cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Evaluation of Miniature Wireless Vital Signs Monitor in a Trauma Intensive Care Unit

ABSTRACT A previous study demonstrated basic proof of principle of the value of a miniature wireless vital signs monitor (MWVSM, MiniMedic, Athena GTX, Des Moines, Iowa) for battlefield triage However, there were unanswered questions related to sensor reliability and uncontrolled conditions in the prehospital environment. This study determined whether MWVSM sensors track vital signs and allow for appropriate triage compared to a gold standard bedside monitor in trauma patients. This was a prospective study in 59 trauma intensive care unit patients. Systolic blood pressure, temperature, heart rate (HR), skin temperature, and pulse oximetry (SpO2) were displayed on a bedside monitor for 60 minutes. Shock index (SI) was calculated. A separate MWVSM monitor was attached to the forehead and finger of each patient. Data from each included pulse wave transit time (PWTT), temperature, HR, SpO2, and a summary status termed “Murphy Factor” (MF), which ranges from 0 to 5. Patients are classified as “routine” if MF =...
Bovine embryo transfer pregnancies. I. Abortion rates and characteristics of calves.

Data were obtained from 1,908 pregnancies resulting from bovine embryo transfer procedures. Responses examined included sex ratio, fetal, neonatal and preweaning death losses, birth weight and calving assistance. The sex ratio for 1,751 embryo transfer calves examined was 51.11% males. Cows older than 10 yr that had become repeat breeders produced more (P less than .05) male calves than other donors. Breed of embryo, age and quality of embryos at the time of transfer, embryo storage time from collection to transfer, asynchrony of recipient with donor estrus and number of palpable corpora lutea in superovulated donors were not related to sex ratio (P greater than .05). The abortion rate between 2 and 3 mo of gestation in embryo transfer recipients was 3.15%, and between 3 to 7 mo, 2.14%. Neonatal and preweaning losses for 1,682 calves with complete information were 1) congenital defects, .54%; 2) death due to premature birth (7 to 8 mo of gestation), .18%; 3) dystocia-related deaths, 2.38%; 4) deaths of unknown causes at birth, 2.14%; 5) deaths of unknown causes from 24 h after birth to weaning, 1.43%; 6) deaths due to calfhood diseases, 1.25% and 7) deaths due to environmental factors, 1.13%. Total losses of 2-mo pregnancies due to abortion or death of calves or recipients were 14%. Birth weight of embryo transfer calves changed .29 kg/d of deviation from average gestation length (P less than .005) for pregnancies within breeds. Birth weight was also affected (P less than .005) by donor breed and recipient breed and age. Male calves averaged 2.19 kg heavier (P less than .005) than females. Calving assistance was affected by donor breed; Angus calves required the least assistance (P less than .005). Hereford, Holstein and Limousin calves were similar and intermediate; Simmental calves needed the most calving assistance. Recipient breed and age influenced calving ease, with younger recipients of Angus and Hereford descent requiring more assistance (average calving score, 2.1) than both cow (1.3) and heifer (1.5) recipients of the larger Continental European breeds. Characteristics of 305 non-embryo transfer calves were not significantly different from 185 embryo transfer calves from the same farms. We conclude that embryo transfer calves did not differ from the non-embryo transfer population in any of the characteristics studied.
OP0079 Pharmacodynamic Changes in Gene Expression Observed in Two Phase 3 Trials of Baff Blockade with Tabalumab in SLE

Background RNA gene expression profiling was performed on 1,760 SLE patients randomly selected from Illuminate Trials 1 & 2 which studied the anti-BAFF, IgG4 monoclonal antibody, tabalumab, for efficacy in SLE (Isenberg D., et al. ACR Boston 2104). The baseline disease activity and clinical characteristics were balanced across treatment and placebo groups in both Trial 1 (N=1164) & 2 (N=1124). The primary endpoint of SRI-5 was not met in Trial 1 but was met in Trial 2 for the 120mg Q2week (W) dose (p=0.002). Objectives The present study characterized baseline and pharmacodynamic (PD)-induced changes in gene expression from these two cohorts of SLE patients. Methods Whole blood was collected in Tempus tubes at baseline, weeks 16 and 52. RNA was extracted and analyzed using Affymetrix HTA 2.0 whole genome microarrays. Serum levels of IgG anti-dsDNA antibodies (abs) were measured by ELISA. Serum complement components C3 and C4 were measured by nephelometry and B cells enumerated using flow cytometry. Statistical analyses to identify PD-induced gene changes were conducted with Q2W and Q4W cohorts using a mixed effects model with relative gene expression as the response and inclusion of baseline clinical covariates. Results Statistically significant PD changes were observed in both trials in the Q2W and Q4W 120mg dosing arms compared to placebo for the following biomarkers: anti-dsDNA abs, C3 & C4, total serum IgG, IgM & IgA, and peripheral blood B cell number (all with p Conclusions Pharmacodynamic changes associated with tabalumab treatment included anti-dsDNA abs, complement components C3 & C4, serum IgG, IgA & IgM, and B cell numbers. Statistically significant changes were observed in 410 genes, broadly consistent with the mechanism of BAFF blockade. Changes in expression of a number of additional genes were unexpected and suggest that these may be of importance in anti-BAFF drug response. The data here confirm previous smaller studies that a Type I interferon signature may represent a distinctive subset of SLE patients. Disclosure of Interest R. Hoffman Shareholder of: Eli Lilly and Company, Employee of: Eli Lilly and Company, J. Merrill: None declared, M. Alarcόn-Riquelme: None declared, M. Petri: None declared, E. Dow Shareholder of: Eli Lilly and Company, Employee of: Eli Lilly and Company, E. Nantz Shareholder of: Eli Lilly and Company, Employee of: Eli Lilly and Company, L. Nisenbaum Shareholder of: Eli Lilly and Company, Employee of: Eli Lilly and Company, K. Schroeder Shareholder of: Eli Lilly and Company, Employee of: Eli Lilly and Company, W. Komocsar Shareholder of: Eli Lilly and Company, Employee of: Eli Lilly and Company, N. Perumal Shareholder of: Eli Lilly and Company, Employee of: Eli Lilly and Company, G. Rocha Shareholder of: Eli Lilly and Company, Employee of: Eli Lilly and Company, R. Higgs Shareholder of: Eli Lilly and Company, Employee of: Eli Lilly and Company
Neurocutaneous Syndromes and the Neural Crest

The role of the neural crest as an inducer of neurocutaneous syndromes and associated craniofacial abnormalities is proposed by researchers at the University of Calgary and Alberta Children’s Hospital, AB, Canada.
What's wrong with this quantum world, February 2004

If you ask Google to search for “no quantum world,” you will get nearly 300 hits. They all give the following quotation (or recognizable corruptions of it): There is no quantum world. There is only an abstract quantum physical description. It is wrong to think that the task of physics is to find out how nature is. Physics concerns what we can say about nature. Over 90% of them attribute the statement to Niels Bohr, with phrases like “Bohr's dictum …,” “Bohr insisted that …,” “Bohr proclaimed …,” “Niels Bohr said, in a frequently quoted passage …,” “Niels Bohr wrote [my emphasis] …,” and even “Explain and evaluate Bohr's philosophy of quantum theory with reference to his assertion ….” Here is yet another example of the power of the internet to enrich our knowledge. There is only one problem. Bohr, who took writing very seriously indeed, never published such an assertion in any of his writings, although he repeatedly refined, reformulated, and often simply repeated his position on the philosophical foundations of the quantum theory. The statement actually comes from an essay by Aage Petersen, “The Philosophy of Niels Bohr” [1], which he published in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists shortly after Bohr's death. Petersen introduced the words with When asked whether the algorithm of quantum mechanics could be considered as somehow mirroring an underlying quantum world, Bohr would answer … So what may now be the most celebrated of all Bohr quotations on the nature of the quantum theory is at best an attempt by a close associate to characterize Bohr's general response to the highly problematic notion of a “quantum world,” written too late for Bohr to respond. When you ask Google to list only those pages that also mention the actual author of the words, Petersen, the number of hits drops from 286 to 18. The status of this “quotation” as hearsay is in danger of being lost. I'm particularly sensitive to this risk because in the 1980s I used to enjoy giving physics colloquia on Bell's theorem and its implications for our understanding of quantum mechanics. I was always fond of Petersen's recollection of what Bohr used to say, and I felt that his formulation captured something important about the situation revealed by Bell's theorem.
Quantifying decision making for data science: from data acquisition to modeling

Organizations, irrespective of their size and type, are increasingly becoming data-driven or aspire to become data-driven. There is a rush to quantify value of their own internal data or the value of integrating their internal data with external data, and performing modeling on such data. A question that analytics teams often grapple with is whether to acquire more data or expend additional effort on more complex modeling, or both. If these decisions can be quantified a priori, it can be used to guide budget and investment decisions. To that end, we quantify the Net Present Value (NPV) of the tasks of additional data acquisition or more complex modeling, which are critical to the data science process. We develop a framework, NPVModel, for a comparative analysis of various external data acquisition and in-house model development scenarios using NPVs of costs and returns as a measure of feasibility. We then demonstrate the effectiveness of NPVModel in prescribing strategies for various scenarios. Our framework not only acts as a suggestion engine, but it also provides valuable insights into budgeting and roadmap planning for Big Data ventures.
Local strategies and action plans towards resource efficiency in South East Europe

Abstract The role of cities and their commitment to meet the European targets on energy and climate has steadily increased in the latest years as testified by the large number of ambitious initiatives undertaken by European cities to face multiple challenges towards sustainability. Many projects and initiatives have arisen all around Europe to support cities in the achievement of the Europe 2020 targets of smart, sustainable and inclusive growth. RE-SEEties “Towards resource-efficient urban communities in SEE” is one of the projects funded under the South East Europe program aimed to enhance the policy-making and strategic planning competences of municipalities in the field of energy efficiency, renewable energy sources and waste valorization. This paper focuses on the methods developed and the main results achieved in the framework of RE-SEEties. The main focus is on the eight partner cities (The Local Government of Budapest District 18 – Hungary/HU, Municipality of Aigaleo – Greece/EL, Municipality of Potenza – Italy/IT, City of Nitra – Slovakia/SK, City of Skopje – Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia/FYROM, City of Miercurea Ciuc – Romania/RO, Municipality of Ptuj – Slovenia/SI, City of Ivanic-Grad – Croatia/HR) and how they were assisted by professional institutions in translating their commitments towards resource efficiency into Local Strategies and Action Plans. A critical comparison of these final results points out differences and similarities in the state-of-the-art of cities across South East Europe as well as a the level of ambition and difficulties faced to turn into resource efficient urban communities.
ExBox: Experience Management Middlebox for Wireless Networks

Enterprise wireless networks face significant challenges to deliver Quality-of-Experience (QoE) with the variety of mobile applications. One of the fundamental challenges is that the traditional definition of network capacity (often defined as throughput capacity) is not sufficient to reflect applications' requirements in wireless networks. In this paper, we propose to rethink the network capacity of wireless networks to better incorporate QoE. Specifically, we first propose a novel concept of an Experiential Capacity Region (ExCR) for wireless networks. ExCR is defined as a set of simultaneous application flows whose QoE requirements can be satisfied by the network. Next, we present the infrastructure based ExBox system that measures per-application QoE metrics and determines the ExCR for wireless networks to better serve a set of mobile application flows. In its core, ExBox employs light-weight machine learning techniques that are tailored for dynamic wireless environments. Through both large-scale simulations and extensive real-life experiments on WiFi and LTE networks, we show that ExBox delivers QoE in admission control decision with a precision of ≈ 0.8 - 0.9, even when clients experience diverse channel quality. Moreover, ExBox quickly adapts to changing network environments without much overhead.
The Analyst as Catalyst: Cultivating Mind in the Shadow of Neglect

I describe an effort to cultivate mind and deepen relatedness in patients who exhibit rudimentary thought and constricted forms of object contact, due to the effects of certain neglect or serious disturbance. Some of these patients require the analyst to serve as a catalyst, who takes proactive steps to summon a psychic realm to the patient’s experience and to forge components of the dyadic bonds that promote such function. The insights of the object relations tradition into foreclosed development are noted. I argue that such insights can be optimally applied with the benefit of the relational school’s emphasis on forms of dyadic engagement and use of the analyst’s subjectivity. In some cases of neglect, and others in which serious developmental challenge is the result of disturbance, priority is placed on the patient’s growth. Similarly, in my case illustration, my goal in using my subjectivity, as a catalyst, is for my patient to take his own emerging mind and psychic self with interest.
Interpreting millimeter‐wave radiances over tropical convective clouds

Attempts to interpret the measurements of mm-wave radiometers over tropical storms must overcome the difficulty of modeling the scattering signatures of hydrometeors at these frequencies. Most approaches to date try to retrieve surface precipitation, to which the observations are not directly sensitive. In fact, millimeter wavelengths are most sensitive to the scattering from solid hydrometeors within the upper levels of the cloud. Millimeter-wavelength radiometers have a definite advantage over the lower-frequency radiometers in that they have finer spatial resolution to resolve deep convection. Preliminary analyses summarized here indicate that the measurements are indeed sensitive to the depth and intensity of convection. The challenge is to derive a robust approach to make quantitative estimates of the characteristics of the convection directly from the observations, and conversely to derive a robust forward representation of the dependence of the radiances on the underlying moisture fields, to enable effective data assimilation. This is accomplished using a two-step semi-empirical approach: first, nearly-simultaneous coincident observations by mm-wave radiometers and orbiting atmospheric profiling radars are used to enforce unbiased consistency between modeled brightness temperatures and radar and radiometer observations; second, the departure from the first-step mean empirical relations are explained in terms of the moisture variables, using cloud-resolving simulations with different microphysical schemes, including an original microphysical representation that proves to be more consistent with remote sensing observations than existing schemes. The results are a retrieval approach and a forward representation that are unbiased by construction, with uncertainties quantified by the corresponding conditional variances.
Are the Central Andes Mountains a Warming Hot Spot

AbstractGlobal climate model simulations project that the tropical Andes Mountains of South America, which are particularly vulnerable to climate change because of a reliance on snow and glacial melt for freshwater resources, will experience enhanced warming in the near future, with both higher rates of warming at higher elevations within the mountain range itself and localized enhancement of warming exceeding surrounding areas of the globe. Yet recent surface temperature changes in the tropical Andes do not show evidence for either elevation-dependent warming or regional enhancement of warming on average. However, it remains a possibility that the expected warming trends in this region have begun to manifest in other ways (e.g., in the free atmosphere or at intermediate mountain elevations). This paper proposes evidence from several reanalysis products that there has indeed been a regional enhancement of midtropospheric warming around the central Andes over the past few decades that makes this region sta...
Solvation Effects for Oxygen Evolution Reaction Catalysis on IrO2(110)

We study the electrochemical interface between rutile IrO2(110) and water to investigate how the inclusion of an explicit solvent influences the stabilities of adsorbed intermediates in the oxygen evolution reaction. Solvent is modeled by explicit nondissociated water molecules, and their structure is determined by a global optimization method. We find that the inclusion of an explicit solvent can significantly affect the geometry of adsorbed intermediates, changing from an interaction with the surface to an interaction with the water bilayer. These water structures consist of stacked octagonal sheets in an ordered network. Solvent stabilization is pronounced for adsorbed *OH and *OOH, which are capable of donating hydrogen bonds. We find little to no change in adsorbate binding energy as the number of layers of solvent is increased from 1 to 3, suggesting a single water bilayer is sufficient to describe the system. With either *O or *OH coadsorbates, the energetics of the reaction pathway are relatively ...
Hint Generation Under Uncertainty: The Effect of Hint Quality on Help-Seeking Behavior

Much research in Intelligent Tutoring Systems has explored how to provide on-demand hints, how they should be used, and what effect they have on student learning and performance. Most of this work relies on hints created by experts and assumes that all help provided by the tutor is correct and of high quality. However, hints may not all be of equal value, especially in open-ended problem solving domains, where context is important. This work argues that hint quality, especially when using data-driven hint generation techniques, is inherently uncertain. We investigate the impact of hint quality on students’ help-seeking behavior in an open-ended programming environment with on-demand hints. Our results suggest that the quality of the first few hints on an assignment is positively associated with future hint use on the same assignment. Initial hint quality also correlates with possible help abuse. These results have important implications for hint design and generation.
Carbapenem-Resistant, Gram-Negative Bacilli: The State of the Art

The evolution of antimicrobial resistance in bacteria is a complex and longstanding process that has gathered much attention by outpacing the discovery and development of new antibiotics. Among Gram-negative bacilli, resistance has been progressive and unremitting in Enterobacteriaceae, Pseudomonas aeruginosa , and Acinetobacter baumannii . In particular, the spread of carbapenem-resistant, Gram-negative bacilli during the last decade has escalated worldwide, resulting in severe infections, some of which respond to only a few therapeutic options. Often viewed as last-resort antibiotics, carbapenems are rendered inactive against bacteria via the production of carbapenem-hydrolyzing enzymes, utilization of impermeable cell wall porins, active expulsion of carbapenem molecules by efflux pumps, production of mutant penicillin-binding proteins, or a combination. This chapter describes the mechanisms and epidemiology of resistance to carbapenems in Gram-negative pathogens. It also sheds a light on laboratory detection of these pathogens and presents available control and therapeutic options for their containment.
Investigation of physiological differences between immersive virtual environment and indoor environment in a building

In the domain of building science and architectural design, the immersive virtual environment is being commonly adopted due to its convenience and cost-effectiveness, especially for research releva...
Conflict and Peace in Central Eurasia: Towards Explanations and Understanding, by Babak Rezvani

It is becoming increasingly clear that the Fukyamian world, the world which he imagined in his famous article almost 30 years ago, is falling apart, and the major tenets of the article should be re...
Influences of Processing and Fatigue Cycling on Residual Stresses in a NiCrY-Coated Powder Metallurgy Disk Superalloy

Oxidation and corrosion can attack superalloy disk surfaces exposed to increasing operating temperatures in some turbine engine environments. Any potential protective coatings must also be resistant to harmful fatigue cracking during service. The objective of this study was to investigate how residual stresses evolve in one such coating. Fatigue specimens of a powder metallurgy-processed disk superalloy were coated with a NiCrY coating, shot peened, and then subjected to fatigue in air at room and high temperatures. The effects of this processing and fatigue cycling on axial residual stresses and other aspects of the coating were assessed. While shot peening did induce beneficial compressive residual stresses in the coating and substrate, these stresses relaxed in the coating with subsequent heating. Several cast alloys having compositions near the coating were subjected to thermal expansion and tensile stress relaxation tests to help explain this response of residual stresses in the coating. For the coated fatigue specimens, this response contributed to earlier cracking of the coating than for the uncoated surface during long intervals of cycling at 760 °C. Yet, substantial compressive residual stresses still remained in the substrate adjacent to the coating, which were sufficient to suppress fatigue cracking there. The coating continued to protect the substrate from hot corrosion pitting, even after fatigue cracks initiated in the coating.
Abstract TP208: Sleep Disordered Breathing (SDB) - An Overlooked Modifiable Risk Factor in Acute Stroke Care

Introduction: In patients with acute stroke, part of the acute management entails identifying the risk factors; modifiable or non modifiable. Early recognition of these factors is essential for opt...
Effect of Surface Hydration on Antifouling Properties of Mixed Charged Polymers

Interfacial water structure on a polymer surface in water (or surface hydration) is related to the antifouling activity of the polymer. Zwitterionic polymer materials exhibit excellent antifouling activity due to their strong surface hydration. It was proposed to replace zwitterionic polymers using mixed charged polymers because it is much easier to prepare mixed charged polymer samples with much lower costs. In this study, using sum frequency generation (SFG) vibrational spectroscopy, we investigated interfacial water structures on mixed charged polymer surfaces in water and how such structures change while being exposed to salt solutions and protein solutions. The 1:1 mixed charged polymer exhibits excellent antifouling property whereas other mixed charged polymers with different ratios of the positive/negative charges do not. It was found that on the 1:1 mixed charged polymer surface, SFG water signal is dominated by the contribution of the strongly hydrogen bonded water molecules, indicating strong hydration of the polymer surface. The responses of the 1:1 mixed charged polymer surface to salt solutions are similar to those of zwitterionic polymers. Interestingly, exposure to high concentrations of salt solutions leads to stronger hydration of the 1:1 mixed charged polymer surface after replacing the salt solution with water. Protein molecules do not substantially perturb the interfacial water structure on the 1:1 mixed charged polymer surface and do not adsorb to the surface, showing that this mixed charged polymer is an excellent antifouling material.
Family Privacy and the Custody and Visitation Rights of Adult Outsiders

The subject of this symposium, custody law and practice, could not be more appropriate in light of Professor Robert J. Levy's grand con tributions to the field as both a scholar and a lawyer. I first met Bob Levy some thirty years ago when I attended a three-week teaching conference sponsored by the Association of American Law Students, at which Professor Levy was a faculty member. During the ensuing three decades or so, he has been a generous, kind, and nurturing mentor for me. If a law professor can have a guru, then Bob Levy is certainly mine. More importantly, his contributions to the field of matrimonial and family law are virtually incalculable. His 1976 casebook, Cases and Materials on Family Law, has influenced this field enormously, and I would venture to say that every casebook editor since that time owes Bob Levy a debt of gratitude. His many articles on a variety of topics have similarly influenced not only scholars but also decision makers in the field. Future family law teachers would do well to aspire to the standard that Bob Levy has set. To provide a context for the subject of this article, here is a brief passage by Professor Levy, a respected family law scholar, teacher, and practitioner who was the William J. Prosser Professor of Family Law at the University of Minnesota Law School:
Peptide-Mediated Targeting of Liposomes to Tumor Cells

One of the biggest obstacles for efficient drug delivery is specific cellular targeting. Liposomes have long been used for drug delivery, but do not possess targeting capabilities. This limitation may be circumvented by surface coating of colloidal delivery systems with peptides, proteins, carbohydrates, vitamins, or antibodies that target cell surface receptors or other biomolecules. Each of these coatings has significant drawbacks. One idealized system for drug delivery combines stabilized "protein module" ligands with a colloidal delivery vehicle. Prior studies have shown that peptide-amphiphiles, whereby both a peptide "head group" and a lipid-like "tail" are present in the same molecule, can be used to engineer collagen-like triple-helical or alpha-helical miniproteins. The tails serve to stabilize the head group structural elements. These peptide-amphiphiles can be designed to bind to specific cell surface receptors with high affinity. Structural stabilization of the integrated targeting ligand in the peptide-amphiphile system equates to prolonged in vivo stability through resistance to proteolytic degradation. Liposomes have been prepared incorporating a melanoma targeting peptide-amphiphile ligand, and shown to be stable with retention of peptide-amphiphile triple-helical structure. Encapsulated fluorescent dyes are selectively delivered to cells. In this chapter we describe the methods and techniques employed in the preparation and characterization of peptide-amphiphiles and peptide-amphiphile-targeted large and small unilamellar vesicles (LUVs and SUVs). Fluorescence microscopy is subsequently utilized to examine the targeting capabilities of peptide-amphiphile LUVs, which should allow for improved drug selectivity towards melanoma vs normal cells based on differences in the relative abundance of the targeted cell surface receptors.
Accidental Beings in Aristotle’s Ontology

Along with substances and their properties, Aristotle includes in his ontology such curious entities as the pale man, and seated Socrates,, entities he holds to be intermediate between and hence distinct from both the properties (pallor, being seated) and substances (man, Socrates) of which they are composed. These “accidental beings” or “kooky objects,” as they have been called, have been the cause of perplexity or even dismay in many of Aristotle’s readers. Following the lead of Gareth Matthews, among others, I investigate the role of accidental beings in Aristotle’s thought in hopes of making them seem a little less strange. I contend that these entities make their first appearance in Aristotle’s corpus not in the Physics, and Metaphysics, (where their presence has long been noted) but as the non-substantial particulars of the (presumably earlier) Categories,. I argue that this identification of accidental beings with non-substantial particulars helps to resolve a long-standing dispute about the nature of the particulars in the non-substance categories. Finally, I propose that the identity conditions of accidental beings suggest that they are best thought of as states or events—the particular states of (or particular events involving) particular substances. An accidental being thus owes its particularity to the particular substance with which it coincides, not to the (universal) property that is one of its constituents.
How do they do it? investigating dialogue moves within dialogue modes in expert human tutoring

Expert human tutors are widely considered to be the gold standard for increasing student learning. While not every student has access to an expert tutor, it is possible to model intelligent tutoring systems after expert tutors. In an effort to achieve this goal, we have analyzed a corpus of 50 hours of one-to-one expert human tutoring sessions. This corpus was coded for speech acts (dialogue moves) and larger pedagogical strategies (dialogue modes). Using mixed-effects modeling, we found that expert tutors differentially used dialogue moves depending on the dialogue mode. Specifically, tutor posed questions, explanations, and motivational statements were predictive of different dialogue modes (e.g., Lecture, Scaffolding).
PROMIS and FAAM Minimal Clinically Important Differences in Foot and Ankle Orthopedics.

Background:Establishing score points that reflect meaningful change from the patient perspective is important for interpreting patient-reported outcomes. This study estimated the minimum clinically...
Computational analysis of cerebrovascular structures imaged using two-photon microscopy

Neurodegenerative diseases including Alzheimer’s affect millions around the world, and this number is projected to increase over the years unless a breakthrough is made. There are several theories on the pathogenesis of neurodegenerative diseases, with the amyloid cascade and tau theory being the most prominent ones. The formation of amyloid plaques and tau tangles collapses capillaries in the brain, thereby inducing hypoxia and destruction of neurons from loss of nourishment. While we do understand some of the changes that occur in the brain’s vasculature form the pathogenesis of these diseases, they have not yet been mathematically characterized with precision. A computational pipeline is presented here to analyze optically sectioned mice brain sections imaged via two-photon microscopy and characterize various vasculature parameters which are known to deteriorate from neurogenerative diseases. Our proposed pipeline aims to quantify various brain vasculature parameters, such as, vessel tortuosity, diameter, volume and length, as well the degree of difference to understand disease pathogenesis with the eventual hope of providing drug intervention to regress or minimize these changes.
Mechanistic study of the superior anti-cancer properties of a first-in-class small molecule targeting PCNA.

e14636Background: Proliferating cell nuclear antigen (PCNA), through its interaction with various proteins involved in DNA synthesis, cell cycle regulation, and DNA repair, plays a central role in ...
Allostatic load in the association of depressive symptoms with incident coronary heart disease: The Jackson Heart Study.

Abstract African Americans are at heightened risk for coronary heart disease (CHD), with biologic pathways poorly understood. We examined the role of allostatic load (AL) in the association of depressive symptoms with incident CHD among 2,670 African American men and women in the prospective Jackson Heart Study. Depressive symptoms were quantified using the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES-D). Incident CHD was ascertained by self-report, death certificate survey, and adjudicated medical record surveillance. Baseline AL was quantified using biologic parameters of metabolic, cardiovascular, immune, and neuroendocrine subsystems and as a combined meta-factor. Sequential models adjusted for demographic, socioeconomic, and behavioral covariates, stratified to examine differences by sex. Greater depressive symptomatology was associated with greater metabolic, cardiovascular, and immune AL ( p -values 0.036) and AL meta-factor z-scores ( p = 0.007), with findings driven by observations among females. Each 1-point increase in baseline depressive symptomatology, and 1-SD increase in metabolic AL, neuroendocrine AL, and AL meta-factor z-scores was associated with 3.3%, 88%, 39%, and 130% increases in CHD risk, respectively ( p- values p = 0.044), a finding present among females ( p = 0.016) but not males ( p = 0.840). Among African American adults, we present novel findings of an association between depressive symptomatology and incident CHD, partially mediated by metabolic AL. These findings appear to be unique to females, an important consideration in the design of targeted interventions for CHD prevention.
Simulation of Electric Field Intensity of Overhead Lines at Corona Discharge

The article deals with the issues related to the study of the electric field influence of the overhead lines on the environment. It is shown that the constantly increasing use of the electric energy leads to the electromagnetic pollution of the environment. Due to the electromagnetic influence of energy objects on the environment it is necessary to limit their influence on the environment. From the whole complex of energy facilities, the overhead lines are chosen according to the degree of their impact on the environment, as having a considerable length. The data confirming the increase in the electric field strength during wet weather are presented. A computational model for determining the electric field strength in the event of a corona discharge in a wet weather is proposed. This model allows taking into account the influence of weather conditions on the electric field intensity.
Evaluation and treatment of swimming pool avoidance exhibited by an adolescent girl with autism

We evaluated and treated swimming pool avoidance that was exhibited by a 14-year-old girl diagnosed with autism. In part, treatment involved blocking for flopping (dropping to the ground) and elopement (running away from the pool) and access to food for movements toward a swimming pool. Treatment also involved reinforcement for exposure to various depths of water. Generalization of treatment outcome was demonstrated by showing sustained effects with her mother without food reinforcement and, subsequently, by replicating these effects with her mother in an untrained setting.
Duty, Surviving, Social Contact

Duty, Surviving, Social Contact, continues to depict the context in which Holmes developed his views and the emphasis on problem solving.
Centrally symmetric and balanced triangulations of S2×Sd−3 with few vertices

Abstract A small triangulation of the sphere product can be found in lower dimensions by computer search and is known in few other cases: Klee and Novik constructed a centrally symmetric triangulation of S i × S d − i − 1 with 2 d + 2 vertices for all d ≥ 3 and 1 ≤ i ≤ d − 2 ; they also proposed a balanced triangulation of S 1 × S d − 2 with 3 d or 3 d + 2 vertices. In this paper, we provide another centrally symmetric ( 2 d + 2 ) -vertex triangulation of S 2 × S d − 3 . We also construct the first balanced triangulation of S 2 × S d − 3 with 4 d vertices, using a sphere decomposition inspired by handle theory.
Chapter 3 – GRAPHIC TECHNIQUES

Publisher Summary This chapter presents graphic techniques such as diagrams, drawings, and pictographs, which can be used to present data quickly and effectively. Those graphic techniques can be used to summarize information, portray relationships, show changes over time, and present conclusions. The graphic techniques include charts, time series plots, maps, diagrams, and even cartoons. Analysts use various types of graphic methods to present data visually. The principal purpose of these methods is to summarize and simplify complex relationships. Graphic presentation methods should be selected for their simplicity, clarity, and usefulness for conveying the meaning of a set of data to the intended audience. Few of the graphic techniques discussed in the chapter include pie charts, bar charts, histograms, dot diagrams and time series diagrams. Pie charts illustrate proportions or shares of the whole. The categories of pie charts are computed as proportions of the 360o circle. Bar charts compare the differences among mutually exclusive categories of noncontinuous nominal or ordinal data. The heights of the bars depict the frequencies of the categories of the variable being studied.
Resolvability of the Multiple Access Channel with Two-Sided Cooperation

We study the randomness required at the inputs of a multiple access channel in order to produce a desired, approximately i.i.d., output distribution, subject to cooperation in one of the following forms: (i) a common message, (ii) conferencing, (iii) feedback and (iv) generalized feedback. For the cases (i)-(iii), we characterize the channel resolvability via matching inner and outer bounds, and for generalized feedback we provide two inner bounds representing the role of decoding and randomness extraction, which can also be combined. One of the main contributions of this work is to show that resolvability rates of the multiple access channel are not improved with feedback, unlike the multiple access channel capacity which is improved by feedback.
Gut Microbiota Dynamics in Parkinsonian Mice.

Peripheral immunity is thought to be dysregulated in Parkinson’s disease (PD) and may provide an avenue for novel immunotherapeutic interventions. Gut microbiota is a potential factor for modulatin...
Genetic background amplifies the effect of immunodeficiency in antibiotic efficacy against Borrelia burgdorferi.

Unrecognized immunodeficiency has been proposed as a possible cause of failure of antibiotics to resolve symptoms of Lyme disease. Here, we examined the efficacy of doxycycline in different immunodeficient mice to identify defects that impair antibiotic treatment outcomes. We found that doxycycline had significantly lower efficacy in the absence of adaptive immunity, specifically B cells. This effect was most pronounced in immunodeficient C3H mice compared with C57BL/6 mice, suggesting a role for genetic background beyond immunodeficiency. Addition of a single dose of ceftriaxone to doxycycline treatment effectively cleared infection in C3H mice with severe combined immunodeficiency.
Elucidating the Role of Microprocessor Protein DGCR8 in Bending RNA Structures

Abstract Although conformational dynamics of RNA molecules are potentially important in microRNA (miRNA) processing, the role of the protein binding partners in facilitating the requisite structural changes is not well understood. In previous work, we and others have demonstrated that nonduplex structural elements and the conformational flexibility they support are necessary for efficient RNA binding and cleavage by the proteins associated with the two major stages of miRNA processing. However, recent studies showed that the protein DGCR8 binds primary miRNA and duplex RNA with similar affinities. Here, we study RNA binding by a small recombinant construct of the DGCR8 protein and the RNA conformation changes that result. This construct, the DGCR8 core, contains two double-stranded RNA-binding domains (dsRBDs) and a C-terminal tail. To assess conformational changes resulting from binding, we applied small-angle x-ray scattering with contrast variation to detect conformational changes of primary-miR-16-1 in complex with the DGCR8 core. This method reports only on the RNA conformation within the complex and suggests that the protein bends the RNA upon binding. Supporting work using smFRET to study the conformation of RNA duplexes bound to the core also shows bending. Together, these studies elucidate the role of DGCR8 in interacting with RNA during the early stages of miRNA processing.
Fabrication and electromechanical characterization of freestanding asymmetric membranes.

Abstract All biological cell membranes maintain an electric transmembrane potential of around 100 mV, due in part to an asymmetric distribution of charged phospholipids across the membrane. This asymmetry is crucial to cell health and physiological processes such as intracell signaling, receptor-mediated endocytosis, and membrane protein function. Experimental artificial membrane systems incorporate essential cell membrane structures, such as the phospholipid bilayer, in a controllable manner in which specific properties and processes can be isolated and examined. Here, we describe an approach to fabricate and characterize planar, freestanding, asymmetric membranes and use it to examine the effect of headgroup charge on membrane stiffness. The approach relies on a thin film balance used to form a freestanding membrane by adsorbing aqueous phase lipid vesicles to an oil-water interface and subsequently thinning the oil to form a bilayer. We validate this lipid-in-aqueous approach by analyzing the thickness and compressibility of symmetric membranes with varying zwitterionic 1,2-dioleoyl-sn-glycero-3-phosphocholine (DOPC) and anionic 1,2-dioleoyl-sn-glycero-3-phospho-(1′-rac-glycerol) sodium salt (DOPG) content as compared with previous lipid-in-oil methods. We find that as the concentration of DOPG increases, membranes become thicker and stiffer. Asymmetric membranes are fabricated by controlling the lipid vesicle composition in the aqueous reservoirs on either side of the oil. Membrane compositional asymmetry is qualitatively demonstrated using a fluorescence quenching assay and quantitatively characterized through voltage-dependent capacitance measurements. Stable asymmetric membranes with DOPC on one side and DOPC-DOPG mixtures on the other were created with transmembrane potentials ranging from 15 to 80 mV. Introducing membrane charge asymmetry decreases both the thickness and stiffness in comparison with symmetric membranes with the same overall phospholipid composition. These initial successes demonstrate a viable pathway to quantitatively characterize asymmetric bilayers that can be extended to accommodate more complex membranes and membrane processes in the future.
Labeling Cost Sensitive Batch Active Learning For Brain Tumor Segmentation

Over the last decade, deep learning methods have achieved state-of-the-art for medical image segmentation tasks. However, the difficulty of obtaining sufficient labeled data can be a bottleneck. To this end, we design a novel active learning framework specially adapted to the brain tumor segmentation. Our approach includes a novel labeling cost designed to capture radiologists’ practical labeling costs. This is combined with two acquisition functions to incorporate uncertainty and representation information, ensuring that the active learning selects informative and diverse data. The resulting procedure is a constrained combinatorial optimization problem. We propose an efficient algorithm for this task and demonstrate the proposed method’s advantages for segmenting brain MRI data.
Simulation of Ultra-Wideband Radar Returns from a Notional Sea Surface

An effort to simulate Ultra-wideband (UWB) backscattering from a time-varying sinusoidal air-dielectric interface is described. The simulation generates time-dependent high-resolution radar echoes from a surface whose characteristics are represented by the gravitational component of a wind-driven sea. This surface scattering model employs an antenna-reciprocity relationship, which was initially used for terrain and later for sea surfaces, to compute the radar echoes. That relationship accounts for the combined effects of spatial/temporal coherence of the returns in relation to the antenna radiation characteristics of the illuminated portion of the surface. By employing a surface scattering approximation derived for small surface slopes in the antenna-reciprocity relationship, the simulated radar echoes are computed at X-band. Once a coherent-processing interval (CPI) of the data is produced, range-Doppler and range-time-intensity maps are generated from the simulated returns from the notional sea surface. The results obtained from this investigation may aid in the analysis of the effects of coherence of sea clutter as seen by a monostatic radar. The objective is to further develop the 3D UWB model to further investigate the high-resolution spatial-temporal behavior of sea clutter.
Elucidating posttraumatic stress symptom dimensions and health correlates among postpartum women.

Author(s): Thomas, Jordan L; Cleveland, Shiloh; Pietrzak, Robert H; Dunkel Schetter, Christine; Sumner, Jennifer A | Abstract: BackgroundPosttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is associated with interpersonal dysfunction and adverse maternal health during the perinatal period (extending from conception through one year postpartum). However, PTSD is a heterogeneous disorder, and little is known about which aspects of this disorder may be particularly deleterious to the health of new mothers. Such data may inform more personalized approaches to PTSD prevention and treatment among postpartum women.MethodsUsing confirmatory factor analysis, we compared three models of PTSD symptom structure-the four-factor dysphoria model, four-factor emotional numbing model, and five-factor dysphoric arousal model-in 1,663 postpartum women from the Community and Child Health Network (CCHN). We examined associations between PTSD symptom dimensions of the best-fitting model with four correlates relevant to maternal health and functioning-parenting stress, partner relationship stress, relationship satisfaction, and contraceptive use.ResultsThough all models fit well, the five-factor dysphoric arousal model provided optimal fit. Symptom dimensions from this model-re-experiencing, avoidance, numbing, dysphoric arousal, and anxious arousal-evidenced differential associations with the maternal health indicators. Numbing symptoms were most strongly associated with indicators of poor interpersonal functioning, whereas dysphoric arousal symptoms were most strongly related to low-efficacy contraceptive use.LimitationsOur cross-sectional study assessed DSM-IV PTSD symptoms.ConclusionsPTSD symptoms among postpartum women are best-represented by five factors. Numbing symptoms (e.g., restricted affect, detachment) are most strongly associated with interpersonal difficulties, whereas dysphoric arousal symptoms (e.g., agitation, irritability) are linked with low-efficacy contraceptive use. Screening for these symptoms may help promote the health of new mothers.