cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
The Magnitude of Maternal Mortality: Definitions and Methods of Measurement

Over 200 million women become pregnant each year and 130 million bear children. Each year nearly 500,000 women die as a result of complications of pregnancy or childbearing. Ninety-nine percent of these deaths would be prevented if the lowest mortality rates in developed countries were achieved worldwide. Moreover, all regions of the World Health Organization (WHO) give high priority to lowering maternal mortality to achieve ‘Health for A11’ by the year 2000. Even in developed countries with low maternal mortality, such as the United States, an estimated 50 percent or more of maternal deaths are preventable—and lowering the rate to five per 100,000 live births is among the United States’ stated public health priorities.
Sleep Disorders in Epilepsy

Publisher Summary Many patients with epilepsy complain of excessive daytime sleepiness (EDS) or fatigue. These symptoms are commonly attributed to the effects of antiepileptic drugs (AEDs) or seizures. The impact of sleep disorders on quality of life is becoming increasingly recognized. EDS is the most common complaint of subjects referred to sleep disorder centers. Of those referred for polysomnography(PSG) for the evaluation of EDS, sleep apnea is identified in approximately 75%, narcolepsy in 20%, and restless legs syndrome (RLS) or periodic limb movements in sleep (PLMS) in 5% of cases. The incidence of primary sleep disorders in the epileptic population is unknown. The literature contains mostly retrospective studies in which patients with epilepsy and suspected sleep disorders are included. Studies have confirmed a high incidence of primary sleep disorders in subjects with epilepsy and sleep complaints. Despite limited follow-up, daytime sleepiness improves with treatment of the sleep disorder in most cases. Seizures occurring both at night and during the day can affect sleep architecture and produce daytime sleepiness. This chapter concludes that insomnia is a common reason for discontinuation of the drugs.
A Dual Frequency Ultrasound Technique for the Improved Detection of Bimodal Nanosized Contrast Agents

Every biomedical imaging technique exploits different physical principles and can provide peculiar information, which is often unachievable with different techniques and can be further enhanced by the employment of suitable contrast agents (CAs). However, each imaging technique typically requires its own specific CAs, with corresponding increments of procedure duration, costs and invasiveness for the patients, who should undergo two injections. In the last years, great effort has been addressed toward the development of multimodal CAs that can be real-time detected by different techniques. In this context, we developed a new type of bimodal nanoparticles (NPs), consisting of silica nanospheres (NSs) covered by an outer shell of smaller superparamagnetic NPs, to be used as dual-mode imaging CAs for ultrasound and magnetic resonance imaging techniques. Aim of the present study was to evaluate the echographic detectability of these bimodal NPs through a recently developed algorithm that was originally implemented to detect pure silica NSs. In particular, we performed a series of “in vitro” experiments on custom-designed tissue- mimicking phantoms, focused on a specific objective of direct clinical interest: the detection of multimodal NPs with a diameter of about 330 nm at a low and biocompatible volume concentration (0.2 %). The obtained results demonstrated the possibility of deleting the US echoes coming from structures other than NPs with high effectiveness, therefore enhancing the brightness of nanosized contrast agents in the final diagnostic images. The effectiveness of the proposed method shows very promising perspectives for future clinical applications.
Evaluating the impact and equity of a tobacco-free pharmacy law on retailer density in New York City neighbourhoods.

Background In 2018, New York City (NYC) implemented a tobacco-free pharmacy law as part of a comprehensive policy approach to curb tobacco use. This study models the reduction in tobacco retailer density following the ban to examine differences in the policy’s impact across neighbourhoods. Methods Tobacco retailer density per 1000 residents was calculated in July 2017 for each of NYC’s Neighborhood Tabulation Areas (NTAs, n=188) before and after removing pharmacies as licensed tobacco retailers. Pearson correlations and linear regression (with predictors scaled to 10 unit increments) measured associations between the projected change in retailer density after the ban and NTA demographic characteristics. Results On average, retailer density decreased by 6.8% across neighbourhoods (SD: 6.3), with 17 NTAs experiencing reductions over 15%. Density reduction was greater in NTAs with higher median household income (r: 0.41, B: 1.00, p Conclusions NYC’s tobacco-free pharmacy law substantially reduces tobacco retailer density overall, but the impact is not equal across neighbourhoods. In order to minimise disparities in the tobacco retail environment, local governments considering a similar ban should supplement this strategy with other retailer restrictions to achieve equitable outcomes.
Feature-Based SLAM for Imaging Sonar with Under-Constrained Landmarks

Recent algorithms have demonstrated the feasibility of underwater feature-based SLAM using imaging sonar. But previous methods have either relied on manual feature extraction and correspondence or used prior knowledge of the scene, such as the planar scene assumption. Our proposed system provides a general-purpose method for feature-point extraction and correspondence in arbitrary scenes. Additionally, we develop a method of identifying point landmarks that are likely to be well-constrained and reliably reconstructed. Finally, we demonstrate that while under-constrained landmarks cannot be accurately reconstructed themselves, they can still be used to constrain and correct the sensor motion. These advances represent a large step towards general-purpose, feature-based SLAM with imaging sonar.
Food insecurity and disability in the United States

Abstract Background Households with a disabled adult are disproportionately food insecure, yet the mechanisms linking food insecurity to disability are under-specified. Objective To develop and empirically examine a model of the potential pathways connecting specific types of disability with food insecurity. Methods With pooled, repeated cross-sectional National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey data (1999–2014) including 38,354 participants, we ran probit models to estimate the probability of being food insecure as a function of different sets of disability measures and our control variables. We explored the extent to which these patterns differed for prime-aged individuals (19–59) from those age 60 and older. Results Work-limiting disabilities, functional limitations, and trouble managing money were associated with an increased likelihood of food insecurity for both prime-aged and older individuals, net of other forms of disability. Mobility limitations, trouble seeing, and trouble hearing increased the likelihood of food insecurity for prime-aged individuals only. Conclusion These findings suggest that disabilities are associated with food insecurity through multiple pathways. Revised public health and policy solutions are needed to address the high rates of food insecurity among those with disabilities.
A Computational Assay that Explores the Hemagglutinin/Neuraminidase Functional Balance Reveals the Neuraminidase Secondary Site as a Novel Anti-Influenza Target

Studies of pathogen–host specificity, virulence, and transmissibility are critical for basic research as well as for assessing the pandemic potential of emerging infectious diseases. This is especially true for viruses such as influenza, which continue to affect millions of people annually through both seasonal and occasional pandemic events. Although the influenza virus has been fairly well studied for decades, our understanding of host-cell binding and its relation to viral transmissibility and infection is still incomplete. Assessing the binding mechanisms of complex biological systems with atomic-scale detail is challenging given current experimental limitations. Much remains to be learned, for example, about how the terminal residue of influenza-binding host-cell receptors (sialic acid) interacts with the viral surface. Here, we present an integrative structural-modeling and physics-based computational assay that reveals the sialic acid association rate constants (kon) to three influenza sites: the h...
Comparative Stability Analysis for Common Grid-Connected PV Inverter Control Strategies

When connected to distribution networks with distorted grid voltages, inverters can easily produce high levels of current harmonics. When these networks have high interface impedances, the control schemes designed to mitigate these harmonics can become destabilized. This paper compares the relative stability of several different control schemes used for this purpose. Specific comparisons are made when connected to a purely inductive grid with impedance as high as 10% per unit. The paper compares multiple resonant control, repetitive control, and a new multirate control scheme.
Methanesulfonyl-polarized halogen bonding enables strong halide recognition in an arylethynyl anion receptor.

A 3,5-bis((2-iodophenyl)ethynyl)pyridinium scaffold was synthesized which introduces the use of methanesulfonyl withdrawing groups to polarize iodine halogen bonding units for anion binding. We investigate the capability of this receptor to bind halides in polar media, while further probing the structure–property relationship of this well-polarized yet under-explored halogen bonding system.
Expansion of multi-rate capabilities for agile DPSK lasercom transceivers (Conference Presentation)

Flexible multi-rate capabilities are attractive for communications over the dynamic free-space optical (FSO) channel since it enables links to be efficiently established over a variety of distances, channel conditions, aperture sizes, and transmitter power levels. Recently, multi-rate differential phase shift keying (DPSK) modulation has been shown to provide good performance with modest complexity over a wide range of data rates. For these reasons, multi-rate DPSK has become the high-rate baseline format for NASA’s Laser Communication Relay Demonstration (LCRD) and other space-based FSO systems currently in development, operating at channel rates from 72 Mbit/s to 2.88 Gbit/s. Here, we report WDM-scalable power-efficient optical-transceiver advances that can extend single-channel rates by a factor of four to 11.52 Gbit/s using LCRD-compatible waveforms. Transmitter waveforms are implemented using time-frequency-windowed directly modulated lasers (DMLs) that can generate burstmode 2-DPSK and 4-DPSK waveforms at the standard LCRD 2.88 GHz symbol rate and twice the rate at 5.76 GHz. At the receiver, standard 2.88 GHz delay-line-interferometer (DLI) based demodulation is implemented for 2-DPSK. For 4-DPSK, a second 2.88 GHz DLI is required to demodulate the 2-bit-persymbol format, with the pair of DLIs biased at ±/4. With proper precoding of the transmitter waveforms, the double-rate 5.76 GHz symbols may be demodulated using the same 2.88 GHz DLIs using non-adjacent DPSK demodulation. In this manner, a common DPSK receiver platform may be used to demodulate standard multi-rate LCRD waveforms as well as 4-DSPK waveforms at 1x and 2x the standard symbol rate.
Effects of Type and Strength of Force Feedback on the Path of Movement in a Target Selection Task

New flight deck technologies being developed under the proposed NextGen National Airspace System will require precise and efficient input from flight crews. The benefits of force feedback for these types of inputs in terms of a reduction in overall movement times have been shown in the past; however, an important component of input efficiency is the path taken by the cursor. The present study investigates the effects of multiple levels of two types of force feedback (gravitational and spring forces) on the path of movement for a target selection task. Mean square error from an ideal straight line path and cursor speeds in terms of the distance from the target were measured. Results suggest that increasing the gravitational force has an effect on path error at short distances and produces higher cursor speeds as the target is approached.
Phylogenetics in HIV transmission: taking within-host diversity into account

Purpose of reviewWithin-host diversity complicates transmission models because it recognizes that between-host virus phylogenies are not identical to the transmission history among the infected hosts. This review presents the biological and theoretical foundations for recent development in this fiel
Healthy Code Reveals the Problem and Solution

Source code reveals abstractions from two places: the problem and the solution. It's easier to design and evolve a system when you understand each of them separately before you combine them in code. With skill, it's possible to separate those concerns in the code. Declarative understanding of the abstractions is the most useful and easy to convey. However, current software development processes rarely guide developers to do this.
Deep neural network architectures to approximate the fluid-filled pore size distributions of subsurface geological formations

Abstract Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) is a popular nondestructive technique used for sensing subsurface and near-surface geological formations to characterize the fluid-filled pore size distribution. NMR logging tools excite fluid-filled geological formations and record the resulting T1 and T2 relaxations/decays as well logs. At any given depth, T2 relaxation is processed to obtain the T2 distribution, which can be used to estimate the fluid mobility, fluid components, and fluid-filled pore size distribution critical for developing and producing from hydrocarbon- and water-bearing reservoirs. However, the acquisition of subsurface NMR log is limited due to financial expense and operational challenges in its subsurface deployment. This chapter develops four deep neural network architectures that process the conventional “easy-to-acquire” logs to synthesize the NMR T2 distribution, which approximate fluid-filled pore size distribution, along a 300-ft depth interval in a shale oil reservoir. We implement the following architectures: variational autoencoder (VAE) assisted neural network (VAE-NN), generative adversarial network (GAN) assisted neural network (GAN-NN), long short-term memory (LSTM) network, and variational autoencoder with a convolutional layer (VAEc) network. The performance of trained VAE-NN, GAN-NN, LSTM, and VAEc on 100 discrete test depths in terms of coefficient of determination, R2, is 0.75, 0.8, 0.78, and 0.75, respectively.
Regulation of mTOR signaling by long non-coding RNA

Abstract The mechanistic target of rapamycin (mTOR) is a major signaling hub that coordinates cellular and organismal responses, such as cell growth, proliferation, apoptosis, and metabolism. Dysregulation of mTOR signaling occurs in many human diseases, and there are significant ongoing efforts to pharmacologically target this pathway. Long noncoding RNAs (lncRNA), defined by a length > 200 nucleotides and absence of a long open-reading-frame, are a class of non-protein-coding RNAs. Mutations and dysregulations of lncRNAs are directly linked to the development and progression of many diseases, including cancer, diabetes, and neurologic disorders. Recent findings reveal diverse functions for lncRNA that include transcriptional regulation, organization of nuclear domains, and regulation of proteins or RNA molecules. Despite considerable development in our understanding of lncRNA over the past decade, only a fraction of annotated lncRNAs has been examined for biological function. In addition, lncRNAs have emerged as therapeutic targets due to their ability to modulate multiple pathways, including mTOR signaling. This review will provide an up-to-date summary of lncRNAs that are involved in regulating mTOR pathway.
Cervical spine evaluation in pediatric trauma: A cost-effectiveness analysis.

Abstract Objective The emergent evaluation of children with suspected traumatic cervical spine injuries (CSI) remains a challenge. Pediatric clinical pathways have been developed to stratify the risk of CSI and guide computed tomography (CT) utilization. The cost-effectiveness of their application has not been evaluated. Our objective was to examine the cost-effectiveness of three common strategies for the evaluation of children with suspected CSI after blunt injury. Methods We developed a decision analytic model comparing these strategies to estimate clinical outcomes and costs for a hypothetical population of 0–17 year old patients with blunt neck trauma. Strategies included: 1) clinical pathway to stratify risk using NEXUS criteria and determine need for diagnostic testing; 2) screening radiographs as a first diagnostic; and 3) immediate CT scanning for all patients. We measured effectiveness with quality-adjusted life years (QALYs), and costs with 2018 U.S. dollars. Costs and effectiveness were discounted at 3% per year. Results The use of the clinical pathway results in a gain of 0.04 QALYs and a cost saving of $2800 compared with immediate CT scanning of all patients. Use of the clinical pathway was less costly and more effective than immediate CT scan as long as the sensitivity of the clinical prediction rule was greater than 87% and when the sensitivity of x-ray was greater than 84%. Conclusion A strategy using a clinical pathway to first stratify risk before further diagnostic testing was less costly and more effective than either performing CT scanning or screening cervical radiographs on all patients.
Iatrogenic Tibia Fracture from an "Errant" Traction Pin Placement Resulting in a Cortical Defect: A Case Study.

Case A 78-year-old women presented with a closed left midshaft femur fracture after sustaining a fall from standing height and underwent proximal tibial traction pin placement. After subsequent intramedullary nailing of femur fracture, the patient returned 2 months later with a proximal tibia fracture through the unicortical defect left from the traction pin site and underwent successful intramedullary nailing of the tibia. Conclusion Errant anteriorly placed proximal tibial traction pins pass tangentially across the vertex of the tibia and create residual unicortical defects that may increase the risk for late iatrogenic pin site fractures.
The Neurohistochemistry of Mammalian Ureter

Publisher Summary This chapter discusses the neurohistochemistry of mammalian ureter. It presents histochemical evidence of balanced adrenergic and cholinergic mechanisms in each ureteral layer, the localization of one group of ganglion cells (adrenergic and cholinergic) at the ureterovesical junction and the presence of a few ganglion cells close to the pelviureteral junction. Adrenergic and cholinergic terminals exist in close anatomic proximity to these ganglion cells. A great number of sympathetic and parasympathetic fibers enter the ureteral wall with the blood vessels. Ganglion cells are consistently found in clusters in the lower ureteral segment and in a scattered distribution along the middle and upper segments. Some ganglion cells, generally in groups of 2–3, are occasionally located at the lower portion of the renal pelvis. These cells are more closely related to the blood vessels and the muscle surface than to the main nerve trunk itself.
Stability of food insecurity status in paediatric primary care.

Objective: The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends screening for food insecurity (FI) at all well-child visits due to well-documented negative effects of experiencing FI in childhood. Before age 3, children have twelve recommended primary care visits at which screening could occur. Little is known regarding the stability of FI status at this frequency of screening. Design: Data derived from electronic health records were used to retrospectively examine the stability of household FI status. Age-stratified (infant v. toddler) analyses accounted for age-based differences in visit frequency. Regression models with time since last screening as the predictor of FI transitions were estimated via generalised estimating equations adjusting for age and race/ethnicity. Setting: A paediatric primary care practice in Philadelphia. Participants: 3451 distinct patients were identified whose health record documented two or more household FI screens between April 1, 2012 and July 31, 2018 and were aged 0–3 years at first screen. Results: Overall, 9·5 % of patients had a transition in household FI status, with a similar frequency of transitioning from food insecure to secure (5·0 %) and from food secure to insecure (4·5 %). Families of toddlers whose last screen was more than a year ago were more likely to experience a transition to FI compared with those screened 0–6 months prior (OR 1·91 (95 % CI 1·05, 3·47)). Conclusions: Screening more than annually may not contribute substantially to the identification of transitions to FI.
Essential Workers: A Multiplayer Game for Enacting Patterns of Social Interdependency in a Pandemic

In order to understand a pandemic like the COVID-19 crisis of 2020, we have to keep in mind larger patterns (e.g., information visualizations such as charts), and individual perspectives (e.g., interviews). However, it is challenging to connect these larger patterns with lived experiences. In this work-in-progress paper, we argue that interactive digital experiences such as games have the potential to bridge this gap by allowing players to explore the pandemic at multiple levels of abstraction. We present Essential Workers: an online multiplayer game which situates players as one of four workers?Nurse, Grocery Worker, Office Worker, or Delivery Driver?who face difficult dilemmas as they live through three weeks of rising infection during the COVID-19 pandemic. Through a core cooperative game mechanic, Essential Workers seeks to tie the constraints and choices of the individual to the health of their communities, and to simulate some of the interdependencies that keep our communities functional during the pandemic. We aim to illustrate our approach to key challenges commonly faced by designers seeking to model the entanglements of the individual and society.
Hide and Seek: Costly Consumer Privacy in a Market with Repeat Purchases

When a firm can recognize its previous customers, it may use information about their past purchases in order to price discriminate. We study a model with a monopolist and a continuum of heterogeneous consumers, where consumers have the ability to maintain their anonymity and avoid being identified as past customers, possibly at a cost. When consumers can freely maintain their anonymity, they all individually choose to do so, which results in the highest profit for the monopolist. Increasing the cost of anonymity can benefit consumers, but only up to a point, after which the effect is reversed. We show that if the monopolist or an independent third party controls the cost of anonymity, it often works to the detriment of consumers.
The Diffusion of Cultural District Laws across US States

With the increasing number of cultural districts as place-based policies, one of the first questions that arise is: why do some states adopt cultural district laws but not others? Exploring the difference in timing of adoption by each state, I examine the determinants of cultural district laws. Following the policy diffusion literature I test whether there is government, imitation, and learning mechanisms driving the adoption of cultural district laws in the United States. The results suggest the presence of government competition and imitation mechanisms. That is, government compete with those nearby and close in production structure, and learn from those similar to them.
A Framework to Guide Educational Technology Studies in the Evolving Classroom Research Environment

Despite the drastic change to school environments due to the COVID-19 pandemic, it is still important that educational technology researchers conduct school-based research to understand the impact of technology in an authentic learning context, even remotely. However, the transition to remote research has made it challenging for researchers to collect classroom data, observe teacher-student-technology interactions, and facilitate study sessions. To explore how researchers can effectively plan and conduct technology-based educational studies in the new, evolving classroom research environment, we interviewed seven US teachers, investigating their perceptions of participating in remote classroom studies. Based on the findings and the authors’ experience of running classroom studies, we propose a framework that educational technology researchers can refer to when planning and conducting research in the evolving classroom research environment. Specifically, the framework informs researchers of several types of questions they can explore with teachers, students, and researchers themselves to be better prepared to address potential confusion, unexpected issues, and practical benefits in remote classroom research. Our work contributes by providing a practical guide for running technology-based research remotely, which may remain as a means of classroom research in the future. Some of the findings and the framework would also be applied to in-person classroom research setting.
Few-shot Learning for Post-disaster Structure Damage Assessment

Automating post-disaster damage assessment with remote sensing data is critical for faster surveys of structures impacted by natural disasters. One significant obstacle to training state-of-the-art deep neural networks to support this automation is that large quantities of labelled data are often required. However, obtaining those labels is particularly unrealistic to support post-disaster damage assessment in a timely manner. Few-shot learning methods could help to mitigate this by reducing the amount of labelled data required to successfully train a model while achieving satisfactory results. To this end, we explore a feature reweighting method to the YOLOv3 object detection architecture to achieve few-shot learning of damage assessment models on the xBD dataset. Our results show that the feature reweighting approach yield improved mAP over the baseline with significantly fewer labelled samples. In addition, we use t-SNE to analyze the class-specific reweighting vectors generated by the reweighting module in order to evaluate their inter-class and intra-class similarity. We find that the vectors form clusters based on class, and that these clusters overlap with visually similar classes. Those results show the potential to employ this few-shot learning strategy for rapid damage assessment with post-event remote sensing images.
Legal Precedents, Judicial Discretion, and the Diffusion of the Strict Liability Rule for Manufacturing Defects, 1963-87

This article reports the results of a study that uses social network analysis to compare the persuasiveness of legal precedents in the diffusion of the strict liability rule for manufacturing defects. This new study tests which legal precedents were most influential and also whether certain state judicial variables influenced the diffusion process. The results are striking. The federal circuit regions appeared to define an important reference group in the diffusion process and social network effects dominated economic and political variables. In addition, the de facto separation of powers in the enactment of new state legislation appeared to influence courts’ propensities to adopt the strict liability rule. When the executive and legislative branches were controlled by the same political party – regardless of whether it was the Republican or Democratic Party – state courts were more inclined to adopt the strict liability rule. This last result contradicts an economic hypothesis that predicts courts should be less inclined to exercise discretion when the de facto separation of powers between the executive and legislative branches is narrower.
Private Browsing Mode Not Really That Private: Dealing with Privacy Breach Caused by Browser Extensions

Private Browsing Mode (PBM) is widely supported by all major commodity web browsers. However, browser extensions can greatly undermine PBM. In this paper, we propose an approach to comprehensively identify and stop privacy breaches under PBM caused by browser extensions. Our approach is primarily based on run-time behavior tracking. We combine dynamic analysis and symbolic execution to represent extensions' behavior to identify privacy breaches in PBM caused by extensions. Our analysis shows that many extensions have not fulfilled PBM's guidelines on handling private browsing data. To the best of our knowledge, our approach also provides the first work to stop privacy breaches through instrumentation. We implemented a prototype SoPB on top of Firefox and evaluated it with 1,912 extensions. The results show that our approach can effectively identify and stop privacy breaches under PBM caused by extensions, with almost negligible performance impact.
Real Ease™ Nonstick Porcelain Enamel

RealEase is an innovative, ceramic-based nonstick coating developed by Ferro. It has excellent scratch, abrasion, and heat resistance as well as superb cleanability.
Prevalence of pain and association with psychiatric symptom severity in perinatally HIV-infected children as compared to controls living in HIV-affected households.

Abstract This cross-sectional study evaluated the prevalence of pain and psychiatric symptoms in perinatally HIV-infected children at entry into P1055, a multicenter investigation of the prevalence and severity of psychiatric symptoms in HIV-infected children. Subjects 6–17 years of age and their primary caregivers were recruited from 29 International Maternal Pediatric Adolescent AIDS Clinical Trials sites in the USA and Puerto Rico. A total of 576 children (320 HIV+ and 256 HIV– children) were enrolled from June 2005 to September 2006. Subject self-reports of pain were measured by the Wong–Baker visual analog scale and Short-Form McGill Pain Questionnaire. Symptomatology for anxiety, depression, and dysthymia was assessed through Symptom Inventory instruments. Caregiver's assessment of their child's pain and psychiatric symptomatology was similarly measured. Logistic regression models were used to evaluate predictors of pain. We found that a higher proportion of HIV-infected than uninfected subjects rep...
Stopping the Anthropological Machine: Agamben with Heidegger and Merleau-Ponty

Agamben maintains that Heidegger continues the work of the anthropological machine by defining Dasein as uniquely open to the closedness of the animal. Yet, Agamben’s own thinking does not so much open up the concept of animal as it attempts to save humanity from the anthropological machine that always produces the animal as the constitutive outside within the human itself. Agamben’s return to religious metaphors at best displaces the binary man-animal with the binary religion-science, and at worst returns us to a discourse at least as violent as the one from which he is trying to escape. Merleau-Ponty’s reanimation of science provides an alternative.
Effective ARQ protocols using adaptive modulation and symbol mapping diversity

We propose a generalized ARQ protocol that employs adaptive modulation and symbol mapping diversity for EEC-coded systems. By adapting the bit-to-symbol mapping for each retransmission, effective signal processing techniques can be developed to combine multiple transmissions to improve bit error rates (BER) and data throughput. Moreover, adapting the modulation for each retransmission can produce better bandwidth or energy efficiency, while maintaining good error rate performance through proper mapping selections. We discuss this proposed protocol, and develop a method for choosing mappings that optimize system performance. Simulation results indicate that rather substantial gains are achieved by mapping diversity.
The Tax Hike on Carried Interest

Congress is considering a bill that would increase taxes on the carried interest managers of private equity funds, hedge funds, and real estate funds receive. Although the arguments commonly made for the proposed change seem plausible at first glance, most of their plausibility disappears upon further scrutiny because most of these arguments are based on misunderstandings about carried interest and its tax treatment. It would be unwise to adopt this tax increase on investment when there is no compelling case that it will produce a more efficient allocation of capital.
Gastroscopy per gastrostomy: Another indication for the use of a small diameter flexible fiberoptic endoscope

Seven fiberoptic examinations of the upper gastrointestinal tract were performed through gastrostomies in 5 patients. In 3 of 4 attempts, a string was recovered from the stomach, allowing guided esophageal dilation. The technique permits limited examination of the gastric mucosa with a minimum of anesthesia. Disadvantages include inability to examine the esophagus and difficulty in advancing the instrument to the pylorus. Complications were limited to minor fissures at the stoma. "Gastroscopy per gastrostomy" is another indication for the use of small caliber fiberoptic endoscopes.
Hemopericardium in a Patient With Systemic Lupus Erythematosus

The Clinicopathological Conference in Circulation for July 21, 1998,1 was fascinating and ably discussed, with a useful review of the literature. I think one might supplement observations that might have been made during the patient’s hospital course and might have been acted on. There is no mention of the neck veins, which may have been difficult to “read,” but the echocardiographic description of the pericardial effusion includes “without evidence of hemodynamic compromise.” Quite clearly, this indicates absence of chamber collapses. However, collapses need not be present even in florid tamponade and particularly in some cases with chamber hypertrophy.2 Similarly, the absence of pulsus …
Abdominal pregnancy: Survey of the literature and report of an unusual case

Abstract Abdominal pregnancy has been reviewed on the basis of an analysis of 236 cases by Cornell and Lash and twenty-two more cases from the literature from the points of view of its incidence, etiology, methods of diagnosis, optimal time of operative intervention, and disposition of the placenta; and an unusual case, hitherto unreported, has been presented.
Molecular components of the circadian clock in mammals

The circadian clock mechanism in animals involves a transcriptional feedback loop in which the bHLH-PAS proteins CLOCK and BMAL1 form a transcriptional activator complex to activate the transcription of the Period and Cryptochrome genes, which in turn feed back to repress their own transcription. In the mouse liver, CLOCK and BMAL1 interact with the regulatory regions of thousands of genes, which are both cyclically and constitutively expressed. The circadian transcription in the liver is clustered in phase and this is accompanied by circadian occupancy of RNA polymerase II recruitment and initiation. These changes also lead to circadian fluctuations in histone H3 lysine4 trimethylation (H3K4me3) as well as H3 lysine9 acetylation (H3K9ac) and H3 lysine27 acetylation (H3K27ac). Thus, the circadian clock regulates global transcriptional poise and chromatin state by regulation of RNA polymerase II.
Interdepartmental Committee on Nutrition for National Defense Surveys in Asia and Africa

I suppose I should establish my bonafides for participation in this symposium. I did participate in 3 Interdepartmental Committee on Nutrition for National Defense (ICNND) surveys as far separated as one on the Blackfeet Indian Reservation (1) in Montana and 2 in Asia-Burma (2) and East Pakistan (3). In fact, the Blackfeet Reservation and Burma surveys were my training grounds for becoming the clinical chief for the East Pakistan survey and later the codirector. More importantly, in 1962, I followed Alan Forbes, who is much missed at this symposium, as the deputy to Arnie Schaefer at ICNND and NIH, and did have experience of an office in the Stone House on the NIH campus. There I participated in the transmutation of the ICNND to the Interdepartmental Committee on National Development and its alignment with the Office of International Research at the NIH and a repositioning within the Department of Health and Human Services. It was from this position that ICNND went on to organize some civilian surveys in the mid-1960s, including those in Central America and Panama (4), and it was from this position that the groundwork was laid for the application of ICNND techniques to the first U.S. domestic survey outside of an Indian reservation, culminating in the Ten State Nutrition Survey (5), which documented that there was hunger in America, as well as abroad.
GABAergic and Glutamatergic Modulation of Spontaneous and Motor-Cortex-Evoked Complex Spike Activity

Olivocerebellar activity is organized such that synchronous complex spikes occur primarily among Purkinje cells located within the same parasagittally oriented strip of cortex. Previous findings ha...
Ritual Communication and Use Value: The South Central Farm and the Political Economy of Place

This article examines factors that led to the destruction of the South Central Farm, a 14-acre urban garden that was bulldozed after a lengthy property rights battle. The analysis is guided by 2 theoretical frameworks—J. Carey's (1989) conception of the ritual and transmission views of communication, as well as J. R. Logan and H. L. Molotch's (1987) treatment of use and exchange value in the urban development “growth machine.” Although farm supporters blamed political corruption, this work argues that their defeat was consistent with the market-based logic of the contemporary city. While farmers demonstrated significant use value through ritual communication, their efforts were deemed illegitimate in a political economic landscape that prioritized exchange value and was dominated by a transmission view of communication.
Synthesis and Immunological Characterization of Toll-Like Receptor 7 Agonistic Conjugates

Activation of toll-like receptors (TLRs) on cells of the innate immune system initiates, amplifies, and directs the antigen-specific acquired immune response. Ligands that stimulate TLRs, therefore, represent potential immune adjuvants. In this study, a potent TLR7 agonist was conjugated to phospholipids, poly(ethylene glycol) (PEG), or phospholipid-PEG via a versatile benzoic acid functional group. Compared to the unmodified TLR7 agonist, each conjugate displayed a distinctive immunological profile in vitro and in vivo. In mouse macrophages and human peripheral blood mononuclear cells, the phospholipid TLR7 agonist conjugate was at least 100-fold more potent than the free TLR7 ligands, while the potency of PEG-phospholipid conjugate was similar to that of the unmodified TLR7 agonist. When administered systemically in mice, the phospholipid and phospholipid-PEG TLR7 conjugates induced prolonged increases in the levels of proinflammatory cytokines in serum, compared to the unmodified TLR7 activator. When the conjugates were used as adjuvants during vaccination, only the phospholipid TLR7 agonist conjugates induced both Th1 and Th2 antigen-specific immune responses. These data show that the immunostimulatory activity of a TLR7 ligand can be amplified and focused by conjugation, thus broadening the potential therapeutic application of these agents.
How Much In-Kind Support Do Low-Income Nonresident Fathers Provide? A Mixed-Method Analysis

Past child support research has largely focused on cash payments made through the courts (formal support) or given directly to the mother (informal support), almost to the exclusion of a third type: non-cash goods (in-kind support). Drawing on repeated, semistructured interviews with nearly 400 low-income noncustodial fathers, the authors found that in-kind support constitutes about one quarter of total support. Children in receipt of some in-kind support receive, on average, $60 per month worth of goods. Multilevel regression analyses demonstrated that children who are younger and have more hours of visitation, as well as those whose father has a high school education and no current substance abuse problem, receive in-kind support of greater value. Yet children whose fathers lack stable employment, or are Black, receive a greater proportion of their total support in kind. A subsequent qualitative analysis revealed that fathers' logic for providing in-kind support is primarily relational, and not financial.
Body Temperatures of White Leghorn Hens Infected With Salmonella Pullorum

Abstract IN connection with a study of the relationship between body temperature of the fowl and susceptibility to pullorum disease it seemed desirable to secure accurate information concerning the body temperatures of adult fowls infected with Salmonella pullorum and to compare them with temperatures of birds free from such infection. Data on this point seems to be lacking since studies of body temperatures in adult fowls have been confined chiefly to breed differences, diurnal and seasonal fluctuations, and the effects of broodiness. For this purpose the rectal temperatures of 200 S. C. W. Leghorn hens were determined. Of these 101 were controls from the departmental flock which had reacted negatively to tube agglutination tests for pullorum disease made at the New York State Veterinary College. The remainder were from other sources, reported to carry pullorum infection, and received by the Veterinary College for further study. Ninety-three of these were subsequently found . . .
Integrated job analysis: a technique to document job activities and to identify occupational risk factors and modes of remediation and accommodation.

AbstractIntegrated job analysis is a form of job evaluation that considers cognitive, physical, and environmental factors related to occupational performance, assessment, and rehabilitation. First, the analysis describes cognitive factors that determine worker interactions with data, people, and things and educational and training requirements. A task description is provided and tools used are identified, along with job physical requirements, environmental conditions, and personal protective equipment needs. Supplementary information is elicited to describe the environment, task requirements, workstations, and work areas. Based on this information, preliminary recommendations are made for abating occupational hazards, and accommodations for alternatively challenged individuals are identified. The value of this approach is in the detailed documentation of all occupational components regarding a specific job classification, which can then guide the development of meaningful pre-placement and periodic medica...
Surface roughness and optical transmission through CuCl.

The transmission of coherent laser light through the semiconductor CuCl is studied and consideration of the backward-propagating wave's contribution, produced by the mismatch of the boundary dielectric constants, is included in the treatment. The interference of the backward wave with the forward wave, the \'etalon effects, is absent from experimental data. We explain this discrepancy by assuming rough surfaces and treating an ensemble average of CuCl samples of different length. We conclude that surface roughness is an important experimental factor and that it may lead to an apparent attenuation which would be interpreted as an increase in the damping constants, especially for long samples.
Axial vector ward identities and dimensional regularization

Abstract Using dimensional regularization we examine the axial vector Ward identities of a spontaneously broken, locally gauge-invariant quantum field theory which is free from Adler-Bell-Jackiw anomalies. We show explicitly to the two- and three-loop level that these Ward identities are valid independently of several definitions of γs in n dimensions. We discuss the issues originally raised by Frampton, of whether or not there are new, mass-dependent anomalies. We show by an heuristic argument and by explicit calculation that such new anomalies vanish in 4 dimensions.
ON THE JOHNSON-NEYMAN TECHNIQUE AND SOME EXTENSIONS THEREOF

The Johnson-Neyman technique is a statistical tool used most frequently in educational and psychological applications. This paper starts by briefly reviewing the Johnson-Neyman technique and suggesting when it should and should not be used; then several different modifications and extensions of the Johnson-Neyman technique, all of them conceptually simple, are proposed. The close relation between confidence intervals and regions of significance of the Johnson-Neyman type is pointed out. The problem of what to do when more than two groups are being compared is considered. The situation of more than one criterion variable is also considered.
Measuring object location with load cells

This paper presents experimental results on the use of strain-gage load cells for the purpose of measuring the location of objects in the workspace of industrial robots. The measuring method and its realization steps are described. Data acquisition, signal conditioning, and interface with computers are addressed, and information about the hardware and software is given. Factors affecting the accuracy of the load cell method are discussed and recommendations are given.
Monotone optimal replacement policies for a Markovian deteriorating system in a controllable environment

We consider the optimal replacement of a periodically inspected system under Markov deterioration that operates in a controlled environment. Provided are sufficient conditions that characterize an optimal control-limit replacement policy with respect to the system's condition and its environment. The structure of the optimal policy is illustrated by a numerical example.
High-temperature superconductivity: To pair or not to pair?

Is the mysterious pseudogap in the copper oxide superconductors a signature of preformed pairs or a competing ordered state? Measurements of broken symmetries suggest that the pseudogap cannot originate from superconductivity alone.
Violence against women and postpartum depression: the experience of Chilean women

This article is based on the findings from a cross-sectional study of women (N = 163) who were at least two weeks postpartum and attending primary care clinics in Arica, Chile. The researcher in this study examined the prevalence of history of violence and its association with postpartum depression. The Women Abuse Screen and the Postpartum Depression Screening Scale-Spanish version were used to assess interpersonal violence and postpartum depression. A history of violence was reported by 64% of the women. Of those who experienced abuse, 44% reported ongoing abuse during their pregnancy. Women who experienced violence screened positive for elevated symptoms categories of postpartum depression such as anxiety/insecurity, emotional lability, and mental confusion compared to women who had not experienced violence. Postpartum depression symptom reporting decreased with increasing number of pregnancies (OR = 0.70, 95% CI 0.54-0.97) and greater social support (OR = 0.64, 95% CI 0.46-0.88). Postpartum depression symptom reporting increased with smoking (OR = 1.71, 95% CI 1.00-2.86), and with reporting history of violence (OR = 1.79, 95% CI 1.24-2.34). Acknowledgment of the strong association between domestic violence and postpartum depression should lead to routine screening during prenatal and postpartum periods as a way to isolate risk for postpartum depression.