cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Cultural Guides, Cultural Critics: Distrust of Doctors and Social Support during Mental Health Treatment.

Research on relationships and health often interprets culture as the passively transmitted “content” of social ties, an approach that overlooks the influence of cultural resources on relationships themselves. I propose that mental health patients seek social support partly based on cultural resources held by their network members, including members’ medical knowledge and beliefs. I test hypotheses using data from the Indianapolis Network Mental Health Study, an egocentric network survey of new mental health patients (N = 152) and their personal relationships (N = 1,868). Results from random-intercept regressions show that patients obtain support from network members who trust doctors and who have experience with mental problems. In contrast, network members who distrust doctors disproportionately cause problems for patients. I discuss how cultural resources can categorize network members as supportive cultural guides or disruptive cultural critics. Reconsidering how culture shapes relationships clarifies ...
The Deconstruction of Stereotypes: Homosexuals and Military Policy

Four years ago, Captain Kenneth Karols and I submitted to the Department of Defense a draft report in which we recommended that research be undertaken, the results of which might facilitate the integration of gay men and lesbians into the armed forces. The recommendation followed from a historical and social psychological analysis, and also from the expectation that continuing pressures from civil rights advocates would influence the president, the Congress, or the Courts to rescind the discriminatory policy. On the basis of our conclusions that stereotypes, rather than empirically confirmed facts, provided the support for the resistance to changing the exclusionary policy, the recommended research would have focused on ways and means of deconstructing stereotypes (Sarbin & Karols, 1988). Our recommendation fell on deaf ears.
Pim kinases significantly impact humoral immune responses (IRM12P.648)

The Provirus Integration site for Moloney murine leukemia virus (Pim) family of oncogenic serine/threonine kinases regulates a variety of metabolic functions in hematopoietic cells and lymphocytes. We examined the importance of Pim kinases in B cell activation following antigen stimulation. Humoral immune responses were significantly impaired in Pim 1 and 2 deficient mice (Pim 1 -/- 2 -/- ) T cell dependent responses were compromised while T cell independent type 1 and 2 antigen responses were virtually absent. Humoral deficiencies were owing to reduced production of antibody secreting cells due to the diminished induction of BLIMP-1 expression. The central role of Pim in these responses is consistent with our observation that Pims are induced downstream of multiple B cell activation receptors including CD40, BCR, and TLR4. We suggest that Pim 1 and 2 dependent signaling pathways are involved in B cell activation and their loss requires increased signaling through other pathways to reach an activation threshold. This hypothesis is further supported by the initial higher affinity of BCRs on Pim deficient B cells activated in a TD response and their inability to proliferate or undergo isotype switching in culture at the same rate as WT B cells when activator concentrations are decreased. Taken together, these data demonstrate a critical role for Pim kinases in affinity maturation, isotype switching, proliferation and the production of antibody secreting cells by B lymphocytes. .
The Trouble with Savanna and Other Environmental Categories, Especially in Africa

Environmental categories are simplifications of reality meant to enable generalization, which is necessary to produce predictive physical geographic knowledge. We argue here that these categories are social constructions related to ideas shared broadly in society, including environmental deterministic explanations of human difference. The biophysical, philosophical, and sociocultural problems associated with environmental categories are exemplified by ‘savanna’ in Africa. Examining environmental categorization is an important point of engagement in critical physical geography because it is a social process, explicitly centered on simplification and generalization, and significant broadly across scientific practice and society.
Evaluating the potential of endothelial cells derived from human induced pluripotent stem cells to form microvascular networks in 3D cultures

A major translational challenge in the fields of therapeutic angiogenesis and regenerative medicine is the need to create functional microvasculature. The purpose of this study was to assess whether a potentially autologous endothelial cell (EC) source derived from human induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSC-ECs) can form the same robust, stable microvasculature as previously documented for other sources of ECs. We utilized a well-established in vitro assay, in which endothelial cell-coated (iPSC-EC or HUVEC) beads were co-embedded with fibroblasts in a 3D fibrin matrix to assess their ability to form stable microvessels. iPSC-ECs exhibited a five-fold reduction in capillary network formation compared to HUVECs. Increasing matrix density reduced sprouting, although this effect was attenuated by distributing the NHLFs throughout the matrix. Inhibition of both MMP- and plasmin-mediated fibrinolysis was required to completely block sprouting of both HUVECs and iPSC-ECs. Further analysis revealed MMP-9 expression and activity were significantly lower in iPSC-EC/NHLF co-cultures than in HUVEC/NHLF co-cultures at later time points, which may account for the observed deficiencies in angiogenic sprouting of the iPSC-ECs. Collectively, these findings suggest fundamental differences in EC phenotypes must be better understood to enable the promise and potential of iPSC-ECs for clinical translation to be realized.
Next-generation radioisotope thermoelectric generator study

Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generators (RTGs) have been used to power NASA missions of various types throughout the past five decades. The most recent RTG iteration, used for NASA's Mars Science Laboratory, is the Multi-Mission RTG (MMRTG), which is currently the only spaceflight-qualified system available. The U.S. planetary science community has expressed a desire for more power system options to be available to accommodate a range of ambitious future mission concepts across the solar system. Recent advancements in thermoelectric (TE) materials technology have raised a potential for significantly increased efficiency in future RTGs, which helped spur a recent in-depth NASA study of options for future systems. A “next-generation” RTG study was conducted to develop new RTG concepts that could meet the needs of planetary science missions through the 2030s and beyond. A Next-Generation RTG would aim to extend the types of potential NASA missions able to be supported, while fulfilling requirements related to technical risk and schedule. In this study, 21 potential thermoelectric couple configurations were analyzed by considering various high-performance, high-temperature TE materials and segmentation techniques that maximize convertor efficiency and power density. System modularity was explored, and found to be a promising means to offer improved flexibility for NASA mission concepts with varying scope and power requirements. This paper presents the results of the study, demonstrating the viability of developing an updated RTG system design, and defining conceptual system approaches for a new, potentially revolutionary RTG.
Analog Baseband Filter Design Considerations for Wireless Receivers

Design considerations applicable to analog baseband design for wireless receivers are discussed. Importance of out-of-band linearity and blocker tolerance requirements in analog filters is highlighted. A systematic analysis to evaluate the interdependence of analog baseband filter and a subsequent analog-to-digital converter (ADC) performance is presented. The analysis quantifies the effect of digital and analog modulated blockers on the design of the baseband filter specifications (order and approximation) and the ADC dynamic range. A cascaded, programmable, hybrid active-RC and switched capacitor low-pass filter suitable for a broadband UHF wireless receiver is illustrated as an example. Experimental results from the baseband filter and the prototype receiver are also included.
Algorithms for routing lookups and packet classification

The work presented in this thesis is motivated by the twin goals of increasing the capacity and the flexibility of the Internet. The Internet is comprised of packet-processing nodes, called routers, that route packets towards their destinations, and physical links that transport packets from one router to another. Owing to advances in optical technologies, such as Wavelength Division Multiplexing, the data rates of links have increased rapidly over the years. However, routers have failed to keep up with this pace because they must perform expensive per-packet processing operations. Every router is required to perform a forwarding decision on an incoming packet to determine the packet's next-hop router. This is achieved by looking up the destination address of the incoming packet in a forwarding table. Besides increased packet arrival rates because of higher speed links, the complexity of the forwarding lookup mechanism and the large size of forwarding tables have made routing lookups a bottleneck in the routers that form the core of the Internet. The first part of this thesis describes fast and efficient routing lookup algorithms that attempt to overcome this bottleneck. The second part of this thesis concerns itself with increasing the flexibility and functionality of the Internet. Traditionally, the Internet provides only a “best-effort” service, treating all packets going to the same destination identically, and servicing them in a first-come-first-served manner. However, Internet Service Providers are seeking ways to provide differentiated services (on the same network infrastructure) to different users based on their different requirements and expectations of quality from the Internet. For this, routers need to have the capability to distinguish and isolate traffic belonging to different flows. The ability to classify each incoming packet to determine the flow it belongs to is called packet classification, and could be based on an arbitrary number of fields in the packet header. The second part of this thesis highlights some of the issues in designing efficient packet classification algorithms, and describes novel algorithms that enable routers to perform fast packet classification on multiple fields.
Unraveling Substituent Effects on Frontier Orbitals of Conjugated Molecules Using an Absolutely Localized Molecular Orbital Based Analysis

It is common to introduce electron-donating or electron-withdrawing substituent groups into functional conjugated molecules (such as dyes) to tune their electronic structure properties (such as frontier orbital energy levels) and photophysical properties (such as absorption and emission wavelengths). However, there lacks a generally applicable tool that can unravel the underlying interactions between orbitals from a substrate molecule and those from its substituents in modern electronic structure calculations, despite the long history of qualitative molecular orbital theory. In this work, the absolutely localized molecular orbitals (ALMO) based analysis is extended to analyze the effects of substituent groups on the highest occupied molecular orbital (HOMO) and lowest unoccupied molecular orbital (LUMO) of a given system. This provides a bottom-up avenue towards quantification of effects from distinct physical origins (e.g. permanent electrostatics/Pauli repulsion, mutual polarization, inter-fragment orbital mixing). For the example case of prodan (a typical dye molecule), it is found that inter-fragment orbital mixing plays a key role in narrowing the HOMO-LUMO gap of the naphthalene core. Specifically, an out-of-phase mixing of high-lying occupied orbitals on the naphthalene core and the dimethylamino group leads to an elevated HOMO, whereas an in-phase combination of LUMOs on the naphthalene core and the propionyl group lowers the LUMO energy of the entire molecule. We expect this ALMO-based analysis to bridge the gap between concepts from qualitative orbital interaction analysis and quantitative electronic structure calculations.
Active Motion-Based Communication for Robots with Monocular Vision

In this paper, we consider motion as a means of sending messages between robots. We focus on a scenario in which a message is encoded in a sending robot's trajectory, and decoded by a receiver robot equipped with a monocular camera. The relative pose between the robots is unknown. We introduce an online Bayesian estimation algorithm based on the Multi-hypothesis Extended Kalman Filter for the receiving robot to simultaneously estimate its relative pose to the sender, and the trajectory class of the sender. The difficulty in this problem arises from the monocular vision model of the receiver and the unknown relative pose between robots, which brings inherent ambiguity into the trajectory identification, and hence the message decoding. An active vision-based control policy is derived and combined with the Bayesian estimation in order to deal with this difficulty. The policy is constructed online based on Monte Carlo Tree Search and aims at reducing the entropy over the trajectory class distribution. The algorithm has broad applications, e.g., to intent modeling and motion prediction for autonomous driving and autonomous drone operations. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed estimation algorithm and the control policy result in an accurate trajectory classification.
Payments in Lieu of Trouble: Nonprofit Pilots as Extortion or Efficient Public Finance?

Under state law, nonprofit institutions are wholly exempt from paying state and local property taxes. Yet large nonprofits increasingly make “Payments in Lieu of Taxes,” or PILOTs, to the locality in which they reside. Municipalities largely ask “eds and meds”—institutions of higher education and hospitals—for payment because of their large landholdings and financial stability.The payments (and their moniker) are counterintuitive because these organizations have no independent legal responsibility to pay property taxes. PILOTs have been criticized as extortive, inconsistent, and inefficient.Yet there are strong arguments in favor of making eds and meds contribute through some mechanism to their municipality’s budget, and each of these critiques can be rebutted. Many towns and cities are in dire economic straits, in part because of shrinking property tax rolls. Although nonprofits do provide valuable services to their communities, they also impose costs on them by consuming municipal services. PILOTs offer municipalities and nonprofits an intermediate, flexible solution between full taxation and total exemption.
I Choose, You Decide: Structural Tools for Supreme Court Legitimation

Efforts to rein in partisanship (or the perception thereof) on the Supreme Court tend to focus on reforms to the selection, appointment, or tenure of Justices. I propose a different, and perhaps complementary reform, which would not require constitutional amendment. I propose that the selection of a case for the Court’s discretionary appellate docket should be performed by a different group of judicial officers than those who hear and decide that case. The proposal leverages the insight of the “I cut, you choose” procedure for ensuring fair division — only here, it manifests as “I choose, you decide.” This proposal, rather than attempting to correct any supposed institutional deficiency that exacerbates the effects of partisanship, instead seeks to create a structure of checks and balances by pitting partisanship against partisanship.
The Cuyahoga fire at fifty: a false history obscures the real water crisis that never ceased

Popular history relates that on June 22, 1969, the Cuyahoga River burst into flames as it flowed through Cleveland, Ohio, on its way to Lake Erie. The nation responded with such outrage, the story continues, that the environmental movement was founded, the US Environmental Protection Agency was created, the 1972 Federal Clean Water Act written, and the modern era of environmental law launched. None of these assertions are true. As in the children’s game of telephone, a railroad trestle fire became a river conflagration, unfairly stigmatizing the Cuyahoga and the city of Cleveland, and casting in the shadows seminal events that formed the nation’s rich environmental history. Worse, the tale is used today as evidence that the nation’s waters are now well-protected when the condition of most is poor. This article surveys the history that actually paved the way for contemporary environmental policy, and describes how the Cuyahoga story has been used, even if unintentionally, to deflect attention from the failings of that policy. It is time for a new story, not only about the Cuyahoga but also the nation’s water crisis that never ceased. Shortcuts of convenience to environmental history should give way to a serious treatment of a deeply rooted American environmentalism that created bold goals the nation has yet to achieve. Environmental curricula should teach that statutes such as the Clean Water Act must be evaluated based on present performance, more than past accomplishments. In light of the profound threats to national water quality that still persist, environmental study programs should question, rather than accept on faith, the relevance of current law and policy. Perhaps students and a fresh generation of leaders will be inspired to write new laws, reform policies, halt pollution, and set environmental goals worthy of the twenty-first century.
Strength and Function Across Maturational Levels in Young Athletes at the Time of Return to Sport After ACL Reconstruction.

Background:The impact of maturation on lower extremity strength and function after anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction (ACLR) may help guide future studies of age-specific rehabilitation.Hypo...
FDA approval summary: Palbociclib for Male patients with metastatic breast cancer

On April 4, 2019, the FDA approved a supplemental new drug application for palbociclib (IBRANCE), to expand the approved indications in women with hormone receptor (HR)-positive, HER2-negative advanced or metastatic breast cancer (MBC) in combination with an aromatase inhibitor or fulvestrant, to include men. Palbociclib was first approved in 2015 for use in combination with letrozole for the treatment of estrogen receptor-positive, HER2-negative advanced breast cancer as initial endocrine-based therapy in postmenopausal women and subsequently in 2016 in combination with fulvestrant in women with HR-positive, HER2-negative advanced breast cancer with disease progression following endocrine therapy. The current approval was primarily based on the results of the PALOMA-2 and PALOMA-3 trials and, supported by real-world data from electronic health records and insurance claims. To support the safety evaluation in male patients, data from two phase I studies with palbociclib and safety information from the global safety database, were also reviewed. This article summarizes FDA decision-making and data supporting the approval of palbociclib for the treatment of male patients with HR-positive, HER2-negative advanced or MBC.
Plantar pressures following surgical release in children with clubfoot: Comparison of posterior release, posteromedial release, and nonoperative correction

Background Functional deficits observed at long-term follow-up in surgically released clubfeet have led to the adoption of a nonoperative approach. Gait results reported at age 5 years found ankle motion was limited in clubfeet treated by posteromedial release (PMR), compared with those that required posterior release (PR) or remained nonoperative. The purpose of this study was to assess plantar pressures in clubfeet that required surgical correction by 5 years of age. Methods Pedobarograph data were collected at age 5 years on patients with clubfeet that underwent surgical correction due to residual deformity or recurrence. Plantar pressures were assessed by subdividing the foot into the medial/lateral hindfoot, midfoot, and forefoot regions. Variables included maximum force, contact area%, contact time% (CT%), the hindfoot-forefoot angle, and displacement of the center of pressure line. Surgical feet were divided into those that underwent an isolated PR versus PMR. A group of 72 clubfeet that remained nonoperative were matched by initial severity and used for comparison. Results Pedobarograph data from 53 patients (72 clubfeet; 25 PR and 47 PMR) showed minimal differences between the PR and PMR feet. Compared with the nonoperative group, both surgical groups had increased CT% in the medial hindfoot and medial midfoot regions. An increase in lateral hindfoot CT% was observed in the PMR group. In addition, CT% in the first metatarsal region in the PMR group was reduced compared with the nonoperative group. Lateralization is present across both surgical groups in the center of pressure line and hindfoot-forefoot angle. Conclusion While there were minimal differences between surgical groups, patients who underwent PR exhibited pressure variables that were more comparable to the nonoperative group while the PMR group had greater deviations. Level of evidence Level II-therapeutic.
Using noisy or incomplete data to discover models of spatiotemporal dynamics

Sparse regression has recently emerged as an attractive approach for discovering models of spatiotemporally complex dynamics directly from data. In many instances, such models are in the form of nonlinear partial differential equations (PDEs); hence sparse regression typically requires the evaluation of various partial derivatives. However, accurate evaluation of derivatives, especially of high order, is infeasible when the data are noisy, which has a dramatic negative effect on the result of regression. We present an alternative and rather general approach that addresses this difficulty by using a weak formulation of the problem. For instance, it allows accurate reconstruction of PDEs involving high-order derivatives, such as the Kuramoto-Sivashinsky equation, from data with a considerable amount of noise. The flexibility of our approach also allows reconstruction of PDE models that involve latent variables which cannot be measured directly with acceptable accuracy. This is illustrated by reconstructing a model for a weakly turbulent flow in a thin fluid layer, where neither the forcing nor the pressure field is known.
Challenges in Implementing the Responsibility to Protect: The Security Council Veto and the Need for a Common Ethical Approach

In 2005 the member states of the United Nations recognized a “responsibility to protect” (“R2P”) victims of mass atrocities such as genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity. They acknowledged a special role for the U.N. Security Council in responding to these atrocities, including potentially authorizing military action using its extensive powers under Chapter VII of the U.N. Charter. However, the Council has very rarely been able to agree on appropriate action, and the five permanent Council members (“P5”), most notably China and Russia, have often vetoed or threatened to veto Council resolutions authorizing R2P action. The article argues that the veto poses a major impediment to the Council acting on its R2P responsibilities, and that to resolve it, the P5, and all U.N. member states, need to agree on a common ethical approach. The article proposes such an approach based on ethical concepts that are widely endorsed by states, especially in the U.N. Charter and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and explores its implications for legal and ethical controversies relating to the role of the Council, its obligations under R2P, and proposed reforms of the veto.
Jewish Law and American Law: A Comparative Study (Foreword)

Over the past several years, the Jewish Law Institute has organized a number of conferences dedicated to exploring important issues of law and religion.Consistent with the mission and activities of the Institute, the conferences have included discussions of the relevance of the Jewish legal tradition to American legal scholarship, American legal practice, and American legal education. Building on the success of these programs, on April 1, 2019, Touro Law Center, Touro Law Review, and the Jewish Law Institute hosted a national conference, “Jewish Law and American Law: A Comparative Study.”
A comparison of performance metrics for cloth masks as source control devices for simulated cough and exhalation aerosols

Universal mask wearing is recommended to help control the spread of COVID-19. Masks reduce the expulsion of aerosols of respiratory fluids into the environment (called source control) and offer som...
System framework of adopting additive manufacturing in mass production line

System framework is for adopting additive manufacturing (AM) in a mass production line where AM processes are integrated to customize protective parts for manual tools that are found to cause damag...
The Latest in Estrous Synchronization in Beef Cattle

To effectively utilize artificial insemination in the beef cattle industry and achieve the genetic progress desired by many beef cattle producers, regulation of the estrous cycle is extremely important. In the past, extensive research has evaluated prostaglandins and progestin compounds such the SyncroMate B® implant system. More recently, extensive use of the MGA/prostaglandin synchronization system has been utilized with beef heifers. Recent research has evaluated the potential of utilizing GnRH in combination with prostaglandin to synchronize estrus in cows and heifers. The following is a brief review of the research data collected to date.
Wandering Eyes: Using Gaze-Tracking Method to Capture Eye Fixations in Unfamiliar Healthcare Environments.

OBJECTIVE This study aims to investigate the elements of wayfinding in indoor complex healthcare environments. BACKGROUND The study replicates Ghamari and Pati's 2018 study to identify the environmental attributes that attract eye fixation during wayfinding by objectively tracking eye movements and fixation as healthy subjects navigate through a complex, unfamiliar indoor healthcare setting. The study addressed what do people look at while navigating in unfamiliar healthcare environments? What are the relative time periods of eye fixations on different visual environmental elements of the healthcare-designed environments? And what role do visual environmental attributes in healthcare facilities, such as configuration, color, art, directories, maps, furniture, and so on, play during the wayfinding process. METHOD Twenty-four adults in different genders and various age groups participated in this study and navigated five routes with different degrees of difficulty. The sequence of the destinations in this study was randomized. The data were collected by tracking gaze fixations while human subjects navigated an indoor complex healthcare environment. RESULTS The findings show that identifying signs (29.1%), informative signs (20.8%), and architectural features (11.3%) constituted the most frequent elements attracting gaze, substantially more than the other classes of information. Four types of signage (identifying signs, informative signs, directional, and safety/regulatory signs) were accounted for 62.3% of the total gaze fixation time. CONCLUSIONS The comparison of the ordered list based on frequencies and time of eye fixations on various elements developed in Ghamari and Pati's study shows a vast degree of similarities.
Quantum Computer Science: An Introduction

Preface 1. Cbits and Qbits 2. General features and some simple examples 3. Breaking RSA encryption with a quantum computer 4. Searching with a quantum computer 5. Quantum error correction 6. Protocols that use just a few Qbits Appendices Index.
Diagnosis and Assessment: An Evidence-Based Approach Using the Strengths Perspective with Children and Adolescents

This chapter discusses diagnostic issues related to developing accurate diagnoses of children and adolescents, a task made more difficult by fluctuating patterns of behavior, limited research and errors often made by clinicians which confirm incorrect observations of clients. The chapter also discusses the psychosocial assessment, which is a way of determining areas of difficulty and areas of strength in client functioning without being excessively oriented toward pathology. Used correctly, it can provide the practitioner with an understanding of the connecting elements that have created the current crisis in a client's life. The psychosocial assessment can help the clinician develop strategies that may move the client in directions that create significant changes. A key to the use of the psychosocial assessment is to focus on client behaviors, and to support assumptions about the cause of a problem and the most efficacious treatment, with recognition of best evidence available in the research literature.
Amino acid substitutions resulting from suppression of nonsense mutations. 3. Tyrosine insertion by the Su-4 gene.

The Su-4 + suppressor gene, which acts on both UAG and UAA nonsense condons, causes a tyrosine residue to be specified by each of the codons.
Kinetics of Utilization of Organic Compounds in the Growth of Mycobacterium tuberculosis

Bowles, Jean A. (University of Colorado School of Medicine, Denver), and William Segal. Kinetics of utilization of organic compounds in the growth of Mycobacterium tuberculosis. J. Bacteriol. 90:157–163. 1965.—To obtain a workable system for a study of the kinetics of nutrient utilization (based on specific quantitative assay) by Mycobacterium tuberculosis, several cultural refinements were introduced: the use of shake culture, a 40-fold increase in the size of inoculum, substitution of glutamate for asparagine as nitrogen source, and elimination of glucose from the medium with glycerol remaining as carbon source. These modifications resulted in reduction to a tenth of the lag phase of glycerol utilization (from 40 to 4 days), and in a greatly increased rate of growth. Both coordinate and sequential patterns of nutrient utilization were in evidence, except in the case of citrate, which was never utilized under a variety of conditions of culture. The coordinate pattern of glucose-glutamate and glucose-glycerol utilization would appear to rule out catabolite repression by glucose. However, elimination of glucose from the medium resulted in elimination of the 4-day lag period before glutamate utilization was initiated, leaving open to question the role of glucose in this system. Evidence is presented for the hypothesis that the sequential pattern of glutamate-glycerol utilization is a function of glutamate repression of glycerol oxidation in the growth of M. tuberculosis, although no diauxie effect is apparent. In a determination of which nutrient-utilization systems were regulated by induction, only in the case of glycerol was evidence obtained for an inducible system. The enzymatic mechanisms underlying these patterns of nutrient utilization are presently being investigated.
Big Business in the BRICs

The growing importance of Brazil, Russia, India and China in the global economy is reflected in the increasing weight of their companies in Fortune Global 500 rankings. Gaining greater knowledge of the characteristics of large firms that dominate the global economy is inherently an important endeavour. Uneven access to data and information makes understanding the strategy, structure, ownership and performance of large business an ambitious programme of research. When it comes to the analysis of the BRICs limitations are even greater. The BRIC economies are different from each other and this is also true as far as the heights of their respective business worlds are considered. But they also share some crucial features: concentrated ownership, with governments and families at the helm, diversification and internationalisation.
Studies on urolithiasis: XII. Association of urine polyelectrolytes

Abstract The property of molecular association of urine polyelectrolytes (UPE) consisting of proteins and peptides isolated from the urine of lambs fed on calculus- and non-calculus-provoking rations has been investigated. The UPE showed a variation in degree of association according to the ration and the ionic media in which they were dissolved. There was a greater degree of association in: (1) the UPE in the presence of calcium than magnesium ions, (2) the UPE of the calculus-provoking than the non-calculus-provoking rations, and (3) the UPE of the small molecular weight fraction (less than 5000) than the larger molecular weight fraction (greater than 5000). The UPE seemed to be in more dissociated forms in the presence of NaCl, KCl, and Na 2 HPO 4 . Dimethyl sulfoxide, which is effective in reducing the incidence of urolithiasis, appeared to be able either to prevent the further association of UPE molecules or to keep the associated molecules in solution. The results of this study showed that the highly associated urine polyelectrolytes, proteins as well as peptides, had apparently contributed to the cause of urinary calculus formation by serving as the calculus matrix.
Chemically modified nanoporous carbons obtained using template carbonization method

New nanoporous carbons with extremely high mesopore volumes and a highly dispersed distribution of metals on the carbon surface have been obtained using mesoporous silica. Polystyrene sulfonic acid-based organic salts were used as carbon precursor. The precursor chemistry was modified by cation exchange with catalytically active metals (i.e., copper, nickel, cobalt), prior to carbonization. The carbons have pore sizes predominantly in the range of 10-50 nm.
The relative importance of light and nutrient limitation of phytoplankton growth: a simple index of coastal ecosystem sensitivity to nutrient enrichment

Anthropogenic nutrient enrichment of the coastal zone is now a well-established fact. However, there is still uncertainty about the mechanisms through which nutrient enrichment can disrupt biological communities and ecosystem processes in the coastal zone. For example, while some estuaries exhibit classic symptoms of acute eutrophication, including enhanced production of algal biomass, other nutrient-rich estuaries maintain low algal biomass and primary production. This implies that large differences exist among coastal ecosystems in the rates and patterns of nutrient assimilation and cycling. Part of this variability comes from differences among ecosystems in the other resource that can limit algal growth and production – the light energy required for photosynthesis. Complete understanding of the eutrophication process requires consideration of the interacting effects of light and nutrients, including the role of light availability as a regulator of the expression of eutrophication. A simple index of the relative strength of light and nutrient limitation of algal growth can be derived from models that describe growth rate as a function of these resources. This index can then be used as one diagnostic to classify the sensitivity of coastal ecosystems to the harmful effects of eutrophication. Here I illustrate the application of this diagnostic with light and nutrient measurements made in three California estuaries and two Dutch estuaries.
Sour Colostrum Dilutions Compared to Whole Milk for Calves

Abstract Two trials with Holstein calves compared various dilutions of sour colostrum with whole milk fed to weaning at 5 wk. Colostral milk was collected for the first six milkings postpartum, allowed to ferment naturally, and stored for an average of 10.5 days before feeding. In Trial 1, 59 calves were assigned to one of four treatments: 1) 3.63kg whole milk offered once daily, 2) 1.81kg sour colostrum + 1.81kg water offered once daily, 3) treatment 2 offered in two equal portions, and 4) 2.72kg sour colostrum + .9kg water offered as in 3. Calves fed whole milk gained more weight than calves fed 1.81kg sour colostrum for 0 to 5 wk. After weaning, growth was not different. Four of 11 calves assigned to 4 refused the diet, and no further assignments were made. Calves fed 2.72kg sour colostrum scoured less than those fed whole milk or 1.81kg sour colostrum twice daily. In Trial 2, 20 calves were fed: 1) whole milk offered at 10% of birth weight once daily, or 2) two parts sour colostrum to one part water offered as in 1. Calves fed whole milk gained more and also scoured more than calves fed sour colostrum. Average daily gains to weaning for calves fed sour colostrum in Trial 2 were comparable to gains of calves fed whole milk in Trial 1 (.32 kg/day and .31 kg/day).
Reversibility of Steroid Δ-Isomerase III. THE SOLUBLE ENZYME OF PSEUDOMONAS TESTOSTERONI

Abstract The purified β-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase and steroid Δ-isomerase of Pseudomonas testosteroni have been incubated, both separately and together, with testosterone-4-14C and reduced diphosphopyridine nucleotide. Substantial yields of androst-4-ene-3β,17β-diol were obtained whenever the dehydrogenase was present, while androst-5-ene-3β, 17β-diol was formed only when both the dehydrogenase and the isomerase were incubated. No radioactive products were detected when only the isomerase was incubated or in the absence of either enzyme.
Coordinated thread scheduling for workstation clusters under windows NT

Coordinated thread scheduling is a critical factor in achieving good performance for tightly-coupled parallel jobs on workstation clusters. We are building a coordinated scheduling system that coexists with the Windows NT scheduler which both provides coordinated scheduling and can generalize to provide a wide range of resource abstractions. We describe the basic approach, called "demand-based coscheduling", and implementation in the context of Windows NT. We report preliminary performance data characterizing the effectiveness of our approach and describe benefits and limitations of our approach.
Identification of an Interneuronal Population that Mediates Recurrent Inhibition of Motoneurons in the Developing Chick Spinal Cord

Studies on the development of synaptic specificity, embryonic activity, and neuronal specification in the spinal cord have all been limited by the absence of a functionally identified interneuron class (defined by its unique set of connections). Here, we identify an interneuron population in the embryonic chick spinal cord that appears to be the avian equivalent of the mammalian Renshaw cell (R-interneurons). These cells receive monosynaptic nicotinic, cholinergic input from motoneuron recurrent collaterals. They make predominately GABAergic connections back onto motoneurons and to other R-interneurons but project rarely to other spinal interneurons. The similarity between the connections of the developing R-interneuron, shortly after circuit formation, and the mature mammalian Renshaw cell raises the possibility that R-interneuronal connections are formed precisely from the onset. Using a newly developed optical approach, we identified the location of R-interneurons in a column, dorsomedial to the motor nucleus. Functional characterization of the R-interneuron population provides the basis for analyses that have so far only been possible for motoneurons.
The State of the Great Northwest

Health care reform proposals dominated Washington State's recent legislative session. Outgoing Governor Booth Gardner and fellow Democrats managed to pass a very tough cost-containment and access bill in the House but fell one vote short of passage in the Republican-controlled Senate. Political hardball has become the name of the game, with insurance companies and many providers weighing in heavily against the House bill, while Democrats and the Governor blame Republicans for the lack of final legislation and vow to go directly to the electorate this fall. Reform gathered steam last year when a highly touted Health Care Cost Containment and Access Commission released its preliminary recommendations. With only a few dissenting votes, it narrowed the field of options to two: something very close to single-payer system, and a "play-or-pay" approach with strong statewide premium controls on a minimum benefits package. Gardner quickly made the second, seemingly more moderate approach his plan, but opposition from small business, among others, lost him support in a key House committee. The Governor, pledging not to let the legislature adjourn until they had produced some major reform legislation, promptly compromised. After some tortuous intraparty politics, a globally budgeted system that still uses multiple insurers passed the House in late February. The bill's powerful Health Services Commission would establish a uniform benefits package and set for that package the maximum premium any certified health plan could charge. Initially the premium would be set to reflect the actual average cost in the state for such coverage, but then the key cost-containment device would kick in: subsequent premium increases would be limited to the rise in the Consumer Price Index. Universal access would be phased in by 1997 as cost containment began to bite; every state resident would receive a voucher sufficient to purchase a uniform benefits package from any certified health plan. Employers and paying individuals would funnel contributions into a general fund, augmented by federal and state dollars for the elderly, poor, and near-poor. The fund would pay competing health plans an age- and sex-adjusted premium for each enrollee. Plans would compete on the basis of service and supplementary benefits, not price for the benefits package. Balance-billing would not be allowed for items in the benefits package, though premium increments for more inclusive packages would be. No plan could deny coverage for preexisting conditions, and no premiums could be experience-rated. Opponents charge that the plan would involve unnecessarily centralized government control and eventually ration services and restrict choice of provider. Republicans in the Senate proposed a more incremental change, providing a standardized claim form and incentives for physicians to serve Medicaid patients; insurers would be barred from rejecting coverage for small employers and limited to charging group premiums 25 percent above the average. …
Database support for collaborative battle planning

Battle planning is a collaborative effort involving decision-making and war gaming at different levels of the command structure. It is an iterative process requiring that appropriate views of the battlefield be conveyed to all the participants of the planning process. This paper details the issue of database support for the collaborative battle planning environment that permits participants to interact with one another in a group battle-planning task by manipulating artifacts in their workspace. Complexity is added by the necessity to add legacy components to the system while permitting the users of the system to meaningfully participate in this collaborative environment and still maintain the integrity of the data. The data model is detailed and system architecture is described. The data server component provides an interface via a data API that provides the functions to authenticate clients, create and store database objects, and access objects and their values. System level details and data issues in collaborative planning are discussed in the paper.
Furnace Cyclic Behavior of Plasma-Sprayed Zirconia-Yttria and Multi-Component Rare Earth Oxide Doped Thermal Barrier Coatings

Ceramic thermal barrier coatings will play an increasingly important role in advanced gas turbine engines because of their ability to enable further increases in engine temperatures. However, the coating performance and durability become a major concern under the increasingly harsh thermal cycling conditions. Advanced zirconia- and hafnia-based cluster oxide thermal barrier coatings with lower thermal conductivity and improved thermal stability are being developed using a high-heat-flux laser-rig based test approach. Although the new composition coatings were not yet optimized for cyclic durability, an initial durability screening of numerous candidate coating materials was carried out using conventional furnace cyclic tests. In this paper, furnace thermal cyclic behavior of the advanced plasma-sprayed zirconia-yttria-based thermal barrier coatings that were co-doped with multi-component rare earth oxides was investigated at 1163 C using 45 min hot cycles. The ceramic coating failure mechanisms were studied by using scanning electron microscopy combined with X-ray diffraction phase analysis after the furnace tests. The coating cyclic lifetime will be discussed in relation to coating phase structures, total dopant concentrations, and other properties.
The interaction of cyclosporin and calmodulin

The interaction of cyclosporin A and dansyl cyclosporin A with bovine and wheat germ calmodulin has been monitored by measurements of induced changes in dansyl and bound toluidinyl naphthalene sulfonate fluorescence. The interaction is Ca2(+)-dependent and 1:1. Measurements of the efficiency of radiationless energy transfer from bound dansyl cyclosporin A to an acceptor group located on Cys-27 of wheat germ calmodulin suggest that the primary binding site is not located on the N-terminal lobe (residues 1-65). However, studies with proteolytic fragments of calmodulin indicate that elements of the N-terminal half-molecule (residues 1-77) may be involved in the stabilization of the binding site. The binding of cyclosporin alters the physical properties of calmodulin and, in particular, reduces the localized rotational mobility of a fluorescent probe.
Decoupling of geometric thickness and refractive index in quantitative phase microscopy

In quantitative phase imaging, a priori knowledge of either refractive index or physical thickness is used to estimate the change in one of these parameters. Here, we report a method for decoupling geometric thickness from refractive index in quantitative phase microscopy.
Incidental learning of event frequency

Two experiments studied the effect of intentionality of learning on memory for the frequency of occurrence of words on a list. Subjects who learned the items intentionally in preparation for an unspecified memory test remembered frequency as accurately as did those who studied specifically for a frequency-estimation test. Both groups recalled frequency information more accurately than did a group that learned the words incidentally. These results. along with a review of the literature. suggest that there is no strong evidence for the automatic encoding of frequency information.
Optical properties of Triton X-100-treated purple membranes embedded in gelatin films☆

Abstract The purple membrane (PM) of the microorganism Halobacterium salinarium contains a hexagonally packed monolayer of the light-sensitive protein, bacteriorhodopsin (BR). The optical characteristics of gelatin-immobilized PMs depend strongly on the chemical environment of the PMs in the matrix. Here we present photoinduced absorptive and holographic characteristics of gelatin-embedded PMs solubilized with the non-ionic detergent, Triton X-100. The BR/detergent interaction was shown to slow the M-to-initial state transition of the photocycle and to increase the photosensitivity of the BR films. The lifetime of the holographic grating in Triton X-100-treated BR films was 2–3 times greater, when compared to the unmodified sample. Holographic grating growth times in BR films were shown to change depending on the extent of solubilization. The measured holographic sensitivity appeared to maximize in the range of Triton X-100/BR molar ratios from 15:1 to 25:1. The possible advantages of solubilized PM films as they are applied to optoelectronic devices are discussed.
The accidental equivalence of protons in 3-hydroxy-3-methylbutyrolactone: Solvent and temperature dependence

The temperature or the nature of the solvent selectively affects the NMR equivalence of the protons at C-2 and C-4 in 1.