cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Robotic musicianship

Inspired and motivated by the prospect of innovating the core of the musical experience, the author have explored a number of research directions in which digital technology bears the promise of revolutionizing the medium. The research directions identified - gestural expression, collaborative networks, and constructionist learning - aimed at creating musical experiences that cannot be facilitated by traditional means. The first direction builds on the notion that through novel sensing and mapping techniques, new expressive musical gestures can be discovered that are not supported by current acoustic instruments. Such gestures, unconstrained by the physical limitation of acoustic sound production, can provide infinite possibilities for expressive and creative musical experiences for novice as well as trained musicians. The second research direction utilizes the digital network in an effort to create new collaborative experiences, allowing players to take an active role in determining and influencing not only their own musical output but also that of their co-performers. By using the network to interdependently share and control musical materials in a group, musicians can combine their musical ideas into a constantly evolving collaborative musical activity that is novel and inspiring. The third research direction utilizes constructionist learning, which bears the promise of revolutionizing music education by providing hands-on access to programmable music making.
Effects of Preloads on Vibration Transmission Through Double Row Angular Contact Ball Bearings

This work investigates the role of double row angular contact ball bearings as a vibration transmitter in shaft-bearing assemblies. In our analyses the double row bearings are represented as five dimensional stiffness elements (with associated damping) through an extension of the stiffness matrix concept described by Lim and Singh (1989) for single row bearings to double row angular contact ball bearings. In particular, the effects of bearing preloads on dynamic characteristics of double row angular contact ball bearings are first numerically explored. The dynamic responses of face-to-face, back-to-back and tandem arrangements are evaluated on a comparative basis under various preloads. The nature and extent of preloads significantly affect the vibration characteristics of the bearing assembly due to major changes in the diagonal and off-diagonal elements of the stiffness matrix, and these effects vary for alternate configurations. The dynamic effects of bearing preloads are then experimentally investigated for a wheel bearing assembly containing double row angular contact ball bearings (with back-to-back arrangement) under two different preloading mechanisms. Experiments show that the mechanism and amount of bearing preloads significantly affect the system natural frequencies, mode shapes and vibration amplitudes, thus altering the vibration behavior of the bearing assembly. Suggestions for further work and applications will be briefly mentioned.© 2011 ASME
On the grammaticalization of nominalization marker =ay in Kavalan and Amis: a contrastive study

In light of a functional perspective on nominalization, this paper investigates the nominalization marker =ay in two Formosan languages Kavalan and Amis. In addition to denoting persons/things or events, the marker also indicates perfectivity or emphasis. The latter non-referring functions of =ay are argued to derive from its grammatical status as an epistemic modality marker conveying a speaker’s strong commitment to a proposition, which presumably has been grammaticalized from its referring functions. Several types of evidence are presented to support the hypothesized grammaticalization path, including synchronic-intralingual, synchronic-interlingual, historical, and typological.
Measurement of the 10B(n,α1γ) 7Li Cross Section in the 0.3 to 4 MeV Neutron Energy Interval

A relative cross section measurement of the 10B(n,α1γ)7Li cross section was made using the ORELA neutron source. The reaction was measured by observing the 478 keV photon using a 30% efficiency germanium detector. The neutron flux was monitored with a high efficiency plastic scintillator. Data analysis required the use of extensive Monte Carlo calculations for corrections to the data. The measured cross section differs as much as 40% from the ENDF/B-VI evaluation for neutron energies greater than 1.5 MeV.
Abstract 2848: Autophagy, senescence and proliferative recovery subsequent to DNA damage in radiation sensitization by PARP inhibition

Radiotherapy continues to be a primary modality in the treatment of cancer. DNA damage induced by radiation can promote apoptosis as well as both autophagy and senescence, where autophagy and senescence can theoretically function to prolong tumor survival. A primary aim of this work was to investigate the hypothesis that autophagy and/or senescence could be permissive for DNA repair, thereby facilitating tumor cell recovery from radiation-induced growth arrest and/or cell death. In addition, studies were designed to elucidate the involvement of autophagy and senescence in radiation sensitization by PARP inhibitors and the re-emergence of a proliferating tumor cell population. In the context of this work, the relationship between radiation-induced autophagy and senescence was also determined. Studies were performed using DNA repair proficient HCT116 colon carcinoma cells and a repair deficient Ligase IV (-/-) isogenic cell line. Irradiation promoted a parallel induction of autophagy and senescence that was strongly correlated with the extent of persistent H2AX phosphorylation in both cell lines; however inhibition of autophagy failed to suppress senescence, indicating that the two responses were dissociable. Irradiation resulted in a transient arrest in the HCT116 cells while arrest was prolonged in the Ligase IV (-/-) cells; however, both cell lines ultimately recovered proliferative function, which may reflect maintenance of DNA repair capacity. The PARP inhibitors (Olaparib) and (Niraparib) increased the extent of persistent DNA damage induced by radiation as well as the extent of both autophagy and senescence; neither cell line underwent significant apoptosis by radiation alone or in the presence of the PARP inhibitors. Inhibition of autophagy failed to attenuate radiation sensitization, indicating that autophagy was not involved in the action of the PARP inhibitors. As with radiation alone, despite sensitization by PARP inhibition, proliferative recovery was evident within a period of 10-20 days. While inhibition of DNA repair via PARP inhibition may initially sensitize tumor cells to radiation via the promotion of senescence, this strategy does not appear to interfere with proliferative recovery, which could ultimately contribute to disease recurrence. Citation Format: Moureq R. Alotaibi, Khushboo Sharma, Tareq Saleh, Lawrence Povirk, Eric Hendrickson, David Gewirtz. Autophagy, senescence and proliferative recovery subsequent to DNA damage in radiation sensitization by PARP inhibition. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 107th Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2016 Apr 16-20; New Orleans, LA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2016;76(14 Suppl):Abstract nr 2848.
Interprofessional learning through shadowing: Insights and lessons learned.

AbstractBackground: Interprofessional education (IPE) aims to improve patient outcomes. Interprofessional shadowing improves students’ knowledge of different roles and attitudes toward other professionals.Aim: This study evaluates (1) how pre-clinical medical students describe the roles of the healthcare professionals they shadowed, and (2) whether shadowing can be used to introduce medical students to the benefits of interprofessional collaboration, and if so, in what ways.Methods: Second-year medical students shadow another discipline and write a reflection on the shadowed discipline (SD)’s role and collaboration in patient care. A non-proportional stratified random sample of these reflections was coded during an iterative process. Any number of the 13 possible codes could be assigned to each reflection. Codes relevant to the research questions underwent narrative analysis.Results: The most frequent codes were “specific function of SD” (88%), “SD’s general purpose” (86%), and “value of SD’s role” (68%)....
Nano-sensors for apoptosis detection in Atherosclerotic Plaques

C diseases, including hypertension, coronary heart disease, stroke, congenital cardiovascular defects, congestive heart failure, and peripheral vascular disease, is the leading cause of morbidity and mortality in the industrialized world. These conditions affect more than 60 million people and are responsible for the death of almost 1 million Americans per year. Imaging represents an important component of the diagnosis and evaluation of cardiovascular disease. Modalities to image the heart and vasculature include radiography, echocardiography, nuclear imaging, cineangiography, and computed tomography. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) has recently emerged as a growing means of cardiovascular imaging. The goal of our work is to develop an advanced MRI active nanoparticle (NP) platform with an excellent pharmacokinetic (PK) profile and plaque targeting properties to allow apoptosis sensing in atherosclerosis and locally release therapy. Conventional statin therapies show residual risk of coronary artery disease. Development of cardiovascular sensing and treatment strategies has stagnated in recent years. This can be ascribed to limited improvements in targeting and discriminating between atherosclerotic lesions and establishing robust endpoints for a given sensing is difficult due to the complex vasculature network. Our approach have potential in visualizing, quantifying, and characterizing atherosclerosis, and can be used to determine valid endpoints to address the current limitations. This MRI active NP platform specifically designed for atherosclerosis, when shown effective, can be used as the basis for novel therapeutics for their clinical transition. This talk will be focused to summarize some of our preliminary results based on nanotechnologies for cardiovascular diagnosis and therapy.
Microbial communities for bioprocessing: lessons learned from nature

Microbial bioprocessing has evolved from the use of undefined natural consortia to the construction of synthetic communities tailored to specific processes and bioproducts. This evolution is enabled by recent advances in biotechnology, including cultivation of non-model microbes, metabolic engineering, bioinformatics, and numerical modeling. Equipped with these powerful tools, engineers have designed co-cultures and consortia with an expanded set of capabilities, mainly via ‘bottom-up’ approaches that tether isolates together in culture. Here, we present a brief review of the opportunities, challenges, and recent developments in consortia-based bioprocessing with a focus on lignocellulosic biomass conversion. With improved understanding of microbial community composition and function, we further present a vision to harness defined consortia down-selected from nature via ‘top down’ approaches.
A Non-parametric Learning Method for Confidently Estimating Patient's Clinical State and Dynamics

Estimating patient's clinical state from multiple concurrent physiological streams plays an important role in determining if a therapeutic intervention is necessary and for triaging patients in the hospital. In this paper we construct a non-parametric learning algorithm to estimate the clinical state of a patient. The algorithm addresses several known challenges with clinical state estimation such as eliminating bias introduced by therapeutic intervention censoring, increasing the timeliness of state estimation while ensuring a sufficient accuracy, and the ability to detect anomalous clinical states. These benefits are obtained by combining the tools of non-parametric Bayesian inference, permutation testing, and generalizations of the empirical Bernstein inequality. The algorithm is validated using real-world data from a cancer ward in a large academic hospital.
High spatial resolution burn severity mapping of the New Jersey Pine Barrens with WorldView-3 near-infrared and shortwave infrared imagery

The WorldView-3 WV-3 sensor, launched in 2014, is the first high-spatial resolution scanner to acquire imagery in the shortwave infrared SWIR. A spectral ratio of the SWIR combined with the near-infrared NIR can potentially provide an effective differentiation of wildfire burn severity. Previous high spatial resolution sensors were limited to data from the visible and NIR for mapping burn severity, for example using the normalized difference vegetation index NDVI. Drawing on a study site in the Pine Barrens of New Jersey, USA, we investigate optimal processing methods for analysing WV-3 data, with a focus on the pre-fire minus post-fire differenced normalized burn ratio dNBR. Although the imagery, originally acquired with a 3.7 m instantaneous field of view, was aggregated to 7.5 m pixels by DigitalGlobe due to current licensing constraints, a slight additional smoothing of the data was nevertheless found to help reduce noise in the multi-temporal dNBR imagery. The highest coefficient of determination R2 of the regressions of dNBR with the field-based composite burn index was obtained with a dNBR ratio produced with the NIR1 and SWIR6 bands. Only a very small increase in R2 was found when dNBR was calculated using the average of NIR1 and NIR2 for the NIR bands, and SWIR5 to SWIR8 for the SWIR bands. dNBR calculated using SWIR1 as the NIR band produced notably lower R2 values than when either NIR1 or NIR2 were used. Differenced NDVI data was found to produce models with a much lower R2 than dNBR, emphasizing the importance of the shortwave infrared region for monitoring fire severity. High spatial resolution dNBR data from WV-3 can potentially provide valuable information on finer details regarding burn severity patterns than can be obtained from Landsat 30 m data.
Comparing Smoking Topography and Subjective Measures of Usual Brand Cigarettes Between Pregnant and Non-Pregnant Smokers

Introduction Most pregnant smokers report abruptly reducing their cigarettes per day (CPD) by ~50% after learning of pregnancy and making further smaller reductions over the remainder of their pregnancy. Laboratory and naturalistic studies with non-pregnant smokers have found that these types of reductions often lead to changes in smoking topography (i.e., changes in smoking intensity to maintain a desired blood-nicotine level). If pregnant women smoke more intensely, they may expose themselves and their offspring to similar levels of toxicants despite reporting reductions in CPD. Methods Pregnant and non-pregnant female smokers (n = 20 and 89, respectively) participated. At the experimental session, after biochemical confirmation of acute abstinence, participants smoked one usual brand cigarette ad lib through a Borgwaldt CReSS Desktop Smoking Topography device. Carbon monoxide (CO) and measures of nicotine withdrawal, craving, and reinforcement derived from smoking were also collected. Results The two groups did not differ on demographic or smoking characteristics at screening, except nicotine metabolism rate, which as expected, was faster in pregnant smokers. Analyses suggest that none of the smoking topography parameters differed between pregnant and non-pregnant smokers, although pregnant smokers had a significantly smaller CO boost. Both groups reported similar levels of relief of withdrawal and craving after smoking, but other subjective effects suggest that pregnant smokers find smoking less reinforcing than non-pregnant smokers. Conclusions Pregnant smokers do not smoke cigarettes differently than non-pregnant women, but appear to find smoking comparatively less pleasurable. Implications This is the first study to assess smoking topography in pregnant women. Pregnant women appear to be at increased risk for smoking cigarettes with more intensity because of (1) their tendency to make significant abrupt reductions in the number of cigarettes they smoke each day after learning of pregnancy and (2) an increase in nicotine metabolism induced by pregnancy. Despite these changes, the present results suggest that pregnant women do not smoke cigarettes more intensely or in a way that causes more toxicant exposure, perhaps due to a reportedly less pleasurable smoking experience.
Fabrication and dynamic deflectometry testing methods for freeform and deformable optics

The diverse design space of freeform and deformable optics allows the design of innovative optical system concepts. A manufacturing technology is the remaining piece that prevents full realization of a freeform and adaptable optics age.
Hierarchical Self-Tuning of Concurrency and Resource Units in Data-Analytics Frameworks

Many big-data processing applications use dataanalytics frameworks such as Apache Hadoop. Such frameworks have tunable configuration parameters set by experienced system administrators and/or application developers. However, tuning parameters manually can be hard and time-consuming because it requires domain-specific knowledge and understanding of complex inter-dependencies amongst parameters. Most of the frameworks seek efficient resource management by using slots or containers as resource units to be assigned to jobs or tasks, the maximum number of slots or containers in a system being part of the static configuration of the system. This static resource management has limited effectiveness in coping with jobs’ diversity and workload dynamics, even in the case of a single job. Seeking to improve performance (e.g., multiple-jobs makespan and job completion time) without modification of the framework, this paper proposes a hierarchical approach using a fuzzy-logic controller to dynamically adjust the number of concurrent jobs and additional controllers (one for each cluster node) to adjust the number of resource units assigned to jobs on each node. The fuzzylogic controller uses fuzzy rules based on a concave downward relationship between aggregate CPU usage and the number of concurrent jobs. The other controllers use a simple heuristic algorithm to adjust the number of resource units on the basis of resource usage by job tasks. A prototype of our approach was implemented for Apache Hadoop on a cluster running at CloudLab. The prototype was evaluated using realistic workloads generated by SWIM, a statistical workload injector for MapReduce. The evaluation shows that the proposed approach yields up to a 42% reduction of the jobs makespan that results from using Hadoop default settings.
Gluons of Different Colors

Many bricks, when configured appropriately, constitute one house. How is it possible for plurality to yield unity? This is the metaphysical problem of unity. Introducing another thing, say, the con...
Estimating Relevant Portion of Stability Region using Lyapunov Approach and Sum of Squares

Traditional Lyapunov-based transient stability assessment approaches focus on identifying the stability region (SR) of the equilibrium point under study. When trying to estimate this region using Lyapunov functions, the shape of the final estimate is often limited by the degree of the function chosen – a limitation that results in conservativeness in the estimate of the SR. More conservative the estimate is in a particular region in state space, smaller is the estimate of the critical clearing time (CCT) for disturbances that drive the system towards that region. In order to reduce this conservativeness, we propose a methodology that uses the disturbance trajectory data to skew the shape of the final Lyapunov-based SR estimate. We exploit the advances made in the theory of sum of squares decomposition to algorithmically estimate this region. The effectiveness of this technique is demonstrated on a power systems classical model.
A Framework for MIMO-based Packet Header Obfuscation

Eavesdroppers can exploit exposed packet headers towards attacks that profile clients and their data flows. In this paper, we propose FOG, a framework for effective header blinding using MIMO, to thwart eavesdroppers. FOG effectively tracks header bits as they traverse physical (PHY) layer sub-systems that perform functions like scrambling and interleaving. It combines multiple blinding signals for more effective and less predictable obfuscation, as compared to using a fixed blinding signal. We implement FOG on the WARP platform and demonstrate via extensive experiments that it yields better obfuscation than prior schemes that deploy full packet blinding. It causes a bit error rate (BER) of > 40 % at an eavesdropper if two blinding streams are sent during header transmissions. Furthermore, FOG incurs a very small throughput hit of ≈ 5 % with one blinding stream (and 9 % with two streams). Full packet blinding incurs much higher throughput hits (25 % with one stream and 50 % with two streams).
iPads in the Mathematics Classroom: Developing Criteria for Selecting Appropriate Learning Apps.

Over the last several years, iPads have become increasingly popular in the classroom. The number of available apps that could be used in the mathematics classroom are countless, but some make better mathematical learning tools than others. This research presents a set of sixteen criteria that can be used to evaluate the potential of an iPad app to be an effective mathematical learning tool. A review of the existing literature on digital learning objects and on iPads and tablet PCs in the classroom is conducted. The evaluation instrument is presented, along with a discussion of each of the sixteen criteria. The instrument is then applied to seven apps designed for learning algebraic concepts. From this sample of seven apps, common themes are examined. Implications for educators, designers, and for future research are discussed.
Prelude to a Theory of Musical Representation

In this paper, I present the beginnings of a resemblance theory of representation. I start by surveying the contemporary philosophical debate surrounding musical representation and reveal that its main interlocutors share a conception of artistic representation as a mode of meaningful communication. I then show how conceiving of artistic representation in this way severely limits music’s possibilities as a medium for representation. Next, I propose an alternative conception of representation that, despite its widespread acceptance outside of the philosophy of art, has been largely denigrated within it: namely, that representation fundamentally depends on structural resemblance. Finally, I demonstrate how conceiving of artistic representation as grounded upon structural resemblances, rather than as a mode of meaningful communication, provides us with a more accurate picture of both (a) how music represents and (b) how we perceive and appreciate musical representations.
All-Dielectric Metasurfaces for THz Imaging and Sensing

We demonstrate an approach to terahertz imaging and sensing using all-dielectric metasurface absorbers. THz waves are absorbed by the metasurface, converted to heat, and detected by an infrared camera.
Euchrysine, A Supravital Fluorescent Lysosomal Stain: Technic and Application for Hematologic Investigation

Euchrysine, a fluorescent aminoacridine dye which is selectively accumulated in lysosomes, has been used in an investigation of cells of hematopoietic origin. The technics for its preparation and use are described as well as the characteristics and patterns of lysosomal fluorescence for 1) primary lysosomes in peripheral blood and bone marrow cells; 2) secondary lysosomes; and 3) lysosomes and lysosomal aggregates in states of altered lymphoid proliferation. Euchrysine fluorescent staining appears to be a convenient and reliable technic for the identification of lysosomes in hematologic investigation.
Islamic Capital Markets for United States Parties: Overview and Select Shari'ah Governance Elements

This is a chapter for the forthcoming book in West Publishing Company's Inside the Minds Series focusing on Financial Services Enforcement and Compliance (published by Aspatore Books). This chapter provides an overview of nature and current state of the markets for the equity side and debt (sukuk) side of the Islamic capital markets. Particular attention is devoted to current trends in sukuk issuance. The chapter summarizes the nature and functioning of Shari'ah supervisory boards as elements of the corporate governance paradigm for the Islamic capital markets and includes, as an example, the treatment afforded Shari'ah governance by the Sultanate of Oman in its new Islamic Banking Framework. The chapter also notes some of the specific issues that need to be addressed if sukuk issuance by the private sector (corporates) is to progress to its potential. The current draft is a revision of August 14, 2013. The editors requested an increased focus on United States activities (including a change of the title), and this draft responds to that request.
Sex-Specific Proteomic Changes Induced by Genetic Deletion of Fibroblast Growth Factor 14 (FGF14), a Regulator of Neuronal Ion Channels

Fibroblast growth factor 14 (FGF14) is a member of the intracellular FGFs, which is a group of proteins involved in neuronal ion channel regulation and synaptic transmission. We previously demonstrated that male Fgf14-/- mice recapitulate the salient endophenotypes of synaptic dysfunction and behaviors that are associated with schizophrenia (SZ). As the underlying etiology of SZ and its sex-specific onset remain elusive, the Fgf14-/- model may provide a valuable tool to interrogate pathways related to disease mechanisms. Here, we performed label-free quantitative proteomics to identify enriched pathways in both male and female hippocampi from Fgf14+/+ and Fgf14-/- mice. We discovered that all of the differentially expressed proteins measured in Fgf14-/- animals, relative to their same-sex wildtype counterparts, are associated with SZ based on genome-wide association data. In addition, measured changes in the proteome were predominantly sex-specific, with the male Fgf14-/- mice distinctly enriched for pathways associated with neuropsychiatric disorders. In the male Fgf14-/- mouse, we found molecular characteristics that, in part, may explain a previously described neurotransmission and behavioral phenotype. This includes decreased levels of ALDH1A1 and protein kinase A (PRKAR2B). ALDH1A1 has been shown to mediate an alternative pathway for gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) synthesis, while PRKAR2B is essential for dopamine 2 receptor signaling, which is the basis of current antipsychotics. Collectively, our results provide new insights in the role of FGF14 and support the use of the Fgf14-/- mouse as a useful preclinical model of SZ for generating hypotheses on disease mechanisms, sex-specific manifestation, and therapy.
High-Dose Chemotherapy with Autologous Haematopoietic Progenitor Cell Transplantation for Adenocarcinoma of the Breast

Breast cancer is the second most common malignancy of women in the United States. One hundred and eighty-five thousand new cases are estimated to occur each year and approximately 44,300 women will die this year from breast cancer. No curable regimen including conventional-dose chemotherapy or hormonal therapy has been found for metastatic breast cancer. Although 10–35% of patients will achieve a complete remission with conventional-dose chemotherapy, the median duration of survival is approximately 1–2 years for patients with metastatic breast cancer [1]. These frustrating results prompted the exploration of high-dose chemotherapy for breast cancer and it is now more than a decade since the initial efforts to use high-dose chemotherapy with autologous bone marrow transplantation for patients with metastatic breast cancer. Over this time, the use of this treatment approach has massively expanded and breast cancer is now the most common disease in which high-dose chemotherapy and autologous haematopoietic progenitor cell support is performed.
The unusual demographic presentation of an osteoid osteoma

Demographics are an important tool for narrowing down the differential diagnosis for many medical presentations, and though usually steadfast, there are exceptions in using demographics as a guideline for diagnosis. Neoplastic bony lesions are particularly reliable in their presentation within a specific age range. However, if these cases are not fully evaluated and demarcated from one another, it may lead to overevaluation and treatment or underevaluation and treatment of benign neoplastic bony lesions. In this report, we present the case of a 30-year-old male with an osteoid osteoma presenting out of the typical age range. We also include the subsequent treatment of the benign tumor with radiofrequency ablation after the initial failure in medical management. The age range of the presentation of osteoid osteomas is commonly reported in the literature as 5–25 years, and the treatment can be medical or surgical. Here, we discuss the treatment options, demographic presentation, and course of osteoid osteomas. The following core competencies are addressed in this article: Patient care, Medical knowledge.
Broad-spectrum coronavirus antiviral drug discovery

Introduction: The highly pathogenic coronaviruses severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV) and Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) are lethal zoonotic viruses th...
Jung and the Neurobiology of the Creative Unconscious

The Jungian theories of creativity, like much of Jungian psychology, emphasize the relationship between the conscious mind and the unconscious. This paper explores and elucidates the intriguing parallels between this Jungian framework and recent models that have emerged in the neuroscience of creativity.
Gravitational Waves: Detectors to Detections

We announced the observation of gravitational waves from the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO) on 11-February-2016 [1], one hundred years after Einstein first proposed the existence of gravitational waves [2, 3]. Whether gravitational waves existed or not was controversial among theorists for the first 50 years, and then the actual observation came after another fifty years to develop a detector sensitive enough to observe the tiny distortions in spacetime from gravitational waves. The instrument was developed through the LIGO Laboratory, a Caltech/MIT collaboration, and the scientific exploitation through the LIGO Scientific Collaboration (LSC), having more than a thousand scientists, from around the world, who co-author the gravitational wave observational papers. In addition, many others have made and are making important contributions to our research.
Steering a Multi-armed Robotic Sheath Using Eccentric Precurved Tubes

This paper presents a novel continuum robot sheath for use in single-port minimally invasive procedures such as neuroendoscopy in which the sheath is designed to deliver multiple robotic arms. Articulation of the sheath is achieved by using precurved superelastic tubes lining the working channels used for arm delivery. These tubes perform a similar role to push/pull tendons, but can accomplish shape change of the sheath via rotation as well as translation. A kinematic model using Cosserat rod theory is derived which is based on modeling the system as a set of eccentrically aligned precurved tubes constrained along their length by an elastic backbone. The specific case of a two-arm sheath is considered in detail and its relationship to a concentric tube balanced pair is described. Simulation and experiment are used to investigate the concept, map its workspace and to evaluate the kinematic model.
Beyond design and use: How scholars should study intelligent technologies

Abstract This paper proposes a unified approach to studying intelligent technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI) that extends current studies of design and use. Current discussion of the implication of AI and the future of work gloss four important issues: variation, power, ideology, and institutions. By a unified approach we mean a research agenda that coordinates studies of variation in use with research on power, ideology, design, and institutional change, all focused on a specific technology or set of technologies. The approach rests on the image of a technology timeline that begins with the issues of power and ideology that underwrite the promotion of intelligent technologies by firms and other stakeholders that have an interest in building and diffusing such technologies. Moving to the right the timeline encompasses studies of design, implementation, and use that pay attention to variation in how intelligent technologies occasion changes in work and employment. Finally, the unified approach extends beyond current workplace studies to consider the institutional changes that may arise as the result of how intelligent technologies are used and employs such considerations to shape the agenda of promoters and designers so that they will create technologies that better benefit society.
Sensitivity Analysis of Internal Erosion Models for Dam Safety

WindowsTM Dam Analysis Modules (WinDAM) is a set of modular software components used to analyze the erosion and peak discharges that results from the overtopping or internal erosion in earthen embankment dams. The initial computational modules address routing of floods through the reservoir with dam overtopping and evaluation of the potential for vegetation or riprap to delay or prevent failure of the embankment. Subsequent modules perform dam breach analysis. Current work is underway to include analysis of internal erosion, non-homogeneous, zoned embankments, and the analysis of various other forms of embankment protection. The focus of this paper is on sensitivity analysis of internal erosion models using Sandia National Laboratories' Dakota software suite 6.10 to perform the analysis.
CFD Simulation Analysis on Aerodynamic Parameters of Steel Tubular Transmission Tower Body

This paper utilizes the CFD simulation analysis method, calculates and analyzes the distribution characteristics of streaming around the typical steel tubular transmission tower body and the pressure field, researches the change law of wind load force (torque) coefficient along with each main shaft direction o tower body, and then compares it with corresponding wind tunnel test result, and verifies the adaptability of this CFD simulation result. The result shows that the pole member in the upwind direction on the steel tubular tower has obvious disturbance and shielding effect to wind speed distribution around the pole member of downwind direction. The wind direction has obvious influence on the aerodynamic (torque) parameters of tower body, especially the steel tubular - angle steel combined tower body. The above research result provides a certain theoretical support and value taking basis for the wind-resistant design of steel tubular transmission tower body.
Semi-Blind and l1 Robust System Identification for Anemia Management.

Chronic diseases such as cancer, diabetes, heart diseases, chronic kidney disease (CKD) require a drug management system that ensures a stable and robust output of the patient's condition in response to drug dosage. In the case of CKD, the patients suffer from the deficiency of red blood cell count and external human recombinant erythropoietin (EPO) is required to maintain healthy levels of hemoglobin (Hb). Anemia is a common comorbidity in patients with CKD. For an efficient and robust anemia management system for CKD patients instead of traditional population-based approaches, individualized patient-specific approaches are needed. Hence, individualized system (patient) models for patient-specific drug-dose responses are required. In this research, system identification for CKD is performed for individual patients. For control-oriented system identification, two robust identification techniques are applied: (1) l1 robust identification considering zero initial conditions and (2) semi-blind robust system identification considering non-zero initial conditions. The EPO data of patients are used as the input and Hb data is used as the output of the system. For this study, individualized patient models are developed by using patient-specific data. The ARX one-step-ahead prediction technique is used for model validation at real patient data. The performance of these two techniques is compared by calculating minimum means square error (MMSE). By comparison, we show that the semi-blind robust identification technique gives better results as compared to l1 robust identification.
Modern Evaluation of the Status of WOTUS

AbstractThe term waters of the United States (WOTUS) has been a part of US legal jargon since it was first introduced in the 1972 amendments to the Federal Water Pollution Control Act, now known as...
A militant defence of democracy in hard times

Cristina Lafont gives an impressive defence of deliberative democracy against its critics. This article considers in detail her engagement with the ‘deep pluralist’ position that characterizes Nadi...
Effects of Three Common Choral Configurations on Acoustic and Perceptual Measures of a Soprano Section's Sound.

The purpose of this study was to assess the effects of three choral configurations on a soprano section’s sound. The first configuration resembled a choir section without an assigned standing posit...
Procollagen Trafficking and its Implications in Osteogenesis Imperfecta

Recent discoveries of skeletal dysplasias caused by mutations in COPII coat proteins responsible for a key checkpoint in the secretory pathway have renewed the interest of matrix biologists in procollagen trafficking. Osteogenesis imperfecta (OI) has long been considered a disorder related to malformations or malfunction of type I collagen and its procollagen precursor (type I collagenopathy). However, OI and chondrodysplasia features of patients with mutations in inner COPII coat proteins SEC24D and SEC23A have revealed that procollagen malformations and trafficking defects might cause similar pathology. The goal of this review is to bridge our knowledge of procollagen biosynthesis, secretory protein trafficking, degradative protein trafficking, and genetic defects in skeletal development, in order to understand the pathophysiology of these and related diseases. We argue that folding in the Endoplasmic Reticulum (ER), sorting by COPII-bound proteins at ER exit sites, transport by COPI carriers to Golgi, and autophagy of misfolded molecules are all intimately linked and crucial steps in procollagen homeostasis. Disruptions in these processes by mutations in key regulatory proteins underlie common collagenopathy-like skeletal pathologies in a wide variety of hereditary disorders ranging from OI to lysosomal storage diseases.
Development and Test of a Text-Messaging Follow-Up Program After Sexual Assault:

Patients receiving medical forensic examinations following sexual assault often do not receive important follow-up care. To address this gap, we developed and tested a bidirectional text-messaging ...
Towards Classifying Human Circadian Rhythm Using Multiple Modalities

Autonomous vehicles represent one of the most active technologies currently being developed, with research areas addressing, among others, the modeling of the states and behavioral elements of the occupants. This paper contributes to this line of research by studying the circadian rhythm of individuals using a novel multimodal dataset of 36 subjects consisting of five information channels. These channels include visual, thermal, physiological, linguistic, and background data. Moreover, we propose a framework to explore whether the circadian rhythm can be modeled without continuous monitoring and investigate the hypothesis that multimodal features have a greater propensity for improved performance using data points specific to certain times during the day. Our analysis shows that multimodal fusion can lead to an accuracy of up to 77% on identifying energized and enervated states of the participants. Our findings highlight the validity of our hypothesis and present a novel approach for future research.
Molecular Characterization of Erwinia carotovora hrpL, which Encodes an Alternate Sigma Factor

Many plant and animal pathogenic bacteria use the type III-secretion system to deliver virulence factors into host cells. It is becoming clear that the type III-secretion systems, in phytopathogenic and plant associated bacteria, are specifically used to transport Harpins, the elicitors of hypersensitive reaction (HR), as well as avirulence gene (avr) products, disease-specific (dsp) gene products and other accessory factors that could contribute to pathogenicity (3,1,8). It is, therefore, perhaps to be expected that hrp (gene for HR & pathogenicity), avr, dsp and other genes controlling host interaction are co-regulated by common signals, transcription factors including novel sigma factors, and post-transcription regulators.
Lysosomes to combat Parkinson's disease.

A study finds the transcription factor Lmx1b to be necessary in adults for preventing degeneration of midbrain dopamine neurons and implicates it in lysosomal function and regulation in these neurons.
Configuration debugging as search: finding the needle in the haystack

This work addresses the problem of diagnosing configuration errors that cause a system to function incorrectly. For example, a change to the local firewall policy could cause a network-based application to malfunction. Our approach is based on searching across time for the instant the system transitioned into a failed state. Based on this information, a troubleshooter or administrator can deduce the cause of failure by comparing system state before and after the failure. We present the Chronus tool, which automates the task of searching for a failure-inducing state change. Chronus takes as input a user-provided software probe, which differentiates between working and nonworking states. Chronus performs "time travel" by booting a virtual machine off the system's disk state as it existed at some point in the past. By using binary search, Chronus can find the fault point with effort that grows logarithmically with log size. We demonstrate that Chronus can diagnose a range of common configuration errors for both client-side and server-side applications, and that the performance overhead of the tool is not prohibitive.
Tim-3 is expressed by a majority of NK cells at periphery but not at tumor site in patients with advanced melanoma (TUM2P.919)

Tim-3 is a type I glycoprotein expressed by innate and adaptive immune cells. Tim-3 is an inhibitory receptor expressed by dysfunctional tumor antigen-specific CD8+ T cells of patients with advanced melanoma at periphery and in the tumor microenvironment. Tim-3 is also constitutively expressed by functional and mature NK cells in healthy donors (HD). The expression of Tim-3 on NK cells isolated from melanoma patients (MP) and its role in regulating NK functions have not been evaluated yet. To this end, we have investigated Tim-3 expression by NK cells in PBMCs isolated from HD and MP. In sharp contrast with HD, Tim-3 is upregulated by CD56bright as compared to CD56dim NK cells in PBMCs of MP. Upon stimulation with IL-12 and IL-18, NK cells in HD and MP upregulated Tim-3 expression and Tim-3high NK cells produced more IFN-γ than Tim-3neg, suggesting they are more functional. IFN-γ production increased upon NK stimulation with cytokines and Tim-3 ligand Galectin-9 and did not decrease upon Tim-3 blockade. In contrast to circulating NK cells, tumor-infiltrating NK cells (TINKs) are CD56dim in their large majority (> 98%), and exhibit lower levels of Tim-3 expression. Collectively, our data show that Tim-3 is expressed by a majority of functional circulating NK cells in HD and MP but only a minority of TINK cells, suggesting that TINK may be less functional than their peripheral counterpart.
Virtual Reality: Barter and Restructuring in Russian Industry

A general consensus in the transition economies literature links the existence of enterprise restructuring with the pace of the transition process and the potential for economic growth. The existing literature is less clear, however, about whether the lack of economic growth is caused by the lack of enterprise restructuring. Complicating the debate in Russia is the confusion regarding the role of barter transactions in enterprise restructuring. Much of the confusion is generated by proponents of a ?virtual economy? interpretation of how the Russian economy and Russian enterprise managers operate. This paper dispels much of the confusion about the existence of enterprise restructuring and the corresponding role of barter by demonstrating why the virtual economy model fails to accurately depict economic actions or outcomes in Russia. We develop the argument that barter is closely related to an absence of liquidity in the Russian economy, using both macro-level and micro-level data to document the consequences of ?structural illiquidity.? Our results are unambiguous: both the incidence and volume of barter transactions are inversely related to liquidity. We conclude that analyses using barter transactions as evidence of the lack of enterprise restructuring in Russia stem from: (1) the lack of clear consensus about what constitutes enterprise restructuring in transition economies and how it varies with the stage of the transition process; (2) errant assumptions about managers? objective functions; (3) the relative mix of formal and informal restructuring mechanisms; (4) the lack of attention to industry variation and, within industry, to managerial characteristics; and (5) the Texan complex (if it ain?t big, it ain?t ...) which causes analysts to ignore changes in enterprise operations unless they occur on a grandiose scale.
A Complete Guide to Therapy: From Psychoanalysis to Behaviour Modification

The author cuts through the myths and misunderstandings surrounding today's therapy and explores the pros and cons of both psychoanalysis and the many other, often recently introduced therapies. Although a psychoanalysist himself, Dr Kovel is not a proselytizer for professional treatment. He suggests that a distinction must be made between neurosis and unhappiness and proposes that many psychological problems might be radically altered if there were fundamental changes in society. The author examines the historical origins and discusses the merits of group, family and individual therapy and looks at, among other things, Freudian psychoanalysis, the existential approach, Reich and bioenergetics, Gestalt and Rogerian therapy and behavioural-directive therapies. Above all, this book gives guidance to anyone considering treatment. At the same time it also provides a perspective on the social and political role of therapy in contemporary society.
Infusing the creative-thinking process into undergraduate STEM education: An overview

In this project, we develop and deliver a workshop to teach undergraduate Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) faculty the creative thinking process and help them to develop modules for their classes. Leaning on ideas back to Plato's Theaetetus, we divide the creative process into seven discrete stages, and have developed exercises to help STEM faculty to explore and internalize these concepts. While we believe that many scientists invoke the creative process in their work regularly, we also believe that learning the creative process and practicing creative-process thinking can help STEM faculty and students to invoke this process more fluidly, expediently, and effectively. Initial feedback from the workshop indicates that the nine faculty who participated in the workshop report an increased understanding of the creative thinking process and increased comfort level with incorporating these ideas into their classes, among other things.