cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
integIRTy: a method to identify genes altered in cancer by accounting for multiple mechanisms of regulation using item response theory

Motivation: Identifying genes altered in cancer plays a crucial role in both understanding the mechanism of carcinogenesis and developing novel therapeutics. It is known that there are various mechanisms of regulation that can lead to gene dysfunction, including copy number change, methylation, abnormal expression, mutation and so on. Nowadays, all these types of alterations can be simultaneously interrogated by different types of assays. Although many methods have been proposed to identify altered genes from a single assay, there is no method that can deal with multiple assays accounting for different alteration types systematically. Results: In this article, we propose a novel method, integration using item response theory (integIRTy), to identify altered genes by using item response theory that allows integrated analysis of multiple high-throughput assays. When applied to a single assay, the proposed method is more robust and reliable than conventional methods such as Student’s t-test or the Wilcoxon rank-sum test. When used to integrate multiple assays, integIRTy can identify novel-altered genes that cannot be found by looking at individual assay separately. We applied integIRTy to three public cancer datasets (ovarian carcinoma, breast cancer, glioblastoma) for cross-assay type integration which all show encouraging results. Availability and implementation: The R package integIRTy is available at the web site http://bioinformatics.mdanderson.org/main/OOMPA:Overview. Contact: gro.nosrednadm@sebmoock Supplementary information: Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online.
New, faster, more controlled fitting of implicit polynomial 2D curves and 3D surfaces to data

Denote a point in the plane by z=(z,y) and a polynomial of nth degree in z by f(z) /spl Sigma//sub i,j//spl ges/o/sub 1/i+j/spl les/n(a/sub ij/x/sup i/y/sup j/). Denote by Z(f) the set of points for which f(z)=0. Z(f) is the 2D curve represented by f(z). In this paper, we present a new approach to fitting 2D curves to data in the plane (or 3D surfaces to range data) which has significant advantages over presently known methods. It requires considerably less computation and the resulting curve can be forced to lie close to the data set at prescribed points provided that there is an nth degree polynomial that can reasonably approximate the data. Linear programming is used to do the fitting. The approach can incorporate a variety of distance measures and global geometric constraints.
Reachability calculations for automated aerial refueling

This paper describes Hamilton-Jacobi (HJ) reachability calculations for a hybrid systems formalism governing unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) interacting with another vehicle in a safety-critical situation. We use this problem to lay the foundations toward the goal of refining or designing protocols for multi-UAV and/or manned vehicle interaction. We describe here what mathematical foundations are necessary to formulate verification problems on reachability and safety of flight maneuvers. We finally show how this formalism can be used in the chosen application to inform UAV decisions on avoiding unsafe scenarios while achieving mission objectives.
Filtering current mirror

A simple enhanced current mirroring circuit is presented which enables improvement of the S/N ratio in analogue circuits. Three transistors are added to the conventional mirror, and no additional power is needed. A reduction of >20dB in the sensitivity to high frequency parasitic signals can easily be obtained.
A Class Approach to Municipal Privatization: The Privatization of New York City's Central Park

The privatization of New York City's Central Park in 1998 was among the most high-profile municipal privatizations in the US during the 1990s. Since then, the park's privatization has been cited as an exemplary model of privatization. This essay develops a unique class approach to municipal privatization and uses it to reconceptualize Central Park's privatization. In doing so, it argues that the park's privatization involves an important contradiction—one that regards its ostensible status as one of the nation's most famous and treasured public goods against its production as a capitalist commodity. This class approach to the park's privatization yields four insights. First, it underscores the limitations of the hegemonic cost-efficiency calculus that has long informed the municipal privatization discourse. Second, it raises important questions regarding the troublesome relationship between democratic principles and capitalist production relations. Third, it offers an alternative to a wage-led approach to privatization. Finally, and paradoxically, it provides a framework for theorizing “progressive” privatizations.
Post CMP Cleaning Using Ice Scrubber Cleaning

The surface cleaning technology with the use of ice scrubber cleaning has been developed to remove the particles after Chemical Mechanical Polishing (CMP) process. The ice particles with a high speed nearly equal to the sound velocity bombarded the Si wafer surface, as a result, the residue from the slurry solution was reduced from ∼5/cm2 to ∼0.05/cm2 and the metal impurities are completely eliminated below the defect limitation for ICP mass spectroscopy. The charge build-up damage due to the high speed particles is not introduced into the the MOS capacitors. This technology is quite effective, compared with the conventional brush scrubber method and is applicable for the cleaning process below the quarter micron devices.
Prevalence and Effects of Rape Myths in Print Journalism The Kobe Bryant Case

Two studies examine the prevalence and effects of rape myths in the print media covering a real-life case of alleged sexual assault. Study 1 was an archival study of 156 sources from around the country. Articles about the Kobe Bryant case were coded for instances of rape myths, among other variables. Of the articles, 65 mentioned at least one rape myth (with "she's lying" being the single most common myth perpetuated). Study 2 assessed participants' (N = 62) prior knowledge of the Bryant case and exposed them to a myth-endorsing or myth-challenging article about the case. Those exposed to the myth-endorsing article were more likely to believe that Bryant was not guilty and the alleged victim was lying. The implications for victim reporting and reducing sexual assault in general are discussed.
Evaluation of PAMS' adaptive management services

The management of large-scale parallel and distributed applications is complex, due to factors such as centralized management architectures, lack of coordination and compatibility among heterogeneous network management systems, the dynamic characteristics of networks and application bandwidth requirements. The development of an integrated network management framework that is proactive, scalable and robust is a challenging problem. We present our approach to implement a Proactive Application Management System (PAMS). The architecture consists of two main modules: Application-Centric Management (ACM) and the Management Computing System (MCS). The ACM module provides the application developers with all the tools required to specify the appropriate management schemes to manage any QoS requirement or application attribute/functionality. The MCS provides the core management services to enable the efficient proactive management of a wide range of network applications. The services offered by the MCS are implemented using mobile agents. Furthermore, each MCS service can be implemented using several techniques that can be selected dynamically by invoking the corresponding mobile agent template for the service implementation. We present our preliminary results of evaluating PAMS management services to manage the performance and fault-tolerant execution of three applications of different sizes. The experimental results demonstrate that our agent-based approach can lead to significant gains in the performance and low-overhead fault management of parallel/distributed applications.
STAPHYLINUS CÆSAREUS, CEDERH., AND S. ERYTHROPTERUS, LINN., IN CANADA

Staphylinus erythropterus, Linn. This beetle has been but once recorded in America, the speciment being noted from Detriot. I have now to record it as inhabiting this section of Canada, and, at the same time to correct an error which has been put in circulation through my agency. When Dr. LeConte visited me in July 1883, he named a beetle for me as S.cœsareus, Cederh. (ornaticauda, Lec.), remarking that it has only once been found in America.
Packer identification using Byte plot and Markov plot

Malware is one of the major concerns in computer security. The availability of easy to use malware toolkits and internet popularity has led to the increase in number of malware attacks. Currently signature based malware detection techniques are widely used. However, malware authors use packing techniques to create new variants of existing malwares which defeat signature based malware detection. So, it is very important to identify packed malware and unpack it before analysis. Dynamic unpacking runs the packed executable and provides an unpacked version based on the system. This technique requires dedicated hardware and is computationally expensive. As each individual packer uses its own unpacking algorithm it is important to have a prior knowledge about the packer used, in order to assist in reverse engineering. In this paper, we propose an efficient framework for packer identification problem using Byte plot and Markov plot. First packed malware is converted to Byte plot and Markov plot. Later Gabor and wavelet based features are extracted from Byte plot and Markov plot. We used SVMs (Support Vector Machine) in our analysis. We performed our experiments on nine different packers and we obtained about 95 % accuracy for nine of the packers. Our results show features extracted from Markov plot outperformed features extracted from Byte plot by about 3 %. We compare the performance of Markov plot with PEID (Signature based PE identification tool). Our results show Markov plot produced better accuracy when compared to PEID. We also performed multi class classification using Random Forest and achieved 81 % accuracy using Markov plot based features.
Air Temperature Modification in Lumite® Field Cages in Alfalfa Hay

Air temperatures in alfalfa hay were significantly modified by a Lumite® field cage. Maximum air temperatures in the cage were decreased while minimum temperatures were increased. Air temperatures in alfalfa hay within a Lumite® field cage and outside of the cage can be estimated by using multiple linear regression equations with temperatures obtained from a standard weather shelter.
Variability in Active Galactic Nuclei

This talk explored variability in active galactic nuclei (AGN) for a variety of scales across the time domain. From billion-year-scale intermittency to a quasi-periodic oscillation signal with a period of one hour, time-varying signals offer insights into a myriad of complex processes driven by the AGN central engine. Athough the era of time-domain observations of AGN across the spectrum has but just begun, already observations reveal the rich detail of phenomena associated with actively accreting black holes which challenge theoretical models.
Language and Reading Disorders in Epilepsy

The severity and range of linguistic impairments in youths with epilepsy were studied at UCLA, Los Angeles, State Fullerton University, and UC at Irvine, California.
Research Advance on Agrobacterium tumefaciens-Mediated Transformation of Staple Crops

Agrobacterium tumefaciens-mediated transformation is an effective and well studied method for gene delivery.However,its applications in monocotyledons plants are still very limited and deserve more attentions.In this article,we review the advancement of Agrobacterium tumefaciens-mediated transformation in rice,maize and wheat,mainly focusing on the factors that influence the transformation efficiency and its applications in agronomical and molecular biological studies.
Modeling of Viscous Shock Tube Using ES-BGK Model Kinetic Equations

The viscous effects on unsteady shock wave propagation are investigated by numerical solution of the Boltzmann model kinetic equations. The kinetic equations are solved for two unsteady non-equilibrium flow problems, namely, the one-dimensional Riemann problem and a two-dimensional viscous shock-tube. The numerical method comprises the discrete velocity method in the velocity space and the finite volume discretization in physical space using various flux schemes. The discrete version of H-theorem is applied for analysis of accuracy of the numerical solution as well as of the onset of non-equilibrium. Simulations show that the maximum entropy generation rate in viscous shock tube occurs in the boundary layer / shock wave interaction region. The entropy generation rate is used to determine the time-variation of the speed of propagation of shock, contact discontinuity and rarefaction waves.
Salman Rushdie en Chile

Oscar Hahn se refiere en estas paginas a la accidentada visita del escritor Salman Rushdie a Chile en 1995 y al memorable coloquio que tuvo lugar en el Centro de Estudios Publicos. Si se lo mira retrospectivamente, advierte el poeta chileno, lo mas impactante de ese encuentro fueron sin embargo las observaciones que hizo Rushdie sobre la guerra santa contra Occidente, que en ese entonces se estaba incubando en movimientos politicos del mundo islamico que pretendian imponer su dogmatismo bajo el disfraz de la religion. Por cierto, ninguno de los presentes en esa pequena sala del Centro de Estudios Publicos pudo siquiera vislumbrar el alcance que tendrian esas palabras pronunciadas en la remota ciudad de Santiago y que terminaron siendo profeticas para el futuro de la humanidad. Un ano despues, la faccion musulmana de los talibanes establecio en Afganistan, en nombre de la religion islamica, un regimen de terror, opresion e intolerancia. Seis anos despues, terroristas de Al Qaeda secuestraron aviones de pasajeros y los estrellaron contra las Torres Gemelas de Nueva York.
Rational approach to the management of multiple systems organ failure.

Important considerations in the management of MSOF include the avoidance and therapy of infection, the maintenance of tissue oxygenation, nutritional and metabolic support, and the suppport of the individual organ systems. Prevention is of primary importance. Conventional therapies as well as experimental therapeutic modalities are discussed in this article.
Long-Term Complete Responses to Combination Therapies in Sézary Patients.

Abstract Abstract 3369 Poster Board III-257 Introduction: Sezary syndrome (SS), the leukemic variant of cutaneous T-cell lymphoma (CTCL), is defined as erythroderma and >1000 abnormal T-cells per mm3 in the peripheral blood, and is currently incurable. A recent study of erythrodermic CTCL conducted at our center reported a median overall survival of 5.1 years which is twice that in the literature [Vidulich K, et al. Int. J of Dermatol. 2009; 48: 243-252]. Although complete remissions (CR) may be achieved in earlier stages of CTCL, they are rarely achieved in SS patients. Patients and Methods: A retrospective analysis of a prospective database of 1550 CTCL patients seen at the MD Anderson Cancer Center since 1984 identified a subset of 145 SS patients (9%) whose long-term complete responses (>2 years) to various therapies is reported. The most commonly used combination therapies were topical steroids, psoralen with ultraviolet A (PUVA), oral retinoids (isotretinoin, acetretin, or bexarotene), alpha-interferon, and extracorporeal photopheresis (ECP). A combination of total skin electron beam radiation (TSEB) followed by induction chemotherapy and allogeneic stem-cell transplant was given to 23 CTCL patients. Chronic Staphylococcus aureus carriers identified by cultures were treated with antibiotics and preventive skin care. Results: Of the 145 Sezary Syndrome patients, 13 (8.96%) achieved CRs, including 6 females and 7 males. Their median age was 48 (20 to 85 years) at diagnosis. Nine were Caucasian, 3 were African American, and 1 was Hispanic. At initial diagnosis their stages were IB (n=1), stage III (n=3), stage IVA (n=4), and stage IVB (n=5). Six achieved a CR on front-line combination immunomodulatory therapy consisting of ECP with alpha-interferon and/or oral retinoids, antibiotics, and topical steroids. Seven SS patients failed therapy but were able to obtain CRs after TSEB and allogeneic peripheral blood stem cell transplantation (SCT) from matched related donors (n=6) or unrelated (n=1) donors. The conditioning regimen for SCT was fludarabine and melphalan. The median time between diagnosis and CR was 4.07 years (range 1 to 20 years). The median duration of CR is 5 years (mean 5.15 years, range 2 to 13 years). Conclusion: Sezary Syndrome is extremely symptomatic and usually refractory to current therapies. CRs may be achieved using immunomodulatory therapy with biological response modifiers and photopheresis or with total skin electron beam followed by non-ablative allogeneic stem cell transplant in appropriate patients and may have an impact on overall survival. Disclosures: No relevant conflicts of interest to declare.
An Investigation of the Electrical Properties of Titanium Oxide Coatings for Potential Use in Biosensors

An initial characterization of the electrical properties of two types of base titanium oxide coatings deposited on two different types of substrates is presented. A capacitive/resistive response with an added semiconductor-like behavior was observed. This study provides insight into the electrical behavior of these coatings which can be modified in their composition for potential use in biosensors.
Fuels Management and Habitat Restoration Activities Benefit Eastern Hognose Snakes (Heterodon platirhinos) in a Disturbance-Dependent Ecosystem

Abstract Eastern Hognose Snakes (Heterodon platirhinos) are considered a species of conservation concern in the northeast United States because of their association with rare and declining habitats such as pine barrens and shrublands. These are disturbance-dependent habitats that currently require management to persist. We studied Eastern Hognose Snakes on a pitch pine–scrub oak barren in western Massachusetts from 2008 to 2013 to describe patterns of space use, habitat selection, and survival of this species and to evaluate the effects of habitat restoration and fuels management. We monitored 12 snakes with radio telemetry during the months of May to October 2008–2010. We examined habitat use versus availability using paired logistic regression analyses in which availability was temporally and spatially explicit in relation to radio-tracked snakes' previous use location and likely movements. We found that radio-tracked snakes significantly avoided closed-canopy forests and power line corridors, and inste...
Strategies for Treating Abnormal Lipid Profiles with Drugs

For the past 50 years, cardiovascular diseases have been the leading killers of men and women in the industrialized world [1]. A major advance has been ­control of risk factors, habits, or traits that incline susceptible individuals to coronary heart disease (CHD). Prospectively gathered data from the Framingham Heart Study shows that for men and women who at age 50 have no major risk factors, the burden of CHD is very small [2]. However, for those who reach 50 years of age with risk factors, the event rates for CHD with a reduction in total life expectancy is correspondingly large. Not surprisingly, for those who have already sustained a coronary event, cardiovascular mortality in the absence of treatment is high. Analysis of published studies by Law et al. [3] showed that the rate, if untreated, is 5% per year after a first myocardial infarction (MI) and 10% per year after each subsequent MI. There is consistent evidence from multiple, randomized, placebo-controlled clinical trials (RPCCTs) that the treatment of elevated blood cholesterol, a major CHD risk factor, results in a clinically important outcome difference. For patients who have known CHD or are greatly at its risk, treatment with HMG Coa reductase inhibitors (statins) that lower low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) substantially (more than 30%) is associated with significant reductions in fatal and nonfatal CHD [4,5].
Lipid-lowering drugs, dyslipidemia, and breast cancer risk in a Medicare population.

We sought to disentangle the effects of statins and other lipid-lowering drugs and the underlying dyslipidemia for which they are prescribed on breast cancer risk. We conducted a case–control study within the linked Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End results (SEER)-Medicare data. Cases were women with invasive breast cancer aged 66 + years (N = 30,004) identified by SEER registries (years 2007–2011). Controls were women (N = 198,969) identified from a 5% random sample of Medicare recipients alive and breast cancer free in year of selection. Participants had a minimum of 13 months of Part A, Part B non-health maintenance organization Medicare and Part D Medicare coverage at least 13 months preceding cancer diagnosis/selection. Exposures were assessed until 12 months before diagnosis/control selection. Odds ratios (OR) and 99.9% confidence intervals (CI) were estimated using adjusted unconditional and multinomial logistic regression. ORs of invasive breast cancer associated with dyslipidemia, statins, and non-statin lipid-lowering drugs were 0.86 (99.9% CI 0.81–0.90), 1.07 (99.9% CI 1.03–1.13) and 1.03 (99.9% CI 0.95–1.11), respectively. Risk reductions with dyslipidemia were slightly greater when untreated than treated and did not vary much by time between dyslipidemia and breast cancer diagnosis. Whether treated or untreated, dyslipidemia was associated with greater reductions in risk for later stage than earlier stage breast cancer (p-heterogeneity < 0.0001). Lipid-lowering drugs did not account for the lower breast cancer risk associated with dyslipidemia. Our data do not support using statins or other lipid-lowering drugs to prevent breast cancer.
The Adopt-a-School Service-learning Program: Igniting Comprehensive School Physical Activity Programs through School and University Partnerships

Physical educators have been identified as ideal school champions to lead comprehensive school physical activity program (CSPAP) efforts within their schools. As such, they should be adequately pre...
FlowScan: A Network Traffic Flow Reporting and Visualization Tool

nternet traffic flow profiling has become a useful technique in the passive measurement and analysis field. The prerequisites for flow-based measurements are now available within the network infrastructure - particularly, in popular Cisco network devices. The integration of this feature has enabled the "flow" concept to become a valuable tool for the network administrator, as it had been in the past for the researcher.This paper describes FlowScan, a software package for open systems that is freely available under the terms of the GNU General Public License. FlowScan analyzes and reports on flow data exported by Internet Protocol routers. It is an assemblage of perl scripts and modules and is the glue that binds together other freely available components such as a flow collection engine, a high performance database, and a visualization tool. Once assembled, the FlowScan system produces graph images, suitable for use in web pages. These provide a continuous, near real-time view of the network traffic through a network's border.Although there are now a number of tools available that collect and process flow data, there is a dearth of visualization tools. By utilizing freely available software tools, FlowScan can be readily deployed in most modern educational institution, corporate, and ISP networks. The information presented by FlowScan assists in understanding the nature of the traffic that your network is carrying. It can be useful in the identification and investigation of anomalies such as poor performance and attacks on hosts. It can provide a foundation on which to develop usage-based billing or to verify the effectiveness of Quality-of-Service policies. By understanding the flows of traffic carried by the network, your institution should be able to make informed network management and bandwidth provisioning decisions.
Language and Psychology

Miller (1964) wrote that “a logician is interested in discovering the rules for valid inference, but whether people actually use those rules or not does not concern him” (p. 93). We have here the crux of the issue. Does our study of linguistic analysis have any relevance to psychology? The issue is an epistemological concern that asks if the analysis of a text by logical or grammatical rules is actually mapped onto some variety of psychological structure or apparatus. Can we take rules derived from understanding grammatical form or syntax and the rules of reference and find both psychological and biological correlates that describe the substrate which subsumes that process? Unfortunately, at this time, there is as much sectarianism among linguists as there is among the various psychological schools. The question of whether or not linguistics is mapped onto psychological structures must be posed in this form: Linguistics according to whom? Mapped onto whose version of psychology?
Microsurgical Techniques and Pelvic Adhesions

The 1970s was an era of revolution in infertility surgery, and in particular in surgery of the fallopian tubes. The development and the use of magnifying techniques, the understanding of the cause of and the development of techniques for the prevention of adhesion formation led to a marked improvement in results. A number of specialists have gained renown in the last decade with the excellence of their technique and their results. However, there is no reason why a well-trained gynecologic surgeon with an understanding of the pathophysiology involved and a knowledge of the principles of microsurgery, as well as some specialized training in the technique, cannot accomplish excellent results. In recent years a number of comprehensive reviews and texts have been published.1–4
Manufacturing of Al and Mg nanocomposite microparticles

Abstract Lightweight high-performance metallic powders have great potentials for applications in metal-based additive manufacturing. To enhance their mechanical performance and extend their potentials in addictive manufacturing, ceramic nanoparticles are now incorporated into metal matrix microparticles. However, successful incorporation of high volume percentage nanoparticles and related scalable processing methods have not been developed yet. Here we show an effective manufacturing approach to produce aluminum (Al) and magnesium (Mg) nanocomposite microparticles with densely-packed titanium diboride and titanium carbide nanoparticles. Through a flux-assisted solidification processing method, up to 30 vol% of the nanoparticles were efficiently self-incorporated and self-dispersed into Al and Mg microparticles.
Optimization and Contact Reliability of TiN-Coated Microswitches in Various Gas Environments

Titanium nitride (TiN) is of interest as a material in MEMS and NEMS switches due to its high hardness, low-surface energy, good electrical conductivity, and resistance to chemical oxidation. We perform extensive characterization of TiN for microswitches. We optimize process parameters to attain low resistivity ( $60~\mu \Omega \cdot \text {cm}$ ) and acceptable residual stress. A specific resistivity of $9\cdot 10^{-6}\,\,\Omega $ cm2 is achieved, about 50 times lower than previous reports. We successfully wedge bond to the TiN with Al wire using high ultrasonic power. Because surface stoichiometry of binary alloys may depend on mechanochemical effects, we cycle test in controlled O2, N2, Ar, and N2:C6H6 gas environments. Of these, O2 yielded short lifetimes (~100 cycles), while N2 and Ar gave equivalent results (~105 cycles). The N2:C6H6 environment enabled the longest lifetimes ( $\ge 17 \cdot 10^{6}$ cycles) at the expense of increasing $ECR$ . The cycle count limit in N2 and Ar was investigated and traced to a weak microstructure that develops at corners of the contacting surfaces. If such corners are avoided in future designs, TiN-coated switches likely can survive to much higher cycle counts. [2018-0158]
Salinity-Induced Reduction of Interfacial Energies and Kinetic Factors during Calcium Carbonate Nucleation on Quartz

Nucleation is a crucial nanoscale process during the formation of new phases. This study employs CaCO3 nucleation on quartz as an example system and investigates the effects of salinity on thermody...
Mobile sensing of point-source gas emissions using Bayesian inference: An empirical examination of the likelihood function

Abstract This paper evaluates likelihood function forms for Bayesian inference of point-source gas emissions using a mobile sensor. Whereas Bayesian inference has been successfully used to estimate emission rates from time-averaged concentration data measured by stationary sensors, data collected by mobile sensors do not represent ensemble or time-averaged conditions. To examine the potential impact of this contrast, controlled release experiments were conducted with a mobile sensor measuring concentrations repeatedly along transverse cross sections of the downwind plumes. Experiments were conducted with measurements made at different downwind distances, different sensor heights, and with different obstacle states. An examination is made between two commonly-used likelihood functions, the Gaussian and the log-normal. For experiments conducted in the absence of obstacles, the Bayesian estimates using the log-normal likelihood function yield a much smaller bias than those based on the Gaussian likelihood function. This finding is consistent with the non-Gaussian nature of concentration fluctuations near a point-source. For experiments conducted in the presence of obstacles, the Bayesian inference based on the Gaussian likelihood function exhibits a better performance. This can be explained by the enhanced turbulent mixing due to the obstacle-introduced wake eddies. Overall, we find that the selection of the likelihood function can be physically related to the underlying conditions, and the proper selection is critical to ensure the performance of the Bayesian inference for source characterization using mobile sensing data.
Predictors of placement disruptions in foster care.

Abstract Background Many children who are removed from a dangerous or neglectful home and placed in state custody subsequently experience additional disruptions while in custody, which can compound the effects of ongoing stress and instability. As such, placement stability has been identified as a critical objective and a key indicator of success for children residing in substitutive care. Objective To examine the utility of child protective services data in identifying predictors of placement disruption. Participants and setting The current study examined data from youth in Tennessee state custody who had been assessed using the Child and Adolescent Needs and Strengths (CANS) assessment within 30-days of their first, out-of-home placement. The sample included 8,853 youth ages 5–19 years old (M = 13.1; SD = 4.0; 44.8 % female). Methods Demographics, placement information, and the CANS assessment were collected by the Tennessee Department of Children’s Services for all child welfare episodes for children as part of the system’s usual standard of care. Bivariate correlation and linear regression models were conducted. Results Multiple risk indices from the CANS appeared to significantly increase risk of placement disruption, including child internalizing and externalizing symptoms, school difficulties, youth affect dysregulation, and child age. Conclusions The current findings suggest that data collected as part of standard practice by child welfare workers such as the CANS is both feasible and has utility for identifying sources of risk for placement disruptions and to inform possible targets of intervention to enhance placement stability.
Functional near-infrared spectroscopy detects increased activation of the brain frontal-parietal network in youth with type 1 diabetes.

When considered as a group, children with type 1 diabetes have subtle cognitive deficits relative to neurotypical controls. However, the neural correlates of these differences remain poorly understood. Using functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS), we investigated the brain functional activations of young adolescents (19 individuals with type 1 diabetes, 18 healthy controls, ages 8-16 years) during a Go/No-Go response inhibition task. Both cohorts had the same performance on the task, but the individuals with type 1 diabetes subjects had higher activations in a frontal-parietal network including the bilateral supramarginal gyri and bilateral rostrolateral prefrontal cortices. The activations in these regions were positively correlated with fewer parent-reported conduct problems (ie, lower Conduct Problem scores) on the Behavioral Assessment System for Children, Second Edition. Lower Conduct Problem scores are characteristic of less rule-breaking behavior suggesting a link between this brain network and better self-control. These findings are consistent with a large functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study of children with type 1 diabetes using completely different participants. Perhaps surprisingly, the between-group activation results from fNIRS were statistically stronger than the results using fMRI. This pilot study is the first fNIRS investigation of executive function for individuals with type 1 diabetes. The results suggest that fNIRS is a promising functional neuroimaging resource for detecting the brain correlates of behavior in the pediatric clinic.
Synthesis, Structure, and Reactivity of Gold(I) α‑OxoCarbenoid Complexes

The trifluoromethanesulfonate α-oxo carbenoid complexes (IPr)AuCH(OTf)COR [R = OEt (1a), p-tolyl (1b)] were isolated from reactions of (IPr)Au(OTf) with the corresponding α-diazo carbonyl compounds...
Micro-Doppler classification of activities of daily living incorporating human ethogram

MicroDoppler classification of human motions has been performed thus far without considering the Human ethogram. The ethogram is a catalog of possible activities and the way they are connected. For example, sitting and falling cannot be followed by walking without first standing. The same argument applies to previous motions, e.g., sitting can be only preceded by standing. From a motion classification perspective, the ethogram can be categorized into translation and in-place motions. Whereas the former mainly describe crawling and gait articulations, the latter are primarily associated with motions that do not exhibit considerable changes in range. In this paper, we exploit the human ethogram to guide and improve classification of activities of daily living. Using an FMCW radar with range and Doppler resolution capabilities, we compare the performance of the ethogram-based classifications with the case where all motion classes are considered all the time. The thrust of this comparison is not to advocate one type of human motion classifier over the other, but rather to show the impact of incorporating the ethogram sequence of human motion on classification performance.
Computational and experimental investigation of refractory high entropy alloy Mo15Nb20Re15Ta30W20

Abstract In this study, refractory high entropy alloys (RHEAs) Mo20Nb20Re20Ta20W20, Mo15Nb20Re15Ta30W20, and Mo15Nb20Re10Ta35W20 were studied by applying the first-principles density functional theory (DFT) method. The DFT calculation was based on a large unit cell model of 100-atom supercell, with randomly distributed five element atoms. The mechanical properties of all three RHEAs were calculated and compared. Comparing with the other two RHEAs, Mo15Nb20Re15Ta30W20 possesses balanced mechanical properties with an optimized concentration of expensive Re element. We combined the DFT calculations of a supercell with Debye–Gruneisen theory to investigate the thermal properties of the two RHEAs Mo20Nb20Re20Ta20W20 and Mo15Nb20Re15Ta30W20. Mo15Nb20Re15Ta30W20 was selected for further experimental exploration and the computational results were compared. The experimental study shows the existence of a single BCC structure of Mo15Nb20Re15Ta30W20. The crystal structure, density, lattice parameter, and hardness predicted computationally are consistent with the experiment data.
Depiction of Sexual Harassment in Medical Television Shows

Background and objective Medical television (TV) shows are known to exaggerate medical scenarios, including relationships among/between medical staff and patients. Unfortunately, sexual harassment occurs within the medical and nursing profession. The objective of this study was to analyze the depiction of sexual harassment in eight popular medical TV shows. Methods The first 10 episodes of the first season of eight popular medical TV shows (St. Elsewhere, ER, Scrubs, Private Practice, Grey's Anatomy, Nurse Jackie, The Good Doctor, and The Resident) were viewed and coded by two reviewers. The data abstracted included demographics of those involved in the sexual harassment and examples of sexual harassment depicted. Results The analysis was based on 62 instances of sexual harassment. The victim of sexual harassment was female in 77% (49/62) of instances. The most common relationships depicted pertaining to the acts of sexual harassment were attending physicians toward attending physicians (12/62, 19.3%), interns toward interns (8/62, 12.9%), attending physicians towards interns (7/62, 11.2%), and patients toward attending physicians (5/62, 8.1%). The most common examples of sexual harassment portrayed were telling sexual anecdotes/jokes (23/62, 37.1%), inappropriate touching (12/62, 19.4%), and making sexual comments about appearance, such as body parts or clothes (12/62, 19.4%). Conclusion Based on our analysis of medical TV shows, instances of sexual harassment occurred most commonly between attending physicians, and most of them were associated with sexual anecdotes/jokes. Medical and nursing professionals may draw on relevant instances from medical TV shows to discuss how to recognize and deal with sexual harassment in the workplace in order to promote a safe and nurturing environment devoid of harassment.
A second-order dynamic adaptive hybrid scheme for time-integration of stiff chemistry

Abstract A dynamic adaptive hybrid integration (AHI) scheme of second-order accuracy (AHI2) is proposed for time-integration of chemically reacting flows involving stiff chemistry. AHI2 is extended from a first-order AHI method (AHI1) developed in a previous study, which showed that when significant radical sources are present in the non-chemical source terms, splitting the chemical and the transport sub-systems may incur O(1) errors unless the splitting time steps are comparable to or smaller than that required for explicit integration. As such, the transport term needs to be carried during the integration of stiff chemistry to avoid the large splitting errors. In AHI, fast species and reactions that may induce stiffness are treated implicitly, while the non-stiff variables and source terms, including slow reactions and the mixing term, are treated explicitly. The separation of fast-slow chemistry is performed on-the-fly based on analytically evaluated timescales for species and reactions, such that the complexity of the implicit core in the governing equations is minimized at each time step and the time-integration can be performed with high efficiency. The newly developed AHI2 scheme combines the midpoint scheme and the trapezoidal rule to achieve second-order accuracy. The second-order scheme is tested with a toy problem, as well as auto-ignition and unsteady perfectly stirred reactors (PSR) with detailed chemistry. Results show that AHI2 can significantly improve accuracy compared with AHI1. It was further found that AHI2 can accurately predict extinction of unsteady PSRs while the Strang splitting scheme fails to control the error, showing the necessity not to split the chemistry and transport source terms for prediction of extinction or forced-ignition problems involving significant radical sources. Further analysis of numerical efficiency shows that for auto-ignition AHI2 reduces computational cost primarily through the reduction in the number of variables to be solved implicitly, and the time-saving increases with the mechanism size, reaching approximately 70% for the 111-species USC-Mech II compared with a fully implicit scheme. For unsteady PSR involving homogeneous mixing, AHI2 achieved speedup factors of 20 to 30 compared with the Strang splitting scheme. Furthermore, sparse matrix techniques are integrated into AHI2 (AHI2-S) to achieve high computational efficiency. It is shown that the computational cost of AHI2-S is overall linearly proportional to the mechanism size and is comparable to that of evaluating reaction rates using CHEMKIN-II subroutines. It is further shown that AHI2-S achieves a speed-up factor of around two compared with the efficient fully implicit sparse solver LSODES with analytic Jacobian.
Framing HIV and AIDS: how leaders of black religious institutions in New York City interpret and address sex and sexuality in their HIV interventions

This study explored how leaders of Black churches active in the fight against HIV conceptualised sex and sexuality when describing HIV interventions within their institutions. We analysed interviews with pastors and identified three frames through which leaders understood and communicated about sex and sexuality: (1) an evasive frame, in which participants avoided discussing behaviours and populations that have historically been disparaged within the church by emphasising involuntary risk exposure; (2) an agentic frame, which recognised sexual behaviour that differed from heteronormative conduct; and, (3) a pluralist frame, which allowed individuals to maintain their own beliefs about appropriate sexual conduct. Participants used frames to engage in a range of HIV interventions while upholding stigmatising beliefs about sexual behaviour and identity.
Posterior contraction and credible regions for level sets

For a given function f on a multivariate domain, the level sets, given by {x:f(x)=c} for different values of c, provide important geometrical insights about the underlying function of interest. The distance on level sets of two functions may be measured by the Hausdorff metric or a metric based on the Lebesgue measure of a discrepancy, both of which can be linked with the L∞-distance on the underlying functions. In a Bayesian framework, we derive posterior contraction rates and optimal sized credible sets with assured frequentist coverage for level sets in some nonparametric settings by extending some univariate L∞-posterior contraction rates to the corresponding multivariate settings. For the multivariate Gaussian white noise model, adaptive Hausdorff and Lebesgue contraction rates for levels sets of the signal function and its mixed order partial derivatives are derived using a wavelet series prior on the function. Assuming a known smoothness level of the signal function, an optimal sized credible region for a level set with assured frequentist coverage is derived based on a multidimensional trigonometric series prior. For the nonparametric regression problem, adaptive rates for level sets of the function and its mixed partial derivatives are obtained using a multidimensional wavelet series prior. When the smoothness level is given, optimal sized credible regions with assured frequentist coverage are obtained using a finite random series prior based on tensor products of B-splines. We also derive Hausdorff and Lebesgue contraction rates of a multivariate density function under a known smoothness setting.
Projection methods for the numerical solution of Markov chain models

Projection methods for computing stationary probability distributions for Markov chain models are presented. A general projection method is a method which seeks an approximation from a subspace of small dimension to the original problem. Thus, the original matrix problem of size N is approximated by one of dimension m, typically much smaller than N. A particularly successful class of methods based on this principle is that of Krylov subspace methods which utilize subspaces of the form span(v,av,...,A(exp m-1)v). These methods are effective in solving linear systems and eigenvalue problems (Lanczos, Arnoldi,...) as well as nonlinear equations. They can be combined with more traditional iterative methods such as successive overrelaxation, symmetric successive overrelaxation, or with incomplete factorization methods to enhance convergence.
Acetylcholine and Muscarinic Receptors

Publisher Summary Acetylcholine (ACh) is stored in a bound form in vesicles. On the arrival of an action potential in the cholinergic neuron terminal, voltage-sensitive calcium channels open and ACh stores are released by exocytosis to trigger a postsynaptic physiologic response. The release of ACh can be blocked by botulinum toxin, the etiologic agent in botulism. Botulinum toxin has been used to treat an array of movement disorders and other conditions, including hyperhidrosis. Unfortunately, it requires local injection but is often effective for weeks or months. ACh is the postganglionic neurotransmitter in the parasympathetic nervous system; it is also the preganglionic neurotransmitter for boththe sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous system, and it is important at nonautonomic sites.
Pornography, feminist awards

The Feminist Porn Awards are an awards ceremony sponsored by Good For Her, a women-focused sex toy store in Toronto, Canada. The awards were founded in 2006 after staff at Good For Her wanted a way to recognize and honor individuals who were making pornography that aligned with the feminist and sex-positive mission of their business. Good For Her was frustrated about the lack of erotica and pornography focused on women and marginalized people, including people of color and transgender/gender-variant performers, producers, and directors. Keywords: awards shows; feminist; pornography
Framing the Prosecution

Even as we endeavor to give criminal defendants the means and license to raise reasonable doubts -- to put investigations on trial -- we need to think more about when and how those doubts can be allayed. What tools should we give jurors to assess the alleged holes – the “reasonableness” of an alleged doubt? And how can the prosecution try to mend them? How we answer these questions will affect the value of trials as a systemic regulatory mechanism in a world with very few trials. Sparked by Dan Simon’s work on the “diagnosticity” of criminal trials, this essay proposes a quiet reframing of trials as regulatory interventions into a sparsely regulated world.
Kinetic dialysis as a method for determining mixed micelle composition

A new method for the determination of the cmc using a dialysis technique which allows monomeric species to diffuse through but not micelles has been applied for determining the mixed micelle composition. The method is based on determining the amount of surfactant that diffuses through at two different times which allows for the calculation of the cmc by use of the appropriate equation. This method requires the preparation of only one concentration of solution and lends itself particularly well to the determination of the composition of mixed micelles.