cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Understanding, justifying, and optimizing radiation exposure for CT imaging in nephrourology

An estimated 4–5 million CT scans are performed in the USA every year to investigate nephrourological diseases such as urinary stones and renal masses. Despite the clinical benefits of CT imaging, concerns remain regarding the potential risks associated with exposure to ionizing radiation. To assess the potential risk of harmful biological effects from exposure to ionizing radiation, understanding the mechanisms by which radiation damage and repair occur is essential. Although radiation level and cancer risk follow a linear association at high doses, no strong relationship is apparent below 100 mSv, the doses used in diagnostic imaging. Furthermore, the small theoretical increase in risk of cancer incidence must be considered in the context of the clinical benefit derived from a medically indicated CT and the likelihood of cancer occurrence in the general population. Elimination of unnecessary imaging is the most important method to reduce imaging-related radiation; however, technical aspects of medically justified imaging should also be optimized, such that the required diagnostic information is retained while minimizing the dose of radiation. Despite intensive study, evidence to prove an increased cancer risk associated with radiation doses below ~100 mSv is lacking; however, concerns about ionizing radiation in medical imaging remain and can affect patient care. Overall, the principles of justification and optimization must remain the basis of clinical decision-making regarding the use of ionizing radiation in medicine. Investigation of nephrourological diseases is a common indication for CT examination. However, concerns remain regarding the potential risks associated with exposure to ionizing radiation despite a lack of convincing evidence for any such effect at the low doses used for CT scanning. In this Review, experts in the field explain the data in this area and consider how elimination of unnecessary imaging and optimization of medically justified imaging must remain the basis of clinical decision-making.
Confirmatory Factor Analysis and Structural Equation Modeling

In this chapter, we discuss structural equation models in R. We show how R can be used for both covariance-based and partial least squares modeling, and present basic guidelines for model assessment. We also demonstrate the power of R to simulate data and to use simulation to inform our expectations.
The religious imagination of children project: an initial research report

ABSTRACTThe article presents a report of ongoing research into children’s religious beliefs and practices. Three sources of research are put into conversation with each other: 1) new findings in co...
“Asking, Learning, Seeking Out”: An Exploration of Data Literacy for Teaching

The current study explored preservice and inservice teachers’ perspectives on data literacy for teaching. Semi-structured interviews were employed with 12 teacher candidates in elementary and speci...
Chapter 2.3 – Robot-Assisted Wayfinding for the Visually Impaired in Structured Indoor Environments1

We present a robot-assisted wayfinding system for the visually impaired in structured indoor environments. The system consists of a mobile robotic guide and small passive RFID sensors embedded in the environment. The system is intended for use in indoor environments, such as office buildings, supermarkets and airports. We describe how the system was deployed in two indoor environments and evaluated by visually impaired participants in a series of pilot experiments. We analyze the system's successes and failures and outline our plans for future research and development.
Under pressure: non-medical use of prescription drugs among undergraduate students

ABSTRACT Objective To measure lifetime, last-year and last-month prevalence of Non-Medical Use of Prescription Drugs (NMUPD) as well as the characteristics associated to last-month NMUPD among undergraduate students of a university in southern Brazil. Methods This was a cross-sectional study, with a sample that was selected through a clustered systematic sampling strategy. Multivariate analysis was conducted with Poisson regression according to a four-level hierarchical model of analysis. Fieldwork was conducted in 2015, and 1,423 students participated. Results Lifetime, last-year and last-month prevalence of NMUPD were 25.2%, 13.1% and 8.5%, respectively. Anxiolytics and barbiturates were the most prevalent. Variables independently associated were being female, having a family income lower than one or higher than six Brazilian minimum wages, being enrolled in a health sciences-related undergraduate course, and having reported lifetime NMUPD by a friend. Conclusions Based on these results, we suggest the development of prevention and promotion activities on this theme for students and professors, especially among those from health sciences-related courses. These interventions should focus on harmful effects of NMUPD, psychosocial coping strategies and socially established gender roles.
Preliminary study on characteristics of NA genes and oseltamivir resistance in 2009 pandemic H1N1 influenza viruses in Fujian,China

To investigate characteristics of NA genes and oseltamivir susceptibility of 2009 pandemic H1N1 influenza viruses in Fujian Province,twenty-three strains were randomly selected for detection.Fragments of NA genes were amplified by one-step RT-PCR and then were sequenced.Comparing with the A/California/07/2009(H1N1),alignment of nucleic acid sequences revealed a high homology of 98.1%.While the amino acid residuals at 275 remained histidine,indicating all of the 23 isolates were oseltamivir-sensitive.This observation suggests no oseltamivir-resistant strains has emerged in Fujian.However,continuous surveillance is necessary for control and prevention strategies of the ongoing pandemic.
Pyrolysis Creates Electron Storage Capacity of Black Carbon (Biochar) from Lignocellulosic Biomass

Black carbon such as biochar has been shown to possess electron storage capacity (ESC), which enables black carbon to store and reversibly exchange electrons with its surroundings. However, the ori...
Place and Social Entrepreneurship: Review and Research Agenda

Despite the burgeoning literature on social enterprises, we do not fully understand place-based mechanisms underlying social enterprise models and impact. This omission is surprising given that soc...
Let's Build Theatre Communities . . . or Not: Virtual Teaching and Scholarship in an Exclusionary World

As collaborators who have been working together virtually since 2017, we have written plays and articles, conducted artist interviews, and are in the process of writing a book about teaching older adults theatre. When the pandemic came, everything else in our lives moved online, and we encountered new challenges with both our teaching and our scholarship. We were tasked with transitioning our theatre students to a virtual environment while conducting research for our book. We knew what was successful for us, as working online had helped our own practice, but would it be effective for students? And was it possible to write a scholarly book without access to academic libraries and archives? Our experiences over the past year reminded us that it shouldn't require a pandemic to rethink best practices in teaching and research. While the lessons we learned were because of a restructured academic environment, the issues we addressed existed previously and were often ignored. These are some of the things we will take with us postpandemic as educators and scholars.
On a Vector Calculus Task that Led to Formation of a Praxeology: A Lucky Accident or an Implicit Fine Design?

Acknowledging a complex relation between different teaching practises at the university level, this paper considers an episode from a lecture based course on vector calculus, where students were successful in discovering and justifying a method for constructing an osculating plane to a given curve. While this learning situation was not explicitly designed in the first place, we reconstruct a hypothetical questions and answers sequence that could warrant an emergence of this result in similar settings.
Assessment of Dilute Epinephrine and Mechanical Pressure for Prevention of Feline Postoperative Scrotal Hematoma: A Randomized Controlled Trial.

Abstract To determine whether two immediately postoperative preventive procedures, dilute epinephrine (1:400,000) as a scrotal wash or application of controlled mechanical pressure to the scrotum, reduce the risk or severity of scrotal hematoma following routine castration. Male cats with two descended testicles presenting to Midwestern University's Trap Neuter Return program were eligible for inclusion. Cats were assigned via block randomization to control, dilute epinephrine wash, or controlled mechanical pressure groups. For the epinephrine group, 0.2 ml (0.008 mg) of epinephrine diluted with sterile saline was instilled inside the scrotum. In the case of mechanical pressure, a broad-based clip generating less than 0.5 kg of pressure was applied for 10 minutes. Cats were evaluated for scrotal hematoma and the need for treatment by a veterinarian blinded to treatment group. Multivariable logistic regression was used to determine if the incidence of scrotal hematoma or scrotal hematoma requiring treatment was different between groups while controlling for other variables. There were 276 cats with a median age of 30 months (IQR 12,48) and a mean weight of 3.5 kg (SD 1.2). Scrotal hematomas were noted in 15 of the 92 (16%) control cats, as compared with 12 of the 92 (13%) epinephrine and nine of the 92 (10%) pressure cats. Treatment was required for 10 (67%) control, six (50%) epinephrine, and three (33%) pressure hematomas. Regression demonstrated a decreased risk of scrotal hematoma requiring treatment for cats in the pressure group (OR = 0.2, P = .044) controlling for weight (OR = 2.2, P = .006) and surgical duration (OR = 1.1, P = .026). Weight was the only significant variable for the presence of scrotal hematoma (OR = 2.2, P
Eureka Labs: Enhancing Cybersecurity Education through Inquiry-based Hands-on Activities

In this paper, we will introduce the design and implementation of a variety of intriguing and challenging hands-on laboratories to advance cybersecurity training and education. We call these laboratory projects Eureka Labs in reference to the "aha!" moment of understanding a previously incomprehensible concept. We seek to create illuminating learning experiences by incorporating Inquiry-Based Learning (IBL) activities to hands-on laboratories. In this project, we will develop three types of labs: i) Exploratory, where fun and inspiring activities are centered around basic security concepts in real-world applications; ii) Core, where fundamental security concepts are covered; and, iii) Advanced, where challenging topics and research issues are incorporated. We have also designed and built a suitable lab platform that is critical for the large-scale adoption and deployment of Eureka Labs.
Loss of CD47 Attenuates Angiotensin II Mediated Hypertension

CD47 plays a role in vascular reactivity by inhibiting both nitric oxide (NO) production and signaling. Because altered NO signaling is implicated in cardiovascular disease and hypertension, we explored the role of CD47 in the development of angiotensin II (AngII) mediated hypertension. In anesthetized CD47-/- mice, AngII injection failed to elicit the increase in blood pressure seen in a WT mouse. Expression of the AT1R receptor was measured in homogenized vessels via Western blotting, and it was determined that levels were not significantly different between WT and knockout animals, suggesting decreased response was not due to lack of receptor availability. To further characterize this lack of response, isolated TDAs from both WT and CD47-/- mice were cannulated and pressurized. Vessel diameter was assessed in response to increasing doses of AngII. Unexpectedly, we found that vessels from CD47-/- mice displayed decreased sensitivity to AngII-mediated vasoconstriction compared to WT vessels. Constriction...
Fatigue Crack Growth in Rail Steels

Considerable understanding of fatigue crack initiation and crack growth has been achieved in recent years, with a synthesis of concepts now available which includes crack initiation phenomena and also the growth behavior of short cracks and long cracks. This understanding has been shown to apply to rail steels in both the theoretical and experimental senses. Experimental results illustrating such extension are presented and discussed for both plain carbon and alloy rail compositions, with microstructural dependence of properties featured as a characteristic amenable to exploitation for improvement of rail performance.
Storm Time Energy Budgets of the Global Thermosphere

Space environment data acquired near L 1 and in low Earth orbit have allowed us to develop a deeper appreciation of the unity binding the dynamics of the magnetosphere-ionosphere-thermosphere system. This tutorial focuses on the main phase of large (Dst < -200 nT) magnetic storms when predictions of thermo spheric density models appear "too little-too late" in comparison with neutral mass densities (p) inferred from accelerometers on the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) satellites. Empirically, we find that (1) Dst traces correlate well with orbit-averaged values of p during the main and early recovery phases, but not thereafter and (2) polar cap potentials and magnetospheric electric fields derived from L 1 measurements predict thermospheric responses in all storm phases with lead times of 4―6 h. These two results provide clues for tracking energy transport from the solar wind to the ring current via magnetospheric electric fields. The asymmetric ring current seems to act as a reservoir from which energy is extracted as a net particle and Poynting flux into the ionosphere. Ion-neutral collisions transfer energy to the thermosphere. As the ring current symmetrizes, coupling to the ionosphere-thermosphere diminishes. Radiative losses of energy cause the thermosphere to relax to prestorm levels in ~13 h. We demonstrate a new application of Jacchia's [1977] model to test this conjecture. With inputs from GRACE measurements, the model predicts thermospheric energy increases (ΔE th ) that are about a factor of four greater than the increase in ring current energy (ΔE RC ) predicted by the Dessler-Parker-Sckopke relation. A larger fraction of the thermosphere's storm time energy budget must enter directly into the polar cap from the solar wind rather than indirectly via the magnetosphere into the auroral oval.
Flexible Time-Windows for Advance Reservation Scheduling

Advance-reservation is an essential feature of any system in which resources may need to be co-allocated at predetermined times. In this paper, we discuss unconstrained advance reservations, which use flexible time-windows to lower blocking probability and, consequently, increase resource utilization. We claim and show using simulations that the minimum window size, which theoretically brings the blocking probability to zero, in a first-come-first-served advance reservation model without time-slots, equals the waiting time in a queue-based on-demand model. We also show, with simulations, the effect of the window size on the blocking probability and on the resource utilization, for an advance reservation model with time-slots, for different types of arrival and service times. We then compare the blocking probabilities obtained by on-demand reservations, advance reservations, and unconstrained advance reservations with flexibility.
Trapezoidal phase-shifting method for three-dimensional shape measurement

We propose a novel structured light method, namely a trap- ezoidal phase-shifting method, for 3-D shape measurement. This method uses three patterns coded with phase-shifted, trapezoidal- shaped gray levels. The 3-D information of the object is extracted by direct calculation of an intensity ratio. Compared to traditional intensity- ratio-based methods, the vertical or depth resolution is six times better. Also, this new method is significantly less sensitive to the defocusing effect of the captured images, which makes large-depth 3-D shape mea- surement possible. If compared to sinusoidal phase-shifting methods, the resolution is similar, but the data processing speed is at least 4.5 times faster. The feasibility of this method is demonstrated in a previ- ously developed real-time 3-D shape measurement system. The recon- structed 3-D results show similar quality to those obtained by the sinu- soidal phase-shifting method. However, since the data processing speed is much faster 4.6 ms per frame, both image acquisition and 3-D re- construction can be done in real time at a frame rate of 40 fps and a resolution of 532500 points. This real-time capability allows us to mea- sure dynamically changing objects, such as human faces. The potential applications of this new method include industrial inspection, reverse engineering, robotic vision, computer graphics, medical diagnosis, etc. © 2005 Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers. DOI: 10.1117/1.2147311 Subject terms: 3-D shape measurement; structured light; trapezoidal phase shifting; intensity ratio.
A review of the recent advances in magnetic resonance imaging in the assessment of osteoporosis

Osteoporosis is a common metabolic disorder with considerable associated morbidity and mortality. The loss of bone mineral integrity and the resultant occurrence of atraumatic fractures are typically symptomatic of the disease. Currently skeletal status is commonly assessed using non-invasive conventional radiography and scintigraphy as well as densitometric techniques such as quantitative computed tomography and dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry. But, apart from gross bone mineral density, the fine structure of trabecular bone also plays an important role in defining the biomechanical competence of the skeleton. Recently attention has been focused on deriving measures that provide information about not only trabecular bone density but also microstructure. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is one such new technique which potentially may provide information pertaining to bone density and structure as well as to occult fracture detection. Cortical bone produces a signal void in MR images, due to the fact that it contains very few mobile protons that give rise to a signal in MRI; also the MR relaxation time T2 of these protons is very short which produces a very fast decay of the MR signal during image acquisition. However, the trabecular bone network affects the MR properties of bone marrow. The difference in the magnetic properties of trabecular bone and bone marrow generates local imperfections in the magnetic field. The MR signal from bone marrow is modified due to these imperfections and the MR relaxation time T2* of marrow is shortened. The extent of relaxation time shortening and hence loss of signal intensity is proportional to the density of trabecular bone and marrow interfaces and their spatial architecture. Recent investigation in this area include studies aimed at quantifying marrow relaxation times and establishing their relationship to trabecular bone density and structure. In addition, with advances in imaging software and hardware, MR images at in-plane resolutions of 78–200 µm may be obtained. The trabecular bone structure is clearly revealed in such images and studies aimed at the development of high-resolution MRI techniques combined with quantitative image analysis techniques are currently under way. These potentially useful techniques for assessing osteoporosis and predicting fracture risk are reviewed in this paper.
Results of the sub-thirty-pound high-resolution miniSAR demonstration

Sandia-developed SAR systems are well known for their real-time, high quality, high resolution imagery. One such system, the General Atomics Lynx radar, has been successfully demonstrated on medium-payload UAVs, including the Predator and Fire Scout. Previously, Sandia reported on its system concept and roadmap for SAR miniaturization, including details of the miniSAR program. This paper and its companions provide an update for miniSAR and discuss the results of the successful May 2005 demonstration of the 26 pound, 4-inch resolution system. Accordingly, the miniSAR system and software implementation and performance are reviewed. Additionally, future plans for miniSAR and the Sandia SAR/GMTI miniaturization efforts are discussed, such as the currently planned miniSAR demonstration onboard a small-payload UAV.
Gentamicin ointment versus petrolatum for management of auricular wounds.

BackgroundSurgeons frequently create defects on the ear in the treatment of cutaneous malignancies. Potentially significant complications of second-intention healing on the ear are suppurative and inflammatory chondritis. Consequently, many physicians advocate the use of oral or topical prophylactic
Snakes and seaweed : a case of the swollen organ

Undaunted by the heat and humidity offered on this Wednesday, January 14, 1970, the streets of Sao Paulo were filled with confident rhetoric about Brazil's football team .[†][1] Despite its absence from the finals of the World Cup in 1966, this year's team was felt to have an excellent chance to reign again as champion. The Cup would be held in Mexico this June and Mario Zagalo, former member of the 1958 and 1962 championship teams, would serve as coach. And this time around there would be Pele, who because of injury had missed his team's 3-1 victory over Czechoslovakia on June 17, 1962, in Santiago. [1]: #fn-1
Studying and using failure data from large-scale internet services

Large-scale Internet services are the newest and arguably the most commercially important class of systems requiring 24x7 availability. As a result, very little information has been published about their causes of failure. In an attempt to address this deficiency, we have analyzed detailed failure reports from three large-scale Internet services. Our goals are to (1) identify the major factors contributing to user-visible failures, (2) evaluate the (potential) effectiveness of various techniques for preventing and mitigating service failure, and (3) build a fault model for service-level dependability and recovery benchmarks. Our initial results indicate that operator error and network problems are the leading contributors to user-visible failures, that failures in custom-written front-end software are significant, and that online testing and more thoroughly exposing and handling component failures would reduce failure rates in at least one service.
Thermodynamic Profiling of HIV RREIIB RNA–Zinc Finger Interactions

Abstract The interactions between the HIV Rev-responsive element (RRE) RNA and the HIV regulatory protein Rev, are crucial for the HIV life-cycle. Earlier, we showed that single C2H2 zinc fingers (znfs) have the same binding site as the Rev peptide and exhibit nanomolar affinity. In this study, the specific role of amino acid side chains and molecular processes involved with complex formation were investigated by perturbation of the binding energetics via changes in temperature, pH, buffers, and salt concentrations, as well as znf and RNA mutations, by isothermal titration calorimetry. Interestingly, despite the large cationic charge on the znfs, the number of interactions with the RNA phosphate backbone was lower than intuitively expected. The presence of binding induced protonation was established by ITC and localized by NMR to a histidine on the znf β-sheet. The ΔCp of znf–RNA binding was observed to be substantially negative and could not be accounted for by conventional solvent-accessible surface area models. An alternative model, based on the extent of hydrogen bond changes as a result of differences in ligand-induced water displacement at the binding site, provided reasonable explanation of the trends in ΔCp, as well as ΔH and ΔS. Our studies show that incorporation of favorable interactions at the solvent-excluded binding interface can be used to alleviate the unfavorable enthalpic penalties of displacing water molecules from the hydrated RNA surface.
Atmospheric Stability Measurements at Tropopause Altitudes Using Forward-Scatter CW Radar

Abstract The results of a high-altitude probing experiment are presented which demonstrate the capability of measuring atmospheric stability at tropopause altitudes using a 940-MHz forward-scatter CW radar system. Vertical profiles of the potential temperature gradient measured by radiosondes launched under the common volume of the radar system are well correlated with profiles of received power from radar data, taken nearly simultaneously. Thus, the tropopause can be located within a few hundred meters and its stability structure can be observed as it evolves.
Right Atrial to Pulmonary Capillary Wedge Pressure Ratio Is Not Associated with Failure of Optimal Medical Management in the INTERMACS 4-5 Population

Purpose Intracardiac filling pressures play an important role in in risk stratification of patients with advanced systolic heart failure (HF) undergoing cardiac transplantation (OHT) and left ventricular assist device (LVAD) placement. The right atrial (RA) pressure to pulmonary capillary wedge pressure (PCWP) ratio has been shown to have important prognostic significance. Less is known about the prognostic impact of cardiac filling pressures in patients with ambulatory advanced HF (INTERMACS profiles 4-5). Methods and Materials We retrospectively evaluated 187 patients referred for consideration of advanced HF therapies at our center from January 2005 to July 2010. The endpoint of failure of optimal medical management (OMM) was defined as death, OHT or LVAD implantation. Tertiles of RA:PCWP ratio were defined as 0.583(tertile 3). Median PCWP in each cohort was 16, 25, and 20 mmHg respectively (p Results Patients in tertile 3 had lower PA oxygen saturation(p= 0.006), RV stroke work index (p 20mmHg, p=0.146). However, when evaluating each RA and PCWP independently, only increasing PCWP was associated with failure of OMM [HR 1.046 (1.020-1.073), p Conclusions In a cohort of patients with advanced ambulatory HF (INTERMACS 4-5), increasing RA:PCWP was associated with worsening RV function and decreased exercise capacity but not with failure of OMM. PCWP varied across tertiles of RA:PCWP ratio and was independently associated with failure of OMM. Our study suggests that left and right-sided filling pressures may need to be interpreted independently in advanced ambulatory heart failure.
Quantitative Photochemistry of (η5-C5H5)Fe(CO)2I in Solution: Effective Heterolytic Fe−I Dissociation upon Long-Wavelength Excitation

The quantitative photochemistry of ({eta}{sup 5}-C{sub 5}H{sub 5})Fe(CO){sub 2}I in room-temperature solution involving the heterolytic cleavage of iodide to form ({eta}{sup 5}-C{sub 5}H{sub 5})Fe(CO){sub 2}({eta}{sup 1}-N-pyrrolyl) has been investigated following irradiation at several wavelengths in the 488--647 nm region. The most effective photoconversions were found to take place with excitation at long wavelengths (580--647 nm) into weak low-lying absorption bands; the absolute quantum efficiency for the photoreaction of ({eta}{sup 5}-C{sub 5}H{sub 5})Fe(CO){sub 2}I in room-temperature toluene has been determined to be 0.38 ({+-} 0.02) upon Kr{sup +} laser photolysis at 647 nm. The photochemical results are in accordance with recent assignments for the HOMO orbitals in ({eta}{sup 5}-C{sub 5}H{sub 5})Fe(CO){sub 2}I and demonstrate that long-wavelength irradiation provides a valuable way of effecting heterolytic Fe-I dissociation, facilitating a synthetic pathway to azaferrocene.
Formulas for older infants

We explored the possibility that standard infant formulas designed as the sole source of nutrients for small, rapidly growing infants may not be equally suitable for older, larger, and less rapidly growing infants who obtain a portion of energy intake from belkost. Our approach was to consider the probable nutrient intakes of a 6-month-old hypothetic infant receiving 80% of energy intake from a standard formula and 20% from beikost, and nutrient intakes of a 10-month-old hypothetic infant receiving 50% of energy intake from a standard formula and 50% from beikost. The assortment of beikost items consumed by infants is moderately high in protein and low in fat. Calculated nutrient intakes of the 10-month-old hypothetic infant were compared with intakes of infants of similar age in two national surveys. We conclude that standard infant formulas designed for young infants are reasonably well suited to meeting the nutrient needs of infants during the latter half of the first year of life.
Resource management construct for an adaptive DBF electronic support receiver

This paper provides a resource management (RM) framework for electronic support (ES) receivers. The resource manager estimates the number of interference signals and the bandwidths of each interference signal in the electromagnetic (EM) environment. Environment estimates are used to select an appropriate adaptive digital beamforming (DBF) algorithm from a predefined look-up table (LUT) of adaptive DBF algorithms. Algorithms are selected from the LUT based on their ability to increase the signal-to-interference plus noise level of the desired signal by a desired amount; the algorithms are also selected based upon their computational complexity. A study of the resource manager computational complexity demonstrates that applying the new architecture does not increase the receiver computational complexity above standard ES receivers. The resulting adaptive receiver is capable of operating with reduced computational loading over standard support receivers. The framework allows for the use of a single receiver for both narrowband and wideband operation without imposing unrequited computational complexity in the narrowband environments.
Redistribution of forms of zinc, cadmium and nickel in soils treated with EDTA

Abstract Organic amendments are often added to soils in the form of waste materials which increase the soluble organic ligands in soil. To study the interaction of these soluble organics with metals in soil, Ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid (EDTA) can be used as a model compound for natural organics. The addition of EDTA to soil may alter the physicochemical forms of metals in soil because of its strong chelating capacity. In this work, samples of eight agricultural soils collected in Georgia were spiked with soluble salts of Zn, Cd, and Ni in proportions of 75.9, 1.62, and 4.30 mg kg−1, respectively. Both natural and metal-amended soils were treated with Na2-EDTA (disodium ethylenediamine tetraacetate) solution at amounts of 0, 1.0 and 2.0 g kg−1. After five months incubation in a greenhouse, the soil samples were fractionated into exchangeable (EXC), organic matter (OM), Mn oxide (MNO), amorphous Fe oxide (AFEO), crystalline Fe oxide (CFEO), and residual (RES) fractions. The added Zn was distributed among all fractions in the soils, and added Cd and Ni were found predominantly in the EXC and OM fractions with some of the added Ni occurring in the RES fraction. Increasing the amounts of EDTA significantly raised Zn concentrations in the EXC fraction in both natural and metal-amended soils, and the EDTA also increased Ni and Cd concentrations in the EXC fraction of the metal-amended soils. The results suggested that added EDTA enhanced the solubility of these metals in these soils. The OM-fraction metals decreased with increasing amounts of EDTA, except for Ni in the natural soils. The increase in Zn and Cd associated with the EXC fraction may have been related to solubilization of metals from the OM fraction by EDTA. In the metal-amended soils, EDTA not only removed Ni from the OM fraction, but also from the MNO, AFEO and CFEO fractions, and redistributed it into the EXC fraction. Based on relative percent, Cd in the EXC fraction was higher than Zn, while Ni in this fraction was lowest. This suggests that the order of solubility was: Cd>Zn>Ni for metals added to soils, but when EDTA was present, added Ni may be more vulnerable to solubilization than added Zn and Cd.
Selective amplification and partial sequencing of cDNAs encoding G protein α subunits from cochlear tissues

Abstract An approach utilizing the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) was devised to clone members of a family of cDNAs encoding the α subunit of G proteins in the cochlea. RNA was extracted from the whole cochlea of the mouse and from the organ of Corti or the lateral wall of the cochlea microdissected from the guinea pig cochlea. The RNA was reverse-transcribed to cDNA which was selectively amplified by PCR using degenerate primers corresponding to two conserved regions of the G protein coding sequence. PCR products were cloned into a plasmid for sequencing. The following seven cDNA clones of particular interest were obtained: three clones putatively coding for part of the alpha-subunit of a stimulatory G protein (G S ), one clone putatively coding for part of the alpha-subunit of an inhibitory G protein (G i ) and three clones putatively coding for part of the alpha-subunit of a transducin (G t )-like protein. Possible functions in the cochlea of putative G proteins with alpha-subunits partly encoded by these cDNA clones are briefly discussed and future studies are suggested.
Development of metabolic-process EST-SSR PCR primers within the bocaccio rockfish Sebastes paucispinis

The bocaccio rockfish has historically supported an important fishery on the west coast of North America, and experienced a severe population collapse in the past several decades. Here we report development of 13 EST-SSR PCR primer pairs developed from previously published Sebastes EST databases. All loci are involved in metabolic processes. Diversity in a collection of bocaccio rockfish from off central California ranged from 2 to 17 alleles, with heterozygosities of 0.24–0.92. The loci will be informative in further resolving stock structure issues and possible local adaptation along the species’ broad latitudinal range.
DIRECT MEASUREMENT OF 1CH2 IN FLAMES BY CAVITY RINGDOWN LASER ABSORPTION SPECTROSCOPY

Abstract Singlet methylene is an important combustion intermediate, but has remained difficult to measure in flames. Cavity ringdown laser absorption spectroscopy (CRLAS) allows the sensitive and selective detection of 1 CH 2 with good spatial resolution. Singlet methylene has been detected by CRLAS in a series of rich, low-pressure methane flames with stoichiometries of 1.0, 1.2, 1.4 and 1.6. The measured relative concentration profiles are compared with laminar flame models utilizing detailed chemical reaction mechanisms. The data show good agreement with models at stoichiometries of 1.0 and 1.2, but increasingly poor agreement at richer stoichiometries.
Numerical Simulation of ZnO-Based Terahertz Quantum Cascade Lasers

In this work, a particle-based Monte Carlo model is used to quantify the potential of terahertz sources based on the ZnO-based material system relative to existing devices based on GaAs/AlGaAs quantum wells. Specifically, two otherwise identical quantum cascade structures based on ZnO/MgZnO and GaAs/AlGaAs quantum wells are designed, and their non- equilibrium carrier distributions are then computed as a function of temperature. The simulation results show that, because of their larger optical phonon energy, ZnO/MgZnO quantum cascade laser structures exhibit weaker temperature dependence of the population inversion than in the case of similar structures made of GaAs/AlGaAs. In particular, as the temperature is increased from 10 K to 300 K, population inversion is found to decrease by a factor of 4.48 and 1.50 for the AlGaAs and MgZnO structure, respectively. Based on these results, the MgZnO devices are then predicted to be, in principle, capable of laser action without cryogenic cooling.
Hobbes, Desire, and the Democratization of Rhetoric

This article considers the modern melding of rhetoric and democracy by looking at the approach to rhetoric in the early-modern figure Thomas Hobbes. While other scholars have considered Hobbes's approach to rhetoric in terms of humanistic, Ramistic, and Aristotelian influences, I look at it in light of the psychagogic tradition of rhetoric still active in the Renaissance. Reading Hobbes in light of the psychagogic tradition makes his approach to rhetoric less equivocal or contradictory than is often supposed, even as it helps us see in Hobbes's work a concerted effort to democratize rhetoric. I conclude that the real tension Hobbes presents us with is not found in his approach to rhetoric, which is relatively consistent, but rather in what his work suggests about the tensions of a democratized rhetoric.
Alteration of rat liver endoplasmic reticulum Ca2+-ATPase thiol integrity by ciprofibrate, a peroxisome proliferator

Abstract Ciprofibrate (CP), a peroxisome proliferator, has been shown to reduce rat liver endoplasmic reticulum (ER) Ca2+-ATPase activity both in vitro and in vivo. The ER Ca2+-ATPase is highly susceptible to thiol reactivity, and maintenance of maximal enzyme activity is critically dependent upon the integrity of these thiol groups. We therefore investigated whether CP alters ER Ca2+-ATPase thiol groups as a possible mechanism of enzyme inhibition. Using a thiol immunoblot technique, free thiol groups specifically on the ER Ca2+-ATPase were localized. Exposure of freshly isolated rat liver microsomes to CP (500 μM) resulted in a loss of sulfhydryl reactivity on the ER Ca2+-ATPase protein at 107 kDa, as identified using the thiol immunoblot assay. However, when rat liver microsomes were exposed to CP in the presence of reduced glutathione (GSH), thiol groups on the ER Ca2+-ATPase were protected. Also, the reduction of ER Ca2+-ATPase activity by CP could be ameliorated by co-incubation of rat liver microsomes with GSH. These observations indicate that CP reduces rat liver ER Ca2+-ATPase activity through interactions with free thiol groups located on this enzyme.
Rat liver microsomal NADPH-dependent release of iron from ferritin and lipid peroxidation

Microsomes prepared by the usual method of differential centrifugation were found to contain ferritin, superoxide dismutase (SOD), and catalase which could be removed by chromatography on Sepharose CL-2B. Addition of purified rat liver ferritin to chromatographed microsomes resulted in a significant stimulation of NADPH-dependent lipid peroxidation which was inhibited by exogenously added SOD. Iron release from ferritin by these microsomes was also inhibited by SOD. Ferritin did not promote NADPH-dependent microsomal lipid peroxidation when added to microsomes isolated in the usual manner, presumably due to the endogenous SOD present in the microsomes. Accordingly, only very low rates of iron release from ferritin were observed with these microsomes. Paraquat (PQ), which generates superoxide O2-. via redox cycling, greatly stimulated iron release from ferritin and lipid peroxidation in chromatographed microsomes. Paraquat had no effect on iron release from ferritin or lipid peroxidation in microsomes. which were not chromatographed unless they were first treated with CN- to inhibit endogenous SOD. These studies indicate that the majority of microsomal iron is contained within ferritin and that following release by O2-. this iron serves to promote the peroxidation of microsomal lipids.
Review of: When Religion Meets New Media, by Heidi A. Campbell

Campbell, H. A. (2010). London, England: Routledge, 219 pp. $35.95 (paperback). Religious people are often early adopters of new forms of technology. Nineteenth century Christians were among the fi...
An approach to high-level debugging of distributed systems: preliminary draft

As part of a study of methods and strategies for problem solving in a distributed environment [Less80], we have been investigating techniques suitable for use in debugging programs written for implementation on distributed processing networks.Traditional debugging methods emphasize techniques that apply at the level of computation units and generally allow users to examine, and possibly alter, the state of a computation. Interactive debugging monitors are probably the most powerful implementations of the traditional method and usually permit a user to examine an entire snspshot of system state at any step of the computation. It is the job of the debugger (usually a person directing the error search) to determine what units are relevant to some problem, examine the units in whatever fashion is available, and then fit the results of these examinations into a model of how the computation works. Two elements essential to the successful completion of the debugging task are evident here: the ability to monitor, in some meaningful way, the relevant system activity so as to understand how system behavior differs from the debugger's model, and the ability to perform experiments based (implicitly or explicitly) on the information gathered. Through the interaction of these two elements a debugger attempts to gain an understanding of the causes of an error or at least to note where the implementation and the expected behavior differ.
Apostolic monasticism at tokali kİlİse in cappadocia

At least as early as the day, nearly eighty years ago, when Hans Rott gained access to “Doghalikilise” through an entrance reduced to a narrow cleft by heaps of rubble and alluvial soil, the monument has been recognized as the largest and most important in Goreme. Many of the wall-paintings of both the Old and the New Church at Tokali were published by Jerphanion who correctly appreciated the relative chronology of these successive phases. This pioneering and still fundamental survey was supplemented by the excellent photographs of Jeannine Le Brun in Restle's corpus of 1967. In the same year, Cormack suggested on stylistic and iconographic grounds a probable date of ca. 913–920 for the decoration of the Old Church, a period little less than half a century before its relatively gigantic successor was cut transversely across its eastern end. Now, within a year or two, Tokali Kilise will receive the ultimate accolade of monographic treatment by Ann Wharton Epstein in a book which treats the church as a cultural whole and finally recognizes the frescoes in the New Church as the supreme achievement of Byzantine wall-painting to survive from the tenth century.
Warbling Vireo reproductive success and nest-site characteristics in the northern Sierra Nevada, California

Abstract Over the past 20 yr Warbling Vireo (Vireo gilvus) populations have declined in California. We monitored Warbling Vireo nests in the high elevations of the northern Sierra Nevada in the Tahoe National Forest near Truckee, California. Nest survivorship was low (29.9% Mayfield estimate) compared to Warbling Vireo populations outside of California, but similar to levels reported for other California populations. Brown-headed Cowbird (Molothrus ater) parasitism in the study population was low (7%). Warbling Vireo nest fate was related to nest-site location; successful nests in lodgepole pine (Pinus contorta) were situated on the west or “warmer” side of the tree, in the outer periphery of the foliage, and in areas with slightly less canopy cover compared to unsuccessful nests. These features of the nest site may help reduce the threat of predation and combat cold stress. Our results argue that Warbling Vireos in the northern Sierra Nevada have low nest survivorship (similar to populations in other are...
Implementation and Evaluation of a Scalable Application-Level Checkpoint-Recovery Scheme for MPI Programs

The running times of many computational science applications are much longer than the mean-time-to-failure of current high-performance computing platforms. To run to completion, such applications must tolerate hardware failures. Checkpoint-and-restart (CPR) is the most commonly used scheme for accomplishing this - the state of the computation is saved periodically on stable storage, and when a hardware failure is detected, the computation is restarted from the most recently saved state. Most automatic CPR schemes in the literature can be classified as system-level checkpointing schemes because they take core-dump style snapshots of the computational state when all the processes are blocked at global barriers in the program. Unfortunately, a system that implements this style of checkpointing is tied to a particular platform; in addition, it cannot be used if there are no global barriers in the program. We are exploring an alternative called application-level, non-blocking checkpointing. In our approach, programs are transformed by a pre-processor so that they become self-checkpointing and self-restartable on any platform; there is also no assumption about the existence of global barriers in the code. In this paper, we describe our implementation of application-level, non-blocking checkpointing. We present experimental results on both a Windows cluster and a Compaq Alpha cluster, which show that the overheads introduced by our approach are small.
Competition between macroalgae and corals: effects of herbivore exclusion and increased algal biomass on coral survivorship and growth

Recent declines in coral abundance accompanied by increases in macroalgal cover on Florida reefs highlight the importance of competition for space between these groups. This paper documents the frequency of coral–algal interactions on the Northern Florida Reef Tract and evaluates the effects of grazer exclusions and experimental algal addition on growth and tissue mortality of three coral species, Siderastreasiderea, Poritesastreoides, and Montastraeafaveolata. The frequency of interactions between corals and macroalgae was high as more than 50% of the basal perimeter of colonies was in contact with macroalgae; turf forms, Halimeda spp., and Dictyota spp. were the most common groups in contact with corals. Decreased grazing pressure resulted in significant increases in algal biomass within cages, and caged corals showed species-specific susceptibility to increased algal biomass. While no effects were detected for S. siderea, significant decreases in growth rates were documented for caged P. astreoides which had growth rates three to four times lower than uncaged colonies. When an algal addition treatment was included to duplicate maximum algal biomass levels documented for reefs in the area, colonies of P. astreoides in the algal addition treatment had growth rates up to ten times lower than uncaged colonies. High susceptibility to algal overgrowth was also found for the reef-building coral M. faveolata, which experienced significant tissue mortality under both uncaged (5.2% decrease in live tissue area per month) and caged (10.2% per month) conditions. The documented effects of increased algal biomass on coral growth and tissue mortality suggest a potential threat for the long-term survivorship and growth of corals in the Florida Reef Tract if present rates of algal growth and space utilization are maintained.