cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Forms and functions of school refusal behavior in youth: an empirical analysis of absenteeism severity

Background: School refusal behavior is a particularly nettlesome problem for mental health and education professionals because of its symptom severity and heterogeneity as well as lack of consensus regarding inclusive classification strategies. Alternatively, a functional model of school refusal behavior may provide a particularly useful way of organizing, assessing, and treating this population. Method: The present study included 222 youths aged 5–17 years (134 males, 88 females) with school refusal behavior and their parents. Participants were assessed at a specialized university-based clinic for youths with school refusal behavior. Child self-report and parent-based measures of forms of behavior related to school refusal as well as functions of school refusal behavior were employed. Results: Hierarchical regression analysis and structural equation modeling revealed that function was a better determinant of degree of school absenteeism than behavior form. Conclusions: Assessing the function of school refusal behavior is likely a key factor in the evaluation of this population and may be linked to informed decisions about choice of treatment.
Lossy transmission line metamaterials

Lossy purely LH and generalized CRLH TL metamaterials are analyzed using both an ideal approach, assuming perfectly homogeneous media, and a lumped-element approach, taking into account the real periodic LC configuration of artificial metastructures. The effects of losses are identified and discussed. A CRLH TL metamaterial with small losses is shown to exhibit propagation characteristics identical to that of a lossless metamaterial. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Microwave Opt Technol Lett 43: 112–114, 2004; Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI 10.1002/mop.20392
A Novel Approach to Nodule Feature Optimization on Thin Section Thoracic CT

Rationale and Objectives. An analysis for the optimum selection of image features in feature domain to represent lung nodules was performed, with implementation into a classification module of a computer-aided diagnosis system. Materials andMethods.Forty-two regionsofinterest obtainedfrom 38caseswitheffective diameters of3to8.5mm wereused. On the basis of image characteristics and dimensionality, 11 features were computed. Nonparametric correlation coefficients, multiple regression analysis, and principal-component analysis were used to map the relation between the represented features from four radiologists and the computed features. An artificial neural network was used for the classification of benign and malignant nodules to test the hypothesis obtained from the mapping analysis. Results. Correlation coefficients ranging from 0.2693 to 0.5178 were obtained between the radiologists’ annotations and the computed features. Of the 11 features used, three were found to be redundant when both nodule and non-nodule cases were used, and five were found redundant when nodule or non-nodule cases were used. Combination of analysis from correlation coefficients, regression analysis, principal-component analysis, and the artificial neural network resulted in the selection of optimum features to achieve F-test values of 0.821 and 0.643 for malignant and benign nodules, respectively. Conclusion.This studydemonstrates thatfor theoptimum selectionoffeatures, each feature shouldbeanalyzedindividually and collectively to evaluate the impact on the computer-aided diagnosis system on the basis of its class representation. This methodology will ultimately aid in improving the generalization capability of a classification module for early lung cancer diagnosis.
The myths of laparoscopic surgery

Laparoscopic surgery has been rapidly accepted without rigorous scientific study. New procedures and technologies have advanced rapidly, and most gynecologists have embraced these techniques. I believe that the new technology has given rise to the following myths: (1) that there are associated cost savings, (2) that new technology is always better than the old, (3) that a steep learning curve is acceptable, (4) that market share will be lost without the new techniques, (5) that oncologic surgery is not different when performed laparoscopically, (6) that operations are the same with the laparoscope, and (7) that every gynecologist can do these procedures. A critical evaluation of new technology and of laparoscopic techniques needs to be performed.
Clinical Experience on the Detection of Endotoxemia with the Limulus Test

Eighty-three hospitalized patients suspected of having serious infections were studied for the presence of circulating endotoxin; the limulus lysate test was used. Although 39 patients in this group were infected with organisms capable of releasing endotoxin into the circulation, only two patients had a positive test. Since the test had to be repeated several times before endotoxin was detected in the two positive cases and since the diagnosis could have been established with blood cultures alone in one of these patients, our results cast serious doubt on the usefulness of the limulus test as a diagnostic aid. Although it is widely assumed that endotoxin is the cause of many of the abnormal changes observed in severe infections with gram-negative bacteria, there is still some doubt regarding this concept. Moreover, in patients with bacteremia or circulatory collapse due to infection with this type of organism, endotoxin is not found uniformly. This study was undertaken to provide additional information with respect to the routine diagnostic value of the limulus test in patients with suspected sepsis and to further clarify the role of endotoxin in human infections. Materials and Methods
Factor Analyses of the Pediatric Symptom Checklist-17 With African-American and Caucasian Pediatric Populations

Objectives To validate a three-factor model for the Pediatric Symptom Checklist-17 (PSC-17) and evaluate its diagnostic accuracy with African-American and Caucasian children with and without a chronic illness. Methods Mothers of 723 youth diagnosed with either type I diabetes (n = 210) or sickle cell disease (n = 191) and a nonill peer group (n = 322) completed a demographic questionnaire, the PSC-17, and the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL). Results Confirmatory factor analyses and tests of measurement invariance validated a three-factor structure for the PSC-17 with African-American and Caucasian youth with and without a chronic illness. Receiver operating characteristic curves revealed optimal cut-off scores that are similar to published reports. Conclusions A three-factor solution was replicated for the PSC-17 with African-American and Caucasian children with and without a chronic illness. Cut-off scores for identifying children at risk for emotional/behavioral problems were evaluated using the CBCL as the gold standard and are discussed.
Environment and Development: The Case of the Developing Countries

Interest in the field of ecology, which is centered in the developed countries, has recently increased due to the sudden discovery of a possible imbalance between man and earth. Resulting from the population explosion and the misuse of existing and newly developed technologies, this potential imbalance could bring about an environmental crisis menacing the future of mankind. In several countries the emergence of an interest in ecological problems has not been confined to the realm of the scientific community. It has aroused public concern which has expressed itself, although sometimes vaguely, in such initiatives as Earth Week, celebrated in the United States in April 1970, and the mushrooming of a specialized literature.
Culture and the Sense of Justice A Comprehensive Framework for Analysis

This article examines the intersection of culture and the sense of justice, summarizing a cumulative framework for analyzing human justice judgments that has emerged from several decades of social science research. It outlines a comprehensive guide to the terms and factors where culture may manifest itself and proposes a protocol for discerning the operation of culture. Methodological issues related to the conceptualization and operationalization of justice processes are addressed throughout. The first section develops a framework for justice analysis, distinguishing between ingredients thought to be universal and ingredients in which culture may operate. The second section discusses deductive theories in justice analysis and provides an illustration, in which one of the theories yields implications for individualism and collectivism, thus showing how justice processes can generate phenomena that come to be viewed as culturally based. The concluding section briefly discusses agendas and research designs f...
A DSP microprocessor hybrid control of an inverted pendulum

A hybrid control system implemented in the DSP microprocessor TMS320F2812 is designed to globally stabilize the system for all possible initial conditions. A set of design guidelines for swing-up control and supervisory coordination has been employed in the simulation and real-time experiment. The simulation results and the real-time performance graphs are also presented.
Permeameter wall effect

If the resistance to flow through a granular medium is to be measured in the laboratory with a permeameter, care must be exercised in interpreting the results so as to account for wall effect, A cursory analysis presented in this paper indicates that in general the ratio of permeameter diameter to mean particle diameter should exceed about 40 to eliminate any sizeable effect of the container wall. For ratios less than 40 the Reynolds number of the flow has great influence on wall effect.
Performance Analysis of a Wireless Network with Opportunistic Spectrum Sharing

We analyze the performance of a wireless system that allows opportunistic spectrum sharing. The system consists of a set of primary users sharing a set of channels over a coverage area. The resources allocated to the primary users are shared opportunistically with a set of secondary users. The secondary users are capable of detecting channels that are unused by the primary users and then making use of the idle channels. If no channel is available for a secondary call, the call waits in a buffer until either a channel becomes available or a maximum waiting time is reached. We compute the blocking probabilities, mean reconnection probability, channel utilization, and total carried traffic in the system. Our results suggest that opportunistic spectrum sharing can significantly improve the efficiency of a wireless system, without negatively impacting the performance seen by the primary users.
Efficient on-chip vector processing for multicore processors

Per-core vector support in multicores is not efficient since applications rarely sustain high DLP. We present two Power Gating (PG) schemes to dynamically control Vector co-Processors (VPs) shared by cores. ASIC and FPGA modeling show that PG can reduce the energy by 33% while maintaining high performance.
Components of effective clinical-nutrition training: a national survey of graduate medical education (residency) programs.

A national survey was conducted by The American Society for Clinical Nutrition's Committee on Mcdi- cal/Dental School and Residency Nutrition Education to as- sess the context in which nutrition training is provided in mcdi- cal residency programs. Accreditation guidelines for residency programs suggested eight nutrition components that were en- dorsed by content experts for inclusion in residency training. Directors and nutrition educators from all accredited residen- cies in the United States were surveyed to determine the per- ceived importance ofthe components and the extent to which the components were actually present. The eight components appear to be relevant for exemplary nutrition training at the residency level. An important identified need is to train and involve more clinical-nutrition faculty members in residency programs. Am J Clin Nutr 1990;52:568-7 1.
Extensions of the effective thickness theory of oxide breakdown

The effective thickness concept of oxide breakdown is generalized to a causal time-to-breakdown function, depending only on effective electric field. The function is approximated by a linear and inverse exponential electric-field dependence and applied differentially to data obtained in a pair of step stress tests. The effective thickness distribution is evaluated in both cases and found to be independent of the form chosen. The actual electric-field dependence of the time-to-breakdown function is measured and can be fit with either form over the small range of effective electric fields encountered in the highly accelerated tests. The analysis technique using a pair of tests is presented to illustrate that the effective thickness theory does not require a particular form for the time-to-breakdown function. It demonstrates that the defect density function can be fully obtained at highly accelerated conditions, sampling only a small range of high electric fields. The technique does not of itself allow extrapolation to lower electric fields even though the distribution in effective thickness is known. >
Studying knowledge management in information systems research: discourses and theoretical assumptions

In information systems, most research on knowledge management assumes that knowledge has positive implications for organizations. However, knowledge is a double-edged sword: while too little might result in expensive mistakes, too much might result in unwanted accountability. The purpose of this paper is to highlight the lack of attention paid to the unintended consequences of managing organizational knowledge and thereby to broaden the scope of IS-based knowledge management research. To this end, this paper analyzes the IS literature on knowledge management. Using a framework developed by Deetz (1996), research articles published between 1990 and 2000 in six IS journals are classified into one of four scientific discourses. These discourses are the normative, the interpretive, the critical, and the dialogic. For each of these discourses, we identify the research focus, the metaphors of knowledge, the theoretical foundations, and the implications apparent in the articles representing it. The metaphors of knowledge that emerge from this analysis are knowledge as object, asset, mind, commodity, and discipline. Furthermore, we present a paper that is exemplary of each discourse. Our objective with this analysis is to raise IS researchers' awareness of the potential and the implications of the different discourses in the study of knowledge and knowledge management.
Price clustering of IPOs in the secondary market

This article studies the integer price clustering of Initial Public Offerings (IPOs) in the secondary market trading during the first 240 trading days after their IPO dates. The results indicate the huge difference between the integer price frequency of IPOs in the primary market and that of matched stocks in the secondary market almost disappears on the first trading day after IPO. The integer price frequency of IPOs is still significantly higher than that of matched stocks during the first 240 trading days. However, after controlling for price level, trading characteristics and IPO price support, the integer price frequency of IPOs conforms to that of matched stocks and that those IPOs with integer offer prices have the same integer price frequency as IPOs without.
Academic Success Determinants for Undergraduate Real Estate Students

This study provides some insight into potential determinants of students' academic success by examining gender, age, ethnicity, and performance in two required core knowledge courses as predictors of overall grade point average for a sample of undergraduate real estate students at an AACSB-accredited business school. The results suggest that student performance is significantly related to the grades the students receive in core knowledge courses that are typically taken in the earlier semesters of students' plans of study.
Investigating the Effectiveness of Adlerian Play Therapy (AdPT) with Children with Disruptive Behaviors: A Single-Case Research Design (SCRD)

Disruptive behaviors can be defined as aggressive and rule-breaking behaviors, and examples of such behaviors may include lying, cheating, displaying lack of guilt/remorse, stealing, swearing, arguing, being mean to others, destroying one’s own personal property or that of others, and getting into fights with others (Achenbach & Rescorla, 2001). It is estimated that 10 million children who are identified as having disruptive behaviors will not receive the mental health services they need (Mental Health America, 2010). This gap in services is in part due to insufficient family resources, lack of access to care, and a shortage of identified quality services for children (Mental Health America, 2010; President’s New Freedom Commission on Mental Health, 2003; U.S. Public Health Service, 2000). Because children spend a significant number of hours each day in school, school personnel such as school counselors or school-based counselors have been tasked with providing interventions that meet the mental health ne...
Just In Time Assembly of Accelerators

Despite the significant advancements that have been made in High Level Synthesis, the reconfigurable computing community has failed at getting programmers to use Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs). Existing barriers that prevent programmers from using FPGAs include the need to work within vendor specific CAD tools, knowledge of hardware programming models, and the requirement to pass each design through synthesis, place and route. In this paper we present a new approach that takes these barriers out of the design flows for programmers. Synthesis is eliminated from the application programmers path by becoming part of the initial coding process when creating the programming patterns that define a Domain Specific Language. Programmers see no difference between creating software or hardware functionality when using the DSL. A run time interpreter is introduced that assembles hardware accelerators within a configurable tile array of partially reconfigurable slots at run time. Initial results show the approach allows hardware accelerators to be compiled 100x faster compared to the time required to synthesize the same functionality. Initial performance results further show a compilation/interpretation approach can achieve approximately equivalent performance for matrix operations and filtering compared to synthesizing a custom accelerator.
Mucoid encapsulated streptococci in sporadic and in milk-borne epidemic scarlet fever.

In the course of our studies on Streptococcus epidemicus of septic sore throat we found hemolytic streptococci forming mucoid colonies resembling Str. epidemicus in patients with scarlet fever. Among ten patients with otitis media or mastoiditis who yielded such colonies, four had scarlet fever.1 At that time hemolytic streptococci were recovered in twenty-four patients with otitis media complicating scarlet fever and of these strains four on ascites blood agar resembled the large colonies of Str. epidemicus of epidemic and sporadic septic sore throat. In india ink preparations capsules were demonstrated. Two suggestions were made: First, these mucoid streptococci may be another type of Str. hemolyticus causing scarlet fever or, second, they may be secondary invaders. Our present report is concerned with investigations bearing on the relationship of such encapsulated streptococci to scarlet fever. In the bacteriologic studies, meat or veal infusion agar to which ascites fluid and human blood were added was employed. On this medium, hemolytic streptococci described as Str. epidemicus of sore throat formed large colonies, early moist, later flat, smooth or wrinkled. In india ink preparations capsules were demonstrable. Large colonies obtained from the patients with scarlet fever often resembled such colonies of Str. epidemicus. Most interesting in this connection was the study of strains 1452 and 1462, sent to us by Dr. W. D. Frost of the University of Wisconsin. These were hemolytic streptococci isolated by Jones and Little 2 from the infected udder of a cow the milk of which had caused an epidemic of scarlet fever in which the mode of infection and spread were analogous to that of epidemic milk-borne septic sore throat due to Str. epidemicus. From our observations, these streptococci also have many of the cultural
A preliminary study of screening for pediatric obstructive sleep apnea-hypopnea syndrome by ambulatory electrocardiography

Objective To study the application of ambulatory electrocardiography to screen obstructive sleep apnea/hy-popnea syndrome(OSAHS)in children was evaluated by time-domain and frequency-domain analysis of heart rate variability(HRV).Methods Totally 100 individuals underwent polysomnography and 24-h ambulatory electrocardiography simultaneously. Identify appropriate boundary of HRV parameters to diagnose OSAHS by using ROC curve. Evaluate the feasibility of screening for OSAHS by time-domain and frequency-domain analysis of HRV.Results SDNNall day,SDANNall day,PNN50 night,PNN50day-nightand LF/HFnightwere significantly different in OSAHS group as compared with non-OSAHS group. Thresholds were set at SDNNall day≤95.5 ms,SDANNall day≤80.5 ms,PNN50night≤24.6,LF/HFnight≥0.845 and absolute PNN50day-night≤24.55 by using the ROC curve. The area under ROC curve(AUC)could reach 0.695 by uniting 5 parameters.Conclusion Time-domain and frequency-domain analysis of HRV is a useful method for OSAHS screening.
Getting Back to Basics: Advancing the Study and Practice of Coproduction

ABSTRACTThis article discusses three sets of insights generated in this special issue relating to the intended objectives and desired outcomes of coproduction, the inherent tensions in coproduction activities, and important factors for designing and implementing coproduction processes. It also identifies several problems with coproduction research, and asserts that scholars must get back to the basics and address the need for a clear and consistently applied definition, the need to develop and apply frameworks, typologies, and theories, and the need for more explanatory research. The article concludes with a set of research questions to advance the study and practice of coproduction.
Nonrelativistic Theory of Atoms in a Vacuum

When you follow two separate chains of thought, Watson, you will find some point of intersection which should approximate the truth.
The unbalanced theoretical toolkit: Problems and partial solutions to studying culture and reproduction but not culture and mobility

Many theories explain how culture is linked to class reproduction but few explain how culture is linked to class mobility. This article argues that this theoretical imbalance is problematic as it ignores key stratification processes. The article then develops three concepts that link culture to downward mobility and three concepts that link culture to upward mobility. These concepts offer initial steps toward understanding how cultural differences between the classes are associated with class mobility as well as class reproduction.
RGB-D camera based walking pattern recognition by support vector machines for a smart rollator

This paper presents a walking pattern detection method for a smart rollator. The method detects the rollator user's lower extremities from the depth data of an RGB-D camera. It then segments the 3D point data of the lower extremities into the leg and foot data points, from which a skeletal system with 6 skeletal points and 4 rods is extracted and used to represent a walking gait. A gait feature, comprising the parameters of the gait shape and gait motion, is then constructed to describe a walking state. K-means clustering is employed to cluster all gait features obtained from a number of walking videos into 6 key gait features. Using these key gait features, a walking video sequence is modeled as a Markov chain. The stationary distribution of the Markov chain represents the walking pattern. Three Support Vector Machines (SVMs) are trained for walking pattern detection. Each SVM detects one of the three walking patterns. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed method has a better performance in detecting walking patterns than seven existing methods.
Diagnosis and Management of Hypertensive Renal and Renovascular Disease in the Elderly

The prevalence of both renal parenchymal and renovascular hypertension (RVH) increases sharply with age, making these the two most common causes of secondary hypertension in the elderly (1). The main causes of renal parenchymal disease in the elderly are diabetes mellitus and hypertension (2); the main contributor to RVH is atherosclerosis.
ECOLOGY OF POISONING

I. ABSTRACT Poisoning of vertebrates represents a toxic equation between specific actions of compounds that have arisen in one evolved part of the biota (plants) and specific systems in another (vertebrates). Pressure on plants to evolve defensive mechanisms is greater and more pervasive from herbivorous insects than from the larger herbivorous vertebrates. Secondary compounds of plants form a major defense against insects and may provide other direct benefits for the plant as well. The unusual molecular diversity of secondary compounds and the range of toxic effects they produce in the larger vertebrates have probably not evolved (in most cases) from advantages resulting from those effects, but are instead accidental characteristics of compounds evolved for other positive selective reasons.
Bridging the Adoption Gap for Smart City Technologies: An Interview with Rob Kitchin

Rob Kitchin talks about how we can bridge the adoption gap between city administrations and developers of smart city technologies. This interview is part of a special issue on smart cities.
Active Tendon Control of Structures

A method is developed for the analysis of a continuous structure implemented by an active tendon control under the action of stochastic wind loads. The transfer matrix technique is employed to obtain the frequency response function, in a closed form, of the actively controlled structure. This permits an examination of the behavior of all the vibrational modes in the frequency domain with respect to the variation of control parameters. It is shown that both the displacement and the acceleration of the structure can be reduced significantly in the entire frequency domain only if the feedback control parameters are designed appropriately. It is further shown that although some vibrational modes can be suppressed completely by the active control devices, other vibrational modes may be magnified if the feedback control parameters are not designed carefully.
The Battle of the Parts

WHILE DARWIN, Durkheim and others struggled to define a collectivity made up of individual organisms, a group of nineteenth and early twentieth century scholars, inspired by Darwin’s work, explored collectivity at a smaller scale, sowing the seeds for a full-fledged hierarchical evolutionary theory. This work was primarily done in Germany, by Ernst Haeckel, Wilhelm Roux, and August Weismann, and was inspired by their studies of embryology.
0.3 V ultra-low power sensor interface for EMG

A low-voltage, ultra-low power sensor interface for electromyogram (EMG) signal acquisition is presented. The sensor interface consists of an amplifier and a SAR ADC that work from a 0.3V supply. The low-voltage amplifier topology provides a noise level of 26μVrms, 40dB gain and a state-of the art power efficiency factor (PEF) of 2.2 from a 20–425Hz bandwidth. Low-voltage supply improves the power efficiency of the amplifier compared with previous ultra-low power work. Together with the ADC, the prototype implemented in 65nm CMOS process consumes 3.8nW and has an area of 0.22mm2, which makes the sensor interface suitable for wearable IoT nodes as well as implantable devices.
An Evaluation of the Reliability of Wrist Arthroscopy in the Assessment of Tears of the Triangular Fibrocartilage Complex.

Purpose Wrist arthroscopy is generally considered the reference standard in the diagnosis of triangular fibrocartilage complex (TFCC) injuries. There is a paucity of data examining the reliability of wrist arthroscopy as a diagnostic modality for TFCC injuries. The goal of this study was to evaluate the interobserver and intraobserver reliability of the diagnosis of TFCC pathology during wrist arthroscopy. Methods Twenty-five intraoperative digital videos were captured by the senior author during diagnostic and surgical arthroscopy of the wrist joint for known or suspected articular pathology. The senior author (P.K.B.) confirmed TFCC resilience on visual inspection and ballottement (trampoline effect) to make the diagnosis. Two videos were excluded for poor quality and inadequate visualization. Three hand surgeons subsequently reviewed the remaining 23 videos in a blinded fashion at 2 time points separated by 4 weeks. The reviewers determined if the trampoline test was positive and if a TFCC tear was present. Tears were classified using a morphologic classification. Statistical measures of reliability including percentage agreement and κ coefficients were calculated. Results Agreement between observers for the presence or absence of a tear was 66.7%. The average intraobserver agreement regarding the presence or absence of a tear was 67.4% The kappa value for interobserver agreement was 0.33, whereas the intrarater agreement was 0.88. The 3 reviewers identified an average of 11.3 positive trampoline tests. Agreement between observers for a positive trampoline test was 65.2%. The average percentage of intraobserver agreement regarding a positive trampoline test was 49.3%. In cases where all 3 reviewers agreed on the presence of a TFCC tear, the agreement regarding tear location was 76.6%. Conclusions Wrist arthroscopy remains instrumental in the treatment of TFCC tears. However, given that inter-rater reliability in the assessment of these tears is probably too low, reconsideration should be given to arthroscopy as the reference standard in the diagnosis of these tears. Type of study/level of evidence Diagnostic III.
Understanding the challenges of industrial carbon capture and storage: an example in a U.S. petrochemical corridor

Industrial carbon capture and storage (CCS) is carbon capture from non-power, stationary emissions sources, typically involving high-purity emissions from a non-combustion exhaust stream. I...
Differentiation of Bacterial Populations in Seed Extracts by Flow Cytometry

Current protocols for detection of bacterial pathogens in seed samples generally involve extraction, concentration by centrifugation, plating, and colony recognition on semiselective media. Colonies are further identifed by immunodiagnostic tests or the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) using primer sets specific for each pathogen. Assay sensitivity may be improved by prior enrichment, as in immunofluorescence colony staining (9), enrichment ELISA (7) or Bio-PCR (8). The final confirmation is usually a pathogenicity assay which involves additional time and materials.
Rod Link Reducer Posterior System for Vertebral Column Resection: A Porcine Model

Although a single posterior vertebral column resection (PVCR) has been used for surgical treatment of the most severe spinal deformity, its use may have a number of disadvantages such as the limited correction, potential risk of spinal cord injuries, and long operative time. A new rod link reducer posterior instrumentation system has been developed to overcome the disadvantages of the PVCR. In this study, an average 53° angular kyphosis was created via an anterior tethering in a porcine model. The deformity was corrected via PVCR using the rod link reducer system. The correction rate was 75 %. The new implant system provides rigid stability during the resection and provides outstanding control of the spine segments during the correction to minimize neurologic risk to the spinal cord common in PVCR surgery.
An Overview of the Regulatory Considerations for Animal Cloning

Animal cloning is used to propagate desirable genetics, facilitate more efficient movement of animal genetics, and rescue valuable or endangered genetics. To address safety concerns about cloning, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) conducted a risk assessment that addressed food safety and animal health of animal clones and their progeny. The FDA found that there were no unique animal health risks compared with other assisted reproductive technologies (although those present were seen at higher frequencies), food from animal clones was as safe to eat as food from animals produced using conventional practices, the progeny of clones are not clones, and regulation of animal clones and their progeny in the USA should not differ from that of conventionally produced animals. Although views on whether animal clones and their progeny may be subject to additional regulation varies across international jurisdictions, the scientific findings of the FDA’s cloning risk assessment are consistent with findings of risk assessments performed by other international entities.
Social Networks and Social Isolation

It is widely recognized that social relationships and affiliation have powerful effects on physical and mental health. Social isolation is often a stressful condition. Findings from many studies link social isolation or lack of social integration to increased rates of mortality, morbidity, and biomarkers of stress.
A comparison of three foliar-applied herbicides for controlling mountain laurel thickets in the mixed-oak forests of the central Appalachian Mountains, USA

Abstract In the Appalachian Mountains of eastern North America, mountain laurel (Kalmia latifolia) thickets in mixed-oak (Quercus spp.) stands can lead to hazardous fuel conditions, forest regeneration problems, and possible forest health concerns. Generally, land managers use mechanical means or prescribed fire to control mountain laurel thickets, but these treatments are expensive, dangerous to implement, or have short-term effectiveness. From 2012 to 2016, we compared the effectiveness of three herbicides applied as broadcast foliar treatments at varying rates and in different months for reducing mountain laurel thickets. Triclopyr (ester formulation) top-killed mountain laurel within a few weeks at most month/rate combinations, but subsequent sprouting reduced overall effectiveness by year 3. Conversely, imazapyr provided little initial control of mountain laurel, but by year 3, the herbicide had killed nearly all the treated shrubs with no subsequent sprouting regardless of the month of application or rate. Glyphosate had limited effectiveness; spraying in August at 8 and 12 L/ha killed the mountain laurel over 3 years with little sprouting while all others treatments had little or no impact. From these results, it appears that several month/rate combinations of all three herbicides have potential for controlling mountain laurel thickets and merit further testing to refine application procedures.
Wild Bee Pollen Diets Reveal Patterns of Seasonal Foraging Resources for Honey Bees

Western honey bees (Apis mellifera) are dominant crop pollinators, and access to summer forage is a critical factor influencing colony health in agricultural landscapes. In many temperate agricultural regions, honey bees forage extensively from non-native plants during the summer, but it is unclear whether the use of these species is due to honey bee preference for these plants or is a result of their relative abundance. The foraging choices made by native bees that have evolved with native plants can reveal the seasonal availability of native plant pollens, and so we quantified the pollen collected by 181 wild bee species native to Michigan. Pollen was also trapped from honey bee colonies during the summer to confirm the peak period of non-native pollen collection in this region. Across the state, the generic richness of native pollens collected by wild bees peaked in May before linearly declining into September. Wild social and solitary bees collected a similar proportion of their pollen from non-native plants from April to July, but during August and September social bees collected a significantly greater proportion from non-natives. At a local scale, honey bees collected the majority of their pollen from non-native plants between 4 July and 21 August, with the same trend seen in both social and solitary bees. Across the region, a significantly greater proportion of the solitary bee species that peak during this time are specialists, most of which collect from native plant species that are little utilised by social bees for pollen, such as Dasiphora, Helianthus, Physalis and Vernonia. Our results suggest that Michigan has relatively few native flowering resources during the height of the summer, and that many of those which flower during this time are used primarily by specialised solitary bee species rather than the social bee community, including honey bees. As a result, non-native plant species with a late summer flowering phenology fill a forage gap and thus can contribute to the diet of both honey bees and generalist wild bees during this time, despite the well-documented negative impacts of these species on native plant communities.
The Effect of Core Abdominal Muscle Rehabilitation Exercises on Return to Training and Performance in Horses After Colic Surgery.

Abstract We conducted a retrospective cohort study to test the hypothesis that performing 4 weeks of core abdominal rehabilitation exercises (CARE) postoperatively would be safe and associated with faster return to training and improved performance after colic surgery. Performance horses that recovered from colic surgery performed by the same surgeon and survived ≥ 1 year from 2008 to 2017 were included. Data were obtained from a review of medical records. Information about the horses’ rehabilitation and performance was obtained from owners/trainers. Data from horses that completed a 4-week CARE program after surgery were compared with control horses that did not do the exercises after colic surgery. Data were analyzed using univariate and multiple regression, P
Stress Management with Law Enforcement Personnel: A Controlled Outcome Study of EMDR Versus a Traditional Stress Management Program

Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) has been shown to be effective for treating posttraumatic stress disorder, but its efficacy as a stress management tool for normal individuals in highly stressful occupations has not been demonstrated. Sixty-two police officers were randomly assigned to either EMDR or a standard stress management program (SMP), each consisting of 6 hours of individualized contact. At completion, officers in the EMDR condition provided lower ratings on measures of PTSD symptoms, subjective distress, job stress, and anger; and higher marital satisfaction ratings than those in SMP. The effects of EMDR were maintained at the 6-month follow-up, indicating enduring gains from a relatively brief treatment regimen for this subclinical sample of officers who were experiencing some level of stress from their job.
Pronounced therapeutic benefit of a single bidirectional AAV vector administered systemically in Sandhoff mice

The GM2 gangliosidoses, Tay-Sachs disease (TSD) and Sandhoff disease (SD), are fatal lysosomal storage disorders caused by mutations in the HEXA and HEXB genes, respectively. These mutations cause dysfunction of the lysosomal enzyme β-N-acetylhexosaminidase A (HexA) and accumulation of GM2 ganglioside (GM2) with ensuing neurodegeneration, and death by 5 years of age. Until recently, the most successful therapy was achieved by intracranial co-delivery of monocistronic adeno-associated viral (AAV) vectors encoding Hex alpha and beta-subunits in animal models of SD. The blood-brain barrier crossing properties of AAV9 enables systemic gene therapy; however, the requirement of co-delivery of two monocistronic AAV vectors to overexpress the heterodimeric HexA protein has prevented the use of this approach. To address this need, we developed multiple AAV constructs encoding simultaneously HEXA and HEXB using AAV9 and AAV-PHP.B and tested their therapeutic efficacy in 4- to 6-week-old SD mice after systemic administration. Survival and biochemical outcomes revealed superiority of the AAV vector design using a bidirectional CBA promoter with equivalent dose-dependent outcomes for both capsids. AAV-treated mice performed normally in tests of motor function, CNS GM2 ganglioside levels were significantly reduced, and survival increased by >4-fold with some animals surviving past 2 years of age.
Socio-Economic Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic

In this work, we propose a dynamic cascade model to investigate the systemic risk posed by sector level industries within the U.S. inter-industry network. We then use this model to study the effect of the disruption presented by COVID-19 on the U.S. economy. We construct a weighted digraph G = (V;E;W) using the industry-by-industry total requirements table for the year 2018, provided by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. We impose an initial shock that disrupts the production capacity of one or more industries and calculate the propagation of production shortage with a modified Cobb-Douglas production function. In the case of COVID-19, the initial shock is modeled on the loss of labor between March and April 2020, as reported by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The industries within the network are assigned a resilience r that determines the ability of an industry to absorb input losses, such that if the rate of input loss exceeds the resilience r, the industry fails and its outputs go to zero. We observe a critical resilience rc, such that below this critical value the network experiences a catastrophic cascade resulting in total network collapse.
Single center experience with ultrasound guided axillary vein port placement.

Purpose:To retrospectively review a single institution experience of ultrasound guided axillary vein port placement.Methods:In this retrospective study, a patient list was generated after searching...
Old Wine, New Bottles: Record Collecting, Jazz Reissues, and the Jazz Tradition

This article argues that reissues – whether in the form of repackaged and re-released recordings that have gone out of print, recordings republished in new media with the change of playback technol...
Towards improving engagement of youth of color in cross-age mentoring programs in high poverty, high crime neighborhoods

Abstract This study examines predictors of attendance in a cross-age youth mentoring program offered in four high-poverty, high-crime communities. Youth in greatest need of after school and summer interventions are those residing in such communities, but programs are scarce. More specific to mentoring programs that do exist, past research has demonstrated the significance of attendance as a predictor of positive outcomes. Two datasets were combined for this study: The Saving Lives, Inspiring Youth (SLIY) mentoring program dataset and a neighborhood database. OLS regression results show that for all participants, traveling from a lower-crime home area to a program in a higher-crime area was negatively related to attendance, as was age. In addition to crime, variables related to attendance for mentors included stress, perceived family resources, and race, whereas age and having a sister were related to attendance for mentees. Implications for program designers and policymakers are discussed.
Hematoma Enlargement as a Target for Treating Intracerebral Hemorrhage: A More Granular View.

The choice of outcome in therapeutic trials for any neurologic disease is crucial. The proper choice and calibration of that outcome should be based on a fundamental understanding of the expected biological effect of the treatment on the outcome being measured. Acute stroke treatment trials have been particularly challenging and informative in this regard. For instance, in the first positive stroke study, the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke tissue plasminogen activator (tPA) stroke study comparing tPA to placebo in patients with acute ischemic stroke,1 the primary analysis compared the proportion of patients achieving a modified Rankin Scale (mRS) score of 0 or 1 (near-complete or complete recovery back to baseline) vs 2 to 6 representing ascending levels of disability or death. This choice was made because half of the patients would be treated within 90 minutes of stroke onset, and preclinical and pilot clinical data suggested that removing the offending clot so soon after stroke onset might completely prevent infarction. Thus, measuring the proportion of patients who were “cured” (mRS score 0 or 1) was the biological sweet spot of treatment. On the other hand, another positive treatment, hemicraniectomy applied to patients herniating from massive infarction,2 could not be expected to “cure” patients but rather to salvage them from severe disability of death, so dichotomization of mRS score ≤3 vs 4 to 6 was the appropriate endpoint. A careful analysis of the outcomes of negative/neutral studies can also shed light on the possible biological effect of treatment and help determine the most sensitive outcome for a revised trial. Successful endovascular trials in delayed time windows used a dichotomization of mRS score of ≤2 vs 3 to 6 because earlier neutral studies showed that patients treated late had already suffered some irreversible ischemic brain damage and were often not completely cured.3 The study by Yogendrakumar et al.4 in this issue of Neurology ® follows this line of thinking for patients with intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH) by analyzing outcomes from a neutral trial to understand the biology being targeted by the treatment.,5
Bioethics, (Funding) Priorities, and the Perpetuation of Injustice

If funding allocation is an indicator of a field’s priorities, then the priorities of the field of bioethics are misaligned because they perpetuate injustice. Social justice mandates priority for t...
Comparative Analysis of COVID-19 in April-June 2020 (Without Vaccines) and 2021 (With Vaccines): A Strong Seasonally Effect, Regardless Vaccinations

The goal of this study is to develop a comparative analysis between the period April-May-June 2020 (without vaccinations) and April-May-June 2021 (with vaccinations) in Italy, which was the first European country to experience a rapid increase in confirmed cases and deaths in 2020 and on June 2021 is one of the countries with widespread vaccinations in society. Statistical evidence suggests that fixed significance level α = 0.01, mean of confirmed cases, hospitalizations, ICUs, and deaths in 2020 and 2021 is significantly equal: there is not a significant difference in mean between 2020 and 2021. These findings reveal that the evolution of COVID-19 is associated with seasonality that reduces the effects in summer in terms of confirmed cases and deaths. However, seasonality alone can be a main factor in transmission dynamics of COVID-19 but cannot be a sufficient element to curb the novel coronavirus transmission that requires multidisciplinary and timely intervention policies of short and long run and a scaled up health care capacity and pandemic preparedness in the winter seasons, rather than summer period.
The Model in Action—Baltimore

South East Baltimore is a community known throughout the city for its ethnic diversity. People of Polish, Czechoslovakian, Russian, German, Greek, and Italian origin are all found here. In 1970, over 99,000 people—comprising 11% of the city’s population—lived in South East, most of them in well-kept rowhouses, some of which date back to the late eighteenth century.
Vectors and spaces

The objects of chief interest in the study of a Hilbert space are not the vectors in the space, but the operators on it. Most people who say they study the theory of Hilbert spaces in fact study operator theory. The reason is that the algebra and geometry of vectors, linear functionals, quadratic forms, subspaces and the like are easier than operator theory and are pretty well worked out. Some of these easy and known things are useful and some are amusing; perhaps some are both.