cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Activation of a Stress-Responsive Mitogen-Activated Protein Kinase Cascade Induces the Biosynthesis of Ethylene in Plants

Plants under stress from both biotic and abiotic sources produce increased levels of ethylene, which is perceived by ethylene receptors and triggers cellular responses further downstream. Protein phosphorylation and dephosphorylation were implicated in the regulation of ethylene induction by stresses based on studies using protein kinase and phosphatase inhibitors. However, the kinase(s) involved remains to be determined. Using a conditional gain-of-function transgenic system, we demonstrate that the activation of SIPK, a tobacco mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK), by NtMEK2DD, an active mutant of the upstream kinase of SIPK, resulted in a dramatic increase in ethylene production. The increase in ethylene after the activation of SIPK coincided with a dramatic increase in 1-aminocyclopropane-1-carboxylic acid (ACC) synthase (ACS) activity, which was followed by the activation of a subgroup of ACS and ACC oxidase (ACO) genes, suggesting that either the activation of unidentified ACS(s) or post-transcriptional regulation is involved. Infection with Tobacco mosaic virus (TMV), which is known to activate the SIPK cascade and induce ethylene biosynthesis, also induced the same ACSs and ACOs. After ethylene production in NtMEK2DD plants, strong activation of ETHYLENE-RESPONSE FACTOR (ERF) genes was observed, similar to the effect in NN tobacco plants infected with TMV. In contrast to previous reports, no major increase in jasmonic acid (JA) and methyl jasmonate (MJ) was detected after the activation of SIPK/WIPK in NtMEK2DD transgenic plants. These results suggest that the induction of ethylene but not JA/MJ is involved in plant defense responses mediated by the NtMEK2-SIPK/WIPK pathway.
Chronic salicylism resulting in noncardiogenic pulmonary edema requiring hemodialysis

Salicylate intoxication is frequently overlooked as a cause of noncardiogenic pulmonary edema and altered mental status in adult patients. We describe a 42-year-old woman who presented with two episodes of recurrent noncardiogenic pulmonary edema requiring intubation. The first admission to hospital triggered an extensive initial workup that did not indicate a cause for the pulmonary edema. At the second presentation, recognition of the clinical syndrome in the emergency department led to the correct diagnosis of salicylate intoxication. The patient was successfully treated with hemodialysis and urinary alkalinization, leading to rapid resolution of pulmonary edema and extubation. Several aspects of the clinical presentation suggest that the patient suffers from chronic salicylism, probably complicated by episodic superimposed acute intoxication, a condition often misdiagnosed or diagnosed late in the course of disease, contributing to substantial morbidity and mortality in these patients. Maintenance of a high index of suspicion and rapid institution of appropriate therapy including hemodialysis once the diagnosis is established is an important determinant of outcome in this serious but underdiagnosed disorder.
Reversal and partial reversal shifts with verbal material

A series of four studies was conducted to investigate the influence of mediating representational responses on reversal and partial-reversal shifts involving verbal material. The general assumption tested was that the speed with which a reversal shift is executed depends on the accessibility of appropriate mediating representational responses. In Exp. I Ss were required initially to sort eight items into two categories and then during post-shift training to either switch the sorting response for every item (reversal shift) or for only half of the items in each category (half-reversal shift). Two kinds of verbal items were used: eight words, each one of which was an instance of one of two concepts, and eight unrelated consonant trigrams. With the conceptual words the reversal shift was executed more rapidly but no difference between a reversal and half-reversal was found with the trigrams. It was also discovered that up to 24 post-criterion trials of overlearning had no effect on post-shift behavior with either kind of verbal material. Experiment II found that overlearning up to 40 post-criterion trials had only minimal effects on reversal shifts involving trigrams. In Exp. III four kinds of shifts (one-quarter, one-half, three-quarters, and full-reversal) were compared with both conceptual words and trigrams. The full-reversal with conceptual instances proved to be the easiest. No significant difference existed among the other seven groups. Experiment IV, in which Ss initially sorted the conceptual instances into mixed categories and then shifted into either conceptually consistent categories or a reversal shift, showed the latter to be more difficult, suggesting that the accessibility of the representational response was more important to post-shift behavior than the reversal shift per se. The relevance of these results to mediational S-R theory and the verbal-loop hypothesis was discussed.
Benchmark study on high performing carbon anode materials

Four state-of-the-art carbon graphite morphologies, beads, fibers, flakes and potatoes have been benchmarked with respect to materials properties and electrochemical performance. All four anode materials exhibit various degree of graphitization and performance. Fibers have a higher degree of turbostatic structure. Flakes consist of a binary phase mix. Potatoes and beads have reached an intermediate degree of crystallinity. Although graphite flakes still show the highest performance in early cycles, new materials challenge not only in-cell capacity, but also rate capability and cyclability.
Effect of silane structure on the properties of silanized multiwalled carbon nanotube-epoxy nanocomposites

Abstract Multiwalled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) were functionalized with aminosilanes via an aqueous deposition route. The size and morphology of siloxane oligomers grafted to the MWCNTs was tuned by varying the silane functionality and concentration and their effect on the properties of a filled epoxy system was investigated. The siloxane structure was found to profoundly affect the thermo-mechanical behavior of composites reinforced with the silanized MWCNTs. Well-defined siloxane brushes increased the epoxy Tg by up to 19 °C and significantly altered the network relaxation dynamics, while irregular, siloxane networks grafted to the MWCNTs had little effect. The addition of both types of silanized MWCNTs elicited improvements in the strength of the nanocomposites, but only the well-defined siloxane brushes engendered dramatic improvements in toughness. Because the silanization reaction is simple, rapid, and performed under aqueous conditions, it is also an industrially attractive functionalization route.
Substance P immunoreactivity released from rat spinal cord after kainic acid excitation of the ventral medulla oblongata: a correlation with increases in blood pressure.

Abstract Kainic acid injections into the ventral medulla oblongata of sodium pentobarbital-anesthetized rats caused an almost immediate increase in mean arterial pressure which reached hypertensive levels (200mm Hg). Correlated with this rise in blood pressure was a two-fold increase in the amount of SP-like immunoreactivity (SPLI) in spinal cord superfusion samples. Baseline values obtained from a pool of two rats went from∼ 10pg/10min to∼ 20pg/10min. Rats pretreated with intracerebroventricular injections of the serotonin neurotoxin, 5,7-dihydroxytryptamine (5,7-DHT), were also given kainic acid injections into the ventral medulla. 5,7-DHT did not block the blood pressure response to kainic acid nor the elevation of SPLI in spinal cord superfusates. However, baseline levels of SPLI were decreased by ∼ 50% in 5,7-DHT-treated rats. These findings show that activation of the ventral medulla oblongata causes an elevation of SPLI in spinal cord superfusates conmitant with an elevation in mean arterial blood pressure. These responses appear to be independent of serotonergic systems.
Imidacloprid Effects on Probing and Settling Behavior of Frankliniella fusca and Frankliniella occidentalis (Thysanoptera: Thripidae) in Tomato

Abstract The effects of tomato, Lycopersicum spp., leaves treated with imidacloprid on probing and settling behavior of Frankliniella fusca (Hinds) and Frankliniella occidentalis (Pergrande) were examined using an electrical penetration graph technique and an intact leaf bioassay. For each experiment, thrips were subjected to nontreated plants and plants treated with either of two rates of imidacloprid: 7.81 and 41.55 μg [(AI)] per plant. F. fusca probed less frequently on plants treated with the high rate of imidacloprid compared with the nontreated plants. The duration of F. fusca noningestion probing waveforms and ingestion was shorter on plants treated with the high rate of imidacloprid compared with that on nontreated plants. In contrast, F. occidentalis probed longer and more frequently on plants treated with either the low or high imidacloprid rates compared with nontreated plants. They also ingested more frequently and for longer durations on plants treated with the high rate compared with nontrea...
LoTTS parent–infant interaction coding scale: Ease of use and reliability in a sample of high-risk mothers and their infants

Abstract Reliable and valid measurement of parent–infant interactions is necessary to demonstrate parental skill acquisition, but existing observational coding schemes are too complex for practical use in most human service settings. The LoTTS Parent–Infant Interaction Coding System (LPICS) was developed specifically to require minimal training and to be maximally useful for human service (rather than research) settings. The LPICS consists of three global scales and four behavioral counts. Undergraduate students participated in approximately 9 h of training and coding using the LPICS. Low inter-rater reliability scores initially necessitated modifications to the LPICS in order to enhance reliability. The revised scoring procedure showed more promise, particularly for three behavior counts: talking to the infant (ICC = .86, excellent), touching the infant (ICC = .90, excellent), and smiling at the infant (ICC = .66, good), and one global scale: parental warmth (ICC = .58, fair). The revised LPICS may have utility as a brief, simple, and easy-to-teach observational measure of parent–infant interactions.
Downscaling Monthly Forecasts to Simulate Impacts of Climate Change on Soil Erosion and Wheat Production

Climate change can affect agricultural production and soil and water conservation. The potential for global climate changes to increase the risk of soil erosion is clear, but the actual damage is not. The objectives of this study were to develop a method for downscaling monthly climate forecasts to daily weather series using a climate generator (CLIGEN), and to determine the potential impacts of projected mean and variance changes in precipitation and temperature on soil erosion and wheat (Triticum Aestivum L.) yield. Monthly forecasts for the periods of 1950-1999 and 2056-2085 for the Oklahoma region, projected by a general circulation model (HadCM3), were used. Projected mean and variance changes in precipitation and temperatures between the two periods were satisfactorily incorporated into CLIGEN input parameters derived for the El Reno station, Oklahoma, and future transitional probabilities of precipitation occurrence were estimated as a linear function of historical monthly precipitation. Five climate change scenarios were constructed, and the Water Erosion Prediction Project (WEPP) model was run for each combination of five climate scenarios and three tillage systems. A 50% increase in CO 2 resulted in some 26% increase in wheat yield. At that elevated CO 2 level, projected decrease in total precipitation decreased surface runoff, soil loss, and wheat yield. However, predicted changes in precipitation variance increased runoff by IS to 17%, and increased soil loss by 10 and 19% under conservation and conventional tillage, respectively. Predicted increase in mean temperature reduced wheat yield by 31%, and increased soil loss by 40 and 19% under conservation and conventional tillage, respectively. Under the assumed climate change, predicted average soil loss under conventional tillage was about 2.6 times that under conservation tillage and 29 times that under no-till. With all changes considered, predicted average wheat yield during 2056-2085, compared with the present climate at the present CO 2 level, would decrease by 12%; runoff would increase by <7%; and soil loss would increase by <8% in all tillage systems. Overall results indicate that adoption of conservation tillage and no-till will be effective in controlling soil erosion under projected climate change used in this study.
Gifted education in England

This article reviews the state of gifted education in England. The author incorporates data from a national review to support his challenge that much still needs to be done although the development of a national center is a major step forward. The article concludes with a brief review of the issues facing the movement.
Modeling nuclear dynamics and weak interaction rates during the supernova collapse phase

Abstract Motivated by the success of kinetic theory in the description of observables in intermediate and high energy heavy ion collisions, we use kinetic theory to model the dynamics of the early stage of a type II core collapse supernova. The algorithms employed to model the collapse, the rational for choosing them, and the results of this preliminary calculation are discussed. The main innovation in the present calculation is to introduce a coupled channel weak interaction reaction network of heavy nuclei, which supersedes the conventionally used approximation of a representative heavy nucleus used in neutrino Boltzmann transport.
Comparative analysis of chest tube thoracostomy and video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery in empyema and parapneumonic effusion associated with pneumonia in children.

ABSTRACT Background: Controversy exists regarding the optimal management strategy for children having empyema or parapneumonic effusion as a complication of pneumonia. We hypothesized that video-as...
Hydrothermal fluxes at mid-ocean ridges and on ridge flanks

Hydrothermal fluxes of heat and mass at mid-ocean ridges and on ridge flanks estimated using different approaches are reviewed. Heat and fluid fluxes in high temperature axial systems are best determined by geophysical methods, and are then combined with vent fluid compositions to derive chemical fluxes. Axial chemical fluxes calculated by mass balance using data from hydrothermally altered rocks sampled by deep ocean drilling are generally small, probably because of loss of material during drilling. Most of the hydrothermal heat anomaly in ocean crust occurs at low temperatures in off-axis flank systems, and a significant fraction of this must occur at very low temperatures (<25 °C). Flank processes enhance the axial fluxes of some elements, but offset and cancel the axial fluxes of others. Processes in hydrothermal plumes are also important in determining the net chemical fluxes in MOR systems. To cite this article: J.C. Alt, C. R. Geoscience 335 (2003).
Patterns of turning in courtship orientation of the male German cockroach

Abstract Courtship turning of the male German cockroach, Blattella germanica , was analysed with respect to rotational and translational movements. Three different sources of orientation information are postulated for the control of this behaviour: external sensory information (perception of sex pheromone) releases courtship, proprioception from the legs is required to curtail turning when the specified turn angle is reached, and internally stored information determines the sign of turning and patterns the courtship actions.
Symbolic functions from neural computation

Is thought computation over ideas? Turing, and many cognitive scientists since, have assumed so, and formulated computational systems in which meaningful concepts are encoded by symbols which are the objects of computation. Cognition has been carved into parts, each a function defined over such symbols. This paper reports on a research program aimed at computing these symbolic functions without computing over the symbols. Symbols are encoded as patterns of numerical activation over multiple abstract neurons, each neuron simultaneously contributing to the encoding of multiple symbols. Computation is carried out over the numerical activation values of such neurons, which individually have no conceptual meaning. This is massively parallel numerical computation operating within a continuous computational medium. The paper presents an axiomatic framework for such a computational account of cognition, including a number of formal results. Within the framework, a class of recursive symbolic functions can be computed. Formal languages defined by symbolic rewrite rules can also be specified, the subsymbolic computations producing symbolic outputs that simultaneously display central properties of both facets of human language: universal symbolic grammatical competence and statistical, imperfect performance.
Current Trends In Binary Optics At Perkin-Elmer

Binary optics is an emerging technology whereby light is directed, combined, or distributed by an optical material having a "stepped" phase structure. We produce computer-generated diffractive elements having high optical efficiency using multiple mask lithography. Perkin-Elmer has an active research and development program supporting binary optics activities from software development to practical technology demonstrations. Standard software tools have been developed to facilitate the design of binary optics from general optical prescriptions. These tools are used to design binary masks for the fabrication of binary optics for diverse applications ranging from simple lenses to general phase transformations. This paper briefly reviews the development of binary optics, discusses the tools supporting the design and fabrication of binary optics, and presents recent applications and demonstrations of binary optics.
Reissert compound studies. XLII. Synthesis and reactions of the 3,4-dihydro-β-carboline reissert compound and observations on α, β, and γ-carbolines

3,4-Dihydro-β-carboline and benzo[α]-γ-carboline yielded Reissert compounds. The 3,4-dihydro-β-carboline Reissert compound, through its acid- and base-promoted reactions, was found to be a very useful intermediate in the synthesis of several β-carboline derivatives including tetracyclic compounds. Reaction of the 3,4-dihydro-β-carboline Reissert compound with dichlorodicyanobenzoquinone (DDQ) resulted in the formation of l-cyano-β-carboline thereby providing the first example of an oxidation of a Reissert compound with DDQ. α-, β- and γ-Carbolines failed to form Reissert compounds under a wide variety of conditions. 7-Azaindole also failed to yield a Reissert compound.
PrORAM: dynamic prefetcher for oblivious RAM

Oblivious RAM (ORAM) is an established technique to hide the access pattern to an untrusted storage system. With ORAM, a curious adversary cannot tell what address the user is accessing when observing the bits moving between the user and the storage system. All existing ORAM schemes achieve obliviousness by adding redundancy to the storage system, i.e., each access is turned into multiple random accesses. Such redundancy incurs a large performance overhead. Although traditional data prefetching techniques successfully hide memory latency in DRAM based systems, it turns out that they do not work well for ORAM because ORAM does not have enough memory bandwidth available for issuing prefetch requests. In this paper, we exploit ORAM locality by taking advantage of the ORAM internal structures. While it might seem apparent that obliviousness and locality are two contradictory concepts, we challenge this intuition by exploiting data locality in ORAM without sacrificing security. In particular, we propose a dynamic ORAM prefetching technique called PrORAM (Dynamic Prefetcher for ORAM) and comprehensively explore its design space. PrORAM detects data locality in programs at runtime, and exploits the locality without leaking any information on the access pattern. Our simulation results show that with PrORAM, the performance of ORAM can be significantly improved. PrORAM achieves an average performance gain of 20% over the baseline ORAM for memory intensive benchmarks among Splash2 and 5.5% for SPEC06 workloads. The performance gain for YCSB and TPCC in DBMS benchmarks is 23.6% and 5% respectively. On average, PrORAM offers twice the performance gain than that offered by a static super block scheme.
Counteracting effects of thiocyanate and sucrose on chymotrypsinogen secondary structure and aggregation during freezing, drying, and rehydration.

Studies of numerous proteins with infrared spectroscopy have documented that unfolding is a general response of unprotected proteins to freeze-drying. Some proteins that are unfolded in the dried solid aggregate during rehydration, whereas others refold. It has been proposed for the latter case that aggregation is avoided because refolding kinetically outcompetes intermolecular interactions. In contrast, with proteins that normally aggregate after rehydration, minimizing unfolding during freeze-drying with stabilizer has been shown to be needed to favor the recovery of native protein molecules after rehydration. The purpose of the current study was to examine first the opposite situation, in which a denaturant is used to foster additional unfolding in the protein population during freeze-drying. If the protein is not intrinsically resistant to aggregation under the study conditions (e.g., because of intermolecular charge repulsion) and the denaturant does not disrupt intermolecular interactions during rehydration, this treatment should favor aggregation upon rehydration. With infrared spectroscopy we found that at concentrations of the denaturant Na thiocyanate (NaSCN) that only slightly perturbed chymotrypsinogen secondary structure in solution before freeze-drying, there was a large increase in protein unfolding in the dried solid and in protein aggregation measured after rehydration. Bands assigned to intermolecular beta sheet were present in the spectra of samples dried with NaSCN, indicating that aggregation could also arise in the dried solid. By examining the protein structure in the frozen state, we determined that in the absence of NaSCN the protein remains native. NaSCN caused structural perturbations during freezing, without the formation of intermolecular beta sheet, that were intermediate to structural changes noted after freeze-drying. In contrast, samples treated in the presence of NaSCN and sucrose had native-like spectra in the frozen and dried states, and much reduced aggregation after rehydration. These results indicate that during freezing and drying the sugar can counteract and mostly reverse the structural perturbations induced by NaSCN before and during these treatments.
A continuum manipulator made of interlocking fibers

A new type of continuum manipulator is presented, in which the body of the device is made up of identical, repeated interlocking fibers. A working prototype is demonstrated. Basic models describing the kinematics and mechanical properties of the device are developed, and their predictions are compared with the performance of the physical prototype. Advantages of the interlocking design include improved strength due to better load distribution, controllable stiffness, and a large open lumen.
Oracle Workload Intelligence

Analyzing and understanding the characteristics of the incoming workload is crucial in unraveling trends and tuning the performance of a database system. In this work, we present Oracle Workload Intelligence (WI), a tool for workload modeling and mining, as our attempt to infer the processes that generate a given workload. WI consists of two main functionalities. First, WI derives a model that captures the main characteristics of the workload without overfitting, which makes it likely to generalize well to unseen instances of the workload. Such a model provides insights into the most frequent code paths in the application that drives the workload, and also enables optimizations inside the database system that target sequences of query statements. Second, WI can compare the models of different snapshots of the workload to detect whether the workload has changed. Such changes might indicate new trends, regressions, problems, or even security issues. We demonstrate the effectiveness of WI with an experimental study on synthetic workloads and customer-provided application benchmarks.
Isolation and identification of androstanediol glucuronide from human plasma.

[3H]Dihydrotestosterone (50 μCi) was infused into normal men and women for 8 h. It was previously shown that this was sufficient time for this material to reach a steady state. Venous plasma was obtained at 6 and 8 h, pooled, and the unconjugated steroids removed by ether extraction. The remaining plasma was adjusted to pH 4.9 and the steroid conjugate was extracted first with ethyl acetate and then with an ether-ethanol mixture. The extracts were combined and taken to dryness. Steroid sulfates were solvolyzed using dioxane, and the mixture partitioned between ether and 1% NaOH. The aqueous phase was acidified and added to an XAD-2 column, washed with water, and the glucuronide fraction eluted with methanol. The solvent was concentrated and the methanol extract was passed through a C18 Sep-Pak, filtered through an Acrodisc CR and then subjected to gradient high performance liquid chromatography [HPLC] (Nova-Pak C18, KH2PO4, pH 3, and methanol. The fractions containing steroid glucuronides were collected and esterified with diazomethane and then acetylated with acetic anhydride in pyridine. The glucuronide triacetyl methyl ester (GAME) derivatives were then run in a second HPLC system (3 Lichrosorb 5 μ columns, 4 mm × 25 cm) using a gradient of ethanol-heptane and heptane. We clearly established that this system separates 3α-diol GAME conjugated at the 17 and 3 positions (44 vs 50 min) with authentic samples previously synthesized in our laboratory. We concluded that the pooled plasma contained only the 17-GAME conjugate. No significant activity of the 3-glucuronide was detected. The natural compound in circulation, therefore, is 5α-androstane-3α, 17β-diol 17-glucuronide.
The orientation of adsorbed furan molecules

Abstract The room temperature adsorption of furan vapors by graphitized carbon black was studied by determining adsorbent weight increase at equilibrium as a function of the temperature of the liquid or solid furan that was the source of the vapors. By converting furan temperatures to vapor pressures, the data could be used to solve the Brunauer-Emmett-Teller adsorption equation. The area per furan molecule at the monolayer point was 2.18 times the monolayer area of a nitrogen molecule. Comparison with molecular models indicates that the furan molecules are oriented with the ring parallel to the adsorbing surface. This is the same conclusion that had been previously indicated by the BET equation for the orientation of benzene on graphitized carbon black. However, Ross and Olivier (1) have concluded from their theory of adsorption on homogeneous surfaces that benzene adsorbs on graphitized carbon black with the ring perpendicular to the adsorbing surface. Their theory, applied to the present data for furan adsorption, predicts that the furan rings are perpendicular to the surface. More data will be required to determine which theory is correct.
Site-specific regulatory interaction between spinach leaf sucrose-phosphate synthase and 14-3-3 proteins

We report an Mg2+-dependent interaction between spinach leaf sucrose-phosphate synthase (SPS) and endogenous 14-3-3 proteins, as evidenced by co-elution during gel filtration and co-immunoprecipitation. The content of 14-3-3s associated with an SPS immunoprecipitate was inversely related to activity, and was specifically reduced when tissue was pretreated with 5-aminoimidazole-4-carboxamide riboside, suggesting metabolite control in vivo. A synthetic phosphopeptide based on Ser-229 was shown by surface plasmon resonance to bind a recombinant plant 14-3-3, and addition of the phosphorylated SPS-229 peptide was found to stimulate the SPS activity of an SPS:14-3-3 complex. Taken together, the results suggest a regulatory interaction of 14-3-3 proteins with Ser-229 of SPS.
Optical coherent transients induced by time-delayed fluctuating pulses

A theory is developed to describe the optical transient signals that arise when a sample of two-level atoms is irradiated by a sequence of two or three broad-bandwidth pulses is presented. The first two pulses have a relative delay time of order of the correlation time of the pulse fluctuations. These pulses whose temporal width is much greater than the delay time are fully correlated with one another and can be strong enough to saturate the two-level atomic transition. In the case of three-pulse transients the third pulse is weak non-correlated with the first two and is delayed in time so that it does not overlap them. Taking into account the effects ofinhomogeneous and homogeneous broadening we calculate the intensity of the transient signals as a function of delay time. The signals are found to depend dramatically on the intensities of the excitation pulses. It is shown that for strong excitation pulses a direct dependence of the signal on the cross-correlation time of the pulses r occurs that does not exist when the pulses are weak. In particular for saturating pulses the signals exhibit a peak of width of order r . In the case of the two-pulse transient the peak is found to disappear when the Doppler width of the atomic ensemble becomes sufficiently large. This peak can have a very narrow dip near its maximum whose width is much© (1991) COPYRIGHT SPIE--The International Society for Optical Engineering. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.
Interaction-induced strong localization in quantum dots

We argue that Coulomb blockade phenomena are a useful probe of the crossover to strong correlation in quantum dots. Through calculations at low density using variational and diffusion quantum Monte Carlo (up to ${r}_{s}\ensuremath{\sim}55$), we find that the addition energy shows a clear progression from features associated with shell structure to those caused by commensurability of a Wigner crystal. This crossover (which occurs near ${r}_{s}\ensuremath{\sim}20$ for spin-polarized electrons) is, then, a signature of interaction-driven localization. As the addition energy is directly measurable in Coulomb blockade conductance experiments, this provides a direct probe of localization in the low density electron gas.
THE FINE STRUCTURE OF SPERMATOZOA FROM THE ISOPOD ASELLUS MILITARIS (HAY).

Mature spermatozoa of Asellus militaris (Hay) have been examined with the light and electron microscope. Spermatozoa from the male vas deferens are found grouped in bundles of up to a hundred sperms per bundle. When observed vitro each sperm is seen to be a nonmotile, elongate, threadlike cell approximately 400–500 μ long and 0.5 μ wide. The nucleus extends as a whip-like appendage from the anterior end of a relatively inflexible tail. When observed in the electron microscope the sperm is seen to consist of a nucleus, a mid-region which lacks mitochondria, and a cross-striated, tubelike tail. The nucleus contains filaments, which are arranged in a tightly packed, longitudinally oriented pattern in some areas. The mid-region contains a myelin figure composed of parallel membranes, which are spaced approximately 80 A apart, and the rostral extension of the tail. The tail is cross-striated at major repeating intervals of 750–800 A and minor repeating intervals of 125–150 A. The tube-shaped tail contains a central, electron-dense core which is cross-linked with the hollow tube in the mid-region at intervals of approximately 150 A. On the basis of the observed lack of motility in vitro, the absence of mitochondria in the mid-region, and the unusual fine structure of the tail, it is concluded that this sperm may be nonmotile in vivo and should be classified as nonflagellate.
SU-FF-J-93: Respiration Induced Abdominal Organ Motions and Anatomic Changes: Indications for Gated Radiation Therapy

Purpose: To quantify respiration induced organ motions and anatomic changes for organs at abdomen and to estimate benefits of gated radiation therapy in terms of dosimetry parameters and the normal tissue complication probability (NTCP). Method and Materials: The 4DCT datasets for ten patients with respiratory diaphragm motion larger than 1 cm were selected to analyze. The 4DCT datasets consist of CT sets of ten phases within each respiratory cycle. Various abdominal tumors and structures such as liver, pancreas, spleen and kidney were contoured on individual phase CT sets. Respiration induced motion and variations in organ volumes and centroid positions of these structures were studied by comparing their contours of different breathing phases. The study was performed for all respiratory phases (non‐gating) and for selected phases (gating). The magnitudes of the tumor respiratory motion under both gating and non‐gating conditions were used to determine margins for the planning target volumes (PTV). Representative 3D conformal radiotherapydosimetry plans were generated with or without gating. Dose volume histograms (DVHs) for these organs were calculated and compared. The normal liver DVHs were used to estimate the NTCP based on the Lyman model. Results: It is found that, unlike organs in thorax, the structures in abdomen show negligible changes (<3%) in their volumes during respiration, while their centroids vary during the breathing. The DVHs from the treatment plans of livertumor indicate that the gated delivery results in substantial sparing of normal tissues in abdomen. The gated delivery leads to significant reduction in NTCPs for the normal liver and other abdominal structures. Conclusion:Respiration induced volume changes for abdominal structures are negligible. The gated treatment reduces radiationdoses to normal tissues thus reduces NTCP.
Setting sights higher: category-level attentional set modulates sustained inattentional blindness.

Previous research has shown that inattentional blindness is modulated by how people tune their “attentional set”: the more featurally similar the unexpected object is to what people are trying to attend, the more likely it is that they will notice it. The experiments in this paper show that people can also establish attentional sets based on semantic categories, and that these high-level attentional sets modulate sustained inattentional blindness. In “Experiment 1”, participants tracked four moving numbers and ignored four moving letters or vice versa, and the unexpected object was either a capital letter ‘E’ or its reverse, a block-like number ‘3’. Despite their featural similarity, participants were more likely to notice the unexpected object belonging to the same category as the tracked objects. “Experiment 2” replicated this effect in conditions where the unexpected object possessed a unique luminance and was less likely simply to be confused with other display items.
Temporal corpus summarization using submodular word coverage

In many areas of life, we now have almost complete electronic archives reaching back for well over two decades. This includes, for example, the body of research papers in computer science, all news articles written in the US, and most people's personal email. However, we have only rather limited methods for analyzing and understanding these collections. While keyword-based retrieval systems allow efficient access to individual documents in archives, we still lack methods for understanding a corpus as a whole. In this paper, we explore methods that provide a temporal summary of such corpora in terms of landmark documents, authors, and topics. In particular, we explicitly model the temporal nature of influence between documents and re-interpret summarization as a coverage problem over words anchored in time. The resulting models provide monotone sub-modular objectives for computing informative and non-redundant summaries over time, which can be efficiently optimized with greedy algorithms. Our empirical study shows the effectiveness of our approach over several baselines.
Knowledge Legitimacy: How Trans-Patient Behavior Supports and Challenges Current Medical Knowledge

In this article, I examine the accounts of transsexual/transgender patients and their involvement with medical professionals in the Midwestern United States. Data are taken from 22 in-depth interviews and one year of participant observation of three transsexual/transgender organizations. I show that trans-patients are made aware of larger political, religious, and cultural ideologies through their medical experiences. Trans-patients internalize these views, which affect how they make sense of their medical treatment and how they choose to alter their behavior in future medical encounters. Trans-patients, in an attempt to gain credibility and avoid stigmas, prepare how they will approach doctors to improve their likelihood of receiving desired treatments. The data will reveal that through their approach, trans-patients both support and challenge existing medical knowledge. Patients support medical discourse by using established medical language in their interaction with doctors. Patients challenge medical knowledge by resisting established medical decisions.
Bullying victimization among college students: Negative consequences for alcohol use

This study reports the prevalence of bullying victimization at school and work among college freshmen and the relationships between victimization and changes in alcohol consumption and alcohol problems. Web survey data at 2 time points from a sample of 2118 freshmen from 8 colleges and universities in the Midwestern United States indicated that 43% of students experienced bullying at school and that 33% of students experienced bullying at work. Bullying, particularly at school, consistently predicted alcohol consumption and problematic drinking, after controlling for baseline drinking and other school and work stressors.
Stability of a polynomial and convexity of a frequency response arc

A frequency response arc associated with a polynomial p(s) is the plot of /spl Psi/(w)=p(jw). A proper frequency response arc associated with p(s) is part of the plot which does not pass through the origin, and the net phase change of /spl Psi/(w) does not exceed 180 degrees. Recently Hamann and Barmish [HB] proved convexity of all proper frequency response arcs associated with a Hurwitz polynomial. In this paper we suggest an alternative proof of this result, and discuss connections between stability of a polynomial and convexity of the associated frequency response arc. Our proof is analytical and complements the geometric proof given by HB. It is hoped that the analytic approach will provide an insight into convexity of frequency response arcs associated with Hurwitz quasipolynomials. >
Validated band model for NO 2 molecular transmittance in the infrared

A previously reported transmittance model for nitrogen dioxide in the two fundamental bands ν2 and ν3, plus the combination band ν1 + ν3, is now presented using upgraded synthetic spectra and measured data. The model consists of a well-established double-exponential function which approximates homogeneous path transmittance at 5-cm−1 intervals with a spectral resolution of 20 cm−1. Its parameters and other computational features are developed for direct compatibility with the widely used AFGL lowtran code. Transmittance calculations in the range from zero to unity deviate on the average ~0.84% from a combination of synthetic and measured spectra, which constitutes an improvement over the previously reported model.
Nanocrystalline and Nanocomposite Magnetic Materials and Their Applications

Nanocrystalline materials can possess bulk properties quite different from those commonly associated with conventional large-grained materials. Nanocomposites, a subset of nanocrystalline materials, in addition have been found to possess magnetic properties which are similar to, but different from, the properties of the individual constituents. New magnetic phenomena, unusual property combinations, and both enhanced and diminished magnetic property values are just some of the changes observed in magnetic nanocomposites from conventional magnetic materials. Here, a description will be presented of some of the exciting new properties discovered in nanomaterials and the magnetic applications envisioned for them.
A Harmonic Method of Intercomparing the Oscillators of the National Standard of Radio Frequency

A method of precisely measuring the frequency difference between two frequency standards which have nominally the same fundamental frequency is outlined. The application of this method to the continuous intercomparison of the piezo oscillators in the primary frequency standard maintained by the National Bureau of Standards is described. The customary method of measuring the frequency difference between two piezo oscillators utilizes the beat frequency between the two standards at the fundamental frequency or one of the harmonics. The method described utilizes the frequency produced by heterodyning two consecutive harmonics to obtain any desired precision of frequency comparison without necessitating the operation of any circuits at exceedingly high frequencies.
Cross-Compliance for Erosion Control: Anticipating Efficiency and Distributive Impacts

Despite increasing attention, the effects of using differential agricultural program benefits to achieve soil conservation are largely unexplored. Viewed in a conventional environmental economics framework, the popularly perceived cross-compliance program may fall short on efficiency grounds. Analysis suggests that the greatest incentive to practice conservation may occur on land with little or no net social benefits forthcoming from erosion control. A by-product of cross-compliance worth consideration is that those likely to benefit most from the program are the highest equity and largest farm operators.
INTERLAMINAR ANALYSIS OF LAMINATED COMPOSITES USING A SUBLAMINATE APPROACH.

A simple analysis method based upon a transverse shear deformation theory and a sublaminate approach is utilized to analyze a Mixed-Mode edge delamination specimen. The analysis provides a closed form distribution of the interlaminar shear stresses ahead of the crack, and the parameters controlling the behavior are identified. The effect of specimen stacking sequence and delamination interface on the strain energy release rate components is investigated. Results are compared with a finite element simulation for reference. The simple nature of the method makes it suitable for preliminary design analyses which require a large number of configurations to be evaluated quickly and economically.
Polishing the Gem: A First-Year Design Project

The improvement of the standard Gem paper clip is described as a design project suitable for first-year engineering students.
Cefdinir: An oral alternative to parenteral cephems ☆

Cost savings are possible if oral cephems of equivalent efficacy can be substituted for parenteral cephems. An in vitro study was performed to compare the activity of cefdinir, cefoxitin, cefazolin, ceftriaxone, ceftazidime, and cefepime against 243 clinical isolates of human pathogens. Activities were determined by National Committee for Clinical Laboratory Standards microbroth dilution methodology using an inoculum of approximately 5 x 10(5) CFU/mL. Cefdinir was the single or equally most potent agent against Streptococcus pyogenes, penicillin-susceptible Streptococcus pneumoniae, methicillin-susceptible Staphylococcus aureus, and Klebsiella pneumoniae isolates that produced a variety of beta-lactamase types. Cefdinir was less potent than ceftriaxone, ceftazidime, and cefepime against Haemophilus influenzae, but was 2- to 8-fold more potent than cefoxitin and 8- to 32-fold more potent than cefazolin. Cefdinir was slightly less potent than ceftazidime, against beta-lactamase-positive Moraxella catarrhalis. These data support clinical consideration of cefdinir as an alternative to parenteral cephems in infections where adequate tissue levels can be safely assured.
Parameter estimation on gravitational waves from multiple coalescing binaries

Future ground-based and space-borne interferometric gravitational-wave detectors may capture between tens and thousands of binary coalescence events per year. There is a significant and growing body of work on the estimation of astrophysically relevant parameters, such as masses and spins, from the gravitational-wave signature of a single event. This paper introduces a robust Bayesian framework for combining the parameter estimates for multiple events into a parameter distribution of the underlying event population. The framework can be readily deployed as a rapid post-processing tool.
IS IT TIME TO BURY THE ECOSYSTEM CONCEPT? (WITH FULL MILITARY HONORS, OF COURSE!)1

The ecosystem concept has become a standard paradigm for studying ecological systems. Underlying the ecosystem concept is a “machine analogy” derived from Systems Analysis. This analogy is difficult to reconcile with our current understanding of ecological systems as metastable adaptive systems that may operate far from equilibrium. This paper discusses some logical and scientific problems associated with the ecosystem concept, and suggests a number of modifications in the paradigm to address these problems.
Chlorite Geothermometry?—Contamination and Apparent Octahedral Vacancies

The large contents of octahedral vacancies in published formulae of chlorite from hydrothermal systems and clastic sequences are shown to be largely caused by inclusion of other minerals. Verification is provided by analytical electron microscope (AEM) analyses of chlorite in pelitic rocks from the Gasp6 Peninsula, Quebec and the Gulf Coast, Texas. The Gasp6 chlorite occurs as discrete crystals locally coexisting with corrensite, and the Gulf Coast chlorite is free of mixed layers other than local serpentine- like 7-~ layers. Unlike most electron microprobe analyses (EMPA), but like other AEM analyses, the reported chlorite formulae do not have significant octahedral vacancies, are not Si-rich and (Fe + Mg)- poor relative to classic metamorphic chlorite, and have nearly equal amounts oftetrahedral and octahedral AI. The studied chlorites and those in metabasites and clastic rocks that could be positively identified as containing no or minimal mixed layering or submicroscopic intergrowths have little or no Ca or alkalis. In contrast, EMPA of chlorite reported for other clastic sequences show variable amounts ofNa + K + 2Ca that exhibit a poorly defined positive correlation with the proportion of octahedral vacancies. The EMPA of chlorite from the Salton Sea and Los Azufres geothermal fields that were suggested to contain temperature-dependent amounts of tetrahedral A1 (and thus used as "'chlorite geothermometers") show compositional characteristics similar to those reported for several saponite-chlorite transition series in metabasites. Continuous increases in octahedral occupancy and tetrahedral Al with increasing metamorphic grade are attributed to decreases in abundance of mixed layers or fine-grained intergrown minerals that com- monly occur as a result of increasing crystal size and homogeneity in prograde sequences. Use of"chlorite geothermometry'" based on the proportion of apparent octahedral vacancies or tetrahedral A1 is therefore unwarranted and leads to inaccurate temperature estimates.