cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Higher Fourier harmonics of the directional distribution of an equilibrium wave field under steady wind forcing

Recently, directional wave spectra have been obtained by applying the two-dimensional fast Fourier transform (2D FFT) to the three-dimensional spatial topography of ocean surface waves collected by an airborne scanning laser ranging system during a quasi-equilibrium wind wave condition. The directional distributions show that most wave energy at wavenumbers larger than the peak wavenumber is in two sidelobes at directions symmetrically located about the wind direction. Presented in this study is an analysis of the Fourier harmonics derived from decomposition of the measured bimodal directional distributions. The similarity properties of the Fourier coefficients are analyzed. A nonlinear function is proposed to represent the similarity relation. A bimodal directional distribution model in the form of Fourier series expansion consisting of the first eight Fourier harmonics is developed. Application of this model to extend the directional distribution of buoy measurements is demonstrated.
Synthesis and Biological Evaluation of Lactimidomycin and Its Analogues

The studies culminating in the total synthesis of the glutarimide-containing eukaryote translation elongation inhibitor lactimidomycin are described. The optimized synthetic route features a Zn(II)-mediated intramolecular Horner-Wadsworth-Emmons (HWE) reaction resulting in a highly stereoselective formation of the strained 12-membered macrolactone of lactimidomycin on a 423 mg scale. The presence of the E,Z-diene functionality was found to be key for effective macrocyclizations as a complete removal of these unsaturation units resulted in exclusive formation of the dimer rather than monocyclic enoate. The synthetic route features a late-stage installation of the glutarimide functionality via an asymmetric catalytic Mukaiyama aldol reaction, which allows for a quick generation of lactimidomycin homolog 55 containing two additional carbons in the glutarimide side chain. Similar to lactimidomycin, this analog was found to possess cytotoxicity against MDA-MB-231 breast cancer cells (GI50 =1-3 μM) using in vitro 2D and 3D assays. Although lactimidomycin was found to be the most potent compound in terms of anticancer activity, 55 as well as truncated analogues 50-52 lacking the glutarimide side-chain were found to be significantly less toxic against human mammary epithelial cells.
Not too late: Effects of a diligent recruitment program for hard to place youth

Abstract Among child welfare professionals there is agreement on the negative consequences for youth who age out of foster care without an attachment to a caring adult. There is a particularly challenging sub-population of youth in foster care at highest risk for this scenario: special-needs youth who reside in a congregate care setting and who have been freed for adoption. This paper details the “Parent for Every Child” initiative (PFEC), a federally funded diligent recruitment program which targeted special needs youth who resided in congregate care settings and who had been freed for adoption. PFEC had two primary objectives: 1) identify effective recruitment strategies for matching caring adults with youth in need of permanence and (2) improve permanency outcomes for youth in the target population, inclusive of both legal and relational permanence. The methods used for studying the initiative are described as well as the study's randomly assigned participants, inclusive of both intervention and control groups. Findings related to the initiative's main goals are presented with respect to: the various recruitment strategies employed by project staff and staff working in the control condition; the extent to which those efforts yielded “matches” between youth in need and potential resource families; and, the extent to which youth enrolled in the PFEC project had better permanency outcomes compared to youth in the control group. The limitations of the study are discussed as well as promising directions for future research in this area.
The Turbulent Circulation of a Snowball Earth Ocean

AbstractTheoretical arguments are developed to derive general properties of the ocean circulation in a “snowball” world, and the predictions are confirmed in a series of idealized numerical simulations. As suggested previously, a turbulent flow is driven by geothermal heating at the seafloor, which is balanced by a similar heat loss through the ice sheet above. It is argued that the expected horizontal inhomogeneities in these heat fluxes are sufficient to generate baroclinic instability, which drives geostrophic turbulence. Turbulent eddies then transport heat upward and poleward along isolines of constant density, thereby maintaining a statically stable stratification, contrary to previous findings from numerical models that do not adequately resolve the geostrophic turbulence. The kinetic energy of the turbulent flow is expected to be controlled by a balance between the potential energy input by the diabatic forcing and frictional dissipation in the bottom boundary layer. The resulting characteristic f...
Overcoming the Challenges of Solid Bridging and Constriction during Pd-Catalyzed C−N Bond Formation in Microreactors

We investigate the mechanisms that govern plugging in microreactors during Pd-catalyzed amination reactions. Both bridging and constriction were shown to be important mechanisms that lead to clogging in our system and greatly limited the utility of microsystems for this class of reactions. On the basis of these observations, several approaches were engineered to overcome the challenge of plugging and to enable the continuous-flow synthesis of a biarylamine. Bridging could be eliminated with acoustic irradiation while constriction was managed via fluid velocity and the prediction of growth rates.
Once-mated beet armyworm (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae) : Effects of age at mating on fecundity, fertility, and longevity

We studied the effects of age at mating on reproductive parameters for once-mated beet armyworm, Spodoptera exigua (Hubner), moths in the laboratory. The age of moths at mating significantly influenced the transfer of spermatophores by virgin males and the receipt of spermatophores by virgin females. Female age at mating significantly affected fecundity, fertility, and longevity. Two days after emergence was the optimum mating age for females to achieve their maximum reproductive potential. However, females laying the greatest number of eggs lived the fewest number of days. Male age at mating significantly influenced the fecundity and fertility of their mate and their own longevity. Females mating with 2-d-old males laid the most eggs and had the highest fertility. Males mating on day 2 after emergence lived significantly fewer days than males that mated on day 1 or on days 10 or 11. To document the effects of an adult mortality factor on S. exigua reproductive potential, the age at which moths mate must be standardized.
Reviewing the Book Reviews

Experimental Studies of Politics Futures (Forecasting) General Systems Yearbook Human Ecology Human Rights Quarterly Journal of American Studies Journal of Black Studies Journal of Contemporary History journal of Environmental Education Journal of Ethnic Studies Journal of Libertarian Studies Journal of the American Philosophical Society Micropolitics Plural Societies Political Geography Problems of Communism Publius (Federalism) Review of Public Data Use
Monitoring and Evaluation on Individual Dose of Some Medical Workers Engaged in Interventional Radiology in Tianjin City in 2008

[Objective]To understand the individual dose of occupational external exposure of medical workers engaged in interventional radiology in Tianjin City.[Methods]Thermoluminescence monitoring methods combined with related standard were used to evaluate and analyze 72 radiation workers in 4 hospitals of Tianjin City.[Results]Of the investigated 4 hospitals,annual dose equivalent per capita was 2.08,3.73,0.65 and 0.64 mSv,respectively.Annual dose equivalent per capita of all workers was 2.30 mSv;among which that of 61 workers (84.7%) was lower than 5 mSv;that of 9 (12.5%) was higher than 5 mSv but lower than 10 mSv;2 (2.8%) were higher than 10 mSv but lower than 20 mSv.No one's annual dose equivalent exceeded 20 mSv of all 72 workers.[Conclusion]Some radiation worker's individual dose exceed the standard limit.It is necessary to strengthen the radiation protection management among radiation workers to reduce the levels of individual dose.
Diagnosis and Management of Diastasis Recti

The etiology, diagnosis, and management of diastasis recti is now well understood and has demonstrated predictable and reproducible success. Multiparous women are at highest risk for developing diastasis recti. Diagnosis is easily made by clinical examination and symptomology and characterized by a midline abdominal bulge without a fascial defect. Classification systems have been proposed and based on the degree of rectus abdominis separation and myofascial deformity. Management options vary and will depend on the degree of separation between the rectus abdominis muscles. Simple plication has been effective for mild to moderate diastasis. The use of resorbable or nonresorbable mesh places as an onlay or in the retrorectus space has been effective for moderate-to-severe diastasis. The use of laparoscopic or endoscopic techniques can also be considered in select situations.
Temperamental Contributions to the Development of Psychological Profiles

Publisher Summary A temperamental bias is a biologically based susceptibility for particular feelings and actions, usually appearing during early childhood, that experiences sculpt into a large, but limited number of possible personality traits. The affective components of each bias include the ease and intensity with which particular feelings are experienced and the individual's ability to regulate them. Although most temperamental biases are the result of heritable variation in brain neurochemistry, some temperaments can be produced by prenatal events that are not strictly genetic, including season of conception and maternal infections or stressors that alter the chemical environment during gestation. Because the number of possible biological foundations for a temperament is very large, the majority of biases remain undiscovered. There are over 290000 combinations of the 12 blood types and their variants and the probability that any two people will have the same combination is 3 out of 10000. Because there are many more distinct neurochemical profiles than there are blood types, the chance of any two individuals having the same pattern of temperaments should be far less than 3 out of 10000. Newton's inverse square law explained why there are seasons; Darwinian theory provided an account of the similarities and differences among animals; the concept of “temperament” helps to explain why fraternal twins develop different personalities and why only some individuals exposed to a stressor acquire a form of psychopathology.
Retention of military tasks: A review.

Thirteen experiments conducted or sponsored by the Army Research Institute are reviewed. For the most part, these experiments have examined retention of military tasks performed in an operational environment. They provide empirical data on the effects of method, task, and ability variables that influence attempts to improve retention through training. These data provide information useful to trainers and training-program developers in deciding how, what, and whom to train to enhance retention and achieve greater training management effectiveness.
Diffuse coronary artery disease among other atherosclerotic plaque characteristics by coronary computed tomography angiography for predicting coronary vessel-specific ischemia by fractional flow reserve.

Abstract Background and aims Coronary computed tomography angiography (CCTA) permits effective identification of diffuse CAD and atherosclerotic plaque characteristics (APCs). We sought to examine the usefulness of diffuse CAD beyond luminal narrowing and APCs by CCTA to detect vessel-specific ischemia. Methods 407 vessels (n = 252 patients) from the DeFACTO diagnostic accuracy study were retrospectively analyzed for percent plaque diffuseness (PD). Percent plaque diffuseness (PD) was obtained on per-vessel level by summation of all contiguous lesion lengths and divided by total vessel length, and was logarithmically transformed (log percent PD). Additional CCTA measures of stenosis severity including minimal lumen diameter (MLD), and APCs, such as positive remodeling (PR) and low attenuation plaque (LAP), were also included. Vessel-specific ischemia was defined as fractional flow reserve (FFR) ≤0.80. Multivariable regression, discrimination by area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC), and category-free net reclassification improvement (cNRI) were assessed. Results Backward stepwise logistic regression revealed that for every unit increase in log percent PD, there was a 58% (95% CI: 1.01–2.48, p = 0.048) rise in the odds of having an abnormal FFR, independent of stenosis severity and APCs. The AUC indicated no further improvement in discriminatory ability after adding log percent PD to the final parsimonious model of MLD, PR, and LAP (AUC difference: 0.003, 95% CI: −0.003–0.010, p = 0.33). Conversely, adding log percent PD to the base model of MLD, PR, and LAP improved cNRI by 0.21 (95% CI: 0.01–0.41, p Conclusions Accounting for diffuse CAD may help improve the accuracy of CCTA for detecting vessel-specific ischemia.
Surface Structure of Clauses

Clause structures are the surface units which most regularly encode case frames, i. e., predications. Exceptions to clause-level encoding of predications are mentioned in the next chapter. Also postponed to the next chapter is the presentation of the distinction between independent and dependent clauses as basic structures versus medial and final (or initial and consecutive) clauses as more basic. This chapter is rather the place to discuss (1) systems of clause structure according to transitivity; (2) nominative—accusative versus ergative—absolutive structures; (3) passive, anti-passive, and agency hierarchy; (4) clause extensions, i. e., cleft, pseudocleft, extraposition, left-dislocation, etc.; (5) constituent order typologies. While there is a certain intrinsic interest in all the above, they are discussed here especially in relation to the structure of discourses.
Stability analysis for positive solutions for classes of semilinear elliptic boundary-value problems with nonlinear boundary conditions

We investigate the stability properties of positive steady-state solutions of semilinear initial–boundary-value problems with nonlinear boundary conditions. In particular, we employ a principle of linearized stability for this class of problems to prove sufficient conditions for the stability and instability of such solutions. These results shed some light on the combined effects of the reaction term and the boundary nonlinearity on stability properties. We also discuss various examples satisfying our hypotheses for stability results in dimension 1. In particular, we provide complete bifurcation curves for positive solutions for these examples.
Modeling Affordance Using Formal Methods

Affordances, or the physical interactions that an environment allows for a particular agent, are critical to the design of human-interactive systems. Researchers are developing formal models of human-device interaction that can be used to verify procedures, displays, and controls; however, no formal approaches to guide design exist for affordances. This paper presents such an approach. To model affordance formally, we instantiate an extant formalism from ecological psychology. A human-environment system model represents physical entities in an environment, properties such as 3-D spatial relations among them, and motor capabilities of a human operator. An application is demonstrated in an aircraft cabin door case study, and verification results aid in identifying an undesirable situation involving door openability.
Endogenous glutamate within the prelimbic and infralimbic cortices regulates the incubation of cocaine-seeking in rats

Abstract The incubation of cue-reinforced cocaine-seeking coincides with increased extracellular glutamate within the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC). The vmPFC is comprised of two subregions that oppositely regulate drug-seeking, with infralimbic (IL) activity inhibiting, and prelimibic (PL) activity facilitating, drug-seeking. Thus, we hypothesized that increasing and decreasing endogenous glutamate within the IL would attenuate and potentiate, respectively, cue-reinforced drug-seeking behavior, with the converse effects observed upon manipulations of endogenous glutamate within the PL. Male Sprague-Dawley rats were trained to self-administer cocaine (0.25 mg/infusion; 6 h/day X 10 days), the delivery of which was signaled by a tone-light cue. Rats were then subdivided into 3 or 30 day withdrawal groups. For testing, rats were microinjected with vehicle, 20 mM of the mGlu2/3 agonist LY379268 (to lower endogenous glutamate), or 300 μM of the excitatory amino acid transporter inhibitor threo-β-benzyloxyaspartate (TBOA; to raise endogenous glutamate) into either the IL or PL (0.5 μl/side) and then given a 30-min test for cue-reinforced drug-seeking. Vehicle-infused rats exhibited incubated responding on the cocaine-associated lever. Neither LY379268 nor TBOA altered behavior at 3 days withdrawal, indicating that glutamate within neither subregion regulates cue-reinforced drug-seeking during early withdrawal. At 30 days withdrawal, intra-PL LY379268 microinjection significantly decreased drug-seeking behavior, while the effect was more modest when infused intra-IL. Interestingly, intra-IL TBOA attenuated incubated drug-seeking during protracted withdrawal, but did not affect behavior when infused intra-PL. These results argue that glutamate release within the PL in response to drug-seeking likely drives the manifestation of incubated cocaine-seeking during protracted withdrawal.
Continued Tumor Reduction of Metastatic Pheochromocytoma/Paraganglioma Harboring Succinate Dehydrogenase Subunit B Mutations with Cyclical Chemotherapy

Patients harboring germline mutations in the succinate dehydrogenase complex subunit B (SDHB) gene present with pheochromocytomas and paragangliomas (PPGL) that are more likely malignant and clinically aggressive. The combination chemotherapy cyclophosphamide, vincristine, and dacarbazine (CVD) was retrospectively evaluated in patients with SDHB-associated metastatic PPGL.Query Twelve metastatic PPGL patients harboring SDHB mutations/polymorphisms with undetectable SDHB immunostaining were treated with CVD. CVD therapy consisted of 750 mg/m2 cyclophosphamide with 1.4 mg/m2 vincristine on day 1 and 600 mg/m2 dacarbazine on days 1 and 2, every 21–28 days. Treatment outcome was determined by RECIST criteria as well as determination of response duration and progression-free and overall survivals. A median of 20.5 cycles (range 4–41) was administered. All patients had tumor reduction (12–100% by RECIST). Complete response was seen in two patients, while partial response was observed in 8. The median number of cycles to response was 5.5. Median duration of response was 478 days, with progression-free and overall survivals of 930 and 1190 days, respectively. Serial [18F]-fluorodeoxyglucose positron emission tomography and computed tomography imaging demonstrated continued incremental reduction in maximal standardized uptake values (SUVmax) values in 26/30 lesions. During treatment administration, the median SUV decreased from > 25 to < 6, indicating the efficacy of chemotherapy over a prolonged period of time. Prolonged therapy results in continued incremental tumor reduction, and is consistent with persistent drug sensitivity. CVD chemotherapy is recommended to be considered part of the initial management in patients with metastatic SDHB-related PPGL.
On estimating the determinants of yearling thoroughbred prices.

Using information for 3,562 thoroughbreds listed in Keeneland's 2011 September yearling sale, hedonic pricing models were estimated using both ordinary least squares regression and a Heckman selection model to test the adverse selection hypothesis that vertically integrated sellers whom breed and race are penalised with bid shading relative to sellers whom only breed, ceteris paribus. Though the null hypothesis of no adverse selection was not rejected in the standard regression model, when taking into account censoring due to sellers withdrawing listed yearlings prior to the auction the null hypothesis was rejected. However, the impact of adverse selection was greatly attenuated by bid shading associated with the reputation effect of sellers, both those whom are vertically integrated and those whom just breed horses, willing to accept final bids less than the stud fee further lessening the winner's curse in the auction. This seller type is new to the literature and as such is a key innovation of this research. The models controlled for other observable characteristics of the yearlings as well as those of the seller and the design of the auction.
Hybrid Monolithic 3-D IC Floorplanner

With continued technology scaling, interconnects have become the bottleneck in further performance and power consumption improvements in modern microprocessors. 3-D integrated circuits (3-D ICs) provide a promising approach for alleviating this bottleneck and enabling higher performance while reducing the footprint area, wirelength, and overall power consumption. Among various 3-D IC solutions, monolithic 3-D ICs stand out as they can utilize the third dimension most efficiently owing to high-density monolithic intertier vias. Monolithic integration is possible at different levels of granularity: block level, gate level, and transistor level. A hybrid monolithic design has modules implemented in different monolithic styles to further optimize the design objectives such as area, wirelength, and power consumption. However, a lack of electronic design automation tools makes the hybrid monolithic 3-D IC design quite challenging. In this paper, we introduce the first hybrid monolithic 3-D IC floorplanner. We characterize the OpenSPARC T2 processor core using different monolithic implementations and compare their footprint area, wirelength, power consumption, and temperature. We show, via simulations, that under the same timing constraint, a hybrid monolithic design offers 48.1% reduction in the footprint area and 14.6% reduction in power consumption compared to those of the 2-D design at the cost of higher power density and slightly higher temperature.
A knowledge management architecture for information technology services delivery

This research paper aims to integrate knowledge management and data science practices with information technology services. Knowledge Management is a multidisciplinary scientific domain associated to the knowledge across departments of the organizations and is a field for researchers develop new improvements and innovations. New practices are evolving and incorporated in organizations, as is the case of IT Service Management and the service delivery provided to users and customers. Today's IT business is unstable, characterized by the speed of changes, where technology modify quickly, competitors multiply, and products and services rapidly become outdated. This research aims to provide a contribution to Knowledge Management by defining an architecture in order to demonstrate that this practices can contribute to improve IT services delivery. Design Science Methodology will be used to develop the architecture with a case study to achieve the expected results of providing a better results in the company service level agreement.
Reference Materials for Thermophysical Properties

Reference materials for use in calibrating either the temperature scale of equipment or a physical property measured by the equipment as a function of temperature are available worldwide. Reference materials are useful in developing new test methods as well as ensuring the compatibility of measurements both within and among laboratories. The reference materials that are described in this chapter include those for thermal conductivity, electrical resistivity, heat capacity, and thermal expansion.
ANOMALOUS TRANSPORT AND FRACTAL KINETICS

An orbit of the passive particle transport is associated with a streamline of a flow, if the flow is inviscid, stationary and incompressible. In a general situation 3D flows have a nontrivial topology of streamlines due to their chaotic behaviour. As a result of the chaos the real space has a complicated structure of islands and stochastic sea of fractal or multifractal nature. Transport of a passive particle can be described as a random walk in a multifractal medium. It is important that the random walk is also fractal in time. Altogether, this produces nontrivial exponents of the asymptotic law of the average particle displacement. A kinetic equation of particle transport is described in many details to draw the attention to new nontrivial aspects of the statistical irreversibility. The multifractal transport creates the possibility of anomalous diffusion due to the Levy process of a particle random walk or due to some analog of the Levy process. Coherent structures in the random walk of a passive particle and its intermittency are features of the fractal or multifractal space-time nature.
Trading spatial resolution for improved accuracy in remote sensing imagery: an empirical study using synthetic data

We consider the problem of detecting objects (such as trees, rooftops, roads, or cars) in remote sensing data including, for example, color or hyperspectral imagery. Many detection algorithms applied to this problem operate by assigning a decision statistic to all, or a subset, of spatial locations in the imagery for classification purposes. In this work we investigate a recently proposed method, called Local Averaging for Improved Predictions (LAIP), which can be used for trading off the classification accuracy of detector decision statistics with their spatial precision. We explore the behaviors of LAIP on controlled synthetic data, as we vary several experimental conditions: (a) the difficulty of the detection problem, (b) the spatial area over which LAIP is applied, and (c) how it behaves when the estimated ROC curve of the detector becomes increasingly inaccurate. These results provide basic insights about the conditions under which LAIP is effective.
Reply to Zahednasab et al.: HHV-6 and marmoset EAE.

We thank Zahednasab et al. (1) for their enthusiastic support of our paper (2) and insightful comments. We wholeheartedly agree that additional studies are needed to more fully elucidate mechanisms underlying the association of HHV-6 and other viruses with neuroinflammatory pathologies like multiple sclerosis (MS). The authors correctly note that in many rodent models of experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE), the spinal cord is predominantly affected. However, in marmoset … [↵][1]1To whom correspondence should be addressed. Email: jacobsons{at}ninds.nih.gov. [1]: #xref-corresp-1-1
Mechanical issues of the pelvic ileal pouch

Abstract Mechanical complications of the ileal pouch can be created or acquired. This chapter describes the common and clinically relevant mechanical complications of ileal pouch operations. Diagnostic and therapeutic recommendations are provided.
Abstract # 3084 Rat model of Prenatal Zika Virus infection

Zika virus (ZIKV), a mosquito-borne flavivirus, has been associated with microcephaly and other neurological disorders in infants born to infected mothers. Despite being declared an international emergency by the World Health Organization, comparatively very little is known about the pathogenesis, mechanisms, or behavioral consequences of maternal ZIKV infection in the offspring. Our lab is interested in developing a working animal model to answer some of these questions. Here, we use a rat model of prenatal ZIKV infection to measure the level of infectivity, as well as the rate of viral clearance in both the mother and her pups. We examine various aspects of brain development in pups, including cortical thickness, microglia morphology, apoptosis, and neurogenesis. Given that pregnancy is associated with significant immunomodulation, we are also interested in the role that pregnancy has on the impact of ZIKV infection, therefore we compare viral infectivity between both pregnant and non-pregnant female rats. In this study, we show that prenatal ZIKV infection results in an increase in cell death and reduces hippocampal and cortical volumes in the neonatal rat brain. For the first time, we demonstrate the efficacy and validity of a rat model for maternal ZIKV infection with vertical transmission to the fetus.
Lost in the Black Belt South: health outcomes and transportation infrastructure

The importance of transportation infrastructure to health outcomes has been increasingly recognized. However, the relationship between transportation and health is underexplored in rural areas. This study fills the gap by investigating rural health outcomes in association with two transportation infrastructures-highways and airports-in the Black Belt counties of the USA, a region characterized as predominantly rural and black and as having high poverty and unemployment. Spatial regression models are applied to analyze the 2010 data. The results suggest Black Belt counties have poorer health outcomes than their non-Black Belt counterparts, and the difference increases as the percentage of blacks increases. The results also show that the higher accessibility to an airport a county has, the better its health outcomes. Highways, however, do not have a statistically significant association with health outcomes. The poor health outcomes in the Black Belt counties are also influenced by poverty, rurality, unemployment, and low educational attainment. This research was the first to study transportation, especially airports, in the rural US South with relation to health outcomes. Our findings shed new light on removing the health disadvantages accumulated in the Black Belt.
Superdislocations and point defects in pyrochlore Yb 2 Ti 2 O 7 single crystals and implication on magnetic ground states

This study reports atomic-scale characterization of structural defects in Yb2Ti2O7, a pyrochlore oxide whose subtle magnetic interactions is prone to small perturbations. Due to discrepancies in the reported magnetic ground states, it has become a pressing issue to determine the nature of defects in this system. In the present study, we use atomic resolution scanning transmission electron microscopy techniques to identify the type of defects in the ytterbium titanate single crystals grown by the conventional optical floating zone (FZ) method. In addition to the known point defects of substitution Yb on Ti B-sites, extended defects such as dissociated superdislocations and anti-phase boundaries were discovered for the first time in this material. Such defects were prevalently observed in the FZ grown single crystals (of a darker color), in contrast to the stoichiometric white polycrystalline powders or high quality colorless single crystals grown by the traveling solvent floating zone technique. The lattice strains from these extended defects result in distortions of Yb-tetrahedron. A change of Ti valance was not detected at the defects. Our findings provide new insights into understanding the nature of defects that are of great importance for the physical property studies of geometrically frustrated compounds. Furthermore, this work sheds light on the complicated core structure of superdislocations that have large Burgers vectors in oxides with complex unit cells.
Quantitation of Single and Combinatorial Histone Modifications by Integrated Chromatography of Bottom-up Peptides and Middle-down Polypeptide Tails

The analysis of histone post-translational modifications (PTMs) by mass spectrometry (MS) has been critical to the advancement of the field of epigenetics. The most sensitive and accurate workflow is similar to the canonical proteomics analysis workflow (bottom-up MS), where histones are digested into short peptides (4-20 aa) and quantitated in extracted ion chromatograms. However, this limits the ability to detect even very common co-occurrences of modifications on histone proteins, preventing biological interpretation of PTM crosstalk. By digesting with GluC rather than trypsin, it is possible to produce long polypeptides corresponding to intact histone N-terminal tails (50-60 aa), where most modifications reside. This middle-down MS approach is used to study distant PTM co-existence. However, the most sensitive middle-down workflow uses weak cation exchange-hydrophilic interaction chromatography (WCX-HILIC), which is less robust than conventional reversed-phase chromatography. Additionally, since the buffer systems for middle-down and bottom-up proteomics differ substantially, it is cumbersome to toggle back and forth between both experimental setups on the same LC system. Here, we present a new workflow using porous graphitic carbon (PGC) as a stationary phase for histone analysis where bottom-up and middle-down sized histone peptides can be analyzed simultaneously using the same reversed-phase buffer setup. By using this protocol for middle-down sized peptides, we identified 406 uniquely modified intact histone tails and achieved a correlation of 0.85 between PGC and WCX-HILIC LC methods. Together, our method facilitates the analysis of single and combinatorial histone PTMs with much simpler applicability for conventional proteomics labs than the state-of-the-art middle-down MS.
Rumors of Our Death

Nunez and colleagues (2019) question whether cognitive science still exists "as a coherent academic field with a well-defined and cohesive interdisciplinary research program." This worry may be premature on two grounds. First, we are not convinced that the Lakatosian criterion of coalescence around a core framework is the best standard for judging whether a field is well-defined and productive. Second, although we acknowledge that cognitive science is not as visible as we would like, we doubt that this low profile accurately reflects the state of actual research and teaching programs based on the cognitive science approach.
Results of phase I clinical trial of high doses of seleno-l-methionine (SLM) in sequential combination with axitinib in previously treated and relapsed clear cell renal carcinoma (ccRCC) patients

Abstract Background The overexpression of hypoxia induced factor 1a/2a in ccRCC leads to up-regulation of vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) that results in increased angiogenesis, tumor metastasis, and treatment resistance. Using several preclinical xenograft models, it has been demonstrated that therapeutic doses and schedules of the selenium-containing molecules, seleno-L-methionine (SLM) and methylselenocysteine caused enhanced degradation of HIF1α/2α, down-regulation of oncogenic miRNA-210 and 155, up-regulation tumor suppressor miRNA-664 and LET-7b, and stabilization of tumor vasculature, yielding higher tumor drug uptake and protection from toxic side effects when combined with chemotherapeutic and VEGF-targeted agents. Methods This is a phase I (3 + 3 design) dose finding trial of SLM (2500, 3000 or 4000 µg) given orally twice daily for 14 days, followed by once a day in combination with standard dose axitinib to patients with metastatic ccRCC. Primary endpoint is safety; secondary endpoint is efficacy including overall response rate, progression free survival and overall survival. Results Twelve evaluable patients (pts) with metastatic ccRCC who progressed on one or more prior lines of treatment were enrolled. The first 3 pts were treated at 4000 µg, the second and third 3 pts were treated at 2500 and 3000 µg respectively. Additional 3 pts were added to 4000 µg. No dose limiting toxicity was seen. Most common AEs included fatigue, diarrhea, hypertension, nausea, anorexia, cough, proteinuria and weight loss. Of the 4000 µg cohort, 2 pts achieved complete response with ongoing responses at 31 and 29 months, 1 pt had partial response (PR) for 24 months. Of the 2500 µg cohort, 1 pt with ongoing PR for 21 months. The 3000 µg cohort, one pt has ongoing PR for 12 months. Conclusions SLM of 4000 µg is safe and the recommended phase 2 dose in combination with standard dose axitinib. The combination has promising efficacy with phase 2 trial is ongoing. Further data to be presented at the meeting. Clinical trial identification NCT02535533. Legal entity responsible for the study Yousef Zakharia. Funding Holden Comprehensive Cancer Centre. Disclosure Y. Zakharia: Advisory / Consultancy: Amgen; Advisory / Consultancy: Roche Diagnostics; Advisory / Consultancy: Novartis; Advisory / Consultancy: Jansen; Advisory / Consultancy: Eisai; Advisory / Consultancy: Exelixis; Advisory / Consultancy: Castle Bioscience; Advisory / Consultancy: Pfizer; Advisory / Consultancy: Bayer; Advisory / Consultancy: Array. M. Milhem: Advisory / Consultancy: Amgen; Advisory / Consultancy: Trieza; Advisory / Consultancy: Biontech; Advisory / Consultancy: Blueprint Medicines Corporation; Advisory / Consultancy: Immunocore; Advisory / Consultancy: Array. All other authors have declared no conflicts of interest.
Statistical Analysis Equipment for Propagation Research

The combination of a heavily instrumented research aircraft and automatic data reduction equipment for radio propagation studies is described. The analysis equipment produces 30-level amplitude distributions or twenty-lag auto- or cross-correlation functions at one pass of the film recording through a film-reader. The equipment has proved suitable for field use in improving experimental design, and is sufficiently rapid to make interpretation of results a longer process than routine data reduction. In accurate statistical measurements for such purposes as, say, the prediction of a proposed radar's performance, the overall system is of limited use because of the non-stationary character of the physical phenomena involved, the lack of physical understanding requisite for accurate extrapolations, and the complex propagation of errors through both measuring and proposed systems. The system has, however, shown sufficient accuracy and fiexibility to assist in determining physical cause and effect relationships, by establishing polarization and frequency trends, fiuctuation rates, etc., in field investigations of several propagation phenomena and their underlying physical causes.
Quantifying the effect of demographic stochasticity on the smoking epidemic in the presence of economic stimulus

Abstract Smoking, like many other social behaviors, is considered to spread like an epidemic through social interactions among peers. One of the commonly adopted interventions to curb the smoking epidemic is raise in tobacco taxes, which increases the price of cigarettes and makes it less affordable to consume. However, to what extent these interventions affect the spread of smoking behavior is not clearly known. Coupling the spread of smoking behavior with the commonly used interventions such as an increase in the price of cigarettes may offer new insight to control the smoking epidemic. Here, a mathematical model is formulated using differential equations assuming the increase in tax reduces the incidence rate and increases the quitting rate. The model analysis shows that the smoking epidemic has two steady states — smoking free steady-state (SFSS) and smoking endemic steady-state (SESS). The SFSS is stable until SESS exists, whereas the SESS is stable whenever exists. It is found that the smoking epidemic can coexist with economic interventions due to the strong coupling through a feedback loop. As smoking behavior spread amongst the peers, the contacts are mostly restricted to a small group where stochastic nature of social interactions can play a significant role. In view of this, the proposed model is extended to a Markov chain model that embodies the dynamic social contacts. It is found that demographic stochasticity can break the feedback loop between the smoking epidemic and interventions, thereby guarantee the escape from ‘smoking epidemic trap’, even if the parameters for the deterministic model are set within the basin of attraction of the SESS.
MACHINE LEARNING ALGORITHMS TO PREDICT 10-YEAR ATHEROSCLEROTIC CARDIOVASCULAR RISK IN A CONTEMPORARY, COMMUNITY-BASED HISTORICAL COHORT

The ACC/AHA Pooled Cohort Equation (PCE) for Atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ASCVD) has shown modest accuracy. We assessed if machine learning algorithms (MLA) could improve PCE performance with traditional and selected enriched clinical features. We tested MLA in a community cohort of
Apsidal Alignment in υ Andromedae

One of the parameters fitted by Doppler radial velocity measurements of extrasolar planetary systems is ω, the argument of pericenter of a given planet's orbit referenced to the plane of the sky. Curiously, the ω's of the outer two planets orbiting υ Andromedae are presently nearly identical: Δω ≡ ωD - ωC = 48 ± 48 (1 σ). This observation is least surprising if planets C and D occupy orbits that are seen close to edge-on (sin iC, sin iD 0.5) and whose mutual inclination Θ does not exceed 20°. In this case, planets C and D inhabit a secular resonance in which Δω librates about 0° with an amplitude of ~30° and a period of ~4 × 103 yr. The resonant configuration spends about one-third of its time with |Δω| ≤ 10°. If Θ 40°, either Δω circulates or the system is unstable. This instability is driven by the Kozai mechanism, which couples the eccentricity of planet C to Θ to drive the former quantity to values approaching unity. Our expectation that Θ 20° suggests that planets C and D formed in a flattened, circumstellar disk, and this may be tested by upcoming astrometric measurements with the FAME satellite.
Book Review: Philosophies of Polar Law

A central policy and scholarly concern of international environmental law is the degree of its effectiveness. Several criteria have been offered for defining this overall objective—from changes in physical parameters in the atmosphere, seas, and on land to increased cooperation among nations and peoples who aim to protect the planet. What has been less often addressed is the underlying philosophy that one takes in considerations of the outcomes of legal initiatives. Is the aim of law utilitarian? Is it one of equality of enjoyment or use or exploitation of resources [if so, for whom?]. Should human legal requirements favor those living now or future generations? How should we value human impacts in comparison to the effects on nature? Is there a common good? This volume is a solid contribution to addressing these fundamental concerns. It addresses fascinating questions about goals of law, here Polar law, and it does so in a comprehensive, accessible and convincing way. The volume tackles the fundamental: What is Polar Law trying to achieve? What should be its goals? Philosophies of Polar Law provides perspectives for scholars and policymakers, those for whom this is a first exploration and those who may have set views of the answers.
The Small Aircraft Transportation System Project: An Update

To all peoples in all parts of the world throughout history, the ability to move about easily is a fundamental element of freedom. The American people have charged NASA to increase their freedom and that of their children knowing that their quality of life will improve as our nation s transportation systems improve. In pursuit of this safe, reliable, and affordable personalized air transportation option, in 2000 NASA established the Small Aircraft Transportation System (SATS) Project. As the name suggests personalized air transportation would be built on smaller aircraft than those used by the airlines. Of course, smaller aircraft can operate from smaller airports and 96% of the American population is within thirty miles of a high-quality, underutilized community airport as are the vast majority of their customers, family members, and favorite vacation destinations.
The Evidence on Universal Preschool Are Benefits Worth the Cost

Calls for universal preschool programs have become commonplace, reinforced by President Obama’s call for “high-quality preschool for all” in 2013. Any program that could cost state and federal taxpayers $50 billion per year warrants a closer look at the evidence on its effectiveness.This report reviews the major evaluations of preschool programs, including both traditional programs such as Head Start and those designated as “high quality.” These evaluations do not paint a generally positive picture. The most methodologically rigorous evaluations find that the academic benefits of preschool programs are quite modest, and these gains fade after children enter elementary school. This is the case for Head Start, Early Head Start, and also for the “high-quality” Tennessee preschool program. Meanwhile, most contemporary “high-quality” preschool programs have been evaluated using a flawed, non-experimental methodology called Regression Discontinuity Design (RDD). Existing RDD studies fail to account for children who drop out of treatment groups, thereby biasing outcomes upwards. Further, by their nature RDD evaluations cannot assess the fadeout problem because all children in the study, both treatment and control, have taken preschool. These problems affect the evaluation of the Tulsa, Oklahoma, program, perhaps the most frequently cited contemporary “high-quality” program.Two “high-quality” programs have been evaluated using a rigorous experimental design, and have been shown to have significant academic and social benefits, including long-term benefits. These are the Abecedarian and Perry Preschool programs. However, using these two studies as the basis for policy is problematic for several reasons: the groups studied were very small, they came from single communities several decades ago, and both programs were far more intensive than the programs being contemplated today.Before policymakers consider huge expenditures to expand preschool, especially by making it universal, much more research is needed to demonstrate true effectiveness.
Symplectic semifield planes and ℤ₄–linear codes

There are lovely connections between certain characteristic 2 semifields and their associated translation planes and orthogonal spreads on the one hand, and Z 4 -linear Kerdock and Preparata codes on the other. These interrelationships lead to the construction of large numbers of objects of each type. In the geometric context we construct and study large numbers of nonisomorphic affine planes coordinatized by semifields; or, equivalently, large numbers of non-isotopic semifields: their numbers are not bounded above by any polynomial in the order of the plane. In the coding theory context we construct and study large numbers of Z 4 -linear Kerdock and Preparata codes. All of these are obtained using large numbers of orthogonal spreads of orthogonal spaces of maximal Witt index over finite fields of characteristic 2. We also obtain large numbers of boring affine planes in the sense that the full collineation group fixes the line at infinity pointwise, as well as large numbers of Kerdock codes boring in the sense that each has as small an automorphism group as possible. The connection with affine planes is a crucial tool used to prove inequivalence theorems concerning the orthogonal spreads and associated codes, and also to determine their full automorphism groups.
Discovering Factions in the Computational Linguistics Community

We present a joint probabilistic model of who cites whom in computational linguistics, and also of the words they use to do the citing. The model reveals latent factions, or groups of individuals whom we expect to collaborate more closely within their faction, cite within the faction using language distinct from citation outside the faction, and be largely understandable through the language used when cited from without. We conduct an exploratory data analysis on the ACL Anthology. We extend the model to reveal changes in some authors' faction memberships over time.