bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Free Trade Agreements With The United States: 8 Lessons For Prospective Parties From Australia’s Experience
Authors: Tully Stephen R.
Published: March 2017

This article identifies 8 key lessons for those States contemplating a free trade agreement with the United States (U.S.) arising from Australia’s experience. The standards of intellectual property protection under the Australia-U.S. Free Trade Agreement and their impact on pharmaceutical prices in Australia are a particular focus. Prospective parties must first conduct a national interest self-assessment which reviews the desired strength of intellectual property protection under national law and their preference for using flexibilities available to them under the existing international intellectual property rights framework. The United States negotiates free trade agreements in light of previous ones, negotiating outcomes obtained in other fora and the decisions of international trade tribunals. Negotiations typically occur behind closed doors, which is a process having adverse implications for transparent decision-making, public consultation periods and contributions from interested non-governmental actors. A concluded agreement will build on prior treaties and influence the course of future international arrangements. But the impact of a United States free trade agreement is not always clear, including because of a lack of reliable data, and the extent of national legal change is a contested issue given existing reform agendas and external influences. The United States seek to redesign national health care systems in its own image and had little success in Australia’s case. National legal systems need not be harmonised: although there can be some convergence in intellectual property rights regimes, significant differences may also remain. Negotiators must reconcile competing cultures, philosophies and perspectives between States for a free trade agreement to be worthwhile.
The Brave New (American) World of International Investment Law: Substantive Investment Protection Standards in Mega-Regionals
Authors: Schill Stephan W. , Bray Heather L.
Published: March 2017

Mega-Regionals are transforming and shaping the future of international investment law, concerning both the settlement of investment disputes and the substantive disciplines governing investor-state relations. Focusing on the latter, the present article shows how Mega-Regionals depart from the so far dominant European model of investment protection by going beyond crudely worded post-establishment protections for foreign investment. Instead, Mega-Regionals pursue the twin policy goals of investment liberalization through greater market access commitments and strengthening state control by ensuring host governments sufficient space to regulate in the public interest. In light of these policy goals, and considering the deeper reasons for structural changes to the investment rules in Mega-Regionals, the article argues that the models and conceptual foundations of Mega-Regionals build on prototypes first developed in the context of U.S. and NAFTA investment practices. This suggests that the future of international investment law will be shaped to a considerable extent against the background of U.S. experiences, rather than be forged anew by the mechanics of international diplomacy and negotiation.
Investor-State Dispute Settlement and the Future of the Precautionary Principle
Authors: Davies Haydn
Published: March 2017

The proliferation of bilateral investment treaties and investment chapters in trade megatreaties and the associated increase in the preference of investors for investor-state dispute settlement has given rise to concerns that the regulatory sovereignty of both developed and developing states might be compromised. In response to these concerns many trade agreements (including the recently concluded Comprehensive Economic Trade Agreement between the European Union (EU) and Canada) have incorporated provisions designed to protect the regulatory sovereignty of nation states, especially in relation to labour standards, public health, phytosanitary and environmental protection. This paper examines the nature and scope of environmental protection measures in investment chapters and attempts to analyse the extent to which these measures will, in practice, prevent challenges by investors seeking to chill or prevent environmental regulations which might threaten their investments. The analysis concentrates particularly on measures based on the precautionary principle and uses the current EU restrictions on neonicotinoid pesticides as a case study. The paper concludes that the measures included in investment chapters designed to prevent such challenges by investors will not necessarily achieve the desired level of protection for environmental regulatory sovereignty.
SUMO conjugation – a mechanistic view
Authors: Pichler Andrea , Fatouros Chronis , Lee Heekyoung , Eisenhardt Nathalie
Published: March 2017

The regulation of protein fate by modification with the small ubiquitin-related modifier (SUMO) plays an essential and crucial role in most cellular pathways. Sumoylation is highly dynamic due to the opposing activities of SUMO conjugation and SUMO deconjugation. SUMO conjugation is performed by the hierarchical action of E1, E2 and E3 enzymes, while its deconjugation involves SUMO-specific proteases. In this review, we summarize and compare the mechanistic principles of how SUMO gets conjugated to its substrate. We focus on the interplay of the E1, E2 and E3 enzymes and discuss how specificity could be achieved given the limited number of conjugating enzymes and the thousands of substrates.
Immunoparesis in IgM gammopathies as a useful biomarker to predict disease progression
Authors: Andrade-Campos Marcio , Murillo-Flórez Ilda , García-Sanz Ramón , Giraldo Pilar
Published: March 2017

Background:

The management of IgM monoclonal gammopathies undetermined significance (IgM-MGUS) and Waldenstrom’s macroglobulinemia (WM) may be challenging. Modern immunoassays that quantify specific monoclonal heavy and light chain immunoglobulins are promising for their use in these applications.

Methods:

Ninety consecutive patients (39 IgM-MGUS, 32 indolent WM [iWM], and 19 WM) seen between January 2007 and March 2014 were analyzed. Heavy/light chain (HLC) and serum free light chains assays (FLC) were determined at diagnosis to study their utility as biomarkers in IgM monoclonal gammopathies.

Results:

The HLC involved to uninvolved IgM ratios (iHLC/uHLC) showed a progressive increase when going from IgM-MGUS, to iWM and to WM (p=0.002). Furthermore, an iHLC/uHLC>62 identified a group of iWM patients with a shorter time-to-progression (TTP) (108 vs. 133 months, p=0.033). Separate analysis of the involved and uninvolved components showed that only the suppression of the uninvolvedimmunoglobulin was predictive of shorter TTP (HR=3.04, p=0.03) suggesting that it could be the majorcontributor to the prognostic value of the Hevylite assay. Additionally, a multivariate analysis showed that immunosuppression (either classical immunoparesis or Hevylite immunosuppression) was an independent prognostic factor (p=0.016) reinforcing its relevance in the disease mechanism. Finally, monoclonal sFLC levels were highest in WM patients, with 83% presenting values>60 mg/L.

Conclusions:

The results suggest that the levels of immunosuppression and/or the iHLC/uHLC ratio of IgM immunoglobulins measured by Hevylite are associated with greater disease activity which significantly impacts in the outcome of WM patients and may also help in the differentiation of IgMMGUS from iWM.
Green synthesis of copper nanoparticles with ultrasound assistance
Authors: Cerchier Pietrogiovanni , Dabalà Manuele , Brunelli Katya
Published: March 2017

A study of the synthesis of metallic copper (Cu) nanoparticles using ultrasound assistance and green reagents is presented. Copper recovered from the pre-treatment of electronic circuit boards was used as the raw material in this study. Different process parameters, namely, the effect of ultrasound, reducing agents and capping agents, were investigated, where L-ascorbic acid and sodium borohydride were used as reducing agents. In order to make the process environmentally friendly, the synthesis was performed in aqueous solutions, in ambient conditions, and exposed to air. The nanoparticles were characterized with SEM, TEM, XRD, UV-spectroscopy, and by using laser diffraction particle size analyzer. Results show that, using L-ascorbic acid as reducing agents, the use of ultrasound leads to the production of Cu nanoparticles, with a reaction time of 10 min, compared with a time of several hours when performing the synthesis without ultrasound. The nanoparticles produced by this method have dimensions of approximately 5 nm and remain stable in the solutions for days. Moreover, by using Cu nitrate from the leaching solution of electronic scraps, obtaining nanoparticles with high purity has been made possible.
Synthesis and spectral evaluation of 5,10,15,20-tetrakis(3,4-dibenzyloxyphenyl)porphyrin
Authors: Tidwell Cynthia P. , Bharara Prakash , Belmore Kenneth A. , Liang Qiaoli , Dye Gregory W. , Jarrett Kevin , McKinney William , Su Ting Yu , Tidwell Trever
Published: March 2017

Porphyrins are of interest in many applications that involve electron transfer and absorption of light, such as solar energy and photodynamic cancer therapy. The newly synthesized 5,10,15,20-tetrakis(3,4-dibenzyloxyphenyl)porphyrin, TDBOPP, was characterized using 1H NMR, 13C NMR, UV-vis and fluorescence spectroscopy and MALDI-TOF/TOF high resolution mass spectrometry. Standard 1H NMR and 13C NMR experiments coupled with nuclear Overhauser effect (NOE) experiments confirmed the structure of the compound. The expected M+ and [M+H]+ ions are observed in the MALDI-TOF/TOF mass spectrum. The UV-vis absorption spectrum of TDBOPP shows a Soret band at 424 nm and three Q bands at 519 nm, 556 nm, and 650 nm with molar absorptivity 3.6×105 cm−1
m
−1, 1.6×104 cm−1
m
−1, 1.0×104 cm−1
m
−1 and 5.3×103 cm−1
m
−1, respectively. Excitation at 424 nm gives emission at 650 nm. The quantum yield of the porphyrin is 0.11.
Shared function and moonlighting proteins in molybdenum cofactor biosynthesis
Authors: Leimkühler Silke
Published: March 2017

The biosynthesis of the molybdenum cofactor (Moco) is a highly conserved pathway in bacteria, archaea and eukaryotes. The molybdenum atom in Moco-containing enzymes is coordinated to the dithiolene group of a tricyclic pyranopterin monophosphate cofactor. The biosynthesis of Moco can be divided into three conserved steps, with a fourth present only in bacteria and archaea: (1) formation of cyclic pyranopterin monophosphate, (2) formation of molybdopterin (MPT), (3) insertion of molybdenum into MPT to form Mo-MPT, and (4) additional modification of Mo-MPT in bacteria with the attachment of a GMP or CMP nucleotide, forming the dinucleotide variants of Moco. While the proteins involved in the catalytic reaction of each step of Moco biosynthesis are highly conserved among the Phyla, a surprising link to other cellular pathways has been identified by recent discoveries. In particular, the pathways for FeS cluster assembly and thio-modifications of tRNA are connected to Moco biosynthesis by sharing the same protein components. Further, proteins involved in Moco biosynthesis are not only shared with other pathways, but additionally have moonlighting roles. This review gives an overview of Moco biosynthesis in bacteria and humans and highlights the shared function and moonlighting roles of the participating proteins.
Modeling of Continuous Ultrasonication to Improve Total Phenolic Content and Antioxidant Activity in Sorghum Flour: A Comparison between Response Surface Methodology and Artificial Neural Network
Authors: Lohani Umesh C. , Muthukumarappan K.
Published: March 2017

Fermentation followed by continuous ultrasonication was applied to release the bound phenolics in sorghum flour (SF). Total phenolic content (TPC) and antioxidant activity (AA) increased with decrease in fermentation time (FT), flour to water ratio (FWR), flow rate (FR) and ultrasonication intensity (UI). The influence of process variables was investigated by Box–Behnken design and multi-layer perceptron neural network. The optimum conditions for maximum TPC and AA were obtained as 12 h FT, 10 % (w/v) FWR, 20 W/cm2 UI, 4 ml/s FR and 120 s UT. The values observed for TPC and AA at optimum conditions were 90.1 mg GAE/100 g dm and 190.1 µmol TE/100 g dm, respectively, while these values for control SF were observed as 63.9 mg GAE/100 g dm and 133.5 µmol TE/100 g dm. Ultrasonication improved the free phenolic acid content by releasing bound phenolics in SF. The ANN model prediction was more precise compared to the RSM model.
The I and the Others. Articulations of Personality and Communication Structures in the Lyric
Authors: Burdorf Dieter
Published: March 2017

The paper discusses articulations of personality and communication structures in the lyric: who is speaking in a poem? What is the status of the person who speaks, or the one who is spoken about? Is it the author himself who is speaking, or is it someone else – an autonomous being, completely different and detached from the subject developed in the text? Who is addressed in and by a poem? It is made clear that conventional concepts of
Lyric Words, not Worlds
Authors: Culler Jonathan
Published: March 2017

The notion that a lyric poem generates a world seems derived from the analysis of narrative fiction and risks setting the study of lyric poetry on the wrong track. Although lyrics often contain fictional elements – minimally sketched characters and incident – it is best to start from the presumption that they are at bottom not fiction. One can then analyze the tension between what one might call fiction and song, or fictional elements and ritualistic elements, as in Roland Greene’s analysis of lyric sequences. The positing of a fictional world created by a lyric poem and including a fictional speaker or persona risks trivializing lyric poems by relativizing their claims to the situation of a particular individual instead of granting them the authority of poetic form. Even lyrics that do create a fictional speaker often make claims about the world – our world and not a special fictional world – that are authorized by the poet. A superior default model for thinking about lyric, then is the classical concept of lyric as epideictic discourse, closer to oratory than to mimesis. The lyric characteristically strives to be itself an event rather than a representation of an event.
Philosophy and the Lyric
Authors: Lamarque Peter
Published: March 2017

The paper surveys and comments on some of the issues that arise about the lyric in philosophical, principally analytical, aesthetics. In brief these are: definition, expression, paraphrase, form-content unity, experience, and truth and profundity. The paper shows in each case why these issues are important from the perspective of analytical philosophy but also why lyric poetry is not always an easy subject matter to accommodate to standard analytical presuppositions. It might be thought that theories of meaning within philosophy of language (be it semantics, speech act theory or truth-conditions) should be applicable to a full range of linguistic usage. But lyric poetry confounds that expectation and yields a context where familiar models of meaning and communication can seem inadequate. Yet analytical philosophers should not simply dismiss poetry as somehow exceptional or aberrant but would gain from looking afresh at basic assumptions to see how their views about language might be broadened and modified.
Form and Content, Again. Four Remarks on Lyric Theory
Authors: Lampart Fabian
Published: March 2017

The following statement suggests reconsidering recent debates on a theory of lyric in terms of form and content. Four aspects and issues of the ongoing debate are discussed. In a first step, it is necessary to establish the relation between authorial poetics and lyric theory, since it is often characterised by fuzzy boundaries. Secondly, in order to specify the problem of form in lyric theory, it is suggested to have a closer look at the performative in lyric practice. Another important aspect of form is the semantics of lyrical genres. Lyrical genres mark an area in which form and content are intertwined and in which aspects of the form itself become semantic. Finally, the author argues that we should discuss – if possible assisted by a didactics sensitive to literary texts – whether and how theoretical proposals could be transformed into a practice of teaching poetry.
A World of Gestures
Authors: Rabaté Dominique
Published: March 2017

The lyric poem does not construct a world in the way fiction invents universes. By eluding the circumstances, and promoting an intense plasticity in its modes of enunciation, the lyric poem rather seeks a congruence between what is said and an emotional state, the communication of an impetus crystallizing in the form of the poem. This impetus can be described as a gesture, or as a set of lyrical gestures. Poems try to capture an energy that comes from the outside world as well as from the inner space. A force is conveyed through a form – since modern poetry has given up rules of versification – that is never completely fit. This lyrical energy is shared by the reader through the re-enunciation of the poem. The lyrical »I« has a certain porosity, a manner of subjective transparence that allows the reader’s subjectivity to lodge there and during the time of recitation. It is thus the dynamics between force and form in modern poetry that this article tries to understand.
Lyric Poetry: Intergeneric, Transnational, Translingual?
Authors: Ramazani Jahan
Published: March 2017

This essay ventures a dozen postulates: 1) lyric can’t be defined by one or even many formal features that are exclusive to it; 2) lyric can be described as a range of nonexclusive formal strategies encoded in texts and the communities that produce and receive them; 3) thus, if we understand »genre« in a way that fuses poetics with hermeneutics, lyric is a genre; 4) lyric and affiliated subgenres and modes live historically but survive transhistorically, albeit often dramatically refashioned; 5) lyric is neither merely personal nor entirely impersonal, making it readily appropriable; 6) lyric differs from more empirical and mimetic genres by virtue of the density of its verbal and formal mediation of the world; 7) lyric is intergeneric, best understood in its dialogue with its others; 8) lyric is transnational; 9) lyric needs to be studied at both the micro and macro levels – both its language-specific intricacies and textures, and its participation in broader patterns of genre, history, and cultural migration; 10) the strategies of a transnational poetics can be extended across languages; 11) a transnational poetics should be attentive to cross-cultural hybridization, creolization, and vernacularization in lyric; 12) lyric isn’t dead, and it isn’t only an elite form.
Lyric Reading and Empathy
Authors: Rodriguez Antonio
Published: March 2017

Numerous studies on lyric poetry have considered formalist questions, speakers or historical contexts. The act and the action of reading, however, were less often explored. Thus, the following questions arise: Is there a lyric reading? What are the reader’s motivations? Does the same logic apply to narrative, satirical and didactic poems? How can it be described? This article outlines the many problems which the heterogeneity of poetry is likely to generate. It further intends to examine how the notion of »empathy« could help to actualize this specific way of reading. Based on recent research on intentionality and empathy, this paper makes apparent some of the general principles for a holistic theory of lyric, which enables to link poetics, psychology and anthropology.
Lyric Lost and Found
Authors: Saussy Haun
Published: March 2017

A tenacious tradition considers the lyric as the manifestation of a subjectivity, whether personal or universal. But folk traditions as well as the twentieth-century avant-gardes offer the counter-example of poetry that arises from the collocation of verbal fragments, of artificial languages, of subjects in name only, and dare to present these as a new-style lyric. Less startling versions of this displacement of the lyric subject occur in such artifacts as the overheard poem. For such poems, the fact of publication replaces the mythic occasion of utterance as the poem’s moment of truth. This foregrounding of the moment of production is a feature linking the so-called primitive, oral, or folk poetry of many cultures to the purportedly post-humanist poetry of the different avant-gardes, and it links them, not through an irony, metaphor or coincidence, but through a model of the function of the artwork that indeed puts the act of signifying temporally and axiologically before the signified meanings
Discordia Concors. Immersion and Artifice in the Lyric
Authors: Zettelmann Eva
Published: March 2017

Descriptions of the lyric have been stressing its artificial, self-referential character, constructing it as an intrinsically a-temporal, non-kinetic, non-mimetic and anti-illusionist mode. While the lyric certainly derives much of its effect from its horizontally superimposed patterns of formal equivalence, our pleasure as readers does not solely derive from the physical re-enactment of a poem’s sound patterns or the cognitive appreciation of its formal mastery. Many lyric texts are immersive; they project a fictional universe and prompt readers to emulate a speaker’s strongly perspectivized vision and subjective vantage point. This paper examines the lyric’s world building potential. It investigates the conditioning factors and referential components of lyric illusion, reviewing in particular the genre’s alleged inability to produce narrative sequence, embodiment and experientiality (Fludernik). Conceiving of the lyric speaker as an innovative cognitive blend (Turner/Fauconnier) provides a possible alternative to biographical constructions of the lyric self. Possible worlds theory (Ryan) is used as a way to approach the genre’s marked tendency towards cognitive mapping and conceptual innovation, towards foregrounding the human endeavour of mentally grasping and representing the world.
Lyric and Its ›Worlds‹
Authors: Zymner Rüdiger
Published: March 2017

The article gives a metatheoretical definition of ›lyric‹. The definition pinpoints that lyric is either scriptural and visual or vocal and something that you can hear; it can be fictional or non-fictional, and it belongs to the social system, which modern ›westerners‹ call ›literature‹, but it can also be part of cultural practices, which are outside of any social system of ›literature‹. One can differentiate analytically with regard to the graphic type as well as to the vocal type of ›lyric‹ between the ›material How‹ and the ›semantical What‹. The ›How‹-side and the ›What‹-side provide each and together special signals for the hearer or for the seer or reader, which attract and bind his or her attention and which inform the hearer or the seer and the reader basically that language itself (which is understood as a cognitive system or tool) is something with which you can develop or create meaning; in doing this the signals of lyric constitute aesthetic evidence (the reader, seer or hearer will be ›convinced‹ or ›made sure‹ or emotionally satisfied in a way by the aesthetic qualities of the lyric: non-propositional, as if looking through the ›veils of poetry‹. In the next step the article discusses some types of lyrical ›worlds‹ and lyrical ›world-making‹ with regard to this definition. Finally, the article presents a couple of theses.
A novel DAX-1 mutation in two male siblings presenting with precocious puberty and late-onset hypogonadotropic hypogonadism
Authors: Liu Yanxia , Yuan Jinlei , Zhang Huijuan , Jiang Yanyan , Qin Guijun
Published: March 2017

Background

The

Methods

Clinical features were analyzed and laboratory data were collected from both siblings. Genomic DNA was extracted from the peripheral blood leukocytes of the siblings and their parents and the

Results

AHC was diagnosed based on a comprehensive review of the clinical presentation and laboratory tests. Gene analysis revealed a nonsense mutation in

Conclusions

Our report provides evidence that defined point mutations in the
Progress in neuromorphic photonics
Authors: Ferreira de Lima Thomas , Shastri Bhavin J. , Tait Alexander N. , Nahmias Mitchell A. , Prucnal Paul R.
Published: March 2017

As society’s appetite for information continues to grow, so does our need to process this information with increasing speed and versatility. Many believe that the one-size-fits-all solution of digital electronics is becoming a limiting factor in certain areas such as data links, cognitive radio, and ultrafast control. Analog photonic devices have found relatively simple signal processing niches where electronics can no longer provide sufficient speed and reconfigurability. Recently, the landscape for commercially manufacturable photonic chips has been changing rapidly and now promises to achieve economies of scale previously enjoyed solely by microelectronics. By bridging the mathematical prowess of artificial neural networks to the underlying physics of optoelectronic devices, neuromorphic photonics could breach new domains of information processing demanding significant complexity, low cost, and unmatched speed. In this article, we review the progress in neuromorphic photonics, focusing on photonic integrated devices. The challenges and design rules for optoelectronic instantiation of artificial neurons are presented. The proposed photonic architecture revolves around the processing network node composed of two parts: a nonlinear element and a network interface. We then survey excitable lasers in the recent literature as candidates for the nonlinear node and microring-resonator weight banks as the network interface. Finally, we compare metrics between neuromorphic electronics and neuromorphic photonics and discuss potential applications.
Electromagnetically induced transparency in optical microcavities
Authors: Liu Yong-Chun , Li Bei-Bei , Xiao Yun-Feng
Published: March 2017

Electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT) is a quantum interference effect arising from different transition pathways of optical fields. Within the transparency window, both absorption and dispersion properties strongly change, which results in extensive applications such as slow light and optical storage. Due to the ultrahigh quality factors, massive production on a chip and convenient all-optical control, optical microcavities provide an ideal platform for realizing EIT. Here we review the principle and recent development of EIT in optical microcavities. We focus on the following three situations. First, for a coupled-cavity system, all-optical EIT appears when the optical modes in different cavities couple to each other. Second, in a single microcavity, all-optical EIT is created when interference happens between two optical modes. Moreover, the mechanical oscillation of the microcavity leads to optomechanically induced transparency. Then the applications of EIT effect in microcavity systems are discussed, including light delay and storage, sensing, and field enhancement. A summary is then given in the final part of the paper.
Crystal structure of 2-amino-4-(3,4,5-trimethoxy-phenyl)-5-(oxo-5,6,7,8-tetrahydro-4H-chromene)-3-carbonitrile – ethanol (1/1), C21H26N2O6
Authors: Li Jing , Qiu Ya-Wen
Published: March 2017

C21H26N2O6, triclinic P1̅ (no. 2), a = 8.1553(5) Å, b = 9.0739(9) Å, c = 14.6857(14) Å, α = 100.648(8)°, β = 102.355(7)°, γ = 90.450(6)°, V = 1042.03(16) Å3, Z = 2, R
gt(F) = 0.0538, wR
ref(F
2) = 0.1533, T = 293(2) K.
Structural modifications of metallic glasses followed by techniques of nuclear resonances
Authors: Miglierini Marcel , Matúš Peter
Published: March 2017

Iron-based metallic glasses (MGs) are typical representatives of disordered alloys. They exhibit amorphous structure that is lacking any long-range order. Appropriate chemical composition of MGs ensures soft magnetic properties suitable for variety of practical applications. Because the beneficial magnetic properties are closely related to structural features of MGs it is inevitable to understand the ways how and under which conditions is their original structure modified. Notably elevated temperature can induce formation of crystallites that alter the desired magnetic parameters. Here, we demonstrate the use of 57Fe Mössbauer spectrometry and nuclear forward scattering of synchrotron radiation for the study of structural transformations in (Fe2.85Co1)77Mo8Cu1B14 MG which was chosen as an example. These techniques are based upon nuclear resonances that can scan evolution of hyperfine interactions acting upon nuclear levels of a stable 57Fe isotope. Because iron is typical constituent element of MGs, any deviations from original structural arrangement including modifications of the chemical surrounding can be studied.
Fabrication of short glass fiber reinforced phenol-formaldehyde-lignin and polyurethane-based composite foam: mechanical, friability, and shape memory studies
Authors: Kausar Ayesha
Published: March 2017

In this research effort, phenol-formaldehyde-lignin (PFL) resin was prepared using phenol, formaldehyde, and lignin via a simple approach. The PFL-polyurethane (PFL-PU) was prepared using PU prepolymer and PFL resin. The blend components were then foamed via addition of Tween 80 surfactant and n-pentane as the blowing agent. Short glass fiber was reinforced in the blend sample to attain high performance composite foams. The composite foams were characterized for structure, morphology, stress-strain behavior, friability tests, and shape memory characteristics. Scanning electron microscopy showed a layered, porous, and distorted hexagonal shaped foam structure. The cell size ranges from 10 to 20 μm for PFL-PU-short glass fiber (SGF) Foam with 10–20 wt.% fiber loading. PFL-PU Foam had compression strength and strain of 48.3 MPa and 48.2%. The PFL-PU-SGF 1–20 Foam showed increase in strength from 55.1 to 101.7 MPa and decrease in strain from 57.8% to 35.8% due to filler addition. At temperature above Tg (130°C), the strain was increased up to 45.11%. The shape fixity was improved up to the addition of 10 wt.% filler where the value of 92.1% was achieved with shape recovery of 95%.
A new ex vivo model for optimizing distribution of therapeutic aerosols: the (inverted) bovine urinary bladder
Authors: Schnelle Daniel , Weinreich Frank-Jürgen , Kibat Janek , Reymond Marc A.
Published: March 2017

Background

Development of Pressurized IntraPeritoneal Aerosol Chemotherapy (PIPAC) requires adequate preclinical models.

Methods

The model should be easy to use, reproducible and cost-effective. It should have a volume similar to the human abdominal cavity, and an oval shape. The inner surface should be lined with serosa. The model should allow pharmacological and biological analysis, including histology. No living animals should be used.

Results

The fresh urinary bladder is explanted from an adult bovine in the slaughterhouse. A 4-cm incision is performed into the bladder neck. The bladder can be inverted through the incision, which allows exposition of the serosa on its inner side. A balloon trocar is inserted through the incision and a ligature placed, ensuring full tightness. The therapeutic capnoperitoneum is installed. The bovine bladder has a volume somewhat smaller (2–3 L) than the human abdominal cavity (3–5 L). Costs are minimal. There is no significant bacteriological contamination. Manipulation is simple.

Conclusions

The (inverted) bovine urinary bladder is an innovative and versatileex vivomodel for optimizing drug delivery with therapeutic aerosols both onto the mucosa or the serosa. This model can be used for pharmaceutical Quality-by-Design approaches and will replace a large number of experiments in the animal.
A thermodynamic model for the solubility of HfO2(am) in the aqueous K + – HCO3
− – CO3
2 − –  OH − – H2O system
Authors: Rai Dhanpat , Kitamura Akira , Rosso Kevin M.
Published: March 2017

Solubility of HfO2(am) was determined as a function of KHCO3 concentrations ranging from 0.001 mol·kg−1 to 0.1 mol·kg−1. The solubility of HfO2(am) increased dramatically with the increase in KHCO3 concentrations, indicating that Hf(IV) makes strong complexes with carbonate. Thermodynamic equilibrium constants for the formation of Hf-carbonate complexes were determined using both the Pitzer and SIT models. The dramatic increase in Hf concentrations with the increase in KHCO3 concentrations can best be described by the formation of Hf(OH−)2(CO3)2
2− and Hf(CO3)5
6−. The log10
K
0 values for the reactions [Hf4++2CO3
2−+2OH−⇌Hf(OH)2(CO3)2
2−] and [Hf4++5CO3
2−⇌Hf(CO3)5
6−], based on the SIT model, were determined to be 44.53±0.46 and 41.53±0.46, respectively, and based on the Pitzer model they were 44.56±0.48 and 40.20±0.48, respectively.
Arsenic and breast cancer: a systematic review of epidemiologic studies
Authors: Khanjani Narges , Jafarnejad Abu-Bakr , Tavakkoli Leila
Published: March 2017

Introduction:

Arsenic is one of the heavy metals known to be a cause of cancer and many other serious human health problems. The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), has classified arsenic as a Group 1 carcinogen. Studies were performed in different populations to investigate the association between arsenic and breast cancer and the present paper attempts to review these studies.

Methods and materials:

Accessible electronic resources including, PubMed, Web of Knowledge, Science Direct and Scopus and Google Scholar were searched, with relevant phrases up to October 30, 2016. All articles were reviewed by two people separately and among them, original epidemiologic studies that investigated the association between breast cancer and exposure to arsenic were included.

Results:

Eventually seven articles were selected from 126 retrieved articles. Although three studies (one case-control and two ecological) were not able to show a significant affect, others provide some evidence of a relation between arsenic and breast cancer in specific subgroups.

Conclusion:

Exposure to arsenic may increase the risk of breast cancer. The strength of this relation can vary due to regional and individual differences.
Comparison and visualisation of agreement for paired lists of rankings
Authors: Donald Margaret R. , Wilson Susan R.
Published: March 2017

Output from analysis of a high-throughput ‘omics’ experiment very often is a ranked list. One commonly encountered example is a ranked list of differentially expressed genes from a gene expression experiment, with a length of many hundreds of genes. There are numerous situations where interest is in the comparison of outputs following, say, two (or more) different experiments, or of different approaches to the analysis that produce different ranked lists. Rather than considering exact agreement between the rankings, following others, we consider two ranked lists to be in agreement if the rankings differ by some fixed distance. Generally only a relatively small subset of the k top-ranked items will be in agreement. So the aim is to find the point k at which the probability of agreement in rankings changes from being greater than 0.5 to being less than 0.5. We use penalized splines and a Bayesian logit model, to give a nonparametric smooth to the sequence of agreements, as well as pointwise credible intervals for the probability of agreement. Our approach produces a point estimate and a credible interval for k. R code is provided. The method is applied to rankings of genes from breast cancer microarray experiments.
Prevention of protein aggregation by extracellular fungal sucrase of Termitomyces clypeatus
Authors: Chowdhury Sudeshna , Banik Samudra Prosad , Majumder Rajib , Ghorai Shakuntala , Pal Swagata , Basak Pijush , Khowala Suman
Published: March 2017

Objective

Extracellular sucrase from Termitomyces clypeatus is known to impart stability and enhance activity of cellobiase, another secreted glycosidase of the fungus through co-aggregation with cellobiase. To explore whether sucrase can bind with some proteins like Insulin, BSA, alcohol dehydrogenase (ADH), carbonic anhydrase and whey proteins and prevent their dithiothreitol (DTT) induced/thermal aggregation and/or loss of activity measuring by spectrophotometry, gel filtration assay and activity assays.

Methods

MALDI-TOF and dynamic light scattering were used to assess the monomeric and aggregated molecular size of sucrase. Thermostatted spectrophotometric assays, gel filtration assays were used to study protein aggregation. Fluorescence of bound ANS was used to monitor temperature induced structural changes in sucrase together with determination of melting temperature.

Results

The mass of the monomeric unit of sucrase as 6649 Da. Enzyme inhibited DTT induced aggregation of insulin and suppressed the thermal aggregation of carbonic anhydrase, ADH and whey proteins, respectively by 83%, 68% and 70% at 70°C. Sucrase also protected about 84% activity of ADH.

Conclusion

An extracellular fungal sucrase with a low monomeric size can efficiently prevent protein aggregation. The studies can impart knowledge about potential therapeutic applications of this industrially important enzyme in protein misfolding disorders.
Planarity of substituted pyrrole and furan rings in (3R*, 1′S*, 3′R*)-3-(1′-tert-butylamino-1′H, 3′ H-benzo[c]furan-3′-yl)-2-tert-butyl-2,3-dihydro-1H-benzo[c]pyrrol-1-one
Authors: Dazie Joel Donkeng , Liška Alan , Ludvík Jiří , Fábry Jan , Dušek Michal , Eigner Václav
Published: March 2017

The title structure, (3R*, 1′S*, 3′R*)-3-(1′-tert-butylamino-1′H,3′H-benzo[c]furan-3′-yl)-2-tert-butyl-2,3-dihydro-1H-benzo[c]pyrrol-1-one has been determined at 290 and 150 K by single-crystal X-ray diffraction. The structure comprises two symmetry independent molecules with very similar conformations which differ mostly by orientations of the tert-butyl groups, situated at the periphery of these molecules. The molecules are composed of two parts, the cores of which are isoindolinone and isobenzofuran rings being bound by C–C bonds. The planarities of the pyrrolone and furan rings are compared with the known structures retrieved from the Cambridge Crystal Structure Database. It transpires in the title molecules, the planarity of the carbonyl-substituted pyrrole rings is exceptionally distorted in contrast to the furan rings. This fact is just the opposite of the tendency inferred from the Cambridge Crystal Structure Database. The reason may be the influence of the voluminous tert-butyl group which is attached to the nitrogen of the pyrrole group, as well as short centroid–centroid distances between the carbonyl-substituted pyrrole and furan rings. Cohesion forces between the molecules and their parts are provided by weak interactions only: The packing suggests C–H···O, π–π-electron ring interactions, N–H···π-electron ring as well as C–H···π-electron ring interactions. The structure determination of the title compound, the product of the reaction of o-phthalaldehyde with tert-butylamine, has provided indication about the mechanism of a chemical reaction which resulted in the formation of the title molecule.
Lanthanide(III) complexes with μ-SnSe4 and μ-Sn2Se6 linkers: solvothermal syntheses and properties of new Ln(III) selenidostannates decorated with linear polyamine
Authors: Liu Shuzhen , Sun Peipei , Shen Yali , Han Jingyu , Sun Hui , Jia Dingxian
Published: March 2017

New lanthanide-selenidostannate complexes [{La(peha)(Cl)}{La(peha)(NO3)}(μ-1κ2:2κ2-SnSe4)] (1), [H2trien][{La(trien)2}2(μ-1κ:2κ-Sn2Se6)][Sn2Se6]·H2O (2) and [{Ln(tepa)(μ-OH)}2(μ-1κ:2κ-Sn2Se6)]
n
·nH2O (Ln=Sm(3), Eu(4)) were prepared by solvothermal methods in pentaethylenehexamine (peha), triethylenetetramine (trien) and tetraethylenepentamine (tepa), respectively. Acting as a tetradentate chelating and bridging ligand, μ-1κ2:2κ2-SnSe4, the tetrahedral SnSe4 unit joins {La(peha)(Cl)}2+ and {La(peha)(NO3)}2+ complex fragments to generate the neutral coordination compound 1. The tetradentate μ-1κ2:2κ2 bridge in 1 represents a new coordination mode for the SnSe4 tetrahedron. In 2, dinuclear [Sn2Se6]4− anions are formed of SnSe4 tetrahedra via edge-sharing. One [Sn2Se6]4− anion acts as a bidentate bridging ligand in a μ-1κ:2κ coordination mode to join two {La(trien)2}3+ units, and the other [Sn2Se6]4− anion exists as a free charge compensating ion. In 3 and 4, the [Sn2Se6]4− anion connects binuclear [{Ln(tepa)(μ-OH)}2]2+ (Ln=Sm, Eu) units with a bidentate μ-1κ:2κ mode, giving neutral coordination polymers [{Ln(tepa)(μ-OH)}2(μ-1κ:2κ-Sn2Se6)]
n
. The La(2)3+ ion in 1 is in a 10-fold coordination environment of LaN6O2Se2, whereas the La(1)3+ ions in 1 and 2 are in 9-fold coordinated environments forming polyhedra LaN6ClSe2 and LaN8Se, respectively. The Sm3+ and Eu3+ ions in 3 and 4 are both in an 8-fold coordination environment of LnN5O2Se. Compounds 1−4 exhibit optical band gaps between 2.21 and 2.42 eV. Their thermal stabilities were investigated by thermogravimetric analyses.
The AtMYB12 activation domain maps to a short C-terminal region of the transcription factor
Authors: Stracke Ralf , Turgut-Kara Neslihan , Weisshaar Bernd
Published: March 2017

The Arabidopsis thaliana R2R3-MYB transcription factor MYB12 is a light-inducible, flavonol-specific activator of flavonoid biosynthesis. The transactivation activity of the AtMYB12 protein was analyzed using a C-terminal deletion series in a transient A. thaliana protoplast assay with the goal of mapping the activation domain (AD). Although the deletion of the last 46 C-terminal amino acids did not affect the activation capacity, the deletion of the last 98 amino acids almost totally abolished transactivation of two different target promoters. A domain swap experiment using the yeast GAL4 DNA-binding domain revealed that the region from positions 282 to 328 of AtMYB12 was sufficient for transactivation. In contrast to the R2R3-MYB ADs known thus far, that of AtMYB12 is not located at the rearmost C-terminal end of the protein. The AtMYB12 AD is conserved in other experimentally proven R2R3-MYB flavonol regulators from different species.
Einleitung: Produktion und Verkauf von Kleidung seit dem späten 19. Jahrhundert
Authors: Spoerer Mark
Published: March 2017

Introduction: Production and Sales of Clothing since the End of the 19th Century

This paper traces the development of the clothing industry and the clothing retail trade in Germany, and the historiography thereof. In contrast to the textile industry, which experienced substantial technical progress in the course of the industrialization, these industries remained labour intensive. After World War II, the European clothing industry followed cheap labour. Production was relocated in the 1950s from the urban consumption centers to the countryside, in the 60s to the European periphery and in the 70s outside Europe. The German clothing retail trade underwent fundamental change as well, especially in the 30s when many of them were «aryanized». This issue contains five papers on the German and American clothing business.
Das leise Sterben einer Branche – Der Niedergang der westdeutschen Bekleidungsindustrie in den 1960er/70er Jahren
Authors: Schnaus Julia
Published: March 2017

Unnoticed Disappearance – The Decline of the West-German Clothing Industry in the 1960s/70s

In the beginning of the 20th century the German clothing industry used to be a considerable producer of consumer goods, manufacturing clothes for both home and export market. In the 1960s and 70s this branch of the German industry began to decline, mainly due to the pay gap between the labor costs in Germany and low-wage-countries located in Eastern Europe and Asia. In response to this development bigger German companies outsourced their production abroad to save labor costs. Smaller companies often lacked the needed financial resources and had to face bankruptcy as result. At the end only services like planning and quality control remained in Germany. In consequence of this development a lot of German seamstresses lost their jobs. The government did not care about these problems; the enterprises did not receive subsidies. The unions in the sector were weak due to a high percentage of working women and the high ratio of small and medium sized regionally dispersed enterprises.
Die Rolle des Ghetto Litzmannstadt (Łódź) bei der Versorgung der Wehrmacht und der deutschen Privatwirtschaft mit Kleidung (1940 bis 1944)
Authors: Schnaus Julia , Smolorz Roman , Spoerer Mark
Published: March 2017

The Role of the Ghetto Litzmannstadt (Łódź) for the Clothing Provision of the German Armed Forces and Private Firms (1940 to 1944)

Shortly after the establishment of the Ghetto in Łódź, the German administration set up a textile and clothing department. As Łódź was the leading Polish textile center, many ghetto inhabitants had basic or advanced skills in the textile and clothing business. After several months it became clear for the Jews that working for the Germans was the only chance to making themselves valuable and to avoid or postpone being deported to extermination camps. The textile and clothing department soon became the largest sweatshop in the ghetto and was also an important provider of textiles, clothing and leather goods for the German economy. Previous research followed the claim of the department's head that the German military took over 90 per cent of its production. We show for the large textile and clothing department that the share of production for civilian purposes was much higher, around 50 per cent. Moreover, we analyze the business relationship between the ghetto administration and German firms.
Communication between Brain Areas Based on Nested Oscillations
Authors: Bonnefond Mathilde , Kastner Sabine , Jensen Ole
Published: March 2017

Unraveling how brain regions communicate is crucial for understanding how the brain processes external and internal information. Neuronal oscillations within and across brain regions have been proposed to play a crucial role in this process. Two main hypotheses have been suggested for routing of information based on oscillations, namely communication through coherence and gating by inhibition. Here, we propose a framework unifying these two hypotheses that is based on recent empirical findings. We discuss a theory in which communication between two regions is established by phase synchronization of oscillations at lower frequencies (<25 Hz), which serve as temporal reference frame for information carried by high-frequency activity (>40 Hz). Our framework, consistent with numerous recent empirical findings, posits that cross-frequency interactions are essential for understanding how large-scale cognitive and perceptual networks operate.