cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Pleurabrade: A Spiral Brush for Mechanical Pleurodesis and a Review of the Literature.

Background While the optimal treatment for primary spontaneous pneumothorax remains unclear, mechanical pleurodesis is a well-established treatment. The Pleurabrade is a spiral brush designed for mechanical pleurodesis during thoracoscopy. We present two patients who underwent mechanical pleurodesis with the Pleurabrade. Case Description Two patients with spontaneous pneumothorax underwent operative intervention including mechanical pleurodesis with the Pleurabrade. Chest tubes were removed within 48 hours postoperatively and they were discharged home. Both patients remain recurrence free at 11 and 22 months, respectively. Conclusion While further testing is needed, these case reports and operative video highlight the Pleurabrade as an efficient device for thoracoscopic mechanical pleurodesis.
IL-6 Administration Increases the Exercise Pressor Reflex

IL-6 is both a pro-inflammatory cytokine released from macrophages as well as an anti-inflammatory myokine released from contracting skeletal muscle. Administration of IL-6 and the soluble form of ...
Distribution of Ostracoda at the Eo — Oligocene Boundary in Deep (Barbados) and Shallow Marine Environment (Gulf of Mexico)

Publisher Summary This chapter discusses the distribution of ostracoda at the Eo–Oligocene boundary in deep and shallow marine environment. In the Gulf Coast the shallow marine environment persists from the Eocene into the Oligocene and the fauna does not show any change at the generic level with the only exception of the near extinction of Haplocytheridea and its replacement by the related genus Hemicyprideis. Moreover most of the appearances and disappearances of species take place a little above or below the boundary. In Barbados the environment remained deep during Eocene and Oligocene. Faunas are less diverse than in the sublittoral environment and here also most changes in fauna take place above or below the boundary, where only K. cancuenensis disappears. In the deep environment of Mexico, the same is found with M. ovata disappearing at the Eo–Oligocene boundary. In other areas of Caribbean, the study of ostracodes is hampered by absence of Lower Oligocene beds and presence of massive limestones in the Upper Eocene. In Trinidad, the presence of a wildflysch facies has the effect of producing intense reworking near the Eo–Oligocene boundary.
“Starch is Very Fatty”: Understanding the Logic in Undergraduate Student Conceptions about Biological Molecules

Though student understanding of the nature of matter has been studied extensively, little is known about student knowledge of the biological molecules. This study examined understanding of proteins, carbohydrates, and lipids in 25 undergraduate students in order to document logical structures within student alternative concepts. Student knowledge of the particulate nature of matter (PNM) was collected in a pre-survey. Their knowledge of the biological molecules was collected via pre- and post-surveys, embedded questions, and interviews. No relationship was found between initial PNM knowledge and knowledge of molecules at the start of the course. By the end, however, strong correlations were found between initial PNM knowledge and knowledge of molecules. Students displayed alternative ways of categorizing biomolecules, using overlapping functional categories based on perceived nutritional roles. Their underlying assumptions about molecules fell into six categories: as goes macro, so goes micro; source = substance; molecule/energy equivalence; like acts upon like; functional equivalence; functional limitation. Student alternative conceptions displayed logical structure; their conceptions "worked" in their everyday lives. However, alternative categorizations of biomolecules used by low-PNM students interfered with their ability to understand biological processes that involved these molecules: enzyme activity, photosynthesis, and DNA synthesis. Educational implications of these findings are discussed.
CI-KNOW: recommendation based on social networks

Digital media and communication networks have become an important cyberinfrastructure to enable new levels of interactions in organizations and communities. A complicated knowledge network of individuals, documents, data, concepts, and their interconnections forms a virtual knowledge repository. To be more effective in using these resources, knowledge discovery tools are crucial for an organization and individual users to identify the right expertise or knowledge resources from this large "multidimensional network."Cyberinfrastructure Knowledge Networks on the Web (CI-KNOW) is a suite of Web-based tools that facilitates discovery of resources within communities. CI-KNOW implements a network recommendation system that incorporates social motivations for why we create, maintain, and dissolve our knowledge network ties. The network data is captured by automated harvesting of digital resources using Web crawlers, text miners, tagging tools that automatically generate community-oriented metadata, and scientometric data such as co-authorship and citations. Based on this knowledge network, the CI-KNOW recommender system produces personalized search results through two steps: identify matching entities according to their metadata and network statistics and select the best fits according to requester's perspectives and connections in social networks.Integrated with community Web portals, CI-KNOW navigation and auditing portlets provide analysis and visualization tools for community members and serves as a research testbed to examine social theories on individuals' motivations for seeking expertise from specific resources (people, documents, datasets, and etc.). As a proof-of-concept, this paper demonstrates how CI-KNOW, integrated with the NCI-supported Tobacco Informatics Grid (TobIG), facilitates knowledge sharing in the tobacco control research community.
Superconducting effective-mass anisotropy in Tl2Ba2CaCu2Ox.

Using torque magnetometry, we have obtained a lower bound of \ensuremath{\sim}${10}^{5}$ for the anisotropy of the superconducting effective mass in a single crystal of ${\mathrm{Tl}}_{2}$${\mathrm{Ba}}_{2}$${\mathrm{CaCu}}_{2}$${\mathrm{O}}_{\mathit{x}}$. This is the largest such anisotropy yet reported for a high-${\mathit{T}}_{\mathit{c}}$ material.
Reovirus-Specific Enzyme(s) Associated with Subviral Particles Responds In Vitro to Polyribocytidylate to Yield Double-Stranded Polyribocytidylate·Polyriboguanylate

Abstract In reovirus-infected cells, virus-specific particles accumulate that have associated with them a polyribocytidylate [poly(C)]-dependent polymerase. This enzyme copies in vitro poly(C) to yield the double-stranded poly(C)·polyriboguanylate [poly(G)]. The particles with poly(C)-dependent polymerase were heterogeneous in size, with most sedimenting from 300S to 550S. Exponential increase in these particles began at 23 h, and maximal amounts were present by 31 h, the time of onset of exponential growth of virus at 30°C. Maximal amounts of particles with active transcriptase and replicase were present at 15 and 18 h after infection. Thereafter, there was a marked decrease in particles with active transcriptase and replicase until base line levels were reached at 31 h. Thus, the increase in poly(C)-responding particles occurred coincident with the decrease in particles with active transcriptase and replicase. The requirement for poly(C) as template was specific because no RNA was synthesized in vitro in response to any other homopolymer, including 2′-O-methyl-poly(C). Synthesis was optimal in the presence of Mn2+ as the divalent cation, and no primer was necessary for synthesis. In contrast, the dinucleotide GpG markedly stimulated synthesis in the presence of 8 mM Mg2+. The size of the poly(C)·poly(G) synthesized in vitro was dependent on the size of the poly(C) used as template. This suggested that the whole template was copied into a complementary strand of similar size. The Tm of the product was between 100 and 130°C. Hydrolysis of the product labeled in [32P]GMP with alkali or RNase T2 yielded GMP as the only labeled mononucleotide. This does indicate that the synthesis of the poly(G) strand in vitro did not proceed by end addition to the poly(C) template, but proceeded on a separate strand.
CalvinFS: consistent WAN replication and scalable metadata management for distributed file systems

Existing file systems, even the most scalable systems that store hundreds of petabytes (or more) of data across thousands of machines, store file metadata on a single server or via a shared-disk architecture in order to ensure consistency and validity of the metadata.This paper describes a completely different approach for the design of replicated, scalable file systems, which leverages a high-throughput distributed database system for metadata management. This results in improved scalability of the metadata layer of the file system, as file metadata can be partitioned (and replicated) across a (shared-nothing) cluster of independent servers, and operations on file metadata transformed into distributed transactions.In addition, our file system is able to support standard file system semantics--including fully linearizable random writes by concurrent users to arbitrary byte offsets within the same file--across wide geographic areas. Such high performance, fully consistent, geographically distributed files systems do not exist today.We demonstrate that our approach to file system design can scale to billions of files and handle hundreds of thousands of updates and millions of reads per second-- while maintaining consistently low read latencies. Furthermore, such a deployment can survive entire datacenter outages with only small performance hiccups and no loss of availability.
Bilevel Positive Airway Pressure (BiPAP) by Nasal Mask for the Treatment of Respiratory Insufficiency Following Cardiac Surgery in Children

The authors present their experience with the use of bilevel positive airway pressure (BiPAP) administered via a nasal mask to treat respiratory failure in three children following surgery for congenital heart disease. The three children developed progressive atelectasis, hypoxemia, and impending respiratory failure following tracheal extubation in the postoperative period. The use of BiPAP by nasal mask resulted in a decrease in the patients' respiratory rate, an increase in oxygen saturation and PaO2, a decrease in transcutaneous CO2, and resolution of atelectasis. The applications of this technique and the equipment required are reviewed.
All Access Points are Not Created Equal: Explaining the Fate of Diffuse Interests in the EU

According to literature on organised interests in the European Union, the European Parliament's Environment Committee (ENVI) gives environmental interests a potent point of legislative access. Yet while ENVI helped sustain the EP's commitment to environmental interests in the case of the End-of-Life Vehicles Directive adopted in September 2000, it did not do so for REACH, a regulatory framework for the chemicals sector adopted by the EP and Council in December 2006. Ultimately, the value of legislative access for organised interest groups depends on the extent to which they have privileged interactions with a node in the policy-making apparatus and the degree to which actors in the policy-making process defer to the particular institutional node. For environmental interests, both privileged interactions between environmentalists and ENVI and deference to the committee decline when environmentalists seek regulations that impose concentrated costs on producers. Such instances invoke calls to protect industrial competitiveness and intensify conflict between EP committees.
A passive UHF RFID tag antenna for road marker navigation application

A rectangular spiral top-loaded UHF (910 MHz) passive RFID tag antenna is presented for road marker navigation system. The height of the antenna is reduced to 19 mm (0.057λ) in order to be enclosed in a road marker while maintaining the self-resonance and conical radiation pattern. The 10-dB operating frequency band of the antenna is 0.82%. The maximum directivity of the antenna is 4.17 dBi, and the efficiency is 85%.
Nanostructured Ceramic Thin Films and Membranes by Wet Chemical Processing Methods

Nanostructured ceramic thin films and membranes are used for protective or functional purposes and prepared on dense or porous substrate materials. Wet chemical methods enable cheap, low-temperature, mass-scale manufacturing routes. They produce fine-grained porous and dense micro-structures that cannot be realized otherwise. In wet-chemical processing, clean nanoparticle dispersions are deposited on the substrate at, primarily, ambient conditions. The deposition is followed by a (rapid) thermal processing treatment to remove liquids and organic additives, to convert precursors to the target composition, and to establish the final porous and dense micro-structure. In the synthesis of precursor dispersions it is very important to obtain nanoparticles with a near-isometric shape and a fairly narrow particle size distribution, without the formation of secondary (agglomerate) structures. In particular the latter requires careful control of solution and interfacial chemistry to achieve proper colloidal stability, during and after the synthesis process. Characterization of coating integrity, defect morphology and defect population is done by decoration methods, microscopy, ellipsometry and statistical methods that employ membrane transport properties.
A Global Database of Tropical Storm Surges

Tropical cyclone–generated storm surges are among the world's most deadly and costly natural disasters. The destructive nature of this hazard was clearly seen last fall, as Hurricane Sandy generated a devastating storm surge along the mid-Atlantic coast. The storm killed 147 people and caused approximately $50 billion in economic losses [Blake et al., 2012].
Oxidation of trichloroethene in stagnation flows over inert and catalytic heated ceramic surfaces

Raman scattering was used to measure major species in a stagnation point flow over heated ceramic surfaces. The surfaces were either nominally inert, or were coated with a chromium oxide catalyst. The flow contained trichloroethene and auxiliary fuels, as well as oxygen and nitrogen. The temperature of the surfaces could be adjusted. Resonant Raman scattering was used to measure the trichloroethene in the vicinity of the stagnation point. Results were compared with a numerical model of the flow. The experiments and the modeling showed that methane was not an effective auxiliary fuel for surface temperatures up to about 1200 K. However, propane and dimethyl ether were much more effective. The numerical model was able to achieve good agreement with the measurements after a slight adjustment to the surface temperature that was used in the calculations. Catalytically coated surfaces indicated the action of surface reactions that were successfully predicted with a simple surface reaction model.
Vestibular Deficits Leading to Disequilibrium and Falls in Ambulatory Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis

Abstract Objective To assess vestibular deficits in response to disequilibrium in ambulatory individuals with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ambALS). Design All participants completed standard protocols for the Sensory Organization Test (SOT) by computerized dynamic posturography. Setting Multidisciplinary amyotrophic lateral sclerosis clinic at an academic medical center. Participants Study participants (N=34) consisted of ambALS (n=19) and healthy controls (HC) (n=15). Interventions Not applicable. Main Outcome Measures Equilibrium scores (ESs) obtained from averaged sway amplitude in condition 5 (ES5) and condition 6 (ES6) of the SOT. Results In conditions of altered somatosensory information with vision absent or vision sway-referenced, the mean ± SD scores for ambALS (ES5=51.4±22.5; ES6=50.8±22.1) were lower than those for HC (ES5=65.4±11.7, P ≤.03; ES6=58.9±12.5, P >.05). Seven ambALS (37%) experienced a total of 19 falls during the sway-referenced support test conditions. There were no falls in the HC. Conclusions Nearly 37% of ambALS with normal clinical balance testing have decreased ability to use the vestibular input and required increased reliance on visual input for postural orientation to sustain equilibrium. The mechanism of this alteration in sensory preference is not completely clear. Extrapyramidal involvement early in ALS may be indicated.
The Sweet Tyranny Of Creating One's Own Life: Rethinking Power And Freedom In English Teaching

In this historical study of English teaching, Jory Brass adopts a governmentality perspective to highlight the contingency and limits of pedagogical arguments that construct an oppositional relation between power and freedom. In the first part of the essay, Brass historicizes contemporary critiques of transmission pedagogies by comparing them with touchstone pedagogical texts of the 1890s through the 1920s. Next, he revisits two early twentieth-century pedagogical frameworks to identify links among power, freedom, choice, and social norms that are obscured in contemporary pedagogical writing. Finally, Brass examines a popular contemporary text, Deborah Appleman's Critical Encounters in High School English, to highlight how its strategy to foster adolescents' freedom and empowerment inscribes social patterns of power and regulation. The study denaturalizes oppositional accounts of power and freedom so that scholars and teachers may scrutinize how power circulates when English is positioned to govern how students understand and conduct themselves as free, responsible, and empowered subjects.
Effects of calcium glucarate on the promotion of diethylnitrosamine-initiated altered hepatic foci in rats.

Abstract Calcium glucarate (CGT), an inhibitor of β-glucuronidase, is a potent inhibitor of chemically-induced tumors when administered orally. The present study was undertaken to determine the effects of CGT on the promotion of hepatocarcinogenesis by phenobarbital following initiation with diethylnitrosamine (DENA). Partially hepatectomized, DENA-initiated female Sprague-Dawley rats, previously maintained only on chow diet for 2 months, were supplemented with either 0.05% phenobarbital alone or 0.05% phenobarbital plus 4% dietary CGT, for varying time intervals up to 6 months. Histopathologic evaluation of the liver sections showed that CGT significantly delayed the development of altered hepatic foci (AHF). By the seventh month post-initiation, however, the frequency and severity of changes seen in the livers of experimental animals approximated those of the controls.
Sporadic breakdowns of stability in the PBL over simple and complex terrain

Breakdowns of stability in the PBL are examined using one-minute average horizontal wind speeds and temperatures observed over many nights at stations located in simple and complex terrain. The analysis is based on the temporal behavior of the wind speed-temperature covariance, which is obtained by digital bandpass filtering. It is shown that breakdowns are a common feature of the stable PBL over both simple and complex environments. Vertical fluxes of heat during breakdowns are estimated to be a significant fraction of the nighttime average heat flux. It is hypothesized that a major portion of the nighttime vertical transfer of heat, momentum, and atmospheric pollutants occurs during periods of stability breakdowns.
DEFINING HISTORICAL MATERIAL TRENDS AND CONSUMPTION GROUPS THROUGH ARTIFACT DENSITY

Artifact density is a useful yet overlooked analysis variable in archaeology. Drawing upon a sample of sites in the middle Savannah River valley, artifact density is used to identify diachronic consumption trends between the 1700s and 1900s. Analysis results illustrate the development of consumerism over time in the study area indicated by increasing material deposition at archaeological sites. Artifact density is also used to define consumption groups for different time periods. Within cultural resource management studies, the methods discussed in this article could be used to aid in site evaluation and serve as a systematic framework to guide archaeological testing and excavation.
The kindling-activated neuronal network: Recruitment of somatostatin-synthesizing neurons

The present study demonstrates the anatomical extent of the kindling-activated neuronal network in general, and specifically the recruitment of extrahippocampal somatostatin (SST)-synthesizing neurons into this network. It has been known that SST neurons of the hippocampal formation are activated during episodes of seizure, however, it was not known if this activation was a local event or extended to other areas in the brain. We were therefore interested in determining if and which SST neurons outside the hippocampal formation might be recruited into this seizure-activated neuronal network. Using the kindling model of seizure elicitation, expression of the Fos protein in activated, depolarized neurons was utilized to identify seizure-activated neurons. Subsequently, the mRNA for SST was identified through in situ hybridization in the same tissue section, allowing the identification of seizure-activated, SST-synthesizing neurons. The results show that: (a) the majority of SST-synthesizing neurons in the forebrain and diencephalon became activated during the kindling development; (b) their recruitment into the kindling-activated neuronal network occurred progressively; and, (c) these SST-synthesizing neurons represented a component of the kindling-activated neuronal network throughout the development of kindling-induced seizures.
UMLS content views appropriate for NLP processing of the biomedical literature vs. clinical text

Identification of medical terms in free text is a first step in such Natural Language Processing (NLP) tasks as automatic indexing of biomedical literature and extraction of patients' problem lists from the text of clinical notes. Many tools developed to perform these tasks use biomedical knowledge encoded in the Unified Medical Language System (UMLS) Metathesaurus. We continue our exploration of automatic approaches to creation of subsets (UMLS content views) which can support NLP processing of either the biomedical literature or clinical text. We found that suppression of highly ambiguous terms in the conservative AutoFilter content view can partially replace manual filtering for literature applications, and suppression of two character mappings in the same content view achieves 89.5% precision at 78.6% recall for clinical applications.
Brief neuropsychologic differentiation of demented versus depressed elderly inpatients

Recent investigations have suggested the utility of brief, psychometric screening batteries in the early detection of abnormal mental decline. This study extended the investigation of one of these batteries, comprised of three tests (Controlled Oral Word Association, Visual Retention, Temporal Orientation), to the difficult issue of differentiating dementia from depression in a hospitalized sample composed of a group of depressed only patients (N = 50) vs an age-matched demented group (N = 50), some of whom presented mixed dementia/depression syndromes. Demented patients consistently performed more poorly as a group than depressed patients on each of the three measures. This was the case even when three-group (demented only, mixed demented/depressed, depressed only) comparisons were conducted. Impairment was more common on one or more tests with demented vs depressed patients. However, limitations for screening purposes and for the definitive detection of dementia were noted in view of only moderate predictive power of the tests with discriminant function analysis. Nevertheless, the potential clinical utility of the three tests in the general hospital and other primary care settings was apparent.
Factors impacting the activity of 2,4-diacetylphloroglucinol-producing Pseudomonas fluorescens against take-all of wheat

Abstract Take-all, caused by Gaeumannomyces graminis var. tritici, is an important soilborne disease of wheat worldwide. Pseudomonas fluorescens producing the antibiotic 2,4-diacetylphloroglucinol (2,4-DAPG) are biocontrol agents of take-all and provide natural suppression of the disease during wheat monoculture known as take-all decline. To identify factors that could contribute to the effectiveness of 2,4-DAPG producers in take-all suppression, P. fluorescens strains Q8r1-96 (genotype D) and Q2-87V1 (genotype B; reduced antibiotic production) were tested against three pathogen isolates differing in sensitivity to 2,4-DAPG (LD5, ARS-A1 and R3-111a-1) and two wheat cultivars (Tara and Buchanan). The antibiotic sensitivity of the pathogen and cultivar significantly affected the level of take-all suppression by Q8r1-96 and Q2-87V1; suppression was greatest with LD5 and Tara. Q8r1-96 suppressed ARS-A1 and R3-111a-1 on Tara but not Buchanan, and Q2-87V1 failed to suppress either pathogen isolate on either cultivar. Q8r1-96 colonized the rhizosphere of Tara and Buchanan grown in soil similarly, but 2,4-DAPG accumulation was higher on the roots of Buchanan than Tara. 2,4-DAPG at 7.5 μg mL−1 reduced the growth of roots of both cultivars, and 10 μg mL−1 caused brown necrosis and tissue collapse of seedling roots and reduced root hair development. The half-life of 2,4-DAPG in the rhizosphere was estimated to be 0.25 days. These results suggest that several interconnected factors including sensitivity of G. graminis var. tritici to 2,4-DAPG, wheat cultivar, fluctuations in populations of 2,4-DAPG producers, and antibiotics accumulation in the rhizosphere will impact the robustness of take-all suppression by P. fluorescens in the field.
Immunologic studies in contacts of osteosarcoma in humans and animals

AGENT(S) which could cause unrecognised or subclinical infections in otherwise healthy human household contacts of cancer patients may he detected by epidemiologic studies. Support for this hypothesis is provided by the reports of an increase in tumour specific humoral antibodies, as well as tumour specific cell mediated immunity1–4 in the household contacts of patients with osteosarcoma, adenocarcinoma of the breast and other malignancies. Clear evidence for the validity of this conclusion has not been obtained. To test this hypothesis, we studied antibodies (both humoral and cellular) in the household contacts of a patient with osteosarcoma. In addition, in an animal model for human osteosarcoma, we characterised the sera and lymphocytes of hamster mothers (in close contact with their offspring) before and after induction of the tumour in their immunosuppressed offspring.
Qualitative and quantitative differences in particulate organic matter fractions in organic and conventional farming systems

Abstract To quantify functionally important differences in soil organic matter (SOM) that result from use of different farming practices, soils from 9 long-term trials comparing manure+legume-based organic, legume-based organic, and conventional farming systems were collected and particulate organic matter (POM) was fractionated to reflect its position within the soil matrix. The free, light POM (FPOM; 53 μm) obtained by wet sieving. Fraction C, N, and hydrolyzable N (quantified using the Illinois test (IL-N)) were determined. Organic farming systems had greater quantities of C and N in the OPOM and CF and, greater IL-N contents in all POM fractions considered. The OPOM's C:N ratio (16–19) and was least in the manure+legume-based organic, intermediate in the legume-based organic, and greatest in the conventional systems ( P 0.10 ). Trends in OPOM C:N and IL-N abundance suggested occluded POM was most decomposed, and possibly a greater N reservoir, in the manured soils. The FPOM quality reflected the residues added to each system and its removal improved resolution of quality-based differences in POM associated with long-term management. Subdivision of POM revealed differences in its quality that were not evident using the undifferentiated CF. Quantification of hydrolysable N (IL-N) in POM did not enhance our understanding of management's affect on SOM quality. This multi-site comparison showed organic management simultaneously increased the size of the labile N reservoir and the amount of POM protected within aggregates; and that, occluded POM is more decomposed in manure+legume- than in legume-based organic systems. The characteristics of POM reveal how organic practices improve SOM and suggest the nutrient and substrate decay dynamics of organic systems may differ as a result of the N fertilization strategies they employ.
The SET domain protein Metnase mediates foreign DNA integration and links integration to nonhomologous end-joining repair

The molecular mechanism by which foreign DNA integrates into the human genome is poorly understood yet critical to many disease processes, including retroviral infection and carcinogenesis, and to gene therapy. We hypothesized that the mechanism of genomic integration may be similar to transposition in lower organisms. We identified a protein, termed Metnase, that has a SET domain and a transposase/nuclease domain. Metnase methylates histone H3 lysines 4 and 36, which are associated with open chromatin. Metnase increases resistance to ionizing radiation and increases nonhomologous end-joining repair of DNA doublestrand breaks. Most significantly, Metnase promotes integration of exogenous DNA into the genomes of host cells. Therefore, Metnase is a nonhomologous end-joining repair protein that regulates genomic integration of exogenous DNA and establishes a relationship among histone modification, DNA repair, and integration. The data suggest a model wherein Metnase promotes integration of exogenous DNA by opening chromatin and facilitating joining of DNA ends. This study demonstrates that eukaryotic transposase domains can have important cell functions beyond transposition of genetic elements.
The impact of generic-only drug benefits on patients' use of inhaled corticosteroids in a Medicare population with asthma

Patients face increasing insurance restrictions on prescription drugs, including generic-only coverage. There are no generic inhaled corticosteroids (ICS), which are a mainstay of asthma therapy, and patients pay the full price for these drugs under generic-only policies. We examined changes in ICS use following the introduction of generic-only coverage in a Medicare Advantage population from 2003–2004. Subjects were age 65+, with asthma, prior ICS use, and no chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder (n = 1,802). In 2004, 74.0% switched from having a $30 brand-copayment plan to a generic-only coverage plan (restricted coverage); 26% had $15–25 brand copayments in 2003–2004 (unrestricted coverage). Using linear difference-in-difference models, we examined annual changes in ICS use (measured by days-of-supply dispensed). There was a lower-cost ICS available within the study setting and we also examined changes in drug choice (higher- vs. lower-cost ICS). In multivariable models we adjusted for socio-demographic, clinical, and asthma characteristics. In 2003 subjects had an average of 188 days of ICS supply. Restricted compared with unrestricted coverage was associated with reductions in ICS use from 2003–2004 (-15.5 days-of-supply, 95% confidence interval (CI): -25.0 to -6.0). Among patients using higher-cost ICS drugs in 2003 (n = 662), more restricted versus unrestricted coverage subjects switched to the lower-cost ICS in 2004 (39.8% vs. 10.3%). Restricted coverage was not associated with decreased ICS use (2003–2004) among patients who switched to the lower-cost ICS (18.7 days-of-supply, CI: -27.5 to 65.0), but was among patients who did not switch (-38.6 days-of-supply, CI: -57.0 to -20.3). In addition, restricted coverage was associated with decreases in ICS use among patients with both higher- and lower-risk asthma (-15.0 days-of-supply, CI: -41.4 to 11.44; and -15.6 days-of-supply, CI: -25.8 to -5.3, respectively). In this elderly population, patients reduced their already low ICS use in response to losing drug coverage. Switching to the lower-cost ICS mitigated reductions in use among patients who previously used higher-cost drugs. Additional work is needed to assess barriers to switching ICS drugs and the clinical effects of these drug use changes.
Interactions between the Protonated Schiff Base and Its Counterion in the Photointermediates of Bacteriorhodopsin

In a previous study, we have shown that halide salts of the protonated Schiff base (pSB) of all-trans-retinal with aniline crystallize in the 6-s-trans conformation. These compounds are therefore b...
Potency of commercial anti-bovine sera.

Abstract A survey was made of anti-sera having application for immunoelectrophoretic studies of bovine immunoglobulins. Commercial preparations exhibited extreme variability in potency and, in some instances, failed to meet the manufacturers’ specifications. High potency of a specific anti-serum from one supplier did not necessarily indicate that other reagents from the same source were of equally high quality. All commercial anti-sera should be evaluated prior to use in the laboratory.
Amorphous magnetoelastic sensors for the detection of biological agents

Abstract Freestanding amorphous magnetoelastic (ME) biosensors were fabricated by two ways. One type with larger size, 2000 × 400 × 15 μm, 1000 × 200 × 15 μm and 500 × 100 × 15 μm, was made from an ME Fe40Ni38Mo4B18 ribbon, the other with smaller size 200 × 40 × 4 μm was manufactured by dual beam sputtering and non-traditional microelectronic fabrication techniques. Both platforms were immobilized with JRB7 phage and were developed for the real-time in vitro detection of Bacillus anthracis spores. The experimental results show that the measured sensitivity of the ME sensors agrees with theoretical predictions and the specificity of ME sensors coated with JRB7 phage for B. anthracis spore species is excellent. The 200 × 40 × 4 μm biosensor was found to have a detection limit of 102 cfu/ml and sensitivity of 13.1 kHz/decade.
Estrogen receptor α polymorphism in a species with alternative behavioral phenotypes.

The evolution of behavior relies on changes at the level of the genome; yet the ability to attribute a behavioral change to a specific, naturally occurring genetic change is rare in vertebrates. In the white-throated sparrow (Zonotrichia albicollis), a chromosomal polymorphism (ZAL2/2m) is known to segregate with a behavioral phenotype. Individuals with the ZAL2m haplotype engage in more territorial aggression and less parental behavior than individuals without it. These behaviors are thought to be mediated by sensitivity to sex steroids, and the chromosomal rearrangement underlying the polymorphism has captured a prime candidate gene: estrogen receptor 1 (ESR1), which encodes estrogen receptor α (ERα). We therefore hypothesized that the behavioral effects of the ZAL2m rearrangement are mediated by polymorphism in ESR1. We report here that (i) the ESR1 promoter region contains fixed polymorphisms distinguishing the ZAL2m and ZAL2 alleles; (ii); those polymorphisms regulate transcription efficiency in vitro and therefore potentially do the same in vivo (iii); the local expression of ERα in the brain depends strongly on genotype in a free-living population; and (iv) ERα expression in the medial amygdala and medial preoptic area may fully mediate the effects of genotype on territorial aggression and parenting, respectively. Thus, our study provides a rare glimpse of how a chromosomal polymorphism has affected the brain and social behavior in a vertebrate. Our results suggest that in this species, differentiation of ESR1 has played a causal role in the evolution of phenotypes with alternative life-history strategies.
The EMPMD: A positive force in TMS programming

As one of the five TMS technical divisions, EMPMD consists of the following technical committees: Alloy Phases; Biomaterials; Chemistry and Physics of Materials; Electronic Materials; Electronic Packaging and Interconnection Materials; Energy Conversion and Storage Materials; Magnetic Materials; Nanomaterials; Thin Films and Interfaces. The first three committees are also with the Structural Materials Division, and focus their symposia on functional materials. The Alloy Phases Committee covers metallic phases in relation to thermodynamics, phase equilibria, crystal structure, atomic parameters, and electronic structures. The committee also supports the selection procedure for the Hume– Rothery Award and sponsors the corresponding Hume–Rothery Symposium at TMS Annual Meetings. The Biomaterials Committee develops programming at the TMS Annual Meeting and the Materials Science and Technology (MS&T) meetings. The leading topics relate to biomaterials processing, characterization, in vitro testing, and modeling. These symposia include sessions on nanoparticles for medical diagnosis and treatment, functional nanobiomaterials, novel medical alloys, biologically derived materials, biomimetic materials, surface modification of biomaterials, novel materials for tissue engineering, and novel materials for drug delivery. The Chemistry and Physics of Materials Committee hosts historically wellattended recurring symposia, such as Computational Thermodynamics and The EMPMD: A Positive Force in TMS Programming
Sialocystadenoma papilliferum of the palate.

Summary The clinical and histological data concerning a case of sial-(ocyst)-adenoma papilliferum of the palate are presented. Ten cases of sialadenoma papilliferum have been reported to date. The lesion is characterized by several distinct clinical and histological features resembling in many aspects the syringocystadenoma papilliferum of the skin. Because of the invariable presence of more or less cystically dilated salivary gland ducts we propose to denote the lesion as sialocyst-adenoma papilliferum. Generally these neoplasms behave as benign tumours with an indolent and asymptomatic clinical course, although a single case of a malignant counterpart has been reported. An adequate local excision seems to be the treatment of choice. An accurate follow-up is required.
Bandwidth Extension of Speech using Perceptual Criteria

Bandwidth extension of speech is used in the International Telecommunication Union G.729.1 standard in which the narrowband bitstream is combined with quantized high band parameters. Although this system produces high quality wideband speech, the additional bits used to represent the high band can be further reduced. In addition to the algorithm used in the G.729.1 standard, bandwidth extension methods based on spectrum prediction have also been proposed. Although these algorithms do not require additional bits, they perform poorly when the correlation between the low and the high band is weak. In this dissertation, two wideband speech coding algorithms that rely on bandwidth extension are developed. The algorithms operate as wrappers around existing narrowband compression schemes. More specifically, in these algorithms, the low band is encoded using an existing toll-quality narrowband system, whereas the high band is generated using the proposed extension techniques. The first method relies only on transmitted high-band information to generate the wideband speech. The second algorithm uses a constrained minimum mean square error estimator that combines transmitted high-band envelope information with a predictive scheme driven by narrowband features. Both algorithms make use of novel perceptual models based on loudness that determine optimum quantization strategies for wideband recovery and synthesis. Objective and subjective evaluations reveal that the proposed system performs at a lower average bit rate while improving speech quality when compared to other similar algorithms.
Triple quadrupole mass spectrometry as applied to flame diagnostics: study of the C2H4/N2O/Ar Flame

A recently developed research apparatus for characterization of low-pressure premixed flames has been developed and was used to characterize the C2H4/N2O/Ar flame at 20 torr. This instrument incorporates several diagnostic techniques in one apparatus so that individual techniques can be quantitatively compared and the usable detection range (both in terms of resolution and species detection) expanded. Results discussed in this report include mass analysis by triple quadrupole mass spectrometer and temperature measurement by thermocouple. Concentration profiles in the one-dimensional flame include CO, N2, and C2H4, at nominal m/z 28 as well as CO2 and N2O at m/z 44.
Nucleotide sequences of genes encoding a 72,000 molecular weight mosquitocidal protein and an associated 20,000 molecular weight protein are highly conserved in subspecies of Bacillus thuringiensis from Israel and The Philippines

Two subspecies of #Bacillus thuringiensis#, ssp. #israelensis# (BTI) from the Negev Desert of Israel, and the PG-14 isolate of ssp. #morrisoni# (BTM PG-14) from Cebu City in The Philippines, produce mosquitocidal parasporal bodies with similar but not identical protein complements. To investigate the relatedness of the proteins which occur in the parasporal bodies of these two isolates, we cloned and sequenced the genes encoding a 72,000 M, protein (#CrylVD# gene) and an associated protein of 20,000 M, located 279 base pairs downstream. The nueleotide sequence of the open reading frame for the BTM #crylVD# gene differed from that of the corresponding BTI gene at a single position (1764; T in BTI, C in STM PG-14), but the resulting codon encoded the same amino acid (valine). The nucleotide sequence of the open reading frame for the 20,000 M, protein of BTM PG-14 contained two substitutions in comparison to STI, C for T at position 54, and G for T at position 384, but neither of these substitutions resulted in a change in the amino acid encoded. These results demonstrate that a remarkable degree of conservation exists among the genes encoding CryIVD and 20,000 M, proteins of BTI and BTM PG-14, suggesting that the plasmid encoding these genes has a common origin and perhaps was transmitted from one subspecies to the other during their recent evolutionary past. (Resume d'auteur)
On the mechanical theory for biological pattern formation

Abstract We investigate the pattern-forming potential of mechanical models in embryology proposed by Oster, Murray and their coworkers. We show that the presence of source terms in the tissue extracellular matrix and cell density equations give rise to spatio-temporal oscillations. An extension of one such model to include ‘biologically realistic long range effects induces the formation of stationary spatial patterns. Previous attempts to solve the full system were in one dimension only. We obtain solutions in one dimension and extend our simulations to two dimensions. We show that a single mechanical model alone is capable of generating complex but regular spatial patterns rather than the requirement of model interaction as suggested by Nagorcka et al. and Shaw and Murray. We discuss some biological applications of the models among which are would healing and formation of dermatoglyphic (fingerprint) patterns.
Deficits in reciprocal social behavior in male twins: evidence for a genetically independent domain of psychopathology.

ABSTRACT Objective Previous studies have demonstrated substantial genetic influences on many child psychiatric disorders, including autism. In this study the authors attempted to quantify the degree to which genetic influences on deficits in reciprocal social behavior (a defining feature of pervasive developmental disorders) are shared with genetic influences on other domains of behavior in children. Method Child Behavior Checklists (CBCL) and Social Responsiveness Scales (SRS) were completed for an epidemiological sample of 219 pairs of male twins. The SRS (formerly known as the Social Reciprocity Scale) is a measure of social impairment that distinguishes children with autism spectrum disorders from those with other child psychiatric disorders. Results Regression analysis indicated that CBCL syndromes account for 43% of the variance in SRS scores. Bivariate analyses revealed that SRS scores are affected, in part, by phenotypic influences from the CBCL Social Problem syndrome. Forty-four percent of the causal influences on SRS scores, however, are independent from those on CBCL syndromes and are genetic in nature (90% confidence interval: 0.38–0.49). Conclusion These results support the existence of a continuous distribution of deficits in reciprocal social behavior in the population, which are substantially genetically independent from other domains of child psychopathology.
Expanding Our Understanding of the Assisted Living Experience

Abstract Assisted living has become a common form of community-based care for frail older persons, but research on the experience of assisted living has lagged behind this development. In this study we focused on assisted living residents' perceptions of their residences and their surrounding community in an effort to better understand the assisted living experience in the context of aging-in-place. Using questionnaires completed by residents in different geographical locations, two researchers coded responses to four open-ended questions. Reliability of coding results were supported with tetrachoric correlations and Kappa coefficients. The analyses offer both a confirmation and an expansion of current conceptualizations of assisted living. In particular, we suggest that assisted living helps overcome the tension between disengagement and place attachment, provides purposeful activities for residents that support well-being, and that staff play important roles in activities and the overall experience of a...
Sensitivity of Cultured Mammalian Cells to Streptomycin and Dihydrostreptomycin.

Cultured mammalian cells killed by streptomycin were essentially unaffected by an identical concentration of dihydrostreptomycin.
Interparental aggression and infant patterns of adrenocortical and behavioral stress responses

Drawing on emotional security theory, this study examined linkages between interparental aggression, infant self-regulatory behaviors, and patterns of physiological and behavioral stress responses in a diverse sample of 735 infants residing in predominately low-income, non-metropolitan communities. Latent profile analysis revealed four classes of adrenocortical and behavioral stress-response patterns at 7 months of age, using assessments of behavioral and cortisol reactivity to an emotion eliciting challenge, as well as global ratings of the child's negative affect and basal cortisol levels. The addition of covariates within the latent profile model suggested that children with more violence in the home and children who used less caregiver-oriented regulation strategies were more likely to exhibit a pattern of high cortisol reactivity with moderate signs of distress rather than the average stress response, suggesting possible patterns of adaptation in violent households. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Dev Psychobiol. Language: en