cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Parallel Structures of Computer-Assisted Signature Pedagogy: The Case of Integrated Spreadsheets

This article was motivated by the authors’ work on a project with a group of 2nd-grade students in a computer lab of a rural school in upstate New York. From this project, one goal of which was to provide a capstone experience for a teacher candidate in teaching application-oriented mathematics with technology, the ideas about parallel structures of two universes—the teacher's and the students’—that echo Shulman's structures of signature pedagogy have been developed. In the article the authors introduce the notion of computer-assisted signature pedagogy and explore its features through the combined lens of teaching and learning using the concept of Type I/Type II technology integration.
RhoA and its role in synaptic structural plasticity of isolated salamander photoreceptors.

PURPOSE. Adult salamander photoreceptors retract existing axons and extend new neuritic processes in vitro. In mammalian retina, similar forms of structural plasticity occur in injury and disease. The authors asked whether RhoA is present in photoreceptor axon terminals and whether activity in the RhoA-ROCK pathway contributes to the structural plasticity observed in rod and cone cells. METHODS. Antibodies against RhoA were used to immunolabel Western blots sections and isolated neurons from salamander retina. Isolated photoreceptors were treated with lysophosphatidic acid (LPA; a RhoA activator) or Y27632 (an inhibitor of RhoA effector ROCK) for the first 24 hours, the first 3 days, or the last 24 hours of culture. Growth and retraction were assessed with time-lapse and image analyses. RESULTS. RhoA protein was found throughout the retina, including in rod and cone synaptic terminals. When treated with LPA, photoreceptors significantly reduced the growth of new neuritic processes and presynaptic varicosities and retracted growth at the highest LPA concentrations. When treated with Y27632, rod cells significantly increased the number of varicosities, whereas cone cells increased process growth. Treatment with Y27632 also dramatically reduced retraction of the existing axon, which occurs spontaneously in rod cells during the first 24 hours of culture. CONCLUSIONS. Thus, RhoA-ROCK activity reduces and retracts neuritic growth, but inhibition of activity increases neuritic development and blocks retraction. The results suggest that RhoA activation contributes to axon retraction by rod cells after retinal detachment, whereas inhibition of RhoA contributes to the neuritic sprouting seen in reattached and degenerating retina.
Internet sexual activity: A comparison between contact and non-contact child pornography offenders

By exploring the internet sexual activity of two groups of adult male child pornography offenders (n = 110), this study sought to identify potential risk factors associated with those offenders who also sexually abused minors. In this endeavour, six areas of internet sexual activity were explored: (1) the level of involvement with child pornography; (2) the level of involvement with non-pornographic material depicting minors; (3) the online seduction of minors; (4) the level of communication with individuals who also have a sexual interest in minors; (5) the level of involvement with adult pornography; and (6) the level of involvement in internet chatrooms related to adults. Results indicated that child pornography offenders are a heterogeneous group. Additionally, dispositional factors related to substance abuse, antisocial orientation and deviant sexual interest and situational factors related to internet sexual activity discriminated child pornography offenders who sexually abused minors from those who did not.
Concurrent and predictive validity of parent reports of child language at ages 2 and 3 years.

The MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories (CDI; Dale, 1996; Fenson et al., 1994), parent reports about language skills, are being used increasingly in studies of theoretical and public health importance. This study (N = 113) correlated scores on the CDI at ages 2 and 3 years with scores at age 3 years on tests of cognition and receptive language and measures from parent-child conversation. Associations indicated reasonable concurrent and predictive validity. The findings suggest that satisfactory vocabulary scores at age 2 are likely to predict normal language skills at age 3, although some children with limited skills at age 3 will have had satisfactory scores at age 2. Many children with poor vocabulary scores at 2 will have normal skills at 3. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
Conceptions of Space and Crime in the Punitive Neoliberal City

The entrenchment of neoliberalism in the United States has coincided with an unprecedented expansion of punishment practices that intensify social divisions rooted in class and race. We explore the political culture of this hyperpunitiveness through a discussion of two popularized explanations for urban crime: broken windows and situational crime prevention. These popular criminological theories help legitimate the deepening of social and spatial divisions. They also rest their precepts upon the foundation of a particular geographic imagination. We use this paper to reveal and critique the core assumptions about space upon which each of these theories critically relies. We suggest that each theory understands society–space interactions too simplistically to provide comprehensive insight into the dynamics of landscape construction and interpretation. We argue further that the logics and practices of broken windows and situational crime prevention possess significant elective affinities with social dynamics characteristic of neoliberalism. For these reasons, these popularized criminologies both reflect and reinforce the processes through which neoliberalism exacerbates social differences.
A Longitudinal Study of the Effects of Unemployment and Quality of Reemployment

Abstract One goal of this study was to compare individuals′ perceptions of jobs held before and following a period of unemployment in terms of global job satisfaction, facet job satisfaction, and job characteristics. Results did not support the expectation that most individuals would find poorer quality jobs following a period of unemployment. A second goal of this study was to assess changes in well-being over a 9-month period as unemployed individuals remained unemployed, found satisfactory employment, or found dissatisfactory employment. As expected, individuals moving from unemployment to satisfactory employment reported increased mental health, while individuals who remained unemployed or who found a dissatisfying job reported no changes in mental health.
Discriminative stimulus properties of d-amphetamine-pentobarbital combinations

Pigeons were trained to discriminate IM injections of 1.0 mg/kg d-amphetamine from water, 5.6 mg/kg pentobarbital from water, or 1.0 mg/kg d-amphetamine from 5.6 mg/kg pentobarbital by requiring them to peck different response keys depending on which substance was administered prior to the session. Excellent stimulus control was achieved under all conditions with close to 100% of the responses occurring on the injection-correlated key. In tests with doses different from those used in training, the percentage of responses on the drug key was directly related to drug dose. When d-amphetamine was given to birds trained to discriminate pentobarbital from water or when pentobarbital was given to birds trained to discriminate d-amphetamine from water, responding occurred predominately on the water-correlated key. d-Amphetamine produced a dose-related antagonism of the effects of pentobarbital for birds trained to discriminate pentobarbital from water or from d-amphetamine. Rates of responding on the drug key were generally highes after administration of the drug doses used in discrimination training; but response rates were not systematically related to the percentage of responses occurring on the drug key. All birds were subsequently trained to discriminate a combination of 1.0 mg/kg d-amphetamine and 5.6 mg/kg pentobarbital from either 1.0 mg/kg d-amphetamine or 5.6 mg/kg pentobarbital alone, demonstrating that the discriminative stimulus properties of amphetamine-pentobarbital combinations are different from either drug alone. Several of the drug effects reported were related to the drug discrimination that had been established.
Decomposition methods for stochastic optimal coordination of energy storage and generation

This paper investigates decomposition methods in stochastic optimization to facilitate parallel computing for the security constrained economic dispatch (SCED) problem in power systems with renewable energy and storage devices. A two-stage stochastic version of SCED based on stochastic model predictive control is formulated. The objective is to supply the demand under uncertainties in the most economic and safe manner, achieving optimal coordination between energy storage and dispatchable generators with respect to real power balancing. The uncertainties correspond to the power output of renewable generators and the demand at load buses. A dual decomposition scheme based on optimality condition decomposition (OCD) is applied to the considered stochastic SCED problem and compared with the Benders decomposition algorithm. The effectiveness of the OCD algorithm is demonstrated through the comparison between the OCD and Benders decomposition on a modified WECC 9-bus test system.
Confidence Intervals for Current Status Data

The likelihood ratio statistic for testing pointwise hypotheses about the survival time distribution in the current status model can be inverted to yield confidence intervals (CIs). One advantage of this procedure is that CIs can be formed without estimating the unknown parameters that figure in the asymptotic distribution of the maximum likelihood estimator (MLE) of the distribution function. We discuss the likelihood ratio-based CIs for the distribution function and the quantile function and compare these intervals to several different intervals based on the MLE. The quantiles of the limiting distribution of the MLE are estimated using various methods including parametric fitting, kernel smoothing and subsampling techniques. Comparisons are carried out both for simulated data and on a data set involving time to immunization against rubella. The comparisons indicate that the likelihood ratio-based intervals are preferable from several perspectives.
Dynamical Method for Generating the Gravitational Interaction.

We present a model for self-coupled scalar fields which, when solved subject to a self-consistent constraint, exhibits the same diagrammatic structure as the covariantly quantized Einstein theory of gravity. The graviton appears naturally as a dynamical Goldstone boson. Formal expressions for the graviton propagator, as well as scalar-graviton and graviton-graviton vertices, are derived.
Correction of hyperglycemia by adenoviral vector-mediated insulin gene expression in the murine pancreas

Introduction: Type I diabetes causes autoimmune destruction of b-cells in the islets of Langerhans. Current therapies consist of multiple insulin injections, pump, whole pancreas, or islet transplantation all of which have significant limitations. We hypothesized that the pancreatic acinar cell might be a good target for insulin gene transfer. Pancreatic acinar cells drain into the portal circulation, are not subject to immune attack, and are capable of exporting a variety of peptides.
Sample Size Requirements in Case-Only Designs to Detect Gene-Environment Interaction

With advances in molecular genetic technology, more studies will examine gene-environment interaction in disease etiology. If the primary purpose of the study is to estimate the effect of gene-environment interaction in disease etiology, one can do so without employing controls. The case-only design has been promoted as an efficient and valid method for screening for gene-environment interaction. The authors derive a method for estimating sample size requirements, present sample size estimates, and compare minimum sample size requirements to detect gene-environment interaction in case-only studies with case-control studies. Assuming independence between exposure and genotype in the population, the authors believe that the case-only design is more efficient than a case-control design in detecting gene-environment interaction. They also illustrate a method to estimate sample size when information on marginal effects (relative risk) of exposure and genotype is available from previous studies.
Spaces of Innovation: Patent Activity in Indiana Metropolitan Areas, 1990 to 1998

Organizations and individuals may express their capacity for innovation through patents for new products and services. This study examines one region’s recent history of innovation. How do Indiana’s metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs) compare with other MSAs when measuring patent productivity? Some Indiana MSAs reflect a capacity for innovation, whereas others show less patent activity. Some Indiana MSAs look better nationally when measured in terms of patents per 10,000 employees. Indiana MSAs demonstrate strengths in pharmaceuticals and medical systems, electrical and electronic components, automobiles, and computers. The diffusion of patent volumes among Indiana MSAs varies with distance from Indianapolis. When compared with three MSAs with strengths in the life sciences (Minneapolis-St. Paul, San Diego, and San Francisco), the Indianapolis MSA lags in annual patent production. Life science patents from these three MSAs grew substantially in the late 1990s, whereas the Indianapolis MSA’s life science...
Careers in Psychology: Creating Customized Learning to Expose the Invisible Curriculum

Invisible knowledge or the hidden curriculum, the informal education some students get from faculty mentors, is a privilege not afforded to all students. Many universities have instituted psychology careers courses to assist undergraduate psychology students with academic and career advisement. Designed to share this invisible curriculum with all psychology majors, the Careers in Psychology course introduced here is a one-credit online class required for all majors. The course involves a high level of student engagement through interactive activities, customized curriculum to individual career goals, videos of guest speakers, online discussions, and professional development assignments. Feedback from formal student evaluations and student reflections about the careers course suggest students gained valuable professional skills and mentoring.
Cloud and precipitation remote sensing at 94 GHz

The use of short millimeter-wave Doppler radars for the observation of clouds and precipitation is discussed. Attenuation and scattering (including Mie backscattering by raindrops) of this short-wavelength radiation by hydrometers is discussed as well as the sensitivity of such radars for the observation of clouds. >
Human herpesvirus 6.

The development of techniques for the culture of lymphoid cells and the isolation of viruses that infect these cells led to the discovery of human herpesvirus (HHV) 6 in 1986. At the time, HHV-6 was the first new human herpesvirus to be discovered in roughly a quarter of a century, and its isolation marked the beginning of an era of discovery in herpesvirology, with the identification of HHV-7 and HHV-8 (Kaposi's sarcoma-associated herpesvirus) during the following decade. Like most human herpesviruses, HHV-6 is ubiquitous and capable of establishing a lifelong, latent infection of its host. HHV-6 is particularly efficient at infecting infants and young children, and primary infection with the virus is associated with roseola infantum (exanthem subitum) and, most commonly, an undifferentiated febrile illness. Viral reactivation in the immunocompromised host has been linked to a variety of diseases, including encephalitis, and HHV-6 has been tentatively associated with multiple sclerosis. This article discusses the major properties of HHV-6, its association with human disease, and the pathobiological significance of viral reactivation.
Relative Efficiency of Sperm Transport and Number of Sperm Ejaculated in the Female Rat

We examined whether the percentage of sperm which enters the uterus of the rat is related to the number of sperm which the male ejaculated. After receiving 1 ejaculation, female rats were examined for the presence of sperm in the vagina and uterus and were dissected in order to measure the position of the vaginal plug in the vaginal-cervical junction. There were 3 main results. First, the greater the total number of sperm which were recovered from the female’s entire reporductive tract, the greater was the percentage of those sperm which had reached the uterus. Second, more females with higher total sperm counts than females with lower total sperm counts had vaginal plugs lodged tightly in the vaginal-cervical junction. Third, the more the vaginal plug extended into the vaginal-cervical junction, the greater was the percentage of the total sperm which was found in
Evaluation of the uses and benefits of a social business platform

We evaluated an integrated social software platform, called Handshake, to determine individuals' usage patterns and characterize Handshake's business value. Our multi-step investigation included conducting 63 in-depth interviews, analyzing log data from 4600+ users, and administering an online survey. We found that both the level and type of participation affects whether users experience value. Active participants, for example, say that Handshake supports collaboration, strengthens social connections, fosters awareness of connections' activities, and facilitates knowledge management. This case study captures an early snapshot of behavior that we anticipate will change and grow over time.
Outcomes for Children Exposed to Drugs In Utero

Substance abuse among pregnant women remains a national health issue. The incidence of infants born addicted to licit and illicit substances is increasing. The long-term outcomes have not been consistently documented. These appear to include mild to severe developmental and cognitive problems, depending upon the substance used. Central nervous system problems, behavioral dysfunction, and safety issues are major parental concerns for these children as they grow. Interventions must be aimed at thorough assessments, including an accurate maternal history, use of supports for positive neurodevelopment, parent education about infant/child cues, and encouragement of educational environments that are highly structured and safe. Consistent, long-term follow-up is essential to optimize long-term outcomes.
Immunosuppression on the Horizon

Many novel immunosuppressive agents are under active clinical investigation. In addition, creative approaches are being developed for the use of established immunosuppressive agents, with the goal of minimizing immunosuppression as early as possible posttransplantation. The hope is that these approaches will minimize the toxicity of these agents without sacrificing efficacy. Evidence suggests that the nephrotoxicity of calcineurin inhibitors can be reduced using these approaches. The introduction of newer immunosuppressive agents, including the proliferation signal inhibitors, raises the possibility that some of the long-term scourges of cardiac transplantation, including cardiac allograft vasculopathy and malignancy, can be ameliorated. Finally, costimulatory pathway inhibitors and other new immunosuppressive agents offer hope that all these goals can be accomplished with very low long-term maintenance immunosuppression.
Blow-up dynamics for the aggregation equation with degenerate diffusion

Abstract We study radially symmetric finite-time blow-up dynamics for the aggregation equation with degenerate diffusion u t = Δ u m − ∇ ⋅ ( u ∗ ∇ ( K ∗ u ) ) in R d , where the kernel K ( x ) is of power-law form | x | − γ . Depending on m , d , γ , and the initial data, the solution exhibits three kinds of blow-up behavior: self-similar with no mass concentrated at the core, imploding shock solution, and near-self-similar blow-up with a fixed amount of mass concentrated at the core. Computations are performed for different values of m , d , and γ using an arbitrary Lagrangian Eulerian method with adaptive mesh refinement.
A new modem structure for data transmission

A modem structure for high speed data communications is presented. This modem is designed to operate in the time division multiple access (TDMA) mode using quadriphase shift keying (QPSK). This new structure permits the transmission of higher data rates, thus allowing commercial businesses, such as retailers, farmers, etc., to send and receive sales and inventory figures, commodity prices, etc. without delay and with minimal error. This result is achievable because this structure overcomes the problem of intersymbol interference by incorporating first, a unique adaptive equalizer, and second, new carrier and clock recovery networks. Simulations are shown, as well as the actual circuits for implementation. >
Tissue Plasminogen Activator Mediates Microglial Activation via Its Finger Domain through Annexin II

Microglia are the immunocompetent cells of the CNS, and their activation is thought to play an important neurotoxic role in many diseases modeled by glutamate-induced excitotoxicity. One molecule whose expression is upregulated after excitotoxic injury is tissue plasminogen activator (tPA), a serine protease with dual roles in the CNS. The catalytic activity of tPA, which converts plasminogen into plasmin, leads to neuronal death during excitotoxicity. Via a nonproteolytic mechanism, tPA also mediates microglial activation. We show here in culture studies that stimulated wild-type neurons and microglia can release the tPA that elicits the activation, and that tPA acts in combination with other factors. We also show that the finger domain of tPA is necessary to trigger the activation and identify annexin II as its probable binding partner-receptor. Together, these findings suggest that tPA released by either neurons or microglia can act as a neural cytokine, signaling through annexin II to activate microglia in settings of disease and injury. Developing methods to inhibit the interaction of tPA with annexin II would offer a new and selective approach to interfere with microglial activation for therapeutic purposes.
An interactive land use VRML application (ILUVA) with servlet assist

We summarize progress achieved on an interactive land use VRML application (ILUVA) with servlet assist. The purpose of this application is to enable one to take a virtual land area and add buildings, roadways, landscaping and other features. The application is implemented entirely using standard web based technologies to allow fairly universal accessibility. The Virtual Reality Modeling Language (VRML) is a programming language that describes three dimensional objects and defines interactions associated with these objects. In this work, we show how the interactive capabilities can be expanded by employing Java servlets for recording user actions and for restoring prior sessions. The Java servlets offer several powerful capabilities including enabling logging permanent records of user sessions, retrieval of prior sessions, and dynamically generated VRML.
Small-signal gain for parabolic profile beams in free-electron lasers

Three new types of free electron lasers (FELs) that are being examined in new ranges of parameter design space are: compact systems, XUV systems, and high power devices. Shorter wiggler wavelengths, shorter or longer lasers, higher currents, and higher quality electron beams are a few of the trends in the FEL community. The primary predictor of FEL oscillation is the small signal gain. We present 3-D small-signal calculations for more realistic parabolic-profile electron beams in the limit of moderately wide to wide electron beams. This limit complements the thin electron beam limit and needs be included in any analytical approximation that encompasses all 3-D effects. The system of equations for the optical modes are of Hamiltonian form and are solved as the analytical eigenmodes of the stationary quantum mechanical harmonic oscillator. We show the complete solution to the initial value problem in the special case of a cold, resonant electron beam, including the damped modes heretofore neglected. From this we derive the asymptotic solution as a superposition of Hermite [square symmetry] or Laguerre (circular symmetry) modes. We give expressions for the mode size, the spatial growth rate, and injection fraction for the dominant mode.
Mouse models of Mdm2 and Mdm4 and their clinical implications

Mdm2 and Mdm4 are two key negative regulators of the tumor suppressor p53. Deletion of either Mdm2 or Mdm4 induces p53-dependent early embryonic lethality in knockout mouse models. The tissue-specific deletion of Mdm2 induces p53-dependent apoptosis, whereas the deletion of Mdm4 induces both p53-dependent apoptosis and cell cycle arrest. Compared to Mdm4 deletion, Mdm2 deletion causes more severe phenotypic defects. Disrupting the Mdm2 and Mdm4 interaction using knockin mice models causes embryonic lethality that can be completely rescued by the concomitant loss of p53, suggesting that Mdm2 and Mdm4 heterodimerization is critical to inhibit p53 activity during embryogenesis. Overexpression of Mdm2 and Mdm4 in mice induces spontaneous tumorigenesis, which clearly indicates that Mdm2 and Mdm4 are bona fide oncogenes. Studies from these mouse models strongly suggest that blocking Mdm2- and Mdm4-mediated p53 inhibition is an appealing therapeutic strategy for cancer patients with wild-type p53 alleles.
Design and implementation of open MPI over Quadrics/Elan4

Open MPI is a project recently initiated to provide a fault-tolerant, multi-network capable implementation of MPI-2 (1997), based on experiences gained from FT-MPI (G. E. Fagg et al., 2003), LA-MPI (R. L. Graham et al., 2003), LAM/MPI (J. Squyers et al., 2003), and MVAPICH projects. Its initial communication architecture is layered on top of TCP/IP. In this paper, we have designed and implemented open MPI point-to-point layer on top of a high-end interconnect, Quadrics/Elan4. The restriction of Quadrics static process model has been overcome to accommodate the requirement of MPI-2 dynamic process management. Quadrics queued-based direct memory access (QDMA) and remote direct memory access (RDMA) mechanisms have been integrated to form a low-overhead, high-performance transport layer. Lightweight asynchronous progress is made possible with a combination of Quadrics chained event and QDMA mechanisms. Experimental results indicate that the resulting point-to-point transport layer is able to achieve comparable performance to Quadrics native QDMA operations, from which it is derived. Our implementation provides an MPI-2 compliant message passing library over Quadrics/Elan4 with a performance comparable to MPICH-Quadrics.
Web credibility assessment: Conceptualization, operationalization, variability, and models

This article reviews theoretical and empirical studies on information credibility, with particular questions as to how scholars have conceptualized credibility, which is known as a multifaceted concept with underlying dimensions; how credibility has been operationalized and measured in empirical studies, especially in the web context; what are the important user characteristics that contribute to the variability of web credibility assessment; and how the process of web credibility assessment has been theorized. An agenda for future research on information credibility is also discussed.
Reflecting Microscope Design for Infrared Multireflectance Spectrophotometry

Aspheric reflecting optics for a Cassegrain-type microscope have been designed and have been evaluated with a computer program and found to be aplanatic in the infrared region of the spectrum. Design criteria for construction are established for conic section aspheric optics.
Comparative Studies of Impurities in Intravenous Immunoglobulin Preparations

In a comparative study, seven commercially available immunoglobulin preparations and one experimental preparation, processed by various manufacturers in the United States and Europe, were investigated for non-IgG proteins and impurities. The basic fractionation methodology affects the purity of subsequently processed intravenous preparations. Five of the seven products manufactured in Europe contained varying amounts of plasma proteins other than IgG. A residual heterologous protein was detected and quantitated in one product whose processing includes porcine pepsin treatment. Only one of the eight products was low in aggregates (as judged by both anticomplement activity and nephelometric turbidity), while three products contained anticomplement activity at levels high enough to be a potential cause of reactions in patients. In general, the level of prekallikrein activator activity was proportional to that of amidolytic activity; four products had only trace levels of amidolytic activity as well as prekallikrein activator. Only one product contained significant isoagglutinin levels, while six products had detectable IgA levels.
Characterization and quantitation of differential Tsix transcripts: implications for Tsix function

In dosage compensation of female mammals, the accumulation of Xist RNA initiates silencing of one X-chromosome. Xist action is repressed by the antisense gene, Tsix, whose full-length RNA product is complementary to Xist RNA in mice. While previous work showed that Tsix transcription blocks the accumulation of Xist RNA, it is still unclear whether this repression requires the antisense RNA product or whether the antisense transcriptional movement is sufficient. A better understanding of potential mechanisms requires elucidation of Tsix RNA structure and determination of Tsix RNA copy number relative to that of Xist RNA. Previous work indicated that at least some of murine Tsix is spliced and that human TSIX truncates within the 3' end of XIST. Here, further characterization and quantitation of murine Tsix RNA reveal three new findings: first, in undifferentiated embryonic stem cells, Tsix RNA is present at 10-100-fold molar excess over Xist RNA. Second, only 30-60% of Tsix RNA is spliced at known exon-intron junctions. The nearly equal abundance of spliced and unspliced species leaves open possible roles for both isoforms. Finally, Tsix is spliced heterogeneously at the 5' end and most detectable splice variants exhibit only a 1.9 kb region of complementarity between sense and antisense RNAs. Implications for Tsix's possible mechanisms of action are discussed.
Negative Permittivity in (V2O5)100-xSex Alloys

(V2O5)100-xSex (x = 9, 17, 25, 30 wt %) alloys have been prepared by quenching the melt from 1000 to 273 K in ice water. The XRD data show the presence of crystalline V2O5, V6O13, VO2, and Se phases. High-resolution XPS spectra for a Se 3d peak show the presence of SeO2 and elemental Se phases in the samples. The presence of a reversible endothermic peak ≈343 K in the differential scanning calorimetric (DSC) curve of quenched samples is indicative of the monoclinic to tetragonal transformation in VO2. A selenium melting peak at 495 K is also present in the DSC curve, for x ≥ 17. Room-temperature dielectric measurements in the frequency range 1 Hz to 100 kHz show the presence of negative permittivity in samples with x < 30. Permittivity Vs temperature and loss-factor Vs temperature measurements in the temperature range 273−373 K and at a fixed frequency of 1 kHz were reversible with hysteresis across the monoclinic to tetragonal transformation of VO2. A sample with x = 30 exhibits a minimum temperature ran...
Domain Decomposition of a Two-Dimensional Sn Method

Several vector and parallel processing algorithms for the inherently recursive Sn method are developed for two-dimensional curvilinear geometries. The iterative sweeps through the spatial and direc...
Topology optimization considering overhang constraints: Eliminating sacrificial support material in additive manufacturing through design

Additively manufactured components often require temporary support material to prevent the component from collapsing or warping during fabrication. Whether these support materials are removed chemically as in the case of many polymer additive manufacturing processes, or mechanically as in the case of (for example) Direct Metal Laser Sintering, the use of sacrificial material increases total material usage, build time, and time required in post-fabrication treatments. The goal of this work is to embed a minimum allowable self-supporting angle within the topology optimization framework such that designed components and structures may be manufactured without the use of support material. This is achieved through a series of projection operations that combine a local projection to enforce minimum length scale requirements and a support region projection to ensure a feature is adequately supported from below. The magnitude of the self-supporting angle is process dependent and is thus an input variable provided by the manufacturing or design engineer. The algorithm is demonstrated on standard minimum compliance topology optimization problems and solutions are shown to satisfy minimum length scale, overhang angle, and volume constraints, and are shown to be dependent on the allowable magnitudes of these constraints.
Peripheral Neuropathy in Ataxia-Telangiectasia

EMG examinations performed on 32 children aged three to 13 years with ataxia-telangiectasia are reported from the Neurological Department of the Child Health Centre, Warsaw, Poland.
Genome-Wide Association Study of Meiotic Recombination Phenotypes

Meiotic recombination is an essential step in gametogenesis, and is one that also generates genetic diversity. Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) and molecular studies have identified genes that influence of human meiotic recombination. RNF212 is associated with total or average number of recombination events, and PRDM9 is associated with the locations of hotspots, or sequences where crossing over appears to cluster. In addition, a common inversion on chromosome 17 is strongly associated with recombination. Other genes have been identified by GWAS, but those results have not been replicated. In this study, using new datasets, we characterized additional recombination phenotypes to uncover novel candidates and further dissect the role of already known loci. We used three datasets totaling 1562 two-generation families, including 3108 parents with 4304 children. We estimated five different recombination phenotypes including two novel phenotypes (average recombination counts within recombination hotspots and outside of hotspots) using dense SNP array genotype data. We then performed gender-specific and combined-sex genome-wide association studies (GWAS) meta-analyses. We replicated associations for several previously reported recombination genes, including RNF212 and PRDM9 . By looking specifically at recombination events outside of hotspots, we showed for the first time that PRDM9 has different effects in males and females. We identified several new candidate loci, particularly for recombination events outside of hotspots. These include regions near the genes SPINK6 , EVC2 , ARHGAP25 , and DLGAP2 . This study expands our understanding of human meiotic recombination by characterizing additional features that vary across individuals, and identifying regulatory variants influencing the numbers and locations of recombination events.
Fast and Selective Plasmonic Serotonin Detection with Aptamer-Gold Nanoparticle Conjugates

Neurotransmitters detection is critical to understanding communication between the brain and peripheral tissue. Serotonin is a key neurotransmitter linked to a number of conditions, but a full understanding of its role in disease is still lacking. The development of fast and selective serotonin detection platforms will provide researchers with tools to monitor serotonin in individuals before and after treatment for the condition of interest. Aptamer-gold nanoparticles conjugates that responded colorimetrically to serotonin with minimal response to its metabolite and other neurotransmitters were designed by simply adsorbing the DNA on the surface of AuNPs. A plasmonic assay for serotonin detection was designed with a response to biologically relevant serotonin levels. Importantly, the assay performance was not compromised when tested in filtered spiked fetal bovine serum as a mimic of biofluids. This work shows that these simple and stable Apt-AuNP conjugates are promising tools to develop fast assays for point-of-care and personalized diagnostics applications.
Evaluating the impact of varied compliance to lung cancer screening recommendations using a microsimulation model.

The US preventive services task force (USPSTF) recently recommended that individuals aged 55–80 with heavy smoking history be annually screened by low-dose computed tomography (LDCT), thereby extending the stopping age from 74 to 80 compared to the national lung screening trial (NLST) entry criterion. This decision was made partly with model-based analyses from cancer intervention and surveillance modeling network (CISNET), which assumed perfect compliance to screening. As part of CISNET, we developed a microsimulation model for lung cancer (LC) screening and calibrated and validated it using data from NLST and the prostate, lung, colorectal, and ovarian cancer screening trial (PLCO), respectively. We evaluated population-level outcomes of the lifetime screening program recommended by the USPSTF by varying screening compliance levels. Validation using PLCO shows that our model reproduces observed PLCO outcomes, predicting 884 LC cases [Expected(E)/Observed(O) = 0.99; CI 0.92–1.06] and 563 LC deaths (E/O = 0.94 CI 0.87–1.03) in the screening arm that has an average compliance rate of 87.9% over four annual screening rounds. We predict that perfect compliance to the USPSTF recommendation saves 501 LC deaths per 100,000 persons in the 1950 U.S. birth cohort; however, assuming that compliance behaviors extrapolated and varied from PLCO reduces the number of LC deaths avoided to 258, 230, and 175 as the average compliance rate over 26 annual screening rounds changes from 100 to 46, 39, and 29%, respectively. The implementation of the USPSTF recommendation is expected to contribute to a reduction in LC deaths, but the magnitude of the reduction will likely be heavily influenced by screening compliance.
Review of marine animals and bioinspired robotic vehicles: Classifications and characteristics

Abstract Marine robots are a developing topic for military, scientific, and environmental missions. However, most existing marine robots are either limited to flight or limited to swimming. Therefore, the combination of both provides endless possibilities for tasks, such as espionage, pollution and marine wildlife surveillance, and border protection. Applying bioinspiration and biomimetics not only camouflages the robot, but also increases the efficiency of already perfected designs. Because bioinspiration and aerial-aquatic locomotion are the main attraction for this article, this review gathers the characteristics of aerial-aquatic animals useful for such designs. These animals are diving birds and flying fish, specifically plunge-diving birds, surface-diving birds, both plunge- and surface-diving birds, two-winger flying fish, and four-winger flying fish. The overview of the current marine bioinspired and non-bioinspired robots that are both aerial and aquatic are also presented, followed by the limitations and recommendations of the bioinspired robots. It is shown by a comparison between the bioinspired robot and its corresponding animal that the existing robotic systems are not truly bioinspired. The main traits these systems are missing are replicating the exact weight, size, muscle movement, and skin texture of the biological animal. In order to have efficient robots, bioinspiration needs to be perfected. Doing so requires not only the basic design to be replicated, but every detail of the system to be imitated.
Does this App Really Need My Location?: Context-Aware Privacy Management for Smartphones

The enormous popularity of smartphones, their rich sensing capabilities, and the data they have about their users have lead to millions of apps being developed and used. However, these capabilities have also led to numerous privacy concerns. Platform manufacturers, as well as researchers, have proposed numerous ways of mitigating these concerns, primarily by providing fine-grained visibility and privacy controls to the user on a per-app basis. In this paper, we show that this per-app permission approach is suboptimal for many apps, primarily because most data accesses occur due to a small set of popular third-party libraries which are common across multiple apps. To address this problem, we present the design and implementation of ProtectMyPrivacy (PmP) for Android, which can detect critical contextual information at runtime when privacy-sensitive data accesses occur. In particular, PmP infers the purpose of the data access, i.e. whether the data access is by a third-party library or by the app itself for its functionality. Based on crowdsourced data, we show that there are in fact a set of 30 libraries which are responsible for more than half of private data accesses. Controlling sensitive data accessed by these libraries can therefore be an effective mechanism for managing their privacy. We deployed our PmP app to 1,321 real users, showing that the number of privacy decisions that users have to make are significantly reduced. In addition, we show that our users are better protected against data leakage when using our new library-based blocking mechanism as compared to the traditional app-level permission mechanisms.
Visualidad y escritura como acción: Investigación Acción Participativa en la Costa Caribe colombiana

This article reconstructs the Participatory Action Research (par) methodology developed by Orlando Fals Borda and the Fundacion del Caribe at the beginning of the 1970s in the departments of Cordoba and Sucre, Colombia in collaboration with the Asociacion Nacional de Usuarios Campesinos (anuc) [National Association of Peasant Users]. A parallel reading of Orlando Fals Borda’s personal archives and of the illustrated pamphlets that his team produced to disseminate a narrated peasant history “from below” reveals that the production of these comics constituted a scenario the significance of research could be redefined. Instead of the traditional sequence beginning with the elaboration of a theoretical framework followed by data collection and subsequent analysis, research was transformed into a collective exercise of knowledge-building. At the center of this process was Ulianov Chalarka, an artist from Monteria who for two years drew the four comic strips produced by the project. The article analyzes the act of looking from the point of view of the artist: how Chalarka created iconic images to represent the histories of struggle narrated by peasants, using as an example the comic Tinajones, which narrated the story of the peasant struggle in the region of San Antero and San Bernardo del Viento. The article continues with a comparison of the stories presented by the team in different formats —prose and comics— to comprehend Chalarka’s contribution to the project. With the help of a group of cartoonists, an interpretation is made of the process of creation of the comics by the research team, which began with observations made by the artist of interviews and the production of “illustrated notes” highlighting certain events in the narration. Next, the creation of the panels is analyzed, showing how the visual notes were placed in vignettes containing further information. Finally, the article looks at various errors in perspective in the vignettes in order to study the collective process of the assembly of the comics, highlighting Chalarka’s role as evidence of the importance of taking into account all of the participants in a par project.
Kinetics and Mechanism of Mammalian Mitochondrial Ribosome Assembly

Mammalian mtDNA encodes only 13 proteins, all essential components of respiratory complexes, synthesized by mitochondrial ribosomes. Mitoribosomes contain greatly truncated RNAs transcribed from mtDNA, including a structural tRNA in place of 5S RNA as a scaffold for binding 82 nucleus-encoded proteins, mitoribosomal proteins (MRPs). Cryoelectron microscopy (cryo-EM) studies have determined the structure of the mitoribosome, but its mechanism of assembly is unknown. Our SILAC pulse-labeling experiments determine the rates of mitochondrial import of MRPs and their assembly into intact mitoribosomes, providing a basis for distinguishing MRPs that bind at early and late stages in mitoribosome assembly to generate a working model for mitoribosome assembly. Mitoribosome assembly is a slow process initiated at the mtDNA nucleoid driven by excess synthesis of individual MRPs. MRPs that are tightly associated in the structure frequently join the complex in a coordinated manner. Clinically significant MRP mutations reported to date affect proteins that bind early on during assembly.
Anti-CTLA-4 based therapy elicits humoral immunity to galectin-3 in patients with metastatic melanoma

The combination of CTLA-4 blockade ipilimumab (Ipi) with VEGF-A blocking antibody bevacizumab (Bev) has demonstrated favorable clinical outcomes in patients with advanced melanoma. Galectin-3 (Gal-3) plays a prominent role in tumor growth, metastasis, angiogenesis, and immune evasion. Here we report that Ipi plus Bev (Ipi-Bev) therapy increased Gal-3 antibody titers by 50% or more in approximately one third of treated patients. Antibody responses to Gal-3 were associated with higher complete and partial responses and better overall survival. Ipi alone also elicited antibody responses to Gal-3 at a frequency comparable to the Ipi-Bev combination. However, an association of elicited antibody responses to Gal-3 with clinical outcomes was not observed in Ipi alone treated patients. In contrast to being neutralized in Ipi-Bev treated patients, circulating VEGF-A increased by 100% or more in a subset of patients after Ipi treatment, with most having progressive disease. Among the Ipi treated patients with therapy-induced Gal-3 antibody increases, circulating VEGF-A was increased in 3 of 6 nonresponders but in none of 4 responders as a result of treatment. Gal-3 antibody responses occurred significantly less frequently (3.2%) in a cohort of patients receiving PD-1 blockade where high pre-treatment serum Gal-3 was associated with reduced OS and response rates. Our findings suggest that anti-CTLA-4 elicited humoral immune responses to Gal-3 in melanoma patients which may contribute to the antitumor effect in the presence of an anti-VEGF-A combination. Furthermore, pre-treatment circulating Gal-3 may potentially have prognostic and predictive value for immune checkpoint therapy.
Basic Sleep Tips

Sleep fragmentation and limitation have become more common. It can be difficult to determine usual reactions to stressful life events or abnormal sleep patterns. However, sleep hygiene is useful in helping individuals initiate and maintain sleep. These practices are often neglected in pursuit of prompt symptom relief of sleep disruptions or insomnia. In this article, a review of overall assessment of sleep, abnormal sleep patterns, and valuable and proven cognitive–behavioral techniques are discussed.
Zitterbewegung in Radiative Processes

The zitterbewegung is a local circulatory motion of the electron presumed to be the basis of the electron spin and magnetic moment. A reformulation of the Dirac theory shows that this interpretation can be sustained rigorously, with the complex phase factor in the wave function describing the local frequency and phase of the circulatory motion directly. This reveals the zitterbewegung as a mechanism for storing energy in a single electron, with many implications for radiative processes.