cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Choosing to Abort, Alter, Adopt, or Accept: Teaching About Abortion in the Undergraduate Classroom

Given the sensitive nature of the topic of abortion, it can be a challenging subject to cover in a college classroom. The author offers an activity aimed to help students understand how procreative issues are more complicated than what the polarized rhetoric of “pro-life” or “pro-choice” activists conveys. The activity contextualizes sociological arguments around abortion, then allows students to consider the issue more personally through a survey where they encounter a variety of pregnancy scenarios. This chapter offers guidance for discussing the survey results, provides examples of students’ reactions, and stresses the importance of considering the potential for harm in using the activity. The author also includes results from a study that assessed the effectiveness of the activity. Overall, the activity provides an effective way for students to deconstruct the personal politics of abortion.
Stylizing the preacher: Preaching, performance, and the comedy of Richard Pryor

This article illustrates the ‘moving parts’ involved in the stylization of the voice of the Black preacher in the comedic performances of Richard Pryor with the ultimate goal of uncovering what these linguistic features help the performer to accomplish in interaction. Overall, while Pryor often utilizes hyperbolic and exaggerated features of Black preaching traditions and potentially Southern-inflected speaking styles in his performances, I argue that he engages in a type of linguistic subterfuge, blending elements of his own voice into a more favorable depiction of a witty, street-wise preacher. In fact, stretches of working-class speech, whose features overlap considerably with Pryor's ‘stage voice’, may blur the line between Pryor's ‘own’ personal stance and that of the preacher that he is constructing. (Black preachers, performance, stylization, comedy, African American English)*
Leon Pinsker's Autoemancipation! and the Emergence of German as a Language of Jewish Nationalism

This article examines the role of the German language in early Jewish nationalism. It focuses on the publication, reception, and afterlife of the pamphlet Autoemancipation!, published in 1882 by Leon Pinsker, a Russian Jewish doctor. The first Jewish nationalist pamphlet to be written in German by a Russian Jew, its rhetoric and terminology tapped into various Jewish and European discourses of emancipation. Pinsker not only challenged the legal-political conception of emancipation as it had been commonly used in German-Jewish discourse, but also mobilized its social and revolutionary connotations, which had been associated with radical European political movements since 1848. Moreover, Autoemancipation! marked a shift in Jewish political culture with regard to the potential function of the German language. Since the late eighteenth century and through the nineteenth century, German had a controversial status in Central and Eastern European Jewish societies given its association with Jewish Enlightenment, religious reform, secularization, and assimilation. Pinsker was the first to use German as a transnational language aimed at promoting the Jewish national cause. In this respect, Autoemancipation! set in motion a process whereby German became the chief language of Jewish nationalist activism.
Surface-Enhanced Resonance Hyper-Raman Scattering Elucidates the Molecular Orientation of Rhodamine 6G on Silver Colloids

Herein, we utilize surface-enhanced hyper-Raman scattering (SEHRS) under resonance conditions to probe the adsorbate geometry of rhodamine 6G (R6G) on silver colloids. Our results show resonance SEHRS is highly sensitive to molecular orientation due to non-Condon effects, which do not appear in its linear counterpart surface-enhanced Raman scattering. Comparisons between simulated and measured SEHRS spectra reveal R6G adsorbs mostly perpendicular to the nanoparticle surface along the ethylamine groups with the xanthene ring oriented edgewise. Our results expand upon previous studies that rely on indirect, qualitative probes of R6G’s orientation on plasmonic substrates. More importantly, this work represents the first determination of adsorbate geometry by SEHRS and opens up the possibility to study the orientation of single molecules in complex, plasmonic environments.
La famille à l’épreuve de la prison, C. Touraut. PUF, Paris (2012). 316 p.

Dans son premier livre, Caroline Touraut invite ses lecteurs dans une « zone d’ombre persistante a la peripherie des institutions carcerales » (p. 3) pour y decouvrir les emotions, experiences, et raisonnements des familles des detenus. Son enquete est basee sur plus de deux ans de travail de terrain en France pendant lesquels elle a effectue des observations aux parloirs de trois etablissements penitentiaires, devant deux maisons d’arret et une maison centrale, et dans une association d’hebe...
The successful innovations of the affordable care act of 2010

The purpose of this article is to describe the innovative strategies that were used to develop the first National health insurance program in the United States. The first innovative provisions was the development a fund to expand health coverage under the State Medicaid programs to expand coverage through most Medicaid State Health Plans. The establishment of a new innovative structure of premium subsidies to expand private health insurance for many uninsured Americans, to purchase a Subsidize health plan was the second innovated approach, to finance health insurance to those that were previously uninsured. Unlike most Western nations, that finance health insurance through a national tax or income tax, the American innovative approach relayed on providing government subsidies for individuals to purchase private health insurance plans and/or expand coverage under the existing Medicaid program. This innovated strategy has been very successful to greatly reduce the number of uninsured Americans to be at the lowest since records have been maintained on this topic. However, this program has been successful to lower the number of uninsured Americans, many have opposed this innovated strategy as it relies too much on government subsidies to reduce the number of uninsured. Now efforts are under way to repeal and replace the innovative strategies that have increased the number of insured in the United States.
A low-power optical communication modem for compact autonomous underwater vehicles

The design and implementation of a low-power, optical communication system for compact underwater autonomous vehicles are presented for short-range, high-bandwidth data transmission, with an emphasis on identifying optimal hardware configurations for maximizing transmission distance or link misalignment tolerance. Theoretical power and misalignment models are investigated for a single static, light-emitting diode as transmission source, with optical lenses on both transmitting and receiving ends of the system. The maximum misalignment tolerance, while performing digital data communication, is discussed. It is shown that the trade-off between transmission distance and misalignment tolerance is largely determined by the focus level of the receiver lens, which can be controlled by the position of the receiver photodiode on the optical axis. While defocusing the receiver lens permits a larger misalignment tolerance, the signal strength and effective communication distance are decreased. The transmitter beam width is a limiting factor in finding the maximum misalignment tolerance by defocusing the receiver lens.
Technology Assessment: Demand Response Technologies in the Pacific Northwest

The goal of this research is to develop a decision model that can be used to identify the technology transfer potential of a research proposal. An organization can use the model to select the proposals whose research outcomes are more likely to move into application. The model begins to close the chasm between research and application – otherwise known as the “valley of death.” A hierarchical decision model, along with desirability curves, was used to understand the complexities of the researcher and recipient relationship, specific to technology transfer. In this research, the evaluation criteria of several research organizations were assessed to understand the extent to which the success attributes that were identified in literature were considered when reviewing research proposals. The quantified model was validated using a case study involving demand response (DR) technology proposals in the Pacific Northwest.
Distracted Driving and Risk of Crash or Near-Crash Involvement Among Older Drivers Using Naturalistic Driving Data With a Case-Crossover Study Design.

Background The purpose of this study was to examine the association between secondary task involvement and risk of crash and near-crash involvement among older drivers using naturalistic driving data. Methods Data from drivers aged ≥70 years in the Strategic Highway Research Program (SHRP2) Naturalistic Driving Study database was utilized. The personal vehicle of study participants was equipped with four video cameras enabling recording of the driver and the road environment. Secondary task involvement during a crash or near-crash event was compared to periods of noncrash involvement in a case-crossover study design. Conditional logistic regression was used to generate odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CI). Results Overall, engaging in any secondary task was not associated with crash (OR = 0.94, 95% CI 0.68-1.29) or near-crash (OR = 1.08, 95% CI 0.79-1.50) risk. The risk of a major crash event with cell phone use was 3.79 times higher than the risk with no cell phone use (95% CI 1.00-14.37). Other glances into the interior of the vehicle were associated with an increased risk of near-crash involvement (OR = 2.55, 95% CI 1.24-5.26). Other distractions external to the vehicle were associated with a decreased risk of crash involvement (OR = 0.53, 95% CI 0.30-0.94). Interacting with a passenger and talking/singing were not associated with crash or near-crash risk. Conclusions Older drivers should avoid any cell phone use and minimize nondriving-related eye glances towards the interior of the vehicle while driving. Certain types of events external to the vehicle are associated with a reduced crash risk among older drivers.
Stepped-Impedance Common-Mode Filter for Differential Lines Enhanced With Resonant Planes

High-speed digital systems require differential lines for chip-to-chip links. A common concern in differential lines is the presence of common-mode noise, which is a major contributor to signal integrity problems in high-speed digital systems. Common-mode noise is typically excited by skew. It can occur due to timing mismatches at the driver, length mismatches due to routing constraints, or phase velocity mismatches due to inhomogeneous dielectrics with fiber-weave effect. Common-mode noise results in increased crosstalk and electromagnetic interference on packages and boards. This paper presents a methodology based on varying the common-mode impedance of a differential line, while keeping the differential-mode constant. The variation in impedance results in a filter response solely for the common-mode signals, improving the noise immunity of the differential pair. This design is applied on stripline-type differential lines and the performance is enhanced by adjusting the ground via pitch to create resonant planes with a high-impedance current return path for common-mode signals.
Associations of objective versus subjective social isolation with sleep disturbance, depression, and fatigue in community-dwelling older adults

Objective: Older adults are at higher risk of experiencing social isolation, which has been linked to impaired physical and mental health. The link between social isolation and health might be due ...
Single-Channel Real-Time Drowsiness Detection Based on Electroencephalography

The need of a reliable drowsiness detection system is arising today, as drowsiness is considered as a major cause for accidents as much as alcohol. In this paper, we propose a real-time drowsiness detection algorithm based on a single-channel electroencephalography (EEG) for wearable devices without demanding computing and power resources. The proposed algorithm adopts a cumulative counter to extract important features from 8 different frequency bands: delta (1-3 Hz), theta ($\not\subset-7$ Hz), low-alpha (8-9 Hz), high-alpha (10-12 Hz), low-beta (13-17 Hz), high-beta (18-30 Hz), low-gamma (31-40 Hz), and high-gamma (41-50 Hz). These features are then processed by a support vector machine (SVM) to distinguish between drowsy and awake states. Our preliminary results demonstrate that the proposed algorithm is capable of detecting drowsiness with superior accuracy (83.36%) over the conventional method (70.62%).
Competitions Versus Classes: Exploring the Impact of Case Competitions and Communication Coursework on MBA Ranking:

Business communication programs and business school competitions are a prevalent component of graduate-level business education. Both activities help students develop problem-solving skills, critic...
Monitoring the stabilities of a mixture of peptides by mass-spectrometry-based techniques.

Biomolecular degradation plays a key role in proteostasis. Typically, proteolytic enzymes degrade proteins into smaller peptides by breaking amino acid bonds between specific residues. Cleavage aro...
On-Demand Telemedicine as a Disruptive Health Technology: Qualitative Study Exploring Emerging Business Models and Strategies Among Early Adopter Organizations in the United States

Background: On-demand telemedicine is increasingly adopted by health organizations to meet patient demand for convenient, accessible, and affordable services. Little guidance is currently available to new entrant organizations as they consider viable business models and strategies to harness the disruptive potential of on-demand telemedicine services (in particular, virtual urgent care clinics [VCCs] as a predominant and catalyst form of on-demand telemedicine). Objective: We recognized on-demand telemedicine as a disruptive technology to explore the experiences of early adopter organizations as they launch on-demand telemedicine services and deploy business models and strategies. Focusing on VCC service lines, this study addressed the following research questions: (1) what is the emerging business model being deployed for on-demand telemedicine?; (2) what are the core components of the emerging business model for on-demand telemedicine?; and (3) what are the disruptive business strategies employed by early adopter organizations as they launch on-demand telemedicine services? Methods: This qualitative study gathered data from 32 semistructured phone interviews with key informants from 19 VCC early adopter organizations across the United States. Interview protocols were developed based on noted dissemination and implementation science frameworks. We used the constant comparison method to transform study data into stable dimensions that revealed emerging business models, core business model components (value proposition, key resources, key processes, and profit formula), and accompanying business strategies. Results: Early adopters are deploying business models that most closely align with a value-adding process model archetype. By and large, we found that this general model appropriately matches resources, processes, and profit formulas to support the disruptive potential of on-demand telemedicine. In total, 4 business strategy areas were discovered to particularly contribute to business model success for on-demand disruption among early adopters: fundamental disruptions to the model of care delivery; outsourcing support for on-demand services; disruptive market strategies to target potential users; and new and unexpected organizational partnerships to increase return on investment. Conclusions: On-demand telemedicine is a potentially disruptive innovation currently in the early adopter stage of technology adoption and diffusion. On-demand telemedicine must cross into the early majority stage to truly be a positive disruption that will increase accessibility and affordability for health care consumers. Our findings provide guidance for adopter organizations as they seek to deploy viable business models and successful strategies to smooth the transition to early majority status. We present important insights for both early adopters and potential early majority organizations to better harness the disruptive potential of on-demand telemedicine.
Gene expression profiling of cultured mouse testis fragments treated with ethinylestradiol

The assessment of xenobiotic-induced testicular toxicity is important in drug development. Nonetheless, in vitro models to test drugs and chemicals that may cause testicular toxicity are lacking, requiring the continued use of animal models for those studies. We previously evaluated an in vitro mouse testis organ culture system using ethinylestradiol (EE), a well-studied testicular toxicant, and demonstrated a dose-dependent relationship between adverse effects to germ cell differentiation and increasing EE concentrations. However, we terminated that study after 20 days of culture due to oxygen deficiency during germ cell differentiation. Therefore, in the current study, we aimed to identify gene(s) with potential for supporting the histopathological evaluations of testicular toxicity using in vitro testis organ culture system. We cultured testis fragments obtained from mice at postnatal day (PND) 5 in α-Minimal Essential Medium containing 40 mg/mL AlbuMAX™ I and treated them with 0.01 or 1 nM EE on day 1 of culture. On day 20, we collected testis fragments for RNA sequencing analysis and quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR). We found that phospholipase C, zeta 1 and testis-specific serine kinase 4 genes, that are involved in spermatogenesis and predominantly expressed in the testis, were significantly reduced in testis fragments treated with the highest concentration of EE. Also, cytochrome P450, family 26, subfamily b, polypeptide 1 (Cyp26b1) and interleukin 16 (Il16) were up-regulated in the highest EE-treated groups. Further studies are needed to confirm the variations of these gene expression using other testicular toxicants.
Surgical Treatment of the Greater Occipital Nerve

This chapter discusses all the steps that are required to perform successful nerve decompression surgery at the occipital trigger site. Evaluation and diagnosis of patients with occipital migraines/headaches/neuralgia is explained in detail with videos of neuromodulator/nerve block injection sites. Differential diagnoses are provided. Surgical anatomy and surgical techniques for nerve release are described and accompanied by video, figures, and illustrations. Outcomes at this site are summarized and potential complications are examined.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN – Problem Areas for the Market

Publisher Summary The goods and services provided by public expenditures or encouraged by public policies can be described and classified in a number of different ways. Any review of actual public policies shows great diversity and variety. This chapter presents problem areas for the market. Some kinds of public goods are provided publicly or not at all because there exist no reasonable private alternative ways of providing them. This can happen because there exists no private mechanism to pay for the provision of these goods, or it can happen because compulsory use of the goods by all is required to permit its enjoyment by any group. Other public goods such as public housing or public education can be functionally similar to available private alternatives but be qualitatively different in ways that society somehow prefers. Public goods can be distinguished into three categories: (1) those arising from intrinsic characteristics of specific goods that result in externalities that are not effectively marketed, (2) those arising from imperfections in the market mechanisms, and (3) those arising not from specific goods or services but from aspects concerning the quality or nature of the environment.
Queering social reproduction: Sex, care and activism in San Francisco:

In this paper I ask what is at stake when we move past static ontologies of the ‘gayborhood’ as a form of commercial and residential concentration in decline to theorise gay urban activism as a mod...
Insulin potentiates essential amino acids effects on mechanistic target of rapamycin complex 1 signaling in MAC-T cells

Different models of lactation offer conflicting evidence as to whether insulin signaling is required for AA to stimulate mechanistic target of rapamycin complex 1 (mTORC1) activity. We hypothesized that insulin potentiates essential AA stimulation of mTORC1 activity in the MAC-T mammary epithelial cell line. Here, our objective was to assess mTORC1 signaling activity in response to insulin and individual or grouped essential AA. Insulin and essential AA concentrations in the treatment medium ranged from normo- to supraphysiological, with insulin at 0, 1, 10, or 100 nmol/L and essential AA at approximately 0, 0.01, 0.05, 0.1, 1, or 3× reference plasma levels. Effects and interaction of insulin and total essential AA were tested in a 3 × 5 factorial design (n = 3 replicates/treatment); insulin and the individual AA Leu, Met, Ile, and Arg were likewise tested in 3 × 4 factorials (n = 4). As the remaining individual AA His, Lys, Phe, Thr, Trp, and Val were expected to not affect mTORC1, these were tested only at the highest insulin level, 100 nmol/L (n = 4). For all of these, linear and quadratic effects of total and individual AA were evaluated. Essential AA were subsequently grouped by their positive (Leu, Met, Ile, Arg, and Thr; TOR-AA) or absent-to-negative effects (His, Lys, Phe, Trp, and Val; NTOR-AA), and tested for interaction in a 2 × 2 factorial design (n = 4), with each AA at its respective 1× plasma level, and insulin held at 100 nmol/L. All experiments consisted of 1 h treatment incubation, followed by Western blotting of cell lysates to measure phosphorylation and abundance of the mTORC1 pathway proteins Akt (Ser473); ribosomal protein S6 kinase p70 (S6K1, Thr389); eukaryotic translation initiation factor 4E-binding protein 1 (4E-BP1, Ser65); and ribosomal protein S6 (S6, Ser240/244). The Akt phosphorylation was overall increased by insulin, with a possible negative interaction with both total essential AA and the individual AA Leu. Total essential AA also increased S6K1 and 4E-BP1 phosphorylation in an insulin-dependent manner. The individual AA Leu, Met, Ile, and Arg increased S6K1 phosphorylation in an insulin-dependent manner. Similarly, Met and Arg increased 4E-BP1 phosphorylation in an insulin-dependent manner. Histidine, Lys, Trp, and Val did not affect S6K1 phosphorylation. However, S6K1 phosphorylation was linearly increased by Thr and quadratically decreased by Phe. Relative to the phosphorylation of S6K1 when cells were incubated with no essential AA, the NTOR-AA group had no effect, whereas the TOR-AA increased phosphorylation to the same degree observed with all 10 essential AA. Overall, we have found that insulin is required for essential AA to stimulate mTORC1 activity in MAC-T cells. In addition, the AA responsible for the bulk of mTORC1 activation in MAC-T are limited to Leu, Met, Ile, Arg, and Thr.
Obesity Is Not Associated With an Increased Risk of Serious Infections in Biologic-Treated Patients With Inflammatory Bowel Diseases.

Introduction Obesity has been associated with adverse disease-related outcomes and inferior treatment response to biologic agents in patients with inflammatory bowel diseases (IBDs), but its impact on the risk of treatment-related complications is unknown. We performed a cohort study examining the association between obesity and risk of serious infections in biologic-treated patients with IBD. Methods Using an administrative claims database, in a cohort of biologic-treated patients with IBD between 2014 and 2018 with follow-up 1 year before and after treatment initiation, we compared the risk of serious infections (infections requiring hospitalization) between obese vs nonobese patients (based on validated administrative claims) using Cox proportional hazard analysis. Results We included 5,987 biologic-treated patients with IBD (4,881 on tumor necrosis factor-α antagonists and 1,106 on vedolizumab), of whom 524 (8.8%) were classified as obese. Of the 7,115 person-year follow-up, 520 patients developed serious infection. Risk of serious infection was comparable in obese vs nonobese patients (8.8% vs 8.5%; unadjusted hazard ratio, 1.15; 95% confidence interval, 0.86-1.54). After adjusting for age, comorbidities, disease characteristics, health care utilization, use of corticosteroids, immunomodulators, and opiates, obesity was not associated with an increased risk of serious infection (adjusted hazard ratio, 0.74 [95% confidence interval, 0.55-1.01]). Similar results were seen on stratified analysis by disease phenotype (Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis) and index biologic therapy (tumor necrosis factor-α antagonists and vedolizumab). Discussion After adjusting for comorbid conditions and disease characteristics, obesity is not independently associated with an increased risk of serious infections in biologic-treated patients with IBD.
Binary Black-Box Attacks Against Static Malware Detectors with Reinforcement Learning in Discrete Action Spaces

Recent machine learning- and deep learning-based static malware detectors have shown breakthrough performance in identifying unseen malware variants. As a result, they are increasingly being adopted to lower the cost of dynamic malware analysis and manual signature identification. Despite their success, studies have shown that they can be vulnerable to adversarial malware attacks, in which an adversary modifies a known malware executable subtly to fool the malware detector into recognizing it as a benign file. Recent studies have shown that automatically crafting these adversarial malware variants at scale is beneficial to improve the robustness of malware detectors. For conciseness, we refer to this process as Adversarial Malware example Generation (AMG). Most AMG methods rely on prior knowledge about the architecture or parameters of the detector, which is not often available in practice. Moreover, the majority of these methods are restricted to additive modifications that append contents to the malware executable without modifying its original content. In this study, we offer a novel Reinforcement Learning (RL) method, AMG-VAC, which extends Variational Actor-Critic (VAC) to non-continuous action spaces where modifications are inherently discrete. We evaluate the evasion performance of the proposed AMG-VAC on two reputable machine learning-based malware detectors. While the proposed method outperforms extant non-RL and RL-based AMG methods by statistically significant margins, we show that the obtained evasive action sequences are useful in shedding light on malware detectors’ vulnerabilities.
All Aboard! Getting Faculty Mobilized for Emergency Online Teaching.

This reflective essay describes steps taken by Business faculty in a U.S. Midwestern mid-sized regional university to assist faculty in making the rapid transition to 100% online teaching. These steps include the development of an online course template within the university’s course management system made available to all faculty with tips and video tutorials specifically tailored to business courses. The coronavirus pandemic forced faculty members at institutions across the world into teaching online in about two weeks. Many tenure-track professors and full-time instructors, who were required to complete extensive training prior to teaching online courses, were relatively well-prepared. In spite of this training, some instructors felt overwhelmed when the pandemic forced an immediate transition online. Adjunct instructors and some junior faculty were particularly affected. Consistent with the conservation of resources theory which suggests that individuals conserve their limited resources (e.g., time, money, etc.) to ensure availability when they are most needed, many instructors, particularly adjunct and junior faculty, were constrained by competing demands. Adjunct instructors often teach limited courses while maintaining full-time employment in their respective fields. Junior faculty also have limited resources due to service and publishing demands. The availability of a special online course helped these vulnerable faculty members make the rapid transition to emergency online teaching. This reflective essay also describes the results of a survey about this transition among both faculty and center for teaching and learning (CTL) staff. Lastly, we recommend strategies for CTLs and academic departments to prepare for future crises. “Deputizing” power-users in each academic unit to redistribute workloads during emergencies and sharing tips and tricks customized for their departments is one such strategy. Creating annual online training modules is another strategy to allow seamless transition to unexpected online teaching.
The recognition and treatment of the intermediate syndrome of organophosphate poisoning in a dog

Objective: To discuss a new clinical presentation of organophosphate toxicity called the intermediate syndrome in a dog. Case summary: A mixed breed dog presented with generalized weakness, hypoventilation and hypoxemia. The weakness was most marked in the thoracic limbs, cervical and respiratory muscles. The history revealed a likely exposure to an organophosphate compound. The other dog in the household demonstrated mild clinical signs of organophosphate toxicity. A blood cholinesterase level was markedly reduced. Therapy included placement of a tracheostomy tube and mechanical ventilation. The dog gradually improved over the following 8 days but had persistent cervical ventroflexion for a total of 4 weeks. New or unique information provided: Organophosphate toxicity can present as a paralysis following the acute cholinergic crisis. The muscular weakness predominantly affects the thoracic limb and neck muscles but cranial nerve deficits can also occur. Dogs can die from the associated respiratory depression. Oxime therapy is indicated in the treatment of this syndrome.
Fusing heterogeneous features for the image-guided diagnosis of intraductal breast lesions

In the analysis of histopathological images, both holistic (e.g., architecture features) and local appearance features demonstrate excellent performance, while their accuracy may vary dramatically among different inputs. This motivates us to investigate how to fuse results from these features to further enhance the accuracy. Particularly, we employ content-based image retrieval approaches to discover morphologically relevant images for image-guided diagnosis, using both holistic and local features. However, because of the dramatically different characteristics and representations of these heteroge-nous features, their resulting ranks may have no intersection among the top candidates, causing difficulties for traditional fusion methods. In this paper, we employ graph-based query-specific fusion approach where multiple retrieval ranks are integrated and reordered by conducting link analysis on a fused graph. The proposed method is capable of adaptively combining the strengths of local or holistic features for different queries, and does not need any supervision. We evaluate our method on a challenging clinical problem, i.e., histopatholog-ical image-guided diagnosis of intraductal breast lesions, and it achieves 91.67% classification accuracy on 120 breast tissue images from 40 patients.
Our Friend Max

Our friend Max is in love again at the age of 54 and this time I tell my husband that we should waste no time alerting him to the plain fact that he is heading for disaster. The current object of his affection is a Chinese woman he met over the Internet who couldn't speak a word of English but used some sort of clumsy computerized transla tion program to convey that she was stuck in a lonely God-forsaken Communist pit-stop of a town and would love to meet an American man who would marry her and bring her quickly to democracy. Also that she was pretty ("especially skinny") and enjoyed very much both giving and receiving sexual pleasure. This was more than enough for our chivalrous friend Max. Although he soon discovered she'd employed some old-fashioned bait-and-switch techniques in her advertisement?the photographs she'd attached happened to have been taken about twenty-five years ago, and she was actually 44 years old and had a 22 year old son from a previous marriage?he was not deterred. After three months of halting electronic corre spondence Max bought a plane ticket for Shanghai then traveled inland by train to some dim and unpronounceable interior province where the woman (whose name sounded something like Shi-Shi or Gi-Gi, we were never quite sure) introduced him to her entire set of relatives. They had never met an American up close before and treated him as if he were the Last Emperor, stuffing him with dim sum and promising him lifelong allegiance. Shi-Shi or Gi-Gi lived in a cement block apartment across the street from a dubious structure guarded by a barbed wire fence, which Max surmised was a repository for nuclear waste or perhaps the last remaining stores of the smallpox virus. Shi-Shi's apartment had no hot water; she had to boil a pot on an iron stove for Max's bath?manually igniting a pilot light first?and the toilet was one of those pull-the-chain-and-hope-for-the-best affairs. Nevertheless, Max and Shi-Shi had a honeymoon of sorts. Shi-Shi was as pretty and skinny as promised. Sexual pleasure was duly given and received. Max boasted that Shi-Shi was surprised by certain of his moves. He was "there for her" in a way that no one had been
Aspergillus nidulans swo Mutants Show Defects in Polarity Establishment, Polarity Maintenance and Hyphal Morphogenesis

When the spores of filamentous fungi break dormancy, they grow isotropically, adding cell wall material uniformly in every direction. Later they switch to polarized growth, with new material added to the tip of an emerging germ tube. To identify genes involved in the synthesis and localization of cell wall material in filamentous fungi, we screened a collection of temperature-sensitive Aspergillus nidulans mutants for swollen cells. We have isolated mutants representing eight genes involved in polarity establishment, polarity maintenance, and hyphal morphogenesis. On the basis of the results of temperature-shift experiments, swo C, D, and F are required to establish polarity, while swoA is required to maintain polarity. swo B, E, G, and H are involved in later hyphal morphogenesis. Our results suggest that polarity establishment and polarity maintenance are genetically separate events and that a persistent signal is required for apical extension in A. nidulans.
Lipogenic enzyme activities and cellularity of porcine adipose tissue from various anatomical locations

The activities of acetyl CoA carboxylaqe, citrate cleavage enzyme, malic enzyme, glucose-6-phosphate dehy- drogenase, and 6-phosphogluconate dehydrogenase were de- termined in porcine adipose tissue samples taken from seven anatomical locations, including three layers of backfat, inter- muscular, perirenal, mesenteric, and leg subcutaneous adipose tissues. Adipocyte size and number, as well as lipid and soluble protein content, were also measured in order to establish some of the differences that exist between different areas of porcine adipose tissue. It was found that adipose tissue from areas whrre fat is deposited very readily (particularly the perirenal region) had higher enzyme activities, larger adipose cells, a lesser amount of stromal tissue, a greater amount of ether-ex- tractable lipid, and a lower concentration of adipose cells per gram of tissue than samples from areas where fat is deposited only sparsely (leg subcutaneous).
Analysis of the effects of sequential reinforcement contingencies on aspects of composition

The procedures of manipulating consequent events were applied to the problems of teaching composition in a fifth-grade remedial classroom. Three objective aspects of composition, total number of words, number of different words, and number of new words, were selected for manipulation and reinforcement contingencies were sequentially applied to these components. The writing output of all subjects was greatly increased.
Evidence for arsenic as the immunosuppressive component of gallium arsenide

Gallium arsenide (GaAs) has been shown previously to suppress the in vivo antibody-forming cell (AFC) response to sheep erythrocytes (SRBC) when administered intratracheally at concentrations between 50 and 200 mg/kg. In the present studies, direct addition of GaAs to in vitro-generated antibody cultures resulted in dose-dependent suppression of the primary antibody response, and was only seen when GaAs was added within 36 hr following immunization. Using atomic absorption spectrophotometry on tissue samples from mice exposed to 200 mg/kg GaAs, arsenic concentrations were found to peak in the spleen at 24 hr and decline, whereas gallium concentrations continue to rise through 14 days. Concentrations of each metal in the spleen at 24 hr are comparable to the concentrations achieved for each metal when GaAs is added at 25 microM to the in vitro model system. The 24 hr time point was chosen for comparison because all in vivo-in vitro studies were conducted using spleens from mice 24 hr after GaAs exposure. NaAsO2 and Ga(NO3)3 suppressed the AFC response dose-dependently, and in a time-dependent manner similar to GaAs when added to the in vitro system. However, based on IC50 values for each salt, the role of the gallium component in the immunosuppression appears weak. Oxalic acid (OA) and meso-2,3-dimercaptosuccinic acid (DMSA), chelators of gallium and arsenic respectively, were added to cultures with GaAs to confirm that arsenic was the primary immunosuppressive component. DMSA dose-dependently blocked GaAs-induced immunosuppression in vitro, while OA had no effect. The metal-binding compounds were determined to be specific for the metals used in these studies and did not cross-react with one another. DMSA was evaluated for its ability to prevent suppression of the AFC response in splenocytes from GaAs-exposed mice and was able to block GaAs-induced suppression of the AFC response when given sc every 4 hr beginning 1 hr prior to GaAs exposure. These data indicate that the arsenic component of GaAs is the major contributor to the GaAs-induced immunosuppression and that this effect occurs within the first 36 hr of the 5-day culture period in a concentration-dependent manner.
Ray tracing of broadband bursty radio emissions from Uranus

To determine the source position of the broadband bursty emission, rays of X-mode emissin were traced from source positions along magnetic field lines with footprints that form a large grid centered approximately on the south magnetic pole of Uranus. For large wave normal angles, source regions different from those producing b-smooth emission were found. The emission observed prior to closest approach has a source along field lines that are distinct from those which generate emissions observed after closest approach.
New, improved supergraphs

Abstract When the background field method is used in superspace the resulting covariant Feynman rules simplify the evaluation of supergraphs. We describe methods that lead to additional simplifications in both SSYM and supergravity. The number of supergraphs is smaller and the use of covariant D-algebra implies that they do not depend on the YM spinor connection Γ α , or vielbein E M > α and are therefore more convergent.
Pharmacological Agents for the Treatment of Adult Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder: A Review of the Literature:

Adult attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) has been an emerging area of psychiatry of particular interest over the past few years. Whether this attention is due to new medications prompting the issue (ie, FocalinTM, StratteraTM) or emerging awareness that an estimated 4.4% of adults suffer with this diagnosis, therapy is of a limited selection. Untreated symptoms can lead to several life problems, including work and school difficulties, personal relationship issues, low self-esteem, and an increased chance of tobacco use, alcohol abuse, or other substance abuse. This article is to serve as a general overview of the available information regarding adult ADHD and the pharmacologic therapies available to treat the disorder.
Effect of curare on the development of chicken embryo skeletal muscle in ovo

Abstract Injection of curare in ovo between days 7 and 14 of embryonic development delayed the differentiation of myoneural junctions, and greatly reduced the mass of pectoralis and leg muscles. Although the administration of curare was discontinued at 14 days of development, muscle paralysis persisted and prevented normal hatching at 21 days. The protein composition of muscles from curare-treated embryos was characterized by a decrease in myosin, Ca 2+ transport ATPase, and ATP: creatine phosphotransferase. No significant differences were found in the total Ca 2+ content of muscle, in the Ca 2+ uptake measured in whole muscle homogenates, and in muscle ultrastructure as evident from electron microscopy and histochemical analysis.
Minitrack: Engineering and Economics Interactions

In this minitrack we address two important aspects characterizing the restructuring of the electric power industry in the US. The first is that reliability is now affected substantially by the fact that resources needed for grid operations are purchased from many independent participants in wholesale markets, each with its own profit motive. Thus the reliability obtained from the previous "command and control" system is degraded by a new dependence on market mechanisms that bring their own sources of unreliability and volatility. The effects are both short-term, as in day-ahead and real-time markets for energy, reserves, and congestion relief; and long-term, as in investments in transmission and generation capacity. The severity of these effects is heightened by the fact that in the U.S. the Transmission System Operator must adhere rigorously to the rules established in its tariff approved by FERC, thus eliminating much of the role for operators? judgment and discretion that was implicit in vertically integrated systems.
Local adaptation but not geographical separation promotes assortative mating in a snail

A crucial assumption in models of ecological speciation is that reproductive barriers evolve as a consequence of ecological divergence of populations, rather than geographical separation. To test the prediction that barriers between populations might evolve in the face of gene flow, we studied reproductive barriers between populations of two Swedish ecotypes of the marine snail Littorina saxatilis with inherited differences in shell size and shape, living in adjacent rocky shore microhabitats with zones of overlap making gene flow between ecotypes possible. We compared mounting frequency and duration between mates of different ecotypes with that between mates of the same ecotype but from populations at various geographical distances. (In this species gene flow is substantially reduced over distances of a few kilometres owing to poor dispersal.) Mates of the same ecotype mated more frequently and for longer than mates of different ecotypes, whereas increased geographical distance did not affect this pattern. Snails of similar sizes more frequently initiated copulation than did snails of different sizes, whereas the duration of copulation was affected by shape. Mating between mates of similar sizes but of different ecotype was more frequently interrupted than mating between the same ecotype. Thus ecological rather than geographical separation in this species has resulted in the evolution of local reproductive barriers. This lends support to models of ecological speciation.
Tissue-specific and glucose-responsive expression of the pancreatic derived factor (PANDER) promoter.

Abstract Pancreatic derived factor (PANDER) is a recently identified cytokine-like protein that is dominantly expressed in the islets of Langerhans of the pancreas. To investigate the mechanism of tissue-specific regulation of PANDER, we identified and characterized the promoter region. The transcriptional start site was identified 520 bp upstream of the translational start codon by 5′-RLM-RACE. Computer algorithms identified several islet-associated and glucose-responsive binding motifs that included A and E boxes, hepatocyte nuclear factors 1 and 4, Oct-1, and signal transducer and activator of transcription 3, and 5. Reporter gene analysis revealed cell type-specific PANDER promoter expression in islet and liver-derived cell lines. Levels of PANDER mRNA were directly concordant to the observed cell type-specific PANDER promoter gene expression. The minimal element was mapped to the 5′-UTR and located between +200 and +491 relative to the transcriptional start site and imparted maximal gene expression. In addition, several putative glucose-responsive binding sites were further functionally characterized to reveal critical regulatory elements of PANDER. The PANDER promoter was demonstrated to be glucose-responsive in a dose-dependant manner in murine insulinoma β-TC3 cells and primary murine islets, but unresponsive in glucagon-secreting α-TC3 cells. Our findings revealed that the 5′-UTR of PANDER contains the minimal element for gene expression and imparts both tissue-specificity and glucose-responsiveness. The regulation of PANDER gene expression mimics that of insulin and suggests a potential biological function of PANDER involved in metabolic homeostasis.
Isoniazid: behavioral and biochemical effects in rhesus monkeys

Abstract Isoniazid is added to monkey chow in many primate laboratories for prophylaxis against tuberculosis. Studies using several behavioral and biochemical dependent variables revealed previously unsuspected effects attributable to dietary isoniazid in rhesus monkeys. While these effects cannot be classified within any single mode of action, behavioral and pharmacological interactions of the drug suggest that it may act as an antidepressant in this species. Effects on pyridoxal phosphate using enzymes and body weight were also demonstrated. These findings identify isoniazid as a possible confounding variable in primate research involving models of human psychopathology, neuroendocrine function, and general physiology.
Experimental and Analytical Studies on Flexure Pivot Tilting Pad Gas Bearings With Dampers Applied to Radially Compliant Pads

Hydrodynamic flexure pivot tilting pad gas bearings (FPTPGBs) can enable successful operation of oil-free microturbomachinery, and FPTPGBs with radially compliant pads (FPTPGB-Cs) permit rotor centrifugal and/or thermal growth to exceed original bearing clearances and achieve higher speeds. This work presents the experimental and analytical study of such bearings and the application of dampers behind the pad radial compliance structure. A time domain orbit simulation method was implemented as the primary analysis tool to predict rotor-bearing response to imbalance, the presence and location of critical speeds, etc., and compare with test results. Experiments demonstrate the stable hydrodynamic operation of FPTPGBs with a ∼28.6 mm, 0.8 kg rotor above 120 krpm for the first time. The rotor-bearing system was intentionally destabilized in tests by increasing bearing clearances, and viscoelastic dampers added behind the FPTPGB pads delayed the onset of subsynchronous vibrations (from 43 krpm without damper to above 50 krpm with damper). Midrange subsynchronous vibrations of the destabilized system initiated at ∼20 krpm were suppressed by ∼25 krpm due to the stabilizing effect of rotor centrifugal growth. The viscoelastic dampers had a negligible effect on suppressing these midrange subsynchronous vibrations in experiments, but this was not demonstrated in simulations, presumed to be due to much lower stiffness contribution of the damper at lower frequencies.Copyright © 2009 by ASME