cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
EVOLUTION OF THE PYGMY-FOREST EDAPHIC SUBSPECIES OF PINUS CONTORT A ACROSS AN ECOLOGICAL STAIRCASE

Patterns of allozyme variation within and between two of the subspecies of Pinus contorta were examined for the evolutionary relationship between them. In coastal northern California, these subspecies are parapatric. Pinus contorta ssp. contorta occurs on grassy coastal bluffs on the lowest and youngest of a sequence of five marine terraces; P. contorta ssp. bolanderi is endemic to a pygmy forest ecosystem that occurs on the increasingly older and harsher soils of the third, fourth, and fifth terraces. The soils of the upper three terraces are characterized by extreme podzolization, low pH, low nutrient availability, summer drought (with periodic fires), and winter surface flooding above the hardpan. Dune and cliff soils support a tall redwood and Douglas-fir forest between the terraces. Analyses of seeds collected from 11 pygmy-forest and 6 coastal populations showed ssp. bolanderi to have significantly less allozyme variation than spp. contorta. The two subspecies did not show the phylogenetic dichotomy in allozyme allelic constitutions expected for subspecific classification. Within ssp. bolanderi, the pattern of genetic distances correlated better with edaphic differences among sites than with geographic distance. It appears that ssp. bolanderi is a recently evolved derivative of ssp. contorta, and that the low degree of allozyme differentiation among the bolanderi populations may be due to colonization of the sites by small numbers of individuals, or to hitchhiking of allozyme loci linked to loci undergoing strong selection imposed by the severe edaphic conditions typical of bolanderi sites.
Coverslip Cleaning and Functionalization for Total Internal Reflection Fluorescence Microscopy

Total internal reflection fluorescence (TIRF) microscopy allows visualization of biological events at the single-molecule level by restricting excitation to a precise focal plane near the coverslip and eliminating out-of-focus fluorescence. The quality of TIRF imaging relies on a high signal-to-noise ratio and therefore it is imperative to prevent adherence of molecules to the glass coverslip. Nonspecific interactions can make it difficult to distinguish true binding events and may also interfere with accurate quantification of background noise. In addition, nonspecific binding of the fluorescently tagged protein will lower the effective working concentration, thereby altering values used to calculate affinity constants. To prevent spurious interactions, we thoroughly clean the surface of the coverslip and then functionalize the glass either by applying a layer of silane or by coating with a lipid bilayer.
Design and Implementation of Oil Field WebGIS Based on XML

Petroleum is the lifeline of national economy,the exploration and production of petroleum was closely related to geographic information.At present,some ready-made GIS platforms from foreign countries were adopted by most of major oilfields in our country.These GIS platforms were expensive,but they were very difficult to integrate seamlessly with the oilfield information.Therefore,based on the research of SVG technology,XML technology,WebGIS technology and so on,a light oilfield WebGIS platform is designed and implemented.The GIS platform architecture and the key technologies involved in the processes of implementation are researched emphatically.
Stochastic image processing and simultaneous dewarping for aerial vehicles

There is increasing interest for aerial vehicles to perform image processing tasks (i.e. object recognition and detection) in real-time. Such systems systems should have minimal data throughput, low computational complexity, and low-power. Traditional frame-based digital cameras are not ideal for meeting such specifications. More recent cameras, inspired by biology, drastically reduce data throughput by representing information in event streams, and in doing so, represent image information temporally. In this work, we utilize the ATIS (Asynchronous Time-based Image Sensor) in conjunction with a Field-Programmable Gate Array implementation of the Integrate-and-Fire Array Transceiver for performing an event-based, simultaneous image dewarping and filtering task. The ATIS output is inherently event-based and stochastic, giving our system the low data throughput and low-power specifications that we seek, as it more directly mimics the communication protocol of biological neurons. We further emphasize how our system can be coupled with aerial vehicles that must perform visual tasks in real-time on a coherent representation of what its camera has captured.
The Influence of Policy Context on Transition Age Foster Youths' Views of Self-Sufficiency

In this exploratory study, focus group methodology was used to examine the potential influence of policy context on informing transition age youth (TAY) views of self-sufficiency upon aging out of ...
Biomimetic additive manufactured polymer composites for improved impact resistance

Abstract Biological composites, like nacre and bone, have captured the interest of the scientific community for their outstanding ability to amalgamate a host of properties such as stiffness, strength, toughness, and impact resistance. Nacre, which is composed of 95 wt.% mineral content and 5 wt.% soft biopolymeric matrix, has a toughness orders of magnitude greater than its mineral phase while having to sacrifice very little in stiffness. Consequently, researchers are aiming to mimic the structure of nacre to design tough and strong composite materials with superior properties. However, most of the experiments and simulations of nacre-like composites are confined to simple tension or compression loadings. We hypothesize that nacre-like composites may have superior impact performance compared to their monolithic stiff phase. Here, we develop nacre-like designs using two base materials that are vastly different in properties and assemble them in a ply with an architecture similar to nacre. These plies are then stacked with orientation angles of 0 and 90 degrees to generate a laminate construct. Impact testing of three-dimensional printed (3D-printed) designs is conducted in a droptower test setup. A finite element model is created and validated with experiments to enhance our understanding of the underlying mechanisms occurring during impact. Our experimental and simulation results show that nacre-like designs outperform the constituent materials in impact resistance. This study demonstrates that emerging 3D-printing technology can enable rapid prototyping towards composite designs with optimal impact-resistant properties, suitable for the next generation of protective material systems for soldiers and vehicles.
Biological rhythms: Wild times

Little is known about the biological rhythms that emerge from social behaviours in the wild. A study of shorebird pairs shows that rhythms of nest-incubation duties are mainly governed by strategies to avoid predators. See Letter p.109
Lifetime ultraviolet radiation exposure and lentigo maligna melanoma.

Although ultraviolet light is considered a key factor in the etiology of malignant melanoma (MM), the relationship between sunlight and MM is complex. Intermittent exposure and sunburns are far more predictive of melanoma than chronic exposure, and melanoma can arise in non-sun exposed sites. Furthermore, retrospective studies have shown that outdoor workers exposed to sunlight chronically are not at higher risk of melanoma compared with indoor workers living at the same latitude. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.
Autoimmunity-predisposing PTPN22 C1858T variant associates with diminished human CD4 T cell responses to seasonal influenza vaccination (VAC4P.1112)

PRR-induced Type I IFN is necessary for optimal host responses to antiviral immunization, including CD4 T cell expansion and neutralizing antibody production. The magnitude of T and B cell vaccine responses correlates with protection against influenza virus infection. PTPN22 promotes TI IFN production after PRR engagement on myeloid cells. The autoimmune disease-associated C1858T variant of PTPN22 encodes an R620W substitution (PTPN22-W), which is a reduced function variant for TI IFN production. Since PTPN22-W carriers show reduced capacity for PRR-driven TI IFN production, we tested the hypothesis that PTPN22-W carriers will have diminished immune response to the influenza vaccine. Healthy PTPN22-W carriers (n=18) and age-matched controls were immunized with the 2013-2014 trivalent inactivated influenza vaccine, and immune responses were assessed. Carriers exhibited significantly decreased induction of influenza-specific CD4 T cells expressing TNFα, IL-2, and IFNγ at 2 weeks after immunization. Moreover, carriers show a trend toward impaired induction of neut. antibody titers post vaccination. We did not observe differences between carriers and controls between selected markers of the early interferon transcriptional response, possibly because of inadequate power to detect a partial phenotype. Nevertheless, defects in T cell immunity strongly suggest that PTPN22-W carriage predisposes to defective capacity for mounting protective immune responses to influenza vaccination.
Reproductive Coercion in High School-Aged Girls: Associations with Reproductive Health Risk and Intimate Partner Violence

Abstract Study Objective To determine the prevalence of reproductive coercion, a form of intimate partner violence (IPV) including contraceptive sabotage and pregnancy pressure, among urban high school-aged girls and to examine its associations with reproductive health risks. Design and Setting A self-administered survey completed by high school-aged girls living in high-poverty neighborhoods while awaiting medical care in a pediatric emergency room, inpatient service, school-based, and hospital-based clinic. Participants One hundred forty-nine sexually active girls aged 14-17 years. Interventions and Main Outcome Measures To determine the prevalence of reproductive coercion and to examine associations with unprotected sex, sexually transmitted infections, physical IPV, and risk factors for abusive relationships. Results Twenty-nine of 149 (19%) of girls reported reproductive coercion, most frequently that a romantic or sexual partner had ever: “told them not to use any birth control” (n = 23; 79%); “took off a condom during sex so they would get pregnant” (n = 12; 43%); and “said he would leave them if they didn't get pregnant” (n = 6; 21%). Girls reporting reproductive coercion were nearly 3 times more likely than those not coerced to have had chlamydia (odds ratio [OR], 2.7; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.01-7.19) and nearly 5 times more likely to report IPV (OR, 4.8; 95% CI, 2.0-11.8). In addition, girls reporting coercion were less likely to have high recognition of abusive behaviors (OR, 0.10; 95% CI, 0.01-0.8) and less likely to have high comfort communicating with their sexual partners (OR, 0.32; 95% CI, 0.1-0.7) than girls not reporting coercion. Conclusion Reproductive coercion is experienced by 1 in 5 high school-aged girls in a high-poverty community and is associated with chlamydia infection and IPV. Awareness of the high prevalence and health risks of coercion might allow for intervention.
Breast Specimen Processing and Reporting With an Emphasis on Margin Evaluation: A College of American Pathologists Survey of 866 Laboratories

Context.— The College of American Pathologists (CAP) developed protocols for reporting pathologic characteristics of breast cancer specimens, including margin status. The Society of Surgical Oncology (SSO) and the American Society for Radiation Oncology (ASTRO) published treatment guidelines regarding margins in patients with invasive cancer; and SSO, ASTRO, and the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) recently published guidelines for patients with ductal carcinoma in situ. Objective.— To assess current practices among pathologists with regard to the processing/reporting of breast specimens, assess compliance with CAP cancer protocols, and assess alignment with SSO/ASTRO and SSO/ASTRO/ASCO guidelines. Design.— A survey concerning breast specimen processing/reporting was distributed to pathologists enrolled in the CAP Performance Improvement Program in Surgical Pathology. Results.— Ninety-four percent (716 of 764 respondents) and 91% (699 of 769 respondents) define positive margins as “tumor on in...
Problems Encountered with Conventional Fiber-Reinforced Composites

The problems encountered in dealing with composites can be usefully classified as preparational, computational and operational. That is, we first ask how it is made and the effects of process variables, including the resultant chemistry, on the initial properties.* Then, knowing (or presuming) the component properties and attributes, one may try to calculate the properties of any given composite structure made from these and at the same time estimate its ability to withstand some generalized stress field, i.e., some combination of mechanical, thermal or environmental loads for some stated period of time. Finally, we can ask what problems are encountered under use conditions.
Associations Between Worksite Walkability, Greenness, and Physical Activity Around Work:

This article explores the role of the work environment in determining physical activity gained within and around the workplace. With most adults spending more than half of their waking day at work,...
“Take My Film and Let It Be”: Critics and Consecration in Faith-Based Cinema

This study represents an attempt to better understand how religion fits into the discourse between filmmakers and critics who review their work. The author uses the thought of French sociologist Pi...
Reconsidering important outcomes of the nonsuicidal self-injury disorder diagnostic criterion A

OBJECTIVE The nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI) disorder diagnostic criteria have been the focus of empirical study. However, Criterion A (i.e., required frequency and timeframe) has received relatively limited attention. The current study aimed to examine the relationship between past 12-month NSSI frequency and eight NSSI behavior features among individuals with past 12-month and 1-month NSSI. METHOD Participants were 723 undergraduate students reporting at least 1 past 12-month NSSI act and completed online questionnaires. Decision trees and structural equation model trees were utilized to examine the relationship between NSSI frequency and behavior features. RESULTS Results highlight several potential subgroups: high (i.e., greater than 49 acts), moderate-to-high (i.e., 19-48 acts), low-to-moderate (i.e., 7-18 acts), and low (i.e., fewer than 6 acts) frequency subgroups. CONCLUSIONS Findings suggest that increasing the NSSI disorder criterion A frequency cutoff or requiring at least one past month NSSI act may better demarcate individuals with more severe NSSI behavior.
Instability modes of millimeter-scale supersonic jets

The appearance of instability modes on subsonic and supersonic impinging jets is a phenomenon of great interest that has been observed in jets produced by nozzles of different sizes. The present study describes these instabilities in millimeter-sized supersonic jets produced by convergent and convergent–divergent nozzles ( $$D_\mathrm{throat} = 2 \hbox { mm}$$ ). The smaller nozzle sizes allowed for a comprehensive parametric study involving 378 impingement distance values between $$H{/}D=0.5$$ and $$H{/}D=9.9$$ , as well as 30 nozzle pressure ratio values for both nozzles, totaling a set of more than 22,000 experiments. The detailed resolution on the impingement distance parameter allowed for the observation of acoustic resonant tones that alternate between two or three distinct frequency bands. It was observed that very small changes in the impingement distance ( $$\Delta H{/}D \le 0.5$$ ) are sufficient for resonant mode switching, which is related to the instability mode switching phenomenon. The complementary high-speed schlieren images, captured for a set of 36 cases, allowed for the effective observation and classification of the jet resonant modes via feature tracking. A correlation between the resonant mode shape (helical or axisymmetric) and the resonant tone was clearly observed and quantified. Further experiments with high-resolution schlieren images showed the shape of the acoustic waves produced, connecting the acoustic wave packets with the production of shear layer instabilities. In the helical instability mode, it was possible to observe what appears to be a helix-shaped acoustic wave.
Association of next generation sequencing characteristics of MIBC specimens with clinical outcomes: The USC experience.

397Background: Muscle invasive bladder cancer (MIBC) is an aggressive disease. Several molecular subtypes have been identified. Commercial next generation sequencing (NGS) panels now provide signif...
Functional Reconstitution of Reissner's Mixed Variational Theorem for Finite Element Applications

The functional reconstitution technique is used for the first time to theoretically and a priori assess the numerical performance of Reissner’s Mixed Variational Theorem in the case of linear quadr...
Multiple clinically relevant immunotherapies prolong the function of microencapsulated porcine islet xenografts in diabetic NOD mice without the use of anti‐CD154 mAb

Background Our goal was to identify clinically relevant immunotherapies that synergize with microencapsulation to protect adult porcine islet (API) xenografts in diabetic NOD mice. We have shown previously that dual costimulatory blockade (CTLA4-Ig plus anti-CD154 mAb) combined with encapsulation protects APIs long-term in NOD mice. Since no anti-CD154 mAbs currently are approved for use in humans, we tested the efficacy of other targeted immunosuppression regimens that might be used for diabetic patients receiving encapsulated islets. Methods Microencapsulated APIs were transplanted i.p. in diabetic NOD mice given either no immunosuppression or combinations immunosuppressive reagents. Graft function was monitored by blood glucose levels, i.p. glucose tolerance tests, and histology. Mechanisms of rejection were investigated by phenotyping host peritoneal cells and measuring graft site cytokine and chemokine levels. Results New immunosuppressive therapies were compared to CTLA4-Ig plus anti-CD154 mAb, used here as a control. The most effective was triple treatment with CTLA4-Ig, anti-CD154 mAb, and intracapsular CXCL12, and the next most effective was a non-depleting anti-CD4 mAb (YTS177.9) plus intracapsular CXCL12. Three additional regimens (CTLA4-Ig plus YTS177.9, YTS177.9 alone, and anti-OX40-Ligand mAb alone) significantly prolonged encapsulated API function. Dual treatment with CTLA4-Ig plus anti-CD40 mAb was as effective as CTLA4-Ig plus anti-CD154 mAb. Five other monotherapies and three combination therapies did not augment encapsulated API survival. Most peritoneal cytokines and chemokines were either absent or minimal. At necropsy, the capsules were intact, not fibrosed, and clean when function was maintained, but were coated with host cells if rejection had occurred. Conclusions Multiple different immunotherapies which specifically inhibit CD4+ T cells, modulate T-cell trafficking, or interfere with antigen presentation can substitute for anti-CD154 mAb to prolong encapsulated islet xenograft function in diabetic NOD mice.
A systematic review of the role of pharmacists in vaccination services in low-and middle-income countries.

Abstract Background Pharmacists' role in vaccination has expanded in some countries with pharmacists having greater authority to perform various immunization activities, from vaccine storage, vaccine adverse event reporting, vaccination education and advocacy, to vaccine administration. However, pharmacists’ present involvement in vaccination services is poorly understood across low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Objective To identify and synthesize evidence on pharmacists’ roles in offering vaccination services in LMICs. Methods We searched three databases (PubMed, Embase, Scopus) and the gray literature to identify articles which described pharmacist involvement in vaccination services in LMICs. We abstracted data on reported roles of pharmacists in vaccination, as well as relevant country, vaccines, and populations served. Results From the initial 612 records we identified, twenty-five (n = 25) studies representing 25 LMICs met our inclusion criteria. The most commonly reported role of pharmacists in vaccination across identified LMICs was vaccine advocacy and education (n = 15 countries). Pharmacist administered vaccination and storage of vaccines at pharmacies was reported in 8 countries. An additional 6 countries reported allowing vaccination at community pharmacies by other healthcare professionals. Immunization related training for pharmacists was reported or required in 8 countries. Fewer studies reported that pharmacists have access to patient immunization records in their respective LMICs (n = 6 countries) or had reported pharmacist involvement in vaccine adverse event reporting (n = 4 countries). Conclusions Pharmacists have the potential to play an important role in increasing access to vaccines and improving coverage, yet evidence of their role in vaccinations remains limited across LMICs. Greater documentation of pharmacists’ involvement in vaccination services in LMICs is needed to demonstrate the value of successful integration of pharmacists in immunization programs.
Adeno-Associated Virus and Hematopoietic Stem Cells: The Potential of Adeno-Associated Virus Hematopoietic Stem Cells in Genetic Medicines

Adeno-associated virus (AAV)-based vectors have transformed into powerful elements of genetic medicine with proven therapeutic efficacy and a good safety profile. Over the years, efforts to transdu...
Widespread imprinting of transposable elements and young genes in the maize endosperm

Fertilization and seed development is a critical time in the plant life cycle, and coordinated development of the embryo and endosperm are required to produce a viable seed. In the endosperm, some genes show imprinted expression where transcripts are derived primarily from one parental genome. Imprinted gene expression has been observed across many flowering plant species, though only a small proportion of genes are imprinted. Understanding the rate of turnover for gain or loss of imprinted expression has been complicated by the reliance on single nucleotide polymorphisms between alleles to enable testing for imprinting. Here, we develop a method to use whole genome assemblies of multiple genotypes to assess for imprinting of both shared and variable portions of the genome using data from reciprocal crosses. This reveals widespread maternal expression of genes and transposable elements with presence-absence variation within maize and across species. Most maternally expressed features are expressed primarily in the endosperm, suggesting that maternal de-repression in the central cell facilitates expression. Furthermore, maternally expressed TEs are enriched for maternal expression of the nearest gene. Read alignments over maternal TE-gene pairs indicate fused transcripts, suggesting that variable TEs contribute imprinted expression of nearby genes.
Resonant neutrino self-interactions

If neutrinos have self-interactions, these will induce scatterings between astrophysical and cosmic neutrinos. Prior work proposed looking for possible resulting resonance features in astrophysical neutrino spectra in order to seek a neutrino self-interaction which can be either diagonal in the neutrino flavor space or couple different neutrino flavors. The calculation of the astrophysical spectra involves either a Monte Carlo simulation or a computationally intensive numerical integration of an integro-partial-differential equation. As a result, only limited regions of the neutrino self-interaction parameter space have been explored, and only flavor-diagonal self-interactions have been considered. Here, we present a fully analytic form for the astrophysical neutrino spectra for arbitrary neutrino number and arbitrary self-coupling matrix that accurately obtains the resonance features in the observable neutrino spectra. The results can be applied to calculations of the diffuse supernova neutrino background and of the spectrum from high-energy astrophysical neutrino sources. We illustrate with a few examples.
Raoul Vaneigem et la poésie de Mai 68

In this article, I analyze the radical political and cultural thought of Raoul Vaneigem, as it is developed in his landmark essay Traite de savoir-vivre a l’usage des jeunes generations (The Revolu...
Informative Feature-Guided Siamese Network for Early Diagnosis of Autism

Autism, or autism spectrum disorder (ASD), is a complex developmental disability, and usually diagnosed with observations at around 3-4 years old based on behaviors. Studies have indicated that the early treatment, especially during early brain development in the first two years of life, can significantly improve the symptoms, therefore, it is important to identify ASD as early as possible. Most previous works employed imaging-based biomarkers for the early diagnosis of ASD. However, they only focused on extracting features from the intensity images, ignoring the more informative guidance from segmentation and parcellation maps. Moreover, since the number of autistic subjects is always much smaller than that of normal subjects, this class-imbalance issue makes the ASD diagnosis more challenging. In this work, we propose an end-to-end informative feature-guided Siamese network for the early ASD diagnosis. Specifically, besides T1w and T2w images, the discriminative features from segmentation and parcellation maps are also employed to train the model. To alleviate the class-imbalance issue, the Siamese network is utilized to effectively learn what makes the pair of inputs belong to the same class or different classes. Furthermore, the subject-specific attention module is incorporated to identify the ASD-related regions in an end-to-end fully automatic learning manner. Both ablation study and comparisons demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method, achieving an overall accuracy of 85.4%, sensitivity of 80.8%, and specificity of 86.7%.
A Dynamical Systems Perspective on Online Bayesian Nonparametric Estimators with Adaptive Hyperparameters

This paper presents and analyzes constant step size stochastic gradient algorithms in reproducing kernel Hilbert Space (RKHS), which encapsulates various adaptive nonlinear interpolation schemes. The hyperparameters of the function iterates are updated via a distribution that depends on the estimates generated by the algorithm. Using stochastic averaging theory, we show that the estimates generated by the algorithm converge weakly to an algebraically constrained ordinary differential equation. We illustrate this proposed algorithm in an online multi-class classification problem. Specifically, the proposed RKHS-valued stochastic gradient algorithm operating in concert with a Gaussian kernel whose bandwidth stably evolves during training, performs comparably to when the bandwidth is set according to oracle knowledge of its optimal value.
Identifying charismatic bird species and traits with community science observations

AO_SCPLOWBSTRACTC_SCPLOWIdentifying which species are perceived as charismatic can improve the impact and efficiency of conservation outreach, as charismatic species receive more conservation funding and have their conservation needs prioritized (9; 17; 13). Sociological experiments studying animal charisma have relied on stated preferences to find correlations between hypothetical "willingness to pay" or "empathy" for a species conservation and species size, color, and aesthetic appeal (51; 13; 16). Recognizing the increasing availability of digital records of public engagement with animals that reveal preferences, an emerging field of "culturomics" uses Google search results, Wikipedia article activities, and other digital modes of engagement to identify charismatic species and traits (46; 31; 10; 41). In this study, we take advantage of community science efforts as another form of digital data that can reveal observer preferences. We apply a multi-stage analysis to ask whether opportunistic birders contributing to iNaturalist engage more with larger, more colorful, and rarer birds relative to a baseline, from eBird contributors, approximating unbiased detection. We find that body mass, color contrast, and range size all predict over-representation in the opportunistic dataset. We also find evidence that, across 473 modeled species, 52 species are significantly overreported and 158 are significantly underreported, indicating a wide variety of species-specific effects. Understanding which birds are charismatic can aid conservationists in creating impactful outreach materials and engaging new naturalists. The quantified differences between two prominent community science efforts may also be of use for researchers leveraging the data from one or both of them to answer scientific questions of interest.
Game play, wholehearted engagement, and the good life

One of the many brilliant insights of C. Thi Nguyen’s brilliant book, Games: Agency as Art, is the connection he draws between the distinctive agency of game play and one important feature of a lif...
Improving Sensitivity to Functional Responses without a Loss of Spatiotemporal Precision in Human Brain Imaging

As the neuroimaging field moves towards detecting smaller effects at higher spatial resolutions, and faster sampling rates, there is increased attention given to the deleterious contribution of unstructured, thermal noise. Here, we critically evaluate the performance of a recently developed reconstruction method, termed NORDIC, for suppressing thermal noise using datasets acquired with various field strengths, voxel sizes, sampling rates, and task designs. Following minimal preprocessing, statistical activation (t-values) of NORDIC processed data was compared to the results obtained with alternative denoising methods. Additionally, the consistency of unbiased estimations of task responses at the single-voxel, single run level, using a finite impulse response model were evaluated. To examine the potential impact on effective image resolution, the overall smoothness of the data processed with different methods was examined. Finally, to determine if NORDIC alters or removes important temporal information, an exhaustive K-fold cross validation approach was employed, using unbiased task responses to predict held out timeseries, quantified using R2. After NORDIC, the t-values are increased, an improvement comparable to what could be achieved by 1.5 voxels smoothing, and task events are clearly visible and have less cross-run error. These advantages are achieved without significant compromises in spatial and temporal resolution. Cross-validated R2s based on the unbiased models show that NORDIC is not distorting the temporal structure of the data and is the best predictor of non-denoised time courses. The results demonstrate that 1 run of NORDIC data is equivalent to using 2 to 3 original runs, and performs equally well across a diverse array of functional imaging protocols. Significance StatementFor functional neuroimaging, the increasing availability of higher field strengths and ever higher spatiotemporal resolutions has led to concomitant increase in concerns about the deleterious effects of thermal noise. Historically this noise source was suppressed using methods that reduce spatial precision such as image blurring or averaging over a large number of trials or sessions, which necessitates large data collection efforts. Here, we critically evaluate the performance of a recently developed reconstruction method, termed NORDIC. Across datasets varying in field strength, voxel sizes, sampling rates, and task designs, NORDIC produces substantial gains in data quality. Both conventional t-statistics derived from general linear models and coefficients of determination for predicting unseen data are improved, without notably increasing image smoothness.
The Cape Mendocino Tsunami, 25 April 1992

On 25 April 1992, a magnitude 7.1 Ms earthquake occurred near Cape Mendocino, California, at the southern end of the Cascadia Subduction Zone. Seismological analyses suggest an almost pure dip-slip reverse fault, with subduction of the Gorda Plate beneath the North American Plate. Modeling of crustal deformation due to this fault mechanism produces uplift of the ocean bottom in relatively shallow water just offshore and along the coast, consistent with coastal observations.
Stomatal Opening, Transpiration, and Need/e Moisture in Loblolly Pine Seedlings From Two Texas Seed Sources

Relationships among percentage of open stomates, transpiration, and needle moisture content in seedlings of loblolly pine of two Texas provenances were studied under changing soil moisture conditions. Needle moisture content correlated very well with transpiration under favorable moisture conditions, and with percentage of open stomates under soil moisture stress. Transpiration and percentage of open stomates were correlated under a wide range of moisture conditions. Foliage moisture content was still relatively high in both ecotypes when stomates closed and transpiration drastically declined. The "Lost Pines" seed source appeared to have superior ability to conserve moisture under droughty conditions by closure of stomares and reduction of transpiration. FOREST SCI. 23: 457-462.
The Presidency and the Supreme Court after Bush V. Gore: Implications for Institutional Legitimacy and Effectiveness

In this article we assess the ramifications of the Court's decision in Bush v. Gore for the legitimacy and effectiveness of the Presidency and the Court. In Part I, we briefly explore how the Court came to help determine the outcome of the election, and reflect on several short-term political effects of the decision. In Part II, we examine the political institutions of the Supreme Court and the presidency in light of the Bush v. Gore decision. In Part III, we briefly discuss the theoretical link between institutional legitimacy and effectiveness and examine the impact of Bush v. Gore on public perceptions of institutions' legitimacy. In Part IV, we reconsider the potential consequences of the decision for the Court and the presidency. We conclude that while the decision may have had important short-term effects for both the Court and the President, these institutions' long-term credibility will remain intact.
Program analysis and programming languages for security

The security of a software system is almost always retrofitted to an afterthought. When security problems arise, understanding and correcting them can be very challenging. On the one hand, the programanalysis and programming-languages research community has created numerous static and dynamic analysis tools for performance optimization and bug detection in object-oriented programs. On the other hand, the security and privacy research community has been looking for solutions to automatically detect security problems, information-flow violations, and access-control requirements in object-oriented programs. This tutorial discusses advantages and disadvantages of static and dynamic analysis for automated detection of security problems such as accesscontrol violations and information-flow vulnerabilities.
Identifying the ‘Vulnerables’ in Biomedical Research: the vox populis from the Tuskegee Legacy Project

Objectives: This report presents, for the first time, findings on the vox populis as to who constitutes the “vulnerables in biomedical research.” Methods: The 3-City Tuskegee Legacy Project (TLP) study used the TLP questionnaire as administered via random-digit-dial telephone interviews to 1,162 adult Black people, non-Hispanic White people, and two Puerto Rican (PR) Hispanic groups: Mainland United States and San Juan (SJ) in three cities. The classification schema was based upon respondents' answers to an open-ended question asking which groups of people were the most vulnerable when participating in biomedical research. Results: Subjects provided 749 valid open-ended responses, which were grouped into 29 direct response categories, leading to a four-tier classification schema for vulnerability traits. Tier 1, the summary tier, had five vulnerability categories: 1) Race/ethnicity; 2) Age; 3) SES; 4) Health; and, 5) Gender. Black people and Mainland United States PR Hispanics most frequently identified Race/Ethnicity as a vulnerability trait (42.1 percent of Black people and 42.6 percent of Mainland United States. PR Hispanics versus 15.4 percent of White people and 16.7 percent of SJ R Hispanics) (P < 0.007), while White people and SJ PR Hispanics most frequently identified Age (48.3 percent and 29.2 percent) as a vulnerability trait. Conclusions: The response patterns on “who was vulnerable” were similar for the two minority groups (Black people and Mainland US PR Hispanics), and notably different from the response patterns of the two majority groups (White people and SJ PR Hispanics). Further, the vox populis definition of vulnerables differed from the current official definitions as used by the US federal government.
Exact Cost of Redistributing Multipartite Quantum States

How correlated are two quantum systems from the perspective of a third? We answer this by providing an optimal "quantum state redistribution" protocol for multipartite product sources. Specifically, given an arbitrary quantum state of three systems, where Alice holds two and Bob holds one, we identify the cost, in terms of quantum communication and entanglement, for Alice to give one of her parts to Bob. The communication cost gives the first known operational interpretation to quantum conditional mutual information. The optimal procedure is self-dual under time reversal and is perfectly composable. This generalizes known protocols such as the state merging and fully quantum Slepian-Wolf protocols, from which almost every known protocol in quantum Shannon theory can be derived.
Fabrication of microfluidic mixers and artificial vasculatures using a high-brightness diode-pumped Nd:YAG laser direct write method

This paper describes a direct write laser technology, which is fast and flexible, for fabricating multiple-level microfluidic channels. A high brightness diode-pumped Nd-YAG laser with slab geometry was used for its excellent beam quality. Channels with flat walls and staggered herringbone ridges on the floor have been successfully fabricated and their ability to perform passive mixing of liquid is discussed. Also, a multi-width multi-depth microchannel has been fabricated to generate biomimetic vasculatures whose channel diameters change according to Murray's law, which states that the cube of the radius of a parent vessel equals the sum of the cubes of the radii of the daughters. The multi-depth architecture allows for flow patterns to resemble physiological vascular systems with lower overall resistance and more uniform flow velocities throughout the network compared to planar patterning techniques which generate uniformly thin channels. The ability to directly fabricate multiple level structures using relatively straightforward laser technology enhances our ability to rapidly prototype complex lab-on-a-chip systems and to develop physiological microfluidic structures for tissue engineering and investigations in biomedical fluidics problems.
Algebraic properties of spaces in rough fuzzy set theory

In this paper, we generalize the basic properties of the upper and lower approximation operators of crisp subsets used in rough set theory to fuzzy subsets. We apply our results to T-fuzzy subspaces of a vector space, where T is a t-norm.
Implementation of an evidence-based intervention to promote colorectal cancer screening in community organizations: a cluster randomized trial

The implementation of evidence-based strategies to promote colorectal cancer (CRC) screening remains challenging. The aim of this study is to evaluate two strategies to implement an evidence-based intervention to promote CRC screening in Filipino American community organizations. Twenty-two community organizations were randomized to either a basic or enhanced implementation strategy. In both arms, community health advisors recruited participants non-adherent to CRC screening guidelines, conducted educational sessions, distributed print materials and free fecal occult blood test kits, reminded participants to get screened, and mailed letters to participants’ providers. In the enhanced arm, leaders of the organizations participated in implementation efforts. While the effectiveness was similar in both arms of the study (screening rate at 6-month follow-up was 53 % in the enhanced arm, 49 % in the basic arm), 223 participants were screened in the enhanced arm versus 122 in the basic arm. The enhanced implementation strategy reached 83 % more participants and achieved a higher public health impact. Trial registration: NCT01351220 (ClinicalTrials.gov) Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s13142-015-0349-5) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
27.12MHz GaN resonant power converter with PCB embedded resonant air core inductors and capacitors

This paper presents the design and implementation of a 27.12 MHz, 320 W, 170 V to 28 V dc-dc resonant power converter with resonant inductors and capacitors embedded into the Printed Circuit Board (PCB). Operating at 27.12 MHz allows for small value and size resonant passive components to be implemented using traces on or within a PCB. Previous work [1]-[14] has demonstrated various ways of using PCBs to make inductors and capacitors. In this work, we evaluate a design with goals of achieving good power density, good EMI shielding, (relatively) low manufacturing cost, and the potential to operate in harsh environments (e.g. strong external magnetic field). Specifically, the proposed prototype converter consists of four vertically stacked PCBs. Two low cost 3.2 mm thick FR4 PCBs are used to make the air core toroidal inductors, and the resonant capacitors are implemented using two low-dielectric-loss thin Rogers PCBs and located in the middle of the stack. To help reduce leakage fields from inducing eddy current within the EMI shield, each resonant inductor is formed by the series/parallel combination of two vertically aligned opposite wound toroids placed in different PCBs. In this arrangement, the circumferential currents of the two inductors flow in opposite directions to cancel the axial “one turn” inductance. Capacitors are formed by two thin layers of high frequency laminates to minimize loss and avoid capacitive heating in the lossy FR4 material. A prototype dc-dc converter was built to verify the concept and it reaches an efficiency of 73.6%. A simulated loss analysis is also presented.
Stability degree of switches with finite buffers and non-negligible round-trip time☆ ☆

Abstract We answer the question on how much memory a packet switch/router needs; more specifically, we propose a systematic method that is simple, rigorous and general for determining the absolute lower bound of packet buffering required by practical switching systems. Accordingly, we introduce a deterministic traffic scenario that stresses the global stability property of finite output queues and demonstrate its usefulness by dimensioning the internal buffer capacity of two popular CIOQ switches.
A unique bilirubin-UDP-glucuronosyltransferase deficiency related to neonatal jaundice in mice

This report describes biochemical and cellular characterization of a spontaneous mutation in ICR mice; the mutation has been phenotypically characterized as autosomal recessive jaundice in neonates and juveniles and given the gene symbolhub (J. Hered.76:441–446, 1985;Mouse Newslett.73:28, 1985). The results obtained demonstrate that (1) mice homozygous for the mutation are deficient in bilirubin-UDP-glucuronosyltransferase activity, and there is no deficiency in heterozygous mice, (2) the deficiency is lifelong, even though the clinical symptom of jaundice is transitory and restricted to neonates or juveniles, (3) bilirubin-UDP-glucuronosyltransferase activity in mutant and nonmutant mice is similarly induced by triiodothyronine, (4) glucuronidation and xylodation of bilirubin probably occur as the result of separate enzyme forms in mice, and (5) Western analysis using antibody to rat bilirubin-UDP-glucuronosyltransferase indicates that although there is no electrophoretic mobility difference, there is a diffuse band missing in mutant mice. Hepatic hyperplasia, cytomegaly, single-cell necrosis, and eosinophilic foci are also pleiotropic traits associated with homozygous but not heterozygoushub. Thehub/hub mouse will be useful in the study of substrate specificity and regulation within a complex gene family and, perhaps, provide a new and useful animal model for the long-term health effects of deficiency in the metabolism of xenobiotics cleared via UDP-glucuronosyltransferase.
Reaction Kinetics at Polymer−Polymer Interfaces

We present a theoretical study of polymer−polymer reaction kinetics at an interface separating two immiscible polymer phases. Such reactions are widely employed in reactive blending of incompatible species. When functional groups are weakly reactive, the rate constant k obeys mean field theory: k ∝ h, where h is the interface thickness. For strongly reactive end groups (diffusion-controlled limit) we show that the interface increases the effective dimensionality of the problem by one: reaction rates obey scaling laws as for a 4-dimensional bulk problem. This leads to k ∼ 1/ln N and k ∼ 1/N (to within logarithmic factors) for unentangled and entangled melts, respectively, where N is the degree of polymerization. These are quite different from the corresponding scalings for bulk reactions: k ∼ 1/N1/2 and k ∼ 1/N3/2. k depends only logarithmically on h for unentangled systems and is independent of h for entangled cases. As the interface becomes crowded with diblock product, k becomes exponentially small w...
‘Y ¿tú casarías tu hija con un negro?’: El matrimonio interracial en José Martí

This article explores the relationship between interracial marriages and politics in Jose Marti's writings. It uses as a point of reference a little known statement, barely two pages long, that Marti wrote while he was still living in the United States. Marti declares that he would allow his daughter to marry a black man if she fell in love with him and he proved to be a good man. This article explains the importance of such a statement and Marti's position towards interracial marriages in the South of the United States where this kind of alliance usually took a violent turn. However, in at least one poem, Marti criticizes several interracial relationships in Cuba. His ambivalent criticism reveals a deep concern with moral decay in the island, where it was common to find couples living together, often with children, without being married.