cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Extinction spectra of mineral dust aerosol components in an environmental aerosol chamber: IR resonance studies

Abstract Mineral dust aerosol plays an important role in determining the physical and chemical equilibrium of the atmosphere. To better understand the impact that mineral dust aerosol may have on climate forcing and on remote sensing, we have initiated a study of the optical properties of important components of mineral dust aerosol including silicate clays (illite, kaolinite, and montmorillonite), quartz, anhydrite, and calcite. The extinction spectra are measured in an environmental simulation chamber over a broad wavelength range, which includes both the IR (650–5000 cm −1 ) and UV–vis (12,500–40,000 cm −1 ) spectral regions. In this paper, we focus on the IR region from 800 to 1500 cm −1 , where many of these mineral dust constituents have characteristic vibrational resonance features. Experimental spectra are compared with Mie theory simulations based on published mineral optical constants. We find that Mie theory generally does a poor job in fitting the IR resonance peak positions and band profiles for nonspherical aerosols in the accumulation mode size range ( D ∼0.1–2.5 μm). We explore particle shape effects on the IR resonance line profiles by considering analytic models for extinction of particles with characteristic shapes (i.e. disks, needles, and ellipsoids). Interestingly, Mie theory often appears to give more accurate results for the absorption line profiles of larger particles that fall in the coarse mode size range.
Frequency-Sharing and Spread-Spectrum Transmission with Large Relative Bandwidth

Radio transmission has been based traditionally on the concept of a small relative frequency bandwidth, which permits the use of circuits and structures that resonate with sinusoidal functions. This approach created no problems until high-resolution radar advanced to pulse durations in the order of 1 ns, and spread-spectrum transmission to frequency bands in the order of 100 MHz. The use of a small relative frequency bandwidth requires in these cases operation at frequencies above 10 GHz. Absorption by rain and fog as well as the high noise temperature, make these high frequencies less desirable. Furthermore, the lower frequency bands cannot be used, even though they are there and their absolute bandwidth is perfectly sufficient; only the unnecessary requirement of a small relative bandwidth prevents their use. Concepts and equipment that allow operation with a large relative bandwidth make it possible to operate radar with a resolution up to 0.1 ns in the most desirable range from a few hundred megahertz to about 10 GHz; spread-spectrum transmission can operate without regard to the relative frequency bandwidth. This paper explains primarily the motivation for the development of equipment handling large relative bandwidths, since the equipment itself has already been discussed in the literature and is available on an advanced experimental level.
Left Ventricular Diastolic Function in Children and Young Adults With Congenital Aortic Valve Disease

Young patients with congenital aortic valve disease are at risk of left ventricular (LV) diastolic dysfunction (DD). We evaluated LV remodeling and the prevalence of, and risk factors for, DD in patients with aortic stenosis (AS), pure aortic regurgitation (AR), and AS+AR. Patients aged 8 to 39 years with congenital AS (n = 103), AR (n = 36), or AS+AR (n = 107) were identified. Cross-sectional assessment of the LV remodeling pattern and diastolic function was performed. A diastolic function score (DFS; range 0 to 4) was assigned to each patient, with 1 point for an abnormal value in each of 4 categories: mitral inflow (E/A and E-wave deceleration time), tissue Doppler E′, E/E′, and left atrial volume. Patients with a DFS of ≥2 were compared to those with a DFS
Technical services productivity alternatives

En novembre 1993 l'OCLC a publie un document s'intitulant : Cataloguing and Databases Services Strategy pour permettre aux bibliothecaires de redefinir la diffusion de l'information dans les bibliotheques de facon plus economique. Les methodes discutees dans cet article sont : TECHPRO, un service de catalogage personnel qui offre des fonctions de traitement technique a long et a court terme ; PromptCat, un service qui propose des copies automatiques de catalogage aux bibliotheques et de commande aupres des fournisseurs ; et PromptSelect, un materiel de selection et un systeme de commande
A Critical Review of the Sweeping Federal Civil Service Changes: The Case of the Departments of Homeland Security and Defense

This article critiques the proposed radical changes to the civil service system at the Departments of Homeland Security and Defense. It also summarizes the civil service problems and assesses whether the proposed changes would be likely to address those problems. It identifies the difficulties that one of the critical changes (merit pay or pay-for-performance) has encountered in the past. The article is critical of the proposed termination of the General Schedule system, which has served the civil service system so well in the past. It expresses concern about the proposed weakening of rights of employee appeals, protections, and meaningful union participation. The article argues that there are a number of problems facing the civil service, but that most of the changes do not address those problems. It lauds the major achievements of the federal service and cautions against radical changes that will have the effect of weakening it.
Methinks it is like a folding curve.

Most often, the unfolded state of peptides and proteins has been modeled as a statistical random coil. Here, we suggest an alternative model based on the presence of a significant, temperature-dependent conformational bias in the unfolded population. Conformational bias is suggested by our calculations [Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 96 (1999) 14258-14263], and it is found in recent studies of both proteins and peptides. The imposition of even a modest bias would transform our assessment of the folding problem.
Social Capital and Government Performance in Iowa Communities

Putnam (1993) provides impressive evidence that the enduring geographic patterns of social capital in Italy influence regional government performance. His work has motivated other scholars to search for a link between social capital and performance among nations and other large subnational entities. The purpose of this study is to extend this line of research to the community level. To accomplish this a unique data set consisting of the opinions of approximately 100 people in each of 114 Iowa communities was collected. The data made it possible to examine the extent to which towns characterized as high in social capital by their residents tend to be towns where citizens see their local governments as more responsive and effective. The analyses show a clear relationship: local governments are viewed as more responsive and effective in towns described as high in social capital by their citizens. Additional analyses reveal that social capital is also related to the upkeep of public streets and parks in the communities. Both of these relationships remain significant even after controlling for a variety of socioeconomic factors.
Occlusogram: Its Application to Cleft Palate Rehabilitation

A camera loaded and mounted on one end of a fixed table was used to photograph dental study casts on a platform at the other end of the same table. These pictures were traced and analyzed for changes in arch form and dimensions.
Compound identification using partial and semipartial correlations for gas chromatography-mass spectrometry data

Compound identification is a key component of data analysis in the applications of gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC-MS). Currently, the most widely used compound identification is mass spectrum matching, in which dot product and its composite version are employed as spectral similarity measures. Several forms of transformations for fragment ion intensities have also been proposed to increase the accuracy of compound identification. In this study, we introduced partial and semi-partial correlations as mass spectral similarity measures and applied them to identify compounds along with different transformations of peak intensity. The mixture versions of the proposed method were also developed to further improve the accuracy of compound identification. To demonstrate the performance of the proposed spectral similarity measures, the National Institute of Standard Technology (NIST) mass spectral library and replicate spectral library were used as the reference library and the query spectra, respectively. Identification results showed that the mixture partial and semi-partial correlations always outperform both the dot-product and its composite measure. The mixture similarity with semi-partial correlation has the highest accuracy of 84.6% in compound identification with a transformation of (0.53, 1.3) for fragment ion intensity and m/z value, respectively.
Elastic Analysis of the Loop Tack Test for Pressure Sensitive Adhesives

The behavior of pressure sensitive adhesive (PSA) tapes is sometimes examined via the loop tack test, in which a loop of the tape is brought into contact with a flat surface and then pulled away. A numerical analysis of the test is presented here. The loop is treated as an elastica, but with a nonlinear moment-curvature relation, so that the material is assumed to be elastic and inextensible. Debonding at the edge of the contact region is assumed to occur when the adhesive reaches a critical elongation. This elongation is assumed to depend on the maximum contact pressure and, in part of the results, on the length of time of contact. Shapes of the loop and values of the corresponding forces are obtained using a shooting method, and the effects of the stiffness and thickness of the adhesive and backing are examined.
Misdiagnosis of early Lyme disease as the summer flu

Lyme disease is often identified by the hallmark erythema migrans rash, but not all early cases present with a rash. In other cases the rash may be unseen or unrecognized by a physician. In these situations, Lyme disease is difficult to diagnose because it masquerades as a non-specific viral-like illness. The seasonal peak of Lyme disease ranging from May through September overlaps with that of viral illnesses such as enteroviral infections, West Nile virus, and in rare years such as 2009, early influenza season. We present a case of a patient with Lyme disease who was initially misdiagnosed with influenza A during the summer of 2009. Because of the diagnostic importance of recognizing the erythema migrans rash, physicians in endemic regions should always ask about new rashes or skin lesions and perform a thorough physical examination when patients present over the summer with viral-like symptoms. Even when no rash is evident, Lyme disease should be considered if these symptoms persist or worsen without a specific diagnosis.
Standing-gradient flows driven by active solute transport

Abstract This paper shows that a relatively simple analytic treatment preserves the main features of the equations governing coupled solute and water flow in a long channel closed at one end. Until now, these equations have only been treated numerically. Among the new conclusions yielded by the present study of the standing gradient model are that (i) fluid transport depends on the product of tube radius and solute diffusion constant, (ii) the channel cross-section influences flow only through its perimeter to area ratio, (iii) flow depends only weakly on solute transport site, (iv) the observed weak dependence of transported osmolarity on transport rate is to be expected.
A Survey of Research on Cloud Robotics and Automation

The Cloud infrastructure and its extensive set of Internet-accessible resources has potential to provide significant benefits to robots and automation systems. We consider robots and automation systems that rely on data or code from a network to support their operation, i.e., where not all sensing, computation, and memory is integrated into a standalone system. This survey is organized around four potential benefits of the Cloud: 1) Big Data: access to libraries of images, maps, trajectories, and descriptive data; 2) Cloud Computing: access to parallel grid computing on demand for statistical analysis, learning, and motion planning; 3) Collective Robot Learning: robots sharing trajectories, control policies, and outcomes; and 4) Human Computation: use of crowdsourcing to tap human skills for analyzing images and video, classification, learning, and error recovery. The Cloud can also improve robots and automation systems by providing access to: a) datasets, publications, models, benchmarks, and simulation tools; b) open competitions for designs and systems; and c) open-source software. This survey includes over 150 references on results and open challenges. A website with new developments and updates is available at: http://goldberg.berkeley.edu/cloud-robotics/
Hyperthermal reactions of O(3P) with alkanes: Observations of novel reaction pathways in crossed-beams and theoretical studies

The reactions of O(3P) with CH4, CH3CH3, and CH3CH2CH3 at center-of-mass collision energies in the range of 2.8−3.9 eV have been investigated with crossed-beams experiments and with direct dynamics calculations. The experiments and calculations both provide evidence for previously unobserved reaction pathways which principally lead to O-atom addition and subsequent H-atom elimination or C−C bond breakage: O(3P) + RH → RO + H or R‘O + R‘ ‘. In addition, the expected H-atom abstraction reaction to form OH has been observed. The H-atom abstraction reactions have modest barriers in the range ∼0.1−0.3 eV, whereas the addition pathways have barriers greater than ∼1.8 eV. Nevertheless, theory predicts that abstraction and addition reactions occur with similar probabilities at the collision energies of these studies. Although high barriers prevent the addition reactions from occurring in most thermal environments, such reactions might be important in low-Earth orbit, where spacecraft surfaces and exhaust gases s...
Verification of the gastropod Golgi cycle with an electron microscope.

THE Golgi cycle of the gastropod (Navanax) was detailed1, based on osmicated preparations and studies of living embryos vitally stained with methylene blue. However, because of the scepticism that has surrounded vital-dye observations, particularly since the neutral red controversy of the early 'thirties, these studies with methylene blue have never enjoyed complete acceptance by cytologists and have been severely criticized in some quarters.
Improving Gender Classification Using an Extended Set of Local Binary Patterns

In this article, the authors designed and implemented an efficient gender recognition system with high classification accuracy. In this regard, they proposed a novel local binary descriptor capable of extracting more informative and discriminative local features for the purpose of gender classification. Traditional Local binary patterns include information about the relationship between a central pixel value and those of its neighboring pixels in a very compact manner. In the proposed method the authors incorporate into the descriptor more information from the neighborhood by using extra patterns. They have evaluated their approach on the standard FERET and CAS-PEAL databases and the experiments show that the proposed approach offers superior results compared to techniques using state-of-the-art descriptors such as LBP, LDP and HoG. The results demonstrate the effectiveness and robustness of the proposed system with 98.33% classification accuracy.
Landing on an Unstable Surface Decreases ACL Biomechanical Risk Factors

Objectives:Quadriceps dominant athletes are at a higher risk for anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) injuries because they lack sufficient hamstring activation resulting in a higher Quadricips: hamstr...
Effect of Detailed Guidance on the Writing Efficiency of College Freshmen

This study was designed to determine the effectiveness of extensive pre-guidance, periodic checking, and detailed correction and comment on specific preliminary steps in the development of the documented research paper, written by freshman English students, according to their grade achievement. Also included was a cross-check analysis of written essays, prepared and impromptu. The study involved the research papers of forty-eight students enrolled in two classes. One group received detailed guidance, the other did not. An evaluation chart, developed by the instructor and another rater, was used on all papers; a systematic sampling of 19 percent of these was graded by the second rater. The inter-rater reliability coefficient (Pearson r) was established as .96.The hypothesis-there will be no significant difference in the grade achievement of separate sections of second semester freshman English students on the research paper according to different instructional procedures-was not rejected. The conclusion wa...
Lambing date and lamb production of spring-mated Rambouillet, Dorset and Finnsheep ewes and their F1 crosses.

The reproductive performance of 255 Rambouillet (R), Dorset (D), Finnsheep (F) and F1 ewes born in 1978-1979 (group I) and 1979-1980 (group II) and managed in a semiconfinement fall/winter lambing system was evaluated through 4 yr of age of all ewes and through 5 yr for a portion of group I ewes. Ewes were with rams from approximately May 1 to late September each year, with a 2-wk break late in July/early August. Traits considered were fertility (ewes lambed/ewes exposed), lambing date, litter size, lamb survivial and 70-d lamb weights. Breeds and crossbred groups differed significantly in lambing date, with DR crossbred ewes earliest and F ewes latest. Repeatabilities for groups I and II were .31 and .22, .24 and .24 and .11 and .07 for lambing date, fertility and litter size, respectively. There was no significant heterosis in lambing date, although DR ewes in both groups I and II were superior to (D + R)/2, by about 1 wk on average. There was significant positive heterosis for fertility and traits of which fertility is a component in FR ewes in group I, but none in group II. The FD ewes showed negative heterosis for litter size, -.23 (P less than .05) for group I and -.09 for group II. The results indicate: F and FD ewes are not well adapted to the Mediterranean climate where this experiment was conducted; there is little, if any, useful heterosis in crosses among these three breeds for lambing date or other reproduction traits and RD and R ewes are most suitable of the groups tested, while late onset of the breeding season limits the usefulness of even 50% Finnsheep ewes for an autumn lambing system in this environment.
Elevated CO2 increases sorghum biomass under drought conditions

Summary • Atmospheric CO2 concentration is expected to increase by 50% near the middle of this century. The effects the free air CO2 enrichment (FACE) is presented here on growth and development of field-grown grain sorghum (Sorghum bicolor) at ample (wet) and limiting (dry) levels of irrigation water at Maricopa, AZ, USA. • Daytime CO2 mole fractions were 561 and 368 µmol mol−1 for the FACE and control treatments, respectively. Irrigation plus precipitation averaged 1132 mm for the wet plots and 396 mm in the dry plots. • During the growing season, FACE increased biomass accumulation in the dry plots but the effects in the wet plots were inconsistent. At final harvest, FACE increased total yield from 999 to 1151 g m−2 in the dry plots and had no effect in the wet plots. • If atmospheric CO2 continues to increase, total sorghum yield is likely to be higher in the future in areas where water is limited.
The reconstruction of the nasal ala with interpolated flaps from the cheek and forehead: design and execution modifications to improve surgical outcomes

The nasal ala, critically important in the function and appearance of the central face, has significant reconstructive demands given the lack of suitable adjacent donor tissue that can be used to repair all but the smallest surgical defects in this area. Interpolated flaps from the forehead and cheek have long been ideal reconstructive alternatives for the repair of larger or more difficult alar wounds, and with the design and execution modifications described here, the dermatological surgeon can offer more appropriate restoration of this critically important aesthetic unit.
Root-loci for periodic linear systems

According to the Floquet theory, an nth-order linear periodic (LP) system of the form y/sup n/+/spl alpha//sub n/(t) y/sup n-1/+...+/spl alpha//sub 2/(t)dy(t)/dt+/spl alpha//sub 1/(t)y=0 can be transformed into an equivalent linear time-invariant (LTI) system whose characteristic roots, known as Floquet characteristic exponents (FCEs), determine the stability of the LP system. A technique for obtaining an approximation of the characteristic equation for the FCEs is developed. Parametric loci of the FCE, similar to the root locus plot for a LTI system, are then developed for the LP system. The technique is exemplified by 2nd-order LP systems. The FCE loci are useful in the stability analysis and control design for LP systems.
EXTRAVERSION, CREOLIZATION, AND DEPENDENCY IN THE ATLANTIC SLAVE TRADE*

This article considers the Atlantic slave trade in relation to ‘extraversion’ in African history. Drawing especially on the work of Jean-Francois Bayart, it argues that slaving fit a long-term pattern in which elites drew on external connections in order to further their wealth and power at home. In doing so, they also opened their societies to new goods and ideas, thus bringing about cultural creolization. This is a different approach to the question of creolization than is commonly found among Americanist studies of Atlantic slavery, which tend to treat cultural change without consideration of politics. The concept of extraversion thus helps to link culture and political economy. Nevertheless, it also bears refinement. Recent scholarship on African involvement in the Atlantic slave trade – some of it detailed in this article – makes clear that extraversion may have reflected African agency, as Bayart insisted, but that it also entangled African societies in destructive relationships of dependency.
Luteovirus Gene Expression

Abstract The genome of a luteovirus consists of a positive-sense RNA that is 5.5 to 5.7 kb long and encodes up to six open reading frames. The functions of few of these genes have been identified with certainty. Possible functions of all luteoviral genes and their roles in the viral life cycle are discussed. A variety of unusual translation events, as well as RNA-templated transcription, control expression of luteoviral genes. The translational control mechanisms include ribosomal frameshifting, stop codon suppression, leaky scanning initiation, and, in one case, cap-independent translation. The cis-acting sequences and secondary structures that facilitate these events have been identified to varying degrees. Viral genes are expressed from one or two of the as many as three subgenomic RNAs that have been identified. Luteoviruses fall into two subgroups that have different genome organizations and may employ quite different replication mechanisms. A model for the origin of luteoviral subgroups by replicase...
Flow patterns in agitated vessels

The flow patterns obtained when viscous fluids are agitated inside baffled cylindrical tanks have been studied in both Newtonian and non-Newtonian systems. The experimental technique consisted of observing the motions of small tracer particles in highly illuminated, narrow beams of light. The results may be broken down into two major categories. The first was a qualitative comparison between the flow patterns obtained in non-Newtonian and Newtonian fluids of the same general viscosity levels. This part of the study included observation of changes in the flow fields as one moves from laminar into turbulent conditions for both fluid systems. The second portion of the paper deals with quantitative determinations of local flow velocities, shear rates, and power-dissipation rates in various parts of the vessel. The following conclusions may be drawn from these measurements. 1. Local fluid shear rates were found to be directly proportional to impeller speed, in both Newtonian and non-Newtonian systems. As would be expected, the shear rates decreased more rapidly with increasing distances from the impeller in pseudoplastic non-Newtonian fluids than in Newtonian systems. 2. The rates of local power dissipation decreased rapidly with distance from the impeller. 3. The fluid velocities in the horizontal plane of the impeller varied almost linearly with rotational speed in the Newtonian systems, in accordance with prior observations. On the other hand, movement in pseudoplastic systems increased exponentially with impeller speed. This effect, like the dampening of shear rates, is caused by the cumulative effects of local velocity and viscosity changes in these systems. (Increases in velocity decrease the fluid viscosity, which in turn causes further increases in velocity, etc.) This work serves to define pertinent problems which are of importance in determining mixing rates, on a microscopic scale. Efforts may now perhaps be turned more profitably than before toward macroscopic fluid-mixing studies.
Schema-Independent and Schema-Friendly Scientific Metadata Management

Computational science is creating a deluge of data, and the automated capture and cataloging of detailed descriptive metadata has been recognized as necessary to enable reuse of this data. Scientific communities in varied disciplines have developed detailed XML metadata schemas to describe data products. Our research has identified characteristics of scientific schemas that can be exploited to efficiently capture and search this metadata based on the schemas specific to each community, but using an easily adaptable framework.
An A245T Mutation Conveys on Cytochrome P450eryF the Ability to Oxidize Alternative Substrates

Cytochrome P450eryF (CYP107A1), which hydroxylates deoxyerythronolide B in erythromycin biosynthesis, lacks the otherwise highly conserved threonine that is thought to promote O–O bond scission. The role of this threonine is satisfied in P450eryF by a substrate hydroxyl group, making deoxyerythronolide B the only acceptable substrate. As shown here, replacement of Ala245 by a threonine enables the oxidation of alternative substrates using either H2O2 or O2/spinach ferredoxin/ferredoxin reductase as the source of oxidizing equivalents. Testosterone is oxidized to 1-, 11α-, 12-, and 16α-hydroxytestosterone. A kinetic solvent isotope effect of 2.2 indicates that the A245T mutation facilitates dioxygen bond cleavage. This gain-of-function evidence confirms the role of the conserved threonine in P450 catalysis. Furthermore, a Hill coefficient of 1.3 and dependence of the product distribution on the testosterone concentration suggest that two testosterone molecules bind in the active site, in accord with a published structure of the P450eryF-androstenedione complex. P450eryF is thus a structurally defined model for the catalytic turnover of multiply bound substrates proposed to occur with CYP3A4. In view of its large active site and defined structure, catalytically active P450eryF mutants are also attractive templates for the engineering of novel P450 activities.
Predictors and Prevalence of Postconcussion Depression Symptoms in Collegiate Athletes

Context: Depression is common after concussion and is associated with functional outcome and quality of life after injury. However, few baseline predictors of postconcussion depressive symptoms (PC...
A hardware spinal decoder

Spinal codes are a recently proposed capacity-achieving rateless code. While hardware encoding of spinal codes is straightforward, the design of an efficient, high-speed hardware decoder poses significant challenges. We present the first such decoder. By relaxing data dependencies inherent in the classic M-algorithm decoder, we obtain area and throughput competitive with 3GPP turbo codes as well as greatly reduced latency and complexity. The enabling architectural feature is a novel alpha-beta incremental approximate selection algorithm. We also present a method for obtaining hints which anticipate successful or failed decoding, permitting early termination and/or feedback-driven adaptation of the decoding parameters.We have validated our implementation in FPGA with on-air testing. Provisional hardware synthesis suggests that a near-capacity implementation of spinal codes can achieve a throughput of 12.5 Mbps in a 65 nm technology while using substantially less area than competitive 3GPP turbo code implementations.
Clinical Reasoning: A woman with rapidly progressive apraxia

A 56-year-old woman presented with changes in balance, handwriting, and thinking. Approximately 1 year before her first visit, the patient developed difficulty walking, which caused multiple falls without serious injury. She also developed bilateral upper-extremity tremors that worsened with movement. At the time of her visit, she could barely sign her name. The authors are grateful to James M. Powers, MD, for review of this case and his confirmation of the pathologic diagnosis.
Determination of Dialkyl Phosphate Metabolites of Organophosphorus Pesticides in Human Urine by Automated Solid-Phase Extraction, Derivatization, and Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry

Organophosphorus (OP) pesticides are highly toxic but used commonly worldwide, nevertheless. Their urinary dialkylphosphate (DAP) metabolites are widely used for exposure assessment of OP pesticides in humans. We previously developed an analytical method to measure urinary DAPs utilizing solid-phase extraction (SPE)-derivatization-gas chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (GC-MS-MS) with quantification using isotope-dilution technique. We now present a more cost-effective yet highly accurate method that can be easily adaptable to many laboratories for routine OP exposure assessment. This method is simple and fast and involves automated SPE of the metabolites followed by derivatization with pentafluorobenzyl bromide and quantification by GC-MS. Dibutyl phosphate (DBP) serves as the internal standard. The detection limits for the six metabolites ranged from 0.1 to 0.15 ng/mL. Depending on the metabolite the relative standard deviation of the analytical procedure was 2-15% for the metabolites. We compared performance of DBP as an internal standard with that of isotope-labeled compounds and found that DBP gives reliable results for the analytical procedure. We also optimized reaction parameters of pentafluorobenzylation.
Left-deep vs. bushy trees: an analysis of strategy spaces and its implications for query optimization

We present a combination of analytical and experimental results that shed some light into the shape of the cost function of the strategy spaces that query optimizers must deal with. These are the space that includes only left-deep trees and the space that includes koth deep and bushy trees. We conclude that the cost functions of both spaces essentially form a “well” but of a distinctly different quality. Based on this result, we discuss how Iterative Improvement, Simulated Annealing, and Two Phase Optimization perform on these spaces. We conclude that the space of both deep and bushy trees is easier to optimize than the space of left-deep trees alone.
Aberration Correction for High-Voltage Electron Microscopy

The simultaneous correction of third order aperture aberration and axial chromatic aberration is studied theoretically to determine practical upper limits of the accelerating voltage. Aberrations of a round objective lens are compensated by a quadrupole-octopole corrector similar in design to the Archard, Deltrap and Hardy systems. Severe tolerances on lens stability, large electrostatic fields in the quadrupoles, and chromatic aberration of magnification are the primary factors that adversely affect the performance of these systems at high voltage. The variational calculus is used to compute correctors with low electrostatic fields in the quadrupoles. When lens stability requirements are also considered, the general configuration of high performance systems is deduced. In addition to internal corrector structure, five parameters including voltage and magnification are used to define a system. Optical and field properties are calculated for a wide variety of these parameters. It is concluded that chromatic correction is feasible for accelerating voltages up to 500 kV. Lens stability requirements become very severe for beam energies greater than the electron rest energy, 511 keV. Tabular results are given for systems designed for resolutions of 1, 0.5 and 0.1 nm. In these examples lens stability requirements are one part in $5\times 10^{5},10^{6}$ and $5\times 10^{6}$ respectively. Configuration changes and their effects on stability and field of view are discussed.
Transcriptional regulation of the human prepronociceptin gene.

We have cloned regions of the 5'-untranslated region of the human prepronociceptin (ppN/OFQ) gene into a luciferase reporter plasmid, pGL3 Basic Vector. By primer extension analysis, we determined that one start site of transcription lies within the known human cDNA sequence. There are two cyclic AMP response elements (CRE) with the consensus sequence CGTCA within 250 bp of the start of transcription. We designed various constructs around these sites, performed transient transfections, and measured luciferase activity in NS20Y cells. Transcriptional activity could be regulated by a variety of factors including cAMP levels, Ca(2+), and particularly by a 125-bp region adjacent to an intron located 23 bp upstream of the translation initiating ATG. These data should help in understanding the regulatory mechanisms of ppN/OFQ gene transcription.
A pilot safety-feasibility dietary trial targeting insulin inhibition in ten patients with advanced cancer

Background Hyperinsulinemia, Diabetes type 2, and obesity have been identified as increased risk factors for a variety of cancers [1]. Conversely, insulin inhibition (INSINH) can plausibly limit cancer growth by demonstrated mechanisms including ketosis [2] and regulation of downstream signaling proteins such as mTOR (inhibition) and AMPK (amplification), already in development as drug targets [3,4]. Increased F-2-fluoro, 2-deoxyglucose (FDG) uptake on positron emission tomography (PET) scan is characteristic of many aggressive malignancies. We examined safety and feasibility of a four week INSINH diet in patients with advanced PET positive cancers, and compared exit vs. baseline PET scan changes as surrogate measures for tumor response.
64-bit and multimedia extensions in the PA-RISC 2.0 architecture

This paper describes the architectural extensions to the PA-RISC 1.1 architecture to enable 64-bit processing of integers and pointers. It also describes MAX, the Multi-media Acceleration eXtensions which speed up the processing of multimedia and other applications with parallelism at the intra instruction, or subword, level. Other additions to the PA-RISC 2.0 architecture include performance enhancements with respect to memory hierarchy management, branch penalty reduction, and floating-point performance.
What Factors Influence Long-term Survivorship After Hip Arthroscopy?

Background Hip arthroscopy is an evolving procedure. One small study suggested that a low modified Harris hip score and arthritis at the time of surgery were predictors of poor prognosis.
A First Study on Self-Healing Solid-State Drives

This paper proposes a self-healing solid-state drive (SSD) design strategy that exploits heat-accelerated interface trap recovery of NAND flash memory cells to largely improve the SSD lifetime. The key is to make each NAND flash memory chip self-healable by stacking an extra heater die, and employ system-level redundancy to ensure SSD data storage integrity when one NAND flash memory chip is being self-heated for accelerating interface trap recovery. Based upon detailed thermal modeling and memory cell device modeling, we carried out simulations and analysis, and the results show that this proposed design strategy can potentially improve SSD lifetime by one order of magnitude at reasonable energy consumption overhead.
General weak random sources

The following model for a weak random source is considered. The source is asked only once for R bits, and the source outputs an R-bit string such that no string has probability more than 2/sup - delta R/ of being output. for some fixed delta >0. A pseudorandom generator that runs in time n/sup O(log n)/ and simulates RP using as a seed a string from such a source is exhibited. Under the generalized Paley graph conjecture, a generator that runs in polynomial time and simulates RP is given, as well as a different generator that produces almost perfectly random bits at a rate arbitrarily close to optimal using as seeds strings from a constant number of independent weak random sources. >
Features of Emerging Action Research

Widely divergent forms of action research are emerging to meet requirements of new organizational and social environments. Cases in this special issue are tangible examples of these innovative AR efforts. This article identifies key dimensions that cut through the cases and allow for comparison and contrast. These dimensions include (1) the system level of the charge target, (2) the degree of organization of the research setting, (3) the degree of openness of the AR process, (4) the goals and purpose of the research effort, and (5) the role of the researcher(s). Dimensions are used to locate cases and to support discussion of qualitative aspects that are crucial to understanding. Several general learnings derived from the dimensional analysis and discussion are described.
Experimental measurements of spectral subgrid-scale Prandtl number in a heated turbulent wake flow, EDQNM predictions and 4/3-law

For turbulent flows including scalar transport, the spectral diffusivity as well as the spectral Prandtl number characterizes the scalar-variance transfer rate from any wavenumber κ to all scales smaller than a specified filter scale. Classical theories predict a plateau behavior at inertial-range wavenumbers with deviations of the diffusivity at scales close to the cutoff wavenumber. However, to date these quantities have not been measured in high Reynolds number flows. To examine realistic turbulence at a moderately high Reynolds number, in this study an experimental measurement technique previously applied to obtain spectral eddy viscosities (Cerutti et al. 2000 Journal of Fluid Mechanics 421 307–338) is extended and applied to the case of scalar eddy diffusivity. We show that the subgrid-scale (SGS) dissipation spectrum of scalar variance can be expressed as the co-spectrum of negative SGS scalar flux and filtered scalar gradient. Using local isotropy, the result is expressed in terms of the streamwis...
Aeration management for stored hard red winter wheat: simulated impact on rusty grain beetle (Coleoptera: Cucujidae) populations.

Simulation studies were conducted to determine temperature accumulations below defined thresholds and to show the impact of controlled aeration on populations of the rusty grain beetle, Cryptolestes ferrigineus (Stephens), a major secondary pest of stored wheat, Triticum aestivum (L.). Recorded data from weather stations in Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, eastern New Mexico, and eastern Colorado (356 total) were used to determine hours of temperature accumulation below 23.98C in June and July, 15.68C in September and October, and 7.28C in December. At an airflow rate of 0.0013 m 3 /s/m 3 (0.1cubic ft 3 /min/bu), which requires 120 h of temperatures below the specified threshold to complete an aeration cycle, summer cooling at 23.98C in bulk-stored wheat could be completed throughout the hard red winter wheat zone except for extreme southern Texas. An early-autumn cooling cycle at 15.68C could not be completed throughout most of Texas and Oklahoma before the end of September. The late-autumn cooling cycle could be completed in all states except Texas by the end of November. Five geographic regions were delineated and the times required for completion of the summer, early-autumn, and late-autumn cooling cycles within each region were estimated. Population growth of the rusty grain beetle was modeled for San Antonio, TX; Abilene, TX; Tulsa, OK; Topeka KS; and Goodland, KS, by predicting the numbers of adults in the top, outer middle, outer periphery, and the center of the bin during a 1-yr storage season. Populations of C. ferrugineus in San Antonio and Austin were predicted to exceed the Federal Grain Inspection Service (FGIS) threshold of two beetles per kilogram of wheat in all four levels of the bin during late autumn, decline during the winter, and increase the following spring. In Midland, TX, and Oklahoma City, OK, populations were predicted to exceed the threshold only in the top and outer middle of the bin, whereas populations in the Kansas locations were not predicted to exceed the threshold at any time.
Factors regulating islet regeneration in the post-insulinoma NEDH rat.

Increases in islet β-cell mass can be induced in a variety of experimental models, and can also occur in the face of metabolic stress, such as obesity, or in certain genetic backgrounds such as the ob/ob mouse. The factors responsible for compensatory proliferation of islet β-cells are not understood, but as this volume attests, investigation in the area is intensifying. Our own work has heretofore utilized the insulinoma-bearing New England Deaconess Hospital (NEDH) rat1 as a model for studying islet regeneration.2,3 Implantation of a solid insulinoma tumor into NEDH rats causes dramatic suppression of the mass and function of their islet β-cells; this suppression is reversed rapidly by surgical removal of the tumor.2,3 We have used this model system to address two specific issues. First, we have investigated the regulation and site of expression of the reg gene, which was cloned by Okamoto and coworkers in 19881 by virtue of its preferential expression in a cDNA library prepared from isolated islets taken from 90% pancreatectomized, nicotinamide-injected rats, an alternate model of β-cell regeneration.4,5 The primary sequence of reg was subsequently shown to be identical to that of the pancreatic stone protein (PSP).6-8 an exocrine gene product whose only known function is to inhibit CaC03 crystal growth. thus helping to prevent chronic calcifying pancreatitis.9-13 Second, we have begun to develop differential screening strategies designed at identifying other genes that might be involved in the expansion of β-cell mass. These initiatives are reviewed herein, and new data on the site of expression of reg/PSP is also provided.
Integration of Palliative Care Advanced Practice Nurses Into Intensive Care Unit Teams.

Background:Referrals to palliative care for patients at the end of life in the intensive care unit (ICU) often happen late in the ICU stay, if at all. The integration of a palliative medicine advan...
Dystocia Caused By Chronic Fecal Impaction

case Report The patient, a 19-year-old gravida 2 para 1, was admitted to our hospital on 31 October 1990. By history of last menstrual period she was 42 weeks' gestational age. She complained of the onset of labor pain 3 hours before admission to the hospital. The patient's prenatal care consisted of two prenatal visits to an outlying health department. Her medical history revealed chronic constipation since early childhood, requiring multiple hospitalizations, yet the patient and her family were unaware of a specific diagnosis or of any recommendations for definitive treatment. Chronic constipation and fecal incontinence had persisted into adulthood. It was reponed that numerous physicians had attempted to perform pelvic examinations and Papanicolaou smears but had been unable to do so because of her abnormal colon. The prenatal history also noted that the patient had been hospitalized in psychiatric hospitals, but again a specific diagnosis was not known. Review of the prenatal social history showed that she had at times been homeless during her pregnancy. She had smoked one pack of cigarettes per day during her pregnancy but denied use of alcohol or recreational drugs. The above history was confirmed by family members present at the time of hospitalization. They also reponed that the patient had a profound fear of physicians, which was confirmed by our observations.
ATP-dependent calcium uptake into basolateral vesicles from transporting epithelia of intermolt crayfish

ATP-dependent Ca2+ uptake was determined into inside-out basolateral membrane vesicles (BLMV) from intermolt crayfish (Procambarus clarkii) Ca2+-transporting epithelia: gill, hepatopancreas (liver)...
Effect of preload, afterload, and inotropic state on Doppler ejection dynamics

Early studies on isolated papillary muscle [1] emphasized the importance of the initial velocity of ventricular muscle shortening as an index of muscular function and contractility. Rushmer [2] popularized the concept of the ‘initial ventricular impulse’ as a manifestation of left ventricular function over 20 years ago. Using electromagnetic flowmeters, the velocity and acceleration of blood flow in the ascending aorta have been shown to be closely related to left ventricular function [3–5] to be effected in a characteristic fashion by myocardial ischemia and infarction [6, 7] and by interventions such as the administration of catecholamines [8] and propranolol [9].
East and West at a Crossroad:A Commentary on China's Environmental Regulation and Resource Use

Abstract: This commentary arises from a seminar course on China's environment taught at Yale University. Emerged out of the seminar discussion are five themes, including: a) the balancing act of local interest and regional coordination in the fight against pollution dispersion, b) the creation of special environmental zones for experimenting bold, forward-looking ideas, c) new approaches to environmental education and capacity building, d) the need for international collaboration, and f) the unique situation of checks and balances in China's environmental decision-making. This paper is not intended to provide an in-depth analysis of these topics; rather its goal is to emphasize the need for infusion of western environmental thinking with China's reality.
Assessment of In Vivo Clinical Product Performance of a Weak Basic Drug by Integration of In Vitro Dissolution Tests and Physiologically Based Absorption Modeling

Effective integration of in vitro tests and absorption modeling can greatly improve our capability in understanding, comparing, and predicting in vivo performances of clinical drug products. In this case, we used a proprietary drug candidate galunisertib to describe the procedures of designing key in vitro tests, analyzing relevant experimental and trial data, and integrating them into physiologically based absorption models to evaluate the performances of its clinical products. By simulating the preclinical study result, we estimated high in vivo permeability for the drug. Given the high sensitivity of its solubility to pH, supersaturation may play an important role in the absorption of galunisertib. Using the dynamic dissolution test, i.e., artificial stomach-duodenum (ASD) model and simulation, we concluded galunisertib in solution or tablet products could maintain supersaturation during the transit in the gastrointestinal tract (GIT). A physiologically based absorption model was established by incorporating these key inputs in the simulation of Trial 1 results of galunisertib solution. To predict the performance of three tablet products, we developed z-factor dissolution models from the multi-pH USP dissolution results and integrate them into the absorption model. The resultant biopharmaceutical models provided good prediction of the extent of absorption of all three products, but underestimated the rate of absorption of one tablet product. Leveraging the ASD result and optimization with the dissolution model, we identified the limitation of the model due to complexity of estimating the dissolution parameter z and its in vitro-in vivo correlation.