cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Fractional kinetics and accelerator modes

Abstract Kinetic properties of chaotic dynamics are studied for the web-map. It is shown that depending on the values of the perturbation parameter K, there are alternative possibilities: kinetics, of the quasilinear (normal, i.e. Gaussian) type or kinetics of the anomalous (Levyan) type. If K is close to the values K = lπ when the accelerator modes occur, then there is superdiffusion with anomalous values of the transport exponent. We consider self-similar properties of trajectories near the islands in the phase space. Fractional kinetic equation is proposed and fractal exponents are obtained. Local properties of trajectories (exit time) and nonlocal ones (Poincare cycles) are studied and compared for the normal and anomalous kinetics. It is shown that the power-like law of the trapping distribution function imposes the same kind of asymptotics for the Poincare cycles distribution.
Digital PUF using intentional faults

Digital systems have numerous advantages over analog systems including robustness, resiliency against operational variations. However, one of the most popular hardware security primitive, PUF, has been an analog component. In this paper, we propose the concept of digital PUF where the core idea is to intentionally use high-risk synthesis to induce defects in circuits. Due to the effect of process variation, each manufactured digital implementation is unique with high probability. Compared to the traditional delay based PUF, the induced defects in circuit are permanent defects that guarantee the fault-based digital PUF resilient against operational variations. Meanwhile, our proposed design takes advantage of the digital functionality of the circuits, thus, easy to be integrated with digital logic. We experiment on the standard array multiplier module. Our standard security analysis indicates ideal security properties of the digital PUF.
Training child protective services workers about domestic violence: Needs, strategies, and barriers

Research demonstrates a strong relationship between child abuse and domestic violence. This study assesses the domestic violence training needs of child protective services workers. Surveys were completed by 187 social services supervisors in Virginia. Attention was given to the training needs of child protective services workers, how those needs compare to the domestic violence training needs of other social services workers, the strategies identified as most effective, and barriers to training. Results suggest that child protective services workers presumably know more about domestic violence than other workers, but they need more knowledge in certain areas. Implications are provided.
The Brain of Ornithorhynchus anatinus

In the study of a few specimens of the brains of Monotremes and Marsupials, it was discovered that in spite of the published work upon the brain of Ornithorhynchus by such savants as Koelliker (1901), Ziehen (1908), and Elliot Smith (1898-1900), knowledge of the brain stem of this interesting mammal was incomplete, as judged by present-day standards. It was felt that with the introduction of more recent viewpoints, a new study of this subject might chance to give the old facts new relationships. This monograph, as one of the rapidly increasing number of analyses of the brains of vertebrates, may help to clarify in part the inter-relationships between the brains of lower forms and those of mammals. This research, begun at the suggestion of Prof. Elliot Smith, in London, was continued at the University of Chicago, upon material which he most generously loaned the author, and was brought to a conclusion in Cambridge with the use of three series of brains in the collection of Prof. J. T. Wilson.
TEACHING PRE-COLLEGIATE ANTHROPOLOGY: THE RESULTS OF A SURVEY AND RECOMMENDATIONS1

To identify teachers of pre-college anthropology, a questionnaire was published in the October 1976 issue of Social Education. Only 50 useable replies were received. The questionnaire therefore did not serve the purpose of Identifying teachers of pre-college anthropology which might serve as a point of contact for the Committee on Materials and Methods for the Teaching of Anthropology of the Council on Anthropology and Education. Replies of respondents indicate that anthropology is perceived primarily as an upper grade secondary subject, taught as a one-semester cultural or survey course with regional concentration in the Pacific coast, upper mid-west, northeast, and Florida. A great variety of materials are used, the most frequently reported materials being those developed by the Anthropology Curriculum Study Project. All teachers responding except one indicated some previous course work in anthropology. Thus the teaching of anthropology appears to be related to teacher preparation in anthropology. The inclusion of anthropology in the preparation program of teachers is recommended.
Discovery of group I introns in the nuclear small subunit ribosomal RNA genes of Acanthamoeba

Abstract The discovery of group I introns in small subunit nuclear rDNA (nsrDNA) is becoming more common as the effort to generate phylogenies based upon nsrDNA sequences grows. In this paper we describe the discovery of the first two group I introns in the nsrDNA from the genus Acanthamoeba. The introns are in different locations in the genes, and have no significant primary sequence similarity to each other. They are identified as group I introns by the conserved P, Q, R and S sequences (1), and the ability to fit the sequences to a consensus secondary structure model for the group I introns (1, 2). Both introns are absent from the mature srRNA. A BLAST search (3) of nucleic acid sequences present in GenBank and EMBL revealed that the A. griffini intron was most similar to the nsrDNA group I intron of the green alga Dunaliella parva. A similar search found that the A. lenticulata intron was not similar to any of the other reported group I introns.
Florence Nightingale and the Women's Movement: Friend or foe?

The historical analysis of the complex and often contradictory views of Florence Nightingale regarding the rights of women is explored in this paper. Feminism and nursing are often viewed as contradictory and antithetical. The relationship between the two is examined through the link between Florence Nightingale and her contemporary, Barbara Leigh-Smith Bodichon. Leigh-Smith was founder and primary financier of The English Women's Journal that provided a public platform for the major feminist writings of the period. Its offices in Langham Place formed the administrative centre of the Society for Promoting the Employment of Women. Bodichon and her colleagues were often referred to as the 'Langham Place Group'. Unexplored prior to this study was the fact that Leigh-Smith and Nightingale were first cousins. Utilizing techniques of internal and external criticism, primary and secondary sources were surveyed relating to Nightingale and Leigh-Smith. The views of both women on the subjects of the rights of women, women's suffrage, the employment status of women, and the societal place of women are compared and contrasted. The legacy of both Leigh-Smith and Nightingale to twentieth century feminism, the status of women, and the profession of nursing is then elaborated. The exploration of the views of both Nightingale and Leigh-Smith is important to gain a clearer understanding of the existing relationship between nursing and feminism. In keeping with the aims of feminist inquiry, women's experiences, specifically those of Nightingale and Leigh-Smith, are the major 'objects' of investigation. The concluding interpretation provides a synthesis that is emancipatory as well as knowledge generative.
Science Instruction for the Mildly Handicapped: Direct Instruction versus Discovery Teaching.

The authors' purpose in this study was to compare the effectiveness of two instructional approaches on mildly handicapped and nonhandicapped students' science achievement. Students were assigned at random to one of two conditions: (a) direct instruction, and (b) discovery teaching. The content of the lessons remained constant across conditions and focused on such concepts as displacement, flotation, variable, controlled experimentation, and scientific prediction. The results show that students in both groups learned equally well as measured by an immediate posttest. However, students in the discovery teaching condition outperformed their direct instruction counterparts on a retention test administered two weeks after the posttest. Finally, learning-disabled students in the discovery condition performed better than their direct-instruction counterparts on a performance-based measure designed to assess generalization. Implications for research and for practice are discussed.
Discrimination between wild-type and ampicillin-resistant Escherichia coli by matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry

Matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry (MALDI-TOF MS) was optimized to discriminate between wild-type and ampicillin-resistant Escherichia coli. Only ampicillin-resistant E. coli displayed an m/z approximately 29,000 peak, which was confirmed as beta-lactamase by in-gel digestion followed by peptide mass fingerprinting. Rapid MALDI-TOF MS detection of antibiotic-resistance could fulfill an important clinical need, providing critical phenotypic information beyond genus-species identification.
Inhibition of lipoxygenase and prostaglandin endoperoxide synthase by anacardic acids.

Summary C22:1 ω5-anacardic acid was found to be a good inhibitor of both potato lipoxygenase and ovine prostaglandin endoperoxide synthase with approximate IC 50 's of 6 and 27 μM, respectively. Very similar inhibition was seen with the crude exudate, rich in ω5-anacardic acids, from glandular trichomes of an arthropod-resistant strain of geranium, Pelargonium xhortorum . The saturated anacardic acid (C22:0 sat), abundant in the trichome exudate of susceptible strains, was nearly as inhibitory toward both prostaglandin endoperoxide synthase and lipoxygenase as the ω5-unsaturated compound. However, the dimethyl derivative of C22:1 ω5-anacardic acid was a poor inhibitor of prostaglandin endoperoxide synthase and caused only moderate (32%) inhibition of lipoxygenase even at 135 μM. The possible role of prostaglandin endoperoxide synthase and lipoxygenase inhibition in the enhanced pest resistance of geraniums which produce the ω5-AnAs is discussed.
Occurrence and evolution of homogeneously staining regions may be due to breakage-fusion-bridge cycles following telomere loss.

Chromosomes with homogeneously staining regions (HSR) were analysed in a subclone of the H4 rat hepatoma cell line, where they represent amplification of the ribosomal RNA (rRNA) genes. Detailed G-band analysis of the subclone revealed that an HSR on the short arm of chromosome 3 became unstable and changed its position within the chromosome. The evolution of this marker chromosome was associated with the terminal deletion of the normal long arm of the HSR-bearing chromosome 3 and may have involved ring formation as a result of fusion between the HSR on the short arm and the broken end of the long arm. Evidence was obtained for breakage at different sites within the ring, producing chromosomes with HSRs located terminally on either the long arms or both arms. The terminally located HSR underwent elongation in some cells presumably as a result of a breakage-fusionbridge cycle characteristic of instability due to telomeric loss. It is suggested that terminally located HSRs may generally occur this way.
Historical trend in the research and development of aircraft

A survey of some trends in aircraft design was made in an effort to determine the relation between research, development, test, and evaluation (RDT and E) and aircraft mission capability, requirements, and objectives. Driving forces in the history of aircraft include the quest for speed which involved design concepts incorporating jet propulsion systems and low drag features. The study of high speed design concepts promoted new experimental and analytical research techniques. These research techniques, in turn, have lead to concepts offering new performance potential. Design trends were directed toward increased speed, efficiency, productivity, and safety. Generally speaking, the research and development effort has been evolutionary in nature and, with the exception of the transition to supersonic flight, little has occurred since the origin of flight that has drastically changed the basic design fundamentals of aircraft. However, this does not preclude the possibility of dramatic changes in the future since the products of research are frequently unpredictable. Advances should be expected and sought in improved aerodynamics (reduced drag, enhanced lift, flow field exploitation); propulsion (improved engine cycles, multimode engines, alternate fuels, alternate power sources); structures (new materials, manufacturing techniques); all with a view toward increased efficiency and utility.
Myogenic cell transplantation improves in vivo regional performance in infarcted rabbit myocardium.

Abstract Background: Although cardiac transplantation is an ideal treatment for end-stage heart disease, inadequate donor availability has stimulated efforts to manage terminally injured myocardium by other innovative methods. Autologous skeletal myoblast transplantation, or cellular cardiomyoplasty, is one method to potentially mediate myocardial repair within chronically injured hearts. However, few investigators have documented the ability of myogenic cells to alter load-insensitive indices of systolic and diastolic performance in vivo. In this study, both systolic and diastolic regional myocardial function were evaluated following left ventricular cryoinjury and compared with function after myogenic cell transplantation. Methods Left ventricular pressure and segment length were determined in 9 rabbits by micromanometry and sonomicrometry 1 week following cryoinjury and 3 weeks after myoblast transplantation. At study termination, the extent of myoblast engraftment was determined by histologic analysis. Systolic performance was based on the linear regression of stroke work and end-diastolic segment length. Diastolic properties were evaluated by the curvilinear relationships between left ventricular pressure and strain, and left ventricular pressure and end-diastolic segment length. Results Although mean indices of systolic performance were unchanged after cell transplantation, systolic performance improved in 3 animals. In contrast, myoblast engraftment was associated with significantly improved diastolic properties (strain and dynamic stiffness) in all animals. Conclusions These data quantify temporal changes in regional myocardial performance and suggest that cellular cardiomyoplasty improves diastolic compliance prior to affecting systolic performance. Cellular cardiomyoplasty, a potential therapeutic option for ischemic heart disease, appears to reverse diastolic creep and thus may represent a clinical alternative to transplantation in the near future.
Long-term results of pediatric and adult craniopharyngiomas treated with combined surgery and radiation

From 1958 to 1982, 58 patients with craniopharyngioma were treated with external beam radiation, 56 post surgery. Nineteen were pediatric ( 1 cm) were recorded. The mean tumor and maximum dose for pediatric patients was 5588 and 5870 cGy vs. 6243 and 6542 cGy, respectively for adults. The actuarial 5- and 10-year survivals for pediatric patients were 84% and 72%, respectively and were significantly better than the 54% and 51% for adults (p = 0.01). However, overall disease recurrence rates were 26% (5/19) for pediatric patients and 18% (7/39) for adults. Of the multiple patient and treatment parameters analyzed, initial disease type (i.e. primary vs. recurrence) in pediatric patients, surgical extent, tumor dose, maximum dose, age of adults and use of pretreatment CT evaluation appeared to impact on patient outcome. Pediatric patients treated for primary disease showed improved survival over those treated for recurrence. The same was not observed in adults and appeared to be due to treatment toxicity. Surgical morbidity correlated with extent of surgery. All patients who underwent total resection developed surgical sequelae. Forty-four percent (4/9) of patients receiving tumor doses of 5400 cGy. Nine of the 12 recurrences were in patients who did not undergo pretreatment CT evaluation.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
Nicotine Abstinence Syndrome Precipitated by the Competitive Nicotinic Antagonist Dihydro-β-Erythroidine

Rats infused subcutaneously with 9 mg/kg/day nicotine tartrate for 7 days exhibit behavioral abstinence signs following either termination of nicotine infusion or injection of the noncompetitive nicotinic antagonists mecamylamine (SC) or hexamethonium (ICV). This study examined the abstinence precipitating effects of dihydro-β-erythroidine (DHβE), a competitive nicotinic antagonist. Twenty-four nicotine-dependent rats were injected in the third ventricle with 10, 18, or 25 μg DHβE in 20 μl saline or with saline alone and observed for abstinence signs over a 20-min period. There was a significant positive linear trend of overall abstinence signs as a function of dose, p < 0.01. In 12 nondependent rats, the high dose of DHβE did not induce more abstinence-like signs than saline alone. In a second experiment, 18 nicotine-dependent rats were injected SC with 1 or 6 mg/kg of the muscarinic antagonist scopolamine or with saline alone. Few abstinence signs were observed in any group; there was no significant drug effect. The results suggest that nicotine abstinence signs observed in the rat are specific to reduced stimulation of previously overstimulated nicotinic receptors.
Cannibalism and interspecific predation: Role of oviposition behavior

Cannibalism and interspecific predation among insect predators are common, yet these behaviors are frequently omitted from predator–prey theory and empirical studies. Interactions among predators can disrupt, facilitate, or augment biological pest control. We estimated the relative strengths of cannibalism and interspecific predation in a maize–aphid–coccinellid predator system. We know from previous work that Adalia bipunctata females tend to oviposit at the top of the plant near large aphid aggregations and that Coleomegilla maculata females tend to oviposit at the bottom of the plant far from large aphid aggregations. We used this information to design experiments to estimate the relative strength of cannibalism and interspecific predation. At high aphid densities, eggs at the top of the plant, near aphids, were preyed upon more than eggs at the bottom of the plant, far from aphids. This result implies that A. bipunctata suffers greater egg mortality than C. maculata. In part, this was due to the forag...
Theoretical basis for the practice of community mental health nursing.

An examination of some issues and factors related to constructing a paradigm for community health nursing is presented. Historical influences and ideologies are identified and related to community health nursing practice. Conceptual approaches to defining “community” are discussed. The relationship between the definitions of community and community assessment are identified. Definitions of mental health and their relationship to care are presented. Preventive intervention and community assessment approaches are discussed and applied to community mental health nursing.
The choice of licensing versus direct foreign investment in developing countries

For developing, technology-receiving countries, direct foreign investment is always better than licensing in the short run with sectoral immobility of capital. In the long run with perfect mobility of capital between sectors, the welfare rankings of the two scenarios are dependent upon the amount of domestic capital. The likely case is that the developing country would have a smaller amount of domestic capital than foreign investors, and hence licensing could yield higher national welfare.
Implicit memory Knowledge without awareness

One challenge of neurology is to explain consciousness. Clinically, we avoid the issue by equating level of consciousness with arousal, knowing that consciousness has aspects that are much harder to think about and still harder to test. Seeck et al.1 probe the mechanisms of consciousness by asking whether there is a cortical neurophysiologic correlate of conscious recollection. Their work illustrates progress in memory research that reveals a dichotomy between explicit memory, knowledge that we know we possess; and implicit memory, knowledge without awareness. In earlier studies, they recorded visual evoked responses (VERs) to flashed pictures of human faces.2 Visual evoked responses in the hippocampus and temporal cortex differed when evoked by a familiar face versus that of a stranger. Now they have analyzed where face recognition occurs and found that the localization depends on whether the subject realizes that the face has been seen before. Using frontal and temporal depth electrocorticography, in patients undergoing diagnostic evaluation for intractable epilepsy, they recorded VERs to pictures of unfamiliar human faces. The pictures were presented as a series of sequential pairs of flashed stimuli. The subject was asked if either face in the most recent pair was a repeat from the previous pair. The VERs evoked by the flashed face stimuli were sorted by whether they were evoked by a repeat face or a new one. The authors found that temporal and frontal cortical sites, but not hippocampal sites, show differences in VERs to the repeated faces. Remarkably, the VERs differed even though the subjects failed to consciously recognize which faces were repeats. Thus, the VERs indicated if a face had been …
Nuclear factor‐κB contributes to interleukin‐4‐ and interferon‐dependent polymeric immunoglobulin receptor expression in human intestinal epithelial cells

Polymeric immunoglobulins (pIgs) that are present at mucosal surfaces play key roles in both the innate and adaptive immune responses. These pIgs are delivered to the mucosal surface via transcytosis across the epithelium, a process mediated by the polymeric immunoglobulin receptor (pIgR). Previous studies demonstrate that expression of the pIgR is regulated by multiple immunomodulatory factors including interleukin-4 (IL-4) and interferon-gamma (IFN-gamma). In studies using human intestinal epithelial cells (HT29), multiple inhibitors of the transcription factor nuclear factor-kappaB (NF-kappaB), including a dominant negative IkappaBalpha-serine mutant, inhibited both IL-4- and IFN-dependent increases in pIgR expression. Under identical conditions, NF-kappaB inhibitors had no effect on cytokine-dependent increases in expression of the transcription factor interferon regulatory factor-1. Over-expression of the IkappaBalpha-serine mutant also inhibited reporter gene expression in response to IL-4, TNF-alpha, IL-1beta, and in some cases IFN-gamma using constructs with sequences from the pIgR promoter. Reduced levels of pIgR were observed even when inhibitors were added >/=24 hr after cytokines suggesting that prolonged activation of NF-kappaB is required. Finally, reporter gene studies with NF-kappaB enhancer elements indicated that IFN-gamma alone and IL-4 in combination with other cytokines activated NF-kappaB in HT29 cells. Together, these studies provide additional insight into the signalling pathways that contribute to expression of the pIgR, a critical player in mucosal immunity.
The role of Asian women in national development efforts

Abstract The article describes the origin, structure, and functions of the Asian Women's Institute as an international cooperative effort by nationals in Lebanon, Iran, Pakistan, India, Japan and Korea to improve the status of women. Nine women's studies centers located at nine women's colleges and universities are described, showing how research, educational efforts, and community action programs are carried out in the specific culture represented. International cooperation among the centers is facilitated by an international AWI office with a coordinator, a regular publication of activities, and periodic Asian conferences by scholars from participating countries and the United States. The emphasis in all these studies centers and conferences is on the role women can play in improving their status and in assisting in national development.
Lectures to Working Men

I HEARTILY concur in Mr. Stuart's opinion, that the working men of England—speaking at least for the North—are fully aware of the value of Scientific Instruction in its strict sense. The subject has a special interest for me; as in the winter of 1866-7, I started in this city a series of Science Lectures for the People, which, with the kind help of Prof. Jevons, Dr. Alcock, and Dr. Morgan, were undertaken for the purpose of ascertaining whether the working men of Manchester really appreciate the value of science instruction when given in a plain, but scientific form, illustrated with diagrams and experiments made on a scale such as could be seen by a large audience. The experiment proved highly successful. Upwards of 4,000 people attended the thirteen Lectures which we gave, and the class of persons present was exactly that for whom the lectures were designed; whilst the marked attention and interest invariably exhibited by the audiences showed how keenly they appreciated the information they received, and the insight into true scientific methods which they obtained.
Mechanism of arginine vasopressin suppression of ovine fetal lung fluid secretion: lack of V2-receptor effect.

Fetal lung liquid production is essential for in utero pulmonary development, and the resorption of lung liquid at birth facilitates neonatal transition. Lung liquid also contributes importantly to amniotic fluid volume. Factors that influence lung liquid production/resorption may, therefore, impact fetal pulmonary growth and development as well as amniotic fluid homeostasis. Arginine vasopressin (AVP) inhibits fetal lung liquid production and facilitates lung liquid resorption. In view of studies administering fetal AVP or the V2 receptor agonist, 1 desamino 8-D AVP (dDAVP) for the regulation of amniotic fluid volume, we sought to determine the impact of AVP V2 receptor stimulation on fetal lung liquid production. Eight near-term ovine fetuses (130 ± 2 d; term = 145 d) were prepared with hind limb vascular catheters, a bladder catheter, and a tracheal catheter. Each ewe received vascular and amniotic catheters. After 5 days of recovery, the animals were studied for a 2-hr control period and for 2 hr foll...
Observations of the hard X-ray spectrum of the impulsive phase of solar flares

The impulsive solar hard X-ray spectrum provides a direct diagnostic on the impulsive energy release of the flare. The data from the hard X-ray (14-342 keV) spectrometer on OSO 7 have been examined for events covering a wide energy range to determine the photon spectrum more precisely. This resulted in a sample of 38 events. The data have been fitted with either single- or double-power laws, and with an exponential spectrum, as from thermal bremsstrahlung. The chi-squared statistic between two-parameter fits strongly favors the exponential fit, particularly at peak intensity when the widest energy range is sampled. This result supports a single-temperature thermal source of the impulsive solar hard X-rays with temperatures in the range 4.7-31 keV and emission measures in the range from 8.4 x 10 to the 43rd to 6.0 x 10 to the 46th per cu cm. The temperature reaches a single maximum and then rapidly decays, but the emission measure usually increases throughout, even after temperature maximum, for data with 10-s resolution.
Openness in Adoption and the Level of Child Participation

There is great controversy regarding the impact of openness in adoption, especially the impact of such an arrangement on adopted children. Three indicators of the level of child participation in the openness arrangement were examined: (a) level of openness reported by adoptive parents, (b) level of information adopted children reported having about their birthparents, and (c) whether adoptive parents have withheld any pertinent information gained through communication with the birthmother from the adopted child. 171 children (90 males, 81 females; mean age = 7.99) were studied to assess how that participation influenced their conceptual understanding of what adoption means, general self-worth, satisfaction with level of openness, and curiosity about birthparents. Overall it does not appear that providing information about a child's birthparents will confuse the child about the meaning of adoption or lower the child's self-esteem, but neither will it move them to levels of understanding that are beyond their cognitive capabilities to reach.
Deuterium absorption from the D2O exposure of oxidized 4H-SiC (0001), ( 0001¯), and ( 112¯0) surfaces

We report results on deuterium absorption on several oxidized 4H-SiC surfaces following D2O vapor absorption. Absorption at the oxide/semiconductor interface is strongly face dependent with an order of magnitude more deuterium on the C-face and a-face than on the Si-face, in contrast to the bulk of the oxides which show essentially no face dependence. Annealing in NO gas produces a large reduction in interfacial deuterium absorption in all cases. The reduction of the positive charge at the interface scales linearly with the interface D content. These results also scale with the variation in interface trap density (Dit) and mobility on the three faces after wet oxidation annealing.
The effect of polyol OH number on the bond strength of rigid polyurethane on an aluminum substrate

Changing the blowing agent from CFC-11 to pentane in the formation of Al-faced polyurethane foam insulation results in a lower adhesion to the Al facing. This decrease in bond strength is due to a change in the OH number of the polyether polyol used. In order to establish the relationship between OH number and the adhesion of the polymer to the Al, the bond strengths of rigid polyurethane films to Al were measured, by indentation debonding, as a function of polymer crosslink density and of the number density of the spherulites which formed at the interface. The interphase between the two materials, formed by transcrystallization, crucially affected the failure mode. Cohesive fracture occurred between the spherulites and the amorphous portion of the bulk polymer. In the regions where no spherulites existed, the failure took place by separation of the amorphous polymer from the Al surface. The bond strength appeared to be proportional to the crosslink density calculated using the elastic modulus of the poly...
Moderate and high amounts of tamoxifen in αMHC-MerCreMer mice induce a DNA damage response, leading to heart failure and death.

SUMMARY Numerous mouse models have utilized Cre-loxP technology to modify gene expression. Adverse effects of Cre recombinase activity have been reported, including in the heart. However, the mechanisms associated with cardiac Cre toxicity are largely unknown. Here, we show that expression of Cre in cardiomyocytes induces a DNA damage response, resulting in cardiomyocyte apoptosis, cardiac fibrosis and cardiac dysfunction. In an effort to increase the recombination efficiency of a widely used tamoxifen-sensitive Cre transgene under control of the α-myosin-heavy-chain promoter (αMHC-MerCreMer), we observed myocardial dysfunction and decreased survival, which were dependent on the dose of tamoxifen injected. After excluding a Cre-independent contribution by tamoxifen, we found that Cre induced myocardial fibrosis, activation of pro-fibrotic genes and cardiomyocyte apoptosis. Examination of the molecular mechanisms showed activation of DNA damage response signaling and p53 stabilization in the absence of loxP sites, suggesting that Cre induced illegitimate DNA breaks. Cardiomyocyte apoptosis was also induced by expressing Cre using adenoviral transduction, indicating that the effect was not dependent on genomic integration of the transgene. Cre-mediated homologous recombination at loxP sites was dose-dependent and had a ceiling effect at ~80% of cardiomyocytes showing recombination. By titrating the amount of tamoxifen to maximize recombination while minimizing animal lethality, we determined that 30 μg tamoxifen/g body weight/day injected on three consecutive days is the optimal condition for the αMHC-MerCreMer system to induce recombination in the Rosa26-lacZ strain. Our results further highlight the importance of experimental design, including the use of appropriate genetic controls for Cre expression.
Gold nanoparticles: interesting optical properties and recent applications in cancer diagnostics and therapy

Recent years have seen tremendous progress in the design and study of nanomaterials geared towards biological and biomedical applications, most notable among these being the noble metal nanoparticles. In this review, we outline the surface-plasmon resonance-enhanced optical properties of colloidal gold nanoparticles directed towards recent biomedical applications with an emphasis on cancer diagnostics and therapeutics. Methods of molecular-specific diagnostics/detection of cancer, including strongly enhanced surface plasmon resonance light-scattering, surface-enhanced emission of gold nanorods and surface-enhanced Raman scattering, are described. We also discuss the plasmonic photothermal therapy of cancer achieved by using the strongly enhanced surface-plasmon resonance absorption of gold nanospheres and nanorods.
RRM1 Modulated In Vitro and In Vivo Efficacy of Gemcitabine and Platinum in Non–Small-Cell Lung Cancer

Purpose RRM1 encodes the regulatory subunit of ribonucleotide reductase and is a molecular target of gemcitabine. Previous studies showed increased RRM1 expression on continuous exposure of cell lines to gemcitabine and suggested improved survival for patients with low as opposed to high tumoral RRM1 expression when treated with gemcitabine-containing chemotherapy. However, the principal hypothesis that intratumoral levels of gene expression are associated with disease response has not been addressed. Patients and Methods We constructed genetically modified lung cancer cell lines with increased and decreased RRM1 expression to investigate the in vitro 50% inhibitory concentration (IC50) for gemcitabine, cisplatin, and carboplatin. A prospective phase II clinical trial in patients with locally advanced non–small-cell lung cancer was conducted with pretreatment tumor collection for determination of RRM1 and ERCC1 expression by real-time reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction. The levels of gene exp...
Warfarin Versus Novel Oral Anticoagulants How to Choose

Anticoagulants (commonly called blood thinners) are medications that interact with the body’s natural blood-clotting system to treat and prevent abnormal blood clots. Anticoagulants are used in patients who have blood clots in the legs (called deep vein thrombosis or DVT) or in the lungs (called pulmonary embolism or PE), other types of blood clots in the arteries or veins, an irregular heart rhythm called atrial fibrillation that increases the risk of stroke, and mechanical heart valves. For decades, warfarin (also known as Coumadin) was the primary anticoagulant used. Recently, several other medications known as novel oral anticoagulants (NOACs) have been studied and released on the market as alternatives to warfarin. Given the number of choices now available for patients who need anticoagulants, the benefits, risks, side effects, and convenience of each anticoagulant must be carefully considered. Warfarin treats and prevents blood clots by decreasing the production of several clotting proteins that rely on vitamin K. Warfarin is taken by mouth once daily, and the dose varies depending on inherited factors, reason for the medication, and diet (Table 1). Because of the variations in doses needed for each patient, warfarin requires frequent laboratory monitoring and dose adjustment to maintain blood levels within the target range (called the international normalized ratio or INR). Below target blood levels, patients have an increased risk of clotting. Above target blood levels, the risk of bleeding increases. As with all anticoagulants, warfarin use increases the risk of bleeding. If this happens, vitamin K or various blood products can be given to replace the clotting factors affected by warfarin. View this table: Table 1. Features of Warfarin Versus NOACs NOACs work by targeting individual clotting proteins. They do not require laboratory monitoring or dose adjustment because they reach predictable levels in most patients (Table 1). They are also shorter-acting than warfarin. …
How Do Networks Become Navigable

Networks created and maintained by social processes, such as the human friendship network and the World Wide Web, appear to exhibit the property of navigability: namely, not only do short paths exist between any pair of nodes, but such paths can easily be found using only local information. It has been shown that for networks with an underlying metric, algorithms using only local information perform extremely well if there is a power-law distribution of link lengths. However, it is not clear why or how real networks might develop this distribution. In this paper we define a decentralized ``rewiring'' process, inspired by surfers on the Web, in which each surfer attempts to travel from their home page to a random destination, and updates the outgoing link from their home page if this journey takes too long. We show that this process does indeed cause the link length distribution to converge to a power law, achieving a routing time of O(log^2 n) on networks of size n. We also study finite-size effects on the optimal exponent, and show that it converges polylogarithmically slowly as the lattice size goes to infinity.
Public Meeting Facilitation A Naïve Theory Analysis of Crisis Meeting Interaction

During the record 2009 flood, the city of Fargo, North Dakota, United States held daily televised public meetings. Unknown to many citizens, the city also held private premeetings to prepare for the public meetings. The present study examined city leaders’ naive theories of meeting facilitation in light of a minimalist view of public meetings (McComas, 2001). Interviews of city leaders during and after the flood, as well as meeting transcripts, were analyzed. Findings indicated that city leaders believed debate about controversial issues should be contained within private premeetings, where leaders planned how to be open with citizens during public meetings. City leaders also believed public meetings had to portray a calm yet urgent image for the public. City leaders used micro-level (e.g., humor, explicit vigilant messages, and metaphor) and macro-level (transparency) processes to communicatively accomplish their desires.
Speaker normalization for Chinese vowel recognition in cochlear implants

Because of the limited spectra-temporal resolution associated with cochlear implants, implant patients often have greater difficulty with multitalker speech recognition. The present study investigated whether multitalker speech recognition can be improved by applying speaker normalization techniques to cochlear implant speech processing. Multitalker Chinese vowel recognition was tested with normal-hearing Chinese-speaking subjects listening to a 4-channel cochlear implant simulation, with and without speaker normalization. For each subject, speaker normalization was referenced to the speaker that produced the best recognition performance under conditions without speaker normalization. To match the remaining speakers to this "optimal" output pattern, the overall frequency range of the analysis filter bank was adjusted for each speaker according to the ratio of the mean third formant frequency values between the specific speaker and the reference speaker. Results showed that speaker normalization provided a small but significant improvement in subjects' overall recognition performance. After speaker normalization, subjects' patterns of recognition performance across speakers changed, demonstrating the potential for speaker-dependent effects with the proposed normalization technique.
Differential expression of breast cancer-associated genes between stage- and age-matched tumor specimens from African- and Caucasian-American Women diagnosed with breast cancer

Recent studies suggest that the poorer breast cancer outcome observed in African-American women (AAW) may, in part, result from underlying molecular factors. The purpose of this study was to investigate gene expression differences between Caucasian-American women (CAW) and AAW that may contribute to this poorer prognosis. The expression of 84 genes involved in breast carcinoma prognosis, response to therapy, estrogen signaling, and tumor aggressiveness was assessed in age- and stage-matched CAW and AAW paraffin-embedded breast cancer specimens. The Wilcoxon–Mann–Whitney Test was used to identify genes with a significant difference in expression between CAW and AAW. To determine if the differentially expressed genes could segregate between the CAW and AAW, we performed semi-supervised principal component analysis (SSPCA). Twenty genes were differentially expressed between AAW and CAW. SSPCA incorporating these 20 genes segregated AAW and CAW into two distinct groups. AAW were significantly (p < 0.05) more likely to display aberrations in G1/S cell-cycle regulatory genes, decreased expression of cell-adhesion genes, and low to no expression of ESR1, PGR, ERBB2 and estrogen pathway targets. The gene expression differences identified between AAW and CAW may contribute to more aggressive disease, resistance to therapy, enhanced metastatic potential and poor clinical outcome. These findings support the hypothesis that breast cancer specimens collected from AAW display distinct gene expression differences compared to similar tissues obtained from CAW. Additional population-based studies are necessary to determine if these gene expression variations contribute to the highly aggressive and treatment-resistant breast cancer phenotype frequently observed in AAW.
Responding to a Wake-up Call: An Examination of Federal Agency Diversity Management Programs

This article reports the results of a survey administered to 160 federal agencies and subagencies to gauge the extent to which they have developed diversity management programs. Many agencies report that they have implemented numerous programmatic elements recommended by the growing body of literature on diversity in the workplace. In contrast, other agencies indicate that they have very limited programs or that they have simply repackaged their traditional equal employment opportunity and affirmative action initiatives. A primary determinant of the level of development of agency or subagency diversity programs is support from the head of each organization.
Green Sperm. Identification of Male Gamete Promoters in Arabidopsis

Previously, in an effort to better understand the male contribution to fertilization, we completed a maize (Zea mays) sperm expressed sequence tag project. Here, we used this resource to identify promoters that would direct gene expression in sperm cells. We used reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction to identify probable sperm-specific transcripts in maize and then identified their best sequence matches in the Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) genome. We tested five different Arabidopsis promoters for cell specificity, using an enhanced green fluorescent protein reporter gene. In pollen, the AtGEX1 (At5g55490) promoter is active in the sperm cells and not in the progenitor generative cell or in the vegetative cell, but it is also active in ovules, roots, and guard cells. The AtGEX2 (At5g49150) promoter is active only in the sperm cells and in the progenitor generative cell, but not in the vegetative cell or in other tissues. A third promoter, AtVEX1 (At5g62850) [corrected] was active in the vegetative cell during the later stages of pollen development; the other promoters tested (At1g66770 and At1g73350) did not function in pollen. Comparisons among GEX1 and GEX2 homologs from maize, rice (Oryza sativa), Arabidopsis, and poplar (Populus trichocarpa) revealed a core binding site for Dof transcription factors. The AtGEX1 and AtGEX2 promoters will be useful for manipulating gene expression in sperm cells, for localization and functional analyses of sperm proteins, and for imaging of sperm dynamics as they are transported in the pollen tube to the embryo sac.
Real-time Automatic Price Prediction for eBay Online Trading

We develop a system for attribute-based prediction of final (online) auction pricing, focusing on the eBay laptop category. The system implements a featureweighted k-NN algorithm, using evolutionary computation to determine feature weights, with prior trades used as training data. The resulting average prediction error is 16%. Mostly automatic trading using the system greatly reduces the time a reseller needs to spend on trading activities, since the bulk of market research is now done automatically with the help of the learned model. The result is a 562% increase in trading efficiency (measured as profit/hour).
Enhancement of the numerical stability of the adaptive integral method at low frequencies through a loop-charge formulation of the method-of-moments approximation

The performance of integral-equation-based fast iterative solution schemes such as the adaptive integral method (AIM) and the conjugate gradient (CG) fast Fourier transform (FFT) algorithm can be substantially improved at low frequencies if the electric current and electric charge densities are treated as two separate unknown quantities. The representation of the current density in terms of solenoidal expansion functions (loops) and the charge density in terms of pulse basis functions provides for an exact decomposition of the original electromagnetic (EM) boundary-value problem into its magnetostatic and electrostatic forms at zero frequency. This formulation allows for accurate EM modeling down to very low frequencies free of numerical instabilities, while the spectral properties of the matrix equation are substantially improved compared to the standard method of moments formulation in either loop-tree or loop-star basis. The AIM and the CG FFT algorithms can be appropriately adjusted to accommodate for the use of loop-charge basis functions, thus leading to efficient solvers with O(NlogN) solution complexity and O(N) memory requirements for two-and-one-half-dimensional and penetrable three-dimensional (3-D) structures. For general 3-D objects, the CPU time and memory of the algorithms scale as O(N/sup 1.5/logN) and O(N/sup 1.5/), respectively. The new implementation of the AIM is discussed and demonstrated through its application for the broad-band simulation of complex interconnect and electronic packaging structures.