cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Pets' Roles in Parents' Bereavement

ABSTRACTA sample of 43 mothers and 21 fathers completed a retrospective survey concerning a pet's involvement in adaptation to a child's death. Measures included degree of attachment to the pet, and perceptions of the pet's helpfulness and roles in the process of grief resolution. Most parents (75%) indicated that their pet was helpful. Positive pet roles—a distraction, a comfort, a confidant—were positively correlated with degree of attachment to pet. Negative pet roles—a burden, a scapegoat—were negatively correlated with pet attachment. However, the presence of surviving siblings was negatively correlated with judgments of pet helpfulness, social support roles, and pet bonding itself.
Efficient transduction of early passage human melanoma to secrete IL-4

Abstract Augmentation of tumor immunogenicity has been increasingly studied as a strategy to develop host immunity against established malignancies. Genetic modification of tumors to secrete immunoregulatory peptides such as IL-4 has been demonstrated to augment tumor immunogenicity and enhance the induction of tumor reactive lymphoid cells in animal models. To explore the ability of IL-4 to augment the immunogenicity of melanoma cells, we constructed a recombinant retrovirus vector encoding for human IL-4 and used it to transduce human melanomas. After optimizing retrovirus transduction conditions using a reporter virus, an IL-4 encoding retrovirus vector was used to transduce early and late passage melanoma cells. IL-4 production rates of up to 2000 pg/ml per 24 h per 106 cells were achieved, and provirus could be detected by Southern blot of the transduced cells at 0.1 copies per cell. The IL-4 produced by the melanoma cells was biologically active. Irradiated transduced melanoma cells continued to produce IL-4 for at least two weeks of observation. Thus melanoma cells can be efficiently modified to secrete biologically active IL-4, and may be suitable substrates for autologous tumor cell vaccines.
Blood supply and vascular reactivity of the spinal cord under normal and pathological conditions.

The authors present a review of spinal cord blood supply, discussing the anatomy of the vascular system and physiological aspects of blood flow regulation in normal and injured spinal cords. Unique anatomical functional properties of vessels and blood supply determine the susceptibility of the spinal cord to damage, especially ischemia. Spinal cord injury (SCI), for example, complicating thoracoabdominal aortic aneurysm repair is associated with ischemic trauma. The rate of this devastating complication has been decreased significantly by instituting physiological methods of protection. Traumatic SCI causes complex changes in spinal cord blood flow, which are closely related to the severity of injury. Manipulating physiological parameters such as mean arterial blood pressure and intrathecal pressure may be beneficial for patients with an SCI. Studying the physiopathological processes of the spinal cord under vascular compromise remains challenging because of its central role in almost all of the body's he...
Dopamine prevents lipid peroxidation-induced accumulation of toxic α-synuclein oligomers by preserving autophagy-lysosomal function.

The formation of Lewy bodies containing α-synuclein (α-syn), prominent loss of dopaminergic neurons and dopamine (DA) deficiency in substantia nigra and striatum are histopathological and biochemical hallmarks of Parkinson’s disease (PD). Multiple lines of evidence have indicated that a critical pathogenic factor causing PD is enhanced production of reactive oxygen species(ROS), which reacts readily with polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) to cause lipid peroxidation (LPO). LPO products have been shown to facilitate assembly of toxic α-syn oligomers in in vitro studies. Since DA is prone to autoxidation and cause ROS, it has been suggested that interactions among DA, LPO and α-syn play an important role in neuronal loss in PD. However, the exact mechanism(s) remains unclear. We addressed this issue using a neuronal cell model (referred to as 3D5/DAT) which inducibly expresses human wild-type α-syn by the tetracycline off (TetOff) mechanism and stably expresses high levels of dopamine transporter. Under retinoic acid elicited neuronal differentiation, cells with or without overexpressing α-syn and with or without exposure to LPO inducer--arachidonic acid (AA), plus 0 to 500 µM of DA were assessed for the levels of LPO, α-syn accumulation, cell viability and autophagy. AA exposure elicited similar LPO levels in cells with and without α-syn overexpression, but significantly enhanced the accumulation of α-syn oligomers and monomers only in cultures with TetOff induction and decreased cell survival in a LPO-dependent manner. Surprisingly, DA at low concentrations ( 100 µM), DA exposure enhanced the toxic effects of AA. To our knowledge, this is the first report showing biphasic effects of DA on neuronal survival and α-syn accumulation.
Detecting hand-palm orientation and hand shapes for sign language gesture recognition using 3D images

Automatic gesture recognition, specifically for the purpose of understanding sign language, can be an important aid in communicating with the deaf and hard-of-hearing. Recognition of sign languages requires understanding of various linguistic components such as palm orientation, hand shape, hand location and facial expression. We propose a method and system to estimate the palm orientation and the hand shape of a signer. Our system uses Microsoft Kinect to capture color and the depth images of a signer. It analyzes the depth data corresponding to the hand point region and fits plane to this data and defines the normal to this plane as the orientation of the palm. Then it uses 3-D shape context to determine the hand shape by comparing it to example shapes in the database. Palm orientation of the hand was found to be correct in varying poses. The shape context method for hand shape classification was found to identify 20 test hand shapes correctly and 10 shapes were matched to other but very similar shapes.
Growth of non-pigmented ciliary epithelial cells in serum-free hormone-supplemented media

Bovine non-pigmented ciliary epithelial (NPE) cells are cultured following a dissecting procedure that preserves the original cellular polarity. Cell growth of primary cultures of NPE cells is supported by hormonally defined serum-free culture media and an artificial substrate with high binding affinity to attach cells in culture. Cell proliferation of primary cultures of bovine NPE cells was limited to 3–5 weeks. Nerve growth factor (NGF) was found to have a profound effect on the cellular junctions of growing NPE cells when added to the culture media. Nerve growth factor induced the formation abundant microfilament bundles associated with junctional complexes of undetermined nature between adjacent cells. Electron microscopy of NPE in culture shows a high intracellular transport activity with abundant coated pits and clathrin-coated vesicles, a complex network of microfilaments, microtubules and intermediate filaments associated with desmosomes.
Accounting Error as a Factor in Business History

The questions and issues that arise in thinking about the role played by accounting in business history are complex. While accounting policies and practices have economic consequences, they also are a product of decisions made by individuals and organizations in their own self-interest. Cause and effect relationships in accounting are, therefore, difficult to identify. Paradoxically, business and economic historians have not paid much attention to the details of accounting which is often seen as a technical craft. While it is not customary to regard accounting data as information in the sense that data can be translated into estimates of parameters of interest, a formal error concept is a useful one because it makes the case against viewing accounting as neutral and mechanistic quite compelling. Even if accounting is neutral and accounting choices do not reflect self-interest, accounting errors can influence behavior. The purpose of this paper is to reflect on the nature of error in accounting by using st...
LASER DOPPLER ANEMOMETER MEASUREMENTS OF IRREGULAR WATER WAVE KINEMATICS

Abstract The location of offshore structures for the purpose of recovering deep water resources has provided the impetus to more accurately predict forces acting on the structure so that costs can be minimized while the structure can safely withstand environmental forces. Accurate prediction of wave kinematics is a vital step in the more accurate prediction of environmental forces. In this study, a laser Doppler anemometer is used to measure the horizontal velocity under the largest wave occurring in an irregular sea generated in a laboratory wave tank. Specifically, JONSWAP and Pierson-Moskowitz wave spectra were generated in the wave tank and the horizontal velocity was measured at locations both above and below the still water level beneath the wave crest. The laboratory measured velocity values tend to lie between those predicted by linear extrapolation and Wheeler stretching. The results are not consistently predicted by either of the stretching methods, and therefore, it is not known which method will give a more accurate prediction before the data are measured.
SU‐E‐T‐209: Deconvolution of An Integral Film Exposure in a Cylindrical Phantom for VMAT QA

Purpose: Present an algorithm that is capable of deconvoluting a single radiochromic film exposed in a cylindrical phantom into the basic control point components. Changes noted in the measured control points can be incorporated into a delivered treatment plan using a commercial treatment planning system to compare the delivered dose with the planned dose using DVH tools. Methods: A 180 degree VMAT verification plan was subdivided into control points every 5 degrees. Dose matrices for the individual control points were exported for analysis to a PC with MATLAB software. The dose in the center ring of the cylindrical phantom represents the simulated film measurement. The plan dose is equal to the sum of the control points. Mathematically, the control points are the basis vectors of thedelivered plan. The deconvolution algorithm utilizes linear optimization to first determine the coefficients of the vectors and then to check for changes in the individual control points. Changes in the control points were introduced to test the deconvolution algorithm. For development purposes only a single plane was investigated. Measurement of both the entrance and exit doses improves the accuracy and is also used to compute the control point angle. Results: (1) Measured film has superior resolution compared to electronic detectors, (2) the deconvolution algorithm can determine the individual delivered control point parameters, (3) the measured control points can be used to calculate the delivered dose distribution, and (4) the treatment planning system can be used to compare the plan and delivered dose distribution within the patient using its DVH tools. Conclusion: Deconvolution of an integral film in a cylindrical phantom for a VMAT plan represents the delivered control points that can be entered into the treatment planning system for patient specific VMAT QA utilizing DVH tools.
Relative ordering of 4Se, 4De, and 4Do doubly excited states of lithium isoelectronic sequence

Orbital configuration classification for the lower 4Se and 4De doubly excited states of lithium isoelectronic sequence is proposed as a function of the nuclear charge on the basis of Hartree-Fock energies of 1s 2sns4Se, 1s 2pnp4Se, 1s 2snd4De, 1s 2pnp4De, and 1s 2pnd4Do states. It is found that the asymptotic relative order of states predicted by nuclear charge expansion method is attained by Z as low as 6. Hartree-Fock energies of 4De and 4Do states are used in conjunction with Holoien and Geltman's 4Po and 4Pe energies to compare assignment of lines obtained in the beamfoil spectra of BeII, CIV, and NV.
National trends in utilization of inferior vena cava filters in the United States, 2000-2009

Objective To characterize national trends over a decade in utilization of inferior vena cava (IVC) filters in the U.S. by year, indication, hospital, and patient demographics. Methods Retrospective cross-sectional study utilizing the Nationwide Inpatient Sample Database, 2000 to 2009. IVC filter placement was identified with International Classification of Disease, Ninth Edition codes. Survey weighting, bivariate, and multivariate analysis was performed. Results The number of IVC filters placed in the U.S. increased by 234% over a decade, from 56,380 in 2000 to 132,049 in 2009. A total of 84.7% of patients had a pulmonary embolism or deep venous thrombosis. A total of 94.6% of IVC filters were placed in urban hospitals. The largest number of IVC filters was placed in the South, followed by the Northeast, Midwest, and Western regions (38.7%, 25.8%, 22.4%, and 13%, respectively). Adjusting for other patient and hospital factors, independent predictors of IVC filter placement were year, hospital size, location, teaching status, patient age group 50 to 79 years, insurance status, and urgency of admission. Conclusions The use of IVC filters has dramatically increased over the last decade in the U.S., with variation in utilization based on patient and hospital characteristics. The largest utilization of IVC filters was among patients aged 50 to 79 years, Medicare recipients, and the Southern region of the U.S. The majority of patients receiving IVC filters have a diagnosis of pulmonary embolism or deep venous thrombosis.
The effective feedback ratio of magnetic amplifiers

THE purpose of this paper is to present some approximate expressions relating the factors that govern the self-excitation in magnetic amplifiers. Possibilities are shown of a compensation of diversities of rectifier characteristics so as to obtain uniform steady-state performance, simply by readjustments of feedback turns, without changing any other factors of design or operation. Moreover, the effects of controlled or uncontrolled (drifting) variations of feedback circuit parameters are examined in terms of resulting current gains.
Mitochondrial genome mutations and kidney disease

Mutations in the mitochondrial genome have been shown to be responsible for several neuromuscular diseases in humans. In this article, we discuss the molecular genetics of mitochondria, their centrality in cellular energy production, and reasons why their genome is extremely vulnerable to mutation. Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) mutations and their classic encephalomyopathic clinical phenotypes are briefly reviewed, and evidence presented that mtDNA mutations also present primarily as kidney diseases. Research trends in the field are discussed. Suggestions are made regarding future work, the clinical implications thereof, and potential therapeutic utility accruing from these advances.
Electron centers in single-crystal Al 2 O 3

The two prominent absorption bands centered at 6.1 and 4.8 eV in neutron-bombarded ${\mathrm{Al}}_{2}$${\mathrm{O}}_{3}$ single crystals have been investigated. Optical excitation into the 6.1 eV causes growth of bands at 5.4, 4.8, and 4.1 eV, whereas excitation into these latter bands causes growth of the 6.1-eV band. The oscillator strength of the 4.8-eV band was found to be in the range 0.5-1 as compared to a value nearly twice that for the 6.1-eV band. Excitation with 4.8-eV light produces an emission band at 3.75 eV and the yield and polarization of this emission as a function of the polarization of the exciting light was studied. This polarization behavior together with previous theoretical calculations is consistent with an assignment of the 4.8-eV band to the transition of the ${F}^{+}$ center. The oscillator strength ratio and the reciprocal relationship between the 4.8-eV band and the 6.1-eV band strongly indicate that the latter is associated with the $F$ center.
Management of Infections Complicating Allogeneic Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplantation

The use of allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation for the treatment of hematologic malignancies, as well as some benign hematologic disorders, has continued to grow over the last 10 years. The availability of this procedure to an increasing number of patients has been facilitated by the use of newer techniques, including reduced intensity conditioning (RIC) regimens, peripheral blood stem cells (PBSCs) and cord blood as donor sources, graft manipulation such as selective T-cell depletion, and other in vitro and in vivo attempts to reduce the risk and severity of graft-versus-host disease (GVHD) after transplantation without losing the potential benefits of a graft-versus-tumor effect for patients with hematologic malignancies. The underlying theme of many of these newer techniques has been to minimize the severity and duration of transplant-related immune suppression, thus reducing the risk of morbidity and mortality from infectious complications. This article reviews immune suppression and recovery that occur after allogeneic stem cell transplantation, with changes in the epidemiology, and some of the recent advances that have been made in management of infectious complications.
Dating commitment and within-person perceptual congruency

Rogers (1959) developed an interpersonal congruency model that suggests the greater the degree of agreement among within-person perceptions of the self and a role partner, the more adjusted and satisfied with a relationship one would be. American college students were categorized as occasional, steady or engaged daters and they provided ratings of self and partner on dimensions of perceived dating satisfaction, personal integrity, financial influence, and role of sexuality in the relationship. Congruency measures were then derived which allowed the assessment of cognitive agreement in perceived self/partner perceptions. As predicted, respondents in the Engaged category displayed greater congruency in within-person perceptions than did those in the Occasional and Steady dating groups. There was also a tendency for women to display more within-person congruency than men, particularly on matters involving finances and sex.
Solute distribution during rapid solidification into an undercooled melt

Rapid solidification experiments show that a solute-rich core generally exists in a solid rapidly solidified from an undercooled melt. Several simplified models have been proposed to explain and predict this phenomenon. This paper presents a generalized model that includes mass as well as heat diffusion in both solid and liquid phases and considers nonequilibrium solidification kinetics including solute-trapping to treat the local recalescence. For given local temperature gradients and cooling rates, the model leads to a one-dimensional moving boundary problem with a strongly coupled boundary condition at the solid/liquid interface. The solution is obtained by employing an implicit iterative scheme that uses a coordinate transformation. The model predicts successfully a solute-rich core as observed in the experiments. The results show that both melt undercooling and cooling rates strongly affect the solute distribution in the solidified solid. Selected results for dilute aluminum-copper alloys are presented to illustrate the unique features of solute distribution in rapidly solidified alloys.
Hydrodynamic injection with pneumatic valving for microchip electrophoresis with total analyte utilization

A novel hydrodynamic injector that is directly controlled by a pneumatic valve has been developed for reproducible microchip capillary electrophoresis (CE) separations. The poly(dimethylsiloxane) (PDMS) devices used for evaluation comprise a separation channel, a side channel for sample introduction, and a pneumatic valve aligned at the intersection of the channels. A low pressure (≤ 3 psi) applied to the sample reservoir is sufficient to drive sample into the separation channel. The rapidly actuated pneumatic valve enables injection of discrete sample plugs as small as ~100 pL for CE separation. The injection volume can be easily controlled by adjusting the intersection geometry, the solution back pressure and the valve actuation time. Sample injection could be reliably operated at different frequencies ( 2 Hz) with good reproducibility (peak height relative standard deviation ≤ 3.6%) and no sampling biases associated with the conventional electrokinetic injections. The separation channel was dynamically coated with a cationic polymer, and FITC-labeled amino acids were employed to evaluate the CE separation. Highly efficient (≥ 7.0 × 103 theoretical plates for the ~2.4 cm long channel) and reproducible CE separations were obtained. The demonstrated method has numerous advantages compared with the conventional techniques, including repeatable and unbiased injections, little sample waste, high duty cycle, controllable injected sample volume, and fewer electrodes with no need for voltage switching. The prospects of implementing this injection method for coupling multidimensional separations, for multiplexing CE separations and for sample-limited bioanalyses are discussed.
Flow stabilization with active hydrodynamic cloaks

We demonstrate that fluid flow cloaking solutions, based on active hydrodynamic metamaterials, exist for two-dimensional flows past a cylinder in a wide range of Reynolds numbers (Re's), up to approximately 200. Within the framework of the classical Brinkman equation for homogenized porous flow, we demonstrate using two different methods that such cloaked flows can be dynamically stable for Re's in the range of 5-119. The first highly efficient method is based on a linearization of the Brinkman-Navier-Stokes equation and finding the eigenfrequencies of the least stable eigenperturbations; the second method is a direct numerical integration in the time domain. We show that, by suppressing the von Karman vortex street in the weakly turbulent wake, porous flow cloaks can raise the critical Reynolds number up to about 120 or five times greater than for a bare uncloaked cylinder.
Murine H-rev107 gene encoding a class II tumor suppressor: gene organization and identification of an Sp1/Sp3-binding GC-box required for its transcription.

Abstract H-rev107, which belongs to class II tumor suppressor genes, is ubiquitously expressed in normal cells, but is downregulated in many carcinomas and tumor cell lines. Sequence analysis showed that the murine H-rev107 gene is composed of five exons and four introns. Transfections revealed that 7.6 kb of the H-rev107 promoter directed a high level expression of the reporter gene. There were no significant differences in promoter activity when various 5 ′ -deletion promoter constructs from −7.6 kb to −113 bp were employed. By further deletion and mutation analysis, we found that the region between −83 and −75 containing a GC-box was essential for promoter activity in NIH3T3 or REF52 fibroblasts expressing H-rev107 at moderate to high levels. Gelshifts demonstrated in vitro binding of Sp1 and Sp3 to this GC-box. Cotransfection of Sp1 and Sp3 functionally stimulated promoter activity in SL2 cells. By chromatin immunoprecipitation assays, we observed in vivo binding of Sp1 and Sp3 to the proximal promoter region in NIH3T3 cells and liver, concluding that the transcription of the H-rev107 gene is dependent on Sp1/Sp3-binding to the −83/−75 GC-box.
Transcriptomic Analysis of Carboxylic Acid Challenge in Escherichia coli: Beyond Membrane Damage

Carboxylic acids are an attractive biorenewable chemical. Enormous progress has been made in engineering microbes for production of these compounds though titers remain lower than desired. Here we used transcriptome analysis of Escherichia coli during exogenous challenge with octanoic acid (C8) at pH 7.0 to probe mechanisms of toxicity. This analysis highlights the intracellular acidification and membrane damage caused by C8 challenge. Network component analysis identified transcription factors with altered activity including GadE, the activator of the glutamate-dependent acid resistance system (AR2) and Lrp, the amino acid biosynthesis regulator. The intracellular acidification was quantified during exogenous challenge, but was not observed in a carboxylic acid producing strain, though this may be due to lower titers than those used in our exogenous challenge studies. We developed a framework for predicting the proton motive force during adaptation to strong inorganic acids and carboxylic acids. This model predicts that inorganic acid challenge is mitigated by cation accumulation, but that carboxylic acid challenge inverts the proton motive force and requires anion accumulation. Utilization of native acid resistance systems was not useful in terms of supporting growth or alleviating intracellular acidification. AR2 was found to be non-functional, possibly due to membrane damage. We proposed that interaction of Lrp and C8 resulted in repression of amino acid biosynthesis. However, this hypothesis was not supported by perturbation of lrp expression or amino acid supplementation. E. coli strains were also engineered for altered cyclopropane fatty acid content in the membrane, which had a dramatic effect on membrane properties, though C8 tolerance was not increased. We conclude that achieving higher production titers requires circumventing the membrane damage. As higher titers are achieved, acidification may become problematic.
Myomaxin Is a Novel Transcriptional Target of MEF2A That Encodes a Xin-related α-Actinin-interacting Protein

The physiological targets regulated by MEF2 in striated muscle are not completely known. Several recent studies have identified novel downstream target genes and shed light on the global transcriptional network regulated by MEF2 in muscle. In our continuing effort to identify novel, downstream pathways controlled by MEF2, we have used mef2a knock-out mice to find those genes dependent on MEF2A transcriptional activity. Here, we describe the characterization of a direct, downstream target gene for the MEF2A transcription factor encoding a large, muscle-specific protein that localizes to the Z-disc/costameric region in striated muscle. This gene, called myomaxin, was identified as a gene markedly down-regulated in MEF2A knock-out hearts. Myomaxin is the mouse ortholog of a partial human cDNA of unknown function named cardiomyopathy associated gene 3 (CMYA3). Myomaxin is expressed as a single, large transcript of ∼11 kilobases in adult heart and skeletal muscle with an open reading frame of 3,283 amino acids. The protein encoded by the myomaxin gene is related to the actin-binding protein Xin and interacts with the sarcomeric Z-disc protein, α-actinin-2. Our findings demonstrate that Myomaxin functions directly downstream of MEF2A at the peripheral Z-disc complex in striated muscle potentially playing a role in regulating cytoarchitectural integrity.
A new species of cymopterus (Umbelliferae) from northwestern Wyoming

Cymopterus evertii, from Park and Hot Springs counties, Wyoming, is described as new. It appears to be a derivative taxon from what has been calledC. bipinnatus. Data are presented justifying the relegation of the latter name to synonymy underC. nivalis. A key is provided for distinguishingC. evertii from its presumed closest relatives.
A commentary on the significance of stresscoat and split-line patterns on bone

“Stresscoat,” an industrial technique for showing sites of highest tensile strain and failure in machine parts, has been used for similar purposes in intact living and cadaver bones. Stresscoat cracks only arise from tensile strain in the underlying material and always lie transverse to the direction of the strain. Stresscoat and split-line patterns do not represent stress trajectories. A trajectorial diagram can not be drawn for a bone because a bone is a three dimensional porous body composed of heterogeneous anisotropic material. Split-lines show the “grain” of bone and may be related to its vascularity or growth. The mechanical significance of split-lines is not clear.
Recent Advances in Amebiasis

AbstractAdvancements in our understanding of amebiasis have been rapid over the decade that I have followed this field.″ What was identified morphologically for years as Entamoeba histolytica has been redescribed with modern techniques as a complex of two species, the commensal parasite E. dispar and the pathogenic parasite E. histolytica that is the cause of colitis and liver abscess. Antigen detection tests are now available for the rapid detection in stool of the pathogenic species E. histolytica. New understandings of the importance of luminal as well as tissue-active antimebic medications in the treatment of invasive disease have been reached. The groundwork is being laid for an understanding of the protective immune responses to infection, and at the lab bench DNA transfection of the parasite has opened studies of pathogenesis to genetic analysis. While necessarily an incomplete sketch of the field, I have attempted here to highlight some recent and important developments of interest to clinicians a...
Methods for measuring the strength of discriminable drug effects.

Abstract Drug discriminations can be used to investigate a variety of preclinical psychopharmacological issues. These discriminations are based on the so-called “discriminable” or “discriminative stimulus” effects of drugs. In order to conduct some types of drug discrimination studies, it is helpful or necessary to know the amount or degree of discriminability of the various drugs employed. This paper describes several methods for determining the degree of discriminability of drugs, and evaluates these methods primarily using data obtained by training rats to discriminate drug vs. no drug in a shock-escape T-maze task. The results suggest that useful indices of degree of discriminability can be computed from the rapidity with which drug discriminations are learned. Indices based on average accuracy during acquisition were found to be somewhat superior to indices based on sessions to criterion.
Urethral Mobilization and Advancement For Midshaft to Distal Hypospadias

ABSTRACTPurpose: A urethral mobilization and advancement technique for repairing glanular, subglanular and midshaft hypospadias with or without chordee was developed, and has been used for more than 6 years. A brief description of the procedure and the results are presented.Materials and Methods: From 1995 to 2001, 73 boys 4 months to 12 years old underwent repair of glanular (14), subglanular (38) and midshaft (20) hypospadias. Chordee was present in 37 boys. Upon initiating the surgery, a circumcising incision was made proximal to the urethral orifice. The ventral glanular mucosa was preserved. The penile skin was degloved and any chordee was corrected. The meatus was circumscribed and the urethra was mobilized proximally until a 4 to 5:1 ratio was achieved between the length of the mobilized urethra and the initial distance measured from the meatus to the distal margin of the glanular groove. The ventral glans was incised deeply to the corpora cavernosa and the glans wings were mobilized laterally. The...
Dipolar side chain control of monolayer morphology: symmetrically substituted 1,5-(mono- and diether) anthracenes at the solution-HOPG interface.

Scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) is used to determine the 2-D unit cell parameters of monolayers self-assembled by twelve symmetrical, 1,5-bis(linear aliphatic ether side chain) anthracenes at the solution−graphite interface. The standard morphology assembled by 1,5-bis(alkyloxymethyl) anthracenes consists of single-lamella domains containing columns of anthracene cores alternating with columns of interdigitated, aliphatic side chains. Adjacent side chains within the aliphatic columns adsorb in antiparallel orientations. The terminal methyl (ω-position) of each side chain lies in registration with the 2-positions of its two neighboring chains ((ω↔2)-packing). Anthracenes with diether side chains can generate repulsive or attractive dipole−dipole interactions between proximate ethers of adjacent aliphatic chains. Anthracenes bearing even length side chains with oxygens at the 2- and ω−1 positions or at the 3- and ω-2 positions do not assemble (ω↔2)-packed monolayers. Repulsive dipolar interactions betwe...
Concerted evolution between duplicated genetic elements in Helicobacter pylori.

Abstract The Helicobacter pylori genome includes a family of outer membrane proteins (OMPs) with substantial N and C-terminal identity. To better understand their evolution, the nucleotide sequences for two members, babA and babB, were determined from a worldwide group of 23 strains. The geographic origin of each strain was found to be the major determinant of phylogenetic structure, with strains of Eastern and Western origin showing greatest divergence. For strains 96-10 (Japan) and 96-74 (USA), the 5′ regions of babB are replaced with babA sequences, demonstrating that recombination occurs between the two loci. babA and babB have nearly equivalent variation in nucleotide and amino acid identity, and frequencies of synonymous and non-synonymous substitutions. Both genes have segmental conservation but within the 3′ segment, substitution patterns are nearly identical. Although babA and babB 5′ and midregion segment phylogenies show strong interstrain similarity, the 3′ segments show strong intrastrain similarity, indicative of concerted evolution. Within these 3′ segments, the lower intrastrain than interstrain frequencies of nucleotide substitutions, which are below mean background H. pylori substitution frequencies, indicate selection against intrastrain diversification. Since babA/babB gene conversions likely underlie the concerted evolution of the 3′ segments, in an experimental system, we demonstrate that gene conversions can frequently (10−3) occur in H. pylori. That these events are recA-dependent and DNase-resistant indicates their likely cause is intragenomic recombination.
Restricted expression of cardiac myosin genes reveals regulated aspects of heart tube assembly in zebrafish.

The embryonic vertebrate heart is divided into two major chambers, an anterior ventricle and a posterior atrium. Although the fundamental differences between ventricular and atrial tissues are well documented, it is not known when and how cardiac anterior-posterior (A-P) patterning occurs. The expression patterns of two zebrafish cardiac myosin genes, cardiac myosin light chain 2 (cmlc2) and ventricular myosin heavy chain (vmhc), allow us to distinguish two populations of myocardial precursors at an early stage, well before the heart tube forms. These myocardial subpopulations, which may represent the ventricular and atrial precursors, are organized in a medial-lateral pattern within the precardiac mesoderm. Our examinations of cmlc2 and vmhc expression throughout the process of heart tube assembly indicate the important role of an intermediate structure, the cardiac cone, in the conversion of this early medial-lateral pattern into the A-P pattern of the heart tube. To gain insight into the genetic regulation of heart tube assembly and patterning, we examine cmlc2 and vmhc expression in several zebrafish mutants. Analyses of mutations that cause cardia bifida demonstrate that the achievement of a proper cardiac A-P pattern does not depend upon cardiac fusion. On the other hand, cardiac fusion does not ensure the proper A-P orientation of the ventricle and atrium, as demonstrated by the heart and soul mutation, which blocks cardiac cone morphogenesis. Finally, the pandora mutation interferes with the establishment of the early medial-lateral myocardial pattern. Altogether, these data suggest new models for the mechanisms that regulate the formation of a patterned heart tube and provide an important framework for future analyses of zebrafish mutants with defects in this process.
Machine-learned solutions for three stages of clinical information extraction: the state of the art at i2b2 2010

Objective As clinical text mining continues to mature, its potential as an enabling technology for innovations in patient care and clinical research is becoming a reality. A critical part of that process is rigid benchmark testing of natural language processing methods on realistic clinical narrative. In this paper, the authors describe the design and performance of three state-of-the-art text-mining applications from the National Research Council of Canada on evaluations within the 2010 i2b2 challenge. Design The three systems perform three key steps in clinical information extraction: (1) extraction of medical problems, tests, and treatments, from discharge summaries and progress notes; (2) classification of assertions made on the medical problems; (3) classification of relations between medical concepts. Machine learning systems performed these tasks using large-dimensional bags of features, as derived from both the text itself and from external sources: UMLS, cTAKES, and Medline. Measurements Performance was measured per subtask, using micro-averaged F-scores, as calculated by comparing system annotations with ground-truth annotations on a test set. Results The systems ranked high among all submitted systems in the competition, with the following F-scores: concept extraction 0.8523 (ranked first); assertion detection 0.9362 (ranked first); relationship detection 0.7313 (ranked second). Conclusion for all tasks, we found that the introduction of a wide range of features was crucial to success. Importantly, our choice of machine learning algorithms allowed us to be versatile in our feature design, and to introduce a large number of features without overfitting and without encountering computing-resource bottlenecks.
Biological Effects and Antitumor Activity Induced by Benzocaine Conjugated Anionic Polymers

Three maleic anhydride copolymers [poly(maleic anhydride-vinyl acetate), poly(maleic anhydride-styrene) and poly(maleic anhydride-methyl methacrylate)] were prepared as well as the corresponding be...
Students with Exceptionalities and the Peer Group Context of Bullying and Victimization in Late Elementary School

We examined bullying and victimization in 5th grade classrooms in relation to students’ education status and peer group membership. The sample consisted of 484 participants (258 girls, 226 boys), including 369 general education students, 74 academically gifted students, and 41 students with mild disabilities. Students with mild disabilities were more likely to be perceived as being bullies by both teachers and peers. Teachers also rated students with mild disabilities significantly higher for being bullied by peers. Academically gifted students were rated by teachers as the lowest for both bullying and being bullied. Associating with aggressive or perceived-popular peers increased the likelihood of being perceived as a bully. Social isolates were more likely to be bullied than students who did not associate with perceived-popular peers who, in turn, were more likely to be bullied than students who associated with perceived-popular peers. Students with mild disabilities who had aggressive and perceived-popular associates had more peer nominations for bullying than all others. In contrast, students in general education with neither aggressive nor perceived-popular associates had the fewest peer nominations for bullying. We discuss implications for research and intervention.
Containment of nested XML queries

Query containment is the most fundamental relationship between a pair of database queries: a query Q is said to be contained in a query Q′ if the answer for Q is always a subset of the answer for Q′, independent of the current state of the database. Query containment is an important problem in a wide variety of data management applications, including verification of integrity constraints, reasoning about contents of data sources in data integration, semantic caching, verification of knowledge bases, determining queries independent of updates, and most recently, in query reformulation for peer data management systems. Query containment has been studied extensively in the relational context and for XPath queries, but not for XML queries with nesting. We consider the theoretical aspects of the problem of query containment for XML queries with nesting. We begin by considering conjunctive XML queries (c-XQueries), and show that containment is in polynomial time if we restrict the fanout (number of sibling sub-blocks) to be 1. We prove that for arbitrary fanout, containment is coNP-hard already for queries with nesting depth 2, even if the query does not include variables in the return clauses. We then show that for queries with fixed nesting depth, containment is coNP-complete. Next, we establish the computational complexity of query containment for several practical extensions of c-XQueries, including queries with union and arithmetic comparisons, and queries where the XPath expressions may include descendant edges and negation. Finally, we describe a few heuristics for speeding up query containment checking in practice by exploiting properties of the queries and the underlying schema.
Classroom and Platform Performance

Abstract The following four papers on the teaching of statistics were presented at a session sponsored by Mu Sigma Rho and the Section on Statistical Education at the annual ASA meeting in San Diego in 1978. The four authors are well qualified to discuss the subject of teaching statistics, and the papers present much helpful material for use by teachers of statistics. Since the four papers contain many personal views and opinions, the Editorial Board felt that it would be most appropriate to publish the papers essentially as they were presented at the San Diego meeting.
Kinetic and thermodynamic characterizations of yeast guanylate kinase.

Abstract Yeast guanylate kinase was expressed at high level in Escherichia coli using pET-17b vector. It was purified to homogeneity by a simple two-column procedure with an average yield of ∼100 mg/liter. The steady-state kinetic parameters for both forward and reverse reactions were determined by initial velocity measurements. The turnover numbers (kcat) were 394 s−1 for the forward reaction (formation of ADP and GDP) and 90 s−1 for the reverse reaction (formation of ATP and GMP). Km values were 0.20, 0.091, 0.017, and 0.097 mM for MgATP, GMP, MgADP, and GDP, respectively. Analysis of the initial velocity patterns indicated a sequential mechanism. GMP was found to have partial substrate inhibition. The substrate inhibition was not competitive with MgATP and could be attributed to formation of the abortive complex guanylate kinase·MgADP·GMP. The equilibrium constant of the reaction was measured under various conditions by NMR and a radiometric assay. The results showed that the steady-state kinetic parameters were consistent with the thermodynamic constant. NMR titration and equilibrium dialysis showed that both substrates and products could bind to free guanylate kinase. The dissociation constants were 0.090, 0.18, 0.029, 0.084, and 0.12 mM for MgATP, ATP, GMP, MgADP, and GDP, respectively. Viscosity-dependent kinetics was used to identify the rate-limiting steps of the reaction. The results indicated that the reaction rate is largely controlled by the chemical step.
Change in Radiative Optical Properties of Ta2O5 Thin Films due to High-Temperature Heat Treatment

Thin films (0.85 μm, 3 μm) of Ta 2 O 5 deposited on Si and SiO 2 were heated to 900 °C. Their reflectance in the infrared was measured using a Fourier transform infrared spectrometer equipped with a multiple angle reflectometer before and after exposure to the high-temperature heat treatment. An interfacial layer (TaSi X O y ) formed by the diffusion of Si from the substrate into the deposited film was observed using Auger depth profiling, and the effect of this interfacial layer on the reflectance was measured. Using a least squares optimization technique coupled with an optical admittance algorithm, the multiple angle reflectance data were used to calculate the optical constants of the as deposited Ta 2 Ο 5 film, crystalline Ta 2 Ο 5 , and the interfacial layer in the 1.6 to 10 μm range. The interfacial layer formed due to exposure to high temperature was found to be more absorptive than the crystalline Ta 2 Ο 5 .
Cloud classification from satellite data using a fuzzy sets algorithm - A polar example

Where spatial boundaries between phenomena are diffuse, classification methods which construct mutually exclusive clusters seem inappropriate. The Fuzzy c-means (FCM) algorithm assigns each observation to all clusters, with membership values as a function of distance to the cluster center. The FCM algorithm is applied to AVHRR data for the purpose of classifying polar clouds and surfaces. Careful analysis of the fuzzy sets can provide information on which spectral channels are best suited to the classification of particular features, and can help determine likely areas of misclassification. General agreement in the resulting classes and cloud fraction was found between the FCM algorithm, a manual classification, and an unsupervised maximum likelihood classifier.
Fatigue Life Model Including Crack Propagation for Wind Turbine Tower Base Connections

Wind turbines are typically designed for a target service life of 20 years because of fatigue related failures, which often occur in moving components such as the rotor and blades. Designing the tower to have the same lifetime to other components is required for optimizing the wind turbine. This study focuses on fatigue life of the wind tower due to a mode I fatigue of the welded base connection only. A model for fatigue assessment including crack propagation was developed for the tower base connection. The allowance of crack propagation is expected to extend the service life of the tower in comparison to conventional fatigue life analysis using the S-N curve approach. An illustrative example of fatigue life design for a typical 5-MW wind turbine in Colorado for different operational conditions is then presented. The results of this study will benefit the design of new wind turbine towers and condition evaluation of existing wind turbine towers.
Mapping patient-identified barriers and facilitators to retention in HIV care and antiretroviral therapy adherence to Andersen's Behavioral Model

Andersen's Behavioral Model (ABM) provides a framework for understanding how patient and environmental factors impact health behaviors and outcomes. We compared patient-identified barriers/facilitators to retention in care and antiretroviral therapy (ART) adherence and evaluated how they mapped to ABM. Qualitative semi-structured interviews with 51 HIV-infected adults at HIV clinics in Philadelphia, PA, in 2013 were used to explore patients' experiences with HIV care and treatment. Interview data were analyzed for themes using a grounded theory approach. Among those interviewed, 53% were male and 88% were nonwhite; 49% were retained in care, 96% were on ART, and 57% were virally suppressed. Patients discussed 18 barriers/facilitators to retention in care and ART adherence: 11 common to both behaviors (stigma, mental illness, substance abuse, social support, reminder strategies, housing, insurance, symptoms, competing life activities, colocation of services, provider factors), 3 distinct to retention (transportation, clinic experiences, appointment scheduling), and 4 distinct to adherence (medication characteristics, pharmacy services, health literacy, health beliefs). Identified barriers/facilitators mapped to all ABM domains. These data support the use of ABM as a framework for classifying factors influencing HIV-specific health behaviors and have the potential to inform the design of interventions to improve retention in care and ART adherence.