cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
History of functional neurosurgery.

Whereas in the early days of evil spirits, electric catfish, and phrenology, functional neurosurgery was based on crude observations and dogma, the progress made in neurophysiology at the turn of the century gave the field a strong scientific foundation. Subsequently, the advent of stereotaxis allowed access to deep brain regions and contributed an element of precision. Future directions include the development of frameless stereotaxy; the use of MRI-generated anatomic data, which would circumvent the serious problem of individual variations seen with standard brain atlases; the introduction of various chemicals into brain structures, in an attempt to influence neurochemically mediated disease processes; and finally, the use of the promising techniques of neural transplantation. On hearing of Penfield's intraoperative brain stimulations, Sherrington commented: "It must be great fun to have the physiological preparation speak to you." The idea of therapeutic neurophysiologic interventions is appealing, especially because many disorders show no obvious treatable pathologic cause (e.g., tumor, vascular malformation). As stereotactic technology becomes less cumbersome and more precise, more sophisticated in vivo neurophysiologic preparations become possible. In turn, as our understanding of nervous system physiology grows, our ability to understand pathophysiology and treat disease processes increases.
Domestic exchange rate determination in Renaissance Florence

We explore the price-setting protocol used by the money-changers guild, the Arte del Cambio, to set the exchange rate between domestic gold and silver coins in Renaissance Florence, a precursor in purpose and set-up to the contemporary system of posting interest rates. We show that the protocol is evolutionarily stable and designed to converge to the efficient price, which had important implications to the political economy of Florence and the stability of its monetary system. We also show that the predicted dynamics of convergence are consistent with surviving exchange rates from 1389 to 1432, thereby linking the empirical properties of the historical data to the institutional features of the guild that generated them.
On the class of 2×2 balanced incomplete block designs with nested rows and columns

The necessary conditions for existence of 2×2 balanced incomplete Mock designs with nested rows and columns are found to be sufficient. It is also shown that, sufficient for a B1BRC with p = q to be generally balanced, is that the row and column classifications together form a BIBD, as does the block classification, All "of the 2×2 BIBRCs are constructed to have this property.
Retirement among members of the clergy: Findings from a Protestant fellowship

ABSTRACTThe body of research on retirement has expanded in recent years but the experience of clergy members has received scant attention. In 2009, Knapp, Pruett, and Hicks sought to rectify this situation by conducting an exploratory study that focused on the financial and housing options that will be available to members of the clergy of a nondenominational fellowship when they reach the age of retirement. The present study built upon that foundation and expanded the sample to include ministers within Churches of Christ from multiple states. The results are consistent with the exploratory study and indicate that financial preparedness varies greatly based on factors such as age, years in ministry, size of the church being served, and whether one intends to fully retire. Similarly, housing options vary greatly and are related to financial well-being. The findings reinforce the need for preretirement education for members of the clergy, especially for those who minister in churches that exist outside of a...
Tree age and cavity initiation by red-cockaded woodpeckers

The red-cockaded woodpecker, Picoides borealis, is an endangered species that has declined in numbers with loss of nesting habitat. This loss if due partly to the increased prevalence of short rotations in southern pine forests. Data from Mississippi and South Carolina indicate that, for cavity initiation, the species needs living trees averaging approximately 75 years old for loblolly pine (Pinus taeda), and 95 years old for longleaf pine (P. palustris).
An Initial Investigation of the Efficacy of the Resilience Education Program (REP)

Early intervention and prevention services for students at risk of emotional and behavioral problems are increasingly plentiful in the schools. However, recent reviews have revealed gaps in the literature regarding supports for students with internalizing problems. This gap has set precedent for the development of novel Tier 2 interventions that specifically address internalizing behavior problems. The primary purpose of this study was to investigate the efficacy of a novel, targeted intervention for elementary students who are at risk of internalizing problems: the Resilience Education Program (REP). REP is founded upon a social–ecological framework, integrating small-group cognitive–behavioral instruction with a modified check-in/check-out procedure. The current study employed a multiple-baseline single-case design with three student participants at risk of internalizing concerns. Visual analysis of direct observation data and single-case effect size estimates indicated that the REP intervention resulted in the decrease in internalizing behaviors and an increase in social engagement relative to baseline levels for two of three participants. Findings were further supported in that the changes noted in observational data were also partially confirmed by teacher ratings. Limitations of this study and future directions for researchers and practitioners are discussed.
Pseudotumor of the orbit. Clinical, pathologic, and radiologic evaluation

Pseudotumor, Graves' disease, and lymphoproliferative disease are the most common ophthalmologic disease entities requiring evaluation by CT and MR imaging. A history of acute onset, pain, swelling, proptosis, and response to steroids are the classical findings. The radiologic findings are categorized according to location into dacryoadenitis, myositis, and sclerouveitis, with and without associated infiltrations. The inflammatory infiltrate, which is composed of polymorphic leukocytes, lymphocytes, and plasma cells interspersed with a variable amount of fibrovascular tissue, may be diffuse or localized. The preferred radiologic method used for assessment of pseudotumor is CT. MR imaging, however, is indicated for evaluation of the Tolosa-Hunt syndrome, which is characterized by an inflammatory infiltrate in the orbital apex and cavernous sinus leading to cranial nerve involvement with ophthalmoplegia. The clinical and radiologic constellation of findings allows a definitive diagnosis in most cases.
Blood-Brain Barrier Disruption During Neuroinflammation

Abstract The blood-brain barrier (BBB), as the name implies, is a barrier formed by a selective semipermeable membrane that provides interface between the cerebral circulating blood from the cerebral extracellular fluid within the central nervous system. This barrier is important for the continuation of brain homeostasis, its safety, and regulation of efflux and influx transfer. Disruption of this BBB presents a pathological hallmark as a result of number of neuroinflammatory events. This chapter reviews the existing literature on the anatomy and physiological processes of the BBB in general, and the characteristic disruption of this barrier during neuroinflammation mechanism in special. Understanding of BBB disruption holds considerable promise for the management and avoidance of neurological illnesses.
Novel Lines of Evidence for the Asymmetric Strand Displacement Model of Mitochondrial DNA Replication.

ABSTRACT The mitochondrial genome, which consists of 16,569 bp of DNA with a cytosine-rich light (L) strand and a heavy (H) strand, exists as a multicopy closed circular genome within the mitochondrial matrix. The machinery for replication of the mammalian mitochondrial genome is distinct from that for replication of the nuclear genome. Three models have been proposed for mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) replication, and one of the key differences among them is whether extensive single-stranded regions exist on the H strand. Here, three different methods that can detect single-stranded DNA (ssDNA) are utilized to identify the presence, location, and abundance of ssDNA on mtDNA. Importantly, none of these newly described methods involve the complication of prior mtDNA fractionation. The H strand was found to have extensive single-stranded regions with a profile consistent with the strand displacement model of mtDNA replication, whereas single strandedness was predominantly absent on the L strand. These findings are consistent with the in vivo occupancy of mitochondrial single-stranded DNA binding protein reported previously and provide strong new qualitative and quantitative evidence for the asymmetric strand displacement model of mtDNA replication.
Improving Brigthness Temperature Measurements Near Coastal Areas

The Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) mission was designed to acquire and combine L-band radar and radiometer measurements for the estimation of soil moisture with 4% volumetric accuracy away from coastal zones. In regions near the coast or near inland bodies of water, the SMAP footprint contains land and water, resulting in errors in the soil moisture estimation. In this paper, we address the effort to extract the brightness temperature related to the land fraction or water fraction (depending on the center of the footprint location) from the affected SMAP measurements. We evaluate the performance of our algorithm over simulated data. We then show results over real data. The new SMAP upgraded product is expected to be delivered on April 2018.
Detection and comparison of breast shape variation among different three-dimensional body scan conditions: nude, with a structured bra, and with a soft bra:

To investigate the effect of structured bras and soft bras on breast shape, 46 female participants (Caucasian, BMI < 30, aged 18–45) were recruited for three-dimensional (3D) scanning. Participants...
Mast Cells Get on Your Nerves in Itch

Mast-cell-nerve interactions play an integral role in itch and inflammation. Meixiong et al. (2019) show that the receptors MRGPRB2 and FceRI mediate distinct types of mast cell activation and nerve interactions and that mast cell activation through MRGPRB2 drives itch in allergic contact dermatitis.
'Makeup Calls' in Sports and Courts

This is a short and, hopefully, humorous article that argues that just as referees in sports such as basketball or hockey sometimes correct an erroneous ruling by making a "make up call" that cancels the erroneous ruling, judges sometimes engage in makeup calls to balance the inequity that may have occurred in an earlier ruling. The essay uses as an example the jury selection process where rulings sometimes balance out any unfairness. The essay concludes that appellate courts miss this balancing effect when they look only at a single isolated ruling. If they had looked instead at this ruling as part of a string of rulings, they might see that the error was balanced out by other favorable rulings.
Recombinant subunit vaccines protect guinea pigs from lethal Ebola virus challenge

Ebola virus (EBOV) is among the deadliest pathogens known to man causing infrequent outbreaks of hemorrhagic disease. In humans, the case fatality rates in the outbreaks can reach 90%. During the West African epidemic almost 30,000 people were infected and of these over 11,000 fatalities were reported. Currently, we are facing an uncontained larger outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Even though EBOV was discovered in 1976, extensive efforts to develop countermeasures, particularly therapeutics and vaccines, started late and there is still no FDA-approved product available. Nevertheless, one candidate vaccine, the rVSV-ZEBOV, is being used in clinical trials during the current outbreak with the hope of ending the human transmission chains. However, adverse reactions to administration of some EBOV vaccines have been reported; therefore, we have developed a safe and efficacious formulation of insect-cell derived adjuvanted protein vaccines. Vaccine candidates containing the EBOV glycoprotein with or without matrix proteins VP24 and VP40 formulated with one of three different adjuvants were tested in guinea pigs for immunogenicity and efficacy against lethal EBOV challenge. The results demonstrated that these vaccine candidates engendered high titers of antigen-specific antibodies in immunized animals and two of these vaccine candidates afforded complete or nearly complete protection against lethal challenge. Interestingly, we found a sex bias in partially protected immunized groups with male guinea pigs succumbing to disease and females surviving. In summary, we developed a safe and immunogenic adjuvanted subunit vaccine uniformly protective against EBOV disease in guinea pigs.
Ultrasonic Aspiration for Debulking Infiltrative Masses of the Orbit.

PURPOSE To demonstrate the utility of an ultrasonic aspirator (Sonopet, Stryker Corporation; Kalamazoo, MI) for debulking firm, soft tissue masses of the orbit. METHODS Case series. The ultrasonic aspirator was used to debulk firm, soft tissue masses in 3 cases. The initial patient had a large orbitofacial mass extending to the inferior and lateral orbital apex secondary to IgG4 disease. The second patient had a lacrimal sac adenocarcinoma extending to the medial orbital apex. The third patient had a large orbital mass extending to the apex secondary to granulomatosis with polyangiitis. RESULTS The ultrasonic aspirator facilitated debulking of infiltrative firm soft tissue masses of the orbit. The device's ability to emulsify, irrigate, and aspirate, along with its small footprint, facilitated precise sculpting and debulking to an extent which would have been difficult otherwise due to location. CONCLUSIONS The ultrasonic aspirator allows precise sculpting of infiltrative firm soft tissue masses in the orbit and is particularly useful in cases with challenging anatomical access.
Entre el diario y el recetario: la reivindicación de la escritura íntima en la trilogía culinaria de Laura Esquivel

What occurs when a novel is disguised as both a personal diary and a cookbook, two apparently dissimilar genres? The present article attempts to answer that question through an analysis of the culinary trilogy by Mexican author Laura Esquivel: Como agua para chocolate (1989), El diario de Tita (2016), and Mi negro pasado (2017). Several definitions of the personal diary and of privacy as a historical phenomenon shed light upon the functions of diary-writing that El diario de Tita imitates. I contrast the diary’s intimate space with the kitchen’s private space in the first two novels. Although both spaces can be transgressive in their own manner, the diary gives its writer the freedom to reflect and to define him/herself. To delve into the contrast between diary-writing and recipe-writing, I turn to one of the Latin American prototypes of the cookbook mixed with narrative: Cocina eclectica (1890) by the Argentinian writer Juana Manuela Gorriti. Lastly, I analyze the absence of intimate writing in Mi negro pasado to support the argument that the trilogy defends the right to privacy and reclaims a space for intimate writing within the private space of the family and the public space of society.
Generative Feature Models and Robustness Analysis for Multimedia Content Classification

Automatic content classification is an essential problem for multimedia applications. In this paper, we present a metadata synthesis approach, using real-world distributions, and a machine learning (ML) model for classifying content for local and streaming sources. The synthetic metadata is used to train a neural network. The neural network is then able to classify content (e.g., movies, voice, and music) based on real metadata from YouTube and local content. We demonstrate high accuracy ~ 90% with low latency (viz., on an average 7 ms). We also identified the contribution of each synthetic metadata feature towards the classification performance on real-world content.
Chapter 15 – Bloodborne pathogens

Publisher Summary In the workplace, protection from bloodborne pathogens begins with the recognition of four basic types of potentially infectious materials—human blood, blood components, and products made from human blood; human body fluids; any unfixed tissue or organ from a human, either living or dead; and human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and hepatitis virus (HV)-containing cultures, media, solutions, blood, organs, or other tissues from experimental animals infected with HIV or HV. It must be emphasized that, in any company, any person who provides aid to an injured co-worker, regardless of job assignment, may become exposed to infectious blood or other body fluids. Types of work that routinely involve the risk of infection by bloodborne pathogens include a wide range of jobs typical of health care facilities and services, blood or disease research facilities, pharmaceutical-related work involving experimental drugs for the treatment of bloodborne pathogens, pathology laboratories, and mortuaries. There are universal precautions that consist of a variety of procedures to control the risk of infection.
Factors Influencing Student Success in Associate Degree Respiratory Therapy Programs

Abstract Purpose Research suggests behavioral, personal, and environmental factors each appear to influence student success; however, the results are inconclusive. The purpose of this study was to identify factors influencing student success in associate degree respiratory therapy programs by analyzing existing educational data from student records. Method A convenience sample of students enrolling in the eight associate degree respiratory therapy programs of a large community college system in the Midwestern United States during 2016 and 2017 (N = 226) was utilized. Historical data from student records were categorized as either a behavioral, a personal, or an environmental factor, and then were analyzed to determine the influence of each factor on student success, defined as degree completion. Results Binary logistic regression (BLR) models demonstrated significant predictive relationships between specific behavioral factors, personal factors, and environmental factors and degree completion. Significant predictors of degree completion included the following: grade in first program course, first program term and end of first term cumulative grade point averages (GPAs), and failing a required program course (behavioral factors); student age, ethnicity, and gender (personal factors); and campus of attendance and advising model (environmental factors). Discussion Results suggest specific behavioral factors, specific personal factors, and specific environmental factors each appear to influence student success, providing additional clarity to results found in the literature. Practical implications for leaders and for future research on student success are discussed.
Abstract B21: Proteomic profiling of tandem affinity purified MAP4K family kinases

MAP kinase kinase kinase kinases (MAP4Ks) belong to the mammalian Ste20-like family of serine/threonine kinases and recently have been reported to regulate Hippo pathway via LATS1/2 activation. However, the diverse roles of MAP4Ks in biologic process are still unclear. To identify the MAP4K family kinase interaction network, we employed a tandem affinity purification-mass spectrometry (TAP-MS) approach using SFB tag-conjugated MAP4K1-7. Through a proteomic analysis, we could guess that MAP4K family kinases, especially MAP4K2, may regulate autophagy or interact with striatin-interacting phosphatase and kinase (STRIPAK) components. These results offer a framework for further studies on Hippo pathway and biologic processes involving MAP4Ks. Note: This abstract was not presented at the conference. Citation Format: Gayoung Seo, Han Han, Bing Yang, Rebecca Vargas, Yuxuan Chen, Wenqi Wang. Proteomic profiling of tandem affinity purified MAP4K family kinases [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the AACR Special Conference on the Hippo Pathway: Signaling, Cancer, and Beyond; 2019 May 8-11; San Diego, CA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Mol Cancer Res 2020;18(8_Suppl):Abstract nr B21.
I-Rex: an interactive relational query explainer for SQL

We demonstrate I-Rex1, a system designed to help users understand SQL query evaluation and debug SQL queries. I-Rex lets users interactively "trace" the evaluation of complex SQL queries, including those with correlated subqueries. I-Rex also explains why a query returns an incorrect answer with respect to a reference query over a test database instance---a common use case in education and software regression testing. To avoid the cognitive overload caused by debugging over a large database instance, I-Rex lets users focus on smaller instances contained in the large one (which we call "counterexamples") that still distinguish the two queries. Supporting these features for SQL queries poses two key challenges. First, unlike debugging for procedural languages, it is not clear how to trace a declarative SQL query, because its execution plan often differs from how it was originally written. I-Rex offers a novel interface for tracing SQL query evaluation in a way faithful to how queries are written syntactically, even for complex queries involving multiple levels of nesting and correlation. Second, we need a method for finding small counterexamples that handles the complexity of practical SQL. I-Rex extends provenance support for SQL in non-trivial ways to work with various query constructs. This demonstration walks through use cases in which I-Rex helps users understand and debug SQL queries.
Pancreatic Tissue Proteomics Unveils Key Proteins, Pathways, and Networks Associated with Type 1 Diabetes.

Purpose Type 1 diabetes (T1D) is characterized by autoimmune mediated self-destruction of the pancreatic islet beta cells and the resultant insulin deficiency. However, little is known about the underlying molecular pathogenesis at the pancreatic tissue level given the limited availability of clinical specimens. Experimental design We performed quantitative proteomic studies on age-matched T1D and healthy cadaveric pancreatic tissues (n = 18 each) using TMT 10plex-based isobaric labeling and BoxCar-based label-free LC-MS/MS approaches. ELISA was used to validate the differentially expressed proteins (DEPs). Results Overall, the two quantitative proteomics approaches identified 8,824 proteins, of which 261 were DEPs. KEGG pathway and functional network analyses of the DEPs revealed dysregulations to pancreatic exocrine function, complement coagulation cascades, and ECM receptor interaction pathways in T1D. A selected list of the DEPs associated with pathways, subnetworks, and plasma proteome of T1D were validated using ELISA. Conclusions and clinical relevance Integrating labeling and label-free approaches improved the confidence in quantitative profiling of pancreatic tissue proteome, which furthers our understanding of the dysregulated pathways and functional subnetworks associated with T1D pathogenesis and may aid to develop diagnostic and therapeutic strategies for T1D. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.
Enhanced charge carrier lifetime and mobility as a result of Rb and Cs incorporation in hybrid perovskite

Alkali addition in organic–inorganic perovskite has become the standard recipe for achieving solar cells with efficiencies exceeding 20%, but the mechanism is not well understood. We use non-contact carrier lifetime measurements, mobility measurements, and synchrotron-based x-ray characterization techniques to show that there is a unique benefit to adding hybrid perovskite samples with Rb and Cs simultaneously. When either Rb or Cs is added, charge carrier mobility increases with alkali concentration. Charge carrier lifetime benefits from alkali incorporation as well, but is optimized with only moderate concentration at 1%. When both Rb and Cs are introduced, however, the high mobility is maintained and the charge carrier lifetime increases considerably. Our results show that when incorporated alone, Rb and Cs have very similar roles in a perovskite crystal, but when co-added, halide distribution becomes homogenized correlating with improved charge transport properties.
A Mixed-Modeling Framework for Whole-Brain Dynamic Network Analysis

The emerging area of dynamic brain network analysis has gained considerable attraction in recent years. While current tools have proven useful in providing insight into dynamic patterns of brain networks, development of multivariate statistical frameworks that allow for examining the associations between phenotypic traits and dynamic patterns of system-level properties of the brain, and drawing statistical inference about such associations, has largely lagged behind. To address this need we developed a mixed-modeling framework that allows for assessing the relationship between any desired phenotype and dynamic patterns of whole-brain connectivity and topology. Unlike current tools which largely use data-driven methods, our model-based method enables aligning neuroscientific hypotheses with the analytic approach. We demonstrate the utility of this model in identifying the relationship between fluid intelligence and dynamic brain networks using resting-state fMRI (rfMRI) data from 200 subjects in the Human Connectome Project (HCP) study. To our knowledge, this approach provides the first model-based statistical method for examining dynamic patterns of system-level properties of the brain and their relationships to phenotypic traits.
3D-Radiobiologic dosimetry (3D-RD): Patient-specific, 3-D dosimetry with radiobiologic modeling to evaluate treatment efficacy and toxicity

626 Objectives: Imaging-based 3-D dosimetry methodologies can account for non-uniform activity distributions and individual patient anatomy to estimate the spatial distribution of absorbed dose. Typically, the spatial distribution is characterized as a mean value or as a dose-volume histogram. These representations will not reflect the biological impact of dose-rate and do not easily reflect the impact of dose non-uniformity on likelihood of tumor control or normal organ toxicity. In this work, region-specific kinetic parameters obtained from registered 3-D images are used to estimate voxel-specific biologically equivalent dose (BED) values that account for regional dose-rate differences. Methods: The BED values for tumor and normal organ voxels are convolved with a linear-quadratic (LQ)-model-derived dose-response curve to obtain the equivalent uniform BED (EUBED) (O9Donoghue JNM 999). Using the original absorbed dose values the equivalent uniform dose (EUD) can also be calculated. This reflects the impact of dose distribution alone. Such single, radiobiological model-dependent values are an attempt to incorporate relevant biological considerations in interpreting spatial distributions of absorbed dose. The methodology was implemented for a thyroid cancer patient w/ diffuse lung mets. SPECT/CT obtained, 27, 74 and 147 h post-administration of 37 MBq 131I were registered and used to derive regional kinetics and disintegration number in tumor and lung voxels. The Electron Gamma Shower (EGS) Monte Carlo code was used to obtain an absorbed dose map. To obtain BED distributions, monoexponential repair kinetics were assumed with repair rate parameter, µ = 1.3 /h and 1.5 /h for thyroid carcinoma and normal lung voxels, respectively (Fowler. 988). Corresponding parameters used in the LQ model were 0.37 /Gy and 0.017 /Gy for and 0.028 /Gy2 and 0.0052 /Gy2 for (Gaussen, et al. 91999 and Van Dyk, et al 91981, respectively). Results: The average absorbed dose to tumor and lungs was 12.7 mGy/MBq and 34.1 mGy/MBq, respectively. The EUBED values for 1.31, 1.85, and 3.70 GBq 131I were 16.5, 22.9, and 44.3 Gy for lung and 30.0, 39.0, and 66.5 Gy for tumor, respectively. At 1.85 MBq (50 mCi) administered, the mean tumor absorbed dose is 63.1 Gy and the lung absorbed dose is 23.5 Gy. The tumor EUBED is 39.0 Gy, a 1.6-fold reduction. In contrast, the lung EUDBED is 22.3 Gy. In both cases, the reduction was primarily the result of spatial dose distribution rather than dose rate since the EUD for both tissues was very similar to the EUDBED. Conclusions: This methodology, combined with patient-specific dosimetry is expected to provide better guidance regarding efficacy and toxicity in radionuclide therapy. Research Support (if any): DOE grant DE-FG01-04ER04 17 NIH R01 CA116477
UPC++ as_eager Working Group Draft, Revision 2020.6.2

Author(s): Bonachea, Dan | Abstract: This draft proposes an extension for a new future-based completion variant that can be more effectively streamlined for RMA and atomic access operations that happen to be satisfied at runtime using purely node-local resources. Many such operations are most efficiently performed synchronously using load/store instructions on shared-memory mappings, where the actual access may only require a few CPU instructions. In such cases we believe it’s critical to minimize the overheads imposed by the UPC++ runtime and completion queues, in order to enable efficient operation on hierarchical node hardware using shared-memory bypass. The new upcxx::{source,operation}_cx::as_eager_future() completion variant accomplishes this goal by relaxing the current restriction that future-returning access operations must return a non-ready future whose completion is deferred until a subsequent explicit invocation of user-level progress. This relaxation allows access operations that are completed synchronously to instead return a ready future, thereby avoiding most or all of the runtime costs associated with deferment of future completion and subsequent mandatory entry into the progress engine. We additionally propose to make this new as_eager_future() completion variant the new default completion for communication operations that currently default to returning a future. This should encourage use of the streamlined variant, and may provide performance improvements to some codes without source changes. A mechanism is proposed to restore the legacy behavior on-demand for codes that might happen to rely on deferred completion for correctness. Finally, we propose a new as_eager_promise() completion variant that extends analogous improvements to promise-based completion, and corresponding changes to the default behavior of as_promise().
Regulating the global illicit economy: Singapore's role in United States' spatial financial surveillance

Abstract Illicit transactions are increasingly integrated to legitimate financial flows between international financial centers (IFCs) and offshore jurisdictions (OJs). The United States (US) is actively engaged in regulating illicit transactions through anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing (AML/CFT) regulations backed by economic sanctions statutes. In this paper, I show how US sanctions regulatory capacity has developed by scaling out compliance and enforcement functions to state regulators and advanced business services (ABS) intermediaries in Singapore. Scaling out draws on a relational scale framework that locates the multiscalar surveillance of IFCs and OJs' entangled financial networks as an instrument for governing the illicit global economy. At the same time, Singapore's enrolment in US financial surveillance benefits the financial center by strengthening the city-state's regulatory functions. Using cases of high-profile illicit financial activities as well as interviews with regulatory agents in Singapore and to a lesser extent the US, the paper shows how multiscalar compliance and enforcement practices support US′ extra-jurisdictional discipline of rogue actors and jurisdictions while augmenting Singapore's stature as a clean and trusted financial center.
A combined computational and experimental study of methane activation during oxidative coupling of methane (OCM) by surface metal oxide catalysts.

The experimentally validated computational models developed herein, for the first time, show that Mn-promotion does not enhance the activity of the surface Na2WO4 catalytic active sites for CH4 heterolytic dissociation during OCM. Contrary to previous understanding, it is demonstrated that Mn-promotion poisons the surface WO4 catalytic active sites resulting in surface WO5 sites with retarded kinetics for C-H scission. On the other hand, dimeric Mn2O5 surface sites, identified and studied via ab initio molecular dynamics and thermodynamics, were found to be more efficient in activating CH4 than the poisoned surface WO5 sites or the original WO4 sites. However, the surface reaction intermediates formed from CH4 activation over the Mn2O5 surface sites are more stable than those formed over the Na2WO4 surface sites. The higher stability of the surface intermediates makes their desorption unfavorable, increasing the likelihood of over-oxidation to CO x , in agreement with the experimental findings in the literature on Mn-promoted catalysts. Consequently, the Mn-promoter does not appear to have an essential positive role in synergistically tuning the structure of the Na2WO4 surface sites towards CH4 activation but can yield MnO x surface sites that activate CH4 faster than Na2WO4 surface sites, but unselectively.
Objective Laryngoscopic Measures From Older Patients With Voice Complaints and Signs of Aging.

Purpose The purpose of this study was to use objective measures of glottal gap, bowing, and supraglottic compression from selected images of laryngoscopic examinations from adults over 60 years of age with voice complaints and signs of aging to test current hypotheses on whether degree of severity impacts treatment recommendations and potential follow-through with treatment. Method Records from 108 individuals 60 years or older with voice complaints and signs of aging were reviewed. Three objective measures (normalized glottal gap area [NGGA], total bowing index, and normalized true vocal fold width) were derived. Each measure was subsequently divided into three categories by severity: absence, small degree, or large degree. Nonparametric statistics tested associations between severity and treatment recommendations as well as potential follow-through. Results Noninvasive treatments (observation/voice therapy) were marginally associated with no glottal gap (p = .09). More invasive treatments (injection/bilateral thyroplasty) were associated with glottal gaps being present (p = .026), but bilateral thyroplasty recommendations were not significantly associated with the largest gaps. Treatment modalities were not characterized by specific severity categories for any of the objective measures. No significant differences were found for any of the three objective measures between those who followed through with recommended treatment and those who did not. Discussion Results demonstrated some support for current hypotheses on how degrees of severity of objective measures relate to treatment recommendations. Of the three measures, NGGA appears to be more informative regarding treatment recommendations and follow-through, but due to low power, larger sample sizes are needed to confirm clinical relevance.
Holomorphic Projective Structures and Invariant Distances

In analogy with the intrinsic pseudo-distance on complex analytic spaces (see [3]), I introduced a projectively invariant pseudo-distance on affine and projective manifolds, [4], The same construction can be applied to holomorphic affine and, more generally, projective structures to produce an intrinsic pseudo-distance which depends not only on the complex structure but on the given holomorphic projective structure. In this lecture, I will discuss a few examples of holomorphic projective structures and their projective pseudo-distances, referring for details to [7].
Clinical Assessment of Autonomic Failure

Publisher Summary This chapter focuses on a clinical test for the autonomic nervous system (ANS). Autonomic tests are easy to perform, but they may be difficult to interpret in an individual patient. Most physicians who routinely treat patients with autonomic disorders develop a small armamentarium of tests they feel comfortable with and rely on. For a neurologist, tests of peripheral sudomotor function may form the organizing nucleus of autonomic evaluation; for a cardiologist, it may be tests of blood pressure and heart rate; for an endocrinologist, it may be circulating catecholamines and renin; for an ophthalmologist, it may be pupillary tests; and for a pharmacologist, it may be drug tests for evidence of stimulated autonomic function or hypersensitivity. Despite such dramatically divergent diagnostic approaches, it is remarkable how much consensus is often achieved in terms of the actual diagnosis and therapy of an individual patient.
The Clinical Usefulness of Serum Prostate Specific Antigen After Hormonal Therapy of Metastatic Prostate Cancer

AbstractWe longitudinally followed serum prostate specific antigen (PSA) levels in 48 patients who were treated with either orchiectomy, monthly luteinizing hormone-releasing hormone injection or continuous diethylstilbestrol for stage D2 prostate adenocarcinoma and achieved an objective response. Of the patients 34 had clinical evidence of disease progression (median remission duration 19 months). Median length of followup for the 14 patients who remained in remission was 42 months. Pretreatment performance status, pretreatment extent of metastases as measured by a bone scan and post-treatment nadir PSA level were univariately correlated with remission duration. After adjustment for the 2 former pretreatment variables, a highly significant independent effect of the nadir PSA level on remission duration persisted. Patients whose post-treatment nadir PSA level decreased below 4ng./ml. had a significantly longer remission duration than those whose nadir PSA remained elevated (median 42 versus 10 months, p <...
On the biological occurrence and regulation of 1-acyl and 1-O-alkyl-diradylglycerols in human neutrophils. Selective destruction of diacyl species using Rhizopus lipase.

Abstract The occurrence and regulation of 1-ether-linked diradylglycerol in human neutrophils were investigated using a sensitive and practical analytical mass method which distinguishes 1-O-alkyl- (EAG) versus 1-acyl (DAG) diglycerides. After phosphorylation of diglycerides to the corresponding [32P]phosphatidic acids using [gamma-32P]ATP and diglyceride kinase (Preiss, J., Loomis, C. R., Bishop, W. R., Stein, R., Niedel, J. E., and Bell, R. M. (1986) J. Biol. Chem. 261, 8597-8600), lipase from Rhizopus arrhizus selectively degraded the 1-acyl-containing species (DAG), but the ether lipid (EAG) was resistant and was identified and quantified after thin layer chromatography separation. By using this method, unstimulated neutrophils were demonstrated to contain both DAG and EAG (100-180 and 40-95 pmol/10(7) cells, respectively). The chemoattractant formyl-methionyl-leucyl-phenylalanine (fMLP) caused a rapid (30 s) and transient increase (1.6-fold) in DAG, but no increase in EAG. Opsonized zymosan produced a 6-8-fold sustained increase in DAG peaking at 2 to 3 min, but only a small (1.7-fold) increase in EAG which was not seen until later times (10 min). Thus, under these stimulation conditions, the major diglyceride was DAG. However, in neutrophils "primed" with cytochalasin B or phorbol ester, formyl-methionyl-leucyl-phenylalanine caused a significant increase in EAG. Neutrophils pretreated with cytochalasin B and then stimulated by fMLP showed a rapid (15-60 s) increase (more than 3-fold) in total diglycerides which was sustained beyond 5 min. At the earliest time points (15-30 s), the increase was due almost entirely to DAG (3-fold), but at 1 min and beyond, EAG comprised as much as 40% of the total (up to a 5-fold increase in EAG). Neutrophils pretreated with phorbol ester prior to fMLP stimulation showed a rapid (around 30 s) more than 2-fold increase in both DAG and EAG. Thus, priming conditions (in particular cytochalasin B) may alter either the access of phospholipase(s) C and/or D to membrane phospholipids or may affect their activities, allowing hydrolysis of 1-O-alkyl-containing lipids to generate 1-O-alkyl-containing diglycerides.
Fault-tolerant computer system design

Fault-Tolerant Computer System Design by Dhiraj K. Pradhan 550 pp. $72 Prentice Hall Upper Saddle River, N.J. 1996 ISBN 0-13-057887-8
Human neutrophil collagenase : a distinct gene product with homology to other matrix metalloproteinases

We have identified and sequenced a cDNA encoding human neutrophil collagenase from a lambda gt11 cDNA library constructed from mRNA extracted from the peripheral leukocytes of a patient with chronic granulocytic leukemia. The library was screened with an oligonucleotide probe constructed from the putative zinc-binding region of fibroblast collagenase. Eleven positive clones were identified, of which the one bearing the largest insert (2.2 kilobases (kb)) was sequenced. From the nucleotide sequence of the 2.2-kb cDNA clone we have deduced a 467-amino acid sequence representing the entire coding sequence of the enzyme. The deduced protein was confirmed as neutrophil collagenase by conformity with the amino-terminal sequence analyses of three tryptic peptides of purified neutrophil collagenase. The cDNA clone hybridizes to a 3.3-kb mRNA present in RNA extracted from human bone marrow but did not hybridize with RNA isolated from U937 cells induced to differentiate with phorbol myristate acetate. Neutrophil collagenase was found to possess 57% identity with the deduced protein sequence for fibroblast collagenase with 72% chemical similarity. Certain regions of the molecule, including the putative zinc-binding region, are highly conserved. When compared with the published sequence for fibroblast collagenase, neutrophil collagenase contains four additional sites for glycosylation. Medium from COS-7 cells transfected with a pcDNA1 eucaryotic expression vector containing cDNA for neutrophil collagenase degraded type I collagen into the three-quarter, one-quarter fragments characteristic of mammalian interstitial collagenase activity. Thus, definitive evidence based on the cDNA sequence confirms the neutrophil collagenase is a distinct gene product and a member of the family of matrix metalloproteinases.
Survival of the weakest

Many asteroids have a porous structure, which helps them absorb energy from collisions without being smashed to bits. This shows how planets might have formed, but could be bad news should an asteroid ever threaten Earth.
Comparison of height-averaged and point-measured capillary pressure–saturation relations for sands using a modified Tempe cell

[1] Tempe cells and similar devices are often used for measurements of capillary pressure versus saturation relationships (retention curves) of soils. Average water saturation within the sample is often used as the representative saturation. For cases where the saturation distribution along the cell height is nonuniform, use of the height-averaged water saturation artificially smoothes the retention curve when the capillary pressure head reaches the displacement pressure head. This leads to an inaccurate representation of the retention curve in flow modeling. For nine test sands with a wide range of displacement pressure head values (6–78 cm of water), height-averaged and point-measured retention curves were simultaneously obtained to investigate the effect of the height-averaging procedure. A Tempe cell was used, which was modified by installing a small time domain reflectometry probe and a tensiometer at the midpoint of the sample height to measure water saturation and pressure, respectively. When the sample height is large relative to the displacement pressure head, the bulk drainage (initial drainage at the top of the sample) leads to inaccuracies in the determination of retention curves. For such cases, point-measured saturation should be used, otherwise height correction is necessary.
Indium/Ammonium Chloride‐Mediated Selective Reduction of Aromatic Nitro Compounds: Ethyl 4‐aminobenzoate

Ethyl-4-aminobenzoate Ethyl-4-nitrobenzoate Ammonium chloride Indium Keywords: indium; ammonium chloride; selective reduction; aromatic nitro compounds; waste disposal; ecologically friendly reagents
Dynamics and Control of the Cumulative Mass Fraction of a Particle Size Distribution

A transfer function for the dynamics of the cumulative mass fraction (CMF) of a particle size distribution (PSD) is developed. It fits the general form G p =P 1 (s)-P 2 (s)e-Tds/Q(s) frequently encountered in systems modeled by hyperbolic partial differential equations. Systems of this type are given the name quasi rational distributed systems (QRDS). QRDS can have an infinity of right half-plane zeros but do not exhibit delayed or inverse response. A procedure for designing predictive controllers for QRDS using a Smith predictor structure is presented. It uses pole placement to obtain a controller parameterization with the adjustable parameters being selected to satisfy robustness specifications. A controller for CMF, designed using this procedure, performs better than a PID controller.
Thrombin-thrombomodulin interaction: energetics and potential role of water as an allosteric effector.

The interaction of rabbit lung thrombomodulin (TM) and C-terminal hirudin 54-65 fragment (Hir54-65) with human alpha-thrombin were investigated by exploiting their competitive inhibition of thrombin-fibrinogen interaction. Measurements of Ki values for TM and Hir54-65 interactions with human alpha-thrombin performed over a temperature range spanning from 10 to 40 degrees C showed a constant enthalpy for both ligands. The enthalpic and entropic contributions to the free energy of binding, however, are different for TM and the hirudin peptide. The calculated values of delta H and delta S, in fact, were -47.3 +/- 2.51 kJ (-11.3 +/- 0.6 kcal)/mol and -42.7 +/- 7.9 J (-10.2 +/- 1.9 cal)/mol.K for the hirudin peptide, while being -22.9 +/- 2.09 kJ (-5.47 +/- 0.5 kcal)/mol and 102.50 +/- 6.69 J (24.5 +/- 1.6 cal)/mol.K respectively for TM binding. These findings indicate that the interaction between thrombin and Hir54-65 is largely driven by the enthalpic contribution, whereas the positive entropy change is the driving force for the formation of the thrombin-TM complex. In other experiments performed in the presence of various concentrations of either sorbitol or sucrose it could be demonstrated that the value of the equilibrium association constant for thrombin-TM interaction increases as a function of the osmotic pressure, while the thrombin-Hir54-65 interaction was not affected by the same conditions. Moreover, control experiments showed that no major conformational changes are produced on TM by osmotic pressures used in the present study. From these experiments it was calculated that roughly 35 water molecules are released into the bulk water upon TM binding. Such a phenomenon, which is likely to be responsible for the entropic change described above, indicates the relevance of hydration processes for the formation of the thrombin-TM adduct.