cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Text Analysis of Assembly Work Instructions

The objective of this research is to investigate the requirements and performance of parts-of-speech tagging of assembly work instructions. Natural Language Processing of assembly work instructions is required to perform data mining with the objective of knowledge reuse. Assembly work instructions are key process engineering elements that allow for predictable assembly quality of products and predictable assembly lead times. Authoring of assembly work instructions is a subjective process. It has been observed that most assembly work instructions are not grammatically complete sentences. It is hypothesized that this can lead to false parts-of-speech tagging (by Natural Language Processing tools). To test this hypothesis, two parts-of-speech taggers are used to tag 500 assembly work instructions (obtained from the automotive industry). The first parts-of-speech tagger is obtained from Natural Language Processing Toolkit (nltk.org) and the second parts-of-speech tagger is obtained from Stanford Natural Language Processing Group (nlp.stanford.edu). For each of these taggers, two experiments are conducted. In the first experiment, the assembly work instructions are input to the each tagger in raw form. In the second experiment, the assembly work instructions are preprocessed to make them grammatically complete, and then input to the tagger. It is found that the Stanford Natural Language Processing tagger with the preprocessed assembly work instructions produced the least number of false parts-of-speech tags.Copyright © 2015 by ASME
Gender and Power in Contemporary Spirituality: Ethnographic Approaches

The distinction between spirituality and religion has been at the forefront of both academic and popular discussion about religious life in the contemporary moment. Increasing numbers of people dis...
Extracorporeal Manual Morcellation of Very Large Uteri Within an Enclosed Endoscopic Bag: Our 5-Year Experience.

Abstract Study Objectives To describe a technique to manually morcellate large uteri within a polyurethane endoscopic bag at the time of laparoscopic hysterectomy, and report perioperative outcomes from our 5 years of experience. Study Design Retrospective review of all consecutive hysterectomies with uterine weight >500 g performed between January 2010 and December 2014 in which the uterus was manually morcellated within an endoscopic bag by either an abdominal or vaginal approach (Canadian Task Force Classification Level III). Setting Tertiary care academic medical center. Patients A total of 104 women with a uterine weight >500 g who underwent laparoscopic hysterectomy using a manual morcellation technique. Intervention Manual morcellation was done extracorporeally, within a partially exteriorized specimen bag, using a scalpel under direct visualization by the operating surgeon. Measurements and Main Results A total of 104 laparoscopic hysterectomies were performed in women with a uterus weighing >500 g using a manual morcellation technique for specimen extraction. The median patient age was 48.1 years (range, 34–69 years), and the median body mass index was 31.0 kg/m 2 (range, 19.1–56.7 kg/m 2 ). The median blood loss and specimen weight were 200 mL (range, 20–1200 mL) and 741.5 g (range, 500–1930 g), respectively. Morcellation was performed through an abdominal approach in 58.7% of the patients and through a vaginal approach in 41.3%. The median duration of morcellation was 14.8 minutes (range, 4.5–21.6 minutes) for the abdominal route and 11.7 minutes (range, 5.2–16.8 minutes) for the vaginal route. Occult malignancy was identified in 2 patients. There were no complications related to the morcellation technique or gross bag rupture. Conclusion Manual morcellation within an endoscopic bag allows for the extraction of large uteri without the use of a power morcellator. In our 5 years of experience, we have not experienced any incidence of gross spillage, visually noted bag rupture, or complications associated with our morcellation technique.
Problems and Actions of China Environmental Governance: a Case Study on SO_2 Emission Control and Emission Trade

With more than 20 years' efforts,China has formulated a basket of comprehensive policies to control SO_2,which involve regulations,standards,technologies,economic tools as well as administrative measures.While policies relevant to SO_2 are the components of environmental policies,their evolution and defects will reveal the problems embedded in environmental policies and management.Based on the depiction of the evolution of SO_2 control policies,specially focusing on pilot policy of emissions trading in China,the paper identifies the problems facing environmental protection and diagnoses the causes from Chinese policy process as well as environmental governance.The problems discussed include poor implementation,inadequate coordination,and inconsistency between policies which maybe partly arise from the experience learning process from other countries.The problems are also rooted in institutional arrangement between central and local governments,inter-ministry coordination,and inter-department coordination within SEPA.For the sake of time and maximum feasibility,recommendations are made mostly from SEPA's internal capacity building and coordination,in the areas of policy making,coordinating,and monitoring,as well as inspection and enforcement.
Disassembly Sequence Planning Based on Pareto Ant Colony Algorithm

To improve product disassembly planning efficiency,the multi-objective disassembly planning problem is analyzed,therefore,a multi-objective ant colony algorithm based on Pareto set is proposed,and the construction process of disassembly sequences is presented.To acquire the feasibility disassembly parts and disassembly directions the disassembly matrix is used to derivate the feasible condition of disassembly.The axis aligned bounding boxes is utilized for calculating the disassembly distance of part.The optimal sequence concerning with minimizing the changes of disassembly direction,total disassembly distance and the sequence length is given.The ant colony algorithm is utilized for searching the solutions and the Pareto solution set is acquired by calculating the dominance relations between solutions.The specific steps of algorithm are given.Finally,compared with a typical single target ant colony planning algorithm an internal combustion engine case is conducted to demonstrate the feasibly and efficiency of the proposed method.
The origin of the ‘ l -less perfect’ in the Novgorod birchbark documents

The paper summarizes the previous research on and proposes a wholly new explanation for the so-called ‘l-less perfect’, known from the Novgorod birchbark corpus (vzja esm’ ‘I took’, ni posla esi ‘you didn’t send’ etc.). The existing theories are all problematic. The forms in question cannot be connected with the aorist. Moreover, it is necessary to explain why the l-less perfect is only found in the masculine singular and why it arose exclusively in this particular dialect. In the analysis proposed here, the l-less perfect is explained as the product of a morphological analogy, for which concrete motivation can be indicated.
Promoting Equity and Justice through Storytelling

As the story is told, Willie Lynch was a British slave owner in the West Indies. The story goes on to say that Mr. Lynch was invited in 1712 to teach his methods of controlling black slaves to slave owners in what was then the colony of Virginia. It is said that Willie Lynch utilized methods of controlled identity construction as a primary means to create a mind-set of a sub-human, second class race of people, within the minds of both the slave and the rest of society.
p-adic Beta Functions

Let a1, a2 be elements of ℚ, a2 ∉ z. Let $${L_0} = \Omega \left[ {x,\frac{1}{x},\frac{1}{{1 - x}}} \right] \subset \Omega \left( x \right).$$
Decellularized Wharton's Jelly from human umbilical cord as a novel 3D scaffolding material for tissue engineering applications

In tissue engineering, an ideal scaffold attracts and supports cells thus providing them with the necessary mechanical support and architecture as they reconstruct new tissue in vitro and in vivo. This manuscript details a novel matrix derived from decellularized Wharton's jelly (WJ) obtained from human umbilical cord for use as a scaffold for tissue engineering application. This decellularized Wharton's jelly matrix (DWJM) contained 0.66 ± 0.12 μg/mg sulfated glycosaminoglycans (GAGs), and was abundant in hyaluronic acid, and completely devoid of cells. Mass spectroscopy revealed the presence of collagen types II, VI and XII, fibronectin-I, and lumican I. When seeded onto DWJM, WJ mesenchymal stem cells (WJMSCs), successfully attached to, and penetrated the porous matrix resulting in a slower rate of cell proliferation. Gene expression analysis of WJ and bone marrow (BM) MSCs cultured on DWJM demonstrated decreased expression of proliferation genes with no clear pattern of differentiation. When this matrix was implanted into a murine calvarial defect model with, green fluorescent protein (GFP) labeled osteocytes, the osteocytes were observed to migrate into the matrix as early as 24 hours. They were also identified in the matrix up to 14 days after transplantation. Together with these findings, we conclude that DWJM can be used as a 3D porous, bioactive and biocompatible scaffold for tissue engineering and regenerative medicine applications.
Impurity stabilization of nanocrystalline grains in pulsed laser deposited tantalum

Thermal stability of pulsed laser deposited (PLD) nanocrystalline tantalum was explored through in situ transmission electron microscopy (TEM) annealing over the temperature range of 800–1200 °C. The evolution of the nanostructure was characterized using grain size distributions collectively with electron diffraction analysis and electron energy loss spectroscopy (EELS). Grain growth dynamics were further explored through molecular dynamics (MD) simulations of columnar tantalum nanostructures. The as-deposited grain size of 32 nm increased by only 18% at 1200 °C, i.e., 40% the melting point of tantalum, conflicting with the MD simulations that demonstrated extensive grain coalescence above 1000 °C. Furthermore, the grain size remained stable through the reversible α-to-β phase transition near 800 °C, which is often accompanied by grain growth in nanostructured tantalum. The EELS analysis confirmed the presence of oxygen impurities in the as-deposited films, indicating that impurity stabilization of grain boundaries was responsible for the exceptional thermal stability of PLD nanocrystalline tantalum.
The Målselv District: MFZ Sample

Malselv is in northern Norway near both the coast and the northern end of the Middle Fringe Zone (Fig. 1). However, the area extends so far inland as to be partly in the Outer Fringe Zone also. Administratively it is the Malselv District and adjacent areas in the southwestern center of Troms Fylke (County), an area analyzed economically and described historically in the middle 1950s (Fig. 12).50
Storing Carbon in Agricultural Soils to Help Head-Off a Global Warming

We know for sure that addition of organic matter to soil increases water-holding capacity, imparts fertility with the addition of nutrients, increases soil aggregation and improves tilth. Depending on its type — humus, manure, stubble or litter — organic matter contains between 40 and 60% carbon. We also know that carbon (C, hereafter), as carbon dioxide (CO2), is currently accumulating in the atmosphere as the result of fossil fuel combustion, land use change and tropical deforestation (Table I). The atmospheric concentration of CO2 has increased by ~32%, from about 280 ppmv (parts per million by volume) at the beginning of the industrial revolution (ca. 1850) to about 370 ppmv today.
Identification of volatile profiles of Rio Red grapefruit at various developmental to maturity stages

Grapefruit is an important citrus crop having unique aroma and flavour. In the current study, the juice quality parameters and volatile chemical composition of grapefruits harvested at five differe...
The Impact of Market Conditions on Voting Results in a Student-Managed Fund

The authors analyze voting results for capital allocations from a student-managed fund over a period of three academic years. Primarily, they test for impacts of current and recent market activity on student votes. The fund is managed under the principle of value investing with a long-term investment horizon. A significant relationship between broad market conditions and student votes would support a distinct behavioral influence on the process. They largely find no significant influences from market returns or volatility on the voting results, which suggests students vote on their perception of the merits of the proposal instead of either intentionally or subconsciously allowing market activity to influence their decisions. In the framework of this specific fund, this result corresponds to the fundamentals of value investing and aligns with the educational goal of the program. In ancillary results, the authors find that proposals to buy (acquire a position) are more difficult to pass than those to sell.
Factors Influencing Receipt of Mental Health Services Among Medicaid Beneficiaries With Breast Cancer.

Objective:This study examined associations of state-level Medicaid reimbursement and other policies and patient characteristics with receipt of mental health diagnostic and treatment services for beneficiaries with cancer.Methods:Data (2006–2008) from Medicaid beneficiaries with breast cancer were analyzed to examine predictors of receiving mental health diagnostic services and mental health treatment services. Independent variables included state-level Medicaid policies for reimbursements for mental health services and consultations (requests from one health care provider to another for advice regarding evaluation or management of a specific problem), required patient copayments, and requirements governing the timing of Medicaid eligibility recertification (eligibility recertification period). Generalized estimating equations were used to assess factors influencing receipt of mental health services while controlling for clustering by state.Results:The analysis of diagnostic services included 7,441 Medica...
Modeling a task-based matrix-matrix multiplication application for resilience decision making

Faults are the manifestation of errors, which corrupt data or cause program termination. Currently operational computing clusters already experience the ill effects of faults. As component size decreases in future generations of hardware, faults are projected to increase accordingly. One strategy to minimize the threat of unreliable hardware is to make resilient software. A distributed-memory block matrix-matrix multiplication (MMM) application is used to investigate the development of a decision model that defines application behavior following cluster hardware failure. The MMM application employs a task-based model; each task consists of the multiplication of matrix sub-blocks. This MMM implementation is modeled with distribution functions for worker computation time generation and master-worker communication time generation. Decisions based on such a model are useful, e.g., when a fault results in the loss of a worker and the resilient application may determine to continue and redo certain tasks or to restart from the beginning. The task-based MMM application runtime is predicted by simulating task completion through the master-worker relationship. For a sample size of 42 different configurations, simulated application runtimes are compared to cluster runtimes: considering the errors for all the configurations, the mean error is 1.43%, and the standard deviation is 1.38%. This model may be extended to other task-based applications.
Gender and Sexuality in Aging

Sexuality continues to have gendered scripts and cultural directives even towards the middle and last quartile of men and women’s lives. This article looks at how these scripts create different meanings and consequences for men and women’s sexual self-definition, behaviors, and opportunities. We also help direct future research on men and women post-50 as this population has been under-researched and often overlooked by studies seeking to better understand human sexuality. Studies that do exist generally emphasize the importance of biology and age on sexual activity, too readily neglecting social factors such as gender and presence of an intimate partner. We provide a review of the current knowledge regarding (1) how women and men’s sexuality functions in later life (e.g. frequency of sexual encounters, sexual satisfaction, and the impact of different kinds of pairings), (2) major sex-specific physical transitions that impact sexuality in older populations, and (3) psychosocial factors that influence sexual behavior and attitudes in both heterosexual and LGB individuals. We further analyze gender as a social construct and discuss cultural beliefs about aging as they impact sexuality. We note the paucity of data on older LGB and minority groups and discuss issues that affect these groups’ sexual realities.
Conciencia ambiental y comportamiento ecológico: Un análisis de la escala GEB ( General Ecological Behavior ) de Kaiser

Applying the concept of environmental consciousness, there has been developed an ecobarometer to measure regularly environmental attitudes and ecological behavior across different domains. Using the General Ecological Behavior (GEB) scale of Kaiser (1998a) for cross-cultural applications, searches for potentially effective contextual influences appear promising for the adoption of certain political actions such as legislation and financial incentives from one socio-cultural context to another one. Therefore an ecobarometer, which takes the GEB scale as a generally applicable measure of ecological behavior, should be effective across diflferent countries. The GEB scale takes dinerential behavior diflficulties into account that are most likely caused by contextual influences.
AMP deamination and IMP reamination in working skeletal muscle

The extent of purine nucleotide cycle (PNC) turnover [i.e., the cyclic deamination of adenosine 5'-monophosphate (AMP) and reamination of inosine 5'-monophosphate (IMP)] was estimated in fast-twitch muscle of pentobarbital sodium anesthetized rats during in situ stimulation, by the accumulation of excess IMP after blocking IMP reamination with the adenylosuccinate synthetase inhibitor, hadacidin. Sodium hadacidin (100 mg/kg, iv) did not alter IMP production and was effective in blocking IMP reamination by 80%. Hadacidin had no effect on IMP levels in muscle at rest or during mild stimulation (1 Hz for 30 min). During 30 min of more intense stimulation (5 Hz), hadacidin treatment resulted in a threefold increase in IMP in the fast-twitch white gastrocnemius section, but had no effect in the fast-twitch red section. The IMP in the fast-twitch white section did not accumulate over the 30-min period, but was produced initially (within 5 min) and kept for being reaminated by hadacidin. Thus, the IMP formation and IMP reamination evident in the saline-injected animals did not occur concurrently. This suggests that the IMP reamination arm of the PNC is not an important pathway in "working" muscle.
The rotational spectrum and potential energy surface of the Ar-SiO complex.

The rotational spectra of five isotopic species of the Ar–SiO complex have been observed at high-spectral resolution between 8 and 18 GHz using chirped Fourier transform microwave spectroscopy and a discharge nozzle source; follow-up cavity measurements have extended these measurements to as high as 35 GHz. The spectrum of the normal species is dominated by an intense progression of a-type rotational transitions arising from increasing quanta in the Si–O stretch, in which lines up to v = 12 (∼14 500 cm−1) were identified. A structural determination by isotopic substitution and a hyperfine analysis of the Ar–Si17O spectrum both suggest that the complex is a highly fluxional prolate symmetric rotor with a vibrationally averaged structure between T-shaped and collinear in which the oxygen atom lies closer to argon than the silicon atom, much like Ar–CO. To complement the experimental studies, a full dimensional potential and a series of effective vibrationally averaged, two-dimensional potential energy surfaces of Ar + SiO have been computed at the CCSD(T)-F12b/CBS level of theory. The equilibrium structure of Ar–SiO is predicted to be T-shaped with a well depth of 152 cm−1, but the linear geometry is also a minimum, and the potential energy surface has a long, flat channel between 140 and 180°. Because the barrier between the two wells is calculated to be small (of order 5 cm−1) and well below the zero-point energy, the vibrationally averaged wavefunction is delocalized over nearly 100° of angular freedom. For this reason, Ar–SiO should exhibit large amplitude zero-point motion, in which the vibrationally excited states can be viewed as resonances with long lifetimes. Calculations of the rovibrational level pattern agree to within 2% with the transition frequencies of normal and isotopic ground state Ar–SiO, and the putative Ka = ±1 levels for Ar–28SiO, suggesting that the present theoretical treatment well reproduces the salient properties of the intramolecular potential.
Advances in coronary molecular imaging: Leveraging the power of image processing.

Coronary vascular events are most often caused by rupture of atherosclerotic plaques. Prior to their rupture, such plaques are likely to have at least one of several high-risk structural or biological processes known to associate with increased risk of atherothrombosis. Thus, efforts have long been directed to identify these high risk features non-invasively. While current imaging modalities are adept at measuring high-risk structural features, such as luminal stenosis and vessel wall morphology, they cannot directly report on the important high-risk biological features. On the other hand, molecular imaging techniques, such as positron emission tomography (PET) coupled with sensitive probes provide a unique opportunity to assess atherosclerotic plaque biology, and have the potential to complement structural information and thus, improve risk stratification and enable enhanced monitoring of therapeutic interventions.
Predicting Splicing from Primary Sequence with Deep Learning.

Summary The splicing of pre-mRNAs into mature transcripts is remarkable for its precision, but the mechanisms by which the cellular machinery achieves such specificity are incompletely understood. Here, we describe a deep neural network that accurately predicts splice junctions from an arbitrary pre-mRNA transcript sequence, enabling precise prediction of noncoding genetic variants that cause cryptic splicing. Synonymous and intronic mutations with predicted splice-altering consequence validate at a high rate on RNA-seq and are strongly deleterious in the human population. De novo mutations with predicted splice-altering consequence are significantly enriched in patients with autism and intellectual disability compared to healthy controls and validate against RNA-seq in 21 out of 28 of these patients. We estimate that 9%–11% of pathogenic mutations in patients with rare genetic disorders are caused by this previously underappreciated class of disease variation.
Enzyme-catalyzed synthesis of nucleoside triphosphates from nucleoside monophosphates

Syntheses of adenosine 5′-triphosphate (ATP) from adenosine 5′-monophosphate (AMP) and ribavirin 5′-triphosphate (RTP) from ribavirin 5′-monophosphate (RMP) (1) were performed using enzymes as catalysts. Synthesis of ATP is based on acetyl phosphate as the phosphate donor, and acetate kinase (Bacillus stearothermophilus, EC 2.7.2.1), adenylate kinase (porcine muscle, EC 2.7.4.3), and inorganic pyrophosphatase (yeast, EC 2.6.1.1) as the catalysts. Three reactions on a 150-mmol scale provided ATP as its barium salt in 82% yield and 67% purity. Synthesis of RTP used phosphoenol pyruvate (PEP) as the phosphate donor, and pyruvate kinase (rabbit muscle, EC 2.7.1.40) and adenylate kinase (rabbit muscle) as the catalysts. A gram-scale reaction provided RTP as its barium salt in 93% yield and 97% purity. This work demonstrates the utility of the autoxidationresistant acetate kinase fromB. stearothermophilus, the value of pyrophosphatase in controlling the level of pyrophosphate in the reactions and the ability of adenylate kinase to accept at least one substrate other than a derivative of adenosine.
Intensive Models of Hepatitis C Care for People Who Inject Drugs Receiving Opioid Agonist Therapy: A Randomized Controlled Trial.

Background Many people who inject drugs (PWID) are denied treatment for hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection, even if they are receiving opioid agonist therapy (OAT). Research suggests that HCV in PWID may be treated effectively, but optimal models of care for promoting adherence and sustained virologic response (SVR) have not been evaluated in the direct-acting antiviral (DAA) era. Objective To determine whether directly observed therapy (DOT) and group treatment (GT) are more effective than self-administered individual treatment (SIT) in promoting adherence and achieving SVR among PWID receiving OAT. Design Three-group, randomized controlled trial conducted from October 2013 to April 2017. (ClinicalTrials.gov: NCT01857245). Setting Three OAT programs in Bronx, New York. Participants Persons aged 18 years and older with genotype 1 HCV infection who were willing to receive HCV therapy on site in the OAT program. Of 190 persons screened, 158 were randomly assigned to a study group and 150 initiated treatment: DOT (n = 51), GT (n = 48), and SIT (n = 51). Intervention 2 intensive interventions (DOT and GT) and 1 control condition (SIT). Measurements Primary: adherence, measured by using electronic blister packs. Secondary: HCV treatment completion and SVR 12 weeks after treatment completion. Results Mean age was 51 years; 65% of participants had positive results on urine drug testing during the 6 months before treatment, and 75% reported ever injecting drugs. Overall adherence, estimated from mixed-effects models using the daily timeframe, was 78% (95% CI, 75% to 81%) and was greater among participants randomly assigned to DOT (86% [CI, 80% to 92%]) than those assigned to SIT (75% [CI, 70% to 81%]; difference, 11% [CI, 5% to 18%]; Bonferroni-corrected P = 0.001). No significant difference in adherence was observed between participants randomly assigned to GT (80% [CI, 74% to 86%]) and those assigned to SIT (difference, 4.7% [CI, -2% to 11%]; Bonferroni-corrected P = 0.29). The HCV treatment completion rate was 97%, with no differences among groups (P = 0.53). Overall SVR was 94% (CI, 89% to 97%); the SVR rate was 98% in the DOT group, 94% in the GT group, and 90% in the SIT group (P = 0.152). Limitation These findings may not be generalizable to PWID not enrolled in OAT programs. Conclusion All models of onsite HCV care delivered to PWID in OAT programs resulted in high SVR, despite ongoing drug use. Directly observed therapy was associated with greater adherence than SIT. Primary funding source National Institute on Drug Abuse and Gilead Sciences.
Primary Cutaneous CD4+ Small/Medium-Sized Pleomorphic T-cell Lymphoproliferative Disorder

Primary cutaneous CD4+ small/medium T-cell lymphoproliferative disorder is an indolent lymphoproliferative disorder characterized clinically by a solitary skin lesion and histopathologically by a cutaneous infiltrate of small- and medium-sized pleomorphic CD4-positive T cells. There should be no evidence of patches and/or plaques typical of mycosis fungoides or of systemic lymphoma. This is a provisional entity in the WHO classification.
Anthropogenic noise masking diminishes house wren (Troglodytes aedon) song transmission in urban natural areas

Anthropogenic noise changes the acoustic environment in which avian signals have evolved, possibly decreasing active space or the area over which signals may be detected and discriminated by receiv...
Etiology and pathogenesis of acute pancreatitis.

Knowledge of the cellular events which lead to acute pancreatitis is severely limited and, as a result, concepts regarding the etiology of the disease are limited to epidemiologic data which identify disease states or conditions associated with acute pancreatitis [42].
Physiological Impact and Clinical Relevance of Passive Exercise/Movement

Passive exercise/movement has a long history in both medicine and physiology. Early clinical applications of passive exercise/movement utilized pneumatic and direct limb compression to stimulate the vasculature and evoke changes in blood flow to avoid complications brought about by stasis and vascular disease. Over the last 50 years, passive exercise/movement has continued to progress and has provided physiologists with a reductionist approach to mechanistically examine the cardiorespiratory, hyperemic, and afferent responses to movement without the confounding influence of metabolism that accompanies active exercise. This review, in addition to providing an historical perspective, focuses on the recent advancements utilizing passive leg movement, and how the hyperemic response at the onset of this passive movement has evolved from a method to evaluate the central and peripheral regulation of blood flow during exercise to an innovative and promising tool to assess vascular function. As an assessment of vascular function, passive leg movement is relatively simple to perform and provides a nitric oxide-dependent evaluation of endothelial function across the lifespan that is sensitive to changes in activity/fitness and disease state (heart failure, peripheral artery disease, sepsis). The continual refinement and characterization of passive leg movement are aimed at improving our understanding of blood flow regulation and the development of a clinically ready approach to predict and monitor the progression of cardiovascular disease.
The “Superior Performance” of Covered Calls on the S&P 500: Rethinking an Anomaly

This study shows that previous findings of the superior performance of covered calls on the S&P 500 are spurious because they ignore or dismiss skewness. While academics have previously identified this problem, the financial industry has largely ignored it. The authors show how the problem manifests in that traditional performance measures used in other studies show superior performance even with correctly priced options. They present two new estimates of covered call alphas—one that embeds a benchmark and the other that subtracts the benchmark—and find little basis for these prior claims. The authors also identify a bias in previous studies in which the chosen holding period disguises the effect of skewness. Their results, which are supported in both monthly and daily data, are consistent with intuition that holding the index and selling these widely traded options cannot generate alpha, as has been highly promoted in several practitioner articles. TOPICS:Options, performance measurement, exchange-traded funds and applications Key Findings • The documented abnormal performance of covered call writing is largely driven by disregard of skewness. • There are simple measures that can adjust the alpha of an option strategy for skewness. • The positioning of the holding period during the expiration month can disguise the problem.
Spinoza on the Conditions that Nominally Define the Human Condition

ABSTRACTIn ‘Freedom of the Will and the Concept of a Person,’ Harry Frankfurt argues that a successful analysis of the concept ‘human’ must reveal something that distinguishes humans from non-human...
Research-to-Resource: A Choral Director’s Abridged Guide to the Male Voice Change:

The purpose of this Research-to-Resource article is to provide choral directors a short, practical guide to working with male singers throughout their voice change using research-based strategies. ...
AdS$_6$/CFT$_5$ with O7-planes

Type IIB AdS$_6$ solutions with orientifold 7-planes are constructed. The geometry is a warped product of AdS$_6$ and S$^2$ over a Riemann surface $\Sigma$ and the O7-planes correspond to a particular type of puncture on $\Sigma$. The solutions are identified as near-horizon limits of $(p,q)$ 5-brane webs with O7-planes. The dual 5d SCFTs have relevant deformations to linear quiver gauge theories which have $SO(\cdot)$ or $USp(\cdot)$ nodes or $SU(\cdot)$ nodes with hypermultiplets in symmetric or antisymmetric representations, in addition to $SU(\cdot)$ nodes with fundamental hypermultiplets. The S$^5$ free energies are obtained holographically and matched to field theory computations using supersymmetric localization to support the proposed dualities.
Nickel(II)-methyl complexes adopting unusual seesaw geometries

We report four-coordinate nickel(II)-methyl complexes of tris-carbene borate ligands which adopt rare seesaw geometries. Experimental and computational results suggest the structural distortion from threefold symmetry results from a combination of electronic stabilization of the singlet state, strong field donors, and constrained angles from the chelating ligand.
Thermodynamics of the Arctic Atmosphere

In a such changing environment like the Arctic, improving the understanding of the thermodynamic state and processes of the atmosphere is critical for the development of accurate prediction and climatic models. This is fundamental for example for studies on sea-ice development as well as on cloud formation. Taking into account the above remarks, it is very important to know the pressure, temperature and moisture conditions of the Arctic atmosphere throughout the year and over the whole tropospheric and stratospheric altitude range. Furthermore, knowing these data is necessary to realistically evaluate the radiative effects involving both the short-wave and long-wave radiation fluxes, which regulate the energy balance of the Arctic surface-atmosphere system.
Dharma and the Religious Other in Hindi Popular Cinema

This essay examines common representations of religious minorities in Hindi popular cinema within the context of dominant post-Independence Indian religious and political ideologies—from a religiously pluralist secular socialist framework to a Hindu nationalist late capitalist orientation. We begin by examining the more recent turn to film as a legitimate conveyor of middle-class Indian values worthy of interpretation, and the coeval shift among Indians from embarrassment to pride in film as the industry followed the liberalizing nation-state onto the global stage. Equipped with this interpretive strategy, we turn to the dhārmik, or religious elements within the Hindi sāmājik, or social film, demonstrating concretely how particular notions of Hindu dharma (variously if imperfectly translated as “duty,” “law,” “cosmic order,” “religion”) have long undergirded Hindi popular cinema structurally and topically. Finally, and most significantly, we examine representations of religious minorities, particularly Muslms, Christians, and Sikhs, in Hindi popular cinema against the backdrop of evolving religious and cultural ideologies up to the electoral victory of Prime Minister Modi of the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, or BJP. It is argued that minority representation, like other aspects of Indian public life, can be interpreted as an index of majority concerns about the religious Other. While such representations have never been static, more current depictions present the viewer with a troubling, even ominous picture of the place (or lack thereof) of religious minorities in contemporary Indian society, revealing majoritarian chauvinism and sectarian tensions that call into question the identity of the Indian Republic as a pluralistic secular nation, as well as the easy elisions between Hindu and secular Indian nationalisms. When we now look at past films cognizant of the Hindu nationalist dispensation to come, discontinuity is not the only striking feature. Ideological inconsistencies, tensions, and contradictions have long been manifest on the silver screen, particularly with regard to the religious minorities. The present ascendance of Hindutva as a national (indeed international) religio-political ideology forces us to reconsider past films and the ideologies embedded therein.
P07.02 High-affinity TCRs specific for cancer testis antigens as a therapy for multiple myeloma and solid tumors

Background Cancer Testis Antigens (CTAs) are highly expressed in multiple different tumor types, but silent in normal tissue, except the testis. This tumor-restricted expression pattern makes them an ideal target for adoptive T-cell therapy. However, the responsiveness in clinical setting may be hampered because high-affinity T cells against self-antigens presented in the context of self-HLA are deleted in the thymus by negative selection. In this study, we aim to identify high-affinity T cell receptors (TCRs) specific for CTAs from the allogeneic-HLA repertoire. Materials and Methods In this study, HLA class I binding peptides derived from different CTA genes were identified by HLA-peptide elution experiments and subsequent mass spectrometric analysis. From the identified peptides HLA tetramers were generated to isolate peptide specific CD8+ T cells from healthy allogeneic donors. Efficacy and safety of the TCRs was determined by various different stimulation assays. The most potent TCRs were sequenced, analyzed and transduced into peripheral CD8+ and CD4+ T cells to confirm CTA specific cytokine production and cytotoxicity. Results MAGE and CTAG peptides were eluted from multiple myelomas, EBV-transformed lymphoblastic cells, acute myeloid leukemia and ovarium carcinomas. We selected TCRs recognizing 3 different MAGE-A1 peptides in the context of HLA-A*02:01, HLA-A*03:01 and HLA-B*07:02. Furthermore, we selected TCRs specific for MAGE-A3 in the context of HLA-B*35:01 and HLA-A*01:01; TCRs specific for MAGE-A9 in the context of HLA-A*01:01 and TCRs specific for CTAG1 in the context of HLA-A*02:01. The selected T-cell clones demonstrated efficient recognition of MAGE-A1, MAGE-A3 or CTAG1 positive multiple myeloma and solid tumor cell lines without detectable cross-reactivity. Conclusions We identified multiple different TCRs from the allogeneic-HLA repertoire specific for CTA genes. These TCRs demonstrate efficient recognition and killing of CTA positive multiple myeloma and solid tumor cell lines and did not show any cross-reactivity. The peptides recognized by the TCRs are presented in different HLA alleles. Since, 71% of the world population contains one of these HLA-alleles, a large percentage suffering from a MAGE or CTAG positive tumor could potentially be treated with the identified TCRs by TCR-gene therapy. Disclosure Information M.A.J. de Rooij: None. D.M. van der Steen: None. D. Remst: None. A. Wouters: None. M. van der Meent: None. R.S. Hagedoorn: None. M.G.D. Kester: None. P.A. van Veelen: None. F.J.H. Falkenburg: None. M.H.M. Heemskerk: None.
Office-based Eustachian tube endoscopy

Abstract The Eustachian tube is a conduit between the middle ear and the nasopharynx, allowing the aeration and drainage of the middle ear air space while protecting the ear from contaminants from the nasopharynx. In-office Eustachian tube endoscopy can be a powerful tool to aid in the diagnosis and management of obstructive and patulous Eustachian tube dysfunction. In this chapter, we review the background and technique for Eustachian tube endoscopy, illustrated with clinical cases.
Social Media and the Growth of Disc Golf

While experiences in online communities produced both integrative and disruptive social forces, as shown in the previous chapter and other studies, this chapter argues that digital interactions have had a net positive effect on the disc golf movement. Using the fifty United States as units of analysis, I show that social media use is positively correlated with the volume of face-to-face disc golf activity. States with more disc golf courses, PDGA members, and events tend to have more Facebook group members than states with fewer courses, PDGA members, and events. At the individual level, I also found that players’ involvement in social media is positively associated with their skill levels.
Sex differences in cardio-pulmonary pathology of SARS-CoV2 infected and Trypanosoma cruzi co-infected mice

BackgroundCoronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) caused by Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2; CoV2) is a deadly contagious infectious disease. For those who survived COVID-19, post-COVID cardiac damage poses a major threat for the progression of cardiomyopathy and heart failure. Currently, the number of COVID-related cases and deaths are increasing in Latin America, where a major COVID comorbidity is Chagas heart disease (caused by the parasite Trypanosoma cruzi). Here, we investigated the effect of T. cruzi infection on the pathogenesis and severity of CoV2 infection and, conversely, the effect of CoV2 infection on heart pathology during coinfection. Methodology/findingsWe used transgenic human angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (huACE2) mice infected with CoV2, T. cruzi, or coinfected with both in this study. Our study shows for the first time that white adipose tissue (WAT) serves as a reservoir for CoV2 and the persistence of CoV2 in WAT alters adipose tissue morphology and adipocyte physiology. Our data demonstrate a correlation between the loss of fat cells and the pulmonary adipogenic signaling (via adiponectin isomers) and pathology in CoV2 infection. The viral load in the lungs is inversely proportional to the viral load in WAT, which differs between male and female mice. Our findings also suggest that adiponectin-PPAR signaling may differently regulate Chagas cardiomyopathy in coinfected males and females. ConclusionWe conclude that adipogenic signaling may play important roles in cardio-pulmonary pathogenesis during CoV2 infection and T. cruzi coinfection. The levels of adiponectin isomers differ between male and female mice during CoV2 infection and coinfection with T. cruzi, which may differently regulate inflammation, viral load, and pathology in the lungs of both the sexes. Our findings are in line with other clinical observations that reported that males are more susceptible to COVID-19 than females and suffer greater pulmonary damage.
Feasibility of T2 Mapping of the Sacroiliac Joints in Healthy Control Subjects and Children and Young Adults with Sacroiliitis.

OBJECTIVE To assess the feasibility of T2 mapping for evaluating pediatric SIJ cartilage at 3 Tesla (T) magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). METHODS Healthy control subjects and adolescents with sacroiliitis underwent a 3T MRI dedicated pelvic protocol that included a T2 mapping sequence consisting of multislice, multiecho acquisition. Healthy control subjects were prospectively recruited from our primary care practices as part of a larger imaging study, whereas adolescents with sacroiliitis were recruited specifically for this study. Regions of interest (ROIs) were hand-drawn by a senior pediatric radiologist twice and a radiology fellow twice to calibrate and test reliability using the intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC). T2 relaxation time between control subjects and cases was compared using univariate linear regression. We tested the association of T2 relaxation time in adolescents with sacroiliitis with patient-reported outcomes and the Spondyloarthritis Research Consortium of Canada sacroiliac joint (SIJ) inflammation and structural scores using Pearson correlation coefficients. RESULTS Fourteen subjects were evaluable (six control subjects: median age 13.7 years [interquartile range (IQR): 12.2-15.5], 67% male patients; eight cases: median age 17.4 years [IQR: 12.5-20], 88% male patients]. Acquisition time for T2 mapping sequences was approximately 6 minutes, and segmenting the ROI for each SIJ took approximately 3 minutes. The intrarater and inter-rater ICCs were 0.67 and 0.46, respectively, indicating good to fair reliability. There was a trend, albeit statistically insignificant, in longer median T2 relaxation time in cases (43.04 ms; IQR: 41.25-49.76 ms) versus healthy control subjects (40.0 ms; IQR: 38.9-48.6 ms). Although not statistically significant, cases with longer T2 relaxation time tended to occur with poorer patient-reported outcomes. Correlations with the SIJ inflammation and structural lesion scores were weak. CONCLUSION T2 mapping of the SIJ cartilage in children was feasible and reliable. Larger controlled and longitudinal assessments are needed to assess the validity and utility of these measurements for routine clinical practice and trials.
Identification of complete information games

This paper establishes sufficient conditions for point identification of the utility functions in generalized complete information game models. These models allow generalized interaction structures and generalized behavioral assumptions. The generalized interaction structures allow that the dependence of an agent’s utility function on the other agents’ actions can itself depend on characteristics of the agents, including an endogenous network of connections among the agents. The generalized behavioral assumptions relax the solution concept from Nash equilibrium play to weaker solution concepts like rationalizability. The results allow a non-parametric specification of the unobservables.
Workshop: an introduction to C#

C# is the central language of Microsoft's.NET. It merges many of the features of C++ and Java to produce an interesting and flexible language which has consider merits and is in some ways an advance over its predecessors. Although some think it as Microsoft's Java want-to-be and it has certainly taken and even improved on many of Java's strengths, in some ways is quite un-Java like and more reminiscent of C++. The designers of C# have clearly learned much from earlier languages especially Java and C++, but the language they designed can stand on its own merits. Although it is an over simplification, C# often seems to look a lot like Java and feel a lot like C++. C# has an extensive class library which makes it epecially suitable for both Windows GUI applications and web applications.
Law Review Circulation 2011: More Change, More Same

Every year, the tallying of law review circulation numbers presents at least one opportunity to examine the role played by puffery in the world of scholarly law publishing. Last year the result was a gentle needling of the Virginia Law Review. The year before that it was the Harvard Law Review. This year the Stanford Law Review is honored with similar treatment. But first, a few observations about historic lows in law review circulation, and the wide disparities between the experiences of individual journals.
Extensible Logic Program Schemata

Schema-based transformational systems maintain a library of logic program schemata which capture large classes of logic programs. One of the shortcomings of schema-based transformation approaches is their reliance on a large (possibly incomplete) set of logic program schemata that is required in order to capture all of the minor syntactic differences between semantically similar logic programs. By defining a set of extensible logic program schemata and an associated set of logic program transformations, it is possible to reduce the size of the schema library while maintaining the robustness of the transformational system. In our transformational system, we have defined a set of extensible logic program schemata in λProlog. Because λProlog is a higher-order logic programming language, it can be used as the representation language for both the logic programs and the extensible logic program schemata. In addition to the instantiation of predicate variables, extensible logic program schemata can be extended by applying standard programming techniques (e.g., accumulating results), introducing additional arguments (e.g., a second list to append to the end of the primary list), combining logic program schemata which share a common primary input, and connecting logic program schemata which are connected via a result of one schema being an input to the other schema. These extensions increase the robustness of logic program schemata and enhance traditional schema-based transformational systems.