bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
The Constructive Role of Private Creditors
Authors: Porzecanski Arturo C.
Published: August 2006

During the past couple of years, policy-makers in Washington and other capitals of G-7 countries have been flogging the idea that the functioning of the world's financial markets must be improved by making it easier for insolvent governments, especially in emerging markets, to obtain debt relief from their bondholders and bankers.

Most savvy investors, financial intermediaries, and emerging-market government officials, however, are at a loss to understand why the G-7 and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) believe the international financial system would function better if there were specific mechanisms to facilitate sovereign bankruptcies.
International Justice as Equal Regard and the Use of Force
Authors: Elshtain Jean Bethke
Published: August 2006

Elshtain presents a case for the primacy of politics if one would argue persuasively about international justice. Without political stability, all attempts to assist developing states, or to sustain persons caught in the chaos of “failed states,” must fail. A concept of justice lies at the heart of this discussion and revolves around the fundamental questions of to whom justice is owed and in what justice consists.

Have we any obligations beyond our own borders? If so, what form do these take? These questions are addressed by developing a concept of comparative justice indebted to the just war tradition and tying it to the equal moral regard of persons. This leads, in turn, to two further difficulties. First, what does it mean to make a claim under the equal regard norm? Just war criteria posit certain universal claims in a political universe in which particular bodies politic either respond, or do not, to such claims in light of their own principles and interests. The article develops a citizenship model for cases of humanitarian intervention, rejecting any and all approaches that involve an asymmetrical valuing of human life.

Second, who can be called upon to use coercive force in behalf of justice? Elshtain argues that all states have a stake in creating and sustaining an international system of equal regard. But, at present, there is no universal body that can be turned to with any confidence in situations of catastrophic violence, like ethnic cleansing. UN Peacekeepers are effective only after a measure of order is restored. As a result the state, or states, with the greatest capability to project power bears the lion's sharer of responsibility for enforcing an equal regard norm. Elshtain acknowledges the difficulties of articulating a strong universal justice claim while assigning a particular state, or states, and their people a disproportionate enforcement burden. But that best describes the present moment and it is better by far that those with power deploy that power within a framework of principles and constraints rather than solely along the lines of classic realpolitik.
Network Power and Globalization
Authors: Grewal David Singh
Published: August 2006

Against the celebratory view of globalization comes the charge that globalization represents a kind of empire. But this charge requires a framework in which we can identify the power at work in apparently voluntary processes, such as learning English or joining the World Trade Organization. I advance a concept of “network power” to explain the dynamic that drives many key aspects of globalization. A network is united via a standard, which is the shared norm or convention that enables coordination among its users, such as a language that allows communication among its speakers. A widely used standard is more valuable than a less used one, simply because it governs access to a larger network of people. The idea of network power generalizes this fact to describe globalization as the rise to global dominance of standards that have achieved critical mass in language, high technology, trade, law, and many other areas. It also characterizes the rise to dominance of a successful standard as involving a form of power. While these new standards allow for global coordination, they also eclipse local standards, rendering them unviable to the extent that they prove incompatible with dominant ones. Therefore many of the choices driving globalization are only formally free and, in fact, are constrained because the network power of a dominant standard makes it the only effectively available option. It is this dynamic that generates much of the resentment against globalization and the criticism that it reflects a new imperialism.
The Guilt of Nations?
Authors: Olick Jeffrey K.
Published: August 2006

“What responsibility do ordinary people bear for atrocities committed in their names? According to modern democratic sensibilities, responsibility is an individual affair. The idea, as in Exodus (20:5), that the sins of the fathers could be delivered unto the third and fourth generations goes against the grain. It seems to be part of the collectivistic thinking that characterizes modernity off its rails, a pre-modern remain that produces outbursts of racism, nationalism, and genocide. That is not to say that we are not interested in accountability for political crimes. International human rights entrepreneurs have pressed for holding dictators accountable and have supported efforts to obtain reparations and other forms of redress. But we are very careful to avoid charges of “collective guilt,” which often sound more like the problem than the solution. We don't want to start a culture war or clash of civilizations!

…In contrast to the Mitscherlichs, Sebald is thus very much a man of his times, free of the older orthodoxies of the West German memory wars. For decades, the politics of memory in West Germany was divided between those who feared “too much” memory and those, like Jung and the Mitscherlichs, who believed Germans needed to work through their (collective) guilt if they were to overcome the symptoms of repression. Sebald does indeed pose a strong ethical and political-cultural imperative to remember, but his lecture was controversial because the lost memory it laments is that of German suffering, which heretofore has been the rallying cry of the extreme right. In this regard, Sebald is only one example of a surprising recent interest in the memory of German suffering from the left…. How legitimate is this new interest in German suffering, previously associated with nationalist revanchism and discreditable positions? The answer depends on the purpose…”
The Preventive Use of Force: A Cosmopolitan Institutional Proposal
Authors: Buchanan Allen , Keohane Robert O.
Published: August 2006

Preventive use of force may be defined as the initiation of military action in anticipation of harmful actions that are neither presently occurring nor imminent. This essay explores the permissibility of preventive war from a cosmopolitan normative perspective, one that recognizes the basic human rights of all persons, not just citizens of a particular country or countries. It argues that preventive war can only be justified if it is undertaken within an appropriate rule-governed, institutional framework that is designed to help protect vulnerable countries against unjustified interventions while also avoiding unacceptable risks of the costs of inaction. The key to ensuring the fairness of rules governing the preventive use of force is accountability.

This essay proposes a scheme that would make those promoting and those rejecting the preventive use of force more accountable. The proposal contains the following crucial features:

States proposing preventive war are required to enter into a contract with a diverse body of states as a condition for authorization of their actions;

Prior to taking preventive action, states must make an evidence-based case to the UN Security Council, and agree in advance to submit themselves to an evaluation by an impartial body after the preventive action occurred;

Both proponents of action and those opposing it will be held accountable ex post for the accuracy of their prior statements and the proportionality of their actions;

Sanctions will be imposed against intervening states or states that opposed preventive action, respectively, depending on the findings of the ex post evaluation.

If preventive action were blocked in the Security Council, states seeking to engage in preventive action could then present their case in a different body–a coalition of democratic states–with its own ex post and ex ante accountability procedures.
Global Warming: More Common Than Tragic
Authors: DeSombre Elizabeth R.
Published: August 2006

Global warming is indeed a difficult international environmental problem to address: it has tragedy of the commons characteristics, and problems of time horizons and uncertainty. But previous efforts at international cooperation on other environmental issues such as ozone depletion suggest that international cooperation should be possible–though difficult–on climate change. Cooperation on issues that involve long time horizons suggests that the present generation is not calculating utility quite so narrowly as game theorists posit. Experience also suggests that successful cooperation on climate change will start with measures so small as to seem inconsequential, but will set in place an institutional and scientific process that will ultimately result in much more significant cooperative efforts. Rather than representing a tragedy, the Kyoto Protocol (or something much like it) could represent the beginnings of a process in which current generations take the first steps at collective action that dramatically improve the lives of future generations. Those who are concerned about the weakness of the Kyoto Protocol should first focus on persuading the United States to join-since this is the best way to let the process work and avoid a tragedy of the commons.
Sharing the Riches of the Earth: Democratizing Natural Resource-Led Development
Authors: Slack Keith
Published: August 2006

Many developing countries are attempting to use their natural resource endowments – notably oil, natural gas, and minerals such as gold – as the basis for economic growth and development. Recent history, however, indicates that countries that depend heavily on resource extraction do more poorly on a variety of economic indicators, including growth rates, education levels, and income inequality. This is due in significant part to the way in which wealth derived from resource extraction is concentrated in the hands of a small elite, which often misuses these revenues through corruption, poorly planned investments, and other means. This contrasts with other kinds of economic activity, such as agriculture, in which benefits are distributed more widely. Thus, a key to increasing the development and poverty reduction benefit value of resource extraction is breaking elite control of these revenues and increasing public involvement in decision-making related to their use. Doing so would enhance the likelihood that these funds would be employed with greater concern for the needs of the populace. The experiences of Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia highlight the importance of increasing distributive justice and public participation in resource revenue distribution and provide insights into how this could be implemented in resource-dependent economies.
War and Self-Defense
Authors: Rodin David
Published: August 2006

When the Bush and Blair administrations justified the 2003 war on Iraq as an act of preemptive self-defense, this was greeted in many quarters with understandable skepticism. How can the right of self-defense be legitimately invoked when no prior aggressive attack has occurred and there is no evidence that one is imminent? This question, much debated in the months leading up to the war, invites us to reflect critically on the content of the right of self-defense. Yet there is a deeper question to be asked about the idea of a war of self-defense; namely, how is it that war can be considered an act of self-defense at all? How exactly is it that the concept of self-defense can provide a justification for war? It is this question that I ask in War and Self-Defense and the answer I arrive at is a surprising one.
Self-Defense and the Obligations to Kill and to Die
Authors: Ryan Cheyney C.
Published: August 2006

David Rodin's book, War and Self Defense, is a subtle and provocative analysis of the claim of self-defense and its relation to modern war. Building on his analysis, I raise some further issues about self-defense as a justification of modern nation state war. Principal among these is what I call the conscription paradox: if the state's right to make war is grounded in the right of its citizens to self-defense, how do we explain the right of modern states to conscript its citizens into the military – and order them to die, if need be? This problem has been acknowledged by liberal individual thinkers over the years, but not solved. It raises questions of whether a coherent account of current nation state military practice can be grounded in individual self-defense.
War as Self-Defense
Authors: McMahan Jeff
Published: August 2006

First imagine a case in which a person uses violence in self-defense; then imagine a case in which two people engage in self-defense against a threat they jointly face. Continue to imagine further cases in which increasing numbers of people act with increasing coordination to defend both themselves and each other against a common threat, or a range of threats they face together. What you are imagining is a spectrum of cases that begins with acts of individual self-defense and, as the threats become more complex and extensive, the threatened individuals more numerous, and their defensive action more integrated, eventually reaches cases involving a scale of violence that is constitutive of war. But if war, at least in some instances, lies on a continuum with individual self- and other-defense, and if acts of individual self- and other-defense can sometimes be morally justified, then war can in principle be morally justified as well. It follows that the only coherent forms of pacifism are those that reject the permissibility of individual self- or other-defense—for example, those based on an absolute prohibition of violence or killing.
Self-Defense in International Law and Rights of Persons
Authors: Tesón Fernando R.
Published: August 2006

In War and Self-Defense David Rodin uncovers many flaws of current thinking about war. Rodin correctly points out that the justification of national self-defense goes beyond the justification of individual self-defense. He accurately rejects the standard notion of moral symmetry—the accepted view that both just and unjust warriors can permissibly kill enemies as long as they observe the laws of war. Rodin vindicates the right view: if a war is unjust, each and every injury caused by the unjust warrior is a criminal act. There are no morally justified killings by those who fight unjust wars. Further, Rodin rightly rejects various holistic theories of self-defense. Last but not least, he correctly denounces what I have called the Hegelian Myth, the idea that tyrannical governments are worth defending against interventions aimed at deposing them because they are protected by the principle of sovereignty.
Beyond National Defense
Authors: Rodin David
Published: August 2006

In War and Self-Defense I attempt to generate a dilemma for the just war theory by arguing that the right of national defense cannot be reduced to personal rights of self-defense, nor can it be explained through an analogy with them. Jeff McMahan, David Mapel, and Fernando Tesón doubt this conclusion. In response I argue, first, that their objections are not as opposed to my basic project as they may at first appear. This is because they are premised on a conception of national defense that differs substantially from mainstream just war theory and international law. Second, I argue that McMahan's and Mapel's defense of the reductive argument is unconvincing because (among other things) it is premised on an inadequate view of the norm of proportionality. On the other hand Tesón's defense of the analogical view, based on a conception of the moral value of the just institutions of a legitimate state, cannot account for certain basic features of the international legal and moral order. These include the presumption that even unjust states can possess the right of self-defense against aggression and that it is impermissible for one just state to conquer and rule another just state. Finally I argue that the attempt to bolster the right of national defense through the concept of punishment is inappropriate because it ignores the crucial requirement for proper moral authority in the agent of punishment.
Upholding Humanitarian Principles in an Effective Integrated Response
Authors: Charny Joel R.
Published: August 2006

The integration of political, military, and humanitarian action in responding to complex emergencies offers a compelling promise of resolving long-term problems and thereby providing peace and stability to an entire population. Significant changes are needed, however, to realize this promise fully. The most critical improvements relate to strengthening the humanitarian leadership within the UN system and so refocusing the collective effort on the protection of vulnerable civilians. A movement of independent, complementary agencies working together to realize protection will strengthen the humanitarian component of integrated missions and make a difference in people's lives.
Informing the Integration Debate with Recent Experience
Authors: Minear Larry
Published: August 2006

The overriding challenge faced by policy-makers in the post–Cold War era is not, as many would have us believe, the achievement of integration of humanitarian action into the prevailing politico-military context. It is rather the protection of its independence. The debate, rather than focusing on fitting humanitarian action more snugly into the given political framework, should explore how to ensure the indispensable independence of humanitarian actors from that framework.

The experience of the Humanitarianism and War Project, an action-oriented research and publications initiative studying humanitarian activities in post–Cold War conflicts, suggests the essential elements of such independence. They include structural protection for humanitarian action against political conditionality; more sensitivity to local perceptions regarding humanitarian actors and action; tighter discipline within the humanitarian sector by those providing assistance and protection; increased attention to the origins of aid resources and of the personnel administering them; greater participation and ownership by local institutions and leaders in crisis countries; and an agreed overarching political framework that gives higher priority to human security.
Occupation as Liberation: International Humanitarian Law and Regime Change
Authors: Chesterman Simon
Published: August 2006

The U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003 has been the subject of much discussion for its impact on the use of force outside of UN Security Council authorization. Less commented upon is the fact that the so-called “Operation Iraqi Freedom” resurrected a body of international law that had been dormant through the second half of the twentieth century: the law of military occupation. Developed at a time when war itself was not illegal, this doctrine became something of an embarrassment after the UN Charter established a broad prohibition on the use of force. Nevertheless, through the 1990s the United Nations itself had become involved in operations in Kosovo that looked distinctly like military occupation. Even the most liberal reading of the instruments governing occupation law, however, finds it hard to reconcile this law with military intervention and post-conflict occupation premised on regime change. This article first surveys the law of military occupation before briefly examining the role of the UN Security Council in post-conflict administration. It then turns to the ambiguous responsibilities accorded to the United States and Britain as occupying powers in Iraq in 2003–2004.
Toward Establishing a Universal Basic Health Norm
Authors: Acharya Arnab K.
Published: August 2006

Vast improvements in human health have been made during the past century. Indeed, gains in increased life expectancy and reduced physical impediments for much of the population were greater than in any previous century. Yet the gains were not uniform across the world or even within individual countries. The variations in health status among people cannot for the most part be explained through genetic differences. Instead, in most instances the variations in the last century and at the turn of the current century correspond to the variations in the distribution of control over material resources.
Should We Stop Thinking about Poverty in Terms of Helping the Poor?
Authors: Patten Alan
Published: August 2006

It would be rather unusual for someone to argue publicly that the world's rich have no obligations at all with respect to the global poor. Many, however, claim that the obligations of the affluent countries are both fairly weak and minimal. This claim is typically arrived at via two premises: one is normative, the other factual. The normative premise asserts that while we are under a strict obligation not to harm others, the obligation to benefit people who we have not harmed is rather weak (and is, for instance, best left to private charitable efforts rather than government action or institutional reform). The factual premise is that the affluent are not, individually or collectively, harming the world's poor by causing their poverty (p. 12). Following Thomas Pogge, I will sometimes refer to this view simply as “libertarianism.” According to a second view, which I shall call the “need-based” view, we have a very strong and extensive set of duties to come to the assistance of the global poor: duties that are grounded in the neediness of the poor. In its most pure form, this view rejects altogether the ethical significance of the distinction between harming and failing to help. On a morally demanding version of the need-based view we have duties of assistance to anyone who is worse off than us, not merely those who are severely in need.
Severe Poverty as a Violation of Negative Duties
Authors: Pogge Thomas
Published: August 2006

Mathias Risse discusses whether the global system of territorial sovereignty that emerged in the fifteenth century can be said to harm the poorer societies. This question is distinct from the question I raise in my book—namely, whether present citizens of the affluent countries, in collusion with the ruling elites of most poor countries, are harming the global poor. These questions are different, because present citizens of the affluent countries bear responsibility only for the recent design of the global institutional order. The effects of the states system as it was shaped before 1980, say, is thus of little relevance to the question I have raised. A further difference is that whereas Risse's discussion focuses on the well-being of societies, typically assessed by their GNP per capita, my discussion focuses on the well-being of individual human beings. This difference is significant because what enriches a poor country (in terms of GNP per capita) all too often impoverishes the vast majority of its inhabitants, as I discuss with the example of Nigeria's oil revenues (pp. 112–14).

My focus is then on the present situation, on the radical inequality between the bottom half of humankind, suffering severe poverty, and those in the top seventh, whose per capita share of the global product is 180 times greater than theirs (at market exchange rates). This radical inequality and the continuous misery and death toll it engenders are foreseeably reproduced under the present global institutional order as we have shaped it. And most of it could be avoided, I hold, if this global order had been, or were to be, designed differently. The feasibility of a more poverty-avoiding alternative design of the global institutional order shows, I argue, that the present design is unjust and that, by imposing it, we are harming the global poor by foreseeably subjecting them to avoidable severe poverty.
The Democratic Minimum: Is Democracy a Means to Global Justice?
Authors: Bohman James
Published: August 2006

I argue that transnational democracy provides the basis for a solution to the problem of the “democratic circle”—that in order for democracy to promote justice, it must already be just—at the international level. Transnational democracy could be a means to global justice. First, I briefly recount my argument for the “democratic minimum.” This minimum is freedom from domination, understood in a very specific sense. Employing Hannah Arendt's conception of freedom as “the capacity to begin,” the form of nondomination sufficient for the democratic minimum is the capability to initiate deliberation and thus democratic decision-making processes. My point in developing this argument further concerns the political form of a transnational polity: its citizens enjoy the democratic minimum as members of variousdemoi. In the case of the European Union, this leads to a potential for democratic domination. I call this thedemoiproblem, a difficulty that holds for any multilevel polity, for bounded as well as transnational political communities. Second, I argue that such domination is overcome so long as the capacity to initiate deliberation is distributed among various units and various levels. The democratic minimum could fail to obtain not only because individuals or groups are dominated by nondemocratic means, but also because they are dominated democratically to the extent that the demos of one unit lacks the normative power to initiate deliberation and thus is subordinated to others.
Humanitarian Imperialism
Authors: Nardin Terry
Published: August 2006

Fernando Tesón offers two “humanitarian rationales” for the war in Iraq. The first, which he calls the “narrow” rationale, is that the war was fought to overthrow a tyrant. The second, “grand,” rationale is that it was fought as part of a strategy for defending the United States by establishing democratic regimes in the Middle East and throughout the world–peacefully, if possible, but by force if necessary. Both rationales strain the traditional understanding of humanitarian intervention.
Of Tyrants and Empires
Authors: Tesón Fernando R.
Published: August 2006

Fernando R. Tesón replies to Terry Nardin's critique
Against the New Internationalism
Authors: Burke Anthony
Published: August 2006

When I think of the challenges facing international society in the wake of the invasion of Iraq, two images come to mind. The first, a work of postcard art, depicts a screenprint of the Statue of Liberty, with a twist. In the place of her striking face and radiating crown appears a decidedly masculine image: that of a helmeted marine, grim and tight-jawed, a cigarette poking insolently from his lips. The caption reads, in bold white capitals on black, “PEACE,” and beneath it another phrase, asterisked: “conditions apply.” The second is a newspaper photograph of a young woman in New York taken during the global demonstrations against the war in February 2003. She has been called out of the march by the photographer and stands, at once defiant and bewildered, against a row of mounted police. Rugged up against the winter cold, she holds a placard upon which she has written a question: “Perpetual war for perpetual peace?”
Against the New Utopianism
Authors: Elshtain Jean Bethke
Published: August 2006

There is much that is interesting in Anthony Burke's essay. Unfortunately, Burke is unable to resist hyperbolic language and too readily substitutes rhetorical onslaught for compelling argument. For example, those he criticizes as being neo-imperialists in liberal internationalist clothing are many times over said to present “disturbing” or “disturbing indeed” arguments. We are told that liberty is a “hermaphrodite”; that the war on terrorism constitutes “the democracy that slaughters, the liberator that tortures” (p. 73), as if Abu Ghraib is standard policy rather than aberration and the deaths of civilians intentional rather than a tragic unintended consequence of fighting. Burke's opponents, he says, deploy “notoriously vague” and “fear-soaked rhetoric” as they “scandalously” mimic the ICISS report's title (p. 76). Citing Jürgen Habermas, he calls the war against Saddam Hussein an “unimaginable break” with existing norms (pp. 75, 76). This suggests that there are “imaginable breaks,” but we do not know anything about the criteria he is applying. Reserving sunny language for his own proposed alternatives, Burke blasts the idea of state sovereignty itself as “violent and exclusivist,” and “linger[ing], like a latent illness, in the very depths of modern cosmopolitanism” (p. 74). These excesses are distracting and cloud the observations in his essay that are perceptive and deserve serious consideration.
Just Cause for War
Authors: McMahan Jeff
Published: August 2006

The central contention of this essay is that a just cause for war is a wrong that is of a type that can make those responsible for it morally liable to military attack as a means of preventing or rectifying it. This claim has many implications that conflict with assumptions of the currently orthodox theory of the just war. Among the implications explored in the text are that the requirement of just cause is logically and morally prior to all the other requirements of a just war, that this requirement governs all phases of a war and not just the resort to war, that it is thus impermissible to continue to fight a war once the just cause or causes have been achieved, that it is impermissible to fight at all in a war that lacks a just cause, that just cause is a restriction on the type of aim that may be pursued by means of war and is not a matter of scale, that a war that lacks a just cause may be morally justified even if it is not just, and that a belligerent can pursue both just and unjust causes in the same war, which may then have elements or phases that are just and other elements or phases that are unjust.
What's Wrong with Preventive War? The Moral and Legal Basis for the Preventive Use of Force
Authors: Kaufman Whitley
Published: August 2006

The question of the legitimacy of preventive war has been at the center of the debate about the proper response to terrorism and the legitimacy of the Iraq War. One side has argued that preventive war is a legitimate and necessary tool for nations to use in defense against terrorists; the other side has claimed that war is permissible only in self-defense, and that therefore the preventive use of military force is unjustified both legally and morally. In this essay I attempt to clarify the terms of this debate by demonstrating that neither side is precisely correct. Both under Just War Doctrine and common sense morality, preventive war is indeed justifiable, so long as it satisfies the basic requirements for going to war such as necessity and proportionality. However, under the current international law regime governed by the United Nations Charter, the use of preventive international force is restricted to the Security Council alone. Individual nation states are permitted to use international force only in self-defense. The rise of international terrorism does not by itself change this situation; preventive force against terrorist organization is permissible and appropriate, but it must be authorized by the Security Council in order to be legitimate. Only if the Council proved wholly ineffective in exercising its authority would the right to preventive war revert to individual nations. For all the shortcomings of the United Nations, however, I argue we have not reached a state of total breakdown of international authority sufficient to justify a return to the legitimacy of unilateral preventive war.
“Saving Amina”: Global Justice for Women and Intercultural Dialogue
Authors: Jaggar Alison M.
Published: August 2006

Western moral and political theorists have recently devoted considerable attention to the perceived victimization of women by Non-western cultures. In this paper, I argue that conceiving injustice to poor women in poor countries primarily as a matter of their oppression by illiberal cultures presents an understanding of their situation that is crucially incomplete. This incomplete understanding distorts Western theorists comprehension of our moral relationship to women elsewhere in the world and so of our theoretical task. It also impoverishes our assumptions about the intercultural dialogue necessary to promote global justice for women.
The motion of a freely falling chain tip
Authors: Tomaszewski W. , Pieranski P. , Geminard J.-C.
Published: August 2006

The dynamics of the tip of a falling chain is analyzed. The results of laboratory experiments are presented and compared with the results of numerical simulations. The time dependence of the velocity and the acceleration of the chain tip for several initial conformations of the chain are determined. A simple analytical model of the system is also considered.
Catastrophic bolide impacts on the Earth: Some estimates
Authors: Gratton Julio , Alberto Perazzo Carlos
Published: August 2006

We analyze the impact of large high velocity bodies on the surface of the Earth and obtain estimates of the size of the crater. We show that the atmosphere does not stop large bolides and their mass loss and heating during entry in the atmosphere can be neglected.
Magnetically coupled rotors
Authors: Norris Tiara , Diamond Brendan , Ayars Eric
Published: August 2006

A system with intriguing oscillatory behavior is created using small magnets fixed to the edges of parallel rotating structures. Under certain conditions a system of two rotors will exchange velocities repeatedly in a manner similar to many coupled-oscillator systems, but without oscillations in their position. Simulation of a simple model consisting of two magnetic dipoles on a common axis of rotation yields results that closely match the experimental data.
On visualizing crystal lattice planes
Authors: Aravind P. K.
Published: August 2006

Given the primitive vectors of an arbitrary Bravais lattice and the Miller indices of a set of lattice planes in it, it is shown how to construct an alternative set of primitive vectors that are adapted to the lattice planes in the following sense: all but one of these alternative vectors serve as a basis for the points in one of the lattice planes, and the remaining vector serves to shift any of these lattice planes into a neighboring one. This construction is described for a three-dimensional Bravais lattice and then generalized to arbitrary d-dimensional lattices. This construction can be used to generate computer images of lattice points in a succession of crystal lattice planes, which could be useful for instructional purposes.
An Inexpensive Demonstration of Projectile Motion
Authors: MacInnes Iain
Published: August 2006

It is easily shown that for a projectile with initial upward velocity vo, the height reached, h, is given by h = vo22g. If it is projected at angle θ above the horizontal, the maximum height reached is given by H = vo2 sin2 θ2g and the horizontal range R is given by R = vo2 sin 2θg. For θ = 45°, we can divide Eq. (2) by Eq. (1) to get Hh = sin2 45° = 12 and Eq. (3) by Eq. (1) to obtain Rh = 2 sin 2 (45°) = 2. This means that a projectile that reaches a height of 1 m when fired vertically will, when fired at 45°, reach a maximum height of 0.5 m and have a horizontal range of 2 m. To demonstrate the above, I used a colorful rubber ball of diameter 2 in. First, I dropped it onto a horizontal wooden board (Fig. 1). To rebound to a vertical height of 1 m, it was dropped from a height of 1.2 m. To project it at an angle of 45°, the same wooden board was inclined at an angle of 22.5° (Fig. 2). Assuming that no significant spin is generated in the fall, then the ball will bounce off the board at an angle of 45°.
Exploring Series and Parallel Combinations of Capacitors by Inquiry
Authors: Young Douglas
Published: August 2006

Using lightbulbs and batteries for qualitatively examining resistive combinations has a long and venerable history. There is, however, no similar body of work that explores combinations of capacitors in a similar fashion. This paper begins to fill that gap by describing an inquiry-based method to examine combinations of capacitors.
Interaction between Fosamprenavir, with and without Ritonavir, and Nevirapine in Human Immunodeficiency Virus-Infected Subjects
Authors: DeJesus Edwin , Piliero Peter J. , Summers Kim , Wire Mary Beth , Stein Daniel S. , Masterman Amanda , Lou Yu , Min Sherene S. , Shelton Mark J.
Published: August 2006

Fosamprenavir (FPV) with and without ritonavir (RTV) was added to the antiretroviral regimens of human immunodeficiency virus-infected subjects receiving nevirapine (NVP) to evaluate this drug interaction. Significant reductions in plasma amprenavir exposure (25 to 35%) were observed following coadministration of 1,400 mg of FPV twice a day (BID) and 200 mg of NVP BID. A regimen of 700 mg of FPV BID plus 100 mg of RTV BID may be coadministered with NVP without dose adjustment.
Interaction of the Gelsolin-Derived Antibacterial PBP 10 Peptide with Lipid Bilayers and Cell Membranes
Authors: Bucki Robert , Janmey Paul A.
Published: August 2006

PBP 10, an antibacterial, cell membrane-permeant rhodamine B-conjugated peptide derived from the polyphosphoinositide binding site of gelsolin, interacts selectively with both lipopolysaccharides (LPS) and lipoteichoic acid (LTA), the distinct components of gram-negative and gram-positive bacteria, respectively. Isolated LPS and LTA decrease the antimicrobial activities of PBP 10, as well as other antimicrobial peptides, such as cathelicidin-LL37 (LL37) and mellitin. In an effort to elucidate the mechanism of bacterial killing by PBP 10, we compared its effects on artificial lipid bilayers and eukaryotic cell membranes with the actions of the mellitin, magainin II, and LL37 peptides. This study reveals that pore formation is unlikely to be involved in PBP 10-mediated membrane destabilization. We also investigated the effects of these peptides on platelets and red blood cells (RBCs). Comparison of these antimicrobial peptides shows that only mellitin has a toxic effect on platelets and RBCs in a concentration range concomitant with its bactericidal activity. The hemolytic activities of the PBP 10 and LL37 peptides significantly increase when RBCs are osmotically swollen in hypotonic solution, indicating that these antibacterial peptides may take advantage of the more extended form of bacterial membranes in exerting their killing activities. Additionally, we found that LL37 hemolytic activity was much higher when RBCs were induced to expose phosphatidylserine to the external leaflet of their plasma membranes. This finding suggests that asymmetrical distribution of phospholipids in the external membranes of eukaryotic cells may represent an important factor in determining the specificity of antibacterial peptides for targeting bacteria rather than eukaryotic cells.
Evidence of Antibiotic Resistance Gene Silencing in
Escherichia coli
Authors: Enne Virve I. , Delsol Anne A. , Roe John M. , Bennett Peter M.
Published: August 2006

The possibility that unexpressed antibiotic resistance genes are carried by bacterial genomes is seldom investigated. Potential silencing of the resistance genes
bla
OXA-2
,
aadA1
,
sul1
, and
tetA
carried on the plasmid pVE46 in a recent porcine isolate of
Escherichia coli
was investigated following oral inoculation of the strain into organic piglets. A small proportion of isolates recovered from feces did not express one or more resistance genes, despite retaining the pVE46 plasmid. Different combinations of unexpressed resistance genes were observed, and 12 representative isolates were selected for further study. Surprisingly, in most cases the resistance genes and their promoters, although not expressed, were intact, with fully wild-type sequences. Apart from four isolates exhibiting intermediate-level tetracycline resistance, no mRNA for the unexpressed genes was detected. Silencing of resistance genes was reversible at low frequencies between 10
−6
and 10
−10
. Introduction of the plasmid from silenced isolates to another strain restored expression, indicating that gene silencing was a property of the host chromosome rather than the plasmid itself. When the same recent porcine
E. coli
strain carrying the unrelated plasmid RP1 was inoculated into piglets, three isolates (of 9,492) that no longer expressed RP1-encoded resistance genes were recovered. As with pVE46, in most cases the coding sequences and promoter regions of these genes were found to be intact, but they were not transcribed. Such gene silencing indicates a previously unrecognized form of transcriptional control that overrides standard expression signals to shut down gene expression. These findings suggest that unexpressed resistance genes may occur in the wild and hence may have clinical implications.
Efflux Pump Overexpression in Multiple-Antibiotic-Resistant Mutants of
Bacteroides fragilis
Authors: Pumbwe Lilian , Glass Daniel , Wexler Hannah M.
Published: August 2006

Multidrug-resistant mutants of a wild-type
Bacteroides fragilis
strain (strain ADB77) and a quadruple resistance nodulation division family efflux pump deletion mutant (ADB77 Δ
bmeB1
Δ
bmeB3
Δ
bmeB12
Δ
bmeB15
) were selected with antimicrobials. Ampicillin, doripenem, imipenem, levofloxacin, and metronidazole selected for mutants from both strains; cefoxitin selected for mutants from strain ADB77 only; and sodium dodecyl sulfate selected mutants from ADB77Δ
bmeB1
Δ
bmeB3
Δ
bmeB12
Δ
bmeB15
only. The mutants overexpressed one or more efflux pumps.
Endocarditis Caused by Extended-Spectrum-β-Lactamase-Producing
Klebsiella pneumoniae
: Emergence of Resistance to Ciprofloxacin and Piperacillin-Tazobactam during Treatment despite Initial Susceptibility
Authors: Zimhony Oren , Chmelnitsky Inna , Bardenstein Rita , Goland Sorel , Hammer Muntz Orly , Navon Venezia Shiri , Carmeli Yehuda
Published: August 2006

Three episodes of bacteremia occurred in the course of prosthetic valve endocarditis caused by an extended-spectrum-β-lactamase (ESBL)-producing
Klebsiella pneumoniae
strain. The second isolate developed resistance to ciprofloxacin and the third isolate to piperacillin-tazobactam (PIP-TZ) following sequential therapy with each agent. The first isolate was resistant to PIP-TZ only at high inocula, the second isolate acquired increased transcription of the
acrA
gene, and the third isolate became resistant to PIP-TZ due to loss of β-lactamase inhibition by TZ. We question if and how PIP-TZ susceptibility should be reported for ESBL-producing
Enterobacteriaceae
.
In Vitro Activity and In Vivo Efficacy of Icofungipen (PLD-118), a Novel Oral Antifungal Agent, against the Pathogenic Yeast
Candida albicans
Authors: Hasenoehrl Andreja , Galić Tatjana , Ergović Gabrijela , Maršić Nataša , Skerlev Mihael , Mittendorf Joachim , Geschke Ulrich , Schmidt Axel , Schoenfeld Wolfgang
Published: August 2006

Icofungipen (PLD-118) is the representative of a novel class of antifungals, beta amino acids, active against
Candida
species. It has been taken through phase II clinical trials. The compound actively accumulates in yeast, competitively inhibiting isoleucyl-tRNA synthetase and consequently disrupting protein biosynthesis. As a result, in vitro activity can be studied only in chemically defined growth media without free amino acids that would compete with the uptake of the compound. The MIC of icofungipen was reproducibly measured in a microdilution assay using yeast nitrogen base medium at pH 6 to 7 after 24 h of incubation at 30 to 37°C using an inoculum of 50 to 100 CFU/well. The MICs for 69
Candida albicans
strains ranged from 4 to 32 μg/ml. This modest in vitro activity contrasts with the strong in vivo efficacy in
C. albicans
infection. This was demonstrated in a lethal model of
C. albicans
infection in mice and rats in which icofungipen showed dose-dependent protection at oral doses of 10 to 20 mg/kg of body weight per day in mice and 2 to 10 mg/kg/day in rats. The in vivo efficacy was also demonstrated against
C. albicans
isolates with low susceptibility to fluconazole, indicating activity against azole-resistant strains. The efficacy of icofungipen in mice and rats was not influenced by concomitant administration of equimolar amounts of
l
-isoleucine, which was shown to antagonize its antifungal activity in vitro. Icofungipen shows nearly complete oral bioavailability in a variety of species, and its in vivo efficacy indicates its potential for the oral treatment of yeast infections.
Isolation of a
Lactobacillus salivarius
Strain and Purification of Its Bacteriocin, Which Is Inhibitory to
Campylobacter jejuni
in the Chicken Gastrointestinal System
Authors: Stern N. J. , Svetoch E. A. , Eruslanov B. V. , Perelygin V. V. , Mitsevich E. V. , Mitsevich I. P. , Pokhilenko V. D. , Levchuk V. P. , Svetoch O. E. , Seal B. S.
Published: August 2006

We evaluated anti-
Campylobacter jejuni
activity among >1,200 isolates of different lactic acid bacteria.
Lactobacillus salivarius
strain NRRL B-30514 was selected for further study. The cell-free, ammonium sulfate precipitate from the broth culture was termed the crude antimicrobial preparation. Ten microliters of the crude preparation created a zone of
C. jejuni
growth inhibition, and growth within the zone resumed when the crude preparation was preincubated with proteolytic enzymes. Bacteriocin OR-7, derived from this crude preparation, was further purified using ion-exchange and hydrophobic-interaction chromatography. The determined amino acid sequence was consistent with class IIa bacteriocins. Interestingly, OR-7 had sequence similarity, even in the C-terminal region, to acidocin A, which was previously identified from
L. acidophilus
and had activity only to gram-positive bacteria, whereas OR-7 had activity to a gram-negative bacterium. Bacteriocin activity was stable following exposure to 90°C for 15 min, also consistent with these types of antibacterial peptides. The purified protein was encapsulated in polyvinylpyrrolidone and added to chicken feed. Ten day-of-hatch chicks were placed in each of nine isolation units; two groups of birds were challenged with each of four
C. jejuni
isolates (one isolate per unit). At 7 days of age, one group of birds was treated with bacteriocin-emended feed for 3 days, and one group was left untreated. At 10 days of age, the birds were sacrificed and the challenge strain was enumerated from the bird cecal content. Bacteriocin treatment consistently reduced colonization at least one millionfold compared with levels found in the untreated groups. Nonchallenged birds were never colonized by
C. jejuni
. Bacteriocin from
L. salivarius
NRRL B-30514 appears potentially very useful to reduce
C. jejuni
in poultry prior to processing.
Increase of the M Phenotype among Erythromycin-Resistant
Streptococcus pneumoniae
Isolates from Spain Related to the Serotype 14 Variant of the Spain
9V
-3 Clone
Authors: Ardanuy C. , Fenoll A. , Berrón S. , Calatayud L. , Liñares J. ,   the Spanish Pneumococcal Infection Study Network
Published: August 2006

Between 1998 and 2003 the rate of erythromycin resistance among pneumococci in Spain was 34.4%. Although the MLS
B
phenotype was prevalent (94.7%), the rate of the M phenotype increased from 3.3% to 8.9% (
P
< 0.01). Clonal dissemination of
mef
(E)-carrying strains of serotype 14 variant of the Spain
9V
-3 clone was the major contributor to this increase.