bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Geological Sourcing of Volcanic Stone Adzes from Neolithic Sites in Southeast China
Authors: Rolett Barry Vladimir , Guo Zhengfu , Jiao Tianlong
Published: September 2007

This study uses XRF (X-ray fluorescence) and ICP-MS (inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry) analyses to determine the chemical composition of raw material used in stone tool production. The goal is to identify where stone adzes, which are common in Neolithic sites on the coast of Mainland China, were produced and if they were transported from the production areas to other places. Our study focuses on adzes from three Neolithic sites located on the Fujian coast of Mainland China, opposite Taiwan. The sites date to between 6500 and 3500 b.p. All of the adzes we sampled are made of volcanic rock. A diverse selection of raw materials, including basalts, andesites, and dacites, was used in manufacturing the adzes, indicating that they are made of rock deriving from many di¤erent geological formations. None of the adzes have identical chemical signatures. There is no evidence of specialized centers for adze production. Some of the adzes were probably produced locally, while others were obtained through exchange. This project sets the stage for future research to trace the development and the extent of southeast China Neolithic exchange networks.
Trade Ceramics from the Gotō Islands (Japan), Circa Sixteenth to Early Seventeenth Century: The Yamami Underwater Site (Ojika) and Related Issues
Authors: Seyock Barbara
Published: September 2007

Underwater archaeology is still a new development in Japan, and to date only a few sites have experienced significant investigation. One of them is the recently surveyed Yamami underwater site on the Gotō Islands, which yielded sixteenth-to seventeenth-century trade ceramics from Thailand and Vietnam, as well as from the Jingdezhen kilns in China. After an introduction to the subject of ceramic trade and underwater archaeology in East Asia, the article reviews the ceramic pieces of the Yamami site in detail and links them to comparable finds from various sites in western Japan, such as from the main ports of Hakata and Nagasaki, along with examples from different international museum collections and wreck finds from the South China Sea. After also consulting historical sources, such as the Kai-hentai, the study develops a fresh interpretative approach toward the Yamami find, and—in a broader perspective—suggests strong bonds between the late medieval and early modern Japanese markets and the lively networks of the South China Sea.
Quixotes, Imitations, and Transatlantic Genres
Authors: Bannet Eve Tavor
Published: September 2007

Quixotic texts in the British Atlantic tested the cultural fit of common transnational models through the eruption into rural English or American localities of persons whose conduct and values had been fashioned by them. Fielding, Brackenridge, Lennox and Tenney also contrasted the absurdly "servile" imitation of their quixotes with their own more sophisticated techniques of imitation, to address questions of national difference raised by ubiquitous transnational imitation among the "polite." Imitative practices enable us to see how genres traveled between nations, and offer historically grounded transnational approaches based on the history of writing and reading.
Mme Geoffrin, Painting and Galanterie : Carle Van Loo's Conversation espagnole and Lecture espagnole
Authors: Barker Emma
Published: September 2007

This essay explores Mme Geoffrin's commission of two paintings from Carle Van Loo: the Conversation espagnole (1754) and Lecture espagnole (c. 1755). It argues that the "Spanish" theme needs to be understood with reference to the French discourse on galanterie and to aristocratic spectacle. It also explores the significance of the choice of Mme de Lafayette's novel, Zayde (1671), as the reading matter in the Lecture. The central contention is that Van Loo's paintings evoked the seventeenth-century heyday of galanterie, in which women were thought to have enjoyed far greater cultural authority than they did in Geoffrin's own day.
"Exquisite Torture": The Autoeroticism of Pope's Eloisa
Authors: Carson Anne Elizabeth
Published: September 2007

This essay explores the autoerotic implications of Pope's Eloisa to Abelard. Left to grapple with an overwhelming desire and the contradictory setting which houses this desire, Eloisa must invent ways to cope with the "exquisite torture" that she experiences as a result of her isolation. The heroine, I argue, creates a self-reflexive world of fantasy and sexuality from deep within the solitude of the monastery. As she is the only one participating in this sensual drama, the impassioned nun fuels an onanistic subtext that subversively reacts to a restrictive view of human sexuality.
Tobias Smollett and Cat-for-Hare: The Anatomy of a Picaresque Joke
Authors: Gibson William
Published: September 2007

The article reopens the discussion of Smollett and the picaresque by proposing a method of examining the tradition through specific motifs that are passed from one writer to the next. The article tracks a particular joke, the substitution of cat for hare meat, through the original European novels, English jestbooks and coney-catching pamphlets, up to Smollett's second novel, Peregrine Pickle, to uncover its place in the tradition. The sociological background of the joke involves food aversions, witchcraft, and a deep anxiety about emasculation, all of which Smollett's version openly acknowledges. The conclusion affirms Smollett's place in the tradition through his use of humor unique to it.
Personhood, Poethood, and Pope: Johnson's Life of Pope and the Search for the Man Behind the Author
Authors: Mannheimer Katherine
Published: September 2007

In his biographical preface on Pope, Samuel Johnson attempts to distinguish between "man" and "writer"; but the distinction was one that Pope had preemptively blurred, in both what and how he published. A conflict thus arises in the two writers' portrayals of author vis-à-vis work, art vis-à-vis life. Ultimately, the nature of this conflict is historically determined: Johnson's biography of Pope points toward the origins of "the author" not just as legal and economic entity, but as Cultural Icon, marking a turning-point in the history not just of "the author," but of "the life of the author."
The Adoption of Criminal Disenfranchisement Provisions in the United States: Lessons from the State Constitutional Convention Debates
Authors: Dinan John
Published: September 2007

State criminal disenfranchisement provisions have recently attracted much scholarly attention. Some scholars have examined the consequences of these policies, such as the number of individuals they have disenfranchised (particularly the high percentage of African Americans), the way in which they have altered election outcomes, and their effect on voter turnout. Other scholars have assessed the persuasiveness of various justifications for these policies. Still other scholars have analyzed legal strategies that might be used to repeal these policies.
Limiting Labor: Business Political Mobilization and Union Setback in the States
Authors: Dixon Marc
Published: September 2007

The 1940s were heady times for the American labor movement. The tight wartime labor market and the backing of the federal government in defense industries facilitated impressive membership gains for both AFL and CIO unions. By 1945, labor unions represented almost 35 percent of the workforce—a more than fivefold increase from the early 1930s. What is more, union membership gains penetrated previously unorganized and resistant regions like the South. Unions indeed appeared on the verge of recruiting millions of new members and establishing a truly national social movement. Critics and supporters alike viewed unions as the most powerful institutions of the day. Following the war,Fortune Magazineforesaw little resistance to unionism and to the postwar southern labor organizing drives, while sympathetic scholars like C. Wright Mills viewed labor leaders as the “new men of power.”
Knowledge and Power in State Socialism: Statistical Conventions and Housing Policy in the GDR
Authors: Rowell Jay
Published: September 2007

Since the late 1970s, the historiography of State socialist regimes in Central Europe has been largely structured by an opposition between a “top-down” political history and a more “bottom-up” social history, leaving the analysis of public policy in a sort of no-man's land between politics and society. Without competitive elections, freedom of expression, or interest-group mobilization or participation, most determinants of policy routinely studied in Western democracies are inoperative. Furthermore, given that State socialist regimes and centralized economic planning appear to be historical dead ends, what can be learned today from the study of this political experiment? In this article on housing policy in the GDR, I will argue that the question of knowledge, its construction, its circulation, and its uses are at least as essential to the intelligibility of these regimes as the study of ideology and repression.
“Six Blacks from Home”: Childhood, Motherhood, and Eugenics in America
Authors: Ryan Patrick J.
Published: September 2007

In August 1919, a settlement house worker in Columbus, Ohio, filed a complaint in juvenile court against a seven-year-old girl whom I will call “Marie.” The complaint read, “Marie runs the streets continually. She is very irregular in her attendance at school, and is as dirty as a pig. She has been found in a lumber yard with a negro, and it was alleged by her associates that he raped her there. She goes into stores and begs.” According to the surviving records, Marie's “truancies from home” alerted settlement workers to the case. As a young child she reportedly began staying out late at night and loitering in the company of men and boys, and was threatened with being put out of the house when she was found alone with the African American man. By 1928, after Marie became an unwed mother at the age of sixteen, and had spent nine years in and out of child welfare institutions, a summary report contained the interesting typographical error that Marie's young life had strayed a distance of “six blacks from home.” As incidental as slipping “blocks” into “blacks” may have been in one sense, it captured a powerful truth. Marie violated key boundaries of sexual, gender, and racial purity that made a woman a candidate for respectable motherhood, and she paid dearly for these transgressions.
Renaissance Lyrics and Their Situations
Authors: Alpers Paul J
Published: September 2007

This essay proposes a way of incorporating contextual perspectives, such as have dominated interpretation in the last quarter century, into the formal analysis of lyric poems of the English Renaissance. Following Kenneth Burke's formulation, that poems adopt "various strategies for the encompassing of situations," the discussion centers on George Gascoigne's "Gascoigne's Woodmanship" and Andrew Marvell's "An Horatian Ode upon Cromwell's Return from Ireland." While a reasonably complete interpretation of each poem is offered, the emphasis is equally on the ways in which Burke's ideas are productive for understanding the rhetoric of these and other Renaissance lyrics.
Literary History and the Sublime in Erich Auerbach's Mimesis
Authors: Doran Robert
Published: September 2007

This paper argues that the idea of the sublime lies at the heart of Auerbach's notion of realism as developed in Mimesis. Through a close examination of Auerbach's approach to literary history, I show that his concept of realistic representation, far from being relativistic and radically contingent as Auerbach himself asserts, is actually structural and implicitly theoretical. Auerbach's well-known notion of the mixture of styles is not a mixture or fusion of stylistic levels, but a dialectic of the human drama: a dynamic synthesis between sublimitas and humilitas, the high and the low, which created a new conception of the human being as a self-transcending entity that can be the subject of history. Thus Auerbach can be interpreted as proffering a notion of the sublime that is not merely stylistic, but sociological and humanistic.
Walter Map: Authorship and the Space of Writing
Authors: Edwards Robert
Published: September 2007

Walter Map's De nugis curialium stakes a radical claim for authorship and writing within twelfth-century European literary culture. Map imagines a form of authorship based on his ambivalence toward his immediate court context and the alterity of his being a subordinate, belated writer. He privileges materials from the margins of established literary discourse, and he fashions reading not just as the application of fit moral lessons but as an active, potentially unstable site of intellectual labor and textual meaning. In key episodes of his book, Map goes beyond self-reflexive commentary to test the limits of his precepts and the artistic freedom they allow.
Against the Novel\-\-Meaning and History in Roland Barthes's Le degré zéro de l'écriture
Authors: Just Daniel
Published: September 2007

With a plan to trace the relationship between a purely formal history of writing and the deeper levels of history, Barthes's project in Le degré zéro de l'écriture seems to have failed because it remains unclear what degré zéro historically represents. Drawing on Le degré zéro de l'écriture, as well as Barthes's later texts on film and photography, this essay examines the historical and the political aspects of the theory of "exhausted art" that Barthes developed as an expansion of his notion of degré zéro. As I demonstrate, Barthes's theory suggests that exhausted art is politically committed. By remaining semantically and historically ambiguous, this art not only proposes a new aesthetic paradigm, but, as Barthes believed, also represents a socially reflective type of art—it poses an alternative to the novel and its depiction of the subject as separated from others.
Democracy's "Lawless Music": The Whitmanian Moment in the U.S. Construction of Representative Literariness
Authors: Leypoldt Günter
Published: September 2007

This essay explores the connection between Walt Whitman and the rhetorical uses of "representative literariness," as part of a "post-Kantian" symbolic repertoire of intellectual self-legitimation. My focus lies on American literary studies, where representative literariness emerges as an important critical concept during the construction of an iconic Walt Whitman, beginning in the 1870s, and culminating in the 1940s, when both Whitman and his "age" were refigured in terms of aesthetic modernism and became central to the idea of an American Renaissance. While the American-Renaissance concept lost its critical appeal during the 1970s, its underlying notion of representative literariness has retained some of its cultural centrality.
Who Is Speaking in Traditional Texts? On the Distributed Author of the Sagas of Icelanders and Serbian Epic Poetry
Authors: Ranković Slavica
Published: September 2007

The paper raises the issue of inadequacy of the current narratological vocabulary when it comes to the question of who is speaking in traditional (oral and orally derived) narratives. Drawing on the concepts of "emergence" and "distributed representation" from the sciences of complexity, I attempt to provide an account of traditional narratives as self-organizing adaptive systems, the stories that "tell themselves." Rather than being products of a single mind, traditional narratives evolve over extensive periods of time and arise from networks of interrelated individuals: epic singers, storytellers/writers/scribes, audience members. Each of these individuals (network nodes) makes a local (if creative, or even unique) contribution, but none in particular is responsible for the character/identity of the whole text. This creativity relates irreducibly to the levels of organization beyond the individual, and is to be credited to the evolutionary dynamics of the narrative production itself, here termed the distributed author. The paper focuses on the sagas of Icelanders and Serbian epic poetry as they, due to the strong prevalence of decentralizing social factors in the milieus in which they evolved, represent exemplary products of distributed authorship.
From Redescription to Writing: Rorty, Barthes, and the Idea of a Literary Culture
Authors: Schulenberg Ulf
Published: September 2007

One might feel tempted to advance the argument that Roland Barthes can be regarded as an almost ideal member of a Rortyan literary or poeticized culture, that is, as a strong poet shaping, in a truly idiosyncratic, innovative, and creative manner, a postmetaphysical culture. Concentrating on the late Barthes, this article seeks to elucidate his development from postmetaphysical forms of redescription and self-creation to what could be termed an existential understanding of the practice of writing. In his lecture on Proust at the Collège de France in 1978, it becomes obvious that it is no longer possible to count Barthes among the proponents of a radically antifoundationalist and antiessentialist thinking.
The Uses of the Philosophy of G. E. Moore in the Works of E. M. Forster
Authors: Sidorsky David
Published: September 2007

This essay, as its title "The Uses of the Philosophy of G. E. Moore in the Works of E. M. Forster" indicates, examines the ways in which Moore's philosophical thought, particularly the ethical theory that was formulated at Cambridge during Forster's student years and published as Principia Ethica in 1903, influenced the writings of E. M. Forster. Specifically, aspects of both the persona and philosophy of Moore are examined in three of Forster's novels. In The Longest Journey of 1907, the doctrines of moral and metaphysical realism that Moore taught to Forster at Cambridge emerge as the major theme of engagement and contention among the characters of the novel. In Howards End of 1910, Forster symbolically projected the promise of "Moorism" (the term used by Moore's advocates in Bloomsbury) as a moral philosophy for the reform of English public life and for the resolution of the challenges of industrialization and urbanization that confronted Edwardian England. In A Passage to India of 1924, Forster used the character of Mrs. Moore to demonstrate that Moore's "method" of philosophical dialectic could be directed to rectify an injustice of imperial rule and to clarify personal relationships. Forster's continued support for Moore's approach in the domain of personal relations even as he recognized its limitations as a public philosophy in postwar society is set in this essay against John Maynard Keynes's criticism of the Bloomsbury commitment to Moore's thought as sketched in Keynes's memoir "My Early Beliefs." Aspects of Moore's thought reverberated in Forster's essays which marked his emergence as a major public advocate of anti-Nazism and liberal democracy in the 1930s and 1940s, characteristically expressed in such moderate and ironic tones of "Two Cheers for Democracy." Finally, this essay probes a fundamental dilemma in the interpretation of Forster's oeuvre. On the one hand, Forster was a lifelong advocate of the Moorian ideal of truth in personal relations, and this advocacy was realized through his vocation as an author whose novels provided a continuing quest myth in which each of the main protagonists is in pursuit of this ideal. On the other hand, Forster argues for an interpretation of himself as a modernist writer who is free of any authorial advocacy in his commitment to the ideal of art for art's sake.
A synoptic review of the classification of red algal genera a half century after Kylin's “Die Gattungen der Rhodophyceen”
Authors: Schneider Craig W. , Wynne Michael J.
Published: September 2007

Classification of the red algae (Rhodoplantae) has undergone significant change since the seminal work of Harald Kylin, “Die Gattungen der Rhodophyceen,” a half century ago. The number of genera has nearly doubled over this time period, at least in part due to recent molecular comparative work. Information gleaned from gene-sequencing analyses has resulted in a red algal classification that reflects a more accurate phylogenetic framework than that based solely on morphological data. This paper tabulates the known 834 genera of red algae today with taxonomic synonyms and literature references reflecting the great change over fifty years.
Biotechnology Regulations in the Islamic Republic of Iran
Authors: Tayyar Negar
Published: September 2007

The increasing development in biomedical advances and medical technologies makes awarefor the importance of bioethics. Progresses in the fields of stem cell research, genetic technologies, organ transplantation and cloning aroused the bioethical debate. On one hand, the focus of bioethical issues mostly neglects the Muslim view, on the other hand there is a lack of differentiation within the Islamic positions.
Oedometer Consolidation Test Analysis by Nonlinear Regression
Authors: Barros Pérsio L. A. , Pinto Paulo R. O.
Published: September 2007

A numerical method based on least squares nonlinear regression for the evaluation of the consolidation parameters of soils from consolidation tests is presented. A model which includes the initial compression, the primary consolidation, and the secondary compression is used in the regression. This approach allows the resulting regression curve to better fit the experimental data. The method takes the settlement-time readings from the oedometer step-loading consolidation test and calculates automatically the magnitudes of the coefficients of consolidation and of secondary compression. The performance of the proposed method is accessed through consolidation tests executed on four different clay soils, which are analyzed by nonlinear regression and by the usual graphical methods. It is concluded that the proposed method gives results that are close to those obtained by the standard methods of analysis.
Investigation of the Effect of Heat on Specially Formulated Thermoplastic Polyolefin (TPO) Films by Thermogravimetry, Dynamic Mechanical Analysis, and Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy
Authors: Delgado Ana H. , Howell George , Ober Randy , Oliveira Paul E. , Peterson Arnold , Boon Richard , Paroli Ralph M.
Published: September 2007

To explore the use of chemical methods of analysis in investigating the performance of thermoplastic polyolefins (TPO), the ASTM D08.18 Subcommittee undertook a study to evaluate TPO films of known composition. These specially formulated films with varying amounts of stabilizers were heat-aged for up to 56 days according to ASTM D 6878-03 and then analyzed using dynamic mechanical analysis (DMA), thermogravimetry (TG), and Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy. These techniques were found to be useful in characterizing the effect of heat on the TPO films under study and it is believed that they could be used to evaluate actual TPO membranes. Please note that these are films and not roof membranes. The formulations used for the films could be modified for use in actual membranes.
Measurement of the Resistance of Treated Metal Foils to Scrubbing Abrasion Using a Modified Reciprocating Wear Test
Authors: Qu Jun , Blau Peter J. , Sikka Vinod K.
Published: September 2007

A reciprocating wear test method has been developed to evaluate the resistance of metal foils to scrubbing abrasion. Development included the definition of a quantitative measure of the scrubbing resistance. In order to test the ability of the new method to differentiate between surface treatments, four versions of Type 316 stainless steel foils were tested: annealed (A-NT), cold-worked (C-NT), annealed plus case-hardened (A-T), and cold-worked plus case-hardened (C-T). Measurements were made of their scrubbing resistance using commercial scrub cleaning pads as the counterface material. Results showed that the case-hardening process significantly increased the scrubbing resistance both under dry conditions and with cleaning solutions to lubricate the contact. While this linearly-reciprocating method does not simulate the circular, overlapping motion commonly occurring in service, results indicated that the new test method could sufficiently discriminate levels of two-body abrasion behavior, and therefore can be useful for studying the effects of surface treatments on abrasion resistance.
Motor Force Field Learning Influences Visual Processing of Target Motion
Authors: Brown Liana E. , Wilson Elizabeth T. , Goodale Melvyn A. , Gribble Paul L.
Published: September 2007

There are reciprocal connections between visual and motor areas of the cerebral cortex. Although recent studies have provided intriguing new insights, in comparison with volume of research on the visual control of movement, relatively little is known about how movement influences vision. The motor system is perfectly suited to learn about environmental forces. Does environmental force information, learned by the motor system, influence visual processing? Here, we show that learning to compensate for a force applied to the hand influenced how participants predicted target motion for interception. Ss trained in one of three constant force fields by making reaching movements while holding a robotic manipulandum. The robot applied forces in a null [null force field (NFF)], leftward [leftward force field (LFF)], or [rightward force field (RFF)] direction. Training was followed immediately with an interception task. The target accelerated from left to right and Ss's task was to stab it. When viewing time was optimal for prediction, the RFF group initiated their responses earlier and hit more targets, and the LFF group initiated their responses later and hit fewer targets, than the NFF group. In follow-up experiments, we show that motor learning is necessary, and we rule out the possibility that explicit force direction information drives how Ss altered their predictions of visual motion. Environmental force information, acquired by motor learning, influenced how the motion of nearby visual targets was predicted.
PDZ Protein Interactions Underlying NMDA Receptor-Mediated Excitotoxicity and Neuroprotection by PSD-95 Inhibitors
Authors: Cui Hong , Hayashi Amy , Sun Hong-Shuo , Belmares Michael P. , Cobey Carolyn , Phan Thuymy , Schweizer Johannes , Salter Michael W. , Wang Yu Tian , Tasker R. Andrew , Garman David , Rabinowitz Joshua , Lu Peter S. , Tymianski Michael
Published: September 2007

In neuronal synapses, PDZ domains [postsynaptic density-95 (PSD-95)/Discs large/zona occludens-1] of PSD-95 proteins interact with C termini of NMDA receptor [NMDAR (NR)] subunits, linking them to downstream neurotoxic signaling molecules. Perturbing NMDAR/PSD-95 interactions with a Tat peptide comprising the nine C-terminal residues of the NR2B subunit (Tat-NR2B9c) reduces neurons' vulnerability to excitotoxicity and ischemia. However, NR subunit C termini may bind many of >240 cellular PDZs, any of which could mediate neurotoxic signaling independently of PSD-95. Here, we performed a proteomic and biochemical analysis of the interactions of all known human PDZs with synaptic signaling proteins including NR1, NR2A–NR2D, and neuronal nitric oxide synthase (nNOS). Tat-NR2B9c, whose interactions define PDZs involved in neurotoxic signaling, was also used. NR2A–NR2D subunits and Tat-NR2B9c had similar, highly specific, PDZ protein interactions, of which the strongest were with the PSD-95 family members (PSD-95, PSD-93, SAP97, and SAP102) and Tax interaction protein 1 (TIP1). The PSD-95 PDZ2 domain bound NR2A–NR2C subunits most strongly (EC50, ∼1 μm), and fusing the NR2B C terminus to Tat enhanced its affinity for PSD-95 PDZ2 by >100-fold (EC50, ∼7 nm). IC50values for Tat-NR2B9c inhibiting NR2A–NR2C/PSD-95 interactions (∼1–10 μm) and nNOS/PSD-95 interactions (200 nm) confirmed the feasibility of such inhibition. To determine which of the PDZ interactions of Tat-NR2B9c mediate neuroprotection, one of PSD-95, PSD-93, SAP97, SAP102, TIP1, or nNOS expression was inhibited in cortical neurons exposed to NMDA toxicity. Only neurons lacking PSD-95 or nNOS but not PSD-93, SAP97, SAP102, or TIP1 exhibited reduced excitotoxic vulnerability. Thus, despite the ubiquitousness of PDZ domain-containing proteins, PSD-95 and nNOS above any other PDZ proteins are keys in effecting NMDAR-dependent excitotoxicity. Consequently, PSD-95 inhibition may constitute a highly specific strategy for treating excitotoxic disorders.
Properties of Persistent Postnatal Cortical Subplate Neurons
Authors: Torres-Reveron Juan , Friedlander Michael J.
Published: September 2007

Subplate (SP) neurons are important for the proper development of thalamocortical innervation. They are necessary for formation of ocular dominance and orientation columns in visual cortex. During the perinatal period, many SP neurons die. The surviving cohort forms interstitial cells in the white matter (WM) and a band of horizontally oriented cells below layer VI (layer VIb, layer VII, or subplate cells). Although the function of embryonic SP neurons has been well established, the functional roles of WM and postnatal SP cells are not known. We used a combination of anatomical, immunohistochemical, and electrophysiological techniques to explore the dendritic morphology, neurotransmitter phenotype, intrinsic electrophysiological, and synaptic input properties of these surviving cells in the rat visual cortex. The density of SP and WM cells significantly decreases during the first month of life. Both populations express neuronal markers and have extensive dendritic arborizations within the SP, WM, and to the overlying visual cortex. Some intrinsic electrophysiological properties of SP and WM cells are similar: each generates high-frequency slowly adapting trains of action potentials in response to a sustained depolarization. However, SP cells exhibit greater frequency-dependent action potential broadening than WM neurons. Both cell types receive predominantly AMPA/kainate receptor-mediated excitatory synaptic input that undergoes paired-pulse facilitation as well as NMDA receptor and GABAergic input. Synaptic inputs to these cells can also undergo long-term synaptic plasticity. Thus, surviving SP and WM cells are functional electrogenic neurons integrated within the postnatal visual cortical circuit.
Bimodal Action of Menthol on the Transient Receptor Potential Channel TRPA1
Authors: Karashima Yuji , Damann Nils , Prenen Jean , Talavera Karel , Segal Andrei , Voets Thomas , Nilius Bernd
Published: September 2007

TRPA1 is a calcium-permeable nonselective cation transient receptor potential (TRP) channel that functions as an excitatory ionotropic receptor in nociceptive neurons. TRPA1 is robustly activated by pungent substances in mustard oil, cinnamon, and garlic and mediates the inflammatory actions of environmental irritants and proalgesic agents. Here, we demonstrate a bimodal sensitivity of TRPA1 to menthol, a widely used cooling agent and known activator of the related cold receptor TRPM8. In whole-cell and single-channel recordings of heterologously expressed TRPA1, submicromolar to low-micromolar concentrations of menthol cause channel activation, whereas higher concentrations lead to a reversible channel block. In addition, we provide evidence for TRPA1-mediated menthol responses in mustard oil-sensitive trigeminal ganglion neurons. Our data indicate that TRPA1 is a highly sensitive menthol receptor that very likely contributes to the diverse psychophysical sensations after topical application of menthol to the skin or mucous membranes of the oral and nasal cavities.
Decreased Central μ-Opioid Receptor Availability in Fibromyalgia
Authors: Harris Richard E. , Clauw Daniel J. , Scott David J. , McLean Samuel A. , Gracely Richard H. , Zubieta Jon-Kar
Published: September 2007

The underlying neurophysiology of acute pain is fairly well characterized, whereas the central mechanisms operative in chronic pain states are less well understood. Fibromyalgia (FM), a common chronic pain condition characterized by widespread pain, is thought to originate largely from altered central neurotransmission. We compare a sample of 17 FM patients and 17 age- and sex-matched healthy controls, using μ-opioid receptor (MOR) positron emission tomography. We demonstrate that FM patients display reduced MOR binding potential (BP) within several regions known to play a role in pain modulation, including the nucleus accumbens, the amygdala, and the dorsal cingulate. MOR BP in the accumbens of FM patients was negatively correlated with affective pain ratings. Moreover, MOR BP throughout the cingulate and the striatum was also negatively correlated with the relative amount of affective pain (McGill, affective score/sensory score) within these patients. These findings indicate altered endogenous opioid analgesic activity in FM and suggest a possible reason for why exogenous opiates appear to have reduced efficacy in this population.
Polplatzierung bei der Modellreduktion (On Pole Placement in Model Reduction)
Authors: Antoulas Athanasios C.
Published: September 2007

Im Folgenden wird gezeigt, dass in der Modellreduktion, Krylov-artige Projektionen konstruiert werden können, die gleichzeitig Momente des Systems angleichen und Polplatzierung erlauben. Das heißt, dass gewisse Momente des reduzierten Systems gleich mit Momenten des ursprünglichen Systems sind, und die Pole des reduzierten Systems an vorbestimmten Stellen der komplexen Ebene liegen.

In this note we establish the fact that in model reduction there exist Krylov-type projections which achieve moment matching and pole placement, simultaneously. In other words, the reduced system matches a certain number of moments of the original system and its poles are at pre-assigned locations of the complex plane.
Ein algebraischer Zugang zur Parameteridentifikation in linearen unendlichdimensionalen Systemen (An Algebraic Approach to Parameter Identification in Linear Infinite Dimensional Systems)
Authors: Rudolph Joachim , Woittennek Frank
Published: September 2007

Es wird ein algebraischer Zugang zur Parameteridentifikation in linearen verteiltparametrischen Systemen vorgestellt. Dabei werden zunächst Systeme mit verzögertem Eingang und homogenen Anfangsbedingungen untersucht. Eine mögliche Verallgemeinerung auf Systeme mit inhomogenen Anfangsbedingungen wird am Beispiel einer autonomen Differenzen-Differenzialgleichung diskutiert. Ein analoger Zugang erlaubt die Identifikation von Parametern auch in Systemen, die durch (örtlich eindimensionale) lineare partielle Differenzialgleichungen beschrieben werden. Dabei werden lediglich die Trajektorien von Randgrößen als bekannt vorausgesetzt. Der Zugang wird am Beispiel von partiellen Differenzialgleichungen zweiter Ordnung bezüglich des Orts, insbesondere der eindimensionalen Wärmeleitungsgleichung, diskutiert.

An algebraic approach for identification of parameters in linear infinite dimensional systems based on operational calculus is proposed. First, the method is derived for a system with delayed input and homogeneous initial conditions. A possible generalization to delay systems without input and non-homogeneous initial conditions is sketched. A similar approach is applicable to systems described by linear partial differential equations which, in particular, is discussed for second order p. d. e., as for instance the one dimensional heat equation.
Entwurf nichtlinearer Beobachter für autonome Systeme basierend auf dem Hilfssatz von Lyapunov (Design of Nonlinear Observers for Autonomous Systems using Lyapunov’s Auxiliary Theorem)
Authors: Deutscher Joachim
Published: September 2007

Dieser Beitrag behandelt den Entwurf nichtlinearer Beoachter unter Verwendung des Hilfssatzes von Lyapunov. Zur Berechnung von Beobachtern mit näherungsweise linearer Fehlerdynamik mit dieser Methode werden zwei numerische Verfahren vorgeschlagen. Der erste Ansatz basiert auf einer Potenzreihenentwicklung der Lösung des beim Beobachterentwurf anfallenden Anfangswertproblems und liefert für hinreichend kleine Anfangsfehler eine näherungsweise lineare Fehlerdynamik in den Originalkoordinaten. Beim zweiten Ansatz wird das Galerkin-Verfahren verwendet, um die Nichtlinearitäten der Fehlerdynamik in einem vorgebbaren Bereich im Zustandsraum im quadratischen Mittel klein zu machen und damit näherungsweise zu linearisieren. Für beide Verfahren werden lineare Matrixgleichungen in expliziter Form hergeleitet, was eine Implementierung der vorgeschlagenen Beobachterentwurfsverfahren in numerischen Software-Pakten ermöglicht. Anhand eines einfachen Beispiels werden die beiden Ansätze zum Beobachterentwurf miteinander verglichen.

This paper presents the design of nonlinear observers by using Lyapunov’s Auxiliary Theorem. On the basis of this result two approaches are proposed for the design of nonlinear observers with approximately linear error dynamics. The first approach uses a Taylor expansion of the solution of the initial value problem to be solved for the observer design. The resulting observer has an approximately linear error dynamics in the original coordinates provided that the initial error is sufficiently small. By using the Galerkin approach the second method results in an error dynamics with nonlinearities which are small in the least square sense on a prespecified interval in the state space. Linear matrix equations are derived for both methods enabling the implementation in numerical software packages. A simple example compares the properties of the proposed numerical observer design techniques.
Steuerung eines parallelen Positioniersystems mit Piezoaktoren (Feedforward Control of a Parallel Positioning System with Piezoelectric Actuators)
Authors: Kuhnen Klaus
Published: September 2007

Aufgrund der hohen Stelldynamik und des nahezu unbegrenzten Auflösungsvermögens eignen sich aktive Materialien in Verbindung mit hochpräzisen Wegsensoren und einer rauscharmen Steuerelektronik ganz besonders zur Realisierung hochdynamischer paralleler Feinstpositioniersysteme, sofern die benötigten Stellwege hinreichend klein bleiben. Die Führungselemente solcher Systeme werden fast ausschließlich mit Hilfe von elastischen Festkörpergelenken realisiert, sodass im mechanischen System harte Nichtlinearitäten wie Haft- und Gleitreibung nicht auftreten. In solchen Fällen stellt die Mechanik im Wesentlichen ein lineares strukturdynamisches System dar. Nichtlinearitäten werden in solchen Systemen hauptsächlich durch die aktorischen und sensorischen Übertragungscharakteristiken der aktiven Materialien bei Ansteuerung mit großen Signalen erzeugt. Gegenstand des vorliegenden Beitrages ist es nun, am Beispiel eines zweiachsigen parallelen piezoelektrischen Positioniersystems ein neuartiges Vorsteuerungskonzept abzuleiten, das mit Hilfe von operatorbasierten Methoden simultan die hysterese- und kriechbehafteten Materialnichtlinearitäten in den Aktoren, die ausgeprägte Strukturdynamik sowie die Verkopplung der Ein- und Ausgänge des Systems kompensiert.

Due to the high dynamic positioning capability and the nearly unlimited resolution especially active materials in connection with high precision positioning sensors and a low noise control electronic are well suited for the realisation of ultra high precision parallel positioning systems if the necessary displacements are sufficiently small. The guiding elements of such systems are normally realised with elastic solid-state joints such that hard nonlinearities like static and sliding friction do not occur. In these cases the mechanical part of the system can be mainly regarded as a linear structural dynamical system. Nonlinearites in the overall system are mainly generated by the actuator and sensor characteristics of the active materials if they are driven with high amplitudes. The aim of this article is the development of an innovative feedforward control concept for a 2-dof parallel piezoelectric positioning system which is able to compensate simultaneously the complex hysteretic and creep material nonlinearities in the actuators as well as the pronounced structural dynamic and the coupling between the inputs and outputs of the system.
Ein neuartiger Ansatz zur Querdynamikregelung von Personenkraftwagen (A New Approach to Lateral Dynamics Control of Passenger Vehicles)
Authors: Antonov Sergiy , Fehn Achim , Kugi Andreas
Published: September 2007

Dieser Beitrag beschreibt einen neuen Zugang zur Querdynamikregelung von Personenkraftwagen. Um eine physikalisch interpretierbare Schnittstelle zu der untergeordneten Radregelung zu schaffen, wird das Giermoment um die Hochachse des Fahrzeuges als fiktive Stellgröße eingeführt. Es kann gezeigt werden, dass die Fahrzeugquergeschwindigkeit des nichtlinearen Einspurmodells einen flachen Ausgang des Systems repräsentiert. Das vorgeschlagene Konzept zur Querdynamikregelung basiert auf einer Zwei-Freiheitsgrad-Regelkreisstruktur mit einer flachheitsbasierten Steuerung der Fahrzeugquergeschwindigkeit und einer Stabilisierung des Trajektorienfehlersystems. Da mit diesem Regelungskonzept auch eine indirekte Regelung des Schwimmwinkels erreicht wird, bringt dieser Ansatz diverse Vorteile gegenüber der klassischen Gierratenregelung mit sich. Darüber hinaus wird die Parametrierung des Regelkreises durch den modellbasierten Entwurf deutlich erleichtert. Für die praktische Realisierung werden nur herkömmliche Mess- und Stellgrößen eines ESP®-Systems benötigt. Das Regelungskonzept wurde anhand von zahlreichen Simulationen mit einem detaillierten Fahrzeugmodell getestet.

This paper presents a new approach to the lateral dynamics control of passenger vehicles. In order to establish a physically meaningful interface to the subordinate wheel control system the yawing torque of the vehicle is introduced as a fictitious control input. It is shown that the lateral vehicle velocity of the nonlinear single track model serves as a flat output of the system. The proposed concept for the lateral dynamics control relies on a two degrees-of-freedom control structure with a flatness-based feedforward control of the lateral vehicle velocity and a stabilizing feedback control of the corresponding trajectory error system. Since the control concept indirectly corresponds to the control of the vehicle´s body side-slip angle, it brings along some advantages compared to the classical yaw rate control. Moreover, the model-based approach extremely simplifies the controller parametrization. For the practical implementation of this control scheme only the standard equipment of an ESP®-system is required. The proposed control concept has been tested by means of numerous simulation studies with a detailed vehicle model.
Cancer Patients' Attitudes toward Future Research Uses of Stored Human Biological Materials
Authors: Helft Paul R. , Champion Victoria L. , Eckles Rachael , Johnson Cynthia S. , Meslin Eric M.
Published: September 2007

The policy debate concerning informed consent for future, unspecified research of stored human biological materials (HBM) would benefit from an understanding of the attitudes of individuals who contribute tissue specimens to HBM repositories. Cancer patients who contributed leftover tissue to the Indiana University Cancer Center Tissue Bank under such conditions were recruited for a mail survey study of their attitudes. Our findings suggest that a clear majority of subjects would permit unlimited future research on stored HBMs without re-contact and re-consent, and a significant minority appear to desire ongoing control over future research uses of their tissue. These differences merit further investigation and suggest that a policy of blanket consent for all future, unspecified research would be premature.
Debriefing in Deceptive Research: A Proposed New Procedure
Authors: Oczak Malgorzata , Niedźwieńska Agnieszka
Published: September 2007

This study examines the effectiveness of a new debriefing procedure designed specifically to address possible negative consequences of participation in deceptive research. The new debriefing includes an extended educational procedure that enables participants to gain insight into relevant deceptive practices and how to recognize and deal effectively with them, and thus end their participation with a positive and beneficial learning experience. The usefulness of the new tool was analyzed in a suggestibility study in which we compared the effects of the standard debriefing and the new procedure in terms of participants' mood, self-esteem, and attitudes toward psychological experiments. The most important result was that at the end of the study subjects who received the new debriefing system expressed more positive mood and more positive attitudes toward research than those who received the standard debriefing system. The implications of these results for generalizing to other kinds of deception research are discussed.
Beyond Home-Host Dichotomies: A Comparative Examination of Gender Relations in a Transnational Mexican Community
Authors: Barajas Manuel , Ramirez Elvia
Published: September 2007

Based on a qualitative study with women from a transnational Mexican community, the authors examine how women's perceptions of gender empowerment, adherence and practice of gender ideals, and the household division of labor vary across generations and borders. Generally, immigration scholars suggest that employment and immigration experiences empower women and create greater gender equality among families. This study problematizes these assumptions because they are based on home-host dichotomies, which suggest that “home” countries are the sites of patriarchal oppression, whereas “host” societies offer women greater equality and freedom from patriarchy. This study finds that women in the United States report higher levels of familial authority than women in Mexico but experience a greater burden with household chores and wage labor. This study also finds that although women in Mexico and older generations of women across borders discursively uphold ideas of male dominance, there are gaps between gender ideals and practices.
Peers, Drinking, and the Assimilation of Mexican American Youth
Authors: Cavanagh Shannon E.
Published: September 2007

Drinking alcohol, a normative behavior during adolescence in the United States, has significant consequences for health and well-being in adolescence and beyond. Highly social in nature, it is also a domain in which to assess the implications of the assimilation of immigrant youth into American peer culture. Using a Mexican American sample drawn from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (N = 1,034), this study found generational differences in adolescent drinking behaviors, with more recent immigrants less likely to drink or binge drink. It also found generational differences in the social ecology of friendship groups, with first- and second-generation youth in friendship groups with higher concentrations of coethnic and other immigrant youth who engaged in less party behaviors. These differences did not explain generational differences in adolescent drinking behaviors but did condition the drinking behaviors of second-generation Mexican Americans. More specifically, second-generation youth with more White friends and friends who engaged in more party behaviors were more likely to binge drink than all others.
Toward a Population Health Model of Segmented Assimilation: The Case of Low Birth Weight in Los Angeles
Authors: Finch Brian Karl , Lim Nelson , Perez William , Do D. Phuong
Published: September 2007

The authors adapt the segmented assimilation theory to a model of population health, which posits that assimilation is actually harmful to migrants' health. The authors also specify models of individual and contextual factors to indirectly test the theory of segmented assimilation— a theory that posits interactions between individual and residential circumstances. Using Year 2000 vital statistics data merged with 2000 U.S. census data from Los Angeles County, the authors model the probability of being born low birth weight among the native and foreign born. Results confirm an immigrant advantage at the individual level and protective effects of immigrant coresidence at the neighborhood level.