bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Towards a quantum chemical protocol for the prediction of rovibrational spectroscopic data for transition metal molecules: Exploration of CuCN, CuOH, and CuCCH
Authors: Cheng Qianyi , Fortenberry Ryan C. , DeYonker Nathan J.
Published: December 2017

High accuracy electronic structure computations for small transition metal-containing molecules have been a long term challenge. Due to coupling between electronic and nuclear wave functions, even experimental/theoretical identification of the ground electronic state requires tremendous efforts. Quartic force fields (QFFs) are effective ab initio tools for obtaining reliable anharmonic spectroscopic properties. However, the method that employs complete basis set limit extrapolation (“C”), consideration of core electron correlation (“cC”), and inclusion of scalar relativity (“R”) to produce the energy points on the QFF, the composite CcCR methodology, has not yet been utilized to study inorganic spectroscopy. This work takes the CcCR methodology and adapts it to test whether such an approach is conducive for the closed-shell, copper-containing molecules CuCN, CuOH, and CuCCH. Gas phase rovibrational data are provided for all three species in their ground electronic states. Equilibrium geometries and many higher-order rovibrational properties show good agreement with earlier studies. However, there are notable differences, especially in computation of fundamental vibrational frequencies. Even with further additive corrections for the inner core electron correlation and coupled cluster with full single, double, and triple substitutions (CCSDT), the differences are still larger than expected indicating that more work should follow for predicting rovibrational properties of transition metal molecules.
Transcranial magnetic stimulation promotes the proliferation of dopaminergic neuronal cells in vitro
Authors: Zhong Xiaojing , Luo Jie , Rastogi Priyam , Kanthasamy Anumantha G. , Jiles David C. ,   Fellow, IEEE
Published: December 2017

Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) is a safe and non-invasive treatment for neurological disorders. TMS has been approved as a treatment for major depressive disorders by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in 2008. Due to the phenomenon of electromagnetic induction, a time-varying magnetic field induces an electric field in the conductive tissues in the brain, TMS has the ability to activate neurons in vivo. However, the effects of the magnetic fields on neurons in cell culture have not been investigated adequately. The magnetic fields affect the neurons when the potential across the neuronal membrane exceeds the threshold which in turn causes an action potential. Based on these theories, we investigated the effects of the magnetic fields generated by a monophasic stimulator with a 70 mm double coil on rat dopaminergic neuronal cell lines (N27). The directions of the magnetic fields in each coil of the double coil oppose each other. The effects of changing the direction of the magnetic field on N27 neurons was also investigated. The results of the experiments showed that both of the fields perpendicular to the coil surface promoted the proliferation of N27 dopaminergic neurons. In order to investigate the gene expression and protein expression affected by TMS, quantitative Polymerase Chain Reaction (qPCR) was used. Here we report changes in glial cell line-derived neurotrophic factor (GDNF) in dopaminergic neuronal cells (N27) after TMS treatment.
Combined strain and composition-induced effects in the metal-insulator transition of epitaxial VO2 films
Authors: Théry V. , Boulle A. , Crunteanu A. , Orlianges J. C.
Published: December 2017

The role of epitaxial strain, thermal strain, and bulk (strain-free) lattice parameters in the metal-insulator transition (MIT) and the structural phase transition (SPT) of VO2 is investigated for the case of epitaxial films grown on (001)-oriented TiO2 substrates. Temperature-resolved X-ray reciprocal space mapping has been used to determine the absolute state of strain as well as the bulk lattice parameters of VO2 at 100 °C. For the thinnest film (15 nm), the state of strain is dominated by the film/substrate lattice mismatch yielding an in-plane tensile strain which, in turn, shifts both the MIT and the SPT towards lower temperatures. Conversely, for the thickest film (100 nm), the epitaxial strain is relaxed, so that the state of strain is dominated by the VO2/TiO2 thermal expansion mismatch which is responsible for a compressive in-plane strain. In all cases, a swelling of the strain-free VO2 unit-cell is observed which indicates the presence of interfacial oxygen vacancies and/or Ti diffusion into the VO2 films. The presence of oxygen vacancies stabilizes the metallic rutile phase and counterbalances the action of thermal strain on the MIT and the SPT and degrades the electric properties for the thinnest film. For the thickest film, the resistivity ratio is 6.4 × 104.
Local gyrokinetic study of electrostatic microinstabilities in dipole plasmas
Authors: Xie Hua-sheng , Zhang Yi , Huang Zi-cong , Ou Wei-ke , Li Bo
Published: December 2017

A linear gyrokinetic particle-in-cell scheme, which is valid for an arbitrary perpendicular wavelength k⊥ρi and includes the parallel dynamic along the field line, is developed to study the local electrostatic drift modes in point and ring dipole plasmas. We find that the most unstable mode in this system can be either the electron mode or the ion mode. The properties and relations of these modes are studied in detail as a function of k⊥ρi, the density gradient κn, the temperature gradient κT, electron to ion temperature ratio τ=Te/Ti, and mass ratio mi/me. For conventional weak gradient parameters, the mode is on the ground state (with eigenstate number l = 0) and especially k∥∼0 for small k⊥ρi. Thus, the bounce averaged dispersion relation is also derived for comparison. For strong gradient and large k⊥ρi, most interestingly, higher order eigenstate modes with even (e.g., l = 2, 4) or odd (e.g., l = 1) parity can be most unstable, which is not expected in the previous studies. High order eigenstate can also easily be most unstable at weak gradient when τ>10. This work can be particularly important to understand the turbulent transport in laboratory and space magnetosphere.
Dietary species richness as a measure of food biodiversity and nutritional quality of diets
Authors: Lachat Carl , Raneri Jessica E. , Smith Katherine Walker , Kolsteren Patrick , Van Damme Patrick , Verzelen Kaat , Penafiel Daniela , Vanhove Wouter , Kennedy Gina , Hunter Danny , Odhiambo Francis Oduor , Ntandou-Bouzitou Gervais , De Baets Bernard , Ratnasekera Disna , Ky Hoang The , Remans Roseline , Termote Céline
Published: December 2017

Significance

Current research linking biodiversity and human diets has used metrics without justification from a nutritional point of view. Diet species richness, or a count of the number of different species consumed per day, assesses both nutritional adequacy and food biodiversity of diets for women and children in rural areas. The positive association of food species richness with dietary quality was observed in both the wet and the dry season. Food biodiversity contributes to diet quality in vulnerable populations in areas with high biodiversity. Reporting the number of species consumed during dietary assessment provides a unique opportunity to cut across two critical dimensions of sustainable development—human and environmental health—and complements existing indicators for healthy and sustainable diets.
Structure of sexual networks determines the operation of sexual selection
Authors: McDonald Grant C. , Pizzari Tommaso
Published: December 2017

Significance

Sexual selection is a powerful evolutionary force, but debate persists over its strength and quantification. We argue that current approaches ignore the structure of the sexual network. We capture this network structure with a metric we call “mating assortment” that precisely and exhaustively captures the indirect as well as direct relationship between a male’s promiscuity and that of his sexual partners. We show that mating assortment is highly variable in nature and use simulations to reveal that such variation plays a key—but so far unappreciated—role in determining the strength of sexual selection on males. Our results provide a clear and quantitative method for studying sexual selection in the many mating systems in which both polygyny and polyandry co-occur.
Vocal similarity predicts the relative attraction of musical chords
Authors: Bowling Daniel L. , Purves Dale , Gill Kamraan Z.
Published: December 2017

Significance

The foundations of human music have long puzzled philosophers, mathematicians, psychologists, and neuroscientists. Although virtually all cultures uses combinations of tones as a basis for musical expression, why humans favor some tone combinations over others has been debated for millennia. Here we show that our attraction to specific tone combinations played simultaneously (chords) is predicted by their spectral similarity to voiced speech sounds. This connection between auditory aesthetics and a primary characteristic of vocalization adds to other evidence that tonal preferences arise from the biological advantages of social communication mediated by speech and language.
Direct electrical stimulation of the amygdala enhances declarative memory in humans
Authors: Inman Cory S. , Manns Joseph R. , Bijanki Kelly R. , Bass David I. , Hamann Stephan , Drane Daniel L. , Fasano Rebecca E. , Kovach Christopher K. , Gross Robert E. , Willie Jon T.
Published: December 2017

Significance

Memories for emotional events tend to persist, raising a fundamental question about how the brain prioritizes significant memories. Past studies have pointed to a central role for the amygdala in mediating this endogenous memory enhancement. However, the premise that the amygdala can causally enhance declarative memory has not been directly tested in humans. Here we show that brief electrical stimulation to the human amygdala can enhance declarative memory for specific images of neutral objects without eliciting a subjective emotional response, likely by engaging other memory-related brain regions. The results show the human amygdala has a general capacity to initiate enhancement of specific declarative memories rather than a narrower role limited to indirectly mediating emotional effects on memory.
Dissecting the genetic and metabolic mechanisms of adaptation to the knockout of a major metabolic enzyme in
Escherichia coli
Authors: Long Christopher P. , Gonzalez Jacqueline E. , Feist Adam M. , Palsson Bernhard O. , Antoniewicz Maciek R.
Published: December 2017

Significance

Understanding how microbes adapt to changing conditions is fundamental to biological science and engineering. For example, adaptation is a key driver of antimicrobial resistance, and adaptive laboratory evolution has become a key tool in biotechnology. Here, we present a comprehensive genetic and fluxomic analysis of 10 adaptively evolved
Escherichia coli
phosphoglucose isomerase (
pgi
) knockout strains. The loss of PGI, a key enzyme in glycolysis, results in massive redirection of carbon catabolic flux and reduction in growth rate. Adaptive evolution results in a 3.6-fold increase in growth rate, enabled by key mutations and metabolic flux rewiring. These include global transcriptional regulators, cofactor transhydrogenases, and the phosphotransferase system component
crr
. Overcoming key bottlenecks, rather than a broad metabolic response, is the dominant mechanism of adaptation.
Differential regulation of striatal motor behavior and related cellular responses by dopamine D2L and D2S isoforms
Authors: Radl Daniela , Chiacchiaretta Martina , Lewis Robert G. , Brami-Cherrier Karen , Arcuri Ludovico , Borrelli Emiliana
Published: December 2017

Significance

Dopamine signaling modulates important physiological functions such as reward and motor activity through activation of five different receptors. Dopamine D2 receptors (D2R) are critical in the control of motor behavior. D2Rs exist in two isoforms, a long (D2L) and a short (D2S), both expressed in dopamine neurons as well as in cells receiving dopaminergic afferents. Such diversity questions their individual contribution to presynaptic and postsynaptic events. Using isoform-specific knockout mice, we report that while either isoform can mediate the control of basal behaviors, upon pharmacological stimulation of the dopaminergic system, isoform-specific functions are observed at the behavioral and cellular levels. Therapeutic strategies targeting specific D2R isoforms may present treatment for ailments caused by the activation or blockade of both isoforms.
Synergistic anti-HCV broadly neutralizing human monoclonal antibodies with independent mechanisms
Authors: Mankowski Madeleine C. , Kinchen Valerie J. , Wasilewski Lisa N. , Flyak Andrew I. , Ray Stuart C. , Crowe James E. , Bailey Justin R.
Published: December 2017

Significance

More than 71 million people are infected with HCV, and eradication of this pandemic will likely require a vaccine. Induction of broadly neutralizing monoclonal antibodies (bNAbs) is a goal of vaccine development, but no single bNAb neutralizes all strains of HCV. Here, we measured neutralizing activity of 35 combinations of neutralizing monoclonal antibodies (NAbs), showing that some NAbs form combinations with greater neutralizing breadth than any individual bNAb. One combination was also exceptionally potent because it blocks virus binding to three different HCV receptors. These data suggest that full-length envelope protein might have an advantage as a vaccine antigen relative to truncated protein or single-epitope scaffolds, since it might induce combinations of NAbs that are synergistic, with complementary neutralizing breadth.
Impact of Market Forces on Addictive Substances and Behaviours
Authors: Miller David , Harkins Claire , Schlögl Matthias , Montague Brendan
Published: December 2017

This book examines the ‘web of influence’ formed by industries which manufacture and sell ‘addictive’ products in the EU. The differences between alcohol, food, gambling, and tobacco as consumer products are obvious. However, we explore whether food, alcohol, and gambling industries are merely replicating tobacco tactics or innovating in corporate strategy. Using a new data set on corporate networks formed by the tobacco, alcohol, food, and gambling industries at the EU level, the book shows the interlocking connections between corporations, trade associations, and policy intermediaries, including lobbyists and think tanks. Quantitative data guide qualitative studies on the content of corporate strategy and the attempts of corporations to ‘capture’ policy and three crucial ancillary domains—science, civil society, and the news and promotional media. The effects of these three arenas on policy networks and outcomes are examined with a focus on new forms of policy partnership such as corporate social responsibility and partnership governance. Drawing on our structural data, we show the comprehensive engagement of industry with science-policy issues in the EU, the ways that corporations can dominate agendas and decision making, as well as the potential for popular pressures and public health agendas to be effective. The book concludes by asking what solutions might be possible to the evident public health challenges posed by the addictions web of influence. It proposes key evidence-based transparency and public health reforms that have the best chance of minimizing the burden of disease from addictions in the medium to long term.
Manchuria in Modern East Asia, 1600s–1949
Authors: Shao Dan
Published: December 2017

Manchuria is an English geographical term that, in the past three centuries or so, has referred to the region that approximately overlaps the region of Northeast China (Liaoning, Jilin, and Heilongjiang provinces) in the People’s Republic of China. A scholar’s choice of using or rejecting this term might be associated with their understandings of the historical changes in the territoriality of this region. From the 17th century to the mid-20th century, different powers contested over this region, including different tribes of the Jurchens, before the Manchus founded the Qing Dynasty; Ming Dynasty and Qing Dynasty; the Russians and Japanese; the Republic of China Government and Warlord regime; Japan and China; as well as the Communist Party of China and the Nationalist Party of China. All these contestations redefined the relationship between this region and China Proper, reshaping the social orders, communal identities, and statehood of the local peoples. Located at the nexus of the modern history of multiple ethnic groups and states, studies of modern Manchuria often require scholars to take transnational approaches, or at the least to adopt cross-border perspectives.
The History of Angola
Authors: Ball Jeremy
Published: December 2017

Angola’s contemporary political boundaries resulted from 20th-century colonialism. The roots of Angola, however, reach far into the past. When Portuguese caravels arrived in the Congo River estuary in the late 15th century, independent African polities dotted this vast region. Some people lived in populous, hierarchical states such as the Kingdom of Kongo, but most lived in smaller political entities centered on lineage-village settlements. The Portuguese colony of Angola grew out of a settlement established at Luanda Bay in 1576. From its inception, Portuguese Angola existed to profit from the transatlantic slave trade, which became the colony’s economic foundation for the next three centuries. A Luso-African population and a creole culture developed in the colonial nuclei of Luanda and Benguela (founded 1617). The expansion of the colonial state into the interior occurred intermittently until the end of the 19th century, when Portuguese authorities initiated a series of wars of conquest that lasted up until the end of the First World War. During the 20th century, the colonial state consolidated military control over the whole territory, instituted an infrastructure of administration, and developed an economy of resource extraction. A nationalist sentiment developed among Luso-African thinkers in the early 20th century, and by the 1950s these ideas coalesced into a nationalist movement aimed at independence. Simultaneously, anticolonial movements developed among mission-educated elites in the Kikongo-speaking north and in the Umbundu-speaking central highlands. Portugal’s authoritarian New State leaders brutally suppressed these disparate nationalist movements during more than a decade of guerrilla war. A revolution in Portugal in 1974 ushered in negotiations leading to Angolan independence on November 11, 1975. Competing nationalist movements, bolstered by foreign intervention, refused to share governance and as a result plunged Angola into a brutal civil war that lasted until 2002.
Mahdist Omdurman
Authors: Kramer Robert S.
Published: December 2017

It is tempting to seek an auspicious beginning for the Sudanese city of Omdurman, given its eventual significance, but there is none to be found. From its humble origins as a watering place for local pastoralists on the west bank of the Nile, and a mere hamlet and waystation for travelers by the early 19th century, it grew rapidly in the 1880s into a crowded market center, an administrative capital, and even a holy city: all due to the tumultuous events of the Sudanese Mahdist movement (or Mahdiyyah) of 1881–1898. And while it was not the intention of Muhammad Ahmad al-Mahdi to found anything—he considered Omdurman just another “spot” (buq‘a) among the many he had camped at—the policies of his successor and the devotion of his followers enlarged and ennobled the place, transforming it into the dominant urban center of the Nilotic Sudan.

As a holy city, Omdurman can hardly be compared to such places as Jerusalem, Rome, or Mecca, with their centuries or even millennia of existence; and although it resembles Shaykh ‘Uthman dan Fodio’s city of Sokoto in northern Nigeria as the capital of an expansionist jihadist state, it also differs from it in some important ways. Ultimately, whether one considers its messianic or economic importance, its military or administrative functions, its planned or spontaneous origins, Omdurman is remarkable for becoming, in just over a decade’s time, one of the most important cities across Sudanic Africa. Moreover, the experience of the Sudanese people in so tribally and ethnically diverse an urban environment, under such concentrated and extreme conditions, both impelled by the policies of the state and inspired by fervent Mahdist belief, helped to accelerate ongoing social changes, which ultimately led to the formation of a more coherent national identity.
The Third Debate and Postpositivism
Authors: Balzacq Thierry , Baele Stéphane J.
Published: December 2017

International Relations (IR) theory has undergone a series of debates which have left profound changes on the discipline as a whole. These debates, though highly influential, have still caused some controversy among those in the field. Indeed, IR scholars have yet to reach a consensus as to the number of debates in IR, let alone whether or not the third debate should be recognized as part of that esteemed history, or, further still, whether or not the debates should remain part of IR discourse at all. The eclectic nature of the third debate, after all, makes it difficult to classify, as there are multiple definitions and accounts of what the third debate truly entails. The third debate originated in the 1980s, as a certain set of scholars attempted to open up the theoretical field of international relations to previously neglected viewpoints. These so-called “dissidents,” more specifically, had aimed to liberate the field from the neo-utilitarian tradition of thought. The epistemological-ontological common ground of traditional IR theories stands at the very center of dissidents’ attack, because of their commitment to undermine “foundationalist discourses.” Furthermore, the third debate is credited with the emergence of constructivism as a mainstream theory of IR, the opening up of IR to new objects and subfields, and the growth of critical approaches to IR.
Interdependence in International Organization and Global Governance
Authors: Coate Roger A. , Griffin Jeffrey A. , Elliott-Gower Steven
Published: December 2017

Interdependence is a key structural feature of the international system. While ambiguity exists over the concept and its usage, interdependence is central for explaining the nature and dynamics of international organization (IO), as well as international relations more broadly conceived. Interdependence involves interconnection/linkages among actors and systems of interrelationships of actors. Yet, interdependence means more than simple interconnectedness. It entails a relationship in which two or more parties are linked in a system of action in such a way that changes in one party impact in some meaningful way on the attainment of needs, values, and/or desired outcomes of the others. In other words, the satisfaction of each party’s needs and values is contingent to some degree on the behavior of others. The concept of interdependence is used in several areas. In general international systems, a system functions as a whole because of the interdependence of its parts. Interdependence also plays a significant role in Immanuel Wallenstein’s world-systems theory, as well as the closely related concept of dependency. Another important analytical thread in interdependence theorizing has been international integration, where the creation of cooperative transnational linkages for dealing with technical issues could result in a learning process that changed attitudes about cooperation. Finally, with interdependence as a core element, more systematic frameworks for analyzing and explaining the nature and role of transnational relations in world politics can be made.
World Trade Law
Authors: Froese Marc D.
Published: December 2017

After World War II, a body of rules and institutions have emerged for the purpose of regulating global flows of goods and services. These are known as world trade law, classified under international economic law, an expanding body of transnational regulatory treaties and institutions. World trade law has evolved within the global trading system following the Second World War, beginning with the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), which came into force in 1948. The most-favored nation and national treatment principles are the most prominent principles that give world trade law its distinctive form. The World Trade Organization (WTO) provides a vast store of literature, which covers the waterfront of legal and political issues that animate the global political economy of trade. The WTO’s predecessor, the GATT, also contributed extensively to the growing body of literature on world trade law. The WTO’s inclusion of agreements on the liberalization of services, investment, and intellectual property have begun lively debates about the possible trajectories of governance in new issue areas, such as anti-dumping and intellectual property rights. In addition to the issues raised by the inclusion of many small economies in the institutions of global trade governance, the rise of world trade law has simultaneously highlighted the many areas of importance to national publics in developed economies where trade overlaps with social priorities.
Conflict Escalation
Authors: Bösch Richard
Published: December 2017

Even though most conflicts in everyday life manifest themselves as cursory bagatelles, there are conflicts that end up in situations of organized, collective violence (e.g., armed conflict). To understand how trivial contradictions can become meaningful conflicts in a broader societal context, it is crucial to examine the process of conflict escalation. Conflict escalation can be understood as an intensification of a conflict with regard to the observed extent and the means used. An escalating conflict represents a developing social system in its own right, having the legitimization of violence as a key feature. Here, a broader social science perspective on the concept of conflict escalation is offered, outlining its intellectual history, explaining its major perspectives and current emphases, and exploring newer avenues in approaching social conflict.
Economics and Conflict: Moving Beyond Conjectures and Correlations
Authors: Schneider Gerald
Published: December 2017

The theoretical and empirical literature on the reciprocal topics of economy and war have developed a fertile debate. Most contributions examine the liberal hope that growing economic bonds between or within nations reduce the risk of violent conflict, while an increasing number of studies also examine the destructive and redistributive effect of war, terrorism, and genocides. Most studies in the field do not provide clear micro-foundations for the opportunity-cost arguments that are typically made to justify the deterring effects of increased economic interactions. To move the field forward, contributions need to focus more on how the relationship between business leaders and the government shapes decision-making in periods of crisis. Recent advances have been made to understand the economic impact of massive political violence that can be better understood through the use of temporally disaggregated data.
Ethics of Peacebuilding
Authors: Neufeldt Reina C.
Published: December 2017

The proliferation of international peacebuilding practice in the 2000s was accompanied by a series of questions that has produced a significant body of writing about peacebuilding ethics within International Relations. This growing body of literature has produced questions, debates and theoretical positions. As explored below, a limited set of meta-ethics considerations provide the foundation for normative theorizing, particularly the moral objectivist commitment to positive peace. The majority of theorizing is situated among normative ethics debates. These works respond to the questions: Who has agency or who ought to have agency in peacebuilding? What ends should peacebuilding pursue? And, what means will ensure that peacebuilding is done right? The related literature focuses on a broad range of conditions, from individuals working for nongovernmental organizations to state- and United Nations–sponsored interventions. It includes authors who write from cosmopolitan, consequentialist, postcolonial, virtue, critical, feminist, and Foucaultian perspectives, among others. Finally, there is nascent work in descriptive and applied ethics.

Peacebuilding efforts to rebuild relationships and structures during and after conflict, violence and war present a series of ethical questions and challenges for international and national actors. Should the international community engage in peacebuilding? To what extent? Who ought to be involved? What constitutes good ends for peacebuilding? How can peacebuilding be done right? These questions identify the ways in which peacebuilding has been morally interrogated since its rise in prominence as a form of international intervention in the 1990s. The history of peacebuilding and peacebuilding meta-ethics must be considered with a view toward current normative ethics debates involving agency as well as the ends and means in peacebuilding.
Intelligence and Terrorism
Authors: Dahl Erik J. , Viola David
Published: December 2017

Intelligence scholars and practitioners have analyzed the challenges terrorism presents for intelligence organizations and have debated how intelligence analysts and agencies can best respond to the challenge. The literature on intelligence and terrorism changed following the 9/11 attacks; three schools of thought emerged. Although a large body of literature has developed in recent years, a number of important areas remain in which further research is needed.
Interdisciplinarity: Its Meaning and Consequences
Authors: Miller Raymond C.
Published: December 2017

Interdisciplinarity is an analytically reflective study of the methodological, theoretical, and institutional implications of implementing interdisciplinary approaches to teaching and research. Interdisciplinary approaches in the social sciences began in the 1920s. At a minimum, they involve the application of insights and perspectives from more than one conventional discipline to the understanding of social phenomena. The formal concept of interdisciplinarity entered the literature in the early 1970s. The scholars responsible all shared the thought that the scientific enterprise had become less effective due to disciplinary fragmentation and that a countermovement for the unification of knowledge was the proper response. However, not all interdisciplinarians believe that the unification of existing knowledge is the answer.

There are many ways of differentiating between types of interdisciplinary approaches. One classification distinguishes between multidisciplinary, crossdisciplinary, and transdisciplinary approaches. Multidisciplinary approaches involve the simple act of juxtaposing parts of several conventional disciplines in an effort to get a broader understanding of some common theme or problem. Crossdisciplinary approaches involve real interaction across the conventional disciplines, though the extent of communication; thus, combination, synthesis, or integration of concepts and/or methods vary considerably. Transdisciplinary approaches, meanwhile, involve articulated conceptual frameworks that seek to transcend the more limited world views of the specialized conventional disciplines. Even though many believe that interdisciplinary efforts can create innovative knowledge, the power structure of the disciplinary academy resists interdisciplinary inroads on its authority and resources.
International Organization and Health/Disease
Authors: Lee Kelley , Smith Julia
Published: December 2017

Human history has been shaped by shifting patterns of health and disease. Many of the factors influencing those patterns have spanned national borders, such as human and animal migration, armed conflict, colonization, trade and investment, globalization, and environmental change. International studies scholars’ interest in health and disease has slowly evolved over time. After World War II, international health cooperation was accepted as a key function of the United Nations system, with the creation of the World Health Organization (WHO). However, health was deemed a largely technical field, alongside the activities of international health organizations. The limited scholarship produced during the postwar period was largely descriptive of technical and legal issues. It was not until the 1970s, when debates emerged about the appropriate forms of health development assistance, concerns about large commercial interests, and the role of WHO, that scholars began considering the politics of international health cooperation. The Declaration of Alma Ata on Health for All, Essential Drugs List, and International Code of Marketing of Breast Milk Substitutes were expressions of discontent in international health with a status quo perpetuating inequality among states. These initiatives then spurred accusations of “politicization” of WHO’s technical mandate, accompanied by the freezing of the organization’s budget. The study of international organizations and health began to apply critical theoretical approaches, locating health and disease within the liberal world order. From the 1990s onward, the proliferation of new institutional arrangements for international health cooperation prompted studies of this increasingly complex landscape. The term “global health” was coined to reflect the interplay of state and nonstate actors amid globalization, alongside the concept of global health governance (GHG). This encouraged scholarly exchange across international studies, social policy, law, and anthropology. International organizations with health-related impacts, such as the World Trade Organization, and powerful nonstate actors, such as foundations and commercial interests, were incorporated into GHG scholarship. Concurrently, new theoretical approaches to understanding collective action for global health emerged, notably realist notions of global health security, and social constructivist approaches to the framing of problems and solutions. Major disease outbreaks since the early 2000s, including SARS in 2003–2004, Ebola virus in West Africa in 2014–2015, and COVID-19 since 2020, have intensified scrutiny of GHG. The sharp rise in noncommunicable diseases alongside the globalization of market capitalism also drew growing attention. Amid renewed debate about WHO reform, analyses have focused on the lack of coherence among global health actors, weakness of legal and ethical frameworks for collective action, and inadequacy of resources.
Inter-Organizational Relations: Five Theoretical Approaches
Authors: Franke Ulrich
Published: December 2017

The number of organizations involved in world politics has long been increasing and so has, consequently, the number of relations among them. For scholars of international studies, it is of central importance to examine these inter-organizational relations. The state-centrism in international relations, however, impeded the discipline’s engagement with this phenomenon for some decades. It was only in the mid-2000s that this began to change. Since then, the study of inter-organizational relations in world politics has mostly drawn on five theoretical approaches: sociological neo-institutionalism, resource dependence, network accounts, regime complexity, and classical pragmatism. These approaches will be introduced; for the sake of comparability, all five are presented in the same way, by carving out their theoretical tradition and key concepts, their core argument and causal logic, as well as their understandings of organizations and how they relate. Each presentation offers a brief look at how the respective approach has been applied.
Black Women and Beauty Culture in 20th-Century America
Authors: Craig Maxine Leeds
Published: December 2017

Black beauty culture developed in the context of widespread disparagement of black men and women in images produced by whites, and black women’s exclusion from mainstream cultural institutions, such as beauty contests, which defined beauty standards on a national scale. Though mainstream media rarely represented black women as beautiful, black women’s beauty was valued within black communities. Moreover many black women used cosmetics, hair products and styling, and clothing to meet their communities’ standards for feminine appearance. At the beginning of the 20th century, the black press, which included newspapers, general magazines, and women’s magazines, showcased the beauty of black women. As early as the 1890s, black communities organized beauty contests that celebrated black women’s beauty and served as fora for debating definitions of black beauty. Still, generally, but not always, the black press and black women’s beauty pageants favored women with lighter skin tones, and many cosmetics firms that marketed to black women sold skin lighteners. The favoring of light skin was nonetheless debated and contested within black communities, especially during periods of heightened black political activism. In the 1910s and 1920s and later in the 1960s and 1970s, social movements fostered critiques of black aesthetics and beauty practices deemed Eurocentric. One focus of criticism was the widespread black practice of hair straightening—a critique that has produced an enduring association between hairstyles perceived as natural and racial pride. In the last decades of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st, African migration and the transnational dissemination of information via the internet contributed to a creative proliferation of African American hairstyles. While such styles display hair textures associated with African American hair, and are celebrated as natural hairstyles, they generally require the use of hair products and may incorporate synthetic hair extensions.

Beauty culture provided an important vehicle for African American entrepreneurship at a time when racial discrimination barred black women from other opportunities and most national cosmetics companies ignored black women. Black women’s beauty-culture business activities included beauticians who provided hair care in home settings and the extremely successful nationwide and international brand of hair- and skin-care products developed in the first two decades of the 20th century by Madam C. J. Walker. Hair-care shops provided important places for sharing information and community organizing. By the end of the 20th century, a few black-owned hair-care and cosmetics companies achieved broad markets and substantial profitability, but most declined or disappeared as they faced increased competition from or were purchased by larger white-owned corporations.
Irish American Working Class
Authors: Brundage David
Published: December 2017

Between the 1790s and the 1990s, the Irish American population grew from some 500,000 to nearly 40 million. Part of this growth was due to immigration, especially in the years of the Great Irish Famine, though significant emigration from Ireland both preceded and followed the famine decade of 1846–1855. For much of this 200-year period, Irish-born men and women and their descendants were heavily concentrated in working-class occupations and urban communities. Especially in the years around the opening of the 20th century, Irish Catholic immigrants and their descendants put a distinctive stamp on both the American labor movement and urban working-class culture and politics as a whole. Their outsized influence diminished somewhat over the course of the 20th century, but the American Irish continued to occupy key leadership positions in the U.S. labor movement, the Democratic Party, and the American Catholic Church, even as the working-class members or constituents of these institutions became increasingly ethnically diverse. The experience of Irish American working people thus constitutes an important dimension of a larger story—that of the American working class as a whole.
Latin America and Antarctica
Authors: Howkins Adrian
Published: December 2017

Since the early 19th century, a number of Latin American countries have had active interests in the Antarctic continent. These interests began to accelerate in the early 20th century, and during the 1930s and 1940s, Argentina and Chile formalized sovereignty claims to the Antarctic Peninsula region. These claims overlapped not only with each other, but also with Great Britain’s claim to the “Falkland Islands Dependencies.” The two Latin American claims tended to be framed in the language of anti-imperialism, and for a while at least the idea of a “South American Antarctica” emerged to suggest a common front against the British Empire. Rivalry between Argentina and Chile, however, remained strong, and the alliance against imperialism never developed into a lasting agreement. In 1959, Argentina and Chile joined with ten other nations—including Great Britain, the United States, and the Soviet Union—in signing the Antarctic Treaty. This Treaty suspended sovereignty claims and created a “continent dedicated to peace and science.” Following the ratification of the Treaty in 1961, Argentina and Chile lessened their hostility to the imperial strategy of using scientific research as a justification for political claims, and came to be enthusiastic members of what some outsiders labeled an “exclusive club.” During the 1980s and early 1990s, four other Latin American nations—Brazil, Uruguay, Peru, and Ecuador—became full members of the Antarctic Treaty, attracted, in part, by the prospect of sharing in a potential minerals bonanza in the southern continent. This expected economic boom never came, however, and instead the Antarctic continent became one of the most protected environments anywhere on the planet by the terms of the 1991 Madrid Environmental Protocol.
building techniques and materials, Roman
Authors: Ulrich Roger B.
Published: December 2017

The inherent strengths, weaknesses, and availability of diverse Roman building materials governed the techniques used in construction and greatly influenced the final appearance of Roman architecture. Trace archaeological evidence exists of buildings and burials in Rome from the Italian Bronze Age (second millennium bce) or earlier, and substantial physical remains, in the form of Iron-Age huts and grave goods, roughly correspond to the Romans’ own belief of the foundation date of their city (traditionally 753 bce). Rome’s earliest builders sourced materials obtainable from the immediate environment and transformed them using practical knowledge. Within the span of a couple centuries, architectural design, implementation, and decoration reflect a broad interaction between Roman builders and their counterparts in the regions around central Italy (particularly Etruria to the north and Campania to the south) and also the wider Mediterranean world, particularly those areas where Greeks traditionally lived or had placed colonies. While southern Italy and Sicily represent the closest areas for the transmission of Greek ideas, Greek building practices on the Greek mainland and in Asia Minor also influenced Roman projects from the Archaic period onwards. As Rome grew wealthier and expanded abroad, patrons and builders imported marble to the capital from the Aegean, well before the discovery of more local, Italian sources. The importation of exotic stones grew exponentially over the period of the late Republic and the first two centuries of empire. The coloured marbles that embellished the buildings of Rome served as physical testimony to Rome’s control over the eastern Mediterranean. Nothing, however, was as transformative as the adoption of concrete in the late 3rd century bce, the mass production of fired brick, and the ensuing experimentation that resulted in the vaulted structures that have become the hallmark of Roman architecture.
Gold Tablets
Authors: Graf Fritz
Published: December 2017

Gold Tablets is the collective name for a more or less coherent group of about thirty Greek texts, written on very thin and small gold foil and placed on the body of a deceased; they come from all over the Greek world and date between the late 5th century BCE and the 2nd century CE, with a peak in Hellenistic times. Originally, they were connected with Orphism, then with Pythagoreanism or, more convincingly, with the mystery cult of Dionysus; recent finds however have demonstrated the problematic nature of a narrow definition of their religious affiliation. The article discusses the various forms of these texts, their religious function and the history of scholarship about them.
Exoskeletal Versus Endoskeletal Approaches in Morphology
Authors: Acedo-Matellán Víctor
Published: December 2017

A fundamental difference in theoretical models of morphology and, particularly, of the syntax–morphology interface is that between endoskeletal and exoskeletal approaches. In the former, more traditional, endoskeletal approaches, open-class lexical items like cat or sing are held to be inherently endowed with a series of formal features that determine the properties of the linguistic expressions in which they appear. In the latter, more recent, exoskeletal approaches, it is rather the morphosyntactic configurations, independently produced by the combination of abstract functional elements, that determine those properties. Lexical items, in this latter approach, are part of the structure but, crucially, do not determine it.

Conceptually, although a correlation is usually made between endoskeletalism and lexicalism/projectionism, on the one hand, and between exoskeletalism and (neo)constructionism, on the other, things are actually more complicated, and some frameworks exist that seem to challenge those correlations, in particular when the difference between word and morpheme is taken into account.

Empirically, the difference between these two approaches to morphology and the morphology-syntax interface comes to light when one examines how each one treats a diversity of word-related phenomena: morphosyntactic category and category shift in derivational processes, inflectional class, nominal properties like mass or count, and verbal properties like agentivity and (a)telicity.
VaDiR: an integrated approach to Variant Detection in RNA
Authors: Neums Lisa , Suenaga Seiji , Beyerlein Peter , Anders Sara , Koestler Devin , Mariani Andrea , Chien Jeremy
Published: December 2017

Background

Advances in next-generation DNA sequencing technologies are now enabling detailed characterization of sequence variations in cancer genomes. With whole-genome sequencing, variations in coding and non-coding sequences can be discovered. But the cost associated with it is currently limiting its general use in research. Whole-exome sequencing is used to characterize sequence variations in coding regions, but the cost associated with capture reagents and biases in capture rate limit its full use in research. Additional limitations include uncertainty in assigning the functional significance of the mutations when these mutations are observed in the non-coding region or in genes that are not expressed in cancer tissue.

Results

We investigated the feasibility of uncovering mutations from expressed genes using RNA sequencing datasets with a method called Variant Detection in RNA(VaDiR) that integrates 3 variant callers, namely: SNPiR, RVBoost, and MuTect2. The combination of all 3 methods, which we called Tier 1 variants, produced the highest precision with true positive mutations from RNA-seq that could be validated at the DNA level. We also found that the integration of Tier 1 variants with those called by MuTect2 and SNPiR produced the highest recall with acceptable precision. Finally, we observed a higher rate of mutation discovery in genes that are expressed at higher levels.

Conclusions

Our method, VaDiR, provides a possibility of uncovering mutations from RNA sequencing datasets that could be useful in further functional analysis. In addition, our approach allows orthogonal validation of DNA-based mutation discovery by providing complementary sequence variation analysis from paired RNA/DNA sequencing datasets.