cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Urban forests and green spaces of Tbilisi and ecological problems of the city

Abstract The increase in urbanization is the most dramatic factor in today's world and it did not passed round Tbilisi, the capital of Georgia, too. Since the sixties of the 20th century the population of the city nearly doubled and today is about 1.3–1.4 million. Many problems that may not have been so evident in the past, became obvious and dramatic today. These problems concern urban forests and green spaces of the city because they shrank considerably and as the result, deteriorated ecological situation. Today, their role in improvement of city climate is little. In the Soviet period the main polluters of the air considered factories and plants, but today, after breaking of the Soviet Union and closing or destruction of all factories and plants, the increasing number of light vehicles, especially outdated once, manufactured before 1999(67%) are the main source of pollution(80%). The article highlights the historical development of Tbilisi urban forests and green spaces and outlines some challenges and prospects of ecological condition of the city.
Bridging the gaps: Intergenerational findings from the substance use disorder and recovery field

The substance use disorder and recovery field has undergone rapid transformation over the last 40 years. It currently has a workforce that includes three generations—Baby Boomers, Generation X, and...
Thresholds and Limitations of Adaptive Homeostasis in Stressed and Unstressed Cells

In response to stress-related signaling cells transiently and reversibly expand a wide suite of defense mechanisms, as part of the process of adaptive homeostasis. Included in the array of adaptive responses are alterations to existing proteasomes and increased de novo synthesis of 20S proteasomes, immuno-proteasomes, and PA28 (11S) proteasome regulators that enable more efficient and rapid removal of oxidatively damaged proteins from cells. Our laboratory has shown that this proteasomal adaptive response confers greater survival capacity against oxidative stress in cultured mammalian cells, Caenorhabditis elegans nematode worms, and Drosophila melanogaster fruit flies. There are, however, there are limits and thresholds to adaptive homeostasis stress responses. If cells (or organisms) are already experiencing a degree of increased stress, they may have only a limited ability to further adapt to additional stresses. When we started to explore the adaptive homeostasis phenomenon in mammalian cells, for example, we found that cells grown in room air with 20% ambient O2 were much less able to adapt to H2O2 than were cells grown at 5% ambient O2; importantly, however, the cells grown 20% O2 were initially more H2O2 resistant than were the cells grown at 5% O2. In practice, of course, many cell types used in laboratories throughout the world were derived from tissues where physiological normoxia is 3 - 5% O2, yet they are cultured and studied at ambient 20% O2. This study examined the adaptive response to H2O2 and cellular growth rate of Mouse Embryonic Fibroblasts (MEFs), cultured continuously at either 5% O2, 20% O2, or 40% O2. Our goal was to define thresholds and limitations to adaptive homeostasis imposed by pre-existing oxidative stress levels. Our results show that adaptive homeostasis responses in general, and proteasome induction as a specific marker, decrease with increasing O2 culturing concentrations: in other words, with increasing baseline pre-existing oxidative stress.
Intramuscular allopregnanolone and ganaxolone in a mouse model of treatment-resistant status epilepticus.

Allopregnanolone (5α-pregnan-3α-ol-20-one) and its synthetic 3β-methyl analog, ganaxolone, are positive allosteric modulators of synaptic and extrasynaptic γ-aminobutyric acid (GABA)A receptors that exhibit antiseizure activity in diverse animal seizure models, including models of status epilepticus (SE). The 2 neuroactive steroids are being investigated as treatments for SE, including as a treatment for SE induced by chemical threat agents. Intramuscular injection is the preferred route of administration in the prehospital treatment of SE. The objective of this study was to assess the efficacy of intramuscular allopregnanolone and ganaxolone in the treatment of SE induced by the chemical threat agent tetramethylenedisulfotetramine (TETS). The test agents were administered 40 minutes after the onset of SE when mice are refractory to treatment. Allopregnanolone and ganaxolone (each at 3 mg/kg) terminated SE in, respectively, 92% and 75% of animals, and prevented mortality in 85% and 50% of animals; the mean times to termination of behavioral seizures were, respectively, 172 ± 16 and 447 ± 52 seconds. In a separate series of experiments, mice were dosed with the neuroactive steroids by intramuscular injection, and plasma and brain levels were sampled at various time points following injection to estimate pharmacokinetic parameters. Plasma Cmax (maximum concentration) values for allopregnanolone and ganaxolone were 645 and 550 ng/mL, respectively. Brain exposure of both steroids was approximately 3-fold the plasma exposure. Two-compartment pharmacokinetic analysis revealed that the central compartment Vd (volume of distribution), CL (clearance), t½ (terminal half-life), and F (intramuscular bioavailability) values for allopregnanolone and ganaxolone were, respectively, 4.95 L/kg 12.88 L/kg/h,16 minutes, 97%, and 5.07 L/kg, 8.35 L/kg/h, 25 minutes, 95%. Allopregnanolone and ganaxolone are effective in the treatment of TETS-induced SE when administered by the intramuscular route. Allopregnanolone is more rapidly acting and modestly more effective, possibly because it has greater potency on GABAA receptors.
Expanding the Fulbright Legacy in Vietnam.

• Fulbright University Vietnam, a joint initiative between Vietnam and the United States, is preparing to open its doors to undergraduates in Fall 2018.• Though the ambitious undertaking is inspire...
On improving the performance of an open-source oriental game

This paper describes the design of an algorithm that improves the performance of an open-source Xiangqi (Chinese chess) software program. Our algorithm includes a new database, Opening Book Database (OB). The opening stage of a game provides for many possible moves. By importing the moves from professional players, the OB provides an efficient and fast initial move according to the position. Zobrist Hash is used to implement the OB, which makes efficient use of the storage space.
The Invariant Subspace Problem via Composition Operators-redux

The Invariant Subspace Problem (“ISP”) for Hilbert space operators is known to be equivalent to a question that, on its surface, seems surprisingly concrete: For composition operators induced on the Hardy space H 2 by hyperbolic automorphisms of the unit disc, is every nontrivial minimal invariant subspace one dimensional (i.e., spanned by an eigenvector)? In the hope of reviving interest in the contribution this remarkable result might offer to the studies of both composition operators and the ISP, I revisit some known results, weaken their hypotheses and simplify their proofs. Sample results: If φ is a hyperbolic disc automorphism with fixed points at a and β (both necessarily on the unit circle), and C φ the composition operator it induces on H 2, then for every \( f \in \sqrt {(z - \alpha )(z - \beta )} \) H 2, the doubly C φ-cyclic subspace generated by f contains many independent eigenvectors; more precisely, the point spectrum of C φ’s restriction to that subspace intersects the unit circle in a set of positive measure. Moreover, this restriction of C φ is hypercyclic (some forward orbit is dense). Under the stronger restriction \( f \in \sqrt {(z - \alpha )(z - \beta )} \) H p for some p > 2, the point spectrum of the restricted operator contains an open annulus centered at the origin.
Staphylococcal Scalded Skin Syndrome

Staphylococcal scalded skin syndrome is a serious and potentially life-threatening infection that requires prompt recognition and intervention. This chapter will discuss the physiology behind this exotoxin-mediated disease that results in diffuse erythroderma and subsequent desquamation. Key clinical characteristics, such as the absence of mucosal membrane involvement, are reviewed to aid in early recognition of SSSS and differentiation from conditions with a similar appearance. Treatment with anti-staphylococcal antibiotics and dermatologic care measures is essential in the acute management of SSSS, in addition to prevention of secondary infection, which is a common cause of mortality.
Divergent mitochondrial lineages arose within a large, panmictic population of the Savannah sparrow (Passerculus sandwichensis)

Unusual patterns of mtDNA diversity can reveal interesting aspects of a species' biology. However, making such inferences requires discerning among the many alternative scenarios that could underlie any given mtDNA pattern. Next-generation sequencing methods provide large, multilocus data sets with increased power to resolve unusual mtDNA patterns. A mtDNA-based phylogeography of the Savannah sparrow (Passerculus sandwichensis) previously identified two sympatric, but divergent (~2%) clades within the nominate subspecies group and a third clade that consisted of birds sampled from northwest Mexico. We revisited the phylogeography of this species using a population genomic data set to resolve the processes leading to the evolution of sympatric and divergent mtDNA lineages. We identified two genetic clusters in the genomic data set corresponding to (a) the nominate subspecies group and (b) northwestern Mexico birds. Following divergence, the nominate clade maintained a large, stable population, indicating that divergent mitochondrial lineages arose within a panmictic population. Simulations based on parameter estimates from this model further confirmed that this demographic history could produce observed levels of mtDNA diversity. Patterns of divergent, sympatric mtDNA lineages are frequently interpreted as admixture of historically isolated lineages. Our analyses reject this interpretation for Savannah sparrows and underscore the need for genomic data sets to resolve the evolutionary mechanisms behind anomalous, locus-specific patterns.
Complex responses to inflammatory oxidants by the probiotic bacterium Lactobacillus reuteri

ABSTRACT Inflammatory diseases of the gut are associated with increased intestinal oxygen concentrations and high levels of inflammatory oxidants, including hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) and hypochlorous acid (HOCl), which are antimicrobial compounds produced by the innate immune system. This contributes to dysbiotic changes in the gut microbiome, including increased populations of pro-inflammatory enterobacteria (Escherichia coli and related species) and decreased levels of health-associated anaerobic Firmicutes and Bacteroidetes. The pathways for H2O2 and HOCl resistance in E. coli have been well-studied, but little is known about how commensal and probiotic bacteria respond to inflammatory oxidants. In this work, we have characterized the transcriptomic response of the anti-inflammatory, gut-colonizing Gram-positive probiotic Lactobacillus reuteri to both H2O2 and HOCl. L. reuteri mounts distinct responses to each of these stressors, and both gene expression and survival were strongly affected by the presence or absence of oxygen. Oxidative stress response in L. reuteri required several factors not found in enterobacteria, including the small heat shock protein Lo18, polyphosphate kinase 2, and RsiR, an L. reuteri-specific regulator of anti-inflammatory mechanisms. These results raise the intriguing possibility of developing treatments for inflammatory gut diseases that could sensitize pro-inflammatory enterobacteria to killing by the immune system while sparing anti-inflammatory, health-associated species. IMPORTANCE It is becoming increasingly clear that effective treatment of inflammatory gut diseases will require modulation of the gut microbiota. Preventing pro-inflammatory bacteria from blooming while also preserving anti-inflammatory and commensal species is a considerable challenge, but our results suggest that it may be possible to take advantage of differences in the way different species of gut bacteria resist inflammatory oxidants to accomplish this goal.
A Semi-Supervised CNN Learning Method with Pseudo-class Labels for Atherosclerotic Vascular Calcification Detection

The recent rapid success of deep convolutional neural networks (CNN) on many computer vision tasks largely benefits from the well-annotated Pascal VOC, ImageNet, and MS COCO datasets. However, it is challenging to get ImageNet-like annotations (1000 classes) in the medical imaging domain due to the lack of clinical training in the lay crowdsourcing community. We address this problem by presenting a semi-supervised training method for neural networks with true-class and pseudo-class (un-annotated class) labels on partially annotated training data. The true-class labels are supervised annotations from clinical professionals. The pseudo-class labels are unsupervised clustering of un-annotated data. Our method rests upon the hypothesis of better coherent annotations with discriminative classes leading to better trained CNN models. We validated our method on extra-coronary calcification detection in low dose CT scans. The CNN trained with true-class and 10 pseudo-classes achieved an 85.0% sensitivity at 10 false positives per patient (0.3 false positive per slice), which significantly outperformed the CNN trained with true-class only (sensitivity =56.0% at 10 false positives per patient).
Biosimilar Erythropoiesis-Stimulating Agents in Chronic Kidney Disease

Anemia is a well-known complication of advanced CKD and treatment with erythropoietin analogues (epoetin) remains a key component of management. Although biologic agents, including epoetin, play an extremely important role in the treatment of various medical conditions, their cost can be prohibitive. As a result, several biosimilar agents have now been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Biosimilar epoetin has been used in Europe since 2007. In this article, we will review biosimilar development and focus on the first approved biosimilar epoetin in the United States, epoetin alfa-epbx.
Measurement of fluctuation at the discharge of positive displacement compressors

All positive displacement compressors (PDC's) experience pressure fluctuation at the discharge ports of the compression mechanism, and these fluctuations can adversely affect compressor performance. These pressure fluctuations are caused by the nature of PDC's; when a pocket of working fluid is exposed to system piping at differing pressure levels, a wave of pressure equalization flows through the line, potentially causing the compressor and piping to vibrate and generate noise (Soedel 2007). Compressor manufacturers currently use serial muffler designs, discharge plenums, and valves to minimize this fluctuation, but pressure fluctuation may persist at the outlet of serial muffling methods. A parallel muffling design has been developed for use in Roots blowers, having significantly reduced noise and pressure fluctuation seen in these machines (Huang et al. 2014). To identify the potential for use of this parallel muffling design in refrigeration systems and PDC's, the magnitude of fluctuation at the discharge of a scroll compressor and a dual rotary compressor have been measured at various operating conditions. The compressors were left unmodified, with any current internal muffling methods in place. The measurement of these unmodified compressors determined the effectiveness of current muffling methods, with the intent to determine if using a parallel muffling technique is warranted. Pressure measurements were taken at 1000 Hz, and Fast Fourier Transform implemented to isolate pressure fluctuation based on frequency. Measurements lead to magnitudes of up to 16 kPa in pressure fluctuation with current muffling methods, indicating that further fluctuation reduction is possible.
Relation of Frailty to Cost for Patients Undergoing Transcatheter Aortic Valve Implantation.

Frailty is associated with significant morbidity and mortality for patients undergoing transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI). In addition to clinical outcomes, cost is an important factor to inform clinical decision-making around TAVI. However, the association of frailty with cost is unknown. This study tested whether frailty was associated with cost for adult patients who underwent TAVI at a moderate-volume single center between December 2012 and April 2018 (n = 431). Frailty was determined from pre-TAVI clinical visits as a composite of 2 markers: 5-meter walk time (abnormal: >6 seconds or unable to perform) and serum albumin (abnormal:
Flexible, Personal Service Robot for ALS Patients *

Diseases that cause motor impairment leave people dependent on the help of caregivers or new technologies for their daily tasks. Care robots could support these patients and help them gaining autonomy in some of their daily activities. In this paper, a robotic assistant is introduced based on Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis patients requests for care robotics. The presented use cases are derived from their feedback and integrated using a compliant lightweight robotic arm. The system has been developed to be used independently from the input device owned by the patient, which grants an easy access to the robot without any special training. The system is flexible enough to not harm the patient for tasks that involve physical humanrobot interaction, and yet precise enough to manipulate different objects. Despite the increasing acceptance of care robots in the community nowadays, the robotic assistant is one of the few robot solutions that combines autonomous behaviors and teleoperated control.
Selection of Conventional Generation Resources for Optimal Replacement by Wind Power Generations

Large-scale adoption of renewable energy resources is a relatively new concept for the utilities, and the best ways to integrate these resources into existing power grids is yet to be determined. Renewable energy resources are dramatically different from conventional resources, and are intermittent in nature. Studies have confirmed that the impacts of renewables are largely system-dependent. Hence, to keep bulk power systems reliable and yet facilitate massive integration of wind and solar energy resources, optimal strategies for making use of the remaining conventional generation resources and retiring others are needed. This paper proposes a methodology to determine the best candidate, among traditional resources, for retirement and replacement by wind power generation resources. The goal is to ensure that during unplanned wind power unavailability, power systems remain reliable. High wind penetration scenarios on IEEE 30-bus and IEEE 57-bus systems are analyzed to determine the effectiveness of the developed methodology on maintaining system steady-state stability and reliability.
Radiation Detectors and Instrumentation

Direct measurements of radiation signatures can be utilized as a key functional component to verify a country’s commitments in a transparency agreement. Special nuclear material comprises isotopes of uranium and plutonium, where each has unique signatures that differentiate it from the other isotopes when measured with radiation detection equipment. Depending on the type of confirmatory information desired, a wide range of radiation detection methods are available including several nondestructive methods of gamma spectroscopy, neutron and gamma counting, multiplicity counting, and imaging, and some destructive methods of alpha spectroscopy and mass spectrometry. Each method provides information indicative of material composition, isotopic composition, or processing method where radiation detection equipment is often utilized in the laboratory and field to perform these analyses. This chapter aims to provide a brief introduction to the radiation signatures of interest for radiation detection, an overview of how these signatures are utilized for standard radiation detection-based verification techniques utilized in non-proliferation and arms control monitoring and verification, as well as a description of some of the challenges associated with implementation of these techniques into international agreements.
Hitchhikers in Honey: An investigation of the inhibitory mechanisms of bacteria found in honey

Honey has a stable physiochemical composition that contributes to its long shelf life and has been noted as an antimicrobial substance for centuries. Although it is common knowledge that honey affords some antimicrobial properties, the specific mechanisms behind this remain elusive. This paper hypothesizes that the microorganisms in certain raw honeys contribute towards their antimicrobial properties. In our study, we analyzed several raw and processed honey samples to determine their microbial constituents. The antimicrobial potential of the isolated microbes was tested using several clinically relevant bacteria including Escherichia coli, Staphylococcus aureus, Staphylococcus epidermidis and Pseudomonas aeruginosa. Of the tested honeys, Manuka (New Zealand) and Wildflower honey (Tennessee, USA) contained microorganisms exhibiting antimicrobial activity. All the isolated colonies grew on MacConkey and Mannitol agar and generated bands for the 16S rRNA gene implying that they were bacteria. This paper concludes that bacteria isolated from honey could be a new area of research within the topic of antimicrobial honey samples.
Epidemiology of Blast Neurotrauma: A Meta-analysis of Blast Injury Patterns in the Military and Civilian Populations.

Background Mass casualty incidents (MCIs) due to bombing-related terrorism remain an omnipresent threat to our global society. The aim of this study was to elucidate differences in blast injury patterns between military and civilian victims affected by terrorist bombings. Methods An analysis of the Global Terrorism Database (GTD) and a PubMed literature search of casualty reports of bombing attacks from 2010–2020 was performed (main key words: blast injuries/therapy, terrorism, military personnel) with key epidemiological and injury pattern data extracted and statistically analyzed. Results Demographic analysis of casualties revealed that military casualties tend to be younger and predominantly male (P Conclusions Though the increased number of head/neck injuries was unexpected, we also found that the number of nonlethal head injuries also increased, predicating that more military blast neurotrauma patients survived their injuries. These data can be used to increase blast MCI preparation and education throughout the international neurosurgical community.
Faculty Perspectives on Using High School Data in an Era of Placement Testing Reform

Objective:Community colleges across the country are making dramatic shifts away from traditional reliance on placement testing for developmental education and toward using high school measures to a...
Colorism and the Afro-Latinx Experience: A Review of the Literature:

Using Bronfenbrenner’s Social Ecological Model, this systematic critical literature review investigated factors that contributed to the development of colorism, as well as the effects of colorism o...
Measuring Gas Transport and Sorption in Large Intact Geologic Specimens via the Piezometric Method

Uptake of noble gases into heterogeneous geologic core samples was measured using a piezometric methodology. In addition to measuring accessible porosity—as with gas pycnometry—by monitoring the rate of pressure decay, this method can also be used to estimate the gas effective diffusivity in the sample. In contrast to previous applications of this method, where milligram quantities of fractured grains are characterized, here approximately kilogram core samples were left intact when tested. In doing so, a more representative sample of the heterogeneous field geology is provided. Additionally, alteration of the pore structure and connectivity during sample preparation is avoided. To scale the piezometric method from milligrams to kilograms, the system was designed to operate at medium vacuum (1 to 100 Pa) to restrict transport in pores less than approximately 60 µm to large Knudsen numbers. To test the system performance, two samples of interest were selected: a rhyolitic welded tuff from Blue Canyon Dome at the Energetic Materials Research and Testing Center and a zeolitized non-welded rhyolitic tuff from the Nevada National Security Site. Three noble gases were utilized in this test series; Argon and xenon as they are of direct interest to nuclear monitoring efforts and helium as it is a weakly adsorbing reference standard. Additionally, mercury intrusion porosimetry measurements were made on subsamples of the core to compare the observed porosity by the two methods and to discuss gas transport rates in the context of the measured pore distribution.
MATRIX DECOMPOSITIONS AND STATISTICAL CALCULATIONS

Publisher Summary This chapter discusses several well-known matrix decompositions and their relevance to statistical calculation. It discusses some of the properties of numerical algorithms. The chapter discusses Cholesky decomposition. Given the Cholesky decomposition, it is a simple matter to solve a system of linear equations or to compute the inverse. The chapter reviews the conditioning of matrices, iterative refinement, partial correlation, and least squares. In many statistical calculations, it is necessary to compute certain auxiliary information associated with ATA. These can readily be obtained from the orthogonal decomposition. The chapter reviews the classical Gram–Schmidt algorithm (CGSA) and the modified Gram–Schmidt algorithm (MGSA). One should never use the CGSA without reorthogonalization, which greatly increases the amount of computation. Reorthogonalization is never needed when using the MGSA. The MGSA has the advantages that it is relatively easy to program and experimentally, it seems to be slightly more accurate than the Householder procedure.
Beyond differential expression: methods and tools for mining the transcriptomic landscape of human tissue and disease

Although there are a variety of high-throughput technologies used to perform biological experiments, DNA microarrays have become a standard tool in the modern biologist's arsenal. Microarray experiments provide measurements of thousands of genes simultaneously, and offer a snapshot view of transcriptomic activity. With the rapid growth of public availability of transcriptomic data, there is increasing recognition that large sets of such data can be mined to better understand disease states and mechanisms. Unfortunately, several challenges arise when attempting to perform such large-scale analyses. For instance, public repositories to which the data is being submitted to were designed around the simple task of storage rather than that of data mining. As such, the seemingly simple task of obtaining all data relating to a particular disease becomes an arduous task. Furthermore, prior gene expression analyses, both large and small, have been dichotomous in nature, in which phenotypes are compared using clearly defined controls. Such approaches may require arbitrary decisions about what are considered "normal" phenotypes, and what each phenotype should be compared to. Addressing these issues, we introduce methods for creating a large curated gene expression database geared towards data mining, and explore methods for efficiently expanding this database using active learning. Leveraging our curated expression database, we adopt a holistic approach in which we characterize phenotypes in the context of a myriad of tissues and diseases. We introduce scalable methods that associate expression patterns to phenotypes in order to assign phenotype labels to new expression samples and to select phenotypically meaningful gene signatures. By using a nonparametric statistical approach, we identify signatures that are more precise than those from existing approaches and accurately reveal biological processes that are hidden in case vs. control studies. We conclude the work by exploring the applicability of the heterogeneous expression database in analyzing clinical drugs for the purpose of drug repurposing. (Copies available exclusively from MIT Libraries, Rm. 14-0551, Cambridge, MA 02139-4307. Ph. 617-253-5668; Fax 617-253-1690.)
Boundary scan modification to enhance multichip module testing

A boundary scan modification enables a single scannable application specific memory interface to test interconnects for stuck-at-zero faults and shorts on control, address, and data signal paths to memory devices without boundary scan capability. Texas Instruments used extensive boundary scan embedded testing, via IEEE 1149.1, for design verification and test of the gigabit memory unit (GMU) used in the solid-state recorder (SSR). The GMU utilized multichip module technology to provide 1.2 Gb of memory in 10 in/sup 3/ while using only 1.4 W of power. These applications required one of the first implementations of boundary scan in field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs). The program demonstrated that successful multichip module design and test requires boundary scan capability. >
The leaner P/Q-type calcium channel mutation renders cerebellar Purkinje neurons hyper-excitable and eliminates Ca2+-Na+ spike bursts

The leaner mouse mutation of the Cacnala gene leads to a reduction in P-type Ca 2+ current, the dominant Ca 2+ current in Purkinje cells (PCs). Here, we compare the electro-responsiveness and structure of PCs from age-matched leaner and wild-type (WT) mice in pharmacological isolation from synaptic inputs in cerebellar slices. We report that compared with WT, leaner PCs exhibit lower current threshold for Na + spike firing, larger subthreshold membrane depolarization, rapid adaptation followed by complete block of Na + spikes upon strong depolarization, and fail to generate Ca 2+ -Na + spike bursts. The Na + spike waveforms in leaner PCs have slower kinetics, reduced spike amplitude and afterhyperpolarization. We show that a deficit in the P-type Ca 2+ current caused by the leaner mutation accounts for most but not all of the changes in mutant PC electro-responsiveness. The selective P-type Ca 2+ channel blocker, ω-agatoxin-IVA, eliminated differences in subthreshold membrane depolarization, adaptation of Na + spikes upon strong current-pulse stimuli, Na + spike waveforms and Ca 2+ -Na + burst activity. In contrast, a lower current threshold for eliciting repetitive Na + spikes in leaner PCs was still observed after blockade of the P-type Ca 2+ current, suggesting secondary effects of the mutation that render PCs hyper-excitable. Higher input resistance, reduced whole-cell capacitance and smaller dendritic size accompanied the enhanced excitability in leaner PCs, indicative of developmental retardation in these cells caused by P/Q-type Ca 2+ channel malfunction. Our data indicate that a deficit in P-type Ca 2+ current leads to complex functional and structural changes in PCs, impairing their intrinsic and integrative properties.
An efficient algorithm for performance analysis of nonlinear control systems

A numerical algorithm for computing necessary conditions for performance specifications is developed for nonlinear uncertain systems. The algorithm is similar in nature and behavior to the power algorithm for the /spl mu/ lower bound, and does not rely on a descent method. The algorithm is applied to a practical example.
Binding energy of photonic molecule

The equation for the binding energy of a pair of microsphere lasers due to the dipole force acting between them is found
On the Number of Countable Models of a Countable Supersimple Theory

It is proved that the number of countable models of a countable supersimple theory is either 1 or infinite. This result is an extension of Lachlan‘s theorem on a superstable theory.
Pattern-based transformation of sequence diagrams using QVT

Design patterns provide a proven solution for a recurring design problem. There has been much work on tool support for pattern reuse. However, the existing work focuses mostly on the static structure of design patterns, leaving behavioral aspects largely manual. In this work, we present an approach for transforming application behaviors based on behaviors of design patterns using Query/View/Transformation (QVT). In the approach, we specify a design pattern in terms of a problem specification, a solution specification, and a transformation specification at the metamodel level. A problem model that exhibits the behaviors of the problem specification is transformed to a solution model with the behaviors of the solution specification. We use Role-Based Metamodeling Language (RBML) for specifying problem and solution specifications and QVT for describing transformation rules. We demonstrate the approach using the Observer pattern applied to a graph application.
Bogus Publicity Items and the Contingency Between Awareness and Media-Induced Pretrial Prejudice

Venue surveys can be criticized because they do not attempt to control for response biases, such as the tendency to report having read about any story that seems plausible. Bogus items (fabricated publicity items) are a common way to control for this bias. In two studies we examined whether controlling for this bias changes the relation between exposure to media and prejudice. Based on two actual crimes with quite different media exposure rates, communities were surveyed about their exposure to media surrounding the case and their prejudice toward the defendants. A bogus item was included on each survey. In both studies the correlations between exposure to media and prejudice were significant and remained unchanged when data from respondents who indicated having read about the bogus item were excluded. These findings suggest that, in parallel to the social desirability literature, the response tendency to report awareness of media events does not threaten the validity of venue surveys.
Neonatal Hearing Screening with Otoscopy, Auditory Brain Stem Response, and Otoacoustic Emissions

A study was performed to investigate the relationship between external and middle ear factors and hearing screening results by auditory brain stem response (ABR) and transient evoked otoacoustic emissions (EOAEs). The ears of 200 well newborns aged 5 hours to 48 hours underwent screening by ABR and EOAEs, followed by otoscopic examination. The pass rates for ABR and EOAE screening were 88.5% and 79%, respectively. On otoscopic examination, 13% (53 of 400) ears had occluding vernix obscuring the view of the tympanic membrane. Cleaning of vernix was attempted in ears that failed ABR or EOAE screening. Seventeen ears that failed ABR were cleaned, and 12 (71%) of them passed repeat ABR. Thirty-three ears that failed EOAE screening were cleaned, and 22 (67%) of them passed repeat emissions testing. Cleaning vernix increased the pass rates for ABR and EOAE screening to 91.5% and 84%, respectively. Decreased tympanic membrane mobility was found in 9% of ears that could be evaluated otoscopically. Increased failure rates for both ABR and EOAE screening were found in infant ears with decreased tympanic membrane mobility, but significance testing could not be performed because of inadequate sample size. Prevalence of occluding external canal vernix and middle ear effusion as a function of increasing infant age were studied. Implications for newborn hearing screening are discussed.
Plasmapheresis in the treatment of steroid-resistant focal segmental glomerulosclerosis in native kidneys

A circulating glomerular capillary albumin permeability factor (P(alb)) has been implicated in the pathogenesis of focal segmental glomerulosclerosis (FSGS), which recurs in transplanted kidneys. Plasmapheresis for recurrent FSGS may reduce proteinuria and stabilize renal function if instituted early. We performed six plasmapheresis treatments over 2 weeks in eight patients with a history of steroid-resistant idiopathic FSGS in native kidneys for an average of 12 +/- 2.3 months to determine whether treatment would decrease proteinuria or stabilize renal function. P(alb) was measured before and after plasmapheresis, and patients were followed-up for a mean of 29 +/- 4 months after the development of clinical symptoms. Proteinuria decreased in two of eight treated patients, although only transiently in one of the two. P(alb) improved in one of the two responding patients. Both patients with an improvement in proteinuria had stable renal function at last follow-up. In six of eight patients, there was no improvement in proteinuria despite an improvement in P(alb) (P < 0.0001) after plasmapheresis. At last follow-up, renal function was stable in two of the six nonresponding patients, and four of the six had significant progression of renal disease or were receiving dialysis treatments. These studies suggest that plasmapheresis may diminish proteinuria and stabilize renal function in a small minority of patients with steroid-resistant idiopathic FSGS. However, the lack of a relationship between the removal of the circulating permeability factor and the development of remission in these patients suggests that local factors associated with advanced renal injury or systemic factors unrelated to glomerular permeability play a significant role in determining proteinuria at this late stage of the disease.
Retro-cardiac esophageal mobility and deflection to prevent thermal injury during atrial fibrillation ablation: an anatomic feasibility study

Atrial fibrillation (AF) ablation often causes minor esophageal (ESO) injury, and sometimes lethal posterior left atria (PLA)-ESO fistula. Avoidance techniques (energy reduction and/or complete target avoidance) provide questionable ESO protective value, and are likely associated with increased AF recurrence. Potential independent mobility, deflectability and age-related anatomic factors, assessed by multi-position, and age-progressive thoracic computed tomography scans, show (1) mobility of the retro-cardiac ESO-PLA juxtaposition, (2) age-related increased thermal ablation vulnerability; and also, age-increased potential for retro-cardiac ESO mobility and deflectability to avoid collateral injury; and that (3) the retro-cardiac vertebral bodies and the descending aorta create a patient-specific esophageal corridor which defines the resting supine esophageal position and the subsequent PLA-ESO crossing points. A small, 1–3 mm, increase in separation of the ESO relative to the PLA occurs when moving the patient from supine to lateral and from supine to prone position. Because of the concave spine; the PLA-ESO area of apposition increases. Patient rotation of 90° and 180° does not create enough passive PLA-ESO separation to avoid collateral ESO thermal energy; but, active repositioning lateral and out of ESO corridor appears feasible.
Light-induced red shift of the Qx absorption band of light-harvesting bacteriochlorophyll in Rhodopseudomonas capsulata and Rhodopseudomonas sphaeroides.

Abstract In chromatophores from Rhodopseudomonas sphaeroides and Rhodopseudomonas capsulata , the Q x band(s) of the light-harvesting bacteriochlorophyll (BChl) (λ max ~590 nm) shifts to the red in response to a light-induced membrane potential, as indicated by the characteristics of the light-minus-dark difference spectrum. In green strains, containing light-harvesting complexes I and II, and one or more of neurosporene, methoxyneurosporene, and hydroxyneurosporene as carotenoids, the absorption changes due to the BChl and carotenoid responses to membrane potential in the spectral region 540–610 nm are comparable in magnitude and overlap with cytochrome and reaction center absorption changes in coupled chromatophores. In strains lacking carotenoid and light-harvesting complex II, the BChl shift absorption change is relatively smaller, due in part to the lower BChl/reaction center ratio. In the carotenoid-containing strains, the peak-to-trough absorption change in the BChl difference spectrum is 5–8% of the peak-to-trough change due to the shift of the longest-wavelength carotenoid band, although the absorption of the BChl band is 25–40% of that of the carotenoid band. The responding BChl band(s) does not appear to be significantly red-shifted in the dark in comparison to the total BChl Q x band absorption.
Incorporating Service-Learning, Technology, and Research Supportive Teaching Techniques into the University Chemistry Classroom

Technology was integrated into service-learning activities to create an interactive teaching method for undergraduate students at a large research institution. Chemistry students at the University of Central Florida partnered with high school students at Crooms Academy of Information Technology in interactive service learning projects. The projects allowed UCF students to teach newly acquired content knowledge and build upon course lecture and lab exercises. Activities utilized the web-conferencing tool Adobe Connect Pro to enable interaction with high school students, many of whom have limited access to supplemental educational opportunities due to low socioeconomic status. Seventy chemistry I students created lessons to clarify high school students’ misconceptions through the use of refutational texts. In addition, 21 UCF students enrolled in the chemistry II laboratory course acted as virtual lab partners with Crooms students in an interactive guided inquiry experiment focused on chemical kinetics. An overview of project’s design, implementation, and assessments are detailed in the case study and serve as a model for future community partnerships. Emerging technologies are emphasized as well as a suggested set of best practices for future projects.
Heat Transfer Effects in Facilitated Transport Liquid Membranes

Abstract Various mathematical models have been developed to describe facilitated transport. There are two limiting regimes where steady-state analytical solutions are available; diffusion-limited (reaction equilibrium) and reaction-limited (frozen condition). For intermediate cases, numerical solutions are available. All of these models are valid for isothermal conditions. It is possible in practice that the system may not be isothermal. The gas streams on each side of the membrane may be at different temperatures and/or there can be heat of reaction effects. These effects can cause the total facilitated flux to deviate from the isothermal case. The results of including temperature effects are incorporated in a dimensionless factor θ. θ is the facilitation factor for the non-isothermal case divided by the facilitation factor for the isothermal case. Results show that the imposition of a temperature gradient can cause a significant increase or decrease in the facilitated flux. In extreme cases, there can e...
Investigation of the Martini Force Field for Lipid Raft Membranes

It is now well established that three-component membranes composed of a saturated lipid, an unsaturated lipid, and cholesterol may exhibit coexistence between a liquid ordered phase mainly composed of the saturated lipid and cholesterol, and a liquid disordered phase composed of the unsaturated lipid. These three-component membranes have been used as models for less understood lipid rafts in the plasma membrane. Recently, the MARTINI force field was proposed as an efficient coarse-grained system-specific model for lipids. This model was used to study mixtures of DPPC, Chol and polyunsaturated lipids corresponding to DUPC or DAPC [1]. However, the model has not been investigated in the context of lipids with lower levels of unsaturation such as DOPC for which phase separation has been reported experimentally [2]. We therefore performed systematic molecular dynamics simulations of several ternary mixtures of DPPC/unsaturated-PC/Chol via the MARTINI model, in conjunction with finite size scaling analysis of the net interfacial length between domains in order to unambiguously assess whether the domains represent either thermodynamic or microphase separation. We found that DPPC/DAPC/Chol and DPPC/DUPC/Chol do indeed exhibit thermodynamic phase separation, in agreement with [1]. However, no thermodynamic phase separation is observed in DPPC/DOPC/Chol in contrast with experiments [2]. Through a systematic tweaking of the interactions between the apolar hydrophobic beads of the lipids tail groups, we show that the phase separation between DPPC/unsaturated PC/Chol within the MARTINI model is essentially driven by interactions between the tail beads rather than the conformational incompatibility between tail groups of DPPC and those of unsaturated lipids. This work is supported by a grant from NSF (DMR-0812470 and EPS-1004083).[1] J. Risselada and S. Marrink, PNAS Vol. 105: 17367-17372 (2008).[2] S.L. Veatch and S.L. Keller, Biophys. J. Vol. 85: 3074-3083 (2003).
Using LaX scintillator in a new low-background Compton telescope

The ability of Compton telescopes to perform imaging and spectroscopy in space depends directly on the speed and energy resolution of the calorimeter detectors in the telescope. The calorimeter detectors flown on space-borne or balloon-borne Compton telescopes have included NaI(Tl), CsI(Na), HPGe and liquid organic scintillator. By employing LaX scintillators for the calorimeter, one can take advantage of the unique speed and resolving power of the material to improve the instrument sensitivity and simultaneously enhance its spectroscopic performance and thus its imaging performance. We present a concept for a space-borne Compton telescope that employs LaX as a calorimeter and estimate the improvement in sensitivity over past realizations of Compton telescopes. With some preliminary laboratory measurements, we estimate that in key energy bands, typically corrupted with neutron-induced internal nuclear emissions, this design enjoys a twenty-fold improvement in background rejection.
The potato and human nutrition

The potato plays its role in human nutrition only to the extent that it is consumed. The basic product has excellent nutritional value for today and the future. However, there may be ways to enhance its contribution to human nutrition through education, marketing, breeding, field management, and finally preparation for consumption. “What I say is if a man really likes potatoes, he must be a pretty decent sort of fellow and well nourished.” ... Tom Curry