cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Trauma‐induced alterations in cognition and Arc expression are reduced by previous exposure to 56Fe irradiation

Exposure to ionizing irradiation may affect brain functions directly, but may also change tissue sensitivity to a secondary insult such as trauma, stroke, or degenerative disease. To determine if a low dose of particulate irradiation sensitizes the brain to a subsequent injury, C56BL6 mice were exposed to brain only irradiation with 0.5 Gy of 56 Fe ions. Two months later, unilateral traumatic brain injury was induced using a controlled cortical impact system. Three weeks after trauma, animals received multiple BrdU injections and 30 days later were tested for cognitive performance in the Morris water maze. All animals were able to locate the visible and hidden platform during training; however, treat- ment effects were seen when spatial memory retention was assessed in the probe trial (no platform). Although sham and irradiated animals showed spatial memory retention, mice that received trauma alone did not. When trauma was preceded by irradiation, performance in the water maze was not different from sham-treated animals, suggesting that low- dose irradiation had a protective effect in the context of a subsequent traumatic injury. Measures of hippocampal neurogenesis showed that combined injury did not induce any changes greater that those seen after trauma or radiation alone. After trauma, there was a significant decrease in the percentage of neurons expressing the behaviorally induced imme- diate early gene Arc in both hemispheres, without associated neuronal loss. After combined injury there were no differences relative to sham- treated mice. Our results suggest that combined injury resulted in decreased alterations of our endpoints compared to trauma alone. Although the underlying mechanisms are not yet known, these results resemble a preconditioning, adaptive, or inducible-like protective response, where a sublethal or potentially injurious stimulus (i.e., irradia- tion) induces tolerance to a subsequent and potentially more damaging insult (trauma). V C 2010 Wiley-Liss, Inc.
Modeling and analysis of a trace referenced to a meshed ground plane

Meshed planes are used in today's flexible PCB designs, and due to their non-homogeneous nature, Modeling of nearby interconnects increases in complexity. In this paper, a method to evaluate the effective characteristic impedance of a trace referenced to a meshed plane is proposed that is simpler and optimization based. The effective impedance and the per-unit-length parameters of the line were associated with the meshed plane periodical patterns as well as trace relative locations. A systematic study was performed to reveal the essential relationship between the meshed plane geometric parameters and the trace characteristics.
Elements of Lumped-Parameter Modeling in MEMS

In this chapter, we discuss the various elements of lumped-parameter modeling in MEMS devices. These include the stiffness of microstructures, the inertia elements, and the damping mechanisms of energy dissipation in microstructures. The forces affecting microstructures due to actuation and detection are another element, which is the subject of Chap. 3. The discussion here is focused mainly on linear modeling; nonlinear modeling is introduced in the following chapter.
Comparative Logistics and Production Costs for Global Manufacturing Strategy

Today′s changing global business environment requires firms to develop a better approach to global manufacturing operations. Of particular importance is the interaction between logistics and manufacturing activities. A survey of 101 senior manufacturing and materials managers revealed both important insight into the global co‐production decision and interesting comparative data for key value‐added activities. This research also evaluated the rationale behind, and overall benefit of, global manufacturing strategies. Presents key findings.
Is limiting transfusion safe? The devil is in the details.

From the Department of Surgery, University of Kentucky, Lexington, Ky. Disclosures: Authors have nothing to disclose with regard to commercial support. Received for publication Aug 31, 2015; accepted for publication Aug 31, 2015; available ahead of print Oct 1, 2015. Address for reprints: Victor A. Ferraris, MD, PhD, Department of Surgery, University of Kentucky, A301 Kentucky Clinic, 740 S Limestone, Lexington, KY 40506-0284 (E-mail: ferraris@uky.edu). J Thorac Cardiovasc Surg 2015;150:1032-4 0022-5223/$36.00 Copyright 2015 by The American Association for Thoracic Surgery http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jtcvs.2015.08.109 M ea n pr ed ic te d op er at iv e m or ta lit y
Data Collection in Zooarchaeology: Incorporating Touch-Screen, Speech-Recognition, Barcodes, and GIS

When recording observations on specimens, zooarchaeologists typically use a pen and paper or a keyboard. However, the use of awkward terms and identification codes when recording thousands of specimens makes such data entry prone to human transcription errors. Improving the quantity and quality of the zooarchaeological data we collect can lead to more robust results and new research avenues. This paper presents design tools for building a customized zooarchaeological database that leverages accessible and affordable 21 st century technologies. Scholars interested in investing time in designing a custom-database in common software (here, Microsoft Access) can take advantage of the affordable touch-screen, speech-recognition, and geographic information system (GIS) technologies described here. The efficiency that these approaches offer a research project far exceeds the time commitment a scholar must invest to deploy them.
Classification of Vascular Tumors

Vascular tumors can be challenging to diagnose and represent a number of clinicopathologically distinct entities for which precise histopathological diagnosis is often essential in determining effective therapeutic approach. Although they can resemble one another, their classification is based not only on their divergent biological behavior but also on their pathogenesis and recently described histopathological findings (Hoeger and Colmenero, Br J Dermatol 2013 (in press)). A recent proposal for revised classification of vascular anomalies has been promoted by the International Society for the Study of Vascular Anomalies (ISSVA) based on clinical features and current histopathological findings.
Reduced Reactivity of Amines against Nucleophilic Substitution via Reversible Reaction with Carbon Dioxide

The reversible reaction of carbon dioxide (CO₂) with primary amines to form alkyl-ammonium carbamates is demonstrated in this work to reduce amine reactivity against nucleophilic substitution reactions with benzophenone and phenyl isocyanate. The reversible formation of carbamates has been recently exploited for a number of unique applications including the formation of reversible ionic liquids and surfactants. For these applications, reduced reactivity of the carbamate is imperative, particularly for applications in reactions and separations. In this work, carbamate formation resulted in a 67% reduction in yield for urea synthesis and 55% reduction for imine synthesis. Furthermore, the amine reactivity can be recovered upon reversal of the carbamate reaction, demonstrating reversibility. The strong nucleophilic properties of amines often require protection/de-protection schemes during bi-functional coupling reactions. This typically requires three separate reaction steps to achieve a single transformation, which is the motivation behind Green Chemistry Principle #8: Reduce Derivatives. Based upon the reduced reactivity, there is potential to employ the reversible carbamate reaction as an alternative method for amine protection in the presence of competing reactions. For the context of this work, CO₂ is envisioned as a green protecting agent to suppress formation of n-phenyl benzophenoneimine and various n-phenyl-n-alky ureas.
Abnormal testosterone excretion in men alcoholics.

Urinary testosterone glucuronide excretion was significantly greater in alcoholics than in nonalcoholics, suggesting an increased hepatic conversion of 17-ketosteroids to testosterone and its conju...
Twin Transfusion Syndrome Causing Cutaneous Erythropoiesis

Two cases of twin transfusion syndrome are described in which the donor twin exhibited blueberry muffin-like macules and papules associated with ctuaneous erythropoiesis. No evidence was found in either case for intrauterine viral infection, the most common cause of cutaneous erythropoiesis. Cutaneous erythropoiesis is these two cases is considered to be due to persistence or reactivation of fetal dermal erythropoiesis secondary to prolonged, severe intrauterine anemia.
Efficient queue management for cluster scheduling

Job scheduling in Big Data clusters is crucial both for cluster operators' return on investment and for overall user experience. In this context, we observe several anomalies in how modern cluster schedulers manage queues, and argue that maintaining queues of tasks at worker nodes has significant benefits. On one hand, centralized approaches do not use worker-side queues. Given the inherent feedback delays that these systems incur, they achieve suboptimal cluster utilization, particularly for workloads dominated by short tasks. On the other hand, distributed schedulers typically do employ worker-side queuing, and achieve higher cluster utilization. However, they fail to place tasks at the best possible machine, since they lack cluster-wide information, leading to worse job completion time, especially for heterogeneous workloads. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first work to provide principled solutions to the above problems by introducing queue management techniques, such as appropriate queue sizing, prioritization of task execution via queue reordering, starvation freedom, and careful placement of tasks to queues. We instantiate our techniques by extending both a centralized (YARN) and a distributed (Mercury) scheduler, and evaluate their performance on a wide variety of synthetic and production workloads derived from Microsoft clusters. Our centralized implementation, Yaq-c, achieves 1.7x improvement on median job completion time compared to YARN, and our distributed one, Yaq-d, achieves 9.3x improvement over an implementation of Sparrow's batch sampling on Mercury.
Post hoc ergo propter hoc.

The Greeks and Romans recognized this fallacy in argument thousands of years ago. Because one event follows another event does not mean that the first event caused the second ( post hoc ergo propter hoc ). However, in contemporary medical news this logic is not understood. This faulty reasoning is the most common cause of false and misleading conclusions of research results that are presented as medical news.
Conclusive evidence for the presence of elastin in human and monkey cervix

Mature, cross-linked elastin has been isolated from human and monkey uterine cervix and characterized by the presence of the specific amino acid markers, desmosine and isodesmosine. These two amino acids could be detected in human uterine cervical tissue derived from pregnant and nonpregnant subjects as well as from monkey cervical tissue. These findings provide conclusive evidence that elastin, a protein which is the major constituent of elastic tissue, is present in the cervix. It is suggested on theoretical grounds that elastin has a role to play in the dilatation of the uterine cervix during parturition.
Freestyle Dancing: Randomized Algorithms for Dynamic Storage Load-Balancing

In this work, we study a challenging research problem that arises in minimizing the cost of storing customer data online for reliable accesses in a cloud. It is how to near-perfectly balance the remaining capacities of all disks across the cloud system while adding new file blocks so that the inevitable event of capacity expansion can be postponed as much as possible. The challenges of solving this problem are twofold. First, new file blocks are added to the cloud concurrently by many dispatchers (computing servers) that have no communication or coordination among themselves. Though each dispatcher is updated with information on disk occupancies, the update is infrequent and not synchronized. Second, for fault-tolerance purposes, a combinatorial constraint has to be satisfied in distributing the blocks of each new file across the cloud system. We propose a randomized algorithm, in which each dispatcher independently samples a blocks-to-disks assignment according to a probability distribution on a set of assignments conforming to the aforementioned combinatorial requirement. We show that this algorithm allows a cloud system to near-perfectly balance the remaining disk capacities as rapidly as theoretically possible, when starting from any unbalanced state that is correctable mathematically.
Ophthalmic aspects of orbital injury. A comprehensive diagnostic and management approach.

This article provides information essential to early diagnosis and insight into vision-threatening ocular injuries that commonly accompany facial fractures. It also suggests management of these injuries as it relates to facial fracture repair. The primary focus is on pure ocular and optic nerve injuries. Minor attention is given to ocular motility disturbances and adnexal injuries.
Embryonic lethal abnormal vision proteins and adenine and uridine-rich element mRNAs after global cerebral ischemia and reperfusion in the rat:

Prolonged translation arrest correlates with delayed neuronal death of hippocampal CA1 neurons following global cerebral ischemia and reperfusion. Many previous studies investigated ribosome molecu...
Update on the Management of Pancreatic Cancer in Older Adults

Pancreatic cancer is more common in older adults, who are underrepresented in clinical trials and frequently under treated. Chronological age alone should not deter clinicians from offering treatment to geriatric patients, as they are a heterogeneous population. Geriatric assessment, frailty assessment tools, and toxicity risk scores help clinicians select appropriate patients for therapy. For resectable disease, surgery can be safe but should be done at a high-volume center. Adjuvant therapy is important; though there remains controversy on the role of radiation, chemotherapy is well studied and efficacious. In locally advanced unresectable disease, chemoradiation or chemotherapy alone is an option. Neoadjuvant therapy improves the chances of resectability in borderline resectable disease. Chemotherapy extends survival in metastatic disease, but treatment goals and risk-benefit ratios have to be clarified. Adequate symptom management and supportive care are important. There are now many new treatment strategies and novel therapies for this disease.
Design of an extreme ultraviolet spectrometer suite to characterize rapidly heated solid matter

An ultrafast streaked extreme-ultraviolet (XUV) spectrometer (5–20 nm) was developed to measure the temperature dynamics in rapidly heated samples. Rapid heating makes it possible to create exotic states of matter that can be probed during their inertial confinement time—tens of picoseconds in the case of micron-sized targets. In contrast to other forms of pyrometry, where the temperature is inferred from bulk x-ray emission, XUV emission is restricted to the sample surface, allowing for a temperature measurement at the material–vacuum interface. The surface-temperature measurement constrains models for the release of high-energy-density material. Coupling the XUV spectrometer to an ultrafast (<2-ps) streak camera provided picosecond-time scale evolution of the surface-layer emission. Two high-throughput XUV spectrometers were designed to simultaneously measure the time-resolved and absolute XUV emission.
Schumpeter, Marshall, and Neo-Schumpeterian Evolutionary Economics: A Critical Stocktaking

The focus of evolutionary economics is a process of continuous and irreversible economic and organizational change over time. Currently there is no agreement on the explanation of economic evolution.
Entropy notions for state estimation and model detection with finite-data-rate measurements

We study a notion of estimation entropy for continuous-time nonlinear systems, formulated in terms of the number of system trajectories that approximate all other trajectories up to an exponentially decaying error. We also consider an alternative definition of estimation entropy which uses approximating functions that are not necessarily trajectories of the system, and show that the two entropy notions are equivalent. We establish an upper bound on the estimation entropy in terms of the sum of the desired convergence rate and an upper bound on the matrix measure of the Jacobian, multiplied by the system dimension. We describe an iterative procedure that uses quantized and sampled state measurements to generate state estimates that converge to the true state at the desired exponential rate. The average bit rate utilized by this procedure matches the derived upper bound on the estimation entropy. We also show that no other algorithm of this type can perform the same estimation task with bit rates lower than the estimation entropy. Finally, we discuss an application of the estimation procedure in determining, from the quantized state measurements, which of two competing models of a dynamical system is the true model. We show that under a mild assumption of exponential separation of the candidate models, detection always happens in finite time.
5 Dimensional Hyperspectral FRET Imaging and Analysis Approaches for Measuring cAMP Gradients

cAMP is a second messenger that regulates numerous cellular and physiological functions. A growing body of evidence suggests that cAMP signals are localized resulting in the formation of spatial cAMP gradients. Recently, Forster Resonance energy transfer (FRET) imaging has become a standard method for assessing changes in cAMP concentration. However, many FRET probes have low signal-to-noise ratios and limited dynamic range, making measurements of cAMP difficult. Our previous work suggested that hyperspectral imaging and analysis allows quantitative measurement of FRET efficiencies in 3D (x, y, and t) within single cells. However, traditional (x, y, and t) approaches of measuring FRET often lead to misinterpretation of data. Here, we present data demonstrating that hyperspectral imaging approaches can be used for 5D (x, y, z, λ and t) assessment of FRET efficiency in living cells allowing the study of spatially-localized cAMP signals. We utilized H188-2 (cAMP reporter) and AKAR4 (PKA activity reporter) FRET biosensors that were transfected into PMVECs and HEK 293 cells, respectively. Time lapse hyperspectral Z-stack images were acquired using a Nikon A1R confocal microscope. We used custom MATLAB scripts to calculate FRET efficiencies from image data. These approaches allowed the measurement of spatial cAMP gradients and PKA activity induced by agonist treatment. We found that cAMP gradients developed from the apical to the basolateral side of PMVECs when treated with isoproterenol, while gradients developed from both the basolateral and apical side when treated with PGE1. In addition, we observed an increase in localized phosphorylation upon treatment with isoproterenol and PGE1 in HEK293 cells. Thus, these studies demonstrate the feasibility for simultaneously studying cAMP gradients and PKA activity in cells.This work was supported by AHA 16PRE27130004, NIH P01HL066299, NIH S10RR027535, and the Abraham Mitchell Cancer Research Fund.
Correlation of 64Cu-DOTA-trastuzumab positron emission tomography (PET) imaging with HER2 status by immunohistochemistry (IHC).

618 Background: We have developed 64Cu-DOTA-trastuzumab for PET imaging of HER2-positive breast cancer. We have determined that administering trastuzumab (45 mg) prior to 64Cu-DOTA-trastuzumab shar...
In Vitro Transport Activity and Trafficking of MRP2/ABCC2 Polymorphic Variants

Multidrug resistance-associated protein 2 (MRP2/ABCC2) is an efflux pump that removes drugs and chemicals from cells. We sought to characterize the expression, trafficking and in vitro activity of seven single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in the ABCC2 gene. ABCC2 SNPs were generated using site-directed mutagenesis and stably expressed in Flp-In HEK293 cells, which allows targeted insertion of transgenes within the genome. Total and cell surface expression of MRP2 as well as accumulation of substrates (calcein AM and 5(6)-carboxy-2′,7′-dichlorofluorescein diacetate, CDCF) were quantified in cells or inverted membrane vesicles expressing wild-type (WT) or variant forms. The cell surface expression of the C-24T-, G1249A-, G3542T-, T3563A-, C3972T- and G4544A-MRP2 variants was similar to WT-MRP2. While expression was similar, transport of calcein AM was enhanced in cells expressing the G3542T-, T3563A-, C3972T-, and G4544A-MRP2 variants. By comparison, cells expressing the C2366T-MRP2 variant had 40–50% lower surface expression, which increased the accumulation of calcein AM up to 3-fold. Accumulation of CDCF in inverted membrane vesicles expressing the C2366T-MRP2 variant was also reduced by 50%. In addition, the G1249A-MRP2 variant had decreased transport of CDCF. Taken together, these data demonstrate that genetic variability in the ABCC2 gene influences the in vitro expression, trafficking, and transport activity of MRP2.
ST-Hadoop: A MapReduce Framework for Big Spatio-temporal Data

This paper presents ST-Hadoop; the first full-fledged open-source MapReduce framework with a native support for spatio-temporal data. ST-Hadoop is a comprehensive extension to Hadoop and SpatialHadoop that injects spatio-temporal data awareness inside each of their layers, mainly, language, indexing, and operations layers. In the language layer, ST-Hadoop provides built in spatio-temporal data types and operations. In the indexing layer, ST-Hadoop spatiotemporally loads and divides data across computation nodes in Hadoop Distributed File System in a way that mimics spatio-temporal index structures, which result in achieving orders of magnitude better performance than Hadoop and SpatialHadoop when dealing with spatio-temporal data and queries. In the operations layer, ST-Hadoop shipped with support for two fundamental spatio-temporal queries, namely, spatio-temporal range and join queries. Extensibility of ST-Hadoop allows others to expand features and operations easily using similar approach described in the paper. Extensive experiments conducted on large-scale dataset of size 10 TB that contains over 1 Billion spatio-temporal records, to show that ST-Hadoop achieves orders of magnitude better performance than Hadoop and SpaitalHadoop when dealing with spatio-temporal data and operations. The key idea behind the performance gained in ST-Hadoop is its ability in indexing spatio-temporal data within Hadoop Distributed File System.
A Demonstration of TextDB: Declarative and Scalable Text Analytics on Large Data Sets

We are developing TextDB, an open-source datamanagement system that supports text-centric operations in a declarative and efficient way using an algebraic approach as in relational DBMS. In this demonstration, we show scenarios where we can use TextDB to perform powerful information extraction easily and efficiently on text documents. Video: https://github.com/TextDB/textdb/wiki/Video.
Intra- and Postoperative Electrocochleography May Be Predictive of Final Electrode Position and Postoperative Hearing Preservation

Introduction: The objectives of the current study were to 1) determine the relationship between electrocochleography (ECochG), measured from the cochlear implant (CI) electrode array during and after implantation, and postoperative audiometric thresholds, 2) determine the relationship between ECochG amplitude and electrode scalar location determined by computerized tomography (CT); and 3) determine whether changes in cochlear microphonic (CM) amplitude during electrode insertion were associated with postoperative hearing. Materials & Methods: Eighteen subjects undergoing CI with an Advanced Bionics Mid-Scala device were prospectively studied. ECochG responses were recorded using the implant coupled to a custom signal recording unit. ECochG amplitude collected intraoperatively concurrent with CI insertion and at activation was compared with audiometric thresholds postoperatively. Sixteen patients also underwent postoperative CT to determine scalar location and the relationship to ECochG measures and residual hearing. Results: Mean low-frequency pure tone average (LFPTA) increased following surgery by an average of 28 dB (range 8-50). Threshold elevation was significantly greater for electrodes with transcalar dislocation. No correlation was found between intraoperative ECochG and postoperative behavioral thresholds collapsed across frequency; however, mean differences in thresholds measured by intraoperative ECochG and postoperative audiometry were significantly smaller for electrodes inserted completely within scala tympani (ST) versus those translocating from ST to scala vestibuli. A significant correlation was observed between postoperative ECochG thresholds and behavioral thresholds obtained at activation. Discussion: Postoperative audiometry currently serves as a marker for intracochlear trauma though thresholds are not obtained until device activation or later. When measured at the same time-point postoperatively, low-frequency ECochG thresholds correlated with behavioral thresholds. Intraoperative ECochG thresholds, however, did not correlate significantly with postoperative behavioral thresholds suggesting that changes in cochlear physiology occur between electrode insertion and activation. ECochG may hold clinical utility providing surgeons with feedback regarding insertion trauma due to scalar translocation, which may be predictive of postoperative hearing preservation. Conclusion: CI insertion trauma is generally not confirmed until postoperative audiometry when loss of residual hearing is confirmed. ECochG has potential to provide estimates of trauma during insertion as well as reliable information regarding degree of hearing preservation.
Primary Charge Separation in Photosystem II

The time scale for the formation of the charge separated state in photo-system II (PSII) is ca. 20 ps for temperatures near 277 K. All faster components observed in time-resolved experiments arise primarily from energy transfer processes.
Seismic Monitoring of Structures and New Developments

Presented in this paper is an overview of the seismic monitoring issues as practiced in the past, as well as current applications and new developments to meet the needs of the engineering and user community. A number of examples exhibit the most recent applications that can be used for verification of design (including performance based design) and construction practices, real-time applications for assessing the functionality, damage condition of built environment and understanding the behavior of a particular building during strong and low-amplitude excitations. In addition and in particular, recent developments and approaches to obtain displacements and, in turn, drift ratios, in real-time or near real-time that are related to damage condition and therefore functionality of a structure are introduced. Development of wireless sensors that are now finding limited but growing applications in projects that require long-term monitoring are discussed with an example. Other special instrumentation arrays that include additional sensors to study soil-structure interaction and wave propagation are described with available recorded data.
Anatomy of the Spine

Keen understanding of spinal anatomy is necessary for accurate diagnosis of painful spine conditions and safe undertaking of interventional spine procedures. This chapter provides an overview of the anatomy of the vertebrae, spinal cord, and vascular supply. A review of common pathological symptoms is provided as well as anatomical considerations for safe interventional spine procedures.
Chapter 59 The LES theory of solid plasticity

Publisher Summary This chapter presents the low-energy structure (LES) theory of solid plasticity. The fundamentals of work hardening curves are discussed. The microstructures observed in different materials as a function of the work hardening stages derive the expected flow stresses and other mechanical properties, and to compare these with the experimental evidence. The evidence includes the shape of the stress–strain curve as a function of lattice structure, alloying content and phases, and its strain-rate, temperature and grain-size dependence. The chapter discusses slip-line morphology and stored energy and annealing behavior. It focuses on f.c.c. and b.c.c. metals and dislocation behavior undisturbed by twinning, which strongly modifies the behavior of materials of lesser crystallographic symmetry. To begin with the stress–strain curves, these have been most carefully studied for pure f.c.c. metals and homogenous solid solutions. The chapter shows the transition of single crystal shear stress/shear strain curves from the “wavy-glide” behavior of pure nickel, to the typical “planarglide” behavior of Ni/40at%Co alloy at room temperature.
How Nonlinear Dynamics Complicate the Issue of Global Warming

I have been involved with studies about global climate change since the early 1970s when I was working at the Institute for Environmental Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison on a project led by the late climatologist Reid Bryson.1 This large multidisciplinary group was attempting to model the impacts on world food production of changes in global climate (there had been a big run-up in world grain prices that lasted for 2 years, due to drought in the USSR in 1972, the so-called “great world food crisis,” now largely forgotten). Among the changes the group expected that I was working with was global cooling, and Bryson was among those who would later be labeled “global warming skeptics” (Bryson and Murray, 1977), as were some of his students, most prominently, Patrick J. Michaels (1992). This does not mean that I am one of those who wish to doubt the current science of global warming, and I am certainly not one of those who wish to ridicule science by pointing out how at an earlier time many were worried that we were in danger of experiencing global cooling, as some have done, only to have some of those concerned about global warming proceed to make themselves look foolish by denying that there was ever a time that anyone was worried about global cooling, except for a few “cranks” here or there.
Evaluating antidepressants and anxiolytics.

During recent years, many experimental compounds have entered the clinical research arena. The hope has been to find effective anxiolytics and antidepressants, with clinical efficacy at least as great as such standards as diazepam for anxiety and imipramine or amitriptyline for depression, but at the same time with a milder adverse event profile. For anxiolytics, this would translate primarily into producing less sedation and no dependency-producing properties, and for antidepressants primarily an absence or reduction of anticholinergic properties, excessive sedation, orthostatic hypertension, and cardiac toxicity.
Alcohol Policy and the Public Good: As Simple As One, Two, Three

This chapter summarizes recent advances in alcohol policy research within the tradition of three integrative literature reviews sponsored by the World Health Organization since 1975. The first review (Alcohol Control Policies in Public Health Perspective) introduced the idea of population approaches to the prevention of alcohol-related problems, and suggested that alcohol control policies should focus on the reduction of average alcohol consumption in a society. The second book (Alcohol Policy and the Public Good) expanded that perspective to include a wider variety of individual and population level interventions. The third study (Alcohol: No Ordinary Commodity) indicates that there is now a wide range of evidence-based policy options that should be considered at the local, national and international levels. These options have different strengths, weaknesses and costs, which need to be considered in the development of the optimal mix of alcohol policies to fit the needs of a given community or society. The differences among countries in per capita consumption, patterns of drinking and alcohol-related problems suggest that alcohol policies may have to be tailored to fit the needs of each society. Key Words: alcohol, policy, prevention, alcohol-related problems.
Treatment effect of neoadjuvant endocrine therapy compared to neoadjuvant chemotherapy on breast cancer outcomes.

e12630Background: Over the last decade, there has been increased use of neoadjuvant endocrine therapy (NET) for the treatment of hormone receptor (HR) positive breast cancer. Small clinical trials ...
Toward Better Management of Flood Losses: Flood Insurance in a Wetter World:

Flood is the most frequent and costly of U.S. natural disasters with losses expected to increase due to climate change. The National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) mandates flood insurance purchase...
Organic‐Free Interzeolite Transformation in the Absence of Common Building Units

Zeolite crystals can be used as seeds or aluminosilicate sources in syntheses to control polymorphs and/or reduce the quantity of organics used as structure-directing agents. A frequently invoked hypothesis for interzeolite transformations is that zeolites share some underlying similarity in structure, most notably in cases pertaining to organic-free syntheses. Herein, we show for the first time that ZSM-5 (MFI) can be directly obtained from USY (FAU) through an interzeolite transformation between parent-daughter structures lacking common building units in the absence of a structure-directing agent and seeds. We show that interzeolite transformation leads to a crystalline product with fewer defects. Our findings also reveal that ZSM-5 is a metastable intermediate that undergoes further transformation to mordenite (MOR) and quartz. The MFI-to-MOR transition is counter to reported trends for which transformations lead to structures with reduced molar volume. Herein, we propose mechanistic arguments that suggest the driving force for interzeolite transformation is more complex than guidelines posited in the literature.
Programmable High-Throughput Platform for the Rapid and Scalable Synthesis of Polyester and Polycarbonate Libraries

The critical role of composition, architecture, molecular weight, and molecular weight distribution on the functional properties of macromolecular materials underscores the need for reproducible, r...
Remote Assessment of Wrist Range of Motion: Inter- and Intra-Observer Agreement of Provider Estimation and Direct Measurement With Photographs and Tracings.

Purpose Information is limited regarding the validity and reliability of measurements made during remote assessment of wrist range of motion (ROM) motion. We sought to determine intra- and inter-observer agreement among visual estimation, direct goniometric measurement, and patients’ self-taken digital photographs and line tracings by comparing the degree differences among measurements. We hypothesized that inter- and intra-observer differences would be less than 10° at least 90% of the time for all measurement modalities. Methods Thirty-seven patients were enrolled in this prospective cohort study. Visual estimation immediately followed by direct goniometry of maximal active wrist ROM (extension [E], flexion [F], radial deviation, and ulnar deviation) were independently and blindly assessed by 3 different providers: a hand surgeon, a hand therapist, and an orthopedic resident. Self-taken photographs and line tracings were blindly evaluated 3 weeks later. Intra- and inter-observer agreement was described using the Bland–Altman method. Results The surgeon and hand therapist observed intra-observer agreement within 10° for visual estimation of all 4 directions of motions greater than 90% of the time, but inter-observer agreement for E/F was lower (76% to 86%). Intra-observer agreement by the resident was within 10° 78% of the time for E/F. Intra-observer agreement for photographs and tracings were lower than visual estimation for all observers. Inter-observer agreement for photographs and tracings was higher than intra-observer agreement. The surgeon and hand therapist agreed within 10° at least 76% of the time, the surgeon and resident agreed within 10° at least 62% of the time, and the hand therapist and resident agreed within 10° at least 54% of the time. Conclusions Visual estimation may be a valid method of remote assessment, but compared with goniometry, measurements may be susceptible to observer bias. Self-taken photographs and line tracings are unreliable, perhaps falsely lower owing to submaximal effort from task distraction, and we question their current use for remote assessment of wrist ROM. Clinical relevance These results represent an initial step in evaluating potential methods of remote assessment of wrist ROM.
Don't Let Medicine in Missouri Go to Pot: Oppose Sham Medical Marijuana Referenda on November 2018 Ballot.

John C. Hagan, III, MD, FACS, FAAO, MSMA member since 1975, is a Kansas City, Missouri, ophthalmologist and Missouri MedicineEditor since 2000. He is a multi-year Super Diamond Contributor to MMPAC. Contact: moc.rr.ckzib@nagahj Open in a separate window
Electromigration in Bi-crystal pure Sn solder joints: Elucidating the role of grain orientation

Abstract Intermetallic compound (IMC) and void growth are electromigration (EM) damage mechanisms that are controlled by the anisotropic diffusion of Cu in β-tetragonal Sn solder joints. Single crystal fast diffusion, slow diffusion, and bicrystal solder joints were fabricated and tested under thermal aging and EM conditions to investigate the effect of grain orientation on microstructure evolution including IMC growth, void growth and grain structure. Sample and testing geometry ensured there were no effects from current crowding or joule heating so that crystallographic effects could be isolated. Microstructure characterization by scanning electron microscope (SEM), electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD) and X-ray microtomography revealed interface-nucleated and bulk-nucleated IMC growth, particle stimulated nucleation (PSN) of recrystallized grains, and two unique voiding behaviors, void faceting and void burrowing. The relationship between these features and β-Sn grain orientation and implications for EM damage mitigation are discussed.
Biotin Supplementation Ameliorates Murine Colitis by Preventing NF-κB Activation

Background & Aims Biotin is a water-soluble vitamin that is indispensable for human health. Biotin deficiency can cause failure-to-thrive, immunodeficiency, alopecia, dermatitis, and conjunctivitis. We previously reported that biotin deficiency also can lead to severe colitis in mice, which is completely reversed with supplementation. Our aim in this study was to determine if high-dose biotin supplementation can provide a therapeutic benefit in a preclinical model for inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) and to identify the molecular mechanism by which this occurs. Methods Mice were challenged with dextran sodium sulfate to induce colitis and were treated with 1 mmol/L biotin to induce or maintain remission. Clinical response was monitored by the Disease Activity Index and fecal calprotectin levels. The colon tissue was investigated for histology, length, as well as expression of inflammatory cytokines (interleukin 6, tumor necrosis factor-α, interleukin 1β), intestinal permeability, tight junctions (zonula occludens-1 and claudin-2), and the transcription factor nuclear factor-κB (NF-κB). Results Biotin therapy led to delayed onset and severity of colitis as well as accelerated healing. There was improvement in the Disease Activity Index, fecal calprotectin levels, colon length, and histology. In addition, biotin-treated mice had reduced expression of inflammatory cytokines, reduced intestinal permeability, and reduced activation of NF-κB. Conclusions Oral supplementation with biotin provides benefit for maintenance and induction of remission in the dextran sodium sulfate preclinical model for IBD. Biotin does this by reducing the activation of NF-κB, which prevents the production of inflammatory cytokines and helps maintain the integrity of the intestinal barrier. Clinically, the NF-κB pathway is important in the development of IBD and this finding suggests that biotin may have therapeutic potential for patients with IBD.
Polarized light scattering measurements as a means to characterize particle size and composition of natural assemblages of marine particles.

Polarized light scattering measurements have the potential to provide improved characterization of natural particle assemblages in terms of particle size and composition. However, few studies have investigated this possibility for natural assemblages of marine particles. In this study, seawater samples representing contrasting assemblages of particles from coastal environments have been comprehensively characterized with measurements of angle-resolved polarized light scattering, particle size distribution, and particle composition. We observed robust trends linking samples containing higher proportions of large-sized particles with lower values of the maximum degree of linear polarization and the second element of the scattering matrix at a scattering angle of 100°, p22(100∘). In contrast, lower values of p22(20∘) were found in more non-phytoplankton—or inorganic--dominated samples. We also determined that three measurements involving the combinations of linearly polarized incident and scattered beams at two scattering angles (110° and 18°) have the potential to serve as useful proxies for estimating particle size and composition parameters.
Penetration Depth Engineering in Plasmonic Metafilms for Enhanced Reflection and Confinement

We introduce a metafilm consisting of regions of metal and dielectric, which has a much smaller penetration depth than that of a corresponding metal film, leading to enhanced device performance in lightweight ultrahigh reflectivity reflectors and increased Sacking density of sub wavelength waveguides.
Is the rule of mixture appropriate for assessing bamboo material properties

Abstract Bamboo is often described as a functionally graded unidirectional fibre-reinforced composite material. As such, the Rule of Mixture (RoM) is often reported as an appropriate method of capturing longitudinal material and mechanical properties. However the dominant failure mode of bamboo is associated with longitudinal splitting of the culm and is therefore affected by transverse material properties. The efficacy of RoM in the longitudinal direction suggests its adoption in the transverse direction. It is concluded that the transverse behaviour of bamboo is not adequately captured using the often-adopted RoM approach. Experimental, morphological and numerical approaches are presented to better understand the reasons for bamboo not behaving as a unidirectional fibre reinforced material as is uniformly described in the literature. The approach has identified possible causes of the deviation of the observed behaviour – all which require further study.
Algorithms for Poisson Phase Retrieval.

This paper discusses algorithms based on maximum likelihood (ML) estimation for phase retrieval where the measurements follow independent Poisson distributions. To optimize the log-likelihood for the Poisson ML model, we investigated and implemented several algorithms including a modified Wirtinger flow (WF), majorize minimize (MM) and alternating direction method of multipliers (ADMM), and compared them to the classical WF and Gerchberg Saxton (GS) methods for phase retrieval. Our modified WF approach uses a step size based on the observed Fisher information, eliminating all parameter tuning except the number of iterations. Simulation results using random Gaussian sensing matrix and discrete Fourier transform (DFT) matrix under Poisson measurement noise demonstrated that algorithms based on the Poisson ML model consistently produced higher quality reconstructions than algorithms (WF, GS) derived from Gaussian noise ML models when applied to such data. Moreover, the reconstruction quality can be further improved by adding regularizers that exploit assumed properties of the latent signal/image, such as sparsity of finite differences (anisotropic total variation (TV)) or of the coefficients of a discrete wavelet transform. In terms of the convergence speed, the WF using observed Fisher information for step size decreased NRMSE the fastest among all unregularized algorithms; the regularized WF approach also converged the fastest among all regularized algorithms with the TV regularizer approximated by the Huber function.
Introduction to Acceptance and Commitment Practices

Over the last three decades, a number of multifaceted therapies, categorized as “third-wave behavior therapies” (O’Brien KM, Larson CM, Murrell AR, Third-wave behavior therapies for children and adolescents: progress, challenges and future directions. In: Greco LS, Hayes SC (eds), Acceptance & mindfulness treatments for children and adolescents: a practitioner’s guide. New Harbinger, p. 15, 2008), have been developed for use with a variety of presenting concerns. These therapies have integrated behavioral, cognitive, and mindfulness techniques to work together under a single model. One such third-wave therapy is called Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT). ACT is an approach based on cognitive-behavioral therapy that incorporates mindfulness and acceptance practices designed to help participants move toward values-oriented goals. Whereas more traditional cognitive-behavioral modalities suggest that change occurs through cognitively reinterpreting the meaning of the stimulus, ACT employs an acceptance approach combined with mindful awareness that helps to increase psychological flexibility (Hayes SC, Strosahl KD, Wilson KG, Acceptance and commitment therapy: an experiential approach to behavior change, 2nd ed. Guilford Press, 2012). Psychological flexibility is achieved by having contact with the present moment and changing or persisting in behaviors when doing so serves to achieve goals that are valued by the individual (Hayes SC, Luoma JB, Bond FW, Masuda A, Lillis J, Behav Res Ther, 44(1):1–25, 2006). As is introduced in this chapter, ACT is an effective intervention for a variety of presenting concerns, including burnout and trauma-related employment stress (TRES). The research backing for the use of ACT for these presenting concerns is overviewed.
Sophisticated by Design: the Nonconscious Influence of Primed Concepts and Atmospheric Variables on Consumer Preferences

Four studies sought to bridge the gap between the consumer literature on atmospheric effects on shopping and research on prime-to-behavior effects. Studies 1–3 found that nonconsciously priming sophistication influenced consumer preferences, lending credence to the hypothesis that the accessibility of concepts related to sophistication is sufficient to produce the effects of some atmospheric variables. Unobtrusively priming sophistication led participants to prefer an upscale candy bar rather than a plain candy bar (study 1), to select a high-brow movie rather than a low-brow movie as a raffle prize (study 2), and to order more expensive items at a real-life restaurant (study 3). The effects of sophistication primes were strongest among individuals who had positive automatic associations with sophistication (study 2). Study 4 directly linked primed concepts to an atmospheric variable, demonstrating that music played over headphones influenced both the automatic accessibility of words related to sophistication and corresponding consumer preferences.
Genealogy database for Butler Area Public Library

The Butler Area Public Library (BAPL) houses the largest collection of genealogy resources in Butler County including approximately 120,000 cards of selected data from obituaries from 1885 -1960 and 1990 to the present. Due to the enormous size of the database and its continual growth, a versatile database that efficiently stores and retrieves the data was implemented. A basic search web page provides Internet access to the database; local web pages exist to securely add data to the SQL database.