bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Endothelin-1, Oxidative Stress, and Endogenous Angiotensin II
Authors: Brewer Justin , Liu Ruisheng , Lu Yan , Scott Jeremy , Wallace Kedra , Wallukat Gerd , Moseley Janae , Herse Florian , Dechend Ralf , Martin James N. , LaMarca Babbette
Published: September 2013

Hypertension during preeclampsia is associated with increased maternal vascular sensitivity to angiotensin II (ANGII). This study was designed to determine mechanisms whereby agonistic autoantibodies to the ANGII type I receptor (AT1-AA) enhance blood pressure (mean arterial pressure [MAP]) and renal vascular sensitivity to ANGII during pregnancy. First, we examined MAP and renal artery resistance index in response to chronic administration of ANGII or AT1-AA or AT1-AA+ANGII in pregnant rats compared with control pregnant rats. To examine mechanisms of heightened sensitivity in response to AT1-AA during pregnancy, we examined the role of endogenous ANGII in AT1-AA–infused pregnant rats, and that of endothelin-1 and oxidative stress in AT1-AA+ANGII–treated rats. Chronic ANGII increased MAP from 95±2 in normal pregnant rats to 115±2 mm Hg; chronic AT1-AA increased MAP to 118±1 mm Hg in normal pregnant rats, which further increased to 123±2 mm Hg with AT1-AA+ANGII. Increasing ANGII from 10
−11
to 10
−8
decreased afferent arteriole diameter from 15% to 20% but sharply decreased afferent arteriole diameter to 60% in AT1-AA–pretreated vessels. Renal artery resistance index increased from 0.67 in normal pregnant rats to 0.70 with AT1-AA infusion, which was exacerbated to 0.74 in AT1-AA+ANGII–infused rats. AT1-AA–induced hypertension decreased with enalapril but was not attenuated. Both tissue endothelin-1 and reactive oxygen species increased with AT1-AA+ANGII compared with AT1-AA alone, and blockade of either of these pathways had significant effects on MAP or renal artery resistance index. These data support the hypothesis that AT1-AA, via activation of endothelin-1 and oxidative stress and interaction with endogenous ANGII, is an important mechanism whereby MAP and renal vascular responses are enhanced during preeclampsia.
Governing Ecosystem Carbon
Authors: Boer Henry
Published: September 2013

Governing carbon stored in natural and human-managed ecosystems is an emerging area in global climate politics. Many developed and developing countries are devising and implementing a range of reform programs that aim to reduce emissions and increase sequestration in the land use, land use change and forestry, and agricultural sectors. In developing countries, mitigation programs and projects on the ground have accelerated under the global program Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+). The article applies a governmentality framework to analyze these policies and programs as forms of administrative, economic, and deliberative rationalities and associated technologies. What emerges in the analysis is that governing is conducted through common technologies including policy instruments and rules, stakeholder engagement processes, and the application of the same technical monitoring and carbon accounting methodologies. In the case of REDD+, there has been strong emphasis on the introduction of market and incentive approaches, but the major reforms have focused on government regulatory programs and building technical and administrative capacity. Importantly, this is allowing national and sub-national governments to extend their authority across all aspects of the reform agenda, which poses significant challenges for reducing forest loss in developing countries.
Neoliberalism, Environmental Justice, and the Convention on Biological Diversity: How Problematizing the Commodification of Nature Affects Regime Effectiveness
Authors: Fuentes-George Kemi
Published: September 2013

Payment for ecosystem services (PES) is becoming a dominant approach in generating political and societal support for conservation of globally important biodiversity. PES assumes that corporate actors and policymakers will be more likely to support environmental action if convinced of the economic rationale of doing so. However, by process-tracing two biodiversity projects funded by the Global Environment Facility in Jamaica and Mexico, I argue that linking biodiversity conservation to neoliberal economics reifies a short-term, exploitative view of the environment. Economic calculations about biodiversity will not persuade corporate actors and policymakers to abandon short-term exploitation. Moreover, commodifying nature under the neoliberal paradigm undermines other perspectives on the value of nature, notably those rooted in cultural, historic, subsistence and aesthetic paradigms. In turn, this restricts the ability of populations not integrated into major economic markets to participate in governance and influence what “effective” regime implementation looks like at the local level.
Rio+20: Sustainable Development in a Time of Multilateral Decline
Authors: Bernstein Steven
Published: September 2013

The conditions that led to low expectations for the Rio+20 conference tell us more about the prospects for addressing collective global problems than a focus only on its substantive outcomes. Three conjectures on why expectations were so low are put forward: a lack of vision and modest ambition at the conference's core; unresolved and unconfronted normative contestation that limited progress on potentially transformative ideas such as the green economy; and practices of multilateralism that have not caught up to structural changes in the global system, exacerbated by the inability or unwillingness of key actors to move from entrenched identities. Some surprising institutional outcomes of Rio are also assessed in light of the three conjectures. This form of analysis turns attention to the politics that the outcomes reflect and opportunities and pitfalls going forward.
Taxonomic study of the genus Myrmarachne of Borneo (Araneae: Salticidae)
Authors: YAMASAKI TAKESHI , AHMAD ABDUL HAMID
Published: September 2013

Twenty-two species of the genus Myrmarachne are reported from Borneo in the present study. Among those, eight are new to science, M. acromegalis sp. nov., M. alticephalon sp. nov., M. brevichelicera sp. nov., M. crassembolus sp. nov., M. cyrtodens sp. nov., M. endoi sp. nov., M. lambirensis sp. nov. and M. sabahna sp. nov. The following synonymies are proposed: Myrmarachne topali Żabka, 1985 syn. nov. as a junior synonym of M. hanoii Żabka, 1985, M. gigantea Żabka, 1985 syn. nov. as a junior synonym of M. maxillosa (C. L. Koch, 1846). The females of M. assimilis Banks, 1930, M. biseratensis Badcock, 1918, M. gedongensis Badcock, 1918, M. markaha Barrion & Litsinger, 1995 and M. shelfordii Peckham & Peckham, 1907 are described for the first time.
Uncertainties in CMIP5 Climate Projections due to Carbon Cycle Feedbacks
Authors: Friedlingstein Pierre , Meinshausen Malte , Arora Vivek K. , Jones Chris D. , Anav Alessandro , Liddicoat Spencer K. , Knutti Reto
Published: September 2013

In the context of phase 5 of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project, most climate simulations use prescribed atmospheric CO2 concentration and therefore do not interactively include the effect of carbon cycle feedbacks. However, the representative concentration pathway 8.5 (RCP8.5) scenario has additionally been run by earth system models with prescribed CO2 emissions. This paper analyzes the climate projections of 11 earth system models (ESMs) that performed both emission-driven and concentration-driven RCP8.5 simulations. When forced by RCP8.5 CO2 emissions, models simulate a large spread in atmospheric CO2; the simulated 2100 concentrations range between 795 and 1145 ppm. Seven out of the 11 ESMs simulate a larger CO2 (on average by 44 ppm, 985 ± 97 ppm by 2100) and hence higher radiative forcing (by 0.25 W m−2) when driven by CO2 emissions than for the concentration-driven scenarios (941 ppm). However, most of these models already overestimate the present-day CO2, with the present-day biases reasonably well correlated with future atmospheric concentrations’ departure from the prescribed concentration. The uncertainty in CO2 projections is mainly attributable to uncertainties in the response of the land carbon cycle. As a result of simulated higher CO2 concentrations than in the concentration-driven simulations, temperature projections are generally higher when ESMs are driven with CO2 emissions. Global surface temperature change by 2100 (relative to present day) increased by 3.9° ± 0.9°C for the emission-driven simulations compared to 3.7° ± 0.7°C in the concentration-driven simulations. Although the lower ends are comparable in both sets of simulations, the highest climate projections are significantly warmer in the emission-driven simulations because of stronger carbon cycle feedbacks.
Dynamical Reconstruction of Upper-Ocean Conditions in the Last Glacial Maximum Atlantic
Authors: Dail Holly , Wunsch Carl
Published: September 2013

Proxies indicate that the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) Atlantic Ocean was marked by increased meridional and zonal near sea surface temperature gradients relative to today. Using a least squares fit of a full general circulation and sea ice model to upper-ocean proxy data with specified error estimates, a seasonally varying reconstruction is sought of the Atlantic Ocean state that is consistent with both the known dynamics and the data. With reasonable uncertainty assumptions for the observations and the adjustable (control) variables, a consistent LGM ocean state is found, one not radically different from the modern one. Inferred changes include a strengthening of the easterly and westerly winds, leading to strengthened subtropical and subpolar gyres, and increased upwelling favorable winds off the coast of Africa, leading to particularly cold SSTs in those regions.
Evaluating the Performance of Planetary Boundary Layer and Cloud Microphysical Parameterization Schemes in Convection-Permitting Ensemble Forecasts Using Synthetic GOES-13 Satellite Observations
Authors: Cintineo Rebecca , Otkin Jason A. , Xue Ming , Kong Fanyou
Published: September 2013

In this study, the ability of several cloud microphysical and planetary boundary layer parameterization schemes to accurately simulate cloud characteristics within 4-km grid-spacing ensemble forecasts over the contiguous United States was evaluated through comparison of synthetic Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES) infrared brightness temperatures with observations. Four double-moment microphysics schemes and five planetary boundary layer (PBL) schemes were evaluated. Large differences were found in the simulated cloud cover, especially in the upper troposphere, when using different microphysics schemes. Overall, the results revealed that the Milbrandt–Yau and Morrison microphysics schemes tended to produce too much upper-level cloud cover, whereas the Thompson and the Weather Research and Forecasting Model (WRF) double-moment 6-class (WDM6) microphysics schemes did not contain enough high clouds. Smaller differences occurred in the cloud fields when using different PBL schemes, with the greatest spread in the ensemble statistics occurring during and after daily peak heating hours. Results varied somewhat depending upon the verification method employed, which indicates the importance of using a suite of verification tools when evaluating high-resolution model performance. Finally, large differences between the various microphysics and PBL schemes indicate that large uncertainties remain in how these schemes represent subgrid-scale processes.
Application of Feature Calibration and Alignment to High-Resolution Analysis: Examples Using Observations Sensitive to Cloud and Water Vapor
Authors: Nehrkorn Thomas , Woods Bryan , Auligné Thomas , Hoffman Ross N.
Published: September 2013

Alignment errors [i.e., cases where coherent structures (“features”) of clouds or precipitation in the background have position errors] can lead to large and non-Gaussian background errors. Assimilation of cloud-affected radiances using additive increments derived by variational and/or ensemble methods can be problematic in these situations. To address this problem, the Feature Calibration and Alignment technique (FCA) is used here for correcting position errors by displacing background fields. A set of two-dimensional displacement vectors is applied to forecast fields to improve the alignment of features in the forecast and observations. These displacement vectors are obtained by a nonlinear minimization of a cost function that measures the misfit to observations, along with a number of additional constraints (e.g., smoothness and nondivergence of the displacement vectors) to prevent unphysical solutions. The method was applied in an idealized case using Weather Research and Forecasting Model (WRF) forecast fields for Hurricane Katrina. Application of the displacement vectors to the three-dimensional WRF fields resulted in improved predicted hurricane positions in subsequent forecasts. When applied to a set of high-resolution forecasts of deep moist convection over the central United States, displacements are able to efficiently characterize part of the ensemble spread. To test its application as an analysis preprocessor, FCA was applied to a real-data case of cloud-affected radiances of one of the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) channels. The displaced background resulted in an improved fit to the AIRS observations in all cloud-sensitive channels.
The Impact of School Resource Officer Interaction on Students’ Feelings About School and School Police
Authors: Theriot Matthew T.
Published: September 2013

School resource officer (SRO) programs that place sworn law enforcement officers at schools are a popular violence prevention strategy. Despite widespread implementation, little is known about the impact of interacting with these officers on students’ attitudes about SROs and feelings of school connectedness. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the impact of SRO interaction on the attitudes and feelings of 1,956 middle and high school students at 12 schools in one school district. Multivariate analyses showed that more SRO interactions increased students’ positive attitudes about SROs yet decreased school connectedness. Overall, the results suggested a complex relationship between SRO interactions, students’ attitudes, and experiences with school violence. The implications of these results and strategies for how officers can contribute to a positive school environment are discussed.
Durable press finishing of cotton fabrics: An overview
Authors: Dehabadi Vahid Ameri , Buschmann Hans-Jürgen , Gutmann Jochen Stefan
Published: September 2013

Durable press (DP) or easy care finishing is almost always used for cotton fabrics or textiles with a high content of cellulosic fibers. This finish provides resistance against shrinkage and improved wet and dry wrinkle recovery to cellulosic textiles. Inhibition of easy movement of the cellulose chains by crosslinking with resins/polymers is the mechanism of a DP finish. Initially, derivatives of urea such as urea-formaldehyde and melamine-formaldehyde resins were used. Environmental concerns and the potential danger of formaldehyde led to the introduction of formaldehyde-free finishes. Among them, polycarboxylic acids such as 1,2,3,4-butanetetracarboxylic acids and citric acids are the most promising chemicals. To enhance the flexibility, tensile strength and whiteness of the easy care finished textiles, novel finishing agents have been recently considered; for example, ionic crosslinking, polyamino carboxylic acids and non-ionic polyurethane, as well as employing nano-materials as the catalyst or co-catalyst. The possible application of the easy care treatment with other functional finishes, mainly antimicrobial, flame retardancy and water–oil repellency, has been also been focused upon.
Popular Religion in Zhejiang
Authors: Sun Yanfei
Published: September 2013

Based on eighteen months of fieldwork in a county in Southeast China, this article identifies three tendencies that have appeared in the revitalization of temple-based popular religion in the post-Mao period. These three tendencies—women taking more central roles in popular religion, the bifurcation between the ever increasing popularity and prosperity of a small number of temples and the decline in the majority of small village temples, and the tendency of popular religion temples to acquire Buddhist features—have consequently caused the character and terrain of popular religion to diverge greatly from the pre-1949 past. To explain these changes, the article argues that we have to come to terms with the two faces of popular religion: the communal/mandatory dimension and the individual/voluntary dimension that is largely associated with female devotees. All three tendencies have been taking place when popular religion temples’ bonds with village communities attenuated and their voluntary dimension moved to the forefront. The article attributes the weakening of the communal dimension of popular religion temples to the restructuring of rural society by the Maoist political campaigns and the post-Mao marketization.
An Evaluation of Grading and Instructional Feedback Skills of Graduate Teaching Assistants in Introductory Psychology
Authors: Doe Sue R. , Gingerich Karla J. , Richards Tracy L.
Published: September 2013

This study explored graduate teaching assistant (GTA) grading on 480 papers across two writing assignments as integrated into large Introductory Psychology courses. We measured GTA accuracy, consistency, and commenting (feedback) quality. Results indicate that GTA graders improved, although unevenly, in accuracy and consistency from Time 1 to 2 when compared to professional graders who scored the same papers. GTA commenting on papers improved from Time 1 to Time 2 as well, as indicated by seven measures of feedback effectiveness. However, subsequent to training GTAs gave higher grades than professional graders, and significant interactions between GTAs and time were evident in terms of both grading and commenting improvement. Conclusions for GTA training and professional development are discussed.
Paradigms and Narratives for Sustainable Well-Being in Academic Life
Authors: McGovern Thomas V.
Published: September 2013

I summarize multidisciplinary paradigms and best practices’ recommendations for professional learning by higher education faculty members. This review leads to an innovative narrative model for academic life that synthesizes current personality and vocational psychology theory and positive psychology’s emphasis on virtues and character strengths as a means to sustain well-being.
Adversity and resilience: A synthesis of international research
Authors: Noltemeyer Amity L. , Bush Kevin R.
Published: September 2013

Children and adolescents worldwide experience a variety of adversities that have the potential to disrupt typical development. However, some of these individuals exhibit resilience, evidencing normal development in the face of adversity. Here we review research on these constructs of risk, adversity, and resilience; synthesize international research on factors that may serve to protect children and adolescents from the negative effects of adversity at the individual, family, school, community, and cultural levels; and provide future implications for research on this topic, highlighting the unique contributions of the subsequent articles in this special issue, each of which contributes to an understanding of resilience processes in non-Western populations. Although some general trends in resilience and protection may extend beyond national borders, resilience is also strongly influenced by culture and context; therefore, it is important to advance a research agenda that recognizes the unique protective influences within and across cultural contexts.
Stressful events and depression among Chinese adolescents: The mitigating role of protective factors
Authors: Zhang Wenxin , Li Hailei , Gong Yanming , Ungar Michael
Published: September 2013

This study examines the role of salient external factors (family, peer and school caring relations) and internal factors (goals and aspirations, problem solving and self-efficacy, empathy, and self-awareness) in protecting adolescents experiencing interpersonal problems and academic pressure from depression. A total of 1,297 eighth and ninth grade students in Shandong province of Eastern China completed self-report measures. Results of hierarchical regression analyses indicated that interpersonal problems and academic pressure predicted depression positively. Peer caring relationships, home caring relationships, goals and aspirations, problem solving and self-efficacy, and self-awareness predicted depression negatively, but empathy did so positively. The interactions of home caring relationships with interpersonal problems, peer caring relationships with academic pressure, and self-awareness with academic pressure were negatively associated with depression. The relationships between interpersonal problems and depression, and academic pressure and depression, were less apparent for adolescents who had higher levels of peer caring relationships, home caring relationships, and self-awareness. The results suggest that school psychologists and counselors should note and build upon positive strengths while providing intervention services for adolescents experiencing depression related to interpersonal problems and academic pressure.
Ethnocultural factors, resilience, and school engagement
Authors: Ungar Michael , Liebenberg Linda
Published: September 2013

In this article we examine how cultural and community factors interact with individual level factors to predict school participation. Participants were 497 Atlantic Canadian youth purposefully selected because of their concurrent use of more than one government service or community program at the time they were interviewed. Results revealed that contextual factors associated with resilience (e.g. cultural adherence and involvement in one’s community) affect school engagement more than individual or relational factors among this population. Furthermore, these contextual resilience factors showed a pattern of differential impact, with the greatest influence occurring in the lives of visible minority youth. Findings suggest that improvements in school engagement are likely to result from school-based efforts to enhance children’s experience of their culture and involvement in community activities. Sampling youth outside regular classroom settings and including meso- and exo-systemic factors in studies of school engagement may help to identify protective processes not previously discussed in the literature.
I like news. Searching for the ‘Holy Grail’ of social media: The use of Facebook by Dutch news media and their audiences
Authors: Hille Sanne , Bakker Piet
Published: September 2013

News media are increasingly using Facebook as a platform for distribution and user interaction. This article focuses on how Dutch media use Facebook and how audiences participate. By using Facebook, media outsource part of their distribution to a third party platform, avoiding maintenance costs while also hoping for additional revenues because of the increased website traffic. Results indicate that offline and online presence of legacy media do not predict their footprint on Facebook. Media do not seem to have a clear strategy on using Facebook, which leads to an underperformance on the social media platform with low participation and minimal interaction. As users ‘like’ media and ‘share’ stories, ‘audience distribution’ would be a better term to describe these practices than ‘audience participation’.
The communicative figurations of mediatized worlds: Mediatization research in times of the ‘mediation of everything’
Authors: Hepp Andreas
Published: September 2013

When various media in their entirety mark how we articulate our social worlds, we need an approach of mediatization research that reflects this transmediality. To develop such an approach, the article first discusses the ‘institutionalist’ and ‘social-constructivist’ traditions of mediatization research. Both traditions concur in their understanding of mediatization as being a concept to capture the interrelation between the change of media and communication on the one hand, and the change of culture and society on the other hand. Taking this as a foundation it becomes possible to reflect on the role of certain media as ‘moulding forces’, i.e. as certain institutionalizations and reifications of communication. Such a conceptual reflection offers the chance to view the mediatization process as the change of transmedial communicative figurations by which we construct our mediatized worlds. Based on this theoretical foundation, the article subsequently reflects a twofold operationalization, i.e. as diachronous and synchronous mediatization research.
Framing fraud: Discourse on benefit cheating in Sweden and the UK
Authors: Lundström Ragnar
Published: September 2013

This article analyses discourse on benefit fraud in Swedish and British newspapers. It furthermore compares discourse on fraud in newspapers and political blogs in the two countries. In Sweden, fraud is primarily articulated as a collective social problem in policy discussions related to the health insurance programme. In the UK, it is often articulated employing strategies commonly associated with crime news narratives, and centred on images of individual cheaters. The main result of the analysis presented here is that these observed differences between British and Swedish media representations are related to the ways in which the relationship between the welfare state and the citizens traditionally have been constructed in liberal and social democratic contexts respectively. Political attempts to highlight the issue of benefit fraud, and dominant media representations of such attempts, must therefore be understood not as attempts to combat fraud, but rather as attempts to delegitimize the more general aim and purpose of the welfare state. They challenge the deservingness of welfare recipients in general, not just the ones that cheat, and they thereby transform the conditions for public trust in the welfare state. News discourse on fraud in both countries establishes a neoliberal, financialized and individualized notion of welfare dependency, through which the relationship between social and structural circumstances on the one hand, and poverty, exclusion and inequality on the other, become blurred. The comparison of newspapers and blogs suggests that although dominant media representations are contested through citizen-created journalism in both contexts, they also limit the conditions for discursive struggles over the issue of benefit fraud significantly.
Attenuation of acute d-amphetamine-induced disruption of conflict resolution by clozapine, but not α-flupenthixol in rats
Authors: Reichelt Amy C , Good Mark A , Killcross Simon
Published: September 2013

Previous research demonstrates that disruption of forebrain dopamine systems impairs the use of high-order information to guide goal-directed performance, and that this deficit may be related to impaired use of task-setting cues in patients with schizophrenia. Such deficits can be interrogated through conflict resolution, which has been demonstrated to be sensitive to prefrontal integrity in rodents. We sought to examine the effects of acute systemic d-amphetamine administration on the contextual control of response conflict in rats, and whether deficits were reversed through pre-treatment with clozapine or the D1/D2 antagonist α-flupenthixol. Acute d-amphetamine (1.5 mg/kg) disrupted the utilisation of contextual cues; therefore rats were impaired during presentation of stimulus compounds that require conflict resolution. Evidence suggested that this effect was attenuated through pre-treatment with the atypical antipsychotic clozapine (5.0 mg/kg), but not the typical antipsychotic α-flupenthixol (0.25 mg/kg), at doses previously shown to attenuate d-amphetamine-induced cognitive deficits. These studies therefore demonstrate a potentially viable model of disrupted executive function such as that seen in schizophrenia.
Rapid opiate detoxification and antagonist induction under general anaesthesia or intravenous sedation is humane, sometimes essential and should always be an option. Three illustrative case reports involving diabetes and epilepsy and a review of the literature
Authors: Brewer Colin , de Jong Catherine , Williams Jonathan
Published: September 2013

When abstinence is an appropriate goal, controlled studies and systematic reviews confirm that rapid, antagonist-precipitated opiate withdrawal procedures are the most effective and cost effective methods of initiating abstinence, and naltrexone (NTX) maintenance. While ‘rapid’ withdrawal, better conceptualised as Rapid Antagonist Induction (RAI), can often be humanely achieved with modest sedation levels, we present three case histories to support our argument that for some patients, general anaesthesia (GA), or techniques of intravenous sedation (IVS) that approach GA, are essential for safety and success. This includes patients with intercurrent disease (e.g. epilepsy or insulin-dependent diabetes) but also those with severe withdrawal phobia after previous distressing experiences. We discuss the history of the procedure. The dangers of RAI under GA or IVS in experienced hands have been exaggerated and the appropriate expertise should be more easily available. Patients and clinicians readily accept risks of major surgery for the excessive intake of food that causes most obesity. Similar risk-acceptance exists in cosmetic surgery and obstetrics. The increasing use and effectiveness of long-acting implants or depot-injections of NTX for relapse-prevention have largely solved compliance problems that undermined the potential of oral NTX. Their ability to prevent opiate overdose in abstinent, non-tolerant patients also strengthens arguments both for offering RAI as a therapeutic option and for reducing psychological, professional and practical barriers to using it.
3D normal distributions transform occupancy maps: An efficient representation for mapping in dynamic environments
Authors: Saarinen Jari P. , Andreasson Henrik , Stoyanov Todor , Lilienthal Achim J.
Published: September 2013

In order to enable long-term operation of autonomous vehicles in industrial environments numerous challenges need to be addressed. A basic requirement for many applications is the creation and maintenance of consistent 3D world models. This article proposes a novel 3D spatial representation for online real-world mapping, building upon two known representations: normal distributions transform (NDT) maps and occupancy grid maps. The proposed normal distributions transform occupancy map (NDT-OM) combines the advantages of both representations; compactness of NDT maps and robustness of occupancy maps. One key contribution in this article is that we formulate an exact recursive updates for NDT-OMs. We show that the recursive update equations provide natural support for multi-resolution maps. Next, we describe a modification of the recursive update equations that allows adaptation in dynamic environments. As a second key contribution we introduce NDT-OMs and formulate the occupancy update equations that allow to build consistent maps in dynamic environments. The update of the occupancy values are based on an efficient probabilistic sensor model that is specially formulated for NDT-OMs. In several experiments with a total of 17 hours of data from a milk factory we demonstrate that NDT-OMs enable real-time performance in large-scale, long-term industrial setups.
Effect of surgery on periventricular white matter in normal pressure hydrocephalus patients: comparison of two methods of DTI analysis
Authors: Nicot Benjamin , Bouzerar Roger , Gondry-Jouet Catherine , Capel Cyrille , Peltier Johann , Fichten Anthony , Balédent Olivier
Published: September 2013

Background

Diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) is a useful tool for assessing changes that occur in microstructures. We have developed a novel method for region of interest (ROI) delineation in the assessment of DTI parameters in patients with normal pressure hydrocephalus (NPH).

Purpose

To compare the standard method and our novel method in an evaluation of the impact of surgery on periventricular white matter in patients with NPH.

Material and Methods

Ten patients with NPH underwent 3T magnetic resonance imaging (MRI; including 12-direction DTI sequences) before and after surgery. We recorded diffusion parameters (λi, the fractional anisotropy [FA], the apparent diffusion coefficient, and Dr) in the internal capsule (IC) and the body of the corpus callosum (BCC). Using the standard delineation technique, regions of interest (ROIs) were positioned according to anatomical and functional considerations and then filled with several sub-ROIs. The ROIs delineated with our novel technique (extracted as the six sub-ROIs with the lowest standard deviation for the FA) were arranged in two rows (medial and lateral), from the ventricle to the brain surface.

Results

The within-ROI homogeneity was higher with the novel method than with the conventional method ( P < 10−4). When the conventional delineation method was applied to the IC data, only λ2 was found to be significantly greater after surgery; in contrast, application of our novel method evidenced a significant decrease in FA and λ1 and a significant increase in λ2 ( P < 0.05). Both before and after surgery, the FA in the medial row of ROIs was greater than the FA in the lateral row ( P < 0.01). In the BCC, only λ2 and Dr varied significantly (when evaluated with the novel method).

Conclusion

Our results show that use of a novel method of DTI data analysis may be more sensitive to local changes induced by surgical procedures. Furthermore, this novel method was able to detect the transmantle pressure gradient related to the regional stress distribution.
Safety and tolerability of iopromide intravascular use: a pooled analysis of three non-interventional studies in 132,012 patients
Authors: Palkowitsch Petra K , Bostelmann Sven , Lengsfeld Philipp
Published: September 2013

Background

Determining the safety of contrast agents is challenging. In the absence of large controlled clinical trials, non-interventional (post-marketing surveillance) studies provide an opportunity to clearly investigate the safety profile of contrast agents.

Purpose

To assess the safety profile of iopromide in contrast-enhanced X-ray in clinical practice, using pooled data from three non-interventional studies.

Material and Methods

All studies were international, multicenter, non-interventional studies examining iopromide tolerability in clinical practice. Patients received iopromide (iodine concentrations of 300 mg/mL or 370 mg/mL) via intravenous or intra-arterial administration according to the diagnostic indication and in compliance with the local package insert.

Results

In total, 132,012 patients (37 countries, >1600 centers) were included. Overall, 3823 patients (2.49%) reported an adverse drug reaction (ADR) and 1983 patients (1.50%) reported an ADR without tolerance indicators (injection site warmth, feeling hot or injection site pain, of mild intensity only). This is a similar rate to other low osmolar contrast media. In most patients, ADRs were mild ( n = 2632; 1.99% of all patients) and did not require any action ( n = 2799; 2.12% of all patients). ADRs were more common among women ( n = 1680 [2.8%]) than men ( n = 1586 [2.2%]) and among younger patients (<18 years: n = 98 [3.2%]) than older patients (18–49 years: n = 1261 [3.5%]; 50–69 years: n = 1224 [2.2%]; ≥70 years: n = 362 [1.5%]). The most common ADRs were injection site warmth/feeling hot, nausea/vomiting, and dysguesia. Forty-five serious ADRs were reported in 19 patients. ADRs were more common in at-risk patients (5.00%) than in the overall population.

Conclusion

This pooled analysis confirms the well-established good safety profile of iopromide in clinical practice in Asian and European countries and the USA.
Impact of highly active antiretroviral treatment on expression of HIV-1 coreceptors and ligand levels in peripheral blood from HIV-1 infected patients in China
Authors: Fang Jiajie , Bai Shi , Wu Lijuan , Zhu Xuanwen , Yao Xiaolin , Jin Changzhong , Wang Chaojun
Published: September 2013

Objective

Coreceptors are important for HIV-1 entry into target cells and disease progression. The impact of HIV-1 and highly active antiretroviral treatment (HAART) on coreceptor expression has been little studied.

Methods

Expression of C–C chemokine receptor (CCR) 5 and C–X–C chemokine receptor (CXCR) 4 on CD4+ and CD8 + T cells was compared in HIV-1-infected individuals who had/had not received HAART, and in healthy controls. Relationships between coreceptors and their chemokine ligands were studied.

Results

This study included 23 controls and 88 HIV-1-infected individuals, 35 of whom were HAART naïve. Percentages of CCR5 and CXCR4+ CD8 + T cells were higher, and CXCR4+ CD4 + T cells were lower, in patients than in controls. Patients receiving HAART showed a higher percentage of CCR5 expression on CD4 + T cells compared with HAART-naïve patients. HIV-infected individuals had significantly increased levels of peripheral ligands for coreceptors, compared with controls; levels were significantly higher in those receiving HAART compared with the HAART-naïve.

Conclusions

HIV-1 infection increases coreceptor expression on T cells; HAART increases CCR5 expression further and decreases CXCR4 expression, reversing the switch from CCR5 to CXCR4, which was significant for CD4 + T.
Moisture absorption and mechanical degradation studies of polyurethane foam cored E-glass-reinforced vinyl-ester sandwich composites
Authors: Manujesh BJ , Rao Vijayalakshmi , Aan MP Sham
Published: September 2013

The present paper explores the experimental observations and result of hygrothermic aging of polyurethane foam cored E-glass reinforced vinyl-ester sandwich composites for a long duration of time under salt fog exposure. Four types of sandwich specimens were used for the study. Polyurethane foam cored E-glass mat (woven roving, chopped strand mat, chopped strand stitched mat and stitch bond mat) type reinforcement in vinyl-ester sandwich composites were prepared by manual hand layup method using compression technique. The prepared specimens were tested for moisture up-take behavior and the resulting property degradation in terms of flexural strength, flatwise and edgewise compression strength. The mechanical properties under the salt fog exposure with 95% RH using artificial sea water fogging were monitored for 180 days. The specimens showed reduced strength in terms of core shear and facing bending strength, edgewise and flatwise compressive strength. Scanning electron micrograph of the fracture specimens show face sheet/core debonding.
Effective thermal conductivity of random two-phase composites
Authors: Aadmi Moussa , Karkri Mustapha , Ibos Laurent , Hammouti Mimoun E
Published: September 2013

This work aims to establish a new three-dimensional method for automatically generating three-dimensional FEM models of two-phase composite materials with complex materials arrangement for the purpose of effective thermal conductivity (ETC) evaluation. Tests were carried out in which the shape, spatial distribution, thermal contact resistance and particles volume fraction were taken into account. Thermal conductivity ratio between both component materials was also varied. The aim of the work was to examine how each variable influences the ETC of the composite material. ETC was calculated numerically using COMSOL™ software and a 3D-representative volume element (3D-RVE) was employed to represent the composite material. The results were analysed and compared to various analytical models and experimental data reported in the literature.
Investigation into the trade-off between the part-load fuel efficiency and the transient response for a highly boosted downsized gasoline engine with a supercharger driven through a continuously variable transmission
Authors: Rose Adam TJM , Akehurst Sam , Brace Chris J
Published: September 2013

Downsizing is an established trend in the development of passenger car engines. However, the benefits of an improved fuel economy are often obtained at the expense of the engine’s dynamic response (owing to increasing demands on the boosting system) and, consequently, the vehicle driveability. The use of a continuously variable transmission in the supercharger driveline offers increased control flexibility over the air path, which could allow more suitable calibrations to be developed. This paper gives details of a co-simulation-based investigation into the trade-off between the steady-state part-load fuel efficiency and the resulting tip-in transient response for a highly boosted downsized gasoline engine. The engine was a 2.0 l in-line four-cylinder unit, designed to replace a 5.0 l, naturally aspirated V8, equipped with a positive-displacement supercharger in a sequential series arrangement with a fixed-geometry turbocharger with an external wastegate. The supercharger can be de-clutched and bypassed, and therefore three separate supercharger engagement regimes were investigated for part-load operation, defined as follows: with the supercharger disengaged and bypassed; with the supercharger engaged with a fixed drive ratio; with the supercharger engaged using a variable ratio (i.e. through a continuously variable transmission). For each of these supercharger engagement regimes, design-of-experiments and optimisation techniques were used to find the best settings for the key engine control parameters such as the intake and exhaust valve timings and the exhaust gas recirculation rate. Using these calibrations as a starting point, the transient performance was then assessed in fixed-speed tip-in simulations. The trade-off situation was found to be highly complex; identifying the best overall balance of the steady-state efficiency and the dynamic performance requires a subjective assessment. However, the continuously variable transmission does provide the best potential for dynamic response combined with a satisfactory fuel economy. It is suggested that the most suitable solution would be to have multiple user-selectable calibrations, such as the ‘economy’ and ‘sport’ modes used on many modern vehicles.
Active front-steering control of a sport utility vehicle using a robust linear quadratic regulator method, with emphasis on the roll dynamics
Authors: Elmi Naser , Ohadi Abdolreza , Samadi Behzad
Published: September 2013

One of the well-known methods for improving the lateral stability of a vehicle is to utilize an active steering controller. Common active steering systems use feedback signals from a yaw rate sensor and side-slip angle estimation. However, in some driving conditions, skilled drivers can prevent vehicle rollover using the steering angle of the vehicle. Hence, the effect of an active front-steering controller on the roll angle of the vehicle is studied in this paper. For this study, a three-degree-of-freedom linear model of a vehicle which has the lateral motion, the yaw motion and the roll motion as the degrees of freedom is derived. The effectiveness of the active steering controller on the roll stability of the vehicle is examined by simulations in a wide range of longitudinal velocities of the vehicle using a linear quadratic regulator controller. The results obtained indicate that the active steering controller increases the roll stability of the vehicle only at low vehicle speeds and also that consideration of the roll degree of freedom in the design of the active steering controller is not effective at high vehicle speeds. Therefore a two-degree-of-freedom bicycle model is sufficient for active steering controller design. Another part of this paper is dedicated to designing a practical active steering controller for a vehicle with time-varying and uncertain parameters. In fact, designing a controller which guarantees the stability of the vehicle with simultaneous uncertainties in the cornering stiffnesses of the tyres and in the time-varying velocity is the main goal of this paper. Another important advantage of the proposed controller is its simplicity and static structure. In fact, this controller design is carried out offline and can be implemented for use in a real vehicle. This simple and powerful controller is a robust linear quadratic regulator controller. For designing a robust linear quadratic regulator controller, a polytopic model of the two-degree-of-freedom vehicle is obtained, which considers the uncertainty in the parameters. In addition, a linear matrix inequality is used to design a linear quadratic regulator controller for an uncertain or parameter-varying system. Finally, the performance of the designed robust linear quadratic regulator controller was studied by simulating the vehicle responses in some manoeuvres. A sport utility vehicle model is used for simulation purposes. This non-linear vehicle model has eight degrees of freedom and its tyres are assumed to be both linear and non-linear. The performance of the robust linear quadratic regulator controller was studied for vehicles with both linear and non-linear Pacejka tyres. The proposed controller guarantees robust stability of the closed-loop system in the presence of 50% variation in the vehicle speed and 20% uncertainty in the stiffnesses of the tyres.
Samuel Holden Parsons Lee (1772–1863): American physician, entrepreneur and selfless fighter of the 1798 Yellow Fever epidemic of New London, Connecticut
Authors: Mattie James K , Desai Sukumar P
Published: September 2013

Samuel Holden Parsons Lee practised medicine at a time when the germ theory of disease had not yet been proposed and antibiotics remained undiscovered. In 1798 he served selflessly as the only physician in town who was willing to battle the Yellow Fever outbreak of New London, Connecticut. Because he practised at the dawn of the age of patent medicine, unfortunately his name also came to be associated with medical quackery. We argue that his contributions have been grossly underestimated. He compounded and vended medications – including bilious pills and bitters – that were gold standards of the day. Moreover, one preparation for treatment of kidney stones led to his sub-specialization in this field and was met with such success that its sale continued for nearly 100 years after his death. While a talented medical man, Lee also had a knack for business, finding success in trading, whaling and real estate.
The Professor and the Student, Sir Ronald Aylmer Fisher (1890–1962) and William Sealy Gosset (1876–1937): Careers of two giants in mathematical statistics
Authors: Vyas Shreena A , Desai Sukumar P
Published: September 2013

Sir Ronald Aylmer Fisher and William Sealy Gosset were responsible for laying the foundations of statistical inference. Tests that bear their names are used by students and researchers in a wide variety of scientific disciplines. Similar and different in many respects, their lives and careers are the subject of this essay. They were not teacher and pupil; in fact the student was 14 years older than the professor. Their careers did not require them to interact with one another much but they were aware of one another’s work. Although Sir Ronald is assigned the role of the professor, his success as a teacher was impaired by his inability to understand the limitations of his students. Meanwhile Gosset was forced to publish his work under the pseudonym ‘Student' in order to make contributions to the field of mathematical statistics. Both men are undisputed giants in the field of statistics and we celebrate their achievements as much as we try to understand their struggles.