cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Multiblock Compressible Navier-Stokes Flow Solver Applied to Complex Launch Vehicles

We studied the problem of one-dimensional steady-state heat conduction in metallic foams used as thermal protection systems with varying density in the thickness direction. The thermal conductivity of the foam is a function of temperature as well as the density, and it has a minimum value in the range of densities of our interest. An optimality criterion in the form of a differential equation was derived in order to minimize the total mass of the insulation for a given heat input. The heat-conduction equation and the optimality equation were solved numerically to obtain optimum density profiles for various values of thickness of the insulation. It is shown that for a given thickness using functionally graded foams can reduce the mass of the insulation panel. Acknowledgments
Modular implementation of adaptive decisions in stochastic simulations

We present a modular approach to implement adaptive decisions with existing scientific codes. Using a sophisticated system software tool based on the function call interception technique, an external code module is transparently combined with the given program without altering the original code structure, resulting in a newly composed application with extended behavior. This is useful for generalizing codes into using different parameter values or to switch algorithms or implementations at runtime. Applying the proposed method on a biochemical stochastic simulation software package to implement a set of exemplary use cases, which includes changing program parameters, substituting random number generators, and dynamically changing the stochastic simulation method, we demonstrate how effectively new code modules can be plugged in to construct an application with enhanced capabilities.
Molecular Risk Assessment for Breast Cancer Development in Patients with Ductal Hyperplasias

Purpose: It has been reported that approximately a million women are diagnosed with benign breast lesions that include ductal hyperplasias per year in the United States. Recent studies that followed women with benign lesions have established that about 8% to 9% of them will subsequently develop invasive breast cancer (IBC). However, currently, there are no means of identifying a subclass of “true precancerous tissues” in women with ductal hyperplasias who will subsequently develop cancer. The purpose of this study is to investigate whether expression of hyaluronoglucosaminidase 1 (HYAL1), a known tumor promoter, in hyperplastic tissues identifies a “true precancerous stage” and predicts subsequent IBC development. Experimental Design: A retrospective study was conducted with archival benign tissues of various histologic types and clinical information on development/nondevelopment of IBC. The control group was hyperplastic tissues from women who had no prior history of IBC and did not develop cancer in 5 to 7 years after diagnosis ( n = 81). The test group was hyperplastic tissues from patients who developed cancer ( n = 82). HYAL1 expression was studied by immunohistochemistry, and the results were statistically analyzed for significant association to develop cancer ( P value), specificity, sensitivity, positive predictive value, and negative predictive value. Results: Statistical analysis of HYAL1 expression data showed very highly significant association between its expression and subsequent cancer development ( P = 0) and very high sensitivity (0.83), specificity (0.84), positive predictive value (0.84), and negative predictive value (0.83). Conclusions: The expression of HYAL1 in ductal hyperplastic tissues is a strong predictor of subsequent development of IBC; therefore, it can be applied as a diagnostic marker either singly or in combination with other marker(s) to screen benign tissues to predict subsequent development of IBC. Detection at the precancerous stage and treatment could drastically cut down breast cancer incidence and deaths from it.
On a 'science of modeling' for dynamic-systems; some fundamental ideas and principles

Traditionally, the modeling of (i.e., the creation of mathematical models for) dynamic systems has been more of an art than a science. Today, there is a growing-feeling among scholars in the modeling and simulation community that modeling can, and should, be more scientific in nature. In this paper, a set of fundamental hypotheses and scientific principles are proposed as candidate components for the construction of an effective science of modeling for dynamic systems.
Disease Models, Part II: Querying & Applications

In the previous chapter, the mathematical formalisms that allow us to encode medical knowledge into graphical models were described. Here, we focus on how users can interact with these models (specifically, belief networks) to pose a wide range of questions and understand inferred results - an essential part of the healthcare process as patients and healthcare providers make decisions. Two general classes of queries are explored: belief updating, which computes the posterior probability of the network variables in the presence of evidence; and abductive reasoning, which identifies the most probable instantiation of network variables given some evidence. Many diagnostic, prognostic, and therapeutic questions can be represented in terms of these query Types. For models that are complex, exact inference techniques are computationally intractable; instead, approximate inference methods can be leveraged. We also briefly cover special classes of belief networks that are relevant in medicine: probabilistic relational models, which provide a compact representation of large number of propositional variables through the use of first-order logic; influence diagrams, which provide a means of selecting optimal plans given cost/preference constraints; and naive Bayes classifiers. Importantly, the question of how to validate the accuracy of belief networks is explored through cross validation and sensitivity analysis. Finally, we explore how the intrinsic properties of a graphical model (e.g., variable selection, structure, parameters) can assist users with interacting with and understanding the results of a model through feedback. Applications of Bayesian belief networks in image processing, querying, and case-based retrieval from large imaging repositories are demonstrated.
Flaviviruses: Introduction to Dengue Viruses

Flaviviruses are a genus of positive-sense RNA viruses that includes Japanese encephalitis virus, West Nile virus, tick-borne encephalitis virus, yellow fever virus, and dengue viruses. They are transmitted by arthropod vectors and cause significant human disease worldwide. The rapid rise in human infections caused by these viruses has been attributed to increased urbanization, travel, and increased spread of vectors probably linked to climate change. Dengue viruses now cause the most widespread arthropod-borne viral disease infecting humans. Thus, in this chapter we introduce and describe the molecular and cellular biology of flaviviruses using dengue viruses as an example.
The Narrator and the Nation-Builder: Dialect, Dialogue, and Narrative Voice in Minority and Working-Class Fiction

"The representation of social class and other forms of social centrality and marginality (race, regional identity, rurality, etc.) presents a dilemma for literature. Since in most contexts the literary language is, or is at least held to be, a monopoly of elites, to report characters from the margins speaking and thinking in such a register can seem like an egregious violation of the tenets of realism. On the other hand, to have such characters speak as they would in daily life mars the smoothness and literariness of the text’s language, in way most often thought suitable only for comic e ects, from Aristophanes to Dickens. The question of how to balance these issues, marking marginal characters enough to make their status legible without interfering with the expected literary qualities of the text, has been, and remains, a challenge."
Louisiana's Latest Proposed Composite Return Regulation: Is the Third Time the Charm?

Kalinka reviews Louisiana's revised proposed composite return regulation: though the revised proposed regulation is better than an earlier version, there is still room for improvement, she writes. Louisiana's composite return statute needs revision because it fails to include corporate partners in the composite return requirement and does not require the filing of a composite return by a single-member limited liability company, the author writes. She suggests that the Legislature should extend the application of the composite return statute to nonresident corporate partners and the owners of disregarded entities.
Toward Understanding the Linguistics of Terrorist and Radical Groups

ABSTRCTAlbeit counter-terrorism strategic experts' paradoxical interpretations in identifying terrorism: but random brutality and irrationality will remain the steady characteristics of the norm's tactical insights. During the past decade, the predilections of terrorism were correlated to personality disorders, extremism, and politicized religion. However, the Arab Spring spurred broader matrices of innovative terrorism repeating Al-Qaeda's phenomenal expansionism in the Middle East. This article will review in brief the stereotypical tactics of terrorism in the past decade behind spotting the light on the new findings that skyrocketed chaotic terrorism, resulting in the normalization of suicidal bombings and criminal assailants not only within the Middle East, but also all over the globe. In the past, terrorist attacks were viewed as odd acts of violence. Presently, terrorist activities are being tackled in news headlines by strategic analysts like day-in day-out acts of anarchy without glancing at how m...
Short-term effects of riparian disturbance on Desmognathus brimleyorum (Plethodontidae) at a natural spring in Oklahoma

In February 1996, the United States Department of Agriculture Forest Service completed a renovation project at Horsethief Spring, LeFlore County, Oklahoma. This spring is located on the north face of Winding Stair Mountain along the Talimena Scenic Drive (State Highway 1; T3N R25E Sec. 7). Renovations included paving the existing parking area, installing a restroom facility and picnic site above the spring, resurfacing the existing horse trail that crosses just below the spring origin, reconstructing a stone wall next to the lower parking area, and removing riparian vegetation along the upper portion of the spring. The area of vegetation removal was approximately 0.1 acres. Although this may seem to be a small-scale disturbance, we were concerned about the potential impacts on sensitive salamander species that depend on the spring habitat.
An Evaluation of Commercial Kits for the Detection of Antibodies to Double-Stranded DNA

Antibodies to double-stranded (ds) DNA may provide useful information in the management of patients with systemic lupus erythematosus. commercial radioimmunoassay (RIA) kits for the detection of (ds) DNA antibodies (Lupo-Tec, Wampole Laboratories; anti-DNA kit, Amersham Corporation) were compared with a modified Farr assay and checked for intra-lot, inter-lot and inter-assay variation. Purity of DNA preparations was assessed using rabbit antibody to single-stranded (ss) DNA. Selected sera with low (less than or equal to 15%), moderately elevated (less than or equal to 40%), or markedly elevated (greater than or equal to 44%) (ds) DNA binding values (Farr assay) were tested. Positive and negative control sera when supplied with the kits also were evaluated. Normal sera were used as internal controls. A variable degree of intra-lot, inter-lot, and inter-assay correlation was observed. At low antibody levels, discordance was observed but values greater than or equal to 25% (Farr assay) were abnormally elevated in all kits tested. Clinical and laboratory personnel should be aware of potential pitfalls in RIA methods and carefully interpret results when commercial DNA kits are used.
Heliothis Spp.: Control on Cotton with Pyrethroids, Carbamates, Organophosphates, and Biological Insecticides

When chemical and microbial insecticides were evaluated in replicated small-plot field tests on cotton at Stoneville, MS, in 1975-77, differences in control of Heliothis spp. and resultant yields reflected the infestation pressure. With heavy infestations, the synthetic pyrethroids, permethrin and fenvalerate, and a new carbamate, UC-51762 (dimethyl N,N’ -[thiobis [(methylamino) carbonyloxy]] bisethanimidothioate), gave the most effective control and the greatest increases in yield compared with untreated checks. The biological inseticides, Bacillus thuringiensis Berliner, Baculovirus heliothis , a looper ( Autographa ) NPV, and Nomuraea rileyi (Farlow) Samson were ineffective as a group and, in some cases, no more effective than no treatment. The organophosphate materials, either the standards or new materials, were intermediate in effectiveness between the synthetic pyrethroids and the biological insecticides.
Sudden infant death syndrome and near sudden infant death syndrome: a review of the literature, 1964 to 1982.

During the past decade, investigators have begun to scientifically examine many of the theories that have been proposed to explain sudden infant death syndrome. The authors review the research in this area from 1964 to 1982.
Catalysis of the Ortho-Parahydrogen Conversion

Certain metallic oxides such as chromic oxide, cerium oxide, and neodymium oxide have been reported as highly effective catalysts for ortho-parahydrogen conversion because of their paramagnetic properties. We were familiar with the performance of chromic oxide on alumina pellets since this has been successfully used in the CEL liquefier s over a period of several years. However, no systematic study of catalysts for this application was available and it seemed likely that a material more effective than the chromic-alumina catalyst (actually developed for the petroleum industry) might be found.
"Inline" Axial Reconstructed CT Scans Provide a Significantly Larger Assessment of C2 Pedicle Diameter for Screw Placement Compared With "Standard" Axial Scans: Implications for Surgical Planning.

STUDY DESIGN Radiologic analysis. OBJECTIVE The objective was to compare C2 pedicle diameter and screw feasibility on reconstructed axial computed tomography (CT) cuts created "Inline" (IL) with the intended pedicle screw tract versus unaltered "Standard" (STD) axial cuts. BACKGROUND DATA Axial CT cuts through the C2 pedicle are commonly evaluated when planning pedicle screw fixation as medial aberrancies of the vertebral artery can significantly narrow pedicle diameter. STD axial CT cuts provided by radiology departments are typically formatted orthogonal to the long axis of the neck or the vertical plumb, which is often not IL with the axis of the intended C2 pedicle screw tract. MATERIALS AND METHODS A total of 89 cervical spine CT scans obtained by a single radiology department over 2 years (35 male, 54 female; mean age 64.9 y) were reviewed. STD axial cuts were not manipulated but were assessed as provided. IL axial cuts were created along the intended C2 pedicle screw tract using free, open-source DICOM viewer software. Inner and outer pedicle diameters were measured on axial cuts most closely approximating the isthmus of the intended tract. RESULTS On STD cuts, the mean outer and inner pedicle diameters were 5.05±1.45 and 2.01±1.31 mm, respectively. By contrast, IL measurements yielded significantly larger outer and inner diameters: 5.85±1.78 and 2.68±1.47 mm (P<0.01). IL measurement predicted a higher number of pedicles amenable to insertion of a 3.5 mm screw with safety margins of 1 to 3 mm. CONCLUSIONS Reformatted IL axial cuts through the intended path of C2 pedicle screws provide significantly larger assessments of C2 pedicle diameter than those obtained on STD cuts. IL measurements predict C2 screw insertion feasibility in a substantially higher number of pedicles. As assessment of IL cuts may alter surgical decision-making at no added cost or radiation exposure, we suggest that they be obtained whenever considering C2 pedicle screw placement.
Emerging roles of the bone morphogenetic protein pathway in cancer: potential therapeutic target for kinase inhibition

Bone morphogenetic proteins (BMPs) belong to the transforming growth factor-β (TGF-β) family signalling pathway. Similar to TGF-β, the complex roles of BMPs in development and disease are demonstrated by their dichotomous roles in various cancers and cancer stages. Although early studies implicated BMP signalling in tumour suppressive phenotypes, the results of more recent experiments recognize BMPs as potent tumour promoters. Many of these complexities are becoming illuminated by understanding the role of BMPs in their contextual role in unique cell types of cancer and the impact of their surrounding tumour microenvironment. Here we review the emerging roles of BMP signalling in cancer, with a focus on the molecular underpinnings of BMP signalling in individual cancers as a valid therapeutic target for cancer prevention and treatment.
fREEDA: An Open Source Circuit Simulator

fREEDAtrade is capable of transient, wavelet, harmonic balance, DC and AC analysis of circuits. Of these it is transient analysis has the greatest capability of revolutionizing the ability to design of RF circuits. fREEDAtrade uses a number of new strategies to achieve a dynamic range in transient simulation exceeding 160 dB, large signal noise analysis, modeling of oscillator phase noise, handling arbitrarily long time delays, and capturing mixed-physics. For the first time the overall philosophy behind fREEDAtrade is outlined with particular attention to topology
Effect of climate change on California fish species

Increasing anthropogenic activities have direct connections to global warming and climatic change. The land and ocean temperature show an increasing trend throughout the globe. In this paper, we have analyzed satellite derived ocean temperature data to study the impacts of climate change on the fish catch along the west coast of California during years 2005–2014. We have considered monthly fish landing data of five different species from three different coastal California cities: Eureka, San Francisco, and Los Angeles. The different populations of fish landing were compared with the ocean temperature and other controlling parameters. The detailed analysis of these parameters show a close relation with the different species of fish landing. The increasing ocean surface temperature shows positive and negative correlations with the different species of fish catch, and some fish species seem to decline with the increasing ocean surface temperature.
ICU Care Following Damage Control Surgery

Damage control surgery (DCS) has radically changed the surgical approach to critically ill patients. The primary goals of DCS are to expedite operative interventions, to minimize ongoing physiologic derangements, and to prevent early deaths from exsanguination and refractory shock. The purpose of the chapter is to review the intensive care after DCS that is needed to reverse physiologic derangements and prepare the patient for a second operation where definitive operative treatment will be rendered. The topics that will be discussed will include mechanical ventilation, resuscitation protocols, use of thromboelastography in resuscitation, and methods to correct hypothermia and acidosis.
Une théorie moléculaire de l'anesthésie générale

Nous presentons une theorie moleculaire de l’anesthesie generale valable par un groupe de substances que l’on peut nommer « anesthesiques physiques non-formateurs de liaisons hydrogene ». Nous supposons que ces substances forment des micro-cristaux hydrates, en particulier dans les regions synaptiques du cerveau. Entre autres perturbations possibles, la presence des micro-cristaux doit gener le passage des oscillations electriques dont l’existence, revelee par les electroencephalogrammes, est liee a l’etat de conscience. La diminution energetique des oscillations entrainerait ainsi l’etat d’inconscience.
Abstract 051: Influence of Sex and Obesity on the Effect of Preterm Birth on the Renin-angiotensin System in Adolescents

Background: Preterm birth increases the risk of cardiovascular disease, but the underlying mechanisms are not known. Prematurity may induce programming effects that differentially influence the ren...
A cloud-based brain connectivity analysis tool

With advances in high throughput brain imaging at the cellular and sub-cellular level, there is growing demand for platforms that can support high performance, large-scale brain data processing and analysis. In this paper, we present a novel pipeline that combines Accumulo, D4M, geohashing, and parallel programming to manage large-scale neuron connectivity graphs in a cloud environment. Our brain connectivity graph is represented using vertices (fiber start/end nodes), edges (fiber tracks), and the 3D coordinates of the fiber tracks. For optimal performance, we take the hybrid approach of storing vertices and edges in Accumulo and saving the fiber track 3D coordinates in flat files. Accumulo database operations offer low latency on sparse queries while flat files offer high throughput for storing, querying, and analyzing bulk data. We evaluated our pipeline by using 250 gigabytes of mouse neuron connectivity data. Benchmarking experiments on retrieving vertices and edges from Accumulo demonstrate that we can achieve 1–2 orders of magnitude speedup in retrieval time when compared to the same operation from traditional flat files. The implementation of graph analytics such as Breadth First Search using Accumulo and D4M offers consistent good performance regardless of data size and density, thus is scalable to very large dataset. Indexing of neuron subvolumes is simple and logical with geohashing-based binary tree encoding. This hybrid data management backend is used to drive an interactive web-based 3D graphical user interface, where users can examine the 3D connectivity map in a Google Map-like viewer. Our pipeline is scalable and extensible to other data modalities.
Differential gene expression in healing rat corneal epithelium.

Purpose. The authors used and validated a recently developed method, mRNA differential display, to detect and clone genes that are differentially expressed in healing compared to stationary corneal epithelium. Methods. RNAs from unwounded and 18-hour postwound corneal epithelia were isolated and subjected to mRNA differential display analysis. The generated cDNAs were used as probes in Northern blot analysis and in situ hybridization to confirm their differential expression and to clone longer or full-length cDNAs from a healing corneal epithelial cDNA library. Results. Changes in the pattern of gene expression in healing epitheliumn, compared with that in stationary cells, were noted. To date, 15 combinations of 5'- and 3'-primers were used with approximately 1500 mRNA species screened. Differential expression of nine mRNA species were observed. These included four known proteins. They are nonmuscle tropomyosin TM-1, cytokeratin K14, small GTP binding protein rab 11, and amyloid β-A4 precursor-like protein-2. One is a sequence with homology to type II cytokeratin, and four represent genes with sequences that are unreported. The differential expression of five of these genes was confirmed by Northern blot analysis, in situ hybridization, or both. Conclusions. mRNA differential display provides a unique and powerful experimental system to study differential gene expression in wound healing and cell migration. Using this system, differential expression of nine genes was observed. Detection of genes differentially expressed in healing epithelium may prompt studies that will define the specific role of each of the proteins in wound healing. Invest Ophthalmol Vis Sci. 1995 ; 36 :1997-2007.
A Theoretical Perspective

After being raped at age 8 and enduring the trial and violent death of her attacker, author and poet Maya Angelou decided to be silent, talking to no one but her brother. They were sent from St. Louis to Stamps, Arkansas, to live with their grandmother. There, Marguerite (Angelou’s birth name) “met, or rather got to know, the lady who threw me my first life line” (Angelou, 1969, p. 77). The aristocratic Mrs. Flowers was a contemporary of Marguerite’s grandmother. Mrs. Flowers was stylish and spoke beautifully. One day Mrs. Flowers invited Marguerite for lemonade and cookies. While highly respected in the small town, Mrs. Flowers “didn’t encourage familiarity” (p. 78). So when she singled out Marguerite for attention, the child felt special; she was liked, respected, and engaged. Mrs. Flowers talked with the mute Marguerite about her silence. Acknowledging that no one could or would try to make Marguerite talk, Mrs. Flowers reframed the concept of speech for Marguerite saying, “it takes the human voice to infuse [words] with the shades of deeper meaning” (p. 82). As Mrs. Flowers read aloud to Marguerite, “her voice slid in and curved down through and over the words. She was nearly singing” (p. 84). She gave the girl a book of poems and asked her to memorize one to recite at her next visit. This was the first of what they came to call Marguerite’s “lessons in living.” This silent child who had a mentor with a melodious voice grew up to be a great orator, whose recitations of poetry and prose are inspiring and beloved.
Analysis of Diffusion of Biological Materials by Quasielastic Light Scattering

The investigation of translational and rotational diffusion coefficients represents a principal application of laser light scattering in biology. Diffusion coefficients of numerous biologically important molecules as well as viruses, membrane vesicles and biopolymers have been obtained by this technique.
Sequential incremental-value auctions

We study the distributed allocation of tasks to cooperating robots in real time, where each task has to be assigned to exactly one robot so that the sum of the latencies of all tasks is as small as possible. We propose a new auction-like algorithm, called Sequential Incremental-Value (SIV) auction, which assigns tasks to robots in multiple rounds. The idea behind SIV auctions is to assign as many tasks per round to robots as possible as long as their individual costs for performing these tasks are at most a given bound, which increases exponentially from round to round. Our theoretical results show that the team costs of SIV auctions are at most a constant factor larger than minimal.
Introduction of Basic Fourier Series

Our main objective in this chapter is to define basic Fourier series and to establish some elementary facts about them. In our presentation most of the material can be read independently from Chapters 3 and 4, we only assume that the reader is familiar with the basic exponential and basic trigonometric functions covered in Chapter 2.
Instructional product development: Two approaches to training

For several reasons there has been a marked increase in the activities associated with the systematic development of instructional products. A prime factor impeding the advancement of the field is the shortage of adequately trained personnel. Two quite different schemes for training instructional product developers were described with the hope that comparable training programs might be instituted elsewhere to prepare the much needed product development specialist.
Aiding Understanding of a Contested Information Environment’s Effect on Operations

The operations of government, industry, the military, academia, and even personal activity can be negatively affected by information attacks on and through cyberspace. Modeling and simulation can be used to increase the understanding of potential effects these attacks may generate and guide the development of contingency planning. The increased understanding and more comprehensive and focused contingency planning will enhance the ability of organizations to assure their operation or mission, when operating in a contested information environment. This enhanced mission assurance will increase the overall national security and the deterrence against the use of information attacks in the future. This chapter pulls these concepts together and develops requirements for modeling and simulation capabilities to enhance mission assurance.
Reactive Ion-Beam Etching

Publisher Summary This chapter discusses reactive ion-beam etching (RIBE), which is the technique of removing material from a surface by impinging on it a beam of chemically reactive ions. In fact, RIBE has played a dual role in the evolution of dry-etching techniques for electronic device and integrated circuit applications. For as well as providing a vehicle for possible selective anisotropic etching, the nature of an ion-beam system makes the reactive ion-beam etcher well suited to the study of the interactions of ions, reactive neutrals, and surfaces. RIBE has been used to study the mechanisms of plasma-assisted etching processes, many of which occur in more common dry-etching systems, in which rf plasma excitation complicates their study. Distinctive features of RIBE when compared to other plasma-assisted etching techniques are that the ion energy, ion flux/unit area, and angle of incidence of the reactive ion beam can be independently controlled.
Capillary Graph-Interfaces “in-the-Large”

This paper continues ongoing investigations into questions initiated by seventeenth-century experiments of Mariotte on mutual attractions and repulsions of floating objects, later reformulated mathematically by Laplace in the context of idealized surface tension theory. The characteristic nonlinearity in the governing equations imposes restrictions on behavior of solutions as graphs in the Laplace model, to the effect that a priori relations connecting height and inclination of a presumed surface interface occur, severely restricting the heights that can be achieved by solution curves. We develop below some relevant consequences of that phenomenon. The initial section provides general (perhaps inadequate) background, characterizes global qualitative behavior of all solutions of the underlying equations, and elucidates the significant distinctions in behavior that occur for solutions over an interval that extends unboundedly in one base direction. The section next following presents a non-existence result ensuing from the limitations imposed on such solutions (this result is elaborated in the Appendix). Next follow individual properties of general solutions. The remainder of the paper addresses the forces arising between partially submerged bodies. Theorem 6 offers an alternative derivation of a discovery due to Aspley, He, and McCuan, which displays a remarkable identification of net horizontal force with a first integral of the basic equations. These relations simplify significantly some earlier literature; additionally, as indicated in Section 5, they open the way to consideration of a much larger class of partially immersed objects than appears in the Laplace formulation. We complete Section 5 with an illustrative example in a particular case, indicative of a general study currently underway.
Assessment of flip angle-TR equivalence for standardized dissolved-phase imaging of the lung with hyperpolarized 129Xe MRI.

Purpose To investigate the feasibility of describing the impact of any flip angle-TR combination on the resulting distribution of the hyperpolarized xenon-129 (HXe) dissolved-phase magnetization in the chest using a single virtual parameter, TR90°,equiv . Methods HXe MRI scans with simultaneous gas- (GP) and dissolved-phase (DP) excitation were performed using 2D projection scans in mechanically ventilated rabbits. Measurements with DP flip angles ranging from 6-90° and TRs ranging from 8.3-500 ms were conducted. DP maps based on acquisitions of similar radio frequency pulse-induced relaxation rates were compared. Results The observed distribution of the DP magnetization was strongly affected by acquisition flip angle and TR. However, for flip angles up to 60°, measurements with the same radio frequency pulse-induced relaxation rates, resulted in very similar DP images despite the presence of significant macroscopic gas transport processes. For flip angles approaching 90°, the downstream signal component decreased noticeably relative to acquisitions with lower flip angles. Nevertheless, the total DP signal continued to follow an empirically verified conversion equation over the entire investigated parameter range, which yields the equivalent TR of a hypothetical 90° measurement for any experimental flip angle-TR combination. Conclusion We have introduced a method for converting the flip angle and TR of a given HXe DP measurement to a standardized metric based on the virtual quantity, TR90°,equiv , using their equivalent RF relaxation rates. This conversion permits the comparison of measurements obtained with different pulse sequence types or by different research groups using various acquisition parameters.
Preventing Sexual Abuse: Perspectives of Minor-Attracted Persons About Seeking Help:

The primary aim of this exploratory research was to gain information from minor-attracted persons (MAPs) about their (a) formal and informal experiences with help-seeking for minor attraction, (b) perceived barriers to seeking help for concerns about minor attraction, and (c) treatment priorities as identified by consumers of these services. A nonrandom, purposive sample of MAPs (n = 293, 154 completed all questions) was recruited via an online survey. Results show that 75% of participants did seek formal help from a professional; however, just less than half of them found the experience to be helpful. Characteristics of helpful therapeutic encounters included nonjudgmental attitudes, knowledge about minor attraction, and viewing clients in a person-centered and holistic way. Barriers to help seeking included uncertainty about confidentiality, fear of negative reaction or judgment, difficulties finding a therapist knowledgeable about MAPs, and financial constraints. Understanding or reducing attraction to minors were common treatment goals, but participants also prioritized addressing general mental health and well-being related to depression, anxiety, loneliness, and low self-esteem. Implications for effective and ethical counseling and preventive interventions for MAPs are discussed.
Zimbabwe’s Predatory State: Party, Military and Business

In this book, Zimbabwe’s Predatory State: Party, Military and Business, Shumba provides a comprehensive critical analysis and examination of Zimbabwe’s predatory state dynamics in relation to party...
Adrenocorticotropic hormone and cortisol response to corticotropin-releasing factor and lysine vasopressin in pigs.

Two experiments were conducted to evaluate the ability of corticotropin-releasing factor (CRF) and lysine vasopressin (LVP) to stimulate the secretion of ACTH and cortisol in pigs. In Exp. 1, barrows were blocked by weight (average BW 97 +/- 1 kg) and received an i.v. bolus of 10 (n = 4), 50 (n = 4), or 100 (n = 3) micrograms of LVP. Samples of plasma were obtained at 10-min intervals for 2 h before and for 2 h after peptide treatment. The percentage of change in plasma concentration of ACTH (average of the concentration 1 h after LVP compared with the average of the 1 h before LVP) was greater (P < .001) for 100 micrograms (452.3 +/- 4.7%) than for 10 (81.5 +/- 5.7%) or 50 micrograms (233.6 +/- 11.3%). Furthermore, the ACTH response was greater (P < .001) to 50 micrograms than to 10 micrograms. The cortisol responses to treatment (average of the concentration 2 h after LVP compared to the average of the 2 h before LVP) were similar in pigs given 50 (132.8 +/- 5.3%) and 100 (123.2 +/- 2.4%) micrograms, but both were greater (P < .001) than the response to 10 micrograms (38.2 +/- 1.4%). In Exp. 2, a dose of LVP was chosen that provided a total mass of peptide similar to the lowest dose in Exp. 1, but this time the peptide was administered at .11 nmol/kg BW. This dose of LVP was chosen because it resulted in neither maximum ACTH nor cortisol secretion in Exp. 1.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
The Pictures in Our Heads

Most research has focused on how conventional news influenced second-level agenda setting, but more research needs to investigate how humorous news might affect attribute agenda setting, and compare those effects with conventional news. In this experiment, participants received media messages with the same information structured as either conventional news or humorous news to examine how the structure of the media message might affect second-level agenda setting. The results indicated people accepted the attributes of issues related to certain issues when it was presented as a humorous news program. However, conventional news was more successful in second-level agenda setting as compared to humorous news, meaning people accepted attributes of issues more when presented as a conventional news program.
An intimate cause of proctocolitis.

A 54-year-old male was referred to the GI outpatient clinic with a history of having had diarrhea containing copious blood and mucous occurring 4–5 times daily for 3 months, accompanied by a five-pound weight loss and associated with nonradiating left lower quadrant pain that sometimes improved after a bowel movement, and over time had become almost constant. He denied nausea, vomiting, or other symptoms. A colonoscopy 5 years previous was normal. His medications included aspirin, naproxen as needed for gout, and ranitidine for reflux disease. He had recently added ibuprofen to treat his abdominal pain without improvement. He worked as an office administrator, reported no other illnesses, had not recently travelled, drank alcohol occasionally, and did not smoke. He was in a monogamous relationship with his wife. He had no family history of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), colon cancer, or other enteric disease. On examination, he was afebrile without signs of systemic disturbance, but had tenderness in the left lower quadrant without rebound accentuation. Bowel sounds were present and normal; there was no distension. Initial laboratory investigations demonstrated a peripheral blood white count = 11.9 K/mm with the only other abnormality a slightly elevated serum C-reactive protein = 2.1 mg/dL (N\ 1.0). Clinical Course
Estimation of Wage–Risk Differentials Without Wages:

Utilizing the duality properties of a production/profit function, this article estimates the risk premium received by Pennsylvania bituminous coal miners in 1915, without recourse to any informatio...
“Why Doesn’t Anyone Help Us?”: Therapeutic Implications of Black Girls’ Perceptions of Health

AbstractThe prevalence of overweight and obesity among Black adolescent girls has continued to increase significantly since the 1980s, which indicates that Black girls are disproportionately affect...
Epidemiological considerations in the design of tissue microarrays

2185 Tissue microarrays (TMAs), which have been available to researchers for nearly 10 years, allow investigators to more rapidly evaluate large sets of tissue samples while greatly reducing the cost of reagents and the error due to variations between staining batches. TMAs can be built to address various types of research questions, and each TMA design can be conceptualized as a corresponding epidemiological study design. The two most common types of TMA in cancer research are referred to as “progression” or “outcomes” arrays. Many investigators using TMAs however, are unaware of the study design considerations implicit in planning a TMA and thus may build arrays that are less statistically efficient or are prone to bias. We have identified several major types of designs, and, using examples, discuss important issues affecting the precision or validity of the results. These design types include: cross-sectional, case-control, nested case-control, case-cohort, full cohort and clinical trial. Major issues include: patient selection, control selection (including incidence density vs. other approaches), matching, the use of replicates to reduce donor block sampling error, assignment of sample position within the array, and handling of confounding variables. Relevant statistical issues include the potential use of mixed effects models, conditional vs. unconditional logistic models, and the estimation of predictive values or absolute risk (as opposed to relative risk) from various designs. We have undertaken a systematic sampling of the recent medical literature to describe how TMA design decisions are being made, and how these decisions might affect progress in cancer research.
A Pilot Study Investigating the Feasibility and Acceptability of a Parent-Only Behavioral Weight-Loss Treatment for Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder.

Evidence-based weight-loss treatments for children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are lacking. Therefore, a parent-based weight-loss treatment for children with ASD (PBT-ASD) was developed. A pilot study was conducted to test the initial efficacy, feasibility, and acceptability of this intervention. Parents of 20 children with ASD and overweight/obesity (mean age = 9.90 (SD = 2.31) years; 90% male; 40% Hispanic) participated in a 16-session PBT-ASD. The PBT-ASD program was found to be feasible and acceptable. Both children and parents lost weight from pre- to post-treatment (p's < .05). Parent-reported child physical activity and vegetable consumption increased at post-treatment (p's < .05). This pilot study provides a proof-of-concept for PBT-ASD. Randomized controlled trials with larger samples and follow-up are needed.
Adaptive rangeland management benefits grassland birds utilizing opposing vegetation structure in the shortgrass steppe.

Rangelands are temporally and spatially complex socioecological systems on which the predominant land use is livestock production. In North America, rangelands also contain approximately 80% of remaining habitat for grassland birds, a guild of species that has experienced precipitous declines since the 1970s. While livestock grazing management may benefit certain grassland bird species by generating the vegetation structure and density they prefer, these outcomes are poorly understood for avian species breeding in the shortgrass steppe. We evaluated how two grazing management systems, continuous, season-long grazing and adaptive, rest-rotational grazing, affected grassland bird abundance from 2013 to 2017 in Colorado's shortgrass steppe. We examined grazing impacts in conjunction with ecological sites, which constitute unique soil and plant communities. When grazing management was evaluated in conjunction with spatial variation in ecological sites, we found three of our five focal bird species responded to grazing management. McCown's Longspur abundance decreased in pastures rested from grazing the previous year. The effect of grazing on Horned Lark and Grasshopper Sparrow depended on ecological site: Horned Lark density was highest in pastures that were intensively grazed and Grasshopper Sparrow density was highest in pastures that were rested the previous year in the least productive ecological site. In addition, densities of all species varied across ecological sites. Our results suggest consideration of soil and vegetation characteristics can inform how adaptive management is applied on a landscape to benefit the full suite of breeding grassland birds, including species that have seemingly contrasting habitat needs. For example, a manager could target adaptive drought mitigation practices, such as resting pastures for 1 yr to generate grassbanks, in less productive soils to benefit grassland birds that prefer taller/denser vegetation structure, or could apply intensive, short-duration grazing on less productive soils to benefit species preferring shorter/sparser vegetation. A single year of intensive, short-duration grazing (i.e., one component of our rotational treatment) across the landscape, however, might not create sufficient habitat for species that prefer short/sparse vegetation in our system (e.g., McCown's Longspur). Ultimately, our study indicates how cattle production on rangelands can congruently support grassland bird populations in the shortgrass steppe.
TPsgtR: Neural-Symbolic Tensor Product Scene-Graph-Triplet Representation for Image Captioning

Image captioning can be improved if the structure of the graphical representations can be formulated with conceptual positional binding. In this work, we have introduced a novel technique for caption generation using the neural-symbolic encoding of the scene-graphs, derived from regional visual information of the images and we call it Tensor Product Scene-Graph-Triplet Representation (TP$_{sgt}$R). While, most of the previous works concentrated on identification of the object features in images, we introduce a neuro-symbolic embedding that can embed identified relationships among different regions of the image into concrete forms, instead of relying on the model to compose for any/all combinations. These neural symbolic representation helps in better definition of the neural symbolic space for neuro-symbolic attention and can be transformed to better captions. With this approach, we introduced two novel architectures (TP$_{sgt}$R-TDBU and TP$_{sgt}$R-sTDBU) for comparison and experiment result demonstrates that our approaches outperformed the other models, and generated captions are more comprehensive and natural.
Training Children to Work Productively in Classroom Groups

The problem of grouping children in the classroom for the purpose of improving teaching has been traditionally approached by making groups homogeneous on the basis of age, intelligence test scores, achievement tests, or personality measures. Using an alternative approach, involving direct assessment of academic productivity and pretraining to work in groups, two studies are presented in this article. Experiment I showed that through the management of reinforcement contingencies a teacher could develop and maintain a high rate of academic productivity in a group of two boys with school adjustment problems. Experiment II, which applied similar techniques to a larger group, showed that high rates of work behavior could be maintained as the she of the group increased, and suggested that the proximity of the teacher may be related to the amount of study behavior generated.
Is Batch Norm unique? An empirical investigation and prescription to emulate the best properties of common normalizers without batch dependence.

We perform an extensive empirical study of the statistical properties of Batch Norm and other common normalizers. This includes an examination of the correlation between representations of minibatches, gradient norms, and Hessian spectra both at initialization and over the course of training. Through this analysis, we identify several statistical properties which appear linked to Batch Norm's superior performance. We propose two simple normalizers, PreLayerNorm and RegNorm, which better match these desirable properties without involving operations along the batch dimension. We show that PreLayerNorm and RegNorm achieve much of the performance of Batch Norm without requiring batch dependence, that they reliably outperform LayerNorm, and that they can be applied in situations where Batch Norm is ineffective.
Phase separation and cell fate in Candida.

Epigenetic switching between white and opaque cell types in Candida is mediated by transcription factors that undergo liquid–liquid phase separation.
Forum introduction: communication and the politics of survival

Survival has always been intersectional—raced, classed, gendered, sexed, (dis)abled, and colonized—and if we are to survive this twenty-first century, we need scholars with the experience and train...