cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Renal cortical blood flow and glomerular filtration in myohemoglobinuric acute renal failure

Renal cortical blood flow and glomerular filtration in myohemoglobinuric acute renal failure.Renal cortical blood flow measurements were made serially after the induction of myohemoglobinuric acute renal failure in water-drinking rats and others given 150 mM saline for a month in place of drinking water.Blood flow in both groups fell to some one-third of control in the first two hours after injection.Cortical perfusion of water drinking rats stabilized at approximately 24% of control for the 24 hour study period, but rose rapidly to 85% of control in the saline-drinking group.Glomerular filtration (GFR) of water-drinking animals was too slow for accurate measurement.GFR improved concomitantly with blood flow in the saline-drinking animals, reaching 84% of control within 12 hours.Estimations of intra-glomerular pressure at various blood flow rates and calculated pre- and postglomerular resistances suggested that filtration failure in water-drinking rats was primarily attributable to preglomerular vascular resistance change.A small decrease in postglomerular resistance could not be ruled out, however.In recovery, increased preglomerular resistance still was chiefly responsible for any residual deficit in glomerular filtration and cortical blood flow, but an inhomogeneity of nephron perfusion found earlier, and/or an element of postglomerular vascular relaxation, lowered filtration below that predicted on the basis of preglomerular constriction alone.Long-term saline loading prior to the induction of myohemoglobinuria appears to prevent acute renal failure by abolishing sustained renal cortical ischemia.
Local Government Discretion and Accountability in Burkina Faso

Burkina Faso opted for a progressive approach to decentralization reforms, aiming at building local government capacity first before transferring responsibilities. We employ a diagnostic framework to analyze local government discretion and accountability in Burkina Faso. We find that local governments have a very low degree of discretionary power accompanied with weak accountability towards citizens at all levels. In the political and administrative spheres, the center plays a dominant role in local government affairs leaving little space for discretion. In the fiscal sphere, taxing powers are restricted, while transfers are insufficient and unpredictable, making local financial management extremely difficult. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Costs and Effects of a Water Program for a Small Stripping Company-Southeastern Ohio

The purpose of the study was to use economic analysis in determining the ability of a small strip mining company to incure the financial burden of carrying out various alternative mine drainage abatement programs. The quantity and quality of water with which the company has to deal were determined and treatment and diversion programs were costed out. The company's market area and the market structure were analyzed. It was found that pricing policies were determined by a dominant firm, so the target company had no control over its price per ton of coal. The costs and revenue of the firm were analyzed for the period 1960-1970 and, even without a water quality program, losses were incurred in six out of eleven years. Analysis of the average cost curve indicates that the per unit cost could have been reduced by increasing output thereby increasing efficiency. The conclusions of the study were that the small company could not unilaterally implement mine drainage programs because the added costs would seriously worsen its already precarious financial position. Even uniformly enforced legislation might reduce the small firms competitive position because of economies of scale associated with the large treatment facilities used by big mining companies.
Estrogen effects on MMP-13 and MMP-14 regulation of left ventricular mass in Dahl salt-induced hypertension.

Background:Female Dahl salt-sensitive (DS) rats fed a low-salt diet develop hypertension at 6 months of age. Ovariectomy at 2 months of age accelerates the development of hypertension, and estrogen replacement delays it. Although acute pressure overload induces structural changes in the left ventricle (LV) further effects of gradual hypertension on LV remodeling have not been examined in the DS rat model. Objective: The purpose of this study was to test the hypothesis that aging and estrogen loss in hypertensive DS rats are accompanied by changes in LV remodeling. Methods: Four groups of DS rats were examined: young intact, middle-aged (MA) intact, MA ovariectomized (MA-OVX), and MA-OVX with 17β-eestradiol (E2) supplementation (MA-OVX+E2). Myocardial matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs),tissue inhibitors of metalloproteinases (TIMPs),and extracellular matrix (ECM) proteins were assessed by immunoblotting. Results: Each of the 4 groups comprised 6 animals. Mean (SEM) LV mass was significantly greater in the MA-intact and the MA-OVX groups (1257 [31] mg and 1199 [25] mg, respectively; both, P < 0.05) compared with the young-intact group (697 [6] mg). LV mass in the MA-OVX+E2 group was significantly lower compared with the MA-intact and MA-OVX groups (both, P < 0.05), suggesting that estrogen may attenuate LV remodeling.Fibronectin and collagen III and IV concentrations increased significantly in the MA-intact and MA-OOVX groups (all, P < 0.05),indicating increased fibrosis. Multiple MMPs also increased in the MA-intact an nd MA-OVX rats, including MMP-3, -7, -99, -113, and -114, and all TIMPs. In contrast, estrogen attenuated fibrosis by increasing MMP-8 concentrations and increasing collagen III fragments. From good-fit regression modeling, MMP-13 and MMP-14 concentrations correlated positively with LV mass for the MA-intact and MA-OVX groups, respectively. Conclusions: Gradual hypertension stimulated ECM turnover by increasing both MMP/TIMP production and ECM degradation.Estrogen loss or gain resulted in a shift in MMP profiles, suggesting that MMP-13 and MMP-14 may be differentially regulated in postmenopausal hypertension.
Is early laparoscopic appendectomy feasible in children with acute appendicitis presenting with an appendiceal mass? A prospective study.

Abstract Background The management of an appendiceal mass remains controversial with 2 schools of thought; early surgical intervention vs nonoperative management with or without interval appendectomy. The aim is to determine the role and safety of early laparoscopic appendectomy (LA) in children with acute appendicitis presenting with an appendiceal mass. Methods This is a prospective study of 88 consecutive pediatric patients who underwent attempted LA for suspected acute appendicitis at KK Women's and Children's Hospital, Singapore, between May and October 2003. Results A total of 88 patients with a mean age of 10 ± 3 years (range, 3-16 years) underwent LA for an appendiceal mass (n = 22), simple appendicitis (n = 36), other complicated (gangrenous or perforated) appendicitis (n = 23), and a normal appendix (n = 7). There were 7 conversions to open appendicectomy, 3 of which occurred in patients with an appendiceal mass. There were no perioperative or postoperative mortalities. Morbidity occurred in only one patient who underwent LA for perforated appendicitis. He had prolonged sepsis that resolved after 2 weeks of intravenous antibiotics. None of the patients with an appendiceal mass developed complications. Patients who underwent early LA for an appendiceal mass had a statistically significant ( P Conclusion Although early LA for an appendiceal mass is a technically demanding procedure, it can be performed safely in children with minimal morbidity and mortality. In an era where patients' demand for "key-hole" surgery is rising, early LA is a safe and viable option in the management of children with an appendiceal mass. It also offers the advantage of avoiding misdiagnoses and the need for a second hospitalization.
The Fallacy of Accident and the Dictum de omni : Late Medieval Controversy over a Reciprocal Pair

Problemes medievaux d'interpretation de la notion aristotelicience de paralogisme d'accident. Discussion des points de vue de Richard Campsall et surtout de Guillaume d'Ockham
Role of dynamic cartography in simulations of landscape processes based on multivariate fields

Abstract The development of distributed landscape process models based on multi-variate fields stimulated the integration of GIS and computer cartography with scientific visualization. The new integrated environment supports advanced visual analysis of multivariate georeferenced data by displaying multiple surfaces and volumes in an appropriate projection of 3D space together with vector and point data. Dynamic cartographic models are created by spatial, chronological, and attribute change animation. Interactive visualization using the Internet is supported by a translator of the georeferenced data to Virtual Reality Modeling Language format files. These new tools are used for exploration and presentation of spatio-temporal data, as well as for the support of development and evaluation of a complex soil erosion model. Examples of animations demonstrate the increasing role of dynamic cartography as a research and exploratory tool providing insight into the complex spatial and spatiotemporal relationships of landscape phenomena and their models.
Water turnover in coturnix quail with individual observations on a burrowing owl, Petz conure and vulturine fish eagle.

Abstract 1. 1. The body-water half-life in coturnix quail was 2·1 days and the turnover was 0·2 ml water/g body wt. per day. There was no evidence of sexual dimorphism. Male coturnix drank about 24 ml water/day, and it was calculated that about 95 per cent of the water turnover can be provided by free drinking water. 2. 2. The half-life of body water was about 4 days in the burrowing owl, 7–8 days in the Petz conure and 6 days in the vulturine fish eagle. 3. 3. The turnover of body water appeared to be related to body size.
The IARC Evaluation of Di(2-ethylhexyl)phthalate (DEHP): A Flawed Decision Based on an Untested Hypothesis

(2002). The IARC Evaluation of Di(2-ethylhexyl)phthalate (DEHP): A Flawed Decision Based on an Untested Hypothesis. International Journal of Occupational and Environmental Health: Vol. 8, No. 3, pp. 284-286.
Automatic antenna-tuning unit for software-defined and cognitive radio

This paper discusses the implementation of an automatic antenna tuning unit system (ATU) for software-defined and cognitive radio. The ATU simplifies radio frequency (RF) front-end design for multi-band, multi-mode radios by allowing an electrically small reconfigurable antenna to become a frequency-agile selective component (essentially a tunable filter). In implementing the ATU, impedance synthesizers (tunable matching networks) using RF MEMS switches as the control elements are used to match a more or less arbitrary load to a convenient impedance value. To generate feedback data that can be used to optimize the impedance synthesizer, the incident and reflected powers at the input to the impedance synthesizer are sampled using a power sensor block comprising directional coupler, logarithmic RF power detectors, analog-to-digital converters (ADCS), and return loss computation algorithms running on a field programmable gate array (FPGA). From a practical point of view, in order to be compatible with commercial wireless handset devices, we propose to design and ultimately implement a fully integrated ATU system. In this paper, a hard- ware implementation of the ATU prototype has been demonstrated to verify narrowband automatic tuning ability of the ATU under constantly changing environment conditions, and we present simulated results for a logarithmic power detector designed with 55 dB dynamic range over the 800 MHz–2 GHz frequency band using 0.25 µ CMOS technology. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Potential utility of actuarial methods for identifying specific learning disabilities

This article describes how actuarial methods can supplant discrepancy models and augment problem solving and Response to Intervention (RTI) efforts by guiding the process of identifying specific learning disabilities (SLD). Actuarial methods use routinized selection and execution of formulas derived from empirically established relationships to make predictions that fall within a plausible range of possible future outcomes. In the case of SLD identification, the extent to which predictions are reasonable can be evaluated by their ability to categorize large segments of the population into subgroups that vary considerably along a spectrum of risk for academic failure. Although empirical comparisons of actuarial methods to clinical judgment reveal that actuarial methods consistently outperform clinical judgment, multidisciplinary teams charged with identifying SLD currently rely on clinical judgment. Actuarial methods provide educators with an empirically verifiable indicator of student need for special education and related services that could be used to estimate the relative effects of exclusionary criteria. This indicator would provide a defensible endpoint in the process of identifying SLD as well as a means of informing and improving the SLD identification process. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Mutational analysis of archaeal histone-DNA interactions.

Abstract Site-specific mutagenesis of the hmfB gene cloned from the archaeon Methanothermus fervidus, followed by expression in Escherichia coli, has been used to generate ∼90 recombinant (r) variants of the archaeal histone HMfB. The abilities of these variants to form stable archaeal nucleosome-containing complexes with linear pBR322 DNA, and with an 89 bp restriction fragment of this DNA have been determined. Variants that failed to form such complexes, based on negative gel-shift assays, had substitutions at the N terminus or within the α1, L1 and L2 regions of the rHMfB histone fold, at sites predicted to be homologous to eucaryal histone fold residues that contact the DNA in the eucaryal nucleosome. Variants that failed to give gel shifts were further assayed for their abilities to facilitate ligase-catalyzed circularization of a linear 88 bp DNA molecule, and to reduce the ellipticity of a DNA solution at 275 nm (θ275). Consistent with cooperative but independent sites of DNA binding, a combination of three residue substitutions, one each in α1, L1 and L2, was required to generate a rHMfB variant with no detectable DNA binding based on gel shift, circularization and θ275 reduction assays.
Magnetic fields in massive stars: dynamics and origin

Evidence continues to accumulate in favour of the presence of magnetic fields on the surfaces of massive stars. Some authors hypothesize that such fields originate in a dynamo in the convective core, with buoyancy bringing flux tubes to the surface. Here we show that, when realistic stellar models are used, this ‘core dynamo hypothesis’ encounters a serious difficulty: in order for surface fields to originate in a core dynamo, the core must create magnetic fields that are much stronger than equipartition values. As an alternative hypothesis for the origin of magnetic fields in OB stars, we suggest that a dynamo is operating in shear-unstable gas in the radiative stellar envelope. Using a recently developed code for the evolution of rotating stars, we find that in a 10-M⊙ zero-age main sequence (ZAMS) star with a typical rotation period, more than 90 per cent of the volume of the star is subject to shear instability. We have recently proposed that dynamo operation in shear-unstable gas helps to explain certain properties of mass loss in cool giants. Here, in the context of hot stars, we show that fields which originate in the shear-unstable regions of the envelope can reach the surface without violating the constraints of equipartition. Such fields rise to the surface on time-scales which are short compared to main-sequence lifetimes.
A LINPACK-style condition estimator for the equation AX-XB^{T} = C

Estimation of the condition number of AX- XB^{T} = C requires an approximation of the smallest l 2 singular value of the linear transformation X \rightarrow AX - XB^{T} . The approximation is obtained from a step of inverse iteration applied to a heuristically chosen starting matrix. In the style of LINPACK, the cost of the estimator is kept down by using the same matrix factorizatlons to make the estimate as are used to solve AX - XB^{T} = C . Computational experiments verify its reliability.
Ovarian cystadenofibroma: A masquerader of malignancy

Ovarian cystadenofibroma is a relatively rare benign ovarian tumor that contains both epithelial and fibrous stromal components. The appearance of cystadenofibroma on imaging is often complex; cystic- to solid-appearing masses may be visualized and it often resembles a malignant tumor. Owing to the fibrous component of this tumor, MRI shows low-signal intensity on T2W images. This finding may help a radiologist make a preoperative diagnosis of this tumor and thus perhaps avoid aggressive surgical management.
Defects in SUMO (Small Ubiquitin-related Modifier) Conjugation and Deconjugation Alter Cell Sensitivity to DNA Topoisomerase I-induced DNA Damage

Eukaryotic DNA topoisomerase I (Top1p) has important functions in DNA replication, transcription, and recombination. This enzyme also constitutes the cellular target of camptothecin (CPT), which induces S-phase-dependent cytotoxicity. To define cellular pathways that regulate cell sensitivity to Top1p-induced DNA lesions, we described a yeast genetic screen for conditional tah (top1T722A-hypersensitive) mutants with enhanced sensitivity to low levels of the CPT mimetic mutant top1T722A (Reid, R. J., Fiorani, P., Sugawara, M., and Bjornsti, M. A. (1999) Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U. S. A. 96, 11440-11445; Fiorani, P., Reid, R. J., Schepis, A., Jacquiau, H. R., Guo, H., Thimmaiah, P., Benedetti, P., and Bjornsti, M. A. (2004) J. Biol. Chem. 279, 21271-21281). Here we report that tah mutant ubc9-10 harbors a hypomorphic allele of UBC9, which encodes the essential SUMO (small ubiquitin-related modifier) E2-conjugating enzyme. The same conditional ubc9P123L mutant was also isolated in an independent screen for enhanced sensitivity to a distinct Top1p poison, Top1N726Hp. The ubc9-10 mutant exhibited a decrease in global protein sumoylation and increased sensitivity to a wide range of DNA-damaging agents independent of Top1p. Deletion of the Ulp2 SUMO protease failed to restore ubc9-10 cell resistance to Top1p poisons or hydroxyurea yet adversely affected wild-type TOP1 cell genetic stability and sensitivity to hydroxyurea. Moreover, although mutation of different consensus SUMO sites in the N terminus and linker region of yeast Top1p failed to recapitulate ubc9-10 mutant phenotypes, they revealed distinct and subtle effects on cell sensitivity to CPT. These results provide insights into the complexities of SUMO conjugation and the confounding effects of SUMO modification on Top1p function and cell sensitivity to genotoxic agents.
Neonatal Hyperthyroidism Alters Hepatic Epidermal Growth Factor Receptor Ontogeny in Mice

ABSTRACT: Epidermal growth factor (EGF) liver receptor ontogeny and somatic growth were studied in mice from day 7 to day 70 postnatally to assess long-term effects of short-term postnatal thyroxine treatment. The mice were given 0.4μg thyroxine/g body weight/day for the 1st wk of life. EGF receptor binding in liver tissue was studied on days 7, 15, 20, 30, and 70 postnatally. Treated animals had accelerated eyelid opening and tooth eruption, and permanent growth retardation was obvious from the second week of life. Hepatic EGF receptor-binding capacity increased markedly in control mice with increasing age in contrast to a very slow increase in treated mice, making the difference statistically significant (P < 0.01) from day 30. The affinity of EGF receptor binding initially was similar in the two groups of animals (1.09 × 109 M−1 and 1.02 × 109 M−1) and increased by day 30 in controls (2.57 ± 109 M−1 an increase that was not observed in treated animals either at day 30 or 70. These results suggest a sensitive period of imprinting during the first 7 days postnatally, a period when thyroxine can exert a permanent effect on later growth and later hepatic EGF receptor number.
Sulpiride: a weak antagonist of norepinephrine and 5-hydroxytryptamine.

Antagonism of norepinephrine (NE) and 5-hydroxytryptamine (5-HT) by sulpiride was studied in vitro on rabbit aortic strips. Concentrations of sulpiride ranging from 3 × 10−5 to 3 × 10−3 M caused a progressive shift of the dose response curves of both NE and 5-HT to the right without inhibiting the responses to KCl. pA2 values of sulpiride calculated from Schild plots against NE and 5-HT were 4.6 and 4.4, respectively. Thus, sulpiride, which has been previously shown to be the most potent antagonist of the dopamine vascular receptors, is a very weak α-adrenergic or 5-HT antagonist.
LYMPHOCYTE MIGRATION INTO TISSUE : THE PARADIGM DERIVED FROM CD4 SUBSETS

The appropriate recirculation and migration of naive, effector and memory T cells into inflamed tissue are precisely controlled by adhesive interactions with vascular endothelium. Analyses of CD4 lymphocytes have indicated that naive and antigen-experienced cells exhibit distinctive patterns of homing and recirculation, and that subsets of cells preferentially localize in different anatomical locations as a consequence of previous antigen exposure and differences in adhesion receptor usage.
Molecular Targets for Obesity Therapy in the Brain

Energy balance (intake and expenditure) is under the control of complex and redundant neural pathways that regulate feeding behavior and energy metabolism in response to availability of nutrients in the circulation or in fat stores. A number of hormones are secreted from peripheral organs and act in the hypothalamus to influence appetite and energy expenditure. This review will summarize recent progress in the identification of the neural pathways that respond to peripheral signals of energy availability such as leptin and macronutrients. Although the impact of environmental factors on obesity is underscored by the modern obesity epidemic, new insights into the pathophysiology of weight control provide new targets for therapeutic intervention for obesity.
The Application of Reliability and Validity Measures to Assess the Effectiveness of an Undergraduate Citation Rubric

The increasing popularity of rubrics to assess student learning outcomes in the information literacy classroom is evident within library and information science literature. However, there is a lack of research detailing scientific evaluation of these assessment instruments to determine their reliability and validity. The goal of this study was to use two common measurement methods to determine the content validity and internal consistency reliability of a citation rubric developed by the researcher. Results showed the rubric needed modification in order to improve reliability and validity. Changes were made and the updated rubric will be used in the classroom in a future semester.
Is Thorndikianism the Last Word in the Psychology of Learning

Resume LE “THORNDIKIANISME” EST-IL LE DERNIER MOT DE LA PSYCHOLOGIE DE L'APPRENTISSAGE? A l'egard de la doctrine de la satisfaction, ni la conduction neurale ni l'excitation sensoriale per se ne produisent la satisfaction a moins que les resultats desires ne soient ainsi produits. Un autre aspect de cette doctrine est la theorie de “stamping-in”' (impression). Puisque cette theorie exige un accroissement regulier de la promptitude des reponses avec la frequence des effets “stamping-in”' de la satisfaction, elle n'explique pas les tendances divergentes des reponses du chat de Thorndike. On a montre que la situation a un moment donne n'est ni exclusivement externe ni exclusivement interne selon la croyance de Thorndike. Dans la discussion de la theerie des liens (“bond theory”'), on a donne des preuves pour montrer la faussete des vues suivantes: 1) Les reponses sont attachees aux elements d'une situation. 2) Les changements du comportement sont dus simplement a l'addition ou a la soustraction des liens ou ...
A new computational algorithm for Green's functions : Fourier transform of the Newton polynomial expansion

Abstract A new iterative method to compute the Green's function for continuum systems is presented. It is based on a Newton polynomial expansion of the corresponding propagator, followed by accurate half-Fourier transformation. The new technique is remarkably stable, accurate and can handle very large systems. We apply the new method to the calculation of three-dimensional quantum reaction probabilities for the initial state-selected D+H2(n, j)→DH+H reaction. We find excellent agreement with previous results, requiring very modest amounts of CPU time.
A new class of adaptive controllers for robot trajectory tracking

This article presents a new class of adaptive schemes for the motion control of robot manipulators. The proposed controllers are very general and computationally efficient because they do not require knowledge of either the mathematical model or the parameter values of the manipulator dynamics, and are implemented without calculation of the robot inverse dynamics or inverse kinematic transformations. It is shown that the control strategies are globally uniformly bounded in the presence of bounded disturbances, and that in the absence of disturbances the ultimate bound on the size of the tracking errors can be made arbitrarily small. Computer simulation results are given for a PUMA 560 manipulator, and demonstrate that accurate and robust trajectory tracking can be achieved by using the proposed controllers. © 1994 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
The Evolution of Biobanking Best Practices

Biobanks and biospecimens are critical components for many areas of clinical and basic research. The quality of biospecimens and associated data must be consistent and collected according to standardized methods in order to prevent spurious analytical results that can lead to artifacts being interpreted as valid findings. A number of international institutions have taken the initiative to develop and publish best practices, which include technical recommendations for handling biospecimens as well as recommendations for ethical and regulatory practices in biobanking. These sources of guidance have been useful in raising the overall consistency and quality of research involving biospecimens. However, the lack of international harmonization, uneven adoption, and insufficient oversight of best practices are preventing further improvements in biospecimen quality and coordination among collaborators and biobanking networks. In contrast to the more straightforward technical and management issues, ethical and regulatory practices often involve issues that are more controversial and difficult to standardize.
Political attitudes develop independently of personality traits

The primary assumption within the recent personality and political orientations literature is that personality traits cause people to develop political attitudes. In contrast, research relying on traditional psychological and developmental theories suggests the relationship between most personality dimensions and political orientations are either not significant or weak. Research from behavioral genetics suggests the covariance between personality and political preferences is not causal, but due to a common, latent genetic factor that mutually influences both. The contradictory assumptions and findings from these research streams have yet to be resolved. This is in part due to the reliance on cross-sectional data and the lack of longitudinal genetically informative data. Here, using two independent longitudinal genetically informative samples, we examine the joint development of personality traits and attitude dimensions to explore the underlying causal mechanisms that drive the relationship between these features and provide a first step in resolving the causal question. We find change in personality over a ten-year period does not predict change in political attitudes, which does not support a causal relationship between personality traits and political attitudes as is frequently assumed. Rather, political attitudes are often more stable than the key personality traits assumed to be predicting them. Finally, the results from our genetic models find that no additional variance is accounted for by the causal pathway from personality traits to political attitudes. Our findings remain consistent with the original construction of the five-factor model of personality and developmental theories on attitude formation, but challenge recent work in this area.
A contribution to the Sphagnum (Sphagnaceae) flora of Paraguay

The genusSphagnum is reviewed for Paraguay, with an emphasis on recent collections. Five species and one variety are recognized:S. perichaetiale Hampe,S. magellanicum Brid.,S. pulchricoma C. Mull.,S. itabense Crum & Buck, sp. nov.,S. flaccidum Besch., andS. flaccidum var.lindmanii (Warnst.) Warnst.Sphagnum flaccidum is redescribed; it is illustrated, as areS. perichaetiale andS. itabense.
Effectiveness of long-term vasodilator administration in the treatment of chronic left ventricular failure

Abstract Vasodilators are being widely used in the management of chronic congestive heart failure. Most of the currently employed agents produce sustained hemodynamic effects and increase exercise capacity. The major remaining questions concern the effects of this therapy on morbidity and mortality. In order to assess these endpoints, properly designed large scale studies are needed that should emphasize effects on clinical course rather than effects on hemodynamics and left ventricular function. Such studies must be placebo-controlled, which should not pose any serious ethical problems if one accepts that therapeutic efficacy of vasodilators given long-term is not proven. It is improbable that vasodilators represent a panacea for patients with chronic heart failure, but the data to date are encouraging and some patients will likely derive important benefits from this form of therapy. There are many important unanswered questions concerning long-term vasodilator therapy, in addition to those regarding morbidity and mortality. 86,87 No available agent is an ideal one because of variable effects on different segments of the circulation and because of possible toxic effects. 15 Furthermore, even potent intravenously administered vasodilators are ineffective in some patients in whom it is often necessary to add potent inotropic agents. 88 New orally effective potent inotropic agents are being evaluated and some of these appear to combine vasodilator activity with their inotropic action, which may render these agents very useful in the future. 89,90 The possibility may therefore arise for individualizing therapy according to underlying pathophysiologic mechanisms; one might be able to prescribe selective veno- or arterial dilators, or might use selective inotropic agents or those that combine vasodilator and inotropic activity. It appears likely that vasodilators will have an important role in the treatment of chronic congestive heart failure, but until this role is fully defined, vasodilators should continue to be used as adjuncts to standard therapy with digitalis and diuretics. If vasodilators do indeed turn out to be very effective, several other questions will arise. Should such therapy then be instituted early in the course of heart failure instead of waiting until resistant manifestations appear? This implies a reassessment of the role of maintenance digitalis therapy for chronic pump failure and a need to assess vasodilators used alone rather than with concomitant digitalis administration, as has generally been done in the past. 87 Finally, it is attractive to hypothesize that congestive heart failure may indeed be a disease of regulation in which compensatory mechanisms lead to an increase in systemic vascular resistance and left ventricular outflow resistance resulting in overt clinically manifest heart failure. If a rise in resistance is a fundamental requirement for developing overt heart failure, then vasodilators used early after a myocardial insult might delay or even prevent the onset of clinical manifestations.
Block interaction: a generative summarization scheme for frequent patterns

Frequent pattern mining is an essential tool in the data miner's toolbox, with data applications running the gamut from itemsets, sequences, trees, to graphs and topological structures. Despite its importance, a major issue has clouded the frequent pattern mining methodology: the number of frequent patterns can easily become too large to be analyzed and used. Though many efforts have tried to tackle this issue, it remains to be an open problem. In this paper, we propose a novel block-interaction model to answer this call. This model can help summarize a collection of frequent itemsets and provide accurate support information using only a small number of frequent itemsets. At the heart of our approach is a set of core blocks, each of which is the Cartesian product of a frequent itemset and its support transactions. Those core blocks interact with each other through two basic operators (horizontal union and vertical union) to form the complexity of frequent patterns. Each frequent itemset can be expressed and its frequency can be accurately recovered through the combination of these core blocks. This is also the first complete generative model for describing the formation of frequent patterns. Specifically, we relate the problem of finding a minimal block-interaction model to a generalized set-cover problem, referred to as the graph set cover (GSC) problem. We develop an efficient algorithm based on GSC to discover the core blocks. A detailed experimental evaluation demonstrates the effectiveness of our approach.
The Tuberculin Test as a New Approach to the New Era of Tuberculosis Control

In the past two decades great progress has been made in the treatment of tuberculosis. The discovery of potent antituberculosis drugs and the advances in thoracic surgery have brought about a dramatic decline in the death rate from tuberculosis. Such accomplishment certainly can be viewed with pride and satisfaction. However, while much has been achieved in preventing death due to tuberculosis, not nearly as much has been accomplished in preventing sickness. Even in the United States today, new cases of tuberculosis are being reported at the rate of 100,000 per year and this figure does not include those patients who are not being reported to the health authorities. This disheartening fact stands out in spite of the tremendous progress against tuberculosis that has been made in recent years. A survey of the cases reported reveals that the majority of them were diagnosed in the advanced stages of the disease. This fact is worthy of our attention, because failure of early diagnosis is an important cause of treatment failure today. The potent antituberculosis drugs now available have made the cure of early cases easy. On the other hand, once the disease is allowed to advance to late stages such factors as drug resistance, persistent cavities and necrotic residuals become great hindrances to the success of treatment. From the public health standpoint the advanced cases are responsible for the spread of tuberculosis to healthy individuals. As will be shown later, child after child and family after family are infected by unrecognized or uncontrolled cases of pulmonary tuberculosis. Therefore, from the clinical standpoint, the present method of tuberculosis control is inadequate since too often it fails to find tuberculosis in its early stage. From the public health standpoint, the present method of tuberculosis control is also inadequate because too often it fails to prevent the spread of the infection to healthy individuals. In this paper two aspects of tuberculosis control will be discussed; first, what can be done to prevent the infected from getting sick and second, the early diagnosis of tuberculosis and prevention of infection by an improved case finding technique.
Surgically treated adnexal masses in infancy, childhood, and adolescence

Objective : We retrospectively evaluated the clinical presentation and histopathologic findings of benign and malignant adnexal masses in infants, children, and adolescents. Study Design : Between 1955 and 1992, 486 patients (aged 7 days through 20 years) with adnexal masses were surgically evaluated. Results : Of 521 adnexal masses, 92% were benign, including 335 nonneoplastic and 144 of 186 (77%) neoplastic lesions. The frequency of ovarian malignancies correlated inversely with patient age. Germ cell, stromal, and epithelial malignancies accounted for 40%, 21%, and 33%, respectively, of the 42 cancers. Nonconcordance between preoperative and postoperative diagnoses was noted in 94 cases. The most common preoperative diagnosis necessitating reassignment was acute appendicitis. During the last decade of this study, ultrasonography and computed tomography missed no malignancies. Conclusion : Physicians who care for young girls must be familiar with the differential diagnosis of adnexal masses to advise conservative management when appropriate and surgical intervention when necessary.
The maximal data piling direction for discrimination

We study a discriminant direction vector that generally exists only in high-dimension, low sample size settings. Projections of data onto this direction vector take on only two distinct values, one for each class. There exist infinitely many such directions in the subspace generated by the data; but the maximal data piling vector has the longest distance between the projections. This paper investigates mathematical properties and classification performance of this discrimination method.
Syntactic complexity effects in sentence production.

Syntactic complexity effects have been investigated extensively with respect to comprehension (e.g., Demberg & Keller, 2008; Gibson, 1998, 2000; Gordon et al., 2001, 2004; Grodner & Gibson, 2005; King & Just, 1991; Lewis & Vasishth, 2005; Lewis et al., 2006; McElree et al., 2003; Wanner & Maratsos, 1978). According to one prominent class of accounts (experience-based accounts; e.g., Hale, 2001; Levy, 2008; Gennari & MacDonald, 2008, 2009; Wells et al., 2009), certain structures cause comprehension difficulty due to their scarcity in the language. But why are some structures less frequent than others? In two elicited-production experiments we investigated syntactic complexity effects in relative clauses (Experiment 1) and wh-questions (Experiment 2) varying in whether or not they contained non-local dependencies. In both experiments, we found reliable durational differences between subject-extracted structures (which only contain local dependencies) and object-extracted structures (which contain nonlocal dependencies): Participants took longer to begin and produce object-extractions. Furthermore, participants were more likely to be disfluent in the object-extracted constructions. These results suggest that there is a cost associated with planning and uttering the more syntactically complex, object-extracted structures, and that this cost manifests in the form of longer durations and disfluencies. Although the precise nature of this cost remains to be determined, these effects provide one plausible explanation for the relative rarity of object-extractions: They are more costly to produce.
Surface-Catalyzed Chromium(VI) Reduction: Reactivity Comparisons of Different Organic Reductants and Different Oxide Surfaces

CrVI reduction by low molecular weight organic compounds with various functional groups was examined in the presence and absence of oxide surfaces. Surface-catalyzed CrVI reduction has been demonstrated with α-hydroxyl carboxylic acids (glycolic acid, lactic acid, mandelic acid, and tartaric acid) and their esters (methyl glycolate, methyl lactate, and methyl mandelate), with α-carbonyl carboxylic acids (glyoxylic acid and pyruvic acid), with oxalic acid, and with substituted phenols (salicylic acid, 4-methoxyphenol, and resorcinol). Both goethite (α-FeOOH) and aluminum oxide (γ-Al2O3) exert an appreciable catalytic effect, although somewhat less than that observed with titanium dioxide. This study indicates that surface-catalyzed CrVI reduction may occur in soils, sediments, aquifers, and other aquatic environments rich in mineral surfaces.
Overwinter changes to near-surface bulk density, penetration resistance and infiltration rates in compacted soil

Abstract Previous studies at Yakima Training Center (YTC), in Washington State, suggest freeze-thaw (FT) cycles can ameliorate soil compacted by tracked military vehicles [J. Terramechanics 38 (2001) 133]. However, we know little about the short-term effects of soil freezing over a single winter. We measured bulk density (BD), soil penetration resistance (SPR), and steady-state runoff rates in soil newly tracked by an Abrams tank and in uncompacted soil, before and after a single winter at YTC. We similarly measured BD, SPR and saturated hydraulic conductivity (kfs) in simulated tank tracks at another site near Lind Washington. Average BD was significantly greater in tank ruts at YTC and in simulated tracks at the Lind site than in uncompacted soil soon after tracking and did not change significantly during the winter of 1997–1998. Measurements of SPR were strongly influenced by soil moisture. When soil was moist or tracks were newly formed, SPR was significantly higher in tank ruts than in uncompacted soil from the surface to a depth of about 10–15 cm. The greatest average SPR in compacted soil was observed between 4 and 6 cm depth. We observed less difference in SPR between tank ruts and uncompacted soil near-surface at YTC as the time after trafficking increased. We observed highest SPR ratios (compacted rut:undisturbed) in fresh tracks near the surface, with lower ratios associated with increasing track age or soil depth, indicating that some recovery had occurred at YTC near-surface. However, we did not observe a similar over-winter change in SPR profiles at the Lind site. Rainfall simulator data from YTC showed higher steady-state runoff rates in tank ruts than over uncompacted soil both before and after winter. However, more time was required to reach steady-state flow in tank ruts and the proportion of runoff was slightly lower in May 1998 than in August 1997. At the Lind site, kfs was lower in newly compacted soil than in one-year old compacted soil or uncompacted soil. Our data suggest that indices of water infiltration such as steady-state runoff rates or kfs, are more sensitive indicators of soil recovery after compaction than are BD or SPR.
GEOMETRIC TOPOLOGY FOR INFORMATION ACQUISITION BY MEANS OF SMART SENSOR WEB

The geometric topology of a point per event written in the higher dimensional μ-space of data (e.g. 6W's: who, where, when, what, how, and why) can help in the design of information acquisition (IA) systems. Measurement intensity of each W's sensor, or the number of words used to describe a specific W's attribute, represents the length of each vector dimension. Then, N concurrent reports of the same event become a distribution set of N points scattered all over μ-space. To discover the statistically independent components, an unsupervised or unbiased Artificial Neural Networks (ANN) methodology called Independent Component Analysis (ICA) can be used to reveal a new subspace called the feature space. The major and minor axes of the subspace correspond to highly precise and efficient combinations of old attributes (e.g. 2-D feature domains consisting of "where-who-when" and "what-how-why" could be good choices for Internet search indices). Thus, one realizes that the communication of an event is not just the address-where: but who and when are equally important attributes. In principle, the number of new sensors can be reduced (e.g. from 6 W's to 2 features), provided that they are physically realizable. In the combined space of 6N-dimensional Γ-space, one point can represent all N concurrent measurements; the flow of these generates the event behavior in time. The time flow over the reduced 2N feature space generates invariant features called knowledge. For surveillance against terrorists, legacy electrical power line communication (PLC) will offer a useful relay for the last mile of mobile communications for a Surveillance Sensor Web (SSW) employing ANN: there is no need for "where" addressing for switching because of smart coding and decoding of "who-when." After reviewing Auto-Regression (AR), we generalize AR to a supervised ANN implementation of Principal Component Analysis (PCA) (Appendix A) learning toward unsupervised learning ANN for ICA (Appendix B). This is possible non-statistically because the classical-closed information theory (CIT) of the maximum Shannon entropy S of a closed system must be generalized for open brain information theory (BIT) having non-zero energy exchange E at the minimum Helmholtz free energy H=E-ToS at isothermal equilibrium (To=37°C). For such an open BIT system, we prove the Lyaponov convergence theorem. We compute the ICA features of image textures in order to measure the ICA classifier information content.
Analysis of automatic match results for cone-beam computed tomography localization of conventionally fractionated lung tumors.

Abstract Purpose To evaluate the dependence of an automatic match process on the size of the user-defined region of interest (ROI), the structure volume of interest (VOI), and changes in tumor volume when using cone-beam computed tomography (CBCT) for tumor localization and to compare these results with a gold standard defined by a physician's manual match. Methods and Materials Daily CBCT images for 11 patients with lung cancer treated with conventionally fractionated radiation therapy were retrospectively matched to a reference CT image using the Varian On Board Imager software (Varian, Palo Alto, CA) and a 3-step automatic matching protocol. Matches were performed with 3 ROI sizes (small, medium, large), with and without a structure VOI (internal target volume [ITV] or planning target volume [PTV]) used in the last step. Additionally, matches were performed using an intensity range that isolated the bony anatomy of the spinal column. All automatic matches were compared with a manual match made by a physician. Results The CBCT images from 109 fractions were analyzed. Automatic match results depend on ROI size and the structure VOI. Compared with the physician's manual match, automatic matches using the PTV as the structure VOI and a small ROI resulted in differences ≥ 5 mm in 1.8% of comparisons. Automatic matches using no VOI and a large ROI differed by ≥ 5 mm in 30.3% of comparisons. Differences between manual and automatic matches using the ITV as the structure VOI increased as tumor size decreased during the treatment course. Conclusions Users of automatic matching techniques should carefully consider how user-defined parameters affect tumor localization. Automatic matches using the PTV as the structure VOI and a small ROI were most consistent with a physician's manual match, and were independent of volumetric tumor changes.
Sociopolitical network interactions: A case study of the Classic Maya

The organization of Classic Maya society emerged from diverse and overlapping social interactions which shaped a dynamic political landscape. Vying for power, elites legitimized their status by claiming ancestry from various supernaturals and engaged in conspicuous displays of competition, warfare, and ritual practice which were often recorded on stone monuments. By examining the inscribed relationships between Maya centers, we chart organizational changes in sociopolitical networks throughout the Classic period. Methods derived from social network analysis are used to examine temporal changes in the distribution and centralization of political power through different network interactions. We examine the intersection of antagonistic, diplomatic, subordinate, and kinship relationships and discuss how these overlapping networks contributed to dynamic changes in the Classic period. This case study demonstrates how current network analysis techniques can contribute to archaeological studies of the scalar dynamics and organizational changes of past social and political systems.