cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Sarcopenia of the Psoas Muscles Is Associated With Poor Outcomes Following Lung Transplantation.

Background Sarcopenia, a known component of frailty, defined by diminished cross-sectional area of the psoas muscles, is associated with poor outcomes after a range of surgical procedures. However, little is known of the relationship between sarcopenia of the psoas muscles (SPM) and long-term survival, decline in pulmonary function, and graft failure after lung transplantation. Methods We reviewed patients who underwent primary lung transplantation at our institution from 2011 to 2014. Cross-sectional areas of the psoas muscles at the L4 vertebral level were measured using preoperative computed tomography. Gender-based cutoff values for sarcopenia were generated and validated. The primary outcomes were 1-, 2-, and 3-year all-cause mortality, forced expiratory volume in 1 second values, and graft function. Adjusted logistic regression and survival analysis was used to analyze outcomes. Results Ninety-five patients were included in this study; 39 (41.1%) patients were considered sarcopenic. SPM was significantly associated with short-term and midterm mortality on multivariate analysis (1 year: odds ratio [OR], 8.7, p = 0.017; 2 years: OR, 12.7, p Conclusions This study demonstrates a significant association between SPM and death, pulmonary function, and graft failure in patients receiving a lung transplant. Determining SPM preoperatively may be a useful component of frailty assessment and a predictor of survival in this patient population.
State-dependent size and value premium: evidence from a regime-switching asset pricing model

The conditional CAPM suggests that the market beta and market risk premium should vary over time. In this paper, we provide evidence that the size and value premiums are also state dependent. We develop a joint Markov regime-switching model for the CAPM and the VIX index to study the regime variation of CAPM parameters and to investigate the regime-dependent size and value anomalies. Stock returns from a two-state regime-switching model exhibit the pattern of amplified size (or value) premium in the low VIX state and reversed premium in the high VIX state. A three-state regime-switching model further confirms that the value premiums might be driven by extreme market conditions. These findings have important implications for market timing and portfolio selection decisions.
Chronic Renal Changes After a Single Ischemic Event in an Experimental Model of Feline Chronic Kidney Disease

Previous work demonstrated renal fibrosis 70 days after a single unilateral in vivo renal ischemic event, but changes associated with a single episode of renal ischemia past this time are unknown. In this study, we evaluated renal function and structural changes 6 months after a 90-minute in vivo unilateral renal ischemic event. Six adult female cats underwent unilateral renal ischemia and renal function was followed for 6 months, at which time the kidneys were evaluated by histology and histomorphometry. Over time, there was a significant reduction in the glomerular filtration rate and an elevation of serum creatinine of 31% and 42%, respectively. All cats had tubulointerstitial lesions characterized by segmental interstitial inflammation, tubular atrophy, and interstitial fibrosis. Unlike short-term studies, ischemic kidneys had variable numbers of obsolescent glomeruli, consistent with the development of atubular glomeruli and subsequent ischemic glomerulosclerosis. Chronic changes associated with acute renal ischemia may include loss of function and glomerulosclerosis.
Teacher-Level Value-Added Models on Trial: Empirical and Pragmatic Issues of Concern Across Five Court Cases:

Ongoing or recently completed across the United States are a series of lawsuits via which teacher plaintiffs are contesting how they are being evaluated using value-added models (VAMs) as part of s...
Factoring by the Quadratic Sieve

The RSA and the Blum-Goldwasser cryptosystems both depend on their security on the difficulty of factoring a large modulus m into a product of primes. The Diffie-Hellman key exchange, using the cyclic group of units modulo a large prime, depends for its security on the difficulty of solving the discrete logarithm problem. This chapter first looks at Fermat’s method of factoring a modulus m: find a number b so that \(b^{2} - m = a^{2}\), a square, then the greatest common divisor of m and \(b - a\) is often a factor of m. Fermat’s original approach is a crude method to find such b. The Quadratic Sieve method is a clever adaptation of Fermat’s method for finding b and a that ultimately involves solving a system of equations over the field of two elements. Similar in approach is the Index Calculus method, a clever adaptation of the Baby Step-Giant Step algorithm of Sect. 13.10 for finding discrete logarithms in the group of units modulo a large prime. These methods are examined in sects. 4 and 5. Both methods described in this chapter are models for methods currently used in practice to try to crack those cryptosystems. An appendix compares the speed of Fermat’s original method of factoring with the grade school method of factoring by trial division.
Widening the lens on family processes and the development of parent-child attachment relationships.

This commentary addresses the research conducted by McConnachie et al. (this issue) on attachment in gay father families, lesbian mother families, and heterosexual parent families. Strengths of the...
The Centers For Medicare And Medicaid Services Hospital Ratings: Pitfalls Of Grading On A Single Curve

The star rating system for hospitals of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) pools all hospitals together and awards each institution one to five stars for quality, despite variatio...
High pressure structuring of pea protein concentrates

This work demonstrates the use of high pressure processing (HPP) to induce structural modifications in pea protein concentrates (PPC). Reconstituted PPC with 8–24 g protein /100 g water were subjected to HPP at 250–550 MPa for 15 min, at 20–33°C, or heat treatments at 95°C for 15 min. Structural changes were investigated using dynamic rheology, scanning electron microscopy, differential scanning calorimetry, and mid‐infrared spectroscopy. Gel formation occurred at 16 g protein /100 g water concentration and 250 MPa for the HPP‐treated samples, and at 12 g protein /100 g water concentration for the heat‐treated samples. Gel strength increased with both pressure level and protein concentration. Heat‐treated samples exhibited greater gel strength than pressure‐treated samples at the same protein concentration. A greater extent of protein denaturation, aggregation, and network formation occurred with increasing pressure level, due to protein tertiary and quaternary conformation changes. Starch granules present in PPC retained their structure and were not gelatinized even at 550 MPa. These findings can be used to create novel pea protein products with interesting structures and superior sensory and nutritional properties. PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS: This work shows that a range of unique pea‐based products, such as puddings or tofu analogs, can be created by low temperature HPP treatment of pea protein concentrates at different pressure levels and protein concentrations. This process has the potential to better preserve the organoleptic and nutritional properties of the final products compared to traditional, heat based processing methods. These findings can be also extended to create other pulse protein products using high pressure processing.
Chapple and Loukaitou-Sideris: Transit-Oriented Displacement or Community Dividends? Understanding the Effects of Smarter Growth on Communities

In the early years of transit-oriented development (TOD) in the United States, simply getting a project completed was achievement enough. As TOD has become mainstream, however, concerns have multip...
Effective and multilevel suicide prevention strategies must be developed based on high-quality evidence and public health policy reform

Commentary on : D'Anci KE, Uhl S, Giradi G, et al . Treatments for the prevention and management of suicide: a systematic review. Annal Int Med 2019;171:334–42. Suicide is a major public health concern. Almost 900 000 lives are lost yearly through suicide worldwide, comprising 1.5% of global burden of the disease.1 The absence of firm standards regarding the quality of evidence and heterogeneity of outcome measures limits the conclusions about the current effectiveness of suicide prevention strategies. D’Anci and colleagues conducted a systematic review to examine the evidence on assessing the …
Internships and Occupational Self-Efficacy: Impact and Gender Differences.

This research examines self-efficacy and internships. The purpose is to uncover if internships impact a student’s occupational self-efficacy and if there are gender differences in the effect of an ...
Madam de Bedamore Through the Keyhole: Scandal, Local Knowledge, and Things Unpublished in Late-Stuart England

What happened after Barbara Coningsby discovered Thomas Coningsby alone with Lady Frances Scudamore upset individual lives, families, and Herefordshire political alliances in 1681 and 1682. It also...
Early Recovery Outcomes in Patients Undergoing Total Hip Arthroplasty Through a Posterior Approach With Modified Postoperative Precautions.

Abstract Background Recent data suggest that a modified, more lenient set of precautions after total hip arthroplasty (THA) performed through the posterolateral approach may safely allow more patient movement and exercise in the immediate postoperative period. We hypothesize that 1) patients undergoing THA given modified precautions will demonstrate a fast-track return to functional activity and 2) wrist-based activity trackers will provide valuable information on postoperative activity levels. Methods We prospectively enrolled patients undergoing THA. Patients were given a wrist-based, commercially available activity tracker to wear 1 week preoperatively and 6 weeks postoperatively. Postoperative hip precautions included only the avoidance of the “leg-shaving” position of combined hip flexion, adduction, and internal rotation. Linear mixed models were used to analyze the change in steps and Hip Disability and Osteoarthritis Outcome Score-Junior (HOOS)-JR data. Pearson correlation coefficients were used to describe the relationship between average steps and HOOS-JR scores over time. Results Eighty-two patients were enrolled. Seventy-four percent returned to work by week 4. Seventy-six percent of left THA patients returned to driving by week 4. At 6 weeks, 23% of survey respondents were taking pain medication and 26% were using assistive devices. Average daily steps were 1098 at week 1, 2491 at week 2, 4130 at week 3, 4850 at week 4, 5712 at week 5, and 6069 at week 6. A significant correlation (R: −0.981) was found between increased weekly steps and improved HOOS-JR scores after THA (P Conclusion Defining expected recovery timelines for patients undergoing THA helps surgeons counsel their patients preoperatively. Our study demonstrates an expected pathway for recovery after THA by using modified precautions that will be more clearly outlined with ongoing clinical data analysis.
Nanoengineering cellulose for the selective removal of neodymium: Towards sustainable rare earth element recovery

Abstract Rare earth elements (REE) have exceedingly become critical in advanced industries. Despite the high demand for REE, the world is still experiencing a shortage in ready-to-exploit resources, environmentally friendly processing, and reliable recovery strategies, rendering sustainable REE removal an immediate and unmet environmental, industrial, and economical challenge worldwide. We nanoengineered cellulose, the most abundant biopolymer in the world, to develop a sustainable bio-based technology named anionic hairy nanocellulose (AHNC) for the high-capacity and selective removal of neodymium ions (Nd3+), one of the most widely used REE, from aqueous media. AHNC comprises fully solubilized dicarboxylated cellulose (DCC) chains and cellulose nanocrystals (CNC) decorated with DCC (hairs) bearing a charge density that is about one order of magnitude higher than conventional CNC. The unique colloidal properties of AHNC, particularly the polyanionic hairs, enable the removal of ~ 264 ± 14 mg of Nd3+ per gram of the nanoadsorbent within seconds, which, to the best of our knowledge, place this advanced material among the adsorbents with the highest removal capacity at the shortest contact time. We investigated the roles of ionic strength, pH, and competing iron species on the performance of AHNC. Besides Nd3+ removal at high initial Nd3+ concentrations (C0 > 150 ppm) wherein AHNC is fully neutralized and precipitated, we show, for the first time, that at C0 ≤ 100 ppm wherein AHNC maintains its partial colloidal stability, Nd3+ removal can be enhanced via complementary calcium ion-mediated colloidal bridging. Together, our colloidal engineering approach combined with the biorenewability of cellulose and an ambient, low-cost unit operation, renders AHNC a promising sustainable nanotechnology for the removal of Nd3+ from industrial wastewater, mining tails, e-waste, and NdFeB permanent magnet leachates.
Management of erectile dysfunction in primary care

Erectile dysfunction (ED) is the persistent inability to attain and maintain an erection sufficient to permit satisfactory sexual performance. ED can affect the physical, emotional, and psychosocia...
Real Estate Price Indices and Price Dynamics: An Overview from an Investments Perspective

This article reviews the state of the art in real estate price indexing and the state of knowledge about real estate price dynamics, with a focus on investment property, or income-generating commercial property. Investment properties form a large component of the national wealth and of capital markets and represent a major investment asset class. They are characterized by various types of heterogeneity, including among assets, markets, and data sources, making the study of real estate pricing uniquely challenging. Yet in recent decades, urban economists and econometricians have pioneered major new price indexing methodologies that, combined with new types of data sources, are shedding light on the nature of commercial property price dynamics, revealing both important commonalities and unique differences compared with equities and fixed-income securities pricing.
Control Implementation: Real Time Multitasking/Multiprocessing

Abstract Computer implementation of control systems is standard in virtually all fields of control, from servo to process control. Further, in systems of any complexity at all, the control is implemented with several computers operating cooperatively. A course covering multitasking and multiprocessing real time systems taught for mechanical engineering graduate students is described. It covers introduction to the C language, multitasking concepts, computer configuration issues. The course is taught in a lecture/lab format, with heavy emphasis on laboratory experience. The intent of the course is to enable mechanical engineers to conceptualize and prototype mechanical systems in which the function and performance is heavily determined by its computer control.
Mixed Jurisdiction and the Scottish Legal Tradition: Reconsidering the Concept of Mixture

Scotland is typically regarded as a mixed jurisdiction based on an assessment of its combination of civilian and common law traditions. If this narrow definition of “mixture” is opened up, one will find several other traditions which are constituent parts of the Scottish legal tradition. Those range from the seemingly remote Celtic and feudal law, through feudal and canon law, to the law of the European Union and the European Convention on Human Rights. An holistic approach to the question of mixture requires that each of these traditions is accounted for, especially because of the difficulties in assessing the legacy of any given tradition. Those difficulties are exacerbated by the fact that legal traditions are indiscrete or “impure”, having been the subject of influence, modification, contamination, borrowing and so forth. They have mixed with other traditions, and some have conveyed parts of others. By focusing on the civilian and common law traditions, we risk adopting a reductionist approach to the question of mixture by essentially excluding vital parts of the story: which other traditions were (or are) part of the mixture, which parts disappeared or were subsumed into other traditions, which aspects of one tradition were conveyed by another. An holistic approach also recommends that the predominantly private law oriented focus of the literature is opened up to analysis of public law and criminal law. That will likely bring out further aspects which show that the pedigree of Scots law is a mixture, not only of civilian and common law ingredients, but also of other diverse traditions.
Psychological Indices of Toxicity

Psychology, the science of behavior in its many manifestations, provides the basis for many of the decisions we make about risk. Measures such as IQ scores and related indices are the basis for proposed standards for methylmercury levels in fish. They are the reasons that acceptable lead blood levels declined from 60 μg dl −1 in 1960 to 10 μg dl −1 in 1990. They have also become the standard by which the threats of pesticide exposure to child development are determined. Neurobehavioral measures have also become concrete evidence for the neurotoxic properties of cancer chemotherapeutic drugs. Behavior has planted roots in the entire domain of toxicology.
Cold iron COS theta magnet option for the SSC

In this paper we review first the evolution over the past several years of a cold iron, high field cos theta magnet design option for the SSC. We note the collaborative approach pursued by BNL and LBL on the 2-in-1 option, and the culmination of this effort in the tests of the BNL 4.5 m model magnets. Next, we discuss the subsequent 1-in-1 option being pursued jointly by BNL, Fermilab and LBL.
Modeling and Control of Polymerization Reactors

Abstract The current state and key issues in the modeling and control of polymerization reactors are surveyed. The physical phenomena, types of reactor models, sensor hardware, process monitoring strategies, critical control problems, and control system design strategies are among the issues discussed. Extensive references are provided for further reading.
Ontology alignment using multiple contexts

Ontology alignment involves determining the semantic heterogeneity between two or more domain specifications by considering their associated concepts. Our approach considers name, structural and content matching techniques for aligning ontologies. After comparing the ontologies using concept names, we examine the instance data of the compared concepts and perform content matching using value types based on N-grams and Entropy Based Distribution (EBD). Although these approaches are generally sufficient, additional methods may be required. Subsequently, we compare the structural characteristics between concepts using Expectation-Maximization (EM). To illustrate our approach, we conducted experiments using authentic geographic information systems (GIS) data and generate results which clearly demonstrate the utility of the algorithms while emphasizing the contribution of structural matching.
Laboratory Studies of Isolated Eddies in a Rotating Fluid

Abstract Numerous laboratory techniques have been used to generate isolated eddies in a rotating fluid, but they can all be divided into two categories; those in which the eddies are directly produced by inserting or withdrawing fluid, and those in which eddies are produced by an instability or separation process. Two examples are reviewed for the latter category. Dipole eddies in a homogeneous rotating fluid have been produced by Flierl, Stern, and Whitehead. In most cases, modification was observed due to a third vortex. This is usually accompanied by a curved track of the vortex pairs. Recent studies have focused on isolated eddies which form from rather general and nondescript initial conditions. Baroclinic eddies in a rotating fluid with a sloping bottom were produced by squirting dense salt water up the sloping bottom and along the “eastern” wall. The jet stagnated in shallow water and was ejected normal to the wall. For certain parameters (volume flux of jet, etc.), a coherent lens of dense bottom water formed and propagated west with an overlying cyclonic vortex. The circulation in the bottom lens, on the other hand, was relatively weak. No such eddy forms when the depth of fresh water is relatively deep, and a regime diagram is given for the formation of the coherent eddies. The pressure field determined from analysis of the density distribution and using streak photographs is discussed in terms of an integral theorem for coherent eddies. The westward propagation is also related to previous theories.
Nonlinear Analysis and Design of Shuttle-Type Entry Guidance

Abstract The Shuttle guidance concept is to track a reference drag trajectory The current guidance law provides exponential tracking locally. It was shown in a previous paper that the feedback linearization method leads to an alternative, potentially superior, guidance law In this paper the two guidance laws are further analyzed. Stability and performance domains in state space are defined and constructed, taking into account the nonlinear dynamics, a state constraint, and a control constraint The alternative guidance law achieves the desired performance over a larger domain of the state space: the stability domains for the two laws are similar.
Combinatorial limitations of a strong form of list decoding

We prove the following results concerning the combinatorics of list decoding, motivated by the exponential gap between the known upper bound (of O(1/γ)) and lower bound (of Ωp(log(1/γ))) for the list-size needed to decode up to radius p with rate γ away from capacity, i.e., 1− h(p)− γ (here p ∈ (0, 1/2) and γ > 0). • We prove that in any binary code C ⊆ {0, 1} of rate 1 − h(p) − γ, there must exist a set L ⊂ C of Ωp(1/ √ γ) codewords such that the average distance of the points in L from their centroid is at most pn. In other words, there must exist Ωp(1/ √ γ) codewords with low “average radius”. The motivation for this result is that it gives a list-size lower bound for a strong notion of list decoding; this strong form has been implicitly been used in the previous negative results for list decoding. (The usual notion of list decoding corresponds to replacing average radius by the minimum radius of an enclosing Hamming ball.) The remaining results are for the usual notion of list decoding: • We give a short simple proof, over all fixed alphabets, of the above-mentioned Ωp(log(1/γ)) lower bound due to Blinovsky. • We show that one cannot improve the Ωp(log(1/γ)) lower bound via techniques based on identifying the zero-rate regime for list decoding of constant-weight codes (this is a typical approach for negative results in coding theory, including the Ωp(log(1/γ)) list size lower bound). On a positive note, our Ωp(1/ √ γ) lower bound for the strong form of list decoding does circumvent this barrier. • We show a “reverse connection” showing that constant-weight codes for list decoding imply general codes for list decoding with higher rate. This shows that the best possible list-size, as a function of the gap γ of the rate to the capacity limit, is the same up to constant factors for both constant-weight codes and general codes. • We give simple second moment based proofs that w.h.p. a list-size of Ωp(1/γ) is needed for list decoding random codes from errors as well as erasures, at rates which are γ away from the corresponding capacities. For random linear codes, the corresponding list size bounds are Ωp(1/γ) for errors and exp(Ωp(1/γ)) for erasures. ∗Research supported in part by NSF grants CCF 0953155 and CCF 0963975. Email: guruswami@cmu.edu, srivatsa@cs.cmu.edu ISSN 1433-8092 Electronic Colloquium on Computational Complexity, Report No. 17 (2012)
HAPPY IN THE HOOD? THE IMPACT OF RESIDENTIAL SEGREGATION ON SELF-REPORTED HAPPINESS†

Previous research consistently finds that racially based residential segregation is associated with poor economic, health, and social outcomes. The purpose of this paper is to explore the relationship between residential segregation and self-reported happiness. Using panel data from the National Survey of Families and Households (NSFH), we begin by estimating ordinary least squares (OLS) regressions of happiness on a measure of MSA-level segregation, controlling for a rich set of individual, neighborhood, regional, and state characteristics. The OLS results suggest that increased segregation is associated with a reduction in happiness among blacks. To deal more appropriately with the potential endogeneity of location choice, we extend the methodology to fully exploit the panel structure of the NSFH and incorporate individual fixed effects into the happiness equation. Contrary to the OLS results, our fixed effects estimates imply that blacks are happier in more segregated metropolitan areas. The paper discusses the implications of these results within the context of current integration policies.
Cybersecurity and Optimization in Smart “Autonomous” Buildings

Significant resources have been invested in making buildings “smart” by digitizing, networking and automating key systems and operations. Smart autonomous buildings create new energy efficiency, economic and environmental opportunities. But as buildings become increasingly networked to the Internet, they can also become more vulnerable to various cyber threats. Automated and Internet-connected buildings systems, equipment, controls, and sensors can significantly increase cyber and physical vulnerabilities that threaten the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of critical systems in organizations. Securing smart autonomous buildings presents a national security and economic challenge to the nation. Ignoring this challenge threatens business continuity and the availability of critical infrastructures that are enabled by smart buildings. In this chapter, the authors address challenges and explore new opportunities in securing smart buildings that are enhanced by machine learning, cognitive sensing, artificial intelligence (AI) and smart-energy technologies. The chapter begins by identifying cyber-threats and challenges to smart autonomous buildings. Then it provides recommendations on how AI enabled solutions can help smart buildings and facilities better protect, detect and respond to cyber-physical threats and vulnerabilities. Next, the chapter will provide case studies that examine how combining AI with innovative smart-energy technologies can increase both cybersecurity and energy efficiency savings in buildings. The chapter will conclude by proposing recommendations for future cybersecurity and energy optimization research for examining AI enabled smart-energy technology.
Subjective Well-Being and the Welfare State: Giving a Fish or Teaching to Fish?

To what extent can social policies influence how individuals experience spells of unemployment? Conventional hypotheses posit that more generous unemployment insurance schemes might increase the subjective well-being of the unemployed, but the empirical literature fails to convincingly confirm (or reject) this proposition. This paper contends that a theoretical preoccupation with the overall generosity of social policies obscures more than it reveals about the mechanisms through which the state can shape how individuals experience spells of unemployment. Social support regimes for the unemployed typically include some combination of active and passive labor market measures. Passive measures provide recipients with various forms of income support during unemployment spells, while active measures help individuals find new and better jobs by improving their overall employability. Several factors—the decreasing marginal utility of income, hedonic adaptation to material conditions, and the substantial non-pecuniary costs associated with unemployment—suggest that investments in active labor market measures will yield relatively greater gains in subjective well-being among the unemployed. These intuitions are confirmed in an analysis of data from three rounds of the European Social Survey (2002–2007) using a combination of fixed-effects and random-effects modeling techniques. While the overall generosity of public expenditures on labor market policy exerts no significant effect on the life satisfaction of the unemployed, the analysis supports the notion that active labor market measures are more effective in promoting life satisfaction among the unemployed than passive measures.
Ta-based amorphous metal thin films

Abstract With their lack of grains and grain boundaries, amorphous metals are known to possess advantageous mechanical properties and enhanced chemical stability relative to crystalline metals. Commonly, however, they exhibit poor high-temperature stability because of their metastable nature. Here, we describe two new Ta-based ternary metal thin films that retain thermal stability to 600 °C and above. The new thin-film compositions, Ta 2 Ni 2 Si 1 and Ta 2 Mo 2 Si 1 , are amorphous, exhibiting ultra-smooth surfaces (
F-actin Binding Protein, Anillin, Regulates Integrity of Intercellular Junctions in Human Epithelial Cells

Tight junctions (TJ) and adherens junctions (AJ) are key morphological features of differentiated epithelial cells that regulate the integrity and permeability of tissue barriers. Structure and remodeling of epithelial junctions depends on their association with the underlying actomyosin cytoskeleton. Anillin is a unique scaffolding protein interacting with different cytoskeletal components, including actin filaments and myosin motors. Its role in the regulation of mammalian epithelial junctions remains unexplored. Downregulation of anillin expression in human prostate, colonic, and lung epithelial cells triggered AJ and TJ disassembly without altering the expression of junctional proteins. This junctional disassembly was accompanied by dramatic disorganization of the perijunctional actomyosin belt; while the general architecture of the actin cytoskeleton, and activation status of non-muscle myosin II, remained unchanged. Furthermore, loss of anillin disrupted the adducin–spectrin membrane skeleton at the areas of cell–cell contact, selectively decreased γ-adducin expression, and induced cytoplasmic aggregation of αII-spectrin. Anillin knockdown activated c-Jun N-terminal kinase (JNK), and JNK inhibition restored AJ and TJ integrity and cytoskeletal organization in anillin-depleted cells. These findings suggest a novel role for anillin in regulating intercellular adhesion in model human epithelia by mechanisms involving the suppression of JNK activity and controlling the assembly of the perijunctional cytoskeleton.
ABS Inflows to the United States and the Global Financial Crisis

Abstract Relative to the “global savings glut” (GSG) hypothesis, we present a more complete picture of how capital flows contributed to the financial crisis, drawing attention to the sizable inflows from European investors into U.S. private-label asset-backed securities (ABS), including mortgage-backed securities and other structured investment products. The GSG hypothesis argues that the surge in capital inflows from emerging market economies to the United States led to significant declines in long-term interest rates in the United States and other industrial economies. In turn, these lower interest rates, when combined with both innovations and deficiencies of the U.S. credit market, are believed to have contributed to the U.S. housing bubble and to the buildup in financial vulnerabilities that led to the financial crisis. Because the GSG countries for the most part restricted their U.S. purchases to Treasuries and Agency debt, their provision of savings to ultimately risky subprime mortgage borrowers was necessarily indirect, pushing down yields on safe assets and increasing the appetite for alternative investments on the part of other investors. Foreign acquisitions of private-label ABS, primarily by Europeans, provided credit more directly and, by adding to domestic demand for these securities, contributed to the decline in their spreads over Treasury yields. Through a combination of empirical estimation and model simulation, we verify that both GSG inflows into Treasuries and Agencies, as well as European acquisitions of ABS, played a role in contributing to downward pressures on U.S. interest rates.
A Back Propagation Neural Network for Localizing Abnormal Cortical Regions in FDG PET images in Epileptic Children

In this paper we describe a new method for the definition of cortical abnormalities in epileptic patients. Our objective was to define non-invasively cortical areas with abnormal glucose consumption as measured with positron emission tomography (PET). Using coregistered MRI and PET image volumes, the cortical surface is geometrically parceled into areas of various sizes. The depth of the surface areas is determined using a gray matter mask resulting in small volume elements from which histograms are extracted. Using a back propagation neural network, a system is designed for classifying the histograms into a normal and abnormal group. Those volume elements that are detected as abnormal are marked and the brains are surface rendered in order to allow assessment of cortical abnormalities with respect to cortical landmarks.
The Emerging Law of Electronic Commerce

In this chapter, I define the scope of electronic commerce law and discuss how law can evolve in response to rapid change in social and business practices. I summarize how commercial law has adapted to electronic sales of goods using EDI and Internet distribution systems, discuss the strengths and weaknesses from a legal perspective of a new technology-based model for electronic commerce - digital signatures and public key infrastructure - and compare that model with others for managing the legal risks of electronic sales of goods. I also summarize how changes in payment system technologies and bank practices have produced new laws governing electronic payment systems; and how financial markets have moved to electronic systems for transferring investment securities.
VALUING ACCESS TO MULTIPLE WATER SUPPLY SOURCES IN IRRIGATED AGRICULTURE WITH A HEDONIC PRICING MODEL

Increasing aridity, more frequent and intense drought, and greater degrees of water scarcity create unique challenges for agriculture. In response to these challenges, which often manifest themselves in the form of lower and more variable surface water supplies as well as depleted and degraded ground water supplies, growers are apt to seek out opportunities to adapt. One option confronting growers to reduce their exposure to water scarcity and heightened uncertainty is to diversify. Indeed, having access to a portfolio of supplies is one way in which water and irrigation districts as well as individual growers are responding to the changing landscape of water resource availability. The objective of this paper is to evaluate the benefits to irrigated agriculture from having access to multiple water supply sources, i.e., a water portfolio. With farm-level information on approximately 2000 agricultural parcels across California, we use the hedonic property value method to investigate the extent growers’ benefit from having access to multiple sources of water (i.e., a water portfolio). Our results suggest that while lower quality waters, less reliable water, and less water all negatively impact agricultural land values, holding a water portfolio has a positive impact on land values through its role in mitigating the negative aspects of these factors and reducing the sensitivity of agriculture to climate-related factors. From a policy perspective, such results identify a valuable adaptation tool that water and irrigation districts may consider to help offset the negative impacts of climate change, drought, and population increases on water supply availability and reliability.
The topological fusion of bayes nets

Bayes nets are relatively recent innovations. As a result, most of their theoretical development has focused on the simplest class of single-author models. The introduction of more sophisticated multiple-author settings raises a variety of interesting questions. One such question involves the nature of compromise and consensus. Posterior compromises let each model process all data to arrive at an independent response, and then split the difference. Prior compromises, on the other hand, force compromise to be reached on all points before data is observed. This paper introduces prior compromises in a Bayes net setting. It outlines the problem and develops an efficient algorithm for fusing two directed acyclic graphs into a single, consensus structure, which may then be used as the basis of a prior compromise.
Clinical Approach to Advanced Renal Function Testing in Dogs and Cats

Serum creatinine concentration is insensitive for detecting kidney injury and does not assist in differentiation between glomerular versus tubular damage. Advanced renal function tests, including glomerular filtration rate testing, determining fractional excretion of electrolytes, and assay of urine biomarkers, may allow earlier detection of reduced renal function mass, differentiation of renal from non-renal causes of azotemia, and assist with localization of damage. This article reviews the principles, indications, and limitations of these tests and describes their use in sample clinical scenarios.
Orphans and Ebola : Estimating the Secondary Impact of a Public Health Crisis

The 2014 Ebola Virus Disease outbreak in West Africa is the largest to date by far. Ebola Virus Disease causes disproportionate mortality among the working-age population, resulting in far more mortality for parents of young children than other health crises. This paper combines data on the age distribution of current and projected mortality from Ebola with the fertility distribution of adults in Guinea, Liberia, and Sierra Leone, to estimate the likely impact of the epidemic on the number of orphans in these three countries. Using the latest mortality estimates (from February 11, 2015), it is estimated that more than 9,600 children have lost one or both parents to Ebola Virus Disease. The absolute numbers of orphans created by the Ebola epidemic are significant, but represent a small fraction (1.4 percent) of the existing orphan burden in the affected countries. Ebola is unlikely to increase the numbers of orphans beyond extended family networks' capacities to absorb them. Nonetheless, the pressures of caring for increased numbers of orphans may result in lower quality of care. These estimates should be used to guide policy to support family networks to improve the capacity to provide high quality care to orphans.
A framework for assigning probabilities in knowledge-based systems

This paper discusses a framework for assigning probabilities to rules in an expert system to deal with uncertainty knowledge processing. The objective is to enable a system to respond to environmental or uncontrollable factors in a strategic manner. We define guards for representing probabilities and then discuss operators and axioms, as part of a problem solver, for guiding probability assignments. We then demonstrate the capabilities of this problem solver by applying to an example taken from game theory.
Modeling Crop prices through a Burr distribution and Analysis of Correlation between Crop Prices and Yields using a Copula method.

The U.S. crop insurance program has major policy implications in terms of resource allocations, with government subsidies playing a major role. Efficient implementation of crop revenue insurance contracts requires accurate measures of risk for both crop prices and yields. In addition, rating methods are to consider the natural hedge between prices and yields. Empirical evidence shows that crop prices tend to be positively skewed with fat tails. This paper analysis is two-fold. It first studies crop prices using a Burr distribution, with parameters that capture skewness and kurtosis (fat tails), providing a better fit than current normal or log-normal distributions being used. It then uses a copula method to measure the correlation between crop prices and yields, for the study of crop revenue insurance. Results indicate a smaller probability of payout than present methods being used, having direct implications on the design and rating of crop and revenue insurance contracts.
The International Chamber of Commerce Court of Arbitration

The award must be in writing and signed by the arbitrators. If these require ments of form are not observed, the award is void. But the Act makes an exception if the award has been signed by a majority of the arbitrators, and they have a certificate on the award that the arbitrator whose signature is missing took part in deciding the dispute. Arbitrators may issue dissents. According to the Institute rules, the award must be accompanied by reasons. Even if the rules do not apply, Swedish arbitrators usually give a full account of the reasons on which the award is based, although they are not legally obliged to give reasoned awards. There is no statutory time limit for rendering the award as far as international arbitration is concerned. The Institute rule is that the award shall be made not later than one year after the appointment of the arbitrators. The Institute may, however, at the request of a party or the arbitrators, extend the period for good reasons.
A framework for multi-execution performance tuning

This paper describes a design and prototype implementation of a performance tool designed to answer performance questions that span multiple program executions from all stages of the lifespan of an application. We use the scientific experimentation archetype as a basis for designing an Experiment Management environment for parallel performance. In our model, information from all experiments for one application, including the components of the code executed, the execution environment, and the performance data collected, is gathered in a Program Space. Our Experiment Management tool enables exploration of this space with a simple naming mechanism, a selection and query facility, and a set of visualizations. A key component of this work is the ability to automatically describe the differences between two runs of a program, both the structural differences (differences in program source code and the resources used at runtime), and the performance variation (how were the resources used and how did this change from one run to the next).We present a new approach to automated performance diagnosis that incorporates knowledge from previous runs of the same application. The result is a performance tool that learns from each diagnostic program run, adapting its search strategy to obtain more useful diagnoses more quickly. We show performance gains of up to 98% obtained by incorporating historical knowledge into the Performance Consultant's search strategy. The results presented demonstrate the utility of our approach for repeated performance diagnosis of similar program runs, a common scenario when tuning parallel applications. The improvements achieved show that our new approach to gathering and storing historical application data can be successfully applied to the problem of automating performance diagnosis.
Property (RD) for Cocompact Lattices in a Finite Product of Rank One Lie Groups with Some Rank Two Lie Groups

We apply V. Lafforgue′s techniques to establish property (RD) for cocompact lattices in a finite product of rank one Lie groups with Lie groups whose restricted root system is of type A2.
Classroom video assessment and retrieval via multiple instance learning

We propose a multiple instance learning approach to content-based retrieval of classroom video for the purpose of supporting human assessing the learning environment. The key element of our approach is a mapping between the semantic concepts of the assessment system and features of the video that can be measured using techniques from the fields of computer vision and speech analysis. We report on a formative experiment in content-based video retrieval involving trained experts in the Classroom Assessment Scoring System, a widely used framework for assessment and improvement of learning environments. The results of this experiment suggest that our approach has potential application to productivity enhancement in assessment and to broader retrieval tasks.
Drug-Lab Triggers Have Potential to Prevent Adverse Drug Events in Outpatients

Previous studies have found that many adverse drug events (ADEs) in inpatients can be detected or prevented by alerting physicians to measured physiologic parameters such as an elevated creatinine or hyperkalemia.1,2 In developing a decision support system for an outpatient Electronic Medical Record, we have begun to retrospectively study associations between drugs and labs that could trigger an alert to physicians. …
Microbial community structure and function on sinking particles in the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre

Sinking particles mediate the transport of carbon and energy to the deep-sea, yet the specific microbes associated with sedimenting particles in the ocean’s interior remain largely uncharacterized. In this study, we used particle interceptor traps (PITs) to assess the nature of particle-associated microbial communities collected at a variety of depths in the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre. Comparative metagenomics was used to assess differences in microbial taxa and functional gene repertoires in PITs containing a preservative (poisoned traps) compared to preservative-free traps where growth was allowed to continue in situ (live traps). Live trap microbial communities shared taxonomic and functional similarities with bacteria previously reported to be enriched in dissolved organic matter (DOM) microcosms (e.g., Alteromonas and Methylophaga), in addition to other particle and eukaryote-associated bacteria (e.g., Flavobacteriales and Pseudoalteromonas). Poisoned trap microbial assemblages were enriched in Vibrio and Campylobacterales likely associated with eukaryotic surfaces and intestinal tracts as symbionts, pathogens or saprophytes. The functional gene content of microbial assemblages in poisoned traps included a variety of genes involved in virulence, anaerobic metabolism, attachment to chitinaceaous surfaces, and chitin degradation. The presence of chitinaceaous surfaces was also accompanied by the co-existence of bacteria which encoded the capacity to attach to, transport and metabolize chitin and its derivatives. Distinctly different microbial assemblages predominated in live traps, which were largely represented by copiotrophs and eukaryote-associated bacterial communities. These data indicate the central role of eukaryotic taxa in structuring sinking particle microbial assemblages, as well as the rapid responses of indigenous microbial species in the degradation of marine particulate organic matter in situ in the ocean’s interior.