cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Steroid hormone formation in the human ovary. VII. Stability of the profile of radioactive steroids formed from acetate-1-14C by the corpus luteum in vitro.

Abstract Slices of human corpora lutea of pregnancy and of the cycle have been incubated in the presence of radioactive acetate, without added cofactors, under a variety of conditions. The distinct distribution of 14 C among the steroids, 3β-hydroxy-Δ 5 -pregnen-20-one, progesterone, 17-hydroxyprogesterone, Δ 4 -3, 17-androstenedione, estradiol-17β and estrone, previously described ( Hammerstein et al., Endocr. 24:597, 1964 ), is not substantially changed in further specimens nor by incubation in the presence of added gonadotropin (placental or pituitary), 3′,5′-AMP, nor by the duration of the incubation. The stability of this distribution of 14 C is interpreted as reflecting the transformation of 14 C-labelled cholesterol formed in vitro from acetate- 14 C. It is discussed in terms of the subcellular structures associated with steroidogenesis and the likelihood of their preservation under the in vitro conditions described.
Almost a century of central bank cooperation

The Bank for International Settlements (BIS) was created in 1930 primarily to administer the Young Plan, including reparations loan repayments from Germany. But the first objective of the BIS, as defined in its Statutes, is to “promote the cooperation of central banks” – to provide a meeting place for central bankers to exchange information, discuss common problems, agree on shared aims, set common standards, and possibly even provide mutual support. This objective must be viewed against the background of the 1920s, when there had been episodic, typically bilateral cooperation among central banks. Indeed, episodes of such cooperation can be found in the pre-1914 period, for example, a gold loan by the Bank of France to the Bank of England during the Baring crisis of 1890, or the discounting of English bills by the Bank of France in 1906, 1907, 1909, and 1910, thereby relieving pressure on the gold reserves of the Bank of England (Bloomfield 1959: 56). Examples can be found from even earlier, including the Latin and Scandinavian currency unions (Schloss 1958: 7–24). With the post-1918 breakup of the Austrian, Ottoman, and Russian empires, many new countries were created that needed central banks and economic stabilization. The League of Nations had a program to assist the new states in setting up their financial systems and stabilizing their economies.
On the inefficiency of inequality

A number of studies have examined the implications of preference interdependence. This paper models individual utility as depending either on the level of other people's consumption or on the difference in consumption levels. It assumes that the impact of an increase in other people's consumption on individual utility diminishes with the level of consumption, raising individual utility when that consumption is very small and lowering it when that consumption is very large. Based on that plausible assumption, the paper shows that, whether individual utility depends on the level of other people's consumption or on the difference in consumption levels, i) welfare declines with inequality, ii) equilibrium inequality is inefficient, and iii) the optimal intervention leads to a more equal distribution. Implications for the role of development institutions are examined.
Extragalactic Abundances of Hydrogen, Deuterium and Helium New Steps, Missteps and Next Steps

Estimates of the deuterium abundance in quasar absorbers are reviewed, including a brief account of incorrect claims published by the author and a brief review of the problem of hydrogen contamination. It is concluded that the primordial abundance may be universal with a value (D/H)P ≈ 10-4, within about a factor of two, corresponding to ΩBh 0.7 2 ≈ 0.0fs2 or η10 ≈ 2.7 in the Standard Big Bang. This agrees with current limits on primordial helium, YP ≤ 0.243, which are shown to be surprisingly insensitive to models of stellar enrichment. It also agrees with a tabulated sum of the total density of baryons in observed components. Much lower primordial deuterium (≈ 2 × 10-5) is also possible but disagrees with currently estimated helium abundances; the larger baryon density in this case fits better with current models of the Lyman-α forest but requires the bulk of the baryons to be in some currently uncounted form.
The community of rights

The main thesis of this essay is that human rights, correctly understood, entail a certain communitarian conception of human relationships, one that is characterized by mutuality of consideration and social solidarity. Because such a human grouping is based on human rights, it can appropriately be called a “community of rights”.
Gender equality and economic development : the role for information and communication technologies

The author focuses on the role that information and communication technologies (ICTs) can play in improving gender equality, so as to enhance long-term economic growth. Employing OLS and IV panel regressions with country fixed-effects, he shows that increases in the level of ICT infrastructure tend to improve gender equality in education and employment. In addition, the author shows that education among the general population is important for improving gender equality. The results provide evidence indicating that gender equality in education is an important contributor to gender equality in employment. Lastly, the results show that economic development tends to lead to some improvements in gender equality in the labor market. Hence, the use of ICTs to improve gender equality in education and employment may initiate a continuous cycle of positive reinforcing feedback effects between gender equality in employment and economic development, leading to further improvements in both.
Intergenerational transfers in Philippine rice villages. Gender differences in traditional inheritance customs.

Abstract This paper examines education, land, and nonland asset transfers from parents to children in five rice villages in the Philippines. A model with family fixed effects explains transfers better than either individual heterogeneity or observed parent and child characteristics without family fixed effects. Families facing different land constraints exhibit significantly different patterns of educational investment in children. In a subsample with completed inheritance, daughters receive less education, land, and total inheritance, but are compensated with nonland assets. Parents also exhibit preferential behavior towards children of the same gender: daughters of better educated mothers receive more land, nonland assets and total inheritance; better educated fathers give land preferentially to sons, but favor daughters in education.
Uavsar: Airborne L-Band Radar for Repeat Pass Interferometry

The Costa Rican National Center for Advanced Technology (CeNAT) is sponsoring NASA's G-III(C-20) UAVSAR science deployment to San Jose, Costa Rica April 25-28, 2011. NASA is very thankful for their support and has offered to provide a Top-Level presentation on the G-III UAVSAR program with specific emphasis on the science conducted in Costa Rica. The presentation will overview the G-III capabilities and the various science applications of UAVSAR. Only technical and scientific data that is already in the open literature will be presented.
Turning a Short-Term Fling into a Long-Term Commitment: Board Duties in a New Era

Corporate boards face significant pressure to make decisions that maximize profits in the short run. That pressure comes in part from executives who are financially rewarded for short-term profits despite the long-term risks associated with those profit-making activities. The current financial crisis, where executives at AIG and numerous other institutions ignored the long-term risks associated with their mortgage-backed securities investments, arose largely because those executives were compensated for the short-term profits generated by those investments despite their longer-term risks. Pressure on boards for short-term profits also comes from activist investors who seek to make quick money off of trading in stocks whose prices overly reflect short-term firm values.Yet this excessive focus on producing short-term profits runs counter to the interests of non-short-termist investors, other corporate constituents, as well as our economy and society as a whole in creating corporate enterprises that are profitable on an enduring basis. Once again, the current financial crisis provides a lens through which we can see the distressing impact – both to individual businesses as well as to the entire U.S community - of an excessive focus on short-term profits.I propose a solution to address this problem of short-termism. Under my proposal, directors would be required to make decisions that are in the long-term best interest of stockholders and the corporation under their fiduciary duties. I explain in the article why I propose fixing the short-termism problem through fiduciary duties as well as how, practically, my proposal would be implemented.
Riposte: An Anonymous Messaging System Handling Millions of Users

This paper presents Riposte, a new system for anonymous broadcast messaging. Riposte is the first such system, to our knowledge, that simultaneously protects against traffic-analysis attacks, prevents anonymous denial-of-service by malicious clients, and scales to million-user anonymity sets. To achieve these properties, Riposte makes novel use of techniques used in systems for private information retrieval and secure multi-party computation. For latency-tolerant workloads with many more readers than writers (e.g. Twitter, Wikileaks), we demonstrate that a three-server Riposte cluster can build an anonymity set of 2,895,216 users in 32 hours.
On the Absorption and Emission Properties of Interstellar Grains

Our current understanding of the absorption and emission properties of interstellar grains are reviewed. The constraints placed by the Kramers‐Kronig relation on the wavelength‐dependence and the maximum allowable quantity of the dust absorption are discussed. Comparisons of the opacities (mass absorption coefficients) derived from interstellar dust models with those directly estimated from observations are presented.
Privacy as Intellectual Property

Some economists and privacy advocates have proposed giving individuals property rights in their personal data to promote information privacy in cyberspace. A property rights approach would allow individuals to negotiate with firms about the uses to which they are willing to have personal data put and would force businesses to internalize a higher proportion of the societal costs of personal data processing. However, granting individuals property rights in personal information is unlikely to achieve information privacy goals in part because a key mechanism of property law, namely, the general policy favoring free alienability of such rights, would more likely defeat than achieve information privacy goals. Drawing upon certain concepts from the unfair competition-based law of trade secrecy, this article suggests that information privacy law needs to impose minimum standards of commercial morality on firms engaged in the processing of personal data and proposes that certain default licensing rules of trade secrecy law may be adapted to protect personal information in cyberspace.
CHAPTER 9 - Reliability Theory

Publisher Summary This chapter discusses the reliability theory, which is concerned with determining the probability of a system. For instance, a series system will function if and only if all of its components are functioning, while a parallel system will function if and only if at least one of its components is functioning. The chapter discusses the relationship between the distribution of the amount of time that a system functions and the distributions of the component lifetimes. Whether or not the system as a whole is functioning is completely determined by the state vector x. A parallel system functions if and only if at least one of its components is functioning. The reliability function of the series and/or parallel system of n-independent components is given by r(p) = P{φ(X) =1}. If r(p) is the reliability function of a system of independent components, then r(p) is an increasing function of p.
Chemistry of Trisdecacyclic Pyrazine Antineoplastics: The Cephalostatins and Ritterazines

The search for natural products of medicinal significance led the Pettit group to isolate the cephalostatins1 (from the hemichordate worm Cephalodiscus gilchristi,2 e.g. cephalostatin 1 (1), and the Fusetani team to the ritterazines3 (from the tunicate Ritterella tokioka, e.g. ritterazine B (2)), respectively. The cephalostatins and ritterazines, are a family of 45 trisdecacyclic bissteroidal pyrazines that display striking cytotoxicity against human tumors (~1 nM in the 2-day NCI 60 cell panel;4 and in some cases ~10 fM 6-day in the Purdue mini panel5), thereby ranking them among the most potent anticancer agents tested by the NCI. Computer matching at the NCI using the COMPARE program have revealed several additional compounds exhibiting similar profiles to the Cephalostatin/Ritterazine family. These compounds include OSW-16 (3) a monosteroidal saponin glycoside from the garden perennial Ornithogalum saundersiae (GI50 of 0.8 nM in the NCI 60 cancer cell line), and solamargine7 (4) (from Solanum species) as additional possible candidates for cancer therapy. OSW-1 (3) shows low toxicity to normal human pulmonary cells but encouraging activity against malignant solid tumor cells. Solamargine (4), is an active ingredient of creme Curaderm®, claimed to be 100% effective against melanomas in preliminary clinical trials without significant side effects or recurrence of cancer 10 years after treatment (Figure 1).8 Open in a separate window Figure 1 Steroidal anticancer agents.
Excited-State Geometry Optimization with the Density Matrix Renormalization Group, as Applied to Polyenes

We describe and extend the formalism of state-specific analytic density matrix renormalization group (DMRG) energy gradients, first used by Liu et al. [J. Chem. Theor. Comput. 2013, 9, 4462]. We introduce a DMRG wave function maximum overlap following technique to facilitate state-specific DMRG excited-state optimization. Using DMRG configuration interaction (DMRG-CI) gradients, we relax the low-lying singlet states of a series of trans-polyenes up to C_(20)H_(22). Using the relaxed excited-state geometries, as well as correlation functions, we elucidate the exciton, soliton, and bimagnon (“single-fission”) character of the excited states, and find evidence for a planar conical intersection.
Profile Driven Data Management for Pervasive Environments

The past few years have seen significant work in mobile data management, typically based on the client/proxy/server model. Mobile/wireless devices are treated as clients that are data consumers only, while data sources are on servers that typically reside on the wired network. With the advent of "pervasive computing" environments an alternative scenario arises where mobile devices gather and exchange data from not just wired sources, but also from their ethereal environment and one another. This is accomplished using ad-hoc connectivity engendered by Bluetooth like systems. In this new scenario, mobile devices become both data consumers and producers. We describe the new data management challenges which this scenario introduces. We describe the design and present an implementation prototype of our framework, MoGATU, which addresses these challenges. An important component of our approach is to treat each device as an autonomous entity with its "goals" and "beliefs", expressed using a semantically rich language. We have implemented this framework over a combined Bluetooth and Ad-Hoc 802.11 network with clients running on a variety of mobile devices. We present experimental results validating our approach and measure system performance.
EREP Project Overview

The EREP project develops a neutral CAD representation that supports feature-based, constraint-based design and permits a high level of abstraction. We sketch the architecture that has been adopted to accomplish this objective and explain a number of technical issues that arose. These issues derive from the requirements to support variational constraints, to support feature-based design and editing, and to keep the representation independent of a CAD system that might be used to support implementing the system.
Precursor Routes to Complex Ternary Intermetallics: Single-Crystal and Microcrystalline Preparation of Clathrate-I Na8Al8Si38 from NaSi + NaAlSi.

Single crystals of the ternary clathrate-I Na8Al8Si38 were synthesized by kinetically controlled thermal decomposition (KCTD), and microcrystalline Na8Al8Si38 was synthesized by spark plasma sintering (SPS) using a NaSi + NaAlSi mixture as the precursor. Na8AlxSi46–x compositions with x ≤ 8 were also synthesized by SPS from precursor mixtures of different ratios. The crystal structure of Na8Al8Si38 was investigated using both Rietveld and single-crystal refinements. Temperature-dependent transport and UV/vis measurements were employed in the characterization of Na8Al8Si38, with diffuse-reflectance measurement indicating an indirect optical gap of 0.64 eV. Our results indicate that, when more than one precursor is used, both SPS and KCTD are effective methods for the synthesis of multinary inorganic phases that are not easily accessible by traditional solid-state synthesis or crystal growth techniques.
Simultaneous Population Based Image Alignment for Template Free Spatial Normalisation of Brain Anatomy

Current approaches to spatial normalisation of brain images have made use of a target image to which each subject image is matched. However, in many cases the use of a single brain template, or a statistical one derived from multiple subjects of another population, does not adequately capture the structure present in a population of anatomies under investigation. In such cases this paper proposes that a better approach may be to seek a method of driving subjects in the group into registration with each other, rather than with an unrepresentative template. This paper explores the approach of extending registration concepts from multi-modality registration, specifically those deriving criteria from the joint probability distribution of image values, to the general case of describing the alignment of a population of images simultaneously. Geometric constraints forcing the convergence to an average geometric shape are discussed and results presented on synthetic images and clinical brain image data.
Grain boundary networks in nanocrystalline alloys from atom probe tomography quantization and autocorrelation mapping

A local spatial autocorrelation-based modeling method is developed to reconstruct nanoscale grain structures in nanocrystalline materials from atom probe tomography (APT) data, which provide atomic positions and species, with minimal noise. Using a nanocrystalline alloy with an average grain size of 16 nm as a model material, we reconstruct the three-dimensional grain boundary network by carrying out two series of APT data quantization using ellipsoidal binning, the first probing the anisotropy in the apparent local atomic density and the second quantifying the local spatial autocorrelation. This approach enables automatic and efficient quantification and visualization of grain structure in a large volume and at the finest nanoscale grain sizes, and provides a means for correlating local chemistry with grain boundaries or triple junctions in nanocrystalline materials. Nanoscale grain boundary networks are reconstructed from atom probe tomography data, which provide atomic positions and species for a fraction of atoms within a nanocrystalline material with an average grain size of 16 nm, using a quantization and local spatial autocorrelation-based approach.
Recent increases in extreme temperature occurrence over land

Recently observed global and U.S. temperature increases are probed from the perspective of several hundred climate realizations afforded by the availability of reforecast climate model runs from the NCEP Climate Forecast System Version 2. The large number of seasonal realizations with the observed time-varying CO2 affords a unique opportunity to explore the role of greenhouse gas changes on 3 month seasonal mean temperature increases, and specifically, whether they are the result of a shift in the mean temperature distribution or an increase in its variability. It is found that significant positive shifts in the temperature probability density function (PDF) occur primarily as the result of the time-varying CO2 included in the historical model runs, although a contribution from natural climate variability modes cannot be categorically excluded. The temperature PDF comparison further indicates that the increasing global and U.S. temperatures over the last 30 years are predominantly the result of shifts in the mean temperature distribution and not increasing temperature variability. As such, the likelihood of increases in the occurrence of warm temperature extremes will likely continue to increase worldwide, leading to significant impacts on many socioeconomic sectors such as agriculture and public health.
Space Saving by Dynamic Algebraization

Dynamic programming is widely used for exact computations based on tree decompositions of graphs. However, the space complexity is usually exponential in the treewidth. We study the problem of designing efficient dynamic programming algorithm based on tree decompositions in polynomial space. We show how to construct a tree decomposition and extend the algebraic techniques of Lokshtanov and Nederlof [18] such that the dynamic programming algorithm runs in time O *(2 h ), where h is the maximum number of vertices in the union of bags on the root to leaf paths on a given tree decomposition, which is a parameter closely related to the tree-depth of a graph [21]. We apply our algorithm to the problem of counting perfect matchings on grids and show that it outperforms other polynomial-space solutions. We also apply the algorithm to other set covering and partitioning problems.
The Rise Times of High- and Low-Redshift Type Ia Supernovae Are Consistent

We present a self-consistent comparison of the rise times for low- and high-redshift Type Ia supernovae. Following previous studies, the early light curve is modeled using a t2 law, which is then mated with a modified Leibundgut template light curve. The best-fit t2 law is determined for ensemble samples of low- and high-redshift supernovae by fitting simultaneously for all light-curve parameters for all supernovae in each sample. Our method fully accounts for the nonnegligible covariance among the light-curve fitting parameters, which previous analyses have neglected. Contrary to recent results by Riess et al., we find fair to good agreement between the rise times of the low- and high-redshift Type Ia supernovae. The uncertainty in the rise time of the high-redshift Type Ia supernovae is presently quite large (roughly ±1.2 days statistical), making any search for evidence of evolution based on a comparison of rise times premature. Furthermore, systematic effects on rise-time determinations from the high-redshift observations, due to the form of the late-time light curve and the manner in which the light curves of these supernovae were sampled, can bias the high-redshift rise-time determinations by up to days under extreme situations. The peak brightnesses—used for cosmology—do not suffer any significant bias, nor any significant increase in uncertainty.
Finite-time barriers to front propagation in two-dimensional fluid flows

Recent theoretical and experimental investigations have demonstrated the role of certain invariant manifolds, termed burning invariant manifolds (BIMs), as one-way dynamical barriers to reaction fronts propagating within a flowing fluid. These barriers form one-dimensional curves in a two-dimensional fluid flow. In prior studies, the fluid velocity field was required to be either time-independent or time-periodic. In the present study, we develop an approach to identify prominent one-way barriers based only on fluid velocity data over a finite time interval, which may have arbitrary time-dependence. We call such a barrier a burning Lagrangian coherent structure (bLCS) in analogy to Lagrangian coherent structures (LCSs) commonly used in passive advection. Our approach is based on the variational formulation of LCSs using curves of stationary “Lagrangian shear,” introduced by Farazmand et al. [Physica D 278–279, 44 (2014)] in the context of passive advection. We numerically validate our technique by demonstrating that the bLCS closely tracks the BIM for a time-independent, double-vortex channel flow with an opposing “wind.”
Cepheid Pulsation Theory And Multiperiodic Cepheid Variables

In this review of the situation with regard to the multiperiodic Cepheid variables, our subject matter is divided into four parts. The first discusses general causes of pulsation of Cepheids and other variable stars, and their locations on the H-R diagram. For this section we draw upon the work during the past 10–15 years of J. P. Cox, Baker, Kippenhahn, A. N. Cox, King, Christy, Castor, Stobie, Stellingwerf, Davey, Iben, and Tuggle, mostly with the small amplitude linear nonadiabatic radial pulsation theory. In the second section we review the linear adiabatic and nonadiabatic theory calculation of radial pulsation periods and their application to the problem of masses of double-mode Cepheids. Contributions discussed are by Cogan, J. P. Cox, King, Stellingwerf, Petersen, Hansen, and Ross. Periodic solutions, and their stability, of the nonlinear radial pulsation equations for Cepheids and RR Lyrae stars are considered in the third section. This research has been done by Stellingwerf with previous development of methods by Baker and von Sengbusch and current work by A. N. Cox and Davey at Los Alamos. In the last section we give the latest results on nonlinear, nonperiodic, radial pulsations for Cepheids and RR Lyrae stars. This work has been done by Stellingwerf, King, A. N. Cox, J. P. Cox, and Davey.
The 6-meter breadboard antenna for the deep space network large array

Development of very large arrays of small antennas has been proposed as a way to increase the downlink capability of the NASA deep space network (DSN) by two or three orders of magnitude thereby enabling greatly increased science data from currently configured missions or enabling new mission concepts. The current concept is for an array of 400/spl times/12-m antennas at each of the three longitudes. The DSN array utilizes radio astronomy sources for phase calibration and has wide bandwidth correlation processing for this purpose. A program is currently underway to develop the technology and prove the performance and cost of a very large DSN array. The program includes a 3-element interferometer to be completed by late 2004. This paper describes the design and development of the low cost 6-meter breadboard antenna to be used as part of the interferometer.
Physics of top quark at the Tevatron

We discuss the physics of the top quark at the Fermilab Tevatron. By the year 2000, many properties of the top quark can be measured at the Tevatron.
Stable ultrahigh-density magneto-optical recordings using introduced linear defects.

The stability of data bits in magnetic recording media1,2 at ultra-high densities is compromised by the thermal ‘flips’—magnetic spin reversals—of nano-sized spin domains3, which erase the stored information. Media that are magnetized perpendicular to the plane of the film, such as ultrathin cobalt films or multilayered structures4,5, are more stable against thermal self-erasure2,6 than conventional memory devices. In this context, magneto-optical memories seem particularly promising for ultrahigh-density recording on portable disks, and bit densities of ∼100 Gbit inch-2 (ref. 7) have been demonstrated using recent advances in the bit writing and reading techniques7,8,9,10,11. But the roughness and mobility of the magnetic domain walls12,13 prevents closer packing of the magnetic bits, and therefore presents a challenge to reaching even higher bit densities. Here we report that the strain imposed by a linear defect in a magnetic thin film can smooth rough domain walls over regions hundreds of micrometres in size, and halt their motion. A scaling analysis of this process, based on the generic physics of disorder-controlled elastic lines14,15,16,17, points to a simple way by which magnetic media might be prepared that can store data at densities in excess of 1 Tbit inch-2.
On the quantum hardness of solving isomorphism problems as nonabelian hidden shift problems

We consider an approach to deciding isomorphism of rigid n-vertex graphs (and related isomorphism problems) by solving a nonabelian hidden shift problem on a quantum computer using the standard method. Such an approach is arguably more natural than viewing the problem as a hidden subgroup problem. We prove that the hidden shift approach to rigid graph isomorphism is hard in two senses. First, we prove that Ω(n) copies of the hidden shift states are necessary to solve the problem (whereas O(n log n) copies are sufficient). Second, we prove that if one is restricted to single-register measurements, an exponential number of hidden shift states are required.
Harmonic current protection scheme for voltage source converter-based high-voltage direct current transmission system

Based on the inherent characteristic of the carrier-based pulse-width modulation converters, the response of the first carrier frequency harmonic (FCFH) current in the voltage source converter (VSC)-based high-voltage direct current (HVDC) transmission system is analysed under different fault conditions in this paper. A new protection scheme for the VSC-based HVDC transmission systems is proposed based on the FCFH currents. By extracting the harmonic currents at both the endings of the DC transmission cable, the fault type can be identified. The VSC-based HVDC test system is modelled in the PSCAD/EMTDC and the proposed protection scheme is evaluated with a variety of values of the fault resistance and the fault locations. Comprehensive test studies show that the performance of the proposed protection scheme is inspiring. It can recognise the internal and the external faults correctly.
Scheduling real-time traffic with deadlines over a wireless channel

Recently, there has been widespread interest in the extension of data networks to the wireless domain. However, scheduling results from the wireline domain do not carry over to wireless systems because wireless channels have unique characteristics not found in wireline channels, namely, limited bandwidth, bursty channel errors and location-dependent channel errors.In this paper, we study the problem of scheduling multiple real-time streams with deadlines, over a shared channel. We show that, in general, unlike the wireline case, the earliest due date (EDD) or shortest time to extinction (STE) policy is not always the optimal policy, even if the channel state is perfectly known and EDD is implemented only over channels in a "Good" state. Here, optimality is measured with respect to the number of packets lost due to deadline expiry. However, for most values of the channel parameters that are of practical interest, we show through analytical and numerical results that the EDD policy over "Good" channels is nearly optimal. Finally, through simulations, we also show that by combining this policy with fair scheduling mechanisms would result in scheduling algorithms that provide some degree of isolation between the sources as well as provide a natural way of compensating channels that see prolonged error bursts.
Exenterative operations: Experience with 198 patients

Abstract In a series of 198 exenterative operations performed at the Mayo Clinic for various pelvic malignant lesions, a 5 year survival rate of 33 per cent was obtained. This rate is commendable, since almost 80 per cent of the operations were accomplished for recurrent malignancy. The diminished over-all operative mortality rate of 8.1 per cent, a reduction from 13.5 per cent (1950 through 1962) to 3 per cent (1963 through 1971), is attributed to better methods of urinary diversion and to better management of fluid replacement and of infectious complications. Major complications, excepting bowel fistula and obstruction, now can be controlled reasonably well. When more conservative and equally curative methods of therapy have been exhausted, all patients with pelvic malignancy (whether primary in cervix, vagina, bladder, urethra, rectum, or vulva) should be considered potential candidates for exenteration.
Implications of a Changing Economic Structure for the Strategy of Monetary Policy

Author(s): Walsh, Carl E. | Abstract: This paper surveys the implications of uncertainty for the design of monetary policy. Among the topics discussed are the impact of imperfect or noisy information on the performance of simple rules, the performance of rules that are robust to the exogenous disturbance processes, the effects of parameter uncertainty, and the implications of robust control. The analysis is conducted using a new Keynesian framework. One finding is that difference rules seem to perform well in the presence of imperfect information about the output gap.
Institutional and policy analysis of river basin management: the Brantas river basin, East Java, Indonesia

The authors describe and analyze an unconventional approach to river basin management in a developing country undergoing rapid economic, political, and institutional change. The founding of the Brantas River Basin Management Corporation (Perum Jasa Tirta I - PJT 1), a national state-owned company for river basin management, initiated an emphasis on river basin management to operate and maintain existing infrastructure, plan and implement the allocation of water, and address problems that affect basin-level water resources. The Brantas River basin is located within the province of East Java in Indonesia. It has an area of approximately 11,800 square kilometers and makes up 25 percent of East Java's land area. The basin's population, which amounts to nearly 15 million, has increased by 53.4 percent over the past 30 years and represents 42.4 percent of East Java's population with a density of 1,249 per square kilometer. A shift has taken place in Indonesia since the mid-1990s from emphasizing infrastructure development to strengthening institutional aspects (hydrology, flood fighting, flood warning, flood management, and so on). The institutional arrangement for water resources management in the Brantas basin through a state-owned corporation is an interesting model. PJT I has achieved results in implementing a reasonably good system of water allocation and management and a reliable flood forecasting system, as well as maintaining major infrastructure in fairly good condition. Managing water quality, catchment conditions, and the river environment, however, are the responsibility of many entities, and there is need for greater coordination and authority to address these issues.
A Future for Small Farms? Biodiversity and Sustainable Agriculture

Small farms play a crucial role in conserving the agricultural biodiversity that underpins long-term food security worldwide. Particularly in centers of crop genetic diversity – such as Mesoamerica in the case of maize (corn) and the Andean region in the case of potatoes – small farmers are the ‘keystone species’ in agricultural ecosystems of great value to humankind. Today, however, a formidable nexus of market forces and political forces threatens both small farmers and the biodiversity they sustain. Countervailing public policies are urgently needed. These should include the removal of existing policy biases against small farmers; social recognition of the contribution of in situ conservation to human well-being; development of markets for ‘traditional’ varieties of crops and livestock; the provision of local public goods in areas where farmers cultivate diversity; payments for the environmental service of on-farm conservation; and support for part-time farming as an element of diversified household livelihood strategies.
Mini-bucket heuristics for improved search

The paper is a second in a series of two papers evaluating the power of a new scheme that generates search heuristics mechanically. The heuristics are extracted from an approximation scheme called mini-bucket elimination that was recently introduced. The first paper introduced the idea and evaluated it within Branch-and-Bound search. In the current paper the idea is further extended and evaluated within Best-First search. The resulting algorithms are compared on coding and medical diagnosis problems, using varying strength of the mini-bucket heuristics. Our results demonstrate an effective search scheme that permits controlled tradeoff between preprocessing (for heuristic generation) and search. Best-first search is shown to outperform Branch-and-Bound, when sup plied with good heuristics, and sufficient memory space.
A kinetic model of prostaglandin metabolism in the lung

We have measured the instantaneous extraction of prostaglandin E1 (PGE1) after a single bolus injection of PGE1 and indocyanine green dye into the pulmonary artery of isolated cat lungs. The extraction ratio versus time curves exhibited a characteristic shape; at early times they were concave upward and later in time concave downward. To evaluate this date we utilized a model in which themechanism of PGE1 uptake is saturable and follows Michaelis-Menten kinetics. The model assumes heterogeneous perfusion of the exchanging region of the lung and can be solved by regression analysis to obtain Km and Vmax from the data collected from a single bolus injection. The results indicate that the shape of the extraction ratio curve manifests the influence of nonlinear uptake and heterogeneous perfusion and that the kinetic parameters may be calculated from the data obtained after a single bolus injection ofPGE1.
Does institutional finance matter for agriculture ? evidence using panel data from Uganda

Smallholder agriculture in many developing countries has remained largely self-financed. However, improved productivity for attaining greater food security requires better access to institutional credit. Past efforts to extend institutional credit to smaller farmers has failed for several reasons, including subsidized operation of government-aided credit schemes. Thus, recent efforts to expand credit for smallholder agriculture that rely on innovative credit delivery schemes at market prices have received much policy interest. However, thus far the impacts of these efforts are not fully understood. This study examines credit for smallholder agriculture in the context of Uganda, where agriculture is about 35 percent of gross domestic product, most farmers are smallholders, and the country has introduced policies since 2005 to extend credit access to the sector. The analysis uses newly available household panel data from Uganda for 2005-2006 and 2009-2010 to examine (a) whether credit effectively targets agriculture, by examining determinants of borrowing across different sources; (b) agricultural and nonagricultural determinants of supply and demand credit constraints among non-borrowers; and (c) the effects of borrowing and credit constraints on household income, consumption, and agricultural outcomes. The analysis finds that although not many households report borrowing specifically for agriculture, credit is fungible and agricultural outcomes do substantially improve with institutional borrowing, particularly microcredit. Among non-borrowers, supply and demand credit constraints have fallen considerably over the period, particularly in rural areas. Access to institutions and infrastructure play a strong role in alleviating the negative effect of credit constraints on welfare outcomes, as well as determining the source of lending among borrowing households.
Complexity results about Nash equilibria

Noncooperative game theory provides a normative framework for analyzing strategic interactions. However, for the toolbox to be operational, the solutions it defines will have to be computed. In this paper, we provide a single reduction that 1) demonstrates NP-hardness of determining whether Nash equilibria with certain natural properties exist, and 2) demonstrates the NP-hardness of counting Nash equilibria (or connected sets of Nash equilibria). We also show that 3) determining whether a purestrategy Bayes-Nash equilibrium exists is NP-hard, and that 4) determining whether a pure-strategy Nash equilibrium exists in a stochastic (Markov) game is PSP ACE-hard even if the game is invisible (this remains NP-hard if the game is finite). All of our hardness results hold even if there are only two players and the game is symmetric.
Tunneling dynamics of two interacting one-dimensional particles

We present one-dimensional simulation results for the cold-atom tunneling experiments by the Heidelberg group [Z\"urn et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 108, 075303 (2012); Z\"urn et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 111, 175302 (2013)] on one or two $^{6}\mathrm{Li}$ atoms confined by a potential that consists of an approximately harmonic optical trap plus a linear magnetic-field gradient. At the noninteracting particle level, we find that the Wentzel-Kramers-Brillouin approximation may not be used as a reliable tool to extract the trapping potential parameters from the experimentally measured tunneling data. We use our numerical calculations along with the experimental tunneling rates for the noninteracting system to reparametrize the trapping potential. The reparametrized trapping potentials serve as input for our simulations of two interacting particles. For two interacting (distinguishable) atoms on the upper branch, we reproduce the experimentally measured tunneling rates, which vary over several orders of magnitude, fairly well. For infinitely strong interaction strength, we compare the time dynamics with that of two identical fermions and discuss the implications of fermionization on the dynamics. For two attractively interacting atoms on the molecular branch, we find that single-particle tunneling dominates for weakly attractive interactions, while pair tunneling dominates for strongly attractive interactions. Our first set of calculations yields qualitative but not quantitative agreement with the experimentally measured tunneling rates. We obtain quantitative agreement with the experimentally measured tunneling rates if we allow for a weakened radial confinement.
Institutional and policy analysis of river basin management: the Warta River Basin, Poland

The authors describe and analyze the emergence of river basin management in the Warta River Basin of Poland. The Warta basin's 55,193 km2 cover approximately one-sixth of Poland, and the Warta is a principal tributary to the Oder. Water management issues include pollution of the Warta and its main tributaries, prompting cities to rely on groundwater supplies that are beginning to show signs of overdraft, and growing problems of water allocation and scarcity as the basin urbanizes and industrializes. Since the end of the 1980s, the Polish government has been promoting decentralization, constructing a federal system that includes provinces, counties, and municipalities with authority over land use, water use permits, and environmental protection. Polish authorities have also established river basin management authorities corresponding to basin boundaries throughout the nation, including one for the Warta basin. The efforts toward decentralization and integrated water resource management in Poland have been earnest, but the dispersion of water policy authority across several levels of government, the establishment of basin authorities lacking power and funding to implement resource management programs, few arrangements for stakeholder participation, and delays in Polish water law reform have complicated the development and implementation of integrated management at the basin level.
Stability of a complex polynomial set with coefficients in a diamond and generalizations

An approach originating in system theory is used to prove that the strict Hurwitz property of a family of polynomials having complex coefficients with their real and imaginary parts each varying in a diamond requires the checking of sixteen one-dimensional edges of the diamond for the type of stability that is characterized by the strict Hurwitz property of polynomials. The approach is straightforward and the corresponding recent result advanced for the case of polynomials with real coefficients falls out as a special case. The procedure advanced also applies to a far wider class of regions in parameter space than those represented either by a boxed domain or its set dual-a diamond. >
Models for Diffraction Scattering with Fixed Pole and Shielding Cut

It is proposed that the nonshrinking πp diffraction peak is due to a fixed pomeron,t-channel unitarity being preserved by a shielding cut, which also explains the constancy of high-energy total cross-sections. Several models are discussed and used to fit πp and pp data; in some a new pole is assumed near the pomeron.
Effects of diffusive property heterogeneity on effective matrix diffusion coefficient for fractured rock

[1] Heterogeneities of diffusion properties are likely to influence the effective matrix diffusion coefficient determined from tracer breakthrough curves. The objectives of this study are (1) to examine if it is appropriate to use a single, effective matrix diffusion coefficient to predict breakthrough curves in a fractured formation, (2) to examine if a postulated scale dependence of the effective matrix diffusion coefficient is caused by heterogeneity in diffusion properties, and (3) to examine whether multirate diffusion results in the previously observed time dependence of the effective matrix diffusion coefficient. The results show that the use of a single effective matrix diffusion coefficient is appropriate only if the interchannel and intrachannel variability of diffusion properties is small. The scale dependence of the effective matrix diffusion coefficient is not caused by the studied types of heterogeneity. Finally, the multirate diffusion process does not result in the time dependence of the effective matrix diffusion coefficient.
Export restraints on Russian natural gas and raw timber : what are the economic impacts ?

Export restraints by the Russian Federation on natural gas and timber have been the source of major controversy between the European Union and the Russian Federation. The analysis of this paper suggests that the export restraints in natural gas very substantially benefit Russia. On the other hand, in raw timber the analysis suggests that a substantial reduction of Russian export taxes would increase Russian welfare. The paper explains that Gazprom has failed to invest adequately, resulting in little development of new gas supplies. The result has been progressively increasing use by Gazprom of Central Asian gas supplies, at progressively higher prices for Russia. The increased prices of gas for Russian consumers have shown that it is crucial for Russia to allow new entrants and to introduce competition in the Russian domestic market. Without export restraints, however, competition among multiple gas suppliers from Russia would erode or eliminate the monopoly profits of the Russian Federation on gas exports. Thus, with a more competitive domestic market, the Russian government would be expected to grant exclusive exporting rights to a single entity (as it presently does with Gazprom) or impose export taxes. Thus, Europe should not expect to achieve cheaper Russian gas as a result of structural reforms within the Russian gas market. A more promising avenue for European energy diversification is new pipeline construction to open up new sources of supply independent of Russia (especially the Nabucco pipeline), and liquefied natural gas purchases.