cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Nanomedicine: the promise and challenges in cancer chemotherapy.

Cancer is a leading cause of death worldwide. Conventional chemotherapy has drawbacks ranging from limited effectiveness, chemoresistance, and treatment-related side-effects and damages to healthy tissues. The idea of drug targeting started to emerge as early as 1906. As outlined by Danhier et al., the challenge ahead is about how to find proper targets, to develop a drug that exploits the targets, and finally to design the proper delivery system (carrier) for the drug [1]. Cancer nanomedicine is the use of nano-sized entities (10–200 nm) to diagnose, prevent, or treat cancer. These entities can be loaded with chemotherapeutics, nucleic acids, radiosensitizers, diagnostic agents and/or probes. This chapter displays an updated review of several nano-carrier platforms, their common features, and applications, followed by a discussion of the major mechanisms by which nano-carriers are targeted to cancer cells. Finally it discusses barriers that hinder the applications of nanomedicine in cancer chemotherapy, and how the rational design of the nanomedicine may overcome these barriers.
Self-Assembly of Quantum Dot–Gold Heterodimer Nanocrystals with Orientational Order

The self-assembly of nanocrystals into ordered superlattices is a powerful strategy for the production of functional nanomaterials. The assembly of well-ordered target structures, however, requires control over the building blocks’ size and shape as well as their interactions. While nanocrystals with homogeneous composition are now routinely synthesized with high precision and assembled into various ordered structures, high-quality multicomponent nanocrystals and their ordered assemblies are rarely reported. In this paper, we demonstrate the synthesis of quantum dot–gold (QD-Au) heterodimers. These heterodimers possess a uniform shape and narrow size distribution and are capped with oleylamine and dodecyltrimethylammonium bromide (DTAB). Assembly of the heterodimers results in a superlattice with long-range orientational alignment of dimers. Using synchrotron-based X-ray measurements, we characterize the complex superstructure formed from the dimers. Molecular dynamics simulations of a coarse-grained mode...
A MONOGRAPH ON PASSIVE AND LOW ENERGY ALTERNATIVES IN THE UNITED STATES

ABSTRACT This country regional monograph briefly describes the status in the United States of passive and low energy alternatives. Information and information sources are provided concerning a number of areas, such as climate, building heating and cooling, wind systems, photovoltaics, biogas, hydropower, and solar agriculture. Special emphasis is given to design and performance trends for non-residential buildings.
From Development as Democracy to Innovation as Development

Current local, regional, and global economic and financial conditions and trends make the need to trigger, catalyze, and accelerate high quantity and quality entrepreneurial initiatives that are based on high quality and quantity innovations. Given the uncertainty and change inherent in the innovation process, management must develop skills and understanding of the process a method for managing the disruption. Technology changes the way society functions. The dramatic advances in technology over recent decades have collaterally precipitated wide sweeping and profound change to the functioning of almost every form of human exchange, the world over. Income inequality in the USA has being growing since the late 1970s, but easy credit and rising asset prices had allowed American households to increase financial leverage to finance consumption. Now an increasing number of academics and intellectuals recognize that the growing income inequality is one of the key aspects behind the financial crash. The first step in understanding how the income redistribution can lead to innovation and help an economy move from a stagnant state into a new sustainable economic growth path is to understand how long-term trends in rising and falling income inequality affect the market environment that firms must survive in. In the late twentieth and the beginning of the twenty first century, numerous scholars and practitioners such as Peter Drucker have identified knowledge as perhaps the sixth and most important key input and output factor of economic activity.
Poor Women and Community-Based Participation in Literacy Work in India

Participation in civil society represents a key strategy for achieving Education for All in international policy discourses (The Dakar Framework for Action, 2000; World Declaration on EFA, 1990). While the concept of participation in development terminology is not new, its usage in the global context of neo-liberalization imbues it with new meaning. Within the neo-liberal paradigm, economic and political policies have advocated an increased role for markets, privatization, and reduced social sector spending, accompanied simultaneously by deregulation and democratization (Afshar and Barrientos, 1999; Zaidi, 1999). Restructuring of the political economy along these lines has set in motion a reorganization of the civil society–state relationship. Governments are beginning to perceive their role as that of facilitator rather than provider, thus “creat[ing] conditions where agents other than those of the state can become efficient and effective direct providers” (Zaidi, 1999, p. 7). Participation in civil society assumes importance in this context, because the notion of citizenship appears to be redefined as “the active exercise of responsibilities, including economic self-reliance and political participation” (Schild, 1998, p. 94).
Economics of Education: Household Welfare, Poverty and Child Labour

A central aim of the Government of Ghana “is to have a civil, affordable, quality education at all levels, but in particular at the basic school level, where life really begins”, as cited in the interview with the Minister of Education in late 2010. Education is, however, still not civil (universal) and remains unaffordable for many of the well over a million children of basic school-age who are at the periphery of the school system often due to direct and indirect costs as well as associated opportunity costs of schooling. This chapter sheds light on the interrelationships between schooling, poverty and child labour. It explores the basic question of how widespread levels of poverty and income inequalities across the country affect the demand for, supply of and exclusion from educational services. It also examines, on the same token, the extent to which one’s educational status influences how much one earns later in life, analysing not only the private but also public rate of return to education. Finally, by applying descriptive statistics and regression analysis it takes a particular focus on identifying the determinants of child labour and school participation and their interactions with and consequences on each other, from the findings of which a number of policy options to combat child labour and increase schooling opportunities are derived and discussed.
Lost in translation: Informed consent in the medical mission setting.

Abstract Background Informed consent is a fundamental tenet of ethical care, but even under favorable conditions, patient comprehension of consent conversations may be limited. Little is known about providing informed consent in more uncertain situations such as medical missions. We sought to examine the informed consent process in the medical mission setting. Methods We studied informed consent for adult patients undergoing inguinal herniorrhaphy during a medical mission to Guatemala using a convergent mixed-methods design. We audiotaped informed consents during preoperative visits and immediately conducted separate surveys to elicit comprehension of risks. Informed consent conversations and survey responses were translated and transcribed. We used descriptive statistics to examine informed consent content, including information provided by surgeon, the translation of information, and patient comprehension, and used thematic analysis to examine the consent process. Results Thirteen adult patients (median age 53 years, 69% male) participated. Surgeons conveyed 4 standard risks in 10 out of 13 encounters (77%); all 4 risks were translated to patients in 10 out of 13 encounters (77%). No patient could recall all 4 risks. Qualitative themes regarding the informed consent process included limited physician language skills, verbal domination by physicians and interpreters, and mistranslation of risks. Patients relied on faith and prior or vicarious experiences to qualify surgical risks instead of consent conversations. Many patients restated surgical instructions when asked about risks. Conclusion Despite physicians’ attempts to provide informed consent, medical mission patients did not comprehend surgical risks. Our data reveal a critical need to develop more effective methods for communicating surgical risks during medical missions.
A New Hybrid Intelligent Approach for Traffic Flow Forecasting based on Fuzzy Controllers

Traffic flow forecasting, one of the solutions that prevent congestion on highways. Due to different behavioral patterns of traffic flow, a variety of different conditions, including the possibility of data loss due to a disturbance of failure or faulty sensors, different climatic conditions such as rain or snow, and various conditions such as traffic congestion and accident occurrence on the road, a new prediction model is presented in this paper. We have examined the robustness of the model in the presence of different types of data in a disturbance. Simulations based on real data were performed in MATLAB to show the performance of this new model.
Russian Industry in October 2013

According to the data of business surveys of the Gaidar Institute, in October there were no principal changes neither in the dynamics of the demand, nor in the dynamics of the output of the Russian industry. The above situation caused growth in dissatisfaction about the volumes of current sales and made enterprises switch over again to reduction of prices in a hope to revive the demand. The continued outflow of workers from enterprises, worsening of forecasts as regards changes in the number of workers and negative investment plans supplement the gloomy situation of the beginning of the 4th quarter.
Location choice, life cycle and amenities

Our study proposes a housing location choice model where a household faces a trade‐off between proximity to place of employment and proximity to amenities. We consider subsamples of high amenity cities and low amenity cities and households with and without children. We show that the roles of gender, education, homeownership, household composition, and public transportation vary significantly depending on level of amenities. Households with a female head of household, those with a working spouse and with older children prefer locating closer to downtown amenities. Female workers with and without children locate closer to work, in high and low amenity cities.
Inhibition of growth and aflatoxin production of Aspergillus parasiticus by citrus oils.

Aspergillus parasiticus was inoculated into grapefruit juice and a glucose-yeast extract medium; both contained 500–7000 ppm of citrus oils that were incorporated into the media by sonication. Orange and lemon oil were more inhibitory to mold growth and aflatoxin production than was d-limonene, the main constituent of the two peel oils. After 7 days at 28° C, 2000 ppm of lemon and 3000 ppm of orange oil in grapefruit juice afforded maximum suppression of mold growth and toxin formation. When the glucose-yeast extract medium was used, 3000 ppm of either oil were needed to achieve the same result. After 4 days at 28° C, orange oil at 3500 ppm in either medium markedly inhibited mold growth (as evidenced by dry weight of mold mycelium) and aflatoxin production (only 14 and 1% of the amount normally produced in the juice and artificial medium, respectively). Higher concentrations of orange oil further reduced mold growth and aflatoxin production and also delayed the onset of sporulation, if it occurred. Although aflatoxin was detected in all samples, only 0.2 to 0.5% of the amount found in controls (without the citrus oil) was present when the medium contained 7000 ppm orange oil. The mold consistently grew, albeit very poorly, on the glass at the liquid-atmosphere interface even when the substrate contained a large amount of citrus oil.
ESL Students' Perceptions of Using a Social Bookmarking Tool for the Development of Reading in a Second Language.

Building on research on the development of reading and use of technology for language learning, this multiple-case study explored English as a second language (ESL) students’ perceptions of using a social bookmarking Web 2.0 tool for the development of reading from an ecological perspective. Five students in a community college ESL course in the northeastern part of the USA participated in the study. The data sources included interviews, observations, e-journals, and artifacts. Thorough within-case and cross-case analysis of data revealed a number of Diigo affordances which ESL students found beneficial for their development of reading, role of context and mode, participants’ collaborative stance, and various aspects of influence Diigo had on ESL students’ development of reading. The findings and discussion of the study highlight the role of social bookmarking tools in raising ESL students’ motivation and engagement in reading. The study offers suggestions for further research and implications for practice.
Using fMRI to Measure Stimulus Generalization of Software Notification to Security Warnings

This paper examines how habituation to frequent software notifications may carry over to infrequent security warnings. This general process—known as stimulus generalization or simply generalization—is a well-established phenomenon in neurobiology that has clear implications for information security. Because software user interface guidelines call for visual consistency, software notifications and security warnings have a similar look and feel. Consequently, through frequent exposure to notifications, people may become habituated to security warnings they have never seen before. The objective of this paper to propose an fMRI experimental design to measure the extent to which this occurs. We also propose testing security warning designs that are resistant to generalization of habituation effects.
Direct biosynthesis of adipic acid from lignin-derived aromatics using engineered Pseudomonas putida KT2440.

Abstract Lignin is one largely untapped natural resource that can be exploited as a raw material for the bioproduction of value-added chemicals. Meanwhile, the current petroleum-based process for the production of adipic acid faces sustainability challenges. Here we report the successful engineering of Pseudomonas putida KT2440 strain for the direct biosynthesis of adipic acid from lignin-derived aromatics. The devised bio-adipic acid route features an artificial biosynthetic pathway that is connected to the endogenous aromatics degradation pathway of the host at the branching point, 3-ketoadipoyl-CoA, by taking advantage of the unique carbon skeleton of this key intermediate. Studies of the metabolism of 3-ketoadipoyl-CoA led to the discovery of crosstalk between two aromatics degradation pathways in KT2440. This knowledge facilitated the formulation and implementation of metabolic engineering strategies to optimize the carbon flux into the biosynthesis of adipic acid. By optimizing pathway expression and cultivation conditions, an engineered strain AA-1 produced adipic acid at 0.76 g/L and 18.4% molar yield under shake-flask conditions and 2.5 g/L and 17.4% molar yield under fermenter-controlled conditions from common aromatics that can be derived from lignin. This represents the first example of the direct adipic acid production from model compounds of lignin depolymerization.
Coronavirus "Cures" and the Courts

The coronavirus pandemic has drastically affected nearly every aspect of American life. Unfortunately, it has also created an opportunity for those willing to exploit vulnerable citizens by selling fake “cures.” This Article analyses a lawsuit against televangelist Jim Bakker for doing just that. This Article also calls for increased protection for individuals when a global health pandemic and national emergency have been declared. This Article advocates a novel proposal – the enacting of a federal statute making it a felony for an individual to knowingly sell a fraudulent cure for any disease that has been designated a pandemic by the World Health Organization and in which the President of the United States has designated a national emergency. The following federal criminal statute is proposed: Whoever, having devised or intending to devise any scheme or artifice to defraud, for the express knowing purpose of obtaining money or property by means of false or fraudulent pretenses, representations, or promises of a cure for a disease designated by the World Health Organization as a global pandemic and designated by the President of the United States as a national emergency pursuant to the provisions of the National Emergencies Act, shall be fined not more than $2,000,000 or imprisoned not more than 50 years, or both. This potent statute will help deter individuals such as Jim Bakker from fraudulently selling “cures” during a pandemic crisis. Additionally, it will serve as a preventative measure in limiting the spread of a deadly pandemic disease such as coronavirus.
Enacting Organizational Justice and Institutional Learning in Faculty Dispute Resolution Processes: Lessons Learned from a Study of the UNC System

This study examines dispute resolution processes available to higher education faculty in a nonunion context who are attempting to resolve adverse employment conditions. It assesses the efficacy of those processes for producing outcomes of value both to individual faculty members and to a university. Key areas of interest include faculty knowledge about and levels of confidence in campus systems for dispute resolution, how campuses prepare for and conduct hearings, and the potential for dispute resolution processes to enact organizational justice and produce institutional learning. A survey of faculty affiliated with the 16 constituent higher education institutions of The University of North Carolina and interviews conducted with faculty having direct experience with campus hearings provided data to examine these issues. The data indicates that for dispute resolutions processes to function effectively, there must be greater support of persons engaged in the processes, additional training for administrators, advisors and hearing panel members, and increased transparency in reaching and reporting the outcomes of these processes.
Nonmonotonic Strain Rate Dependence on the Strain Hardening of Polymer Nanocomposites

This Letter investigates the external deformation on modifying the polymer–nanoparticle (NP) and NP–NP interactions as well as their influences on the macroscopic properties of polymer nanocomposit...
eCaaS: A Management Framework of Edge Container as a Service for Business Workload

Enterprises are containerizing their business applications and extending those applications from cloud to edge to achieve better flexibility, agility, and performance for their business workload. Unlike data centers, edge sites including infrastructure and orchestration systems are often heterogeneous and highly customized depending on the resource availability, business requirements of the use case, and technical requirements of the application. However, in many business use cases, the lack of IT professionals with proper domain expertise makes it very challenging to create, manage, and support heterogeneous containerized edge sites at a large scale. In this work, we present the eCaaS framework that provides automated lifecycle management of containerized edge sites and applications. With eCaaS, users can create customized edge sites with only high-level business intents which are analyzed and translated to deployment templates with low-level specifications. The edge site deployment templates are then automatically executed to build, deploy, and configure the containerized edge sites and applications. To support more customization options in the future, eCaaS decouples user intents, deployment rules, and deployment specifications and formulates deployment template generation as an SMT problem to achieve better scalability and extensibility. For creating an edge site with five nodes, eCaaS takes less than one second to generate the deployment template and less than ten minutes to complete the entire deployment.
Orientation in some small and medium enterprises of food processing in Fayoum Governorate

Food processing represents a high degree of importance in the Egyptian economy, due to its role in providing job opportunities, improving the quality of products and their low price. However, it faces many problems for some small and medium enterprises, the most important of which is the lack of knowledge of marketing research completely in addition to the deficiency in the market orientation in these projects and their inability to compete with the products of large projects. The research aimed to study the effect of the market trend on the performance of some small and medium enterprises, the study sample included some small and medium enterprises in the field of food processing in Fayoum Governorate. The results of the study indicated that some departments of these projects were not aware of the importance of identifying the needs and desires of customers (consumers), and the lack of technical skills and material capabilities that would enable these projects to conduct marketing research that It enables it to know the needs and desires of consumers. By studying the economic efficiency of some small and medium enterprises and large factories in Fayoum governorate, it was found that the economic efficiency of large projects (factories) is in a constant state and the change in the return to capacity for costs was found to be about 100%. To achieve the outputs and thus the volume yields are stable, and this level must be maintained, while the full efficiency of small and medium enterprises has not been achieved. Ramadan et al. FJARD VOL. 35, NO. 1. PP.178-190 (2021) 190 Within the framework of the results and indicators reached by the study, the study recommends: Emphasizing the need to spread and consolidate the culture of market orientation within the project at the management level and employees and develop an integrated building for the process of market orientation in its various dimensions and direct it in the manner that Serve its performance. Creating departments to undertake the task of facilitating the implementation of the market orientation process, whose tasks are focused on generating intelligence about the current and potential needs of customers and the market in general, as well as the current and potential trends of competitors, as well as it can disseminate that information within the project at all levels by various methods and means. Conducting marketing research to identify market information related to the current and future needs of customers and disseminating this information among all project workers to meet the needs and desires of clients. Giving the client the first priority in all project activities in terms of meeting his desires, needs and sensitivities The problems he suffers from and working to solve them, by gathering information and distributing it to The necessity to focus on obtaining information about competitors in terms of ability and methods Marketing followed and identify the strengths and weaknesses of competitors to deal with them in the future.
A Novel Supplementary Anchor Fixation Technique for Reinforcing Fixation in Bone Grafting Procedures for Shoulder Instability

Abstract: Bony stabilization procedures are a reliable solution for recurrent shoulder instability, but have a steep learning curve due to technical difficulties. Meticulous capsular closure is critical, and can be augmented with suture anchor constructs. Additionally, while fracture or fragmentation of the coracoid graft is a relatively uncommon, it is devastating. Here, we describe the use of additional circumferential suture fixation to Improve compression across the graft/glenoid interface, and help mitigate the risk of fracture bony augmentation procedures
Electromechanical development of a low cost end effector pose estimation system for articulated excavators

Vision-based pose estimation, in which optical cameras monitor fiducial markers to determine the three dimensional positioning and orientation of an articulated machine’s end effector, offers a promising low-cost alternative to currently available sensor packages that are non-ubiquitous and cost prohibitive for a large portion of the market. Whereas traditional sensor systems determine end effector pose via kinematic chains passing through the links of a machine, optical sensor systems are capable of determining pose by observing an end effector directly. However, since markers cannot be mounted on an excavator’s bucket for occlusion and durability reasons, a short kinematic chain must be used. An electromechanical design is proposed to provide such function for a low cost marker-based excavator pose estimation system. Several iterations of design and experimentation are discussed, including a four-bar linkage system, a synchronous belt system, a bucket linkage system, and a cable potentiometer system. The four-bar linkage and toothed belt systems were designed to transmit bucket angle information to cameras through the manipulation of a marker’s pose, but were found to possess Gimbal lock and practicality issues, respectively. To overcome such issues, a generalized mapping approach was adopted and implemented in a bucket linkage design and a cable potentiometer design. The viability of the cable potentiometer system was experimentally confirmed, along with the identification of further work needed to refine the technology for large-scale practical implementation.
Genetic Classification of Gliomas: Refining Histopathology

Newly published studies validate prior reports that specific combinations of genetic alternations in IDH1/2, ATRX, TERT, TP53, and co-deletion of 1p/19q have the ability to reclassify gliomas into rational subsets, defining a glioma's biological and clinical behavior more accurately than stratifications based solely on histopathology.
Stages of Market Development

The article discusses classifications of market development by various international organizations, such as the World Bank, the United Nations, the International Monetary Fund, and the Economist Intelligence Unit. There are several methods for measuring market development but there is no universal standard. Traditionally, market development is based on economic development (i.e., GDPcapita), but more recent measures attempt to incorporate additional dimensions (i.e., social and political development). Notably, the popular “emerging markets” label is largely absent from official categorizations, with the exception of IMF, which labels one category as “emerging and developing” markets. Furthermore, while economic growth indicates expanding commercial opportunities, the Economist Intelligence Unit found that economic growth is not related to a population's level-of-life satisfaction. Given the inconsistent labeling of stages of development, researchers must carefully assess what is being measured when comparing more than one report or study. In making stand-alone evaluations of market development, researchers should select a classification scheme that best suits the question being asked. Keywords: developed markets; developing markets; emerging markets; development indices; market development
Identifying the Benefits of Knowledge Management in the Department of Defense: A Delphi Study

Abstract : Knowledge Management (KM) has been identified as one of several enablers of the current Transformation effort in the Department of Defense (DoD). Knowledge management is "the attempt to recognize what is essentially a human asset buried in the minds of individuals, and leverage it into an organizational asset that can be accessed and used by a broader set of individuals on whose decisions the firm depends" (Davenport & Prusak, 1998). The ultimate goal of KM is to take advantage of this knowledge asset in order to provide some level of benefit to the organization (Davenport & Prusak, 1998; Nonaka, 1996). However, many in both the military and civilian information resource management communities believe that KM provides nothing beyond what is already accomplished with information management. Given that serious resources are already being committed to KM in the DoD, it follows that identifying the benefits derived from KM from a DoD perspective is highly desirable. Several organizations within the DoD have started using KM and are now interested in identifying and, subsequently, measuring its benefits to gauge success. While many studies have been undertaken to identify the benefits of KM in the commercial sector, similar efforts to investigate the benefits in a DoD context are lacking. Using a Delphi study involving key DoD KM experts, this research aims to identify the major benefits associated with KM practice from a strictly DoD perspective. (27 tables, 8 figures, 45 refs.)
2D hidden Markov model with spatially adaptive state-space for tracing many cells in image sequence

In this paper we propose a two-dimensional hidden Markov model (HMM)-based framework for solving the cell tracing problem in a biological image sequence. Given label initialization in the first frame, we model the problem as pixel labeling for every consequent frame. Common Markov random field-based frameworks for this task require a fixed set of labels S = {1,2,···, L}, while in our framework the set of labels or the state-space is spatially adaptive, i.e., available prior information is exploited to identify a smaller state-space that varies from node to node. In the cell tracing problem, specifically, temporal information on cell location in the previous frame is used to reduce the states to a small subset of the complete label set. The substantial reduction in average cardinality of the label set yields benefits not only in terms of computational complexity, but also in the labeling accuracy. The general idea can be broadly applied to many computer vision and image processing problems, where prior knowledge enables local reduction of the state-space. We consider the cell tracing problem on a publicly available challenging biological image dataset, which contains a series of electron microscopy images of high resolution and a large number of objects (neuronal processes) to be traced. Experimental results compare the approach with other recently proposed methods, and show considerable improvement.
Disparate product distributions observed in Mo(3−x)WxOy− (x=0–3; y=3–9) reactions with D2O and CO2

Results of gas phase reactivity studies on group six transition metal suboxide clusters, Mo3Oy−, Mo2WOy−, MoW2Oy−, and W3Oy− (Mo(3−x)WxOy−, x=0–3; y=ca. 3–9) with both D2O and CO2 are reported. Sequential oxidation for the more reduced species, Mo(3−x)WxOy−+D2O/CO2→Mo(3−x)WxOy+1−+D2/CO, and dissociative addition for certain species, Mo(3−x)WxOy−+D2O/CO2→Mo(3−x)WxOy+1D2−/Mo(3−x)WxOy+1CO−, is evident in the product distributions observed in mass spectrometric measurements. Reactions with D2O proceed at a rate that is on the order of 102 higher than for CO2. The pattern of reaction products reveals composition-dependent chemical properties of these group six unary and binary clusters. At the core of this variation is the difference in Mo–O and W–O bond energies, the latter of which is significantly higher. This results in a larger thermodynamic drive to higher oxidation states in clusters with more tungsten atoms. However, addition products for more oxidized W-rich clusters are not observed, while they are o...
Matrix elements of $Δ B=0$ operators in heavy hadron chiral perturbation theory

We study the light-quark mass and spatial volume dependence of the matrix elements of $\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Delta}}B=0$ four-quark operators relevant for the determination of ${V}_{ub}$ and the lifetime ratios of single-$b$ hadrons. To this end, one-loop diagrams are computed in the framework of heavy hadron chiral perturbation theory with partially quenched formalism for three light-quark flavors in the isospin limit; flavor-connected and -disconnected diagrams are carefully analyzed. These calculations include the leading light-quark flavor and heavy-quark spin symmetry breaking effects in the heavy hadron spectrum. Our results can be used in the chiral extrapolation of lattice calculations of the matrix elements to the physical light-quark masses and to infinite volume. To provide insight on such chiral extrapolation, we evaluate the one-loop contributions to the matrix elements containing external ${B}_{d}$, ${B}_{s}$ mesons and ${\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Lambda}}}_{b}$ baryon in the QCD limit, where sea and valence quark masses become equal. In particular, we find that the matrix elements of the ${\ensuremath{\lambda}}_{3}$ flavor-octet operators with an external ${B}_{d}$ meson receive the contributions solely from connected diagrams in which current lattice techniques are capable of precise determination of the matrix elements. Finite volume effects are at most a few percent for typical lattice sizes and pion masses.
Isoflavones at Concentrations Present in Soy Infant Formula Inhibit Rotavirus Infection in Vitro

Rotavirus (RV) infections are a major cause of acute gastroenteritis in children and domestic animals, infecting virtually all children within their first 5 y of life. Infants consuming soy-based infant formula (SBIF) are exposed to high levels of isoflavones that exhibit antiviral activity on numerous viruses in vitro and in vivo. Thus, the hypothesis that isoflavones would inhibit RV infection was tested. All isoflavones at SBIF concentrations were tested individually and as a mixture (MIX). Virus infectivity was assessed in MA-104 cells using a focus forming unit assay. Genistin and MIX significantly reduced RV infectivity by 33-62% and 66-74%, respectively, compared with the control and across a wide range of RV concentrations. When tested without genistin, the MIX lost its anti-RV activity, suggesting that genistin is the biologically active isoflavone in our model. In a dose response assay, genistin significantly reduced RV infectivity at a concentration as low as 30 mumol/L. We investigated several possible mechanisms of action. Isoflavones decreased RV infectivity by modulating virion attachment to the host cells and by modulating a postbinding step. Isoflavones did not alter RV triple-layered structure and genistin did not act through inhibition of protein tyrosine kinases and topoisomerase II or by mimicking the effect of estrogens. To our knowledge, this is the first study showing the inhibition of RV infectivity by isoflavones present in SBIF. The modulation of SBIF isoflavone composition and concentration represents novel nutritional approaches to potentially reduce the severity of RV infection in human and production animals.
Maternal bisphenol a exposure during pregnancy and its association with adipokines in Mexican-American children

Bisphenol A (BPA) is a high volume production chemical that has been detected in 93% of the United States population. It is thought to have endocrine disrupting activity but human data are limited. In this study, we examined whether prenatal or concurrent urinary BPA concentrations are associated with key metabolism-related hormones, adiponectin and leptin (adipokines), in 9-year-old children. For this analysis, we used 188 mother-child pairs from the Center for the Health Assessment of Mothers and Children of Salinas (CHAMACOS) prospective study. BPA was measured in urinary spot samples during early (12.6 ± 3.9 weeks gestation) and late (26.3 ± 2.5 weeks gestation) pregnancy and in 9-year-old children. We found that BPA concentrations during late pregnancy were associated with increased plasma leptin in boys (β = 0.06, P = 0.01), controlling for maternal prepregnancy body mass index (BMI), pregnancy soda consumption, and smoking, years in US prior to pregnancy, maternal education, household poverty status, child BMI and child soda, fast food and sweet snack consumption at 9 years. Additionally, we found that BPA concentrations during early pregnancy are directly associated with plasma adiponectin levels in girls (β = 3.71, P = 0.03). However, we did not find any significant relationships between concurrent BPA concentrations and 9-year child adiponectin or leptin. Overall, our data suggest that prenatal BPA concentrations may influence adipokine levels in 9-year-old children.
Physiologic findings in children previously ventilator dependent at home due to bronchopulmonary dysplasia

Summary Introduction Bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD) is the primary respiratory complication of premature birth. Some preterm newborns develop chronic respiratory failure, requiring home ventilator support. While physiologic measures have been described for prematurely born children, little is known about spirometric indices in patients with severe BPD who were previously ventilator dependent at home. Methods We retrospectively reviewed medical charts of patients with severe BPD who were ventilator dependent at home. We excluded patients with other comorbidities that could contribute to the severity of BPD. Spirometry was performed when the patient was able to follow commands. Results Between 1984 and 2012, within our severe BPD cohort who previously required home ventilator support, 19 patients were able to perform reproducible spirometry meeting ATS/ERS acceptability criteria. Ten (52.6%) were females, 13 (68.4%) were Caucasians. Mean age at liberation from ventilation was 2.4 years (C.I. 2.0, 2.9) and at decannulation was 3.5 years (C.I. 2.9, 4.0); median age at first reproducible spirometry measurement was 6.6 years (IQR: 4.9, 8.3). Spirometry results revealed significant airway obstruction, as demonstrated by Z-scores values of −1.5 (C.I. −2.5, −0.4) for FVC, −2.7 (C.I. −3.3, −1.9) for FEV1, and −3.6 (C.I. −4.3, −2.9) for FEF25–75. More so, serial spirometric measurements' slopes revealed that the airway obstruction remained static over time (FEV1 slope: −0.07, P-value: 0.2624; FVC slope: −0.01, P-value: 0.9064; and FEF25–75: 0.0, P-value: 0.8532). Conclusions Extreme prematurity associated with severe BPD requiring home ventilator support carries significant risks of morbidity. These patients had substantially diminished respiratory function reflecting airflow abnormalities that remained static over time. Pediatr Pulmonol. 2015; 50:1113–1118. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
The sensitivity of the human eye to infra-red radiation.

The spectral sensitivity of human vision has been measured in the near infra-red, in two areas of the dark adapted eye: the central fovea (cones) to 1000 mμ, and a peripheral area, in which the responses are primarily caused by rods, to 1050 mμ. In both cases the estimates of spectral sensitivity are based upon determinations of the visual thresholds for radiation passing through a series of infra-red filters. By successive approximation, sensitivity functions were chosen which were consistent with the observed thresholds.The spectral sensitivity of the fovea determined in this way is consistent with previous measurements of Goodeve on the unfixated eye. At wave-lengths beyond 800 mμ the periphery becomes appreciably more sensitive than the fovea. This tendency increases at longer wave-lengths, so that at the longest wave-lengths studied, the radiation appeared colorless at the threshold and stimulated only rods.Lengthening the exposure time increases the sensitivity of the peripheral retina relative to the fovea. Our measurements involved exposures of 1 second and fields subtending a visual angle of 1 degree. With shorter exposures or smaller fields the fovea is favored, so that under such circumstances the fovea may become more sensitive than the periphery well into the infra-red.At 1050 mμ the sensitivity of the peripheral retina is only 3×10−13 times its maximum value at 505 mμ. A computation shows that by 1150 or 1200 mμ radiation should be more readily felt as heat by the skin than seen as light by the eye.
Hydrophobicity, Shape, and π-Electron Contributions During Translesion DNA Synthesis

Translesion DNA synthesis, the ability of a DNA polymerase to misinsert a nucleotide opposite a damaged DNA template, represents a common route toward mutagenesis and possibly disease development. To further define the mechanism of this promutagenic process, we synthesized and tested the enzymatic incorporation of two isosteric 5-substituted indolyl-2‘deoxyriboside triphosphates opposite an abasic site. The catalytic efficiency for the incorporation of the 5-cyclohexene-indole derivative opposite an abasic site is 75-fold greater than that for the 5-cyclohexyl-indole derivative. The higher efficiency reflects a substantial increase in the kpol value (compare 25 versus 0.5 s-1, respectively) as opposed to an influence on ground-state binding of either non-natural nucleotide. The faster kpol value for the 5-cyclohexene-indole derivative indicates that π-electron density enhances the rate of the enzymatic conformational change step required for insertion opposite the abasic site. However, the kinetic dissoci...
Social Class and Race: Burdens but Also Some Benefits of Chronic Low Rank

To argue that blacks form the sediment of the American stratificational order is to recognize the extent to which they began at the bottom of the hierarchy during slavery, and the cumulative and re...
Shikimate accumulates in both glyphosate-sensitive and glyphosate-resistant horseweed (Conyza canadensis L. Cronq.).

Horseweed (Conyza canadensis) is a cosmopolitan weed that commonly grows throughout North America. Horseweed that is not completely controlled by normal applications of glyphosate has been reported...
The relationship between behavioral inhibition and time perception in children.

PURPOSE: To test one component of Barkley's (1997) model of executive functions by examining the relationship between behavioral inhibition and time perception in children. METHOD: Correlation analysis was used to determine the relationships between measures of behavioral inhibition and time perception for the entire sample, and for boys (n = 34) and girls (n = 26) separately. FINDINGS: For both parent and child measures, behavioral inhibition and time perception scores were correlated for the total group and for girls. Child measure of behavioral inhibition and time perception were not correlated for boys. CONCLUSIONS: The findings of this study support Barkley's theory and indicate a relationship between poor behavioral inhibition and poor time perception in children.
Dose–Response Relationships for Polyhalogenated Dioxins and Dibenzofurans Following Subchronic Treatment in Mice

Abstract The dose–response relationships for induction of liver, lung, and skin ethoxyresorufin- O -deethylase (EROD) activity and liver acetanilide-4-hydroxylase (ACOH) activity following subchronic exposure to either 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo- p -dioxin (TCDD), 1,2,3,7,8-pentachlorodibenzo- p -dioxin, 2,3,7,8-tetrabromodibenzo- p -dioxin, 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzofuran (TCDF), 1,2,3,7,8-pentachlorodibenzofuran (1-PeCDF), 2,3,4,7,8-pentachlorodibenzofuran (4-PeCDF), or octachlorodibenzofuran (OCDF) were determined in female B6C3F1 mice in order to estimate the relative enzyme inducing potency of these chemicals in three different tissues. The relative potencies were calculated based on tissue concentrations as well as administered dose. A dose-dependent induction of EROD activity in liver, lung, and skin and of ACOH activity in liver was found for all seven chemicals. When based on administered dose, the relative potencies for specific congeners did not vary substantially among tissues. The relative potencies for TCDF and 1-PeCDF, congeners which have much shorter half-lives than TCDD, increased for all enzymes when estimated from tissue concentrations. The relative potency of OCDF, which is poorly absorbed, was greater when estimated from tissue concentrations than when estimated from administered dose. 4-PeCDF is highly sequestered in hepatic tissue and when the relative potency was estimated based on tissue concentration, its potency for skin enzyme induction increased. These data indicate that the relative potency of these chemicals is influenced not only by the relative binding affinity to the Ah receptor, but also by differences in pharmacokinetic properties of these chemicals. In addition, it may be useful to derive two sets of toxic equivalency factor values, one used for estimating intake equivalents and the other for estimating tissue equivalents.
A note on the determination of influence lines and surfaces using finite elements

Abstract This paper presents a simple yet general procedure to determine influence lines and surfaces for frames, beams, trusses, and plates. The method is based on the application of the Muller-Breslau principle and finite elements. It can be easily implemented with most commercial finite element codes.
PROCESSING OF CURED MULLET ROE

In processing of cured mullet roe, the desalting step was required to prepare an acceptable product. When mullet were salted with various levels of solid salt, the data of salt diffusion followed first order kinetics. With a 10% curing salt, the time constant (hr) increased from 42.25 and 45.27 for whole roe and central region, respectively, to 44.39 and 50.07 for those cured with a 20% salt. Cured roe (15% salt for 28 hr and desalted for 6 hr) open sun-dried (T ≅ 30°C) for 7 days contained 5.1% salt, 26.5% moisture and 0.832 a.
Doctors in Ancient Greek and Roman Rhetorical Education

This article collects and examines all references to doctors in rhetorical exercises used in ancient Greek and Roman schools in the Roman Empire. While doctors are sometimes portrayed positively as philanthropic, expert practitioners of their divinely sanctioned art, they are more often depicted as facing charges for poisoning their patients.
Psychological and electroencephalographic relationships in cryothalamectomy for parkinsonism.

Psychological tests and a scalp electroencephalogram were administered to parkinsonians undergoing left, right, or second side thalamic surgery for alleviation of contralateral tremor and rigidity. The psychological tests were designed to assess a range of behavioral activation. EEGs were subjected to frequency analysis from which an activation index was derived. No significant preoperative correlations obtained between EEG activation ratios and the scores of any of the psychological tests under consideration. Nor was any significant relationship found between pre- to postoperative psychological change scores and alterations in EEG patterns of activation. However, a significant decrease in EEG activation ratios for left-brain operates was found in the absence of any such changes for the right-brain operates. This finding was consistent for EEG ratios of both left- and right-hemisphere leads and for parietal and central leads. Some primarily cortical hemispheric specialization was suggested with regard to ...