cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Spatial and Temporal Bias in the Mitotic Origins of Somatostatin- and Parvalbumin-Expressing Interneuron Subgroups and the Chandelier Subtype in the Medial Ganglionic Eminence

GABAergic interneurons modulate cortical activity through the actions of distinct subgroups. Recent studies using interneuron transplants have shown tremendous promise as cell-based therapies for seizure disorders, Parkinson’s disease, and in the study of neocortical plasticity. Previous reports identified a spatial bias for the origins of parvalbumin (PV)- and somatostatin (SST)-expressing interneuron subgroups within the medial ganglionic eminence (MGE). In the current study, the mitotic origins of these interneurons are examined by harvesting MGE cells at 2 time points and evaluating their neurochemical profiles after transplantation into neonatal mouse cortex. Although the dorsal MGE (dMGE)-SST and ventral MGE (vMGE)-PV bias were confirmed, both subgroups originate from progenitors located throughout the MGE. The dMGE bias was also found for SST subgroups that coexpress calretinin or reelin. In contrast, another major subgroup of SST interneuron, neuropeptide Y-expressing, does not appear to originate within the MGE. Finally, novel evidence is provided that a clinically important subtype of PV-expressing interneuron, the chandelier (axo-axonic) cell, is greatly enriched in transplants from the vMGE at embryonic day 15. These findings have important implications both for the study of interneuron fate determination and for studies that use interneuron precursor transplantation to alter cortical activity.
Application of secretary algorithm to dynamic load balancing in user-space on multicore systems

In recent years, multicore processors have become prevalent in many types of systems and are used for a wide range of applications. Although multicore processors present a popular hardware solution to problems that were not possible with traditional single-core processors, they come with their own set of challenges. As Amdahl's law puts it, the performance gain is limited by the percentage of the software that cannot be run in parallel on multiple cores. Even when an application is “embarrassingly” parallelized by a carefully designed algorithm and implemented, load balancing of tasks across different cores is a critical aspect in utilizing a multicore system as close to its fullest potential as possible. In this paper, we investigated how a solution to a cardinal payoff variant of the secretary problem can be applied to a proactive, decentralized, dynamic load balancing technique in user-space to assist single program, multiple data (SPMD) applications in a multiprogrammed environment so that all tasks can make roughly equal progress distributed over all cores. We examined how this method compares with the default Linux load balancer in terms of scalability and predictability. Our experiments of running NAS Parallel Benchmarks (NPB) in OpenMP had promising results that showed our technique outperformed the default Linux scheduler by an average of 40% speedup in a multiprogrammed environment with less time variance between multiple executions.
A Structural Study of the Amorphous to Crystalline Transformation in In2O3 Thin Films

We have investigated the structure of sputter deposited amorphous and crystalline indium oxide films by electron diffraction. Selected area diffraction patterns were recorded for both states from which radial density functions were derived. The comparison of the crystalline radial density function to the amorphous one shows that the first nearest neighbor distance corresponding to the In-O bond length is 2.2A and is the same for both states. A model density function for crystalline structure was used to explore the difference in higher order peak positions. We report that the In-In separation in amorphous state has a single characteristic distance of 3.6A compared to the crystalline state which has two non-equivalent In sites and consequently different separations as In(1)-In(2) at 3.4A and In(2)-In(2) at 4.3A.
Allergic Evaluations and Management Considerations of Patients with Asthma

Although few physicians would debate the role of an immune pathogenesis for most patients with asthma, recent progress in the pharmacologic treatment of asthma has led some to believe that immunologie mechanisms are irrelevant if the patient’s disease can be controlled with appropriate drugs. Other physicians take a different view; they regard the identification of relevant sensitizing antigens as paramount to the patient’s appropriate treatment. The subset of extrinsic noninfectious asthma is believed to represent 30–50% of the total number of patients with reversible obstructive lung disease (1). Prevalence statistics tend to be misleading; sensitization, particularly to pollen, requires several seasons of exposure. Immunologie mechanisms are, therefore, infrequently detected in children under the age of 4 yr in whom infections seem to be the predominant triggering event. Between age 6 and 25 yr, a much larger percentage of patients will fall into the latter atopic class of extrinsic asthma; with increasing age, the number steeply diminishes.
Deny and Attack or Concede and Correct? Image Repair and the Politically Scandalized

In the wake of recent political scandals, pundits have argued that the way a politician reacts to a scandal can make or break said politician's relationship with constituents and future in elected office. Some politicians concede guilt immediately, apologize, promise to take corrective action, and possibly open the door to moving on with their careers. Others deny culpability and attack their accusers, hoping to quickly put accusations behind them, change the subject, and channel public attention in a different direction. Does conceding guilt after a scandal breaks and offering to take corrective action to solve the problem help ameliorate the issue, or does it push the public away even further? Does denying involvement in a scandal and attacking the accuser compound the problem, or can it evoke positive feelings? This research uses an experimental design to test individuals’ reactions to how politicians act after being accused of a personal scandal (in this case, an inappropriate relationship with a staf...
Criminal Procedure in the October 2013 Term: Cell Phones and Some Other Stuff

This brief article reviews the U.S. Supreme Court's criminal procedure decisions in the October 2013 Term. Cases reviewed include:- Kaley v. United States (pre-trial forfeiture and the right to counsel).- Kansas v. Cheever (self-incrimination and mental health examinations). - Fernandez v. California (third-party consent to search).- Navarette v. California (anonymous 911 calls and reasonable suspicion). - Riley v. California (warrantless searches of cell phones incident to arrest).
Abstract W P218: Interleukin 21 receptor: A Major Modulator of Infarct Volume

Using the permanent middle cerebral artery occlusion (MCAO) model of stroke, we have demonstrated that different inbred mouse strains show profound differences in infarct volume, indicating that infarction is under strong genetic control. To identify natural genetic determinants modulating infarction, we employed quantitative trait locus (QTL) linkage analysis and a genome-wide association study of cerebral infarct volume. We identified a locus on distal chromosome 7 that contributes over 50% of the variation in infarct volume, as well as other loci of smaller effect. Using interval-specific ancestral haplotype analysis, we fine-mapped the chromosome 7 locus to only 12 candidate genes. To identify the gene(s) underlying this locus, we determined the strain-specific transcript levels of all 12 genes in relevant tissues that included P1 and adult brain cortex, and embryonic macrophages, the latter due to their importance in the development of the cerebrovascular system. One gene, interleukin 21 receptor (Il...
The Struggle over Management Rights at US Steel, 1946-1960: A Reassessment of Section 2-B of the Collective Bargaining Contract

The steel industry has been criticized for unnecessarily provoking the lengthy 1959 strike that allowed steel imports to penetrate the United States market. The industry demanded from the union the revision of a collective bargaining clause that protected local working practices. Historians have viewed the clause as inconsequential and the industry's demand for revision unnecessary. This article explores the US Steel Corporation's history of cost reductions and modernization during the 1950s in relation to this contract clause. It argues that the corporation's 1959 bargaining stance, although tactically flawed, made strategic sense given US Steel's decision to cut costs through crew reductions and incremental technological changes at its older mills.
Computer Model of the Temperature and Carrier Concentration Induced in Si by Nanosecond and Picosecond Laser Pulses

A set of simultaneous equations for lattice temperature, carrier concentration and carrier temperature in Si is numerically solved for typical nanosecond and picosecond laser pulses. The calculated threshold energies required to reach Si melting temperature are consistent with measured thresholds to reach a flat-top reflectivity of ~ 70% for typical nanosecond pulses at 1.06 and .53 µm. In the picosecond regime, almost the entire pulse energy is at first stored in the carrier system, and a carrier temperature exceeding 30,000 K is achieved for a 3 J/cm2, 30 ps pulse at 1.06 µm. In this case, the surface carrier concentration reaches a high enough value to cause an enhanced reflectivity from the plasma lasting for at least 0.1 ns. The lattice temperature reaches 1410°C, while carriers relax their energy to the lattice after the pulse, and the energy stored in the carrier system would be enough to supply the heat of fusion at the silicon surface.
Active Immunization Methods Against Acute Diffuse Peritonitis

Active peritoneal immunization against a possible inflammatory process of the peritoneum is definitely established both by experimental procedure and clinical application.*• "• *• There is a concurrence of experimental data that peritoneal protection can be achieved. As is true with active immunization in general, there is lacking an efficient antigen and further knowledge of some of the basic principles. The mechanism of peritoneal immunity is apparently still controversial. There is disagreement as to whether the immunity is local as understood by Besredka (Herrmann) or is merely a local, manifestation of a general immunity (Steinberg and Snyder). There is also doubt as to the specificity of such an immunization. However, there are sufficient data to indicate that the process is not specific. Goldblatt and I immunized animals with colon bacilli and induced fecal peritonitis (the feces contained several species of organisms) with a consequent survival of the animals. Morton used nonspecific substances and secured a peritoneal immunity against a hemolytic streptococcus. It is questionable, however, if Morton obtained invariably a peritonitis in his experimental animals. As I* repeatedly pointed out, introduction of bacterial cultures intraperitoneally may not produce peritonitis. The bacteria pass rapidly from the peritoneal cavity into the circulation and the animal may die or survive depending upon the virulence of the organism, but there may be no evidence of peritoneal inflammation. Employment of such a method to induce experimental peritonitis may lead investigators to erroneous conclusions.
Tunable Lipidoid-Telodendrimer Hybrid Nanoparticles for Intracellular Protein Delivery in Brain Tumor Treatment

A strategy to precisely engineer lipidoid-telodendrimer binary hybrid nanoparticles that offer enhanced cell membrane permeability for therapeutic proteins to reach the intracellular targets is established. The highly controllable biochemical and physical properties of the nanoparticles make them promising for protein-based brain cancer treatment with the assistance of convection-enhanced delivery.
Advances in Web Application Testing, 2010–2014

Abstract As web applications increase in popularity, complexity, and size, approaches and tools to automate testing the correctness of web applications must continually evolve. In this chapter, we provide a broad background on web applications and the challenges in testing these distributed, dynamic applications made up of heterogeneous components. We then focus on the recent advances in web application testing that were published between 2010 and 2014, including work on test-case generation, oracles, testing evaluation, and regression testing. Through this targeted survey, we identify trends in web application testing and open problems that still need to be addressed.
Qualitative Inquiry and the Measuring Apparatus

She fit in the corner tightly, squeezing through the seams of plasterboard. Butt to the corner, finger in mouth, blanket in hand, at once desiring to be found and wanting to disappear. Energetically calling for notice and thus signaling of mother love while yearning for seepage into the walls and thus forgetting all. No one came, and she did not disappear, so she emerged damaged.
Geology of the Caribbean Crust

The Caribbean presents several provocative geotectonic problems. Water depths are less than in the main ocean basins. Over most of the Caribbean Basin, seismic-refraction measurements reveal (Fig. 1) crustal thicknesses of 12 to 15 km, much greater than the 6 km crust generally observed beneath the main ocean basins (Officer et al., 1959; Ewing et al., 1960; Edgar et al., 1971). In addition, the seismic-velocity sequence of the Caribbean crust is varied and contrasts sharply with the simple velocity structure generally attributed to crust beneath the main ocean basins (Fig. 1). Correlatable magnetic anomalies of the type characteristic of oceanic crust generated at middle or low latitudes are absent in the Caribbean which is characterized by a relatively quiet field (Ewing et al., 1960; Pitman, personal communication). Recently, however, Christofferson (1973) has attempted to correlate a series of magnetic anomalies observed in the southern Colombia Basin with the Late Cretaceous sequences established for the deep-sea crust. Differences in geophysical character of the Caribbean and the main ocean basins suggest a fundamental difference in composition, origin, and history. Some investigators have suggested that the Caribbean is a former piece of the deep-sea floor in the process of becoming a continent (Ewing et al., 1957; Officer et al., 1959).
Nonsmooth Barrier Functions With Applications to Multi-Robot Systems

As multi-agent systems become more wide-spread and versatile, the ability to satisfy multiple system-level constraints grows increasingly important. In applications ranging from automated cruise control to safety in robot swarms, barrier functions have emerged as a tool to provably meet such constraints by guaranteeing forward invariance of desirable sets. However, satisfying multiple constraints typically implies formulating multiple barrier functions, which would be ameliorated if the barrier functions could be composed together as Boolean logic formulas. The use of max and min operators, which yields nonsmooth functions, represents one path to accomplish Boolean compositions of barrier functions, and this letter extends previously established concepts for barrier functions to a class of nonsmooth barrier functions that operate on systems described by differential inclusions. We validate our results by deploying Boolean compositions of nonsmooth barrier functions onto a team of mobile robots.
"Analyzing User-Event Data using Score- Based Likelihood Ratios with Marked Point Processes"

Abstract In this paper we investigate the application of score-based likelihood ratio techniques to the problem of detecting whether two time-stamped event streams were generated by the same source or by two different sources. We develop score functions for event data streams by building on ideas from the statistical modeling of marked point processes, focusing in particular on the coefficient of segregation and mingling index. The methodology is applied to a data set consisting of logs of computer activity over a 7-day period from 28 different individuals. Experimental results on known same-source and known different-source data sets indicate that the proposed scores have significant discriminative power in this context. The paper concludes with a discussion of the potential benefits and challenges that may arise from the application of statistical analysis to user-event data in digital forensics.
Health promotion and managed care: surveys of California's health plans and population.

Abstract Introduction: The purpose was to examine whether health-promotion programs offered by California health plans are a serious attempt to improve health status or a marketing device used in an increasingly competetive marketplace. The research examined differences in the coverage, availability, utilization, and evaluation of health-promotion programs in California health plans. Methods: A mail survey was done of the 35 HMOs (86% response) and 18 health insurance carriers (83% response) licensed to sell comprehensive health insurance in California in 1996 (some plans sell both HMO and PPO/indemnity products). The final sample included 30 commercial HMOs and 20 PPO and indemnity plans. The 1996 California Behavioral Risk Factor Survey (BRFS) of 4,000 adults was used to estimate population participation rates in health-promotion programs. Results: California’s HMOs in 1996 offered more comprehensive preventive benefits and health-promotion programs compared to PPO and indemnity plans. HMOs relied on a more comprehensive set of health-education methods to communicate health information to members and were more likely to open their programs to the public. HMOs are also more likely to have developed relationships with community-based and public health providers. Participation in health-promotion programs is low (2%–3%), regardless of plan type, and most health plans limit evaluations to assessment of member satisfaction and utilization. Only 35%–45% of HMOs, and no PPO/indemnity plans, assess the impact of health-promotion programs on health risks and behaviors, health status, or health care costs. Conclusion: For the majority of California’s PPO and indemnity plans, health promotion is not an integral part of their business. For the majority of HMOs, health-promotion programs are offered primarily as a marketing vehicle. However, a substantial minority of HMOs offer health-promotion programs to achieve other organizational goals of health improvement and cost control.
PROJECTION THEOREMS FOR FAR FIELD PATTERNS AND THE INVERSE SCATTERING PROBLEM

Publisher Summary This chapter discusses the inverse scattering problem of determining the shape of an obstacle from knowledge of the time-harmonic incident acoustic wave and the far-field pattern of the scattered wave. The chapter focuses on the case when the frequency of the incident time-harmonic wave is in the resonance region, that is, when it is not possible to make use of various asymptotic approximations. The basic difficulty in solving the inverse scattering problem in this case is that the problem is both nonlinear and improperly posed. Hence, a major task in solving the inverse scattering problem is to take full recognition of both the nonlinear and improperly posed nature of the problem and to derive suitable methods for its stabilization and numerical solution. The chapter discusses a new approach to the inverse scattering problem, which has led to the first successful numerical solution of the three-dimensional inverse scattering problem for acoustic waves. This new approach is based on a projection theorem for far-field patterns, which yields two distinct optimization schemes for solving the inverse scattering problem. The chapter also presents a projection theorem for far-field patterns based on the theory of Herglotz wave functions and Herglotz domains. The relationship between generalized Herglotz domains, the Rayleigh hypothesis, and the analytic continuation of solutions to boundary value problems for the Helmholtz equation is also presented in the chapter. The chapter also two optimization methods for solving the inverse scattering problem, corresponding to the two orthogonal subspaces of the projection theorem.
Metabolic clock generates nutrient anticipation rhythms in mTOR signaling.

The mTOR signaling pathway modulates metabolic processes with respect to nutrient availability and other growth-related cues. According to the existing paradigm, mTOR complex 1 (mTORC1) activity in vivo is induced by food and gradually decreases during fasting. We found that mTORC1 activity is controlled by an internal clock mechanism different from the known light-entrainable circadian clock. We observed 24-hr rhythms in phosphorylation of mTORC1 downstream targets, which were entrained by food, persisted during fasting and could be uncoupled from oscillating expression of the canonical circadian clock genes. Furthermore, these rhythms were present in tissues of mice with disrupted light-entrainable circadian clock. We propose tissue-specific rhythms in the expression of tor and its negative regulator deptor as the molecular mechanism of the mTORC1 activity oscillation. Our data demonstrate the existence of at least two independent molecular circadian clocks: one providing metabolic adaptation to periodic light/darkness and the other - to feeding.
Microvascular decompression for trigeminal neuralgia: A five-year follow-up study

A series of 72 patients with typical trigeminal neuralgia who underwent microsurgical exploration of the trigeminal nerve in the posterior fossa is analyzed. The operations were performed between 1977 and 1980 with an average follow-up period of 4.94 years. Seventy-eight percent of the patients have remained free of pain after the operation. Of the 16 patients (22%) that were either not relieved of their pain or had a recurrence, two are well-controlled with medical treatment and the rest have required a variety of surgical procedures (mostly radiofrequency rhizotomy) for pain relief. Recurrences were significantly more common in females. There was no relationship between recurrence rate and the age of the patient or the duration of the symptoms before surgery. Definite compression of the trigeminal nerve at the root entry zone by an arterial loop singly or in combination with other arteries or a vein was found in 82% of the patients. The recurrence rate in this group was 19%. Definite compression by a vein was found in seven patients and the pain recurred in four (47%), a significant difference. There was no death or disabling stroke in this series, but persistent unilateral hearing loss occurred in a total of 14 patients (19%), with complete deafness in the ipsilateral ear in five patients (7%). In addition, two patients suffered mild but persistent ataxia of gait and two patients intermittent diplopia. These results are compared with the results of other reported series.
NOSOCOMIAL PNEUMONIA: Diagnostic and Therapeutic Considerations

Many patients with presumed nosocomial pneumonia probably have infiltrates on the chest radiograph, fever, and leukocytosis resulting from noninfectious causes. Because of the high mortality and morbidity associated with nosocomial pneumonias, however, most clinicians treat such patients with a 2-week empiric trial of antibiotics. Before therapy is initiated, the clinician should rule out other causes of pulmonary infiltrates, fever, and leukocytosis that mimic a nosocomial pneumonia (e.g., pre-existing interstitial lung disease, primary or metastatic lung carcinomas, pulmonary emboli, pulmonary drug reactions, pulmonary hemorrhage, collagen vascular disease affecting the lungs, or congestive heart failure). If these disorders can be eliminated from diagnostic consideration, a 2-week trial of empiric monotherapy is indicated. The clinician should treat cases of presumed nosocomial pneumonia as if P. aeruginosa were the pathogen. Although P. aeruginosa is not the most common cause of nosocomial pneumonia, it is the most virulent pulmonary pathogen associated with nosocomial pneumonia. Coverage directed against P. aeruginosa is effective against all other aerobic gram-negative bacillary pathogens causing hospital-acquired pneumonia. The clinician should select an antibiotic for empiric monotherapy that is highly effective against P. aeruginosa, has a good side-effect profile, has a low resistance potential, and is relatively inexpensive in terms of its cost to the institution. The preferred agents for empiric monotherapy for nosocomial pneumonia are cefepime, meropenem, and piperacillin. Single organisms are responsible for nosocomial pneumonia, not multiple pathogens. S. aureus rarely, if ever, causes nosocomial pneumonia but is mentioned frequently in studies based on cultures of respiratory tract secretions. S. aureus, unless accompanied by a necrotizing pneumonia with rapid cavitation within 72 hours, in the sputum indicates colonization rather than infection and should not be addressed therapeutically. Antibiotics associated with a high resistance potential should not be used as monotherapy or included in combination therapy regimens (i.e., ceftazidime, ciprofloxacin, imipenem, or gentamicin). Combination therapy is more expensive than monotherapy and is indicated only when P. aeruginosa is extremely likely, based on its characteristic clinical presentation, or is proved by tissue biopsy. Therapy should not be based on respiratory secretion cultures regardless of technique. Optimal combination regimens include cefepime or meropenem plus levofloxacin or piperacillin or aztreonam or amikacin. Nosocomial pneumonias usually are treated for 14 days. Lack of radiographic or clinical response to appropriate empiric nosocomial pneumonia monotherapy after 14 days suggests an alternate diagnosis. In these patients, a tissue biopsy specimen should be obtained to determine the cause of the persistence of pulmonary infiltrates unresponsive to appropriate antimicrobial therapy.
Decarbamoylation of acetylcholinesterases is markedly slowed as carbamoyl groups increase in size.

Abstract Carbamates are esters of substituted carbamic acids that react with acetylcholinesterase (AChE) by initially transferring the carbamoyl group to a serine residue in the enzyme active site accompanied by loss of the carbamate leaving group followed by hydrolysis of the carbamoyl enzyme. This hydrolysis, or decarbamoylation, is relatively slow, and half-lives of carbamoylated AChEs range from 4 min to more than 30 days. Therefore, carbamates are effective AChE inhibitors that have been developed as insecticides and as therapeutic agents. We show here, in contrast to a previous report, that decarbamoylation rate constants are independent of the leaving group for a series of carbamates with the same carbamoyl group. When the alkyl substituents on the carbamoyl group increased in size from N -monomethyl- to N , N -dimethyl-, N -ethyl- N -methyl-, or N , N -diethyl-, the decarbamoylation rate constants decreased by 4-, 70-, and 800-fold, respectively. We suggest that this relationship arises as a result of active site distortion, particularly in the acyl pocket of the active site. Furthermore, solvent deuterium oxide isotope effects for decarbamoylation decreased from 2.8 for N -monomethylcarbamoyl AChE to 1.1 for N , N -diethylcarbamoyl AChE, indicating a shift in the rate-limiting step from general acid-base catalysis to a likely conformational change in the distorted active site.
Impact of metformin use on pathologic response following chemoradiotherapy in rectal cancer.

e15642Background: Locally advanced rectal cancer is commonly treated with chemoradiotherapy (CRT) followed by surgical resection. Response to preop CRT is assessed by surgical pathology findings at...
Ageism Amplifies Cost and Prevalence of Health Conditions.

Background and objectives The persistent status of ageism as one of the least acknowledged forms of prejudice may be due in part to an absence of quantifying its costs in economic terms. In this study, we calculated the costs of ageism on health conditions for all persons aged 60 years or older in the United States during 1 year. Research design and materials The ageism predictors were discrimination aimed at older persons, negative age stereotypes, and negative self-perceptions of aging. Health care costs of ageism were computed by combining analyses of the impact of the predictors with comprehensive health care spending data in 1 year for the eight most-expensive health conditions, among all Americans aged 60 years or older. As a secondary analysis, we computed the number of these health conditions experienced due to ageism. Results It was found that the 1-year cost of ageism was $63 billion, or one of every seven dollars spent on the 8 health conditions (15.4%), after adjusting for age and sex as well as removing overlapping costs from the three predictors. Also according to our model, ageism resulted in 17.04 million cases of these health conditions. Discussion and implications This is the first study to identify the economic cost that ageism imposes on health. The findings suggest that a reduction of ageism would not only have a monetary benefit for society, but also have a health benefit for older persons.
Shared classes

The author discusses the close relationship between data and operations and suggests that a compiler should be able to check that data structures are accessed by meaningful procedures only. This idea leads to the introduction of shared classes--a programming notation for the monitor concept. The notation is illustrated by a message buffer for concurrent processes.
Making Procurement Biopsies Important Again for Kidney Transplant Allocation.

Context: Results of procurement biopsies often drive the decision to discard kidneys from deceased donors with advanced age or comorbidities. However, the criteria to perform, process, and score procurement graft biopsies are not standardized. Subject of Review: A recent retrospective, single-center study by Carpenter et al. [Clin J Am Soc Nephrol 2018; 13: 1876–1885] compared the scores obtained from 270 consecutive frozen kidney sections of biopsies at time of procurement with those of paraffin-embedded sections of biopsies at reperfusion and the correlation of both biopsy scores with graft survival. In 116 kidneys, procurement biopsies were repeated, allowing to test the reproducibility of this technique. Procurement biopsies were poorly reproducible, did not correlate with scores obtained with paraffin-embedded reperfusion biopsies, and were not significantly associated with transplant outcomes, while reperfusion biopsies provided an excellent prediction of graft survival. Based on these findings, the authors suggest “an urgent need to reexamine the role of procurement biopsies during allocation given their high resource requirements and association with discards.” Second Opinion: Carpenter’s paper is important because it emphasizes the crucial role of correct histological evaluation of kidney grafts to accurately predict their survival. In this study, procurement biopsies were frozen and read by on-call pathologists, often with no specific training in renal pathology, while reperfusion sections were paraffin embedded and scored by experienced renal pathologists at Columbia University, New York, NY, USA. This methodological difference per se represents an obvious explanation for the poor concordance between the 2 assessments. Use of wedge biopsies in procurement samples versus core-needle samples in reperfusion biopsies may further account for the discrepancies between scores even in seemingly objective measurements, such as the percentage of glomerulosclerosis. Therefore, these data should not mislead us regarding the importance of procurement biopsies to define organ suitability for transplantation. Rather, they should prompt more studies aimed at optimizing the strategies to score these samples properly for optimal organ allocation.
Sex Differences in Initial Treatment for Genital Extramammary Paget’s Disease in the United States: A Systematic Review

Abstract Background Surgery is the standard treatment for genital extramammary Paget’s disease (gEMPD). Objective To determine if gEMPD treatments and outcomes differ by sex and United States (US) region. Methods A systematic review was performed of all English-language studies on initial gEMPD treatment in MEDLINE via PubMed, EMBASE, Cochrane Library, Web of Science, and ClinicalTrials.gov . At least two reviewers performed title/abstract review and data extraction. Surgical categories included total skinning procedure (TSP), partial skinning procedure, Mohs micrographic surgery (MMS), or unspecified surgery. Chi-square tests of association were used for comparisons. Results 60 studies comprising 302 (79.7%) females and 77 (20.3%) males met criteria. Females were most often initially recommended partial skinning procedures. Seventy-four (24.5%) women and 0 men underwent total skinning procedures. Males were more likely to be offered MMS than females (40.3% vs. 1.9%, P Limitations Only twenty states were represented. Conclusion Females are more frequently offered TSP for gEMPD while males are more frequently offered MMS. MMS offers less recurrence and morbidity than TSP and should be recommended equally to both females and males with gEMPD.
Practice patterns and knowledge among California pediatricians regarding human papillomavirus and its relation to head and neck cancer.

Abstract Objective To identify practice patterns regarding human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination efforts and vaccination rates in context of head and neck cancer prevention, identify barriers to vaccination, and identify gaps in knowledge regarding the link between HPV and head and neck cancer in the pediatrician population. Study design/Methods A 27-question cross-sectional survey was distributed to members of the four California chapters of the American Academy of Pediatrics. Results Of the completed responses, 89.4% identified as “always” recommending the HPV vaccine to patients, but only 19.5% of pediatricians estimated that >75% of their eligible patients had completed the HPV vaccination series. 71.5% of respondents felt that further education about HPV's link to head and neck cancer them more comfortable discussing vaccination. Physicians who were in practice longer were less likely to respond that additional education about HPV and its link to head and neck cancer would make them more comfortable discussing vaccination with patients (p = 0.043). Physicians who were in practice longer were more likely to correctly respond that HPV type 16 is the most common strain linked to head and neck cancer (p = 0.021). Conclusion There is need to improve both the knowledge base and comfort level of pediatricians in counseling their patients during vaccine recommendations. Otolaryngologists have a critical role in providing education to physicians, trainees, and the general public in the effort to combat the epidemic of HPV-associated head and neck cancer.
Revenge and Conflict: Social and Cognitive Aspects

Revenge can be conceptualized as an attempt to restore the power balance destroyed by an aggression. It can be risky and costly for the individuals, and it can become completely disruptive at the social and societal level. At the individual level, revenge implies the risk of a counterattack, either coming from the target or from his or her kin and relatives, and it is costly because of the effort it requires. At the social level, a likely and dangerous consequence of revenge is the emergence of feuds, with whole families and groups fighting against each other. Moreover, material resources can get wasted in the conflict, thus further increasing the costs of revenge. Even so, revenge is still part of our behavioral repertoire, humans take revenge continuously, both at a small and at a larger scale. How could have revenge survived if it is costly and dysfunctional? Why do humans still resort to revenge when reacting to a wrong suffered?
Review of Illustrated History of Apples in the United States and Canada: by Daniel J. Bussey and edited by Kent Whealy. Mount Horeb, Wisconsin: Jak Kaw Press, LLC, 2016.

Through seven volumes, The Illustrated History of Apples in the United States and Canada indexes, describes, and chronicles historically-documented apple varieties across the U.S. and Canada. The w...
Cigarette Smoking, Smoking Cessation, and Long-Term Risk of 3 Major Atherosclerotic Diseases

Abstract Background Public statements about the effect of smoking on cardiovascular disease are predominantly based on investigations of coronary heart disease (CHD) and stroke, although smoking is recognized as a strong risk factor for peripheral artery disease (PAD). No study has comprehensively compared the long-term association of cigarette smoking and its cessation with the incidence of 3 major atherosclerotic diseases (PAD, CHD, and stroke). Objectives The aim of this study was to quantify the long-term association of cigarette smoking and its cessation with the incidence of the 3 outcomes. Methods A total of 13,355 participants aged 45 to 64 years in the ARIC (Atherosclerosis Risk In Communities) study without PAD, CHD, or stroke at baseline (1987 to 1989) were included. The associations of smoking parameters (pack-years, duration, intensity, and cessation) with incident PAD were quantified and contrasted with CHD and stroke using Cox models. Results Over a median follow-up of 26 years, there were 492 PAD cases, 1,798 CHD cases, and 1,106 stroke cases. A dose-response relationship was identified between pack-years of smoking and 3 outcomes, with the strongest results for PAD. The pattern was consistent when investigating duration and intensity separately. A longer period of smoking cessation was consistently related to lower risk of PAD, CHD, and stroke, but a significantly elevated risk persisted up to 30 years following smoking cessation for PAD and up to 20 years for CHD. Conclusions All smoking measures showed significant associations with 3 major atherosclerotic diseases, with the strongest effect size for incident PAD. The risk due to smoking lasted up to 30 years for PAD and 20 years for CHD. Our results further highlight the importance of smoking prevention and early smoking cessation, and indicate the need for public statements to take PAD into account when acknowledging the impact of smoking on overall cardiovascular health.
Ursodeoxycholic Acid for Gallstone Dissolution: The Emergence of a New Therapeutic Application of an old Bile Acid

Ursodeoxycholic acid (ursic acid, udc), the 7β-epimer of chenodeoxycholic acid (cdc), is a normal constituent of bile in man and in several animal species (1,2). In man, the biliary content of udc varies normally between trace amounts and about 7% of the total bile acid pool. The first description of udc dates back to 1902 when Hammarsten, in Sweden, isolated in the bile of polar bears, a hitherto unknown bile acid (2). He named it “Tauroursocholeinsaure” (ursus = L. bear) because it shared certain chemical characteristics with “Choleinsaure” (deoxycholic acid). Hammarsten found that “Tauroursocholeinsaure” resembled “Choleinsaure” in that it gave a negative Vahlen iodine test. However, the two bile acids differed in their melting point and specific rotation. Hammarsten noted also that “Tauroursocholeinsaure” was, in contrast to most other bile acids, soluble in acetone. The presently used name “Ursodesoxycholsaure” was first introduced in 1927 by Shoda in Japan, who succeeded in crystallizing this compound (3).
Adipose tissue quantification and primary graft dysfunction after lung transplantation: The Lung Transplant Body Composition study.

BACKGROUND Obesity is associated with an increased risk of primary graft dysfunction (PGD) after lung transplantation. The contribution of specific adipose tissue depots is unknown. METHODS We performed a prospective cohort study of adult lung transplant recipients at 4 U.S. transplant centers. We measured cross-sectional areas of subcutaneous adipose tissue (SAT) and visceral adipose tissue (VAT) on chest and abdominal computed tomography (CT) scans and indexed each measurement to height.2 We used logistic regression to examine the associations of adipose indices and adipose classes with grade 3 PGD at 48 or 72 hours, and Cox proportional hazards models to examine survival. We used latent class analyses to identify the patterns of adipose distribution. We examined the associations of adipose indices with plasma biomarkers of obesity and PGD. RESULTS A total of 262 and 117 subjects had available chest CT scans and underwent protocol abdominal CT scans, respectively. In the adjusted models, a greater abdominal SAT index was associated with an increased risk of PGD (odds ratio 1.9, 95% CI 1.02–3.4, p = 0.04) but not with survival time. VAT indices were not associated with PGD risk or survival time. A greater abdominal SAT index correlated with greater pre- and post-transplant leptin (r = 0.61, p CONCLUSIONS Subcutaneous, but not visceral, adiposity is associated with an increased risk of PGD after lung transplantation.
Exploring Student Preferences When Calculating Expectation Values Using a Computational Features Framework.

Undergraduate quantum mechanics students' lack of confidence in the identification of eigenvalues and their associated probabilities lead them to use plug and chug problem solving methods.
Acute Physiological Response by the Plethodontid Salamander eurycea cirrigera (Southern Two-Lined Salamander) to Predation Stress from Alarm Chemicals and Predator Kairomones

Plethodontid salamanders may reduce predation risk via behavioral responses to predator kairomones and alarm chemicals from injured salamanders. However, it not known whether such predator cues pro...
Adam P. Showman

Exoplanetary and Solar System science lost a major figure with the sudden passing of Professor Adam Showman on 16 March 2020 at the age of 51. He was recognized as the world’s leading authority in the field of atmospheric dynamics of exoplanets.
A child with a severe multisystem inflammatory syndrome following an asymptomatic COVID-19 infection: A novel management for a new disease?

Clinical presentation of COVID‐19 disease is only in part due to viral infection itself, with the host response playing an important role.1‐3 Despite the mild clinical course during the acute phase of infection in children, latest ongoing researches are pointing the attention towards a hyperinflammatory shock or a Kawasaki‐like disease as a possible consequence to COVID‐19 exposure.4,5This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.
Poiesis como tomada de decisão: Chklóvski, Tyniánov, Bakhtin

A ciencia da decisao e uma disciplina relativamente nova: e o produto da imbricacao entre matematica, psicologia, economia e outros ramos do saber. Ela estuda como as pessoas fazem suas escolhas e procura fornecer um “quadro racional de escolha entre alternativas possiveis quando as consequencias resultantes de tal acao sao imprecisamente conhecidas”. Meu artigo aborda as teorias de Viktor Chklovski e Iuri Tynianov resumindo como esses dois membros da Sociedade para o Estudo da Linguagem Poetica (OPOIAZ), de Sao Petersburgo, consideravam o escritor um agente racional que almejava um objetivo especifico e os meios disponiveis para obte-lo. Para concluir, justaponho a conceituacao formalista de criatividade poetica a visao de Mikhail Bakhtin sobre o mesmo assunto, argumentando que a maneira como ele concebe as estrategias disponiveis ao autor literario se adequa a pressupostos da chamada “racionalidade interativa”.
External Capital Factors and Increasing Returns in U.S. Manufacturing

Theoretical models of endogenous growth identify capital accumulation and returns as a potential stimulus to economic growth. Existing empirical studies, however, are based on a limited notion of these returns, which follows from the simple production function framework used for estimation. The purpose of this study is to examine growth issues using dynamic cost function estimation. This methodology enables us to broaden the concept of returns to include returns arising from short-run quasi-fixity of private capital, long-run (internal) scale economies, and external "knowledge" factors--overall investment in research (R&D), technology (high-tech capital), and education (human capital). Based on detailed industry-level data, we find evidence of increasing returns to scale arising from cost savings on variable inputs, although diminishing returns to capital are prevalent. Our results also show that knowledge factors augment growth. More importantly, they appear to explain a substantial proportion of measured scale economies.
Cybersecurity Teamwork: A Review of Current Practices and Suggested Improvements:

As cyber-attacks and their subsequent responses have become more frequent and complex over the past decade, research into the performance and effectiveness of cybersecurity teams has gained an imme...
RCB initiates Arabidopsis thermomorphogenesis by stabilizing the thermoregulator PIF4 in the daytime

Daytime warm temperature elicits thermomorphogenesis in Arabidopsis by stabilizing the central thermoregulator PHYTOCHROME INTERACTING transcription FACTOR 4 (PIF4), whose degradation is otherwise promoted by the photoreceptor and thermosensor phytochrome B. PIF4 stabilization in the light requires a transcriptional activator, HEMERA (HMR), and is abrogated when HMR's transactivation activity is impaired in hmr-22. Here, we report the identification of a hmr-22 suppressor mutant, rcb-101, which surprisingly carries an A275V mutation in REGULATOR OF CHLOROPLAST BIOGENESIS (RCB). rcb-101/hmr-22 restores thermoresponsive PIF4 accumulation and reverts the defects of hmr-22 in chloroplast biogenesis and photomorphogenesis. Strikingly, similar to hmr, the null rcb-10 mutant impedes PIF4 accumulation and thereby loses the warm-temperature response. rcb-101 rescues hmr-22 in an allele-specific manner. Consistently, RCB interacts directly with HMR. Together, these results unveil RCB as a novel temperature signaling component that functions collaboratively with HMR to initiate thermomorphogenesis by selectively stabilizing PIF4 in the daytime.
The Orphan Nuclear Receptor TLX is a Receptor for Synthetic and Natural Retinoids

TLX is an orphan nuclear receptor that plays a role in neurogenesis as well in the pathogenesis of glioblastomas.TLX functions predominately as a transcriptional repressor, but no natural ligands or high affinity synthetic ligands have been identified. Here, we describe the identification retinoids as functional ligands for TLX. We identified potent synthetic retinoids that directly bind to TLX and either activate or inhibit its transcriptional repressor activity. Furthermore, we identified all-trans and 11-cis retinaldehyde, retinoids that play an essential role in the visual cycle, as the preferential natural retinoids that bind to and modulate the function of TLX. Molecular dynamics simulations followed by confirmation by mutational analysis revealed the basis of retinoid binding to TLX. Our data suggests that retinoids may play a physiological role in modulation of TLX activity and support the validity of TLX as a target for development of therapeutics to treat cognitive disorders and/or glioblastomas.
Dennett’s Strategy for Naturalizing Intentionality: an Innovative Play at Second Base

I briefly review the three basic strategies for naturalizing intentionality discussed by Haugeland 4:383–427, 1990, and Hutto and Satne (2015), recounting their deficits. Then, I focus on Dennett’s version of what Haugeland calls the “second-base … neo-behaviorist” strategy. After briefly explaining Dennett’s proposal, I defend it against four common objections: circularity, relativity, under-specified rationality, and failure to track robustly natural facts. I conclude by recounting the advantages of Dennettian neo-behaviorism over the neo-Cartesian and neo-pragmatist alternatives, as well as Hutto and Satne’s proposal that intentionality comes in two distinct kinds.