cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Integrated control of root rot and wilt disease of faba bean by soil amendment with suppressive compost in combination with seed coating with an antagonistic yeast

For this study, 21 isolates of fungi belonging to Rhizoctonia and Fusarium genera were isolated from the diseased faba bean plants, obtained from the different localities in Assiut governorate, showing root rot and wilt symptoms. The isolates proved to be pathogenic on Masr 1 faba bean cultivar under greenhouse conditions. F. oxysporum isolates caused wilt disease; however, the isolates of R. solani and other Fusarium species caused root rot. The virulence of isolates on the tested faba bean cultivar was different. The highly pathogenic isolates of these fungi were employed in this study. The effect of soil amendment with Planta Rich and Rich Composts (CMs) alone or in combination with seed coating by the antagonistic yeast Pichia guilliermondi before sowing on the severity of Rhizoctonia and Fusarium root rot and Fusarium wilt of faba bean was tested under greenhouse and field conditions. The tested isolates of yeast proved to be highly antagonistic to the pathogen in vitro. The test rates of CMs were eq...
Variability of Leaf Phosphorus among Sugarcane Genotypes Grown on Everglades Histosols

The P content of drainage water of the Everglades Agricultural Area (EAA) of Florida must be reduced by at least 25% from a baseline mean calculated using 1978 through 1988 data. This minimum P reduction is one of several measures to sustain much of the unique habitat of remaining natural regions of the Everglades. The objectives of this study were to evaluate variability in leaf tissue P concentration among elite sugarcane (interspecific hybrids of Saccharum spp.) clones and to recommend sampling strategies to detect differences among clones. Leaf samples were collected four times per annual crop in the plant-cane and first-ratoon crops from three fields, representing low, medium, and high available soil P. Leaf P of sugarcane should be tested at several locations in at least two crop years, and at least once, but preferably twice per crop. The clone with the most leaf P had 0.65 g P kg -1 leaf tissue more than the clone with the least. This difference among leaves allowed us to speculate that P removal may differ by about 8.5 kg ha ' among commercial cultivars and that genetic improvement of this trait could be feasible. If further studies show that differences in leaf P concentration can reliably predict differences in total P removal from a sugarcane field, then classification of cultivars for leaf P concentration could make available to EAA sugarcane farmers another best management practice (BMP) to reduce P content of their drainage waters.
Stripping chronocoulometry for the determination of pertechnetate

Abstract Stripping chronocoulometry is proposed as an alternative to linear-sweep anodic stripping voltammetry when the latter technique gives multiple stripping waves. Such complicated stripping waves are commonly observed at solid electrodes. The determination of pertechnetate (99Tc) demonstrates the advantages of stripping chronocoulometry at a wax-impregnated graphite electrode.
Integrating apache spark into PBS-Based HPC environments

This paper describes an effort at the University of Tennessee's National Institute for Computational Sciences (NICS) to integrate Apache Spark into the widely used TORQUE HPC batch environment. The similarities and differences between the execution of a Spark program and that of an MPI program on a cluster are used to motivate how to implement Spark/TORQUE integration. An implementation of this integration, pbs-spark-submit, is described, including demonstrations of functionality on two HPC clusters and a large shared-memory system.
A phase I and pharmacokinetic study of intravenous vinzolidine.

The semi-synthetic vinca alkaloid vinzolidine was administered to advanced cancer patients as an intravenous bolus on a three day schedule every 21 days. Forty-two patients were treated in this phase I trial. Five partial remissions (breast-1, melanoma-2, renal cancer-2) were seen in 30 evaluable patients. The dose limiting toxicities were myelosuppression and neuropathy. Erratic myelosuppression from course to course within the same patient as seen in previous trials with oral vinzolidine, was not observed with the intravenous formulation. The measured pharmacokinetic parameters conformed best to a 2-compartment model with a mean terminal half-life of 23 hours. The anti-tumor activity observed during this phase I trial and acceptable toxicity provide the basis for initiating phase II studies in selected forms of cancer.
Preparation and characterization of several II-IV-V2 chalcopyrite single crystals

Abstract Single crystals of ZnSiP2, ZnGeP2, ZnGeP1.8As0.2, and ZnGeP1.6As0.4 have been grown by several techniques and their electronic and optical properties were compared. For ZnSiP2 there are marked absorption bands at 10 and 11.5 μm, and at 13 μm for ZnGeP2. Upon substitution of 10 mole% of arsenic for phosphorus, the latter band does not shift to higher wavelengths. Further substitution of arsenic for phosphorus in ZnGeP2 showed a weak second band at 9.8 μm.
Magnetic Resonance Imaging Assessment of the Severity of Mitral Regurgitation Comparison With Invasive Techniques

Background In the patient with mitral regurgitation who is being considered for valvular surgery, cardiac catheterization is usually performed to quantify the severity of regurgitation and to determine its influence on left ventricular volumes and systolic function. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) potentially provides a rapid, noninvasive method of acquiring these data. Thus, this study was done to determine whether MRI can reliably measure the magnitude of mitral regurgitation and evaluate the effect of regurgitation on left ventricular volumes and systolic function. Methods and Results Twenty-three subjects (14 women and 9 men 15 to 72 years of age) with (n=17) or without (n=6) mitral regurgitation underwent MRI scanning followed immediately by cardiac catheterization. The presence (or absence) of valvular regurgitation was determined, and left ventricular volumes and regurgitant fraction were quantified during each procedure. There was excellent correlation between invasive and MRI assessments of left...
Association of glaucoma with cutis marmorata telangiectatica congenita: A localized anatomic malformation

pigmentation. Only two cases have been documented in the English-language literature. 2,3 The present case is not only rare, but also remarkable in several aspects. First, in previously reported cases only longitudinal pigmented bands were described,2, 3 and these have been regarded as the characteristic changes in hydroxyurea-induced melanonychia. 5 However, in addition to longitudinal bands, my patient had patterns of diffuse pigmentation. Furthermore, both fingernails and toenails were affected, in contrast to involvement of only the fingernails and sparing of toenails as reported previously.2, 3 Finally, despite the severity of melanonychia, there was no increase in pigmentation elsewhere. This finding differs from most chemotherapeutic agents in which nail pigmentation is often associated with a more generalized skin hyperpigmentation. Indeed, in one of the reported cases of longitudinal melanonychia from hydroxyurea, there was an associated increase in skin pigmentation. 3 The reason for increased pigmentation localized to the naris in this patient is unknown, but individual susceptibility had been proposed. 6 Of approximately 200 patients with myeloproliferative disorder treated with hydroxyurea in our clinic, this patient was the only one in whom melanonychia developed.
Application of glancing-emergent-angle fluorescence for polarized XAFS studies of single crystals.

X-ray absorption fine-structure (XAFS) data were obtained for the V K-edge for a series of anisotropic single crystals of (Cr{sub x}V{sub 1-x}){sub 2}O{sub 3}. The data and the results were compared for the as-prepared bulk single crystals (measured in fluorescence in two different orientations) and those ground to powder (measured in transmission). For the bulk single crystals, the glancing-emergent-angle (GEA) method was used to minimize fluorescence distortion. The reliability of the GEA technique was tested by comparing the polarization-weighted single-crystal XAFS data with the experimental powder data. These data were found to be in excellent agreement throughout the entire energy range. Thus, it was possible to reliably measure individual V-V contributions parallel and perpendicular to the c axis of the single crystals, i.e. those unavailable by powder data XAFS analysis. These experiments demonstrate that GEA is a premiere method for non-destructive high-photon-count in situ studies of local structure in bulk single crystals.
Spatiotemporal variations in growing season exchanges of CO2, H2O, and sensible heat in agricultural fields of the Southern Great Plains

Abstract Climate, vegetation cover, and management create finescale heterogeneity in unirrigated agricultural regions, with important but not well-quantified consequences for spatial and temporal variations in surface CO2, water, and heat fluxes. Eddy covariance fluxes were measured in seven agricultural fields—comprising winter wheat, pasture, and sorghum—in the U.S. Southern Great Plains (SGP) during the 2001–03 growing seasons. Land cover was the dominant source of variation in surface fluxes, with 50%–100% differences between fields planted in winter–spring versus fields planted in summer. Interannual variation was driven mainly by precipitation, which varied more than twofold between years. Peak aboveground biomass and growing season net ecosystem exchange (NEE) of CO2 increased in rough proportion to precipitation. Based on a partitioning of gross fluxes with a regression model, ecosystem respiration increased linearly with gross primary production, but with an offset that increased near the time of...
The Inhibition of Capacitative Calcium Entry Due to ATP Depletion but Not Due to Glucosamine Is Reversed by Staurosporine

Abstract The capacitative Ca2+ entry pathway in J774 macrophages is rapidly inhibited by the amino sugar glucosamine. This pathway is also inhibited by treatments such as 2-deoxy-d-glucose (2dGlc) or glucose deprivation that inhibit glycolysis and lead to significant decreases in cellular ATP and other trinucleotides. We sought to determine whether glucosamine’s effect on capacitative Ca2+ entry was also due to ATP depletion, as has been suggested recently for its link to insulin resistance. In contrast to brief treatments with 2dGlc, there was no significant decrease in ATP following exposure to glucosamine. In addition, the 2dGlc-mediated inhibition of capacitative Ca2+ influx was reversed by staurosporine, a microbial alkaloid that inhibits a broad range of protein kinases. Staurosporine was also able to reverse the inhibition of capacitative Ca2+ entry seen following other treatments that decreased cellular ATP levels, including cytochalasin B and iodoacetic acid. Other inhibitors of protein kinase C, including bisindolylmaleimide, K252a, H-7, and calphostin C, were unable to mimic this effect of staurosporine. However, the inhibition of capacitative Ca2+influx in the presence of glucosamine was not reversed by staurosporine. These data indicate that the inhibitory action on capacitative Ca2+ entry of glucosamine is distinct from that caused by ATP depletion.
Biopsy-Proven Acute Tubular Necrosis due to Vancomycin Toxicity

Vancomycin (VAN) has been associated with acute kidney injury (AKI) since it has been put into clinical use in the 1950's. Early reports of AKI were likely linked to the impurities of the VAN preparation. With the advent of the more purified forms of VAN, the incidence of AKI related to VAN were limited to acute interstitial nephritis (AIN) or as a potentiating agent to other nephrotoxins such as Aminoglycosides. VAN as the sole etiologic factor for nephrotoxic acute tubular necrosis (ATN) has not been described. Here, we report a case of biopsy-proven ATN resulting from VAN.
B-code dilation and structuring element decomposition for restricted convex shapes

A convex, filled polygonal shape in R x R can be uniquely represented in the discrete Zx Z domain by the set of all the lattice points lying in its interior and on its edges. We define a reslricled convex shape as the discrete four connected set of points representing any convex, filled polygon whose vertices lie on the lattice points and whose interior angles are multiples of 450 In this paper we introduce the Boundary Code (B-Code), and we express the morphological dilation operation on the restricted convex shapes with structuring elements that are also restricted convex shapes. The algorithm for this operation is of O( 1) complexity and hence is independent of the size of the object. Further, we show that the algorithmic for the n-fold dilation is of 0(1) complexity. We prove that there is an unique set of thirteen shapes {K1 ,K2, . . . , "13) such that any given restricted convex shape, K, is expressible as K = K' K . . . K3 where K, represents the ni-fold dilation of K. We also derive a finite step algorithm to find this decomposition.
Wave propagation and diffraction on a potential ridge

The drastic perturbation of high Rydberg levels in a magnetic field is interpreted as a prototype effect of wave propagation on a ridge with formation of standing waves and with diffraction from radial into angular excitation modes. Analogs of this phenomenon include two-electron excitations into continuum or high Rydberg levels and may well be quite numerous since ridges occur generally on molecular potential surfaces. The Wannier-Peterkop-Rau theory of two-electron detachment at threshold is shown to provide the essential mathematical model for the description of these phenomena in terms of a base set of two eigenmodes that mediate the diffraction process. The apparent limitation of the original theory to an infinitesimal range of coordinates straddling the ridge is lifted. The problem remains of utilizing the eigenmodes as mediators of the coupling among the complete sets of adiabatic modes that seem to afford an adequate description of phenomena away from the ridges, that is, in potential valleys.
Effects of Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation on the Control of Finger Force during Dexterous Manipulation in Healthy Older Adults

The contribution of poor finger force control to age-related decline in manual dexterity is above and beyond ubiquitous behavioral slowing. Altered control of the finger forces can impart unwanted torque on the object affecting its orientation, thus impairing manual performance. Anodal transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) over primary motor cortex (M1) has been shown to improve the performance speed on manual tasks in older adults. However, the effects of anodal tDCS over M1 on the finger force control during object manipulation in older adults remain to be fully explored. Here we determined the effects of anodal tDCS over M1 on the control of grip force in older adults while they manipulated an object with an uncertain mechanical property. Eight healthy older adults were instructed to grip and lift an object whose contact surfaces were unexpectedly made more or less slippery across trials using acetate and sandpaper surfaces, respectively. Subjects performed this task before and after receiving anodal or sham tDCS over M1 on two separate sessions using a cross-over design. We found that older adults used significantly lower grip force following anodal tDCS compared to sham tDCS. Friction measured at the finger-object interface remained invariant after anodal and sham tDCS. These findings suggest that anodal tDCS over M1 improved the control of grip force during object manipulation in healthy older adults. Although the cortical networks for representing objects and manipulative actions are complex, the reduction in grip force following anodal tDCS over M1 might be due to a cortical excitation yielding improved processing of object-specific sensory information and its integration with the motor commands for production of manipulative forces. Our findings indicate that tDCS has a potential to improve the control of finger force during dexterous manipulation in older adults.
Hepatotoxicity of High Oral Dose (-)-Epigallocatechin-3-Gallate in Mice

The tea polyphenol (-)-epigallocatechin-3-gallate (EGCG) has been studied for chronic disease preventive effects, and is marketed as part of many dietary supplements. However, case-reports have associated the use of green tea-based supplements with liver toxicity. We studied the hepatotoxic effects of high dose EGCG in male CF-1 mice. A single dose of EGCG (1500 mg/kg, i.g.) increased plasma alanine aminotransferase (ALT) by 138-fold and reduced survival by 85%. Once-daily dosing with EGCG increased hepatotoxic response. Plasma ALT levels were increased 184-fold following two once-daily doses of 750 mg/kg, i.g. EGCG. Moderate to severe hepatic necrosis was observed following treatment with EGCG. EGCG hepatotoxicity was associated with oxidative stress including increased hepatic lipid peroxidation (5-fold increase), plasma 8-isoprostane (9.5-fold increase) and increased hepatic metallothionein and gamma-histone 2AX protein expression. EGCG also increased plasma interleukin-6 and monocyte chemoattractant protein-1. Our results indicate that higher bolus doses of EGCG are hepatotoxic to mice. Further studies on the dose-dependent hepatotoxic effects of EGCG and the underlying mechanisms are important given the increasing use of green tea dietary supplements, which may deliver much higher plasma and tissue concentrations of EGCG than tea beverages.
Regulation of the Unfolded Protein Response by eIF2Bδ Isoforms

Cells respond to a variety of stresses, including unfolded proteins in the endoplasmic reticulum (ER), by phosphorylating a subunit of translation initiation factor eIF2, eIF2α. eIF2α phosphorylation inactivates the eIF2B complex. The inactivation of eIF2B not only suppresses the initiation of protein translation but paradoxically up-regulates the translation and expression of transcription factor ATF-4. Both of these processes are important for the cellular response to ER stress, also termed the unfolded protein response. Here we demonstrate that cellular response resulting from eIF2α phosphorylation is attenuated in several cancer cell lines. The deficiency of the unfolded protein response in these cells correlates with the expression of a specific isoform of a regulatory eIF2B subunit, eIF2Bδ variant 1 (V1). Replacement of total eIF2Bδ with V1 renders cells insensitive to eIF2α phosphorylation; specifically, they neither up-regulate ATF-4 and ATF-4 targets nor suppress protein translation. Expression of variant 2 eIF2Bδ in ER stress response-deficient cells restores the stress response. Our data suggest that V1 does not interact with the eIF2 complex, a requisite for eIF2B inhibition by eIF2α phosphorylation. Together, these data delineate a novel physiological mechanism to regulate the ER stress response with a large potential impact on a variety of diseases that result in ER stress.
HPLC‐Based Chemotaxonomy of Florida Bay Phytoplankton: Difficulties in Coastal Environments

Abstract This report covers high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) derived pigment based chemotaxonomy for phytoplankton studies in a turbid coastal environment. Sediment resuspension brings detritus with pheopigments and other chlorophyll (CHL) breakdown products into the water column and hampers data interpretation. Two hundred sixty six water samples from Florida Bay were analyzed from monthly collections (Sept. 2000–Aug. 2002). Comparing biomarker estimated CHLa to measured CHLa, we found a mean of 105.4% (Std. Dev.=24.7; R2=0.9547) and when data was restricted to those samples with <10% pheopigments, estimations improved to 102±16%. It is concluded that all HPLC studies on phytoplankton communities must report the percentage pheopigments.
A target detection scheme for VHF SAR ground surveillance

Detection of targets concealed in foliage is a challenging problem and is critical for ground surveillance. To detect foliage-concealed targets, we need to address two major challenges, namely, 1) how to remotely acquire information that contains important features of foliage-concealed targets, and 2) how to distinguish targets from background and clutter. Synthetic aperture radar operated in low VHF-band has shown very good penetration capability in the forest environment, and hence the first problem can be satisfactorily addressed. The second problem is the focus of this paper. Existing detection schemes can achieve good detection performance but at the cost of high false alarm rate. To address the limitation of the existing schemes, in this paper, we develop a target detection algorithm based on a supervised learning technique that maximizes the margin between two classes, i.e., the target class and the non-target class. Specifically, our target detection algorithm consists of 1) image differencing, 2) maximum-margin classifier, and 3) diversity combining. The image differencing is to enhance and highlight the targets so that the targets are more distinguishable from the background. The maximum-margin classifier is based on a recently developed feature weighting technique called I-RELIEF; the objective of the maximum-margin classifier is to achieve robustness against uncertainties and clutter. The diversity combining utilizes multiple images to further improve the performance of detection, and hence it is a type of multi-pass change detection. We evaluate the performance of our proposed detection algorithm, using the SAR image data collected by Swedish CARABAS-II systems which operates at low VHF-band around 20-90 MHz. The experimental results demonstrate superior performance of our algorithm, compared to the benchmark algorithm associated with the CARABAS-II SAR image data. For example, for the same level of target detection probability, our algorithm only produces 11 false alarms while the benchmark algorithm produces 86 false alarms.
Buried wire gage for wall shear stress measurements

A buried wire gage for measuring wall shear stress in fluid flow was studied and further developed. Several methods of making this relatively new type of gage were examined to arrive at a successful technique that is well-suited for wind-tunnel testing. A series of measurements was made to demonstrate the adequacy of a two-point calibration procedure for these gages. The buried wire gage is also demonstrated to be ideally suited for quantitative measurement of wall shear stress in wind-tunnel testing.
A Deterministic Lagrangian-Based Global Optimization Approach for Large Scale Decomposable Problems

We propose a deterministic approach for global optimization of large-scale nonconvex quasiseparable problems encountered frequently in engineering systems design, such as multidisciplinary design optimization and product family optimization applications. Our branch and bound-based approach applies Lagrangian decomposition to 1) generate tight lower bounds by exploiting the structure of the problem and 2) enable parallel computing of subsystems and the use of efficient dual methods for computing lower bounds. We apply the approach to the product family optimization problem and in particular to a family of universal electric motors with a fixed platform configuration taken from the literature. Results show that the Lagrangian bounds are much tighter than convex underestimating bounds used in commercial software, and the proposed lower bounding scheme shows encouraging efficiency and scalability, enabling solution of large, highly nonlinear problems that cause difficulty for existing solvers. The deterministic approach also provides lower bounds on the global optimum, eliminating uncertainty of solution quality produced by popular applications of stochastic and local solvers. For instance, our results demonstrate that prior product family optimization results reported in the literature obtained via stochastic and local approaches are suboptimal, and application of our global approach improves solution quality by about 10%. The proposed method provides a promising scalable approach for global optimization of large-scale systems-design problems.Copyright © 2008 by ASME
John Marshall Harlan: The Last Whig Justice

Harlan. Known today to every student of constitutional law, principally for his dissenting opinions in early racial discrimination cases, Harlan was an important actor in every major public issue that came before the Supreme Court during his thirty-three-year tenure.Named by a hopeful father for Chief Justice John Marshall, Harlan began his career as a member of the Kentucky Whig slavocracy. Loren Beth traces the young lawyer's development from these early years through the secession crisis and Civil War, when Harlan remained loyal to the Union, both as a politician and as a soldier. As Beth demonstrates, Harlan gradually shifted during these years to an antislavery Republicanism that still emphasized his adherence to the Whig principles of Unionism and national power as against states' rights.Harlan's Supreme Court career (1877-1911) was characterized by his fundamental disagreement with nearly every judicial colleague of his day. His ultimate stance -- as the Great Dissenter, the champion of civil rights, the upholder of the powers of Congress -- emerges as the logical outgrowth of his pre-Court life. Harlan's significance for today's reader is underlined by the Supreme Court's adoption, beginning in the 1930s, of most of his positions on the Fourteenth Amendment and the Commerce Clause of the Constitution.This fine biography is also an important contribution to constitutional history. Historians, political scientists, and legal scholars will come from its pages with renewed appreciation for one of our judicial giants.
A Phenomenological Case Study of the Experiences of African American High School Students

In a progression of scholarly research on the achievement gap, the results remain the same. The data show that there is a statistically significant difference in the achievement of African American and Hispanic students compared with their Caucasian and Asian academic counterparts. The purpose of this phenomenological study was to describe the implications of the gap in achievement for young urban adults. The participants were five African American students who had dropped out of traditional school. These students described their academic decline through interviews and focus group sessions at two alternative educational sites. The data were collected and the results indicated that the students felt disconnected from their teachers and the process of education. As a result of this disconnection, they became adrift in the educational system and were eventually swallowed by the undertow.
A Review of “Vanishing Voices: The Extinction of the World's Languages”

The extinction of languages is part of the larger picture of worldwide near total ecosystem collapse. (Nettle and Romaine, 2000: viiii) Referencing the French existentialist philosopher Gabriel Mar...
Cost Analysis of Mobility Management Entities of SINEMO

Seamless IP-diversity based NEtwork MObility (SINEMO) was proposed to address a number of drawbacks of the Network Mobility (NEMO) protocol for mobility management of a number of hosts moving together in a Local Area Network. Increasing number of mobile hosts results in higher level of signalling cost on the mobility agents in a mobility protocol. Previous works on cost analysis of mobility protocols have considered the cost on some of the mobility agents, but did not consider all possible costs for mobility management, resulting in incomplete cost estimation. In this paper, we have developed analytical models to estimate costs of mobility management as functions of network size, mobility rate, traffic rate and data volume for all the entities of SINEMO. Numerical results, comparing the cost between mobility entities of SINEMO and NEMO, reveal that SINEMO has higher efficiency and lower cost than NEMO. Our comprehensive cost model can be used as a framework for estimating total cost of key mobility management entities of different handover protocols, and can aid in decision making to choose the most efficient protocol for future all-IP mobile and wireless networks.
Protecting nursing home residents during emergencies or disasters: an exploratory study from South Carolina.

PURPOSE: This is an exploratory study of nursing home preparedness in South Carolina intended to: (1) examine nursing home administrators' perceptions of disaster preparedness in their facility in the absence of an immediate emergency or disaster, and changes in their views about preparedness following a large disaster; (2) study whether administrators' knowledge of shortcomings in preparedness leads them to change their views about planning; and (3) suggest ways to enhance preparedness. METHODS: A descriptive survey based on interviews with public officials responsible for nursing home safety was developed and mailed to all 192 licensed nursing homes in South Carolina in July 2005, and an extensive literature review was performed. As responses to the baseline survey were received, Hurricane Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast. Two weeks after Katrina, a brief, post-Katrina survey was mailed, asking administrators if Katrina had influenced their preparedness plans. Quantitative responses were analyzed using descriptive statistics. Three researchers coded the qualitative data and conducted a thematic analysis. RESULTS: One hundred twelve baseline surveys and 50 post-Katrina surveys were completed (response rates 58.3% and 26%, respectively). A large number of respondents reported a high level of satisfaction with the overall ability of their facilities to protect residents during an emergency or disaster. However, many were less satisfied with their preparedness in specific, important areas, including: (1) providing shelter to evacuees from other nursing homes; (2) transportation; and (3) staffing. In the post-Katrina survey, 54% of respondents were re-evaluating their disaster plans; only 36% felt well-prepared. Those re-evaluating their plans specifically mentioned evacuation, transportation, supplies, staffing, and communication. CONCLUSIONS: Transportation, communication, supplies, staffing, and the ability to provide shelter to evacuees are important domains to consider when evaluating nursing home preparedness. Administrators believe their nursing homes need to improve in all of these areas. Recommendations include developing improved transportation arrangements, redundant communication systems, and stronger linkages with local emergency preparedness systems. Language: en
Currency Derivatives and Exchange Rate Forecastability

By incorporating new information generated by currency derivatives trading, underlying exchange rates should be less forecastable than previously and the underlying currency markets should, therefore, be more efficient. This hypothesis was tested, for the first time, for the period 1982 through 1997 on a clean sample of three major types of currency derivatives launched in two prominent markets. Various statistical tests indicate that following the introduction of the derivative contracts, the underlying exchange rates became more random and the currencies involved tended thus to be priced more efficiently, which supports the hypothesis.
The Energy Box: Locally Automated Optimal Control of Residential Electricity Usage

The Energy Box is proposed as a 24/7 background processor operating on a local computer or in a remote location, silently managing one's home or small business electrical energy usage hour-by-hour and even minute-by-minute. It operates best in an environment of demand-sensitive real-time pricing, now made feasible via ‘smart grid’ technology. We assume that, in time, virtually every electrical device in a home or small business will be controllable from the Energy Box. There are multiple motivations for an Energy Box: (1) By delaying or pushing forward various uses of electricity (e.g., space conditioning), widespread use of the Energy Box could ‘shave the peaks and fill in the valleys of demand,’ thereby reducing the need for capacity expansion in electrical power generation and distribution; (2) The system should result in reduced electrical energy costs to the consumer; (3) The system supports local generation, storage and sale of electricity back to the grid; (4) The system supports graceful reduction...
Black holes, information and decoherence

We investigate the experimental capabilities required to test whether black holes destroy information. We show that an experiment capable of illuminating the information puzzle must necessarily be able to detect or manipulate macroscopic superpositions (i.e., Everett branches). Hence, it could also address the fundamental question of decoherence versus wave function collapse.
Medical Management of High-Grade Astrocytoma: Current and Emerging Therapies

High-grade astrocytomas are aggressive and incurable primary brain tumors. Radiation therapy with concurrent and adjuvant temozolomide chemotherapy is the standard-of-care treatment for newly diagnosed glioblastoma, while the role of chemotherapy in the initial treatment of anaplastic astrocytoma is evolving. Currently available medical options at tumor progression include further cytotoxic therapy and the vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) inhibitor bevacizumab. Investigational treatments including numerous molecularly targeted agents and immunotherapeutic approaches are currently being evaluated. Significant future progress will require better understanding and exploitation of the molecular heterogeneity within high-grade astrocytoma, as well as innovative trial designs to evaluate efficiently targeted therapies in the subsets of patients in which they are most likely to be effective.
Normative evidence accumulation in unpredictable environments

In our dynamic world, decisions about noisy stimuli can require temporal accumulation of evidence to identify steady signals, differentiation to detect unpredictable changes in those signals, or both. Normative models can account for learning in these environments but have not yet been applied to faster decision processes. We present a novel, normative formulation of adaptive learning models that forms decisions by acting as a leaky accumulator with non-absorbing bounds. These dynamics, derived for both discrete and continuous cases, depend on the expected rate of change of the statistics of the evidence and balance signal identification and change detection. We found that, for two different tasks, human subjects learned these expectations, albeit imperfectly, then used them to make decisions in accordance with the normative model. The results represent a unified, empirically supported account of decision-making in unpredictable environments that provides new insights into the expectation-driven dynamics of the underlying neural signals.
Attributions After a Group Failure Do They Matter? Effects of Attributions on Group Communication and Performance

Attributions have been studied extensively in groups, yet little is known about the effects attributions have on group communication and performance. This study examines how attributions for a group failure affect socioemotional communication, procedural changes, effort, and performance on the next task. Three-member computer-mediated groups worked on two decision-making tasks. All groups received bogus failure feedback for the first task and, dependent on the attributional condition, members were led to attribute the failure either to self, other members, the group as a whole, or situational constraints. The results demonstrate that the way group members explain previous performance influences subsequent group processes and performance. Specifically, attribution to situational constraints prompted groups to discuss and change communication procedures. Attributing failure to the self or group yielded the highest effort. Attributions to others increased the ratio of negative to positive socioemotional communication and decreased performance quality.
Diffusion of Oxygen in Fused Silica

Oxygen diffusion in fused silica was measured over the range 850° to 1250°C by means of heterogeneous isotope exchange. In this temperature range and at 1 atm oxygen pressure the diffusion coefficients can be represented by the relation: D= 2 × 10−9 exp (-29 kcal/RT). The oxygen diffusion coefficients are almost directly proportional to the oxygen pressure which suggests that the oxygen is diffusing in a molecular form.
A new simple model for land mobile satellite channels: first- and second-order statistics

We propose a new shadowed Rice (1948) model for land mobile satellite channels. In this model, the amplitude of the line-of-sight is characterized by the Nakagami distribution. The major advantage of the model is that it leads to closed-form and mathematically-tractable expressions for the fundamental channel statistics such as the envelope probability density function, moment generating function of the instantaneous power, and the level crossing rate. The model is very convenient for analytical and numerical performance prediction of complicated narrowband and wideband land mobile satellite systems, with different types of uncoded/coded modulations, with or without diversity. Comparison of the first- and the second-order statistics of the proposed model with different sets of published channel data demonstrates the flexibility of the new model in characterizing a variety of channel conditions and propagation mechanisms over satellite links. Interestingly, the proposed model provides a similar fit to the experimental data as the well-accepted Loo's (1985) model but with significantly less computational burden.
Systematic Review: Smoking Cessation Intervention Strategies for Adults and Adults in Special Populations

Although self-help strategies alone marginally affect quit rates, individual and combined pharmacotherapies and counseling either alone or in combination can significantly increase cessation. Using...
Developmental and genetic regulation of human surfactant protein B in vivo.

Background: Genetic and developmental disruption of surfactant protein B (SP-B) expression causes neonatal respiratory distress syndrome (RDS). Objectives: To ass
The effect of poor sleep quality on mood outcome differs between men and women: A longitudinal study of bipolar disorder

Background Sleep disturbance is bi-directionally related to mood de-stabilization in bipolar disorder (BD), and sleep quality differs in men and women. We aimed to determine whether perception of poor sleep quality would have a different effect on mood outcome in men versus women.
Effects of a Rape Experience: A Longitudinal Study

After reviewing previous work on psychological effects of a rape experience, this paper reports the results of a longitudinal investigation of victim reactions to rape. Adult victims (N = 20) were assessed at 1 month, 6 months, and 1 year postrape, and a group of matched non-victims (N = 20) were assessed at similar intervals. Findings were that victims were significantly more anxious, fearful, suspicious, and confused than nonvictims for at least a year after their assaults. However, there was significant improvement on those as well as other measures of personality and mood state over time, particularly between 1 and 6 months. Implications of these findings with regard to both social learning and feminist theory and therapy are discussed.
Complications of inappropriate use of spironolactone in heart failure: when an old medicine spirals out of new guidelines.

OBJECTIVES This study was designed to investigate the appropriateness and complications of the use of spironolactone for heart failure (HF) in clinical practice. BACKGROUND Spironolactone was reported by one prospective randomized trial to decrease morbidity and mortality in patients with New York Heart Association (NYHA) class III and IV HF. With this report (Randomized Spironolactone Evaluation Study [RALES] trial), we noted a marked increase in widespread use of spironolactone in patients with HF. Long-term outcome data with respect to safety and utilization of this medication in HF are not available. METHODS To investigate the use of spironolactone for HF in a clinical setting, we analyzed the application of the RALES trial protocol to the care of 104 patients, whom we identified as being started on spironolactone for HF after prerelease of the RALES trial. RESULTS We found broader use, less intensive follow-up, and increased complications with spironolactone treatment compared with the RALES trial. Cardiologists provided more appropriate care than did primary care providers. CONCLUSIONS These data suggest that spironolactone is being used widely in HF without consideration of the NYHA class and ejection fraction, and without optimization of background treatment with angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors and beta-blockers. Clinical follow-up does not adhere to the RALES trial guidelines, resulting in higher complications. We conclude that long-term studies with further safety and efficacy data are needed.
The Role of Social Support vs. Modeling on Adolescents' Diet and Physical Activity: Findings from a School-based Weight Management Trial.

Objective: Social influences play an important role in shaping adolescents’ dietary and physical activity behaviors. We examined the role of perceived modeling and perceived social support from family and friends on diet and physical activity behaviors among overweight and obese adolescents participating in a weight management trial. Methods: Six high schools were randomized to a school-nurse delivered behavioral weight management intervention or an information attention-control. Data on perceived support and modeling of healthy eating and physical activity from family and friends and dietary and physical activity behaviors were obtained from participants (N=82) at baseline and 2- and 6-months follow-up. Results: Linear mixed models were used to examine associations between social factors at baseline and diet and physical behaviors at 6 months. Friend support was correlated with increased fruit and vegetable consumption (0.4 servings/day) and decreased added sugar intake (-14.2 grams/day) (p’s<0.05). Family support for physical activity, friend support for physical activity, and family modeling of physical activity were associated with increased number of days/week active for ≥ 60 minutes/day (0.7 days/week; 0.6 days/week; and 0.4 days/week, respectively, p’s<0.05). Conclusions: Among overweight and obese high school adolescents, support from family and friends was associated with a greater number of improvements in diet and physical activity at follow-up than modeling. Strategies to solicit support may maximize efficacy of adolescent obesity intervention efforts.
Foundations of Probability Theory and Statistical Mechanics

Scientific theories are invented and cared for by people ; and so have the properties of any other human institution — vigorous growth when all the factors are right; stagnation, decadence, and even retrograde progress when they are not. And the factors that determine which it will be are seldom the ones (such as the state of experimental or mathematical techniques) that one might at first expect. Among factors that have seemed, historically, to be more important are practical considerations, accidents of birth or personality of individual people; and above all, the general philosophical climate in which the scientist lives, which determines whether efforts in a certain direction will be approved or deprecated by the scientific community as a whole.
The Effect of Health Reform on Public and Private Insurance in the Long Run

We use established methods and recent data to estimate the effects of changes in premium taxes and Medicaid eligibility on the likelihood of being covered by public or private insurance. We find Medicaid expansion for working adults will crowd-out private insurance at a high rate and that premium taxes will make private coverage less attractive and public coverage more attractive to lower-income workers. We illustrate the implications of these findings by simulating the consequences of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010. As the high-premium excise tax affects increasing numbers of workers between 2018 and 2030, we predict that some will shift from private to public coverage, amplifying the effect of Medicaid expansion. The proportion of workers and their families covered by public insurance will grow from 6% in 2006 to about 14% in 2030 while about 5% will obtain subsidized coverage through exchanges. The fraction covered by private insurance will grow initially in response to the mandate and then decline in response to the tax.
Using Local Principal Components to Explore Relationships Between Heterogeneous Omics Datasets

In the post-genomic era, high-throughput technologies lead to the generation of large amounts of ‘omics’ data such as transcriptomics, metabolomics, proteomics or metabolomics, that are measured on the same set of samples. The development of methods that are capable to perform joint analysis of multiple datasets from different technology platforms to unravel the relationships between different biological functional levels becomes crucial. A common way to analyze the relationships between a pair of data sources based on their correlation is canonical correlation analysis (CCA). CCA seeks for linear combinations of all the variables from each dataset which maximize the correlation between them. However, in high dimensional datasets, where the number of variables exceeds the number of experimental units, CCA may not lead to meaningful information. Moreover, when collinearity exists in one or both the datasets, CCA may not be applicable. Here, we present a novel method, (LPC-KR), to extract common features from a pair of data sources using Local Principal Components and Kendall’s Ranking. The results show that the proposed algorithm outperforms CCA in many scenarios and is more robust to noisy data. Moreover, meaningful results are obtained using the proposed algorithm when the number of variables exceeds the number of experimental units.
Histological Analysis of Cottontail Rabbit Papilloma Virus-Induced Papillomas Treated with Hematoporphyrin Photodynamic Therapy

Our findings of papilloma regression following treatment with HPD-PDT have been reported recently (Shikowitz et.al., 1986). HPD has been shown to localize selectively in rapidly growing tissue such as malignancies and papillomas. Henderson et.al. (1980) demonstrated the ability of HPD to localize in both squamous cell carcinomas and chemically induced papillomas raised on the shaved backs of Swiss white mice by painting with 9,10-dimethyl-1,2-benzanthracene and croton oil. This prompted our initial investigation into the possible efficacy of HPD-PDT for the treatment of virally induced papilloma disease, utilizing CRPV as a model system. We successfully treated large cutaneous rabbit papillomas with intravenous administration of HPD followed by activation with light at 630 nm from an Argon pump dye laser. Two animals were maintained for 18 months following treatment. The animals were sacrificed and biopsies were taken from totally regressed papillomas, partially regressed papillomas, untreated papillomas and normal skin. The histological analysis with molecular analysis confirmation form the basis of this report.
The effects of environmental chemicals on renal function

The identification of modifiable risk factors that are associated with declining renal function is required to stem the increasing incidence of chronic kidney disease worldwide. In this Review, Howard Trachtman and colleagues discuss the impact of environmental chemicals on cardiorenal function. They highlight the ubiquity of exposure to environmental chemicals in the general public, the main sources of contamination, and the predominant adverse effects that might affect renal function.