cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
N-methyl-D-aspartate receptors on neurons that synthesize nitric oxide in rat nucleus tractus solitarii.

Abstract The aim of this study was to determine whether neuronal nitric oxide synthase and N-methyl- d -aspartate receptors are co-localized in the rat nucleus tractus solitarii. Such co-localization would support the hypothesis that nitric oxide participates in nucleus tractus solitarii-mediated functions, such as cardiovascular regulation, by a link to N-methyl- d -aspartate receptors. We used double fluorescent immunohistochemistry using antibodies against neuronal nitric oxide synthase and N-methyl- d -aspartate receptor subunit 1, the fundamental subunit for functional N-methyl- d -aspartate receptors. Labeled brainstem sections were examined with confocal laser scanning microscopy. Most of the N-methyl- d -aspartate receptor subunit 1 immunoreactivity was in cell bodies and proximal dendrites of the numerous labeled cells in the brainstem. High levels of N-methyl- d -aspartate receptor subunit 1 immunoreactivity were present in the dorsal motor nucleus of vagus, hypoglossal nucleus and nucleus ambiguus. All subnuclei of the nucleus tractus solitarii contained moderate levels of N-methyl- d -aspartate receptor subunit 1 immunoreactivity. The distribution of neuronal nitric oxide synthase immunoreactivity in the nucleus tractus solitarii was similar to that described in earlier reports. Superimposition of images revealed that almost all neuronal nitric oxide synthase immunoreactive neurons in the nucleus tractus solitarii contained N-methyl- d -aspartate receptor subunit 1 immunoreactivity, but a lesser portion of N-methyl- d -aspartate receptor subunit 1-immunoreactive cells contained neuronal nitric oxide synthase immunoreactivity. Although all nucleus tractus solitarii subnuclei contained double-labeled neurons, the central subnucleus exhibited the highest density of double-labeled neurons. Co-localization of neuronal nitric oxide synthase and N-methyl- d -aspartate receptor subunit 1 in the nucleus tractus solitarii provides anatomical support for the hypothesis that N-methyl- d -aspartate receptor activation can affect nucleus tractus solitarii-controlled functions via actions on neurons that synthesize nitric oxide.
“Financialization” of public discourse: the case of AIG

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate a particular shift in the language used in economic policy debates since the late 1970s. We call this phenomenon the “financialization of public discourse”, which refers to the use of particular metaphors and linguistic styles that are friendly to the economic interest of the financial industry. Design/methodology/approach – We used a rhetorical analysis to discover and analyze the specific cases which exemplify what we call the financialization of public discourse. A case study, the USA Treasury’s justification for its AIG policy, is used to strengthen the thesis of the paper. Findings – As the AIG case helps demonstrate, the language of finance limits the policy conversation and disguises the fact that the government’s role in this case is not different than its overall collective risk management function. Research limitations/implications – We assume that framing of economic events helps shape public perceptions of the desirability of various polici...
THE EFFECT OF THE INTRASPLENIC OVARIAN GRAFT ON PITUITARY GONADOTROPINS

THE formation in the rat of a luteinized tumor from an ovary transplanted into the spleen at time of castration raises important questions concerning the pituitary-ovarian relationship. Previous investigators have shown that the increase in circulating gonadotropin resulting from gonadectomy is due mainly, if not wholly, to an elevation of FSH (Witschi and Levine 1934, Biddulph et al. 1940, Biddulph and Meyer 1946). The LH component accumulates and is stored in the pituitary gland itself (Lipshutz and Villagran 1936, Hellbaum and Greep 1943, Greep and Hellbaum 1940). Different techniques have been used to demonstrate these clearly denned post-castration changes. Parabiosis experiments provide a measure of the circulating gonadotropins that have been, or are being discharged from the hypophysis whereas bioassay of the gland using immature recipients measures its gonadotropic content at time of autopsy. The possible influence of an intrasplenic ovary on pituitary storage or release of gonadotropins after ca...
Chemical Identification of Defective Thyroid Preparations

A modification of the Leland and Foster method for estimation of the thyroxine-like fraction in thyroid materials is described. This chemical method can be used to identify commercial thyroid preparations which are defective by clinical evaluation or by biological assay. In contrast, no difference in the content of the thyroxine-like fraction of effective and defective thyroid samples could be shown by our use of Blau's method.
Theoretical study of molecular structures and properties of the complete series of chlorophenols

Density functional theory and ab initio molecular orbital calculations have been carried out to investigate the molecular structures and properties of all 19 chlorophenol congeners. The results have been delineanated systematically in terms of the position and the total number of chlorine substitutions. Intramolecular hydrogen bonding in ortho chlorophenols and the induction by the electron-withdrawing chlorine are identified as strongly affecting the stability, structure, and properties of these compounds. Ortho chlorophenols are found to be more stable than other isomers as a result of intramolecular hydrogen bonding. Correlations between the known acidities of chlorophenols and the molecular structures are presented. Ortho chlorophenols are more acidic than other isomers because of the large inductive effect of chlorine on the hydroxyl group in close proximity. For the same reason, the acidity of a chlorophenol increases with the number of chlorine substitutions. Major trends and variations in molecula...
Reply to comment on electrolyte friction

Abstract It is suggested that the theories of Schurr and Booth, respectively, overestimate and underestimate the electrolyte friction. The Navier-Stokes equatio
Applying Geodesy to Hydrologic Cycle Monitoring

[1] IGCP 565 Workshop 3: Separating Hydrological and Tectonic Signals in Geodetic Observations; Reno, Nevada, 11–13 October 2010; The third International Geoscience Programme (IGCP) 565 workshop took place in Nevada. There were 57 participants from 11 countries representing universities, national laboratories, and government agencies. A series of plenary presentations was followed by breakout sessions addressing topics that included the advances needed to improve modeling algorithms for applications of geodesy to hydrology, working with the Group on Earth Observations (GEO) Water Cycle Community of Practice, and developing a hydrogeodetic data portal. The presentations and discussions underlined the added value in applying geodesy to support hydrologic cycle monitoring and modeling, especially terrestrial water storage. However, before the full benefits of the emerging field of hydrogeodesy become exploitable, there is a need to reduce model uncertainty through validation with point to basin observations; to increase consistency in processing and modeling displacement, gravity variations, and hydrologic processes; and to develop new technologies that merge scale mismatches. Improving accuracy and stability of the geodetic reference frames will extend the applicability of geodesy to hydrologic problems. In tectonically active areas, joint interpretation of tectonic and hydrologic signals is required. Ground truth networks are needed at a higher density and with quality control protocols that ensure accuracy.
Individual and institutional influences on faith-based health and wellness programming

The majority of the US population is affiliated with faith-based organizations (FBO). Health and wellness activities (HWAs) within FBOs have great potential for reach, though the factors influencing faith-based HWA are not well understood. The purpose of this study was to examine individual faith leader and institutional influences on HWAs offered within FBOs. A national convenience sample of faith leaders (N 5 844) completed an online survey assessing individual (demographics, health, health behaviors and attitudes) and institutional influences (size, location and external support) on health and HWAwithin FBO. Respondents were primarily White (93%), male (72%), middle-aged and affiliated with Methodist (42.5%) or Lutheran (20.2%) religions. Respondents reported 4.8 % 3.2 HWA within their FBO per year. Faith leader education, length of service to the FBO, physical activity and fruit/vegetable intake were positively related to HWA and body mass index was negatively related. Denomination, congregation diversity, location and size were also related to HWA. Results show a strong relationship between faith leaders’ health and HWA, indicating the influence of the social environment on health promotion in FBOs. Institutional variables, though not modifiable, were significant predictors of HWA and should be considered when delivering interventions to achieve a significant impact.
Complete discrete 2-D Gabor transforms by neural networks for image analysis and compression

A three-layered neural network is described for transforming two-dimensional discrete signals into generalized nonorthogonal 2-D Gabor representations for image analysis, segmentation, and compression. These transforms are conjoint spatial/spectral representations, which provide a complete image description in terms of locally windowed 2-D spectral coordinates embedded within global 2-D spatial coordinates. In the present neural network approach, based on interlaminar interactions involving two layers with fixed weights and one layer with adjustable weights, the network finds coefficients for complete conjoint 2-D Gabor transforms without restrictive conditions. In wavelet expansions based on a biologically inspired log-polar ensemble of dilations, rotations, and translations of a single underlying 2-D Gabor wavelet template, image compression is illustrated with ratios up to 20:1. Also demonstrated is image segmentation based on the clustering of coefficients in the complete 2-D Gabor transform. >
Neuropsychological Studies of Linguistic and Affective Facial Expressions in Deaf Signers

For deaf users of American Sign Language (ASL), facial behaviors function in two distinct ways: to convey affect (as with spoken languages) and to mark certain specific grammatical structures (e.g., relative clauses), thus subserving distinctly linguistic functions in ways that are unique to signed languages. The existence of two functionally different classes of facial behaviors raises questions concerning neural control of language and nonlanguage functions. Examining patterns of neural mediation for differential functions of facial expressions, linguistic versus affective, provides a unique perspective on the determinants of hemispheric specialization. This paper presents two studies which explore facial expression production in deaf signers.1 An experimental paradigm uses chimeric stimuli of ASL linguistic and affective facial expressions (photographs of right vs. left composites of posed expressions) to explore patterns of productive asymmetries in brain-intactsigners. A second study examines facial ...
Sonar sensing strategies

Develops theoretical and practical techniques to recover the pose of planar surfaces with minimal sensor readings and motion. A proof is given that two sonar readings suffice to precisely locate a single planar surface that returns the sonar's signal. An implementation is described that takes into account the physical restrictions on actual Polaroid sensors and experiments are described based on actual Polaroid sensor data.
Microsatellites indicate minimal barriers to mule deer Odocoileus hemionus dispersal across Montana, USA

To better understand the future spread of chronic wasting disease, we conducted a genetic assessment of mule deer Odocoileus hemionus population structure across the state of Montana, USA. Individual based analyses were used to test for population structure in the absence of a priori designations of population membership across the sampling area. Samples from the states of Wyoming, Colorado and Utah were also included in the analysis to provide a geographic context to the levels of population structure observed within Montana. Results showed that mule deer across our entire study region were characterized by weak isolation by distance and a lack of spatial autocorrelation at distances > 10 km. We found evidence for contemporary male bias in dispersal, with female mule deer exhibiting higher mean individual pairwise genetic distance than males. We tested for potential homogenizing effects of past translocations within Montana, but were unable to detect a genetic signature of these events. Our results indic...
Phylogeny of Pedaliaceae and Martyniaceae and the Placement of Trapella in Plantaginaceae s. l.

Abstract— Pedaliaceae and Martyniaceae are Old World and New World families occurring primarily in arid environments with some taxa exhibiting similar adaptations to dispersal by large animals. Their taxonomic histories have also been intertwined, since they have often been combined as one family (e.g. Pedaliaceae). The temperate Asian aquatic plant Trapella was also assigned to Pedaliaceae, based on fruits with similar dispersal traits. With expanded sampling of both families, including Trapella, and data from ndhF, trnLF, and ETS sequences, this study confirms that the two families are distinct lineages, identifies a new placement for Trapella in tribe Gratioleae (Plantaginaceae s. 1), and shows that the two families exhibit a combination of shared floral morphology due to their proximity in Lamiales, and convergent functional morphology for dispersal. The phylogeny indicates the three tribes of Pedaliaceae are monophyletic, but that Sesamum is not.
Improved typings for probabilistic noninterference in a multi-threaded language

With the variables of a program classified as L (low, public) or H (high, private), the secure information flow problem is concerned with preventing the program from leaking information from H variables to L variables. In the context of a multi-threaded imperative language with probabilistic scheduling, the goal can be formalized as a probabilistic noninterference property. Previous work identified a type system sufficient to guarantee probabilistic noninterference, but at the cost of severe restrictions to prevent timing leaks -- for example, H variables were forbidden in the guards of while loops. Here we present a more permissive type system that allows the running times of threads to depend on the values of H variables, provided that these timing variations cannot affect the values of L variables. The type system gives each command a type of the form τ1 cmd τ2; this type says that the command assigns only to variables of level τ1 (or higher) and has running time that depends only on variables of level τ2 (or lower). Also it uses types of the form τ cmd n for commands that terminate in exactly n steps. With these typings, timing leaks can be prevented by demanding that no assignment to an L variable may sequentially follow a command whose running time depends on H variables. We prove that well-typed multi-threaded programs satisfy a property that we call weak probabilistic noninterference ; it is based on a notion of weak probabilistic bisimulation for Markov chains, allowing two Markov chains to be regarded as equivalent even when one “runs” more slowly than the other. Finally, we show that the language can safely be extended with a fork command that allows new threads to be spawned.
Excitation and Adaptation in Bacteria–a Model Signal Transduction System that Controls Taxis and Spatial Pattern Formation

The machinery for transduction of chemotactic stimuli in the bacterium E. coli is one of the most completely characterized signal transduction systems, and because of its relative simplicity, quantitative analysis of this system is possible. Here we discuss models which reproduce many of the important behaviors of the system. The important characteristics of the signal transduction system are excitation and adaptation, and the latter implies that the transduction system can function as a “derivative sensor” with respect to the ligand concentration in that the DC component of a signal is ultimately ignored if it is not too large. This temporal sensing mechanism provides the bacterium with a memory of its passage through spatially- or temporally-varying signal fields, and adaptation is essential for successful chemotaxis. We also discuss some of the spatial patterns observed in populations and indicate how cell-level behavior can be embedded in population-level descriptions.
Income distribution, human capital and economic growth in Colombia

Abstract Colombian income distribution has followed a clear path during the last two decades: in the second half of the 1970s, human capital accumulation reduced the dispersion of income distribution, and lead to a period of stagnation between 1983 and 1990, when mobility declined. After the structural reforms (a skill-bias technological change), the wage differential for skilled workers increased inequality by a polarization in the bi-modal distribution of income. These topics are discussed in the paper along some dynamic aspects of income and educational mobility in Colombia.
Information Flow and Search in Unstructured Keyword Based Social Networks

In online social networks (OSNs), user connections can be represented as a network. The network formed has distinct properties that distinguish it from other network topologies. In this work, we consider an unstructured keyword based social network topology where each edge has a trust value associated with it to represent the mutual relationship between the corresponding nodes. Users have keywords as their profile attributes that have policies associated with them to define abstractly the flow of keyword information and the accessibility to other users in the network. We also address privacy concerns as outlined in works on future OSN architectures.This paper makes two key contributions. First, we develop an information flow model to disseminate keyword information when users add keywords as their profile attributes. Second, for keyword based queries, we design and develop a search algorithm to find users with the specified keywords in their profile attributes. It is based on a linear combination of topological distance and trust metrics. It is also dynamic in nature such that it adapts itself for each individual node during the search process. We observe an improvement in orders of magnitude when the search algorithm is compared to breadth first search.
Detachment of compliant films adhered to stiff substrates via van der Waals interactions: role of frictional sliding during peeling

The remarkable ability of some plants and animals to cling strongly to substrates despite relatively weak interfacial bonds has important implications for the development of synthetic adhesives. Here, we examine the origins of large detachment forces using a thin elastomer tape adhered to a glass slide via van der Waals interactions, which serves as a model system for geckos, mussels and ivy. The forces required for peeling of the tape are shown to be a strong function of the angle of peeling, which is a consequence of frictional sliding at the edge of attachment that serves to dissipate energy that would otherwise drive detachment. Experiments and theory demonstrate that proper accounting for frictional sliding leads to an inferred work of adhesion of only approximately 0.5 J m(-2) (defined for purely normal separations) for all load orientations. This starkly contrasts with the interface energies inferred using conventional interface fracture models that assume pure sticking behaviour, which are considerably larger and shown to depend not only on the mode-mixity, but also on the magnitude of the mode-I stress intensity factor. The implications for developing frameworks to predict detachment forces in the presence of interface sliding are briefly discussed.
Low-energy solar positrons.

Fluxes of solar particles, consistent with Kinsey's (1970) measurements and demodulated in a manner consistent with the cosmic-ray transport equations discussed by Gleeson and Axford (1967), are shown to be able to produce low-energy positrons in the solar atmosphere via unstable CNO beta-particle emitters. Computed positron fluxes are presented for various diffusion coefficient values and compared with measurements of Cline and Hones (1970).
Treatment of Patients with Hematologic Neoplasm, Fever, and Neutropenia

Choices of empirical antibiotic therapy for patients with febrile neutropenia must be made with very little information about the source and site of infection. The clinician is aided by recognition of the subtle signs and symptoms of infection in immunocompromised patients. National guidelines should be applied according to the microbiological patterns and trends in drug resistance at each institution. Case studies are provided to illustrate these challenges in daily practice.
A Mathematical Setting for Inductive Reasoning

The aim of this paper is to develop and describe a mathematical structure rich enough to provide an adequate setting for inductive reasoning. It is not our purpose here to advocate any particular inference procedure — rather, we propose a mathematical framework within which the possibilities can be studied formally with a minimum of prejudice. In particular, we shall have a look at a generalization of the Bayesian inference procedure in this framework. In the process of constructing this system, four of the principal kinds of probability arise quite naturally and in harmony. As a consequence, the customary mathematical representation of the notion of conditioning is resolved into a number of conditioning concepts. Although this excess of conditioning operations creates many mathematical problems, it also provides the machinery to unravel many of the confusing issues that are associated with inference.
Chimeric GII.4 Norovirus Virus-Like-Particle-Based Vaccines Induce Broadly Blocking Immune Responses

There is currently no licensed vaccine for noroviruses, and development is hindered, in part, by an incomplete understanding of the host adaptive immune response to these highly heterogeneous viruses and rapid GII.4 norovirus molecular evolution. Emergence of a new predominant GII.4 norovirus strain occurs every 2 to 4 years. To address the problem of GII.4 antigenic variation, we tested the hypothesis that chimeric virus-like particle (VLP)-based vaccine platforms, which incorporate antigenic determinants from multiple strains into a single genetic background, will elicit a broader immune response against contemporary and emergent strains. Here, we compare the immune response generated by chimeric VLPs to that of parental strains and a multivalent VLP cocktail. Results demonstrate that chimeric VLPs induce a more broadly cross-blocking immune response than single parental VLPs and a similar response to a multivalent GII.4 VLP cocktail. Furthermore, we show that incorporating epitope site A alone from one strain into the background of another is sufficient to induce a blockade response against the strain donating epitope site A. This suggests a mechanism by which population-wide surveillance of mutations in a single epitope could be used to evaluate antigenic changes in order to identify potential emergent strains and quickly reformulate vaccines against future epidemic strains as they emerge in human populations. IMPORTANCE Noroviruses are gastrointestinal pathogens that infect an estimated 21 million people per year in the United States alone. GII.4 noroviruses account for >70% of all outbreaks, making them the most clinically important genotype. GII.4 noroviruses undergo a pattern of epochal evolution, resulting in the emergence of new strains with altered antigenicity over time, complicating vaccine design. This work is relevant to norovirus vaccine design as it demonstrates the potential for development of a chimeric VLP-based vaccine platform that may broaden the protective response against multiple GII.4 strains and proposes a potential reformulation strategy to control newly emergent strains in the human population.
Growing a Sustainable Biofuels Industry: Economics, Environmental Considerations, and the Role of the Conservation Reserve Program

Biofuels are expected to be a major contributor to renewable energy in the coming decades under the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS). These fuels have many attractive properties including the promotion of energy independence, rural development, and the reduction of national carbon emissions. However, several unresolved environmental and economic concerns remain. Environmentally, much of the biomass is expected to come from agricultural expansion and/or intensification, which may greatly affect the net environmental impact, and economically, the lack of a developed infrastructure and bottlenecks along the supply chain may affect the industry’s economic vitality. The approximately 30 million acres (12 million hectares) under the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) represent one land base for possible expansion. Here, we examine the potential role of the CRP in biofuels industry development, by (1) assessing the range of environmental effects on six end points of concern, and (2) simulating differences in potential industry growth nationally using a systems dynamics model. The model examines seven land-use scenarios (various percentages of CRP cultivation for biofuel) and five economic scenarios (subsidy schemes) to explore the benefits of using the CRP. The environmental assessment revealed wide variation in potential impacts. Lignocellulosic feedstocks had the greatest potential to improve the environmental condition relative to row crops, but the most plausible impacts were considered to be neutral or slightly negative. Model simulations revealed that industry growth was much more sensitive to economic scenarios than land-use scenarios—similar volumes of biofuels could be produced with no CRP as with 100% utilization. The range of responses to economic policy was substantial, including long-term market stagnation at current levels of first-generation biofuels under minimal policy intervention, or RFS-scale quantities of biofuels if policy or market conditions were more favorable. In total, the combination of the environmental assessment and the supply chain model suggests that large-scale conversion of the CRP to row crops would likely incur a significant environmental cost, without a concomitant benefit in terms of biofuel production.
A parallel evolutionary strategy based simulation–optimization approach for solving groundwater source identification problems

Abstract Groundwater characterization involves the resolution of unknown system characteristics from observation data, and is often classified as an inverse problem. Inverse problems are difficult to solve due to natural ill-posedness and computational intractability. Here we adopt the use of a simulation–optimization approach that couples a numerical pollutant-transport simulation model with evolutionary search algorithms for solution of the inverse problem. In this approach, the numerical transport model is solved iteratively during the evolutionary search. This process can be computationally intensive since several hundreds to thousands of forward model evaluations are typically required for solution. Given the potential computational intractability of such a simulation–optimization approach, parallel computation is employed to ease and enable the solution of such problems. In this paper, several variations of a groundwater source identification problem is examined in terms of solution quality and computational performance. The computational experiments were performed on the TeraGrid cluster available at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications. The results demonstrate the performance of the parallel simulation–optimization approach in terms of solution quality and computational performance.
Plasma alkaline phosphatase and pregnancy outcome

The objective was to determine the relationship between plasma alkaline phosphatase (AP) activity and birthweight (BWT) and preterm delivery (PTD). Five hundred eighty African-American women had plasma AP activities measured at various gestational ages (GA) with the results compared to a number of pregnancy outcomes. Plasma AP activity rose linearly during pregnancy from a mean of 39 U/L at 19 weeks to 130 U/L at delivery. In individual women, AP activities were consistently high or low as confirmed by cotrelation coefficients in adjacent time periods ranging from 0.63 to 0.87. AP at 19 weeks was not significantly associated with any outcome measure. However, at 26 weeks, AP in the highest quartile was associated with a 15.0% incidence of PTD <37 weeks compared to 6.8% in the lower three quartiles (P =. 004). For PTD ≤32 weeks, the difference in PTD was 6.8 vs. 1.6% (P <. 003). When women in the highest quartile of increase in AP from 19 to 26 weeks were compared to those in the lower quartiles, the rate ...
The "Clustering Effect": An Idea-Generation Phenomenon during Nominal Grouping.

With the growing complexity of decision making in modern social institutions, managers are finding it increasingly necessary to involve groups of experts and advisers in order to achieve effective solutions to problems. Considerable research has been devoted to the task of identifying the relative characteristics of the more popular group decision-making techniques. This experiment measures the clustering effect found during the idea-generation phase of nominal grouping.
Predicting NN5 Time Series with Neurosolver

Neurosolver is a neuromorphic planner and a problem solving system. It was tested on several problem solving and planning tasks such as re-arranging blocks and controlling a software-simulated artificial rat running in a maze. In these tasks, the Neurosolver created models of the problem as temporal patterns in the problem space. These behavioral traces were then used to perform searches and generate actions. In this paper, we present an analysis of the capabilities of the Neurosolver to predict data points in time series. We report on testing those capabilities on the sample data sets that were made available for the neural network forecasting competition NN5 [14]. We conclude with a brief description of several ideas that we are currently applying to the data sets posted for the 2010 competition, NN GC1.
Being human in a global age of technology

This philosophical enquiry considers the impact of a global world view and technology on the meaning of being human. The global vision increases our awareness of the common bond between all humans, while technology tends to separate us from an understanding of ourselves as human persons. We review some advances in connecting as community within our world, and many examples of technological changes. This review is not exhaustive. The focus is to understand enough changes to think through the possibility of healthcare professionals becoming cyborgs, human-machine units that are subsequently neither human and nor machine. It is seen that human technology interfaces are a different way of interacting but do not change what it is to be human in our rational capacities of providing meaningful speech and freely chosen actions. In the highly technical environment of the ICU, expert nurses work in harmony with both the technical equipment and the patient. We used Heidegger to consider the nature of equipment, and Descartes to explore unique human capacities. Aristotle, Wallace, Sokolowski, and Clarke provide a summary of humanity as substantial and relational.
Polymer-coated nanoporous carbons for trace seawater uranium adsorption

Polymer-coated mesoporous carbon nanocomposites were prepared from the immobilization of acrylonitrile and acrylic acid copolymers with divinylbenzene as a crosslinker onto a mesoporous carbon framework. High surface areas were maintained after polymerization with accessible porosity. This functional nanocomposite was tested as an adsorbent for uranium from high salinity solutions. Uranium adsorption results have shown that the adsorption capacities are strongly influenced by the density of the amidoxime groups and the specific surface area.
Partisan underestimation of the polarizing influence of group discussion.

Abstract Group polarization occurs when people's attitudes become more extreme following discussion with like-minded others. We hypothesized that people underestimate how much a relatively brief group discussion polarizes their own attitudes. People often perceive their own attitudes as unbiased and stable over time. Therefore, people's polarized post-discussion attitudes may cause them to misremember their pre-discussion attitudes as having been more extreme than they were. In two experiments, participants engaged in 15-minute discussions with 4–6 like-minded others regarding two political topics: whether Barack Obama or George W. Bush was the better president (Experiment 1) and whether they supported Barack Obama or Mitt Romney during the 2012 presidential election (Experiment 2). Group discussion polarized participants' attitudes, and participants misremembered their pre-discussion attitudes as having been more extreme than they actually were. Participants' polarized post-discussion attitudes significantly predicted their recalled pre-discussion attitudes, controlling for their actual pre-discussion attitudes, suggesting that their post-discussion attitudes guided reconstruction of their pre-discussion attitudes. These findings have implications for people's awareness of psychological biases and for the societal effects of partisan enclavement.
An Electric Fence Enclosure for Small Mammals

A screen-wire fence topped on each side by an electric fence shows promise as a method of restricting small mammals to an area for study. Such a fence constructed around one acre should take three men less than one day to assemble, and at a cost of approximately $150, discounting labor.
Righting the Resource Curse: Institutional Politics and State Capabilities in Edo State, Nigeria

The poor record of liberal reforms sponsored by the international community in postcolonial settings underscores the real politik of institutional change. What we call a ‘new normal’ in development...
Influence of genetic variants of isocitrate dehydrogenase 1 on cytarabine resistance on African population with acute myeloid leukemia

Objective To explore the influence of gene polymorphism of isocitrate dehydrogenase1(IDH1) on cytarabine(ara-C) resistance on African population with acute myeloid leukemia.Methods Cell lines from international HapMap project panels with African ancestry were cultured and exposure to araC in different concentration(1,5,40,80 μmol/L) for 72 h.Percent cell survival values and resistance of araC depicted by the area under the survival curve(AUC) were determined by alamar Blue.The AUC of araC was calculated using the trapezoidal rule and AUC values were Log2 transformed before statistical analysis.IDH1 genetic variants of African population were identified with Taqman PCR.Results IDH1 rs10173938,rs10192397 were significantly associated with high AUC of araC [rs10173938: AA vs(AC+CC),P = 0.040;rs10192397:(CC+ CT) vs TT,P = 0.036].Conclusion Cytarabine resistance in African population with acute myeloid leukemia is influenced by Gene polymorphism of IDH1.
Malignant angiomyolipoma: a rare entity with unusual biology.

The authors present an interesting case of a very rare renal neoplasm, malignant epithelioid angiomyolipoma (AML), which belongs to a family of mesenchymal tumors known as perivascular epithelioid tumors (PEComas).
Under the Law of God: mimesis and mimetic discipleship among Jewish‐affinity Christians

Messianic Judaism, a network of congregations that incorporate Jewish ritual into evangelical worship, is one branch of a fast-growing trend among Christians globally towards ‘Jewish affinity’. Drawing on a multi-site comparison in North America, this article examines one of Messianic Judaism's most significant internal debates: should non-ethnically Jewish ‘gentile believers’ (GBs) obey biblical laws? It argues that GBs do not simply imitate Jews badly, as outsiders and their own leaders often believe. Rather, their actions are best characterized as mimesis in two complementary forms: mimesis of Jews and ‘mimetic discipleship’ of Jesus-the-Jew. Taken together, these forms offer a heuristic tool sufficiently capacious to explain both individuals’ propensity for Jewish practice and the socially specific ways it is constructed. I conclude that Jewish affinity reflects a key problem in contemporary Christianity, namely what happens when people in one religion (Christianity) come to believe that their God incarnated in the body of a man they now associate with another religion (Judaism)? Sous la Loi de Dieu : mimese et disciples mimetiques parmi des chretiens d'affinite judaique Resume Le judaisme messianique, reseau de congregations qui integrent le rituel judaique dans la veneration evangelique, est une branche d'un courant dans lequel de plus en plus de chretiens du monde entier se tournent vers une « affinite judaique ». A partir d'une comparaison multi-sites menee en Amerique du Nord, l'article examine l'un des debats internes les plus importants du judaisme messianique : les « croyants gentils », qui ne sont pas ethniquement juifs, doivent-ils obeir aux lois bibliques ? Il avance qu'ils ne font pas qu'imiter mediocrement les juifs, comme le croient souvent les observateurs exterieurs et les chefs de leur propre mouvement. Leurs actions relevent plutot de la mimese, sous deux formes complementaires : mimese des juifs et statut de « disciples mimetiques » de Jesus-le-Juif. Ces deux formes reunies forment un outil heuristique qui peut expliquer a la fois la propension des individus a la pratique judaique et les manieres socialement specifiques dont elle se construit. L'auteur conclut que l'affinite judaique reflete un probleme crucial du christianisme contemporain : que se passe-t-il lorsque les croyants d'une religion (le christianisme) en viennent a croire que leur Dieu s'est incarne dans un homme qu'ils associent a present a une autre religion (le judaisme) ?
Anxiety and Alcohol Use Disorders: A Perspective from Molecular and Epigenetic Studies

Alcoholism is a chronic relapsing brain disorder. Several clinical and preclinical studies indicate that alcohol use disorders (AUD) and anxiety disorders are highly correlated and have a shared etiology, promoting each other’s development and also feeding back into each other’s maintenance. The molecular and epigenetic mechanisms in specific brain circuitry such as the central nucleus of amygdala (CeA) may be involved in the comorbidity of anxiety and alcoholism. Innate or ethanol-induced changes in signaling cascade pathways leading to adaptations at the level of cAMP responsive element–binding (CREB) protein gene-transcription factor function and associated chromatin remodeling due to histone modifications and DNA methylation in the CeA have become one of the emerging mechanisms underlying AUD and anxiety. Studies conducted in the field suggest that histone deacetylases and DNA methyltransferase inhibitors may be potential therapeutic agents to treat or prevent alcoholism with or without comorbid anxiety disorders.
Uniform Motion of a Charge

In this chapter we consider a uniformly moving charge, that is, the case where the motion of the charge is translational with a constant velocity. Solutions of the nonlinear Schrodinger and nonlinear Klein-Gordon equation which describe uniformly moving charges have a form of wave-corpuscles. We describe point attributes of wave corpuscles such as their translational velocity and momentum and wave attributes such as group velocity and de Broglie wavevector. We consider both non-relativistic and relativistic cases.
Finding Semantic Web Ontology Terms from Words

The Semantic Web was designed to unambiguously define and use ontologies to encode data and knowledge on the Web. Many people find it difficult, however, to write complex RDF statements and queries because it requires familiarity with the appropriate ontologies and the terms they define. We describe a framework that eases the experiences in authoring and querying RDF data, in which we focus on automatically finding a set of appropriate Semantic Web ontology terms from a set of words used as the labels of nodes and edges in an incoming semantic graph.
A Bayesian Framework for Abundance Estimation in Hyperspectral Data using Markov Random Fields

A model is proposed which uses neighborhoods of pixels as priors in a Bayesian setting to extract abundance information from a hyperspectral image. It is assumed that elements of the abundance vector for a pixel are independent, but that corresponding elements of abundance vectors for neighboring pixels are correlated. A posterior density encourages estimated abundances in neighboring pixels to be similar. Minimum mean- square error estimates are obtained by averaging samples from this density, where the samples are obtained by Gibbs sampling.
Extreme biophysics: Enzymes under pressure

A critical question about piezophilic (pressure-loving) microbes is how their constituent molecules maintain function under high pressure. Here, factors are examined that may lead to the increased activity under pressure in dihydrofolate reductase from the piezophilic Moritella profunda compared to the homologous enzyme from the mesophilic Escherichia coli. Molecular dynamics simulations are performed at various temperatures and pressures to examine how pressure affects the flexibility of the enzymes from these two microbes, since both stability and flexibility are necessary for enzyme activity. The results suggest that collective motions on the 10-ns timescale are responsible for the flexibility necessary for "corresponding states" activity at the growth conditions of the parent organism. In addition, the results suggest that while the lower stability of many enzymes from deep-sea microbes may be an adaptation for greater flexibility at low temperatures, high pressure may enhance their adaptation to low temperatures. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Acceptance of the Mineralogical Society of America Award for 1999

Mr. President, Members of the society, and guests: It is a great honor to be the recipient of this year’s MSA award. It has been a long journey for me from a high school graduate in China who spoke no English to a young scientist recognized by my good friends and colleagues of the MSA. I could not have completed this journey without the help of many distinguished scientists and the opportunities created for me at different times and places. The year I graduated from high school was the second year after the reform of the Chinese education system that allowed students to enter college based solely on the accumulative score of their national entry exams. I was fortunate enough to become a student in the Department of Geology at Zhejiang University, one of the prestigious universities in China. During my last year in college, I was assigned to do a senior thesis at the Institute of Geochemistry, Academia Sinica, where Lin Chuanxian introduced me to geological problems that can be solved by thermodynamic calculations. The following year, I went back to the Institute of Geochemistry as a special graduate student after I received a fellowship from the Chinese Education Ministry that allowed me to pursue a Ph.D. degree abroad. While I applied for graduate schools in the United States, I …
A client-centered perspective on ‘psychopathology’

ABSTRACTI present a client-centered perspective on psychopathology. People have a natural capacity for self-regeneration, self-healing, intelligent functioning, and self-organizing wisdom. Psychopathology occurs when various factors get in the way of people productively utilizing that capacity. Conditions of worth are a major factor. Conditions of worth are ubiquitous, not just occurring in early childhood. We need to change society in order to change psychopathology.
Strategically out of control: A self-presentational conceptualization of narcissism and low self-control

Abstract Vazire and Funder (2006) suggested that narcissists struggle to control themselves and their characteristic narcissistic behaviors reflect this struggle. Here, we seek to propose a different perspective on narcissists' apparent struggle with low self-control. Because power is associated with freedom and autonomy and because narcissists have a heightened motivation to exude power, we suggest that they may intend to act in ways that imply they do not inhibit their urges (i.e., are low in “self-control”). In the present study, participants ( N = 542) completed an index of power motivation, their prizing of low-self-control characteristics (e.g., being “uninhibited”), their strategic displays of these characteristics, and trait indices of low self-control. A path model revealed that narcissism was positively associated with power motivation, which in turn, related to prizing low-self-control characteristics. This enhanced prizing of low self-control characteristics, in turn, predicted participants' strategic displays of these characteristics, which, in turn, related to scoring lower self-control trait measures. The evidence is in line with the view that narcissists' apparent battle with self-control is actually a strategy.
Aerobic capacity mediates susceptibility for the transition from steatosis to steatohepatitis.

Key points Low intrinsic aerobic capacity is associated with increased all-cause and liver-related mortality in humans. Low intrinsic aerobic capacity in the low capacity runner (LCR) rat increases susceptibility to acute and chronic high-fat/high-sucrose diet-induced steatosis, without observed increases in liver inflammation. Addition of excess cholesterol to a high-fat/high-sucrose diet produced greater steatosis in LCR and high capacity runner (HCR) rats. However, the LCR rat demonstrated greater susceptibility to increased liver inflammatory and apoptotic markers compared to the HCR rat. The progressive non-alcoholic fatty liver disease observed in the LCR rats following western diet feeding was associated with further declines in liver fatty acid oxidation and mitochondrial respiratory capacity compared to HCR rats. Abstract Low aerobic capacity increases risk for non-alcoholic fatty liver disease and liver-related disease mortality, but mechanisms mediating these effects remain unknown. We recently reported that rats bred for low aerobic capacity (low capacity runner; LCR) displayed susceptibility to high fat diet-induced steatosis in association with reduced hepatic mitochondrial fatty acid oxidation (FAO) and respiratory capacity compared to high aerobic capacity (high capacity runner; HCR) rats. Here we tested the impact of aerobic capacity on susceptibility for progressive liver disease following a 16-week 'western diet' (WD) high in fat (45% kcal), cholesterol (1% w/w) and sucrose (15% kcal). Unlike previously with a diet high in fat and sucrose alone, the inclusion of cholesterol in the WD induced hepatomegaly and steatosis in both HCR and LCR rats, while producing greater cholesterol ester accumulation in LCR compared to HCR rats. Importantly, WD-fed low-fitness LCR rats displayed greater inflammatory cell infiltration, serum alanine transaminase, expression of hepatic inflammatory markers (F4/80, MCP-1, TLR4, TLR2 and IL-1β) and effector caspase (caspase 3 and 7) activation compared to HCR rats. Further, LCR rats had greater WD-induced decreases in complete FAO and mitochondrial respiratory capacity. Intrinsic aerobic capacity had no impact on WD-induced hepatic steatosis; however, rats bred for low aerobic capacity developed greater hepatic inflammation, which was associated with reduced hepatic mitochondrial FAO and respiratory capacity and increased accumulation of cholesterol esters. These results confirm epidemiological reports that aerobic capacity impacts progression of liver disease and suggest that these effects are mediated through alterations in hepatic mitochondrial function.