cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Students with Food Insecurity Are More Likely to Screen Positive for an Eating Disorder at a Large, Public University in the Midwest.

Abstract Background College students experience a disproportionately high prevalence of both food insecurity and eating disorders. Food insecurity is associated with stress, irregular eating patterns, weight change, depression, and body dissatisfaction, making it a possible risk factor for the onset of eating disorders. However, the association between food insecurity and eating disorders among college students is not well understood. Objective This study explored the relation between food insecurity and screening positive for an eating disorder among students attending a large, public Midwestern university. Design Cross-sectional data were collected using an online survey administered from March through June 2018. Participants/setting Participants were recruited from a random sample of 2,000 students, with oversampling from the following groups: racial/ethnic minorities, first-generation students, and students from lower-income households. Of those sampled, 851 students (43%) responded. The final analytic sample comprised 804 students after excluding those with missing data. Main outcome measure The validated 5-item Sick, Control, One stone, Fat, Food (SCOFF) questionnaire was used to screen for the presence of an eating disorder. Statistical analyses performed Poisson regression was used to model prevalence ratios for positive SCOFF screens (≥2 affirmative responses) by levels of food security (ie, high, marginal, low, or very low). Models were adjusted for sex, age, race/ethnicity, degree type, financial aid, and first-generation student status. Results Compared to students with high food security, a higher prevalence of positive SCOFF screens was found among students with marginal food security (prevalence ratio [PR], 1.83, 95% CI 1.26 to 2.65; P = 0.001), low food security (PR 1.72, 95% CI 1.16 to 2.54; P = 0.007), and very low food security (PR 2.83, 95% CI 2.01 to 3.97; P Conclusions Students with food insecurity at any level were more likely to screen positive for an eating disorder via the SCOFF questionnaire. Prospective studies are needed to determine whether food insecurity is a risk factor for the onset of eating disorders among college students.
Prosthetic Valve Monitoring via In Situ Pressure Sensors: In Silico Concept Evaluation using Supervised Learning

Patients receiving transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) can benefit from continuous, longitudinal monitoring of valve prosthesis to prevent leaflet thrombosis-related complications. We present a computational proof-of-concept study of a novel, non-invasive and non-toxic valve monitoring technique for TAVs which uses pressure measurements from microsensors embedded on the valve stent. We perform a data-driven analysis to determine the signal processing and machine learning required to detect reduced mobility in individual leaflets. We use direct numerical simulations to describe hemodynamic differences in transvalvular flow in ascending aorta models with healthy and stenotic valves. A Cartesian-grid flow solver and a reduced-order valve model simulate the complex dynamics of blood flow and leaflet motion, respectively. The two-way fluid-structure interaction coupling is achieved using a sharp interface immersed boundary method. From a dataset of 21 simulations, we show leaflets with reduced mobility result in large, asymmetric pressure fluctuations in their vicinity, particularly in the region extending from the aortic sinus to the sino-tubular junction (STJ). We train a linear classifier algorithm by correlating sinus and STJ pressure measurements on the stent surface to individual leaflet status. The algorithm was shown to have >90% accuracy for prospective detection of individual leaflet dysfunction. We demonstrate that using only two discrete pressure measurements, per leaflet, on the TAV stent, individual leaflet status can be accurately predicted. Such a sensorized TAV system could enable safe and inexpensive detection of prosthetic valve dysfunction.
Baseline Targeted Moderation in a Trial of the Family Check-Up 4 Health: Potential Explanations for Finding Few Practical Effects.

Not all participants will benefit equally from even well-established, evidence-based prevention programs. For this reason, the field of prevention science is beginning to embrace individual tailoring of interventions. The Family Check-Up was among the first prevention programs to tailor at the family level as opposed to the more prevalent focus on adapting programs for different cultures, genders, and other immutable participant characteristics. Despite tailoring, families with lower levels of stress and parental mental health issues, children with lower baseline conduct problems, and families living in an extremely deprived neighborhood benefitted less from the Family Check-Up. This study examined baseline targeted moderation (BTM) within a trial of the Family Check-Up 4 Health (FCU4Health) program, an adaptation of the Family Check-Up for primary care delivery and explicit targeting of obesogenic behaviors. Ethnically diverse, low-income families (N = 240) with children ages 5.5 to 12 years identified in pediatric primary care with elevated body mass index (BMI) were enrolled and randomized to FCU4Health or usual care. Few BTM effects were found using single-variable-as-moderator and latent-class-as-moderator analytic approaches across the primary (child BMI, body composition) and secondary outcomes (family health routines; child eating behaviors, food choices, emotional problems, problem behaviors, quality of life; caregiver BMI and body composition), as well as hypothesized mediators (child self-regulation, parenting skills). The high-risk nature of the sample and the FCU4Health being individually tailored might have mitigated finding BTM effects. This trial was prospectively registered (NCT03013309 ClinicalTrials.gov).
How do you solve a problem like Maria? The politics of disaster response in Puerto Rico, Florida and Texas

COVID-19 is not the first, nor the last, public health challenge the US political system has faced. Understanding drivers of governmental responses to public health emergencies is important for policy decision-making, planning, health and social outcomes, and advocacy. We use federal political disaster-aid debates to examine political factors related to variations in outcomes for Puerto Rico, Texas, and Florida after the 2017 hurricane season. Despite the comparable need and unprecedented mortality, Puerto Rico received delayed and substantially less aid. We find bipartisan participation in floor debates over aid to Texas and Florida, but primarily Democrat participation for Puerto Rican aid. Yet, deliberation and participation in the debates were strongly influenced by whether a state or district was at risk of natural disasters. Nearly one-third of all states did not participate in any aid debate. States' local disaster risk levels and political parties' attachments to different racial and ethnic groups may help explain Congressional public health disaster response failures. These lessons are of increasing importance in the face of growing collective action problems around the climate crisis and subsequent emergent threats from natural disasters.
Depletion torques between anisotropic colloidal particles.

We explore how the entropic notion of depletion forces between spheres, introduced by Asakura and Oosawa, can be extended to depletion torques that affect the orientations of colloidal particles having complex shapes. In prior experimental work, systems of microscale plate-like particles in the presence of a nanoscale depletion agent have been shown to form polymer-like columnar chains; restoring depletion torques act to align lithographically-structured platelets within a chain orientationally about the chain’s axis. We consider depletion torques corresponding to parallel, face-to-face, near-contact pair interactions for complex-shaped, plate-like, prismatic lithographic particles in colloidal dispersions containing a spherical nanoscale depletion agent. We calculate depletion torques for a wide variety of such particles, including rotationally symmetric, asymmetric, achiral, chiral, and elongated particles. Moreover, we determine depletion torques between two non-parallel proximate square platelets connected by a lossless hinge along a common edge. Our investigations show that depletion torques can be tailored through lithographic or synthetic design of specific geometrical features in the shapes of particles.
QoS-aware service composition for large-scale peer-to-peer systems

In this chapter, we present a scalable QoS-aware service Composition framework, SpiderNet for large-scale peer-to-peer (P2P) systems. The SpiderNet framework comprises: (1) service path selection, which is responsible for selecting and composing proper service components into an end-to-end service path satisfying the user's functional and quality requirements; (2) service path instantiation, which decides the specific peers, where the chosen service components are actually instantiated, based on the distributed, dynamic, and composite resource information; and (3) benefit-driven clustering, which dynamically organizes a large-scale P2P system into an overlay network, based on each peer's benefit. Conducting extensive simulations of a large-scale P2P system (104 peers), we show that SpiderNet can achieve much higher service provisioning success rate than other common heuristic approaches.
What is meant by overproduction of apo B-containing lipoproteins?

Several mechanisms have been implicated in the development of hyperlipidemia. These include reduced activity of receptors for low density lipoproteins (LDL), deficiencies in lipoprotein lipase (LPL), abnormalities in the primary structures of apolipoproteins C-II, E, and B-100, and overproduction of lipoproteins containing apolipoprotein B-100 (apo B) . All of these except the last are well documented. On the other hand, many researchers believe that overproduction of apo B-containing lipoproteins is one of the more common causes of hyperlipidemia. Therefore, it is worthwhile to consider the evidence for the existence of lipoprotein overproduction as a cause for hyperlipidemia. The present paper will examine the available data related to this question.
Keeping virtual information resources up and running

The maintenance of materialized views in large-scale environments composed of numerous heterogeneous information sources (ISs), such as the WWW, has importance for the new breed of information service providers. These applications face the problem that such large-scale environments are plagued with ISs not only continuously modifying their contents, but also their schemas and query capabilities. Current view technology assumes a static environment, in the sense that once the underlying environment upon which the view is defined changes its capabilities, views become undefined. This paper is the first attempt of addressing this problem, which we coin view synchronization. Our EVE (Evolvable View Environment) solution is capable of maintaining virtual repositories (views) under capabilities changes of the underlying sources in situations where current view technology would fail. In this paper, we introduce the key concepts of the EVE solution, in particular, the EVE architecture, a new flexible view specification language called Evolvable-SQL (short E-SQL), a Model for Information Source Descriptions (MISD), and our view synchronization algorithm (VSA). Examples to illustrate the key ideas of the EVE approach are given throughout the paper.
1,4‐Dinitrobutane

1,4-Dinitrobutane product: 1,4-dinitrobutane product: 1,6-dinitrohexane product: 1,3-Dinitropropane product: 1,5-Dinitropentane Keywords: replacement reactions, miscellaneous; bath, cooling, dry ice and methylene chloride; stirrers, sealed
A Fast and Noise‐Resilient Approach to Detect Rare‐Variant Associations With Deep Sequencing Data for Complex Disorders

Next generation sequencing technology has enabled the paradigm shift in genetic association studies from the common disease/common variant to common disease/rare-variant hypothesis. Analyzing individual rare variants is known to be underpowered; therefore association methods have been developed that aggregate variants across a genetic region, which for exome sequencing is usually a gene. The foreseeable widespread use of whole genome sequencing poses new challenges in statistical analysis. It calls for new rare-variant association methods that are statistically powerful, robust against high levels of noise due to inclusion of noncausal variants, and yet computationally efficient. We propose a simple and powerful statistic that combines the disease-associated P-values of individual variants using a weight that is the inverse of the expected standard deviation of the allele frequencies under the null. This approach, dubbed as Sigma-P method, is extremely robust to the inclusion of a high proportion of noncausal variants and is also powerful when both detrimental and protective variants are present within a genetic region. The performance of the Sigma-P method was tested using simulated data based on realistic population demographic and disease models and its power was compared to several previously published methods. The results demonstrate that this method generally outperforms other rare-variant association methods over a wide range of models. Additionally, sequence data on the ANGPTL family of genes from the Dallas Heart Study were tested for associations with nine metabolic traits and both known and novel putative associations were uncovered using the Sigma-P method.
Increasing the Use of Science to Improve Child-Rearing

The prevention of problems of human behavior will be facilitated if scientific findings and methods become an integral part of policy making and program adoption. The present paper provides a conceptual framework for research on this problem, using the dissemination of empirically-supported preventive programs for youth as an example. As empirically-supported preventive practices are identified, analyses are needed of what organizations might adopt each practice and the factors influencing such adoptions. Ultimately, experimental studies that manipulate presumed influences on practice adoption and maintenance will be needed.
Blasting away leukemia.

CD44 delivers a differentiation signal to leukemic blast cells that may be exploited to create new therapies for acute myeloid leukemia (pages 669–676).
A comparison of two indirect methods for localizing the site of urinary tract infection: Beta glucuronidase levels and the presence of antibody-coated bacteria

A comparison of two of the indirect methods used for localization of the site of urinary tract infection was made for 218 obstetric patients. There was no correlation between urinary beta glucuronidase activity and the presence of a positive fluorescent antibody test. The ranges of beta glucuronidase activity were so variable that this test could not differentiate between the presence of renal, bladder, or absence of infection.
On the singularities of the pluricomplex green's function

It is shown that, on a compact Kahler manifold with boundary, the singularities of the pluricomplex Green's function with multiple poles can be prescribed to be of the form $\log\sum_{j=1}^n|f_j(z)|^2$ at each pole, where $f_j(z)$ are arbitrary local holomorphic functions with the pole as their only common zero. The proof is a combination of blow-ups and recent a priori estimates for the degenerate complex Monge-Ampere equation, and particularly the $C^1$ estimates away from a divisor.
Immunohistochemical localization of prostaglandin H synthase in the female reproductive tract and endometriosis.

Prostaglandin H synthase, also known as cyclooxygenase, is an essential enzyme in prostaglandin synthesis. Using a monoclonal antibody and immunohistochemical techniques, we studied the localization of this enzyme in the female reproductive tract and in endometriosis. In the uterus, prostaglandin H synthase was primarily localized to endometrial epithelium, with surface epithelium containing more immunoreactive prostaglandin H synthase than glandular epithelium. Fallopian tube secretory epithelial cells also contained prostaglandin H synthase while ciliated epithelial cells did not. Cervical epithelium and myometrial cells did not contain prostaglandin H synthase. A higher percentage of glands in endometriosis and adenomyosis, as compared with eutopic endometrium, contained prostaglandin H synthase suggesting that these tissues are also capable of prostaglandin synthesis. These findings may have important physiologic significance in the mechanisms of embryo implantation, in menstruation, and in the pathophysiologic features of endometriosis.
Adolescent-onset nicotine self-administration modeled in female rats.

Although the great majority of tobacco addiction begins during adolescence, little is known about differential nicotine effects in adolescents versus adults. A rat model was used to determine the impact of the age of onset on nicotine self-administration. In expt 1, nicotine self-administration of female Sprague-Dawley rats over a range of acute doses (0.01–0.08 mg/kg per infusion) was determined in adolescent (beginning at 54–62 days) versus adult (beginning at 84–90 days). In expt 2, chronic nicotine self-administration over 4 weeks from adolescence into adulthood was compared with the chronic self-administration beginning in adulthood. In expt 3, adolescent-adult differences in nicotine effects on body temperature and locomotor responses were determined. Adolescent-onset rats showed a significant main effect of increased nicotine intake compared with adult-onset rats in an eight-fold range of acute unit doses/infusion. Significant age differences were also seen in the chronic level of nicotine self-administration. Over 4 weeks, the adolescent-onset group had nearly double the rate of nicotine self-administration of the benchmark nicotine dose (0.03 mg/kg per infusion) compared to the adult-onset group. This increased nicotine intake persisted into adulthood. Adolescent rats had significantly greater response than adults to the hypothermic effects of nicotine, but had significantly less response than adults to the reduction in locomotor activity seen after nicotine. Adolescent-onset nicotine self-administration in female rats was associated with significantly higher levels of nicotine self-administration versus rats, which began nicotine self-administration in adulthood. This greater self-administration persists into adulthood and may underlie greater propensity of adolescents to nicotine addiction.
Recompression of Optical Pulses Broadened by Passage Through Optical Fibers

A new technique for achieving distortion-free pulse propagation through single-mode optical fibers is demonstrated. Mode-locked dye-laser pulses with 3.3-psec pulse widths and a wavelength of 5878 A were propagated through a 325-m single-mode optical fiber and emerged with 13-psec pulse widths. These output pulses were recompressed to their original 3.3-psec pulse widths by passage through a 50-cm near-resonant atomic sodium-vapor delay line.
Using number fields to compute logarithms in finite fields

We describe an adaptation of the number field sieve to the problem of computing logarithms in a finite field. We conjecture that the running time of the algorithm, when restricted to finite fields of an arbitrary but fixed degree, is L q [1/3; (64/9) 1/3 + o(1)], where q is the cardinality of the field, L q [s; c] = exp(c(log q) s (log log q) 1- s ), and the o(1) is for q → ∞. The number field sieve factoring algorithm is conjectured to factor a number the size of q in the same amount of time.
Two Views of Whitman in 1856: Uncollected Reviews of Leaves of Grass from the New York Daily News and Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper

Presents two 1856 reviews of the 1855 edition of Leaves of Grass not included in Kenneth M. Price's Walt Whitman: The Contemporary Reviews.
Update on prevention and screening of cervical cancer

Cervical cancer is the third most common cause of cancer in women in the world. During the past few decades tremendous strides have been made toward decreasing the incidence and mortality of cervical cancer with the implementation of various prevention and screening strategies. The causative agent linked to cervical cancer development and its precursors is the human papillomavirus (HPV). Prevention and screening measures for cervical cancer are paramount because the ability to identify and treat the illness at its premature stage often disrupts the process of neoplasia. Cervical carcinogenesis can be the result of infections from multiple high-risk HPV types that act synergistically. This imposes a level of complexity to identifying and vaccinating against the actual causative agent. Additionally, most HPV infections spontaneously clear. Therefore, screening strategies should optimally weigh the benefits and risks of screening to avoid the discovery and needless treatment of transient HPV infections. This article provides an update of the preventative and screening methods for cervical cancer, mainly HPV vaccination, screening with Pap smear cytology, and HPV testing. It also provides a discussion of the newest United States 2012 guidelines for cervical cancer screening, which changed the age to begin and end screening and lengthened the screening intervals.
An Investigation of the Vertical Wavenumber and Frequency Spectra of Gravity Wave Motions in the Lower Stratosphere

The vertical and oblique velocities of atmospheric motions in the lower stratosphere were analyzed using data obtained on February 1-5, 1986, from the Poker Flat, Alaska, MST radar; two beams of orthogonal polarization were directed vertically, and four oblique beams at 7 deg off-vertical were directed at azimuths of 64, 154, 244, and 334 deg from north. Results indicate that the majority of the energy at gravity wave periods is associated with inertia-gravity wave motions having an upward direction of propagation and dominant vertical wavelengths near 2 km. The results of vertical wavenumber spectra support the saturation hypothesis of Dewan and Good (1986) and Smith et al. (1987), suggesting that saturation processes act to control spectral amplitudes at large wavenumbers.
CT of the skin and subcutaneous tissues

A broad spectrum of skin and subcutaneous (SQ) findings may be discovered in the emergency setting on CT examinations. There are some findings that are directly relevant to the reason or reasons why the patient has undergone the CT examination. However, other findings may be incidental. The skin and SQ tissues are by definition on the periphery of CT images and may be overlooked by the radiologist, although findings related to them can be of clinical importance. The purpose of this pictorial essay is to present a broad spectrum of skin and subcutaneous findings which may be identified on CT examinations in the emergency setting (and in some cases nonemergently), and to briefly review the relevant imaging literature, which surprisingly is relatively limited on this topic. Categories of cutaneous and subcutaneous abnormalities that will be covered include trauma and hemorrhage, iatrogenic findings, infection, neoplasms, calcification, and other miscellaneous entities, all of which may initially present on emergency CT examinations of the body.
Measurement of Surface Heat Transfer Due to Particle Impact

Heat transfer coefficients for a surface continuously impacted by a stream of falling particles in air and in helium were measured as functions of particle flux and particle velocity. The purpose was to provide well-controlled data to clarify the mechanisms of heat transfer in particle suspension flows. The particles were spherical glass beads with mean diameters of 0.5, 1.13, and 2.6 mm. The distribution of the particle impact flux on the surface was determined by deconvolution from the measurement of the total solid masses collected at both sides of a movable splitter plate. The particle velocity was calculated from a simple, well-established model. The experimental results showed that in air, the heat transfer coefficient increases approximately linearly with particle impact flux. At high impact fluxes, the heat transfer coefficient decreases with particle impact velocity, and at low impact fluxes, it increases with particle impact velocity. Furthermore, the heat transfer coefficient decreases drastically with the particle size. In helium gas, it was found that at low particle impact fluxes, the difference between the coefficients in helium and in air is small, whereas at high fluxes, the difference becomes large. A length scale, V/nd{sup 2}{sub p}, was used to correlate the data.more » At low particle Reynolds numbers, gas-mediated heat conduction was identified as the dominant particle/surface heat transfer mechanism, whereas at high particle Reynolds numbers, induced gas convection was the dominant mechanism. 23 refs., 10 figs.« less
Pheromone Signaling: A Pissing Contest in Tilapia

In many species, males produce elaborate signals used by females in the evaluation of potential mates. Two urinary steroid epimers have now been shown to be components of a courtship display by male Mozambique tilapia that promotes female maturation.
Quasi-continuous fiber optic liquid level sensor

A quasi-continuous liquid level sensor that exploits changes in reflection upon contact with a target fluid has been successfully developed and tested for a host of liquids including liquid nitrogen, oils and boiling water.
A new automated quality assessment algorithm for image fusion

Automated image quality assessment is highly desirable to evaluate the performance of various image fusion algorithms for night vision applications. In this paper we propose a perceptual quality evaluation method for image fusion which is based on human visual system (HVS) models. Our method assesses the image quality of a fused image using the following steps. First, the source and fused images are filtered by a contrast sensitivity function (CSF) after which a local contrast map is computed for each image. Second, a contrast preservation map is generated to describe the relationship between the fused image and each source image. Finally, the preservation maps are weighted by a saliency map to obtain an overall quality map. The mean of the quality map indicates the quality of the fused image. Experimental results compare the predictions made by our algorithm with human perceptual evaluations for several different parameter settings in our algorithm. The most popular existing algorithms are also evaluated. For some specific parameter settings, we find our algorithm provides better predictions, which are more closely matched to human perceptual evaluations, than the existing algorithms. The evaluations focus on the night vision application, but the algorithm we propose is applicable to other applications also.
Infant with Bilateral Cataracts from Non-accidental Trauma

*Department of Surgery, Thomas Jefferson University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, †Division of Ophthalmology, ‡Department of General Pediatrics, §Department of General Pediatrics, Division of Emergency Medicine, and jjDivision of General Surgery, Alfred I. duPont Hospital for Children, Wilmington, Delaware Reprint Address: David W. Rittenhouse, MD, Department of Surgery, Thomas Jefferson University, 1015 Walnut Street, 620 Curtis Building, Philadelphia, PA 19107
Semiparametric inference with kernel likelihood

We study a class of semiparametric likelihood models in which parameters are incorporated explicitly, with the unknown likelihood specified nonparametrically by the kernel estimator. The maximum likelihood estimator (MLE) under this semiparametric model is used for inference of the parameters. The method is a generalisation of the semiparametric regression model we proposed recently. Such semiparametric models are robust, and MLEs under these likelihoods are shown to be consistent, asymptotic normal with rate √n and possess Wilks property.
The use of endocavitary irradiation for selected carcinomas of the rectum: ten years experience.

Summary Since July, 1973, endocavitary irradiation has been used to treat 129 patients with rectal carcinoma. The lesion must be a modified Dukes' A, well-differentiated adenocarcinoma and no more than 5 cm in diameter and within 12 cm of the anal verge. Specialized diagnostic techniques assist with the clinical selection. Specially designed proctoscopes are used to visualize the carcinoma which is treated by a Philips RT-50 contact machine. 11 000–12 000 cGy are delivered in four treatments administered at 2–3 weekly intervals. No systemic side effects have been observed and local morbidity is minimal. This treatment preserves the anal sphincter, and sexual function in male patients. Hospitalization is not required and there is no risk of mortality. Recurrence has been observed in six of 129 patients within 18 months of treatment for known reasons. Two of these six patients have died from disease and a further 25 from other causes. The local control rate is 95.3%. This treatment modality has been offered also to 87 patients for palliation and this has been effectively obtained in 82.7%. This technique is an alternative to surgery in selected cases.
Journal Citations in Master's Theses: One Measurement of a Journal Collection.

The authors examined the journal citations that appeared in Education and English theses at the University of Rhode Island. The purpose of the investigation was to develop one means of measuring the use of the collection. Additionally, the study looks at the use/cost aspect and closes by noting some of the implications of the study for more rational decision-making and inter-library cooperation.
Glycosyltransferases as probes for non-reducing terminal monosaccharide residues on nitrocellulose immobilized glycoproteins: The β (1–4) galactosyltransferase model

This paper reviews a technique for detecting non-reducing terminal N-acetyl-glucosamine residues on glycoproteins in a mixture of proteins resolved by sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis and immobilized on nitrocellulose by electrophoretic transfer. Detection is accomplished by fluorography after enzymatic modification with galactosyltransferase (UDP-galactose: N-acetyl-D-glucosaminyl-glycopeptide 4-β-D-galactosyltransferase, E.C. 2.4.1.38), which transfers radiolabeled galactose from its nucleotide sugar substrate, UDP-[6-3H]-galactose, into any immobilized glycoprotein with a non-reducing terminal 2-acetamido-2-deoxy-D-glucose (GlcNAc) acceptor site. The kinetics of radiolabeling are independent of the amount of immobilized glycoprotein substrate. Half-maximal incorporation of [6-3H]galactose occurs by 5 h and saturation by 16 h. We have used enzyme blotting with galactosyltransferase: (i) to detect non-reducing terminal GlcNAc residues on isolated glycoproteins, (ii) to detect, in combination with endo-β-N-acetylglucosaminidase F digestion, Asn-linked oligosaccharides on glycoproteins, and (iii) to identify a subset of glycoproteins with non-reducing terminal N-acetylglucosamine residues in both F9 and PYS murine teratocarcinoma cell extracts, two of which appear to be unique to PYS cells. Because the family of glycosyltransferases recognizes a large variety of non-reducing terminal monosaccharide residues, this technique, termed enzyme blotting, could be applied to the analysis of any non-reducing terminal monosaccharide. This method could be used to obtain initial information about the carbohydrate structures of a particular glycoprotein without any prior purification steps. This technique may also be potentially useful in elucidating the functional contribution of non-reducing terminal monosaccharide residues in intercellular recognition and adhesion.
Image matching using alpha-entropy measures and entropic graphs

Matching a reference image to a secondary image extracted from a database of transformed exemplars constitutes an important image retrieval task. Two related problems are: specification of a general class of discriminatory image features and an appropriate similarity measure to rank the closeness of the query to the database. In this paper we present a general method based on matching high dimensional image features, using entropic similarity measures that can be empirically estimated using entropic graphs such as the minimal spanning tree (MST). The entropic measures we consider are generalizations of the well-known Kullback Liebler (KL) distance, the mutual information (MI) measure, and the Jensen difference. Our entropic graph approach has the advantage of being implementable for high dimensional feature spaces for which other entropy-based pattern matching methods are computationally difficult. We compare our technique to previous entropy matching methods for a variety of continuous and discrete features sets including: single pixel gray levels: tag sub-image features: and independent component analysis (ICA) features. We illustrate the methodology for multimodal face retrieval and ultrasound (US) breast image registration.
Do Postcard Reminders Improve Influenza Vaccination Compliance? A Prospective Trial of Different Postcard "Cues"

A randomized trial of various postcard reminder "cues" was performed to improve understanding of health-related behavior and to find better strategies for improving influenza vaccination compliance. Data were gathered on 283 high-risk patients (92 per cent response rate) who received: 1) a "neutral" card simply announcing the availability of vaccine; 2) a "Health-Belief-Model" card written to take advantage of the association between certain health beliefs and vaccination behavior; 3) a "personal" card signed by the patient's physician; or 4) no postcard. The highest rate of vaccination occurred among recipients of the Health-Belief-Model postcard (51.5 per cent vs. 20.2 per cent for control, p < 0.001). Linear logistic regression analysis found that age, prior vaccination history and experimental group had a significant effect on likelihood of being vaccinated. After adjusting for age and prior vaccination experience, the vaccination rate was found to be significantly higher for persons receiving the Health-Belief-Model postcard compared with persons receiving no postcard or a neutral postcard. We conclude that reminder postcards emphasizing elements of the health belief model may help increase vaccination rates.
Diagonal Norm Hermitian Matrices.

Abstract If v is a norm on C n, let H(v) denote the set of all norm-Hermitians in C nn. Let S be a subset of the set of real diagonal matrices D. Then there exists a norm v such that S=H(v) (or S = H(v)∩D) if and only if S contains the identity and S is a subspace of D with a basis consisting of rational vectors. As a corollary, it is shown that, for a diagonable matrix h with distinct eigenvalues λ1,…, λr, r⩽n, there is a norm v such that h ∈ H(v), but hs∉H(v), for some integer s, if and only if λ2–λ1,…, λr–λ1 are linearly dependent over the rationals. It is also shown that the set of all norms v, for which H(v) consists of all real multiples of the identity, is an open, dense subset, in a natural metric, of the set of all norms.
Optimal pricing and quantity of products with two offerings

This paper analyzes the decision of a firm offering two versions of a product, a deluxe and a regular. While both products satisfy the same market, the deluxe version is sold at a high price relative to its cost and is aimed at the high end of the demand curve. The regular version is sold at a low price relative to its cost and is targeted to customers at the low end of the demand curve. This two-offering strategy is especially popular with book publishers where a paperback book is introduced some time after the hardbound version is introduced. The time between the introduction of the two versions of the product is accompanied by a downward shift in the demand curve due to customers losing interest in the product or satisfying their demand from a secondary used market. We solve a profit maximization model for a firm using a two-offering strategy. The model is solved for linear and exponential deterioration in demand, which is assumed to be deterministic. Also, a model with linear deterioration in demand, which is assumed to be stochastic, is solved. The results indicate that substantial improvements in profit can be obtained by using the two-offering strategy. Numerical sensitivity analysis and examples are used to illustrate the results.
Marine macroalgal diversity assessment of Saba Bank, Netherlands Antilles.

Background Located in the Dutch Windward Islands, Saba Bank is a flat-topped seamount (20-45 m deep in the shallower regions). The primary goals of the survey were to improve knowledge of biodiversity for one of the world's most significant, but little-known, seamounts and to increase basic data and analyses to promote the development of an improved management plan. Methodology/principal findings Our team of three divers used scuba to collect algal samples to depths of 50 m at 17 dive sites. Over 360 macrophyte specimens (12 putative new species) were collected, more than 1,000 photographs were taken in truly exceptional habitats, and three astonishing new seaweed community types were discovered. These included: (1) "Field of Greens" (N 17 degrees 30.620', W 63 degrees 27.707') dominated by green seaweeds as well as some filamentous reds, (2) "Brown Town" (N 17 degrees 28.027', W 63 degrees 14.944') dominated by large brown algae, and (3) "Seaweed City" (N 17 degrees 26.485', W 63 degrees 16.850') with a diversity of spectacular fleshy red algae. Conclusions/significance Dives to 30 m in the more two-dimensional interior habitats revealed particularly robust specimens of algae typical of shallower seagrass beds, but here in the total absence of any seagrasses (seagrasses generally do not grow below 20 m). Our preliminary estimate of the number of total seaweed species on Saba Bank ranges from a minimum of 150 to 200. Few filamentous and thin sheet forms indicative of stressed or physically disturbed environments were observed. A more precise number still awaits further microscopic and molecular examinations in the laboratory. The expedition, while intensive, has only scratched the surface of this unique submerged seamount/atoll.
Prognostic value of p53 and MIB-1 in transitional cell carcinoma of the urinary bladder with regional lymph node involvement

BACKGROUND The effect of p53 protein expression and MIB-1 proliferative activity on survival and chemotherapeutic response in patients with lymph node (LN)-positive transitional cell carcinoma (TCC) of the urinary bladder remains unclear. The objective of this study was to assess the ability of these markers to predict disease-associated outcomes and response to chemotherapy in a cohort of patients with LN-positive TCC. METHODS The authors examined the expression of p53 and MIB-1 in the LN metastases from 139 patients who underwent cystectomy for TCC at their institution. P53 and MIB-1 nuclear staining were quantified using an image-analysis system. Cox proportional hazards regression models were used to test associations of these markers with death from TCC, distant metastases, and local recurrence for all patients and in the subset of patients who were treated with adjuvant chemotherapy. RESULTS The median p53 and MIB-1 indices were 45.2% and 30.3%, respectively. The median follow-up was 4.5 years (range, 0.1–10 years). There were no statistically significant associations noted between the p53 and MIB-1 indices and the outcomes studied. When the analysis was limited to patients who were treated with adjuvant chemotherapy (n = 37 patients), the p53 index was found to have no prognostic value; however, there was a significant association between MIB-1 and distant metastases (P = 0.049). When disease-specific survival rates were stratified according to p53 index and chemotherapy, patients exhibited a response to chemotherapy regardless of p53 index. CONCLUSIONS p53 and MIB-1 were not found to be associated significantly with disease-related outcomes in patients with LN-positive TCC. Adjuvant chemotherapy appeared to be effective regardless of p53 status. MIB-1 may prove useful in predicting response to chemotherapy. Cancer 2004. © 2004 American Cancer Society.
Depression and social comparison motives

This study examined the role of informational social comparison motives in depressed and nondepressed individuals' opinion comparison activities. In particular. We examined the impact of agreement and disagreement from sources similar or dissimilar to depressed and nondepressed subjects on an attribute related to the focal judgment. AS predicted, depressed compared to nondepressed subjects indicated a greater preference for the similar-disagreer, whereas nondepressed preferred as a partner the dissimilar-agreer to a greater extent than did depressed subjects. Furthermore, measures of validation and construction motives were found to be associated with diflerent partner preferences. Results are discussed in terms of the multiple motivations underlying and distinguishing depressed and nondepressed social comparison activities.
“Until She's Done with You”: The empathy story

This is a Suitor's Fable. A Suitor's Fable contains a task or challenge for the prospective suitor to attempt and master to prove his “suitability” to pursue the hand of the “fair maiden.” My fathe...
High sensitivity and wide-dynamic-range optical receiver for 40 Gbit/s optical communication networks

An optical receiver for 40 Gbit/s communication networks demonstrating very high sensitivity without optical amplification has been developed. The receiver comprises an InP-based pin diode and HBT transimpedance amplifier. The receiver achieves a back-to-back sensitivity of −9 dBm and a high dynamic range of 13 dBm, measured using a pseudorandom binary sequence of 231−1 at a bit error rate of 10−12. These results show the highest sensitivity and widest dynamic range yet reported for 40 Gbit/s optical receivers without optical amplification.
Measurement of modulation of mouse complement levels in vivo, utilizing a microtiter hemolytic assay.

The complement system, with its protein components, plays a fundamental role in host defense as the major immunological mechanism of innate immunity. Effects of immunotoxic agents on serum complement have not been studied due to the lack of an assay capable of measuring thein vivo effects of compounds in the mouse, the species of choice for immunotoxicological testing. A microtiter hemolytic assay was developed and utilized to measure modulation of serum complementin vivo in B6C3F1 mice. In order to validate this functional assay, Cobra Venom Factor (CVF) was used to produce decomplementation. CVF administered intravenously produced a dose-dependent suppression of complement activity when evaluated 24 hours after a single injection. Administration of 25 or more anticomplementary units (ACU/kg) completely abolished functional hemolytic activity. The duration of the effect was dose dependent with 100 ACU/kg suppressing the response for 48 hours. A decomplemented state could be maintained for up to 6 days, with a second injection. A third injection failed to prolong the decomplementation. Elevated complement levels were obtained following a single injection, with Pyran Copolymer. Pyran, a macrophage activator, produce a dose dependent increase in serum complement levels 8 days after administration. The microtiter hemolytic complement assay represents a useful tool capable of evaluating thein vivo effects of agents on serum complement in the mouse.
Control of hepatic differentiation via cellular aggregation in an alginate microenvironment.

Integral to the development of embryonic stem cell therapeutic strategies for hepatic disorders is the iden- tification and establishment of a controllable hepatic differ- entiation strategy. In order to address this issue we have established an alginate microencapsulation approach which provides a means to modulate the differentiation process through changes in key encapsulation parameters. We report that a wide array of hepatocyte specific markers is expressed by cells differentiated during a 23-day period within an alginate bead microenvironment. These include urea and albumin secretion, glycogen storage, and cyto- chrome P450 transcription factor activity. In addition, we demonstrate that cellular aggregation is integral to the control of differentiation within the bead environment and this process is mediated by the E-cadherin protein. The temporal expression of surface E-cadherin and hepa- tocyte functional expression occur concomitantly and both cellularaggregation andalbumin synthesisare blockedinthe presence of anti E-cadherin immunoglobulin. Furthermore, by establishing a compartmental model of differentiation, which incorporates this aggregation phenomenon, we can optimize key encapsulation parameters. Biotechnol. Bioeng. 2007;98: 631-644.
Ethics and breast cancer risk assessment.

Abstract Clinical risk assessment holds great promise for identifying individuals who might benefit from preventive interventions. In the case of breast cancer, statistical models, notably the Gail model, have been developed to assess an individual woman's future risk of developing disease. However, the estimates derived from these models are subject to substantial uncertainty and there is controversy over how to translate risk information into prevention and control measures. In light of these uncertainties, ethical concerns have been raised about appropriate use of these models. The potential benefits of individualized risk assessment must be weighed against current limitations and potential harms. The fact that breast cancer is a significant source of anxiety for many women suggests that the potential harms from misinformation are substantial. This paper concludes that the profound uncertainties surrounding breast cancer risk assessment warrant caution in the use of such models. Breast cancer risk assessment tools occupy a grey area between public health education and individualized clinical attention. When public health officials promise individualized risk information, there is potential for women to place too much importance and trust in these risk estimates. Moreover, use of these models in counseling women about participation in clinical trials should be responsive to the complexity of informed consent.
Isolated bowel segment (model 1): Creation by myoenteropexy

A surgical technique to create an isolated bowel segment (IBS) that is completely free of its mesenteric attachment, and yet preserves the viability of IBS is described. The procedure consists of (1) initial myoenteropexy between the abdominal wall muscle and the IBS, and (2) secondary division of the mesentery of the IBS 6 weeks later when the vascular collaterals have formed at the myoenteropexy. The IBS created by this technique is useful for the studies of bowel physiology and possible elongation of the bowel in the management of the short-bowel syndrome.