cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Adrenocorticotropic hormone–dependent Cushing's Syndrome: Sensitivity and Specificity of Inferior Petrosal Sinus Sampling

BACKROUND AND PURPOSE: Determining the cause of Cushing9s syndrome can be difficult. Bilateral inferior petrosal sinus (IPS) sampling after ovine corticotropin–releasing hormone (oCRH) stimulation is an established technique for the differentiation of pituitary from nonpituitary sources of adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH) production. The purpose of this study was to review our experience to determine the sensitivity and specificity of bilateral IPS sampling. METHODS: Between January 1990 and February 1997, 92 patients underwent 94 IPS sampling procedures. Indications for these patients with Cushing9s syndrome included no discrete lesion on MR images or CT scans, a discrete lesion present on images but equivocal peripheral ACTH sampling after oCRH stimulation, and persistent Cushing9s syndrome after trans-sphenoidal surgery. RESULTS: IPS sampling yielded six false-negative results and one false-positive result, manifesting an overall sensitivity of 92.2% and a specificity of 90.0% for detection of a pituitary source of ACTH after oCRH stimulation. Microadenoma lateralization by IPS sampling after oCRH stimulation agreed with the surgical location in 70.0% of the patients. The technical success rate of initial (presampling) bilateral IPS catheterization was 93.6%. Two serious complications occurred and consisted of a venous subarachnoid hemorrhage and a lower extremity deep venous thrombosis. CONCLUSION: Bilateral IPS sampling after oCRH stimulation is helpful in the evaluation of ACTH-dependent Cushing9s syndrome. False-negative results, however, suggest that the possibility of a pituitary source must still be considered when no response to oCRH is documented. Interpetrosal ACTH gradient alone is not sufficient to lateralize the tumor reliably.
/spl Phi/-test: Perfect hashed index test for test response validation

A scheme called /spl Phi/-test for checking the fidelity of test responses generated by a specially tailored sequence of test inputs is described. /spl Phi/-test, which performs the checks without storing the test responses in any manner, can be used for fault diagnosis and isolation in (1) embedded combinational or sequential logic, and (2) a system of units connected via a bus. Unlike signature analysis, /spl Phi/-test flags the offending values in case of discrepancy, thereby exposing the test inputs (and by implication, the devices) that generated them. >
Between Rights and Responsibilities: Insurgent Performance in an Invisible Landscape:

The rise of voluntary and participatory discourses under neoliberalism has been met with suspicion among scholars who identify within them vulnerabilities to state cooptation and control. A growing body of research suggests, however, that local communities and volunteer organizations are not so easily duped and that the new politics of public participation offer otherwise rare opportunities to pursue and enact alternative political agendas. This paper contributes to this debate by examining voluntarism in a long-marginalized African American community in Philadelphia. Far from being co-opted agents of state agendas, I argue that voluntary participation in the restoration of a local park has been seized upon by local residents in their efforts to reclaim public space, expose racialized injustice, and enact community citizenship. I adopt social theories of insurgency and performance to make my argument. I conclude with a discussion of the significance of devolution to communities whose principal experience ...
QoS path selection exploiting minimum link delays in MPLS-based networks

Real-time multimedia is typically associated with various quality of service (QoS) requirements. Several QoS routing schemes have been proposed to determine a path which has sufficient bandwidth to achieve the desired QoS requirements. Some of these schemes flood nodes with advertisements to obtain information about congestion on the links. Consequently, protocol overhead is of concern in such cases. Other schemes use source routing to determine the shortest routing path, but security is a major concern for allowing source routing in the Internet. To efficiently support QoS over IP networks, traffic engineering (TE) has introduced multiprotocol label switching (MPLS). QoS routing is an essential component of MPLS to maximize network resources. In this paper, we propose an approach that sets up a label switched path (LSP) based on the lowest time delay from the ingress to the egress router using only the ingress, rather than requiring all the nodes in the network to exchange information. Our simulation results show that with our proposed approach, we obtain an improvement in the number of packets delivered and better use of network resources. Furthermore, modification of the MPLS domain is not required.
Incremental Computation of Pseudo-Inverse of Laplacian

A divide-and-conquer based approach for computing the Moore-Penrose pseudo-inverse of the combinatorial Laplacian matrix \((\mathbf L^+)\) of a simple, undirected graph is proposed. The nature of the underlying sub-problems is studied in detail by means of an elegant interplay between \(\mathbf L^+\) and the effective resistance distance \((\varOmega )\). Closed forms are provided for a novel two-stage process that helps compute the pseudo-inverse incrementally. Analogous scalar forms are obtained for the converse case, that of structural regress, which entails the breaking up of a graph into disjoint components through successive edge deletions. The scalar forms in both cases, show absolute element-wise independence at all stages, thus suggesting potential parallelizability. Analytical and experimental results are presented for dynamic (time-evolving) graphs as well as large graphs in general (representing real-world networks). An order of magnitude reduction in computational time is achieved for dynamic graphs; while in the general case, our approach performs better in practice than the standard methods, even though the worst case theoretical complexities may remain the same: an important contribution with consequences to the study of online social networks.
Psychology of Science as a New Subdiscipline in Psychology

Scientific behavior, interest, talent, and achievement can be and have been investigated from each of the fundamental subdisciplines in psychology. Simply put, there is a psychology behind science. I review and summarize the major empirical findings from different subdisciplines—namely, cognitive, developmental, personality, social, and clinical. For the last 10 years, the discipline of the psychology of science has shown some real promise in becoming a new psychological subdiscipline in its own right. I review some of the evidence for such a claim.
Goiter in Domestic Pigeons

Abstract INTRODUCTION THE occurrence of “simple” goiter in pigeons, and its relation to weakness of offspring at the hatching stage, have been noted by the authors (1943) in a preliminary report. The present paper provides an adequate account of the observations and tests made on this topic. Goiter in domestic birds, particularly in the fowl, has been noted by a number of investigators, but its effect on reproduction has received very little attention. Kalkus (1920) states: “It has been repeatedly observed by individuals who dress poultry that adult chickens in goitrous districts [State of Washington] are commonly affected with goitre. . . . However, newly hatched chicks are apparently not affected or at least no trouble is experienced from this source by poultry raisers.” On the other hand, Kalkus described in detail the difficulties of reproduction in goitrous livestock such as pigs, sheep and goats. Apparently the chief symptoms were debility . . .
Angular dependence of dynamic load transfer due to explosive loading in granular aggregate chains

AbstractAn experimental investigation was conducted to study the dependence of packing geometry on the dynamic load transfer in two dimensional granular aggregate chains. The granular media was sim...
The future of plant drug discovery.

To have a future in the pharmaceutical industry, plant drug discovery must compete with combinatorial chemistry and high-throughput pharmacologic screening (HTPS). Plant functional genomics coupled with HTPS may achieve this; thus, functional biology can identify ‘libraries’ of candidate plant species from which individuals can be prioritized by ‘differential HTPS’. The full genomic potential of a species for bioactivity can be accessed by cellular mutagenesis and elicitation, with HTPS identifying clones with novel activity. The comparison of ‘positive’ clonal phenotypes with their almost identical ‘negatives’ facilitates the identification of active compounds and ‘genomic’ products. The logical conclusion is to use combinatorial genomics together with HTPS to direct plant cellular ‘evolution’ continuously towards metabolites with specific pharmacologic activity. Mankind would then become the orchestrator of plant secondary metabolism, rather than its passive beneficiary.
A Stable Isotope Tracer (δ13C) Study of Escherichia coli Retention in Two Freshwater Bivalves (Corbicula fluminea and Elliptio complanata) (Corbiculidae and Unionidae)

Abstract: Bacteria are ingested by suspension feeding bivalves and can be an important component of their diet. This study evaluated whether a common bacterium of vertebrate enteric origin, Escherichia coli (Migula, 1895), is retained in the stomach or gill by two different freshwater bivalve species, Corbicula fluminea (Muller, 1974) and Elliptio complanata (Lightfoot, 1786). A series of diet treatment experiments were conducted comparing each anatomical section using a δ13C label and E. coli cells grown from stock cultures. A significant difference in δ13C values was related to anatomic structure among all treatment groups during a 7-day feeding experiment (24 jars, df = 140; F = 4.88; P < 0.001). A key finding was that in gill tissue, a significant difference was observed among <δ13C-labeled and unlabeled treatment combinations for both C. fluminea and E. complanata (F = 13.57; df = 31; P < 0.0001). The results suggest that water column E. coli are likely retained on gill tissue and to a lesser degree ...
If you are happy and you know it... tweet

Extracting sentiment from Twitter data is one of the fundamental problems in social media analytics. Twitter's length constraint renders determining the positive/negative sentiment of a tweet difficult, even for a human judge. In this work we present a general framework for per-tweet (in contrast with batches of tweets) sentiment analysis which consists of: (1) extracting tweets about a desired target subject, (2) separating tweets with sentiment, and (3) setting apart positive from negative tweets. For each step, we study the performance of a number of classical and new machine learning algorithms. We also show that the intrinsic sparsity of tweets allows performing classification in a low dimensional space, via random projections, without losing accuracy. In addition, we present weighted variants of all employed algorithms, exploiting the available labeling uncertainty, which further improve classification accuracy. Finally, we show that spatially aggregating our per-tweet classification results produces a very satisfactory outcome, making our approach a good candidate for batch tweet sentiment analysis.
A retrospective analysis of catheter-based thrombolytic therapy for acute submassive and massive pulmonary embolism:

Catheter-based thrombolysis (CBT) is emerging as an option for acute pulmonary embolism (PE). Although prior studies have demonstrated improvement in right ventricular function, little data is available regarding clinical patient outcomes. Our institution adopted CBT as an option for patients with submassive and massive PE and we evaluated its effect on patient outcomes. Two hundred and twenty-one patients who presented to our institution with submassive and massive PE were analyzed over three years by time period; 102 prior to the use of CBT and 119 during the time CBT was performed. The primary outcome was in-hospital major adverse clinical events (a composite of death, recurrent embolism, major bleeding, or stroke). Secondary outcomes were overall and ICU length of stay and individual components of the composite outcome. Mean age was 56.3±16 years with high rates of central PE (57.9%), RV dysfunction (37%), and myocardial necrosis (26%). Mean RV/LV ratio was 1.2. Thirty-two patients were treated with CBT. The composite endpoint occurred more frequently in the CBT era vs the pre-CBT era (21.0% vs 14.7%, p=0.23). After multivariate adjustment, CBT treatment demonstrated no effect on major adverse clinical events (OR 0.84, CI 0.22–3.22, p=0.80). CBT era patients had an unadjusted 37% increase in ICU days and 54% increase in total length of stay (p<0.001). Within the CBT era, CBT treatment resulted in an adjusted 190% increase in overall length of stay (p<0.001). CBT did not demonstrate improvement in hospital outcomes, despite adjustments of PE severity, and was associated with a significant increase in overall and ICU length of stay.
An adaptive external ramp control of the peak current controlled Buck converters for high control bandwidth and wide operation range

Buck converters for wide operation range are frequently seen in various applications. In many cases it is preferable to use one fixed compensator to fit the wide operation range. In this paper, an adaptive ramp control scheme is applied to peak current mode (PCM) controlled Buck converters for wide operation range. The control bandwidth of the PCM Buck converter is improved by adaptively adjusting the external ramp. This paper revisits the small signal model of the PCM control and analyzes the relationship between the external ramp and the system dynamics. Based on the analysis, the proposed adaptive external ramp for PCM is developed to achieve high control bandwidth for wide operation range Buck converters. Assuming one single fixed compensator design, the proposed control scheme can increase the control bandwidth significantly compared to fixed external ramp design. Faster transient response is verified with experimental results.
Performance Bounds for Turbo Coded Half Duplex Relay Systems

We develop performance bounds for half duplex relay systems operating in decode-forward mode over additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN) channels. We consider the distributed turbo coding scheme [1] where the relay decodes the information obtained from the source, interleaves, re-encodes and forwards it to the destination. Unlike most other half duplex schemes proposed in the literature where the source remains silent during the relay transmission, the source and the relay in our scheme are allowed to transmit simultaneously in the same frequency band, in order to improve the overall spectral efficiency of the system. We employ the union bound on the average error probability for the general case of imperfect source to relay link assuming uniform interleaving at the source and the relay. We compare the bound with the simulation results obtained by the iterative decoding algorithm of [1] and show that for relatively large signal to noise ratios and large interleaver sizes the performance of the iterative algorithm is close to that predicted by the bound. The bounds are not restricted to turbo codes alone, i.e, they can be applied to other linear block codes including LDPC codes as well.
Silicon-induced cadmium resistance in rice (Oryza sativa)

Silicon (Si)-induced cadmium (Cd) tolerance in rice (Oryza sativa L.) was investigated by analyzing Cd uptake, growth, and physiological parameters. Silicon treatments (0.0, 0.2, or 0.6 mM) were added to 6 d–old seedlings, and Cd treatments (0.0 or 5.0 lM) were added to 20 d–old seedlings. Parameters determined included: maximum net CO2 assimilation (Amax), stomatal conductance (gsmax), and transpiration (Emax) rates at varying intercellular CO2 concentrations (Ci). Also measured were chlorophyll fluorescence, growth, and Cd-uptake parameters. Results showed a Si-induced inhibition of Cd uptake. However, 0.2 mM or 0.6 mM Si treatment concentrations did not differentially inhibit Cd uptake or differentially alleviate Cd-induced growth inhibition, despite a significant increase in tissue Si concentration due to 0.6 mM Si treatment compared to 0.2 mM Si treatment. Additionally, photosynthesis and chlorophyll-fluorescence analysis showed that treatment with Cd significantly inhibited photosynthetic efficiency. Interestingly, the addition of 0.2 mM Si, more so than the addition of 0.6 mM Si, significantly alleviated the inhibitory effects of Cd toxicity on photosynthesis and chlorophyll-fluorescence parameters. Our results suggest that 0.2 mM Si could be close to an optimum Si-dose requirement for the alleviation of toxicity symptoms mediated by moderate (5 lM) Cd exposure.
Dealing with Tentative Data Values in Disconnected Work Groups

This paper describes a problem of weakly-consistent replicated data systems used in support of disconnected groups of people. The problem concerns actions and updates derived from tentative data updates that are ultimately determined to be in conflict. While some such actions and updates can be automatically resolved, many require human intervention. FurthemOre, although some file and database systems support internal conflict detection and resolution. derived actions may be external to those systems, implying that human users must ensure that proper consistency is maintained between independent components of the system. The entire problem becomes exascerbated when disconnected work groups are taken into account, where tentative data values may be seen and acted upon by multiple people.
Reusable dialog component for content selection from large data sets

Inherent limitations of spoken language interfaces make the task of information access from large data sets difficult. Providing a dialog component which can be easily configured to access information from such data sets is immensely useful. Such component would ease and expedite the development of speech applications. We propose a dialog component which makes use of user preferences, user profile and utterance history to select relevant information from large data sets. Content presentation is also determined by user preferences and utterance history. The evaluation shows the effectiveness of the technique and effect of user profile in accessing information. It also demonstrates reusability of component to access different datasets
Angiotensin converting enzyme inhibition increases ADMA concentration in patients on maintenance hemodialysis – a randomized cross-over study

Endothelial dysfunction occurs in patients with end-stage renal disease (ESRD) and is associated with increased cardiovascular morbidity and mortality. Asymmetric dimethylarginine (ADMA) contributes to endothelial dysfunction in ESRD. In the general population, angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitors and angiotensin receptor blockers (ARBs) decrease ADMA levels, but no study has compared the effect of these drugs in patients with ESRD on maintenance hemodialysis (MHD). We evaluated the effect of 1-week treatment with ramipril (5 mg/d), valsartan (160 mg/d), and placebo on ADMA levels in 15 patients on MHD in a double-blind, placebo-controlled, three x three cross-over study. We found that ADMA levels were increased at baseline and throughout the dialysis session during ramipril treatment (p < 0.001 compared to both, placebo and valsartan). Ramipril did not increase ADMA levels in a study of patients without ESRD, suggesting that factors related to ESRD or hemodialysis contribute to the ACE inhibitor-induced increase in ADMA. We have previously shown that ACE inhibition increases bradykinin (BK) levels during hemodialysis. We therefore evaluated the effect of bradykinin on ADMA production in A549 cells; a cell line that expresses BK receptors. Incubation with BK increased intracellular ADMA concentration through BK B2-receptor stimulation. These data indicate that short-term ACE inhibition increases ADMA in patients on MHD whereas ARBs do not. In vitro studies further suggest that this may occur through BK-mediated increase in ADMA production during ACE inhibition. Clinicaltrials.gov NCT00732069 August 6 2008 and NCT00607672 February 4 2008
Assessing Health Status in the Elderly: The Nutrition Screening Initiative

The recent dramatic growth in the population aged 65 and over is projected to continue well into the 21st century. While improved health status of most aging Americans is also expected, such is not the case in certain vulnerable subgroups at risk for poor health. This includes older women; minority groups; those aged 85 and above; older persons with limited economic resources, those isolated from family and friends; and older persons with impaired physical, cognitive, or emotional status. These factors, plus the cost implications of caring for a rapidly aging population, provided the impetus for the development of the Nutrition Screening Initiative (NSI). Established in 1990, the goal of the NSI is to promote the incorporation of routine nutrition screening and nutritional care into America's health services delivery system. The NSI has devoted its activities toward increasing the awareness of nutritional factors as they relate to the older population.
Predictability horizon of oceanic rogue waves

Prediction is a central goal and a yet-unresolved challenge in the investigation of oceanic rogue waves. Here we define a horizon of predictability for oceanic rogue waves and derive, via extensive computational experiments, a statistically converged predictability time scale for these structures. We show that this time scale is a function of the sea state (i.e., severity of the ambient ocean waves), the height of the anticipated rogue wave, and the level of uncertainties in the ocean measurements. The presented predictability time scale establishes a quantitative metric on the combined temporal effects of the variety of mechanisms that together lead to the formation of a rogue wave and is crucial for the assessment of validity of rogue wave predictions, as well as for the critical evaluation of results from the widely used model equations.
Advances in Prenatal Diagnosis and Treatment of Congenital Diaphragmatic Hernia

Congenital diaphragmatic hernia (CDH) is a common birth anomaly. Absence or presence of liver herniation and determination of lung-to-head ratio are the most accurate predictors of prognosis for fetuses with CDH. Though open fetal CDH repair has been abandoned, fetal endoscopic balloon tracheal occlusion promotes lung growth in fetuses with severe CDH. Although significant improvements in lung function have not yet been shown in humans, reversible or dynamic tracheal occlusion is promising for select fetuses with severe CDH. This article reviews advances in prenatal diagnosis of CDH, the experimental basis for tracheal occlusion, and its translation into human clinical trials.
Neuropsychological constructs of the PPVT with learning‐disabled children: Printed stimulus card versus oral administration

The purpose of our study was to determine the underlying neuropsychological constructs measured by both the standard and printed stimulus card formats of the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (PPVT) with 934 learning‐disabled children. Subtests of the complete Halstead‐Reitan Neuropsychological Battery and Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children‐Revised were used as predictor variables for each PPVT version and on an index of the difference scores between the two PPVT measures. Results showed that, although the two modes of PPVT administration offered much overlapping neuropsychological information, particularly in verbal and attentional areas, there was unique information tapped by each. However, less than 6% of the variability in the difference scores was explained by neuropsychological measures. Results lend support for the independent interpretation of scores from both formats of PPVT administration. Implications for clinicians involved in the assessment of hearing‐impaired and learning‐disabled childr...
Thermal Convection and Stress Analysis of the Cooling System for a Terahertz Radiation Detector

Detailed three-dimensional numerical simulations have been carried out to find the velocity and temperature fields, in combination with shear and normal stresses, of the fluid flow inside a rectangular channel with large aspect-ratio. The channel under analysis is aimed to cool a thermochromic liquid crystal material (TLC) that is able to capture laser irradiation in the terahertz range. The TLC is manufactured on an extremely-thin substrate. The overall objective of the cooling system is to maintain a nearly-homogeneous temperature of the TLC-domain that is not exposed to the direct laser irradiation, while minimizing the deformation in the TLC caused by the fluid-solid interaction. The fluid flow, stress-strain and heat transfer simulations are carried out on the basis of three-dimensional Navier-Stokes and energy equations for an incompressible flow, coupled with the stress-strain equation for the TLC-layer, to determine values of velocity, pressure and temperature for the fluid inside the channel and the stresses and deformation of the TLC layer, under different operating conditions. These values are then used to find, from a specific set, the value of the channel gap that enables a nearly-uniform temperature distribution in the fluid and the least amount of deformation in the solid layer, within the expected operating conditions. Results from this analysis indicate that, for all the inlet velocities considered, there is a common value of the channel gap, that represents the optimum for the cooling system.Copyright © 2015 by ASME
Escalated Focal Liver Radiation and Concurrent Hepatic Artery Fluorodeoxyuridine for Unresectable Intrahepatic Malignancies

PURPOSE: To evaluate the response, time to progression, survival, and impact of radiation (RT) dose on survival in patients with intrahepatic malignancies treated on a phase I trial of escalated focal liver RT. PATIENTS AND METHODS: From April 1996 to January 1998, 43 patients with unresectable intrahepatic hepatobiliary cancer (HB; 27 patients) and colorectal liver metastases (LM; 16 patients) were treated with high-dose conformal RT. The median tumor size was 10 × 10 × 8 cm. The median RT dose was 58.5 Gy (range, 28.5 to 90 Gy), 1.5 Gy twice daily, with concurrent continuous-infusion hepatic arterial fluorodeoxyuridine (0.2 mg/kg/d) during the first 4 weeks of RT. RESULTS: The response rate in 25 assessable patients was 68% (16 partial and one complete response). With a median potential follow-up period of 26.5 months, the median times to progression for all tumors, LM, and HB were 6, 8, and 3 months, respectively. The median survival times of all patients, patients with LM, and patients with HB were 16...
Does the Biosocial Model Explain the Emergence of Status Differences in Conversations among Unacquainted Men

Fifteen triads of unacquainted men conversed for ten minutes while stress was measured in real time by pulse rate and thumb blood volume (TBV). Salivary measures of testosterone (T), cortisol (C), and the stress-related enzyme alpha-amylase (AA) were measured at the beginning and end of the session. Fully or partially transitive status hierarchies formed in 14 triads. (Highest ranked man was scored 1, lowest 3, with ties allowed.) Ten of the triads participated in Study 1, where nothing was at stake in the casual conversation. Five additional triads were run in Study 2, intended to introduce competition by offering a $20 reward to the man afterward chosen as having led the conversation. Most results from the two studies are similar, suggesting that the $20 reward had little effect. Combining studies, pulse and TBV show that conversation is more stressful than watching a video beforehand. Within the conversation, speaking turns are more stressful than listening turns, especially among the lowest ranked men, less so among those higher in rank. This supports a stress-based mechanism for status allocation among humans. Apparently, human speech is a form of status signaling, homologous with nonlinguistic status signals used by other primates, as posited by the “biosocial model.” The biosocial model also posits that a physiological substrate (T, C, and AA) is related to dominance or status. Predicted effects are not replicated here, except for an inverse relationship between the stress enzyme AA and status. The mostly null results, obtained from conversations where there was little or nothing at stake, suggest that T and C (and their interaction) are not relevant to emergent status in the absence of serious competition.
The Legitimacy of Protest: Explaining White Southerners' Attitudes Toward the Civil Rights Movement

Activists seek attention for their causes and want to win sympathy from the broader public. Why do some citizens but not others approve when activists use protest tactics? This is a crucial but poorly understood aspect of social movements. While most prior research has focused on the personal determinants of attitudes toward movements, we argue that proximity to protest may cultivate positive views about a movement. Individuals living near centers of movement activity may become more favorable to protest because they become more sympathetic to the demands of activists. We investigate public support about protest tactics among white Southerners during the early stages of the civil rights movement. To do so, we employ a representative survey conducted in 1961 with nearly 700 white adults living in the South. These survey data are combined with contextual data measuring local protest, political behavior, and civic organizations. Most scholars have focused on the ways that civil rights activity propelled white counter-mobilization, but protest also won sympathy from a small subset of white Southerners, thereby fracturing the dominant consensus in support of Jim Crow segregation. We also find that local racial political context matters: individuals living in counties with weaker support for segregationist politics, where white moderates were active, and outside the Deep South were generally more favorable. At the individual level, our strongest findings indicate that sit-in support was more likely from those with greater educational attainment, less frequent church attendance, and exposure to discussions about race relations from the pulpit.
Electrode Degradation of Direct Methanol Fuel Cells Evidenced by X-ray Tomography

Long-term stability of direct methanol fuel cells (DMFCs) is one of the most critical requirements for the successful commercialization of this technology. While gradual performance loss during continuous cell operation is commonly observed for all types of fuel cells, the performance loss of DMFCs is often accompanied by cell resistance increase. In our previous studies, we suggested interfacial de-lamination between membrane and electrode can cause this type of performance degradation and established the correlation between degradation rate and water uptake of membranes. Recently we observed similar degradation behavior for Nafion-based membrane-electrode assemblies (MEAs) which have a durable interface. This motivated us to explore about another possible degradation mechanism for DMFCs.
The Folly of Fighting for Providence, or, the End of Empire and Exceptionalism

This article provides an overview of U.S. exceptionalism, the rhetorical habit of portraying the United States as God’s chosen city upon a hill, and thus as a nation better than, stronger than, and more righteous than all others. Linking post-World War II reactions to Communism to post-9/11 reactions to terrorism–with a detour through Mark Twain’s critique of the Spanish-American War and John L. O’Sullivan’s celebration of the Mexican-American War–the essay argues that the habit of invoking U.S. exceptionalism encourages a dangerous form of rhetorical absolutism in which political disagreements are escalated into eschatological threats to life itself, thus justifying a recurring pattern of waging war in the name of nation and God. Despite his promises of Hope and Change, the article finds President Barack Obama particularly susceptible to this rhetorical dynamic. The essay closes with common-sense suggestions for how to begin debunking exceptionalism, hopefully creating space for re-thinking America’s rol...
Relative Enthalpy of Beryllium 1:1-Aluminate, BeO · Al2O3, from 273 to 1173 °K. Thermodynamic Properties from 273 to 2150 °K.

The relative enthalpy of the beryllium aluminate BeO · Al2O3 was measured by "drop" calorimetry from 273 to 1173 °K. The thermodynamic properties were calculated up to 2150 °K (approximately the melting point). For this calculation, the data were extrapolated above 1173 °K and the entropy at 273 °K, previously determined at the NBS, was used.
Epigenetic Therapy for Colorectal Cancer

Aberrations in epigenome that include alterations in DNA methylation, histone acetylation, and miRNA (microRNA) expression may govern the progression of colorectal cancer (CRC). These epigenetic changes affect every phase of tumor development from initiation to metastasis. Since epigenetic alterations can be reversed by DNA demethylating and histone acetylating agents, current status of the implication of epigenetic therapy in CRC is discussed in this article. Interestingly, DNA methyltransferase inhibitors (DNMTi) and histone deacetylase inhibitors (HDACi) have shown promising results in controlling cancer progression. The information provided here might be useful in developing personalized medicine approaches.
Abstract IA28: PI3K and mTOR inhibitors in lymphoid malignancies: Clinical data

Activation of pathways associated with PI3 Kinase and mTOR is commonly associated with a variety of lymphoid cancers, and can result in cell survival, growth and resistance to standard chemoimmunotherapeutics. Strong preclinical rationale has led to several agents that have been evaluated in clinical trials, both as monotherapy and in combination strategies. The mTOR inhibitors everolimus Iand temsirolimus have demonstrated clear clinical activity and acceptable toxicity profiles in patients with a variety of lymphoid malignancies. Temsirolimus has been approved in the European Union and several other countries outside of the US for the treatment of relapsed and/or refractory mantle cell lymphoma. This approval was based on a phase 3 randomized trial comparing temsirolimus at 2 dosing levels vs. investigator9s therapy choice, which demonstrated an improvement in progression-free survival and overall response rate. Single agent activity of temsirolimus has also been demonstrated in other lymphoma subtypes such as diffuse large B cell and follicular lymphoma, and combination studies have been performed with rituximab. Everolimus has also been evaluated in mantle cell, diffuse large B cell and follicular lymphoma, as well as Hodgkin lymphoma, and clinical activity has also been noted. Combination studies with histone deacetylase inhibitors, rituximab and lenalidomide are underway. To date, activity of PI3K inhibitors appears to be most significant in lymphoid malignancies. Idelalisib, an inhibitor of the PI3K delta isoform, is FDA approved as a single agent for patients with follicular lymphoma and small lymphocytic lymphoma, and in combination with rituximab for recurrent chronic lymphocytic leukemia. Responses have been noted in mantle cell lymphoma, though durability is short. Numerous combination studies with chemotherapy and rituximab are ongoing. IPI-145 is an oral inhibitor of the delta and gamma isoforms of PI3K, and early studies have shown activity in both indolent B cell lymphomas as well as T cell histologies. The alpha and delta PI3K inhibitor copanlisib has also demonstrated early activity in a range of lymphoid histologies. The clinical activity and toxicity profile of PI3K inhibitors has suggested a significant potential role for these agents in the treatment of various lymphoproliferative cancers. Ongoing studies are evaluating potential biomarkers for response and resistance, as well as the development of rational combination approaches. Clinical findings suggest at this stage that targeting mTOR and PI3K represents a valuable therapeutic approach in lymphoma and that further investigation in this area will lead to further progress in improving patient outcomes. Citation Format: John P. Leonard. PI3K and mTOR inhibitors in lymphoid malignancies: Clinical data. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the AACR Special Conference: Targeting the PI3K-mTOR Network in Cancer; Sep 14-17, 2014; Philadelphia, PA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Mol Cancer Ther 2015;14(7 Suppl):Abstract nr IA28.
Compare two methods of testing for Enterobacter sakazakii in food

Objective:To compare the national standard method and real-time fluorescent PCR method of testing for Enterobacter sakazakii in food.Methods:The samples were tested in accordance with the national standard and Real-time fluorescence PCR method,then the results comparison analysed.Results:The 54 strains of Enterobacter sakazakii were detected from 850 samples of 10 kinds of food.The detection rate with the national standard was 6.4%,and the detection rate with real-time fluorescence PCR method was 7.4%.Conclusion:The results indicated that the two identification methods could increase the detection credibility of Enterobacter sakazakii.The report would be with the national standard.
Guarantees for Customers of Incentive Anonymizing Networks.

We raise and propose solutions to the problem of guaranteeing that a user of incentive remailing services for anonymization cannot lose money if he does not get full service, i.e., if his message does not reach its destination. Applications such as voting over the Internet or reviewing of articles require anonymous delivery of messages. An anonymizing technique was proposed several decades ago by Chaum and is based on a group of volunteer agents called mixnet. However, mixnets are not yet widely known and used today, and one often mentioned reason is the lack of incentives for volunteers. A recently proposed solution is based on adding digital coins to messages, such that each volunteer can extract only the digital coin designated as a payment for her. However, registered volunteers can sabotage the system by extracting and using their coins without performing their task — which consists of forwarding anonymized messages. The main improvement we propose is to guarantee that no money is lost by the user without getting his message at the destination. This is an essential property for a viable service. Solutions described are based on handshaking mechanisms where each volunteer gets her payment (or key to decrypt the payment) from the agent to which she is expected to forward the message, or from the destination using a public board or a reply message. This ensures that a volunteer gets her financial support only if she fulfills her task. We discuss how techniques for nonrepudiation of receipt of a message, together with reputation systems, can address the remaining problems.
New Results on Some Ionic-Fluid Problems

The ionic-fluid problems considered herein are all concerned with understanding and describing the thermodynamics and structural properties of strong electrolytes and molten salts. This general line of development has occupied the attention of theoreticians since the first quarter of the 20 th century but the special focus of this seminar is on those thermodynamic states for which one finds criticality and phase separation (demixing) into two fluid states, either liquid-gas or liquid-liquid. This is a somewhat more recent concern among theoreticians that only began to receive serious attention over the past two decades or so. Well before that time ionic solutions that unmix had been observed and ionic melts were known to vaporize at sufficiently high temperature, despite the experimental inaccessibility of the critical regions of most of them. But whether a system of particles interacting via nothing but inverse-square Coulombic forces and repulsive core terms would have a critical point associated with liquid-gas phase separation was a question that had not been systematically studied previously. Stell, Larsen, and Wu made such a study that appeared in 1976 [1] for the system that has come to called to restricted primitive model (RPM) — a symmetric mixture of charged hard-sphere anions and cations of equal size and charge number.
Target NoC Platform

This chapter provides an overview of the network-on-chip architecture and application models utilized in this book. We first describe the target NoC platform and list our basic assumptions. Then, we present the NoC architecture and application models employed throughout the book. Finally, we conclude this chapter by discussing the technology implications on networks-on-chip design.
Colorectal Findings at Repeat CT Colonography Screening after Initial CT Colonography Screening Negative for Polyps Larger than 5 mm

Purpose To determine the rate and types of polyps detected at repeat computed tomographic (CT) colonography screening after initial negative findings at CT colonography screening. Materials and Methods Among 5640 negative CT colonography screenings (no polyps ≥ 6 mm) performed before 2010 at one medical center, 1429 (25.3%; mean age, 61.4 years; 736 women, 693 men) patients have returned for repeat CT colonography screening (mean interval, 5.7 years ± 0.9; range, 4.5-10.7 years). Positive rates and histologic findings of initial and repeat screening were compared in this HIPAA-compliant, institutional review board-approved study. For all patients with positive findings at repeat CT colonography, the findings were directly compared against the initial CT colonography findings. Fisher exact, Pearson χ2, and Student t tests were applied as indicated. Results Repeat CT colonography screening was positive for lesions 6 mm or larger in 173 (12.1%) adults (compared with 14.3% at initial CT colonography screening, P = .29). In the 173 patients, 29.5% (61 of 207) of nondiminutive polyps could be identified as diminutive at the initial CT colonography and 12.6% (26 of 207) were missed. Large polyps, advanced neoplasia (advanced adenomas and cancer), and invasive cancer were seen in 3.8% (55 of 1429), 2.8% (40 of 1429), and 0.14% (two of 1429), respectively, at follow-up, compared with 5.2% (P = .02), 3.2% (P = .52), and 0.45% (P = .17), respectively, at initial screening. Of 42 advanced lesions in 40 follow-up screenings, 33 (78.6%) were right sided and 22 (52.4%) were flat, compared with 45.4% (P < .001) and 11.3% (P < .001), respectively, at initial screening. Large right-sided serrated lesions were confirmed in 20 individuals (1.4%), compared with 0.5% (P < .001) confirmed at initial screening. Conclusion Positive rates for large polyps at repeat CT colonography screening (3.7%) were lower compared with those at initial screening (5.2%). However, more advanced right-sided lesions were detected at follow-up CT colonography, many of which were flat, serrated lesions. The cumulative findings support both the nonreporting of diminutive lesions and a 5-10-year screening interval. © RSNA, 2016 An earlier incorrect version of this article appeared online. This article was corrected on August 30, 2016.
False Dichotomies and Health Policy Research Designs: Randomized Trials Are Not Always the Answer.

Some medical scientists argue that only data from randomized controlled trials (RCTs) are trustworthy. They claim data from natural experiments and administrative data sets are always spurious and cannot be used to evaluate health policies and other population-wide phenomena in the real world. While many acknowledge biases caused by poor study designs, in this article we argue that several valid designs using administrative data can produce strong findings, particularly the interrupted time series (ITS) design. Many policy studies neither permit nor require an RCT for cause-and-effect inference. Framing our arguments using Campbell and Stanley’s classic research design monograph, we show that several “quasi-experimental” designs, especially interrupted time series (ITS), can estimate valid effects (or non-effects) of health interventions and policies as diverse as public insurance coverage, speed limits, hospital safety programs, drug abuse regulation and withdrawal of drugs from the market. We further note the recent rapid uptake of ITS and argue for expanded training in quasi-experimental designs in medical and graduate schools and in post-doctoral curricula.
Smartphone usage contexts and sensable patterns as predictors of future sedentary behaviors

Sedentary behaviors such as prolonged occupational and leisure-time sitting are now ubiquitous in modern societies. Sedentary time is positively associated with increased risk of obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and all-cause mortality. Smartphones can sense the sedentary behaviors performed by their users, as well as the contexts (situations) in which sedentary behaviors occur. In this paper, we explore whether the contexts that can be sensed by users' smartphones can be used to predict their future sedentary behaviors reliably. We analyze data gathered in a term-long study of 49 college students in order to discover their sedentary behavior patterns and contexts strongly correlated with sedentary states. The ability to predict sedentary behaviors will facilitate more effective computer-driven interventions based on the theory of planned behavior. Using logistic regression, we are able to classify user context variables such as location, time, and app usage to predict if the user will be "very sedentary" in the next hour with a precision of 73.1% (recall of 87.7%).
Demographic Group Prediction Based on Smart Device User Recognition Gestures

We propose a novel demographic group prediction mechanism for smart device users based upon the recognition of user gestures. The core idea of our proposed approach is to utilize data from a variety of the internal environmental sensors in the device to predict useful demographics information. In order to achieve this objective, an application with several intuitive user interfaces was implemented and used to capture user data. The results presented here are based upon the data from fifty users. These captured data are integrated or fused, pre-processed, analyzed, and used as training data for a supervised machine learning predictive approach. The data reduction methods are based upon principal component analysis (PCA) and linear discriminant analysis (LDA). PCA/LDA were implemented to reduce the data feature dimensions and to improve the k-nearest neighbors (KNN) supervised classification predictions. The results of our experiment indicate that high accuracy is achieved from this method. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first research that uses user recognition gestures to predict multiple demographic groups.
Primate brain size is predicted by diet but not sociality.

Using updated phylogenies and the largest dataset to date, the authors find that primate brain size is better predicted by diet than any measure of sociality, suggesting a revision is needed to prevailing hypotheses explaining brain size evolution.
Moran's I for impulse noise detection and removal in color images

A method for impulse noise detection and removal in color images comprising a detection module and a vector median filter.