cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Biocompatible Nanoscale Dispersion of Single-Walled Carbon Nanotubes Minimizes in vivo Pulmonary Toxicity

Excitement surrounding the attractive physical and chemical characteristics of single walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs) has been tempered by concerns regarding their potential health risks. Here we consider the lung toxicity of nanoscale dispersed SWCNTs (mean diameter approximately 1 nm). Because dispersion of the SWCNTs increases their aspect ratio relative to as-produced aggregates, we directly test the prevailing hypothesis that lung toxicity associated with SWCNTs compared with other carbon structures is attributable to the large aspect ratio of the individual particles. Thirty days after their intratracheal administration to mice, the granuloma-like structures with mild fibrosis in the large airways observed in mice treated with aggregated SWCNTs were absent in mice treated with nanoscale dispersed SWCNTs. Examination of lung sections from mice treated with nanoscale dispersed SWCNTs revealed uptake of the SWCNTs by macrophages and gradual clearance over time. We conclude that the toxicity of SWCNTs in vivo is attributable to aggregation of the nanomaterial rather than the large aspect ratio of the individual nanotubes. Biocompatible nanoscale dispersion provides a scalable method to generate purified preparations of SWCNTs with minimal toxicity, thus allowing them to be used safely in commercial and biomedical applications.
The viral mechanism of Reye's Syndrome

Abstract In the initial stages of Reye's Syndrome, following an influenza infection, the viral RNA polymerase activates liver host cell ornithine decarboxylase by combining with this enzyme. Once the reaction has occured, ornithine decarboxylase is no longer available to combine with and to activate host cell RNA polymerase. The virally activated ornithine decarboxylase removes ornithine from participation in the urea cycle by metabolizing ornithine to putrescine which, in turn, is metabolized to spermidine. Once ornithine has been removed from participation in the urea cycle, mitochondrial carbamoyl phosphate levels increase until the carbamoyl phosphate passes from the mitochondria into the cytosol where it is metabolized by the de novo pyrimidine synthesis pathway. Through the implementation of this process, the virus has insured that: (a) host cell RNA polymerase in liver cells is inactivated, (b) viral RNA polymerase has complete access to newly synthesized pyrimidines, (c) production of pyrimidines for the synthesis of viral messenger RNA is initiated, (d) spermidine, a mRNA stabilizer is produced, (e) many of the components necessary for viral mRNA synthesis are provided by the host cell's RNA synthesizing mechanism.
Healing: Analysis of the concept

Healing, a concept familiar to many nurses has recently gained wide recognition and use in both professional and lay circles. In spite of the wide use and scrutiny of the term, the concept remains confusing and inexact. Lack of clarity in meaning leads to multiple definitions, communication problems and difficulties in measurement and theory development. Continued discussion and examination of healing and related concepts will help nurses more clearly define this important concept. The Walker and Avant method of concept analysis can be applied to the concept healing for exploring and clarifying its meaning. Healing, as defined here, is a natural, active and multidimensional process that is individually expressed with common patterns. Body condition, personal attitudes and relationships influence healing.
Roles for Endoplasmic Reticulum–Associated Degradation and the Novel Endoplasmic Reticulum Stress Response Gene Derlin-3 in the Ischemic Heart

Rationale: Stresses, such as ischemia, impair folding of nascent proteins in the rough endoplasmic reticulum (ER), activating the unfolded protein response, which restores efficient ER protein folding, thus leading to protection from stress. In part, the unfolded protein response alleviates ER stress and cell death by increasing the degradation of terminally misfolded ER proteins via ER-associated degradation (ERAD). ERAD is increased by the ER stress modulator, activating transcription factor (ATF)6, which can induce genes that encode components of the ERAD machinery. Objective: Recently, it was shown that the mouse heart is protected from ischemic damage by ATF6; however, ERAD has not been studied in the cardiac context. A recent microarray study showed that the Derlin-3 (Derl3) gene, which encodes an important component of the ERAD machinery, is robustly induced by ATF6 in the mouse heart. Methods and Results: In the present study, activated ATF6 induced Derl3 in cultured cardiomyocytes, and in the heart, in vivo. Simulated ischemia (sI), which activates ER stress, induced Derl3 in cultured myocytes, and in an in vivo mouse model of myocardial infarction, Derl3 was also induced. Derl3 overexpression enhanced ERAD and protected cardiomyocytes from simulated ischemia–induced cell death, whereas dominant-negative Derl3 decreased ERAD and increased simulated ischemia–induced cardiomyocyte death. Conclusions: This study describes a potentially protective role for Derl3 in the heart, and is the first to investigate the functional consequences of enhancing ERAD in the cardiac context.
The Velocity of Light

IN articles in NATURE and elsewhere, M. E. J. Gheury de Bray has proposed and defended the suggestion that the velocity of light may be a decreasing function of time, varying at present by about 4 km. a second a year. He bases this idea on an examination of the published results of measurements by a number of experimenters over a period of several decades, and concludes that all the results are in good agreement with his hypothesis.
Relationship between language impairment and pragmatic behavior in aphasic adults

Abstract We explored the relationship between language impairment and pragmatic performance in aphasic adults during the first 48 weeks postonset. Twenty patients, ten fluent and ten nonfluent, who had suffered a single left hemisphere stroke participated in the study. Half of the patients received 44 weeks of individual treatment and half received 44 weeks of group treatment. Language impairment—auditory comprehension, reading, oral-expressive language, and writing—was determined with the Porch Index of Communicative Ability at four weeks postonset, pretreatment, and at 15, 26, 37, and 48 weeks postonset. Pragmatic performance—verbal aspects, paralinguistic aspects, and nonverbal aspects—was assessed during conversation with a pragmatic protocol at the same points in time. The patients made significant improvement in both language impairment and pragmatic performance between 4 and 48 weeks postonset, and there were no significant differences in improvement between the fluent and nonfluent groups or between patients receiving individual or group treatment. In our fluent aphasic patients, language impairment and pragmatic performance were significantly related at four weeks postonset but not thereafter. Conversely, in our nonfluent aphasic patients, language impairment and pragmatic performance were not significantly related at four weeks postonset, but they were significantly related at 15, 26, 37, and 48 weeks postonset. The significance of the relationship between language impairment and pragmatic performance was sporadic over time in the individual and group treatment groups.
EFFECTIVE MATCHMAKING (RECURSION THEORETIC ASPECTS OF A THEOREM OF PHILIP HALL)

Given a set B of boys and a set 0 of girls, we call a subset S of BxO a society and we say that b knows g when (b,gy e S. The marriage problem for the society S is said to be solvable if it is possible to marry, in the traditional one-to-one manner, each boy to a girl whom he knows. We are concerned here with the computable analogues of these notions. Thus a society is recursive if there exists an algorithm which, when presented with a boy 6 and a girl g, effectively determines whether 6 knows g. Similarly, the marriage problem for the society S is said to be recursively solvable if there exists a one-to-one algorithm which, when presented with a boy 6, effectively marries him to a girl whom he knows. We first show that, even if (the marriage problem for) a recursive society is solvable, it need not be recursively solvable. We then consider several conditions on solvable recursive societies; for each we determine whether such a society must be recursively solvable and, if not, how computationally complex its solutions need be. We also discuss some sociological variations of the marriage problem and indicate how our results can be applied to them. We have drawn upon ideas from two branches of mathematics— combinatorics and recursive function theory. The combinatorial motivation has its source in a famous theorem of Philip Hall ([4]) which implies that if there are only a finite number of boys, then the society S is solvable if and only if, for each natural number k, any k distinct boys know among them at least k different girls. Using a compactness argument one can show that this same condition is necessary and sufficient even if there are an infinite number of boys, so long as no boy knows infinitely many girls. (See either [5] for a combinatorial argument or [1], p. 47, for a proof based on the propositional calculus. This generalization was first proved by M. Hall ([3]). L. Mirsky's new book ([10]) contains an exhaustive
Forbidden transitions in the absorption spectra of C60

Abstract Vibrationally induced forbidden transitions in C 60 are analyzed with a tight-binding Hamiltonian. The predicted electron-vibration coupling is rather weak for low transitions, in agreement with observation. The prominent peaks observed in the 3 eV region are explained as the T 2u singlet state coupling to Herzberg—Teller active h g modes. The vibronic structures observed in the 2 eV region are assigned to singlet (t 1u h u −1 ) states coupled to high frequency h u and t 1u vibrational modes. However, there remains some disagreement with respect to higher energy transitions.
Macro-Experimental Economics in the Kyrgyz Republic: Social Security Sustainability and Pension Reform

Despite a decade of transition, pension systems in formerly socialist countries still desperately need viable reform. Few viable reform options exist, due to the near absence of capital markets, the collapse of formal sector employment, and huge differences between urban and rural sectors. This paper assesses packages advocated by different international agencies, and considers their sensitivity to varying economic and demographic assumptions. Failure to account for demographic-economic interactions strongly biases forecasts. The divergent results from projections made under different assumptions imply that policymakers should examine the realism of policy suggestions (and associated actuarial forecasts) very carefully.
A 2-level environmental-stress-screening (ESS) model: a mixed-distribution approach

Environmental stress screening (ESS) is used to reduce, if not eliminate, the occurrence of some types of failures from the field by fixing them before the product is deployed. This paper models a 2-level ESS program where screening is performed at the part and unit levels. The parts are screened for a specified duration before being assembled into a unit. Defects induced during the assembly process are screened at the unit level. These parts and connections are assumed to come from either a good or a substandard population, and their times-to-failure distributions are modeled by mixed distributions. The optimal screening durations are obtained by minimizing the life-cycle cost. The model is simple to use and its viability is illustrated using mixed exponential distributions. The implementation of screens at various levels depends on costs and failure distribution characteristics. >
Classroom-based physical activity, cognition, and academic achievement.

Abstract Background There is increasing evidence for the association between physical activity, cardiovascular fitness, fatness, and cognitive function during childhood and adolescence. Evidence also suggests that these variables are linked to academic achievement. Classroom-based physical activity provides a viable approach to improve fitness, body mass index (BMI), cognitive function, and ultimately academic achievement. Methods Studies examining the relation between physical activity, fitness, fatness, cognitive function, and academic achievement are described. The results of a large-scale, longitudinal, cluster randomized trial to examine the impact of classroom based physical activity on body mass index and academic achievement will be presented. Results Overall, the data support the link between physical activity, cognitive function, and academic achievement. The role of physical activity in the classroom was also supported by the Physical Activity Across the Curriculum (PAAC) project. Physically active academic lessons of moderate intensity improved overall performance on a standardized test of academic achievement by 6% compared to a decrease of 1% for controls (p Conclusions Future research examining the effects of physically active academic instruction is warranted. The impact of physically active academic lessons of greater intensity may provide larger benefits for body mass index and academic achievement.
The Truth about Moral Hazard and Adverse Selection

This brief is actually going to have two levels. One level will go with the advertised title, and I’ll tell you my current views on the truth about moral hazard and adverse selection. Adverse selection will serve as somewhat of a handmaid of moral hazard, as you will see. That’s one level.The other level, though, which continues to surprise me, is that these two topics - they’re two buzzwords from insurance theory - have generated an enormous amount of policy interest and, yes, passion. Some people passionately believe some things about moral hazard that others passionately disbelieve. And so as part of this second level I will draw back a bit from the actual subject matter to ask a kind of positive public policy question: Why is it that some people can get so passionate about a subject that seems fairly esoteric?
Uprootedness as (Cruel and Unusual) Punishment

In spite of some protestations to the contrary, some of the practices that the United States immigration law permits are punitive. They are, moreover, terribly severe. If American citizens were to be treated in the ways in which some noncitizens are treated in the United States, they would be victims of cruel and unusual punishment. The paper seeks to show the implausibility of the euphemistic maneuvers that seek to deny this fact, by appealing to arguments put forth by the United States Supreme Court. In particular, the paper argues that the reasons why the United States Supreme Court considers expatriation to be cruel and unusual punishment apply as well to some instances of deportation.
Multihop lightwave networks based on De Bruijn graphs

The authors de Bruijn graphs as logical topologies for multihop lightwave networks. The throughput and delay performance of networks based on de Bruijn graphs are compared with those of shufflenets. It is shown that for a given maximum nodal in- and out-degree and average number of hops between stations, a network based on a de Bruijn graph can support a much larger number of stations than a shufflenet. This increase in the number of stations is obtained at the expense of some nonuniformity in edge loading when the traffic distribution over the source-destination pairs is uniform. In the 1024-node example, this results in a slightly lower throughput for the network based on the de Bruijn graph compared to the shufflenet, but the former has lower delay at low offered loads. >
Similarity of the two-dimensional and axisymmetric boundary-layer flows for purely viscous non-Newtonian fluids

Similarity of two-dimensional and axisymmetric boundary-layer flows for purely viscous non-Newtonian fluids
The Ongoing Disaster

On March 15, 2011, late at night at the Osaka train station, I met the first refugees from the earthquake that I would come to know. The family of four did not look like what I thought that people who were fleeing the horrendous images on television would. The mother, father, and two young daughters were neatly dressed, and their yellow lab was obediently packed into a crate that stood in the middle of their matching suitcases. Each wore a crisp, white mask. Much as I wanted to hear stories of what they had seen, I imagined that they did not want to talk. My son, however, zoomed a toy train over to their youngest girl, who was about six or seven; she happily raced it back. I motioned for him to stop and smiled at the mother, who acknowledged me from behind her mask as she brushed a hand across her forehead in exhaustion. “Are you OK?” I asked, not knowing how to avoid noticing that something appeared wrong. “Mmmm-hmmm.” “Are you traveling further tonight?” “Kanazawa.” “How terrible it all must be.” “We're from Fukushima,” she said. “We're fine. Our house is fine. It all looks fine, but we don't know what will happen, and the girls are so young.”
Frederick A. Cook: the role of photography in the making of his polar explorer-hero image

This paper aims to show how the photography of Frederick A. Cook (1865–1940) played an important role in the making of his polar explorer-hero image. It considers portraits and Arctic and Antarctic photographs that Cook used in his own publications and illustrated lectures, and which he provided for press articles. The paper is underpinned by discourse analysis and the concept of the photograph as a representation of reality filtered through various lenses. The visual impact and discursive messages of the photographs were aimed at situating readers and audiences in responsive attitudes that would generate a public persona which he exploited to increase his fame and heroic reputation. In time, Cook’s photography also played a critical part in the collapse of the hero image.
Strikes, Frames, And Touchdowns: The Institutional Struggle For Meaning In The 1987 National Football League Season

The introduction of “replacement” teams for the first time in the NFL provided an opportunity to investigate how controversial social definitions and the meaning of such frames emerge within a modern social world. Seven processes were identified: disrupting social worlds, experiencing social ambiguity, interpreting disruption institutionally, socially constructing laminations, disattending problematics of laminations, culturally adapting to anomaly, and negating collective protest. Conclusions are based on an emergent content analysis of extensive newspaper, sport and newsmagazine, and live television and radio accounts. The value of Goffman's framing ideas for symbolic interactionism is discussed.
An operationally adaptive system for rapid acoustic transmission loss prediction

An operationally adaptive (OA) system for prediction of acoustic transmission loss (TL) in the atmosphere is developed in this paper. This system uses expert neural network predictors, each corresponding to a specific range of source elevation. The outputs of the expert predictors are combined using a weighting mechanism and a nonlinear fusion system. Using this prediction methodology the computational intractability of traditional acoustic propagation models is eliminated. The proposed system is tested on a synthetically generated acoustic data set for a wide range of geometric, source, environmental, and operational conditions. The results show a significant improvement in both accuracy and reliability over a benchmark prediction system.
Out-of-core volume rendering for time-varying fields using a space-partitioning time (SPT) tree

In this paper, we propose a novel out-of-core volume rendering algorithm for large time-varying fields. Exploring temporal and spatial coherences has been an important direction for speeding up the rendering of time-varying data. Previously, there were techniques that hierarchically partition both the time and space domains into a data structure so as to re-use some results from the previous time step in multiresolution rendering; however, it has not been studied on which domain should be partitioned first to obtain a better re-use rate. We address this open question, and show both theoretically and experimentally that partitioning the time domain first is better. We call the resulting structure (a binary time tree as the primary structure and an octree as the secondary structure) the space-partitioning time (SPT) tree. Typically, our SPT-tree rendering has a higher level of details, a higher re-use rate, and runs faster. In addition, we devise a novel cut-finding algorithm to facilitate efficient out-of-core volume rendering using our SPT tree, we develop a novel out-of-core preprocessing algorithm to build our SPT tree I/O-efficiently, and we propose modified error metrics with a theoretical guarantee of a monotonicity property that is desirable for the tree search. The experiments on datasets as large as 25GB using a PC with only 2GB of RAM demonstrated the efficacy of our new approach.
From Corynebacterium glutamicum to Mycobacterium tuberculosis—towards transfers of gene regulatory networks and integrated data analyses with MycoRegNet

Year by year, approximately two million people die from tuberculosis, a disease caused by the bacterium Mycobacterium tuberculosis. There is a tremendous need for new anti-tuberculosis therapies (antituberculotica) and drugs to cope with the spread of tuberculosis. Despite many efforts to obtain a better understanding of M. tuberculosis' pathogenicity and its survival strategy in humans, many questions are still unresolved. Among other cellular processes in bacteria, pathogenicity is controlled by transcriptional regulation. Thus, various studies on M. tuberculosis concentrate on the analysis of transcriptional regulation in order to gain new insights on pathogenicity and other essential processes ensuring mycobacterial survival. We designed a bioinformatics pipeline for the reliable transfer of gene regulations between taxonomically closely related organisms that incorporates (i) a prediction of orthologous genes and (ii) the prediction of transcription factor binding sites. In total, 460 regulatory interactions were identified for M. tuberculosis using our comparative approach. Based on that, we designed a publicly available platform that aims to data integration, analysis, visualization and finally the reconstruction of mycobacterial transcriptional gene regulatory networks: MycoRegNet. It is a comprehensive database system and analysis platform that offers several methods for data exploration and the generation of novel hypotheses. MycoRegNet is publicly available at http://mycoregnet.cebitec.uni-bielefeld.de.
Polymer Dispersed Liquid Crystals as Mesoscale 2D and 3D Lattices

We introduce and explore two- and three-dimensional lattices formed in Holographic-Polymer Dispersed Liquid Crystals (H-PDLC) materials, which exhibit an electrically controllable index modulation in multiple dimensions. As electro-optically active holograms, these materials exhibit fast dynamic switching phenomena (~100 microseconds), and are simple to fabricate. While many applications have been proposed for these materials, almost all are based on one-dimensional index modulations in various grating regimes. However, constraints in additional dimensions lead to a much greater sensitivity of the polymer morphology to monomer functionality, exposure irradiance, and grating pitch. In an effort to begin to understand this relationship, two-dimensional triangle lattices were created using two monomeric blends exposed over a range of powers. Final diffraction efficiency (Bragg regime), saturation voltage, and polymer morphology were examined from the resulting triangle lattices. Three-dimensional lattices are discussed and a six-beam holographic method is proposed. Photonic crystal applications are envisioned where the pseudo-bandgap can be electrically controlled.
Evaluating the potency of HIV‐1 protease drugs to combat resistance

HIV-1 protease has been an important drug target for the antiretroviral treatment of HIV infection. The efficacy of protease drugs is impaired by the rapid emergence of resistant virus strains. Understanding the molecular basis and evaluating the potency of an inhibitor to combat resistance are no doubt important in AIDS therapy. In this study, we first identified residues that have significant contributions to binding with six substrates using molecular dynamics simulations and Molecular Mechanics Generalized Born Surface Area calculations. Among the critical residues, Asp25, Gly27, Ala28, Asp29, and Gly49 are well conserved, with which the potent drugs should form strong interactions. We then calculated the contribution of each residue to binding with eight FDA approved drugs. We analyzed the conservation of each protease residue and also compared the interaction between the HIV protease and individual residues of the drugs and substrates. Our analyses showed that resistant mutations usually occur at less conserved residues forming more favorable interactions with drugs than with substrates. To quantitatively integrate the binding free energy and conservation information, we defined an empirical parameter called free energy/variability (FV) value, which is the product of the contribution of a single residue to the binding free energy and the sequence variability at that position. As a validation, the FV value was shown to identify single resistant mutations with an accuracy of 88%. Finally, we evaluated the potency of a newly approved drug, darunavir, to combat resistance and predicted that darunavir is more potent than amprenavir but may be susceptible to mutations on Val32 and Ile84.
Wittgenstein's Rule-Following Considerations and Moral Particularism

Moral particularists have seen Wittgenstein as a close ally. One of the main reasons for this is that particularists such as Jonathan Dancy and John McDowell have argued that Wittgenstein's so-called "rule-following considerations" (RFCs) provide support for their skepticism about the existence and/or role of rules and principles in ethics. In this paper, I show that while Wittgenstein's RFCs challenge the notion that competence with language, i.e., the ability to apply concepts properly, is like mechanically following a rule, he does not reject the idea that there are rules that govern proper use of language. I then argue that while the RFCs may, at best, support a weak form of particularism that denies that moral competence is dependent on an explicit grasp of rules, they do not support a stronger version of particularism that denies that there are any true rules or principles in ethics.
Potential for new hydropower development by the corps of engineers

This paper covers the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers' efforts to identify potential sites at which additional or new hydroelectric generating capacity could be developed. It also traces past development of hydroelectric generation by the Corps up to present day installations of turbines and generators using slant-axis technology at specific Corps projects.
Feedforward Control of Accelerator RF Fields

A new and very effective technique for accelerator field control is demonstrated, using a feedforward control loop to complement a standard feedback controller. The accelerated beam current envelope, which acts as a load disturbance on the accelerator field amplitude and phase, is detected upstream from the module to be controlled. Due to differences in propagation velocity in the accelerator and external cables, true anticipating control is possible by feeding the current signal forward to the controller. In tests with full beam loading (22%) in the first 201.25 MHz tank at LAMPF, peak amplitude error was reduced to 0.4% and settling time to 20 ?sec at beam turn-on.
The Use of Archival Proxies in Strategic Management Studies Castles Made of Sand

Archival proxies have long played a central role within strategic management research, but the degree to which archival proxies are construct valid measures of theoretical constructs remains a source of concern. In some cases, there does not appear to be a close association between an archival proxy and the construct that the proxy is meant to capture. In this brief commentary, we discuss the use of three prominent archival proxies (research and development intensity, patent counts, and patent citations) within recent articles in three leading journals. Each of these measures has been used to represent a wide variety of constructs, which creates challenges when interpreting findings. We then offer three suggestions for improving the use of archival proxies. Implementation of these suggestions would enhance knowledge development within the strategic management field.
Sequences of the E. coli uvrC gene and protein.

Abstract We have determined the sequence of a 2400 bp region of E. coli chromosomal DNA containing the uvrC gene. The coding region of uvrc is 2267 bp in length, encodes a polypeptide with a calculated molecular weight of 66,038 daltons, and is preceded by a typical E. coli ribosome binding site. By constructing deletion derivatives we have established that a uvrC promoter lies within the 113 bp region preceding the translational start of uvrC. The codon usage in uvrC is strongly biased in favor of codons used infrequently in E. coli, which may contribute to the relatively low intracellular concentration of uvrC protein.
GTD-based scattering models for bistatic SAR

This paper discusses development of physics-based models for bistatic scattering. We generalize parametric equations for monostatic scattering mechanisms in a plane to achieve analogous bistatic approximations. Combination of these mechanisms, as separable azimuth and elevation components, allows 3-D modelling of six scattering primitives: sphere, tophat, trihedral, dihedral, cylinder, and flat plate. The responses of these scattering center models are shown to compare favorably with results obtained from validated high-frequency simulations.
Susceptibility of Upland Cotton Cultivars to Bemisia tabaci Biotype B (Homoptera: Aleyrodidae) in Relation to Leaf Age and Trichome Density

The relationships between leaf trichome densities, leaf age, and sweetpotato whitefly, Bemisia tabaci (Gennadius) biotype B, infestations of 13 upland cotton, Gossypium hirsutum L., cultivars were investigated in 1990 and 2000. Stoneville 474 supported higher numbers of B. tabaci biotype B eggs, nymphs and adults, and also had higher numbers of stellate trichomes on abaxial leaf surfaces compared with other cotton cultivars. Siokra L-23, in general, had fewer stellate trichomes and also fewer whiteflies. However, the positive trichome–whitefly density relationships were affected by the ages of leaves from different main stem cotton nodes. The youngest leaves on main stem node 1 below the terminal for all cultivars had higher numbers of stellate trichomes but fewer whiteflies compared with older leaves.
Characterizing the Performance of Denitrifying Bioreactors during Simulated Subsurface Drainage Events

The need to mitigate nitrate export from corn and soybean fields with subsurface (tile) drainage systems, a major environmental issue in the midwestern United States, has made the efficacy of field-edge, subsurface bioreactors an active subject of research. This study of three such bioreactors located on the University of Illinois South Farms during their first 6 mo of operation (July-Dec. 2012) focused on the interactions of seasonal temperature changes and hydraulic retention times (HRTs), which were subject to experimental manipulation. Changes in nitrate, phosphate, oxygen, and dissolved organic carbon were monitored in influent and effluent to assess the benefits and the potential harmful effects of bioreactors for nearby aquatic ecosystems. On average, bioreactors reduced nitrate loads by 63%, with minimum and maximum reductions of 20 and 98% at low and high HRTs, respectively. The removal rate per unit reactor volume averaged 11.6 g NO-N m d (range, 5-30 g NO-N m d). Multiple regression models with exponential dependencies on influent water temperature and on HRT explained 73% of the variance in NO-N load reduction and 43% of the variance in its removal rate. Although concentrations of dissolved reactive phosphorus and dissolved organic carbon in the bioreactor effluent increased relative to the influent by an order of magnitude during initial tests, within 1 mo of operation they stabilized at nearly equal values.
Ethanol and Cognition

Ethanol affects cognition in a number of ways—both direct and indirect. Nutritional deficiencies include thiamine (Wernicke–Korsakoff syndrome) and niacin (pellagra). Ethanol-related cognitive dysfunction can also be the result of brain trauma, CNS infection, ischemicor hemorrhagic stroke, and hypoglycemia. “Alcoholic dementia” is caused by direct toxicity of ethanol on brain neurons. On the other hand, although heavy drinking increases risk for dementia, mild-to-moderate ethanol consumption reduces the risk of cognitive decline, including Alzheimer’s dementia, compared to nondrinking.
Characterization of bacterial diversity in drinking water by pyrosequencing

Controlling microbial contamination of drinking water is critical to public health. However, understanding of the microbial ecology of drinking water remains incomplete. Representing the first application of high-throughput sequencing in drinking water microbiology, the objective of this study is to evaluate pyrosequencing as a high-throughput technique for the characterization of bacterial diversity in drinking water in comparison with conventional clone library analysis. Pyrosequencing and clone library analysis were performed in parallel to study the bacterial community composition in drinking water samples following the concentration of microbial biomass in drinking water with ultrafiltration. Validated by clone library analysis, pyrosequencing was confirmed as a highly efficient deep-sequencing technique to characterize the bacterial diversity in drinking water. Sequences of Alphaproteobacteria and Betaproteobacteria dominated the bacterial community in drinking water with Oxalobacteraceae and Methylobacteriaceae as the most abundant bacterial families, which is consistent with the prominent abundance of these populations frequently detected in various freshwater environments where source waters originate. Bacterial populations represented by the most abundant sequences in drinking water were closely related to cultures of metabolically versatile bacterial taxa widely distributed in the environment, suggesting a potential link between environmental distribution, metabolic characteristics, and abundance in drinking water.
Two-Stage Nonparametric Sequential Estimation of the Directional Density with Complete and Missing Observations

AbstractStein (1945) proposed a two-stage sequential methodology of inference that influenced numerous areas of statistics. In this article, the Stein's methodology is used and expands upon nonparametric estimation of the directional probability density. The aim is to propose a data-driven nonparametric sequential procedure that mimics performance of an oracle that knows smoothness of an estimated density and minimizes the mean stopping time given an assigned mean integrated squared error. For such a setting, using a sequential estimator is the must because smoothness of the density is unknown. It is known that for a general random variable the stated problem has no solution because an estimator cannot perform as well as the minimax oracle. At the same time, this article shows that for the case of directional density, under a mild assumption, there exists a data-driven two-stage sequential procedure that is minimax and adapts to unknown smoothness of an underlying density. Furthermore, we are able to solv...
Adherence to low-carbohydrate and low-fat diets in relation to weight loss and cardiovascular risk factors.

Objective A low‐carbohydrate diet can reduce body weight and some cardiovascular disease risk factors more than a low‐fat diet, but differential adherence may play a role in these effects.
14 – Starting Cattle on Feed

Publisher Summary A recommended program for handling newly purchased feeder cattle upon their arrival at their new feedlot home is presented. However, it is quite a workable program when followed in principle. Isolate the new cattle so that they are not adjacent to cattle which are already “adjusted.” Clean dry quarters should be available where the new cattle may rest. Cattle should not be crowded. It is best to have shed-type shelter. Treatments for external parasites may be handled by spraying, dipping, pour-ons, or injection. Even though the cattle should have been injected with vitamin A in the “shots” step, it is a good practice to feed 50,000 IU of vitamin A per head, daily, during the adjustment period. Starting new cattle on feed is a major problem facing cattle feeders. Starting new cattle on silage include: the value of adding hay to corn silage, hay plus grain versus corn silage, the value of corn added to corn silage and mineral programs for new cattle. Feeding regimens for new feeder cattle includes hay program, corn silage program, hay as a rumen regulator, soybean meal versus urea as sources of protein in the receiving diet, protein level effect on new feedlot cattle, preconditioning feeder cattle, preconditioned calves, and backgrounding feeder cattle.
The “Late Victorian” Intellectual Context of Marshall’s Labor Market Views

One of the most striking things about the history of economists’ treatment of unemployment is the comparatively late stage at which it was even considered a problem worthy of attention (see Garraty, 1978). In the texts of the period of classical political economy the issue was not widely discussed, it generally being considered part and parcel of poverty and the conditions of the working class.
Non-Native Users in the Let's Go!! Spoken Dialogue System: Dealing with Linguistic Mismatch

This paper describes the CMU Let’s Go!! bus information system, an experimental system designed to study the use of spoken dialogue interfaces by non-native speakers. The differences in performance of the speech recognition and language understanding modules of the system when confronted with native and non-native spontaneous speech are analyzed. Focus is placed on the linguistic mismatch between the user input and the system’s expectations, and on its implications in terms of language modeling and parsing performance. The effect of including non-native data when building the speech recognition and language understanding modules is discussed. In order to close the gap between non-native and native input, a method is proposed to automatically generate confirmation prompts that are both close to the user’s input and covered by the system’s language model and grammar, in order to help the user acquire idiomatic expressions appropriate to the task.
Savings Medicare Beneficiaries Need for Health Expenses: Some Couples Could Need as Much as $350,000

This paper examines the amount of savings Medicare beneficiaries are projected to need to cover program deductibles, premiums and other health expenses in retirement. For the purposes of this study, health expenses include premiums for Medicare Parts B and D, premiums for Medigap Plan F, and out-of-pocket spending for outpatient prescription drugs. Data come from a variety of sources and are used in a Monte Carlo simulation model that simulates 100,000 observations, allowing for the uncertainty related to individual mortality and rates of return on assets in retirement. In 2016, a 65-year-old man would need $72,000 in savings and a 65-year-old woman would need $93,000 if each had a goal of having a 50 percent chance of having enough savings to cover health care expenses in retirement. If they wanted a 90 percent chance of having enough savings, the man would need $127,000 and the woman would need $143,000. A couple with median prescription drug expenses would need $165,000 if they had a goal of having a 50 percent chance of having enough savings to cover health care expenses in retirement. If they wanted a 90 percent chance of having enough savings, they would need $265,000. For a couple with drug expenses at the 90th percentile throughout retirement who wanted a 90 percent chance of having enough money saved for health care expenses in retirement by age 65, targeted savings would be $349,000 in 2016. From 2015 to 2016, projected savings targets increased between 0 percent and 6 percent. In contrast, savings targets declined between 2011 and 2014, but then they increased from 2014 to 2015 as well. Despite the increase in savings targets since 2014, the 2016 savings targets continue to be lower than they were in 2012 almost across the board. It is important to note that many individuals are likely to need more than the amounts cited in this report. This analysis does not factor in the savings needed to cover long-term care expenses and other expenses not covered by Medicare, nor does it take into account the fact that many individuals retire prior to becoming eligible for Medicare. However, some workers will need to save less than what is reported if they choose to work past age 65, thereby postponing enrollment in Medicare Parts B and D if they receive health benefits as active workers.
Sigmoid Adenocarcinoma with Regional Scrotal Metastasis

Colorectal cancer is a common disease, representing the third and second most common cause of cancer death in the United States in women and men, respectively. [Ahnen et al.: Mayo Clin Proc 2014;89: 216-224; Siegel et al.: CA Cancer J Clin 2016;66: 7]. It is estimated that 20% of patients have distant metastatic disease at time of diagnosis [Ahnen et al.: Mayo Clin Proc 2014;89: 216-224; Siegel et al.: CA Cancer J Clin 2016;66: 7]. The most common metastatic sites include regional lymph nodes, liver, lungs, and peritoneum via lymphatic/hematogenous dissemination as well as contiguous and transperitoneal routes [Ahnen et al.: Mayo Clin Proc 2014;89: 216-224; Siegel et al.: CA Cancer J Clin 2016;66: 7]. Upon review of the literature, we found that metastatic colon cancer to the scrotum is rare. The following case report proved to be a unique example of this type of metastasis. This rare regional metastasis is theorized to have resulted from a colo-urethro-scrotal fistula that precipitated from the patient's prior traumatic event.
Anarchy, Vegetarianism and The Secret Agent

This chapter will examine Conrad’s anarchist critique of capitalism in The Secret Agent through the rhetoric of vegetarianism, meat eating and metaphorical cannibalism. In considering the symbolic meaning of the natural diet I will look at the opposing forces of anarchy and capitalism within the context of Promethean mythology, employing the analogy of the raw and the cooked. In addition, I will juxtapose the political implications of meat eating from a Romantic perspective against those ironically portrayed in The Secret Agent.
Bringing Student Responsibility to Life: Avenues to Personalizing High Schools for Student Success

ABSTRACTThis study examines how school structures and policies shape school culture to ultimately influence student success in one urban high school. We develop a model that explains how caring and personalized connections between students and teachers, coupled with a focus on academic press and support, interact with teacher efficacy to influence student self-efficacy, student attachment to school, and ultimately greater student achievement. We collected data through focus group and individual interviews with students, teachers, and leaders, classroom observations, and school artifacts. Data were analyzed using the constant comparative method allowing for the emergence of important patterns. The data revealed several interrelated structures and processes that support teacher and student efficacy and ultimately instill in students a responsibility for their own learning. This case study highlights the need for administrators to develop buy-in from teachers around a cohesive vision in order for structural ...
Determining the order of the functional autoregressive model: ORDER OF FUNCTIONAL AUTOREGRESSION

We propose a multistage testing procedure to determine the order p of a functional autoregressive process, FAR (p). At its core is the representation of the FAR(p) process as a fully functional linear model with dependent regressors. Estimating the kernel function in this linear model allows us to construct a test statistic which has, approximately, a chi–square distribution with the number of degrees of freedom determined by the number of functional principal components used to represent the data. The asymptotic justification relies on the concept of Lp–m–approximability which quantifies the temporal dependence of functional time series. The procedure enjoys very good finite sample properties, as confirmed by a simulation study and applications to functional time series derived from credit card transactions and Eurodollar futures data.
Natural history and management of Kommerell's diverticulum in a single tertiary referral center.

Abstract Objective The Kommerell diverticulum (KD) is an extremely rare developmental abnormality of the aorta related to an aberrant subclavian artery (ASCA). The objective of our study was to review the natural history of KD and ASCA using our single-center experience in diagnosing and managing KD and ASCA. Methods A retrospective review of the Yale radiological database from January 1999 to December 2016 was performed. Only patients with KD/ASCA and a computed tomography (CT) scan of the chest were selected for review. The primary goal was to examine the natural history of KD and ASCA and the secondary goals were to review the management and outcomes of those patients treated for KD and ASCA. Results There were 75 patients with KD/ASCA identified, with a mean age of 63 ± 19 years; 49 were female (65%). On CT scans, left- and right-sided aortas were present in 47 (63%) and 28 (37%) patients. A right ASCA or a left ASCA were present in 47 (63%) and 28 (37%) patients. Six patients were symptomatic on presentation. Symptoms included dysphagia, chest or back pain, and emboli to the fingers. The mean KD diameter was 21.8 ± 6.0 mm and the distance to the opposite aortic wall (DAW) was 48.3 ± 10.8 mm. Sixty-six patients were followed for a mean of 31.7 ± 32.5 months. One patient ruptured without repair. Nine patients underwent operative intervention, including eight open and one endovascular repair. Complications from operative intervention included ischemic stroke with hemorrhagic transformation, deep vein thrombosis and pneumonia. The mean growth rate for KD and DAW was 1.45 ± 0.39 mm/year and 2.29 ± 0.47 mm/year, respectively. On multivariable regression analysis, hypertension was a predictor of growth of DAW (P = .03). Conclusions KD is uncommon and shows a female predominance. The diverticulum grows, albeit slowly (KD and DAW growth rates of 1.45 ± 0.39 mm/year and 2.29 ± 0.47 mm/year). Most patients are asymptomatic, but dysphagia, chest/back pain, and distal emboli may occur. Rupture is rare. Symptomatic patients should be operated. Asymptomatic patients can be followed with serial CT scans.