cometadata/datacite-rtg-text-other-reclassification-records huggingface dataset:
The intentionality of smell
Creators: name: Lycan, William G.
Publisher: name: The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill University Libraries
Year: 2014

description: If any sense modality represents, vision does, but argument is needed to show that smell does. This paper rebuts two reasons for doubting that smell represents, and offers several arguments that it does. The paper then considers several recent proposals as to exactly what a smell represents, and defends a version of the author's original proposal—that a smell represents a miasma in the air—against its competitors.
Soft Skills : clarification d'un concept à l'ère du temps
Creators: name: Najeddine Majida
Publisher: name: Zenodo
Year: 2023

description: Les soft skills est un terme de plus en plus utilisé pour parler de tout ce qui n'est pas de l'ordre de la technique. Il prend une place de plus en plus importante sur le plan académique et dans le milieu professionnel. Or, plusieurs termes sont utilisés pour en parler et plusieurs définitions sont données par les professionnels ou par les chercheurs. Or, il n'existe aucun consensus ni sur le terme ni sur la définition. Nous nous proposons de faire un état des lieux de ce concept afin d'en clarifier la signification. Nous commencerons par une clarification des concepts associés à savoir la compétence et la performance avant de voir ce que recouvre vraiment le concept de soft skills.
Examining the Dynamic Structure of Daily Internalizing and Externalizing Behavior at Multiple Levels of Analysis
Creators: name: Wright, Aidan G. C.
name: Simms, Leonard J.
name: Gates, Kathleen M.
name: Molenaar, Peter C. M.
name: Beltz, Adriene M.
Publisher: name: The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill University Libraries
Year: 2015

description: Psychiatric diagnostic covariation suggests that the underlying structure of psychopathology is not one of circumscribed disorders. Quantitative modeling of individual differences in diagnostic patterns has uncovered several broad domains of mental disorder liability, of which the Internalizing and Externalizing spectra have garnered the greatest support. These dimensions have generally been estimated from lifetime or past-year comorbidity patters, which are distal from the covariation of symptoms and maladaptive behavior that ebb and flow in daily life. In this study, structural models are applied to daily diary data (Median = 94 days) of maladaptive behaviors collected from a sample (N = 101) of individuals diagnosed with personality disorders (PDs). Using multilevel and unified structural equation modeling, between-person, within-person, and person-specific structures were estimated from 16 behaviors that are encompassed by the Internalizing and Externalizing spectra. At the between-person level (i.e., individual differences in average endorsement across days) we found support for a two-factor Internalizing–Externalizing model, which exhibits significant associations with corresponding diagnostic spectra. At the within-person level (i.e., dynamic covariation among daily behavior pooled across individuals) we found support for a more differentiated, four-factor, Negative Affect-Detachment-Hostility-Disinhibition structure. Finally, we demonstrate that the person-specific structures of associations between these four domains are highly idiosyncratic.
Analysis of the compressible, isotropic, neo-Hookean hyperelastic model
Creators: name: Kossa, Attila
name: Valentine, Megan T.
name: McMeeking, Robert M.
Publisher: name: Dordrecht [u.a.] : Springer Science + Business Media B.V
Year: 2023
Subjects: subject: Compressibility
subject: Constitutive model
subject: Hyperelasticity
subject: Material modeling
subject: Neo-Hookean
subject: 600

description: The most widely-used representation of the compressible, isotropic, neo-Hookean hyperelastic model is considered in this paper. The version under investigation is that which is implemented in the commercial finite element software ABAQUS, ANSYS and COMSOL. Transverse stretch solutions are obtained for the following homogeneous deformations: uniaxial loading, equibiaxial loading in plane stress, and uniaxial loading in plane strain. The ground-state Poisson’s ratio is used to parameterize the constitutive model, and stress solutions are computed numerically for the physically permitted range of its values. Despite its broad application to a number of engineering problems, the physical limitations of the model, particularly in the small to moderate stretch regimes, are not explored. In this work, we describe and analyze results and make some critical observations, underlining the model’s advantages and limitations. For example, a snap-back feature of the transverse stretch is identified in uniaxial compression, a physically undesirable behavior unless validated by experimental data. The domain of this non-unique solution is determined in terms of the ground-state Poisson’s ratio and the state of stretch and stress. The analyses we perform are essential to enable the understanding of the characteristics of the standard, compressible, isotropic, neo-Hookean model used in ABAQUS, ANSYS and COMSOL. In addition, our results provide a framework for the parameter-fitting procedure needed to characterize this standard, compressible, isotropic neo-Hookean model in terms of experimental data.
A Criticism of the Current Security, Privacy and Accountability Issues in Electronic Health Records
Creators: name: Omotosho, Adebayo
name: Emuoyibofarhe, Justice
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2015
Subjects: subject: Cryptography and Security (cs.CR)
subject: Computers and Society (cs.CY)
subject: FOS: Computer and information sciences

description: Cryptography has been widely accepted for security and partly for privacy control as discovered from past works. However, many of these works did not provide a way to manage cryptographic keys effectively especially in EHR applications, as this is the Achilles heel of cryptographic techniques currently proposed. The issue of accountability for legitimate users also has not been so popular and only a few considered it in EHR. Unless a different approach is used, the reliant on cryptography and password or escrow based system for key management will impede trust of the system and hence its acceptability. Also users with right access should also be monitored without affecting the clinician workflow. This paper presents a detailed review of some selected recent approaches to ensuring security, privacy and accountability in EHR and gaps for future research were also identified.
description: published (2014)
A Comparison of Classifiers in Performing Speaker Accent Recognition Using MFCCs
Creators: name: Ma, Zichen
name: Fokoue, Ernest
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2015
Subjects: subject: Sound (cs.SD)
subject: Applications (stat.AP)
subject: FOS: Computer and information sciences
subject: 62H25, 62H30

description: An algorithm involving Mel-Frequency Cepstral Coefficients (MFCCs) is provided to perform signal feature extraction for the task of speaker accent recognition. Then different classifiers are compared based on the MFCC feature. For each signal, the mean vector of MFCC matrix is used as an input vector for pattern recognition. A sample of 330 signals, containing 165 US voice and 165 non-US voice, is analyzed. By comparison, k-nearest neighbors yield the highest average test accuracy, after using a cross-validation of size 500, and least time being used in the computation
description: 9 pages, 7 figures
Tensor Hierarchy and Generalized Cartan Calculus in SL(3)$\times$SL(2) Exceptional Field Theory
Creators: name: Hohm, Olaf
name: Wang, Yi-Nan
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2015
Subjects: subject: High Energy Physics - Theory (hep-th)
subject: Mathematical Physics (math-ph)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: We construct exceptional field theory for the duality group SL(3)$\times$SL(2). The theory is defined on a space with 8 `external' coordinates and 6 `internal' coordinates in the $(3,2)$ fundamental representation, leading to a 14-dimensional generalized spacetime. The bosonic theory is uniquely determined by gauge invariance under generalized external and internal diffeomorphisms. The latter invariance can be made manifest by introducing higher form gauge fields and a so-called tensor hierarchy, which we systematically develop to much higher degree than in previous studies. To this end we introduce a novel Cartan-like tensor calculus based on a covariant nil-potent differential, generalizing the exterior derivative of conventional differential geometry. The theory encodes the full $D=11$ or type IIB supergravity, respectively.
description: 49 pages
Increased reward value of non-social stimuli in children and adolescents with autism
Creators: name: Watson, Karli K.
name: Dichter, Gabriel S.
name: Sabatino-DiCrisco, Antoinette
name: Damiano, Cara R.
name: Sasson, Noah J.
name: Turner-Brown, Lauren
name: Hannah, Eleanor
name: Platt, Michael L.
name: Kovac, Megan
name: Miller, Stephanie
Publisher: name: The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill University Libraries
Year: 2015

description: An econometric choice task was used to estimate the implicit reward value of social and non-social stimuli related to restricted interests in children and adolescents with (n = 12) and without (n = 22) autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Mixed effects logistic regression analyses revealed that groups differed in valuation of images related to restricted interests: control children were indifferent to cash payouts to view these images, but children with ASD were willing to receive less cash payout to view these images. Groups did not differ in valuation of social images or non-social images not related to restricted interests. Results highlight that motivational accounts of ASD should also consider the reward value of non-social stimuli related to restricted interests in ASD (Dichter and Adolphs, 2012).
Spectroscopic Evidence for Strong Quantum Spin Fluctuations with Itinerant Character in YFe2Ge2
Creators: name: Sirica, N.
name: Bondino, F.
name: Nappini, S.
name: Píš, I.
name: Poudel, L.
name: Christianson, A. D.
name: Mandrus, D.
name: Singh, D. J.
name: Mannella, N.
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2015
Subjects: subject: Superconductivity (cond-mat.supr-con)
subject: Strongly Correlated Electrons (cond-mat.str-el)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: We report x-ray absorption and photoemission spectroscopy of the electronic structure in the normal state of metallic YFe2Ge2. The data reveal evidence for large fluctuating spin moments on the Fe sites, as indicated by exchange multiplets appearing in the Fe 3s core level photoemission spectra, even though the compound does not show magnetic order. The magnitude of the multiplet splitting is comparable to that observed in the normal state of the Fe-pnictide superconductors. This shows a connection between YFe2Ge2 and the Fe-based superconductors even though it contains neither pnictogens nor chalcogens. The implication is that the chemical range of compounds showing at least one of the characteristic magnetic signatures of the Fe-based superconductors is broader than previously thought.
description: To appear
Additional file 1: of PROtective Ventilation with a low versus high Inspiratory Oxygen fraction (PROVIO) and its effects on postoperative pulmonary complications: protocol for a randomized controlled trial
Creators: name: Li, Xue-Fei
name: Jiang, Dan
name: Jiang, Yu-Lian
name: Yu, Hong
name: Jiang, Jia-Li
name: He, Lei-Lei
name: Yang, Xiao-Yun
name: Yu, Hai
Publisher: name: figshare
Year: 2019
Subjects: subject: Medicine
subject: Physiology
subject: FOS: Biological sciences
subject: Cancer
subject: Science Policy
subject: 111714 Mental Health
subject: FOS: Health sciences

description: Standard Protocol Items: Recommendations for Interventional Trials (SPIRIT) Checklist for the protocol of a clinical trial. (DOCX 25 kb)
KOI-3158: The oldest known system of terrestrial-size planets
Creators: name: Campante, T. L.
name: Barclay, T.
name: Swift, J. J.
name: Huber, D.
name: Adibekyan, V. Zh.
name: Cochran, W.
name: Burke, C. J.
name: Isaacson, H.
name: Quintana, E. V.
name: Davies, G. R.
name: Aguirre, V. Silva
name: Ragozzine, D.
name: Riddle, R.
name: Baranec, C.
name: Basu, S.
name: Chaplin, W. J.
name: Christensen-Dalsgaard, J.
name: Metcalfe, T. S.
name: Bedding, T. R.
name: Handberg, R.
name: Stello, D.
name: Brewer, J. M.
name: Hekker, S.
name: Karoff, C.
name: Kolbl, R.
name: Law, N. M.
name: Lundkvist, M.
name: Miglio, A.
name: Rowe, J. F.
name: Santos, N. C.
name: Van Laerhoven, C.
name: Arentoft, T.
name: Elsworth, Y. P.
name: Fischer, D. A.
name: Kawaler, S. D.
name: Kjeldsen, H.
name: Lund, M. N.
name: Marcy, G. W.
name: Sousa, S. G.
name: Sozzetti, A.
name: White, T. R.
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2015
Subjects: subject: Earth and Planetary Astrophysics (astro-ph.EP)
subject: Solar and Stellar Astrophysics (astro-ph.SR)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: The first discoveries of exoplanets around Sun-like stars have fueled efforts to find ever smaller worlds evocative of Earth and other terrestrial planets in the Solar System. While gas-giant planets appear to form preferentially around metal-rich stars, small planets (with radii less than four Earth radii) can form under a wide range of metallicities. This implies that small, including Earth-size, planets may have readily formed at earlier epochs in the Universe's history when metals were far less abundant. We report Kepler spacecraft observations of KOI-3158, a metal-poor Sun-like star from the old population of the Galactic thick disk, which hosts five planets with sizes between Mercury and Venus. We used asteroseismology to directly measure a precise age of 11.2+/-1.0 Gyr for the host star, indicating that KOI-3158 formed when the Universe was less than 20% of its current age and making it the oldest known system of terrestrial-size planets. We thus show that Earth-size planets have formed throughout most of the Universe's 13.8-billion-year history, providing scope for the existence of ancient life in the Galaxy.
description: Submitted to EPJ Web of Conferences, to appear in the Proceedings of the 3rd CoRoT Symposium, Kepler KASC7 joint meeting; 4 pages, 1 figure
Investigating the shape bias in typically developing children and children with autism spectrum disorders
Creators: name: Potrzeba, Emily R.
name: Naigles, Letitia
name: Fein, Deborah
Publisher: name: The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill University Libraries
Year: 2015

description: Young typically developing (TD) children have been observed to utilize word learning strategies such as the noun bias and shape bias; these improve their efficiency in acquiring and categorizing novel terms. Children using the shape bias extend object labels to new objects of the same shape; thus, the shape bias prompts the categorization of object words based on the global characteristic of shape over local, discrete details. Individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) frequently attend to minor details of objects rather than their global structure. Therefore, children with ASD may not use shape bias to acquire new words. Previous research with children with ASD has provided evidence that they parallel TD children in showing a noun bias, but not a shape bias (Tek et al., 2008). However, this sample was small and individual and item differences were not investigated in depth. In an extension of Tek et al. (2008) with twice the sample size and a wider developmental timespan, we tested 32 children with ASD and 35 TD children in a longitudinal study across 20 months using the intermodal preferential looking paradigm. Children saw five triads of novel objects (target, shape-match, color-match) in both NoName and Name trials; those who looked longer at the shape-match during the Name trials than the NoName trials demonstrated a shape bias. The TD group showed a significant shape bias at all visits, beginning at 20 months of age while the language-matched ASD group did not show a significant shape bias at any visit. Within the ASD group, though, some children did show a shape bias; these children had larger vocabularies concurrently and longitudinally. Degree of shape bias elicitation varied by item, but did not seem related to perceptual complexity. We conclude that shape does not appear to be an organizing factor for word learning by children with ASD.
Levels of attention and task difficulty in the modulation of interval duration mismatch negativity
Creators: name: Campbell, Alana M.
name: Davalos, Deana B.
Publisher: name: The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill University Libraries
Year: 2015

description: Time perception has been described as a fundamental skill needed to engage in a number of higher level cognitive processes essential to successfully navigate everyday life (e.g., planning, sequencing, etc.) Temporal processing is often thought of as a basic neural process that impacts a variety of other cognitive processes. Others, however, have argued that timing in the brain can be affected by a number of variables such as attention and motivation. In an effort to better understand timing in the brain at a basic level with minimal attentional demands, researchers have often employed use of the mismatch negativity (MMN). MMN, specifically duration MMN (dMMN) and interval MMN (iMMN) have been popular methods for studying temporal processing in populations for which attention or motivation may be an issue (e.g., clinical populations, early developmental studies). There are, however, select studies which suggest that attention may in fact modify both temporal processing in general and the MMN event-related potential. It is unclear the degree to which attention affects MMN or whether the effects differ depending on the complexity or difficulty of the MMN paradigm. The iMMN indexes temporal processing and is elicited by introducing a deviant interval duration amid a series of standards. A greater degree of difference in the deviant from the standard elicits a heightened iMMN. Unlike past studies, in which attention was intentionally directed toward a closed-captioned move, the current study had participants partake in tasks involving varying degrees of attention (passive, low, and high) with varying degrees of deviants (small, medium, and large) to better understand the role of attention on the iMMN and to assess whether level of attention paired with changes in task difficulty differentially influence the iMMN electrophysiological responses. Data from 19 subjects were recorded in an iMMN paradigm. The amplitude of the iMMN waveform showed an increase with attention, particularly for intervals that were the most distinct from a standard interval (p < 0.02). Results suggest that the role of attention on the iMMN is complex. Both the degree of attention paid as well as the level of difficulty of the MMN task likely influence the neuronal response within a timing network. These results suggest that electrophysiological perception of time is modified by attention and that the design of the iMMN study is critical to minimize the possible confounding effects of attention. In addition, the implications of these results for future studies assessing interval duration-based MMN in clinical populations is also addressed.
Nanotechnology: a slightly different history
Creators: name: Schulz, Peter
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2015
Subjects: subject: History and Philosophy of Physics (physics.hist-ph)
subject: Physics and Society (physics.soc-ph)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: Many introductory articles and books about nanotechnology have been written to disseminate this apparently new technology, which investigate and manipulates matter at dimension of a billionth of a meter. However, these texts show in general a common feature: there is very little about the origins of this multidisciplinary field. If anything is mentioned at all, a few dates, facts and characters are reinforced, which under the scrutiny of a careful historical digging do not sustain as really founding landmarks of the field. Nevertheless, in spite of these flaws, such historical narratives bring up important elements to understand and contextualize this human endeavor, as well as the corresponding dissemination among the public: would nanotechnology be a cultural imperative?
description: Originally published in Portuguese as a diffusion of Science article
Maladaptive autonomic regulation in PTSD accelerates physiological aging
Creators: name: Lamb, Damon G.
name: Williamson, John B.
name: Porges, Stephen W.
name: Porges, Eric C.
Publisher: name: The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill University Libraries
Year: 2015

description: A core manifestation of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a disconnection between physiological state and psychological or behavioral processes necessary to adequately respond to environmental demands. Patients with PTSD experience abnormal oscillations in autonomic states supporting either fight and flight behaviors or withdrawal, immobilization, and dissociation without an intervening “calm” state that would provide opportunities for positive social interactions. This defensive autonomic disposition is adaptive in dangerous and life threatening situations, but in the context of every-day life may lead to significant psychosocial distress and deteriorating social relationships. The perpetuation of these maladaptive autonomic responses may contribute to the development of comorbid mental health issues such as depression, loneliness, and hostility that further modify the nature of cardiovascular behavior in the context of internal and external stressors. Over time, changes in autonomic, endocrine, and immune function contribute to deteriorating health, which is potently expressed in brain dysfunction and cardiovascular disease. In this theoretical review paper, we present an overview of the literature on the chronic health effects of PTSD. We discuss the brain networks underlying PTSD in the context of autonomic efferent and afferent contributions and how disruption of these networks leads to poor health outcomes. Finally, we discuss treatment approaches based on our theoretical model of PTSD.
Molecules as magnetic probes of starspots
Creators: name: Afram, Nadine
name: Berdyugina, Svetlana V.
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2015
Subjects: subject: Solar and Stellar Astrophysics (astro-ph.SR)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: Stellar dynamo processes can be explored by measuring the magnetic field. This is usually obtained using the atomic and molecular Zeeman effect in spectral lines. While the atomic Zeeman effect can only access warmer regions, the use of molecular lines is of advantage for studying cool objects. The molecules MgH, TiO, CaH, and FeH are suited to probe stellar magnetic fields, each one for a different range of spectral types, by considering the signal that is obtained from modeling various spectral types. We have analyzed the usefulness of different molecules (MgH, TiO, CaH, and FeH) as diagnostic tools for studying stellar magnetism on active G-K-M dwarfs. We investigate the temperature range in which the selected molecules can serve as indicators for magnetic fields on highly active cool stars and present synthetic Stokes profiles for the modeled spectral type. We modeled a star with a spot size of 10% of the stellar disk and a spot comprising either only longitudinal or only transverse magnetic fields and estimated the strengths of the polarization Stokes V and Q signals for the molecules MgH, TiO, CaH, and FeH. We combined various photosphere and spot models according to realistic scenarios. In G dwarfs, the molecules MgH and FeH show overall the strongest Stokes V and Q signals from the starspot, whereas FeH has a stronger Stokes V signal in all G dwarfs, with a spot temperature of 3800K. In K dwarfs, CaH signals are generally stronger, and the TiO signature is most prominent in M dwarfs. Modeling synthetic polarization signals from starspots for a range of G-K-M dwarfs leads to differences in the prominence of various molecular signatures in different wavelength regions, which helps to efficiently select targets and exposure times for observations.
description: 9 pages, 5 figures, 1 table
BEACH 2014 Theory Summary
Creators: name: Jäger, Sebastian
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2015
Subjects: subject: High Energy Physics - Phenomenology (hep-ph)
subject: High Energy Physics - Experiment (hep-ex)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: I summarize key aspects of the quest for physics beyond the Standard Model in flavour physics as discussed at the BEACH 2014 conference in Birmingham.
description: as published in the BEACH 2014 proceedings
Nurse managers' perceptions and experiences regarding staff nurse empowerment: a qualitative study
Creators: name: Van heusden, Danny
name: Havens, Donna S.
name: de Wit, Marlinde
name: Peremans, Lieve
name: Franck, Erik
name: Van Bogaert, Peter
name: Timmermans, Olaf
Publisher: name: The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill University Libraries
Year: 2015

description: Aim: To study nurse managers' perceptions and experiences of staff nurse structural empowerment and its impact on the nurse manager leadership role and style.
The role of language in emotion: predictions from psychological constructionism
Creators: name: Shablack, Holly
name: MacCormack, Jennifer K.
name: Lindquist, Kristen A.
Publisher: name: The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill University Libraries
Year: 2015

description: Common sense suggests that emotions are physical types that have little to do with the words we use to label them. Yet recent psychological constructionist accounts reveal that language is a fundamental element in emotion that is constitutive of both emotion experiences and perceptions. According to the psychological constructionist Conceptual Act Theory (CAT), an instance of emotion occurs when information from one’s body or other people’s bodies is made meaningful in light of the present situation using concept knowledge about emotion. The CAT suggests that language plays a role in emotion because language supports the conceptual knowledge used to make meaning of sensations from the body and world in a given context. In the present paper, we review evidence from developmental and cognitive science to reveal that language scaffolds concept knowledge in humans, helping humans to acquire abstract concepts such as emotion categories across the lifespan. Critically, language later helps individuals use concepts to make meaning of on-going sensory perceptions. Building on this evidence, we outline predictions from a psychological constructionist model of emotion in which language serves as the “glue” for emotion concept knowledge, binding concepts to embodied experiences and in turn shaping the ongoing processing of sensory information from the body and world to create emotional experiences and perceptions.
Mammalian diseases of phosphatidylinositol transfer proteins and their homologs
Creators: name: Nile, Aaron H
name: Bankaitis, Vytas A
name: Grabon, Aby
Publisher: name: The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill University Libraries
Year: 2010

description: Inositol and phosphoinositide signaling pathways represent major regulatory systems in eukaryotes. The physiological importance of these pathways is amply demonstrated by the variety of diseases that involve derangements in individual steps in inositide and phosphoinositide production and degradation. These diseases include numerous cancers, lipodystrophies and neurological syndromes. Phosphatidylinositol transfer proteins (PITPs) are emerging as fascinating regulators of phosphoinositide metabolism. Recent advances identify PITPs (and PITP-like proteins) to be coincidence detectors, which spatially and temporally coordinate the activities of diverse aspects of the cellular lipid metabolome with phosphoinositide signaling. These insights are providing new ideas regarding mechanisms of inherited mammalian diseases associated with derangements in the activities of PITPs and PITP-like proteins.
Phosphodiesterase inhibitors as a new generation of antiprotozoan drugs: exploiting the benefit of enzymes that are highly conserved between host and parasite
Creators: name: Seebeck, Thomas
name: Sterk, Geert Jan
name: Ke, Hengming
Publisher: name: The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill University Libraries
Year: 2011

description: Protozoan infections remain a major unsolved medical problem in many parts of our world. A major obstacle to their treatment is the blatant lack of medication that is affordable, effective, safe and easy to administer. For some of these diseases, including human sleeping sickness, very few compounds are available, many of them old and all of them fraught with toxic side effects. We explore a new concept for developing new-generation antiprotozoan drugs that are based on phosphodiesterase (PDE) inhibitors. Such inhibitors are already used extensively in human pharmacology. Given the high degree of structural similarity between the human and the protozoan PDEs, the vast expertise available in the human field can now be applied to developing disease-specific PDE inhibitors as new antiprotozoan drugs.
Molecular mechanisms, thermodynamics, and dissociation kinetics of knob-hole interactions in fibrin
Creators: name: Kononova, Olga
name: Litvinov, Rustem I.
name: Zhmurov, Artem
name: Alekseenko, Andrey
name: Cheng, Chai-Ho
name: Agarwal, Silvi
name: Marx, Kenneth A.
name: Weisel, John W.
name: Barsegov, Valeri
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2015
Subjects: subject: Biological Physics (physics.bio-ph)
subject: Soft Condensed Matter (cond-mat.soft)
subject: Biomolecules (q-bio.BM)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences
subject: FOS: Biological sciences

description: Polymerization of fibrin, the primary structural protein of blood clots and thrombi, occurs through binding of knobs 'A' and 'B' in the central nodule of fibrin monomer to complementary holes 'a' and 'b' in the beta- and gamma-nodules, respectively, of another monomer. We characterized the A:a and B:b knob-hole interactions under varying solution conditions using Molecular Dynamics simulations of the structural models of fibrin(ogen) fragment D complexed with synthetic peptides GPRP (knob 'A' mimetic) and GHRP (knob 'B' mimetic). The strength of A:a and B:b knob-hole complexes was roughly equal, decreasing with pulling force; yet, the dissociation kinetics were sensitive to variations in acidity (pH=5-7) and temperature (T=25-37 C). There were similar structural changes in holes 'a' and 'b' during forced dissociation of the knob-hole complexes: elongation of loop I, stretching of interior region, and translocation of the moveable flap. The disruption of the knob-hole interactions was not an "all-or-none" transition, as it occurred through distinct two-step or single-step pathways with or without intermediate states. The knob-hole bonds were stronger, tighter, and more brittle at pH=7 than at pH=5. The B:b knob-hole bonds were weaker, looser, and more compliant than the A:a knob-hole bonds at pH=7, but stronger, tighter, and less compliant at pH=5. Surprisingly, the knob-hole bonds were stronger, not weaker, at elevated temperature (T=37 C) compared to T=25 C due to the helix-to-coil transition in loop I, which helps stabilize the bonds. These results provide detailed qualitative and quantitative characteristics underlying the most significant non-covalent interactions involved in fibrin polymerization.
Gold nanoparticles to improve HIV drug delivery
Creators: name: Garrido, Carolina
name: Whitehead, Daniel C
name: Simpson, Carrie A
name: Carter, Carly J
name: Feldheim, Daniel L
name: Dahl, Noelle P
name: Margolis, David M
name: Smith, Candice A
name: Harris, Tyler L
name: Lindsey, Erick A
name: Bresee, Jamee
name: Melander, Christian
Publisher: name: The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill University Libraries
Year: 2015

description: Antiretroviral therapy (ART) has improved lifespan and quality of life of patients infected with the HIV-1. However, ART has several potential limitations, including the development of drug resistance and suboptimal penetration to selected anatomic compartments. Improving the delivery of antiretroviral molecules could overcome several of the limitations of current ART.
Laser beam self-symmetrization in air in the multifilamentation regime
Creators: name: Milian, Carles
name: Jukna, Vytautas
name: Couairon, Arnaud
name: Houard, Aurelien
name: Forestier, Benjamin
name: Carbonnel, Jerome
name: Liu, Yi
name: Prade, Bernard
name: Mysyrowicz, Andre
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2015
Subjects: subject: Optics (physics.optics)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: We show experimental and numerical evidence of spontaneous self-symmetrization of focused laser beams experiencing multi-filamentation in air. The symmetrization effect is observed as the multiple filaments generated prior to focus approach the focal volume. This phenomenon is attributed to the nonlinear interactions amongst the different parts of the beam mediated by the optical Kerr effect, which leads to a symmetric redistribution of the wave vectors even when the beam consists of a bundle of many filaments.
description: 9 pages, 7 figures
Enhancing student learning of two-level quantum systems with interactive simulations
Creators: name: Kohnle, Antje
name: Baily, Charles
name: Campbell, Anna
name: Korolkova, Natalia
name: Paetkau, Mark J.
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2015
Subjects: subject: Physics Education (physics.ed-ph)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: The QuVis Quantum Mechanics Visualization project aims to address challenges of quantum mechanics instruction through the development of interactive simulations for the learning and teaching of quantum mechanics. In this article, we describe evaluation of simulations focusing on two-level systems developed as part of the Institute of Physics Quantum Physics resources. Simulations are research-based and have been iteratively refined using student feedback in individual observation sessions and in-class trials. We give evidence that these simulations are helping students learn quantum mechanics concepts at both the introductory and advanced undergraduate level, and that students perceive simulations to be beneficial to their learning.
description: 15 pages, 5 figures, 1 table; accepted for publication in the American Journal of Physics
Protein export systems of Mycobacterium tuberculosis : novel targets for drug development?
Creators: name: Feltcher, Meghan E
name: Sullivan, Jonathan Tabb
name: Braunstein, Miriam
Publisher: name: The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill University Libraries
Year: 2010

description: Protein export is essential in all bacteria and many bacterial pathogens depend on specialized protein export systems for virulence. In Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the etiological agent of the disease tuberculosis, the conserved general secretion (Sec) and twin-arginine translocation (Tat) pathways perform the bulk of protein export and are both essential. M. tuberculosis also has specialized export pathways that transport specific subsets of proteins. One such pathway is the accessory SecA2 system, which is important for M. tuberculosis virulence. There are also specialized ESX export systems that function in virulence (ESX-1) or essential physiologic processes (ESX-3). The increasing prevalence of drug-resistant M. tuberculosis strains makes the development of novel drugs for tuberculosis an urgent priority. In this article, we discuss our current understanding of the protein export systems of M. tuberculosis and consider the potential of these pathways to be novel targets for tuberculosis drugs.
Emergence of multidrug-resistant, extensively drug-resistant and untreatable gonorrhea
Creators: name: Nicholas, Robert A
name: Unemo, Magnus
Publisher: name: The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill University Libraries
Year: 2012

description: The new superbug Neisseria gonorrhoeae has retained resistance to antimicrobials previously recommended for first-line treatment and has now demonstrated its capacity to develop resistance to the extended-spectrum cephalosporin, ceftriaxone, the last remaining option for first-line empiric treatment of gonorrhea. An era of untreatable gonorrhea may be approaching, which represents an exceedingly serious public health problem. Herein, we review the evolution, origin and spread of antimicrobial resistance and resistance determinants (with a focus on extended-spectrum cephalosporins) in N. gonorrhoeae, detail the current situation regarding verified treatment failures with extended-spectrum cephalosporins and future treatment options, and highlight essential actions to meet the large public health challenge that arises with the possible emergence of untreatable gonorrhea. Essential actions include: implementing action/response plans globally and nationally; enhancing surveillance of gonococcal antimicrobial resistance, treatment failures and antimicrobial use/misuse; and improving prevention, early diagnosis and treatment of gonorrhea. Novel treatment strategies, antimicrobials (or other compounds) and, ideally, a vaccine must be developed.
Novel Approaches for Predicting Risk Factors of Atherosclerosis
Creators: name: Rao, V. Sree Hari
name: Kumar, M. Naresh
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2015
Subjects: subject: Machine Learning (cs.LG)
subject: FOS: Computer and information sciences

description: Coronary heart disease (CHD) caused by hardening of artery walls due to cholesterol known as atherosclerosis is responsible for large number of deaths world-wide. The disease progression is slow, asymptomatic and may lead to sudden cardiac arrest, stroke or myocardial infraction. Presently, imaging techniques are being employed to understand the molecular and metabolic activity of atherosclerotic plaques to estimate the risk. Though imaging methods are able to provide some information on plaque metabolism they lack the required resolution and sensitivity for detection. In this paper we consider the clinical observations and habits of individuals for predicting the risk factors of CHD. The identification of risk factors helps in stratifying patients for further intensive tests such as nuclear imaging or coronary angiography. We present a novel approach for predicting the risk factors of atherosclerosis with an in-built imputation algorithm and particle swarm optimization (PSO). We compare the performance of our methodology with other machine learning techniques on STULONG dataset which is based on longitudinal study of middle aged individuals lasting for twenty years. Our methodology powered by PSO search has identified physical inactivity as one of the risk factor for the onset of atherosclerosis in addition to other already known factors. The decision rules extracted by our methodology are able to predict the risk factors with an accuracy of $99.73%$ which is higher than the accuracies obtained by application of the state-of-the-art machine learning techniques presently being employed in the identification of atherosclerosis risk studies.
description: 7 pages, 2 figures
Kaposi’s sarcoma-associated herpesvirus and innate immunity
Creators: name: Damania, Blossom
name: West, John A
Publisher: name: The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill University Libraries
Year: 2010

description: Kaposi's sarcoma-associated herpesvirus (KSHV) is the most recently discovered human herpesvirus, first isolated and identified from a Kaposi's sarcoma lesion in 1994. It is the etiological agent of Kaposi's sarcoma, a vascular lesion that is the predominant cancer among AIDS patients. KSHV is also the primary etiological agent of two B-cell lymphomas, primary effusion lymphoma and multicentric Castleman's disease. KSHV can exist in either a lytic phase, in which the viral DNA is actively replicated and virions are assembled, or in a latent phase, in which the viral genome is tethered to the host chromosome via protein–protein interactions. The lytic cycle generally occurs following primary infection, and within 72–96 h in most cell types, the virus enters the latent state. Reactivation from latency also leads to the intiation of the lytic cycle, which is necessary for virus propagation and survival in the host. Several KSHV proteins have been implicated in modulation of the host immune response to viral infection. This article summarizes recent discoveries involving the innate immune response to KSHV infection.
SAD-3, a Putative Helicase Required for Meiotic Silencing by Unpaired DNA, Interacts with Other Components of the Silencing Machinery
Creators: name: Boone, Erin C.
name: Hammond, Thomas M.
name: Pukkila, Patricia J.
name: Perdue, Tony D.
name: Shiu, Patrick K. T.
name: Xiao, Hua
Publisher: name: The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill University Libraries
Year: 2011

description: In Neurospora crassa, genes lacking a pairing partner during meiosis are suppressed by a process known as meiotic silencing by unpaired DNA (MSUD). To identify novel MSUD components, we have developed a high-throughput reverse-genetic screen for use with the N. crassa knockout library. Here we describe the screening method and the characterization of a gene (sad-3) subsequently discovered. SAD-3 is a putative helicase required for MSUD and sexual spore production. It exists in a complex with other known MSUD proteins in the perinuclear region, a center for meiotic silencing activity. Orthologs of SAD-3 include Schizosaccharomyces pombe Hrr1, a helicase required for RNAi-induced heterochromatin formation. Both SAD-3 and Hrr1 interact with an RNA-directed RNA polymerase and an Argonaute, suggesting that certain aspects of silencing complex formation may be conserved between the two fungal species.
Smoluchowski Diffusion Equation for Active Brownian Swimmers
Creators: name: Sevilla, Francisco J.
name: Sandoval, Mario
Publisher: name: arXiv
Year: 2015
Subjects: subject: Statistical Mechanics (cond-mat.stat-mech)
subject: FOS: Physical sciences

description: We study the free diffusion in two dimensions of active-Brownian swimmers subject to passive fluctuations on the translational motion and to active fluctuations on the rotational one. The Smoluchowski equation is derived from a Langevin-like model of active swimmers, and analytically solved in the long-time regime for arbitrary values of the Péclet number, this allows us to analyze the out-of-equilibrium evolution of the positions distribution of active particles at all time regimes. Explicit expressions for the mean-square displacement and for the kurtosis of the probability distribution function are presented, and the effects of persistence discussed. We show through Brownian dynamics simulations that our prescription for the mean-square displacement gives the exact time dependence at all times. The departure of the probability distribution from a Gaussian, measured by the kurtosis, is also analyzed both analytically and computationally. We find that for Péclet numbers $\lesssim 0.1$, the distance from Gaussian increases as $\sim t^{-2}$ at short times, while it diminishes as $\sim t^{-1}$ in the asymptotic limit.
description: The misspelled name of an author has been corrected
Promoting extensive cattle production in the European Union has major implications for global agricultural trade and climate change
Creators: name: Haddad, Salwa
name: Escobar, Neus
name: Bruckner, Martin
name: Britz, Wolfgang
name: Haddad, Salwa
name: Escobar, Neus
name: Bruckner, Martin
name: Britz, Wolfgang
Publisher: name: Unknown
Year: 2022
Subjects: subject: Agricultural and Food Policy
subject: Environmental Economics and Policy
subject: Land Economics/Use
subject: Pastureland
subject: Cattle
subject: Land Use Change (LUC) and GHG emissions
subject: CGE-MRIO approach

description: This paper assesses the potential market-mediated impacts, including global Land Use Change (LUC) and GHG emissions, from increased subsidies to pastureland-based livestock sectors in the EU, through a “tax recycling strategy” simulated against a baseline under SSP2 up to 2030. The budget neutral increase in the level of pastureland subsidy rates in different Member States is achieved by a decrease in land subsidies to other cropping activities. We employ an integrated CGE-MRIO approach, in which we link a recursive dynamic version of the well-known GTAP-CGE model, called GTAP-RDEM to the FABIO MRIO. This approach allows to take advantages from both methods. FABIO offers better resolution with regards to agricultural sectors than in the GTAP database, while the combined use of this MRIO with a CGE model allows to consider price and income dependent feedbacks, required for policy analyses and long run assessments of changes in the global economy. Results show that the redistribution of land-based subsidies provokes significant changes in agricultural markets across the EU. Pastureland areas and cattle production increases in almost all EU Member States, whereas crop land and crop production decreases. The resulting increase in crop prices translates into reduced output of intensive animal production sector, mainly pig and poultry, which rely on concentrate feed to a larger extent compared to cattle. As a result of the decrease in cropland area and overall crop production in the EU, most EU countries increase imports of grain, oilseeds, and cakes from major agricultural producers, essentially soybean cake from Brazil and North America. This generates significant LUC and related GHG emissions that spill outside the EU, mainly in major feed exporters while some emission saving is observed at global level.
Documenting Environmental Protest: Taiwan's Gongliao Fourth Nuclear Power Plant and the Cultural Politics of Dialogic Artifice
Creators: Lupke, Christopher
Publisher: name: University of Alberta Library
Year: 2012

The period of Martial Law in Taiwan (1949-1987) was clearly not a setting that encouraged much criticism of the government or public works. This began to change in the early 1980s as the global environmentalist movement took shape and concerns were increasingly being raised over such things as the use of nuclear power. Filmmaker Cui Suxin’s Gongliao, How Are You? (2004) endeavors to record the evolution of these events. Utilizing a mixture of archival footage, interviews, and footage recorded as events were taking place, Cui Suxin (Ts'ui Su-hsin) documents one aspect of the anti-nuclear movement in Taiwan as it pertains to the building of the so-called “Fourth Nuclear Power Plant” in the northern coastal village of Gongliao (Kung-liau). Cui melds together a variety of intriguing film techniques, such as a second-person narrative voice that addresses a “you” in the cinematic text, the mixture of historical and contemporary material, and a teletype style set of interstitial written narrative to create a complex, multi-layered documentary that is subtle but powerfully persuasive. Cui’s use of an extradiagetic narrative voice overlay that engages one of the principal protestors is an important step in the direction of the reflexive documentary mode. However, as I attempt to illustrate in my essay, rather than an avenue through which extensive self-reflection on the documentary process is carried out, this “dialogic artifice” actually serves to bring cohesion to her cinematic project, add a layer of suspense to the narrative, and develop a bond between her and her mysterious and silent interlocutor. One can also speculate that there is a further intertextual level, as the dialogic/epistolary method is one also put into practice by Wu Yii-feng in his influential film Gift of Life, released a year prior to Gongliao. My essay also analyzes the contrasting techniques of the highly subjective voiceover with the more journalistic style of “objective” interview. In comparing Gongliao to some of the classic examples of documentary and cinematic ethnography, I attempt to show how this film on the one hand appears to be a dispassionate attempt to merely document the subject while on the other actually serves as a means to incite the spectator to antipathy for the government and, ultimately and hopefully (in the view of the filmmaker), to activism against the nuclear power in Taiwan.