cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Migration with Dignity

Migration involves moving from a country of origin to another country in pursuit of a better life, and is a growing global phenomenon. The UN International Organization for Migration estimates that nearly a quarter of a billion people migrated in 2018 alone, nearly three-quarters of whom are workers, one-half of whom are women, and nearly one in nine of whom are children. Migration comes with a host of dangers, challenges and risks, beginning with systemic corruption of government authorities and officials; trusting third parties facilitators, and modes of transport; guarding oneself, friends and loved ones from abuse and criminal behavior along the journey; and, avoiding mistreatment at the point of entry and exploitation afterward. Reflecting human dignity’s role in the rule of law can help. Human dignity recognizes the equal worth of each person without regard to gender, race, wealth, political status or any other societal signifier. Dignity is inherent, immutable, inalienable and universal. Human dignity encapsulates the notion that every person has equal worth. Dignity is recognized in myriad international and regional treaties, thus garmenting international human rights law with common dignity rights thread. It is also guaranteed by the constitutions of 160 nations. This report examines how human dignity under law affects various aspects of migration, including the right to equality and non-discrimination, freedom of movement, the right to personal safety and security, the right to live with dignity and well-being, access to services, and civil and political rights. As we shall see, migration with dignity is an idea whose time has come.
Changes in the place of death for older adults with cancer: Reason to celebrate or a risk for unintended disparities?

Abstract Background Place of death is important to patients and caregivers, and often a surrogate measure of health care disparities. While recent trends in place of death suggest an increased frequency of dying at home, data is largely unknown for older adults with cancer. Methods Deidentified death certificate data were obtained via the National Center for Health Statistics. All lung, colon, prostate, breast, and pancreas cancer deaths for older adults (defined as >65 years of age) from 2003 to 2017 were included. Multinomial logistic regression was used to test for differences in place of death associated with sociodemographic variables. Results From 2003 through 2017, a total of 3,182,707 older adults died from lung, colon, breast, prostate and pancreas cancer. During this time, hospital and nursing home deaths decreased, and the rate of home and hospice facility deaths increased (all p Conclusion Hospital and nursing facility cancer deaths among older adults with cancer decreased since 2003, while deaths at home and hospice facilities increased. Differences in place of death were noted for non-white patients and older adults of advanced age.
A Comparison of Gene Expression Changes in the Blood of Individuals Consuming Diets Supplemented with Olives, Nuts or Long-Chain Omega-3 Fatty Acids.

Background: The Mediterranean diet, which is rich in olive oil, nuts, and fish, is considered healthy and may reduce the risk of chronic diseases. Methods: Here, we compared the transcriptome from the blood of subjects with diets supplemented with olives, nuts, or long-chain omega-3 fatty acids and identified the genes differentially expressed. The dietary genes obtained were subjected to network analysis to determine the main pathways, as well as the transcription factors and microRNA interaction networks to elucidate their regulation. Finally, a gene-associated disease interaction network was performed. Results: We identified several genes whose expression is altered after the intake of components of the Mediterranean diets compared to controls. These genes were associated with infection and inflammation. Transcription factors and miRNAs were identified as potential regulators of the dietary genes. Interestingly, caspase 1 and sialophorin are differentially expressed in the opposite direction after the intake of supplements compared to Alzheimer’s disease patients. In addition, ten transcription factors were identified that regulated gene expression in supplemented diets, mild cognitive impairment, and Alzheimer’s disease. Conclusions: We identified genes whose expression is altered after the intake of the supplements as well as the transcription factors and miRNAs involved in their regulation. These genes are associated with schizophrenia, neoplasms, and rheumatic arthritis, suggesting that the Mediterranean diet may be beneficial in reducing these diseases. In addition, the results suggest that the Mediterranean diet may also be beneficial in reducing the risk of dementia.
Identifying airline price discrimination and the effect of competition

Abstract Empirical studies exploring the relationship between competition and price discrimination don’t generally consider the role of product differentiation or the asymmetric adoption of discrimination across firms. Using a customized empirical approach to examine the use of Saturday-night stayover discounts in the U.S. airline industry, I show that discounts are used more often when facing competitors that offer differentiated products but less often when competing with firms that don’t use discounts. Legacy carriers rarely use discounts when competing with Southwest or other low-cost carriers, but the presence of competing legacy carriers sometimes enhances the use of discounts.
Pediatric resident training and the role of the EHR in addressing tobacco smoke exposure: A survey of pediatric program directors

Purpose Pediatricians and trainees should address tobacco smoke exposure (TSE) with adolescents and parents, but this is not consistently done. Pediatric Program Directors (PDs) reported in 2011 that 65% of residency programs had tobacco control curricula, but the curricula primarily focused on health effects, not on clinical intervention. Features of electronic health records (EHRs) such as prompts, order sets and electronic referrals may facilitate addressing TSE. Objectives of this study were to assess if and how addressing …
Market Pricing of Deposit Insurance

We provide an approach to the market valuation of deposit insurance that is based on reduced-form methods for the pricing of fixed-income securities under default risk. By reference to bank debt prices as well as qualitative-response models of the probability of bank failure, we suggest how a risk-neutral valuation model for deposit insurance can be applied both to the calculation of fair-market deposit insurance premia and to the valuation of long-term claims against the insurer.
Shock compression of iron

New high-pressure Fe Hugoniot data are obtained. We interpret these and former data to indicate a transition to a liquid phase on the single shock Hugoniot of Fe.
Future Human Intervention in Ecosystems and the Critical Role for Evolutionary Biology

In 1978, at the first conference to discuss the emerging field of conservation biology, there were 4 billion people on Earth. Now there are more than 7 billion, with 10.1 billion projected by 2100. Sustainably meeting the needs of 10 billion people and conserving natural resources at the same time will require profound creativity and innovation. Scholars who study human-caused climate change have a word for this creativity, adaptation. Adaptation involves some acceptance that change is occurring and will continue to occur and an acknowledgment that new forms and combinations of nature are being created. Adaptation also requires humans to design new tools, draw upon new theories and resources, and manage natural and social systems to a greater degree than we have before. To allow successful adaptation of ecosystems to global change, conservation biology will have to shift its perspective from backward to forward looking. Restoring and maintaining ecosystems to a historic baseline has been a common goal of conservation, but alterations in land cover, climate change, and environmental contaminants are making it impossible to recreate the past. Instead, society has to ask what kind of nature it would like to create and what ecosystem functions it would like to maintain. We think conservation biology should strive to preserve economic, cultural, aesthetic, and option value with little or no reduction in the biological diversity that underlies that value. To achieve this, however, society will need to maintain genetic diversity and functioning ecosystems alongside humans. And it will be necessary to foster biotic changes that are achievable given the realities of global change. We argue that adaptation of nature by humans to global changes such as climate change, habitat loss and fragmentation, and nutrient deposition will require a sophisticated understanding of evolutionary theory and genome
Population Genetics and Pharmacogenetics

Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have been hugely successful in identifying thousands of genetic loci robustly associated with hundreds of disease and other human traits. Since the first GWAS publication in an endocrinology-related topic, obesity in 2007, these studies have very rapidly increased in size and productivity. In 2011, this chapter is now largely dominated by a number of ‘mega’ or greatly-expanded GWAS papers, each involving over 100,000 participants in the combined initial discovery and replication phases. Hundreds of new genes, or genetic loci, are reported for adult height, lipids, BMI, waist-hip ratio, type 2 diabetes (T2DM), and age at menarche. New topics for GWAS are also described, including polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) and hypospadias. Prior to this wave of expanded studies, some commentators had criticized the relatively minor effect sizes of common genetic variants. They argued that the previous GWAS papers, already involving tens of thousands of individuals, would have already found the loci with the strongest effects, and that further expansion would only find variants with effects that are too small to be of biological interest. In addition to simple identification of genetic loci, many of the current papers describe key applications and supporting experimental data that underline the new biological advances. The GWAS locus at HMGCR is held up as an important illustration of the potential application of these novel findings, being associated with only a very modest change in LDL cholesterol levels, yet it encodes the target of statins that currently benefit tens of millions of patients. We should not forget that prior to the GWAS era we had to endure barren decades of linkage mapping and weakly replicable candidate genotyping studies. Eric Lander’s review article published in February 2011 on the 10th anniversary of the Human Genome Project describes the remarkable extent of achievements in the last decade and the rapid pace of current research efforts towards the routine use of sequencing as ‘a simple and inexpensive general-purpose tool throughout biomedicine’.
Dynamics of the Oso-Steelhead landslide from broadband seismic analysis

Abstract. We carry out a combined analysis of the short- and long-period seismic signals generated by the devastating Oso-Steelhead landslide that occurred on 22 March 2014. The seismic records show that the Oso-Steelhead landslide was not a single slope failure, but a succession of multiple failures distinguished by two major collapses that occurred approximately 3 min apart. The first generated long-period surface waves that were recorded at several proximal stations. We invert these long-period signals for the forces acting at the source, and obtain estimates of the first failure runout and kinematics, as well as its mass after calibration against the mass-centre displacement estimated from remote-sensing imagery. Short-period analysis of both events suggests that the source dynamics of the second event is more complex than the first. No distinct long-period surface waves were recorded for the second failure, which prevents inversion for its source parameters. However, by comparing the seismic energy of the short-period waves generated by both events we are able to estimate the volume of the second. Our analysis suggests that the volume of the second failure is about 15–30% of the total landslide volume, giving a total volume mobilized by the two events between 7 × 106 and 10 × 106 m3, in agreement with estimates from ground observations and lidar mapping.
The Parallelization of a Knowledge Discovery System with Hypergraph Representation

Knowledge discovery is a time-consuming and space intensive endeavor. By distributing such an endeavor, we can diminish both time and space. System INDED(pronounced "indeed") is an inductive implementation that performs rule discovery using the techniques of inductive logic programming and accumulates and handles knowledge using a deductive nonmonotonic reasoning engine. We present four schemes of transforming this large serial inductive logic programming (ILP) knowledge-based discovery system into a distributed ILP discovery system running on a Beowulf cluster. We also present our data partitioning algorithm based on locality used to accomplish the data decomposition used in the scenarios.
Neonatal body condition, immune responsiveness, and hematocrit predict longevity in a wild bird population

Measures of body condition, immune function, and hematological health are widely used in ecological studies of vertebrate populations, predicated on the assumption that these traits are linked to fitness. However, compelling evidence that these traits actually predict long-term survival and reproductive success among individuals in the wild is lacking. Here, we show that body condition (i.e., size-adjusted body mass) and cutaneous immune responsiveness to phytohaemagglutinin (PHA) injection among neonates positively predict recruitment and subsequent longevity in a wild, migratory population of house wrens (Troglodytes aedon). However, neonates with intermediate hematocrit had the highest recruitment and longevity. Neonates with the highest PHA responsiveness and intermediate hematocrit prior to independence eventually produced the most offspring during their lifetime breeding on the study site. Importantly, the effects of PHA responsiveness and hematocrit were revealed while controlling for variation in body condition, sex, and environmental variation. Thus, our data demonstrate that body condition, cutaneous immune responsiveness, and hematocrit as a neonate are associated with individual fitness. Although hematocrit's effect is more complex than traditionally thought, our results suggest a previously underappreciated role for this trait in influencing survival in the wild.
Determination of Stackelberg–Nash equilibria using a sensitivity based approach

Abstract A sensitivity based approach is presented to determine Nash solution(s) in multiobjective problems modeled as a non-cooperative game. The proposed approach provides an approximation to the rational reaction set (RRS) for each player. An intersection of these sets yields the Nash solution for the game. An alternate approach for generating the RRS based on design of experiments (DOE) combined with response surface methodology (RSM) is also explored. The two approaches for generating the RRS are compared on three example problems to find Nash and Stackelberg solutions. For the examples presented, it is seen that the proposed sensitivity based approach (i) requires less computational effort than a RSM-DOE approach, (ii) is less prone to numerical errors than the RSM-DOE approach, (iii) has the ability to find multiple Nash solutions when the Nash solution is not a singleton, (iv) is able to approximate nonlinear RRS, and (v) on one example problem, found a Nash solution better than the one reported in the literature.
Review of Understanding the Presidency

James P. Pfiffner and Roger H. Davison. 2007. Understanding the Presidency . (4th ed.) New York: Pearson Longman. ISBN: 9780321434357. Now in its fourth edition, Pfiffner and Davidson's Understandi...
Performance of LANDSAT-5 TM data in land-cover classification†

Abstract An experimental analysis has been conducted on the performance of the new LANDSAT-5 Thematic Mapper (TM) data for detailed land-cover classification using a maximum-likelihood method. Data used is the TM test data of the Tokyo metropolitan area (path-107, row-035) of 4 November, 1984. Map-precision geometric correction is performed and TM data are resampled to 30 m pixel spacing. The experiment is designed to determine how well TM categories land-cover types in comparison with the Detailed Numerical Information digitally formatted data (Geographical Survey Institute of Japan, 10 m spatial accuracy), together with ground truth data in a representative test area. Classification accuracy for aggregated 12 categories within the test area is about 47 per cent with the application of the explicit filtering technique utilizing 3×3 neighbourhood operations. This increases to 70 per cent using a majority logic filter with a larger 5×5 neighbourhood function. Associated with the classification accuracy, ...
Overview of US academic programs in electric propulsion

Michael M. Micci Pennsylvania State University lain D. Boyd Cornell University Manual M. Martinez-Sanchez Massachusetts Institute of Technology Dennis R. Keefer University of Tennessee Space Institute Nikos A. Gatsonis Worcester Polytechnic Institute Mark A. Cappelli Stanford University Alec D. Gallimore University of Michigan Peter J. Turchi Ohio State University Paul J. Wilbur Colorado State University Ivana Hrbud Auburn University Edgar Y. Choueiri Princeton University Rodney L. Burton University Of Illinois At Urbana-Champaign
Effect of Macrolides as Part of Initial Empiric Therapy on Medical Outcomes for Hospitalized Patients with Community-Acquired Pneumonia

Abstract Objective The goal of this study was to compare the outcomes of hospitalized patients receiving a nonpseudomonal third-generation cephalosporin with or without a macrolide for the treatment of community-acquired pneumonia (CAP). Background The initial treatment of CAP is usually based on empirically selected antibiotic therapy. The need for coverage of atypical pathogens in hospitalized patients is widely debated, and regional variations may exist. Methods All patients admitted to a community hospital or to a university hospital for 1 year who were aged ≥18 years and had a principal discharge diagnosis of pneumonia with no organism specified according to the International Classification of Diseases, Ninth Revision, Clinical Modification were evaluated. Each patient's medical chart was reviewed by a clinical pharmacist at each facility. The following information was collected for each patient using a standardized form: demographic characteristics, coexisting illnesses, length of hospital and intensive care unit stays, antibiotic regimens, length of parenteral and oral therapy, laboratory and radiographic findings (ie, blood urea nitrogen, glucose, hematocrit, sodium, Po 2 , pH, and pleural effusion), physical examination results, and mortality. Patients treated with a nonpseudomonal third-generation cephalosporin with or without a macrolide were included in this analysis. Categoric variables were compared using the chi-square test or the Fisher exact test, and continuous variables were compared using the Mann-Whitney U test. A P value Results A total of 213 patients met the entry criteria and were treated with a non-pseudomonal third-generation cephalosporin with (116 patients) or without (97 patients) a macrolide. The mean (± SD) age of the patients was 62.2 ± 19.6 years; 47% were male. The most common comorbid conditions were chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, diabetes mellitus, congestive heart failure, and cerebrovascular accident (CVA). Of the 116 patients who received a macrolide, the majority (66%) received erythromycin. Other macrolides used were clarithromycin (19%) and oral azithromycin (15%). There were no statistical differences between patients who did and did not receive a macrolide in terms of comorbid illnesses, length of hospital stay (5.2 ± 2.8 vs 5.2 ± 3.4 days, respectively), length of intravenous antibiotic therapy (4.4 ± 2.5 vs 4.1 ± 2.3 days, respectively), or mortality (0.9% vs 3.1%, respectively; P = 0.333). The only difference between the groups was in age. Those patients who received a macrolide were significantly younger than those who received only a nonpseudomonal third-generation cephalosporin (57.4 ± 19.2 years vs 67.9 ± 18.5 years; P Conclusions We concluded that the addition of a macrolide to a nonpseudomonal third-generation cephalosporin as initial therapy for the treatment of CAP may not be necessary. A randomized, prospective clinical trial comparing a nonpseudomonal third-generation cephalosporin alone and in combination with a macrolide is warranted.
Mitochondrial crowding in smooth muscle cells after arterial ligation

Although the ultrastructural appearance of mitochondrial crowding after ischemic injury has been reported in myocardial and skeletal muscles, the mechanism for this is not clear. Thirty-five branches of the mesenteric arteries removed from eight patients during surgery were examined by electron microscopy: 22 had ligatures applied 30 minutes to 4 hours before resection, 13 had no ligatures. The number of mitochondria per smooth muscle cell was significantly increased in the arterial segments under the ligature (ligated site) and immediately distal to the ligature (distal site) compared with the nonligated segments (control site). Mitochondria in ischemic cells were also noted to be swollen compared with those in nonischemic cells. Within the ligated site, paradoxically, the severity of ischemic injury correlated inversely with the increase in mitochondrial counts. In conclusion, mitochondria crowding after ischemic injury is due to both swelling and an increase in the number of organelles, and appears as early as 30 min after injury. The results also suggest that, in severely ischemic sites, cells capable of rapidly increasing their mitochondrial count may suffer less ischemic injury.
Concentration of Carbon Dioxide by Electrochemically Modulated Complexation with a Binuclear Copper Complex

The reactions of bicarbonate ion with a series of binuclear Cu(II) complexes in buffered aqueous solution have been studied, and effective binding constants for bicarbonate have been determined at pH 7.4 for the complexes [Cu2(taec)]4+ (taec = N,N',N'',N'''-tetrakis(2-aminoethyl)-1,4,8,11-tetraazacyclotetradecane) and [Cu2(tpmc)(OH)]3+ (tpmc = N, N',N'',N'''-tetrakis(2-pyridylmethyl)-1,4,8,11-tetraazacyclotetradecane). [Cu2(o-xyl-DMC2)]4+ (o-xyl-DMC2 = alpha,alpha'-bis(5,7-dimethyl-1,4,8,11-tetraazacyclotetradecan-6-yl)-o-xylene) did not react with bicarbonate ion in an aqueous solution buffered at this pH. The complexes were reduced by controlled-potential electrolysis, and the stability of the Cu(I) derivatives in aqueous solution and their affinity for bicarbonate/carbonate ion were investigated. On the basis of these fundamental studies, [Cu2(tpmc)(mu-OH)]3+ has been identified as an air-stable, water-soluble carrier for the capture and concentration of CO2 by electrochemically modulated complexation. The carrier binds to the carbonate ion strongly in its oxidized, Cu(II) form and releases the ion rapidly when reduced to the Cu(I) complex. In small-scale electrochemical pumping experiments designed to demonstrate the feasibility of this approach, CO2 has been pumped from an initial 10% CO2/N2 mixture up to a final concentration of 75%.
Further evidence of a possible association between house dogs and multiple sclerosis

The present study was undertaken because of the recent report of an association between familial multiple sclerosis (MS) and prior ownership of a small pet. Forty-five patients with sporadic MS were retrospectively compared with 45 closely matched controls and were found to have owned a significantly greater number of indoor dogs prior to the onset of MS. Importantly, the MS patients had also had more exposure to neurologically ill dogs in the five years before the onset of symptoms. These new data further support the hypothesis that house dogs may serve as an animal vector in MS.
Improving the thermal stability of polystyrene by Friedel-Crafts chemistry

Abstract The alkylation of polystyrene with a difunctional alkylating agent, such as 1,4-benzenedimethanol, proceeds in the presence of a zeolite catalyst to give a significant amount of cross-linked, and thermally stable, polymer. Various zeolites are used as catalysts; there is apparently some relationship between the type of zeolite and its catalytic activity. The extent of cross-linking depends upon temperature. With some zeolites there is no reaction below 300 °C while others will permit reaction below 300 °C. A significant fraction of the polymer does not volatilize at 800 °C in a nitrogen atmosphere.
Mobile Media: Making It a Reality: Two prototype apps reveal the challenges in delivering mobile media services.

Many future mobile applications are predicated on the existence of rich, interactive media services. The promise and challenge of such services is to provide applications under the most hostile conditions - and at low cost to a user community that has high expectations. Context-aware services require information about who, where, when, and what a user is doing and must be delivered in a timely manner with minimum latency. This article reveals some of the current state-of-the-art "magic" and the research challenges.
A glucagon effect on rabbit reticulocyte cell-free protein synthesis.

Abstract Commercially prepared glucagon added in μmolar quantities to reticulocyte lysates caused a concentration-dependent depression in the cell-free translation of globin mRNA. Nuclease activity and non-specific protein effects are ruled out as explanations of the glucagon influence.
An Analytical Study of Interior Noise Control Using Segmented Panels

This paper presents initial analytical studies of a new method for active interior noise control. The method proposes to control the vibration of segmented trim panels in order to reduce interior noise levels. Since trim panels are often made of light-weight and stiff composite materials, this actuation strategy will enable the creation of active trim panels for interior noise control without using heavy duty structural actuators. The segmentation would provide abilities for both structural sound transmission and active noise control. Numerical studies are performed to demonstrate the effectiveness of segmented trim panels as acoustic control sources. Geometrical design considerations are also studied. A comparison of the forces required for suppressing acoustic pressure is made between segmented trim panels and direct actuation on a single-piece trim panel.
Numerical investigation of Nernst effect in quasi-one-dimensional systems

Recent theoretical and experimental studies show that the Lebed ``magic angle'' effects (for magnetic field rotations in the least conducting, $y\text{\ensuremath{-}}z$, plane of quasi-one-dimensional conductors) can be greatly enhanced by the presence of a field along the most conducting, $x$, direction. Here, we complete the picture with numerical Boltzmann calculations including the Nernst effect ${S}_{zx}$. Our results confirm that ${B}_{x}$ enhances the ${\ensuremath{\sigma}}_{zz}$ peaks at magic angles, but does not qualitatively affect the angular dependence of the Nernst effect ${S}_{zx}$. These results suggest that the magic angle effect cannot be explained simply by the Boltzmann transport of quasiparticles on the Fermi surface.
Tgif1 and Tgif2 regulate Nodal signaling and are required for gastrulation.

Tgif1 and Tgif2 are transcriptional co-repressors that limit the response to TGFβ signaling and play a role in regulating retinoic-acid-mediated gene expression. Mutations in human TGIF1 are associated with holoprosencephaly, but it is unclear whether this is a result of deregulation of TGFβ/Nodal signaling, or of effects on other pathways. Surprisingly, mutation of Tgif1 in mice results in only relatively mild developmental phenotypes in most strain backgrounds. Here, we show that loss-of-function mutations in both Tgif1 and Tgif2 result in a failure of gastrulation. By conditionally deleting Tgif1 in the epiblast, we demonstrate that a single wild-type allele of Tgif1 in the extra-embryonic tissue allows the double null embryos to gastrulate and begin organogenesis, suggesting that extra-embryonic Tgif function is required for patterning the epiblast. Genetically reducing the dose of Nodal in embryos lacking all Tgif function results in partial rescue of the gastrulation defects. Conditional double null embryos have defects in left-right asymmetry, which are also alleviated by reducing the dose of Nodal. Together, these data show that Tgif function is required for gastrulation, and provide the first clear evidence that Tgifs limit the transcriptional response to Nodal signaling during early embryogenesis.
A strychnine-sensitive site is involved in dynorphin-induced paralysis and loss of the tail-flick reflex.

Abstract Dynorphin A(1–13) administered intrathecally to rats induces a reversible hindlimb paralysis and permanent loss of the tail-flick reflex in a dose-dependent and all-or-none manner. The loss of the tail-flick reflex has been determined to result from neurotoxicity linked to theN-methyl- d -aspartate (NMDA) receptor. Recently, it has been reported that NMDA antagonists attenuate irreversible paralysis induced by dynorphin A(1–17) and dynorphin A(2–17). In the present studies, we examined whether repeated injections of dynorphin A(1–13) acetate salt could change the characteristics of the reversible paralysis. Injections repeated every 48 h resulted in hindlimb paralysis upon each injection which was not different in terms of magnitude or duration (P>0.60). Injections repeated at 2 h intervals resulted in desensitization of the paralytic effects (P
CFD Comparison to 3D Laser Anemometer and Rotordynamic Force Measurements for Grooved Liquid Annular Seals

A pressure-based computational fluid dynamics (CFD) code is employed to calculate the flow field and rotordynamic forces in a whirling, grooved liquid annular seal. To validate the capabilities of the CFD code for this class of problems, comparisons of basic fluid dynamic parameters are made to three-dimensi onal laser Doppler anemometer (LDA) measurements for a spinning, centered grooved seal. Predictions are made using both a standard and low Reynolds number K-B turbulence model. Comparisons show good overall agreement of the axial and radial velocities in the through flow jet, shear layer, and recirculation zone. The tangential swirl velocity is slightly under-predicted as the flow passes through the seal. By generating an eccen­ tric three-dimensional, body fitted mesh of the geometry, a quasi-steady solution may be obtained in the whirling reference frame allowing the net reaction force to be calculated for different whirl frequency ratios, yielding the rotordynamic force coeffi­ cients. Comparisons are made to the rotordynamic force measurements for a grooved liquid annular seal. The CFD predictions show improved stiffness prediction over traditional multi-control volume, bulk flow methods over a wide range of operating conditions. In cases where the flow conditions at the seal inlet are unknown, a twodimensional, axisymmetric CFD analysis may be employed to efficiently calculate these boundary conditions by including the upstream region leading to the seal. This approach is also demonstrated in this study.
Comparison of two oxytocin regimens to prevent uterine atony at cesarean delivery: a randomized controlled trial.

Abstract OBJECTIVE: To determine if high-dose oxytocin reduces the need for additional uterotonic agents at cesarean. METHODS: A randomized, double-masked trial of two oxytocin regimens was performed to prevent postpartum uterine atony in laboring women. The pharmacy prepared sequentially numbered oxytocin solutions containing either 10 U/500 mL or 80 U/500 mL of lactated Ringer’s solution infused over 30 minutes after cord clamping. The need for additional uterotonic agents was determined by the surgical team. Hypotension was diagnosed and treated with crystalloid or a pressor agent. To detect a 50% decrease in the need for additional uterotonic agents and considering a β error of 0.2, 220 patients would be required in each group (α = 0.05, two-tailed χ2 test). RESULTS: The low-dose group (n = 163) received 333 mU/min, and the high-dose group (n = 158) received 2667 mU/min of oxytocin. The groups were similar with respect to risk factors for atony. Women in the low-dose group received additional uterotonic medication significantly more often than those in the high-dose group (39% compared with 19%, P CONCLUSION: Compared with an infusion rate of 333 mU/min, oxytocin infused at 2667 mU/min for the first 30 minutes postpartum reduces the need for additional uterotonic agents at cesarean delivery.
Anharmonic thermal resistivity of dielectric crystals at low temperatures.

The intrinsic thermal resistance of dielectric crystals at low temperatures due to three-phonon Umklapp processes has been treated theoretically, taking account of the restrictions imposed by wave-vector selection and frequency conservation rules, as well as the known phonon-dispersion curves. Since low-frequency phonons cannot interact directly with zone-boundary phonons, the transfer of excess momentum takes place in two steps: a normal process with modes of intermediate frequency, followed by an Umklapp process of intermediate-frequency phonons with phonons near the zone boundary of two different polarization branches with different frequencies. The intermediate frequency is given by that frequency difference. The second step can also be scattering by point defects, so that the apparent Umklapp resistance can be modified by point defects, which scatter the intermediate-frequency phonons much more strongly than the thermal phonons. The important processes in different frequency ranges depend on the dispersion curves and on the residual point defects; various cases are discussed. The theory has only one adjustable parameter, the Gr\"uneisen constant. The point-defect scattering strength is deduced from the departures of the thermal conductivity in the boundary scattering regime at very low temperatures from a ${\mathit{T}}^{3}$ dependence. The theory has been compared to measurements on LiF, NaF, diamond, Si, and enriched $^{74}\mathrm{Ge}$. Reasonably good agreement with experimental data can be obtained without invoking an adjustable exponent in the Umklapp resistance.
Importance is Not Unimportant: The Role of Importance Weighting in QOL Measures

The effect of relative domain importance as a weighting mechanism in quality of life (QoL) measures has been a topic of debate for decades. Studies investigating the role of domain importance in QoL measures have produced mixed results. The mixed results may very well be the consequences of a limited choice of global satisfaction or QoL measures, measurements of domain satisfaction, measurements of domain importance and weighting approaches applied to date. This study investigated the effect of importance weighting without assigning any arbitrary weighting function of domain importance. A cluster analysis was first used to classify individuals into groups, based on their perceived importance of various life domains, and then the relationship between global life satisfaction measure and the composite of domain satisfaction scores between these groups was compared. Results of this study showed that the relationship between global life satisfaction and composite of satisfaction scores did not remain consistent for respondents with different importance rankings of major life domains, which suggested an important effect of domain importance in QoL measures.
La fièvre de Lassa

La fievre de Lassa est une infection virale grave, endemique dans plusieurs pays d'Afrique de l'Ouest. Elle est due a un arenavirus transmis par le rongeur Mastomys natalensis . La transmission du virus a l'homme se fait par l'intermediaire d'un rongeur infecte chroniquement ou par contact direct avec un malade. La mortalite est importante (15–20 %), en particulier pendant la grossesse. La guerison peut etre totale, sauf chez certains patients qui conservent une surdite. Les conditions economiques difficiles des pays d'endemie rendent l'utilisation du traitement antiviral specifique, la ribavirine, le plus souvent impossible.
The Compton effect as one path to QED

Abstract Quantum electrodynamics (QED) is the theory of electrons and other elementary charged particles, interacting through the exchange of light quanta. Albert Einstein introduced the light quantum (now called photon) in 1905, but for about three decades physicists applied quantum ideas mainly in theories of the structure and behavior of matter, not to electromagnetic radiation itself, which was always treated semi-classically. This began to change after 1923 with the discovery of the Compton effect and its kinematic description by Arthur Compton and Peter Debye, based on the light quantum. In this paper we review the study of high-energy radiation that led to Compton's discovery. We discuss the analysis of the intensity distribution of Compton-scattered radiation that together with the “new” quantum theory beginning in 1925, resulted in the development, especially by Pascual Jordan and Paul Dirac, of a quantum theory of electromagnetic radiation in interaction with matter.
Stimulus discrimination gradients as a function of test stimuli spacing.

Stimulus discrimination gradients were compared for conditions in which intervening (test) stimuli were spaced equally between the positive (S+) and negative (S−) stimuli and when test stimuli were spaced unequally between S+ and S−. When the gradients are plotted as a function of the physical units of the stimulus dimension, no differences attributable to stimulus spacing are evident. The results further suggested that the Ss responded to intervening stimuli according to their arrangement on an interval scale rather than to their arrangement on an ordinal scale.
Hepatic Chemoembolization: Effect of Intraarterial Lidocaine on Pain and Postprocedure Recovery

Purpose: To determine if intraarterial lidocaine reduces pain during and after chemoembolization, and whether it influences postprocedure recovery.
SU‐FF‐I‐75: Noise Equivalent Quanta of CT Images: Results and Challenges

Purpose: To evaluate changes in noise equivalent quanta (NEQ) as technique factors are varied in CT, and to evaluate NPS, MTF, and NEQ as standard quantitative metrics for CTimage quality assessment.Method and Materials: The modulation transfer function [MTF(f)] of a GE lightspeed16, clinical CTscanner was measured. A 13μm, nickel‐chromium wire was scanned at 120kVp and 400mAs to obtain a point spread function (PSF). Three reconstruction filters were evaluated. The measured PSF was integrated to obtain the line spread function (LSF), and the MTF(f) was then computed. Ten CT scans of a 20 cm diameter water‐filled pipe were also acquired to measure the noise power spectra [NPS(f)] on the same scanner. The mAs was varied from 10 to 400mAs at constant kVp, and the kVp was varied from 80 to 140kVp at constant mAs. Images using each of the reconstruction filters were evaluated. Using N × N regions of interest (ROI) the NPS(f) was computed by calculating the 2D FFT of each ROI and averaging all of the magnitude, squared FFT results. A minimum of 64 ROI were used per volume, and different ROI placement distributions were evaluated. The 2D results were averaged radially to obtain the 1D NPS(f). The NEQ(f) was computed by dividing the MTF2(f) by the NPS(f). Results: The MTF(f) measurement is straightforward and the NPS(f) metric for CTimages demonstrates behavior consistent with trends in photon fluence and apodizing filter behavior. The NPS(f) and NEQ(f) curves demonstrated sensitive changes with kVp, mAs, and slice thickness. Conclusion: While NPS(f) and NEQ(f) normalization issues exist due to the normalization of CTimages into Hounsfield Units, these metrics are sensitive to changes in technique and slice thickness changes and therefore are strong candidates for routine quantitative assessment of CTimage quality.
Reversible Redox Cleavage/Coupling of Polystyrene with Disulfide or Thiol Groups Prepared by Atom Transfer Radical Polymerization

Polymers with chemically labile disulfide groups in the backbone were prepared by atom transfer radical polymerization (ATRP) of styrene using the 2-bromopropionic acid diester of bis(2-hydroxyethyl) disulfide as the initiator and CuBr/N,N,N‘,N‘ ‘,N‘ ‘-pentamethyldiethylenetriamine as the catalyst at 90 °C. Polymerization kinetics indicated insignificant transfer to the disulfide originating from the initiator. Using a monomer-to-initiator-to-catalyst ratio of 300:1:0.2, radical coupling reactions were suppressed compared to systems with more catalyst (300:1:1), and well-defined (with symmetrical and narrow (Mw/Mn < 1.1) molecular weight distribution) disulfide-containing polymers were prepared. The internal disulfide bond was cleaved by reduction with dithiothreitol to yield the corresponding thiol-terminated polystyrene. The thiol end groups were efficiently coupled back to the starting disulfide by oxidation with FeCl3. A dibromo-terminated polystyrene was synthesized under similar ATRP conditions usin...
Characterization of poly(vinyl alcohol) during the emulsion polymerization of vinyl acetate using poly(vinyl alcohol) as emulsifier

During the emulsion polymerization of vinyl acetate (VAc) using poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) as stabilizer and potassium persulfate as initiator, the VAc reacts with PVA forming PVA-graft-PVAc. When the grafted polymer reaches a critical size it becomes water-insoluble and precipitates from the aqueous phase contributing to the formation of polymer particles. Since particle formation and therefore the properties of the final latex will depend on the degree of grafting, it is important to quantify and to characterize the grafted PVA. In this work, the quantitative separation and characterization of the grafted water-insoluble PVA was carried out by a two-step selective solubilization of the PVAc latex, first with acetonitrile to separate PVAc homopolymer, followed by water to separate the water-soluble PVA from the remaining acetonitrile-insoluble material. After the separation, the water-soluble and water-insoluble PVA were characterized by Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy and 1 H and 13 C nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) analyses, from which the details of the PVA-graft-PVAc structure were obtained.
Valence orbital energetics as a tool for organometallic synthesis: On the scarcity of two-legged piano-stool complexes

Abstract The stability of 18-electron two-legged piano-stool complexes of the type (ηn-CnHn,)ML2(n = 4, 5 or 6; L = CO or NO; M = first-row transition metal) is correlated to the energetic separation of the HOMO from both the LUMO and the SHOMO (second-highest occupied molecular orbital) of the complexes calculated by using the Fenske-Hall molecular orbital method. Complex stability is observed to increase with increasing HOMO/LUMO and decreasing HOMO/SHOMO separations. This correlation is reflected in an examination of known stable complexes and unsuccessful synthetic attempts at others. On the basis of these findings, predictions are made as to the stability of a number of unknown 18-electron two-legged piano-stool complexes for which syntheses have not yet been attempted.
RACE, PERINATAL OUTCOME, AND AMNIOTIC INFECTION

Racial differences in rates of amniotic infection were examined through a review of the literature. Following a computerized and manual search of the literature from 1966 to 1994, studies were selected that reported the prevalence by race of presumed markers of amniotic infection. These markers included: amniotic infection syndrome, histologic chorioamnionitis, clinical chorioamnionitis, premature rupture of the membranes, and early neonatal mortality from sepsis. With the exception of overall rates of histologic chorioamnionitis, black women showed higher rates of the all the conditions examined. Insofar as amniotic infection is a risk factor for poor perinatal outcomes, the finding of higher rates of markers of amniotic infection among black women suggests that such infections may contribute to racial disparities in perinatal outcome.
Problems of functional determinant and fictitious lagrangian in gauge theories

Using the method of Lagrange multiplier fields the fictitious Lagrangian of gauge-fixed gauge theories can be constructed. We obtain different but equivalent forms depending on the extent to which constraint equations are used. These constructions yield fictitious Lagrangians which restore unitarity and gauge invariance. The usual method of constructing fictitious Lagrangians using the change of gauge conditions under gauge transformations does not always lead to the same fictitious Lagrangian constructed by the above method. They are, however, related by an interchange of fictitious fields and lead to the same amplitudes. We also discuss a scale transformation of the fictitious fields, which changes the explicit form of the fictitious Lagrangian but not its amplitudes. In the course of this study we display certain technical problems in the definition of the functional determinants related to a fictitious Lagrangian.
Federal Law Against Age and Disability Discrimination Meets the Dignity of the States: The Supreme Court, States’ Sovereign Immunity, and Judicial Review

Building on Norma Riccucci’s Review of Public Personnel Administration article on “The U.S. Supreme Court’s New Federalism and Its Impact on Antidiscrimination Legislation,” the present study proceeds by (a) outlining public employees’ federal statutory rights to equal employment opportunity; (b) analyzing state sovereign immunity doctrine; (c) explaining how, when coupled with Fourteenth Amendment equal protection analysis, state sovereign immunity frustrates Congress’ effort to protect state employees from age and disability discrimination; and (d) considering whether jurisprudential concern for the role of the federal courts in the constitutional separation of powers contributes to the Supreme Court’s unwillingness to authorize state employees to litigate their federal statutorily based age and disability claims in federal and state courts. The article concludes that, when combined, the Supreme Court’s state sovereign immunity doctrine and equal protection analysis negate state employees’ federal statu...
Incorporating Reference Price Effects into a Theory of Consumer Choice

Although there has been a good deal of research on incorporating the effects of reference price formation into empirical models of consumer buying behavior, little formal theoretical work had been undertaken to date. This paper incorporates reference price effects into the traditional economic theory of consumer choice, and examines the effects of reference price formation on the results of the traditional theory, its marketing implications, and the implications for empirical models which examine the effects of reference price formation on actual consumer behavior. Several implications of the theoretical model are empirically tested using weekly retail egg sales data from Southern California. This analysis indicates that reference price formation does have significant effects on consumer behavior. Furthermore, these effects are asymmetric with consumers two and a half times more responsive to egg price increases that are in excess of the reference price than they are to comparable egg price decreases.