cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Strategic Recruiting: A Human Resource Management Case Study

This is a Human Resource Management (HRM) case used to encourage student thought and discussion following a class segment on recruiting. Midwest Education, Inc.: A Human Resource Management Case is used to exemplify many of the human resource problems encountered in a typical complex organization. It provides history and background of the company, Midwest Education, Inc. (which is closely modeled after a major developer and supplier of educational materials). The case presents the three major divisions of the company and shows how each is following a different strategy. With this background, the case presents the current problems which arise as the company seeks to change from ad hoc recruiting practices to a planned, strategically aligned process. As the case develops, it is seen that corporate headquarters is challenging the HR directors of each of the operating divisions to address recruiting issues through a systematic approach. Readers are challenged to determine what issues are most pressing during the recruiting process, and to develop comprehensive recruiting plans for the divisions.
The anabolic response to a meal containing different amounts of protein is not limited by the maximal stimulation of protein synthesis in healthy young adults

We have determined whole body protein kinetics, i.e., protein synthesis (PS), breakdown (PB), and net balance (NB) in human subjects in the fasted state and following ingestion of ~40 g [moderate protein (MP)], which has been reported to maximize the protein synthetic response or ~70 g [higher protein (HP)] protein, more representative of the amount of protein in the dinner of an average American diet. Twenty-three healthy young adults who had performed prior resistance exercise (X-MP or X-HP) or time-matched resting (R-MP or R-HP) were studied during a primed continuous infusion of l-[(2)H5]phenylalanine and l-[(2)H2]tyrosine. Subjects were randomly assigned into an exercise (X, n = 12) or resting (R, n = 11) group, and each group was studied at the two levels of dietary protein intake in random order. PS, PB, and NB were expressed as increases above the basal, fasting values (mg·kg lean body mass(-1)·min(-1)). Exercise did not significantly affect protein kinetics and blood chemistry. Feeding resulted in positive NB at both levels of protein intake: NB was greater in response to the meal containing HP vs. MP (P < 0.00001). The greater NB with HP was achieved primarily through a greater reduction in PB and to a lesser extent stimulation of protein synthesis (for all, P < 0.0001). HP resulted in greater plasma essential amino acid responses (P < 0.01) vs. MP, with no differences in insulin and glucose responses. In conclusion, whole body net protein balance improves with greater protein intake above that previously suggested to maximally stimulating muscle protein synthesis because of a simultaneous reduction in protein breakdown.
NEUTRON ENERGY SPECTRUM MEASUREMENTS IN UNMODERATED ASSEMBLIES

The neutron energy spectrum at the center of the dilute fast core of the coupled fast-thermal reactor ZPR-V was studied by use of fission chambers having electrodes quantitatively electrodeposited with U/sup 234/, U/sup 235/, U/sup 236/ and U/sup 238/ Atomic fission ratios found with these four isotopes determine a four-group neutron energy spectrum which can readily be measured as a function of position in the core by use of suitable drive units. The same fission chamber procedure was used to study the equilibrium neutron energy spectrum in a nataral uranium exponential column at Los Alamos. The results of meesurements in these two spectra are shown and compared with theoretical predictions. The ZPR-V results are also compared to an analysis of this spectrum made by use of nuclear emulsions for the range 0.2 to 2.2 Mev. (auth)
Neurological Correlates of Speech

Disorders of speech and language in children are a major management concern for the primary care physician and parents. Delays, disorders, and dysfunctions of communication skills constitute some of the most frequent reasons for referral to the developmental pediatrician and/or interdisciplinary diagnostic centers. The next several chapters review issues of speech and language disorders in childhood from various perspectives. This chapter highlights recent neurological findings related to the control of speech skills.
In Vivo Studies of Mitochondrial Respiration

In the course of an investigation of adding new collateral blood flow to the cortex of ischemic patients, the point was raised as to whether an increase in cortical oxygen tension would lead to improved oxygen utilization and energy production. If so, this might at least partially supply an explanation for improved neurologic function. The work on isolated mitochondria is firm in stating that there is no decrease in O2 utilization until less than 0.1 mmHg ambient PO2 (Chance et al, 1955, 1973). On the other hand, recent work on in vivo mitochondria suggest that they may respond differently, i.e., changes in cortical mitochondrial respiration may occur at a much higher brain PO2 (Rosenthal et al, 1975 & Austin et al, 1975). To investigate this problem, the authors used cats anesthetized similarly to humans undergoing microanastomosis surgery. Previous reported studies by others had shown the cytochrome a3 end of the respiratory chain to be more responsive to changes in O2 concentration. In the present study, the authors have added measurements of relative cortical PO2 (bPO2), relative cortical O2 utilization (bṖO2), and a power spectral analysis of the cortical electrical activity to obtain a measure of functional brain metabolism.
Political Economy of Foreign Direct Investment: Globalized Production in the Twenty-First Century

This article reviews scholarly research on the political economy of foreign direct investment (FDI) over the past 20 years. FDI research during this period reflects FDI's rapid growth, particularly in developing countries, and the emergence of intense competition among countries to attract investments. Countries have grown more open to FDI as evidenced by FDI deregulation, generous financial investment incentives, and the adoption of international agreements. Although extensive research shows that multinational corporations prefer to invest in countries with strong property rights protections, whether incentives and international agreements help countries attract FDI remains contested. Scholars can advance research by disaggregating FDI into multinational firms' specific production activities because the scope for countries to compete for FDI and firms' sensitivity to property rights vary widely. More generally, scholars should recast the separate study of trade and FDI into the study of global production...
Uteroperitoneal fistula formation after proximal salpingectomy with harmonic scalpel resulting in a third consecutive fallopian tube ectopic pregnancy: a case report.

Background Poststerilization ectopic pregnancies occur as the result of tuboperitoneal or uteroperitoneal fistula formation allowing sperm access to the peritoneal cavity and ovulated ova. This fistula formation is more likely to occur with dissection involving the proximal fallopian tube. Case Three consecutive fallopian tube ectopic pregnancies occurred in a woman whose first 2 were treated with laparoscopic salpingectomy. Conclusion Like with tubal sterilization, ectopic pregnancy resection, when possible, should preserve the proximal fallopian tube to limit the possibility of tuboperitoneal or uteroperitoneal fistula formation.
Development of the cone photoreceptor mosaic in the mouse retina revealed by fluorescent cones in transgenic mice.

Purpose Normal function of the retina relies on the orderly stereotyped organization of different neurons and their synaptic connections. How such neural organization is patterned during development remains poorly understood due to the paucity of adequate developmental markers. This study was to examine the spatial organization and development of cone photoreceptors quantitatively in the mouse retina. Methods A transgenic approach was used to generate a living cone cell marker by driving GFP expression in mouse cones with the human red/green opsin gene 5' sequences. The spatial organization and development of the cones in the mouse retinas were examined quantitatively with epifluorescence and scanning laser confocal microscopy. Cone specific GFP expression in the developing retinas was verified with peanut agglutinin (PNA) staining. Developmental expression of mouse cone opsin genes was determined with RT-PCR. Results The fluorescent retinal cells expressing GFP can be visualized as early as on embryonic day E15. Following up morphological differentiation of these cells revealed features that were consistent with the typical morphology of the mouse cones. Double labeling with cone specific PNA showed that these cells were co-labeled starting from postnatal day P1, and that a subpopulation of PNA positive cones expressed the GFP. The fluorescent cell densities had a similar ventral and dorsal distribution from E15 to P2, increased dramatically in the ventral by P6, and in the dorsal from P7. Nearest neighbor distance analysis demonstrated that this subpopulation of cones was organized into a regular mosaic pattern with a regularity index of 4.82 in the central and 3.55 in the peripheral retina. Quantitative pattern assessment of the developing cones revealed that the fluorescent cells appeared to be distributed in a non-random array before birth. The regularity of the cone array began to rise on P7, in parallel with the onset of mouse green opsin gene expression and the development of cone pedicles. The regular pattern of cone mosaic organization was basically formed by P10, coinciding with the timing of the cone pedicle maturation. Conclusions The cones in the mouse retina are organized in a regular mosaic pattern. Patterning the cone mosaic appears to follow a two phase developmental process involving regulated opsin gene expression and cone pedicle maturation: an early phase where a non-random array emerges during cone differentiation, and a late phase where the regular mosaic pattern is mature at the time when cone synaptic contacts are being formed.
Teaching philosophies guiding sexuality instruction in US colleges and universities

ABSTRACTTeaching philosophies are central to the approach of pedagogical strategies but there has been little examination of discipline-specific teaching philosophies. This study addresses a significant gap in the literature by discussing the teaching philosophies of 122 instructors of sexuality courses. Sexuality education is unique compared to most disciplines due to the personal nature of the content, thus being more difficult for students and instructors to distance themselves from the course content. The teaching philosophies in this study conveyed two overarching approaches to sexuality instruction: the instructor’s perspective of the course and the approach of the sexuality instruction. Although teaching philosophies typically inform one’s practice of teaching and course content, this study proposes that sexuality education is intrinsically different than other areas of instruction despite the interdisciplinary backgrounds of college instructors.
MICROSCALE HEAT TRANSFER IN BIOLOGICAL SYSTEMS AT LOW TEMPERATURES

This review of heat and mass transfer in biological systems is focused on phenomena occurring at low temperatures at the micro- and nano-scates. The discussed temperature range is divided into temperatures above freezing and temperatures below freezing. At temperatures above freezing, the effects of low temperature relate to changes in the molecular structure of cell membranes, changes in ionic pump function, and chemical reaction kinetics. Below freezing, processes relate to water transport across cell membranes and changes in intracellular composition. The mechanisms through which organisms survive changes induced by low temperatures are also discussed together with biomedical applications of low temperatures in cryopreservation of organs for transplantation and destruction of undesirable tissues by freezing in cryosurgery.
The impact of measurement of respiratory quotient by indirect calorimetry on the achievement of nitrogen balance in patients with severe traumatic brain injury

This study evaluated the impact of IC on the optimization of nutritional support and the achievement of +NB in patients with TBI. 27 patients (GCS ≤ 8), treated with a 5-day multimodality monitoring and goal-directed therapy protocol, received enteral nutrition on day 1 followed by IC on days 3 and 5 and assessment of NB on day 7. In the first cohort (n = 11), no adjustment in kcal was made. In the second cohort (n = 16), nutrition was targeted to an RQ of 0.83 by day 3. The first cohort was analyzed with respect to NB status; the second cohort was compared to patients with (−) and +NB of the first cohort. Data (mean ± SD) were analyzed with unpaired t test, and Chi square and Fisher exact tests. 4/11(36 %) patients in the first cohort had +NB. The predicted mortality by TRISS, substrate utilization, and RQ was significantly lower compared to the second cohort. The mortality predicted by the CrasH model did not differ between the two cohorts. A RQ of 0.74 was associated with the preferential use of fat and protein and −NB, whereas a RQ of 0.84 favored utilization of carbohydrates and +NB. All patients whose kcal intake was adjusted based on the RQ on day 3 reached a +NB by day 7. An increase in kcal ≥25 % in patients with a RQ < 0.83 on day 3 improves substrate utilization, decreases protein utilization and optimizes the achievement of +NB by day 7.
Public spheres on the move: the embodied deliberation of cycling in Los Angeles

Across Los Angeles, mass bike events have exploded in popularity and regularly stop cars to allow thousands of bodies to move together through the city. We argue that such “mobility events” are sha...
Spatial Data Analysis Uncertainties Introduced by Selected Sources of Error

Spatial data analysis uncertainty has been examined with various sources of error through simulation experiments. The general sources of the uncertainty are sampling error, measurement error, specification error, and location error. Location error is a unique error in spatial data analysis and occurs when an observed location deviates from its true location. We simulate spatial data analyses with different levels of location and measurement error, and compare the simulation results. Geographically aggregated pediatric blood lead level point data for Syracuse, New York, are utilized for the simulation together with a simultaneous autoregressive model. The results show that even with different levels of error, regression coefficients are quite robust. However, coefficient standard errors become larger with higher levels of location error and smaller administration units, such as census blocks.
Suicidal Behavior in Posttraumatic Stress Disorder: Focus on Combat Exposure

Data in veterans and active personnel has revealed a robust association between combat trauma, posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and suicidal behavior, a concerning relationship considering the highly traumatic nature of combat action. Additionally, mood, anxiety, substance abuse, and personality disorders are frequently comorbid with the diagnosis of PTSD and can synergistically or additively elevate the risk of suicide in the military as well as civilian patients already struggling with this disorder. The relationship between PTSD and suicidal behavior is even further complicated by the fact that some studies implicate traumatic experience and not symptoms of PTSD in the elevated risk of suicidal behavior observed in this patient population. More longitudinal studies are needed in order to evaluate the temporal relationship between the traumatic events and the clinical manifestations of PTSD, in order to disentangle this convoluted relationship. Once the mechanisms of trauma-driven suicidal behavior are better understood, improved therapeutic modalities and reduction of suicidal behavior in veterans as well as civilians struggling with PTSD and co-occurring psychiatric disorders should follow.
Páginas da escravidão: raça e gênero nas representações de cativos brasileiros na imprensa e na literatura Oitocentista.

Com a proibicao do comercio atlântico de escravos em 1850 para o Brasil, as elites proprietarias tiveram que se adaptar a essa nova realidade, e tanto literatura como imprensa discutiram a questao escrava e seu futuro. Nesse contexto, e perceptivel a emergencia de uma nova sensibilidade em relacao a escravidao, em que se observa a centralidade da mulher escravizada na decada de 1850. Eu argumento que tais discussoes apresentam um sentido duplo, pois tanto se relacionam com os debates antiescravistas que ocorriam em outras partes do Atlântico, como tambem com a questao brasileira que se via diante da necessidade de reproduzir a escravidao internamente. Essa analise se baseia nos textos de duas escritoras, a francesa Adele Toussaint e a brasileira Nisia Floresta, e os discuto em dialogo com outras obras literarias e artigos da imprensa da decada de 1850. Este artigo pretende-se, ainda, uma contribuicao aos estudos sobre ideias antiescravistas para periodos anteriores a decada de 1860 e, principalmente, considera a participacao de mulheres nesses debates.
Toward a model for local stakeholder participation in landscape-level wildlife conservation

The conservation community is increasingly taking a landscape-level approach to wildlife conservation. This approach faces obstacles, including how to ensure transboundary wildlife conservation goa...
Chemotherapy for CNS Atypical Teratoid/Rhabdoid Tumor

Abstract Atypical Teratoid/Rhabdoid Tumor (AT/RT) is a highly malignant central nervous system tumor that occurs predominantly in early childhood. Once thought to be uniformly fatal, subsets of patients with AT/RT have had long-term survival and have even been cured with intensive multimodal therapy that includes surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation therapy. Given the very young age of most patients and untoward effects of cranial irradiation, chemotherapy is considered the cornerstone of treatment. Most reported successful regimens include combinations of intensive multiagent chemotherapy, high-dose chemotherapy with autologous hematopoietic progenitor cell rescue, or intrathecal chemotherapy. Studies have shown survival rates approaching 50% with such therapeutic approaches. The candidate tumor suppressor gene, SMARCB1, is abnormal in AT/RT. Efforts are currently underway to understand the molecular underpinnings of AT/RT, which may allow for risk stratification based on genomic profiling, ultimately leading to more tailored therapeutic approaches and improved outcomes.
Suicide in Chronic Pain Patients: Risk Factors and Clinical Considerations

Chronic pain patients are at increased risk of suicide. Patients with chronic pain are at increased suicide risk due to neurobiological vulnerabilities, demographic risk factors, psychiatric comorbidities, personality traits, and the misuse of opioid medications. Risk for suicide is much more likely when vulnerable individuals enter time periods of great stress, loss, or transition. Chronic pain patients are also more likely to enter into vulnerable periods (such as pain exacerbations, advanced age, or loss), which may induce a suicidal crisis. Warning signs of an imminent suicidal crisis include increased isolation, feelings of hopelessness, and decreases in problem-solving abilities or cognitive control. An actuarial approach to suicide risk in chronic pain patients is crucial to ensure safe and effective management. Psychotherapeutic interventions can aid suicidal pain patients in successfully managing suicidal crises through building distress tolerance skills, challenging catastrophic thoughts, and instilling hope in the future.
Turtleheading the Tough Aortic Necks! A Novel Endovascular Method to Avoid Bird-beaking, Invagination, and Stent Migration in Thoracic Aortic Grafts

Conventional repair of aortic pathology such as thoracic aortic aneurysms (TAA), aortic dissections, and intramural hematomas (IMH) involves major cardiothoracic surgery. Complication rates can be as high as 30%, therefore percutaneous endograft placement has become the new gold standard. However, not every patient is a suitable candidate for endovascular repair of a thoracic aneurysm, especially, patients with a very short proximal landing zone neck or a difficult type II or type III configuration of the aortic arch. Emerging techniques have been described in the literature, but until now none have been able to confidently conquer this problem. Stacked stents in a "turtlehead" fashion offer a solution to this obstacle. The turtlehead technique utilizes commercially available stents deployed in an on-label fashion to create a rigid yet conformable endograft that can precisely treat difficult proximal landing zone necks.
Barriers to Care in Chinese Immigrants with Hepatocellular Carcinoma: A Focus Group Study in New York City

The incidence of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is rising sharply in the United States and deaths from HCC have increased at the highest rate of all cancers. Though Asians have the highest incidence of HCC of all ethnicities in the US, racial/ethnic minorities, including Asians, have worse survival from HCC. We sought to identify barriers to care in treatment of HCC among affected individuals in the NYC Chinese immigrant community. We held focus groups with Chinese immigrant patients in NYC with HCC. 29 individuals participated in the focus groups. We analyzed focus group data using grounded theory methodology. Barriers to care identified included insurance, money, time, language, residency status, and stigma. The impact of provider bias and culture were also discussed. Knowledge gathering with minority patients with HCC is essential for us to fully comprehend the barriers to healthcare experienced by this community. Future policy and intervention efforts must be founded in this reality.
Estimating Flood Damage in Texas Using GIS: Predictors, Consequences, and Policy Implications

Floods continue to pose the greatest threat to the property and safety of human communities among all natural hazards in the United States. While the link between urbanization and flooding is established, the degree to which specific characteristics of the built environment affect the level of damage sustained by a community has never been thoroughly investigated at the regional scale. Our study addresses this lack of research by examining the relationship between the built environment and flood impacts in Texas, which consistently sustains the most damage from flooding more than any other state in the country. Specifically, we calculate property damage resulting from 423 flood events over a five year period between 1997 and 2001 at the county level. We identify the impact of several built environment measures, including wetland alteration, impervious surface, and dams on reported property damage while controlling for biophysical and socioeconomic characteristics. Statistical results suggest that naturally occurring wetlands play a particularly important role in mitigating flood damage. These findings provide guidance to homeland security experts and flood managers on how to most effectively mitigate the costly impacts of floods at the community level.
Investigation of the methyl fluoride technique for determining rhizospheric methane oxidation

Methane oxidation rates in the rhizosphere of Pontederia cordata,Sagittaria lancifolia, and Typha latifolia were quantified in fieldstudies using the methyl fluoride inhibition technique. An averageoxidation of 22.9 ± 17.7% (sd,n = 44) was found for all field experiments (oxidation is expressedas a % of total potential emission in the presumedabsence of oxidation). Greenhouse experiments using the same techniquegave an average rhizospheric oxidation of 64.9 ±17.0% (sd, n = 44). Comparison of a subset ofgreenhouse plants with the methyl fluoride (MF) and a light oxic/darkanoxic (LO/DA) technique for suppressing CH4 oxidationyielded similar percentages (57.7 ±15.0% for MF and 58.5 ±13.9% for LO/DA, n = 11). Rhizospheric oxidationdisplayed a seasonal trend in Typha latifolia with decreasingoxidation percentages during warmer months as the importance ofrhizospheric CH4 oxidation declined relative toCH4 emission (46.5 ±13.8% in December and 13.5 ±1.7% in July). However, the absolute rateof methane oxidation was highest during the warmer months (44.2± 3.4 mg m-2 d-1 inDecember and 318.7 ± 151.4 mg m-2d-1 in July). As methane emission rates increased,the sensitivity of the methyl fluoride technique decreased dueto the larger error between replicate flux measurements.
Make and Take an Ethics Module: Ethics Across the CS Curriculum

This Workshop is intended to be a generative space for participants to create a module on ethics in a Computer Science course of their choice. Participants will choose an existing course in the typical CS curriculum; and coalesce around common themes to create a module that integrates critical reflection on ethical choices and societal impact of computing with the practice of computing. The workshop will offer a space to collaboratively work on designing an ethics module for a CS course chosen by the participants. The ethics module would integrate teaching specific concepts and practices in computing alongside a critical reflection of these practices. Ideally, these modules would be flexible enough to fit into curricula at various institutions.
Controlling Product Inhibition through Substrate-Specific Active Sites in Nanoparticle-Based Phosphodiesterase and Esterase

Hydrolysis of phosphodiester bonds is catalyzed efficiently by DNA- and RNA-hydrolyzing enzymes, but their synthetic mimics often fail to display catalytic turnovers because the phosphate products ...
Giving Suggestions: Using Quantity Requests to Increase Donations

Across six studies (N = 7,822), we provide evidence that quantity requests, wherein people consider ordinal choice options of how much to give to a prosocial cause (e.g., $5, $10, or $15), increase contributions compared to binary (yes/no) requests. Specifically, quantity requests encourage greater donations (Study 1), even for quantity requests starting with low (e.g., $1) or high (e.g., $10) suggested donation options (Study 2). Quantity requests also outperform other requests with multiple donation options (e.g., multiple options of when to donate or to which charity branch to donate; Study 3), suggesting that multiple options alone are insufficient to increase donations. We propose that quantity requests: (a) focus donation decisions on how much (rather than whether) to give (Study 4), and (b) communicate normative donation magnitudes (Study 5). In doing so, quantity requests increase donation rates and, ultimately, total donations. Finally, we offer one way to transform non-quantity requests to be more effective: Adding a numeric scale alongside choice options focuses potential donors on the question of how much to give, thereby increasing contributions for this transformed request (Study 6). Our findings offer a practical nudge for promoting prosocial action and a theoretical framework of why quantity requests increase donations.
Scaling Microfluidics to Complex, Dynamic Protocols: Invited Paper

Microfluidic devices promise to automate wetlab procedures by manipulating small chemical or biological samples. We are developing a full-stack microfluidic automation platform that allows and allows users to scale up the complexity of microfluidic programming, encouraging them to mix fluidic manipulations with traditional programming. Puddle is a runtime system that provides a high-level API for microfluidic manipulations. It manages fluidic resources dynamically, allowing programmers to freely mix regular computation with microfluidics, resulting in more expressive programs. It also provides real-time error correction through a computer vision system, allowing robust execution on cheaper digital microfluidic hardware. We have been running Puddle on PurpleDrop, a new digital microfluidic device that is affordable and has novel features such as fully automated input/output of fluids. With this combination, we have demonstrated PCR with automated replenishment, a DNA sequencing preparation protocol, and the complete retrieval of digital data stored in dehydrated spots of DNA on the device's surface. Going forward, we see Puddle and PurpleDrop as part of a platform for further research. PurpleDrop is affordable and extensible, which makes a compelling case for adding new periferials or even scaling out by connecting multiple devices. And Puddle provides a flexible and abstract programming model that could enable microfluidic programs to run on different hardware targets (DMF or liquid handling robots), or even a combination thereof.
Hierarchical Micro-Nanostructured Surfaces for Isotropic/Anisotropic Liquid Transport

The control of liquid transport using hierarchical micro-nanostructured surfaces is of significant interest for a broad range of applications, including thermal management, digital lab-on-chip, self-cleaning surfaces, antifogging, and water harvesting, among others. Although a variety of fabrication techniques can be utilized to produce micro/nanostructured patterns for controlling liquid transport, each sample usually needs to be patterned and developed separately, making the micro/nanofabrication process tedious and expensive. Here, based on scalable template stripping and chemical oxidation techniques, we demonstrate hierarchical micro-nanostructured surfaces for isotropic or anisotropic liquid transport. Furthermore, the overall structure is thin and flexible, making it ideal for applications where geometry and weight are constrained, such as aerospace, flexible, and wearable devices.
Oxygen Functionalized Copper Nanoparticles for Solar-Driven Conversion of Carbon Dioxide to Methane

Solar conversion of carbon dioxide (CO2) into hydrocarbon fuels offers a promising approach to fulfill the world’s ever-increasing energy demands in a sustainable way. However, a highly active cata...
Structure Activity Relationship Study of the XIP Quorum Sensing Pheromone in Streptococcus mutans Reveal Inhibitors of the Competence Regulon

The dental cariogenic pathogen Streptococcus mutans coordinates competence for genetic transformation via two peptide pheromones, competence stimulating peptide (CSP) and comX-inducing peptide (XIP). CSP is sensed by the comCDE system and induces competence indirectly, whereas XIP is sensed by the comRS system and induces competence directly. In chemically defined media (CDM), after uptake by oligopeptide permease, XIP interacts with the cytosolic receptor ComR to form the XIP::ComR complex that activates the expression of comX, an alternative sigma factor that initiates the transcription of late-competence genes. In this study, we set out to determine the molecular mechanism of XIP::ComR interaction. To this end, we performed systematic replacement of the amino acid residues in the XIP pheromone and assessed the ability of the mutated analogs to modulate the competence regulon in CDM. We were able to identify structural features that are important to ComR binding and activation. Our structure-activity relationship insights led us to construct multiple XIP-based inhibitors of the comRS pathway. Furthermore, when comCDE and comRS were both stimulated with CSP and XIP, respectively, a lead XIP-based inhibitor was able to maintain the inhibitory activity. Last, phenotypic assays were used to highlight the potential of XIP-based inhibitors to attenuate pathogenicity in S. mutans and to validate the specificity of these compounds to the comRS pathway within the competence regulon. The XIP-based inhibitors developed in this study can be used as lead scaffolds for the design and development of potential therapeutics against S. mutans infections.
Does Traumatic Brain Injury Cause Risky Substance Use or Substance Use Disorder

There is a high co-occurrence of risky substance use among adults with traumatic brain injury (TBI), although it is unknown if the neurologic sequelae of TBI can promote this behavior. We propose that to conclude that TBI can cause risky substance use, it must be determined that TBI precedes risky substance use, that confounders with the potential to increase the likelihood of both TBI and risky substance use must be ruled out, and that there must be a plausible mechanism of action. In this review, we address these factors by providing an overview of key clinical and preclinical studies and list plausible mechanisms by which TBI could increase risky substance use. Human and animal studies have identified an association between TBI and risky substance use, although the strength of this association varies. Factors that may limit detection of this relationship include differential variability due to substance, sex, age of injury, and confounders that may influence the likelihood of both TBI and risky substance use. We propose possible mechanisms by which TBI could increase substance use that include damage-associated neuroplasticity, chronic changes in neuroimmune signaling, and TBI-associated alterations in brain networks.
Third Time Still Charms: A Review of the Lawyer's Guide to Writing Well by Tom Goldstein & Jethro K. Lieberman

This book changed my life. Well, my professional life. When I read the first edition of The Lawyer’s Guide to Writing Well in 1994, a stark reality struck me and stuck: as lawyers, we are professional writers, but we don’t act like it. That truth has informed my teaching and writing ever since. The Lawyer’s Guide to Writing Well, first published in 1989 with a second edition in 2002, is now in its third edition. The authors, Tom Goldstein (a professor of journalism) and Jethro K. Lieberman (an emeritus law professor and former legal writing director), issue the same challenge they did in the first two editions: lawyers can write better, and here’s how. The Lawyer’s Guide is a motivational legal writing style guide — not a reference; you can’t look up rules for commas and capitals — but a guide.
Valsartan nano-filaments alter mitochondrial energetics and promote faster healing in diabetic rat wounds.

Chronic wounds are a common and debilitating condition associated with aging populations that impact more than 6.5 million patients in the United States. We have previously demonstrated the efficacy of daily topical 1% valsartan in treating wounds in diabetic mouse and pig models. Despite these promising results, there remains a need to develop an extended-release formulation that would reduce patient burden by decreasing the frequency of daily applications. Here, we used nanotechnology to self-assemble valsartan amphiphiles into a filamentous structure (val-filaments) that would serve as a scaffold in wound beds and allow for steady, localised and tunable release of valsartan amphiphiles over 24 days. Two topical treatments of this peptide-based hydrogel on full-thickness wounds in Zucker Diabetic Fatty rats resulted in faster rates of wound closure. By day 23, all val-filament treated wounds were completely closed, as compared to one wound closed in the placebo group. Mechanistically, we observed enrichment of proteins involved in cell adhesion and energetics pathways, downregulation of Tgf-β signalling pathway mediators (pSmad2, pSmad3 and Smad4) and increased mitochondrial metabolic pathway intermediates. This study demonstrates the successful synthesis of a sustained-release valsartan filament hydrogel, its impact on mitochondrial energetics and efficacy in treating diabetic wounds.
Asian Women's Mariology in Christological Context

Le point de depart de la mariologie des femmes asiatiques est la christologie parce que Marie conduit au Christ et non a elle-meme. Les femmes asiatiques affirment que Marie doit etre libre de derives androcentriques qui caracterisent la mariologie traditionnelle. Marie ne peut apparaitre comme une femme domestiquee au sens ou elle serait une femme soumise, un modele de maternite qui marquerait une stricte limite aux aspirations feminines. Elle n'est pas non plus une femme exaltee qui serait parfaite et dont les perfections seraient inaccessibles aux femmes du quotidien
Prosody and Intention Recognition

Listeners face multiple challenges in mapping prosody onto intentions: The relevant intentions vary with the general context of an utterance (e.g., the speaker’s goals) and how prosodic contours are realized varies across speakers, accents, and speech conditions. We propose that listeners map acoustic information onto prosodic representations using (rational) probabilistic inference, in the form of generative models, which are updated on the fly based on the match between predictions and the input. We review some ongoing work, motivated by this framework, focusing on the “It looks like an X” construction, which, depending on the pitch contour and context, can be interpreted as “It looks like an X and it is” or “It looks like an X and it isn’t.” We use this construction to investigate the hypothesis that pragmatic processing shows the pattern of adaptation effects that is expected if the mapping of speech onto intentions involves rational inference.
SPECTRA AND STRUCTURE OF PHOSPHORUS‐BORON COMPOUNDS PART 5, SYNTHESIS AND SPECTROSCOPIC STUDY OF DIMETHYLCHLOROPHOSPHINEBORANE

Abstract The reaction of dimethylchlorophosphine and diborane(6) yields the new adduct dimethylchlorophosphineborane. The physical properties of this molecule are described. The compound has been characterized by nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy (1H and 11B) and the infrared (33–3100 cm−1) spectrum of the solid and the Raman (20–3100 cm−1) spectra of liquid and solid (CH3)PClBH3 and (CH3)2PClBD3 have been recorded. The spectra have been interpreted on the basis of the molecule possessing Cs symmetry. A complete vibrational assignment for the solid phase is proposed. The presence of two PCl stretching modes in the solid samples is believed to be the result of the crystal form which possesses at least two molecules per unit cell, giving rise to in-phase and out-of-phase vibrations.
Performance advantages of partitioned global address space languages

For nearly a decade, the Message Passing Interface (MPI) has been the dominant programming model for high performance parallel computing, in large part because it is universally available and scales to thousands of processors. In this talk I will describe some of the alternatives to MPI based on a Partitioned Global Address Space model of programming, such as UPC and Titanium. I will show that these models offer significant advantages in performance as well as programmer productivity, because they allow the programmer to build global data structures and perform one-sided communication in the form of remote reads and writes, while still giving programmers control over data layout. In particular, I will show that these languages make more effective use of cluster networks with RDMA support, allowing them to outperform two-sided communication on both microbenchmarks and bandwidth-limited computational problems, such as global FFTs. The key optimization is overlap of communication with computation and pipelining communication. Surprisingly, sending smaller messages more frequently can be faster than a few large messages if overlap with computation is possible. This creates an interesting open problem for global scheduling of communication, since the simple strategy of maximum aggregation is not always best. I will also show some of the productivity advantages of these languages through application case studies, including complete Titanium implementations of two different application frameworks: an immersed boundary method package and an elliptic solver using adaptive mesh refinement.
Predicting the Demand for Spectrum Allocation Through Auctions

The projected rare resource spectrum generates high profits if utilized efficiently. The current static allocation lead the spectrum to underutilized with fixed income. Predicting the user requirement for spectrum and auctioning the spectrum helps to better serve the customers and at the same time increases the income. In this research we use the automated collaborative filtering model for predicting the customer requirement and then allocate the spectrum through auctions (bidding for spectrum in open market). Genetic algorithm is used for optimization of the spectrum bidding problem and concluded that the spectrum will be used efficiently while generating more revenue by bidding for spectrum in the market.
Stock Returns and Inflation Revisited

The stock return-inflation relation has been an important issue in financial economics. Several hypotheses have been proposed to explain the relation. Among these, the Modigliani and Cohn's inflation illusion hypothesis has received renewed attention recently. Another hypothesis is the two-regime hypothesis. We reexamine these hypotheses using long sample data. We find that the Modigliani and Cohn hypothesis can explain the post-war negative relation between stock returns and inflation, but it is not easily compatible with the pre-war positive relation. We confirm the presence of two regimes in the relation between the pre- and post-war periods using an alternative structural VAR identification method.
Filter Design and Approximation

This chapter contains sections titled: Introduction Ideal and Approximate Filter Types Transfer Function and Basic Filter Concepts Ladder Network Filters Elliptic Filter Matching Between Unequal Resistance Levels Conclusions Problems References
Subsequence packing: complexity, approximation, and application

We study the subsequence packing problem: given a string T and a collection of strings {Si}, find disjoint subsequences {Ti} of T with maximum total length such that each Ti is a subsequence of Si. We prove the NP-completeness of the decision problem, present the first non-trivial deterministic approximation, and show its applications to DNA sequencing verification and preemptive job shop scheduling with two machines.
Avian brains and a new understanding of vertebrate brain evolution

We believe that names have a powerful influence on the experiments we do and the way in which we think. For this reason, and in the light of new evidence about the function and evolution of the vertebrate brain, an international consortium of neuroscientists has reconsidered the traditional, 100-year-old terminology that is used to describe the avian cerebrum. Our current understanding of the avian brain - in particular the neocortex-like cognitive functions of the avian pallium - requires a new terminology that better reflects these functions and the homologies between avian and mammalian brains.
Norms on earthquake measures and Zygmund functions

The infinitesimal earthquake theorem gives a one-to-one correspondence between Thurston bounded earthquake measures and normalized Zygmund bounded functions. In this paper, we provide an intrinsic proof of a theorem given in an earlier paper by the author; that is, we show that the cross-ratio norm of a Zygmund bounded function is equivalent to the Thurston norm of the earthquake measure in the correspondence.
Broadband RCS reduction of rectangular patch by using distributed loading

A scheme is presented for reducing the RCS of patch antennas outside their operational band without compromising gain performance. This is achieved by placing a narrow resistive strip (distributed loading) around the periphery of the patch which has minimal effect at the operational frequency of the patch. Results are presented using a finite element-boundary integral code demonstrating the effectiveness of this scheme over the traditional method of using lumped loads.
Human-Cognition-Based CAPTCHAs

CAPTCHAs play a significant role in differentiating humans and machines in any Web-based authentication process. With technological advances in text recognition and image extraction, it's now possible to extract the characters shown in a CAPTCHA with satisfactory accuracy. CAPTCHAs were introduced to cope with the immense threat to online authentication systems, but interpreting them becomes harder for regular Internet users every day. The authors' alternative CAPTCHA provides a variety of mathematical, logical, and inference problems that only humans can understand and answer correctly. The proposed framework supports question diversity and a user-friendly interface. The authors' informal user study evaluates the developed system's performance with different backgrounds. The study shows the efficacy of the implemented system with a good level of user satisfaction.
Acetazolamide as an adjunct to CPAP treatment: a case of complex sleep apnea in a patient on long-acting opioid therapy.

A 41-year-old white woman on long-acting opioid therapy was diagnosed with moderate obstructive sleep apnea. On initiation of continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP), she manifested severe central apnea that was unresponsive to supplemental oxygen and interfered with CPAP titration. Acetazolamide, 250 mg, nightly at bedtime was initiated, and CPAP titration was repeated. On acetazolamide, optimal CPAP pressure was obtained with no manifestation of clinically significant central respiratory disturbance. This case suggests that acetazolamide may be an effective adjunct to positive airway pressure therapy in patients on long-acting opioids. A need exists for examination of acetazolamide in this capacity. Citation: Glidewell RN; Orr WC; Imes N. Acetazolamide as an adjunct to CPAP treatment: a case of complex sleep apnea in a patient on long-acting opioid therapy. J Clin Sleep Med 2009;5(1):63-64.
Comments on toric varieties

Here are few notes on not necessarily normal toric varieties and resolution by toric blow-up. These notes are independent of, but in the same spirit as the earlier preprint [Tho03]. That is, they focus on the fact that toric varieties are locally given by monoid algebras.
Clinical experience with suction biopsy of the rectal mucosa.

Summary Four hundred forty-five rectal suction biopsies from 212 patients were examined in an effort to assess the clinical usefulness of this technique. A method was evolved which provided good specimens. These specimens were then embedded and cut in a uniform fashion to permit microscopic study of properly oriented, serial sections. Histologic categories of normal, equivocal, and abnormal were recognized. Common sources of artifacts were also recognized (1) trauma; (2) too small a specimen; (3) lymphoid nodules; and (4) proximity to the anus. Patients were grouped into clinical categories for analysis:(1) normal; (2) probably normal; (3) edema; (4) colonic polyp; (5) celiac sprue ; (6) infectious colitis; (7) regional enteritis; (8) ulcerative colitis; (9) unclassified diarrhea; and (10) miscellaneous. Some abnormal specimens were obtained in all of the clinical groups except the normal and probably normal. Abnormal findings including crypt abscess were most frequent and most severe in idiopathic and infectious colitis although no specific histologic pattern was invariably associated with this single disease entity. The biopsies were evaluated without knowledge of the clinical facts. A good diagnostic correlation was obtained between careful sigmoidoscopy and biopsy obtained on the same day. Despite the nonspecificity of the abnormalities seen, biopsy was of considerable clinical value as an adjunct to sigmoidoscopy in that objective evidence of early organic disease was often obtained by biopsy when the clinical picture pointed to no more than a functional disturbance.