cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Studies on the relative binding affinities of chlorhexidine analogs to cation exchange surfaces.

An in vitro model system was employed ot dtermine the relative binding affinities fo a series fo sixteen chlorhexidine analogs to acidic funcitonal groups similar to those which are abundan in the oral cavity. The chlorhexidine analogs displayd a range ofbindign affinities and were dispalced subsequent ot binding from caboxylate and phosphonate substituted resins, although not from sulphnate substituted resins, by divalent cations or by saliva-like divalent cation-rich solutions. The agent were not displaced from such surfaces by monovalent cations there appears to be no correlation between the relative binding affinities fo agents to anionic groups and their previously observed in vitro antiplaque potencies.
Cell biology: a switch for S phase.

DNA replication is a necessary prelude to the division of a eukaryotic cell. Initiation of this process requires a complex script, involving many proteins: details of one of the main acts now emerge. Cyclin-dependent kinases (CDKs) regulate many cellular events including the cell cycle. It is one of these kinases that determines when DNA replication initiates and when a cell divides. Two groups now report the identification of the CDK targets essential to DNA replication as the proteins Sld2 and Sld3. This work was carried out in yeast, but it is likely that a similar system is conserved in the higher eukaryotes. This finding opens a new window on the molecular mechanism of DNA replication and the possible control of cell proliferation as cancer chemotherapy.
Comparing Visual and Statistical Analysis in Single-Case Studies Using Published Studies

Little is known about the extent to which interrupted time series analysis (ITSA) can be applied to short, single-case study designs and whether those applications produce results consistent with visual analysis (VA). This article examines the extent to which ITSA can be applied to single-case study designs and compares the results based on two methods: ITSA and VA, using papers published in the Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis in 2010. The study was made possible by the development of software called UnGraph®, which facilitates the recovery of raw data from the graphs. ITSA was successfully applied to 94% of the examined graphs with the number of observations ranging from 8 to 136. Moderate to high lag-1 autocorrelations (>.50) were found for 46% of the data series. Effect sizes similar to group-level Cohen's d were identified based on the tertile distribution. Effects ranging from 0.00 to 0.99 were classified as small, those ranging from 1.00 to 2.49 as medium, and large effect sizes were defined as 2.50 or greater. Comparison of the conclusions from VA and ITSA had a low level of agreement (Kappa =.14, accounting for the agreement expected by chance). The results demonstrate that ITSA can be broadly implemented in applied behavior analysis research. These two methods should be viewed as complementary and used concurrently.
Endoscopic ultrasound guided fine-needle aspiration cytology of pancreatic carcinoma: a 3-year experience and review of the literature.

BACKGROUND Endoscopic ultrasound-guided fine-needle aspiration biopsy (EUS-FNAB) of small pancreatic lesions that are undetectable by computed tomography has gained wide acceptance for the procurement of cells for diagnostic purposes. However, this technique is not without difficulty. The authors examined the sensitivity, specificity, and positive and negative predictive values (PPV and NPV, respectively) of this technique in the evaluation of patients with pancreatic biliary duct strictures/masses. The authors were interested in reviewing their cases of pancreatic adenocarcinoma of ductal type and finding the sources of their false-negative cases. METHODS A computer search was performed between January 1998 and July 2001. For the last 3 years, a total of 80 cases of suspected ductal adenocarcinoma of the pancreas was identified. Thirty-four patients (42%) underwent a subsequent Whipple procedure or biopsy. Cytologic and histologic correlation was performed in these cases. The rest of the 23 patients (29%) considered to be positive and the 23 patients (29%) considered to be negative underwent no subsequent biopsy and were followed clinically. Cases termed “suspicious” on cytology were considered positive and those termed “atypical cytology” were considered negative in the authors' final calculation. The causes of the false-negative diagnoses were evaluated carefully. RESULTS Of the 34 cases followed with subsequent tissue biopsy or surgery; 12 were confirmed to be positive, 12 were confirmed to be negative, and 10 were considered to be false-negative. Previously identified cytomorphologic features of malignancy were used to review all cases. These features were: loss of the honeycomb pattern (100%), anisonucleosis (100%), nuclear contour irregularity (100%), a high nuclear/cytoplasmic ratio (100%), paranuclear chromatin clearing (77%), and the presence of prominent nucleoli in the absence of inflammatory cells (77%). The causes of the 10 false-negative cases were technical difficulty of procuring material in 6 cases, the nature of the lesion in 2 cases, and the scarcity of lesional tissue in 2 cases. CONCLUSIONS Using strict cytoarchitectural and cytomorphologic criteria of malignancy for ductal pancreatic lesions previously described in the literature, the sensitivity of this technique at the study institution was 78% with a specificity of 100%. The PPV and NPV of this technique were 100% and 78%, respectively. The most common causes of the false-negative results in descending order were the technical aspect of the procedure, the size and nature of the lesion, and the scarcity of lesional tissue. Cancer (Cancer Cytopathol) 2002;96:000–000. © 2002 American Cancer Society. DOI 10.1002/cncr.10759
Analysis of pelvic tumor control and impact on survival in carcinoma of the uterine cervix treated with radiation therapy alone

Abstract A total of 1054 patients with histologically confirmed invasive carcinoma of the uterine cervix were treated with radiation therapy alone between 1959 and 1982. All patients are available for a minimum of 3 years follow-up. Radiation therapy consisted of external irradiation to the whole pelvis (1000–2000 cGy) and parametria (for a total of 4000–6000 cGy) combined with two intracavitary radioactive source insertions (6000–7500 cGy to point A). Patients with Stage IIB, III, and IVA have been consistently treated with somewhat higher doses of external irradiation and intracavitary insertions. A small group of 54 patients with Stage IIB or IIIB had pelvic lymphadenectomy following the irradiation (1960–1964). There was a strong correlation between the tumor regression within 30 days from completion of radiotherapy and the incidence of pelvic recurrences or distant metastases for each of the anatomical stages. The 10-year survival rate for Stage III was 76%, Stage IIA 60%, Stage IIB 145%, and Stage III 25%. Many of the deaths were due to intercurrent disease. Thus, the 10-year tumor-free survival was 80% for Stage IB, 60% for Stages IIA and IIB and 35% for Stage III. In Stage IB total doses of 6000 cGy or higher to point A resulted in 94% pelvic tumor control. In Stage IIA, the pelvic tumor control was 87% with doses of 6000 cGy to point A or higher. However, in Stage IIB the pelvic tumor control was 58% with doses below 6000 cGy, 78% with 6001–7500 cGy and 82% with higher doses. In Stage IIIB the pelvic tumor control was 42% with doses below 6000 cGy, 57% with 6001–7500 cGy and 68% with higher doses. Tumor control in the pelvis was correlated with the following 5 year survivals: Stage IB-95% (353 patients); Stage IIA-84% (116 patients); Stage IIB-84% (308 patients); Stage IIIB-74% (245 patients). The 5-year survival for patients that recurred in the pelvis was 30% for Stage IB, about 15% for Stages IIA-B and only 5% in Stage 111. Patients with tumor control in the pelvis had a significantly lower incidence of distant metastases than patients who initially failed in the pelvis (9.3% vs. 58.6% in Stage IB, 21.6% vs 52.6% in Stage IIA, 19.8% vs 16.7% in Stage IIB, and 31.2% vs 50% in Stage III). In Stage IIB the figures were 19.8% and 16.7% because the initial pelvic recurrence was frequently concurrent with distant metastases. Adequate initial therapy is crucial in determining the probability of pelvic tumor control and survival in patients with invasive carcinoma of the cervix. Salvage procedures for pelvic recurrences, even in the absence of distant metastases, yields a low long-term survival.
The structure of crystalline and membrane-bound gramicidin A by vibrational analysis.

Abstract The results of normal mode calculations on the β4.4, β6.3, ⇅β 5.6 , and ⇅β 7.2 structures of gramicidin A are compared with infrared and Raman spectra of crystalline native, crystalline Cs+-bound, and vesicle-bound gramicidin A. The observed frequencies and frequency splittings are in good agreement with an assignment of ⇅β 5.6 , ⇅β 7.2 , and β6.3 structures, respectively, to the gramicidin A molecules in the above three systems.
Parallel QuadTree encoding of large-scale raster geospatial data on multicore CPUs and GPGPUs

Global remote sensing and large-scale environment modeling have generated vast amounts of raster geospatial images. To gain a better understanding of this data, researchers are interested in performing spatial queries over them, and the computation of those queries' results is greatly facilitated by the existence of spatial indices. Additionally, though there have been major advances in computational power, the I/O transfer is becoming the major bottleneck in the overall system performance. One of the solutions to the I/O channel bandwidth issue is to compress data first and then send it over an I/O channel. Therefore, a compression technique that achieves not only indexing but also compression is highly desirable. The performance of geospatial raster data compression and indexing can benefit from high performance technologies such as General Purpose Graphics Processing Units (GPGPUs) that are increasingly becoming affordable. Our purpose in this article is two-fold: we will first present issues relating to compressing geospatial raster data and popular compression techniques. Afterwards, we will present a parallel implementation of the compression of geospatial raster data using a cache-conscious quadtree data structure. Experiments show that our GPGPU implementation is capable of constructing a BQ-Tree encoding for the 16-bit NASA MODIS geospatial raster of up to 950 MB in less than one second with an Nvidia C2050 GPU card. This performance represents a 3x speedup with respect to our best implementation of the same algorithm on multi-core CPUs with 16 threads, and up to a 12x speedup compared with a multi-core implementation (with 16 threads) of the popular Zlib compression library.
Healthcare for the Ageing of Muslim Populations & Countries of Middle East and North Africa (MENA)

I am very pleased to introduce this Special Issue of The Aging International Journal. This Special Issue has articles covering topics from Europe, Pakistan, United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and other aspects of aging in Middle East. This Special Issue consists of papers that address topics from different perspectives of interest to healthcare policy makers, academic researchers and practitioners. The Special Issue was posted and advertised on a national and international scale All of the papers for these special issues were subjected to blind, peer review and the authors revised the manuscripts in accordance with the Guest Editor’s and reviewers’ comments. I trust that the reader will find the papers in this Special Issue to be both interesting and provocative, and that they will provoke further research, case studies and demonstrations in the field of Public Health. This issue would never have been possible without the support and patience I received from Professor Sue Levkov at Harvard Medical School and Professor Hongtu Chen at Partners HealthCare, Boston, MA. I gratefully acknowledge valuable guidance and feedback provided by the Ad-Hoc Editorial Board. The completion of this Special Issue would not have been possible without the many hours contributed by all of the anonymous reviewers who dedicated their time and expertise to helping make this Special Issue a reality.
On the vanishing and stability of the gradient of weak solutions of certain quasilinear parabolic equations

Abstract We study the vanishing and stability of the spatial gradient of solutions to the quasilinear equation u t + λ div ( | ∇ Δ u | p - 2 ∇ Δ u ) - γ div ( ∇ ϕ ( u ) ) = 0 under suitable initial data on bounded domains with prescribed boundary conditions and in R n .
Rhodiola rosea versus sertraline for major depressive disorder: A randomized placebo-controlled trial

Abstract Background: We performed a proof of concept trial to evaluate relative safety and efficacy of Rhodiola rosea (R. rosea) versus sertraline for mild to moderate major depressive disorder. Hypothesis: We hypothesize that R. rosea would have similar therapeutic effects as sertraline but with less adverse events. Study design: Phase II randomized placebo controlled clinical trial. Methods: 57 subjects were randomized to 12 weeks of standardized R. rosea extract, sertraline, or placebo. Changes over time in Hamilton Depression Rating (HAM-D), Beck Depression Inventory (BDI), and Clinical Global Impression Change (CGI/C) scores among groups were examined using mixed-effects models. Results: Modest, albeit statistically non-significant, reductions were observed for HAM-D, BDI, and CGI/C scores for all treatment conditions with no significant difference between groups (p = 0.79, p = 0.28, and p = 0.17, respectively). The decline in HAM-D scores was greater for sertraline (−8.2, 95% confidence interval [CI], −12.7 to −3.6) versus R. rosea (−5.1, 95% CI: −8.8 to −1.3) and placebo (−4.6, 95% CI: −8.6 to −0.6). While the odds of improving (versus placebo) were greater for sertraline (1.90 [0.44–8.20]; odds ratio [95% CI]) than R. rosea (1.39 [0.38–5.04]), more subjects on sertraline reported adverse events (63.2%) than R. rosea (30.0%) or placebo (16.7%) (p = 0.012). Conclusions: Although R. rosea produced less antidepressant effect versus sertraline, it also resulted in significantly fewer adverse events and was better tolerated. These findings suggest that R. rosea, although less effective than sertraline, may possess a more favorable risk to benefit ratio for individuals with mild to moderate depression.
Two Separate Sites Compete for Singlet Oxygen in the Photodynamic Modification of HCN Channels

Molecule oxygen has three electronic configurations, the triplet ground state, the first and the second singlet excited states. Singlet oxygen (1O2) is highly reactive and oxidizes a wide range of biomolecules including DNA and protein. Because of the short life time in microseconds and the short working distance in nanometers, 1O2 eliminates the function of specific protein molecules at high temporal and spatial precisions and thus holds the potential as an effective photonics tool to probe protein dynamics. Recently we discovered that HCN channels are sensitive to the modification by the singlet oxygen (1O2) generated through photosensitization processes. 1O2 modification slows down the channel deactivation and enhances the expression of the voltage-insensitive instantaneous current (Iins). A histidine residue located in the pore of the HCN channel, H434, was found to be critical. The alanine replacement mutation, H434A, abolished the above effects so that 1O2 modification does not prolong the channel deactivation nor enhance the Iins. However, the reduction in Ih amplitude in H434A mutant channel becomes more significant than that in WT channel. After five short laser pulses, the amplitude of the Ih current was reduced to 76.9 ± 1.7 % of the control level in the WT channel but to 43.4 ± 2.4 % in the H434A mutant channel. This result suggests that H434 is the major target of 1O2 modification and consumes the majority of the 1O2 generated through the photosensitization process. In the H434A mutant channel, other parts of the channel reacts with the 1O2 that becomes transiently more abundant and the modification leads to the reduction in Ih amplitude. Possibly, 1O2 modification of protein molecules is not a process of random modifications but distinctly targets certain conformational and functional states.
Autoimmune hepatitis: Classification, heterogeneity, and treatment

Abstract Autoimmune hepatitis, a chronic necroinflammatory disorder of unknown etiology, is characterized by immunologic and autoimmunologic features. It is more prevalent in women than in men, and genetic factors appear to play a major role in the disease. The classification of autoimmune hepatitis is based on circulating autoantibody status; however, heterogeneity is distinguished not only by autoantibodies, but by histologic differences, a variety of clinical features, immunogenetic status, and probably pathogenesis. Presentation extends from the asymptomatic to the severely ill patient. Although patients may present with or without evidence of circulating autoantibodies, hyperglobulinemia is a rather consistent laboratory feature. Because the disease is generally steroid-responsive, therapeutic remission rates of 60–80% have been achieved with prednisone or a combination of prednisone and azathioprine, and many patients can be maintained with these drugs alone or in combination. There are no firm guidelines for decisions regarding withdrawal or reduction of medication. When treatment failures occur, orthotopic liver transplantation may be required.
Facile synthesis of chain-end functionalized glycopolymers for site-specific bioconjugation.

A series of derivatized arylamine initiators were used to generate chain-end functionalized glycopolymers by cyanoxyl-mediated free-radical polymerization. Significant features of this strategy include the capacity to produce polymers of low polydispersity (PDI < 1.5) under aqueous conditions using unprotected monomers bearing a wide range of functional groups. In addition, the presence of a phenyl ring simplifies calculation of polymer saccharide content and molar mass by 1H NMR. It is particularly noteworthy, however, that derivatized arylamine initiators in conjunction with the presence of a terminal cyanate group provide a convenient approach for synthesizing polymers with a variety of distinct functional groups at α and ω chain ends. In the process, the capacity to label glycopolymers or otherwise conjugate them to proteins or other molecules is greatly enhanced.
Recurrence spectroscopy of atoms in electric fields: Scattering in the presence of bifurcations

Closed-orbit theory gives a semiclassical formula for the photoabsorption oscillator strength density of atoms in external fields. The oscillator strength can be calculated from the properties of the classical orbits of the highly excited electron moving in the combined Coulomb and electric field. The deviation from the Coulomb potential due to an alkali-metal atom core causes scattering between the classical orbits when a closed orbit returns to the origin. Bifurcations of closed orbits happen when a focus moves through the origin and we present a theory that describes the scattering of the electron waves by the alkali-metal core for atoms in external electric fields in the presence of a bifurcation. @S1050-2947~98!03211-9# Highly excited electronic state atoms in external fields have become good testing grounds for the connection between quantum and semiclassical mechanics. They are amenable to both theoretical calculations and experimental measurement @1‐5#. Closed-orbit theory is a semiclassical theory which predicts the positions and amplitudes of peaks in the Fourier transform of the photoabsorption spectrum: The peaks are at the periods of classical orbits that go out and return to the nucleus; the amplitude depends on the divergence rate of the neighbors of the orbits @6,7#. Closed-orbit theory was developed for hydrogen in a magnetic field by Du and Delos @7#. It was applied to alkali-metal atoms in an electric field by Gao and Delos @8#. The general picture of closed-orbit theory, in which waves excited by the laser go out and are turned around in the external fields, was simple. There were, however, the usual problems that occur in any primitive semiclassical formula. The semiclassical approximation for the returning wave near the core could, and would, become infinite as a focus or caustic passed through the origin. These failures occur at the bifurcation energies where closed orbits are created or destroyed as the parameters controlling the classical dynamics vary @9‐12#. Uniform approximations to semiclassical wave functions which repair these failures have been developed in the chemical physics and mathematical literature @13‐15# and have become better known in atomic physics @16‐19#. The nonhydrogenic core of an alkali-metal atom can be treated semiclassically by either propagating trajectories through a model core potential @20# or by a scattering expansion in terms of hydrogenic closed orbits that are coupled together by the core @21#. The closed-orbit approach in Ref. @21# works well for highly excited states where the effective size of \ is small and one can partially avoid the neighborhood of bifurcations. It is an open question how to apply this theory near a bifurcation. We present a closed-orbit theory for scattering in alkali-metal atoms in the presence of bifurcations that occur in static electric fields. The theory can be generalized to handle other types of bifurcations in other static fields.
Using permutations in regenerative simulations to reduce variance

We propose a new estimator for a large class of performance measures obtained from a regenerative simulation of a system having two distinct sequences of regeneration times. To construct our new estimator, we first generate a sample path of a fixed number of cycles based on one sequence of regeneration times, divide the path into segments based on the second sequence of regeneration times, permute the segments, and calculate the performance on the new path using the first sequence of regeneration times. We average over all possible permutations to construct the new estimator. This strictly reduces variance when the original estimator is not simply an additive functional of the sample path. To use the new estimator in practice, the extra computational effort is not large since all permutations do not actually have to be computed as we derive explicit formulas for our new estimators. We examine the small-sample behavior of our estimators. In particular, we prove that for any fixed number of cycles from the first regenerative sequence, our new estimator has smaller mean squared error than the standard estimator. We show explicitly that our method can be used to derive new estimators for the expected cumulative reward until a certain set of states is hit and the time-average variance parameter of a regenerative simulation.
Greene’s residue criterion for the breakup of invariant tori of volume-preserving maps

Abstract Invariant tori play a fundamental role in the dynamics of symplectic and volume-preserving maps. Codimension-one tori are particularly important as they form barriers to transport. Such tori foliate the phase space of integrable, volume-preserving maps with one action and d angles. For the area-preserving case, Greene’s residue criterion is often used to predict the destruction of tori from the properties of nearby periodic orbits. Even though KAM theory applies to the three-dimensional case, the robustness of tori in such systems is still poorly understood. We study a three-dimensional, reversible, volume-preserving analogue of Chirikov’s standard map with one action and two angles. We investigate the preservation and destruction of tori under perturbation by computing the “residue” of nearby periodic orbits. We find tori with Diophantine rotation vectors in the “spiral mean” cubic algebraic field. The residue is used to generate the critical function of the map and find a candidate for the most robust torus.
ECOLOGY AND DEVELOPMENTAL MORPHOLOGY OF MALE PLANTS OF CHONDRUS CRISPUS (GIGARTINALES, RHODOPHYTA)1

The ecology and developmental morphology of the male plants of Chondrus crispus Stackhouse from New England and the Canadian Maritime Provinces are described. The period of maturation and release of spermatia varies spatially; however, the peak discharge generally occurs over a broad period during the summer or fall. Male plants may exhibit comparable abundances to female plants, particularly during periods of maximum spermatial discharge. At maturity, the spermatangial sorus appears as a pink band on dark red terminal branchlets; following spermatial discharge, the sorus becomes white in color. The developmental morphology of spermatia is described from electron microscopic observations.
Effects of methotrexate on established cell lines of human choriocarcinoma.

Abstract Cell lines of human choriocarcinoma (BeWo and Jar lines) were incubated in vitro for up to 7 days with 0·10, 10 , or 1000 μM methotrexate (MTX). The cell population did not change significantly for up to 6 days after daily addition of 0·10 to 1000 μM MTX to the culture medium, that was also changed each day. During the same time period the cell population quadrupled in untreated control flasks. The drug caused an increase in amount of protein per cell and in the protein: DNA ratio. Incubation for 5 hr with MTX at concentrations of 0·10 and 10 μM resulted in 83 and 93% inhibition, respectively, of deoxyuridine- 6 - 3 H incorporation into DNA. After 3 days of incubation with either 0·10 or 10 μM MTX, no incorporation of labeled deoxyuridine into DNA was observed. Incubation in the presence of the antifolate resulted in a rapid dose-dependent compensatory increase in incorporation of thymidine- 2 - 14 C into DNA, rising to 135 and 197% of untreated control levels after 24 hr of incubation with 0·10 and 10 μM MTX, respectively. At later times a decrease occurred in absolute rate of thymidine incorporation into DNA, but not in the relative rate compared to untreated cells of the same age. MTX did not significantly alter the incorporation of leucine- 3 H or uridine- 3 H into the trichloroacetic acid precipitate, nor of glucose- 3 H into DNA, RNA, protein, or lipid in the trophoblastic cells. Omission of serum from the daily medium did not change the above results. Unsuccessful attempts were made to subculture cells previously incubated with concentrations of 0·10 μM MTX or greater, although successful subculturing was possible in the presence of 0·01 μM MTX. The deleterious effects of MTX observed in both the BeWo and Jar cell lines were consistent with the suggestion that the major effect of the drug is to inhibit dihydrofolate reductase.
Modern Muslim identities: Negotiating religion and ethnicity in Malaysia

Malay and Muslim identity politics and the Malaysian nation-state have been the focus of much recent literature. Most contemporary anthropologists have used poststructural, postmodern, and symbolic...
Partition density functional theory and its extension to the spin-polarized case

Partition density functional theory (PDFT) [P. Elliott, K. Burke, M.H. Cohen, and A. Wasserman, Phys. Rev. A 82 (2), 024501 (2010)] is a formally exact method for obtaining molecular properties from Kohn–Sham calculations on isolated fragments. Here, we express the partition energy of PDFT as an implicit functional of the molecular spin-densities for a given choice of fragmentation, and use the principle of von Barth and Hedin to formulate the spin-decomposed version of PDFT. We introduce a partition energy functional of the spin-up and spin-down electronic densities and derive the associated polarized partition potentials, which are found to be global quantities that influence every fragment in the molecule. Along with the formal theory, we propose a simplified approach to computing the spin-partition potentials, and illustrate its utility and accuracy with two simple examples. Finally, we propose a viable approach to including external electric and magnetic fields in the framework of spin-PDFT.
Overwintering of the Pathogen Entomophthora floridana and its Host, the Twospotted Spider Mite

Tetranychus urticae Koch was found on feral host plants during the winter months. Individual mites collected in January with the physical appearance of being in diapause laid eggs immediately when placed on excised lima bean leaves at 27°C and 16-h photoperiod. A pathogenic1 fungus, Entomophthora floridana Weiser and Muma, was found in a viable state throughout the winter. Laboratory studies indicated that the fungus can maintain itself at low winter temperatures common to eastern North Carolina. Infection of twospotted spider mites and fungal development, although significantly reduced from that measured at higher temperatures, occurred at 5°C.
The debt laffer curve: Some estimates

Abstract The existence of a Debt Laffer Curve has been used as an argument that it is in the creditors' collective interest to forgive some of the external debt of a heavily indebted country. The creditors would stand to gain from unilaterally reducing the debt when the debtor country is on the wrong side of the Debt Laffer curve. The side of the Debt Laffer Curve on which the debtor is also plays a crucial role in determining the benefits of market-based debt reductions schemes (such as buybacks and exit-bonds) for creditors and debtor. This paper presents some estimates, using secondary market prices of commercial bank debt, of the Debt Laffer curves for the highly indebted and sub-Saharan African countries. The empirical evidence suggests that only a few indebted countries are on the wrong side of their Debt Laffer curve.
Slow light in semiconductor quantum wells and quantum dots

Slow light using quantum-well and quantum-dot semiconductor optical amplifiers at room temperature is presented. Theory and experiment with excellent agreement will be discussed.
Declining memberships, changing members? European political party members in a new era

In recent years, membership in established political parties has been shrinking, but at the same time members of some parties have received increased powers to help select candidates, leaders and party policies. These twin trends make it important to re-examine who is joining today’s smaller parties. As parties shrink, do they attract a changed mixture of members, possibly with different political priorities? Using data from two sets of European surveys, our study investigates this question to study longitudinal change in party membership. The data show a growing gap between the age of party members and the general population. In most other respects, however, party members seem to be becoming more, not less, like their fellow citizens. This suggests that today’s smaller but more powerful memberships still have the potential to help link their parties to a wider electoral base.
Gpa2p, a G-protein α-Subunit, Regulates Growth and Pseudohyphal Development in Saccharomyces cerevisiae via a cAMP-dependent Mechanism

Abstract The small GTP-binding protein Ras and heterotrimeric G-proteins are key regulators of growth and development in eukaryotic cells. In mammalian cells, Ras functions to regulate the mitogen-activated protein kinase pathway in response to growth factors, whereas many heterotrimeric GTP-binding protein α-subunits modulate cAMP levels through adenylyl cyclase as a consequence of hormonal action. In contrast, in the yeastSaccharomyces cerevisiae, it is the Ras1 and Ras2 proteins that regulate adenylyl cyclase. Of the two yeast G-protein α-subunits (GPA1 and GPA2), only GPA1 has been well studied and shown to negatively regulate the mitogen-activated protein kinase pathway upon pheromone stimulation. In this report, we show that deletion of the GPA2 gene encoding the other yeast G-protein α-subunit leads to a defect in pseudohyphal development. Also, the GPA2 gene is indispensable for normal growth in the absence of Ras2p. Both of these phenotypes can be rescued by deletion of the PDE2 gene product, which inactivates cAMP by cleavage, suggesting that these phenotypes can be attributed to low levels of intracellular cAMP. In support of this notion, addition of exogenous cAMP to the growth media was also sufficient to rescue the phenotype of a GPA2deletion strain. Taken together, our results directly demonstrate that a G-protein α-subunit can regulate the growth and pseudohyphal development of S. cerevisiae via a cAMP-dependent mechanism. Heterologous expression of mammalian G-protein α-subunits in these yeast GPA2deletion strains could provide a valuable tool for the mutational analysis of mammalian G-protein function in an in vivo null setting.
Salivary endoscopy in a pediatric patient with HLA-B27 seropositivity and recurrent submandibular sialadenitis

Patients with human leukocyte antigen (HLA)-B27 seropositivity have a genetic predisposition to form spondyloarthropathies, especially ankylosing spondylitis. Other related inflammatory or autoimmune disorders include reactive arthritis, uveitis, psoriatic arthritis, and Crohn's disease. Although juvenile recurrent parotitis is not uncommon, recurrent submandibular sialadenitis is rare in pediatric patients. Sialadenitis is typically caused by salivary stones, infection, or duct stricture. To our knowledge, there has not been report of HLA-B27 positivity and recurrent sialadenitis described previously. We describe a patient with HLA-B27 seropositivity and multiple episodes of left submandibular sialadenitis who underwent diagnostic and therapeutic sialendoscopy. Previous treatment included antibiotics, sialogogues, warm compresses, and hydration before he underwent definitive sialendoscopy treatment at a tertiary care medical center. Salivary endoscopy showed salivary stasis and sludging within the left submandibular gland duct, with no salivary stones. Topical steroid was applied to the duct. At one year following his surgery, he has not had any recurrent episodes of sialadenitis. HLA-B27 seropositivity is associated with many inflammatory disorders; we report a case in which the patient had coexisting recurrent sialadenitis. In the pediatric population, sialadenitis is traditionally managed with antibiotics and supportive care, however our patient underwent salivary endoscopy. Sialendoscopy is an emerging modality that potentially avoids radiation exposure from CT or sialography and should be considered as another preferred treatment option. More investigation is required to prove a possible correlation between existing HLA-B27 and the propensity to develop this clinical problem.
Spectral solutions of the Yang–Baxter matrix equation

Abstract Let A be an arbitrary square matrix. We find a collection of solutions of the matrix equation of A X A = X A X in terms of the spectral projectors.
Calculation of AGARD Wing 445.6 Flutter Using Navier-Stokes Aerodynamics

The flutter characteristics of the first AGARD standard aeroelastic configuration for dynamic response, Wing 445.6, are studied using an unsteady Navier-Stokes algorithm in order to investigate a previously noted discrepancy between Euler flutter characteristics and the experimental data. The algorithm, which is a three-dimensional, implicit, upwind Euler/Navier-Stokes code (CFL3D Version 2.1), was previously modified for the time-marching, aeroelastic analysis of wings using the unsteady Euler equations. These modifications include the incorporation of a deforming mesh algorithm and the addition of the structural equations of motion for their simultaneous time integration with the governing flow equations. In this paper, the aeroelastic method is extended and evaluated for applications that use the Navier-Stokes aerodynamics. The paper presents a brief description of the aeroelastic method and presents unsteady calculations which verify this method for Navier-Stokes calculations. A linear stability analysis and a time-marching aeroelastic analysis are used to determine the flutter characteristics of the isolated 45° swept-back wing. Effects of fluid viscosity, structural damping, and number of modes in the structural model are investigated. For the linear stability analysis, the unsteady generalized aerodynamic forces of the wing are computed for a range of reduced frequencies using the pulse transfer-function approach. The flutter characteristics of the wing are determined using these unsteady generalized aerodynamic forces in a traditional V-g analysis. This stability analysis is used to determine the flutter characteristics of the wing at free-stream Mach numbers of 0.96 and 1.141 using the generalized aerodynamic forces generated by solving the Euler equations and the Navier-Stokes equations. Time-marching aeroelastic calculations are performed at a free-stream Mach number of 1.141 using the Euler and Navier-Stokes equations to compare with the linear V-g flutter analysis method. The V-g analysis, which is used in conjunction with the time-marching analysis, indicates that the fluid viscosity has a significant effect on the supersonic flutter boundary for this wing while the structural damping and number of modes in the structural model have a lesser effect.
Optimization Model of Electricity Production in Iron and Steel Enterprises and its Application

On the base of the analysis of the electricity production and consumption characteristics of iron and steel enterprises, this paper has established a optimization model of electricity production in iron and steel enterprises which comprehensive considered the electricity, gas, and steam. It can do joint optimization scheduling from electricity production and outsourcing, gas distribution, and steam production three sides, so that it can provide a reasonable electricity production and outsourcing strategy for iron and steel enterprises to reduce the system operation costs. Where, the optimized allocation of surplus gas and steam production scheduling is the means, the optimization scheduling of electricity production and outsourcing is ultimate goal.
Cinnamic acid-carbohydrate esters: an evaluation of a model system

Chemical esterification of cinnamic acids to cell walls has been proposed to simulate the negative effect of these acids on fibre digestion by ruminants. In this model a spontaneous reaction between an acid chloride and a free hydroxyl group forms an ester linkage between p-coumaric acid (PCA), for example, and cell wall carbohydrates. This study was conducted to evaluate that system. Esterification of p-coumaric acid (PCA) to switchgrass (Panicum virgatum L) neutral detergent fibre (NDF) significantly (P <0·05) increased PCA concentration 12·3 to 32·7 mg g−1 NDF and reduced (P <0·05) NDF digestibility from 385·4 to 244·4 mg g−1 NDF. Treated NDF (0, 50, 100 mg PCA g−1 NDF) was sieved through screens with diminishing mesh size in order to isolate fractions with increasing surface area per unit mass. Measured PCA concentration was 50% greater in PCA-treated fractions isolated by 0.11-mm mesh than in fractions isolated by 0·50-mm mesh, suggesting that esterification of PCA occurred predominantly at the surface of the particle. In addition, at the highest level of PCA treatment, digestibility of the fraction isolated from the smallest mesh sieves was 17% greater than that of the material from the largest mesh sieve. The predominant placement of PCA on the particle surface constitutes a major limitation of this technique. Other serious limitations include the potential for polymerisation of cinnamic acids with free hydroxyl groups prior to esterification to fibre, and the non-specific placement of the ester linkages on the fibre. All three factors cause the model fibre to depart substantially from the characteristics of plant cell wall.
Measurements of frequency fluctuations in aluminum nitride contour-mode resonators

As part of the current drive to engineer miniaturized monolithic high-performance microelectromechanicalenabled oscillators, there is a need for further study of frequency fluctuations in microelectromechanical resonators. To this end, we present the measurement of frequency fluctuations for 128 aluminum nitride contour-mode resonators. The measurements show that fluctuations are sufficiently large to play an important role in oscillator performance. These results were obtained for the first time from vector network analyzer measurements and are accompanied by an analysis of the experimental setup.
Talisman or taboo: the controversy of the suicide-prevention contract.

The suicide-prevention contract is a widely used but overvalued clinical and risk-management technique. The scant information on this topic in the psychiatric and mental health literature is review...
Proton radiography and accurate density measurements: A window into shock wave processes

Direct density measurements were made from shock-loaded aluminum and copper samples by combining plate-impact experiments with proton radiography at the Los Alamos Neutron Science Center. Flyer plates were accelerated using a 40 mm bore powder gun to create a shock wave in a sample. The sample material was then interrogated in real time using the proton radiography facility. The increase in density behind the shock front causes a measurable change in the transmission of protons through the sample, which can then be quantified as a density value in the material. Hugoniot values were calculated using more traditional techniques to evaluate the accuracy of the radiographically obtained density measurements.
Large contribution of organic aerosols to cloud-condensation-nuclei concentrations

THE albedo and radiative properties of marine stratus clouds are determined largely by the number density of cloud condensation nuclei (CCN) over the oceans. Modelling studies have suggested that most of these nuclei are sulphate aerosols derived from both anthropogenic and natural sources1. Here we present evidence that organic aerosols also play a key role in cloud nucleation. We determine the relative contributions of sulphate and organic aerosols to CCN concentrations at a marine site known to be influenced by anthropogenic emissions, and find that organic aerosols account for the major part of both the total aerosol number concentration and the CCN fraction. Thus, in regions that are affected by anthropogenic pollutants, organic aerosols may play at least as important a role as sulphate aerosols in determining the climate effect of clouds.
Hierarchical Route Planner

A two-level hierarchical route planner has been developed. The data input to the system is a cross-country mobility map. For a given vehicle type, this map specifies regions which are "GO" or "NO-GO." A line-thinning algorithm is used to generate a skeleton of the "GO" areas. This skeleton is then converted into a graph-theoretic structure. A first-level route planner using elevation-grid data is used to compute the traversal time of each arc of the graph. These traversal times become the weights used by the second level route planner. This route planner is an A* algorithm that is used to search for a specified number of non-competing routes, i.e., routes that have no arc-segments in common. Thus, the first level route planner does detailed planning over a small area but is subject to combinatorial explosion when a search over a wider area is required. The second level graph-search algorithm provides the capability to efficiently plan a route over a larger area but without detail about the precise path followed. This system was implemented in Common Lisp on a Lisp machine. The software has also been integrated into a workstation that was developed to provide support to Army robotic vehicle research. The workstation provides support for comparing the capabilities of alternative route finding algorithms.
Diversity in academic medicine no. 4 Northeast Consortium: innovation in minority faculty development.

In fiscal year 2006, the US Government abruptly and drastically reduced its funding for programs to increase the racial and ethnic diversity of academic medicine, including programs to increase the development of minority medical faculty. Anticipating this reduction, 4 such programs—the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Mount Sinai School of Medicine, University of Medicine and Dentistry in New Jersey–New Jersey Medical School, and University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine—decided to pool their resources, forming the Northeast Consortium of Minority Faculty Development. An innovation in minority faculty development, the Northeast Consortium of Minority Faculty Development has succeeded in exposing faculty trainees to research and teaching that they might not have considered otherwise, expanding the number and diversity of their mentors and role models, providing them potential access to larger and different populations and databases for purposes of research, and expanding their peer contacts. After introducing the Northeast Consortium of Minority Faculty Development, this article describes the origins and goals of each member program. Mt Sinai J Med 75:517–522, © 2008 Mount Sinai School of Medicine
Meteorological Satellites-The Very Early Years Prior to Launch of TIROS-1.

The meteorological satellite program began in the United States as the result of the actions taken by a very small but dedicated group of people from the late 1940s to 1960. This paper provides firsthand accounts by two of these dedicated individuals. Their remarks provide an insight into the trials and tribulations they and the program encountered during these very early years. Those now active in the program, many of whom do not recall this time, might appreciate the effort of these pioneers and the legacy they left for us.
Use of a screw-syringe injector for cement delivery during kyphoplasty: technical report.

Objective Percutaneous kyphoplasty is postulated to have several advantages over percutaneous vertebroplasty for the treatment of vertebral compression fractures and is gaining increased popularity. However, cement delivery with the KyphX kit (Kyphon, Inc., Santa Clara, CA), the only commercially available device for percutaneous kyphoplasty, is relatively problematic. This kit uses a series of "bone filler device" (BFD) tubes. Each BFD must be loaded manually with cement, which is then injected into the kyphoplasty cavity by manually depressing an inner stylet. The high profile of the BFD cannulas and their stylets requires frequent repositioning of the image intensifier tube and table. Because each accommodates only a small volume, the BFDs must be exchanged frequently. This delivery method also places the operator's hands directly in the field of radiation. We sought to overcome these limitations. Methods Dissatisfied with the shortcomings of the BFDs, we substituted the EZflow screw-syringe injector (Parallax Medical, Mountain View, CA) we use to deliver cement during conventional percutaneous vertebroplasty. This amalgam of the KyphX kit and the screw-syringe injector has been used for kyphoplasty treatment of 26 thoracolumbar compression fractures in 17 patients. Results The screw-syringe injector allows controlled volumetric delivery of large boluses of high-viscosity cement without having to refill the reservoir. It minimizes radiation exposure and does not require repositioning of the x-ray tubes. It may theoretically allow decompression should cement extrusion occur. Also, it delivers cement to the interstices of bony trabeculae outside the kyphoplasty cavity, thus combining the mechanical benefits of percutaneous kyphoplasty and percutaneous vertebroplasty. Conclusion The use of a screw-syringe injector has several merits over the customary means of cement delivery during kyphoplasty.
Compressed Sensing Techniques for Image Reconstruction in Optical Interferometry

We develop a novel method of image reconstruction from bispectrum and magnitude observables of an optical interferometer using Compressed-Sensing techniques.We validate our method in simulation and with actual measurements from a Fizeau interferometer.