bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Social instability and reaction to deviance: A multilevel analysis of the Swiss lifelong detention initiative
Authors: Garin Vincent
Published: July 2012

The right of initiative offers the opportunity to Swiss citizens to have a direct and prominent influence on penal policy. This research tries to evaluate the effect of social instability on social reaction to deviance using the results of the 2004 Swiss vote on the lifelong detention initiative. I determine that extreme right-wing political orientation ( p < 0.001) and xenophobic attitudes such as national preference ( p < 0.05) and preference for a closed country ( p < 0.05) explain the support for this measure at the individual level. These results can be interpreted according to the Durkheimian view of punishment, which considers this process as an emotional response in order to defend established norms and values. At the macro-social level, social instability ( p < 0.05) reinforces the positive relationship between xenophobic attitudes ( p < 0.001) and support for lifelong detention. This result supports Young's theory concerning the effect of social instability on social reaction to deviance. Social instability would create a situation in which norms and values are contested. The need to reinforce these norms and values would be fostered by these circumstances.
Structured sentencing: Lessons from England and Wales for common law jurisdictions
Authors: Roberts Julian V.
Published: July 2012

Sentencing guidelines have been slowly evolving in England and Wales since 1998. Definitive guidelines now exist for all common offences. This jurisdiction is the only one outside the United States to develop formal, numerical guidelines which are presumptively binding on courts. Despite their unique status – as the only alternative to the grid-based schemes found in many US states – the English guidelines have attracted almost no attention from sentencing scholars. This article describes the latest developments in England and Wales. As a result of the Coroners and Justice Act 2009 much has changed: a new departure test has been created, and the old statutory bodies have been replaced by a single new Council which has issued a new format of guideline which will become the model to replace the old format. These important changes are discussed and some lessons drawn for other jurisdictions seeking to structure sentencing without resort to the two dimensional sentencing grids found across the United States.
Father and son: Two generations through prison
Authors: Halsey Mark , Deegan Simone
Published: July 2012

In this article we draw on select data from the longitudinal study ‘Generativity in young male (ex)prisoners: Caring for self, other and future within prison and beyond’ in order to explore the dynamics of repeat incarceration and release of a small cohort of young men from the perspectives of their formerly incarcerated fathers. Focusing on nine key themes – generated from in-depth interviews – we describe how and under what conditions fathers assist their children to manage the physical and emotional challenges of the prison and/or post-release environments. Importantly, we draw out the ostensibly redemptive if challenging dimensions of such conduct and highlight the prison as a site of secondary trauma for ex-incarcerates attempting to connect with their young incarcerated sons. We suggest that the ex-prisoner-as-visitor-to-their-incarcerated-son equates, in the eyes of prison administrators, to a surrogate form of recidivism. Penal implications of such are discussed.
The war that wasn’t on the news: ‘In-group nationalism’ and ‘out-group nationalism’ in newspaper supplements
Authors: Neiger Motti , Rimmer-Tsory Karni
Published: July 2012

Media scholars investigating journalism during conflicts tend to focus on the news sections. This study, conversely, probes newspapers’ sports, lifestyle, arts and entertainment supplements. Based on a close reading of Israel’s leading daily newspapers’ supplements during the 2006 Lebanon War (July–August 2006), the article’s narratological analysis conceptualizes and distinguishes between ‘in-group nationalism’ and ‘out-group nationalism’; that is, manifestations of nationalism that look inward, to the ‘in-group’ (‘us’), expressed through journalistic representations of national unity (e.g. coverage of artists performing in war zones), versus manifestations of nationalism directed at ‘out-groups’ (‘them’), which are scrutinized according to ‘friend or foe’ criteria while using charged terminology, including allegations of anti-Semitism. The article also refers to rare manifestations of anti-nationalism, which only serve to emphasize the overall ‘rallying ’round the flag’ of the supplements. This typology helps to expose the political role of popular culture during wartime.
Navigating the school system in Sweden, Belgium, Austria and Germany: School segregation and second generation school trajectories
Authors: Baysu Gülseli , de Valk Helga
Published: July 2012

In this article we describe and explain how children of immigrants navigate their educational careers. Sequence analyses followed by optimal matching is used to cluster individual educational trajectories in four European countries, which differ in national educational systems, ranging from comprehensive to highly differentiated (Sweden, Belgium, Austria and Germany). Samples are young adults of the Turkish and Moroccan second-generation and the majority group (aged 18–35) in seven cities in the selected countries ( N = 4022). We examine how perceived segregation and friendship networks affect the routes that students take through the educational system, i.e. school trajectories. Across school systems, having majority group friends increases the chances of following academic trajectories that end with university attendance. The effects of perceived school segregation are mixed. More comprehensive school systems protect against negative effects of segregation for second-generation students.
Immune Reconstitution Inflammatory Syndrome (IRIS) with Acute Tuberculous Osteomyelitis and Disseminated Mutilating Tuberculous Dactylitis in a Person Living with HIV and AIDS (PLHA)
Authors: Krishnaraj Raja , Chockalingam Chandrasekar , Krishnarajasekhar O. R. , Ayyamperumal Mahilmaran , Narayanan Ravichandran , Satagopan Kumar
Published: July 2012

HIV infection changed the scenario of infectious diseases. The pre-HAART (highly active antiretroviral therapy) era had resulted in new opportunistic infections. HIV and tuberculosis together had high mortality in countries with high prevalence of tuberculosis. Disseminated and extra pulmonary tuberculosis is common in PLHA (People Living with HIV and AIDS). IRIS (Immune Reconstitution Inflammatory Syndrome) after HAART is common (10% to 25%) in PLHA. Pott's spine is the most common presentation in PLHA of bone and skeletal system. IRIS tuberculosis, especially extra pulmonary tuberculosis, is the most common. In this case, we are presenting an IRIS disseminated tuberculosis in the form of acute osteomyelitis and mutilating dactylitis involving many joints of the fingers. Of 37 cases (9 from India) reported worldwide multiple dactylitis was never presented in the medical journals. This might be the first multiple dactylitis with extensive mutilation to the dactyls due to IRIS in a patient on ART.
Narrative, Cognition, and the Flow of Mirror’s Edge
Authors: Ciccoricco David
Published: July 2012

Faith, the protagonist of Mirror’s Edge, marks an empowered female character that is not hypersexualized, and the decision to employ a first-person perspective (thereby subverting any gaze offered by a third-person view) supports this design objective through gameplay. But despite Faith’s welcome debut on the main stage of commercial gaming, the game raises more significant questions through its engagement with the multifarious concept of “fluidity” or “flow,” which is integral to both the gameplay of Mirror’s Edge and the themes in it. Is Faith’s flow—in line with radical critical moves in literary history and cultural theory of the late 20th century to gender this trope—essentially or inevitably feminine, or for that matter, feminist? Does the game ultimately avoid, perpetuate, or contest the gendered discourses that it evokes? What can its simulations of a fictional mind in action tell us about our own? This article draws on cognitive, feminist, and narrative theoretical frameworks to question what the concept of fluidity means for a video game that mobilizes it through both narrative design and gameplay.
Comparing Analysis Frames for Visual Data Sets
Authors: Wall Kate , Higgins Steve , Remedios Richard , Rafferty Victoria , Tiplady Lucy
Published: July 2012

A key challenge of visual methodology is how to combine large-scale qualitative data sets with epistemologically acceptable and rigorous analysis techniques. The authors argue that a pragmatic approach drawing on ideas from mixed methods is helpful to open up the full potential of visual data. However, before one starts to “mix” the stages of analysis one needs to be aware of the strengths and weaknesses provided by the various qualitative and quantitative perspectives. This article therefore provides a methodological discussion based on empirical research experiences with one visual data set: Pupil Views Templates (Wall and Higgins). The authors investigate two different approaches to the analysis of these data: inductive and deductive processes. The two approaches are applied separately to the same data set and observations are made regarding the affordances and constraints of each process, and the findings and implications for developing visual analysis in this area are presented. The authors show how both processes provide useful insight, but without clear strategy as to how they can be combined to achieve the intent of the research, the true potential of visual data will remain unlocked.
Alcohol and intellectual disability
Authors: Simpson Murray
Published: July 2012

The small number of studies on alcohol use among adults with intellectual disabilities shows their usage is significantly less than average, with very high levels of abstinence. Despite this, the literature focuses almost to exclusion on the very small number of people who do have problems, and neglects to question the possible reasons for this differential pattern of consumption. This article reviews the extant literature, showing that it constructs an inherently pathological view of drinking in people with intellectual disabilities, framing it entirely within a discourse of risk and as a personal behaviour, rather than as a social and cultural one. As a counter to this perspective, the article opens up new lines of exploration around the significance of abstinence, why it might occur to such a high degree and whether, in fact, it might itself be and also point towards the cultural exclusion of people with intellectual disabilities.
Tracing sexual contacts of HIV-infected individuals in a rural prefecture, Eastern China
Authors: Lin Haijiang , He Na , Ding Yingying , Qiu Danhong , Zhu Weiming , Liu Xing , Zhang Tiejun , Detels Roger
Published: July 2012

Background

Contact tracing is especially useful for identifying an infection with few cases in the population, such as HIV in China. Little such research is available in China.

Methods

Every newly diagnosed HIV case from 2008–2010 in Taizhou Prefecture, Zhejiang Province in China, was invited to participate as an “index case” in a contact tracing survey by providing contact information for up to eight sexual contacts who themselves were approached for voluntary HIV counseling and testing (VCT). Those who tested HIV-positive were then subjected to another contact tracing survey. This process was repeated until no more sexual contacts were reported or tested positive.

Results

A total of 463 HIV-infected individuals were newly identified during the study period, including 338 cases who were identified from routine surveillance programs and 125 cases who were identified from the present contact tracing survey. Among these 463 cases, 398 (86.0%) served as ‘index cases’ in the survey, including 290 (85.8%) out of the 338 cases identified from routine surveillance programs and 108 (86.4%) out of the 125 cases identified from the present survey. These 398 ‘index cases’ reported a total of 1,403 contactable sexual contacts, of whom 320 (22.8%) received HIV testing and 125 (39.1%) tested positive for HIV. Willingness to receive HIV testing was high among spouses and long term heterosexual or homosexual partners but extremely low among casual and commercial sex partners of ‘index cases’. Consistent condom use was rare for all participants. A total of 290 independent sexual network components were constructed, with high complexity.

Conclusion

Contact tracing is useful for identifying new HIV infections from spouses or long term sexual partners of HIV-infected individuals. The complicated sexual networks existing between and beyond HIV-infected persons provide opportunities for rapid spread of HIV in such areas.
RETRACTED ARTICLE: In vitro and in vivo anti-colon cancer effects of Garcinia mangostana xanthones extract
Authors: Aisha Abdalrahim F A , Abu-Salah Khalid M , Ismail Zhari , Majid Amin Malik Shah Abdul
Published: July 2012

Background

Xanthones are a group of oxygen-containing heterocyclic compounds with remarkable pharmacological effects such as anti-cancer, antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and antimicrobial activities.

Methods

A xanthones extract (81% α-mangostin and 16% γ-mangostin), was prepared by crystallization of a toluene extract of G. mangostana fruit rinds and was analyzed by LC-MS. Anti-colon cancer effect was investigated on HCT 116 human colorectal carcinoma cells including cytotoxicity, apoptosis, anti-tumorigenicity, and effect on cell signalling pathways. The in vivo anti-colon cancer activity was also investigated on subcutaneous tumors established in nude mice.

Results

The extract showed potent cytotoxicity (median inhibitory concentration 6.5 ± 1.0 μg/ml), due to induction of the mitochondrial pathway of apoptosis. Three key steps in tumor metastasis including the cell migration, cell invasion and clonogenicity, were also inhibited. The extract and α-mangostin up-regulate the MAPK/ERK, c-Myc/Max, and p53 cell signalling pathways. The xanthones extract, when fed to nude mice, caused significant growth inhibition of the subcutaneous tumor of HCT 116 colorectal carcinoma cells.

Conclusions

Our data suggest new mechanisms of action of α-mangostin and the G. mangostana xanthones, and suggest the xanthones extract of as a potential anti-colon cancer candidate.
Introduction: Voir venir
Authors: Khalip Jacques
Published: July 2012

It has been more than twenty-five years since the death of Michel Foucault, one of the last century’s most crucial philosophers, as well as just as many years since the publication of the final two volumes of The History of Sexuality. Since then, an extraordinary body of interdisciplinary scholarship has emerged around the work of Foucault, with much attention focused on his writings on ethics, neoliberalism, governmentality, biopolitics, and war. The introduction considers notions of futurity, openness, and risk in Foucault’s thought and how such notions intersect with his various projects of relationality.
The Biopolitics of Pleasure
Authors: Dean Tim
Published: July 2012

This essay reconsiders biopolitical theory in relation to Michel Foucault’s pursuit of the problematic of pleasure during the final decade of his work. The question of pleasure straddles the temporal and methodological gulf that separates the first volume of his History of Sexuality from the second and third volumes eight years later. In seeking to retrieve the full complexity of Foucault’s account of pleasure, my essay offers a critique of Giorgio Agamben’s elision of pleasure from biopolitical theory, on one hand, and queer theoretical reductions of pleasure to sexual pleasure, on the other. Arguing that the category of pleasure is recruited to heterogeneous positions in Foucault’s work, I trace the various purposes that it is enlisted to serve in his thinking, as well as the topological structure he evokes to conceptualize pleasure—that of the spiral. His famous “spirals of power and pleasure” provide an image of the inseparability of power not only from knowledge but also from pleasure. By way of Georges Canguilhem’s reading of James Watson and Francis Crick, I contend that Foucault borrowed the model of those spirals from the double helix of DNA—and that the iconography of the life sciences thus provided the philosopher of biopower with a model for conceptualizing how power takes hold of life even at the “subindividual” level. The double helix gave Foucault not only a model for the imbrication of pleasure with power but also a biopolitical intuition about the molecularization of life. What Nikolas Rose calls the “molecularization of vitality” has displaced the human body as the principal unit of biopolitical interest, in favor less of the macro-effects characteristic of populations than of the micro-processes of subindividual life. Yet, in multiplying the sites of power’s penetration, this biopolitical disaggregation of human anatomy has multiplied sites of possible pleasure too. I suggest that his preoccupation with rendering bodies “infinitely more susceptible to pleasure” derived from Foucault’s conviction that the qualitative instability of pleasure makes it difficult for systems of knowledge to capture. Precisely insofar as pleasure thus may appear incompatible with philosophical or political seriousness, it remained a vital concern in Foucault’s thinking.
Gender Must Be Defended
Authors: Armstrong Nancy
Published: July 2012

Victorian novelists were the first to confront the problem of the relationship between themselves as individuals and what Michel Foucault calls “man-as-species” or “population.” This is a problem for theorists of liberal democracy as well. In his 1975–76 lectures at the Collège de France, the English translation titled “Society Must Be Defended,” Foucault offers his most comprehensive explanation as to why the disciplinary procedures aimed at producing self-governing individuals required supplementary policies that dealt with the population at large and so gave rise during the nineteenth century to a body of semiofficial policies that form the basis of a new form of government: biopolitics. Even here, however, he stops short of acknowledging the difficulty of articulating the subject presupposed by liberal societies to the object of biopower he elsewhere calls “population.” I show how gender simultaneously exposes the biological continuity underlying these different models of collectivity and transforms that continuity into difference.
Afterword: The Agency of Sex: Volition after Foucault
Authors: Dean Carolyn J.
Published: July 2012

Michel Foucault’s shift to “biopower” away from his earlier conception of power as a form of constraint from which there is no clear path to liberation is the subject of the essays in this issue. In the context of this shift, these essays address from fresh perspectives Foucault’s articulation of the “fear” underlying the loss of human autonomy as a political problem, including the ways in which Foucault’s efforts to theorize resistance and the refusal of normative structures of social organization are still forceful or remain inadequate. Many of these authors are concerned with the political praxis that might enable us to move beyond the limits of our discourse—or the articulation of what particular agency we have beyond unmasking fear as a political problem with serious consequences. Indeed, such concerns align these authors with a more general effort to think agency and historical change in the context of postfoundationalism—of the challenge to yoke a commitment to the dispersal, fragmentation, and diffusion of knowledge to a vision of radical democracy that can no longer rely on normative concepts of universalism and individualism.
Occupy London
Authors: Dowling Emma , Feigenbaum Anna , Pell Susan , Stanley Katherine
Published: July 2012

This essay brings together the authors’ experiences and observations with reflections gathered in an open workshop about Occupy London organized under the banner of the Tent City University working group. The essay posits Occupy London not as one entity but as an organizing process located in more than one area within the City of London. They see Occupy London as both a powerful idea and as a material practice. The authors reflect on the social composition, organizational politics, and infrastructure of Occupy London. They conclude that, aside from the challenges of collective organization and the desire to maintain visibility, one recurring concern within the Occupy London movement is how its embodied practices of struggle can emanate from centralized and often symbolic moments into the everyday realms of production and reproduction within society.
Mammalian formin Fhod3 plays an essential role in cardiogenesis by organizing myofibrillogenesis
Authors: Kan-O Meikun , Takeya Ryu , Abe Takaya , Kitajima Naoyuki , Nishida Motohiro , Tominaga Ryuji , Kurose Hitoshi , Sumimoto Hideki
Published: July 2012

Heart development requires organized integration of actin filaments into the sarcomere, the contractile unit of myofibrils, although it remains largely unknown how actin filaments are assembled during myofibrillogenesis. Here we show that Fhod3, a member of the formin family of proteins that play pivotal roles in actin filament assembly, is essential for myofibrillogenesis at an early stage of heart development. Fhod3−/− mice appear normal up to embryonic day (E) 8.5, when the developing heart, composed of premyofibrils, initiates spontaneous contraction. However, these premyofibrils fail to mature and myocardial development does not continue, leading to embryonic lethality by E11.5. Transgenic expression of wild-type Fhod3 in the heart restores myofibril maturation and cardiomyogenesis, which allow Fhod3−/− embryos to develop further. Moreover, cardiomyopathic changes with immature myofibrils are caused in mice overexpressing a mutant Fhod3, defective in binding to actin. These findings indicate that actin dynamics, regulated by Fhod3, participate in sarcomere organization during myofibrillogenesis and thus play a crucial role in heart development.
Defects in GPI biosynthesis perturb Cripto signaling during forebrain development in two new mouse models of holoprosencephaly
Authors: McKean David M. , Niswander Lee
Published: July 2012

Holoprosencephaly is the most common forebrain defect in humans. We describe two novel mouse mutants that display a holoprosencephaly-like phenotype. Both mutations disrupt genes in the glycerophosphatidyl inositol (GPI) biosynthesis pathway: gonzo disrupts Pign and beaker disrupts Pgap1. GPI anchors normally target and anchor a diverse group of proteins to lipid raft domains. Mechanistically we show that GPI anchored proteins are mislocalized in GPI biosynthesis mutants. Disruption of the GPI-anchored protein Cripto (mouse) and TDGF1 (human ortholog) have been shown to result in holoprosencephaly, leading to our hypothesis that Cripto is the key GPI anchored protein whose altered function results in an HPE-like phenotype. Cripto is an obligate Nodal co-factor involved in TGFβ signaling, and we show that TGFβ signaling is reduced both in vitro and in vivo. This work demonstrates the importance of the GPI anchor in normal forebrain development and suggests that GPI biosynthesis genes should be screened for association with human holoprosencephaly.
Do high temperatures enhance the negative effects of ultraviolet-B radiation in embryonic and larval amphibians?
Authors: Alton Lesley A. , Franklin Craig E.
Published: July 2012

For the embryos and tadpoles of amphibian species, exposure to ultraviolet-B radiation (UVBR) can be lethal, or cause a variety of sublethal effects. Low temperatures enhance the detrimental effects of UVBR and this is most likely because the enzyme-mediated processes involved in the repair of UVBR-induced damage function less effectively at low temperatures. Whether these repair processes are also impaired, and thus the negative effects of UVBR similarly enhanced, at high temperatures is not known, but is an ecologically relevant question to ask given that organisms that inhabit environments where the temperature fluctuates widely on a daily timescale are likely to experience high doses of UVBR when temperatures are high. Here we examined the thermal-dependence of UVBR effects in the context of an ecologically-relevant fluctuating UVBR and temperature regime to test the hypothesis that exposure to peak UVBR levels while the temperature is high (35°C) is more detrimental to embryonic and larval Limnodynastes peronii than exposure to peak UVBR levels while the temperature is moderate (25°C). Embryos exposed to peak UVBR levels at 35°C hatched 10 h later than those exposed to peak UVBR levels at 25°C and, as tadpoles, were smaller and consequently swam more slowly but, in an environment with predators, exhibited no difference in survival time. There was also no effect of experimental treatment on the hatching success of embryos, nor on the post-hatch survival of tadpoles. These findings, therefore, are not sufficiently strong to support our hypothesis that high temperatures enhance the negative effects of UVBR in embryonic and larval amphibians.
Induction of oxazolone mediated features of atopic dermatitis in NOD-scid IL2R γnull mice engrafted with human peripheral blood mononuclear cells
Authors: Nolte Thomas , Zadeh-Khorasani Maryam , Safarov Orkhan , Rueff Franziska , Varga Rita , Herbach Nadja , Wanke Rüdiger , Wollenberg Andreas , Mueller Thomas , Gropp Roswitha , Wolf Eckhard , Siebeck Matthias
Published: July 2012

Animal models mimicking human diseases have been used extensively to study the pathogenesis of autoimmune diseases and the efficacy of potential therapeutics. They are, however, limited with regard to their similarity to the human disease and cannot be used if the antagonist and its cognate receptor require high similarity in structure or binding. Here, we examine the induction of oxazolone mediated features of atopic dermatitis (AD) in NOD-scid IL2Rγnull mice engrafted with human peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) which developed the same symptoms as immunocompetent BALB/c mice. Histological alterations induced by oxazolone were characterized by keratosis, epithelial hyperplasia and influx of inflammatory cells into the dermis and epidermis. The cellular infiltrate was identified as human leukocytes with T-cells being the major constituent. In addition, oxazolone increased human serum IgE levels. The response, however, required the engraftment of PBMC derived from patients suffering from AD suggesting that this model reflects the immunological status of the donor. Taken together, the model described here has the potential to evaluate the efficacy of therapeutics targeting human lymphocytes in vivo and in addition, it might be developed further to elucidate molecular mechanisms inducing and sustaining flares of the disease.
Inflammation, paraoxonase-1 activity and HDL physico-chemical properties: a comparison between Prader-Willi syndrome and obese subjects
Authors: Ferretti Gianna , Bacchetti Tiziana , Masciangelo Simona , Grugni Graziano , Bicchiega Virginia
Published: July 2012

Prader-Willi syndrome (PWS) represents the most common form of genetic obesity. Several studies confirm that obesity is associated with inflammation, oxidative stress and impairment of antioxidant system, while no data are available concerning PWS subjects.

We compared levels of plasma lipids and C-reactive protein (CRP) in 30 normal weight subjects, 15 PWS obese subjects and 13 body mass index-matched obese not affected by PWS. In all subjects we evaluated levels of lipid hydroperoxides and the activity of paraoxonase-1 (PON1), an enzyme involved in the antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties exerted by high density lipoproteins (HDL). Furthermore using the fluorescent molecule of Laurdan, we investigated the physico-chemical properties of HDL isolated from normal weight and obese patients.

Our results demonstrated, for the first time, higher levels of lipid hydroperoxides and a lower PON1 activity in plasma of PWS with respect to controls. These alterations are related with CRP levels with a PON1:CRP ratio lower in PWS compared with non-PWS obese subjects. The study of Laurdan fluorescence parameters showed significant modifications of physico-chemical properties in HDL from PWS. Whatever are the causes of obesity, the increase of adiposity is associated with inflammation, oxidative stress and with alterations of HDL compositional and functional properties.
Closed loop neural stimulation for pentylenetetrazole seizures in zebrafish
Authors: Pineda Ricardo , Beattie Christine E. , Hall Charles W.
Published: July 2012

Neural stimulation can reduce the frequency of seizures in persons with epilepsy, but rates of seizure free outcome are low. Vagus nerve stimulation prevents seizures by continuously activating noradrenergic projections from the brainstem to the cortex. Cortical norepinephrine then increases GABAergic transmission and increases seizure threshold. Another approach, responsive nervous stimulation, prevents seizures by reactively shocking the seizure onset zone in precise synchrony with seizure onset. The electrical shocks abort seizures before they can spread and manifest clinically. The goal of this study is to determine if a hybrid platform in which brainstem activation triggered in response to impending seizure activity can prevent seizures. We chose the zebrafish as a model organism for this study because of its ability to recapitulate human disease in conjunction with its innate capacity for tightly controlled - high throughput experimentation. We first set out to determine if electrical stimulation of the hindbrain could have an anticonvulsant effect. We found that pulse train electrical stimulation of the hindbrain significantly increased the latency to onset of pentylenetetrazole seizures, and that this apparent anticonvulsant effect was blocked by noradrenergic antagonists, as is also the case with rodents and humans. We also found that the anticonvulsant effect of hindbrain stimulation could be potentiated by reactive triggering of single pulse electrical stimulations in response to impending seizure activity. Finally, we found that the rate of stimulation triggering was directly proportional to pentylenetetrazole concentration and that the stimulation rate was reduced by the anticonvulsant valproic acid and by larger stimulation currents. Taken as a whole, these results show that that the anticonvulsant effect of brainstem activation can be efficiently utilized by reactive triggering, which suggests that alternative stimulation paradigms for vagus nerve stimulation may be useful. Moreover, our results show that the zebrafish epilepsy model can be used to advance our understanding of neural stimulation in the treatment of epilepsy.
A Novel Preparation Method of Ni–Sn Alloy Catalysts Supported on Aluminium Hydroxide: Application to Chemoselective Hydrogenation of Unsaturated Carbonyl Compounds
Authors: Rodiansono  , Hara Takayoshi , Ichikuni Nobuyuki , Shimazu Shogo
Published: July 2012

A novel method was applied for the preparation of Ni–Sn alloy catalysts that were utilized for chemoselective hydrogenation of unsaturated carbonyl compounds, producing unsaturated alcohols almost exclusively. The formation of the Ni–Sn alloy may have played a key role in the enhancement of the chemoselectivity.
Optimal Market-Making with Risk Aversion
Authors: Huang Kan , Simchi-Levi David , Song Miao
Published: July 2012

Market-makers have the obligation to trade any given amount of assets at quoted bid or ask prices, and their inventories are exposed to the potential loss when the market price moves in an undesirable direction. One approach to reduce the risk brought by price uncertainty is to adjust the inventory at the price of losing potential spread gain. Using stochastic dynamic programming, we show that a threshold inventory control policy is optimal with respect to an exponential utility criterion and a mean-variance trade-off model. Symmetric and monotone properties of the threshold levels are also established.
A Stochastic Network Under Proportional Fair Resource Control—Diffusion Limit with Multiple Bottlenecks
Authors: Ye Heng-Qing , Yao David D.
Published: July 2012

We study a multiclass stochastic processing network operating under the so-called proportional fair allocation scheme, and following the head-of-the-line processor-sharing discipline. Specifically, each server's capacity is shared among the job classes that require its service, and it is allocated, in every state of the network, among the first waiting job of each class to maximize a log-utility function. We establish the limiting regime of the network under diffusion scaling, allowing multiple bottlenecks in the network, and relaxing some of the conditions required in prior studies. We also identify the class of allocation schemes among which the proportional fair allocation minimizes a quadratic cost objective function of the diffusion-scaled queue lengths, and we illustrate the limitation of this asymptotic optimality through a counterexample.
Conflicting Congestion Effects in Resource Allocation Games
Authors: Feldman Michal , Tamir Tami
Published: July 2012

We study strategic resource allocation settings, where jobs correspond to self-interested players who choose resources with the objective of minimizing their individual cost. Our framework departs from the existing game-theoretic models mainly in assuming conflicting congestion effects, but also in assuming an unlimited supply of resources. In our model, a job's cost is composed of both its resource's load (which increases with congestion) and its share in the resource's activation cost (which decreases with congestion). We provide results for a job-scheduling setting with heterogeneous jobs and identical machines.

We show that if the resource's activation cost is shared equally among its users, a pure Nash equilibrium (NE) might not exist. In contrast, the proportional sharing rule induces a game that admits a pure NE, which can also be computed in polynomial time. As part of the algorithm's analysis, we establish a new, nontrivial property of schedules obtained by the longest processing time algorithm. We also observe that, unlike in congestion games, best-response dynamics (BRD) are not guaranteed to converge to a Nash equilibrium. Finally, we measure the inefficiency of equilibria with respect to the minimax objective function, and prove that there is no universal bound for the worst-case inefficiency (as quantified by the “price of anarchy” measure). However, the best-case inefficiency (quantified by the “price of stability” measure) is bounded by 5/4, and this is tight. These results add another layer to the growing literature on the price of anarchy and stability, which studies the extent to which selfish behavior affects system efficiency.
Technical Note—A Sampling-Based Approach to Appointment Scheduling
Authors: Begen Mehmet A. , Levi Retsef , Queyranne Maurice
Published: July 2012

We consider the problem of appointment scheduling with discrete random durations but under the more realistic assumption that the duration probability distributions are not known and only a set of independent samples is available, e.g., historical data. For a given sequence of appointments (jobs, tasks), the goal is to determine the planned starting time of each appointment such that the expected total underage and overage costs due to the mismatch between allocated and realized durations is minimized. We use the convexity and subdifferential of the objective function of the appointment scheduling problem to determine bounds on the number of independent samples required to obtain a provably near-optimal solution with high probability.
Reclaiming Diaspora: The Israeli State, Migration, and Ethnonationalism in the Global Era
Authors: Yonah Yossi
Published: July 2012

This article offers an analysis of Israel’s migration policies toward Soviet Jews and argues, based on patterns it reveals, that “the compression of relations of time and space” characterizing the global era do not necessarily render the nation-state weaker, let alone idle or irrelevant. It discusses Israel’s attempts to construct these potential Jewish migrants, while they were still in the Soviet Union, as its conationals, and to facilitate their arrival in Israel. Israel’s migration policies and practices vis-à-vis this particular population provide a case study of the nexus connecting the nation-state, globalization, diaspora, migration, and ethnic belonging. The article shows that while during the 1970s and 1980s the patterns of Jewish emigration from the Soviet Union were less rigid and considerably defied the wishes of the Jewish nation-state, from the end of the 1980s through the 1990s, at a time of accelerating globalization, the patterns of Jewish emigration from the Soviet Union heeded the dictates of the nation-state more rigidly. The changing patterns of emigration from the USSR and immigration to Israel provide a compelling case showing that the nation-state may exert more power under global conditions than it was supposed to exert before the ascendance of hyper-globalization that is alleged to dominate the world today. This article contributes to accumulating research on “the state of the state” under global conditions, and argues that the state does not necessarily become weaker in this era—as many contend—but may even grow stronger, at least with respect to some important affairs within its sphere of governance.
Writing in Translationese: Kazuo Ishiguro’s The Remains of the Day and the Uncanny Dialect of the Diasporic Writer
Authors: Belau Linda , Cameron Ed
Published: July 2012

This essay argues that with his third novel, Kazuo Ishiguro has crafted a postcolonial work that illustrates how the crisis of decolonization is linked inextricably to the crisis of subjectivity itself. Unlike the novels of Achebe, Rushdie, and other postcolonial writers who represent colonial and postcolonial conditions by focusing on the actual postcolonial contexts, Ishiguro accomplishes his postcolonial critique by focusing more on the issue of cultural difference within the developed world than on issues explicitly resulting from the decolonizing process in the colonized parts of the world. Furthermore, his focus on the issue of cultural difference in Britain is not articulated around issues of immigration and assimilation of the other but, rather, around the internal otherness of the British subject itself. Ishiguro’s novel in effect argues that this internal otherness, always present to some degree, emerges most prominently during the breakdown of the Empire, when the traditional symbolic coordinates for British identity are weakened. Ishiguro expresses this perspective in his novel (1) by ever so faintly re-inscribing a traditional narrative form to reflect its internal strangeness or foreignness, (2) by providing an uncanny narrative documentation of the consciousness of a second-class British subject during the height of the decolonization period, and (3) by constructing a narrative that sublimates his own unique diasporic position as a means of coming to grips with his somewhat unique and personal ethnic and cultural conflicts.
Diasporan Subalternities: The Armenian Community in Syria
Authors: Payaslian Simon
Published: July 2012

This article offers an account of Syria’s substantial Armenian diasporic community, concentrating on how it negotiated its integration without assimilation into the larger Syrian society (itself not homogeneous but long dominated by a single political system). The analysis relies on themes and approaches developed by subaltern studies; ideas drawn from it enable us to delineate the trajectory of the diasporan community. Successfully maintaining its distinct cultural identity as a result of the closed nature of the political system, and further buttressed by the religio-cultural barriers between the Armenian Christian community and the Arab Muslim dominant groups, this community has nevertheless accepted permanent subalternization; it has failed to develop its full potential in cultural creativity and political confidence. Neither the technological nor the economic forces emanating from globalization, despite the liberalization policies pursued under the Asad governments, have proved sufficient to change the closed nature of the Syrian political economy. The permanent peripheralization of the Armenians in Syria has meant that they either dwell voicelessly in the realm of diasporan subalternities or exit. The community has declined, in terms of both numbers and vitality, since the early 1960s. This article proposes a theoretical framework that combines studies of diasporan transformation and Albert Hirschman’s analysis of “voice, exit, and loyalty” in order to develop a more complete picture of the evolution of an exilic community into a diasporic community and, finally, its decline and potential dissolution.
State, Migrants, and the Negotiation of Second-Generation Citizenship in the Israeli Diaspora
Authors: Cohen Nir
Published: July 2012

Using second-generation Israeli migrants in the United States as a case study, this article explores one unusual site in which the politics of diasporic citizenship unfolds. It examines the North American chapter of the Israeli Scouts (Tzofim Tzabar) as an arena of negotiation between representatives of the sending state apparatus and migrants over the meaning (and practices) of citizenship outside national territory. This quotidian space is important to migrants’ contestation with the state concerning their claims for a form of membership that is neither territorial nor contingent upon the fulfillment of traditional civic duties (e.g., military service). Challenging the state-supported model of republicanism, in which presence in territory and the fulfillment of a predetermined set of civic duties are preconditions for citizenship, Israeli migrants advocate instead an arrangement based on a strong cultural identity and a revised set of diaspora-based material practices of support.
Indian Ocean Cosmopolitanism?: M.G. Vassanji’s Hybrid Parables of Kenyan Nationalism
Authors: Myambo Melissa Tandiwe
Published: July 2012

This article examines the relationship between cosmopolitanism, nationalism, and hybridity in contemporary theory and the fiction of M.G. Vassanji about the Indian diaspora in east Africa. The interregional space of the Indian Ocean has been posited as a historical site of multicultural hybridity, a precursor to globalization, and a productively theoretical example of contemporary postcolonial cosmopolitanism. Investigating these ideas more closely, I look specifically at the case of modern-day Kenyans of Indian descent and how they fare in the postcolonial nation, particularly in their positioning as “hybrid” middlemen. Engaging with some of the dominant theories regarding the relationship between cosmopolitanism and nationalism—with a particular emphasis on the place of hybridity within these theories, which pivotally divides nationalism from cosmopolitanism—I use Vassanji’s work to interrogate commonly held theoretical assumptions.
Alte und neue Gottheit
Authors: Kondylis Panajotis
Published: July 2012

The article discusses if opposing ideologies use the same conceptional means and structures. The comparison of theistic and modern world views shows that they have similar aims. Both world views claim power via universal explanations and assert their own moral superiority. Atheism thus remains tied to theism and has itself an implicit metaphysics.
Apodiktischer Dezisionismus? Kondylis’ Machtdenken
Authors: Flügel-Martinsen Oliver
Published: July 2012

Today Kondylis seems to be a more or less forgotten philosopher. This is astonishing insofar as Kondylis’ writings reflect very prominent subjects of contemporary political and philosophical thought. Firstly there is the conceptualization of the history of thought as conflict, a major thesis of Kondylis’ work, which is shared in principle by influential thinkers such as Michel Foucault on the one hand and Quentin Skinner on the other. Secondly, we can find in Kondylis a theory of the constitutive role of conflict and power in political relations and in the constitution of political orders  a topic again prominently discussed today, e.g. in the writings of Chantal Mouffe and Jacques Rancière. But taking  in the light of contemporary debates – a closer look at Kondylis’ conceptualization of these subjects, his apodictic tendencies become evident, resulting from his highly problematic social ontology of conflict and struggle for power.
Wahrheit, Selbsttäuschung und praktische Rationalität. Über: Tilo Wesche: Wahrheit und Werturteil
Authors: Hoffmann Thomas
Published: July 2012

Tilo Wesche: Wahrheit und Werturteil. Eine Theorie der praktischen Rationalität. Mohr Siebeck Verlag, Tübingen 2011, 384 S.
Achtung der Menschenwürde ist mehr als das Verbot der Instrumentalisierung. Über: Peter Schaber: Instrumentalisierung und Würde
Authors: Düwell Marcus
Published: July 2012

Peter Schaber: Instrumentalisierung und Würde. Mentis Verlag, Paderborn 2010, 171 S.
Kann die Sprachphilosophie von der Rhetorik lernen? Über: Andreas Hetzel: Die Wirksamkeit der Rede
Authors: Liptow Jasper
Published: July 2012

Andreas Hetzel: Die Wirksamkeit der Rede. Zur Aktualität klassischer Rhetorik für die moderne Sprachphilosophie. Transcript Verlag, Bielefeld 2011, 484 S.
Diagnostic and prognostic characteristics of phytotoxicity caused by fluoride on Spondias dulcis Forst. F. (Anacardiaceae)
Authors: Sant'Anna-Santos Bruno F. , Azevedo Aristéa A. , Silva Luzimar C. , Oliva Marco A.
Published: July 2012

The goal of this study was to determine the symptoms and microscopic damage caused by fluoride on Spondias dulcis, a fluoride-sensitive species. The plants were exposed to simulated fog with fluoride (0, 5, 10, 15 and 20 mg L-1) for 20 min daily during four consecutive days. Samples from leaflets without any apparent fluoride injury were collected to microscopic analysis. The percentage of necrosed leaf area was measured, and the level of pollutant in the dry matter from the basal and apical portions of the plant was determined. The necroses began 24 h after the first simulation mainly from the base of the leaflets. A higher level of necrosis was observed at the apical portion of the plants, a region of higher fluoride accumulation. The damage on the surface of the leaflets was characterized as plasmolysis, erosion of the epicuticular waxes and epidermal rupture. Structurally, the noticeable accumulation of granules and droplets green stained by toluidine blue in the spongy parenchima and the boundaries of ending veinlets was observed. The limb thickness reduction occurred due to plasmolysis in the mesophyll, showing an apparent correlation with the damage observed on the surface. The parameters observed in the laboratory are promising for field biomonitoring studies.