cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Historical Vignette of Infamous Gunshot Injury to Spine: “An Ailment not to be Treated”?

The increasing prevalence and gloomy socioeconomic consequence of spine injury remain a concern in modern medicine. In this article, we highlight the infamous gunshot spinal injuries of a few eminent personalities across multiple centuries and their sociopolitical impact in context with the evolution of modern medicine. The role of available medicine in these victims was not more than a mere watcher, thus substantiating an infamous quote from ancient literature that describes spine injury as "an ailment not to be treated."
Anelastic and dielectric relaxation of scandia-doped ceria

Abstract Of all the trivalent dopants which may be added to ceria (CeO2) to make it an oxygen-ion conductor, Sc3+ appears to be unique in producing unusually low conductivity due to a relatively high vacancy-dopant association energy. In order to better understand the defect structure of Sc3+-doped ceria, the present work was undertaken using both anelastic and dielectric relaxation. A number of relaxation peaks were found. Most strikingly, a new low temperature relaxation with activation enthalpy near 0.2 eV was observed; it was shown to be due to a low-symmetry off-center configuration of an isolated ScCe defect. At higher temperatures the relaxation due to Sc-Vo pairs (where vo = oxygen vacancy) was found to have an activation enthalpy of 0.41 eV (much lower than that of larger dopant ions, e.g. Y3+ and Gd3+. In addition, complex relaxation spectra are observed even for concentrations as low as 0.3mol% Sc2O3, showing that higher clustered defects readily form in this system.
Combustion zone - Acoustic cavity interactions in rocket combustors

Analytical and numerical models are employed to assess the stabilizing impact of acoustic absorbers on liquid propellant rocket engine intrinsic stability. The tuning and stability behavior of cavities in which two-dimensional flow and temperature variations exist are predicted through the application of an iterative-integral, Green's function method of analysis. Results of stability calculations performed for a variety of cavity geometries and temperature gradients indicate that adding a large open area absorber to a combustion chamber significantly alters the spatial shape of the oscillation. This alteration consequently affects the driving and damping mechanisms in the chamber. Because of this interaction, the maximal stabilizing effect of a cavity with a given open area does not in general occur for a design tuned in the acoustic sense to the frequency of the oscillation, but rather for a design that is not tuned but which tends to maximize the influence of the damping mechanisms in the chamber relative to the driving mechanisms. Additionally, absorbers with large backing cavities are shown to perform better over a wider range of operating conditions than absorbers with small backing cavities. Calculations also reveal that large temperature gradients in an absorber tend to reduce its broadband effectiveness.
Dynamics of rotating paramagnetic particle chains simulated by particle dynamics, Stokesian dynamics and lattice Boltzmann methods

Paramagnetic particles, when subjected to external unidirectional rotating magnetic fields, form chains which rotate along with the magnetic field. In this paper three simulation methods, particle dynamics (PD), Stokesian dynamics (SD) and lattice Boltzmann (LB) methods, are used to study the dynamics of these rotating chains. SD simulations with two different levels of approximations—additivity of forces (AF) and additivity of velocities (AV)—for hydrodynamic interactions have been carried out. The effect of hydrodynamic interactions between paramagnetic particles under the effect of a rotating magnetic field is analyzed by comparing the LB and SD simulations, both of which include hydrodynamic interactions, with PD simulations in which hydrodynamic interactions are neglected. It was determined that for macroscopically observable properties like average chain length as a function of Mason number, reasonable agreement is found between all the three methods. For microscopic properties like the force distribution on each particle along the chain, inclusion of hydrodynamic interaction becomes important to understand the underlying physics of chain formation.
FPGA-based parallel implementation for the lifting discrete wavelet transform

The rapidly increasing popularity of the discrete wavelet transform (DWT) as an effective tool in many signal processing and data compression applications, and its integration into JPEG 2000 has given rise to various DWT algorithms and their VLSI implementations to reduce complexity and enhance performance. In this paper, we present an efficient hardware implementation of the discrete wavelet transform and its deployment on a reconfigurable FPGA based platform. Our implementation is a novel architecture based on the lifting factorization of the wavelet filter banks. This factorization leads to a block based parallel DWT architecture suitable for hardware implementation. To overcome the communication overhead associated with the DWT block transform, we utilize the new Overlap-State1,2 technique to compute the DWT near block boundaries. A VHDL description of the lifting polyphase factorization architecture was developed and ported to an FPGA hardware platform that was chosen to allow partial and full reconfigurability to accommodate various applications with different filter banks. Our hardware implementation improves the performance by better than twofold speed up when compared to an efficient pipelined FPGA based implementation.© (2000) COPYRIGHT SPIE--The International Society for Optical Engineering. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.
A solution to the artifact problem in Fourier transform vibrational circular dichroism

Using a newly constructed FT-IR vibrational circular dichroism (VCD) instrument, we have found that elimination of the ellipsoidal collection mirror before the detector and its replacement by a lens leads to a significant improvement in the absorption artifact problem seen previously in FT-IR/VCD. In the mid-IR region, we have been able to measure VCD of a single enantiomer for molecules such as α-pinene, 3-methyl-cyclohexanone, and dimethyltartrate. More importantly, this reduction in artifact level brings the FT-IR/VCD band shape of some particularly-difficult-to-measure bands, such as carbonyl stretches, into better agreement with those found in dispersive measurements. These results imply that the dispersive results are reliable, though of lower resolution than those obtained with the use of FT-IR/VCD.
The Dialectic of Time and Television

The article reviews the key question of the effects of television as proposed by Elihu Katz in his introduction and the various responses to it in the contributions to this volume. It argues that the question is a proper concern of sociology, engaged as it is with the politics of the present and immediate, short-term effects. The question of long-term effects, however, is beyond the scope of a social science methodology concerned with the impact of the new. Long-term effects only show up with the passing of time and are the concern of historical studies. As television begins to have a history, it begins to be possible to examine its historical record to try to tease out its long-term impact on the world—so far!
Hydrogen Exchange between Hydride and Methyl Ligands in [Cp*Os(dmpm)(CH3)H+]

Very recently Gross and Girolami described the first report of a transition metal methyl/hydride complex in which the hydrogens of the alkyl and hydride are exchanging at a rate sufficient to be dynamic on the NMR time scale. The results suggest that an alkane complex L{sub x}M(CH{sub 4}) is formed reversibly from the methyl/hydride complex. This communication reports density functional theory (DFT) calculations on a model of the Os(IV) methyl/hydride studied by Gross and Girolami. A bound methane complex is indeed found which lies {approx} 6 kcal/mol above the methyl/hydride. The theoretical barrier height connecting the two is in good agreement with the experimental kinetic data reported for hydrogen exchange. Once formed, the methane complex can scramble the hydrogen bound to the metal through a lower-lying transition state involving {eta}{sup 2}-H,H coordination to the metal. The larger barrier measured for the reductive elimination of CH{sub 4} may be a measure of the stability of the methyl/hydride.
"THERE IS NO HELP OUT THERE AND IF THERE IS, IT'S REALLY HARD TO FIND": A QUALITATIVE STUDY OF THE HEALTHCARE ACCESS AND CONCERNS OF LATINO "DREAMERS"

Author(s): Raymond-Flesch, Marissa; Siemons, Rachel; Pourat, Nadereh; Jacobs, Ken; Brindis, Claire
APART: Automated Preprocessing for NMR Assignments with Reduced Tedium

Motivation: High-throughput NMR structure determination is a goal that will require progress on many fronts, one of which is rapid resonance assignment. An important rate-limiting step in the resonance assignment process is accurate identification of resonance peaks in the NMR spectra. Peak-picking schemes range from incomplete (which lose essential assignment connectivities) to noisy (which obscure true connectivities with many false ones). We introduce an automated preassignment process that removes false peaks from noisy peak lists by requiring consensus between multiple NMR experiments and exploiting a priori information about NMR spectra. This process is designed to accept multiple input formats and generate multiple output formats, in an effort to be compatible with a variety of user preferences. Results: Automated preprocessing with APART rapidly identifies and removes false peaks from initial peak lists, reduces the burden of manual data entry, and documents and standardizes the peak filtering process. Successful preprocessing is demonstrated by the increased number of correct assignments obtained when data are submitted to an automated assignment program. Availability: APART is available from http://sir.lanl.gov/NMR/APART.htm Contact:[email protected]; [email protected] Supplementary information: Manual pages with installation instructions, procedures and screen shots can also be found at http://sir.lanl.gov/NMR/APART_Manual1.pdf
Stigma, race, and disease in 20th century America.

reducing the absolute level of bad enacted stigma (“presumably” because there are few data on how effectively law does this). Even if enacted stigma is reduced, however, people do not make decisions based on what happens, but on their perceptions of what happens. Hence the important questions include: Can law promote resistance by reducing the perceived risks of resistance and by changing self-conception? Can law facilitate activism by acting against discrimination and providing a script to guide social interactions? Can it mobilise collective action? Clearly, resistance to stigma needs to become more prominent in any thinking about how law can address the problem. Some insights may be forthcoming from studies of the Americans with Disabilities Act. Researchers are looking at how people with disabilities integrate a new protective law into their long-term coping strategies. The “disabled” label may make things worse in some ways—eg, reinforcing separate status or victimhood. Prohibition is also permission; the Act forbids discrimination against a person with a disability who can do a job with no more than minimal changes in procedures or job environment, but therefore authorises discrimination against those who need more. Stigma exemplifies the fact that law is more than just words on paper. “Laws on the books” are transformed in the course of implementation into social practices and attitudes that must be accounted for in any consideration of law’s relation, good and bad, to stigma. The stigma research agenda thus demands greater integration of health, science, and law.
Breadth of Neutralizing Antibodies Elicited by Stable, Homogeneous Clade A and Clade C HIV-1 gp140 Envelope Trimers in Guinea Pigs

The native envelope (Env) spike on the surface of human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) is trimeric, and thus trimeric Env vaccine immunogens are currently being explored in preclinical immunogenicity studies. Key challenges have included the production and purification of biochemically homogeneous and stable trimers and the evaluation of these immunogens utilizing standardized virus panels for neutralization assays. Here we report the binding and neutralizing antibody (NAb) responses elicited by clade A (92UG037.8) and clade C (CZA97.012) Env gp140 trimer immunogens in guinea pigs. These trimers have been selected and engineered for optimal biochemical stability and have defined antigenic properties. Purified gp140 trimers with Ribi adjuvant elicited potent, cross-clade NAb responses against tier 1 viruses as well as detectable but low-titer NAb responses against select tier 2 viruses from clades A, B, and C. In particular, the clade C trimer elicited NAbs that neutralized 27%, 20%, and 47% of tier 2 viruses from clades A, B, and C, respectively. Heterologous DNA prime, protein boost as well as DNA prime, recombinant adenovirus boost regimens expressing these antigens, however, did not result in an increased magnitude or breadth of NAb responses in this system. These data demonstrate the immunogenicity of stable, homogeneous clade A and clade C gp140 trimers and exemplify the utility of standardized tier 1 and tier 2 virus panels for assessing the NAb responses of candidate HIV-1 Env immunogens.
Liability, Regulation, and Endogenous Risk: The Incidence and Severity of Escaped Prescribed Fires in the United States

Abstract Prescribed fire is a useful but risky method for reducing the general wildfire risk and improving wildlife habitats, biodiversity, timber growth, and agricultural forage. In the past 15 years, laws to further promote the use of prescribed fire have been adopted in several states. This article examines the effect of liability laws and common regulations on the incidence and severity of escaped prescribed fires in the United States from 1970 to 2002. Regression results show that stringent statutory liability laws and regulations tend to reduce the number and severity of escaped prescribed fires on private land but not on federal land, where state liability laws do not directly apply. An economic motivation—based on the explicit recognition in these statutes of the perceived public benefits provided by prescribed fires—for the recent changes in statutory laws is provided.
Selective Inhibition of Microglia-Mediated Neuroinflammation Mitigates Radiation-Induced Cognitive Impairment

Cognitive impairment precipitated by irradiation of normal brain tissue is commonly associated with radiation therapy for treatment of brain cancer, and typically manifests more than 6 months after radiation exposure. The risks of cognitive impairment are of particular concern for an increasing number of long-term cancer survivors. There is presently no effective means of preventing or mitigating this debilitating condition. Neuroinflammation mediated by activated microglial cytokines has been implicated in the pathogenesis of radiation-induced cognitive impairment in animal models, including the disruption of neurogenesis and activity-induced gene expression in the hippocampus. These pathologies evolve rapidly and are associated with relatively subtle cognitive impairment at 2 months postirradiation. However, recent reports suggest that more profound cognitive impairment develops at later post-irradiation time points, perhaps reflecting a gradual loss of responsiveness within the hippocampus by the disru...
DXA-derived section modulus and bone mineral content predict long-bone torsional strength

Previous studies have used dual energy x-ray absorptiometry (DXA) scans to calculate the section modulus (Z) of adolescent and adult human femurs. The DXA-derived values of Z were assumed to be proportional to bone strength in bending and torsion. In this study we used dog (n 5), pig (n 4), and human (n 13) femurs covering a linear bone mineral content (BMCL) range of 0.91-6.1 g/cm. Using DXA scans, ex vivo torsional strength tests, and torsional finite element models, we assessed the validity of using the DXA-derived Z value as an indicator of strength. The correlation between BMCL and strength was r2 = 0.87 and the correlation between Z and strength was r2 = 0.86. Based on finite element results, the dog and pig section moduli were adjusted to be comparable to the human data based on cross-sectional shape and bone tissue shear strength differences. With these adjustments, the correlation between adjusted section modulus and measured strength did not improve (r2 = 0.87). These data indicate that DXA-deri...
A Case Report of Porphyria Variegata Management in the Emergency Department

Abstract Background: Porphyria variegata (VP) is one of the hepatic porphyrias that results from the deficiency of protoporphyrinogen oxidase, an enzyme in the heme synthesis pathway. The name porphyria variegata refers to its many presentations, which include various neuropsychiatric and cutaneous manifestations. Emergency department (ED) presentations due to VP are most commonly neuropathic abdominal pain. Case Report: We present the case of a 57-year-old woman presenting to an ED with abdominal pain consistent with prior VP attacks. In addition to analgesics and supportive care, infusion of intravenous dextrose resulted in improvement in her symptoms. Conclusion: Intravenous dextrose and heme administration remain the first-line treatment for abdominal pain attributable to known acute hepatic porphyria attacks. Recently, the mechanism of action of carbohydrates in treating porphyria has been elucidated. Current information on this illness and ED management are discussed.
Alternative mating strategies may favour the persistence of a genetically based colour polymorphism in a pentamorphic fish

Males of the pentamorphic fish, Poecilia parae, show a striking colour polymorphism that ranges from drab coloration resembling females to brilliant black and red stripes. We tested the hypothesis that the observed polymorphism may persist because each morph uses a unique but equally successful mating strategy. We quantified the mating behaviour, testes investment and sperm morphometrics of each morph. We found that the smallest morph (immaculata), which resembles drab females, used a ‘sneaker’ tactic (i.e. forgoing courtship and mostly ‘stealing’ copulations) as a mating strategy. Immaculata males also had larger testes, and produced larger ejaculates and sperm with longer flagella, which should provide advantages during sperm competition. The largest morph (parae) and the coloured blue, red and yellow morphs used a combination of courtship and sneaker tactics. However, they achieved greater copulation success as a result of courtships. The testes investment of parae and yellow morphs were similar but larger than those of the blue and red males. Our results suggest that male morphs of the pentamorphic Poecilia parae use unique mating strategies that exploit different aspects of pre- and postcopulatory sexual selection, which, in turn, may help maintain their relatively stable frequencies in the wild.
Computing the Trajectory of Free Jets

In recent years, design floods have increased beyond spillway capacity at numerous large dams. When additional spillway capacity is difficult or expensive to develop, designers may consider allowing the overtopping of a dam during extreme events. For concrete arch dams, this often raises issues of potential erosion and scour downstream from the dam, where the free jet initiating at the dam crest impacts the abutments and the downstream river channel. A recent review has shown that a commonly cited equation for predicting the trajectory of free jets is flawed, producing jet trajectories that are much too flat in this application. This could lead analysts to underestimate the amount of scour that could occur near a dam foundation, or conversely to overestimate the extent of scour protection required. This technical note presents the correct and incorrect jet trajectory equations, quantifies the errors associated with the flawed equation, and summarizes practical information needed to model the trajectory of free jets overtopping dam crests.
Perinatal hypothermia and maternal temperature declines during labor in pigtailed macaques (Macaca nemestrina).

Body temperature, respiration, and heart rate were recorded for 90 perinatal pigtailed macaques (Macaca nemestrina) within the first hour after birth. Hypothermia and corresponding depressed respiration and heart rate were evident in all animals. Regression analysis revealed that time-since-birth accounted for most of the observed variance in all measures. Temperatures of three pregnant females were monitored during labor and delivery. Declines in maternal temperature during labor suggested that depressed maternal temperature influenced the observed hypothermia in newborns. Increases in ambient (cage) temperatures during labor indicated that the females were emitting heat while declining in temperature.
Synthesis and characterization of Co(III) amidoamine complexes: influence of substituents of the ligand on catalytic cyclic carbonate synthesis from epoxide and carbon dioxide

A series of amidoamine ligands (1) and their cobalt(III) complexes (2) were synthesized and characterized by various spectroscopic techniques including (1)H-NMR and X-ray crystallographic techniques. X-ray crystallography shows that one of the complexes, 2a, forms a chiral coordination polymer due to bridge formation with Li(+) associated with the complex, although the ligand is achiral. Complex 2 was employed for catalytic synthesis of cyclic carbonates from epoxides and carbon dioxide (CO2) in a solvent free condition. A strong influence of the substituents on the ligand 1 was revealed by the varied activity of complex 2. The presence of electron withdrawing groups such as chloro (2b) and nitro (2c) increases the Lewis acidity of the catalyst, which, in turn, enhances the catalytic activity of 2. An electron withdrawing group containing complexes (2b and 2c) showed exceptionally high catalytic activity with a turnover frequency (TOF) of 662 and 602 h(-1) respectively at 130 °C and 300 psig CO2 pressure. On the other hand, our studies indicate that a catalyst with an electron releasing group (2d) showed relatively lower activity with a TOF of 488 h(-1) under similar reaction conditions. Our results show that cobalt(iii) complexes follow the reactivity order of 2d < 2a < 2c < 2b.
Dynamic Lateral Force Measurements during Chemical Mechanical Polishing of Silica

Lateral frictional force measurement provides an understanding of pad‐surface interactions in chemical mechanical polishing. The lateral forces have been found to be significantly dependent on the surface roughness of the silica, thus showing that in situ dynamic changes in the surface roughness could be observed. Studies of the effect of and ionic strength on polishing characteristics of silica are presented. The studies were conducted with particle‐free slurries, so as to obtain a better signal‐to‐noise ratio. The rate of material removal as a function of and ionic strength was determined and correlated with the friction force measurements. ©1999 The Electrochemical Society
A region-based approach for cooperative multi-target tracking in a structured environment

This paper addresses the problem of tracking multiple targets using a network of communicating robots and stationary sensors. We introduce a region-based approach which controls robot deployment at two levels. A coarse deployment controller distributes robots across regions using a topological map and density estimates, and a target-following controller attempts to maximize the number of tracked targets within a region. A behavior-based system is presented implementing the region-based approach. Intensive simulations were performed to investigate the correlation between our approach and the degree of occlusion in the environment. The region-based approach shows better performance than a 'naive' local-following strategy when the environment has significant occlusion. We performed real-robot experiments to validate the system. These experiments open up a new line of research, which suggests that an optimal ratio of robots to stationary sensors may exist for a given environment with certain occlusion characteristics.
Channel Capacity Between Antenna Arrays— Part II: Amplifier Noise Dominates

In this paper (Part II of two), we continue examining the use of space-time coding techniques to achieve very-high spectral efficiencies in highly scattering environments, using multiple transmit and receive antennas. The goal is to increase as much as possible the number of antenna elements, which is particularly difficult at the remote station, which usually has a more limited space allotted to the antenna array than at the base station. Under the assumption that sky noise was the dominant noise source, Part I addressed the channel-capacity effects of mutual impedance between antenna elements in the remote array, and the correlation between the signal and noise fields received by these elements. In Part II, we consider the same effects under the assumption that amplifier noise is the dominant noise source. The question of how closely the receiving array elements can be spaced depends on how precisely the channel can be estimated. This is related to the high-precision requirement experienced with supergain antenna arrays. The supergain connection is made explicit by showing that the optimum channel capacity for the case of a single transmitting element is achieved by using the supergain weights for the receiving array. To indicate the effect of noisy channel estimation, the loss in receiver antenna gain due to noise in weight estimates is computed with a simple simulation model of scattered propagation for the single-transmitting-antenna element case
Increased Lactate Dehydrogenase Activity in Buccal Epithelium of Zinc-Deficient Rats

Previous studies by us and by others have shown that the body weight of rats fed a zinc-deficient diet is significantly lower than that of pair fed controls, but marked hyperplasia and parakeratosis are seen intra-orally in the buccal epithelium. No histologie changes occur in palatal epithelium. This investigation was undertaken to assay lactate dehydro- genase (LDH) activity in the buccal and palatal epithelium in rats fed a zinc-deficient diet. Weanling male Simonsen rats were fed a diet contain ing 1.2 ppm zinc for a 30-day period. Pair fed controls were fed the same diet containing 40 ppm zinc. LDH levels were determined by ultramicro- chemical assay. In the buccal epithelium, a more than twofold increase over that of controls was observed in zinc-deficient rats, but there was no change in the palatal epithelium. These results support the conclusion of others of an organ-specific sensitivity of LDH to zinc deprivation. No in creases in LDH activity in zinc-deficient rats, as observed in the hyper- plastic buccal epithelium in this study, have previously been reported. J. Nutr. 107: 724-729,1977.
Gel: A Generic Extensible Language

Both XML and Lisp have demonstrated the utility of generic syntax for expressing tree-structured data. But generic languages do not provide the syntactic richness of custom languages. Generic Extensible Language (Gel) is a rich generic syntax that embodies many of the common syntactic conventions for operators, grouping and lists in widely-used languages. Prefix/infix operators are disambiguated by white-space, so that documents which violate common white-space conventions will not necessarily parse correctly with Gel. With some character replacements and adjusting for mismatch in operator precedence, Gel can extract meaningful structure from typical files in many languages, including Java, Cascading Style Sheets, Smalltalk, and ANTLR grammars. This evaluation shows the expressive power of Gel, not that Gel can be used as a parser for existing languages. Gel is intended to serve as a generic language for creating composable domain-specific languages.
Now You Be the Judge

In a previous article (1) I presented reasons why you should say yes when asked to serve as a peer reviewer. I hope I was able to convince you of the benefits of serving as a peer reviewer and you have accepted an invitation to evaluate a manuscript. Now what do you do? Since you might be blaming me for getting you into this situation, it is the least I can do to provide you with resources and advice on how to review the submitted manuscript. So, in this article I will focus on questions to be answered and information to be gathered as you read the manuscript. In the next article in this series, I will discuss how to write the actual review. I want to emphasize that although I present here what I believe is a good approach, I encourage you to look at the advice of others (2–9), not only because these articles will complement the information that I present but also because you will find important commonalities on how to perform a fair and thorough review of a manuscript. The first step in the process is to learn what the journal wants. Many journals have general or specific guidelines for reviewers that inform peer reviewers of the criteria the journal uses in making decisions regarding publication, factors to be considered when reviewing a manuscript for that journal, the journal's conflict-of-interest policy, and even questions the reviewer should answer when writing the final review. These guidelines are often published as online documents available on the journal's website, so even if you have not received specific instructions from the journal, take a few minutes to educate yourself about the requesting journal's policies and how they want the review to be written. Remember, as a peer reviewer …
Determination of the collective modes from the quantum-mechanical time-correlation functions

Theoretical characterization of vibrational spectra for large molecular systems often comes from the normal modes analysis derived from the quadratic approximation of the potential energy surface near its minimum. The normal modes of motion provide accurate representation of low-energy collective motion within a system near equilibrium, but they may be inadequate at high energies or for strongly anharmonic systems. In this article, the collective modes of motion are examined from the time-dependent perspective. It is shown that the imaginary part of the quantum-mechanical position–position correlation functions contains all the information about the collective modes of motion without the harmonic approximation on the potential energy of a system.
Status of Alzheimer Disease Research

Since its inception in 1974, the National Institute on Aging (NIA), the Federal agency with the prime responsibility for conducting and supporting research on the biomedical and behavioral processes of aging and the diseases of aging, has targeted Alzheimer’s disease (AD) as one of the most important research priorities and challenges. Within the Public Health Service (PHS) of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), the NIA shares an interest and responsibility for this research with its sister institutes, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases; and the National Institute of Mental Health, ADAMHA.
Multiple Projective Dictionary Learning to Detect Plastic Surgery for Face Verification

Researchers have shown that the changes in face features due to plastic surgery can be modeled as a covariate that reduces the ability of algorithms to recognize a person’s identity. Traditional dictionary learning methods learn a sparse representation using $l_{0}$ and $l_{1}$ norms that are computationally expensive. This paper presents a multiple projective dictionary learning (MPDL) framework that does not require the computation of $l_{0}$ and $l_{1}$ norms. We propose a novel solution to discriminate plastic surgery faces from regular faces by learning representations of local and global plastic surgery faces using multiple projective dictionaries and by using compact binary face descriptors. Experimental results on the plastic surgery database show that the proposed MPDL framework is able to detect plastic surgery faces with a high accuracy of 97.96%. To verify the identity of a person, the detected plastic surgery faces are divided into local regions of interest (ROIs) that are likely to be altered by a particular plastic surgery. The cosine distance between the compact binary face descriptors is computed for each ROI in the detected plastic surgery faces. In addition, we compute the human visual system feature similarity score based on phase congruency and gradient magnitude between the same ROIs. The cosine distance scores and the feature similarity scores are combined to learn a support vector machine model to verify if the faces belong to the same person. We integrate our proposed MPDL framework for face verification with two commercial systems to demonstrate an improvement in verification performance on a combined database of plastic surgery and regular face images.
Enteropathogenic E. coli attenuates secretagogue-induced net intestinal ion transport but not Cl- secretion.

Enteric bacterial pathogens often increase intestinal Cl− secretion. Enteropathogenic Escherichia coli(EPEC) does not stimulate active ion secretion. In fact, EPEC infection decreases net ion trans...
Herd Health Interventions and Farmers' Participation near Ho, Ghana

During Ohio State ATI’s ninth annual Ghana study abroad in June 2012, students purchased vaccinations and administered PPR vaccines to 1250 goats and sheep and Newcastle vaccines to 150 chickens in six Ghanaian villages. They also provided treatment for mange, other parasites, and other diseases they encountered. Working with a local community development worker, the students discussed the benefits of treatments with villagers and advised them that preventive measures lead to better overall herd health, higher meat quality, and healthier consumers. Preliminary questionnaires show that farmers value the treatments and state that they agree they are worth the outlay of precious cash. This research project will document whether villagers will decide that the benefit of veterinary interventions outweighs their cost. In June 2012, a grant paid the cost of vaccinations in six villages. In May 2013, students will meet with farmers to assess and discuss the health of their herds and offer vaccines and treatments at half their cost. In future years, farmers will assume the full cost. We expect that the direct experience of the health benefits of interventions and ensuing improved incomes will lead to increased willingness and ability to purchase interventions.
Evaluation for Partial Event Coreference

This paper proposes an evaluation scheme to measure the performance of a system that detects hierarchical event structure for event coreference resolution. We show that each system output is represented as a forest of unordered trees, and introduce the notion of conceptual event hierarchy to simplify the evaluation process. We enumerate the desiderata for a similarity metric to measure the system performance. We examine three metrics along with the desiderata, and show that metrics extended from MUC and BLANC are more adequate than a metric based on Simple Tree Matching.
A Survey of State Conceal and Carry Statutes: Can Small Changes Help Reduce the Controversy?

The purpose of this paper is to survey state conceal-and-carry statutes and examine the broad trend within the states toward the liberalization of these laws through the enactment of “shall-issue” legislation. It begins with a discussion of the context of the CCW debate and outlines the historical foundations of CCW laws. It then provides an overview of the typical elements of a conceal-and-carry statute, compares existing statutes, and discusses what “well crafted” conceal-and-carry legislation should look like. Finally, the author argues that the vast majority of state laws currently enacted fail to meet the interests of those on both sides of the debate, and have only heightened controversy, instead of settling it. The author argues that a revision of laws within the states, drafted to include reasonable compromises that address the policy issues raised by those on both sides of the debate, would help settle the controversy, resulting in legislation that better meets the needs of the broader public.
125-μm-Cladding coupled multi-core fiber with ultra-low loss of 0.158 dB/km and record-low spatial mode dispersion of 6.1 ps/km

A 125-μm-cladding coupled four-core fiber realized 0.158-dB/km attenuation at 1550 nm and 6.1-ps/km12 spatial mode dispersion over C-band, both of which are the lowest ever reported among optical fibers for the space-division multiplexed transmission.
Molecular-Level Consequences of Biomass Pretreatment by Dilute Sulfuric Acid at Various Temperatures

Ex situ room-temperature 13C nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) measurements are reported on powdered poplar wood that has been pretreated with dilute sulfuric acid (concentrations up to 1 wt %) for times ranging up to 20 min and at temperatures of 120, 130, 140, and 150 °C. There are significant, albeit not dramatic, changes in the measured NMR spectra of the biomass as result of dilute sulfuric acid treatment. Values of T1 for 13C and 1H, as well as TCH and T1ρH, were measured for lignin peaks and cellulose peaks in the 13C NMR spectra, as potential indicators of the degree of atomic-level motion. For lignin components, one finds a trend to larger TCH values as the treatment time or H2SO4 concentration is increased for treatment temperatures of 120 and 130 °C; however, for treatment temperatures of 140 and 150 °C, TCH apparently decreases as the treatment time is increased. This higher temperature TCH behavior implies that the lignin may actually become more rigid at later stages of treatment at temperatu...
The Role of Oxygen during Thermal Reduction of Graphene Oxide Studied by Infrared Absorption Spectroscopy

Understanding the thermal reduction of graphene oxide (GO) is important for graphene exfoliation, and chemical and morphological modifications. In this process, the role of trapped water and the evolution of oxygen during annealing are still not well-understood. To unravel the complex mechanisms leading to the removal of oxygen in reduced GO, we have performed in situ transmission infrared absorption spectroscopy measurements of GO films upon thermal annealing at 60–850 °C in vacuum (10–3–10–4 Torr). Using cluster-based first-principles calculations, epoxides, ethers (pyrans and furans), hydroxyls, carboxyls, lactols, and various types of ketones and their possible derivatives have been identified from the spectroscopic data. Furthermore, the interactions between randomly arranged nearby oxygen species are found to affect the spectral response (red and blue shifts) and the overall chemistry during annealing. For instance, the initial composition of oxygen species (relative amounts and types of species, su...
Revisiting Whether Recent Surface Temperature Trends Agree with the CMIP5 Ensemble

AbstractIn an earlier study, a weaker trend in global mean temperature over the past 15 years relative to the preceding decades was characterized as significantly lower than those contained within the phase 5 of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP5) ensemble. In this study, divergence between model simulations and observations is estimated using a fixed-intercept linear trend with a slope estimator that has one-third the noise variance compared to simple linear regression. Following the approach of the earlier study, where intermodel spread is used to assess the distribution of trends, but using the fixed-intercept trend metric demonstrates that recently observed trends in global mean temperature are consistent () with the CMIP5 ensemble for all 15-yr intervals of observation–model divergence since 1970. Significant clustering of global trends according to modeling center indicates that the spread in CMIP5 trends is better characterized using ensemble members drawn across models as opposed to ...
Effects of Monensin and Tylosin Concentrations in Limit-fed, High-energy Growing Diets for Beef Cattle1

Abstract Two experiments were conducted to evaluate the effects of monensin and tylosin concentrations in limit-fed, high-energy growing diets for beef cattle. In Experiment 1, crossbred beef steers (n = 164; mean BW = 261 kg) were offered growing diets at 1.8% of BW (DM basis) to provide 33, 44, or 55 mg of monensin/kg (M33, M44, and M55, respectively) and then finished on a common diet offered ad libitum. Monensin concentration did not affect rate of DMI (P>0.71) or performance (P>0.74) during the growing period. Increasing monensin concentration during the growing period tended to increase DMI (quadratic, P
Cell Aware and stuck-open tests

Cell Aware testing (CAT) has received much publicity in recent years, with several reported success stories in screening defects missed by traditional stuck-at and transition delay fault (TDF) testing. For example, at ITC 2012, Hapke et al. reported 885 DPPM test escapes in a 32 nm notebook processor part despite industrial strength stuck-at and 5-detect TDF testing. Significant additional fallout from cell aware tests has also been reported for automotive parts already screened to stringent “zero-defect” standards. Importantly, the vast majority of these test escapes were observed to cause failure in actual system application, pointing to a serious field reliability issue. This raises some important questions: What are these new defects that are being detected by cell aware tests? Why are they missed by traditional stuck-at and TDF testing? Why has this problem only recently been discovered? Can traditional cell unaware test generation be enhanced to detect these faults? This tutorial presents a detailed study of the cell aware test generation methodology to answer these questions. The aim is not only to analyze and understand the defects in modern standard cell libraries missed by traditional tests that are uniquely covered by this new test approach, but also which of these test escapes necessarily need cell layout information for detection, and which can be systematically targeted in a layout unaware manner by enhanced stuck-at and two-pattern test generation. The large majority of the additional fallout from cell aware tests appears to be from the delay patterns that primarily target open defects. However, the structural limitations of scan DFT can limit the detectability of open defects even with CAT. Commonly employed LOC delay tests are not sufficient to screen all open defects capable of generating erroneous circuit outputs. We show that hazard activated open defects are the likely causes of at least some of the failures being observed in system level tests (SLT) even after parts are screened with CAT.
Nationalism and Political Identity

During the early fifteenth century, the French people felt no strong national identity. Feudal lords dominated several regions. Allied with the feudal fiefdom Burgundy, the English controlled most areas of present-day France. Roman Catholic Church authority extended over a more universal community. The French King Charles, who remained subordinate to both the feudal lords and the Church, governed only a few provinces within the central and southern areas of France. In 1429 if English troops had captured the city of Orleans, they would have controlled the whole French territory. Faced with this disintegrating political situation, Charles VII proved unable to mobilize the French forces against England.
Association of Left Atrial Function Index With Late Atrial Fibrillation Recurrence after Catheter Ablation

Introduction Although catheter ablation (CA) for atrial fibrillation (AF) is commonly used to improve symptoms, AF recurrence is common and new tools are needed to better inform patient selection for CA. Left Atrial Function Index (LAFI), an echocardiographic measure of atrial mechanical function, has shown promise as a non-invasive predictor of AF. We hypothesized that LAFI would relate to AF recurrence after CA. Methods and Results All AF patients undergoing index CA were enrolled in a prospective institutional AF Treatment Registry between 2011 and 2014. LAFI was measured post-hoc from pre-ablation clinical echocardiographic images in 168 participants. Participants were mostly male (33% female), middle-aged (60±10 years), obese and had paroxysmal AF (64%). Mean LAFI was 25.9±17.6. Over 12 months of follow-up, 78 participants (46%) experienced a late AF recurrence. In logistic regression analyses adjusting for factors known to be associated with AF, lower LAFI remained associated with AF recurrence after CA [OR 0.04 (0.01 – 0.67), p = 0.02]. LAFI discriminated AF recurrence after CA slightly better than CHADS2 (C-statistic 0.60 LAFI, 0.57 CHADS2). For participants with persistent AF, LAFI performed significantly better than CHADS2 score (C statistic = 0.79 LAFI, 0.56 CHADS2, p = 0.02). Conclusion LAFI, an echocardiographic measure of atrial function, is associated with AF recurrence after CA and has improved ability to discriminate AF recurrence as compared to the CHADS-2 score, especially among persistent AF patients. Since LAFI can be calculated using standard two-dimensional echocardiographic images, it may be a helpful tool for predicting AF recurrence. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved
Influence of insurance status and income in anaplastic astrocytoma: an analysis of 4325 patients.

To determine the impact of insurance status and income for anaplastic astrocytoma (AA). Data were extracted from the National Cancer Data Base. Chi square test, Kaplan–Meier method, and Cox regression models were employed in SPSS 22.0 (Armonk, NY: IBM Corp.) for data analyses. 4325 patients with AA diagnosed from 2004 to 2013 were identified. 2781 (64.3%) had private insurance, 925 (21.4%) Medicare, 396 (9.2%) Medicaid, and 223 (5.2%) were uninsured. Those uninsured were more likely to be Black or Hispanic versus White or Asian (p < 0.001), have lower median income (p < 0.001), less educated (p < 0.001), and not receive adjuvant chemoradiation (p < 0.001). 1651 (38.2%) had income ≥$63,000, 1204 (27.8%) $48,000–$62,999, 889 (20.5%) $38,000–$47,999, and 581 (13.4%) had income <$38,000. Those with lower income were more likely to be Black or Hispanic versus White or Asian (p < 0.001), uninsured (p < 0.001), reside in a rural area (p < 0.001), less educated (p < 0.001), and not receive adjuvant chemoradiation (p < 0.001). Those with private insurance had significantly higher overall survival (OS) than those uninsured, on Medicaid, or on Medicare (p < 0.001). Those with income ≥$63,000 had significantly higher OS than those with lower income (p < 0.001). On multivariate analysis, age, insurance status, income, and adjuvant therapy were independent prognostic factors for OS. Being uninsured and having income <$38,000 were independent prognostic factors for worse OS in AA. Further investigations are warranted to help determine ways to ensure adequate medical care for those who may be socially disadvantaged so that outcome can be maximized for all patients regardless of socioeconomic status.