cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
The infinite time limit for the time-dependent Born-Oppenheimer approximation

We analyze the Schrodinger equation\(i\varepsilon ^2 \tfrac{\partial }{{\partial t}}\Psi = H(\varepsilon )\Psi \), whereH(ɛ) is the hamiltonian of the molecular system consisting of nuclei with masses proportional to ɛ−4 and electrons with masses of order 1. Using the Born-Oppenheimer method we construct the leading order asymptotic expansion to the exact solutions of the equation. We show that if the particles interact through smooth potentials decaying suitably as the distance between particles tends to ∞, then the expansion holds uniformly for all timest∈[0,∞). By similar analysis one can show validity of the expansion fort∈(−∞,0], thus our results hold for scattering theory.
Design of a CCD focal-plane codec preprocessor for lossless image compression

The paper presents the design of a CCD-based codec preprocessor (CP) integrated with an areal imager. 3 x 3 pixel neighborhood blocks, where the center pixel arrives first, are utilized for the lossless compression algorithm in the image coding scheme. A 256 x 256 buried-channel frame transfer device with 15 x 15 square microns pixels is employed as the imager. The neighborhood reconstruction is effected by means of both row regrouping and pixel resequencing operations. Four designs for CCD CP chips are described: two hybridized to the imager array, and two integrated with the imager. The chips operate at a 30 Hz frame rate with power dissipation at less than 10 uW. The size of the hybrid chips is 2.5 x 5.5 sq mm, and the focal-plane chips' CPs require an area of 250 x 400 square microns. The CPs provide differential output appropriate for lossless coding and compression to off-chip electronics when reorganization of the image data into local 3 x 3 neighborhood blocks is complete.© (1990) COPYRIGHT SPIE--The International Society for Optical Engineering. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.
The auscultatory and phonocardiographic signs of ventricular septal defects.

Abstract 1. 1. Forty-four proved cases of ventricular septal defect have been reviewed from the auscultatory and phonocardiographic stand-point. 2. 2. A loud, harsh pansystolic murmur, moderately split and normal to increased intensity of pulmonary closure, a third heart sound at the apex and occasionally a mid-diastolic ventricular filling murmur are the most characteristic observations. The systolic murmur is invariably associated with a thrill and is maximal in the third or fourth left intercostal space. 3. 3. An aortic diastolic murmur was observed in three patients who had aortic insufficiency. 4. 4. A widely split and decreased sound of pulmonary closure was noted in four patients with associated infundibular pulmonary stenosis. 5. 5. Pulmonary hypertension caused a narrowly split or single second sound that was of increased intensity. The systolic murmur was softer and non-holosystolic in three of seven patients with pulmonary hypertension. 6. 6. The differentiation between ventricular septal defect and other conditions associated with a similar harsh systolic murmur was briefly discussed.
Genetic study of 'necrotic leaf spot' mutation induced in an inbred line of maize (Zea mays L.) by thermal neutron irradiation of seed.

Abstract Thermal-neutron irradiation of maize seeds produced a sub-line of N25 inbred that developed necrotic leaf-spots just prior to tasseling time. Genetic studies clearly indicate that the trait is controlled by a pair of alleles with the normal allele being completely dominant over the necrotic leaf-spot allele. In homozygous recessive plants, degree of spotting varied from leaf to leaf, but symptoms were always present with one exception, which conceivably could have been an outcross. The mutant line yields 18·7 per cent less grain than the normal, but the heterozygote exhibited a surprising amount of heterosis, outyielding the two-parent mean by 18·6 per cent and the normal parent by 7·5 per cent. The latter was not statistically significant, however. In population studies, genes such as this contribute an important amount of genetic variability in some quantitative traits. The chromosome on which the gene is located has not yet been established.
Dynamical Friciton near the Galactic Center

Numerical simulations of the dynamical friction suffered by a star cluster near the Galactic center have been performed with a parallelized tree code. Gerhard (2001) has suggested that dynamical friction, which causes a cluster to lose orbital energy and spiral in towards the galactic center, may explain the presence of a cluster of very young stars in the central parsec, where star formation might be prohibitively difficult owing to strong tidal forces. The clusters modeled in our simulations have an initial total mass of 105–106 M⊙ and initial galactocentric radii of 2.5–30 pc. We have identified a few simulations in which dynamical friction indeed brings a cluster to the central parsec, although this is only possible if the cluster is either very massive (∼ 106M⊙), or is formed near the central parsec (≲5 pc). In both cases, the cluster should have an initially very dense core (>106M⊙pc−3). The initial segregation of massive stars into the cluster core can help achieve the requisite density, and can help account for the observed distribution of He I stars in the central parsec.
Common Expression of Varicella-Zoster Viral Glycoprotein Antigens in Vitro and in Chickenpox and Zoster Vesicles

Human cells infected with varicella-zoster virus (VZV) produce at least three major virus-specific, immunogenic glycoproteins: gp118, gp98, and gp62. Since glycoproteins gp98 and gp62 were found to be prominent constituents of the infected cell membrane, a murine monoclonal antibody (clone 3B3) that reacted avidly with this glycoprotein complex was selected as a probe for detection of VZV replication in laboratory and clinical settings. Cultured cells of human, simian, and caviid origin, when infected with wild-type isolates as well as laboratory and vaccine strains of VZV all expressed these viral glycoproteins. The monoclonal antibody immunostained the basal and malpighian epithelial layers of a zoster vesicle biopsy specimen and also reacted with all specimens of vesicular cells obtained from epidemiologically unrelated patients with chickenpox and zoster. Thus, these studies demonstrate that the VZV-specific glycoprotein complex gp98/gp62 is highly conserved, abundantly expressed, and easily detected with a monoclonal antibody probe. Varicella-zoster virus (VZV) is a human herpesgroup virus that causes the primary infection chickenpox. The pathogenesis of this common childhood exanthem has remained obscure, although considerable evidence derived from "experiments of nature" as well as immunization studies with wild-type and attenuated strains of VZV suggests a dual viremic schema based on the
Effect of Dynamic Contact Angle on Single Bubbles During Nucleate Pool Boiling

Nucleate pool boiling at low heat flux is typically characterized by cyclic growth and departure of single vapor bubbles from the heated wall. It has been experimentally observed that the contact angle at the bubble base varies during the ebullition cycle. In the present numerical study, dynamic advancing and receding contact angles obtained from experimental observations are specified at the base of a vapor bubble growing on a wall. The complete Navier-Stokes equations are solved and the liquid-vapor interface is captured using the level-set technique. The effect of dynamic contact angle on the bubble dynamics and vapor removal rate are compared to results obtained with static contact angle. The results show that bubble base exhibits a slip/stick behavior with dynamic contact angle though the overall effect on the vapor removal rate is small. Higher advancing contact angle is found to increase the vapor removal rate.Copyright © 2004 by ASME
vPFS: Bandwidth virtualization of parallel storage systems

Existing parallel file systems are unable to differentiate I/Os requests from concurrent applications and meet per-application bandwidth requirements. This limitation prevents applications from meeting their desired Quality of Service (QoS) as high-performance computing (HPC) systems continue to scale up. This paper presents vPFS, a new solution to address this challenge through a bandwidth virtualization layer for parallel file systems. vPFS employs user-level parallel file system proxies to interpose requests between native clients and servers and to schedule parallel I/Os from different applications based on configurable bandwidth management policies. vPFS is designed to be generic enough to support various scheduling algorithms and parallel file systems. Its utility and performance are studied with a prototype which virtualizes PVFS2, a widely used parallel file system. Enhanced proportional sharing schedulers are enabled based on the unique characteristics (parallel striped I/Os) and requirement (high throughput) of parallel storage systems. The enhancements include new threshold- and layout-driven scheduling synchronization schemes which reduce global communication overhead while delivering total-service fairness. An experimental evaluation using typical HPC benchmarks (IOR, NPB BTIO) shows that the throughput overhead of vPFS is small ( 96% of target sharing ratio) for competing applications with diverse I/O patterns.
Malignant catarrhal fever-like disease in sheep after intranasal inoculation with ovine herpesvirus-2.

A malignant catarrhal fever (MCF)–like disease was induced experimentally in 3 sheep after aerosol inoculation with ovine herpesvirus-2 (OvHV-2). Each of 3 OvHV-2–negative sheep was nebulized with 2 ml of nasal secretions containing approximately 3.07 − 109 OvHV-2 DNA copies from a sheep experiencing an intensive viral-shedding episode. Ovine herpesvirus-2 DNA became detectable by polymerase chain reaction in the peripheral blood leukocytes of all 3 sheep within 3 days, and all 3 seroconverted between 6 and 8 days postinfection (PI). The sheep developed clinical signs, with copious mucopurulent nasal discharge and fever around 14 days PI. One of the 3 clinically affected sheep was euthanized at 18 days PI. Major lesions at necropsy were multifocal linear erosions and ulcers in mucosa of the cheeks, tongue, pharynx, and proximal esophagus and mild disseminated pneumonia. Microscopically, there was extensive moderate superficial histiocytic–lymphocytic rhinitis with epithelial dissociation and degeneration....
Sensitivity of prevertebral soft tissue measurement at C3 for detection of cervical spine fractures and dislocations

A prevertebral soft tissue measurement exceeding 4 to 5 mm at C3 on a lateral spine radiograph is considered to be evidence of cervical spine injury. The objective of this study was to determine the sensitivity of the prevertebral soft tissue measurement at C3 in patients with proven cervical spine fractures or dislocations and to determine if this measurement correlates with the location or mechanism of injury. Consecutive patients 16 years of age or older who were admitted from July 1988 to June 1995 to a tertiary referral hospital with a discharge diagnosis of cervical spine fracture or dislocation were retrospectively studied. Patients were excluded if an interpretable lateral cervical radiograph taken within 24 hours of the injury was unavailable, medical records were unavailable or incomplete, the injury was caused by penetrating trauma or attempted hanging, or retropharyngeal air was present on the lateral radiograph. For each study patient, the earliest available lateral radiograph was obtained, and the prevertebral soft tissue measurement at the inferior aspect of C3 was recorded. All medical records and reports of imaging studies were reviewed. Two hundred thirty-two patients were identified and 21 were excluded, leaving 212 study patients. Injuries were classified as high (C1 to C2), low (C3 to C7), anterior, or posterior. For each patient the mechanism of injury was inferred from the fracture pattern according to established criteria. For all patients the sensitivity of a prevertebral soft tissue measurement at C3 of > 4 mm was 66% (95% confidence interval [CI] 59, 72). For C1 to C2 (n = 71) and C3 to C7 (n = 138) injuries, the sensitivities were 64% (95% CI 56, 78) and 64% (95% CI 56, 72), respectively. For anterior (n = 95) and posterior (n = 70) injuries the sensitivities were 64% (95% CI 54, 74) and 64% (95% CI 52, 75), respectively. There was no statistically significant difference in the prevertebral soft tissue measurement at C3 for high versus low injury, anterior versus posterior injury, or mechanism of injury. These results show that the prevertebral soft tissue measurement at C3 is an insensitive marker of cervical spine fracture or dislocation and does not correlate with the location or mechanism of injury.
Stability of linear periodic systems

Abstract A method for calculating the solution, in Floquet form, to a system of linear differential equations with periodic parameters is developed. As a result, both the periodic and exponential parts of the solution are developed as power series in a small parameter, ϵ. From this solution, approximate expressions for the characteristic exponents are derived and hence the stability of the system can be determined. The technique is analogous and parallels that developed by Cesari, Hale, Gambill, et al. By returning to the basis of the underlying process of casting out the secular terms, a method is developed which has advantages from the technical and computational point of view. The expressions for the characteristic exponents are explicit, namely, series of powers of ϵ, whose terms can be easily written, and which converge for ϵ sufficiently small. More importantly, from a practical standpoint, an estimate of the error which results when the series is truncated is derived. Using such an estimate, we draw a circle on the complex plane, centered at the approximate characteristic exponents, within which the exact characteristic exponents must lie.
The Political Afterlife of Eleonora Duse

Eleonora Duse (1858–1924), international star, national treasure, and patriotic Italian died in Pittsburgh in April 1924. Those involved in the memorializing process contended for control of her body, attempting to interpolate her renown in competing narratives of national pride and the universality of art. Duse died at a turning point for Italy, the year Mussolini's Fascists became the majority party. For Mussolini and the Fascists, Duse's death became the occasion for a pageant of Italian pride through a series of carefully orchestrated ceremonies. At the same time, the theatre community tried to establish an artistic narrative more akin to the ideals Duse expressed in life. In the end, nationalist motifs dominated the memorial discourse. Duse's own assertions of the importance of spirit over corporeality became an ironic footnote to a story in which the actress's body stood in for the nation.
Evaluation of the OptiMAL Test for Rapid Diagnosis of Plasmodium vivax and Plasmodium falciparum Malaria

The development of rapid and specific diagnostic tests to identify individuals infected with malaria is of paramount importance in efforts to control the severe public health impact of this disease. This study evaluated the ability of a newly developed rapid malaria diagnostic test, OptiMAL (Flow Inc., Portland, Oreg.), to detect Plasmodium vivax and Plasmodium falciparum malaria during an outbreak in Honduras. OptiMAL is a rapid (10-min) malaria detection test which utilizes a dipstick coated with monoclonal antibodies against the intracellular metabolic enzyme parasite lactate dehydrogenase (pLDH). Differentiation of malaria parasites is based on antigenic differences between the pLDH isoforms. Since pLDH is produced only by live Plasmodium parasites, this test has the ability to differentiate live from dead organisms. Results from the OptiMAL test were compared to those obtained by reading 100 fields of traditional Giemsa-stained thick-smear blood films. Whole-blood samples were obtained from 202 patients suspected of having malaria. A total of 96 samples (48%) were positive by blood films, while 91 (45%) were positive by the OptiMAL test. The blood films indicated that 82% (79 of 96) of the patients were positive for P. vivax and 18% (17 of 96) were infected with P. falciparum. The OptiMAL test showed that 81% (74 of 91) were positive for P. vivax and 19% (17 of 91) were positive for P. falciparum. These results demonstrated that the OptiMAL test had sensitivities of 94 and 88% and specificities of 100 and 99%, respectively, when compared to traditional blood films for the detection of P. vivax and P. falciparum malaria. Blood samples not identified by OptiMAL as malaria positive normally contained parasites at concentrations of less than 100/microl of blood. Samples found to contain P. falciparum were further tested by two other commercially available rapid malaria diagnostic tests, ParaSight-F (Becton Dickinson, Cockeysville, Md.) and ICT Malaria P.f. (ICT Diagnostics, Sydney, Australia), both of which detect only P. falciparum. Only 11 of the 17 (65%) P. falciparum-positive blood samples were identified by the ICT and ParaSight-F tests. Thus, OptiMAL correctly identified P. falciparum malaria parasites in patient blood samples more often than did the other two commercially available diagnostic tests and showed an excellent correlation with traditional blood films in the identification of both P. vivax malaria and P. falciparum malaria. We conclude that the OptiMAL test is an effective tool for the rapid diagnosis of malaria.
Factors Which Contribute to the Financial Performance of Selected Tennessee Dairies

income between the upper and lower one-fourth The objective of this study was to identify in 1985 (Garland, 1986). factors which contributed to the financial per- Several studies have also attempted to formance of 81 selected dairy farms in Ten- analyze various farm-level factors which connessee. The study analyzes several measures tribute to financial success or lack of it (Kauffof financial performance including cash farm man and Tauer; Tauer and Belbase; Grisley income, net farm income, and returns to and Maarenhas; Liesand Morehart). Kauffoperator labor and management. Regressions man and Tauer analyzed 16 dairy farm charwith ten explanatory variables were used to acteristics using logit regression to determine determine factors that explained the variation which factors led to a greater probability of in the measures of financial performance. Pro- success on New York dairy farms. They duction per cow, number of cows, price received categorized dairy operations into successful or for milk, forage costs, and level of debt use ap- nonsuccessful groups based upon the perforpeared to influence financial performance. mance criteria of labor and management income per operator, labor and management in
Disease correction the iPSC way: advances in iPSC-based therapy.

Pluripotent stem cells possess the capacity for self-renewal and the ability to differentiate into all cell types of the three embryonic germ layers. Accordingly, given their potential use in regenerative medicine, they have long attracted the attention of researchers. Embryonic stem cells (ESCs) represent the model pluripotent stem cell population. However, the use of ESCs in regenerative therapies faces major hurdles—namely, immune rejection and the necessity to use early-stage embryos for ESC isolation. Clinical Pharmacology & Therapeutics (2011) 89 5, 746–749. doi:10.1038/clpt.2010.341
CONDITIONED SUPPRESSION BY A STIMULUS ASSOCIATED WITH NALORPHINE IN MORPHINE‐DEPENDENT MONKEYS1

Three rhesus monkeys, physically dependent on morphine, were trained to press a lever for food on a fixed ratio of 10 responses. A tone, initially a neutral stimulus, was aperiodically presented every third or fourth session, 5 min before and after the intravenous injection of nalorphine, a morphine antagonist which produces an immediate withdrawal syndrome in morphine-dependent monkeys. After several sessions, conditioned suppression of food-lever response rate was observed. Conditioned bradycardia, emesis, and excessive salivation also occurred. In 40 to 45 sessions the conditioned suppression of food-lever response rate and the conditioned autonomic changes were extinguished by presenting pairings of a tone and saline injection. The monkeys were then reconditioned by presenting the tone aperiodically, every third or fourth session, 5 min before and after the intravenous injection of nalorphine. Results were similar to the initial conditioning sessions. Two rhesus monkeys not dependent on morphine were stabilized on a food schedule similar to that used for the first three monkeys. These monkeys showed no change in food-lever response rate during or after nalorphine injections.
The Global Network for Women's and Children's Health Research: A model of capacity-building research

In response to the global effort to accelerate progress towards the Millennium Development Goals 4 and 5, a partnership was created between the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to establish the Global Network for Women's and Children's Health Research (Global Network) in 2000. The Global Network was developed with a goal of building local maternal and child health research capacity in resource-poor settings. The objective of the network was to conduct research focused on several high-need areas, such as preventing life-threatening obstetric complications, improving birth weight and infant growth, and improving childbirth practices in order to reduce mortality. Scientists from developing countries, together with peers in the USA, lead research teams that identify and address population needs through randomized clinical trials and other research studies. Global Network projects develop and test cost-effective, sustainable interventions for pregnant women and newborns and provide guidance for national policy and for the practice of evidence-based medicine. This article reviews the results of the Global Network's research, the impact on policy and practice, and highlights the capacity-building efforts and collaborations developed since its inception.
An Efficient Algorithm for Vibration Suppression to Meet Pointing Requirements of Optical Payloads

For several future imaging spacecraft, vibration isolation and suppression of its optical payloads have become a challenging problem. These spacecraft have increased performance requirements for the payload, resulting in increased fine steering and vibration isolation requirements. The vibration sources on the spacecraft, however, are increased due to the new large flexible structures and addition of rotating devices. One promising way to address both issues is through the Stewart platform. By using a hexapod with six actuated struts, it is possible to achieve both fine pointing and vibration control. Traditional vibration control algorithms rely on the knowledge of the plant and are usually computationally intensive. This paper applies a computationally efficient vibration control to the Stewart hexapod problem. This algorithm does not rely on the knowledge of the plant other than to find the adaptation rate coefficient and performs well on highly non-linear plants. A convergence analysis is presented. Results are shown for a voice-coil actuated hexapod.
Chemical Bonding and Molecular Structure

One currently held view about organic chemistry that seems to be receiving broad acceptance is that for organizational purposes, it can best be divided into three main areas. These areas are structure, dynamics, and synthesis, and they are interdependent.1 In order to appreciate fully the latter two areas, both of which will be developed at length in subsequent chapters, a firm grounding in the principles of structure and chemical bonding is essential.
Operating system support for improving data locality on CC-NUMA compute servers

The dominant architecture for the next generation of shared-memory multiprocessors is CC-NUMA (cache-coherent non-uniform memory architecture). These machines are attractive as compute servers because they provide transparent access to local and remote memory. However, the access latency to remote memory is 3 to 5 times the latency to local memory. CC-NOW machines provide the benefits of cache coherence to networks of workstations, at the cost of even higher remote access latency. Given the large remote access latencies of these architectures, data locality is potentially the most important performance issue. Using realistic workloads, we study the performance improvements provided by OS supported dynamic page migration and replication. Analyzing our kernel-based implementation, we provide a detailed breakdown of the costs. We show that sampling of cache misses can be used to reduce cost without compromising performance, and that TLB misses may not be a consistent approximation for cache misses. Finally, our experiments show that dynamic page migration and replication can substantially increase application performance, as much as 30%, and reduce contention for resources in the NUMA memory system.
Comparing Symmetric-key and Public-key Based Security Schemes in Sensor Networks: A Case Study of User Access Control

While symmetric-key schemes are efficient in processing time for sensor networks, they generally require complicated key management, which may introduce large memory and communication overhead. On the contrary, public-key based schemes have simple and clean key management, but cost more computational time. The recent progress of elliptic curve cryptography (ECC) implementation on sensors motivates us to design a public-key scheme and compare its performance with the symmetric-key counterparts. This paper builds the user access control on commercial off-the-shelf sensor devices as a case study to show that the public-key scheme can be more advantageous in terms of the memory usage, message complexity, and security resilience. Meanwhile, our work also provides insights in integrating and designing public-key based security protocols for sensor networks.
Early hominid feeding mechanisms

Three predominant influences mark the evolution of human head form: big brain, erect bipedalism, modified oral apparatus. Confusing interplay between different adaptive requirements of each feature has made explanation of skull structure extremely difficult in the past. It now seems possible to isolate each influence in early fossil forms. A model of mammalian modes of feeding adaptation is proposed in the form of a “Natural Experiment” for tighter analysis of fossil forms. Two forms of australopithecines are recognized, “gracile” and “robust.” Both had closely similar brains, both had erect bipedalism, but each had different masticatory construction. Separation of the first two similar influences isolates the adaptive differences in oral mechanics. The gracile form had a projecting oral apparatus, distinct canine and zygomatic buttresses, moderate jaw-lever development, jaw joint not unlike most higher primates, large unusual anterior teeth, moderately sized posterior teeth. The robust form had a retruded, greatly deepened oral apparatus, “dished-in” face with fused canine and zygomatic buttresses, powerful jaw-lever development, distinctively different joint construction, remarkably small anterior teeth, enormous posterior teeth. Striking evidence for extraordinary jaw movements emerges from these features in the robust form. This is strongly supported by remarkably close parallels in Ursidae: grizzly bear and giant panda.
Variable-Rate Universal Slepian-Wolf Coding with Feedback

Traditional Slepian-Wolf coding assumes known statistics and relies on asymptotically long sequences. However, in practice the statistics are unknown, and the input sequences are of finite length. In this finite regime, we must allow a non-zero probability of codeword error isin and also pay a penalty by adding redundant bits in the encoding process. In this paper, we develop a universal scheme for Slepian-Wolf coding that allows encoding at variable rates close to the Slepian-Wolf limit. We illustrate our scheme in a setup where we encode a uniform Bernoulli source sequence and the second sequence, which is correlated to the first via a binary symmetric correlation channel, is available as side information at the decoder. This specific setup is easily extended to more general settings. For length n source sequences and a fixed isin, we show that the redundancy of our scheme is O(radicnPhi-1(isin)) bits over the Slepian-Wolf limit. The prior art for Slepian-Wolf coding with known statistics shows that the redundancy is Omega(radicnPhi-1(isin)). Therefore, we infer that for Slepian-Wolf coding, the penalty needed to accommodate universality is thetas(radicnPhi-1(isin))
Minimum-Cost Data Delivery in Heterogeneous Wireless Networks

With various wireless technologies developed, a ubiquitous and integrated architecture is envisioned for future wireless communication. An important optimization issue in such an integrated system is how to minimize the overall communication cost by intelligently utilizing the available heterogeneous wireless technologies while, at the same time, meeting the quality-of-service requirements of mobile users. In this paper, we first identify the cost-minimization (CM) problem to be NP-hard. We then present an efficient minimum-cost data-delivery algorithm based on linear programming (LP), with various constraints, such as channel bandwidth, link costs, delay budgets, and user mobility, taken into consideration. In case of insufficient bandwidth for communication with the core network, prefetch is employed to fully utilize the wireless-network capacity. If multiple routes are available, a probability-based approach is taken for CM. Extensive simulations are carried out to evaluate the proposed CM scheme. Our results show that the proposed LP approach can effectively reduce the overall communication cost, with small overhead (< 3%) for signaling, computing, and handoff. We expect that minimum-cost data delivery will become imperative for the future heterogeneous wireless networks and the emerging 4G wireless systems.
Highly available atomic objects

The author describes an approach to implement highly available atomic objects in a distributed system. The approach uses the semantics of an object's type to increase availability and concurrency. The increase comes at the expense of writing a layer of type-specific code for concurrency control. The type-specific code can be written without making any assumption of any underlying replication or the serialization order used, allowing it to be reused more easily. He uses the virtual partition algorithm (A. Al Abbadi et al., 1986) for replica control. It avoids reading multiple replicas during normal operation at the expense of synchronizing the replicas when they re-establish communication. The optimization is important in the context of semantics-based implementations because potentially no replica is more up-to-date than the others. In contrast to similar semantics-based approaches, this approach assigns quorums to operations of the nonatomic objects used to implement the atomic objects, rather than to operations of the atomic objects. >
PS3-35: MRI Detection of Substantia Nigra Degeneration in Parkinson’s Disease: Developing a Candidate Biomarker

Background/Aims The substantia nigra (SN) selectively degenerates in Parkinson’s disease (PD). Prior MRI studies of SN have used manual segmentation to make quantitative measurements, an approach with inherently limited accuracy. Here we used an in-house optimized neuromelanin MRI (NM-MRI) protocol, and a novel semi-automated segmentation method to investigate changes in SN associated with PD. The relationship between MRI measures and orthostatic hypotension, a phenotypic feature of PD, was also examined.
Comparison of mechanical and tribological properties of permalloy and high moment FeTaN thin films for tape recording heads

This paper reports experimental results of a comparative study for mechanical and tribological properties of permalloy (NiFe) and magnetically soft high moment FeTaN sputtered thin films. It was observed that the hardness, elastic modulus and wear resistance of FeTaN films are all superior to those of NiFe permalloy films. AFM observations on unworn films and worn surfaces of a wear scar revealed that pit formation may contribute to wear damage mechanisms for low load abrasive wear.
Outcomes of Surgical Treatment for Chronic Postoperative Breast and Abdominal Pain Attributed to the Intercostal Nerve

Background Postoperative breast and abdominal pain arising from lesion of the intercostal nerves is an often overlooked and misdiagnosed clinical entity. Typically, affected patients experience a high degree of frustration in addition to persistent pain. Surgical options for management of this pain are not widely reported. Study design Medical records were reviewed of all consecutive patients of the senior author who had undergone surgical treatment for postoperative breast and abdominal pain since May of 2003. All patients underwent surgical excision of the involved nerve or nerves proximal to the likely area of injury with subsequent implantation of the nerve stump into the muscle. The involved intercostal nerve, inciting procedure, percentage decrease in pain, and followup time were recorded. Success was defined as symptom relief of at least 50% as reported by the patient. Mean followup time and success rates were calculated. Results Five patients with breast pain and seven patients with abdominal pain underwent surgical treatment. Four of five breast patients (80%) and six of seven abdominal-pain patients (87%) experienced considerable pain relief after operation. Combined, the success rate was 84%. Mean followup duration for breast-pain patients was 8.7 months. Mean followup in abdominal-pain patients was 12.5 months. Conclusions Operation appears to be a viable alternative for patients experiencing postoperative pain of the breast and abdomen from lesions of the intercostal nerve. Increased awareness of this diagnosis and the options for its management as presented in our algorithm should help to more quickly alleviate the pain of patients suffering from this disorder.
TACC3 expression and localization in the murine egg and ovary

A protein spot cored from a silver-stained two dimensional (2D) gel of germinal vesicle stage immature mouse oocytes was identified as Transforming Acidic Coiled Coil containing protein (TACC3) by tandem mass spectrometry. PCR amplification revealed two alternatively spliced forms, Tacc3a and Tacc3b, in mouse ovarian cDNA libraries. TACC3a encoded a 630 aa protein with a predicted mass of 70 kDa. It contained seven 24 aa repeats at the N-terminus and two coiled-coil domains at the C-terminus. TACC3b encoded a 426 aa protein with a predicted mass of 49 kDa also containing two coiled coil domains, but lacking the 168 aa repeat region. In addition to homology to the TACC family members, murine TACC3 also showed 35.7% identity to the Xenopus protein, Maskin, a cytoplasmic polyadenylation element binding protein (CPEB)-associated factor. Northern blot analysis demonstrated that TACC3a is abundantly expressed in adult testis and spleen and is moderately expressed in the ovary, heart, and lung, suggesting a wide tissue distribution. Both myc-tagged TACC3a and TACC3b targeted to the cytoplasm of transiently transfected CV-1 cells. In situ hybridization of mouse ovarian tissue sections displayed abundant expression of TACC3 specifically in the cytoplasm of growing oocytes, but not in primordial or atretic follicles. This pattern of expression suggests that TACC3 is expressed in ovarian cells undergoing active growth and development.
Overwintering and Comparative Sampling of Neoseiulus fallacis (Acari: Phytoseiidae) on Ornamental Nursery Plants

The predatory mite Neoseiulus fallacis (Garman) is an important biological control agent of spider mites in many agroecosystems, including ornamental nurseries. In this study, sampling methods, tendencies to overwinter among a range of plant types, and the effect of winter protective practices were assessed for N. fallacis females. Ten spider mite-infested plant species representing a range of five plant types (conifer, shade tree, evergreen shrub, deciduous shrub, herbaceous perennial) were inoculated with 100 adult female N. fallacis in late autumn. Early the following spring, N. fallacis was extracted from each plant species by either washing plant parts (leaves, branches, trunks-crowns) in 70% ethanol and filtering contents or placing plant parts into separate Berlese funnels for 5 d. The washing method extracted more N. fallacis than the funnel method. When comparing overwintering among a range of plant types, higher densities of N. fallacis were extracted from conifers > evergreen shrubs > herbaceous perennials = deciduous shrubs = shade trees. With respect to overwintering location of N. fallacis within plants, higher densities of N. fallacis were recovered on leaves than trunks-crowns; branches were intermediate. Densities of N. fallacis were positively correlated with those of their spider mite prey. Higher densities of N. fallacis were collected from plants that were held in a greenhouse versus those left unprotected or under a sheet of polyethylene plastic. Manipulating overwintering sites for the conservation of phytoseiid natural enemies is discussed.
Selection for Sexual Bill Dimorphism in Ibises: An Evaluation of Hypotheses

Abstract Male Scarlet Ibises (Eudocimus ruber) and White Ibises (Eudocimus albus) have bills that are on average 22% longer than females, yet only half of this difference can be attributed to body-size differences. In this work it is suggested that the sexual dimorphism in bill length and bill shape is based in large part upon the role of bill length in determining the outcome of male bill-sparring contests. Sexual differences in bill morphology and behavior were investigated in a captive flock of 350 Scarlet Ibises. In 29 instances of males sparring with males in contests prior to breeding and in 11 instances of nest take-over during breeding, no significant differences in age, body size, or body condition between winning and losing males were found. However, males winning bill-sparring contests and nest take-overs had significantly longer bills than losing males. Longer billed males also bred significantly earlier than shorter billed males in captivity. Sexual differences in the relationship between bil...
Genes for all metals : a bacterial view of the periodic table the 1996 thom award lecture

Bacterial chromosomes have genes for transport proteins for inorganic nutrient cations and oxyanions, such as NH4+, K+, Mg2+, Co2+, Fe3+, Mn2+, Zn2+ and other trace cations, and PO4(3-), SO4(2-) and less abundant oxyanions. Together these account for perhaps a few hundred genes in many bacteria. Bacterial plasmids encode resistance systems for toxic metal and metalloid ions including Ag+, AsO2-, AsO4(3-), Cd2+, Co2+, CrO4(2-), Cu2+, Hg2+, Ni2+, Pb2+, TeO3(2-), Tl+ and Zn2+. Most resistance systems function by energy-dependent efflux of toxic ions. A few involve enzymatic (mostly redox) transformations. Some of the efflux resistance systems are ATPases and others are chemiosmotic ion/proton exchangers. The Cd(2+)-resistance cation pump of Gram-positive bacteria is membrane P-type ATPase, which has been labeled with 32P from [gamma-32P]ATP and drives ATP-dependent Cd2+ (and Zn2+) transport by membrane vesicles. The genes defective in the human hereditary diseases of copper metabolism, Menkes syndrome and Wilson's disease, encode P-type ATPases that are similar to bacterial cadmium ATPases. The arsenic resistance system transports arsenite [As(III)], alternatively with the ArsB polypeptide functioning as a chemiosmotic efflux transporter or with two polypeptides, ArsB and ArsA, functioning as an ATPase. The third protein of the arsenic resistance system is an enzyme that reduces intracellular arsenate [As(V)] to arsenite [As(III)], the substrate of the efflux system. In Gram-negative cells, a three polypeptide complex functions as a chemiosmotic cation/protein exchanger to efflux Cd2+, Zn2+ and Co2+. This pump consists of an inner membrane (CzcA), an outer membrane (CzcC) and a membrane-spanning (CzcB) protein that function together.
Respect Vocabulary in Austronesian

In some languages, particular forms are chosen to show respect for the addressee or referent. In Samoan, for example, respect words replace everyday terms when a speaker addresses or refers to chiefs and orators. Word choice also depends on the rank of the chief or orator. Respect words refer to items, activities, etc. that are part of or very close to the individual. Such words mitigate the disrespect that would be shown by talking about such personal matters. People, no matter how high their rank, use ordinary (and not respect) words when they refer to themselves, their relatives, or their possessions.
Innovators and Imitators: An Analysis of Proposed Legislation Implementing an Abbreviated Approval Pathway for Follow-On Biologics in the United States

Biopharmaceuticals, also called biologics, account for nearly one out of eight prescriptions written worldwide. One source estimates that more than $10 billion worth of biologics will come off patent by 2010. Few generic competitors are likely to enter this market, however, in light of the fact that no abbreviated approval pathway presently exists for generic biologics, also called follow-on protein products. Without such a system in place, generic manufacturers must perform a full complement of lengthy and costly clinical trials in order to receive approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to market their follow-on biologics. Congress is presently considering legislation, titled the Access to Life-Saving Medicine Act, which would permit expedited approval of certain off-patent biologics. This legislation is modeled upon the Hatch-Waxman Act of 1984, which facilitates abbreviated approval of generic versions of traditional pharmaceuticals. This article analyzes the legal and policy implications of an abbreviated approval pathway for follow-on biologics, focusing on three salient aspects of this issue. First, the article examines the effect of the Hatch-Waxman Act on the market for conventional drugs, and concludes that legislative enactment of an abbreviated approval pathway for follow-on protein products will have a similar salutary effect on the market for these biological products. Second, the article considers the current state of scientific knowledge regarding biologics, and determines that an abbreviated approval framework for biologics is feasible, at least for simpler molecules. Third, the article analyzes the intellectual property implications of an abbreviated approval pathway for follow-on protein products. The article offers some recommendations for amending the Access to Life-Saving Medicine Act so as to maximize pioneer firms' incentives to innovate while simultaneously encouraging competition from follow-on manufacturers.
Aversive learning shapes neuronal orientation tuning in human visual cortex

The responses of sensory cortical neurons are shaped by experience. As a result perceptual biases evolve, selectively facilitating the detection and identification of sensory events that are relevant for adaptive behaviour. Here we examine the involvement of human visual cortex in the formation of learned perceptual biases. We use classical aversive conditioning to associate one out of a series of oriented gratings with a noxious sound stimulus. After as few as two grating-sound pairings, visual cortical responses to the sound-paired grating show selective amplification. Furthermore, as learning progresses, responses to the orientations with greatest similarity to the sound-paired grating are increasingly suppressed, suggesting inhibitory interactions between orientation-selective neuronal populations. Changes in cortical connectivity between occipital and fronto-temporal regions mirror the changes in visuo-cortical response amplitudes. These findings suggest that short-term behaviourally driven retuning of human visual cortical neurons involves distal top-down projections as well as local inhibitory interactions.
Advances in Presbyopia Correction and Cataract Surgery

The talk will focus on recent advances in optimizing outcomes of presbyopia correction and cataract surgery by using new ophthalmic lens designs, in vivo imaging modality and binocular combination of unequal optical blur.
Extracting paramagnon excitations from resonant inelastic x-ray scattering experiments

Resonant x-ray scattering experiments on high-temperature superconductors and related cuprates have revealed the presence of intense paramagnon scattering at high excitation energies, of the order of several hundred meV. The excitation energies appear to show very similar behavior across all compounds, ranging from magnetically ordered, via superconductors, to heavy fermion systems. However, we argue that this apparent behavior has been inferred from the data through model fitting which implicitly imposes such similarities. Using model fitting that is free from such restrictions, we show that the paramagnons are not nearly as well defined as has been asserted previously, and that some paramagnons might not represent propagating excitations at all. Our work indicates that the data published previously in the literature will need to be reanalyzed with proper models.
Knowledge and Intellectual Virtue

An intellectual virtue is a quality bound to help maximize one's surplus of truth over error; or so let us assume for now, though a more just conception may include as desiderata also generality, coherence, and explanatory power, unless the value of these is itself explained as derivative from the character of their contribution precisely to one's surplus of truth over error. This last is an issue I mention in order to lay it aside. Here we assume only a teleological conception of intellectual virtue, the relevant end being a proper relation to the truth, exact requirements of such propriety not here fully specified. Whatever exactly the end may be, the virtue of a virtue derives not simply from leading us to it, perhaps accidentally, but from leading us to it reliably: e.g., “in a way bound to maximize one's surplus of truth over error.” Rationalist intuition and deduction are thus prime candidates, since they would always lead us aright. But it is not so clearly virtuous to admit no other faculties, seeing the narrow limits beyond which intuition and deduction will never lead us. What other faculties might one admit? There are faculties of two broad sorts: those that lead to beliefs from beliefs already formed, and those that lead to beliefs but not from beliefs.
Host Preference of the Grass Webworm, Herpetogramma licarsisalis to Warm Season Turfgrasses

No significant differences were found among 8 grasses as sites for oviposition by female moths of the grass webworm, Herpetogramma licarsisalis (Walker). Differences were found in total amount of larval feeding injury and the rate at which feeding injury developed on the different grasses. Common bermudagrass [ Cynodon dactylon (L.) Pers.] and Tifway bermudagrass (C. dactylon × C. transvaalensis Burtt-Davey) showed the least feeding injury. Feeding injury developed faster on fine textured grasses than on coarse textured ones. Differences were also found in number of adults emerging from different grasses.
A Nontraditional Curriculum for Graduate Education in Medical Technology

Faced with increasing educational costs, diminished financial aid, and a need in the professional community for part-time graduate and undergraduate medical technology education, the Department of Medical Technology of the University of Health Sciences/The Chicago Medical School sought to provide a flexible curriculum designed to meet the needs of the fully employed adult learner. A discussion of development and implementation of a part-time graduate program is discussed with emphasis placed on special considerations of the adult learner.