bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
PROSPERous: high-throughput prediction of substrate cleavage sites for 90 proteases with improved accuracy
Authors: Song Jiangning , Li Fuyi , Leier André , Marquez-Lago Tatiana T , Akutsu Tatsuya , Haffari Gholamreza , Chou Kuo-Chen , Webb Geoffrey I , Pike Robert N
Published: October 2017

Proteases are enzymes that specifically cleave the peptide backbone of their target proteins. As an important type of irreversible post-translational modification, protein cleavage underlies many key physiological processes. When dysregulated, proteases’ actions are associated with numerous diseases. Many proteases are highly specific, cleaving only those target substrates that present certain particular amino acid sequence patterns. Therefore, tools that successfully identify potential target substrates for proteases may also identify previously unknown, physiologically relevant cleavage sites, thus providing insights into biological processes and guiding hypothesis-driven experiments aimed at verifying protease–substrate interaction. In this work, we present PROSPERous, a tool for rapid in silico prediction of protease-specific cleavage sites in substrate sequences. Our tool is based on logistic regression models and uses different scoring functions and their pairwise combinations to subsequently predict potential cleavage sites. PROSPERous represents a state-of-the-art tool that enables fast, accurate and high-throughput prediction of substrate cleavage sites for 90 proteases.

Availability and implementation

http://prosperous.erc.monash.edu/

Supplementary information

Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online.
Protective effect of FGF-2 and low-molecular-weight heparin/protamine nanoparticles on radiation-induced healing-impaired wound repair in rats
Authors: Kinoda Jun , Ishihara Masayuki , Nakamura Shingo , Fujita Masanori , Fukuda Koichi , Sato Yoko , Yokoe Hidetaka
Published: October 2017

We examined the effectiveness of localized administration of fibroblast growth factor-2 containing low-molecular-weight heparin/protamine nanoparticles (FGF-2&LMWH/P NPs) on apoptosis in vivo and on healing of radiation-induced skin injury in a rat model. FGF-2 binds onto LMWH/P NPs, which can significantly enhance and stabilize FGF-2 as a local carrier. X-irradiation at a dose of 25 Gy was administered to the lower part of the back (using a lead sheet with two holes) 1 h before the administration of FGF-2&LMWH/P NPs. Cutaneous full-thickness defect wounds were then formed in X-irradiated areas to examine the time-course of wound healing, and the wound tissues were microscopically and histologically compared and examined. Wound healing was significantly delayed by X-irradiation, but FGF-2&LMWH/P NPs administration prior to irradiation led to a significantly shorter delay compared with FGF-2 alone, LMWH/P NPs alone, and controls. Furthermore, terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase–mediated dUTP nick-end labeling (TUNEL) staining showed that the proportions of apoptotic dermal fibroblasts in X-irradiated skin were significantly lower in rats administered FGF-2&LMWH/P NPs than in controls. However, 8-hydroxy-2’-deoxyguanosine (8-OHdG) staining showed no differences. Thus, localized administration of FGF-2&LMWH/P NPs prior to irradiation may alleviate X-irradiation-induced healing-impaired wound repair in normal tissue.
The Cultural Construction of Memory in Early Childhood
Authors: Nelson Katherine
Published: October 2017

Research on memory from infancy through early childhood and the school years over the past four decades has dramatically changed our knowledge about the development of this important mental faculty. This chapter considers the important changes in memory during the preschool years, with emphasis on the emergence of autobiographical memory toward the end of that period, the significance of social and cultural contributions to this emergence in terms of the “mediated mind,” and the qualitative changes in memory and self-concept necessary for its mature operations. These developments are considered in relation to the evolutionary levels of human language and cognition described by Donald (see chapter 1).
Death Rituals and Politics in Northern Song China
Authors: Choi Mihwa
Published: October 2017

This study inquires into a historical question of how politics surrounding death rituals and ensuing changes in ritual performance shaped a revival of Confucianism during eleventh-century China. It investigates how polarizing debates about death rituals introduced new terrain for political power dynamics between monarchy and officialdom, and between groups of court officials. During the reign of Renzong, in reaction to Emperor Zhenzong’s statewide Daoist ritual programs for venerating the royal ancestors, some court officials maneuvered in the imperial court to return Confucian canonical rituals to their place of primacy. Later, a faction of scholar-officials took a lead in reviving the Confucian rituals as a way of checking the power of both the emperors and the wealthy merchants. By perceiving Confucian rituals as the models for social reality as it ought to be, they wrote new ritual manuals, condemned non-Confucian rituals, took legal actions, and established public graveyards.
Creative Imagination
Authors: Glăveanu Vlad Petre , Karwowski Maciej , Jankowska Dorota M. , de Saint-Laurent Constance
Published: October 2017

This chapter focuses on the relationship between imagination and creativity as reflected in the study of creative imagination. It is argued that, in order to appreciate today’s close association between imagination and creativity, we need first to consider the intellectual trajectory of these concepts before and after the advent of “scientific” psychology. Using sociocultural perspectives in psychology, the authors challenge the easy assumption that creative imagination is all about generating new, original, or vivid images and, following the legacy of Vygotsky, they conceive of creative imagination as both grounded in and constructive of experience. They use three simple illustrations of children making drawings of Victory to introduce and discuss, comparatively, three sociocultural approaches to (creative) imagination: the gap-filling, the loop, and the perspectival models. The authors conclude by raising new questions about imagination as a cultural, developmental, and creative process.
Imagination in Adults and the Aging Person
Authors: Zittoun Tania , Sato Tatsuya
Published: October 2017

Life course psychology has taught us that people change and develop lifelong. Also, imagination plays an important role in the making of our life course, especially in transitions or bifurcation points. However, if imagination has been quite studied in children and adolescents, what about imagination in adulthood and, especially, in older adults? In this chapter, the authors present a model of imagination to be used in the life course. The authors review the literature on aging and identify the role of imagination within it. Finally, the authors discuss an extreme case of development, which comes about when the future seems interrupted because of a trauma. Through the case study of an older woman’s development after the Fuskushima catastrophe, the authors provide a general reflection about the role of imagination in the life of adults and elderly people.
Parsimony and the Sentencing of Multiple Offenders
Authors: Lippke Richard L.
Published: October 2017

This chapter examines the principle of parsimony (PP) as it applies to the sentencing of multiple offenders. It first explains what the PP means and challenges its basic assumptions as an independent, substantive sentencing principle. It then recasts the PP as a second-order principle, that is, as a principle designed to help us better ensure that the traditional aims of sentencing are more fully realized. It also distinguishes crime reduction and retributivism versions of the PP as a second-order principle and considers how they might be integrated into a mixed theory of sentencing. Finally, it explores whether and to what extent the PP as a second-order principle is useful in thinking about multiple-offense sentencing. It argues that the PP might play a role in determining sentence ranges for crime types, as well as in formulating broader penal and social policies.
Toward a Theoretical and Practical Model for Multiple-Offense Sentencing
Authors: Vibla Natalia
Published: October 2017

This chapter examines the conflicting positions regarding the sentencing of multiple offenders and proposes a theoretical and practical model for multiple-offense sentencing within the framework of desert theory. It begins with a discussion of desert theory and its two major dimensions of offense seriousness: the harm caused and the culpability of the offender. It then describes several sentencing practices in an attempt to better understand the way that bulk discounts operate. It also explores a number of normative propositions that support the concept of a discount in multiple-offense sentencing, focusing on the absence of normative breaks and overall proportionality based on living standard analysis. Finally, it considers two empirically derived propositions: first, that there is a considerable degree of connectedness between the offenses comprising a multiple-offense case, and second, that there is a continuum in criminal conduct.
Statistical Approaches to the Rise of Concubinage in Islam
Authors: Robinson Majied
Published: October 2017

A statistical analysis of an early Arabic text, Nasab Quraysh of al-Zubayri (d.c. 850), is used to examine the rise of concubinage during the first period of Islamic history. Using basic prosopographical and statistical techniques, the author argues for a sharp rise in reliance on concubinage by elite Arab families following the appearance of Islam during the seventh century CE. Contrary to what is often claimed, concubines and their progeny enjoyed a significant presence in elite Arab families well before the Abbasid era, and there is little evidence to suggest that either mothers or their offspring were discriminated against on a systematic basis. The value of new methods of reading medieval Arabic texts is emphasized in an effort to reconstruct the history of gender and slavery in Islamic history.
Singing Across Divides
Authors: Stirr Anna Marie
Published: October 2017

An ethnographic study of music, performance, migration, and circulation, this book examines how forms of love and intimacy are linked to changing conceptions of political solidarity and forms of belonging, through the lens of Nepali dohori song. The book describes dohori: improvised, dialogic performed poetry that is sung, in which a witty repartee of exchanges is based on poetic couplets with a fixed rhyme scheme, often backed by instrumental music and accompanying dance, performed between men and women, with a primary focus on romantic love. The book tells the story of dohori’s relationship with changing ideas of Nepal as a nation-state, and how different concepts of national unity have incorporated marginality, in the intersectional arenas of caste, indigeneity, class, gender, and regional identity. In the aftermath of Nepal’s ten-year civil war, changing political realities, increased migration, and circulation of people, media, and practices are redefining concepts of appropriate intimate relationships and their associated systems of exchange. Through multi-sited ethnography of performances, media production, circulation, reception, and the daily lives of performers and fans in Nepal and the United Kingdom, this book examines how people use dohori to challenge (and uphold) social categories, while also creating affective solidarities.
Forms of Dictatorship
Authors: Harford Vargas Jennifer
Published: October 2017

An intraethnic study of Latina/o fiction written in the United States from the early 1990s to the present, this book examines novels that depict the historical reality of dictatorship and exploit dictatorship as a literary trope. This literature constitutes a new subgenre of Latina/o fiction that the author calls the Latina/o dictatorship novel. The book illuminates Latina/os’ central contributions to the literary history of the dictatorship novel by analyzing how U.S. Latina/os with national origin roots in the Caribbean, Mexico, and Central and South America imaginatively represent authoritarianism. The novels collectively generate what the author terms a “Latina/o counter-dictatorial imaginary” that positions authoritarianism on a continuum of domination alongside imperialism, white supremacy, heteropatriarchy, neoliberalism, and border militarization. The book reveals how Latina/o dictatorship novels foreground these modes of oppression to indict Latin American dictatorships, U.S. imperialism, and structural discrimination in the United States, as well as repressive hierarchies of power in general. The author simultaneously utilizes formalist analysis to investigate how Latina/o writers mobilize the genre of the novel and formal techniques such as footnotes, focalization, emplotment, and metafiction to depict dictatorial structures and relations. The author builds on narrative theories of character, plot, temporality, and perspective to explore how the Latina/o dictatorship novel stages power dynamics. The book thus queries the relationship between different forms of power and the power of narrative form—that is, between various instantiations of repressive power structures and the ways in which different narrative structures can reproduce and resist repressive power.
Autonomous Vehicles and Moral Uncertainty
Authors: Bhargava Vikram , Kim Tae Wan
Published: October 2017

The chief purposes of this chapter are to explore the problem of moral uncertainty as it pertains to autonomous vehicles and to outline possible solutions. The problem is the following: How should autonomous vehicles be programmed to act when the person who has the authority to choose the ethics of the autonomous vehicle is under moral uncertainty? Roughly, an agent is morally uncertain when she has access to all (or most) of the relevant non-moral facts, including but not limited to empirical and legal facts, but still remains uncertain about what morality requires of her. We argue that the problem of moral uncertainty in the context of autonomous vehicles is an important problem and then critically engage with two solutions to the problem. We conclude by discussing a solution that we think is more promising—that of the philosopher Andrew Sepielli—and offer some support in its defense.
Autonomy and Responsibility in Hybrid Systems
Authors: Loh Wulf , Loh Janina
Published: October 2017

In this chapter, we give a brief overview of the traditional notion of responsibility and introduce a concept of distributed responsibility within a responsibility network of engineers, driver, and autonomous driving system. In order to evaluate this concept, we explore the notion of man–machine hybrid systems with regard to self-driving cars and conclude that the unit comprising the car and the operator/driver consists of such a hybrid system that can assume a shared responsibility different from the responsibility of other actors in the responsibility network. Discussing certain moral dilemma situations that are structured much like trolley cases, we deduce that as long as there is something like a driver in autonomous cars as part of the hybrid system, she will have to bear the responsibility for making the morally relevant decisions that are not covered by traffic rules.
Imputing Driverhood
Authors: Gurney Jeffrey K.
Published: October 2017

As society embarks on the robotics revolution, lawmakers will need to enact laws that directly address robotic interactions with humans. They will have to consider who or what is responsible for any harm caused by robots and how to properly compensate the injured parties. If they do not, robot producers may incur unexpected and excessive costs, which would disincentivize investment. Or if victims are not adequately compensated, such producers may face a backlash from injured parties. This chapter examines these issues in the realm of autonomous vehicles, and it recommends that manufacturers of autonomous vehicles be treated as the drivers of their vehicles for purposes of assigning civil liability for harm caused by the vehicles’ autonomous mode.
Robots and Space Ethics
Authors: Abney Keith
Published: October 2017

As we begin our venture into space, issues with serious ethical implications deserve heightened scrutiny: among them are protection from space debris, hazardous asteroids, and other cosmic threats; planetary protection/quarantine and other safety and risk issues; protection of astronaut health; commercial and private sector activities in space, including tourism; and terraforming, colonization, and space settlements. The presumption that these activities require human astronauts is itself worthy of serious question; whether for reasons of cost, efficiency, or moral qualms, robots may be an ethically preferable choice to engage in most or perhaps even all of these activities. This chapter examines these issues and analyzes the moral case for robots, rather than human beings, filling the roles of space explorers, developers, miners, defenders, and settlers of the final frontier.
Dignity through Thick and Thin
Authors: Sumner L. W.
Published: October 2017

Some critics have argued that the concept of dignity has outlived whatever usefulness it ever had, at least in bioethics. However, the concept of dignity has the annoying habit of turning up on both sides of the debate about the ethics and legality of physician-assisted death. This chapter distinguishes two conceptions of dignity: a thick one (commonly invoked by the pro side), which is derived from the experiences of patients at the end of life, and a thin one (often utilized by the anti side), which is rooted in a Kantian ethic. The chapter then provides reasons for preferring the former to the latter.
Omission and Attribution Error
Authors: Talbert Matthew
Published: October 2017

Attributionists believe that moral responsibility has mainly to do with how a person is, and with what can be attributed to her for the purposes of moral assessment. Critics of the view have tended to charge that it proposes a standard for blameworthiness that is too easily satisfied. This chapter defends Attributionism from an opposing criticism—one that notes that many agents who are judged blameworthy by common-sense morality do not fulfill the necessary conditions on blameworthiness that Attributionism proposes. In this context, the chapter pays particular attention to cases in which agents commit apparently blameworthy unwitting omissions. It argues that such agents are often not blameworthy and offers an explanation as to why common-sense morality delivers a contrary judgment.
Contesting the Repressive State
Authors: Jumet Kira D.
Published: October 2017

This book advances research on the collective action dilemma in protest movements by examining protest mobilization leading up to, and during, the 2011 Egyptian Revolution and 2013 June 30th Coup in Cairo, Egypt. The book is organized chronologically and touches on why and how people make the decision to protest or not protest during different periods of the revolutionary process. The overarching question is: Why and how do individuals who are not members of political groups or organizers of political movements choose to engage or not engage in anti-government protest under a repressive regime? In answering the question, the book argues that individual decisions to protest or not protest are based on the intersection of the following three factors: political opportunity structures, mobilizing structures, and framing processes. It further demonstrates that the way these decisions to protest or not protest take place is through emotional mechanisms that are activated by specific combinations of these factors. The goal of the book is to investigate the relationship between key structural factors and the emotional responses they produce. By examining 170 interviews with individuals who either protested or did not protest, it explores how social media, violent government repression, changes in political opportunities, and the military influenced individual decisions to protest or not protest.
Introduction
Authors: Cynthia Roberts , Armijo Leslie , Katada Saori
Published: October 2017

This chapter uses international relations theory to conceptualize the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) as a club emulating the incumbent world powers. The BRICS operate as an informal club to increase their bargaining power and influence global economic governance. They are motivated by their common aversions to the dominant power of the G7, particularly the United States, and challenges to their autonomy. These five countries press to have a greater voice within existing multilateral institutions, including the major international financial institutions, while pursuing the outside option of founding parallel multilateral institutions. Given China’s disproportionate strength within this club, this asymmetry of capabilities among the members has enabled China to dominate their internal decisions. Nonetheless, the other members continue to find value in their collaboration with China. In adopting this stance, China within the BRICS presents some echoes of the role played by the United States within the G7.
BRICS Collective Financial Statecraft
Authors: Cynthia Roberts , Armijo Leslie , Katada Saori
Published: October 2017

This chapter examines four ideal types of collective financial statecraft of the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) in four case studies occurring between 2007 and mid-2016. The first type is inside reforms of existing institutions, illustrated by the BRICS’ attempt to gain greater influence within the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank. A second type is inside reforms of markets, defined as resisting or reallocating the political power accruing to states that possess currency and financial market power. The associated case profiles the BRICS’ opposition to sanctions against Russia over its intervention in Ukraine. A third type of BRICS collective action occurs via the outside option to create new parallel institutions such as the New Development Bank (NDB) and Contingent Reserve Arrangement (CRA). Finally, a fourth type combines the choice of an outside option with a market-based venue. The chapter examines BRICS support of greater internationalization of China’s currency, rivaling the U.S. dollar and thus altering international financial markets. The BRICS have cooperated successfully in most of their attempts.
Reform as Routine
Authors: Brunsson Nils
Published: October 2017

Large contemporary organizations seem to be in an almost continual state of change. Whether in public or private organizations, managers are trying to implement new organizational forms, introduce new procedures or systems, or change the attitudes of employees. Such reforms often yield disappointing results, and so new reforms are deemed necessary. This book considers why reform takes place. It looks at why reforms occur when they do, what their consequences are, and the role of social intuitions, public discourse, reform models, fashions, and hope. The text draws on both European and American traditions to develop a distinctive voice and stance.
Quantitative Historical Linguistics
Authors: Jenset Gard B. , McGillivray Barbara
Published: October 2017

An innovative guide to quantitative, corpus-based research in historical and diachronic linguistics, this book provides an original and thoroughly worked-out methodological framework, which encompasses the entire research process. The authors argue that, although historical linguistics has been successful in using the comparative method, the field lags behind other branches of linguistics with respect to adopting quantitative methods. In a theoretically agnostic way, the book provides a framework for quantitatively assessing models and hypotheses in historical linguistics, based on corpus data. Using case studies, the authors illustrate how research questions in historical linguistics can be answered within a framework of quantitative corpus linguistics. With an eye for the needs of researchers, the book explains and exemplifies the benefits of working with quantitative methods, corpus data, corpus annotation, and the benefits of open and reproducible research. Historical corpora, corpus annotation, and historical language resources are discussed in depth, with the aim of enabling researchers to identify appropriate existing resources, or creating their own. The view of quantitative corpus linguistics advocated here offers a unified account of how they fit into the bigger research picture of historical linguistics research.
Strategies and adaptations to aquatic life at high altitude
Authors: Jacobsen Dean , Dangles Olivier
Published: October 2017

Chapter 5 is focused on how organisms cope with the environmental conditions that are a direct result of high altitude. Organisms reveal a number of fascinating ways of dealing with a life at high altitude; for example, avoidance and pigmentation as protection against damaging high levels of ultraviolet radiation, accumulation of antifreeze proteins, and metabolic cold adaptation among species encountering low temperatures with the risk of freezing, oxy-regulatory capacity in animals due to low availability of oxygen, and root uptake from the sediment of inorganic carbon by plants living in waters poor in dissolved carbon dioxide. These and more adaptations are carefully described through a number of examples from famous flagship species in addition to the less well-known ones. Harsh environmental conditions work as an environmental filter that only allows the well-adapted species to slip through to colonize high altitude waters.
High altitude waters in the face of climate change
Authors: Jacobsen Dean , Dangles Olivier
Published: October 2017

Chapter 8 focuses on the effects of warming and changes in precipitation patterns on aquatic life at high altitude. Located near the edge of their climatic limits, in regions where the rate of warming is generally amplified compared with lowlands, high altitude aquatic systems present a high sensitivity to climate change. Changes in mountain climate create a number of indirect effects on aquatic life through the control of hydrological systems and processes, particularly those associated with the cryosphere (e.g. permafrost and ice melting) and the soil–vegetation interface (e.g. treeline expansion). The chapter then presents the three basic options faced by all aquatic organisms as their environmental conditions alter as a result of climate change: adapt, migrate, or perish. At an ecosystem level, small changes in physical, chemical, or biological characteristics can be amplified into major shifts in limnological properties.
The Free Port of Livorno and the Transformation of the Mediterranean World
Authors: Tazzara Corey
Published: October 2017

In the twilight of the Renaissance, the grand duke of Tuscany—a scion of the fabled Medici family of bankers—invited foreign merchants, artisans, and ship captains to settle in his port city of Livorno. The town quickly became one of the most bustling port cities in the Mediterranean, presenting a rich tableau of officials, merchants, mariners, and slaves. Nobody could have predicted in 1600 that their activities would contribute a chapter in the history of free trade. Yet by the late seventeenth century, the grand duke’s invitation had evolved into a general program of hospitality towards foreign visitors, the liberal treatment of goods, and a model for the elimination of customs duties. Livorno was the earliest and most successful example of a free port in Europe. The story of Livorno shows the seeds of liberalism emerging, not from the studies of philosophers such as Adam Smith, but out of the nexus between commerce, politics, and identity in the early modern Mediterranean.
Philosophical Progress
Authors: Stoljar Daniel
Published: October 2017

Can there be progress in philosophy? On the one hand, it is often thought that problems in philosophy, in contrast to those in science, are perennials for which it is pointless to expect a solution. On the other hand, professional philosophy seems to have organized itself, perhaps unconsciously, around the opposite view: how else to explain the panoply of books, papers, journals, conferences, graduate programmes, websites, etc.? Who is right? And what turns on who is right? This book defends a reasonable optimism about philosophical progress. Optimistic, because the author argues that, contrary to a widespread attitude of pessimism common even among professional philosophers, we have correctly answered philosophical questions in the past and therefore should expect to do so in the future; The work discusses several examples from philosophy of mind, philosophy of language, and epistemology. Reasonable, because the optimism the author has in mind does not extend to every instance of the sort of problem called ‘philosophical’ or even to every subkind of that sort of problem.
Thought and Talk about Knowledge
Authors: Gerken Mikkel
Published: October 2017

Chapter 1 outlines the core assumptions of the epistemological framework to be defended. For example, a variety of a relevant-alternatives framework that appeals to normal circumstances is adopted, as is a competence epistemology according to which S may obtain knowledge and warranted belief only by exercising a cognitive competence. Moving from the epistemological framework to our folk epistemology, the ways in which the term ‘knowledge’ is central to our folk epistemology are considered. Special emphasis is given to knowledge ascriptions’ social and communicative functions. Thus, Chapter 1 introduces some core assumptions of a fairly traditional epistemology.
The Political Economy of National Statistics
Authors: Coyle Diane
Published: October 2017

There have been challenges over the decades to the status of real GDP growth as an indicator of economic progress, including forceful critiques from those urging the need to account for environmental sustainability, and now from the digital sector arguing their industry’s ‘true’ contribution to the economy is mismeasured. As a result, there is a broad coalition in favour of replacing GDP as the gauge of economic health. However, there is no consensus about a single alternative. Instead, there is a proliferation of approaches. This paper models the setting of national accounting standards as a cooperative game with multiple equilibrium outcomes, and considers the conditions for a move away from the prevailing standard. The success of such a move depends on sufficient agreement on an alternative for a co-ordinated move. However, there is unlikely to be sufficient consensus without a compelling theory around which economists and policymakers can coalesce.
Wealth, Top Incomes, and Inequality
Authors: Cowell Frank , Nolan Brian , Olivera Javier , Kerm Philippe Van
Published: October 2017

Although it is heartening to see wealth inequality being taken seriously, key concepts are often muddled, including the distinction between income and wealth; what is included in ‘wealth’; and facts about wealth distributions. This chapter highlights issues that arise in making ideas and facts about wealth inequality precise, and employs newly available data to take a fresh look at wealth and wealth inequality in a comparative perspective. The composition of wealth is similar across countries, with housing wealth being the key asset. Wealth is considerably more unequally distributed than income, and it is distinctively so in the US. Extending definitions to include pension wealth, however, reduces inequality substantially. Analysis also sheds light on life-cycle patterns and the role of inheritance. Discussion of the joint distributions of income and wealth suggests that interactions between increasing top-income shares and the concentration of wealth and income from wealth towards the top are critical.
Authority, Legitimacy, and Fragmentation in the (Envisaged) Dispute Settlement Disciplines in Mega-Regionals
Authors: Schill Stephan W
Published: October 2017

This chapter analyses the inter-state and investor-state dispute settlement disciplines included in mega-regionals, focusing on the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement and the Trans-Pacific Partnership. It argues that dispute settlement assumes a pivotal role in trade and investment negotiations, raising fundamental questions about authority and legitimacy and concerns of fragmentation. While preferences of states participating in mega-regionals coincide in agreeing on inter-state arbitration as a compliance mechanism that minimises the authority of dispute resolvers and negative effects of fragmentation in relation to the World Trade Organization, starker differences arise on investor-state dispute settlement. Whereas the EU pushes for the creation of permanent judicial bodies, other states seemingly prefer a reformed version of investor-state arbitration. The underlying clash of ideologies shapes what may become a constitutional moment for international economic law as the debates about the reform of investment dispute settlement progress.
Intellectual Property and Mega-Regional Trade Agreements
Authors: Cottier Thomas
Published: October 2017

The chapter assesses recent developments in intellectual property protection in the EU–Canadian Comprehensive Economic Cooperation Agreement and the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement, and extrapolates results of these negotiations to the pending EU–US negotiations on the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP). It discusses the likely implications of ever-increasing protection of IPRs on international trade, innovation, and technology transfer. Given the complex interaction of TRIPs and WIPO Agreements with the newly emerging agreements, the chapter finally examines the structure and operation of dispute settlement and how existing fragmentation could be overcome. Intellectual property, it is submitted, offers an important case to extend the jurisdiction of WTO dispute settlement to preferential trade agreements.
3.2 ka BP Megadrought and the Late Bronze Age Collapse
Authors: Kaniewski David , Van Campo Elise
Published: October 2017

The collapse of Bronze Age civilizations in the Aegean, southwest Asia, and the eastern Mediterranean 3200 years ago remains a persistent riddle in Eastern Mediterranean archaeology, as both archaeologists and historians believe the event was violent, sudden, and culturally disruptive. In the first phase of this period, many cities between Pylos and Gaza were destroyed violently and often left unoccupied thereafter. The palace economy of the Aegean Region and Anatolia that characterized the Late Bronze Age was replaced by the isolated village cultures of the Dark Ages. Earthquakes, attacks of the Sea Peoples, and socio-political unrest are among the most frequently suggested causes for this phenomenon. However, while climate change has long been considered a potential prime factor in this crisis, only recent studies have pinpointed the megadrought behind the collapse. An abrupt climate shift seems to have caused, or hastened, the fall of the Late Bronze Age world by sparking political and economic turmoil, migrations, and famines. The entirety of the megadrought’s effects terminated the Late Bronze Age in the eastern Mediterranean.
Imposing Risk
Authors: Oberdiek John
Published: October 2017

Human life has always been shadowed by risks like disease and natural disaster, but modern life is distinctively risky. The risks we now face are morally cognizable. For they are, in the main, subject to our control—indeed, they are typically our creation. The risks that define modern life are therefore our responsibility. As they are largely imposed by people on people, they call for moral assessment. This book addresses some of the central questions stimulated by our contemporary practices of imposing risk, including the nature of risk, as the concept is employed in a normative framework of risk imposition; the moral signifiance of imposing risk on others; the possibility of a right against risking; and the moral standards governing the imposition of risk on others.
Effect of Climatic Variables on Abundance and Dispersal ofLecanosticta acicolaSpores and Their Impact on Defoliation on Eastern White Pine
Authors: Wyka S. A. , McIntire C. D. , Smith C. , Munck I. A. , Rock B. N. , Asbjornsen H. , Broders K. D.
Published: October 2017

The disease complex white pine needle damage (WPND), first reported in 2006, has now escalated to an epidemic state across the northeastern United States. Although this complex is composed of several fungal species, Lecanosticta acicola is considered to be the primary causal agent. Knowledge regarding the epidemiology, specific climatic factors that affect the spread of L. acicola on eastern white pine (Pinus strobus) in natural forest settings, and potential risks repeated defoliation may have on tree health is limited. Therefore, this study examined how climatic variables affect the abundance and distance of spore dispersal of L. acicola and compared litterfall caused by defoliation versus natural needle abscission. Conidia were observed on spore traps from May through August, with a peak in abundance occurring in June, corresponding to the defoliation of second- and third-year foliage measured in litter traps. During peak spore production, relative humidity and the occurrence of rainfall was found to have the greatest influence on spore abundance. Our results will aid managers in determining how far from infected trees natural regeneration will likely be affected and predicting future disease severity based on climatic conditions.
Hearts and Minds
Authors: Joy George , Whiskey Eromona , Bolstridge Mark , Porras-Segovia Alejandro , McDonagh Theresa A. , Plymen Carla M. , Shergill Sukhi S.
Published: October 2017

Background

Schizophrenia has a 1% prevalence in the population; 30% of these patients are treatment refractory. Clozapine is the only drug licensed to treat treatment refractory psychosis, but concerns about potential adverse effects result in only a proportion of eligible patients being treated. Although a well-documented neutropenia risk is mitigated by routine blood testing, cardiac toxicity is a commonly cited reason to discontinue clozapine treatment. However, there is little data on the real-life cardiac outcomes in those receiving clozapine treatment.

Methods

Retrospective review of electrocardiogram, echocardiogram, and clinical outcomes in 39 inpatients with treatment-refractory schizophrenia, treated with clozapine and other antipsychotic medication, referred for cardiology opinion.

Results

Commonest reasons for referral were development of left ventricular (LV) impairment or sinus tachycardia with normal LV function. Patients were reviewed by a range of cardiologists, receiving varied interventions.

Median LV ejection fraction in the clozapine group was normal (52%). Serial echocardiograms demonstrated that clozapine-treated patients with LV impairment had no change in LV ejection fraction over a 4-month follow-up. Left ventricular ejection fraction did not differ between patients treated with clozapine and other antipsychotics. However, over an 11-year follow-up period, 48% of patients had discontinued clozapine treatment.

Conclusions

This naturalistic study demonstrates that clozapine is not associated with significant cardiac mortality or morbidity. There is a real need for multidisciplinary working between specialist cardiologists and psychiatrists caring for these complex patients to facilitate optimal long-term physical and mental health outcomes.
Prevalence of Antipsychotic-Treated Patients in a Cohort of Adult Addicted Patients
Authors: Peyrière Hélène , Diot Caroline , Nogue Erika , Verschave Marie , Laure Morgan , Picot Marie-Christine , Petit Pierre , Donnadieu-Rigole Hélène , Leglise Yves
Published: October 2017

Purpose

The objective of this cross-sectional study was to describe and estimate the prevalence of antipsychotics (AP) in a cohort of addicted patients, and to compare the profiles of addictive patients receiving AP or not.

Methods

We included all adult patients seen at the addiction care center of Montpellier University Hospital, between January 1, 2015, and March 31, 2015. Demographic, clinical, and therapeutic data were collected from the patients’ medical records.

Results

During the study period, 415 patients were included, with a mean age of 38 ± 10 years. They were mostly men (73.3%), French (54.9%), and unemployed (61.8%). Among the study population, 93 patients (patients treated with AP [trAP], 22.4%) were treated by 111 different AP, mainly cyamemazine (29.0% of treated patients), aripiprazole (20.4%), olanzapine (17.2%), and quetiapine (16.1%), mostly in monotherapy (80.6%) and by oral route (93.2% of AP). Psychiatric history was more frequent in trAP than in those without AP (untrAP) (55.9% vs 35.4% respectively; P < 0.001). Professional activity tended to be less frequent in patients with AP (25.3% vs 38.9%, P = 0.08).

When compared with untrAP, trAP consumed more amphetamine (10.8% vs 4.4%; P = 0.02) and tended to consume less opiates (7.5% vs 14.9%; P = 0.06); the consumptions of cannabis (43.0% vs 35.7%; P = 0.20) and cocaine (22.6% vs 16.8%; P = 0.20) were not statistically different.

Opiate maintenance therapy was reported in 63.7% of trAP and 68.4% of untrAP (P = 0.41): it consisted of methadone (trAP, 60.3% vs untrAP, 56.5%) and buprenorphine (trAP, 39.7% vs untrAP, 43.5%).

Conclusions

The concomitant management of psychiatric and substance use disorders in the same center may explain the high prevalence of trAP in this study. Cannabis and psychostimulants may have been used in these patients as self-medication for mental disease-related symptoms or adverse effects of APs.
Palliative Nursing for Cancer Patients as an Abstract Concept: A Hermeneutic Study
Authors: BORIMNEJAD Leili , MARDANI-HAMOOLEH Marjan , SEYEDFATEMI Naimeh , TAHMASEBI Mamak
Published: October 2017

Background:

Understanding the outcomes of palliative care (PC) that is provided to patients with cancer is necessary.

Purpose:

The aim of this study was to explore the lived experiences of Iranian nurses with regard to PC outcomes in cancer patients.

Methods:

This hermeneutic study interviewed 14 nurses to understand their lived experiences with regard to PC outcomes in cancer patients. A seven-stage process of data analysis was employed.

Results:

One constitutive pattern “palliative nursing for cancer patients is an abstractive concept” and the two associated themes of “providing excellent PC” and “PC as an alarm” were identified. Providing excellent PC had two subthemes: being a unique nurse and experiencing the humanistic approach to caring. PC as an alarm also had two subthemes: caring-related concerns and challenging issues caused by caring.

Conclusions:

The findings provide a deeper understanding of the nursing experience with regard to PC outcomes in cancer patients.
Angulated Stents—A Novel Stent Improvisation to Manage Difficult Post-tuberculosis Bronchial Stenosis
Authors: Tay Chee Kiang , Jeong Byeong-Ho , Kim Hojoong
Published: October 2017

Post-tuberculosis bronchostenosis (PTBS), a complication of endobronchial tuberculosis is currently treated by bronchial stenting. However, in cases of angulated bronchial stenoses, difficulty is often encountered in stent insertion and maintenance, resulting in stent migration, granulation tissue overgrowth, and restenosis. To accommodate the angulated alignment of the stenosis, we devised an “angulated stent”—a novel improvisation of the conventional stent via splicing and suturing to achieve a resultant angulated shape. A retrospective review was undertaken to evaluate the performance of this stent. Among 283 PTBS patients who underwent interventional bronchoscopy at our center from 2004 to 2014, 21 were treated with at least one angulated stent. Clinical outcomes, including the stenting duration were investigated. After a median follow-up of 26 months, stent removal was successful in 7 (33.3%) out of 21 patients. In patients managed with angulated stents, the median duration to stent change or eventual removal was longer than those treated with straight tube stents (392 days vs. 86 days; p < 0.05). Angulated stents are a feasible treatment option in patients with angulated PTBS by reducing complications and prolonging the stent-changing interval.
Changing pathological diagnosis from hyperplastic polyp to sessile serrated adenoma: systematic review and meta-analysis
Authors: Niv Yaron
Published: October 2017

The WHO published a new classification of colonic polyps in 2010, including the group of serrated polyps, which can be divided into hyperplastic polyps (HP), traditional serrated adenomas, and sessile serrated adenomas (SSA) or polyps. To assess the rate of re-diagnosis of HP to SSA and to look for possible predictors for changing the diagnosis. English Medical literature searches were performed for ‘reassessment’ OR ‘reclassification’ AND ‘hyperplastic polyp’ OR ‘sessile serrated adenoma’ till 31 January 2017. PRISMA guidelines for systematic reviews were followed. Studies that included a precise re-diagnosis of HP into SSA were included. We also looked for predictors of SSA diagnosis such as polyp location and size, patient sex and age, and synchronous advanced adenoma. Altogether, we found 220 eligible studies; 212 were excluded as they did not fulfill the inclusion criteria and we were left with eight studies including 2625 patients. The odds ratio for the number of polyps with changed pathological diagnosis from HP to SSA was 0.112 with 95% confidence interval (CI): 0.099–0.126 (P<0.0001) or 11.2%. Heterogeneity between studies was significant with Q=199.4, d.f. (Q)=9, P<0.0001, and I
2=95.486%. The odds ratio for changing the pathological diagnosis from HP to SSA for polyp proximal location and polyp size more than 5 mm were 4.401, 95% CI: 2.784–6.958, P<0.0001, and 8.336, 95% CI: 4.963–15.571, P<0.0001, respectively. Endoscopists and pathologists should be aware of the SSA diagnosis when finding HPs larger than 5 mm in the right colon. The diagnosis of HP in these cases should be reassessed by experienced gastrointestinal pathologists.
Serum Cyclosporine Levels
Authors: Garbin Livia Maria , Simões Belinda Pinto , Curcioli Ana Carolina de Jesus Vieira , de Carvalho Emilia Campos
Published: October 2017

Background

There are controversies regarding the best way to collect blood samples for cyclosporine A (CsA) serum levels when this immunosuppressant is administered continuously through a silicone central venous catheter (CVC) to hematopoietic stem cell transplant recipients.

Objective

The aim of this study was to verify the effect of the time elapsed between the interruption of a continuous intravenous CsA infusion and the collection of blood samples on CsA serum levels.

Methods

This randomized 2-group clinical trial involved 32 adults. In group A, blood samples were collected immediately after interrupting the medication from peripheral vein and CVC lines. In group B, the same procedures were performed 5 minutes after interrupting the infusion.

Results

We did not observe influence of the time elapsed between interruption of the infusion and collection of the samples, independent of the collection mode and the volume discarded (P > .05). The line used for the infusion maintained a constant high level when compared with different moments of collection (P > .05), whereas in the other lines, there was a significant increase when compared with the levels obtained at 24 hours and 7 days after CsA start (P = .00).

Conclusion

The CVC line free from cyclosporine can safely be used to collect blood. The procedure can be performed immediately after interrupting the infusion, and discarding 5 mL is sufficient to obtain accurate levels.

Implications for Practice

The results can help nurses choose how to collect blood samples through the CVC, thus preventing patients from having a painful and stressful procedure such as peripheral venipuncture.