cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
A three-dimensional computed tomography-assisted Monte Carlo evaluation of ovoid shielding on the dose to the bladder and rectum in intracavitary radiotherapy for cervical cancer.

Purpose: To determine the effects of Fletcher Suit Delclos ovoid shielding on dose to the bladder and rectum during intracavitary radiotherapy for cervical cancer. Methods and Materials: The Monte Carlo method was used to calculate the dose in 12 patients receiving low-dose-rate intracavitary radiotherapy with both shielded and unshielded ovoids. Cumulative dose-difference surface histograms were computed for the bladder and rectum. Doses to the 2-cm 3 and 5-cm 3 volumes of highest dose were computed for the bladder and rectum with and without shielding. Results: Shielding affected dose to the 2-cm 3 and 5-cm 3 volumes of highest dose for the rectum (10.1% and 11.1% differences, respectively). Shielding did not have a major impact on the dose to the 2-cm 3 and 5-cm 3 volumes of highest dose for the bladder. The average dose reduction to 5% of the surface area of the bladder was 53 cGy. Reductions as large as 150 cGy were observed to 5% of the surface area of the bladder. The average dose reduction to 5% of the surface area of the rectum was 195 cGy. Reductions as large as 405 cGy were observed to 5% of the surface area of the rectum. Conclusions: Our data suggest that the ovoid shields can greatly reduce the radiation dose delivered to the rectum. We did not find the same degree of effect on the dose to the bladder. To calculate the dose accurately, however, the ovoid shields must be included in the dose model.
Initiating and Sustaining Breastfeeding in African American Women

Objective: To explore issues related to initiating and sustaining breastfeeding in African American women. Design: Qualitative design using focus groups, guided by Leininger's theory of culture care diversity and universality. Setting: Three different regions of a southeastern state in the United States. Participants: Fifteen self-identified African American women who had recently breastfed were recruited by lactation consultants and by word of mouth. Methods: Three focus groups were conducted with initial guiding questions. New ideas that emerged were fully explored in the group and included as a guiding question for the next group. Results: Categories identified from the data were reasons to start and stop breastfeeding, advice about breastfeeding that was useful or not useful, and cultural issues related to breastfeeding that were perceived to be unique among African Americans. Three overall themes were identified that cut across categories: perceived lack of information about benefits and management of breastfeeding, difficulties breastfeeding in public, and lack of a support system for continued breastfeeding. Conclusion: Women need to be taught early in their pregnancies about the benefits of breastfeeding and offered continuing support and teaching once breastfeeding is established. Peer support groups for breastfeeding African American women should be established.
Characteristics of emergency department "doctor shoppers".

Background There is a need to accurately identify patients at risk for drug abuse before giving a prescription for a scheduled medication. Objective Our aim was to describe a subset of emergency department (ED) patients that had eight or more schedule II-V prescriptions filled from eight or more providers in 1 year, known as "doctor-shopping" (DS) behavior, to compare demographic features of DS and non-DS patients, and to determine clinical factors associated with DS. Methods We conducted a prospective, observational study of emergency providers' (EPs) assessment of patients with back pain, dental pain, or headache. EPs recorded patient demographics, clinical characteristics, and numbers of schedule II-V prescriptions, subset opioid prescriptions, providers, and pharmacies utilized in a 12-month period, as reported on the state prescription drug-monitoring program. χ(2) and t-tests were used to compare DS with non-DS patients on demographics; a multivariate logistic regression was performed to determine clinical factors associated with DS. Results Five hundred and forty-four patient visits were recorded; 12.3% (n = 67) had DS behavior. DS and non-DS patients were similar in sex but differed in age, race, chief complaint, and weekday vs. weekend arrival. DS patients utilized a median of 12.0 (interquartile range [IQR] 9.0-18.0) providers compared with a median of 1.0 (IQR 0-2.0) providers in the non-DS group. Reporting allergies to non-narcotic medications (odds ratio [OR] = 3.1; 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.4-6.9; p = 0.01), requesting medications by name (OR = 2.7; 95% CI 1.5-4.9; p Conclusions There are multiple clinical characteristics associated with DS in this patient population.
Spindle assembly requires complete disassembly of spindle remnants from the previous cell cycle

Incomplete mitotic spindle disassembly causes lethality in budding yeast. To determine why spindle disassembly is required for cell viability, we used live-cell microscopy to analyze a double mutant strain containing a conditional mutant and a deletion mutant compromised for the kinesin-8 and anaphase-promoting complex-driven spindle-disassembly pathways (td-kip3 and doc1Δ, respectively). Under nonpermissive conditions, spindles in td-kip3 doc1Δ cells could break apart but could not disassemble completely. These cells could exit mitosis and undergo cell division. However, the daughter cells could not assemble functional, bipolar spindles in the ensuing mitosis. During the formation of these dysfunctional spindles, centrosome duplication and separation, as well as recruitment of key midzone-stabilizing proteins all appeared normal, but microtubule polymerization was nevertheless impaired and these spindles often collapsed. Introduction of free tubulin through episomal expression of α- and β-tubulin or introduction of a brief pulse of the microtubule-depolymerizing drug nocodazole allowed spindle assembly in these td-kip3 doc1Δ mutants. Therefore we propose that spindle disassembly is essential for regeneration of the intracellular pool of assembly-competent tubulin required for efficient spindle assembly during subsequent mitoses of daughter cells.
OCCURRENCE OF CAMPYLOBACTER SPECIES, SALMONELLA SPECIES AND GENERIC ESCHERICHIA COLI IN MEAT PRODUCTS FROM RETAIL OUTLETS IN THE FARGO METROPOLITAN AREA

Foodborne illnesses are a substantial health burden in the United States, with Campylobacter, pathogenic Escherichia coli and Salmonella reported among the major bacterial foodborne pathogens. These organisms are often present in fresh meat and poultry with regional differences in incidence. The objectives of this study were (1) to determine occurrence of foodborne pathogens Campylobacter and Salmonella as well as generic Escherichia coli in raw meats sold in retail grocery stores in the Fargo metropolitan area of North Dakota in the Midwestern United States; and (2) to correlate observed prevalence with the product type and retail store. A total of 456 fresh raw meats (turkey, chicken, pork, beef) were purchased and tested for microbial contamination. Overall, 341 (75%) of the samples were contaminated with generic E. coli (n = 316, 72%), Campylobacter (n = 12, 2.6%) and Salmonella (n = 13, 2.9%). The meats differed significantly (P < 0.0001) in contamination rate with Campylobacter and Salmonella, but not among the five stores. PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS The data indicate that meat products, particularly poultry (chicken and turkey), purchased from retail stores in the Fargo metropolitan area may occasionally be contaminated with Campylobacter and Salmonella. This signifies the importance of sustained surveillance of foodborne pathogens in retail meats. In addition, the data suggest that microbial contamination on raw retail meats purchased in the metropolitan area of a rural agricultural state are not higher than those reported for larger urban locales.
Naturalistically observed swearing, emotional support, and depressive symptoms in women coping with illness.

Objective: The goal of this study was to explore the intra- and interpersonal consequences of swearing. Specifically, it investigated what implications swearing has for coping with and adjustment to illness. Methods: The present project combined data from two pilot studies of 13 women with rheumatoid arthritis and 21 women with breast cancer. Participants wore the Electronically Activated Recorder, an unobtrusive observation sampling method that periodically records snippets of ambient sounds, on weekends to track spontaneous swearing in their daily interactions, and completed self-reported measures of depressive symptoms and emotional support. Results: Naturalistically observed swearing in the presence of others, but not alone, was related to decreases in reported emotional support and increases in depressive symptoms over the study period. Further, decreases in emotional support mediated the effect of swearing on disease-severity adjusted changes in depressive symptoms. Conclusion: These exploratory results are consistent with the notion that swearing can sometimes repel emotional support at the expense of psychological adjustment. This is one of the first studies to examine the role of swearing, a ubiquitous but understudied psychological phenomenon, in a medical context.
On optimization and parallelization of fuzzy connected segmentation for medical imaging

Fuzzy Connectedness is an important image segmentation routine for image processing of medical images. It is often used in preparation for surgery and sometimes during surgery. It is important to have an algorithm which can execute very fast, especially in the intra-operative environment. We have taken code from a popular image processing toolkit called ITK and ported it to a C environment. We optimized the implementation to give maximal performance (giving speedup of 23 times). We attempted three different levels of parallelization. We found that MPI was not an efficient method of parallelization as the algorithm is data dependant and large amounts of communication must be done. This communication overshadows the speed increase from doing computation on multiple processors, or nodes in a cluster. However, some limited speedup over the optimizations was obtained using OpenMP on an SMP system leading to a speedup of fifty using four processors over the original ITK implementation.
Polymer Microneedles for Controlled-Release Drug Delivery

As an alternative to hypodermic injection or implantation of controlled-release systems, this study designed and evaluated biodegradable polymer microneedles that encapsulate drug for controlled release in skin and are suitable for self-administration by patients. Arrays of microneedles were fabricated out of poly-lactide-co-glycolide using a mold-based technique to encapsulate model drugs—calcein and bovine serum albumin (BSA)—either as a single encapsulation within the needle matrix or as a double encapsulation, by first encapsulating the drug within carboxymethylcellulose or poly-l-lactide microparticles and then encapsulating drug-loaded microparticles within needles. By measuring failure force over a range of conditions, poly-lactide-co-glycolide microneedles were shown to exhibit sufficient mechanical strength to insert into human skin. Microneedles were also shown to encapsulate drug at mass fractions up to 10% and to release encapsulated compounds within human cadaver skin. In vitro release of calcein and BSA from three different encapsulation formulations was measured over time and was shown to be controlled by the encapsulation method to achieve release kinetics ranging from hours to months. Release was modeled using the Higuchi equation with good agreement (r 2 ≥ 0.90). After microneedle fabrication at elevated temperature, up to 90% of encapsulated BSA remained in its native state, as determined by measuring effects on primary, secondary, and tertiary protein structure. Biodegradable polymer microneedles can encapsulate drug to provide controlled-release delivery in skin for hours to months.
Faculty Awareness of Textbook Prices

Considerable variation exists in textbook prices, and this variation is not correlated with book quality as judged by instructors. Community college faculty are more price conscious and more accurate in estimating prices than are university faculty. Most faculty interviewed believe that publishers are not making significant efforts to compete in the area of price, and increased faculty access to price information would lower textbook prices. Recommendations are made for increasing price awareness and knowledge among faculty.
AMPA glutamate receptor subunit 2 in normal and visually deprived macaque visual cortex.

Glutamate and its various receptors are known to play an important role in excitatory synaptic transmission throughout the CNS, including the primary visual cortex. Among subunits of the AMPA receptors (α-amino-3-hydroxy-5-methyl-4-isoxazole propionic acid), subunit 2 (GluR2) is of special significance because it controls their Ca 2+ permeability. In the past, this subunit has been studied mostly in conjunction with other AMPA subunits. The present study sought to determine if GluR2 alone has a distinct laminar distribution in the normal macaque visual cortex, and if its pattern correlated with that of cytochrome oxidase (CO) under normal and monocularly deprived conditions. In the normal adult cortex, GluR2 immunoreactivity (ir) had a patchy distribution in layers II/III, in register with CO-rich puffs. GluR2-ir highlighted the upper border of layer II, the lower border of layer IV (previously termed IVC βdark ) and, most prominently, layer VI. Labeled neurons were primarily of the pyramidal type present in the upper border and lower half of layer VI, layers II/III, and scattered in layers V and upper IVB. Labeled nonpyramidal cells were large in layer IVB and small in IVC βdark . Notably, the bulk of CO-rich layers IVC and IVA had very low levels of GluR2-ir. At fetal day 13, however, GluR2 labeling showed a honeycomb-like pattern in layer IVA not found in the adult. A fragment of GluR2 cDNA was generated from a human cDNA library, and in situ hybridization revealed an expression pattern similar to that of GluR2 proteins. After 1–4 weeks of monocular impulse blockade with tetrodotoxin (TTX), alternating rows of strong and weak GluR2-ir in layers VI and II/III appeared in register with CO-labeled dark and light ocular dominance columns in layer IVC and puffs in II/III, respectively. Our results indicate that various cortical layers are differentially influenced by glutamate. The bulk of the major geniculate-recipient layers IVC and IVA have low levels of GluR2, presumably favoring synaptic transmission via Ca 2+ -permeable glutamate receptors. GluR2 plays a more important role in supragranular and infragranular layers, where the initial geniculate signals are further modified and are transmitted to other cortical and subcortical centers. The maintenance of GluR2 in these output layers is governed by visual input and neuronal activity, as monocular impulse blockade induced a down-regulation of this subunit in deprived ocular dominance columns.
Self partitioning backpropagation network for target recognition

A method for qualifying the degree of noncooperation that exists among the target members of the training set is presented. Both the network architecture and the training algorithm are taken into consideration while computing non-cooperation measures. Based on these measures, the network automatically creates several topologically identical partitions. Each partition learns a subset of the targets. The partitioning takes place only when necessary and requires minima computation. Each partition is simple with only one hidden layer and one node in the output layer. A fusion network combines partial results to produce the final response. Simulation results indicate that the method is robust and capable of self organization to overcome the ill effects of non-cooperating targets in the training set. Thus the network complexity and training time are significantly reduced. The self partitioning neural network (SPNN) approach has been tested through extensive simulation using more than 15 sets of real ATR data provided by the US Army Missile Command. Each data set consisted of hundreds of images which were extracted by the target detection system from the sensor's field of view for further processing. The study has indicated that the SPNN approach has the potential for use in real-time target recognition applications.
On the initial-value problem in the kinetic theory of gases

The relaxation of an initially non-uniform gas to equilibrium is studied within the framework of the kinetic theory of gases. The macroscopic gas properties are taken to depend on one spatial dimension as well as the time. The amplitude of the non-uniformity is assumed to be small with a length scale large compared with the mean free path, and the Krook model of the Boltzmann collision integral is employed. By applying multi-time scale perturbation methods to this reduced problem, uniformly valid analytical solutions for the macroscopic velocity, density and temperature are obtained. The macroscopic equations appropriate to each stage of the relaxation process are obtained in a straightforward and unambiguous manner. The distribution function obtained is shown to be a re-expansion of the Chapman–Enskog solution of the Krook equation, with additional terms accounting for the relaxation of the initial conditions to a near equilibrium form. The results indicate that the uniformly valid frst approximation to the macroscopic velocity, density and temperature can be obtained from the Navier–Stokes equations, but that no purely macroscopic set of equations will suffice for the determination of higher approximations.
Fostering Academic Cooperation and Collaboration through the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning: A Faculty Research Abroad Program in Poland

This study is a narrative analysis of participants’ perceptions of the development of crosscultural awareness through The Faculty Research Abroad Program in Poland, a joint initiative between a regional campus of a Midwestern land grant university and a private university in Poland. The purpose was to foster academic cooperation and collaboration through a co-sponsored symposium on the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL). Results from a survey of the 15 participating faculty members from the United States provided the basis for the development of the University Global Collaboration Model. The model depicts how awareness of culture, connection to others, and collaboration can result in tangible outcomes. The American faculty participating in the week-long sojourn in Poland experienced a different culture, but the short amount of time on-site attenuated the development of cultural awareness. Participants viewed the experience as having the potential for international collaboration.
Electron Correlation and the Mechanism of Atomic Autoionization

This review deals with our present understanding of the nature of the quantum states of two-electron atoms. The exposition, a description of new insights into the dynamics of electron correlation and origins of correlation-induced auto- ionization, is in large part a brief summary of a discussion given recently by Paul Rehmus and myself (Rehmus and Berry, 1981) and of the earlier studies of stationary states of two- electron atoms that led to the analysis of autoionization (Rehmus and Berry, 1979); Rehmus et al., 1978a,b). The essence of the approach is the construction of the reduced two-particle density ρ (r1,r2,θ12), forming the conditional probability density $$ \rho \left( {{{\text{r}}_{2}},{\theta _{{12}}}|{r_{1}} = \alpha } \right) = \frac{{\rho \left( {{{\text{r}}_{1}} = \alpha ,{{\text{r}}_{2}},{\theta _{{12}}}} \right)}}{{\left[ {\int {{\text{d}}{{\text{r}}_{2}}\int {{\text{d}}{\theta _{{12}}}\rho \left( {{{\text{r}}_{1}},{{\text{r}}_{2}},{\theta _{{12}}}} \right)} } } \right]}}. $$ (1) This distribution is the probability of finding particle 2 at distance r2 from the origin (essentially the nucleus, in a two-electron atom) and at angle θ12 from the vector \( {\vec{r}_{2}} \) when the distance r1 of particle 1 from the origin has the value α.
Seasonal life stage abundance of Diaprepes abbreviatus in irrigated and non-irrigated citrus plantings in central Florida.

Abstract The seasonal abundance of various life stages of Diaprepes abbreviatus (L.), was monitored in separate years in adjacent irrigated and non-irrigated citrus plantings, as well as thickets of Brazilian-pepper located near Poinciana, FL in Osceola County. Adult emergence, estimated by weekly catches in cone-shaped ground traps, occurred throughout the year with a peak in mid-June in both citrus and Brazilian-pepper plantings. Onset of adult emergence coincided with an increase in soil moisture and temperature. Trap counts were highest when soil water potential increased to 3-5 centibars at a depth of 15-30 cm and soil temperature averaged 22-24EC. In the non-irrigated citrus planting, the adult emergence peak was of shorter duration, but of greater magnitude, compared to the irrigated planting. Although the alternate host, Brazilian-pepper, produced fewer weevils than did citrus, the seasonal emergence pattern was virtually the same. Adult abundance within the citrus plantings was also monitored wee...
Separation of Americium, Curium, and Trivalent Lanthanides from High-Level Wastes by Oxalate Precipitation: Experiments with Synthetic Waste Solutions

The separation of trivalent actinides and rare earths from other fission products in high-level nuclear wastes by oxalate precipitation followed by ion exchange (OPIX) was experimentally investigated using synthetic wastes and a small-scale, continuous-flow oxalic acid precipitation and solid-liquid separation system. Trivalent actinide and rare earth oxalates are relatively insoluble in 0.5 to 1.0 M HNO/sub 3/ whereas other fission product oxalates are not. The continuous-flow system consisted of one or two stirred-tank reactors in series for crystal growth. Oxalic acid and waste solutions were mixed in the first tank, with the product solid-liquid slurry leaving the second tank. Solid-liquid separation was tested by filters and by a gravity settler. The experiments determined the fraction of rare earths precipitated and separated from synthetic waste streams as a function of number of reactors, system temperature, oxalic acid concentration, liquid residence time in the process, power input to the stirred-tank reactors, and method of solid-liquid separation. The crystalline precipitate was characterized with respect to form, size, and chemical composition. These experiments are only the first step in converting a proposed chemical flowsheet into a process flowsheet suitable for large-scale remote operations at high activity levels.
Acceptability and effects of tools to assist with controller managed spacing in the terminal area

In a human-in-the-loop simulation, a scheduler delivered aircraft to meter fixes in the Los Angeles terminal area with a -60 to +30 second accuracy. This study investigated whether, and how well, controllers could control aircraft to land them as close to their scheduled time of arrival (STA) as possible using speed control alone. Controllers were assigned one of three levels of tools to assist them but had to compensate for errors in the forecast winds that had not been taken into account by the scheduler. Results show that speed clearances were sufficient under all conditions to maneuver aircraft closer to their STAs. From participant reports, this form of control incurred manageable workload and two of the three levels of tools were deemed easy to use.
Calculation of Passive Membrane Properties for Experimentally Determined Dendritic Geometries of Laterodorsal Tegmental Neurons in Vitro

The laterodorsal tegmental nucleus (LDT) is located in the dorsolateral pontine reticular formation. Cholinergie neurons in LDT and the adjacent pedunculopontine tegmental nucleus provide the major cholinergic input to the thalamus and play a critical role in the initiation and maintenance of rapid eye movement sleep (1, 2, 4), We determined the cable parameters of LDT neurons as a first step towards a more quantitative understanding of the behavior of these cells and their role in this process. The cells characterized in this study were identified as type II LDT cells on the basis of their physiological properties and were presumed to be cholinergie based on previous double-labeling studies (4, 5). Detailed morphological data were obtained for individual cells and used to set up appropriate cable equations. The parameters appearing in these cable equations were then fit to physiological data obtained from intracellular current clamp recordings for each cell. Resultant membrane parameters had surprisingly high values for intracellular resistivity and relatively long electrotonic path lengths from the soma to the periphery of the dendritic tree. Moreover, it was found that a subthreshold and persistent TTX-sensitive conductance functions to shorten these path lengths.
Use of the Pherocon AM Trap as a Scouting Tool for Predicting Damage by Corn Rootworm (Coleoptera: Chrysomelidae) Larvae

Damage by northern and western corn rootworm, Diabrotica barberi Smith and Lawrence and Diabrotica virgifera virgifera LeConte, respectively, larvae was assessed in 34 cornfields in 1980 and 1981 where adult populations had been monitored the previous August and early September by using unbaited Pherocon AM traps and insect counts taken on entire corn plants. Correlations between population estimates and subsequent damage ratings in 1980 were significant, averaging 0.72 for both sampling methods. The following year, correlations were not as high, averaging 0.32 for the plant count and 0.39 for the Pherocon AM trap, and significant correlations with damage for both methods were obtained for only a single sampling period in mid-August. Regression equations describing the relationship between these adult population estimates and subsequent larval damage are given. These equations result in significant R 2 values of 0.26 for the Pherocon AM trap and 0.27 for the plant count. Because the Pherocon AM sampling technique predicts larval damage as well as the currently standard plant-count method and may have advantages over it, a sampling plan is proposed for the use of the Pherocon AM trap as a tool for scouting corn rootworms.
The value of mammography vs. physical examination in detecting a recurrent breast cancer in women with a previous diagnosis of breast cancer.

CTRC-AACR San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium: 2008 Abstracts Abstract #5014 Background: The value of mammography in detecting early breast cancer has been firmly established, however the benefit of mammography in detecting recurrent breast cancer has not been clearly elucidated. The purpose of this study is to determine the value of mammography versus physical examination in detecting a recurrent breast cancer in women with a previous diagnosis of breast cancer. Methods: This is an IRB approved retrospective chart review. Fifty-eight patients were identified from our institution's Breast Center tumor registry who were diagnosed with stage I-II breast cancer from 1973-2006 and who subsequently developed a locoregional recurrence. The method of detection of the initial breast cancer was recorded and compared to the method of detection of the recurrent breast cancer. Results: The mean age at the original diagnosis was 47 years (range 29-89 years). The mean time to recurrent breast cancer or second primary was 38 months (range 6-173 months). Seventeen patients (29%) were initially diagnosed with breast cancer by screening mammography. Of those 17, 3 (18%) were diagnosed with a recurrent breast cancer by mammography, and the remaining 14 by physical exam. Among the 14 patients that presented initially with a palpable breast mass and positive mammogram, 3 (21%) had recurrent breast cancer detected by mammography. Thirty-four patients (59%) initially presented with a palpable mass. Nineteen of these patients had mammograms, 5 did not have mammography, and 8 were unknown whether imaging was done. Of those 19 that had mammography, 14 were positive and 5 were negative. The 5 patients with palpable masses and negative mammograms all had mastectomies initially and their locoregional recurrence was detected by physical exam. Forty-nine patients (84%) had a clinical finding leading to the diagnosis of recurrent breast cancer and seven (12%) had recurrence identified by mammography. Two patients had unknown method of detection of recurrence. The clinical recurrences were identified in the axilla (53.4%), chest wall (12%), supraclavicular fossa (8.6%), breast (3.4%), and skin (3.4%). Conclusions: One-third of patients with a recurrent breast cancer had their initial cancer identified by mammography but only 12% had their recurrence identified by mammography. Fifty-nine percent of patients were initially diagnosed by physical examination and 84% of recurrence was diagnosed with physical examination. Patients whose initial cancer was visible on mammogram are likely to have a recurrence also visible on mammogram. Though mammography is useful in detecting the first early stage breast cancer, most patients present with a clinical finding when they present with the recurrent breast cancer. Citation Information: Cancer Res 2009;69(2 Suppl):Abstract nr 5014.
A PARAFAC-based long-term assessment of DOM in a multi-coagulant drinking water treatment scheme.

A parallel factor (PARAFAC) analysis approach was used to study the character and composition of dissolved organic matter (DOM) in a multicoagulant (two aluminum-based coagulants) full scale drinking water treatment plant. A three year, long-term assessment was conducted based on deconstruction of the excitation–emission matrices (EEM) of over 1000 water samples collected before and after parallel coagulation treatment basins. Two humic moieties and a protein-like group were identified in the raw and treated waters. Apportionment of fluorophores was established using a novel approach based on the overall fluorescence intensity (OFI) of PARAFAC components. Uncorrected matrix correlation (UMC) revealed minimal changes of the fluorescence moieties after treatment (UMC > 0.98), and a comparable effect of both coagulants on the structure (UMC > 0.99) and distribution of these groups. Coagulation increased the proportion of the protein-like fluorophore and preferentially removed a humic-like group irrespective ...
Abstract IA19: Towards the next clinical option: Experience from a precision cancer medicine trial

Understanding molecular mechanisms of response and resistance to anticancer therapies requires prospective patient follow-up and clinical and functional validation of both common and low frequency mutations. We describe an evidence-based precision medicine program designed to bring whole exome sequencing (WES) into clinical practice and illustrate how this can be utilized to identify novel predictive biomarkers associated with exceptional systemic response. Metastatic and treatment-resistant cancer patients are prospectively enrolled for paired metastatic tumor and normal WES. Using a comprehensive computational pipeline, point mutations, indels and copy number alterations are detected. Mutations are categorized as Category I-III based on actionability and a report is generated and discussed in tumor board. Patients are followed prospectively for correlation of molecular information with clinical response and patient outcomes. A rapid response functional team follows on key findings to expand actionability based on the WES results. In the first year, 154 tumor-normal pairs from 97 patients were sequenced, with an average coverage of 95X of over 21,000 genes and 16 somatic alterations detected on average per patient. In total, 16 mutations were Category I, 98 were Category II, and 1474 were Category III. Tumor purity ranged from 14 to near 100%. Among unexpected findings, a prostate cancer exceptional responder was identified that harbored a somatic hemizygous deletion of the DNA repair gene FANCA and likely loss of function of the second allele through germline missense variant. Follow-up experiments established that loss of FANCA function was associated with platinum hypersensitivity both in vitro and in patient-derived xenografts, thus providing biologic rationale and functional evidence for his extreme clinical response. The establishment of a clinical program for whole exome sequencing of metastatic tumors with prospective follow-up of patients can help identify candidate predictive biomarkers of response. Citation Format: Mark A. Rubin. Towards the next clinical option: Experience from a precision cancer medicine trial. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the AACR Special Conference on Translation of the Cancer Genome; Feb 7-9, 2015; San Francisco, CA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2015;75(22 Suppl 1):Abstract nr IA19.
[Might it be epilepsy? What should the genera;l practitioner look out for in differential diagnosis].

Both a missed diagnosis of epilepsy, a wrong diagnosis of epilepsy as something else, and a misdiagnosis of something else as epilepsy can have serious consequences for the patient, e.g. therapeutic deviations, or physical, physical and social complications. Not all possible but some important problems of differential diagnosis are discussed, including both typical misdiagnoses of epileptic seizures as cardiac synkope or pseudoepileptic fits, oversight of subtle manifestions of epilepsy such as absences, juvenile myoclonic epilepsy, and isolated auras, and misdiagnoses as epilepsy of migraine variants, syncope, episodic ataxias, narcolepsy, and parasomnias.
An Integrative Vernacular

Published in the American Scholar in 1978, Ellison’s “The Little Man at Chehaw Station” is a longer version of a commencement address he gave to the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia in 1975, titled “The Little Man Behind the Stove.” Given the publication date of Ellison’s essay it would make sense that terms, concepts and, especially in the little man himself, aesthetic figurations related to integration would feature prominently. With the destruction of Jim Crow the civil rights movement had ended centuries of segregation and pushed the USA into an age of social integration. It is important to think about the integrative message of “The Little Man at Chehaw Station” not only as a product of Brown vs. Board of Education but also of more immediate events. Ellison’s remarks come a little more than a decade after Lyndon B. Johnson’s 1964 Civil Rights Act and Executive Order 11246 in 1965, as well as Swann vs. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education in 1971. Abolishing the legal grounds for separate but equal institutions however led to what Orlando Patterson has called the “paradoxes of integration” (15). While the federal government continued to pass legislation dismantling the legal legacy of Jim Crow, Patterson discovers that the same post-Brown vs. Board decades saw an increase in racial chauvinism (65).
The Intern Handover: the Gap Between Expectations and Performance

The effective resident handover during transitions of patient care is a skill that is identified as one of the entrustable professional activities (EPAs) required for entering residency training. This study describes the results of an objective structured clinical exam (OSCE) station designed to assess interns’ skills in writing a handover of a standardized patient scenario. In 2015, 130 entering interns, representative of 47 of 125 allopathic medical schools, from 13 residency programs at the University of Florida participated in an OSCE that included a written handover station. A nine-item checklist was used to assess performance of interns on the station. Scores on the station ranged from 11.1 % (1 of 9 items correct) to 88.9 % (8 of 9 items correct). While there were no significant differences in handover performance between males and females or between surgical and non-surgical specialties, interns who graduated from top-50 medical schools performed better than graduates from the medical schools not ranked in the top 50. However, the overall failure rate on the handover station was 73 %. This study demonstrates that, despite the fact that the handover is an identified EPA, our interns did not enter residency with the skillset required to successfully demonstrate the required key components of a written patient handover. This demonstrates an undergraduate curricular need for the newly identified EPA that must be addressed.
Frequency, Family and Social Aspects of TS

Results of a prospective, longitudinal study of 21 children recruited at age 2 1/2 to 3 1/2 years without tics but with a first-degree relative with Tourette syndrome (TS) are reported from the Department of Psychology and Child Study Center, Yale University, New Haven, CT.
Reverse Genetics Approaches for the Development of Influenza Vaccines

Influenza viruses cause annual seasonal epidemics and occasional pandemics of human respiratory disease. Influenza virus infections represent a serious public health and economic problem, which are most effectively prevented through vaccination. However, influenza viruses undergo continual antigenic variation, which requires either the annual reformulation of seasonal influenza vaccines or the rapid generation of vaccines against potential pandemic virus strains. The segmented nature of influenza virus allows for the reassortment between two or more viruses within a co-infected cell, and this characteristic has also been harnessed in the laboratory to generate reassortant viruses for their use as either inactivated or live-attenuated influenza vaccines. With the implementation of plasmid-based reverse genetics techniques, it is now possible to engineer recombinant influenza viruses entirely from full-length complementary DNA copies of the viral genome by transfection of susceptible cells. These reverse genetics systems have provided investigators with novel and powerful approaches to answer important questions about the biology of influenza viruses, including the function of viral proteins, their interaction with cellular host factors and the mechanisms of influenza virus transmission and pathogenesis. In addition, reverse genetics techniques have allowed the generation of recombinant influenza viruses, providing a powerful technology to develop both inactivated and live-attenuated influenza vaccines. In this review, we will summarize the current knowledge of state-of-the-art, plasmid-based, influenza reverse genetics approaches and their implementation to provide rapid, convenient, safe and more effective influenza inactivated or live-attenuated vaccines.
Zollinger-Ellison Syndrome

In 1955, Zollinger and Ellison described a syndrome (Zollinger-Ellison syndrome or ZES) consisting of recurrent and often fatal gastrointestinal bleeding from peptic …
Multiple Endocrine Neoplasia Type 2

Multiple endocrine neoplasia type 2 (MEN2) is a rare autosomal dominant disorder that predisposes patients to medullary thyroid cancer (MTC), pheochromocytoma (PHEO), and primary parathyroid hyperplasia (PHPT). MEN2 is subclassified into three distinct syndromes: Multiple endocrine neoplasia type 2A (MEN2A), multiple endocrine neoplasia type 2B (MEN2B), and familial medullary thyroid cancer (FMTC). All three syndromes are the result of mutations of the RET proto-oncogene. The diagnosis and management of MEN2 syndromes in children is discussed.
To use or not to use: Feature selection for sentiment analysis of highly imbalanced data †

We investigate feature selection methods for machine learning approaches in sentiment analysis. More specifically, we use data from the cooking platform Epicurious and attempt to predict ratings for recipes based on user reviews. In machine learning approaches to such tasks, it is a common approach to use word or part-of-speech n-grams. This results in a large set of features, out of which only a small subset may be good indicators for the sentiment. One of the questions we investigate concerns the extension of feature selection methods from a binary classification setting to a multi-class problem. We show that an inherently multi-class approach, multi-class information gain, outperforms ensembles of binary methods. We also investigate how to mitigate the effects of extreme skewing in our data set by making our features more robust and by using review and recipe sampling. We show that over-sampling is the best method for boosting performance on the minority classes, but it also results in a severe drop in overall accuracy of at least 6 per cent points.
Spiral waves characterization: Implications for an automated cardiodynamic tissue characterization.

Abstract Background and objective: Spiral waves are phenomena observed in cardiac tissue especially during fibrillatory activities. Spiral waves are revealed through in-vivo and in-vitro studies using high density mapping that requires special experimental setup. Also, in-silico spiral wave analysis and classification is performed using membrane potentials from entire tissue. In this study, we report a characterization approach that identifies spiral wave behaviors using intracardiac electrogram (EGM) readings obtained with commonly used multipolar diagnostic catheters that perform localized but high-resolution readings. Specifically, the algorithm is designed to distinguish between stationary, meandering, and break-up rotors. Methods: The clustering and classification algorithms are tested on simulated data produced using a phenomenological 2D model of cardiac propagation. For EGM measurements, unipolar-bipolar EGM readings from various locations on tissue using two catheter types are modeled. The distance measure between spiral behaviors are assessed using normalized compression distance (NCD), an information theoretical distance. NCD is a universal metric in the sense it is solely based on compressibility of dataset and not requiring feature extraction. We also introduce normalized FFT distance (NFFTD) where compressibility is replaced with a FFT parameter. Results: Overall, outstanding clustering performance was achieved across varying EGM reading configurations. We found that effectiveness in distinguishing was superior in case of NCD than NFFTD. We demonstrated that distinct spiral activity identification on a behaviorally heterogeneous tissue is also possible. Conclusions: This report demonstrates a theoretical validation of clustering and classification approaches that provide an automated mapping from EGM signals to assessment of spiral wave behaviors and hence offers a potential mapping and analysis framework for cardiac tissue wavefront propagation patterns.
Ibrutinib: coming of age?

In this issue of Blood, O’Brien et al report long-term efficacy and safety of ibrutinib in the first cohort of patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) treated, now with 5-year follow-up, the longest of any CLL cohort to date.1
If two deletions don't stop growth, try three.

How many and which genes does an organism need at a minimum to sustain growth? With the identification of essential genes in a variety of organisms such as yeast ( 1 ), worms ( 2 ), and human cultured cells ( 3 – 5 ), the answer may seem obvious: Remove all nonessential genes, and the organism should be able to continue to survive and grow. In the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae , the workhorse of genetic interaction mapping, ∼1000 of the ∼6000 (∼17%) protein-coding genes are essential for viability ( 1 ). So theoretically, one might think that one could remove the other ∼5000 nonessential genes and still have a growing yeast. The reason this does not work is that genes interact with each other to drive different traits, including viability and growth. On page 283 of this issue, Kuzmin et al. ( 6 ) provide the first systematic analysis of trigenic interactions in yeast in which three gene deletions are combined in individual strains in order to ascertain the importance of multigene interactions for growth. This study shows that higher-order genetic interactions are abundant, which has implications for the interpretation of human gene variants that may interact to affect health and disease.
Quantifying the error level in computed magnetic amplitude data for 3D magnetization inversion

ABSTRACTThree-dimensional inversion plays an important role in the quantitative interpretation of magnetic data in exploration problems, and magnetic amplitude data can be an effective tool in case...
Representation on 0L2(Г\G)

The algebraic and arithmetic properties of SL 2 begin to be felt when we consider the representation on Г\G for some discrete subgroup Г. In this chapter, after a general discussion of the nature of the factor space Г\G or Г\G/K = Г\ℌ, which is essentially classical, we prove that on a certain subspace 0L2(Г\G) of L2(Г\G) the representation is completely reducible when Г = SL 2(Z). The method works just as well for any “arithmetic” subgroup, i.e. a subgroup of finite index in SL 2(Z). It uses the Poisson summation formula, in addition to some estimates. It has the advantage of being very rapid and of using a minimum of analysis.
Robust voice activity detection in stereo recording with crosstalk.

Crosstalk in a stereo recording occurs when the speech from one participant is leaked into the close-talking microphones of the other participants. This crosstalk causes degradation of the voice activity detection (VAD) performance on individual channels, in spite of the strength of the crosstalk signal being lower than that of the participant’s speech. To address this problem, we first detect speech using a standard VAD scheme on the merged signal obtained by adding the signals from two channels and then determine the target channel using a channel selection scheme. Although VAD is performed on a short-term frame basis, we found that the channel selection performance improves with long-term signal information. Experiments using stereo recordings of real conversations demonstrate that the VAD accuracy averaged over both channels improves by 22% (absolute) indicating the robustness of the proposed approach to crosstalk compared to the single channel VAD scheme.
Pathways to Terawatt Solar Photovoltaics

There are multiple roadblocks and bottlenecks for the current commercial solar cell technologies to become a noticeable source of energy in our future energy mix. Roadblocks represent showstoppers which we have to remove in order to move forward. Bottlenecks are difficulties which we would like to overcome, but we can live with if push comes to shove. For terawatt-scale deployment of solar photovoltaics, resource limitations are roadblocks, and cost and efficiency are bottlenecks.
Beyond Good Queen Anne: Anne of Bohemia, Patronage, and Politics

Anne of Bohemia (1366–1394), Richard II of England’s first queen, is routinely depicted as a paragon of Victorian female virtues—an apolitical and devoted wife who sought to ensure peace. This chapter explores how Anne of Bohemia made use of the traditional duties of queenship (intercession, cultural patronage, religious patronage) to craft for herself a political persona that was unexceptional and acceptable to her English subjects. Anne was a notable patron and an especially active intercessor. She communicated with her natal family and kept abreast of continental politics. Queenship, as an office, consisted of a number of conventional political tasks, which, while not always flashy, still meant that the political involvement of elite medieval women was routine and commonplace.