bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Nav2 is necessary for cranial nerve development and blood pressure regulation
Authors: McNeill Elizabeth M , Roos Kenneth P , Moechars Dieder , Clagett-Dame Margaret
Published: February 2010

Background

All-trans retinoic acid (atRA) is required for nervous system development, including the developing hindbrain region. Neuron navigator 2 (Nav2) was first identified as an atRA-responsive gene in human neuroblastoma cells (retinoic acid-induced in neuroblastoma 1, Rainb1), and is required for atRA-mediated neurite outgrowth. In this paper, we explore the importance of Nav2 in nervous system development and function in vivo.

Results

Nav2 hypomorphic homozygous mutants show decreased survival starting at birth. Nav2 mutant embryos show an overall reduction in nerve fiber density, as well as specific defects in cranial nerves IX (glossopharyngeal) and X (vagus). Nav2 hypomorphic mutant adult mice also display a blunted baroreceptor response compared to wild-type controls.

Conclusions

Nav2 functions in mammalian nervous system development, and is required for normal cranial nerve development and blood pressure regulation in the adult.
Transforming Growth Factor-β Coordinately Induces Suppressor of Cytokine Signaling 3 and Leukemia Inhibitory Factor to Suppress Osteoclast Apoptosis
Authors: Ruan Ming , Pederson Larry , Bradley Elizabeth W. , Bamberger Ana-Maria , Oursler Merry Jo
Published: February 2010

Local release of TGF-β during times of high bone turnover leads to elevated levels within the bone microenvironment, and we have shown that TGF-β suppresses osteoclast apoptosis. Therefore, understanding the influences of TGF-β on bone resorbing osteoclasts is critical to the design of therapies to reduce excess bone loss. Here we investigated the mechanisms by which TGF-β sustains suppression of osteoclast apoptosis. We found TGF-β rapidly increased leukemia inhibitory factor (LIF) expression and secretion by phosphorylated mothers against decapentaplegic-dependent and -independent signaling pathways. TGF-β also induced suppressor of cytokine signaling 3 (SOCS3) expression, which was required for TGF-β or LIF to promote osteoclast survival by. Blocking LIF or SOCS3 blocked TGF-β promotion of osteoclast survival, confirming that LIF and SOCS3 expression are necessary for TGF-β-mediated suppression of osteoclast apoptosis. Investigation of the mechanisms by which LIF promotes osteoclast survival revealed that LIF-induced expression of Bcl-XL and repressed Bcl-2 interacting domain expression by activating MAPK kinase, AKT, and nuclear factor-κB pathways. Suppression of Janus kinase/signal transducer and activator of transcription signaling further increased Bcl-XL expression and enhanced osteoclast survival, supporting that this pathway is not involved in prosurvival effects of TGF-β and LIF. These data show that TGF-β coordinately induces LIF and SOCS3 to promote prosurvival signaling. This alters the ratio of prosurvival Bcl2 family member Bcl-XL to proapoptotic family member Bcl-2 interacting domain, leading to prolonged osteoclast survival.
Human tRNA-derived small RNAs in the global regulation of RNA silencing
Authors: Haussecker Dirk , Huang Yong , Lau Ashley , Parameswaran Poornima , Fire Andrew Z. , Kay Mark A.
Published: February 2010

Competition between mammalian RNAi-related gene silencing pathways is well documented. It is therefore important to identify all classes of small RNAs to determine their relationship with RNAi and how they affect each other functionally. Here, we identify two types of 5′-phosphate, 3′-hydroxylated human tRNA-derived small RNAs (tsRNAs). tsRNAs differ from microRNAs in being essentially restricted to the cytoplasm and in associating with Argonaute proteins, but not MOV10. The first type belongs to a previously predicted Dicer-dependent class of small RNAs that we find can modestly down-regulate target genes in trans. The 5′ end of type II tsRNA was generated by RNaseZ cleavage downstream from a tRNA gene, while the 3′ end resulted from transcription termination by RNA polymerase III. Consistent with their preferential association with the nonslicing Argonautes 3 and 4, canonical gene silencing activity was not observed for type II tsRNAs. The addition, however, of an oligonucleotide that was sense to the reporter gene, but antisense to an overexpressed version of the type II tsRNA, triggered robust, >80% gene silencing. This correlated with the redirection of the thus reconstituted fully duplexed double-stranded RNA into Argonaute 2, whereas Argonautes 3 and 4 were skewed toward less structured small RNAs, particularly single-strand RNAs. We observed that the modulation of tsRNA levels had minor effects on the abundance of microRNAs, but more pronounced changes in the silencing activities of both microRNAs and siRNAs. These findings support that tsRNAs are involved in the global control of small RNA silencing through differential Argonaute association, suggesting that small RNA-mediated gene regulation may be even more finely regulated than previously realized.
Nebulized Colistin for the Treatment of Multidrug-Resistant Gram-Negative Pneumonia
Authors: Louzon Patricia R. , Birrer Kara L. , Brady Jason M.
Published: February 2010

Purpose

To describe the use of nebulized colistin (colistimethate sodium) for the treatment of multidrug-resistant gram-negative infections. Specific aims were to identify dose and frequency of nebulized colistin therapy currently used, to assess clinical and microbiological efficacy, and to assess the prevalence of adverse events resulting from colistin therapy.

Methods

A retrospective chart review was performed at a tertiary care, level I trauma center and teaching hospital. The review included examination of 29 courses of colistin therapy administered to 24 adults receiving at least 24 hours of nebulized colistin for the treatment of gram-negative pneumonia.

Results

Demographic, medication, adverse event, and outcome data were collected for the duration of colistin therapy. Colistin was administered to patients with multidrug-resistant infections caused by gram-negative organisms. Many patients had a history of exposure to multiple antibiotics or drug allergies. Resistance to colistin was observed in 3 of 18 isolates with available susceptibility data. Determining the prevalence of adverse events was difficult because of the use of multiple medications. Many patients had missed antibiotic doses. A 25% mortality rate was observed.

Conclusion

The findings of this study serve to demonstrate the use of nebulized colistin for treatment of multidrug-resistant gram-negative pneumonia in patients without cystic fibrosis; to raise concern with regard to the large number of missed antibiotic doses; and to emphasize the need for further investigation by a larger, prospective, randomized trial.
Assessing the Influence of Acetadote on Use of Intravenous N-acetylcysteine for Acetaminophen Poisonings
Authors: Cantrell Lee , Shah Nilofar , Anderson Philip O. , Birnbaum Kathleen , Kearney Thomas E.
Published: February 2010

Background

Until recently in the United States, the intravenous (IV) administration of N-acetylcysteine (NAC) in acetaminophen (APAP) poisonings was reserved for patients unable to take or tolerate oral NAC. Aside from these situations, oral administration of NAC was preferred. In February 2004 an IV formulation of NAC, Acetadote, was approved by the US Food and Drug Administration. This study was designed to examine the influence of Acetadote availability on the use of IV NAC in the treatment of APAP poisonings.

Methods

A retrospective review of poison center records was performed for cases reported to a poison control system 6 months before (PRE) and 6 months after (POST) the release of Acetadote. Extracted variables included patient age and sex, reason for exposure, type of APAP product involved, exposure duration, rationale for use of IV NAC, reported adverse reactions, medical outcomes, and source of IV. Also, the average wholesale price for Acetadote, Mucomyst, and generic NAC were obtained.

Results

IV NAC was administered to 50 (2.9%) patients in the PRE group and to 183 (9.6%) patients in the POST group. Demographic data were similar for both groups. Adverse reactions to IV NAC included 2 allergic-type reactions and 1 complaint of chest tightness in the POST group and 1 allergic-type reaction in the PRE group.

Discussion

The release of Acetadote was associated with a 266% (2.9% to 9.6%) increase in IV NAC use. This change occurred despite a higher risk of serious adverse events with the IV route, an increase in cost when using Acetadote with equivalent treatment durations, and a lack of convincing data demonstrating that the IV route is superior in efficacy to the oral route.

Conclusion

The change in IV NAC usage without published rationale may be the result of effective promotional campaigns by the manufacturer of Acetadote or the assumption that newly approved products are superior to existing products.
Cognitive Set and Lexicalization Strategy in Dogon Action Verbs
Authors: Heath Jeffrey , McPherson Laura
Published: February 2010

Dogon languages lexicalize action verbs with obligatory reference to manner and/or process. This contrasts with English and “Standard Average European,” which (in neutral contexts) profile result and/or function. Many common English verbs like carry and eat correspond to sets of Dogon verbs with senses like ‘carry on back’ and ‘munch’. The pattern cuts across many semantic domains and constitutes a generalized lexicalization strategy, which suggests that Dogon speakers, on the one hand, and speakers of English and “Standard Average European,” on the other, have distinct cognitive orientations toward observable actions. A number of explanatory frameworks are available to account for these cultural differences.
How to Swear in Maliseet-Passamaquoddy and Penobscot
Authors: LeSourd Philip S. , Quinn Conor McDonough
Published: February 2010

In the Eastern Algonquian languages Maliseet-Passamaquoddy and Penobscot, evaluative forms of verbs are derived by inserting one of several morphemes, not meaningful in themselves, within the verb stem. Corresponding derivatives of nouns and particles are formed by suffixation. This article documents the shapes that these derivatives take and the ways in which they are used to express anger, scorn, impatience, or intensity. Comparative evidence suggests that the source of these formations is an old process by which morphemes making reference to intimate body parts and other off-color concepts were added to verbs and nouns.
Dream as Deceit, Dream as Truth: The Grammar of Telling Dreams
Authors: Kracke Waud H.
Published: February 2010

The Kagwahiv (Tupí-Guaraní) grammatical particle used exclusively in the telling of dreams had earlier been claimed to be just a specialized tense marker used in dream narrative. Instead, it is argued that this particle is also part of a system of evidentials—specifically, of a set of reportative past markers. This is supported both by the form of the particle and by examination of its functions and etymological connections.
Generational Collaborations in Emma Donoghue's Kissing the Witch : Old Tales in New Skins
Authors: Martin Ann
Published: February 2010

"Generational Collaborations" situates Emma Donoghue's in the context of third-wave feminism, and explores how her retellings of fairy tales deconstruct binary political positions and the hierarchies with which they are associated. Productive exchanges between different generations of women in Donoghue's short stories, as well as Donoghue's own interactions with rather than rebellions against her precursors, Anne Sexton and Olga Broumas, model the active, creative, and collaborative reading practices that are encouraged of Young Adult and LGBTQ readers in her collection.
Toy Presses and Treasure Maps: Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne as Collaborators
Authors: Smith Victoria Ford
Published: February 2010

Stevenson wrote of authorship as a social act between writers, publishers, and readers, and he felt particularly indebted to Osbourne, his stepson. This article explores Stevenson and Osbourne as collaborators, examining first their partnership over toy press printing. While toy presses were designed to encourage traditional adult-child relationships, Stevenson and Osbourne constructed a nuanced negotiation between adult and child as author and publisher. This collaboration shaped Stevenson's Treasure Island , a novel imagined in cooperation with Osbourne that articulates the possibilities and pitfalls of intergenerational partnerships. Stevenson and Osbourne's collaborations reveal how nineteenth-century ideas about the child's imagination transformed adultchild dynamics.
From Individual to Community: The Shifting Moral Subject in The Middle Moffat and The Alley by Eleanor Estes
Authors: Mills Claudia
Published: February 2010

This paper examines two novels from two different periods in Eleanor Estes's career, and , to explore how Estes characterizes the moral subject in each decade. The Middle Moffat focuses on the individual moral growth of its protagonist, tracing Jane's development from adherence to external norms to an autonomous legislating of internal norms. In contrast, The Alley takes as its subject a community of children and shows how their norms evolve from directives delivered by a ruling authority to an expression of mutual respect for the community and its members.
When the North Last Headed South: Revisiting the 1930s
Authors: Reinhart Carmen M. , Reinhart Vincent R.
Published: February 2010

The U.S. recession of 2007–09 is unique in the post–World War II experience in the broad company it kept. Activity contracted around the world, with the advanced economies of the North experiencing declines in spending more typical of the developing economies of the South for the first time since the 1930s. This paper examines the role of policy in fostering recovery in that earlier decade. With nominal short-term interest rates already near zero, monetary policy in most countries took the unconventional step of delinking currencies from the gold standard. However, analysis of a sample that includes developing countries shows that this was not as universally effective as often claimed, perhaps because the exit from gold was uncoordinated in time, scale, and scope and, in many countries, failed to bring about a substantial depreciation against the dollar. Fiscal policy was also active—most countries sharply increased government spending—but was prone to reversals that may have undermined confidence. Countries that more consistently kept spending high tended to recover more quickly.
The Age of Reason: Financial Decisions over the Life Cycle and Implications for Regulation
Authors: Agarwal Sumit , Driscoll John C. , Gabaix Xavier , Laibson David
Published: February 2010

Many consumers make poor financial choices, and older adults are particularly vulnerable to such errors. About half of the population between ages 80 and 89 have a medical diagnosis of substantial cognitive impairment. We study life-cycle patterns in financial mistakes using a proprietary database with information on 10 types of credit transactions. Financial mistakes include suboptimal use of credit card balance transfer offers and excess interest rate and fee payments. In a cross section of prime borrowers, middle-aged adults made fewer financial mistakes than either younger or older adults. We conclude that financial mistakes follow a U-shaped pattern, with the cost-minimizing performance occurring around age 53. We analyze nine regulatory strategies that may help individuals avoid financial mistakes. We discuss laissez-faire, disclosure, nudges, financial "driver's licenses," advance directives, fiduciaries, asset safe harbors, and ex post and ex ante regulatory oversight. Finally, we pose seven questions for future research on cognitive limitations and associated policy responses.
Interpreting the Unconventional U.S. Monetary Policy of 2007–09
Authors: Reis Ricardo
Published: February 2010

This paper reviews the unconventional U.S. monetary policy responses to the financial and real crises of 2007–09, dividing these responses into three groups: interest rate policy, quantitative policy, and credit policy. To interpret interest rate policy, it compares the Federal Reserve's actions with the literature on optimal policy in a liquidity trap. This comparison suggests that policy has been in the direction indicated by theory, but it has not gone far enough. To interpret quantitative policy, the paper reviews the determination of inflation under different policy regimes. The main danger for inflation from current actions is that the Federal Reserve may lose its policy independence; a beneficial side effect of the crisis is that the Friedman rule can be implemented by paying interest on reserves. To interpret credit policy, the paper presents a new model of capital market imperfections with different financial institutions and roles for securitization, leveraging, and mark-to-market accounting. The model suggests that providing credit to traders in securities markets is a more effective response than extending credit to the originators of loans.
By How Much Does GDP Rise If the Government Buys More Output?
Authors: Hall Robert E.
Published: February 2010

During World War II and the Korean War, real GDP grew by about half the increase in government purchases. With allowance for other factors holding back GDP growth during those wars, the multiplier linking government purchases to GDP may be in the range of 0.7 to 1.0, a range generally supported by research based on vector autoregressions that control for other determinants, but higher values are not ruled out. New Keynesian macroeconomic models yield multipliers in that range as well. Neoclassical models produce much lower multipliers, because they predict that consumption falls when government purchases rise. Models that deliver higher multipliers feature a decline in the markup ratio of price over cost when output rises, and an elastic response of employment to increased demand. These characteristics are complementary to another Keynesian feature, the linkage of consumption to current income. The GDP multiplier is higher—perhaps around 1.7—when the nominal interest rate is at its lower bound of zero.
From Grand Tour to a Space of Detour: Henry James's Europe
Authors: Oltean Roxana
Published: February 2010

This essay looks at Henry James's late writings, produced after his 1904-1905 American tour, and emphasizes the transition from the motif of Europe as the place for a "grand tour" enriching the American innocent's experience to the representation of Europe as a detour in an essentially American trajectory. Europe thus paradoxically serves to strengthen what one might call the Jamesian myth of America as place of return and redemption.
Henry James, c'est moi : Jamesian Afterlives
Authors: Rivkin Julie
Published: February 2010

This paper explains the recent efflorescence of biographical novels about Henry James and the particular way in which people have claimed the life of Henry James using the psychoanalytic and the cultural-historical as a way to think about bio-fictions.
Irish Strands and the Imperial Eye: Henry James's "The Modern Warning"
Authors: Flannery Denis
Published: February 2010

This essay considers the representation of Ireland in James 1888 novella "The Modern Warning." It begins by arguing that James's representation of Ireland more broadly is divided between his use of anti-Irish stereotypes common in the nineteenth century and his fiction's simultaneous critique and undermining of the very figures who employ those same stereotypes. The essay then explores the impact that Ireland has on "The Modern Warning"'s modes of representation. These include the relationship between naming and sound, the strategic manipulation of the very term "Irish," and the story's increasingly uncontrolled use of free indirect discourse as it progresses towards a suicidal conclusion.
The Laughter of the Diviners, or Manners and the Sacred
Authors: O'Farrell Mary Ann
Published: February 2010

"The Laughter of the Diviners, or Manners and the Sacred" explores the language of sacredness and of terror in Henry James's The Awkward Age , considering James's allusion to Cicero and Cato on augurs who might laugh together "behind the altar" as figuring the mutual dependence that, as manners, defines and constitutes relationship and sociability. Examining this allusion alongside James's notions of "sacred terror" and "salutary terror," the essay finds that, in James, terror and the sacred are associated with the problem of knowledge in the world of manners and, consequently, with the constant reading (divination) demanded of subjects inhabiting that world.
Who cares about Charlotte Wentworth?: Fancy-work in Henry James
Authors: Coulson Victoria
Published: February 2010

Exploring The Europeans, Washington Square , and The Spoils of Poynton , this article demonstrates James's evocation of medieval annunciation iconography and argues that James's annunciation scenes allegorize the dynamic intrasubjective relationships that constitute the self. Noting the historical shift of the Virgin's occupation from needlework to reading, the article analyses the Wentworth sisters as comparably differentiated models of subjectivity. Gertrude, a reader, models the self as a book: a dematerialized interior plenitude lodged within an outer body. Charlotte, a textile artist, models the self as a form of embroidery: an expressive surface structure coterminous with the exterior organ of the skin.
Aspern's Archive
Authors: Savoy Eric
Published: February 2010

Like many of James's major fictions, "The Aspern Papers" concludes with the burning of documents. Such closure is usually understood as both ethical and ironic. It is possible, however, that Aspern's archive is not merely a "McGuffin"--an empty signifier around which the narrative revolves--but rather is an agency that wills its own destruction. Following Derrida's argument in Archive Fever that the archive is always already on fire, this essay explores the figurative economy by which living bodies are in the grip of the dead and which sustains a continuity between the hand that writes and the hand that burns.
Attention! Henry James and the Distracted Reader
Authors: Stougaard-Nielsen Jakob
Published: February 2010

In the famous "Ozymandias letter" to W.D. Howells from 1915, James complained about the lack of "critical attention" paid to his New York Edition. The same year, in the just as famous "Boon letter" to Wells, James used the concept of attention to describe his notion of fictional form: "The fine thing about the fictional form to me is that it opens such widely different windows of attention." This article discusses and contextualizes the problem of attention in James's prefaces and late fiction. It is proposed that contemporary conceptions of attention in psychology, aesthetics, and cultural criticism, e.g., William James's first formulation of the psychology of attentiveness, had a significant impact on the way James imagined both fictional form and his readers.
The Roman Lotus: Digestion and Retrospect
Authors: Herford Oliver
Published: February 2010

This paper traces retrospective references to the constipation James suffered in Italy in 1869-1870 and 1873 in some non-fictional works of the fourth phase. Proposing an alternative to queer readings of James's constipation by Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick and Gert Buelens, it argues that the temporal aspect of digestion – an assimilation over time – provides James with a metaphor for the retrospective processes of re-reading and alluding. In allusions to Tennyson's "The Lotos-Eaters" in the essay "Honoé de Balzac" (1902) and in William Wetmore Story and His Friends (1903), James successfully digests the hazards and difficulties of his early experience of Europe.
Anti-Social James
Authors: Caserio Robert L.
Published: February 2010

Homosexual eros, according to an important strand of queer theory, undermines one's assumption that human life is inalienably social in character. Henry James's work anticipates such an "anti-social" claim. The Middle Years recapitulates James's sense of the value of radical detachment from immersion in social life and social norms. In "The Middle Years," "The Pupil," and "The Aspern Papers," James portrays homosexual desire's responses to an imperialism that might be inherent in social being. James's portrayal suggests that it is impossible to surmount finitude and mortality by any means available to society, love, or art.
Problematic Potential: The Human Rights Consequences of Peacekeeping Interventions in Civil Wars
Authors: Murdie Amanda , Davis David R.
Published: February 2010

Does peacekeeping intervention improve the human rights situation in states with a history of civil war? While this question has received a myriad of attention and debate within the human rights community, there have been relatively few studies that attempt to answer this question. Examining the characteristics of peacekeeping following civil war from 1980 to 2004, this article finds that peacekeeping can both encourage and undermine respect for human rights. Specifically, the mission and activities of peacekeepers matter. These findings support the human rights community's stance that peacekeeping can be problematic but holds promise for human rights in post-conflict states.
Methods of Human Rights Research: A Primer
Authors: Coomans Fons , Grünfeld Fred , Kamminga Menno T.
Published: February 2010

This article suggests that research in the field of human rights, especially when it is legal in nature, tends to devote surprisingly little attention to questions of methodology. This may be a result of the fact that human rights scholars often are (former) human rights activists. Dispensing with methodological constraints enables researchers to engage in wishful thinking and to reach the conclusions they were hoping to find in the first place. The article makes some suggestions for those who wish to avoid this pitfall, including carefully spelling out a research method, discussing which alternative methods have been rejected, and avoiding the label "emerging" human right.
What Are Human Rights? Four Schools of Thought
Authors: Dembour Marie-Bénédicte
Published: February 2010

A close reading of academic literature reveals that we do not all conceive of human rights in the same way. This contribution proposes that "natural scholars" conceive of human rights as given ; "deliberative scholars" as agreed upon ; "protest scholars" as fought for ; and "discourse scholars" as talked about . The position of each of these four schools on the foundation, universality, possible realization, and legal embodiment of human rights is reviewed, as well as is the schools' faith, or lack thereof, in human rights. Quotations from academic texts illustrate how the four school model cuts across the academic disciplines with examples drawn from philosophy, politics, law, and anthropology.
Women Lawyers, Women's Rights in Senegal: The Association of Senegalese Women Lawyers
Authors: Scales-Trent Judy
Published: February 2010

L'Association des Femmes Juristes Sénégalaises (The Association of Senegalese Women Lawyers) has been working to improve the lives of women in Senegal for almost forty years. In a predominantly Muslim country where most women do not even attend high school, these women have used their legal skills to make change. With little money, no paid attorneys on staff, and using a borrowed room in a law firm as an office, they have successfully pushed the government to make positive changes in the Family Code and other laws and have played an important role in the development of human rights consciousness in Senegal.
The Normativity of Human Rights Is Self-Evident
Authors: Etzioni Amitai
Published: February 2010

Attempts to justify human rights in terms of other sources of normativity unwittingly weaken the case of human rights. Instead these rights should be treated as moral causes that speak to us directly, as one of those rare precepts that are self-evident. All will hear self-evident moral claims unless they have been severely distracted, and even these persons will hear these claims once they are engaged in open moral dialogue. Oddly, the strongest support for treating human rights as self-evident may well be a consequentialist argument.
The High Cost of Freedom: A Legal and Policy Analysis of Shelter Detention for Victims of Trafficking
Authors: Gallagher Anne , Pearson Elaine
Published: February 2010

In countries around the world it is common practice for victims of human trafficking who have been "rescued" or who have escaped from situations of exploitation to be placed and detained in public or private shelters. In the most egregious situations, victims can be effectively imprisoned in such shelters for months, even years. This article uses field-based research to document this largely unreported phenomenon. It then considers the international legal aspects of victim detention in shelters and weighs the common justifications for such detention from legal, policy, and practical perspectives.
Chronicle of an Announced Birth: The Coming into Life of the Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights—The Missing Piece of the International Bill of Human Rights
Authors: de Albuquerque Catarina
Published: February 2010

At the 2009 Treaty Event held at UN Headquarters in New York, twentynine states signed the Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. This new treaty had been adopted by consensus of the United Nations General Assembly on 10 December 2008, after decades of discussions and a surprisingly short nine months of intergovernmental negotiations over a draft. This article aims to share some of the history of discussions on economic, social, and cultural rights and on an optional protocol to the Social Rights Covenant within the United Nations. It also intends to show how this debate has evolved up until now, especially during the discussions within the UN open-ended working group on an optional protocol.
Multiculturalism and International Law: Discussing Universal Standards
Authors: Xanthaki Alexandra
Published: February 2010

This article aims to assess the contribution of current international human rights law to the multicultural debate. The article argues that although international law has not engaged in a sustained way with the concept, the basic elements of multiculturalism are in fact promoted by current standards. Among these discussed are the recognition of cultural attachments in the public sphere, the need for interaction among cultures, and the understanding of sub-national groups as equal partners in the evolution of the society. A closer look at the standards and their dynamic interpretation by UN bodies also reveals helpful answers to difficult challenges currently posed by multiculturalism, including extremism and clashes between cultural practices and other human rights.
Rethinking Comparativism
Authors: Spivak Gayatri Chakravorty
Published: February 2010

In an era of globalization, Comparative Literature must think of all languages as equivalent, not in terms of translatability, but because any language(s) can be (a) first language(s) and thus activate the infant's metapsychological circuits, that reach out to meet lingual memory and provide the ingredients for ethical semiosis. Comparative Literature must try to reproduce this reflexivity through deep language learning accessing lingual memory. This is the demand of disciplinary rigor today. In actual practice, since we may not be able to achieve this under current circumstances, an alternative method is also suggested: we look for signs of "comparativism"—a reaching out to other spaces and times—in our object of investigation.
Chomsky's Golden Rule: Comparison and Cosmopolitanism
Authors: Robbins Bruce
Published: February 2010

Noam Chomsky's rhetoric is emphatically cosmopolitan: written as if for instant translation with an absolute minimum of the vocal markers of location or nationality. Nevertheless it is a rhetoric, and its signature device is national comparison—more precisely, the comparison built as an imperative into the Golden Rule: that the United States should do unto other countries as it would have them do unto it. While appreciative of this point, this essay argues that the place of the United States in Chomsky's comparisons undermines both Chomsky's apparent universalism and his self-declared anarchism. The essay tries to re-direct Chomsky's readers toward a cosmopolitanism that would be both qualified and empowered.
Why Compare?
Authors: Radhakrishnan R.
Published: February 2010

The purpose of this essay is to complicate the rationale that informs "our" will to comparative knowledge. Why do we want to compare when we are not sure who the "we" is? Any act of comparison, despite the best of intentions, is bound to flounder in that perilous and nameless region that lies between Identity and Difference. Unless "between-ness" is acknowledged as a serious epistemological and political issue in its own right, projects of comparison are doomed to profound self mystification. This essay argues that not only are comparative endeavors mired in relationships of uneven and asymmetrical power that they are unconscious of, but are also symptoms of a developmental epistemology that denies coevalness among the many worlds that constitute our one world. The essay suggests not that we abandon comparisons altogether, but rather that we undertake comparisons in the name of a multilateral relationality that opposes any form of hegemonic centrism.
Comparison Literature
Authors: Walkowitz Rebecca L.
Published: February 2010

Some novels do not belong to any one national, ethnic, or linguistic tradition. They are instead comparative novels, or works of what this essay calls "comparison literature." Works of comparison literature are "born-translated": they were published almost simultaneously in multiple languages, and they engage formally, thematically, and sometimes typographically with the theory and practice of translation. Comparison literature fits uneasily within methodologies, comparative and national, that assign unique locations or unique substance to literary artifacts. It urges us to imagine new geographies of literary production and requires methodologies that understand the history of the book to include its many editions and translations. Treating Benedict Anderson's Imagined Communities and J. M. Coetzee's Diary of a Bad Year as examples of comparison literature, this essay asks how the multilingualism of the book tests the national singularity of the work and how the translation of literary texts, into more languages and faster than ever before, establishes networks of affiliation that are less exclusive and less bounded than the nation's "community of fate."
Anthropology, Migration, and Comparative Consciousness
Authors: Brettell Caroline B.
Published: February 2010

This essay offers a brief and broad overview of debates about the use of the comparative method in anthropological research beginning with the work of nineteenth-century anthropologists who operated within an evolutionary framework, running through Boasian historical particularism and British structural functionalism, and ending with the critiques put forward by symbolic, interpretive, and postmodern anthropological theorists as well as late-twentieth and early-twenty-first-century efforts to resituate comparison, or a comparative consciousness, within anthropology. The essay then moves to a discussion of the application of this comparative consciousness to our understanding of an important problem in the human experience that concerns scholars across a range of disciplines—migration. Comparisons are essential if we are to avoid both national and temporal exceptionalism in our understanding of the causes and consequences of migration.
Double-Crossings: The Trans-American Patriotism of Francis Berrian
Authors: Holt Keri
Published: February 2010

“Double-Crossings: The Trans-American Patriotism of Francis Berrian” examines Timothy Flint’s unusual novel Francis Berrian, or The Mexican Patriot (1826), which tells the story of an itinerant New Englander who joins in the Mexican struggle for independence from Spain. By tracing Berrian’s border-crossing adventures, this essay shows how Flint’s novel re-orients US citizenship in relation to the history and culture of the newly emerging Mexican republic, a move which ultimately encouraged readers to imagine American identity in more hemispheric and multinational terms.
Doctor Bat’s Ass: Buffon, American Degeneracy, and Cooper’s The Prairie
Authors: Sivils Matthew Wynn
Published: February 2010

This essay focuses on how James Fenimore Cooper’s third Leather-Stocking novel, The Prairie (1827), serves as a rebuttal to George-Louis Leclerc, Count de Buffon’s theory of American degeneracy, which asserted that the American climate and lush vegetation Created an environment that reduced the size and vitality of its mammals, including humans. Cooper, in this tale of violence and loss in an ethereal Great Plains landscape, refutes Buffon’s theory by constructing his own myth of an American natural world populated not with Buffon’s diminutive weaklings but with formidable animals and people who reside in a harsh, dry American prairie. Additionally, by satirizing European modes of biological inquiry via the comic character of Dr. Bat, The Prairie serves as Cooper’s own contradictory volume of natural and social history.
Automated Mass Spectral Deconvolution and Identification System for GC-MS Screening for Drugs, Poisons, and Metabolites in Urine
Authors: Meyer Markus R , Peters Frank T , Maurer Hans H
Published: February 2010

Background: The challenge in systematic toxicological analysis using gas chromatography and/or liquid chromatography coupled to mass spectrometry is to identify compounds of interest from background noise. The large amount of spectral information collected in one full-scan MS run demands the use of automated evaluation of recorded data files. We evaluated the applicability of the freeware deconvolution software AMDIS (Automated Mass Spectral Deconvolution and Identification System) for GC-MS–based systematic toxicological analysis in urine for increasing the speed of evaluation and automating the daily routine workload.

Methods: We prepared a set of 111 urine samples for GC-MS analysis by acidic hydrolysis, liquid-liquid extraction, and acetylation. After analysis, the resulting data files were evaluated manually by an experienced toxicologist and automatically using AMDIS with deconvolution and identification settings previously optimized for this type of analysis. The results by manual and AMDIS evaluation were then compared.

Results: The deconvolution settings for the AMDIS evaluation were successfully optimized to obtain the highest possible number of components. Identification settings were evaluated and chosen for a compromise between most identified targets and general number of hits. With the use of these optimized settings, AMDIS-based data analysis was comparable or even superior to manual evaluation and reduced by half the overall analysis time.

Conclusions: AMDIS proved to be a reliable and powerful tool for daily routine and emergency toxicology. Nevertheless, AMDIS can identify only targets present in the user-defined target library and may therefore not indicate unknown compounds that might be relevant in clinical and forensic toxicology.
Temporal variability of two contrasting transient pollution events in a pastoral stream
Authors: Yillia P. T. , Kreuzinger N. , Mwetu K. K.
Published: February 2010

Two transient pollution events were monitored in a pastoral stream in southwestern Kenya to evaluate their relative contribution to diffuse pollution. Peak loads of pollutants during storm-induced transients were within 3–4 orders of magnitude higher than the short-lived (30–60 minutes) diurnal episodes provoked by in-stream activities of people and livestock. Transient yields were striking during storm-induced events; 778,000, 8,400, 550 and 100 kg day−1 for suspended solids, BOD5, total P and total N, respectively, compared to wet weather base flow (150, 30, 0.8 and 1.4 kg day−1, for the same parameters, respectively). Two forms of concentration-discharge relationships were observed: increases in concentration for turbidity, suspended solids, BOD5, total P and the faecal indicator bacteria at the peak of the stream hydrograph, and concurrent decreases in concentration for conductivity and total N. Following each storm-induced transient event, a marked improvement in water quality was observed within 48–72 hrs of the receding limb of the stream hydrograph before the next base low was established. It was concluded that storm-induced transients are exceedingly important for the mobilization of pollutants from diffuse sources but both transient events affect stream-channel processes, especially water quality, with the possibility of attendant consequences on the health of riparian inhabitants.
Biological denitrification of brines from membrane treatment processes using an upflow sludge blanket (USB) reactor
Authors: Beliavski M. , Meerovich I. , Tarre S. , Green M.
Published: February 2010

This paper investigates denitrification of brines originating from membrane treatment of groundwater in an upflow sludge blanket (USB) reactor, a biofilm reactor without carrier. A simulated brine wastewater was prepared from tap water and contained a nitrate concentration of 125 mg/l as N and a total salt concentration of about 1%. In order to select for a suitable energy source for denitrification, two electron donors were compared: one promoting precipitation of calcium compounds (ethanol), while the other (acetic acid), no precipitation was expected. After extended operation to reach steady state, the sludge from the two reactors showed very different mineral contents. The VSS/TSS ratio in the ethanol fed reactor was 0.2, i.e., 80% mineral content, while the VSS/TSS ratio in the acetic acid fed reactor was 0.9, i.e., 10% mineral content. In spite of the low mineral content, the sludge from the acetic acid fed reactor showed remarkably excellent granulation and settling characteristics. Although the denitrification performance of the acetic acid fed reactor was similar to that of the ethanol fed reactor, there was a huge difference in the sludge production due to mineral precipitation, with the corresponding negative aspects including increased costs of sludge treatment and disposal and moreover, instability and difficulties in reactor operation (channeling). These arguments make acetic acid a much more suitable candidate for brine denitrification, despite previous findings observed in groundwater denitrification regarding the essential role of a relatively high sludge mineral fraction for stable and effective USB reactor operation. Based on a comparison between two denitrification reactors with and without salt addition and using acetic acid as the electron donor, it was concluded that the reason for the excellent sludge settling characteristics found in the acetic acid fed reactor is the positive effects of higher salinity on granular sludge formation.
Nitrogen removal in maturation waste stabilisation ponds via biological uptake and sedimentation of dead biomass
Authors: Camargo Valero M. A. , Mara D. D. , Newton R. J.
Published: February 2010

In this work a set of experiments was undertaken in a pilot-scale WSP system to determine the importance of organic nitrogen sedimentation on ammonium and total nitrogen removals in maturation ponds and its seasonal variation under British weather conditions, from September 2004 to May 2007. The nitrogen content in collected sediment samples varied from 4.17% to 6.78% (dry weight) and calculated nitrogen sedimentation rates ranged from 273 to 2868 g N/ha d. High ammonium removals were observed together with high concentrations of chlorophyll-a in the pond effluent. Moreover, chlorophyll-a had a very good correlation with the corresponding increment of VSS (algal biomass) and suspended organic nitrogen (biological nitrogen uptake) in the maturation pond effluents. Therefore, when ammonium removal reached its maximum, total nitrogen removal was very poor as most of the ammonia taken up by algae was washed out in the pond effluent in the form of suspended solids. After sedimentation of the dead algal biomass, it was clear that algal-cell nitrogen was recycled from the sludge layer into the pond water column. Recycled nitrogen can either be taken up by algae or washed out in the pond effluent. Biological (mainly algal) uptake of inorganic nitrogen species and further sedimentation of dead biomass (together with its subsequent mineralization) is one of the major mechanisms controlling in-pond nitrogen recycling in maturation WSP, particularly when environmental and operational conditions are favourable for algal growth.
Assessment of classical surface organic loading design equations based on the actual performance of primary and secondary facultative ponds
Authors: Oliveira Sílvia C. , von Sperling Marcos
Published: February 2010

This article presents results from a performance evaluation of 73 full-scale primary facultative ponds and 37 secondary facultative ponds in Brazil. The data were used to test the applicability of some classical design equations for recommended surface BOD loading rates. The empirical equations proposed by Mara in 1976 and 1987 and the equation developed by McGarry and Pescod in 1970 were evaluated. The loading and hydraulic operating conditions were also evaluated to support the analysis of the influence of the parameters surface BOD loading (Ls) and hydraulic retention time (HRT) on the performance of the ponds. The results showed that the design equations proposed by Mara showed good applicability for primary facultative ponds, representing good indicators of the limit value of loading rates to be applied on the units. But the secondary facultative ponds showed good and poor performances for all loading rates and the best ponds, in general, were not those which followed the design equations recommendation. Finally, the influence of the actual loading conditions on the ponds performance was very small and scattered, indicating that other unquantified design and operational aspects were playing an important role.
Comparative analysis of existing disinfection models
Authors: Andrianarison T. , Jupsin H. , Ouali A. , Vasel J.-L.
Published: February 2010

For a long time Marais's model has been the main tool for disinfection prediction in waste stabilization ponds (WSPs), although various authors have developed other disinfection models. Some ten other empirical models have been listed over the past fifteen years. Unfortunately, their predictions of disinfection in a given pond are very different. The existing models are too empirical to give reliable predictions: often their explanatory variables were chosen arbitrarily. In this work, we try to demonstrate that if influent variables have daily variations, the use of their average values in simulations may overestimate the disinfection effect. New methods are thus needed to provide better fittings of the models. Better knowledge of the mechanisms involved is needed to improve disinfection models.