cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Compact representation and efficient generation of s-expanded symbolic network functions for computer-aided analog circuit design

A graph-based approach is presented for the generation of exact symbolic network functions in the form of rational polynomials of the complex frequency variable s for analog integrated circuits. The approach employs determinant decision diagrams (DDDs) to represent the determinant of a circuit matrix and its cofactors. A notion of multiroot DDDs is introduced, where each root represents a symbolic expression for an individual coefficient of the powers of s in the numerator and denominator of a network function, and multiple roots share their common subgraphs. A DDD-based algorithm is presented for generating s-expanded network functions. We prove theoretically and validate experimentally that the algorithm constructs in O(kl|DDD|) time an s-expanded DDD with no more than kl|DDD| vertices, where k is the degree of the denominator s polynomial, l is the maximum number of devices that connect to a circuit node, and |DDD| is the number of DDD vertices representing the circuit-matrix determinant. For a practical circuit, |DDD| is often many orders-of-magnitude less than the number of product terms. In contrast, previous approaches require the time and space complexities proportional to the number of product terms, which grows exponentially with the size of a circuit. Experimental results have demonstrated that the new approach can produce exact s-expanded-symbolic network functions for /spl mu/A741 operational amplifiers in several CPU seconds on an UltraSparc-I workstation. The expressive power of multiroot s-expanded DDDs is so remarkable that in one instance, over 10/sup 35/ symbolic product terms have been represented by a multiroot DDD with less than 17 K vertices. The compactness of DDDs is further demonstrated in the context of symbolic noise evaluation, where potentially many transfer functions, each being used for a noise source in the circuit, can be represented by a single DDD with the size comparable to that for a few transfer functions. This provides a powerful tool for solving many symbolic analysis problems such as deriving interpretable symbolic expressions, dominant pole/zero estimation, and analog testability analysis. We have also demonstrated that repetitive numerical evaluation with the derived s-expanded symbolic expressions for frequency-domain simulation and small-signal noise analysis can be much faster than SPICE-like simulators and the resulting expressions for a circuit block can be used as behavioral models for high-level simulation.
Role of the G-Protein Subunit α-Gustducin in Taste Cell Responses to Bitter Stimuli

Many bitter stimuli are believed to bind to specific G-protein-coupled membrane receptors on taste cells. Despite the compelling evidence for its pivotal role in bitter taste sensation, a direct involvement of the G-protein subunit alpha-gustducin in bitter taste transduction in taste cells has not been demonstrated in situ at the cellular level. We recorded activation of taste cells by bitter stimuli using Ca2+ imaging in lingual slices and examined alpha-gustducin immunoreactivity in the same cells. In mice vallate papillae, many, but not all, bitter-responsive cells expressed alpha-gustducin. In agreement with this correlation, the incidence of cells responding to bitter stimuli was reduced by 70% in mutant mice lacking alpha-gustducin. Nevertheless, some taste cells lacking alpha-gustducin responded to bitter stimuli, suggesting that other G-protein alpha subunits are involved. We found that the G-protein alpha subunit Galpha(i2) is present in most bitter-responsive cells and thus may also play a role in bitter taste transduction. The reduced behavioral sensitivity to bitter stimuli in alpha-gustducin knock-out mice thus appears to be the consequence of a reduced number of bitter-activated taste cells, as well as reduced sensitivity.
Properties of indoor received signal strength for WLAN location fingerprinting

Indoor positioning systems that make use of received signal strength based location fingerprints and existing wireless local area network infrastructure have recently been the focus for supporting location-based services in indoor and campus areas. A knowledge and understanding of the properties of the location fingerprint can assist in improving design of algorithms and deployment of position location systems. However, most existing research work ignores the radio signal properties. This paper investigates the properties of the received signal strength reported by IEEE 802.11b wireless network interface cards. Analyses of the data are performed to understand the underlying features of location fingerprints. The performance of an indoor positioning system in terms of its precision is compared using measured data and a Gaussian model to see how closely a Gaussian model may fit the measured data.
Modeling Heterogeneous Risk-Taking Behavior in Route Choice: A Stochastic Dominance Approach

This paper proposes a unified approach to modeling heterogonous risk-taking behavior in route choice based on the theory of stochastic dominance (SD). Specifically, the first-, second-, and third-order stochastic dominance (FSD, SSD, TSD) are respectively linked to insatiability, risk-aversion and ruin-aversion within the framework of utility maximization. The paths that may be selected by travelers of different risk-taking preferences can be obtained from the corresponding SD-admissible paths, which can be generated using general dynamic programming. This paper also analyzes the relationship between the SD-based approach and other route choice models that consider risk-taking behavior. These route choice models employ a variety of reliability indexes, which often make the problem of finding optimal paths intractable. We show that the optimal paths with respect to these reliability indexes often belong to one of the three SD-admissible path sets. This finding offers not only an interpretation of risk-taking behavior consistent with the SD theory for these route choice models, but also a unified and computationally viable solution approach through SD-admissible path sets, which are usually small and can be generated without having to enumerate all paths. A generic label-correcting algorithm is proposed to generate FSD-, SSD-, and TSD-admissible paths, and numerical experiments are conducted to test the algorithm and to verify the analytical results.
Hippocampal place cells: Parallel input streams, subregional processing, and implications for episodic memory

The hippocampus is thought to be involved in episodic memory in humans. Place cells of the rat hippocampus offer a poten- tially important model system to understand episodic memory. However, the difficulties in determining whether rats have episodic memory are profound. Progress can be made by considering the hippo- campus as a computational device that presumably performs similar transformations on its inputs in both rats and in humans. Understanding the input/output transformations of rat place cells can thus inform research on the computational basis of human episodic memory. Two examples of different transformations in the CA3 and CA1 regions are presented. In one example, CA3 place fields are shown to maintain a greater degree of population coherence than CA1 place fields after a rearrangement of the salient landmarks in an environment, in agreement with computational models of CA3 as an autoassociative network. In the second example, CA3 place field appears to store information about the spatiotemporal sequences of place fields, starting with the first exposure to a cue-altered environment, whereas CA1 place fields store this information only on a temporary basis. Finally, recordings of hippo- campal afferents from the lateral and medial entorhinal cortex (EC) suggest that these two regions convey fundamentally different represen- tations to the hippocampus, with spatial information conveyed by the medial EC and nonspatial information conveyed by the lateral EC. The dentate gyrus and CA3 regions may create configural object þ place (or item þ context) representations that provide the spatiotemporal context of an episodic memory. V C 2006 Wiley-Liss, Inc.
Electromyographic patterns of individuals suffering from lateral tennis elbow

Abstract This study investigated the applicability of using surface electromyography (EMG) as a tool for differentiating between persons suffering from lateral tennis elbow and the healthy age-matched adults. Temporal muscle activation patterns of the tennis elbow group were evaluated to determine if they varied between subject groups and if noted variations might be interpreted as arresting or exacerbating the injury. Sixteen subjects (Healthy Controls, n =6; Tennis Elbow, n =10) were tested under simulated tennis playing conditions. All subjects were males (Healthy group (CON) 38.8±13.1, Injured group (INJ) 40.8±10.8 yrs). EMG response data, temporal and spatial muscle activities, of the forearm extensors (Ext), the forearm flexors (Flex) and the triceps (Tri) were recorded for each subject during a single test session using all combinations of three different velocities on three different racket head impact locations. Data were collected at a frequency of 1000 Hz. Statistical analysis was performed using a 2×3×3 (Health status×Impact velocity×Impact location) ANOVA with repeated measures. Results indicated statistically significant differences ( p
Perturbation theory of spherically symmetric self-similar black holes

The theory of perturbations of spherically symmetric self-similar black holes is presented, in the Newman-Penrose formalism. It is shown that the wave equations for gravitational, electromagnetic, and scalar waves are separable, though not decoupled. A generalization of the Teukolsky equation is given. Monopole and dipole modes are treated. The Newman-Penrose wave equations governing polar and axial spin-0 perturbations are explored.
Human Papillomavirus Prevalence in Women Who Have and Have Not Undergone Hysterectomies

We compared human papillomavirus (HPV) prevalence in an age-stratified random sample of women who have undergone a hysterectomy (WH) (n=573) with the HPV prevalence in age-matched women with intact cervices (women who have not undergone a hysterectomy [WNH]) (n=581) participating in a study at Kaiser Permanente in Portland, Oregon. Testing cervicovaginal lavage fluids for >40 HPV genotypes using an MY09/11 L1 consensus primer polymerase chain reaction method, we found no statistical differences in the prevalence of HPV (16% for WNH vs. 13.9% for WH) or carcinogenic HPV (6.5% for WNH vs. 4.5% for WH) between the 2 groups of women. Although WH have a similar prevalence of carcinogenic HPV infection, compared with WNH without a cervix, they have minimal risk of HPV-induced cancer and are unlikely to benefit from HPV testing.
Crisis Intervention Teams in the Schools

When a crisis occurs in the school setting, school officials must be prepared to handle the situation effectively and efficiently. One of the ways school officials can handle a crisis situation is through the use of crisis intervention teams. The steps in establishing a crisis intervention team in a school setting include: determining goals, performing a needs assessment, finding model programs, developing a membership pool, developing a training program, preparing and maintaining a list of resources and plans for support services, establishing a communication network, designating a base of operations, planning team meetings, keeping records, and implementing the phases of debriefing. A crisis management scenario is presented and discussed in terms of the steps.
MARM: Multiscale Adaptive Regression Models for Neuroimaging Data

We develop a novel statistical model, called multiscale adaptive regression model (MARM) , for spatial and adaptive analysis of neuroimaging data. The primary motivation and application of the proposed methodology is statistical analysis of imaging data on the two-dimensional (2D) surface or in the 3D volume for various neuroimaging studies. The existing voxel-wise approach has several major limitations for the analyses of imaging data, underscoring the great need for methodological development. The voxel-wise approach essentially treats all voxels as independent units, whereas neuroimaging data are spatially correlated in nature and spatially contiguous regions of activation with rather sharp edges are usually expected. The initial smoothing step before the voxel-wise approach often blurs the image data near the edges of activated regions and thus it can dramatically increase the numbers of false positives and false negatives. The MARM, which is developed for addressing these limitations, has three key features in the analysis of imaging data: being spatial, being hierarchical, and being adaptive. The MARM builds a small sphere at each location (called voxel) and use these consecutively connected spheres across all voxels to capture spatial dependence among imaging observations. Then, the MARM builds hierarchically nested spheres by increasing the radius of a spherical neighborhood around each voxel and combine all the data in a given radius of each voxel with appropriate weights to adaptively calculate parameter estimates and test statistics. Theoretically, we first establish that the MARM outperforms classical voxel-wise approach. Simulation studies are used to demonstrate the methodology and examine the finite sample performance of the MARM. We apply our methods to the detection of spatial patterns of brain atrophy in a neuroimaging study of Alzheimer's disease. Our simulation studies with known ground truth confirm that the MARM significantly outperforms the voxel-wise methods.
Comparison of strategies for sustaining weight loss: the weight loss maintenance randomized controlled trial.

Context Behavioral weight loss interventions achieve short-term success, but re-gain is common. Objective To compare 2 weight loss maintenance interventions with a self-directed control group. Design, Setting, and Participants Two-phase trial in which 1032 overweight or obese adults (38% African American, 63% women) with hypertension, dyslipidemia, or both who had lost at least 4 kg during a 6-month weight loss program (phase 1) were randomized to a weight-loss maintenance intervention (phase 2). Enrollment at 4 academic centers occurred August 2003-July 2004 and randomization, February-December 2004. Data collection was completed in June 2007. Interventions After the phase 1 weight-loss program, participants were randomized to one of the following groups for 30 months: monthly personal contact, unlimited access to an interactive technology–based intervention, or self-directed control. Main Outcome Changes in weight from randomization. Results Mean entry weight was 96.7 kg. During the initial 6-month program, mean weight loss was 8.5 kg. After randomization, weight regain occurred. Participants in the personal-contact group regained less weight (4.0 kg) than those in the self-directed group (5.5 kg; mean difference at 30 months, −1.5 kg; 95% confidence interval [CI], −2.4 to −0.6 kg; P = .001). At 30 months, weight regain did not differ between the interactive technology–based (5.2 kg) and self-directed groups (5.5 kg; mean difference −0.3 kg; 95% CI, −1.2 to 0.6 kg; P = .51); however, weight regain was lower in the interactive technology–based than in the self-directed group at 18 months (mean difference, −1.1 kg; 95% CI, −1.9 to −0.4 kg; P = .003) and at 24 months (mean difference, −0.9 kg; 95% CI, −1.7 to −0.02 kg; P = .04). At 30 months, the difference between the personal-contact and interactive technology–based group was −1.2 kg (95% CI −2.1 to −0.3; P = .008). Effects did not differ significantly by sex, race, age, and body mass index subgroups. Overall, 71% of study participants remained below entry weight. Conclusions The majority of individuals who successfully completed an initial behavioral weight loss program maintained a weight below their initial level. Monthly brief personal contact provided modest benefit in sustaining weight loss, whereas an interactive techonology–based intervention provided early but transient benefit. Trial Registration clinicaltrials.gov Identifier: NCT00054925
Free Banking in History and Theory

This paper surveys economists’ work on the theory and the history of free banking regimes. Support for free banking - a laissez-faire monetary system without a central bank, typically conceived as operating under a commodity standard - has been much rarer than support for free trade, even among self-identified free-market economists. Yet where something close to a free banking system was given a trial, for example in Scotland and Canada (seven other cases are also reviewed), the consensus among economic historians finds that it functioned better for the typical user of money and banking services than more heavily restricted systems in other countries. The widespread adoption of central banking, despite the success of free banking, can be explained by the latter’s fiscal advantages to national governments. The standard arguments for deposit insurance, and the leading counter-arguments, are also reviewed. Recent work on the importance of credible commitments - in monetary, fiscal, and bank regulatory policies - has the potential to reinvigorate the case for free banking on a commodity standard.
The Hyperborean Maidens on Delos

Within the sanctuary of Artemis, on a small plain just east of the Sacred Harbor of Delos, lies a tomb dating from Minoan times which remained holy throughout most of antiquity. Modern investigators call it the sema of the Hyperborean Maidens, identifying it with a tomb which Herodotus says is “on your left as you enter the Artemisium” (4.34). Here, he was told, lay the remains of two maidens, Hyperoche and Laodice, who had once brought a tribute to the goddess Eileithyia from the Hyperboreans and had died on the island; here, in their honor, the boys and girls of Delos placed locks of their own hair. Callimachus, writing around 270, seems to know of this tomb; he does not mention it, but he says that the Delian girls offer their hair to the daughters of Boreas, Upis, Hecaerge, and Loxo, who once brought a tribute from the Arimaspians. The boys now give “the first-fruits of their beards” to honor some men who escorted the “Arimaspian” maidens to Delos (Hymn 4.278 ff.). And Pausanias says that the Delian maidens used to cut their hair in honor of Hecaerge and Opis (1.43.4).
Towards a standard approach for controlling board-level test functions

The architecture and some of the specific features of a scan-and-clock resource (SCR) chip are described. This chip is used in a high-end workstation product to provide access to the testability features of the individual chips and or printed circuit boards. The chip is designed to be included on each system board and is capable of controlling up to eight independent scan ports. By careful examination of different scan styles, it was discovered that there are two basic styles of scan, differentiated by their clocking mechanisms. The SCR chip uses a mode bit to specify the scan style for each port separately and by so doing to convert from the actual scan style to an internal style so that actual chip characteristics are hidden from the scan/diagnostics software. It is pointed out that using a board-level controller to gain access to the testability features of system components and interfacing the controller to a diagnostics processor (or external tester) are emerging as a common strategy for designing testable digital systems. On the basis of experience gained from such an application, controller features which are deemed useful are discussed. >
Bird-Window Collisions at a West-Coast Urban Park Museum: Analyses of Bird Biology and Window Attributes from Golden Gate Park, San Francisco.

Bird-window collisions are a major and poorly-understood generator of bird mortality. In North America, studies of this topic tend to be focused east of the Mississippi River, resulting in a paucity of data from the Western flyways. Additionally, few available data can critically evaluate factors such as time of day, sex and age bias, and effect of window pane size on collisions. We collected and analyzed 5 years of window strike data from a 3-story building in a large urban park in San Francisco, California. To evaluate our window collision data in context, we collected weekly data on local bird abundance in the adjacent parkland. Our study asks two overarching questions: first–what aspects of a bird’s biology might make them more likely to fatally strike windows; and second, what characteristics of a building’s design contribute to bird-window collisions. We used a dataset of 308 fatal bird strikes to examine the relationships of strikes relative to age, sex, time of day, time of year, and a variety of other factors, including mitigation efforts. We found that actively migrating birds may not be major contributors to collisions as has been found elsewhere. We found that males and young birds were both significantly overrepresented relative to their abundance in the habitat surrounding the building. We also analyzed the effect of external window shades as mitigation, finding that an overall reduction in large panes, whether covered or in some way broken up with mullions, effectively reduced window collisions. We conclude that effective mitigation or design will be required in all seasons, but that breeding seasons and migratory seasons are most critical, especially for low-rise buildings and other sites away from urban migrant traps. Finally, strikes occur throughout the day, but mitigation may be most effective in the morning and midday.
Lost and Found: Gender, Narrative, Miss Burchfield, and the Construction of Knowledge in Public Administration

This paper uses feminist narrative analytics to examine Mary Ellen Guy's (2000) life history of Miss Burchfield. Burchfield played a key, but largely invisible, role in the early development of American public administration. This paper examines how Guy constructed the Burchfield narrative and the different ways it might be read (e.g., insider/outsider, visible/invisible, gender success/gender victim, public administration founder/public administration staffer). A systematic examination of her narrative can illuminate both the gender relations surrounding public administration's disciplinary beginnings and how that past moment speaks to the present moment in public administration. Specifically, Burchfield's story speaks to the problem of gender invisibility that remains in public administration today. Guy's research stands as an exemplar of feminist life history that contributes to the "emerging gender narrative" within public administration (White, 1999).
Nonblocking wdm switching networks: complexity and constructions

With the advances of dense wavelength division multiplexing (DWDM) technology, the number of wavelengths in a wavelength division multiplexed (WDM) network increases to hundreds or more per fiber, and each wavelength operates at 10Gbps or higher. While raw bandwidth has increased by more than four orders of magnitude over the last decade or so, capacity of switches has only been up by a factor of ten. Switching speed is the bottleneck at the core of the optical network infrastructure. Consequently, a challenge is to design cost-effective WDM switches that can scale in size beyond a hundred of inputs and outputs, and at the same time, switch fast. Typically, there are two request models widely considered. In one model, a connection request asks to go from a wavelength on an input fiber of the WDM switch to a particular wavelength on an output fiber. In the other, a connection only needs to get to a particular output fiber, irrespective of what wavelength it will be on. Complexity. Since it's difficult to compare the cost between different constructions, we need to somehow quantify the networks. There are several ways to do that. First one will be counting the number of components in the networks, especially the wavelength converters. As wavelength conversion is unavoidable when the source and destination involve different wavelengths, also full wavelength converters are still not practical, limited wavelength converters (LWC) are preferred when performing wavelength conversion. Hence our objective is to minimize the total number of LWCs without affecting the nonblockingness of the networks. Secondly we model the network as a graph and study the complexity of these graphs, which is defined as the number of edges in the graph. This gives a good estimate of the cost of the networks. Here we extend some known results from traditional circuit switching networks to the WDM networks. Construction. We will give both theoretical and practical constructions. Theoretical constructions will realize some upper bounds on the result from our analysis of the complexity and many time can lead to good practical constructions. We will also give novel constructions of strictly nonblocking and rearrangeably nonblocking WDM switches for both request models in unicast using limited range wavelength converters and Arrayed Waveguide Grating Routers. We will also give several cost-effective constructions for multicast under both request models. Our designs are all relatively simple and easy to be laid out, consume little power, do no accumulate much noise, and are useful for both optical circuit-switching and optical packet/burst switching.
Lithogenic Properties of Enterocystoplasty

AbstractCalculi formed in 26 of 87 patients (30%) following augmentation enterocystoplasty, of which 23 formed within the reservoir, at a mean interval of 25 months postoperatively. The calculi were composed principally of triple phosphates suggesting an important etiological role of bacteriuria and the urease reaction. Open cystolithotomy was the most successful means of removing the calculi.
DIFFERENCES IN THE CELL SURFACE PHENOTYPE OF NORMAL AND LEUKEMIC PRE-B CELLS

ABSTRACT Two monoclonal rat antibodies which were developed against a murine B lymphoma cross-reacted with human hemopoietic cells. In both species the antibodies were specific for lymphoid cells in normal marrow and included all recognizable cμ + , sIg − “pre-B” cells. Human pre-B cell lines were not stained by these antibodies. Initial observations suggest that pre-B ALL cells from pretreatment patients may also fail to stain with these antibodies. Possible reasons for this apparent difference in surface antigen representation are discussed.
Introduction to a Special Issue on Political Violence and Terrorism: Political Violence as Contentious Politics

Five lessons for future research on political violence may be drawn from the articles in this special issue. Researchers should (1) analyze political violence not as a sui generis phenomenon but as one form among others that contentious politics sometimes takes; (2) attempt to determine actors' own reasons for their choice (or rejection) of violent strategies; (3) take the "conflict situation" that encompasses the interactions of all the relevant actors (not single states, movements, or networks) as the unit of analysis for explaining collective strategic choices; (4) take the networks in which individuals interact (not single individuals) as the unit of analysis for explaining individuals' strategic choices; and (5) examine actors' decisions to eschew violence as well as their decisions to employ it in order to avoid overgeneralized explanations for the latter.
Flow Characteristics in a Scaled-up Multi-inlet Vortex Nanoprecipitation Reactor

The microscale multi-inlet vortex reactor (MIVR) has been developed for use in flash nanoprecipitation, a technique to generate functional nanoparticles. A scaled-up MIVR is motivated by the desire for a higher output of nanoparticles than the microscale reactor can provide. As the first step of this scaling process, the flow characteristics in a macro-scale MIVR have been investigated by stereoscopic particle image velocimetry. The studied Reynolds numbers based on the inlet geometry range from 3290 to 8225, resulting in a turbulent swirling flow within the reactor. The flow in the mixing chamber is found to be unstable with a wandering vortex center. The vortex wandering is constrained to a small area near the center of the reactor and has little effect on the mean velocity field. However, the measured turbulence kinetic energy and Reynolds stresses are found to be sensitive to the vortex wandering. The flow characteristics of the macro-scale MIVR are compared with the microscale MIVR in terms of swirl ...
Effects of Small Intravenous Doses of Epinephrine on Serum Insulin, Glucose Tolerance and Serum Free Fatty Acids

Eighteen intravenous glucose tolerance tests (IVGTT) were carried out in six young, normal subjects while they were receiving normal saline or epinephrine (E) intravenously at the low rates of 0.1 and 0.3 μgm. per minute. The lower dose of E caused changes in the rate of urinary excretion of free E similar to those caused by caffeine; the higher dose caused changes similar to those reported to occur during various moderate to severe stresses. The higher dose of E augmented the insulin response to IVGTT. Glucose tolerance was not significantly decreased, resulting in relatively low glucose-insulin ratios following glucose injection. Serum free fatty acids were unaffected.
RESTORATION OF TYRAMINE PRESSOR RESPONSES IN RESERPINE-TREATED ANIMALS BY METHYLDOPA AND ITS AMINE METABOLITES.

SummaryAdministration of methyldopa (L-a-methyldopa) to reserpine-treated dogs and rabbits results in restoration of pressor responses to tyramine. The amine metabolites of methyldopa, α-methyldopamine and α-methylnorepinephrine, cause similar but more prompt enhancement of tyramine responses with the latter compound showing maximum potency and more prompt onset of effect. That the effects of methyldopa are due to its amine metabolites is also indicated by the fact that D-α-methyldopa, which is not decarboxylated, is inactive. Present evidence favors α-methylnorepinephrine as the mediator responsible for the blood pressure lowering produced by methyldopa in man, as well as the preservation and restoration of tyramine responses following administration of the parent drug.
A fisher vector representation of GPR data for detecting buried objects

We present a new method, based on the Fisher Vector (FV), for detecting buried explosive objects using ground- penetrating radar (GPR) data. First, low-level dense SIFT features are extracted from a grid covering a region of interest (ROIs). ROIs are identified as regions with high-energy along the (down-track, depth) dimensions of the 3-D GPR cube, or with high-energy along the (cross-track, depth) dimensions. Next, we model the training data (in the SIFT feature space) by a mixture of Gaussian components. Then, we construct FV descriptors based on the Fisher Kernel. The Fisher Kernel characterizes low-level features from an ROI by their deviation from a generative model. The deviation is the gradient of the ROI log-likelihood with respect to the generative model parameters. The vectorial representation of all the deviations is called the Fisher Vector. FV is a generalization of the standard Bag of Words (BoW) method, which provides a framework to map a set of local descriptors to a global feature vector. It is more efficient to compute than the BoW since it relies on a significantly smaller codebook. In addition, mapping a GPR signature into one global feature vector using this technique makes it more efficient to classify using simple and fast linear classifiers such as Support Vector Machines. The proposed approach is applied to detect buried explosive objects using GPR data. The selected data were accumulated across multiple dates and multiple test sites by a vehicle mounted mine detector (VMMD) using GPR sensor. This data consist of a diverse set of conventional landmines and other buried explosive objects consisting of varying shapes, metal content, and burial depths. The performance of the proposed approach is analyzed using receiver operating characteristics (ROC) and is compared to other state-of-the-art feature representation methods.
Bacteriostatic Activity of Astragali Endophytic Fungi

Objective: For the isolated endophytic fungi of five strains from astragalus,trace extracts,fungi and bacteria processing to the bacteriostatic experiment. Methods: Single factor test and orthogonal experiment method were for screening the best combination in order that relative inhibition rate reflected bacteriostatic effect. Results: Micro extraction of orthogonal design to get the best combination against Escherichia coli was 50% ethanol concentration,extraction time extracting for 2 times,40 times the volume of 20min extract; Anti Staphylococcus aureus was the best combination of 70% ethanol,extracting 10min,20 times volume of extract,extract 3 times. This study determines the endophytic fungi of astragalus trace extraction of the optimal combination of antimicrobial active substances. Microbial extract had obvious bacteriostasison to escherichia coli and staphylococcus aureus. Conclusion: This study determines the endophytic fungi of astragalus trace extraction of the optimal combination of antimicrobial active substances. Bacteria liquid extract has an obvious bacteriostasis against Escherichia coli and staphylococcus aureus.
Bacterial Nanocellulose-Based Flexible Surface Enhanced Raman Scattering Substrate

Owing to high purity, simple surface chemistry, and 3D nanofibrous structure, biosynthesized bacterial nanocellulose (BNC) is a highly attractive biomaterial for a wide range of applications. Conventional cellulose-based laboratory filter paper, adsorbed with plasmonic nanostructures can be employed as a flexible surface enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) substrate. In this work, a BNC film-based SERS substrate fabricated by gravity-assisted filtration method is reported. The 3D porous structure of BNC facilitates uniform and dense adsorption of plasmonic nanostructures on the surface and in subsurface regions, which results in large SERS enhancement. Furthermore, significantly lower surface roughness of BNC compared to conventional filter paper results in an excellent uniformity of SERS activity across the entire substrate. Harnessing the smooth surface of BNC, it is shown that BNC-based SERS substrate serves as an ideal platform for collection, detection, and recognition of bacteria. The 3D plasmonic BNC composites demonstrated here are highly attractive for a broad range of applications including sensing, catalysis, and energy harvesting.
Thermal-Mechanical Stress Analysis of PWR Pressure Vessel and Nozzles under Grid Load-Following Mode: Interim Report on the Effect of Cyclic Hardening Material Properties and Pre-existing Cracks on Stress Analysis Results

This report provides an update on an assessment of environmentally assisted fatigue for light water reactor components under extended service conditions. This report is a deliverable under the work package for environmentally assisted fatigue as part of DOE’s Light Water Reactor Sustainability Program. In a previous report (September 2015), we presented tensile and fatigue test data and related hardening material properties for 508 low-alloys steel base metal and other reactor metals. In this report, we present thermal-mechanical stress analysis of the reactor pressure vessel and its hot-leg and cold-leg nozzles based on estimated material properties. We also present results from thermal and thermal-mechanical stress analysis under reactor heat-up, cool-down, and grid load-following conditions. Analysis results are given with and without the presence of preexisting cracks in the reactor nozzles (axial or circumferential crack). In addition, results from validation stress analysis based on tensile and fatigue experiments are reported.
FASTUS: a system for extracting information from text

FASTUS is a (slightly permuted) acronym for Finite State Automaton Text Understanding System. It is a system for extracting information from free text in English (Japanese is under development), for entry into a database, and potentially for other applications. It works essentially as a set of cascaded, nondeterministic finite state automata.
A Worldwide Measure of Societal Quality of Life

This paper proposes a comprehensive new measure of societal quality of life (QOL) at the national level. Focusing on livability, the environmental, external factors that constitute a society’s QOL this measure derives from a novel and multifaceted analysis of subjective wellbeing data. In determining what people actually value, the measure allows for a comprehensive cross-country comparison of QOL that complements normative objective-list or capabilities approaches. The analysis supports the five broad categories of Community and Relationships, Freedom and Opportunity, Health and Environment, Living Standard, and Peace and Security as antecedents to QOL. Current measures overlook or deemphasize aspects of these elements. This paper explains the methodology used to construct the index and, provides complete country rankings of QOL for 143 countries since 2000.
“Climate response functions” for the Arctic Ocean: a proposed coordinated modelling experiment

Abstract. A coordinated set of Arctic modelling experiments, which explore how the Arctic responds to changes in external forcing, is proposed. Our goal is to compute and compare climate response functions (CRFs) – the transient response of key observable indicators such as sea-ice extent, freshwater content of the Beaufort Gyre, etc. – to abrupt step changes in forcing fields across a number of Arctic models. Changes in wind, freshwater sources, and inflows to the Arctic basin are considered. Convolutions of known or postulated time series of these forcing fields with their respective CRFs then yield the (linear) response of these observables. This allows the project to inform, and interface directly with, Arctic observations and observers and the climate change community. Here we outline the rationale behind such experiments and illustrate our approach in the context of a coarse-resolution model of the Arctic based on the MITgcm. We conclude by summarizing the expected benefits of such an activity and encourage other modelling groups to compute CRFs with their own models so that we might begin to document their robustness to model formulation, resolution, and parameterization.
Small Molecule Inhibition of SIRT Activity: A Novel Therapeutic Approach for Acute Myeloid Leukemia

Abstract 84 New therapeutic strategies are urgently needed to improve clinical outcomes for patients with acute myeloid leukemia (AML), which is an extremely aggressive disease with very few long-term survivors. The sirtuin deacetylases (SIRTs) are critical regulators of genes that are essential for longevity, cell growth, tumor suppression, and apoptosis. Elevated SIRT expression has been reported in several types of cancer and may promote pathogenesis and drug resistance by increasing the lifespan and survival capacity of malignant cells. Our preliminary analysis of SIRT expression indicated that SIRT1 was consistently expressed at significantly higher levels in AML cell lines and primary AML blasts as compared with normal controls. In order to investigate the potential role of SIRT1 as a regulator of AML pathogenesis, we utilized shRNA to stably knockdown its expression in MV4-11 and KG-1 AML cells. Cells with targeted SIRT1 knockdown displayed an altered gene expression profile as compared with non-targeted controls. Moreover, antagonizing SIRT1 expression significantly impeded the progression of AML in a xenograft mouse model. A number of deacetylase inhibitors have been clinically evaluated for cancer therapy. However, disrupting SIRT function as an anticancer strategy remains to be rigorously investigated as none of these previously studied drugs significantly inhibit the activity of this class of NAD+-dependent deacteylases. Tenovin-6 is a novel small molecule SIRT inhibitor. We investigated the efficacy and pharmacodynamic effects of tenovin-6 in AML cell lines, primary blasts from patients with AML, and mouse models. Treatment with tenovin-6 induced apoptosis and dramatically diminished AML clonogenic survival. Tenovin-6 promoted a dose-dependent increase in the acetylated levels of the SIRT-regulated gene p53 in AML cells and triggered the induction of several p53 transcriptional targets including p21 and PUMA. Targeted knockdown of PUMA with shRNA significantly reduced the pro-apoptotic effects of tenovin-6, indicating that it is a critical mediator of its anti-leukemic activity. Notably, administration of tenovin-6 to mice implanted with AML cells was well-tolerated and led to a highly significant reduction in disease burden and increase in overall survival. Our collective findings demonstrate that SIRT1 is a promising novel therapeutic target in AML. Further investigation aimed to elucidate the safety, efficacy, and mechanism of action of tenovin-6 is warranted. Disclosures: No relevant conflicts of interest to declare.
Organizational Citizenship Behavior: An Exploration of One Aspect of Cultural Adjustment Faced by U.S. Army Soldiers Transitioning From Military to Civilian Careers

The ProblemOrganizational citizenship behaviors (OCBs) are discretionary employee behaviors, such as helping fellow employees or voluntarily promoting the organization, that are important contributors to several aspects of performance in organizations. One of the defining aspects of OCBs is that these behaviors are offered freely by employees; they are engaged in voluntarily. However, for some employees, these kinds of behaviors may be considered expected or required as part of the employees in-role job prescriptions. This is the case with Soldiers in the United States Army.The SolutionIn this conceptual paper, we juxtapose the treatment and conceptualization of OCBs in Army work culture with that in civilian work culture and posit that individuals transitioning from a career in military service to a civilian career may encounter a need for reframing these behaviors in their new work contexts.The StakeholdersFor Soldiers, OCB-like behaviors are expected as part of their role and are measured in evaluation...
The Changing of the Guard: The Political Economy of Administrative Bloat in American Higher Education

The cost of higher education in the United States has risen dramatically in recent years. Numerous explanations have been provided to explain this increase. This paper focuses on one contributing factor: The dramatic growth in the size and expense of non-academic administrators and other university bureaucrats, which has outpaced the growth of expenditures on academic programs. Given that university faculty are typically viewed as the constituency that primarily controls universities, this growth of non-academic employees and expenses appears to be anomalous. Some theories are provided to explain this transition.
Find Your Summer Soulmate with Blur

Columnist Charles Day describes a new dating app called Blur and how it stacks up to the human brain in matching potential mates.
Hemolytic anemia in myelogenous leukemia with splenectomy.

A patient with chronic myelogenous leukemia developed anemia with evidence of increased red cell destruction. After anemia had persisted for eleven months in spite of 49 blood transfusions, splenectomy was performed. The hemolysis subsided and her health remained good during the following thirty months. ACKNOWLEDGMENT We are indebted to Dr. George T. Harrell, Jr., Bowman Gray School of Medicine for hematologic data on the patient obtained before her admission to Duke Hospital.
"Translating" the Origins of the Spanish Nation in Miguel de Luna's Verdadera historia del Rey don Rodrigo

"In 1592, Miguel de Luna, official translator to King Felipe II, published a translation of a long-lost history written by an Arab historian. According to one of the prefaces of his text, Luna discovered the manuscript of Abulcacin Tarif Abentariq....This article investigates the various types of artifices that Luna employed to frame Verdadera historia as an authentic translation and to inscribe himself in the text as a reliable translator. More particularly, I will analyze the position of (pseudo) translation in the work, and the ways in which it becomes a vehicle through which Luna, as a morisco, could present a counter-history of the proto-national legend of King Rodrigo. Furthermore, I will argue that Miguel de Luna’s position as an official translator to the court allowed him to play upon the conventions of translation in order to present an alternative history of the imagined glorious origin of the Spanish nation, one that exalted the pivotal role that Arabs played in the foundation of Spain."
Convection due to surface-tension gradients

The use of dimensionless parameters to study fluid motions that could occur in a reduced-gravity environment is discussed. The significance of the Marangoni instability is considered, and the use of dimensionless parameters to investigate problems such as thermo and diffusocapillary flows is described. Characteristics of fluid flow in space are described, and the relation and interaction of motions due to capillarity and buoyancy is examined.
Molecular Pathology and Diagnostics of Cutaneous Malignancy

Advances and discoveries in molecular genetics over the past decade have literally changed the face of diagnosis and treatment decisions for patients with melanoma and non-melanoma skin cancer. These include genetic analysis of skin biopsies as a diagnostic aid, genotyping of tumors from patients with malignant melanoma for personalized treatment of metastatic disease, and discovery of a new virus thought to play a role in the pathogenesis of Merkel cell carcinoma. Initiated by the discovery of a familial cancer gene in patients with familial melanoma and atypical nevi over three decades ago, molecular pathology techniques now play a central role in genetic testing for melanoma risk, in evaluation of melanocytic proliferations with uncertain biologic potential, and in stratifying patients with metastatic melanoma for treatment with targeted therapeutic agents, driving the search for better markers of prognosis and response to therapy. Targeted therapy is now available for treatment of unresectable or metastatic basal cell carcinoma. It is likely that continual improvements in techniques for analyzing blood and fresh and archival tumor tissue will uncover the pathogenesis of skin tumors related and unrelated to sun exposure, spawn the development of vaccinations or chemopreventive agents for these tumors, and enable physicians to customize treatment based on unique patient and tumor characteristics. This chapter will highlight relevant information concerning the molecular pathogenesis of melanoma, basal and squamous cell carcinoma, and Merkel cell carcinoma. Sections on molecular techniques available for diagnosis, prognosis, and treatment selection, emphasizing melanoma where this is most highly developed, are included