cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Effects of matrix viscoelasticity on the lateral migration of a deformable drop in a wall-bounded shear

The dynamics of a drop deforming, orienting and moving in a shear flow of a viscoelastic liquid near a wall is numerically investigated using a front-tracking finite-difference method and a semi-analytic theory. The viscoelasticity is modelled using the modified FENE-CR constitutive equation. In a Newtonian system, deformation in a drop breaks the reversal symmetry of the system resulting in a migration away from the wall. This study shows that the matrix elasticity reduces the migration velocity, the reduction scaling approximately linearly with viscoelasticity (product of the Deborah number De and the ratio of polymer viscosity to total viscosity . The transient dynamics of the migrating drop is seen to be governed by the finite time needed for development of the viscoelastic stresses. For larger capillary numbers, in both Newtonian and viscoelastic matrices, a viscous drop fails to reach a quasi-steady state independent of initial drop–wall separation. Matrix viscoelasticity tends to prevent drop breakup. Drops that break up in a Newtonian matrix are stabilized in a viscoelastic matrix if it is initially far away from the wall. Initial proximity to the wall enhances deformation and aids in drop breakup.
Pattern recognition with SVM and dual-tree complex wavelets

A novel descriptor for pattern recognition is proposed by using dual-tree complex wavelet features and SVM. The approximate shift-invariant property of the dual-tree complex wavelet and its good directional selectivity in 2D make it a very appealing choice for pattern recognition. Recently, SVM has been shown to be very successful in pattern recognition. By combining these two tools we find that better recognition results are obtained. We achieve the highest rates when we use the dual-tree complex wavelet features with the Gaussian radial basis function kernel and the wavelet kernel for recognizing similar handwritten numerals, and when we use the Gaussian radial basis function for palmprint classification. Our findings are that the dual-tree complex wavelets are always better than the scalar wavelet for pattern recognition when SVM is used. Also, among many frequently used SVM kernels, the Gaussian radial basis function kernel and the wavelet kernel are the best for pattern recognition applications.
ICE: Managing Multiple Clusters Using Web Services

High-performance computing architectures are mainly represented by clusters and grids. Usually, clusters are composed by a controled environment, using specific tools that work well to obtain performance. Grids present a set of machines that work as a unique image and treat issues like resource discovery and heterogeneity that are not common in clusters. Analyzing this context, we detect a situation between clusters and grids where users have an isolated access to different clusters. This scenario usually obligates users to learn details about how to interact with the tools of each cluster that they have access to. The management of this scenario is the aim of ICE - Integrated Cluster Environment. ICE is based on a service-oriented architecture (SOA) that hides the complexity to deal with multiple clusters. It offers a Web Portal to achieve access transparency and its framework provides extensibility, facilitating the management of cluster tools and its functionalities. This paper describes ICE, its testbed environment, results and related work.
Personalized medicine in psoriasis: developing a genomic classifier to predict histological response to Alefacept

Background Alefacept treatment is highly effective in a select group patients with moderate-to-severe psoriasis, and is an ideal candidate to develop systems to predict who will respond to therapy. A clinical trial of 22 patients with moderate to severe psoriasis treated with alefacept was conducted in 2002-2003, as a mechanism of action study. Patients were classified as responders or non-responders to alefacept based on histological criteria. Results of the original mechanism of action study have been published. Peripheral blood was collected at the start of this clinical trial, and a prior analysis demonstrated that gene expression in PBMCs differed between responders and non-responders, however, the analysis performed could not be used to predict response.
Animal Models for the Study of Infant Botulism

Intestinal infection with Clostridium botulinum was produced by intragastric administration of C. botulinum spores in conventionally reared mice seven to 13 days old but not in younger or older mice. The 50% infective dose of one of the culture strains administered was 170 spores per nine-day-old mouse. Overt botulism did not develop in these animals, but infection with C. botulinum was evidenced by the presence of botulinal toxin in the colon for up to seven days after challenge. Infant mice were at least as sensitive to the lethal action of botulinal toxin as were adult mice, and evidence suggests that infant rats may have a similar age-related susceptibility to enteric botulinal infection. Germfree adult mice were very susceptible to infection with C. botulinum, acquiring intestinally infective doses of airborne spores. Within a few days after exposure to normal mice, the axenic mice became resistant to challenge with 10(5) C. botulinum spores.
Outdoor experimental comparison of four ad hoc routing algorithms

Most comparisons of wireless ad hoc routing algorithms involve simulated or indoor trial runs, or outdoor runs with only a small number of nodes, potentially leading to an incorrect picture of algorithm performance. In this paper, we report on an outdoor comparison of four different routing algorithms, APRL, AODV, ODMRP, and STARA, running on top of thirty-three 802.11-enabled laptops moving randomly through an athletic field. This comparison provides insight into the behavior of ad hoc routing algorithms at larger real-world scales than have been considered so far. In addition, we compare the outdoor results with both indoor ("tabletop") and simulation results for the same algorithms, examining the differences between the indoor results and the outdoor reality. Finally, we describe the software infrastructure that allowed us to implement the ad hoc routing algorithms in a comparable way, and use the same codebase for indoor, outdoor, and simulated trial runs.
An improved chaotic digital encoder

In this work an improved chaotic digital encoder/decoder pair is introduced. The structure of the encoder is that of a digital random-number generator. The characterization of digital chaos shows that it belongs to the class of pseudorandom number generators.
Dynamic Mechanical Characterization of a Soy Based Epoxy Resin System

Two novel soy based resin systems namely Epoxidized Allyl Soyate (EAS) and Epoxidized Methyl Soyate (EMS) have been synthesized at the University of Missouri-Rolla. These resins form co-polymers with base epoxy in varied proportions to obtain a family of polymeric networks. The effects of the stoichiometry on the dynamic mechanical properties of the resulting resins were investigated. The results show that the damping ability is enhanced through the
Time hopped transmitted reference with multiple autocorrelation sampling for ultra wideband radio

Transmitted reference (TR) schemes for ultra wideband (UWB) eliminate the need for channel estimation, reducing receiver complexity at the cost of reduced performance. This letter proposes a transmitted reference (TR) scheme with multiple autocorrelation sampling detection. The proposed receiver captures the energy in the received signal's autocorrelation side lobes, outperforming the traditional TR scheme for the operational range of signal to noise ratio (SNR) values. Time hoping, as well as the use of bandwidth efficient signaling with favorable spectral characteristics, facilitate significant improvement in system capacity in comparison to a similar scheme using orthogonal chirp signals in multipath spread channels.
Advances in electrophysiology in the diagnosis of behavioral disorders.

Introduction: Diagnosis in psychiatry remains largely subjective. Developing biological observations in psychiatric disorders into laboratory-based diagnostic tests can significantly impact diagnosis and management of these disorders. Diagnostic electrophysiological techniques are non-invasive and relatively inexpensive. Areas covered: In this review, the authors propose that enough knowledge has accumulated to allow the establishment of psychiatry-based clinical electrophysiology laboratories (PCELs). A brief summary of established clinical indications for electrophysiology tests, summary of highly promising technologies and a presentation of a proposed four-step approach to facilitate the translation of promising biological observations into diagnostic tests are provided. The reader should develop an appreciation of the current status of the clinical applications of psychiatric electrophysiology. The authors propose to capitalize on the widely accepted indication to rule out medical causes of psychiatri...
Cicero and Editorial Revision

Abstract In this essay I discuss Cicero's practice of submitting his texts to others for comment, arguing that the mutual reading and correction of friends' works played an important social function. By discussing what would make a text better, Cicero and his collaborators worked to forge and maintain social ties. In addition, I pursue an important corollary: for a text to provoke this activity, it must present itself as unfinished or in progress. Cicero was aware of this corollary, and in the Brutus he used images of textual incompletion to critique Atticist and Caesarian theories of style as solitary, antisocial, and implicitly autocratic. This led him to formulate an important new literary politics, which he put into practice in the years after Pompey's defeat in the civil war.
a Simulation of Smooth-Variable Intensity Rainfall Patterns

: Continuous rainfall patterns are currently simulated by approximating them by stair-stepped (piece-wise) patterns. The effects of this approximation on infiltration and runoff processes are not well known. A new technique for simulating smooth-variable intensity rainfall patterns is presented. This technique is based on the fundamental principles of a moving water head in a container. The proposed technique is general and capable of simulating any rainfall pattern. However, as the rainfall pattern gets more complicated, the equipment required for simulation becomes more involved. The proposed technique has been tested experimentally. A close agreement was found between the theoretical and experimental simulations. It is concluded that the proposed technique might be very useful in studying the infiltration and runoff processes under variable intensity rainfall, especially for simple convex patterns.
HABITAT AND SEX DIFFERENCES IN PHYSIOLOGICAL CONDITION OF BREEDING SOUTHWESTERN WILLOW FLYCATCHERS (EMPIDONAX TRAILLIIEXTIMUS)

Abstract The Southwestern Willow Flycatcher (Empidonax traillii extimus; here- after “flycatcher”) is a federally listed endangered species that breeds in densely vegetated riparian habitats dominated by native and exotic plants, including introduced monotypic saltcedar (Tamarix ramosissima). Some workers have theorized that saltcedar is unsuitable habitat for the flycatcher, primarily because it generally supports a smaller and less diverse invertebrate community (the flycatcher's food base) than native habitats (e.g. Salix spp.). However, differences in insect communities between native and saltcedar habitats are not proof that saltcedar habitats are inferior. The only way to evaluate whether the habitats differ in dietary or energetic quality is to document actual food limitation or its manifestations. Measurements of an individual's body condition and metabolic state can serve as indicators of environmental stressors, such as food limitation and environmental extremes. We captured 130 flycatchers bree...
The irregularity of the menstrual function.

The literature concerning the regularity of the menstrual function is reviewed. In addition a study was carried out using the menstrual records of 131 members of a Nurses Training School. 1522 menstrual periods are recorded 1414 in the controlled group and 231 in the questionable group. The study illustrates the marked irregularity of the memstrual period. Irregularity in interval number of pads used and length of flow was marked even among the 87 women who considered their periods to be absolutely regular. Variation in occupation did not seem to appreciably affect the general cycle or the amount of dysmenorrhea experienced except that work involving stepping into the large refrigerators seemed to increase the amount of pain experienced. The idea of normal regular periods of 28-day intervals should be abandoned.
Prolonged Operative Time to Extubation Is Not a Useful Metric for Comparing the Performance of Individual Anesthesia Providers.

Background:One anesthesiologist performance metric is the incidence of “prolonged” (15 min or longer after dressing complete) times to extubation. The authors used several methods to identify the performance outliers and assess whether targeting these outliers for reduction could improve operating r
Surgical Versus Percutaneous Coronary Revascularization for Multivessel Disease in Diabetic Patients With Non–ST-Segment–Elevation Acute Coronary Syndrome Analysis From the Acute Catheterization and Early Intervention Triage Strategy Trial

Background— The preferred revascularization strategy for diabetic patients with acute coronary syndromes and multivessel coronary artery disease is uncertain. We evaluated the outcomes of diabetic patients with moderate and high-risk acute coronary syndrome and multivessel disease managed with percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) versus coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG). Methods and Results— Among 13 819 moderate and high-risk acute coronary syndrome patients enrolled in the Acute Catheterization and Early Intervention Triage Strategy (ACUITY) trial, 1772 diabetic patients had multivessel disease with left anterior descending artery involvement and were managed by PCI (n=1349) or CABG (n=423). Propensity scoring was applied to adjust for differences in baseline clinical and angiographic characteristics, yielding a total of 326 matched patients (163 managed by PCI and 163 managed by CABG). At 30 days, treatment with PCI compared with CABG was associated with lower rates of major bleeding (15.3% versus 55.6%; P <0.0001), blood transfusions (9.2% versus 43.2%; P <0.0001), and acute kidney injury (13.4% versus 33.6%; P <0.0001), but more unplanned revascularization procedures (6.9% versus 1.9%; P =0.03). At 1 year PCI was associated with higher rates of repeat revascularization procedures (19.5% versus 5.2%; P =0.0001), with nonsignificantly different rates of myocardial infarction, stroke, and death at either 30 days or 1 year. Conclusions— In the large-scale ACUITY trial, diabetic patients with acute coronary syndrome and multivessel disease treated with PCI rather than CABG had less bleeding and acute kidney injury, greater need for repeat revascularization procedures, and comparable rates of myocardial infarction, stroke, and death through 1-year follow-up. Clinical Trial Registration— URL: . Unique identifier: [NCT00093158][1]. [1]: /lookup/external-ref?link_type=CLINTRIALGOV&access_num=NCT00093158&atom=%2Fcirccvint%2F8%2F6%2Fe002032.atom
Description of the TERRA_LM Module of the Meteorological Model COSMO_LM

The objective of the present report is to describe comprehensively the model SVAT TERRA_LM, thanks to equations of mass conservation and heat conduction between soil, vegetation and atmosphere, SVAT models simulate heat and humidity fluxes between soil and atmosphere surfaces. These models have been widely used in recent years in both biophysics and ecology for the determination of vegetation behaviour when faced with extreme conditions, coupled with models of floods prediction for the determination of water volumes initially present in soil, and above all in metereological studies for the determination of conditions of the lower part of the atmospheric part of the model, at the interface of soil and atmosphere.
Abstract 81: Rapid Microbleed Formation in the First Year Following Primary Intracerebral Hemorrhage

Introduction: Cerebral microbleeds (MBs) have emerged as a marker for a hemorrhage-prone vasculopathy. Few studies have evaluated MBs prospectively following intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH). We sought to investigate the frequency of rapid MB development in a predominantly African-American hypertensive ICH population. Methods: The Differences in the Imaging of Primary Hemorrhage Based on Ethnicity or Race (DECIPHER) study is an ongoing prospective, longitudinal, MR-based cohort study designed to evaluate racial/ethnic differences in risk factors for MBs and to prospectively evaluate the prognostic impact of MBs in underserved patients with ICH. We evaluated new MB formation in 2 time periods: from baseline to 30-day and from 30-day to 1-year. All 30-day images were coregistered to the baseline images in the first analysis; 1-year images were coregistered to 30-day images in the second. MB presence and location were determined by consensus review. Only subjects with 3T GRE sequences were included in this analysis. Univariate analyses were performed for both time intervals and subsequent logistic regression analysis was performed on the 30-day to 1-year analysis with new MB formation as the outcome variable. Results: Of the 35 subjects in the baseline to 30-day analysis, 7 (20%) had new MBs, compared to 20 of 55 (36%) in the 30-day to 1-year analysis. Univariate analyses are shown in the Table. Primary ICH location was deep in 32/35 (91%) in the first analysis and in 35/47 (74%) in the second. ApoE status, CAD, smoking status, and atrial fibrillation were not significantly different in either analysis. Logistic regression analysis demonstrated that MAP was significantly associated with new MB formation (OR 1.04 [95% CI 1.0, 1.07], p=0.038); a protective effect of hyperlipidemia was non-significant (OR 0.256, p=0.116). Conclusions: Despite a relatively small sample size, we found that more than one-third of ICH patients surviving one year developed new MBs, which suggests a dynamic and rapidly progressive vasculopathy at work. Future studies will examine the impact of new MB formation on patient outcomes.
Kinetics of Peptides and Arginine Production from Microalgae (Scenedesmus sp.) by Flash Hydrolysis

Water under subcritical conditions in a continuous-flow reactor (flash hydrolysis) has proved to be an efficient and environmentally friendly method for hydrolyzing proteins from microalgae biomass in a very short residence time (few seconds). In this study, flash hydrolysis experiments were conducted at three different temperatures (240, 280, and 320 °C) and three residence times (6, 9, and 12 s) to understand the kinetics of the hydrolysis of algae proteins to water-soluble peptides and arginine. Laboratory-grown protein-rich Scenedesmus sp. with an average composition of 54% proteins, 17% lipids, and 23% carbohydrates was used as the feedstock. After flash hydrolysis, both liquid and solid products were collected, and the contents of soluble peptides and arginine in the liquid fraction and of remaining proteinaceous material in the solids were analyzed. For all experiments above 240 °C at all residence times, the yield of soluble peptides was in the range of 57–67% of the algae protein, whereas the max...
Multiscale Nanoporous Structures for Sensing and Diagnostics

Current trends in sensing and diagnostics is towards developing hybrid devices that incorporate nanomaterial for enhancing device performance. These devices and systems have a broad impact ranging from personalized medicine in health care, environmental sensing and building multifunctional sensors for military applications. The overarching objective of the research work is to develop a new class of portable, bio-analytical tools with improved functionality and performance capabilities by utilizing the electrical effects on cellular and sub cellular species in micro and nanoscale domains. There are two key ideas underlying this research work. The first is to design and manufacture structures comprising of nanoscale-confined spaces integrated on to multi-scale architecture platforms. This model architecture has been engineered to harness the principle of macromolecular crowding for biomolecule binding and detection by monitoring perturbations in the electrical bi-layer in tailored nanoscale confined spaces. Enhanced performance metrics in biomolecule detection have been demonstrated in developing electrical immunoassays. We have demonstrated picogram/ml sensitivity in detection of specific cardiovascular disease biomarkers, cancer biomarkers from human serum samples with a dynamic range of response varying from pg/ml to g/ml and response time within 120 seconds.
The Development, Implementation, and Assessment of a Systematic Academic Advising Program for Exploratory First-Year Students

All students, but especially freshmen, must understand their personal characteristics (interests, abilities, and values), learn the characteristics of academic programs, and use this information to develop their educational plans. In addition, they must learn about academic rules, procedures, and deadlines. We describe the development, implementation, and assessment of a systematic academic-advising program, The DUS Navigator, for exploratory freshmen. After a 1-semester pilot study, the program was delivered and assessed through five iterations. The results indicate that the program helps exploratory students take an active and productive role with advisors to make informed decisions about their educational plans.
Sleep-Disordered Breathing in Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy: An Assessment of the Literature.

Study Objectives:The aim of this review is to review the literature on sleep-disordered breathing in Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD).Methods:PubMed was searched with an array of search terms, inc...
Industry Transfer's Influence on RMB Exchange Rate and China' s Trade Structure Adjustment

We have set up in this paper a theoretical model of industry transfer' s influence on real exchange rate. We have checked up the real exchange rate of Japanese Yen from the 1960s to 2004. We have also checked up the real exchange rate of RMB and China's TSC index from the 1980s to 2004. The conclusion is that Balassa-Samuelson effect is actually in effect in China. China' s processing trade is almost half in proportion to total trade volume these years. We suggest at last that China should adjust the trade structure in time before estimating RMB exchange rate anew.
The Soil Water Apportioning Method (SWAM): An approach for long-term, low-cost monitoring of green roof hydrologic performance

Abstract As cities increasingly adopt green infrastructure for the decentralized management of stormwater, there is a growing need to develop cost-effective approaches for the long-term monitoring and performance evaluation of these systems. In this study, a water balance approach – termed the Soil Water Apportioning Method (SWAM) – was developed to enable economic assessment of the long-term hydrologic performance of green roofs. SWAM provides estimates of green roof runoff and evapotranspiration (ET) based solely on measurements of local precipitation, substrate moisture, and the substrate maximum water storage capacity. To validate the approach, SWAM generated values of runoff and ET were compared with 30 months of runoff and ET data obtained from an extensive vegetated mat green roof located in New York City. Accurate runoff and ET estimates were obtained using as few as one substrate moisture measurement per day, although various other data logging frequencies were tested – with best results achieved with data logged every 6–24-h (Nash-Sutcliffe efficiency indices of 0.85–0.91 and 0.73–0.78, for runoff and ET respectively). SWAM-generated runoff values were further validated using 14 months of runoff data obtained at two other extensive green roof sites located in New York City, one a built-in-place system and the other a modular tray system. Results from this study indicate that SWAM provides a viable, low-cost approach for the citywide monitoring of green roof hydrologic performance with nominal instrumentation and implementation costs.
Ethical Issues in Medicine: A House Officer's Views

(1971). Ethical Issues in Medicine: A House Officer's Views. Hospital Practice: Vol. 6, No. 11, pp. 37-43.
Determination of Selectivity Coefficients of Ion-Selective Microelectrodes

The application of an ion-selective microelectrode to measurements of ion activities requires a determination of its selectivity coefficient, i.e. the ability of a given ion-selective microelectrode to distinguish between the primary ion and the interfering ion. For the measurements of intracellular Na, Ca, Cl, and extracellular K ion activities, it is necessary to determine accurately the selectivity coefficient of each microelectrode because interfering ion activities are much greater than the primary ion activities. In this study we have attempted to evaluate the methods used usually for determining the selectivity coefficients as well as a method modified from others. For this evaluation, selectivity coefficients of recessed-tip and protruded-tip Na+-selective glass microelectrodes were determined by the various methods and examined.
Effect of simulated weightlessness on phase II drug metabolism in the rat.

Background Exposure to weightlessness is known to alter physiological processes in humans and animals. As a result of these changes, hepatic drug metabolism may be altered as well. Indeed, short term simulated weightlessness in the rat has been shown to increase oxidative metabolism. Hypothesis Simulated weightlessness will increase Phase II drug metabolism in the rat during short-term tail suspension. Methods The tail-suspended rat model was used to simulate weightlessness. Rats were subjected to 1, 3, 7, or 10 d of tail-suspension in order to mimic the effect of exposure to a microgravity environment. One additional rat group was not suspended and served as a control. On the final day of the study, rats we administered a single intravenous bolus dose of acetaminophen 25 mg x kg(-1) through an implanted jugular catheter and serial blood samples were taken for 90 min. Serum acetaminophen concentrations were measured by high-performance liquid chromatography. Pharmacokinetic parameters were determined by using standard model independent methods. Results The results show that simulated weightlessness in the rat has no effect on Phase II drug metabolism, using acetaminophen as a marker compound. Conclusions These data support the hypothesis that simulated weightlessness in the rat modulates oxidative metabolism, but not drug conjugation to glucuronide or sulfate metabolites. These data offer insight into the physiological changes and variability seen in hepatic metabolic profiles in humans and animals following actual spaceflight.
Personalized Recommendations using Knowledge Graphs: A Probabilistic Logic Programming Approach

Improving the performance of recommender systems using knowledge graphs is an important task. There have been many hybrid systems proposed in the past that use a mix of content-based and collaborative filtering techniques to boost the performance. More recently, some work has focused on recommendations that use external knowledge graphs (KGs) to supplement content-based recommendation. In this paper, we investigate three methods for making KG based recommendations using a general-purpose probabilistic logic system called ProPPR. The simplest of the models, EntitySim, uses only the links of the graph. We then extend the model to TypeSim that also uses the types of the entities to boost its generalization capabilities. Next, we develop a graph based latent factor model, GraphLF, which combines the strengths of latent factorization with graphs. We compare our approaches to a recently proposed state-of-the-art graph recommendation method on two large datasets, Yelp and MovieLens-100K. The experiments illustrate that our approaches can give large performance improvements. Additionally, we demonstrate that knowledge graphs give maximum advantage when the dataset is sparse, and gradually become redundant as more training data becomes available, and hence are most useful in cold-start settings.
Use of AOAC INTERNATIONAL Method Performance Statistics in the Laboratory

Method performance statistics are included with many AOAC methods and are estimates of precision or variability. These statistics can provide useful guidelines as to the degree of precision that can be achieved when a method is used routinely. Indeed, defining method performance in a practical, meaningful, and standardized way is one of the goals of the AOAC Official Methods program. This paper gives some guidelines for understanding and interpreting AOAC method performance statistics for practical use in the laboratory.
Genetic Polymorphisms Associated with Priapism in Sickle Cell Disease.

Abstract Priapism, a painful and prolonged erection, has been reported to occur in 30–45% of male patients with sickle cell disease (SCD). However, little is known about the pathological processes and genetic risk factors that contribute to the occurrence of priapism. The identification of genetic variables that are associated with priapism may therefore help define both critical pathophysiologic mechanisms not otherwise apparent, as well as patients at increased risk. We examined genetic variation in our sample of 199 unrelated, adult (>18 years), male patients with Hb SS and Hb Sβ0-thalassemia, 83 (42%) of whom reported a history of priapism. Candidate genes for association with priapism were identified based on their involvement in adhesion, coagulation, inflammation, and cell signaling. Additionally, we examined genes involved in NO biology (NOS2, NOS3, SOD1, SLC4A1). Finally, we also examined polymorphisms in the KLOTHO gene, which has previously been associated with priapism. We examined a total of 389 SNPs in 48 candidate genes. Except for the gene encoding the β2 adrenergic receptor, SNP genotyping was performed by TaqMan, using Assays-on-Demand or Assays-by-Design genotyping products (Applied Biosystems). Allele tests were used to detect genetic associations with priapism. Strong evidence of association was found for SNP rs7526590 in the transforming growth factor-β receptor, type III (TGFBR3) gene (p=.00058), SNP rs10244884 in the aquaporin (AQP1) gene (p=.00068), and SNP rs3768780 in the integrin αV (ITGAV) gene (p=0.00090). A second ITGAV SNP (rs3768778), in linkage disequilibrium (r2=.59) with the first, also showed association with priapism (p=.00888). The A1 subunit of coagulation factor XIII (F13A1) had four SNPs (hcv1860621, rs1032045, rs1674074, rs381061 ) with p-values less than 0.010 (p-values = 0.00156, 0.00415, 0.00648, and 0.00712, respectively). The linkage disequilibrium among these F13A1 SNPs is negligible (r2 rs211234 and rs211239 showed a virtually identical distribution of genotypes for individuals with and without a history of priapism. However, our population is not identical to the previous study, which included patients as young as 10 years old. In conclusion, our data support the hypothesis that genetic variation is associated with risk for priapism among males with SCD and suggest that genes involved in the TGFβ pathway, coagulation, cell adhesion and cell hydration pathways may be important.
First-principles identification of novel double perovskites for water-splitting applications

Identification of new materials for photo-electrochemical conversion of water into hydrogen and oxygen using visible solar light is one of the grand challenges of our times. Toward this goal, here we employ a hierarchy of down-selection steps based on structural constraints, thermodynamic stability, constraints on bandgap and band-edge positions to identify potential candidates residing in a target double perovskite chemical space. The adopted screening strategy results in four new promising candidate materials, which were studied in greater detail using first-principles computations for their thermodynamic stability, electronic structure and octahedral structural distortions. Our theoretical investigation is expected to serve as a motivation for future experimental efforts targeted toward realizing these identified promising materials.
Disclosure of Mental Disability by College and University Faculty: The Negotiation of Accommodations, Supports, and Barriers

High-profile shootings and student suicides have made mental health issues on college campuses a major national issue. College students are usually the focus of this conversation, while little attention beyond anecdotal accounts has been paid to faculty with mental health issues. In response to this lack of broad-scale research, a first-of-its-kind cross-institutional survey of faculty with mental disabilities was conducted. Respondents self-identified as faculty with mental disabilities, mental illness or mental-health histories. Results from 267 respondents indicated that nearly 70% had no or limited familiarity with accommodations, and even fewer used them (87%). A majority of respondents (62%) disclosed to at least one person on campus, primarily colleagues (50%) and department chairs (21%). Respondents felt most supported by spouses/significant others (75% very or extremely supported) and friends (51%) rather than colleagues (29%) and supervisors (25%). In our discussion of these findings, we offer suggestions for practice that will improve environments, rather than focusing on case-by-case "fixes" for those who disclose. We also suggest directions for further research into this topic, which is frequently mentioned (in both scholarly and popular publications) but rarely investigated systematically or on a wide scale.
Effect of shear stress on iPSC-derived human brain microvascular endothelial cells (dhBMECs)

The endothelial cells that form the lumen of capillaries and microvessels are an important component of the blood–brain barrier. Cell phenotype is regulated by transducing a range of biomechanical and biochemical signals in the local microenvironment. Here we report on the role of shear stress in modulating the morphology, motility, proliferation, apoptosis, and protein and gene expression, of confluent monolayers of human brain microvascular endothelial cells derived from induced pluripotent stem cells. To assess the response of derived human brain microvascular endothelial cells (dhBMECs) to shear stress, confluent monolayers were formed in a microfluidic device. Monolayers were subjected to a shear stress of 4 or 12 dyne cm−2 for 40 h. Static conditions were used as the control. Live cell imaging was used to assess cell morphology, cell speed, persistence, and the rates of proliferation and apoptosis as a function of time. In addition, immunofluorescence imaging and protein and gene expression analysis of key markers of the blood–brain barrier were performed. Human brain microvascular endothelial cells exhibit a unique phenotype in response to shear stress compared to static conditions: (1) they do not elongate and align, (2) the rates of proliferation and apoptosis decrease significantly, (3) the mean displacement of individual cells within the monolayer over time is significantly decreased, (4) there is no cytoskeletal reorganization or formation of stress fibers within the cell, and (5) there is no change in expression levels of key blood–brain barrier markers. The characteristic response of dhBMECs to shear stress is significantly different from human and animal-derived endothelial cells from other tissues, suggesting that this unique phenotype that may be important in maintenance of the blood–brain barrier. The implications of this work are that: (1) in confluent monolayers of dhBMECs, tight junctions are formed under static conditions, (2) the formation of tight junctions decreases cell motility and prevents any morphological transitions, (3) flow serves to increase the contact area between cells, resulting in very low cell displacement in the monolayer, (4) since tight junctions are already formed under static conditions, increasing the contact area between cells does not cause upregulation in protein and gene expression of BBB markers, and (5) the increase in contact area induced by flow makes barrier function more robust.
Fast methods for reaching AC steady state in FE transient analysis

Two efficient methods are introduced to speed up the transient process for reaching the AC steady state. The techniques are suitable for virtually all poly phase AC machines. In one of the methods, the transient DC flux linkage component is eliminated by applying an additional voltage component within a small time interval for each phase winding. The flux linkages at the end of this interval are the perfect initial values for the successive transient simulation. The other method is based on referring the rotor conductivity to locked rotor operation for induction motors so that the rotor time constant can be significantly reduced. As a result, the steady-state AC flux linkages can be obtained immediately within the next period. The effectiveness of the proposed methods is validated by some application examples.
Health Conditions and Behaviors as Surfaces

All physiological processes can be mapped onto topological surfaces or manifolds. All evolving systems are dynamical and undergo phase changes at multiple levels, microscopic to macroscopic. In modeling realistic, comprehensive health outcomes on systems of health independent variables, it is important that we carefully specify these models based upon the available data, their collinearity with each other, and their interactions across multiple systems and levels of hierarchy (e.g., molecule to cell to organ systems). The advent of reliable data storage and ethical sharing of data on mobile smartphone applications represents a promising disruptive technology for improving our data capture to enable the analysis of phase changes across multiple physiological and behavioral changes for individuals and social networking groups/populations.
A high speed motion capture method and performance metrics for studying gaits on an insect-scale legged robot

This paper develops a custom motion capture system that uses vision-based methods to rapidly and accurately track the body and leg position/orientation of a 1.43g legged microrobot, the Harvard Ambulatory MicroRobot (HAMR). Two new generalized metrics for quantifying locomotion performance are defined: amplitude-normalized stride correlation, and percent ineffective stance. Six different gaits are run on HAMR to validate the experimental setup and establish baseline performance. Furthermore, HAMR is compared with the cockroach, Blaberus Discoidalis, and with other legged robots. Future studies can leverage the experimental setup to study gait selection and transitions for small legged systems.
Transplant Center Variability in Disparities for African-American Kidney Transplant Recipients.

BACKGROUND Disparities research has traditionally focused on patient-level variables to ascertain predominant risk factors driving differences in outcomes for African-American (AA) kidney transplant recipients. Our objectives were to determine the magnitude and impact of transplant center variability for graft outcome disparities. MATERIAL AND METHODS This was a retrospective cohort study analyzing 25 years of U.S. national transplant registry data at both the patient and center levels using univariate descriptive statistics and multivariable modeling. RESULTS A total of 257,024 recipients from 191 centers were analyzed; AAs represented 31.1% of recipients. After adjusting for baseline characteristics, AAs had 42% higher risk of graft loss (aHR 1.42, 95% CI 1.39 to 1.45; p 0.05) and 25% of centers had a large AA disparity (aHR >1.75). In a more recent transplant time period (2000-14), overall racial disparities decreased but center-level disparities increased in variability. Center-level factors significantly associated with increasing disparity included higher acute rejection rates, fewer transplants per year, longer length of stay, lower use of calcineurin inhibitors (CNI), and lower living donor rates. CONCLUSIONS There is evidence of significant center-level variability in graft outcome disparities for AA kidney recipients. Further, there appears to be a number of center-level factors associated with this variability, including acute rejection rates, CNI use, number of transplants per year, and, in recent years, low living donor rates.
Toward Building Psychoanalytically Based Mathematical Models of Psychotherapeutic Paradigms

Psychoanalysis has long been the stepchild of science. Though its origins include Freud’s (1895) valiant efforts to establish a neurophysiological substrate for both conscious and unconscious mental phenomena, psychoanalysts—including Freud himself—have long since abandoned their own psychophysiological roots. Nonetheless, as psychoanalysts struggle to justify their labors and to provide their efforts with some foundation in research, there is a small but perceptible movement toward developing a truly significant foundation for psychoanalytic observations, clinical practice, and theory. Indeed, these efforts now include some crude but vital first attempts to generate mathematical models in realms pertinent to psychoanalytic investigation. Sashin’s (1985) work with the application of catastrophe theory in understanding the vicissitudes of affect is pioneering in this respect.
Exophoric Reference as an Interactiove Resource

Certain items of talk, for example demonstratives such as ‘this’ and ‘that’, have the property that “instead of being interpreted semantically in their own right, they make reference to something else for their interpretation” (Halliday and Hasan 1976:30). Halliday and Hasan (1976:31) note that such items “are directives indicating that information is to be retrieved from elsewhere” and use the term exophoric reference to designate cases where the information to be retrieved is not in the talk being produced but rather in the situation within which that talk occurs.2
Rule Configuration Checking in Secure Cooperative Data Access

In this paper, we consider an environment where a group of parties have their own relational databases and provide restricted access to other parties. In order to implement desired business services, each party defines a set of authorization rules over the join of basic relations, and these rules can be viewed as the configurations of the accessible information in the cooperative data access environment. However, authorization rules are likely to be developed by each enterprise somewhat independently based on their business needs and may not be sufficiently well defined to be enforceable. That is, the rules may be missing some crucial access capabilities that are essential for implementing the desired restrictions. In this paper, we propose a mechanism to check the rule enforceability for each given authorization rule.
Overview of Recent BLS Research and Immunology

Recently developed methodology for modeling and identification of bilinear systems, BLS, by means of orthogonal functional expansions are summarized here along with the evolution of bilinear models in the decomposition of a complex model of the immune system. In particular, BLS structure is analyzed in terms of Volterra kernels, and identification by means of Walsh functions and a cross-correlation algorithm is discussed.
How to be a Terrible Teacher: Kierkegaard’s Philosophical Fragments on what Education is not:

I argue for an approach to Philosophical Fragments that allows it to be philosophical (as opposed to theological) and fragmentary (as opposed to systematic), and that pays particular attention to t...
Prevalence of and Risk Factors for Urinary Incontinence in Home Hospice Patients

Urinary incontinence (UI) is a debilitating and embarrassing condition that is prevalent among aging males and females. Little is known about UI in the home hospice setting. We sought to determine UI prevalence and risk factors in a cohort of 15432 home hospice patients over 4yr. Most of the study patients were female (59%) and aged ≥75yr. This was a retrospective observational study and no patients were excluded. The median length of service was 19 d. Approximately one-third of patients were diagnosed with UI during their hospice stay. Female sex and age were associated with a greater risk of UI. Diagnoses that increased the risk of UI included dementia and stroke. The risk of UI diagnosis was lower among those without a health care proxy, as well among those with higher Palliative Performance Scale scores. UI affects a substantial number of patients in home hospice and there are no guidelines for its diagnosis or mitigation. There is a pressing need to further understand the impact of UI on home hospice patients. PATIENT SUMMARY: We investigated the prevalence of urinary incontinence (UI) among home hospice patients. Approximately one-third of patients were diagnosed with UI during their hospice care. Female sex, age, dementia, and stroke were associated with a greater risk of UI. Guidelines are required for UI diagnosis and mitigation in home hospice care.
Towards Greater Inclusion in Cancer Genomics Studies.

The study by Jaratlerdsiri and colleagues represents the first whole-genome sequencing study of prostate cancer from men in sub-Saharan Africa. Preliminary findings include a higher tumor mutation burden in these tumors compared with data from other available prostate cancer cohorts. Although larger studies are needed and greater effort and investment to include patients of African ancestry in cancer genomic studies overall, the findings begin to catalog the diversity of prostate cancer genomics in the African population, which has a high burden of disease and mortality from prostate cancer. See related article by Jaratlerdsiri et al., p. 6736
Stability of silicones modified with PEO-silane amphiphiles: Impact of structure and concentration

Abstract The efficacy of poly (ethylene oxide) (PEO)-based surface-modifying additives (SMAs), following the bulk-modification of silicones, requires sustained, water-driven PEO migration to the surface to achieve hydrophilicity and subsequent reduction of protein adsorption. Herein, a condensation cure silicone was modified with PEO-silane amphiphile SMAs (5–100 μmol per 1 g silicone) comprised of an oligo (dimethyl siloxane) (ODMS) tether, PEO segment and optional triethoxysilane (TEOS) crosslinkable group. This allowed us to confirm that the TEOS crosslinkable group was not necessary and that the ODMS tether (m = 13 or 30) could sufficiently physically anchor the amphiphile in the silicone network. Surface hydrophilicity was examined before and after aqueous conditioning, as well as mass loss and water uptake after conditioning. Overall, silicones modified with all amphiphilic SMAs produced increasingly hydrophilic surfaces and their hydrophilicity was maintained following conditioning. At all concentrations, all amphiphilic SMA modified silicones had minimal water uptake and mass loss, comparable to that of unmodified silicone. Finally, silicones modified with all amphiphilic SMAs ≥25 μmol exhibited exceptional protein resistance that was not appreciably diminished after conditioning.