cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
“Retribution Must Succeed Rebellion”: The Colonial Origins of Counterinsurgency Failure

What can explain the decline in incumbent victory in counterinsurgency wars? Political scientists offer a variety of explanations for these trends. Some focus on the structure and doctrine of counterinsurgent forces, while others emphasize the lethality and motivation of insurgent adversaries. I challenge these explanations. Declines in incumbent victory in counterinsurgency wars are not driven by fundamental shifts in the character of these conflicts, but in the political context in which they take place. Nineteenth-century colonial incumbents enjoyed a variety of political advantages—including strong political will, a permissive international environment, access to local collaborators, and flexibility to pick their battles—which granted them the time and resources necessary to meet insurgent challenges. In contrast, twentieth-century colonial incumbents struggled in the face of apathetic publics, hostile superpowers, vanishing collaborators, and constrained options. The decline in incumbent victory in counterinsurgency warfare, therefore, stems not from problems in force structure or strategy, but in political shifts in the profitability and legitimacy of colonial forms of governance.
Design model of high-performance ramjet or scramjet-powered vehicles

A procedure is described for designing a long-range, high-speed vehicle integrating airframe and propulsion components. As envisioned here, the process involves the following steps: 1) establish performance criteria, 2) vary engine and airframe parameters to optimize performance, and 3) find a configuration that fits these desired parameters. In this paper, an approximate analysis of scramjet or ramjet engine performance is developed and coupled with appropriate airframe parameters. An example is provided to show how the procedure could be applied to the preliminary design of a scramjet-powered missile that cruises at Mach number 6.
Spring and summer patterns in flowering onset, duration, and constancy across a water-limited gradient

 Premise of the study: Community-level fl owering patterns can be characterized by onset, duration, and end as well as constancy , the degree to which species commence, cease, and reinitiate fl owering within a season. In the mountainous Sky Islands region of the southwestern United States, fl owering onset is clearly infl uenced by elevation in the spring, but much less so in the summer season. We evaluated whether these fl owering metrics refl ect these dissimilar patterns between distinct spring and summer seasons regarding the infl uence of the elevation and moisture gradient.  Methods: We characterized fl owering onset, end, duration, and constancy by plant functional type and their relationships to climate variables in spring and summer. We also evaluated the infl uence of climate on seasonal fl owering patterns.  Key results: Gaps in seasonal fl owering occur frequently in this system in both seasons and among all plant functional types. In both seasons, annual plants exhibit the shortest fl owering durations and highest constancies, and plants at low elevations, inhabiting environments with variable moisture conditions, show a greater tendency for longer fl owering durations and lower constancy than high-elevation plants. Spring fl owering characteristics are most infl uenced by the total amount of October– March precipitation as well as temperatures in these months, whereas summer fl owering characteristics are infl uenced by the timing of summer-season precipitation, and next by the total amount of summer precipitation.  Conclusions: Flowering metrics, especially constancy and duration, show similar patterns in spring and summer and vary across elevation and moisture gradients. These patterns have substantial implications for plant and animal communities.
Optimal Flight Trajectories Through Recursive Thermal Streets with Uncertain Climb Rates

The performance of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) has been recently examined through various soaring flight methodologies. The corresponding optimal paths can be generated for specific flight scenarios where the rising air currents in the flight region are assumed to be isolated from one another and have deterministic climb rates. In order to improve these algorithmic approaches some degree of uncertainty yet needs to be allowed in describing thermal profiles whose characteristic parameters can be used to construct enhanced flight routes. In this paper we model recursive thermal streets through Gaussian distributions with uncertain means and standard deviations and generate the flight trajectory for a UAV to reach its destination in minimum time. The aircraft climbs several successive thermals in an attempt to collect data and characterize each thermal street with the estimates of the peak thermal strength and location. A more effective navigation strategy is hence developed in comparison to the existing tools based merely on remote detection data.
Assay of properdin in biological fluids.

Summary1. A sensitive, reproducible assay for properdin is described using spectro-photometric determinations of C'3 content. 2. RP and R3 reagent sera for the properdin assay may be readily prepared from guinea pig serum. 3. RP and R3 from both human and guinea pig sources may be used interchangeably in the reported properdin assay. 4. Tnu-lin was found to be more satisfactory than zymosan as a properdin binding and C'3 inactivating agent.
Practical Uses of Modeling, Feedback, and Practice—Specification of Some Behaviors for Pupils, Teachers, and Supervisors:

Shaping and acquiring new behavior can be facilitated through techniques called practice, modeling, and feedback. The paper also deals with the portrayal of desired behavior such as what it is the individual is to say or do. Identified discrete behaviors and behavior clusters subsequently become target behaviors for teacher training, classroom instruction, and teacher supervision. The emphasis here is upon building a repertoire of skills to enable individuals to perform tasks they seek to accomplish.
IntelliSense Technology of Data Edit Environment in Power Simulation Software

The authors propose that applying the IntelliSense technology to data edit environment of power system simulation to implement the online error checking of original data in simulation,automatic completeness of key word,automatic prompting of data card and intelligent help of data field. The developed data edit software for power system simulation with IntelliSense function,which can improve work efficiency and decease error rate,is suitable for primary and senior users. The configurable regulation management way applied in IntelliSense technology extends the application of data editor to the developers of model and algorithm to offer a simple and convenient way for the timely updating and publication of new models and arithmetic function.
Analysis on Pollutant Removal Performance of Integrated A/O Biocontact Oxidation Reactor

By combining traditional bio-contact oxidation technique with the A/O process,an integrated A/O bio-contact oxidation reactor was designed to treat domestic sewage.The removal efficiency of the process for pollutants,especially nitrogen and phosphorus,with various reflux ratios and gas-water ratios was studied to obtain the optimum operation parameters.Under the conditions of influent 165 L/h,HRT 5.2 to 5.7 h,temperature 26 to 32 ℃,pH 7.2 to 7.6,gas-water ratio 7 ∶ 1 and reflux ratio 100%,the process achieved good pollutant removal efficiency.The concentrations of COD,NH+4-N,TN and TP in the effluent met the first level B criteria specified in Discharge Standard of Pollutants for Municipal Wastewater Treatment Plant(GB 18918-2002).The corresponding removal rates were 85.7%,98.1%,54.7% and 83.9% respectively.
Differences in the Genetic Susceptibility to Age-Related Macular Degeneration Clinical Subtypes

Purpose We compared across age-related macular degeneration (AMD) subtypes the effect of AMD risk variants, their predictive power, and heritability.
Other Hypotheses on the Cause of Alzheimer’s Disease

One of the most rewarding aspects of basic research is to discover the cause of a disease. The road to such a discovery requires investigators to display the patience of Buddhist monks and the ingenuity of Solomon during their research. Even then, there is no guarantee that the experiments will succeed. The reason is that one also needs luck. This seemed to be the case when the cholinergic hypothesis, as it became known, was born in the mid-1970s following an observation made from Alzheimer’s brain material. It was found that the enzyme choline acetyl transferase (CAT) was significantly reduced in the brains of people who had died of Alzheimer’s disease.
Complete Genome Sequences of Campylobacter jejuni Strains OD267 and WP2202 Isolated from Retail Chicken Livers and Gizzards Reveal the Presence of Novel 116-Kilobase and 119-Kilobase Megaplasmids with Type VI Secretion Systems.

ABSTRACT Genome sequences of Campylobacter jejuni strains OD267 and WP2202, isolated from chicken livers and gizzards, showed the presence of novel 116-kb and 119-kb megaplasmids, respectively. The two megaplasmids carry a type VI secretion system and tetracycline resistance genes. These are the largest sequenced Campylobacter plasmids to date.
Simulations of morphotype-dependent hemodynamics in non-dilated bicuspid aortic valve aortas

Bicuspid aortic valves (BAVs) generate flow abnormalities that may promote aortopathy. While positive helix fraction (PHF) index, flow angle (θ), flow displacement (d) and wall shear stress (WSS) exhibit abnormalities in dilated BAV aortas, it is unclear whether those anomalies stem from the abnormal valve anatomy or the dilated aorta. Therefore, the objective of this study was to quantify the early impact of different BAV morphotypes on aorta hemodynamics prior to dilation. Fluid-structure interaction models were designed to quantify standard peak-systolic flow metrics and temporal WSS characteristics in a realistic non-dilated aorta connected to functional tricuspid aortic valve (TAV) and type-I BAVs. While BAVs generated increased helicity (PHF>0.68) in the middle ascending aorta (AA), larger systolic flow skewness (θ>11.2°) and displacement (d>6.8mm) relative to the TAV (PHF=0.51; θ<5.5°; d<3.3mm), no distinct pattern was observed between morphotypes. In contrast, WSS magnitude and directionality abnormalities were BAV morphotype- and site-dependent. Type-I BAVs subjected the AA convexity to peak-systolic WSS overloads (up to 1014% difference vs. TAV). While all BAVs increased WSS unidirectionality on the proximal AA relative to the TAV, the most significant abnormality was achieved by the BAV with left-right-coronary cusp fusion on the wall convexity (up to 0.26 decrease in oscillatory shear index vs. TAV). The results indicate the existence of strong hemodynamic abnormalities in non-dilated type-I BAV AAs, their colocalization with sites vulnerable to dilation and the superior specificity of WSS metrics over global hemodynamic metrics to the valve anatomy.
A Self-Configuring Location Discovery System for Smart Environments

This chapter describes our experiences with the design and use of a rapidly installable self-configuring beaconing system. Our system is comprised of a set of custom-designed wireless sensor nodes, the Medusa MK-2 nodes that can form a local coordinate system a few seconds after they are deployed. This results in a versatile, low-cost system based on battery operated devices eliminates the need for costly and time-consuming infrastructure installations. During the system bootstrapping phase, the Medusa Kindergarten - 2(MK-2) nodes localize themselves and then enter a service phase in which they act as “satellites” that assist other objects in the room to determine their locations with a few centimeters of accuracy.
When Soviet Jewish photographers confront the very American question of identity

I can spot a Russian immigrant from a mile away. OK, maybe not a mile, because my vision isn’t that good, but most immigrants represent their places of origin through a complex code of visual signi...
The Advance of Rescue Technologies and the Border of Viability.

In April 2017 a pediatric surgery group at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia published a report of its development of a pumpless oxygenator circuit connected to a lamb fetus via an umbilical-cord...
A Neural Network Approach for Truth Discovery in Social Sensing

Social sensing has emerged as a new application paradigm in networked sensing communities where a colossal amount of observations about the physical world are contributed by people or devices they use. Our work solves a critical challenge in social sensing applications where the goal is to estimate the reliability of social sensors and the truthfulness of observed variables (typically known as claims) with little prior knowledge on either of them. This challenge is referred to as truth discovery. An important limitation in the previous truth discovery solutions is that they assume the relationship between source reliability and claim truthfulness can be represented by simplified functions (e.g., linear, quadratic and binomial). This assumption leads to suboptimal truth discovery results because the exact relational dependency between sources and claims is often unknown a priori. In this paper, we show that a neural network approach can learn the complex relational dependency better than the previous truth discovery methods. In particular, we develop a multi-layer neural network model that solves the truth discovery problem in social sensing without any assumption on the prior knowledge of the source-claim relational dependency distribution. The performance of our model is evaluated through two real-world events using data crawled from Twitter. The evaluation results show that our neural network approach significantly outperforms previous truth discovery methods.
Les “dues Barcelones” i el seu capitalisme gore: El cos de l’immigrant com a espai de tensió a biutiful (Iñárritu, 2010)

The immigrant body struggling to survive in the neoliberal city is one of the main topics in Biutiful (2010), directed by Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu. The film explores how corporeality and urban e...
Implications of bipartite interferometry for the measurement problem

Nonlocal interferometry, in which two photons are entangled in the "measurement state" (MS) of quantum measurement theory, illuminates the measurement problem. Experiments done in 1990 by Rarity and Tapster and by Mandel's group, in which each photon "measures" the other, probe the effect of a variable phase factor inserted between the two superposed terms of the MS. The results show that, when a bipartite (two-part) system is in the MS, its subsystems are not in superpositions but are instead in collapsed, or mixed, states with each subsystem exhibiting a definite, but unpredictable, outcome. Standard quantum theory (without the collapse postulate) predicts this MS and thus correctly predicts these observations. The experiment confirms that, when a quantum system and a measuring apparatus are entangled in the MS, the state actually detected by an observer of either subsystem is the local or "reduced" state of the subsystem. The global superposition state, which continues evolving unitarily, merely records the nonlocal correlations and does not contradict the definite, non-superposed, outcomes. Thus Schrodinger's cat, for example, is in a non-paradoxical mixture of being alive on trials when the nucleus didn't decay, and dead on trials when the nucleus decayed. This resolves the problem of definite outcomes, with no assistance from human minds, other worlds, hidden variables, the environment, a collapse postulate, collapse mechanisms, or "for all practical purposes" arguments.
Cholinergic drug studies in dementia and depression.

For over 30 years researchers have been investigating the involvement of central cholinergic systems in the processes of memory, learning, attention and other cognitive operations. These studies received a boost when the hypothesis was generated that cholinergic lesions in the brains of patients suffering from Alzheimer’s Disease might be related to the cognitive pathology of that disorder (Coyle et al., 1983). This hypothesis has led to a number of therapeutic studies in Alzheimer’s Disease aimed at improving the cognitive symptomatology by cholinergic stimulation or replacement (for example, Brinkman et al., 1982; Davis and Mohs, 1982; Ferris et al., 1979; Mohs et al., 1985). The results of the studies have been for the most part disappointing; the reasons for this remain incompletely understood. This chapter will review a series of studies done in our laboratory at the National Institute of Mental Health attempting to examine in more detail the clinical relevance of cholinergic pathology in Alzheimer’s disease. The general paradigm uses acute doses of cholinergic agonists and antagonists as pharmacological probes of the functional status of the central cholinergic system in demented patients suffering from Alzheimer’s Disease, and as comparison groups, elderly normals and elderly patients suffering from depression.
Efficient city-sized 3D reconstruction from ultra-high resolution aerial and ground video imagery

This paper introduces an approach for geo-registered, dense 3D reconstruction of city-sized scenes using a combination of ultra-high resolution aerial and ground video imagery. While 3D reconstructions from ground imagery provide high-detail street-level views of a city, they do not completely cover the entire city scene and might have distortions due to GPS drift. Such a reconstruction can be complemented by aerial imagery to capture missing scene surfaces as well as improve geo-registration. We present a computationally efficient method for 3D reconstruction of city-sized scenes using both aerial and ground video imagery to obtain a more complete and self-consistent georegistered 3D city model. The reconstruction results of a 1×1km city area, covered with a 66 Mega-pixel airborne system along with a 60 Mega-pixel ground camera system, are presented and validated to geo-register to within 3m to prior airborne-collected LiDAR data.
Characterization of Tellurium as a Back Contact for CdTe Solar Cells

CdTe solar cells currently use a hetero-junction design allowing for ideal band alignment engineering. The back contact has often been a source of CdTe performance limitations due to the formation of a barrier at the back interface. Tellurium has been studied as a possible high quality back contact to CdTe. Temperature dependent current density-voltage measurements and x-ray and ultraviolet photoelectron spectroscopy were carried out in order to approximate offsets at the CdTe/Te interface.
Practicing Pathology in the Post-genomic Era: Challenges and Opportunities

The rapid implementation of new molecular methods in support of precision medicine has been both exciting and challenging to pathology. Next-generation sequencing is coming to maturity as a clinical procedure, with concomitant development of guidelines for assay validation and performance, quality standards, and proficiency programs. Evolving issues include the type, target, and timing of genomic analysis of tumors and regulatory and reimbursement issues. Additionally, educational needs for pathology trainees, practicing pathologists, and clinical colleagues should be addressed.
Differential scanning calorimetry in the biopharmaceutical sciences

Abstract Differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) is a technique used to measure thermodynamics of solid or liquid phase transitions that produce or absorb heat. DSC is commonly applied in the biopharmaceutical setting for the characterization and engineering of manufacturable drug products. Proteins and peptides represent the largest sector of “Biologic” pharmaceuticals and this chapter describes the use of DSC for the thermal analyses of therapeutic proteins in dilute solutions and to a lesser extent in solid states. DSC measurements of solutions and solids are quite different and typically use separate instrument designs. Solution measurements require high sensitivity and are made using DSC instruments that are commonly classified as “microcalorimeters”, while solid phase DSC is performed using “standard” DSC instrument designs. In this chapter, we describe the fundamental information DSC provides for protein therapeutics, a description of the instruments and parameters of their use, and finally common DSC applications within the biopharmaceutical setting.
BRAF Mutation Class and Clinical Outcomes-Response.

We appreciate the interest generated by our study on the impact of BRAF functional class on clinical outcomes in patients with NSCLC. In our analysis, responses to standard first-line chemotherapy were not durable for patients with class II and III BRAF mutations. We therefore agree that it is
DIFFERENTIAL INFLUENCE OF PHYSIOLOGICAL, PHARMACOLOGICAL AND PATHOLOGICAL ALTERATIONS ON HEPATIC AND EXTRAHEPATIC DRUG METABOLISM

SUMMARY Factors known to influence hepatic drug metabolism were evaluated for their influence on drug metabolism in extrahepatic organs. The well-documented sex-related differences in drug metabolism in rat liver were not seen in either lung or kidney. Treatment of rats with phenobarbital elicited the expected increases in mixed function oxidase (MFO) parameters in liver without concomitant changes in these activities in lung and with only scattered and less marked changes in kidney. UDP-Glucuronyltransferase activity was undetectable toward two substrates in rabbit lung microsomes. Several activators which stimulated hepatic UDP-glucuronyltranferase several fold had no effect on the pulmonary enzyme. Treatment of rats with CCl 4 inhibited the hepatic and pulmonary MFO systems in a quantitatively and temporally similar manner but was without effect on the renal system. Increases in hepatic and renal but not pulmonary UDP-glucuronyltransferase were observed after CCl 4 . Scurvy impaired most MFO activities in liver microsomes but evoked no change or much smaller changes in extrahepatic organs. It is concluded that some factors that influence hepatic drug metabolism produce similar effects in lung and kidney while the effects of other factors are organ-specific.
Abstract 307: Chemogenetic Activation of Paraventricular Oxytocin Neurons Reduces Cardiac Dysfunction During Heart Failure

There is a distinctive cardiac autonomic imbalance in HF consisting of increased sympathetic activity and decreased parasympathetic tone. Recent work has indicated that activation of paraventricula...
Preparation of cellulose nanofibril/titanium dioxide nanoparticle nanocomposites as fillers for PVA-based packaging and investigation into their intestinal toxicity.

Abstract The aims of this work were to synthesize cellulose nanofibril/titanium dioxide nanoparticle (CNF/TiO2NP) nanocomposites, evaluate the use of CNF/TiO2NP nanocomposites in PVA-based films, and investigate the intestinal toxicity of the nanocomposites. Via a mixing method, CNF/TiO2NP nanocomposites were synthesized. The addition of the nanocomposites significantly enhanced the tensile strength, Young's modulus, and light barrier capacity of PVA films. Moreover, a high concentration of CNF/TiO2NP nanocomposites (10 mg/mL) had no appreciable effect on the growth of Escherichia coli P-24, Lactobacillus acidophilus ADH, and Bifidobacterium animalis Bif-6 cells. The nanocomposites did not exhibit significant toxicity to cancerous and normal colon cells even when their concentrations increased to a high level of 1000 μg/mL. The results indicate that CNF/TiO2NP nanocomposites can potentially be used as functional fillers for a PVA-based packaging system.
Prevalence of prognostic uncertainty and impact on prognostic discussions in thoracic oncology.

33Background: Recent advances for late-stage lung cancer may have led to a shift from therapeutic ‘nihilism’ to ‘optimism’ (Temel, JCO 2016). It is not known whether this shift has increased progno...
Identification of Genes That Result in High Mortality of Oryctes rhinoceros (Scarabaeidae: Coleoptera) When Targeted Using an RNA Interference Approach: Implications for Large Invasive Insects

Coconut rhinoceros beetle, Oryctes rhinoceros (L., 1758), is a large scarab beetle native to Southeast Asia and a major pest of coconut (Cocos nucifera) and oil (Elaeis guineensis) palms in its invaded range. Few tools are available for coconut rhinoceros beetle management, particularly for an emerging haplotype with resistance to known strains of Oryctes rhinoceros nudivirus, the traditional biological control agent used in coconut rhinoceros beetle management programs. RNA interference (RNAi) represents an emerging tool for insect pest control that exploits an existing pathway for gene regulation in the target organism. In this study, we evaluated RNAi as a potential tool for coconut rhinoceros beetle management. Using transcriptome data generated from gut tissue of early instar larvae, we identified 24 RNAi target sequences that were either highly expressed or had demonstrated efficacy in other insect systems. Double-stranded (ds)RNAs ranging from 249 to 297 bp in length were generated for 23 of these target sequences and 150 ng were microinjected into coconut rhinoceros beetle 1st, 2nd, and 3rd instar larvae and adults. Five of these dsRNAs that targeted genes putatively encoding V-type ATPase, polyadenylate binding protein, and three forms of actin induced 30.8–100% mortality within 14 days post injection (dpi). Microinjection of 2nd instars with 10 and 100 ng of these same five dsRNAs induced 20–100% and 80–100% mortality at 7 and 14 dpi, respectively. These results indicate RNAi should be explored as a possible management option for coconut rhinoceros beetle. Coconut rhinoceros beetle may also represent a model species for using RNAi in the management of large invasive insect species.
Autoimmune: A "Medicinal History"

In this project, I provide a "medicinal history" (Morales 1998) of my experiences of disability, Madness, and medical abuse, offering a creative format for archiving the past in order to craft healing futures. Weaving stories together with a rag doll index of myself, I craft my own "theory in the flesh," (Moraga and Anzaldua 2015, 19) a counternarrative of resistance to interlocking systems of oppression grounded in my own lived experience as a queer, non-binary, mixed-race, desi, disabled, Mad, femme of color. By tracing white supremacist, colonial, heteropatriarchal, ableist, and saneist violence onto my body, I reimagine the ways that embodied traumas can morph to become possibilities for generative healing praxes. "Autoimmune" is a story of disabled and mad becoming, of the unspooling of the self and ableist/sanist definitions of (dis)ability and madness, and of the "re-storying" (Driskill 2016, 3) of disability and madness through a praxis of kinship.
Commercial Trolling: Social Media and the Corporate Deformation of Democracy

While “trolling” originally named and is today often thought to be the activity of recalcitrant or obstreperous individuals with too much time or their hands or axes to grind about particular issues, a great deal of trolling on today’s social media platforms is crafted not by such individuals but instead by persons (or even computer programs) acting on behalf of (and usually employed by) powerful interests, including corporations, institutions, governments, and lobbying groups, and whose goal is not so much contributing to real exchange of political views, but instead the tilting of the discursive field to make some positions appear reasonable or even popular, and to marginalize other opinions (and those who hold them). Such action is visible in the range of ongoing intrusions by corporate actors into Wikipedia, which is reflected in the elaborate infrastructure the site maintains to police such intrusions, an infrastructure not available to much of the rest of the internet. It is even more obvious in Anti-Global Warming (AGW) discourse, by agents of industry lobbying groups and energy companies, in many locations across the web. Given the ease with which capital can purchase the services of agents to advocate effectively for views that are disfavored by a large portion — at times, such as in the climate change debate, a large majority — of the population, questions are raised about the apparently inherent democratic nature of information distribution on the web, and about what means might be utilized to level the playing field between good-faith contributors to discourse on the one hand, and institutionally-directed contributors on the other.
“Working together as a team really gets them fired up”: Afterschool program mentoring strategies to promote collaborative learning among adolescent participants

Opportunities for collaborative learning reflect positive peer processes that have strong implications for adolescents’ developmental experiences in afterschool programs (ASPs). However, collaborat...
The Transmission of Knowledge

How do we transmit or distribute knowledge, as distinct from generating or producing it? In this book John Greco examines the interpersonal relations and social structures which enable and inhibit the sharing of knowledge within and across epistemic communities. Drawing on resources from moral theory, the philosophy of language, action theory and the cognitive sciences, he considers the role of interpersonal trust in transmitting knowledge, and argues that sharing knowledge involves a kind of shared agency similar to giving a gift or passing a ball. He also explains why transmitting knowledge is easy in some social contexts, such as those involving friendship or caregiving, but impossible in contexts characterized by suspicion and competition rather than by trust and cooperation. His book explores phenomena that have been undertheorized by traditional epistemology, and throws new light on existing problems in social epistemology and the epistemology of testimony.
The Cambridge Introduction to Emmanuel Levinas

This book provides a clear and helpful overview of the thought of Emmanuel Levinas, one of the most significant and interesting philosophers of the late twentieth century. Michael L. Morgan presents an overall interpretation of Levinas' central principle that human existence is fundamentally ethical and that its ethical character is grounded in our face-to-face relationships. He explores the religious, cultural and political implications of this insight for modern Western culture and how it relates to our conception of selfhood and what it is to be a person, our understanding of the ground of moral values, our experience of time and the meaning of history, and our experience of religious concepts and discourse. Includes an annotated list of recommended readings and a selected bibliography of books by and about Levinas. An excellent introduction to Levinas for readers unfamiliar with his work and even for those without a background in philosophy.
Excited-State Properties of Defected Halide Perovskite Quantum Dots: Insights from Computation

CsPbBr3 quantum dots (QDs) have been recently suggested for their application as bright green light-emitting diodes (LEDs); however, their optical properties are yet to be fully understood and characterized. In this work, we utilize time-dependent density functional theory to analyze the ground and excited states of the CsPbBr3 clusters in the presence of various low formation energy vacancy defects. Our study finds that the QD perovskites retain their defect tolerance with limited perturbance to the simulated UV-vis spectra. The exception to this general trend is that Br vacancies must be avoided, as they cause molecular orbital localization, resulting in trap states and lower LED performance. Blinking will likely still plague CsPbBr3 QDs, given that the charged defects critically perturb the spectra via red-shifting and lower absorbance. Our study provides insight into the tunability of CsPbBr3 QDs optical properties by understanding the nature of the electronic excitations and guiding improved development for high-performance LEDs.
Context dependency in risky decision making: Is there a description-experience gap?

When making decisions involving risk, people may learn about the risk from descriptions or from experience. The description-experience gap refers to the difference in decision patterns driven by this discrepancy in learning format. Across two experiments, we investigated whether learning from description versus experience differentially affects the direction and the magnitude of a context effect in risky decision making. In Study 1 and 2, a computerized game called the Decisions about Risk Task (DART) was used to measure people’s risk-taking tendencies toward hazard stimuli that exploded probabilistically. The rate at which a context hazard caused harm was manipulated, while the rate at which a focal hazard caused harm was held constant. The format by which this information was learned was also manipulated; it was learned primarily by experience or by description. The results revealed that participants’ behavior toward the focal hazard varied depending on what they had learned about the context hazard. Specifically, there were contrast effects in which participants were more likely to choose a risky behavior toward the focal hazard when the harm rate posed by the context hazard was high rather than low. Critically, these contrast effects were of similar strength irrespective of whether the risk information was learned from experience or description. Participants’ verbal assessments of risk likelihood also showed contrast effects, irrespective of learning format. Although risk information about a context hazard in DART does nothing to affect the objective expected value of risky versus safe behaviors toward focal hazards, it did affect participants’ perceptions and behaviors—regardless of whether the information was learned from description or experience. Our findings suggest that context has a broad-based role in how people assess and make decisions about hazards.
Field trial of two calcium supplements on early lactation health and production in multiparous Holstein cows

Subclinical hypocalcemia is a common and costly metabolic disorder of dairy cows in the early postpartum period and has been associated with hyperketonemia, displaced abomasum, retained placenta, metritis and mastitis, decreased reproductive performance, and decreased milk production. Prevention of subclinical hypocalcemia thus represents a sizable opportunity for avoiding other postpartum diseases in dairy cows, thereby improving animal well-being and farm economics. To our knowledge, oral and injectable calcium supplements have not been compared in a field trial on a commercial dairy. Our objectives were to 1) observe serum Ca concentrations in the first 48 h postpartum in cows supplemented with oral Ca or subcutaneous Ca and nonsupplemented cows and 2) evaluate the association of these supplements with diagnosis of metritis, displaced abomasum, mastitis, and early lactation disease (any of the diseases milk fever, retained placenta, metritis, or displaced abomasum), removal from the herd, pregnancy to first insemination, and average d milk yield by wk for the first 10 wk of lactation.
How Possessiveness Cues in Brand Names Impact Brand Evaluations

Drawing from psychological ownership and linguistics theories, we show that compared to a non-possessive brand name, a possessive brand name leads to more favorable brand evaluations and purchase intentions, which is mediated by greater attributions of identity-relevant brand attributes and moderated by whether a brand name includes an identity marker.
Robustness of the Exact t Method for a Three-arm Clinical Endpoint Bioequivalence Study under Non-normality

A clinical endpoint bioequivalence (BE) study aims to establish BE between a generic drug (TEST) and an innovator drug (REF). A placebo (PLB) is usually included to demonstrate the sensitivity of the study. BE is established if TEST is shown to be superior to PLB, REF superior to PLB, and TEST equivalent to REF. Therefore, an overall BE test for a clinical endpoint BE study is composed of two superiority tests (TEST vs. PLB and REF vs. PLB) and one equivalence test(TEST vs. REF).Chang et al. [1] calculated the sample size and power for an overall BE test based on one superiority test (TEST vs. PLB) and an equivalence test (TEST vs. REF) using the joint distribution of sample means and sample variances (we call this a Z-ChiSquare method). Previously, we proposed an exact method to calculate the power and sample size for an overall BE test based on two superiority tests (TEST vs. PLB, REF vs. PLB) and one equivalence test (TEST vs. REF) using a multivariate non-central t distribution directly (we call this an Exact-t method) for a clinical endpoint BE study with two superiority tests and one equivalence test. Yang and Sun showed that the Exact-t method is computationally more efficient and more accurate when sample size is small as compared to the Z-ChiSquare method. These methods, however, were generally verified by simulation under thenormality assumption. In reality, data can deviate from normality (e.g., be skewed). In this paper, we test the robustness of the Exact-t method and the Z-ChiSquare method when data is mildly or severely skewed. It turns out that both methods remain accurate even when data is severely skewed as long as the mean and variance of the data are correctly specified. One thing to note is that when data is more skewed, the required sample size to attain a desired power is larger. Therefore, the Exact-t method is recommended when calculating power and determining sample size for a three-arm clinical endpoint study.
Three-year reliability of MEG resting-state oscillatory power.

Abstract Introduction Resting-state oscillatory activity has been extensively studied across a wide array of disorders. Establishing which spectrally- and spatially-specific oscillatory components exhibit test-retest reliability is essential to move the field forward. While studies have shown short-term reliability of MEG resting-state activity, no studies have examined test-retest reliability across an extended period of time to establish the stability of these signals, which is critical for reproducibility. Methods We examined 18 healthy adults age 23 - 61 who completed three visits across three years. For each visit, participants completed both a resting state MEG and structural MRI scan. MEG data were source imaged, and the cortical power in canonical frequency bands (delta, theta, alpha, beta, low gamma, high gamma) was computed. Intra-class correlation coefficients (ICC) were then calculated across the cortex for each frequency band. Results Over three years, power in the alpha and beta bands displayed the highest reliability estimates, while gamma showed the lowest estimates of three-year reliability. Spatially, delta, alpha, and beta all showed the highest degrees of reliability in the parietal cortex. Interestingly, the peak signal for each of these frequency bands was located outside of the parietal cortex, suggesting that reliability estimates were not solely dependent on the signal-to-noise ratio. Conclusion Oscillatory resting-state power in parietal delta, posterior beta, and alpha across most of the cortex are reliable across three years and future MEEG studies may focus on these measures for the development of specific markers.
Dysplastic changes of peripheral eosinophils in acute myeloid leukemia with myelodysplastic syndrome–related features

![Figure][1] A 41-year-old man presented with epistaxis for 1 day and was found to have leukocytosis (23 200/µL) with 38% blasts, anemia (9.3 g/dL), and thrombocytopenia (7000/µL). Bone marrow aspiration and biopsy showed sheets of blasts comprising 90% of the overall cellularity. Flow
The Laplace Transform Boundary Element (LTBE) Method for the Solution of Diffusion-Type Equations

A new numerical method, the Laplace Transform Boundary Element (LTBE) method, was developed for the solution of diffusion-type PDE’s by eliminating the time dependency of the problem using a Laplace transform formulation. In essence, LTBE yields a solution numerical in space and semi-analytical in time. It consists of 4 steps: 1) a Laplace transform is performed on the PDE, 2) the transformed PDE is approximated using the Boundary Element Method (BEM), 3) the resulting system of simultaneous equations is solved and the transformed vector of unknowns is determined in the Laplace space, and 4) the solution vector obtained in step 3 is inverted numerically to yield the solution in time. The solution in the Laplace space renders the time interpolation and time marching schemes employed in the standard BEM irrelevant because time is no longer considered. The method was tested against results obtained from two- and three-dimensional test cases of heat conduction and groundwater flow using a standard BEM simulator and analytical models. For a single time-step, LTBE requires an execution time 6 times longer than the analogous BEM requirement without an increase in storage. This disadvantage is outweighed by the fact that LTBE allows an unlimited time-step size with a more accurate solution than the conventional BEM treatment. Execution times are reduced by orders of magnitude because calculations in the LTBE scheme are necessary only at the desired observation times, while the standard BEM requires calculations at all the intermediate times of the discretized time domain. Roundoff and material balance errors are stable, non-increasing, and much lower than in the standard BEM simulations.
Probabilistic Retrieval Approaches for Thorough and Heterogeneous XML Retrieval

For this year’s INEX UC Berkeley focused on the Heterogeneous track, and submitted only two runs for the Adhoc tasks, a “thorough” run and a “BestInContext” run. For these runs we used the TREC2 probabilistic model with blind feedback. The Thorough run was ranked 21st out of the 106 runs submitted for the Thorough task. The majority of our effort for INEX was on the Heterogeneous (Het) track where we submitted three collection ranking runs and two content-only runs. As the only group to actually submit runs for the Het track, we are guaranteed both the highest, and lowest, effectiveness scores for each task. However, because it was deemed pointless to conduct the actual relevance assessments on the submissions of a single system, we do not know the exact values of these results.
Digital Human Modeling and Measurement Considerations for Wheeled Mobility Device Users

Three-dimensional landmark delimitations (3DLD) for wheeled mobility users are outlined. A subset of 3DLD definitions is given. Each 3DLD includes a rationale for inclusion in data collection and suggested capturing techniques for the digital human modeling of wheeled mobility users. Structural and functional protocols have been developed for these 3DLD and serve as the basis for a large-scale anthropometric study of wheeled mobility users. This paper focuses on a few key issues in the development of the wheeled mobility user anthropometric protocols such as measurement consistency and rationale for landmarks for use in universal design. The benefits to this approach with comparisons to existing approaches will be discussed.
Decoupling of fermions from bosons in the strong-coupling limit of gauge theories

It is pointed out that, in a previously introduced approach to the strong-coupling limit of renormalizable field theory, the strong-coupling limit of spin-one gauge fields coupled to spin-1/2 fermions is a limit in which the respective fermions are free. This result is an extension of a previously reported decoupling result for Yukawa theories.
Mathematical Modelling of Biological Signaling Networks

Intracellular signaling networks, which are composed of interconnected biochemical pathways, regulate and actuate responses such as cell-cycle progression and cell migration, survival, and differentiation. Although our knowledge of the intricate biochemical mechanisms at the level of individual proteins and molecular interactions is ever expanding, those details leave us with an even murkier view of how the complex network operates as a whole. True understanding requires knowing not only what happens at the molecular level but also how these mechanisms influence the precise magnitude, timing, and spatial localization of signal transduction processes. Hence, mathematical modeling and analysis has emerged in recent years as a legitimate approach for interpreting experimental results and generating novel hypotheses for additional study and model refinement. Once conducted in isolation and scorned by most biologists, quantitative modeling has moved into the mainstream as a powerful tool for the analysis of cell signaling. In this article, the biological, chemical, and physical underpinnings of this approach are presented, as are its current applications and future challenges.
Comparison study of broth macrodilution and microdilution antifungal susceptibility tests

An evaluation of broth dilution antifungal susceptibility tests was performed by determining both the micro- and macrodilution MICs of amphotericin B, flucytosine, fluconazole, ketoconazole, and cilofungin against 38 isolates of Candida albicans, Candida lusitaniae, Candida parapsilosis, Candida tropicalis, Cryptococcus neoformans, and Torulopsis glabrata. The following preliminary antifungal working group recommendations of the National Committee for Clinical Laboratory Standards for broth macrodilution tests with antifungal agents were used: inocula standardized to 1 x 10(4) to 5 x 10(4) CFU/ml with a spectrophotometer, RPMI 1640 medium buffered with morpholinopropanesulfonic acid (pH 7.0), incubation at 35 degrees C for 24 to 48 h, and an additive drug dilution procedure. Broth microdilution MICs were higher (two or more dilutions) than broth macrodilution MICs for all isolates tested with amphotericin B and for most isolates tested with ketoconazole, fluconazole, and cilofungin. MICs of flucytosine were the same by both techniques or lower by the broth microdilution test except in tests with C. neoformans. However, the only statistically significant differences between the two tests were observed with amphotericin B against all isolates (P = 0.01 to 0.07), ketoconazole against C. neoformans (P = 0.01 to 0.02), and cilofungin against C. albicans (P = 0.05 to 0.14). Tests performed with less dense inocula (1 x 10(3) to 5 x 10(3] produced similar results.
Life Cycle Greenhouse Gas Emissions of Utility-Scale Wind Power

A systematic review and harmonization of life cycle assessment (LCA) literature of utility-scale wind power systems was performed to determine the causes of and, where possible, reduce variability in estimates of life cycle greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Screening of approximately 240 LCAs of onshore and offshore systems yielded 72 references meeting minimum thresholds for quality, transparency, and relevance. Of those, 49 references provided 126 estimates of life cycle GHG emissions. Published estimates ranged from 1.7 to 81 grams CO{sub 2}-equivalent per kilowatt-hour (g CO{sub 2}-eq/kWh), with median and interquartile range (IQR) both at 12 g CO{sub 2}-eq/kWh. After adjusting the published estimates to use consistent gross system boundaries and values for several important system parameters, the total range was reduced by 47% to 3.0 to 45 g CO{sub 2}-eq/kWh and the IQR was reduced by 14% to 10 g CO{sub 2}-eq/kWh, while the median remained relatively constant (11 g CO{sub 2}-eq/kWh). Harmonization of capacity factor resulted in the largest reduction in variability in life cycle GHG emission estimates. This study concludes that the large number of previously published life cycle GHG emission estimates of wind power systems and their tight distribution suggest that new process-based LCAs of similar wind turbinemore » technologies are unlikely to differ greatly. However, additional consequential LCAs would enhance the understanding of true life cycle GHG emissions of wind power (e.g., changes to other generators operations when wind electricity is added to the grid), although even those are unlikely to fundamentally change the comparison of wind to other electricity generation sources.« less