully autonomous citizen workers, which will in turn exacerbate gender inequalities in later life. The article argues first, that the degree of behavioural change does not fully support the major shift in policy assumptions; second, that the assumptions being made by policy-makers about what will happen to care work are untenable; and third, reviews the existing policy logics and debates about care before sketching what is needed to secure a holistic approach to care.
Whose Experiences? Whose Interpretations? Contribution of Asian Theologies to Theological Epistemology
Authors: Phan Peter C.
Published: February 2007

A contrast is evident between the historical, literary, and cultural criticism, which is dominant in Western academies and which privileges the written text, and the Asian hermeneutical method that takes into account the multifaceted sources and resources, written and unwritten, of the Asian context. In light of these sources and resources, the author introduces a number of Asian hermeneutics with a view to enriching the Western hermeneutical methods.
Edith Stein on the Symbolic Theology of Dionysius the Areopagite
Authors: Madden Nicholas
Published: February 2007

Edith Stein, erstwhile phenomenologist, became a Catholic and eventually a Carmelite nun. She was murdered in Birkenau in 1942 and was canonized in 1998 as St Teresa Benedicta of the Cross. Scholarship and contemplation come together in her writings. She translated the works of Dionysius the Areopagite into German. In this article we examine an essay she wrote on Dionysius, taking as her theme ways of knowing God that she understood to underlie his writing.
Creation, Finitude, and the Mutable Will: Augustine on the Origin of Moral Evil
Authors: Torchia Joseph
Published: February 2007

Augustine did not root the cause of the evil will in any specific nature, but in the fact that rational beings were created from nothing. His link between the cause of the evil will in finite, mutable creatures and creation ex nihilo offers a critical touchstone for assessing a cluster of anthropological and soteriological issues that lie at the heart of his moral theory.
Theology East and West: Difference and Harmony
Authors: Cross Lawrence
Published: February 2007

The difference in style and temperament in the way Eastern and Western theologians approach their common subject, already evident in Patristic times, became very marked after the 12th century with the rise of scholasticism in the West. Today both are challenged by the newly emerging theological paradigm. Theologians of both traditions are called to engage in a new ‘patristic’ enterprise, namely to search together for ways of expressing the mystery of redemption which can once again engage our contemporaries in the age of post-modernity.
Towards a Psychoanalytic Theology of Original Sin
Authors: Dalzell Thomas
Published: February 2007

The author seeks to be faithful to Tradition while drawing on Lacanian psychoanalysis to understand the inheritance of the effects of Original Sin in terms of an intergenerational transmission of signifiers which he finds illustrated in the three generations of the Coûfontaine family in Paul Claudel's trilogy.
The Monastic Liturgy of the Hours in the Nauigatio sancti Brendani: A Preliminary Investigation
Authors: O'Loughlin Thomas
Published: February 2007

It is readily acknowledged that the recitation of the psalms was central to the Liturgy of the Hours in the Latin monastic tradition, and in this, there was great variation on how best this liturgy was to be celebrated. Against this variation, the author examines the light shed on the Liturgy of the Hours by the Nauigatio of St. Brendan.
Deification in the Thought of John Paul II
Authors: Meconi David V.
Published: February 2007

For John Paul II the deification of humanity is the ultimate economic purpose of Christianity. The human person, made in the image and likeness of God, the exhortation to become other Christs and a focus on the sacramental life of the Church are among the themes that place his theology in the company of the great theologians of deification.
Vatican II and the Theologians on the Church as Sacrament
Authors: McDermott John M.
Published: February 2007

Theologies depend on philosophies. Vatican II introduced the Church as sacrament. Although the Council followed no theologian, that idea was proposed variously by the preconciliar Schillebeeckx, Rahner, and Semmelroth. Each theory manifests weaknesses and strengths, complementing each other in addressing human freedom. This emphasis accords with John Paul II's thought.
Modeling and Simulation in Inquiry Learning: Checking Solutions and Giving Intelligent Advice
Authors: Bravo Crescencio , van Joolingen Wouter R. , de Jong Ton
Published: February 2007

Inquiry learning is a didactic approach in which students acquire knowledge and skills through processes of theory building and experimentation. Computer modeling and simulation can play a prominent role within this approach. Students construct representations of physical systems using modeling. Using simulation, they execute these representations to study the phenomena or systems modeled. However, the modeling task is complex, and students can fail to create adequate models, which prevents effective learning. This necessitates supportive measures to scaffold the modeling processes. In this paper, we address the issue of designing such support through the development of intelligent advice to be incorporated in modeling environments. The advice is based on the definition of a family of reference solutions for each modeling problem, on the comparison of the reference solutions with the students' solutions, and on the use of an advice knowledge base. This advice guides the students to the construction of a better solution, helping them acquire the knowledge required for successful modeling and for the correction of modeling mistakes. In a collaborative session, having the advice encourages discussion between students about the advice and the best way of proceeding. Empirical validations of the advice approach are presented.
Injecting Creativity into Teaching Simulation Modeling to Computer Science Students
Authors: Fishwick Paul
Published: February 2007

The computer simulation classes in the Computer and Information Sciences and Engineering Department at the University of Florida emphasize a skill set focusing on dynamic system model construction, syntax, and execution. Simulation models are treated as types of formal languages, resulting in instruction that concentrates on key facets of language such as syntax, semantics, and pragmatics. For the past 12 years, the class was predicated on learning a collection of model types and their applications. In the Fall of 2004 and 2005, we modified the class to emphasize student creativity in model construction, allowing students to design their own model representations for a fixed model structure. This experiment resulted in significant positive student feedback, and has the potential to suggest visual language exploration in other computer science classes as a means of comprehending the relevant topical material.
Teaching through Simulation: Epidemic Dynamics and Public Health Policies
Authors: Hsieh Ji-Lung , Sun Chuen-Tsai , Kao Gloria Yi-Ming , Huang Chung-Yuan
Published: February 2007

A growing number of epidemiologists are now working to refine computer simulation methods for diseases as a strategy for helping public policy decision-makers assess the potential efficacies of tactics in response to newly emerging epidemics. These efforts spiked after the SARS outbreak of 2002– 2003. Here we describe our attempt to help novice researchers understand epidemic dynamics with the help of the cellular automata with social mirror identity model (CASMIM), a small-world epidemiological simulation system created by Huang et al. in 2004. Using the SARS scenario as a teaching example, we designed three sets of instructional experiments to test our assumptions regarding (i) simulating epidemic transmission dynamics and associated public health policies, (ii) assisting with understanding the properties and efficacies of various public health policies, (iii) constructing an effective, low-cost (in social and financial terms) and executable suite of epidemic prevention strategies, and (iv) reducing the difficulties and costs associated with learning epidemiological concepts. With the aid of the proposed simulation tool, novice researchers can create various scenarios for discovering epidemic dynamics and for exploring applicable combinations of prevention or suppression strategies. Results from an evaluative test indicate a significant improvement in the ability of a group of college students with little experience in epidemiology to understand epidemiological concepts.
Enhancing System Thinking in Education Using System Dynamics
Authors: Arndt Holger
Published: February 2007

System thinking skills are a prerequisite for acting successfully and responsibly in a complex world. However, traditional education largely fails to enhance system thinking skills whereas learnercentered educational methods seem more promising. Several such educational methods are compared with respect to their suitability for improving system thinking. It is proposed that integrated learning environments consisting of system dynamics models and additional didactical material have positive learning effects.This is exemplified by the illustration and validation of two learning sequences.
Putting transnational labour process in its place
Authors: Ngai PUN , Smith Chris
Published: February 2007

Globalization of capital accumulation and transnational production highlight a shifting paradigm in labour process theory, which requires a theorization on the spatial politics of production.The shift from Taylorism and Fordism (mass production and welfare-state interventions) to flexible accumulation (flexible production, casual labour, deregulation and privatization) may be a periodization that has become increasingly problematic. What is emerging is the transnational political economy of production that links not only to a new scale of the economic, but a new economy of scale, in which mass production and the space of work-residence are extensively reconfigured for capital accumulation on a global scale.This article aims to explore a new spatial politics of transnational labour process in China at the time of its rapid incorporation into the world economy. We study a distinctive form of labour regime, the dormitory labour regime in China, and explore the articulation of production and daily reproduction of labour using two contrasting case studies.
Legal obligation or personal lottery?
Authors: Foster Deborah
Published: February 2007

This article ‘gives voice’ to disabled employees by documenting their experiences of negotiating workplace adjustments under the terms of the UK's Disability Discrimination Act, 1995.This ad hoc process of ‘negotiation’ is explored through in-depth interviews that reveal persistent problems with the character of legislation and its implementation in public sector organizations. Negotiations on adjustments were characteristically highly individualized and outcomes almost entirely contingent upon the knowledge, attitudes and goodwill of poorly trained line managers. The adjustment process itself often led to instances of bullying by managers, resulting in stress and ill health among employees.An analysis of managers' behaviour in the context of wider debates on power and organizational decision-making concludes that, even where outcomes are positive for employees, managers still choose to abdicate responsibility in this area. Such behaviour represents a form of non-decision-making that is essentially political in character and has wider implications for equality agendas.
Employee experience of aesthetic labour in retail and hospitality
Authors: Warhurst Chris , Nickson Dennis
Published: February 2007

Interactive service job growth in the UK is significant.Analysis of labour within these services has tended to focus on employee attitudes, framed through emotional labour. Such analysis is not incorrect, just partial. Some employers also demand aesthetic labour, or employees with particular embodied capacities and attributes that appeal to the senses of customers. Reporting survey and focus group data, this article explores aesthetic labour as it is experienced by interactive service employees in the retail and hospitality industries. Issues examined are recruitment and selection; image and appearance; uniforms and dress codes; skills and training. By extending awareness of aesthetic labour so that both employee attitude and appearance are empirically and conceptually revealed, the article extends understanding of the job demands made of employees in interactive services.
Knowledge workers: what keeps them committed; what turns them away
Authors: Benson John , Brown Michelle
Published: February 2007

There is a well established literature on the antecedents of organizational commitment, though the relative importance of these antecedents to particular groups of workers remains unclear. Relying on a general set of antecedents for all workers may result in the application of inappropriate HRM policies and practices. Our focus is on knowledge workers as they have been identified as important to organizational success.The literature is, however, divided on what constitutes knowledge work so we develop and apply a measure that focuses on what these workers do.We then use this measure to examine attitudinal and behavioural commitment. We find, using responses from 1969 employees, knowledge workers have higher attitudinal commitment and lower intention to quit than routine-task workers. Further, the antecedents of commitment for knowledge workers and routine-task workers differ in many important respects, creating challenges for organizational decision makers.
Sequential Retrieval and Inhibition of Parallel (Re)Activated Representations: A Neurocomputational Comparison of Competitive Queuing and Resampling Models
Authors: Davelaar Eddy J.
Published: February 2007

Sequential behavior is observed in various domains of cognitive psychology, including free recall paradigms. In this article, within a neurocomputational framework, resampling (RS) mechanisms are compared with competitive queuing (CQ) mechanisms. While both types of implementations select the most active representation, the subsequent inhibition is at the level of selection for RS models and at the level of (re)activation for CQ models. It is shown that despite the overwhelming success of CQ models in serial recall (with regard to types of sequencing error) RS models outperform CQ models with regard to inter-response times in a free recall task. Additional analyses show that decay of response suppression reduces the difference between the models. The RS model is sensitive to the size of the search set and accounts for memory selection performance in patients with Alzheimer’s dementia or Huntington’s disease. Finally, a non-mnemonic clustering behavior is observed, which is related to the dynamical process of the selection mechanism.
Experiencing Belugas: Action Selection for an Interactive Aquarium Exhibit
Authors: DiPaola Steve , Akai Caitlin , Kraus Bill
Published: February 2007

In this article we present a case study of an action-selection system designed with adaptive techniques to create a virtual beluga aquarium exhibit. The beluga interactive exhibit uses a realistic three-dimensional simulation system, which allows the virtual belugas, in a natural pod context, to learn and alter their behavior based on contextual visitor interaction. Ethogram information on beluga behavior was incorporated into the simulation, which uses physically based systems for natural whale locomotion and water, artificial intelligence systems including modified neural networks and a reactive hierarchical action-selection mechanism to simulate real-time natural individual beluga and group behavior. The beluga’s behavioral system consists of two layers: a low-level navigation system and a high-level reaction hierarchical action-selection system. The system is designed to be run on consumer level hardware while maintaining real-time speeds.
Forced Moves or Good Tricks in Design Space? Landmarks in the Evolution of Neural Mechanisms for Action Selection
Authors: Prescott Tony J.
Published: February 2007

This review considers some important landmarks in animal evolution, asking to what extent specialized action-selection mechanisms play a role in the functional architecture of different nervous system plans, and looking for “forced moves” or “good tricks” (see Dennett, D., 1995, Darwin’s Dangerous Idea, Penguin Books, London) that could possibly transfer to the design of robot control systems. A key conclusion is that while cnidarians (e.g. jellyfish) appear to have discovered some good tricks for the design of behavior-based control systems—largely lacking specialized selection mechanisms—the emergence of bilaterians may have forced the evolution of a central ganglion, or “archaic brain”, whose main function is to resolve conflicts between peripheral systems. Whilst vertebrates have many interesting selection substrates it is likely that here too the evolution of centralized structures such as the medial reticular formation and the basal ganglia may have been a forced move because of the need to limit connection costs as brains increased in size.
Poster Presentations as a Genre in Knowledge Communication: A Case Study of Forms, Norms, and Values
Authors: MacIntosh-Murray Anu
Published: February 2007

Learning to communicate research well through posters involves far more than formatting issues such as font size. The conventions of poster presentations as social practices are part of academic apprenticeship in many health disciplines. This case study examines doctoral students’ poster presentations as a research-process genre. The article maps genre knowledge required of novice researchers: poster form, creation processes, presentation practices, and underlying values. Complexity arises from the multiple roles that posters must fulfill, combined with formatting restrictions, the nature of audience interaction, and prestige issues. Posters are often considered as second class compared to oral presentations, perhaps unfairly. The reuse of posters raises questions about publication as academic currency and appropriate knowledge-exchange practices. Poster presentations are evolving with digital media, which may affect competence development in this multimodal form of research communication. Future research should consider how posters’ technology-influenced evolution affects interaction, communicative purposes, and the texts themselves.
Accounting for Cosmetic Surgery in the USA and Great Britain: A Cross-cultural Analysis of Women's Narratives
Authors: Gimlin Debra
Published: February 2007

The concept of ‘accounts’ (Scott and Lyman, 1968) – or linguistic strategies for neutralizing the negative social meanings of norm violation – has a long history in sociology. This work examines British and American women's accounts of cosmetic surgery. In the medical literature, feminist writings and the popular press, aesthetic plastic surgery has been associated with narcissism, psychological instability and self-hatred. Given these negative connotations, cosmetic surgery remains a practice requiring justification even as its popularity increases. Drawing on interview data, I argue that respondents' efforts to account for cosmetic surgery vary according to the ‘repertoires of evaluation’ (Lamont and Thévenot, 2000) made available by their own nation and, particularly, by its healthcare culture. In the market-based US healthcare system, women justify cosmetic surgery by referring to their personal and financial ‘investments’ in physical attractiveness and well-being. Such explanations are less legitimate in Britain, where healthcare is considered a social right rather than a consumer good. In the latter context, women employ narratives that medicalize the pre-surgical body by stressing the physical pain and emotional distress that it caused.
Drag Kinging: Embodied Acts and Acts of Embodiment
Authors: Hanson Julie
Published: February 2007

This article offers speculative analyses on embodiment and corporeality, with particular reference made to drag kinging as an embodied performance of female masculinity to both initiate and highlight these. In particular I explore and employ Karen Barad's post-humanist elaboration of performativity, and Warwick and Cavallaro's provocative discussions on the dress/body relationship to do this. This lends itself to thinking and theorizing corporeality and the socially produced body in terms not reducible to easy dualisms; for example, material/immaterial, mind/body and nature/culture divides. By maintaining a ‘tension’ between such dualisms, I hope to highlight, through personal drag king narratives and my own speculative writing, that drag kinging is much more than just a ‘performance’, but is in fact a powerful corporeal experience that I have come to term ‘drag king embodiment’.
Health, spending and the effort to improve quality in OECD countries: a review of the data
Authors: Kelley Ed
Published: February 2007

The performance of health systems is of concern to both policy-makers and academics and a large body of recent literature has advanced the debate significantly on methods and results of health system performance assessments. In this article, I attempt to summarize what is known about a range of areas of health system performance, specifically in the areas of spending and outcomes, using data from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in the areas of health, spending, risk factors and quality of care. In so doing, we use new data from the OECD's Health Care Quality Indicators (HCQI) to examine a factor that is frequently cited at the national level but rarely compared at the international level, namely the quality of the healthcare provided. In keeping with other assessments of trends in health, we show that health has improved dramatically since the 1970s in all of the countries of the OECD. Likewise, all of the OECD countries are spending many times more on health per person than in 1970. However, the gains in health as well as the spending levels vary tremendously across countries. Quality of care is relatively high in some areas such as vaccination rates. In other areas such as breast cancer survival, the HCQI data show that most countries are making progress somewhat universally, but that all countries still have progress to be made. Finally, in other areas, such as inpatient care for acute myocardial infarction (AMI), there is wide variation in quality. Future work will need to be undertaken in order to examine possible best practices at the policy and operational level of health care delivery, their impact on spending and, most importantly, on health outcomes.
The future of regulation and governance
Authors: Scrivens Ellie
Published: February 2007

The NHS in England is undergoing considerable structural change as it introduces more locally accountable hospitals, greater patient choice, payment by results and local general practitioner based commissioning of services. To deliver the anticipated service improvement associated with these changes, there is a need to ensure that the reformed NHS provides incentives for service improvement, while at the same time maintaining consistency in access to services and the safe delivery of services. The UK government is committed to reducing bureaucracy, which is based upon the associated desire to reduce the overall costs of regulation, while increasing the accountability of health services. This requires a new approach to regulation, balancing a standardised concept of quality with incentives to encourage local innovation in service design and delivery.

Accountability through regulation brings with it the burdens of supplying information for audit and inspection, which are placed upon the organization. This article examines the issues that need to be considered in the design of an effective regulatory system; one that must operate within a restricted cost envelope, and in particular focuses on the concept of reducing the administrative burden associated with both inspection and self-assessment and the need to make these proportionate to a demonstrable contribution to the improvement in regulation and the ultimate goal of improvement in quality of healthcare.
The problem of engaging hospital doctors in promoting safety and quality in clinical care
Authors: Neale Graham , Vincent Charles , Darzi Sir Ara
Published: February 2007

There is widespread agreement that the medical profession has much to learn about addressing adverse events in clinical practice and participating in clinical governance. In England and Wales centrally driven initiatives such as medical audit, clinical governance and the National Reporting and Learning System have failed to transform the management of iatrogenic adverse events. In this article we explore the historical and cultural background of these issues with respect to hospital medicine and suggest means of tackling the challenges ahead.
One relative risk versus two odds ratios: implications for meta-analyses involving paired and unpaired binary data
Authors: Zou Guang Yong
Published: February 2007

Background There are debates on whether the conditional odds ratio or marginal odds ratio should be used in meta-analysis involving both paired and unpaired binary data. Although statistically sound, both approaches result in overall odds ratios which are known to be less meaningful to consumers.

Purpose To show that while two odds ratios can be calculated in a pair-matched study, there is only one relative risk for such design, and to discuss the implications for meta-analysis involving both paired and unpaired binary data.

Methods Algebra and an example, along with standard software for implementing relative risk regression models.

Results The choice of relative risk as the effect measure in pair-matched design not only simplifies analysis and interpretation for individual studies, but makes mata-analysis involving both paired and unpaired studies straightforward. Pooling marginal odds ratios in a meta-analysis of diabetic retinopathy treatment resulted in a summarized odds ratio of 2.25 (95% CI 1.83–2.75), compared with that of 2.44 (95% CI 1.95–3.04) from pooling conditional odds ratios. In contrast, summarizing relative risks resulted in an overall effect measure of 1.09 (95% CI 1.06–1.11), implying the treatment reduces visual deterioration rate by 9%.

Conclusion Relative risk may be the first consideration in measuring effect for analyzing prospective studies with binary outcomes.
Bayesian decision-theoretic group sequential clinical trial design based on a quadratic loss function: a frequentist evaluation
Authors: Lewis Roger J , Lipsky Ari M , Berry Donald A
Published: February 2007

The decision to terminate a controlled clinical trial at the time of an interim analysis is perhaps best made by weighing the value of the likely additional information to be gained if further subjects are enrolled against the various costs of that further enrollment. The most commonly used statistical plans for interim analysis (eg, O'Brien–Fleming), however, are based on a frequentist approach that makes no such comparison. A two-armed Bayesian decision-theoretic clinical trial design is developed for a disease with two possible outcomes, incorporating a quadratic decision loss function and using backward induction to quantify the cost of future enrollment. Monte Carlo simulation is used to compare frequentist error rates and mean required sample sizes for these Bayesian designs with the two-tailed frequentist group-sequential designs of, O'Brien–Fleming and Pocock. When the terminal decision loss function is chosen to yield typical frequentist error rates, the mean sample sizes required by the Bayesian designs are smaller than those of the corresponding O'Brien–Fleming frequentist designs, largely due to the more frequent interim analyses typically used with the Bayesian designs and the ability of the Bayesian designs to terminate early and conclude equivalence. Adding stochastic curtailment to the frequentist designs and using the same number of interim analyses results in largely equivalent trials. An example of a Bayesian design for the data safety monitoring of a clinical trial is given. Our design assumes independence of the probabilities of success in the two trial arms. Additionally, we have chosen non-informative priors and selected loss functions to produce trials with appealing frequentist error rates, rather than choosing priors that reflect realistic prior information and loss functions that reflect true costs. Our Bayesian designs allow interpretation of the final results along either Bayesian or frequentist lines. For the Bayesian, they minimize the total cost and allow the direct calculation of the probability density function for the difference in efficacy. For the frequentist, they have well-characterized type I and II error rates and in some cases lead to a reduction in the mean sample size.