cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
DNA Repair Defects

The human cell genome is exposed to DNA damage from various sources. Human cells have mechanisms for self-protection and repair. Genetic instability, predisposition to cancer, and somatic disease occur when these mechanisms are not efficient or are affected by mutations that cause the absence of proteins essential to DNA repair. DNA repair mechanisms can fail and allow mutations during DNA replication, thus becoming a source of diversity. The generation of diversity is important, especially for the immune system. DNA repair defects compromise the balance between generation of diversity and cellular transformation, thus causing disease and immune deficiency. DNA damage also compromises essential cellular processes and leads to mutation and cell death. DNA repair defects include ataxia-telangiectasia, Bloom syndrome, Nijmegen breakage syndrome, and RIDDLE syndrome. DNA repair defects are typically autosomal recessive disorders. They have in common, in their phenotype, the presence of immune deficiency, cellular radiosensitivity, predisposition to cancer, developmental defects, and DNA double-strand break (DSB) repair defects. DSBs occur when both DNA strands are damaged in close proximity; if they are not repaired, the strands physically become disconnected. DSB repair defects are associated with immune deficiency because they compromise V(D)J recombination, lymphocyte maturation, generation of T and B cell receptors, and class switching.
New ideas connecting the cell cycle and pancreatic endocrine-lineage specification

Neurogenin 3 (Neurog3) is a pro-endocrine transcription factor required for endocrine-lineage specification during mouse pancreas development. It was a long-standing notion that Neurog3 activation ...
The Role of Eco-Cultural Attractions in ‘Perception Engineering’: A Case Study Conducted in Goa, India

A destination must be favorably differentiated from its competition, or positively positioned, in the minds of tourists. Tourists employ destination images to differentiate and store meanings they hold for specific destinations (Echtner and Ritchie 2003). Favorable destination images lead to both first and subsequent visitations (Chon 1990). As pointed out by Kotler, Haider, and Rein (1993), a destination’s tourist image and its general image often align: if a destination has a bad tourist-related reputation, the same would negatively impact a destination’s campaign for non-touristic initiatives as well. This makes the concern for superior destination image crucial and often reaching beyond the direct and immediate tourism stakeholder groups.
Poverty Is Good for Development

There are two prominent versions of the idea that poverty promotes economic development. One version argues that poverty incentivizes workers, thus creating a strong, globally competitive economy. Another version postulates that higher marginal products of capital in poorer (capital-scarce) countries entail that they enjoy higher growth rates, such that they automatically catch up to rich countries in due course. Both versions should be rejected.
SCA31 Flies Perform in a Balancing Act between RAN Translation and RNA-Binding Proteins

In this issue of Neuron, Ishiguro et al. (2017) explore the toxicity of RAN translation in spinocerebellar ataxia 31. Using a Drosophila model, the authors demonstrate that TDP-43 and other RNA-binding proteins act as chaperones to regulate the formation of toxic RNA aggregates.
Chapter 12: A Closer Look at the Causes and Consequences of Frequent Stock Trading

This chapter examines the phenomenon of frequent stock trading. Specifically, it covers the ample research demonstrating the negative effects of frequent trading on investor returns, as well as several possible underlying causes for this irrational behavior. Possible causes of frequent trading discussed include overconfidence, risk seeking, gambling addiction, frequency of negative emotions, and emotional instability. The chapter also examines gender differences. Although the body of research showing that frequent trading is bad for returns is vast, many investors continue to trade too often for their own good. Therefore, besides discussing potential causes of frequent stock trading, this chapter also stresses the need for future research to identify effective methods of helping investors reduce this financially harmful behavior.
Impact of immunotherapy among patients with melanoma brain metastases managed with radiotherapy.

Abstract Background Patients with melanoma brain metastases (MBM) have been excluded from trials evaluating immunotherapy in melanoma. As such, immunotherapy's role in MBM is poorly understood, particularly in combination with radiotherapy. Methods The National Cancer Database was queried for patients with MBM receiving brain radiotherapy. They were classified according to immunotherapy receipt. Multivariate Cox regression was performed to identify factors associated with survival. Results Among 1287 patients, 185 received immunotherapy. Factors associated with improved survival included younger age, academic facility, lower extracranial disease burden, stereotactic radiotherapy, chemotherapy, and immunotherapy. Conclusions Adding immunotherapy to radiotherapy for MBM is associated with improved survival.
Predictors of radiation-induced acute skin toxicity in breast cancer at a single institution: Role of fractionation and treatment volume.

Abstract Purpose The associations among radiation fractionation, body mass index (BMI), and acute skin toxicity with adjuvant radiation for breast cancer is of increasing interest. This study evaluated the rate of grade ≥2 dermatitis and moist desquamation (MD) in patients with a high BMI who were treated to the breast or chest wall to understand the role of radiation target, fractionation regimen, and BMI. Methods and materials We retrospectively evaluated 280 patients treated with adjuvant radiation for breast cancer after up-front surgery. We collected information on patient demographics, disease and treatment characteristics, and acute skin toxicities. Multiple logistic regression models were used to evaluate for predictors of grade ≥2 dermatitis and MD. Results Patients undergoing post-mastectomy radiation therapy (PMRT) had the highest rate of MD (24%). The rate was lower (8.7%) among lumpectomy patients, but those receiving conventional fractionation had a higher rate of MD (10.9%) compared with hypofractionated therapy (1.8%; P = .05). Among lumpectomy patients, chemotherapy use (odds ratio, 3.74; P = .04) and regional nodal irradiation (odds ratio, 3.29; P = .03) were also significant predictors of MD. Despite an elevated average BMI among lumpectomy patients, hypofractionated therapy resulted in lower rates of skin toxicity. Conclusions We identified multiple risk factors for acute skin toxicity, including the use of PMRT and conventionally fractionated regimens. Elevated BMI, regional nodal irradiation, and chemotherapy use were associated with an increased risk of MD. Our findings highlight the need to explore the use of less toxic hypofractionated regimens in patients who are at the highest risk of acute skin toxicity, including those with a higher BMI and those receiving PMRT.
Impact of step size on histotripsy treatment of staphylococcus aureus biofilms on surgical mesh

Infections on medical implants are difficult to treat because of the formation of bacteria biofilms that protect the microbes from antibiotics. Currently, infected implants must be removed, allowing for the infection to heal and a new implant inserted. The goal of our work is to develop cavitation-based ultrasound histotripsy for the noninvasive treatment of bacteria biofilms with an initial focus on the surgical mesh used for hernia repair. Based on prior results, we hypothesized that greater biofilm destruction could be achieved if we reduced the step size used for the treatment. When comparing colony forming units (CFUs) on the mesh, there was a statistically significant difference between sham and both treatment exposures (step sizes of 0.35 and 0.7 mm) with more consistent results obtained for the smaller step size. For the gel, the sham exposures had more CFUs than the smaller step with no statistical difference between the larger step and the sham exposures.
Biliary Bypass with Laparoscopic Choledochoduodenostomy

Laparoscopic choledochoduodenostomy (LCDD) is employed to treat many benign biliary diseases when endoscopic or percutaneous techniques are not feasible. We describe our technique for LCDD, which utilizes common bile duct transection and an end-to-side biliary-enteric anastomosis. This procedure includes the following elements: isolation and transection of the common bile duct, mobilization of the duodenum (Kocher maneuver), inspection of the common bile duct, and end-to-side biliary-enteric anastomosis. Key details and pitfalls are discussed. Over a 5-year period, LCDD was performed on 18 patients. Indications included intractable abdominal pain (10) and choledocholithiasis (8). The majority of patients, 83%, tolerated the operation well with no complications. There was one postoperative intra-abdominal abscess and two anastomotic strictures, one in the immediate postoperative period and the other 9 months after the operation. The median length of stay was 4 days (IQR 3.0–5.3), and there was minimal blood loss. Based on our experience, LCDD with transection and end-to-side biliary-enteric anastomosis is a safe and effective biliary bypass technique.
Cognitive Investigations into Knowledge Representation in Engineering Design

As engineering students gain experience and become experts in their domain, the structure and content of their knowledge changes. Two studies are presented that examine differences in knowledge representation among freshman and senior engineering students. The first study uses a recall paradigm, and the second uses Latent Semantic Analysis to analyze brief descriptions written by engineering students. Both studies find that the most prominent differences between these two groups of students are their representations of the function of electromechanical components and how these components interact. The findings from these studies highlight some ways in which the structure and content of mental representations of design knowledge differ with experience.
Common Femoral Artery Pseudoaneurysm Associated with Arteriovenous Fistula

BackgroundThrombin injection (TI) is a common modality for the treatment of femoral artery pseudoaneurysm (PSA) of arterial access sites. It has decreased the need for open repair in this cohort of...
Hydrophobic interaction chromatography of proteins. II. Solution thermodynamic properties as a determinant of retention.

A general thermodynamic relation was derived to correlate protein solubility to retention in hydrophobic interaction chromatography (HIC). This relation is built on a thermodynamic formulation presented previously by Melander, Horvath and co-workers in the context of the solvophobic theory, but the final result is independent of this model framework. The relation reflects an increase in protein retention in HIC under conditions that promote precipitation or crystallization, consistent with early descriptions of HIC. To examine the contribution of protein solubility to retention in HIC, isocratic elution experiments were performed with four different commercially available agarose media and four model proteins (ribonuclease A (RNA), lysozyme (LYS), myoglobin (MYO), and ovalbumin (OVA)). A wide variety of retention trends were observed as a function of protein, adsorbent type, salt type and concentration, and pH. In general, however, the results show that solubility, or its surrogate, the second osmotic virial coefficient, which reflects solution thermodynamic properties, correlates well with HIC retention in many cases; this includes correctly predicting reverse Hofmeister effects, which cannot be explained by retention models based on the solvophobic theory and preferential interaction theory. However, solution properties could not explain retention behavior under some conditions. In those cases, effects such as protein-surface interactions or conformational change could be important determinants of protein adsorption.
Application of Program Laura to Thermochemical Nonequilibrium Flow Through a Nozzle

Program LAURA (Langley Aerothermodynamic Upwind Relaxation Algorithm) is an upwind-biased, point-implicit relaxation algorithm for obtaining the numerical solution to the governing equations for three-dimensional, viscous, hypersonic flows in chemical and thermal nonequilibrium. The algorithm is derived using a finite-volume formulation in which the inviscid components of flux across cell walls are described with a modified Roe’s averaging and with second-order corrections based on Yee’s Symmetric Total Variation Diminishing scheme. The code has been applied to Problem 8.2 of this workshop for the case of thermochemical nonequilibrium flow through a nozzle. Chemical reaction rates are defined with the model of Park. Thermal nonequilibrium is modeled using a two-temperature approximation in which the vibrational energies of all molecules are assumed to be in equilibrium at a single temperature TV which is generally different from the translational-rotational temperature T. Two grids were used to define the flow for the original problem, with a stagnation temperature of 6500 K. A third case, with a stagnation temperature of 10,000 K, is also presented. The solution domain includes the converging nozzle, subsonic flow domain in which the gas is substantially in thermochemical equilibrium and the diverging nozzle, hypersonic flow domain in which the gas is substantially in thermochemical nonequilibrium.
Interaction of dietary protein and trypsin inhibitor on plasma cholecystokinin and pancreatic growth in rats.

Pancreatic exocrine secretion in the rat is inhibited by trypsin, chymotrypsin and elastase in the proximal small intestine (Green and Lyman, 1972; Schneeman and Lyman, 1973; Green and Levan, 1985). Recent studies have supported the hypothesis that this negative feedback control of pancreatic secretion is mediated by cholecystokinin (CCK). Orogastric administration of trypsin inhibitors to rats caused a transient reduction of intestinal levels of CCK (Brand and Morgan, 1981) and greatly increased plasma levels of CCK (Liddle, Goldfine and Williams, 1984). Diversion of bile-pancreatic juice from the intestine increased plasma CCK levels, which were returned to normal by intraduodenal infusion of trypsin (Louie et al, 1985; Folsh et al, 1984). The mechanism by which pancreatic proteases inhibit CCK release is not known. Miyasaka and Green (1983) hypothesized that trypsin inhibited pancreatic secretion by inactivating an intraluminally-secreted peptide, possibly a CCK-releasing factor.
Capreolus capreolus (Roe deer)

Skin biopsies of these animals (l♂,l♀) were made available by Dr. H. Heck, Catskill Game Farm, Catskill, New York, USA. Pairing of autosomes is arbitrary with the exception of the largest pair whose long arms usually bear minute satellites.
Vaso-obliteration in the canine model of oxygen-induced retinopathy.

Purpose. To quantify the acute constrictive response of developing retinal blood vessels to hyperoxia and to examine the vaso-obliterative phase of sustained oxygen breathing in the neonatal dog model of retinopathy of prematurity. Methods. Seven littermates were used to examine the acute constrictive response of the developing retinal vessels to hyperoxia (30 minutes to 96 hours of 100% oxygen). ADPase retinal flatmounts were prepared, and morphometric measurements were made using computer-assisted analysis. Vaso-obliteration also was examined in three animals killed after prolonged exposure to hyperoxia (4 days of 100% oxygen) and in three room air controls using ADPase flat-embedded retinas and cross-sections. Choroids were processed for alkaline phosphatase flat-embedding. Results. After 1 hour of oxygen breathing, all vascular components showed a reduction in diameter : Arteries were reduced 27%, veins 18.3%, and capillaries 27.7%. Capillary constriction peaked by 24 hours (69.4% reduction), whereas arteries and veins continued to close. Although capillary diameters did not decrease significantly after 24 hours, the number of capillaries, as determined by percent vascular area calculations, continued to decrease in all areas through the additional 3 days of oxygen breathing. In contrast, after 4 days of hyperoxia, the choriocapillaris lumenal diameters and percent vascular area did not vary significantly from controls. Analysis of sections taken through various retinal regions of these animals revealed significant decreases (40%) in the volume of the extracellular spaces available for blood vessel formation. Hyperoxia also resulted in a 55.6% decrease in the total number of cells (endothelial cells, ablumenal cells, perivascular cells) within the inner retina ; however, there was no significant difference in ganglion cell counts in the two groups. Conclusions. This study demonstrates that the pattern and severity of the reaction of developing retinal vessels to hyperoxia in the newborn dog is similar to that described for the kitten and the premature human. This response is unlike that exhibited by the newborn rat or mouse.
Abstract 1249: Animal model in the prevention of alcoholic pancreatitis

Background: Alcohol abuse is a major risk factor for pancreatitis. Alcohol addiction-induced molecular pathogenesis of pancreatitis remains obscure, and no current effective treatment exists. Therefore, approaches to investigate pathogenesis, prevention and cellular mechanisms by which alcohol causes pancreatitis are necessary for establishing therapeutics. Our efforts demonstrate that alcohol induces activation of a major intracellular transcriptional factor, cyclic AMP response element-binding protein (CREB). We further investigated the functional role of CREB in alcohol-induced pathogenesis of pancreatitis using cellular and genetic mouse models of pancreas. Materials and Methods: Human tissue microarrays were immunostained to determine the significance of pCREB expression among pancreatic tissues obtained from normal and chronic pancreatitis. Rat acinar cell line AR42J and mouse PSCs (mPSCs) were exposed to alcohol (50 mMol/L). Inducible Ptf1aCreERTM knockin mice and Ptf1aCreERTM;CREBfl/fl (iPC) mice were fed with Lieber Decarli diet alcohol or regular diet for 14 weeks with or without caerulein (50 µg/kg). Mice were then euthanized 24 hours after the last caerulein injection, and pancreas tissues were processed for morphometric analysis (necrosis, vacuolization, hemorrhage, edema and inflammation) and immunohistochemical analysis of amylase, trichrome blue, SMA, collagen 1, fibronectin and pCREB expression. To determine whether alcohol accelerated morbidity in mice, we evaluated pathogenesis of chronic pancreatitis by analyzing acinar atrophy and pancreatic fibrosis. Results: Expression of pCREB was significantly higher (p Conclusion: CREB is overexpressed in pancreatitis and alcohol activates CREB, which then drives pathogenesis of pancreatitis. Severity of pancreatitis in response to alcohol is diminished in the absence of CREB. Therefore, we conclude that targeting CREB represents a promising treatment for alcohol-induced pancreatitis. Citation Format: Supriya Srinivasan, Tulasigeri Totiger, Michael VanSaun, Fanuel Messaggio, Chanjuan Shi, Austin Dosch, Eric Nestler, Nipun Merchant, Nagaraj Nagathihalli. Animal model in the prevention of alcoholic pancreatitis [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2018; 2018 Apr 14-18; Chicago, IL. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2018;78(13 Suppl):Abstract nr 1249.
The Volume-Value Relationship in Shoulder Arthroplasty

Improving value in shoulder arthroplasty has gained increasing importance as procedure volume increases. To enhance the value of shoulder arthroplasty, an improvement of outcomes or a decrease in associated costs must occur. With the recent shift to a value-based care delivery model, analysis of the effects of surgical volume presents an opportunity to improve outcomes and reduce costs in shoulder arthroplasty. There are multiple reports in the literature expanding on the relationship between increased surgeon and hospital procedure volume and increased value for shoulder arthroplasty, by way of improved outcomes or decreased cost. This article highlights these studies.
Acute Kidney Injury After Burn: A Cohort Study From the Parkland Burn Intensive Care Unit

Acute kidney injury (AKI) is a common and morbid complication in patients with severe burn. The reported incidence of AKI and mortality in this population varies widely due to inconsistent and changing definitions. They aimed to examine the incidence, severity, and hospital mortality of patients with AKI after burn using consensus criteria. This is a retrospective cohort study of adults with thermal injury admitted to the Parkland burn intensive care unit (ICU) from 2008 to 2015. One thousand forty adult patients with burn were admitted to the burn ICU. AKI was defined by KDIGO serum creatinine criteria. Primary outcome includes hospital death and secondary outcome includes length of mechanical ventilation, ICU, and hospital stay. All available serum creatinine measurements were used to determine the occurrence of AKI during the hospitalization. All relevant clinical data were collected. The median total body surface area (TBSA) of burn was 16% (IQR: 6%-29%). AKI occurred in 601 patients (58%; AKI stage 1, 60%; stage 2, 19.8%; stage 3, 10.5%; and stage 3 requiring renal replacement therapy [3-RRT], 9.7%). Patients with AKI had larger TBSA burn (median 20.5% vs 11.0%; P 40%). Urine output data were unavailable. AKI occurs frequently in patients after burn. Presence of and increasing severity of AKI are associated with increased hospital mortality. AKI appears to be independently and strongly associated with mortality in patients with TBSA ≤ 40%. Further investigation to develop risk-stratification tools tailoring this susceptible population is direly needed.
Consumer evaluation, use and health relevance of health claims in the European Union

Abstract Foods with health claims are intended to have positive impacts on specific health conditions, yet we lack evidence of whether health claims appeal to, and are used by the target market for whom they may have specific health relevance. Using a large-scale online survey in 10 European countries (n = 5337), our study explores consumers’ views and use of health claims while accounting for health claim diversity and country differences. The objectives of the study are to provide an overview of consumers’ evaluations on familiarity, understandability and credibility for a list of 17 authorised health claims in the European Union; to profile health claim user segments; and to describe the relationship between specific health claim use and health relevance. Our results show that the interaction between active ingredients and claimed health benefits may influence health claims’ ratings, while heterogeneity within the 10 European countries was rather limited. Socio-demographic characteristics only described the health claim user segments to a small extent, and the link between health claim use and health relevance was inconsistent. Our study shows some evidence that the presence of high blood cholesterol in an individual or their household members is associated with the use of health claims referring to plant sterols and stanol esters featuring cholesterol-lowering effects. Nevertheless, only certain health claims have reached, or have been used by the targeted user group. Better targeted communication efforts are thus needed to make health claims effective in supporting informed food choice among population groups for whom they might be relevant.
An Emergency Internet Bypass Lane Protocol

A new Emergency Internet Bypass Lane (EIBL) protocol was developed and tested over the Global Environment for Network Innovations (GENI) testbeds for its timely and reliable data delivery with quick recovery on network component failures. The EIBL protocol prescribes a technique that captures the structural and connectivity information among sets of routers in a network, where the sets were defined based on their specific tasks. The connectivity information is captured in labels, and multiple labels are assigned to routers to provide multiple paths for routing data packets. The multiple paths in readiness also facilitates quick recovery on link/device failures. The EIBL protocol operates below the Internet Protocol (IP). When deployed in a network, the EIBL protocol will capture incoming IP packets encapsulate them in special EIBL headers and deliver to the destination router. The protocol can be invoked during an emergency for expedited information transfer between the emergency incident scene, the Emergency Office of Management and other stakeholders. In this article, the performance of the EIBL protocol is compared with Open Shortest Path First and Border Gateway Protocol the two commonly used routing protocols by IP, for identical topologies on the GENI testbed.
Adolescents' peer orientation: changes in the support system during the past three decades

Identical questionnaires were administered to samples of high school students (N = 570) in 1963, 1976, and 1982. The purpose was to determine to what extent they relied on their peers on a number of important issues. The findings revealed no monolithic orientation, but showed that the nature of the issue determines which reference group is activated: peers or parents. While educational, career, and financial concerns are more parent oriented, almost all social activities are peer oriented. However, the strength of the orientation has been fluctuating over the past decades: the teenagers showed lowest peer orientation in 1963, highest in 1976, and intermediate in 1982.
Ethical Discussions in Approaching Fertility Preservation

Cancer survivors may wish to become parents, if they have lost their reproductive function, by using previously stored gametes or gonadal tissue. Fertility preservation serves such a wide range of medico-social circumstances, some quite unique, that patient care requires an individualized and multidisciplinary approach. In particular, fertility specialists offering fertility preservation options to cancer patients should be properly trained and knowledgeable to discuss patient’s treatment plan, prognosis, as well as unusual health risks for future offspring and the potential harmful effects of pregnancy. Overall, there should be no ethical objections to offer these services since they are offered with the scope of preserving future fertility. However, in practice, there are objections: many options are still experimental; posthumous use of stored tissue or gametes carries some legal issues; concerns exist about the welfare of offspring resulting from an expected shortened life span of the parent; concerns exist about the welfare of children born using gametes frozen after chemotherapy already started; and reseeding of cancer is possible after transplanting cryopreserved tissue.
Fat and Protein Variability in Donor Human Milk and Associations with Milk Banking Processes

Background: The impact of milk banking processes on macronutrient variability in donor human milk (DHM) is largely unknown. Objective: To gain a better understanding of fat and protein composition ...
The Role of Danger Associated Molecular Patterns in Human Fetal Membrane Weakening

The idea that cellular stress (including that precipitated by stretch), plays a significant role in the mechanisms initiating parturition, has gained considerable traction over the last decade. One key consequence of this cellular stress is the increased production of Danger Associated Molecular Patterns (DAMPs). This diverse family of molecules are known to initiate inflammation through their interaction with Pattern Recognition Receptors (PRRs) including, Toll-like receptors (TLRs). TLRs are the key innate immune system surveillance receptors that detect Pathogen Associated Molecular Patterns (PAMPs) during bacterial and viral infection. This is also seen during Chorioamnionitis. The activation of TLR commonly results in the activation of the pro-inflammatory transcription factor Nuclear Factor Kappa-B (NF-kB) and the downstream production of pro-inflammatory cytokines. It is thought that in the human fetal membranes both DAMPs and PAMPs are able, perhaps via their interaction with PRRs and the induction of their downstream inflammatory cascades, to lead to both tissue remodeling and weakening. Due to the high incidence of infection-driven Pre-Term Birth (PTB), including those that have preterm Premature Rupture of the Membranes (pPROM), the role of TLR in fetal membranes with Chorioamnionitis has been the subject of considerable study. Most of the work in this field has focused on the effect of PAMPs on whole pieces of fetal membrane and the resultant inflammatory cascade. This is important to understand, in order to develop novel prevention, detection, and therapeutic approaches, which aim to reduce the high number of mothers suffering from infection driven PTB, including those with pPROM. Studying the role of sterile inflammation driven by these endogenous ligands (DAMPs) activating PRRs system in the mesenchymal and epithelial cells in the amnion is important. These cells are key for the maintenance of the integrity and strength of the human fetal membranes. This review aims to (1) summarize the knowledge to date pertinent to the role of DAMPs and PRRs in fetal membrane weakening and (2) discuss the clinical potential brought by a better understanding of these pathways by pathway manipulation strategies.
Frequency-modulated diode laser frequency combs at 2 μm wavelength

Chip-scale electrically pumped optical frequency combs (OFCs) are expected to play a fundamental role in applications ranging from telecommunications to optical sensing. To date, however, the availability of such sources around 2 μm has been scarce. Here, we present a frequency-modulated OFC operating around 2060 nm of wavelength exploiting the inherent gain nonlinearity of single-section GaSb-based quantum well diode lasers. A 2 mm long device operating as a self-starting comb outputs 50 mW of optical power over more than 10 nm of bandwidth while consuming <1 W of electrical power. Using the shifted-wave interference Fourier transform spectroscopy technique, we characterize the generated frequency-modulated waveform and demonstrate a linearly chirped intermodal phase relationship among the entire emission optical bandwidth. Furthermore, by compensating for the linear chirp using a single-mode optical fiber with opposite dispersion, 6 ps long optical pulses are generated. The frequency stability of the devices with ∼19.3 GHz repetition rates allows us to perform mode-resolved free-running dual-comb spectroscopy. All rights reserved.
Controlled release of anti-VEGF by redox-responsive polydopamine nanoparticles

Reactive oxidative species (ROS) are the primary mediator of angiogenesis by upregulating the expression of vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) in the development of wet age-related macular degeneration (AMD). However, the current treatment of AMD currently relies on monthly intravitreal injection of anti-angiogenic therapeutics to inhibit new choroidal angiogenesis. However, repeated injections have been associated with side-effects, are costly, and may lower patient compliance. Moreover, the intraocular oxidative stress-dependent angiogenesis is not alleviated by current treatments, which limits the overall efficacy of the treatment strategy. Recently, nanoparticle-based devices present potential in sustained delivery of angiogenesis inhibitors and excellent capability of scavenging reactive oxygen species (ROS). Nevertheless, limited efforts have been dedicated to the treatment of oxidative stress-related diseases via a combined anti-angiogenesis and anti-oxidization pathway. For this purpose, we developed anti-angiogenetic protein-loaded polydopamine (PDA) nanoparticles for the enhanced treatment of AMD. Remarkably, the PDA nanoparticles could efficiently scavenge ROS to reduce the expression of angiogenic agents. In parallel, the particles were able to controllably release loaded anti-angiogenic drugs in response to oxidative stress.
Parkinson's disease: Are gut microbes involved?

Parkinson’s disease (PD) is a common neurodegenerative disorder characterized by motor and gastrointestinal (GI) deficits. Despite its prevalence, the pathophysiology of PD is not well understood. ...
Design and Analysis of a Hook Shaped Stator Core with Ring Winding Transverse Flux Machine for Wind Turbine Applications

This paper presents a hook-shaped stator core with the ring winding transverse flux machine (TFM) for direct-drive wind turbine application. The proposed topology has a double stator with ring winding and a single rotor with a flux concentrating method to increase the air gap flux density. It has an axial air gap and better magnet utilization, which eventually results in higher torque density. Moreover, usage of the ferrite magnets decreases the overall cost of the machine. Besides, the hook-shaped stator core reduces the length of the winding, which eventually decreases the weight of the coil and improves efficiency. Simple rotor and stator structure of the machine makes it more suitable for easier construction. A two-phase version of the machine is presented here. Finite element analysis (FEA) is used to design and analyze the machine operating at 1.2 kW with a corner speed of 400 rpm. Performance of the proposed machine is compared to the conventional TFM topologies in terms of torque density, efficiency, and power factor.
A Preliminary Exploration on the Views of Terrorism Among Indian and U.S. College Students

No corner of the world is completely safe from terrorist attacks. Both India and the United States have suffered horrific acts of terrorist-inspired violence. While views of terrorism vary for diff...
Predictors of COVID-19 Vaccine Hesitancy: Socio-demographics, Co-Morbidity and Past Racial Discrimination

Importance Immunization programs are only successful when there are high rates of acceptance and coverage. While delivering billions of COVID 19 doses globally addressing vaccine hesitancy will be one of the most significant public health communication efforts ever undertaken. Objective The goal of this study is to explore predictors of COVID 19 vaccine hesitancy, including sociodemographic factors, comorbidity, risk perception, and experience of discrimination, in a sample of the U.S. population. Design We used a cross sectional online survey study design. The survey was implemented between Dec 13 and 23, 2020. Setting The survey was limited to respondents over 18 years of age residing in the USA. Participants Respondents were individuals belonging to priority groups for vaccine distribution. Main Outcome(s) and Measure(s) Respondents were asked how likely they would be to take a COVID 19 vaccine if offered at no cost within two months. Vaccine hesitancy was measured using a scale ranging from 1 (low hesitancy) to 6 (high hesitancy). Results Responses were received from 2,650 respondents (response rate 84%) from all 50 states and Puerto Rico, American Samoa, and Guam. The majority were in the age category between 25 and 44 years (66%), male (53%), and working in the healthcare sector (61%). Most were White and non-Hispanic (66%) respondents followed by Black non-Hispanic (14%) and Hispanic (8%) respondents. Experience with racial discrimination was a predictor of vaccine hesitancy. Those reporting racial discrimination having 21% increased odds of being at a higher level of hesitancy compared to those who did not report such experience (OR=1.21, 95% C.I. 1.01-1.45). Conclusions and Relevance Communication and logistical aspects during the COVID 19 vaccination campaign need to be sensitive to individuals past-experience of discrimination by identifying appropriate channels of communication and sites for vaccine distribution to reach those who may have sentiments of mistrust in the vaccination campaign.
New Literacies in One Rural South African Elementary School

espanolEste estudio de investigacion cualitativa longitudinal abordo un proyecto de desarrollo profesional de tres anos, Project South Africa, que llevamos a cabo en una escuela primaria rural, Williams Primary School en el Cabo Occidental de Sudafrica, con ocho maestros de recepcion para el tercer grado. Se investigo ?que sucede cuando los maestros se involucran en el desarrollo profesional (DP) que se centra en la integracion de tecnologias simples para ensenar alfabetizacion? Tambien estudiamos hasta que punto este DP refleja el exito en el aprendizaje de la alfabetizacion de los ninos, tanto desde la perspectiva de los maestros como en las pruebas estandarizadas nacionales y provinciales. Situamos este estudio en el marco teorico de la alfabetizacion critica como practica social. Adoptamos un enfoque metodo-logico de la teoria fundamentada constructivista transformadora (TCGT) (Charmaz, 2005) que centralizo los fenomenos estudiados que contribuyen tanto a la transformacion personal como social. Este estudio presenta los resultados de nuestro analisis de un subconjunto de datos que se centraron en el uso de la tecnologia por parte de los profesores para ensenar a leer y escribir. Encontramos una trans-formacion personal en los ocho maestros en su uso de la tecnologia para crear aulas en las que se promulgaron nuevas alfabetizaciones. Argumentamos que esto condujo a una transformacion social, en el sentido de que los maestros compartieron este conocimiento a nivel local, en todo el distrito y con otros alfabetizadores e investigadores en una conferencia internacional. EnglishThis longitudinal qualitative research study addressed a three-year professional development project, Project South Africa, we con-ducted in one rural elementary school, Williams Primary School in the Western Cape of South Africa, with eight Reception to Grade 3 teachers. Our research investigated “What happens when teachers engage in professional development (PD) that is focused on the integration of simple technologies to teach literacy?” We also studied the extent to which this PD reflected success in children’s literacy learning, both from the teachers’ perspectives and on national and provincial standardized tests. We situated this study theoretically in critical literacy as social practice. We adopted a transformative constructivist grounded theory (CGT) methodological approach (Charmaz, 2005) that centralized the phenomena studied which contributes both to personal and societal transformation. This study presents findings from our analysis of a subset of data that focused directly on teachers’ use of technology to teach literacy. We found personal transformation in all eight teachers in their use of technology to create classrooms in which new literacies were enacted. This, we argued, led to societal transformation in that teachers shared this knowledge locally, district-wide, and with other literacy teachers and researchers at an international conference.
SGD: The Role of Implicit Regularization, Batch-size and Multiple-epochs

Multi-epoch, small-batch, Stochastic Gradient Descent (SGD) has been the method of choice for learning with large over-parameterized models. A popular theory for explaining why SGD works well in practice is that the algorithm has an implicit regularization that biases its output towards a good solution. Perhaps the theoretically most well understood learning setting for SGD is that of Stochastic Convex Optimization (SCO), where it is well known that SGD learns at a rate of $O(1/\sqrt{n})$, where $n$ is the number of samples. In this paper, we consider the problem of SCO and explore the role of implicit regularization, batch size and multiple epochs for SGD. Our main contributions are threefold: (a) We show that for any regularizer, there is an SCO problem for which Regularized Empirical Risk Minimzation fails to learn. This automatically rules out any implicit regularization based explanation for the success of SGD. (b) We provide a separation between SGD and learning via Gradient Descent on empirical loss (GD) in terms of sample complexity. We show that there is an SCO problem such that GD with any step size and number of iterations can only learn at a suboptimal rate: at least $\widetilde{\Omega}(1/n^{5/12})$. (c) We present a multi-epoch variant of SGD commonly used in practice. We prove that this algorithm is at least as good as single pass SGD in the worst case. However, for certain SCO problems, taking multiple passes over the dataset can significantly outperform single pass SGD. We extend our results to the general learning setting by showing a problem which is learnable for any data distribution, and for this problem, SGD is strictly better than RERM for any regularization function. We conclude by discussing the implications of our results for deep learning, and show a separation between SGD and ERM for two layer diagonal neural networks.
Frequency of anxiety and depression and screening performance of the Edmonton Symptom Assessment Scale in a psycho-oncology clinic

Objective The primary objective of this study was to determine the frequency of screening instrument-detected depression and anxiety in outpatients on initial presentation to a consultation psychiatric oncology clinic. The secondary objectives were to identify characteristics associated with depression and anxiety among these patients, and to determine the optimal cut-off score for the ESAS-Anxiety (ESAS-A) and ESAS-Depression (ESAS-D) items, using the Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ-9) and the General Anxiety Disorder Scale (GAD-7) as a gold standard in cancer patients. Methods A retrospective chart review was conducted for 1221 consecutive cancer patients seen in the Psychiatric Oncology Center as an initial consult between June 1, 2014 and January 31, 2017. Results When the cutoff was 10 for the PHQ-9 and the GAD-7, 60% of patients self-reported depression and 51% self-reported anxiety. When the cutoff was 15 (severe symptom) for the PHQ-9 and GAD-7, approximately 30% and 27% of the patients had severe depression or anxiety, respectively. Age and gender were found to be associated with anxiety. An ESAS cutoff value of ≥3 for depression and ≥5 for anxiety resulted in sensitivity of 0.84 and 0.85 when using PHQ 9 ≥ 10 for depression and GAD 7 ≥ 10 for anxiety, respectively. Conclusions Self-reported depression and anxiety are frequent symptoms among patients at a psychiatric oncology center for an initial visit. ESAS-A and ESAS-D have good sensitivity for anxiety and depression screening of cancer patients.
Fabrication of Skin-Mountable Flexible Sensor Patch for Monitoring of Swallowing Function.

Swallowing is a critical function that enables humans to sustain life. When swallowing is compromised, the consequences can be devastating and include malnutrition, dehydration, respiratory compromise, and even death. Swallowing disorders (i.e., dysphagia) are very common in many disorders and diseases, such as stroke, ALS, Parkinson disease, and more, and in fact millions of people across the world are diagnosed with oropharyngeal swallowing disorders every year. Current rehabilitative interventions for dysphagia can be effective, but require daily performance of swallowing exercises that primarily rely on expensive biofeedback devices (e.g., oral manometers, electromyographic (EMG) devices, and endoscopic devices). These types of devices are often only available in medical facilities. However, it is not feasible or economically viable for patients to make multiple visits per day or week to a clinic to receive intensive treatment, especially given mobility limitations that many affected patients often experience. This can reduce treatment adherence and result in decreased rehabilitation potential, re-hospitalizations, and increased healthcare costs. To address this gap, we designed a novel specialized portable skin-mounted flexible sensor system that allows remote signal acquisition of swallowing-related signals. Herein, we report technical details for the fabrication of the skin-mounted flexible sensor patch that is tailored for the human submental (under the chin) area, enabling the continuous, reliable monitoring of both muscles' activity (i.e., EMG signals) and laryngeal movements during swallowing events. The sensor patch is wired to a portable reusable wireless (Bluetooth) unit compatible with smart watches, phones, and tablets for post-data analysis and reporting through a cloud server, which would potentially enable telemonitoring of patients with dysphagia.
Nitric Oxide and the Cerebral Circulation

This chapter discusses the role of nitric oxide (NO) in cerebral circulation. Nitric oxide, an inorganic membrane-permeant gas, has been discovered as a ubiquitous molecule in mammalian tissues. Nitric oxide is a powerful vasodilator and it, or a derivative nitroso compound, is accepted as the endothelium-dependent relaxing factor. Vasodilatory mediators like acetylcholine or substance P raise intracellular calcium in endothelium and stimulate endothelial NO synthase (NOS) activity to release NO, which, in turn, activates guanylyl cyclase and initiates a cascade in vascular smooth muscle causing relaxation. Topical or systemic administration of NOS inhibitors constrict cerebral arteries and reduce regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF), suggesting that NO contributes to normal vascular tonus. Nitric oxides contribution to basal tone varies among brain regions and species. Thus, brain regions with higher NOS activity show a greater decrease in CBF after NOS inhibition. Available evidence suggests that both neuronal and endothelial NO regulate vascular tone. The vasculature in the eNOS mutant is clearly abnormal inasmuch as these animals are hypertensive and show a proportionally reduced rCBF at the lower limb of the autoregulatory curve.
Real-Time GPU Computing: Cache or No Cache?

Recent Graphics Processing Units (GPUs) have employed cache memories to boost performance. However, cache memories are well known to be harmful to time predictability for CPUs. For high-performance real-time systems using GPUs, it remains unknown whether or not cache memories should be employed. In this paper, we quantitatively compare the performance for GPUs with and without caches, and find that GPUs without the cache actually lead to better average-case performance, with higher time predictability. However, we also study a profiling-based cache bypassing method, which can use the L1 data cache more efficiently to achieve better average-case performance than that without the cache. Therefore, it seems still beneficial to employ caches for real-time computing on GPUs.
Performance analysis of AADL models using real-time calculus

Architecture Analysis and Design Language (AADL) captures both platform and software architectures of embedded systems in a component-oriented fashion. Properties embedded in an AADL model enable several high-level analysis techniques. In this work, we explore how to perform analysis of end-to-end timing characteristics of an AADL model using Real-Time Calculus (RTC). We identify properties of AADL models that are necessary to enable such analysis and develop an algorithm to transform an AADL model into an RTC model. We use the proposed technique to identify analyze the infrastructure for sensor network architecture.