cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Denitrification and the nitrogen gas excess in the eastern tropical South Pacific oxygen deficient zone

Abstract Recent studies of the nitrogen gas excess produced during water column denitrification have indicated that water column denitrification rates calculated using nitrate deficit-type methods could be a substantial underestimate. Since there are no other significant processes that produce (or consume) N2 in the oxygen deficient zone (ODZ), its excess above background can be used to estimate the amount of denitrification, avoiding assumptions made in nitrate deficit calculations of the composition of the respired organic matter and also uncertainties in the nitrogen removal pathways. Dissolved N2, Ar, and nutrient concentrations were measured at 2 stations in the ODZ of the eastern tropical South Pacific (ETSP) in order to compare the nitrogen gas excess with the dissolved inorganic nitrogen (DIN) deficit due to denitrification. In contrast with previous findings in the Arabian Sea ODZ, the shapes of the N2 excess and DIN deficit profiles were similar in the ETSP ODZ, with maxima at the top of the ODZ. Maximum DIN deficits at each station were 19 and 18 μM N compared to the maximum N2 excesses of 15 and 20 μM N, respectively. Given the same considerations of the volume and residence time for the oxygen deficient zone waters, denitrification rates for the ETSP estimated from the N2 excess would be comparable or no greater than 30% larger than the one determined using the DIN deficit. This implies that the source of the DIN removed from the ODZ is either deep sea nitrate or organic matter with an N:P ratio close to Redfield.
Product safety for a monopolist under strict liability

Abstract This paper views strict producer liability as essentially requiring the producer to provide a tie-in sale of full coverage insurance to its customers. The output and safety levels under strict producer liability are compared to those that would exist when the consumer retains all liability. The risk averseness of the producer and the availability of commercial liability coverage are shown to affect the producer's output and safety decision. In general, a shift from consumer to producer liability might not encourage the production of safer products, either with or without the availability of commercial liability insurance to the producer.
Introduction: The adversities of aging

The aging process is evolutionarily conserved and subject to quantitative modification by both genetic and environmental factors. Fundamental mechanisms of aging result in progressive deficits in the function of cells and organs, often leading to diseases that ultimately kill the organism such as cancers, cardiovascular disease and neurodegenerative disorders. Oxidative stress and damage to all of the major classes of molecules in cells are involved in aging and age-related diseases. The widely pursued approach of targeting disease-specific processes to develop therapeutic interventions has not had a major impact on healthspan. A more productive approach would be to target the fundamental mechanisms of aging throughout adult life so as to extend healthspan. Caloric restriction and regular exercise are two such approaches.
Abstract LB-159: Characterization of cell-cycle progression using a novel bi-cistronic lentiviral FUCCI reporter

Proceedings: AACR Annual Meeting 2014; April 5-9, 2014; San Diego, CA Currently, there are few methods to visualize cell cycle progression in leukemia stem cells (LSC). Human LSC are characterized as quiescent self-renewing cells that drive leukemic transformation of myeloproliferative neoplasms and myelodysplastic syndromes. Additionally, current methods require sequential transduction and clonal selection. These methods and conditions are not feasible to study primary patient samples and LSC, which are generally limited in sample size. To alleviate this challenge, we generated a lentiviral biscistronic vector encoding FUCCI (fluorescent ubiquitination-based cell-cycle indicator) probes. Time-lapse confocal imaging of transduced 293 cells and SKNO-1 cells exhibited normal cell division and distinct nuclear staining of either green or red fluorescence. Further, analysis by flow cytometry of 293 cell confirms that S/G2/M and G1/G0 phases of cell cycle correlate to expression of fluorescent reporters expressed from bicistronic lentiviral vector and recapitulate FACS plots using traditional Ki67 and 7AAD staining. The development of this new reagent offers a new and more effective method to track cell cycle progression in limited mammalian cell populations. Future studies will utilize primary patient CD34+CD38- selected leukemic stem cell populations. Citation Format: Gabriel Pineda, Florence Lambert-Fliszar, Gennarina L. Riso, Kathleen M. Kane, Catriona Jamieson. Characterization of cell-cycle progression using a novel bi-cistronic lentiviral FUCCI reporter. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 105th Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2014 Apr 5-9; San Diego, CA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2014;74(19 Suppl):Abstract nr LB-159. doi:10.1158/1538-7445.AM2014-LB-159
Objective and automated protocols for the evaluation of biomedical search engines using No Title Evaluation protocols

The evaluation of information retrieval techniques has traditionally relied on human judges to determine which documents are relevant to a query and which are not. This protocol is used in the Text Retrieval Evaluation Conference (TREC), organized annually for the past 15 years, to support the unbiased evaluation of novel information retrieval approaches. The TREC Genomics Track has recently been introduced to measure the performance of information retrieval for biomedical applications. We describe two protocols for evaluating biomedical information retrieval techniques without human relevance judgments. We call these protocols No Title Evaluation (NT Evaluation). The first protocol measures performance for focused searches, where only one relevant document exists for each query. The second protocol measures performance for queries expected to have potentially many relevant documents per query (high-recall searches). Both protocols take advantage of the clear separation of titles and abstracts found in Medline. We compare the performance obtained with these evaluation protocols to results obtained by reusing the relevance judgments produced in the 2004 and 2005 TREC Genomics Track and observe significant correlations between performance rankings generated by our approach and TREC. Spearman's correlation coefficients in the range of 0.79–0.92 are observed comparing bpref measured with NT Evaluation or with TREC evaluations. For comparison, coefficients in the range 0.86–0.94 can be observed when evaluating the same set of methods with data from two independent TREC Genomics Track evaluations. We discuss the advantages of NT Evaluation over the TRels and the data fusion evaluation protocols introduced recently. Our results suggest that the NT Evaluation protocols described here could be used to optimize some search engine parameters before human evaluation. Further research is needed to determine if NT Evaluation or variants of these protocols can fully substitute for human evaluations.
Traffic Dynamics: Analysis of Stability in Car Following

The manner in which vehicles follow each other on a highway without passing and the propagation of disturbances down a line of vehicles has been investigated further. Criteria are derived for both local and asymptotic stability in a chain of vehicles. The influence of next nearest neighbors as well as a statistical theory of stability is discussed. “Acceleration noise” is proposed as a parameter that might be employed to characterize the driver-car-road complex under various conditions. Some preliminary experimental measurements of acceleration noise are discussed.
Myocardial oxygen metabolism and myocardial blood flow in dogs in hemorrhagic shock.

We have studied the interrelations of myocardial oxygen metabolism and myocardial blood flow in hemorrhagic shock. Myocardial blood flow was measured by the 133Xe-washout method in closed-chest anesthetized dogs while the dogs were breathing either room air at ambient pressure or oxygen at high pressure. In animals with normal blood pressure, oxygen at high pressure produced a consistent decrease in myocardial blood flow from a mean of 70 ml/100 g/min to a mean of 43 ml/100 g/min, with a proportionate decrease in myocardial O2 consumption. In animals in hemorrhagic shock, oxygen at high pressure induced no change in myocardial blood flow but increased myocardial O2 consumption from a mean of 5.9 ml/100 g/min to a mean of 7.4 ml/100 g/min. When the animals in hemorrhagic shock breathed room air again at ambient pressure following oxygen at high pressure, the myocardial blood flow increased from a mean of 40 ml/100 g/min to a mean of 51 ml/100 g/min. The myocardial O2 consumption did not change. We conclude...
WC-2 mediates WC-1–FRQ interaction within the PAS protein-linked circadian feedback loop of Neurospora

Eukaryotic circadian clocks comprise feedback loops where PAS domain-containing transcriptional activators drive gene expression of negative elements. In Neurospora, clock models posit a White Collar complex (WCC) containing WC-1 and WC-2 that activates expression of the central clock gene frequency (frq); FRQ protein is hypothesized to feed back to block the activity of the WCC. We have characterized the WC-2 protein and its role in this complex: WC-2 is an abundant constitutive nuclear protein, in contrast to rhythmically expressed FRQ and WC-1. WC-2 interacts with WC-1 and FRQ but, significantly, WC-1 and FRQ do not interact in the absence of WC-2. By quantifying the relative numbers of WC-2, FRQ and WC-1 proteins and complexes in cell extracts, both the numbers and types of complexes at different circadian times were estimated, yielding results consistent with the model. Constitutive and abundant WC-2 appears to provide a scaffold allowing for the interaction of two limiting and rhythmically out-of-phase proteins, FRQ and WC-1, and this temporal and physical relationship may be responsible for rhythmic expression of frq.
Adiponectin modulates focal adhesion disassembly in activated hepatic stellate cells: implication for reversing hepatic fibrosis

Previous evidence indicates that adiponectin possesses antifibrogenic activity in inhibiting liver fibrosis. Therapeutic strategies, however, are limited by adiponectin quaternary structure and effective concentrations in circulation. Here we postulate a novel molecular mechanism, whereby adiponectin targets focal adhesion kinase (FAK) activity and disrupts key features of the fibrogenic response. Adiponectin-null (Ad(-/-)) mice and wild-type littermates were exposed to either saline or carbon tetrachloride (CCl4) for 6 wk. CCl4-gavaged mice were also injected with attenuated adenoviral adiponectin (Ad-Adn) or Ad-LacZ for 2 wk. Hepatic stellate cells (HSCs) were treated with or without adiponectin to elucidate signal transduction mechanisms. In vivo delivery of Ad-Adn markedly attenuates CCl4-induced expression of key integrin proteins and markers of HSC activation: αv, β3, β1, α2(I) collagen, and α-smooth muscle actin. Confocal experiments of liver tissues demonstrated that adiponectin delivery also suppressed vinculin and p-FAK activity in activated HSCs. In vitro, adiponectin induced dephosphorylation of FAK, mediated by a physical association with activated tyrosine phosphatase, Shp2. Conversely, Shp2 knockdown by siRNA significantly attenuated adiponectin-induced FAK deactivation, and expression of TIMP1 and α2(I) collagen was abolished in the presence of adiponectin and si-FAK. Finally, we documented that either adiponectin or the synthetic peptide with adiponectin properties, ADP355, suppressed p-FAK in synthetic matrices with stiffness measurements of 9 and 15 kPa, assessed by immunofluorescent imaging and quantitation. The in vivo and in vitro data presented indicate that disassembly of focal adhesion complexes in HSCs is pivotal for hepatic fibrosis therapy, now that small adiponectin-like peptides are available.
The Architectural Profession: Limits to Leadership

The objective in this paper is to investigate whether a key element of the professional tradition—the role of the architect as agent of the building entrepreneur—continues to be an appropriate means for enhancing the design capability and authority of architects in the newer, more participative forms of project organization. The functions comprising the leadership role of the architect in these organizations are reviewed and it is shown that they have become not only more complex but also more overlapped in time when compared with the situation existing in the long-standing rigidly sequential form of project organization known as “the system “. A review of leadership in participative social systems—using a functions approach —reveals that there is considerable reluctance on the part of members of such systems to placing both design and management functions in the hands of one individual. The reasons behind this resistance are studied and found to be associated with the contradictory nature of the behaviou...
Tricuspid atresia or severe stenosis with partial common atrioventricular canal: Anatomic data, clinical profile and surgical considerations

The anatomic findings in 11 cases of tricuspid atresia and in two cases of severe tricuspid stenosis, both combined with partial common atrioventricular (AV) canal, are presented in detail. Twelve cases were documented by postmortem examination and the diagnosis was confirmed by echocardiography and surgical observation in the one living patient. Clinical data available in nine cases and cardiac catheterization data obtained in eight are included in this report. In three cases (23%)--two with tricuspid atresia and one with extreme tricuspid stenosis--the tricuspid valve and right ventricle exhibited characteristics seen in Ebstein's anomaly. In all 13 cases, the great arteries were normally related. The ventricular septal defect(s) in 10 (83%) of the 12 postmortem cases rapidly became smaller and this resulted in marked diminution of the pulmonary blood flow and severe hypoxia. Only three of the eight patients with available cardiac catheterization and angiocardiographic data showed the scooped-out appearance of the left ventricular septal surface characteristic of AV canal defects. By contrast, two-dimensional echocardiography, available in the three most recent cases, accurately demonstrated all the defects present and represents the diagnostic method of choice. Early surgical intervention to establish a systemic to pulmonary artery anastomosis is essential for survival. More definitive surgical treatment can be achieved later by an atriopulmonary or cavopulmonary anastomosis with or without replacement of the cleft and often regurgitant mitral valve. The one living patient exemplifies this approach. This is the largest series of this unusual type of tricuspid atresia reported to date.
Automatic processing of memory for spatial location

Earlier research on the automaticity of memory for spatial location was extended. A series of four-photograph sets were presented to subjects, who then attempted to relocate the photographs to their original locations on posters. Number of locations on the posters varied from 4, 9, or 16, and instructions were intentional or incidental. Memory for location decreased with increased matrix size. Instructions had no effect. The recognition of photographs was unaffected by these variables. No firm evidence for effortful processing of location memory was found.
Angiotensin receptor blockers and antiplatelet agents are associated with improved primary patency after arteriovenous hemodialysis access placement.

Objective Dialysis access failure is a major cause of morbidity, mortality, and cost in end-stage renal disease. We undertook a study to determine the influence of medication use on dialysis access failure. Methods After institutional review board approval, we performed a retrospective analysis of all upper extremity hemodialysis accesses placed from 2005 to 2009 at the Washington DC Veterans Affairs Medical Center. For each access, the date of failure was recorded. For patients who died or were lost to follow-up, the date of the last documented functional patency (censoring) was recorded. The primary exposures were 12 medication classes. Patient demographics, behaviors, comorbidities, and access characteristics were used as covariates. Patency rates were calculated using Kaplan-Meier methods. Cox proportional hazard models controlling for patient characteristics and all medication classes, with procedures clustered within patients, were used to determine the influence of medication class on primary patency. Results Two hundred sixty autogenous and 126 prosthetic newly placed accesses were identified. Of these, three lower extremity accesses and six accesses with unknown thrombosis date were excluded. Forty-five (18%) of the remaining 257 autogenous accesses were excluded for primary nonfunctionality (patent, but with inadequate venous dilatation for initial hemodialysis), because the primary outcome was long-term functional patency. The remaining 212 autogenous and 120 prosthetic accesses were analyzed. Primary patency rates at 1 and 2 years were 55.2% and 49.1% for autogenous accesses, and 50.2% and 29.7% for prosthetic accesses, respectively. On multivariable analysis, angiotensin receptor blockers (ARBs) were associated with reduced hazard of both autogenous (hazard ratio [HR], 0.35; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.16-0.76; P = .008) and prosthetic (HR, 0.41; 95% CI, 0.18-0.95; P = .039) access failure. On subgroup analysis, ARBs prolonged autogenous access primary patency among patients receiving antiplatelet medication (aspirin, clopidogrel; HR, 0.16; 95% CI, 0.05-0.52; P = .002) but had no demonstrable benefit among patients not receiving antiplatelets (HR, 1.35; 95% CI, 0.34-5.31; P = .670). There were no significant drug–drug interactions in the analysis of prosthetic accesses. Weighted regression models demonstrated low multicollinearity among the model variables. Conclusion Our data suggest that therapy with an ARB plus antiplatelet agent is associated with prolonged autogenous access primary patency, and therapy with an ARB with or without antiplatelet agents is associated with prolonged prosthetic access primary patency. Randomized studies are needed to confirm the causal role of ARBs and to determine the optimal therapeutic regimen (dose, timing, and duration) to promote access patency.
Planning optimal precedence-constraint robot assembly sequences problem with neural computation

The problem of automatically finding the optimal robot assembly sequence for a set of n parts that construct a mechanical object is presented. Generally, to assemble a mechanical object, the assembly operation involves precedence relation of jointing the parts; that is, the order of attaching pats together crucially determines whether the desired object is able to be constructed from the parts. The precedence relationship of assembling the object results from the geometric constraint of parts structure. A feasible assembly sequence is the sequence satisfying these geometric constraints to be able to construct the desired object. Thus, geometric constraints dominate generation of all the feasible assembly sequences and play an important role in planning the optimal one. The problem of obtaining all the feasible assembly sequences can be formulated as a constrained traveling salesman problem (CTSP). The proposed approach will show that all the feasible assembly sequences can be generated by transforming the geometric constraints of parts to the pattern-matching operation based on the concept of CTSP. The optimal assembly sequence can then be obtained from the set of generated feasible assembly sequences. A novel method proposed here is to obtain the optimal assembly sequence while in generating all the feasible assembly sequences. Two approaches, which are a traditional search method and an artificial neural network computational scheme, in obtaining the optimal sequence will be discussed. For the traditional search method, the set of constraints describing the geometric relationship among parts are properly transformed into the matching problem. While for the neural computation, these geometric constraints are transformed into the elements of the connection matrix specifying the connection strength among neurons. The designed algorithm can accommodate various constraints and applications. Detailed algorithms and analysis, examples and experiments will be presented.
The effect of post-hydrogenation on the equilibrium and metastable properties of hydrogenated amorphous silicon

Abstract Hydrogenated amorphous silicon films were exposed to monatomic deuterium at 350°C up to 8 hours. The defect densities in the annealed state, after illumination and after deuteration were determined using CPM measurements following each exposure sequence. We find that an increase of the concentration of Si-H bonds by as much as 3 × 1021cm−3 changes neither the defect density, the weak Si-Si bond density nor the defect metastability. This suggests that the weak Si-Si bond density as well as the dangling bond density is determined by equilibration with strong Si-Si bonds through the interchange of H. The implications of these resultsfor H bonding are discussed.
Occlusive effect of metallic stents on canine ureters

A three-part study, with successive modifications based on preceding results, was conducted to evaluate ureteral placement of metallic stents. Gianturco self-expanding (10 mm and 4 mm diameter) and balloon-expanded (4 mm diameter) metallic stents were placed in normal and stenotic canine ureters. No migration or ureteral perforation occurred during the follow-up of 10 mm stents. Varying degrees of hydronephrosis and hydroureter were found on all 1-week pyelograms. At 4 weeks, complete occlusion of the stented ureter was noted in all cases because of mucosal hyperplasia around the stent wires. To prevent this reaction, 4 mm self-expanding stents constructed of smaller wire that was uncoated or coated with either Teflon or polyurethane were tested in five dogs. In all cases, results were similar to those obtained with the larger prostheses. Finally, 4 mm balloon-expanded stents were placed in a normal ureter of three dogs. In one dog, the stent migrated out of the ureter. No migration or ureteral perforation occurred in the two remaining dogs. In these animals, mucosal hyperplasia and complete ureteral occlusion occurred 6 and 8 weeks after placement. Therefore, ureteral placement of Gianturco self-expanding as well as balloon-expanded metallic stents leads to occlusion of the ureter instead of maintaining its patency. Stents, therefore, may be useful as ureteral occlusion devices.
The Prevention and Treatment of Varicella- Zoster Infection in Patients at High Risk:

Disseminated herpes zoster or varicella can be life-threatening to patients with malignancy or immune deficiency and those receiving immunosuppres sive or cytotoxic drugs. For prevention of the infection, convalescent zoster plasma or Zoster Immune Globulin (ZIG) should be given within 72 hours after exposure to herpes zoster or varicella. For such patients already ill with herpes zoster infection or varicella, cytosine arabinoside should be infused continuously for several days until the infection is under control.
Regulating Repair Regulatory T Cells in Myocardial Infarction

Ischemic injury to the myocardium is likely the most frequent but certainly the most deadly contemporary wound in humans. The lack of oxygen jeopardizes cardiac resident cells, which include myocytes, fibroblasts, endothelial cells, and cardiac macrophages. These cells then die or react by releasing danger signals, which systemically alert the immune system.1 The most numerous responders are myeloid cells, including neutrophils, monocytes, and macrophages. The past decade elucidated the time line of response, in which consistent high-rate inflammatory neutrophil and monocyte recruitment dominate the first hours to days.1–3 After day 4, inflammation begins to resolve, and recruited monocytes give rise to less inflammatory reparative macrophages.4 These 2 phases, a first inflammatory and a second resolution phase, are essential for infarct healing.5,6 In mice with atherosclerosis7 and likely in patients,1 lack or delay of the inflammation resolution phase brings about infarct rupture, infarct expansion, and ultimately heart failure. In patients with acute myocardial infarction (MI), systemic markers of inflammation correlate with higher mortality.1 These insights have triggered an interesting question with potentially high therapeutic value: what brings about the switch from phase 1 to phase 2? In other words, what are the mechanisms that initiate resolution of infarct inflammation, shielding the reparative actions of wound healing in the heart from inflammatory immune cells? Are these mechanisms local or systemic, macrophage-intrinsic or not? And how can we harness them …
Minimally invasive bar repair for ‘redo’ correction of pectus excavatum

Abstract Background/Purpose: A small percentage of patients who have undergone traditional, “Ravitch-type” pectus excavatum repair present with unsatisfactory results and require a second procedure for correction. Reoperative open surgery for pectus excavatum has been associated with extensive dissection and substantial blood loss. The minimally invasive (MIS) bar repair for the correction of pectus excavatum has been gaining acceptance. This study evaluates the authors results with patients who have undergone the MIS bar repair for redo correction of their pectus excavatum. Methods: A retrospective chart review of all patients undergoing MIS bar repair between December 1997 and August 2001 was performed. Information about demographics, deformity, operative course, complications, and early outcome was recorded. Results: Ninety-two patients underwent MIS repair during this period. Ten patients had redo MIS bar repair for unsatisfactory prior open correction. Operating time was 52 minutes for standard patients and 70 minutes for the redo patients ( P Conclusion: The minimally invasive pectus repair can be performed safely with minimal blood loss and short operating time in patients who have undergone prior unsatisfactory open repair of pectus excavatum and can be an alternative approach to reoperative open repair in these patients. J Pediatr Surg 37:1090-1092. Copyright 2002, Elsevier Science (USA). All rights reserved.
Observational Learning From Internal Feedback: A Simulation of an Adaptive Learning Method

Much natural learning occurs by observation without explicit feedback or tutaring, yet few models of learning address this class of tasks. Further, many natural cases of observational learning are complex, ond efficient learning seems to demand strategic learning procedures. The present work adopts o design perspective and asks what learning mechanisms would be both useful and feasible for natural induction. Work on closely related learning problems is briefly reviewed ond a model for observational rule learning is proposed and simulated. The model extends learning mechanisms developed for explicit learning with feedback to less structured, observational tasks. In particular, the focused samphg mechanism, which is an extension of the attentional learning procedure developed by Zeaman and House (1963). is introduced. The operation of an attention01 learning procedure is less clear when extended to learning without feedbock, so a simulotion was done to evaluate the performance of the model. A series of simuloted experiments were run, comparing performance of the learning model with and without the focused sampling component. We evaluated whether and when focused sampling benefits observational learning, investigated the effects of different distributions of systematic and unsystematic features, and compared observational leorning to learning with feedback. Results of the simulation suggest that focused sampling does benefit leorning. that benefit increases with the complexity of the learning task, ond that leorning with and learning without feedback exhibit differences in how each is affected by changes in the learning problem. Suggestions obout the relation to humon data ore offered.
North American emergencies: The use of emergency powers in Canada and the United States

Although the United States and Canada have had quite different constitutional frameworks, their uses of emergency powers through most of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries were very similar. In the nineteenth century, national troops were used to put down local rebellions in both countries, often at the request of local governors. With World War I, however, both moved to a statute-based system of regulating emergencies. In Canada, the War Powers Act provided broad delegations of power from the parliament to the executive. In the U.S., delegations were also broad, but accomplished through a series of smaller statutes. These frameworks lasted until abuses of emergency powers were exposed in both countries in the 1970s. And there the parallel history ended. Canada adopted a comprehensive constitutional revision that brought all emergency powers within constitutional understandings. The U.S., on the other hand, continued its use of statutory patches to regulate the relationship between the executive and legislature in times of crisis. As a result, the reactions of the two countries to the events of 9/11 were quite different. Canada responded with a moderate use of exceptional powers, while the US plunged into more extreme uses of emergency powers. When war, rebellions, and dangers erupt, most constitutional governments step outside their usual procedures to deal with regime-threatening conflicts. In this article, I argue that Canada and the United States used extraordinarily similar means for coping with war, rebellion, and danger from their colonial times until the 1970s. After that, however, the two countries followed very different paths. In the 1970s, both Canada and the U.S. came to grips with the use of emergency powers that had spun out of control, but they reacted with different solutions. Canada changed its conception of what constitutionalism required because it saw the excesses as structural. The U.S., by contrast,
CHANGES IN THE TITER OF ANTIPNEUMOCOCCAL HUMORAL IMMUNITY IN ADULT HUMAN BEINGS

Fifty-five individuals were tested to determine the pneumococcidal promoting activity of their serum against Types I and II pneumococci. By repeated tests an attempt was made to study the constancy of the degree of their immunity over intervals of 2 to 6 months. In this group were included nine persons with common colds and twelve cases of a severe influenza-like infection. Fifteen of the fifty-five cases showed a change in titer of their humoral immunity against either Type I or Type II or both. Three of these showed an increase, and twelve a decrease. This reaction in most instances was a specific one in that the altered reaction toward one type was not associated with a similar change toward the other type pneumococcus. Colds and influenza-like infections apparently exerted no effect upon the titer of humoral immune substances.
Pre-Islamic Monotheism in Arabia

The search for the presumed “sources” of Muhammad's religious ideas, as these are expressed in the Qur'an, has inspired a considerablerange of studies, varying in tone from tentative to polemical. Most writers on the topic seek to demonstrate either a predominantly Jewish or a predominantly Christian “influence.” It is relatively easy, of course, to compile a catena of passages from the Qur'an which can be paralleled by Scriptural texts or by haggadic or apocryphal materials or compared with the practices of Jewish or Christian communities. The argument tends to become inconclusive on the whole; Jewish scholars who argue for a Jewish source or sources are apt to forgetthat the Old Testament was as much a part of Christian as of Jewish Scripture and that even haggadic supplements had long since been taken up into Christian writings; Christian scholars who argue for a Christian source or sources are somewhat embarrassed by Muhammad's decisive rejection of Christological doctrine;and each side can produce valid arguments against the other.
Neonatal torsion: a 14-year experience and proposed algorithm for management.

Purpose: Management of neonatal torsion is controversial, since the likelihood of testicular salvage and metachronous contralateral torsion must be weighed against the risk of neonatal anesthesia. We reviewed a large series of such cases and stratified neonatal torsion based on time of presentation to determine the potential for testicular salvage. To our knowledge this is the largest series of its kind in the literature.Materials and Methods: All cases of neonatal torsion were classified as either prenatal (noted at the time of delivery) or postnatal (noted after birth and before age 1 month). The charts of all patients were reviewed and data were collected on demographic information, pregnancy and birth history, laterality, physical examination findings, radiological imaging, intraoperative findings, anesthetic morbidities, perioperative complications and pathological diagnoses. Followup data were also collected for patients who underwent detorsion and orchiopexy.Results: A total of 16 neonatal torsions...
Survey of coherent 1 Hz waves in Mercury's inner magnetosphere from MESSENGER observations

[1] We summarize observations by the MESSENGER spacecraft of highly coherent waves at frequencies between 0.4 and 5 Hz in Mercury's inner magnetosphere. This survey covers the time period from 24 March to 25 September 2011, or 2.1 Mercury years. These waves typically exhibit banded harmonic structure that drifts in frequency as the spacecraft traverses the magnetic equator. The waves are seen at all magnetic local times, but their observed rate of occurrence is much less on the dayside, at least in part the result of MESSENGER's orbit. On the nightside, on average, wave power is maximum near the equator and decreases with increasing magnetic latitude, consistent with an equatorial source. When the spacecraft traverses the plasma sheet during its equatorial crossings, wave power is a factor of 2 larger than for equatorial crossings that do not cross the plasma sheet. The waves are highly transverse at large magnetic latitudes but are more compressional near the equator. However, at the equator the transverse component of these waves increases relative to the compressional component as the degree of polarization decreases. Also, there is a substantial minority of events that are transverse at all magnetic latitudes, including the equator. A few of these latter events could be interpreted as ion cyclotron waves. In general, the waves tend to be strongly linear and characterized by values of the ellipticity <0.3 and wave-normal angles peaked near 90°. Their maxima in wave power at the equator coupled with their narrow-band character suggests that these waves might be generated locally in loss cone plasma characterized by high values of the ratio β of plasma pressure to magnetic pressure. Presumably both electromagnetic ion cyclotron waves and electromagnetic ion Bernstein waves can be generated by ion loss cone distributions. If proton β decreases with increasing magnetic latitude along a field line, then electromagnetic ion Bernstein waves are predicted to transition from compressional to transverse, a pattern consistent with our observations. We hypothesize that these local instabilities can lead to enhanced ion precipitation and directly feed field-line resonances.
Infectious precipitants of acute hyperammonemia are associated with indicators of increased morbidity in patients with urea cycle disorders.

Objective To prospectively characterize acute hyperammonemic episodes in patients with urea cycle disorders (UCDs) in terms of precipitating factors, treatments, and use of medical resources. Study design This was a prospective, longitudinal observational study of hyperammonemic episodes in patients with UCD enrolled in the National Institutes of Health–sponsored Urea Cycle Disorders Consortium Longitudinal Study. An acute hyperammonemic event was defined as plasma ammonia level >100 μmol/L. Physician-reported data regarding the precipitating event and laboratory and clinical variables were recorded in a central database. Results In our study population, 128 patients with UCD experienced a total of 413 hyperammonemia events. Most patients experienced between 1 and 3 (65%) or between 4 and 6 (23%) hyperammonemia events since study inception, averaging fewer than 1 event/year. The most common identifiable precipitant was infection (33%), 24% of which were upper/lower respiratory tract infections. Indicators of increased morbidity were seen with infection, including increased hospitalization rates (P = .02), longer hospital stays (+2.0 days; P = .003), and increased use of intravenous ammonia scavengers (+45%-52%; P = .003-.03). Conclusion Infection is the most common precipitant of acute hyperammonemia in patients with UCD and is associated with indicators of increased morbidity (ie, hospitalization rate, length of stay, and use of intravenous ammonia scavengers). These findings suggest that the catabolic and immune effects of infection may be a target for clinical intervention in inborn errors of metabolism.
Reliability of mCP method for identification of Clostridium perfringens from faecal polluted aquatic environments

Aims: The purpose of the work was to evaluate the mCP method to correctly identify and enumerate Clostridium perfringens that are present in surface waters impacted by a mixture of faecal pollution sources. Methods: Clostridium perfringens were enumerated and isolated from sewage influent, surface water and suspended sediments using the mCP method. Molecular characterization of isolates was performed using species-specific PCR, along with full-length sequencing of the 16S rRNA gene for a subset of isolates. Results: The environmental isolates were presumptively identified as C. perfringens based on utilization of sucrose, inability to ferment cellobiose and a positive action for acid phosphatase activity. All isolates (n = 126) were classified as C. perfringens based on positive results with species-specific PCR with a subset confirmed as C. perfringens based on the 16S rRNA gene identity. Conclusions: The molecular results indicated all of the presumptive positive isolates were C. perfringens regardless of the source, e.g. sewage influent or environmental water samples. Sequencing revealed that C. perfringens obtained from sewage and the aquatic environment were nearly identical (c. 99·5% similarity). Significance and Impact of the Study: From this study we conclude that the mCP method is a robust approach to enumerate and isolate C. perfringens from aquatic environments that receive diverse sources of faecal pollution.
The structure of ferricytochrome c552 from the psychrophilic marine bacterium Colwellia psychrerythraea 34H

Approximately 40% of all proteins are metalloproteins, and approximately 80% of Earth's ecosystems are at temperatures ≤5 °C, including 90% of the global ocean. Thus, an essential aspect of marine metallobiochemistry is an understanding of the structure, dynamics, and mechanisms of cold adaptation of metalloproteins from marine microorganisms. Here, the molecular structure of the electron-transfer protein cytochrome c552 from the psychrophilic marine bacterium Colwellia psychrerythraea 34H has been determined by X-ray crystallography (PDB: 4O1W). The structure is highly superimposable with that of the homologous cytochrome from the mesophile Marinobacter hydrocarbonoclasticus. Based on structural analysis and comparison of psychrophilic, psychrotolerant, and mesophilic sequences, a methionine-based ligand-substitution mechanism for psychrophilic protein stabilization is proposed.
A relation among geology, tectonics, and velocity structure, western to central Nevada Basin and Range

In the northwestern to central Nevada Basin and Range, there are correlations between velocity and specific geologic structures of the crust. Mapped range-bounding faults at the surface can be traced to appreciable (10 km) depths based on velocity variations and are consistent with subsurface projections of the faults based on seismic reflection images. The limiting depth of the faults, as indicated by the velocity variations, corresponds to the maximum depth of earthquakes along the seismic profile. Correlations between velocity and the surface geology show that in the upper crust the pre-Cenozoic rocks are underlain by high-velocity (6.0 km/s) rocks, whereas the Tertiary ranges are underlain by lower-velocity (4.0-5.7 km/s) rocks to depths as great as 10 km. Although the Tertiary rocks differ in composition from the Mesozoic rocks, the lower-velocity Tertiary rocks may also be attributed to rock masses which are broken (4.0-5.7 km/s), and the higher-velocity Mesozoic rocks (6.0 km/s) may be attributed to largely unbroken rock masses. The regional seismicity pattern is consistent with this interpretation, as earthquakes are largely confined within or near the base of the low-velocity rocks. These low-velocity, highly fractured rocks are laterally distributed in discrete zones, suggesting that extension is not uniformly distributed but occurs in discrete, highly extended zones. Beneath these highly extended zones, the lower-crustal layers show structural evidence of extension, and velocity measurements suggest that the lowermost crust has been magmatically underplated. The superposition of Tertiary volcanic rocks, highly fractured upper crust, and lower-crustal magmatic underplating suggests that the Tertiary volcanic rocks originated from lower-crustal magmas that migrated to the surface via the highly extended zones. The velocity structure of one of the highly extended zones and the Lahonton Basin resembles that of many continental rifts. The velocity structure beneath central Nevada, however, is much more like normal continental crust. On the basis of isotopic studies, it is concluded that the transition between highly extended crust and more normal crust occurs in the area inferred to be the edge of the North American craton.
A method for organic/inorganic differentiation using an x‐ray forward/backscatter personnel scanner

A method is proposed for performing organic/inorganic materials discrimination using an x-ray forward/backscatter scanner. The method is demonstrated using a commercially available personnel security-screening system and requires only image post processing. The method relies upon x-ray interaction physics, and the exact registration of forward- and backscattered images, permitting reliable discrimination between low and high atomic number materials over a range of thicknesses. The materials information is used to colorize images, and examples of the results are given. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Exposure to Ionizing Radiation and Risk of Cutaneous Malignant Melanoma Search for Error and Bias

In a 1984 case-control study of cutaneous malignant melanoma (CMM) among workers at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Austin and Reynolds found an association between reported employment in proximity to ionizing radiation and CMM (odds ratio (OR) = 5.4; 95% confidence interval (CI): 1.4, 20.7). But in a preliminary study in 1981, they found no association between individual radiation dosimetry readings and CMM. We reanalyzed the 1984 Austin-Reynolds case-control data to determine whether error or bias explain the inconsistency between reported employment in proximity to radiation and individual radiation dosimetry readings. Using individual radiation dosimetry readings, we developed an index of occupation-specific radiation. This index was associated with case status (OR = 10.8; 95% CI: 1.4, 85.1). No definitive evidence for influential matched sets, confounding, recall bias, or any other sources of bias was identified. These results suggest that the odds ratio for reported employment in proximity to radiation may be valid.
The unidirectional equiangular spiral antenna

Circularly polarized unidirectional radiation, over a bandwidth which is at the discretion of the designer, is obtainable with a single antenna. The antenna is constructed by wrapping balanced equiangular spiral arms on a conical surface. The non-planar structure retains the frequency-independent qualifies of the planar models, and, in addition, provides a single lobe radiation pattern off the apex of the cone. Practical antennas have been constructed with radiation patterns and input impedance essentially constant over bandwidths greater than 12 to 1 and there is no reason to assume that these cannot be readily extended to more than 20 or 30 to 1.
The Fact of Evolution: Implications for Science Education

Creationists who object to evolution in the science curriculum of public schools often cite Jonathan Well's book Icons of Evolution in their support (Wells 2000). In the third chapter of his book Wells claims that neither paleontological nor molecular evidence supports the thesis that the history of life is an evolutionary process of descent from preexisting ancestors. We argue that Wells inappropriately relies upon ambiguities inherent in the term 'Darwinian' and the phrase 'Darwin's theory'. Furthermore, he does not accurately distinguish between the overwhelming evidence that supports the thesis of common descent and controversies that pertain to causal mechanisms such as natural selection. We also argue that Wells' attempts to undermine the evidence in support of com- mon descent are flawed and his characterization of the relevant data is misleading. In particular, his assessment of the 'Cambrian explosion' does not do justice to the fossil record. Nor do his selective references to debate about molecular and paleontological phylogenies constitute a case against com- mon descent. We conclude that the fossil and molecular evidence is more than sufficient to warrant science educators to present common descent as a well-established scientific fact. We also argue that diagrams depicting the 'tree of life' can be pedagogically useful as simplified representations of the history of life.
Near-Earth wave propagation characteristics of electric dipole in presence of vegetation or snow layer

The problem of near-earth wave propagation in the presence of a dielectric layer such as a vegetation or snow covering is considered in this paper by modeling the propagation environment as a homogeneous two-layer medium (air/dielectric/ground). A number of studies have demonstrated the relevancy of the lateral wave for the case when both the transmitter and receiver are located within a simple half-space dielectric medium . Unfortunately, for the generalized two-layer model, for configurations in which the transmitter or receiver (or both) is located above the dielectric layer, far-field analytical expressions that include all propagation features do not exist. In this paper, in order to arrive at a computational efficient solution for the two-layer model, a second-order asymptotic evaluation for the electric fields of an arbitrarily oriented, infinitesimal electric dipole-for source and observation points located in the vicinity of the air/dielectric interface-is carried out through the method of steepest descents. The formulations are valid in the far field, with the limitation that the exponentially decaying pole and branch cut contributions have been ignored. It is observed that the Norton wave, though it is highly localized near the air/dielectric interface, is a significant contribution either when the dipole and observation points are both located above the dielectric layer or when one is above and the other is within the layer.