cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Morphogenetic pattern formation during ascidian notochord formation is regulative and highly robust

The ascidian notochord forms through simultaneous invagination and convergent extension of a monolayer epithelial plate. Here we combine micromanipulation with time lapse and confocal microscopy to examine how notochord-intrinsic morphogenetic behaviors and interactions with surrounding tissues, determine these global patterns of movement. We show that notochord rudiments isolated at the 64-cell stage divide and become motile with normal timing; but, in the absence of interactions with non-notochordal tissues, they neither invaginate nor converge and extend. We find that notochord formation is robust in the sense that no particular neighboring tissue is required for notochord formation. Basal contact with either neural plate or anterior endoderm/lateral mesenchyme or posterior mesoderm are each alone sufficient to ensure that the notochord plate forms and extends a cylindrical rod. Surprisingly, the axis of convergent extension depends on the specific tissues that contact the notochord, as do other patterns of cell shape change, movement and tissue deformation that accompany notochord formation. We characterize one case in detail, namely, embryos lacking neural plates, in which a normal notochord forms but by an entirely different trajectory. Our results show ascidian notochord formation to be regulative in a fashion and to a degree never before appreciated. They suggest this regulative behavior depends on a complex interplay between morphogenetic tendencies intrinsic to the notochord plate and instructive and permissive interactions with surrounding tissues. We discuss mechanisms that could account for these data and what they imply about notochord morphogenesis and its evolution within the chordate phylum.
Community Colleges Online.

Presently, community colleges are bursting at the seams. In 2011, community colleges turned away more than 400,000 prospective students. In the next six years, 63 percent of all U. S. jobs will require postsecondary education. Twenty two million new workers with postsecondary degrees will be needed by 2018. Community colleges are turning increasingly to online technology to increase capacity in order to meet the surging demand for higher education attainment. In this article we will look at the role of online education in the community college setting.
Gallstone pancreatitis in older patients: Are we operating enough?

Background The recommended therapy for mild gallstone pancreatitis is cholecystectomy on initial hospitalization. Methods Using a 5% national Medicare sample (1996–2005), we evaluated adherence to current recommendations for gallstone pancreatitis (cholecystectomy rates on initial hospitalization and the use of endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography [ERCP]/sphincterotomy). We evaluated predictors of cholecystectomy, gallstone-related readmissions, and 2-year mortality. Results Adherence to current guidelines was low. Only 57% of 8,452 Medicare beneficiaries presenting to an acute care hospital with a first episode of mild gallstone pancreatitis underwent cholecystectomy on initial hospitalization. Of the patients who did not undergo cholecystectomy, 55% were never evaluated by a surgeon. Likewise, only 28% of patients who did not undergo cholecystectomy had a sphincterotomy. The 2-year readmission rates were higher among patients who did not undergo cholecystectomy (44% vs 4%; P P Conclusion Adherence to current recommendations for the management of mild gallstone pancreatitis is low in older patients. Our data suggest that >40% of patients who did not undergo cholecystectomy would have benefited from early definitive therapy. Implementation of policies to increase adherence to guidelines would prevent gallstone-related morbidity and mortality in older patients.
OT Syntax -- Decidability of Generation-based Optimization

In Optimality-Theoretic Syntax, optimization with unrestricted expressive power on the side of the OT constraints is undecidable. This paper provides a proof for the decidability of optimization based on constraints expressed with reference to local subtrees (which is in the spirit of OT theory). The proof builds on Kaplan and Wedekind's (2000) construction showing that LFG generation produces context-free languages.
A Highly Selective Catalyst for Partial Hydrogenation of 1,3‐Butadiene: MgO‐Supported Rhodium Clusters Selectively Poisoned with CO

The research was supported by the European Union Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007-2013) under grant agreement n8 PIOF-GA-2009-253129 (P.S.) and by DOE Basic Energy Sciences (Contract No. FG02-04ER15513) (DY). We thank the DOE Division of Materials Sciences for its role in the operation and development of beam lines 4-1 at the Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource. We thank the beamline staff for valuable support.
Enhanced conversion efficiency for harmonic generation with double resonance

Conversion efficiency for cw harmonic generation is calculated for the situation in which both fundamental and harmonic waves are resonant. Compared with the situation of a singly resonant cavity at the fundamental, the doubly resonant geometry can lead to an increase of the effective nonlinear coefficient. High conversion efficiency can thus be achieved with nonlinear crystals of relatively low nonlinear coefficient. and with modest pump power for the fundamental input,
Troponin T nuclear localization and its role in aging skeletal muscle

Troponin T (TnT) is known to mediate the interaction between Tn complex and tropomyosin (Tm), which is essential for calcium-activated striated muscle contraction. This regulatory function takes place in the myoplasm, where TnT binds Tm. However, recent findings of troponin I and Tm nuclear translocation in Drosophila and mammalian cells imply other roles for the Tn–Tm complex. We hypothesized that TnT plays a nonclassical role through nuclear translocation. Immunoblotting with different antibodies targeting the NH2- or COOH-terminal region uncovered a pool of fast skeletal muscle TnT3 localized in the nuclear fraction of mouse skeletal muscle as either an intact or fragmented protein. Construction of TnT3–DsRed fusion proteins led to the further observation that TnT3 fragments are closely related to nucleolus and RNA polymerase activity, suggesting a role for TnT3 in regulating transcription. Functionally, overexpression of TnT3 fragments produced significant defects in nuclear shape and caused high levels of apoptosis. Interestingly, nuclear TnT3 and its fragments were highly regulated by aging, thus creating a possible link between the deleterious effects of TnT3 and sarcopenia. We propose that changes in nuclear TnT3 and its fragments cause the number of myonuclei to decrease with age, contributing to muscle damage and wasting.
Filtered Component Analysis to Increase Robustness to Local Minima in Appearance Models

Appearance models (AM) are commonly used to model appearance and shape variation of objects in images. In particular, they have proven useful to detection, tracking, and synthesis of people's faces from video. While AM have numerous advantages relative to alternative approaches, they have at least two important drawbacks. First, they are especially prone to local minima in fitting; this problem becomes increasingly problematic as the number of parameters to estimate grows. Second, often few if any of the local minima correspond to the correct location of the model error. To address these problems, we propose filtered component analysis (FCA), an extension of traditional principal component analysis (PCA). FCA learns an optimal set of filters with which to build a multi-band representation of the object. FCA representations were found to be more robust than either grayscale or Gabor filters to problems of local minima. The effectiveness and robustness of the proposed algorithm is demonstrated in both synthetic and real data.
Dealing with uninvited and unwelcomed guests: a survey of current state legislative efforts to control illegal immigration within their borders

The inability of the Congress to provide a solution to address illegal immigration have left states to shoulder the economic and social costs associated with the nearly 11 million unwelcomed guests within their borders. This paper examines the current legislative efforts in Arizona and eight other states intended to curb illegal immigration.
Stochastic Stability of a Class of Distributed Delay Systems

Criteria for the stability of a class of distributed delay systems are given via the stochastic version of the Lyapunov-Krasovskii theory. The new results obtained follow from a state augmentation technique which reduces the distributed delay system to one with a single crisp (point-) delay.
The spread of pathogens through trade in small ruminants and their products.

While the international trade in small ruminants and small ruminant products is small relative to the trade in bovine, swine and poultry products, it is still economically important. In addition to wool, it includes some unique products (such as goat and sheep milk cheeses, cashmere fibre and karakul pelts) and the sheep/goat meat trade plays a large part in sustaining livelihoods in several regions of the world. The trade in small ruminants and their products also merits consideration because sheep and goats may transmit zoonotic diseases such as Rift Valley fever, Crimean Congo haemorrhagic fever, brucellosis and listeriosis. They also may transmit highly infectious livestock diseases, such as peste des petits ruminants, to naive populations of small ruminants in other countries. This can have dramatic consequences, particularly for poor people whose livelihood often depends on small ruminants. In addition, sheep and goats can serve as an important source of foot and mouth disease (FMD) for cattle. This has enormous global trade implications and it is important, therefore, that sheep and goats be considered in FMD control programmes aimed at improving access to trade.
Synthesis, Characterization, and Optical Properties of Inorganic Polymer Films

The linear and non-linear optical response of phosphazene and siloxane polymers and cyclic precursors is influenced by the nature of chemical groups substituted onto the heteronuclear backbone chains. Polymer mechanical properties, chemical stability, and solubility also are affected. Significant variations in both second and third order susceptibilities have been measured for various substituted phosphazene materials. The electron donating tendency of substitutional groups appears to correlate with the measured non-linear optical properties determined by SHG and DFWM experiments in these systems where d ¦ -p ¦ bonding along the polymer chain is important. Approaches to the synthesis, and deposition of these materials as thin films will be discussed. Variations in optical properties are highlighted for several model systems in terms of substitutional group perturbation to the chemical bonding between the chain heteroatoms.
Phylogeography of spruce beetles (Dendroctonus rufipennis Kirby) (Curculionidae: Scolytinae) in North America

Tree-feeding insects that are widespread in north temperate regions are excellent models for studying how past glaciations have impacted differentiation and speciation. We used mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) sequences and allele frequencies at nine microsatellite loci to examine genetic population structure across the current range of the spruce beetle ( Dendroctonus rufipennis ), an economically important insect in North America. Two major haplotype groups occur across northern North America, from Newfoundland to Alaska, on white spruce ( Picea glauca ), and a third distinctive haplotype group occurs throughout the Rocky Mountains on Engelmann spruce ( Picea engelmannii ). The two mtDNA lineages found in northern populations are 3–4% divergent from each other and from the lineages found in the Rocky Mountains. Analyses of microsatellite data also suggest the existence of major population groupings associated with different geographical regions. In the Pacific Northwest, concordant contact zones for genetically distinct populations of spruce beetles and their principal hosts appear to reflect recent secondary contact. Although we could detect no evidence of historical mtDNA gene flow between allopatric population groups, patterns of variation in the Pacific Northwest suggest recent hybridization and introgression. Together with the pollen record for spruce, they also suggest that beetles have spread from at least three glacial refugia. A minimum estimate of divergence time between the Rocky Mountain and northern populations was 1.7 Myr (million years), presumably reflecting the combined effects of isolation during multiple glacial cycles.
RSFQ: The fastest digital technology

This paper deals with the recent progress in the development of Rapid Single-Flux-Quantum (RSFQ) digital technology based on macroscopic quantum effects in superconductors. Elementary cells of this logic family store and process digital bits in the form of single quanta of magnetic flux, while the data exchange between the cells is provided with picosecond pulses transferred along superconductor microstrip lines with a speed approaching the speed of light. RSFQ devices combine a unique set of
Fibronectin Fiber Extension Decreases Cell Spreading and Migration

The extracellular matrix (ECM) is present in a range of molecular conformations and intermolecular arrangements. Fibronectin (Fn) molecules that constitute fibers within the ECM can exist in a variety of conformations that result from both mechanical stress and chemical factors such as allosteric binding partners. The long-standing hypothesis that conformational changes regulate the binding of cells to Fn fibers has only been tested for mutated molecules of Fn and has yet to be fully evaluated with Fn fibers. Using time-lapse microscopy we examined how mechanical extension of single fibers of Fn affects the adhesion and migration of endothelial cells. Using this single fiber adhesion technique, we show that high levels of mechanical strain applied to Fn fibers decreases the rates of both cell spreading and cell migration. These data indicate a fundamental cellular response to mechanical strain in the ECM that might have important implications for understanding how cells are recruited during tissue development and repair. J. Cell. Physiol. 231: 1728-1736, 2016. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Courts on Courts: Contracting for Engagement and Indifference in International Judicial Encounters

This paper explores the dynamics of international judicial interactions in civil cases. It proposes a positive model of court-on-court encounters based on contract theory. It argues that this model provides a superior account of these interactions compared to the prevailing account. The dialogue model developed by international relations specialists and international lawyers posits transnational judicial networks that engage judges in a constitutive and constructive project of building the global rule of law. The paper demonstrates that this model does not capture contemporary judicial practice, rests on outmodes historical judgments, and is normatively problematic. Contract theory not only explains contemporary judicial practice, but also is normatively attractive as a basis for international and transnational judicial interactions.
Cryoprecipitable Immunoglobulins with Native DNA Reactivity in the Glomerulopathies

During the course of studies of the composition of antigen–antibody systems in disease states associated with cryoglobulinemia, a method which appeared to allow us to examine cold-precipitable immunoglobulins for antibody specificity was developed. Presuming that cryoglobulins represent immune reactants, it was reasoned that it would be necessary to dissociate intact antigen–antibody complexes prior to examining them for antibody content. The approach adopted was to first solubilize the cryoprecipitates in acid buffer. The material then was tested for antibody activity against nuclear antigens. In addition, cryoglobulins were examined for antibodies reactive with the mitochondrial double-stranded DNA (dsDNA) of the kinetoplast of Crithidia luciliae as evidence of anti-native DNA activity. The results of these studies of the anti-DNA and native DNA content of the serum cryoglobulins of patients within several diagnostic categories are presented.
Normative and Non-Normative Religious Experience Among High School Youth

A sample of 451 Catholic, Baptist, and Methodist tenth-grade youth were asked about definite religious experiences in their lives, and 58 percent reported them. Most took place in church services or at a retreat or camp. We tried categorizing the experiences using the Elkind-Elkind and Stark typologies and found that with one additional category the Elkind-Elkind typology was apt. The "salvation or inspiration" type is the most common, especially among the Baptists and Methodists. This type is normative in those denominations, and church life facilitates it. The analysis of factors encouraging the experiences showed the necessity of distinguishing normative from non-normative religious experiences, since their determinants are different. The former are encouraged in certain denominations, and their occurrence is patterned. The latter are idiosyncratic and unpatterned.
Perception of Personality Traits in Oneself and Others

ABSTRACT Personality trait theory suggests that impressions of other people are veridical reports of their individual characteristics, and social perception theory suggests that personality descriptions are merely individuals' attributions, assumptions, and perceptions about others. Prior research has often used fixed adjectives to study personality descriptions and generally neglected the naturalistic study of the personality judgment process. A group of 101 American students listed six free-response adjectives that they felt were descriptive of their personality and six adjectives that they felt were descriptive of someone they knew well. The nature of these trait-descriptive adjectives was then examined, as well as their relationship to behaviors and situations and the manner in which they were expressed. Results indicate support for many of the tenets of the social perception approach—that distortions in the relative descriptions of oneself and others are present. However, many expected biases were no...
Differential patterning of genes involved in serotonin metabolism and transport in extra-embryonic tissues of the mouse.

Abstract Introduction Serotonin (5-HT) is an important neuromodulator, but recently has been shown to be involved in neurodevelopment. Although previous studies have demonstrated that the placenta is a major source of forebrain 5-HT during early forebrain development, the processes of how 5-HT production, metabolism, and transport from placenta to fetus are regulated are unknown. As an initial step in determining the mechanisms involved, we investigated the expression patterns of genes critical for 5-HT system function in mouse extraembryonic tissues. Methods Mid-through late gestation expression of 5-HT system-related enzymes, Tph1 , Ddc , Maoa , and 5-HT transporters, Sert/Slc6a4 , Oct3 / Slc22a3 , Vmat2 / Slc18a2 , and 5-HT in placenta and yolk sac were examined, with cell type-specific resolution, using multiplex fluorescent in situ hybridization to co-localize transcripts and immunocytochemistry to co-localize the corresponding proteins and neurotransmitter. Results Tph1 and Ddc are found in the syncytiotrophoblast I (SynT-I) and sinusoidal trophoblast giant cells (S-TGC), whereas Maoa is expressed in SynT-I, syncytiotrophoblast II (SynT-II) and S-TGC. Oct3 expression is observed in the SynT-II only, while Vmat2 is mainly expressed in S-TGC. Surprisingly, there were comparatively high expression of Tph1 , Ddc , and Maoa in the yolk sac visceral endoderm. Discussion In addition to trophoblast cells, visceral endoderm cells in the yolk sac may contribute to fetal 5-HT production. The findings raise the possibility of a more complex regulation of 5-HT access to the fetus through the differential roles of trophoblasts that surround maternal and fetal blood space and of yolk sac endoderm prior to normal degeneration.
Electrochemical and structural effects of in situ Li2O extraction from Li2MnO3 for Li-Ion batteries.

Li2MnO3 is an attractive cathode material due to its low cost, nontoxicity and potentially high capacity. However, its electrochemical inactivity, its poor electronic conductivity, and uncertainty about its underlying mechanism have limited its development. In this work, an in situ technique for extraction of Li and O during deposition of the thin film cathode is developed to investigate structural and electrochemical effects in a controlled fashion. MnO2 has been observed in samples with severe O and Li deficiency (capacity of 115 mAh g–1), while Li2MnO3 cathodes with slight excess of O and Li (capacity of 225 mAh g–1) can be synthesized by tuning growth conditions appropriately. Formation of a MnO2 phase, especially in Li and O deficient structures, could be a possible reason for irreversible capacity loss in Li2MnO3 related materials. Further investigation into stoichiometric and microstructure variations enabled by this technique allows rapid investigation of Li2MnO3 as well as other Li-rich composites.
Reduced anastomotic bleeding using new sutures with a needle-suture diameter ratio of one.

Reduction of blood loss from a vascular anastomosis, especially when one is using a polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) graft, is of great interest; even when a technically perfect anastomosis has been performed, there can still be significant and often bothersome bleeding from the needle holes. Currently, sutures have a needle-to-suture ratio of 2:1 or 3:1. Two new sutures, one made of PTFE and the other of polypropylene, were designed to have a needle-to-suture diameter ratio of 1:1. Theoretically, this allows the suture to completely fill the graft needle hole and control bleeding. These sutures were evaluated in a heparin-treated canine in vivo model to measure graft needle-hole bleeding. The materials were also tested by an independent laboratory to compare the basic physical characteristics. Twenty centimeters of 6 mm PTFE graft was interposed in an end-to-end fashion to the infrarenal canine aorta. The graft was then transected at its midpoint and a series of end-to-end, graft-to-graft anastomoses were performed with alternate experimental and control sutures. The experimental PTFE suture bled a mean of 12.46 ml per anastomosis. The experimental polypropylene bled 4.32 ml per anastomosis, while a control suture of polypropelene with a needle-to-suture ratio of 1.94 (5-0 prolene with a C-1 needle), produced a mean blood loss of 33.35 ml per anastomosis. These data are based on a total of 82 anastomoses. The results were analyzed with a two-tailed paired t test. As the data indicate, both experimental sutures allowed significantly less bleeding than the controls (p = .05). The testing of physical properties of the suture included diameter, tensile strength, needle pull-off strength, and elongation percent and were performed by an independent laboratory. These findings are included along with subjective evaluations of the sutures' handling qualities. We believe that sutures produced with needle-to-suture ratios of 1:1 greatly reduce graft needle-hole bleeding and will be a useful addition to the vascular surgeon's armamentarium.
Hürthle cell carcinoma in a patient with Graves' Disease.

Hurthle cell, a rare form of thyroid carcinoma, has been reported only five times in patients with Grave's Disease. We present a case report and comprehensive review of the literature. Surgery should be considered in patients with both Graves' Disease and an expanding goiter. Initial high-dose radioiodine should be administered post-operatively in patients with Hurthle cell carcinoma. Serum thyroglobulin and 18-FDG total body PET imaging may be valuable in discovering residual or recurrent disease.
Annette B. Weiner, Inalienable Possessions: The Paradox of Keeping-While-Giving , Exchange, Gender, and Inalienable Possesions

DURING THE PRE-WORLD WAR II YEARS , it was fairly common, even with the emphasis on ethnographic particularism, for anthropologists to devote their intellectual energies to generating grand syntheses and overarching theories of social relations. Since then, despite the proliferation of anthropologists, there have been proportionally far fewer synthetic works. Most anthropologists, reacting to criticisms of earlier ethnologists, afraid that critical comment will damage their own careers, and mindful of the exigencies of satisfying grant and manuscript reviewers, dissertation supervisors, and tenure committees, have retreated to the safer havens of narrow topics, narrow areas, and ethnographic analyses of limited sectors of social life. Annette Weiner’s ambitious, challenging, impressively argued book returns to an earlier tradition of broad ethnological analysis and theory building. But this is theory envisioned through intimate knowledge of one place, the Trobriand Islands, over a twenty-year period--plus a shorter period of field research in Western Samoa--and closely grounded in the reinterpretation of cross-cultural ethnographic data.
Optimistic semantic synchronization

Within the last decade multi-core processors have become increasingly commonplace with the power and performance demands of modern real-world programs acting to accelerate this trend. The rapid advancements in designing and adoption of such architectures mean that there is a serious need for programming models that allow the development of correct parallel programs that execute efficiently on these processors. A principle problem in this regard is that of efficiently synchronizing concurrent accesses to shared memory. Traditional solutions to this problem are either inefficient but provide programmability (coarse-grained locks) or are efficient but are not composable and very hard to program and verify (fine-grained locks). Optimistic Transactional Memory systems provide many of the composability and programmability advantages of coarse-grained locks and good theoretical scaling but several studies have found that their performance in practice for many programs remains quite poor primarily because of the high overheads of providing safe optimism. Moreover current transactional memory models remain rigid—they are not suited for expressing some of the complex thread interactions that are prevalent in modern parallel programs. Moreover, the synchronization achieved by these transactional memory systems is at the physical or memory level. This thesis advocates a position that memory synchronization problem for threads should be modeled and solved in terms of synchronization of underlying program values which have semantics associated with them. It presents optimistic synchronization techniques that address the semantic synchronization requirements of a parallel program instead. These techniques include methods to 1) enable optimistic transactions to recover from expensive sharing con icts without discarding all the work made possible by the optimism 2) enable a hybrid pessimistic-optimistic form of concurrency control that lowers overheads 3) make synchronization value-aware and semantics-aware 4) enable finer grained consistency rules (than allowed by traditional optimistic TM models) therefore avoiding con icts that do not enforce any semantic property required by the program. In addition to improving the expressibility of specific synchronization idioms all these techniques are also effective in improving parallel performance. This thesis formulates these techniques in terms of their purpose, the extensions to the language, the compiler as well as to the concurrency control runtime necessary to implement them. It also briefly presents an experimental evaluation of each of them on a variety of modern parallel workloads. These experiments show that these techniques significantly improve parallel performance and scalability over programs using state-of-the-art optimistic synchronization methods.
Modifications of nutrient regime, chlorophyll-a, and trophic state relations in Daechung Reservoir after the construction of an upper dam

Previous numerous studies on watershed scale demonstrated that the constructions of upper dams may influence the below dams due to modifications of flow regime and nutrient inputs. Little is known about how the dam constructions influence the downstream lakes or reservoirs in the regional scale. This study demonstrates how the construction of upper dam (i.e., Yongdam Dam) influences nutrient regime, trophic relations, and empirical models in Daechung Reservoir (DR). Yongdam Dam was constructed at the upstream region of DR in year 2000. The analysis of hydrological variables showed that inflow and discharge in the DR were largely reduced after the year 2000. The construction of upper dam construction also resulted in increases of water temperature, pH and conductivity (as an indicator of ionic content) in the DR. Empirical models of TP-CHL and N:P ratio-CHL suggested that stronger responses of CHL to the phosphorus were evident after the upper dam construction, indicating that algal production at a unit phosphorus increased after the upper dam construction. Mann-Kendall tests on the relations of N:P ratios to TN showed weak or no relations (t au = −0.143, z = −0.371, p = 0.7105) before the dam construction, while the relation of N:P ratios to TP showed strong in the periods of before- (tau = −0714, z = −2.351, p = 0.0187) and after the construction (t au = −0.868, z = −4.270, p = 0.0000). This outcome indicates that TP is key determinant on N:P ratios in the reservoir. Scatter Plots on Trophic State Index Deviations (TSIDs) of “TSI(SD) - TSI(CHL)” against “TSI(TP) - TSI(CHL)” showed that the dominance of clay turbidity or light limitation was evident before the upper dam construction [TSI(TP) - TSI(CHL) > 0 and TSI(SD) - TSI(CHL) > 0] and phosphorus limitation became stronger after the dam construction [(TSI(TP) - TSI(CHL) 0]. Overall, our analysis suggests that the upper dam construction modified the response of trophic components (phytoplankton) to the nutrients or nutrient ratios through the alteration of flow regime, resulting in modifications of ecological functions and trophic relations in the low trophic levels.
Birdsong learning as a social process

This paper describes a 30-year investigation into the role of social and ecological factors affecting song learning in song sparrows, Melospiza melodia. It addresses the question of why song sparrows learn the songs they do, given that they are exposed to many more songs than they will keep for their final repertoire of 7–11 song types. A young song sparrow moves from his natal area at about 1 month of age, eventually settling in an area where he learns the songs of the resident males and attempts to establish his own territory. Birds that share many songs with their neighbours in their first breeding season (the spring following their hatch summer) survive for more years on territory than birds that do not. Many features of the song-learning process lead to a high level of sharing with first-year neighbours, including preferentially learning the songs of their tutor-neighbours who survive the winter, and learning songs that are shared by several tutors. Social interaction appears to be critical in song learning, but indirect effects (eavesdropping on adults countersinging) seem to be at least as important as direct interaction between the young bird and his tutor-neighbours. Although our evidence suggests that the song-learning strategy of young song sparrows is beneficial to them, a preliminary analysis suggests it may not benefit their tutors.
Compact and low-cost humanoid hand powered by nylon artificial muscles

This paper focuses on design, fabrication and characterization of a biomimetic, compact, low-cost and lightweight 3D printed humanoid hand (TCP Hand) that is actuated by twisted and coiled polymeric (TCP) artificial muscles. The TCP muscles were recently introduced and provided unprecedented strain, mechanical work, and lifecycle (Haines et al 2014 Science 343 868-72). The five-fingered humanoid hand is under-actuated and has 16 degrees of freedom (DOF) in total (15 for fingers and 1 at the palm). In the under-actuated hand designs, a single actuator provides coupled motions at the phalanges of each finger. Two different designs are presented along with the essential elements consisting of actuators, springs, tendons and guide systems. Experiments were conducted to investigate the performance of the TCP muscles in response to the power input (power magnitude, type of wave form such as pulsed or square wave, and pulse duration) and the resulting actuation stroke and force generation. A kinematic model of the flexor tendons was developed to simulate the flexion motion and compare with experimental results. For fast finger movements, short high-power pulses were employed. Finally, we demonstrated the grasping of various objects using the humanoid TCP hand showing an array of functions similar to a natural hand.
Implicit Black identification and stereotype threat among African American students

This study detects statistically significant and substantively large stereotype threat effects that would remain hidden if Black identification were measured only explicitly. Three hundred and fifty-one students at Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) were tested on an implicit Black identification measure in an online survey, and stereotype threat was manipulated beforehand by randomly presenting one of three introductory screens: an all-White research team (high-threat condition), an all-Black research team (low-threat condition), or no team picture (control condition). The implicit Black identification measure predicted pro-Black political opinions (regarding affirmative action and government aid to Blacks, slavery reparations, and the Racial Resentment Scale), high performance on a political knowledge test, and high self-reported political participation. However, under the high-threat condition, Black students with the highest implicit Black identification scores answered 25% fewer political knowledge questions correctly, and reported 25% fewer acts of political participation, compared with students operating under the low-threat conditions.
Forestry operations and the problem of noise.

Along with air and water pollution, the problem of noise is becoming increasingly impor:ant in all of the industrialised societies of the world. As a result of the developments of industry and transport, there has been an increase in the number and power of sources of noise, which have led to what may be called an acoustic pollution of many workplaces...
“It Just Got Real:” Navigating the Affordances and Constraints of School-Based Learning in a Mathematics-Specific Induction Program

As beginning teachers encounter their first classrooms, they struggle to enact curriculum and negotiate expectations of local context with their visions of “good teaching.” This article is a qualit...
Barriers to Recovery in Concussion (P6.167)

Objective: The purpose of this study was to determine factors that influence recovery from a concussion and to investigate the association between duration and quality of prescribed rest and recovery time. Background: The prescribed treatment for a concussion is physical and cognitive rest. Both physicians and patients struggle with defining “rest” and understanding the consequences of compliance. Few studies have been done to determine the optimal prescription of rest necessary to influence recovery. Design/Methods: Patients diagnosed with concussion between the ages 7 and 70 years completed a questionnaire regarding their activity during their recovery period. 180 patients had completed the questionnaire between November 2011 and October 2016. Chi-square tests were used to test factors associated with prolonged recovery. Results: Females were nearly two times as susceptible to risk for prolonged recovery (OR:1.91; p=0.036). Individuals who sustained a concussion via fall were over three times as likely to have a recovery ≥ 30 days (OR:3.29; p Conclusions: These factors all have a significant impact on concussion recovery time: gender, injury mechanism, sport played, and pastimes during recovery. Females have a more difficult time recovering than males. Simple activities such as using the computer for leisure or carrying heavy items may prolong recovery. Patients with a history of learning disability may experience longer recovery times. Disclosure: Dr. Halvorsen has nothing to disclose. Dr. Bains has nothing to disclose. Dr. Nguyen has nothing to disclose. Dr. Cogsil has nothing to disclose. Dr. Cummings has nothing to disclose. Dr. Dalal has nothing to disclose. Dr. Zhang has nothing to disclose. Dr. Teena has received personal compensation for activities with GE-NFL as a medical advisory board member. Dr. Teena has received research support from GE-NFL, Chembio, and Abbott.
The Wrinkling of a Twisted Ribbon

Recent experiments by Chopin and Kudrolli (Phys Rev Lett 111:174302, 2013) showed that a thin elastic ribbon, when twisted into a helicoid, may wrinkle in the center. We study this from the perspective of elastic energy minimization, building on recent work by Chopin et al. (J Elast 119(1–2):137–189, 2015) in which they derive a modified von Karman functional and solve the relaxed problem. Our main contribution is to show matching upper and lower bounds for the minimum energy in the small-thickness limit. Along the way, we show that the displacements must be small where we expect that the ribbon is helicoidal, and we estimate the wavelength of the wrinkles.
Distributions Which Are Gaussian Convolutions

Let Z ~ N(0,1). We consider distributions on IR which arise as convolutions with Z. The intersection of this class of convolutions with the family of normal scale mixtures is completely characterized and the implications are discussed. We also study the tail properties of the convolutions. A domain of attraction theorem is proved. Finally, we give a characterization of all random variables Y such that the convolution Z + Y is unimodal and relate the number of modes of Y to that of the convolution. One particularly surprising example is given of a harshly oscillating density which becomes unimodal when convolved with Z.
On the Death of the Pilgrim: The Postcolonial Hermeneutics of Jarava Lal Mehta

“Dialogue” has become a fashionable term of in many circles of comparative studies. The twentieth century German philosopher Hans-Georg Gadamer placed dialogue at the center of his philosophical hermeneutics. Proposing the accomplishment of a “fusion of horizons” between initially opposed parties, Gadamer outlined the structure of engagement between self and other. Situating the self in an irrevocable historical context, he argued that this self must encounter the other and through this encounter enrich its own position. Though ostensibly intended as a corrective to more openly colonial intentions and agendas, a close examination of Gadamer's philosophical hermeneutics betrays lingering colonial interests. These interests become pronounced when compared with what I call the postcolonial hermeneutics of the twentieth century Indian philosopher Jarava Lal Mehta. What distinguishes philosophical from postcolonial hermeneutics is the condition of the self subsequent to its encounter with the other. Where for Gadamer the other is a moment of the self's enrichment and edification — those elements of the other that do not facilitate such conservative agendas being discarded — the other for Mehta is a moment of the self's disruption. Mehta emphasizes an encounter wherein both parties are not edified but rather ruptured. Such rupture highlights the incompletion of all subjects subject to the “dialogue.” Where philosophical hermeneutics emphasize edifying supplementation, postcolonial hermeneutics emphasize rupture, dislocation, and incompletion.
Survival Outcomes and Patterns of Management for Anal Adenocarcinoma.

Anal adenocarcinoma (AA) is a rare histologic subtype of anal cancer believed to have worse outcomes than anal squamous cell carcinoma (AS). This study aimed to examine practice patterns and treatment outcomes for this rare subtype using the National Cancer Data Base (NCDB). Patients who had new diagnoses of anal cancer treated with chemoradiation were selected from the NCDB from 2004 to 2015. The patients were divided into two histologic groups (AA or AS). Statistics included the Chi square test to analyze categorical proportions in demographic information, Kaplan–Meier analysis to evaluate overall survival (OS), and Cox proportional hazards modeling to determine variables associated with OS. The study analyzed 24,461 patients. Compared with AS patients, AA patients were more likely to be male, to present with a higher cancer stage, to be older (> 65 years), and to undergo surgery with an abdominoperineal resection (APR). The median OS was 72.5 months for the AA patients and 143.8 months for the AS patients (P < 0.001). Survival was longer for the AA patients undergoing APR within 6 months after chemoradiation (CRT) than for the AA patients who had an APR 6 months after CRT (88.3 vs. 58.1 months; P < 0.001). In the multivariable analysis, the factors associated with worse survival included adenocarcinoma subtype, age of 55 years or older, male gender, T stage of 3 or higher, comorbidity score of 1 or higher, lower income, and treatment at a nonacademic institution. In this largest study of anal adenocarcinoma to date, trimodality therapy was associated with better survival than chemoradiation alone.
Phase Transitions to Superrotation in a Coupled Fluid—Rotating Sphere System

A family of spin-lattice models are derived as convergent finite dimensional approximations to the rest frame kinetic energy of a barotropic find coupled to a massive rotating sphere. The angular momentum of the fluid component changes under complex torques that are not resolved and the kinetic energy of the fluid is not a conserved Hamiltonian in these models. These models are used in a statistical equilibrium formulation for the energy — relative enstrophy theory of the coupled barotropic fluid — rotating sphere system, known as Kac’s spherical model, to study the interactions between the energy cascade to large scales and angular momentum transfer. Exact solution of this model provides critical temperatures and amplitudes of the ground modes — superrotating solid body flows — in the BECondensed phase.
FXCO2 laser therapy of existing burn scars does not significantly improve outcomes in a porcine model

Abstract Introduction Fractional CO2 lasers have been used to improve scar properties following burn injury; however, the efficacy of laser therapy alone has been difficult to ascertain. The goal of this study was to evaluate the effect of fractional CO2 laser therapy on objectively measured scar outcomes including scar area, pigmentation, erythema, roughness, histology, and biomechanics in a porcine burn model. Methods Full thickness burn wounds were created on female red Duroc pigs; burn eschar was excised and wounds were grafted with split-thickness autograft. Sites had no additional treatment for 105 days resulting in thick contracted scars. At 105 days post burn, scars were treated with either a single pulse or three stacked pulses of a fractional CO2 laser at 70 mJ. Three treatments were given at four-week intervals. Scar area, pigmentation, erythema, roughness, histology, and mechanics were evaluated before treatment and at days 133, 161 and 189 post-injury. Results Neither single nor stacked laser treatment resulted in a significant improvement in scar area, appearance, or biomechanics compared to control scars. Scar roughness was, on average, reduced with fractional CO2 treatment; however, this did not reach statistical significance. Conclusion Although many clinical studies have reported significant benefits when treating burn scars with fractional CO2 laser therapy, this study did not find significant differences following laser therapy. For greatest efficacy, the selection of laser delivery parameters and co-treatments must account for variability in scar properties, including thickness.
HALO: accelerating flow classification for scalable packet processing in NFV

Network Function Virtualization (NFV) has become the new standard in the cloud platform, as it provides the flexibility and agility for deploying various network services on general-purpose servers. However, it still suffers from sub-optimal performance in software packet processing. Our characterization study of virtual switches shows that the flow classification is the major bottleneck that limits the throughput of the packet processing in NFV, even though a large portion of the classification rules can be cached in the last level cache (LLC) in modern servers. To overcome this bottleneck, we propose Halo, an effective near-cache computing solution for accelerating the flow classification. Halo exploits the hardware parallelism of the cache architecture consists of Non-Uniform Cache Access (NUCA) and Caching and Home Agent (CHA) available in almost all Intel® multi-core CPUs. It associates the accelerator with each CHA component to speed up and scale the flow classification within LLC. To make Halo more generic, we extend the x86--64 instruction set with three simple data lookup instructions for utilizing the proposed near-cache accelerators. We develop Halo with the full-system simulator gem5. The experiments with a variety of real-world workloads of network services demonstrate that Halo improves the throughput of basic flow-rule lookup operations by 3.3×, and scales the representative flow classification algorithm - tuple space search by up to 23.4× with negligible negative impact on the performance of collocated network services, compared with state-of-the-art software-based solutions. Halo also performs up to 48.2× more energy-efficient than the fastest but expensive ternary content-addressable memory (TCAM), with trivial power and area overhead.
Criminal thinking as a moderator of the perceived certainty–offending relationship: age variations

ABSTRACTThe purpose of this study was to determine whether the perceived certainty of punishment and general criminal thinking interact and whether the effect varies as a function of age. Data from...
Laser Diffractometer for Measuring Bacterial Biodegradation of Dental Materials

Streptococcus mutans (S. mutans), a major cariogenic bacterium, has exhibited esterase activities, and has been shown to degrade dental resin composites and adhesives contributing to the risk of developing secondary caries and failed restorations. Changes to the surface morphology of the resin materials have been observed through SEMs; however, they were not quantified. In the current study, we present the development of a laser diffractometer whereby we can apply it to determining quantitatively the surface roughness spectrum of a dental material due to bacteria biodegradation.
Using a Situational Awareness Display to Improve Rider Trust and Comfort with an AV Taxi

There is evidence that a significant portion of the population does not trust automated vehicles (AV). Research on trust in automation suggests that providing insight into how automation functions ...