cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Stress generation during lithiation of high-capacity electrode particles in lithium ion batteries

Abstract A model is developed to study the stress generation in a spherical particle subjected to lithium insertion. The model accounts for both the plastic deformation and the coexistence of lithium-poor and lithium-rich phases with a sharp and curved phase boundary. Such two-phase and inelastic deformation characteristics often arise during lithiation of crystalline particles with high capacity. A flexible sigmoid function is used to create the lithium profile with a step-like change in lithium concentration, mimicking a sharp phase boundary that separates a pristine core and a lithiated shell in the particle. The mechanics results, obtained by an analytic formulation and finite difference calculations, show the development of tensile hoop stress in the surface layer of the lithiated shell. This hoop tension provides the driving force of surface cracking, as observed by in situ transmission electron microscopy. The two-phase lithiation model is further compared with the single-phase one, which assumes a gradual and smooth variation in radial lithium distributions, and thus predicts only hoop compression in the surface layer of the particle. Furthermore, the effect of dilatational vs. unidirectional lithiation strains in the two-phase model is studied, thereby underscoring the critical role of anisotropy of lithiation strain in controlling stress generation in high-capacity electrodes for lithium ion batteries.
Compiler-directed content-aware prefetching for dynamic data structures

This paper describes Compiler-Directed Content-Aware Prefetching (CDCAP), an integrated compiler and hardware approach for prefetching dynamic data structures. The approach utilizes compiler-inserted prefetch instructions to convey information about a dynamic data structure to a prefetching engine. The technique eliminates the need to transform the data structure without the use of excessive prefetches and does not require prior knowledge of data traversals. The approach also eliminates the need for large hardware structures and reduces unnecessary prefetches. For pointer intensive programs, the CDCAP approach reduces memory stall time by up to 40% and out performs previously proposed prefetching techniques.
Building Inclusive Community: A Challenge for Occupational Therapy

Occupational therapy was founded on values of choice, relevance, and active participation in meaningful occupations. To assure choice in daily living, learning, work, and play for persons with disabilities or significant health issues, occupational therapy practitioners are challenged to gain increased understanding of the unique culture and community of each person and family with whom they work; create opportunities for these persons to develop their capabilities in community settings of their choice; promote more interactive models of practice in which the practitioner affects the arrangements between the person and society; work with communities to welcome the gifts of diversity; and develop skill in analyzing environments and facilitating environmental interaction. The environment category of the spatiotemporal adaptation theory is expanded and a communication model for collaboration in building individual community is proposed as means for addressing the challenges.
A low conductance chloride channel in the basolateral membranes of the non-pigmented ciliary epithelium of the rabbit eye

PURPOSE. Chloride efflux plays an important role in aqueous p < humor production. Chloride currents have been described in bovine non-pigmented ciliary epithelium (NPE), in transformed cultured human NPE, and in volume-activated chloride channels described in the latter. It is the basolateral membranes of the NPE of ocular ciliary processes that comprise the exit pathway for the process of aqueous secretion performed by the double syncytial layer of ciliary epithelium, however. Therefore, we studied both cell-attached, and, excised, inside-out patches from basolateral membranes of the NPE. METHODS. Cell-attached and cell-free excised patches were formed from the basolateral membranes of NPE and single channel currents recorded with a Dagan 3900A patCH clamp amplifier. RESULTS. A low conductance channel of 14 pS was observed and recorded in 30% of cell attached patches and in 35% of excised inside out patches under symmetrical conditions (160 mM chloride). This channel displayed a nearly linear current-...
Higher-Order Tooth Flank Form Error Correction for Face-Milled Spiral Bevel and Hypoid Gears

The increasing demand for low noise and high strength leads to higher quality requirements in manufacturing spiral bevel and hypoid gears. Due to heat treatment distortions, machine tolerances, variation of cutting forces, and other unpredictable factors, the real tooth flank form geometry may deviate from the theoretical or master target geometry. This will cause unfavorable displacement of tooth contact and increased transmission errors, resulting in noisy operation and premature failure due to edge contact and highly concentrated stresses. In the hypoid gear development process, a corrective machine setting technique is usually employed to modify the machine settings, compensating for the tooth flank form errors. Existing published works described the corrective machine setting technique based on the use of mechanical hypoid gear generators, and the second-order approximation of error surfaces. Today, computer numerically controlled (CNC) hypoid gear generators have been widely employed by the gear industry. The universal motion concept has been implemented on most CNC hypoid generators, providing additional freedoms for the corrections of tooth flank form errors. Higher-order components of the error surfaces may be corrected by using the higher-order universal motions. This paper describes a new method of tooth flank form error correction utilizing the universal motions for spiral bevel and hypoid gears produced by the face-milling process. The sensitivity of the changes of tooth flank form geometry to the changes of universal motion coefficients is investigated. The corrective universal motion coefficients are determined through an optimization process with the target of minimization of the tooth flank form errors. A numerical example of a face-mill completing process is presented. The developed new approach has been implemented with computer software. The new approach can also be applied to the face-hobbing process.
Genetic analysis of germinating ability and seedling vigor under cold stress in US weedy rice

Low temperature stress is a major constraint for rice production in temperate and high altitude areas of the world. Delayed germination coupled with reduced seedling vigor hinders crop establishment and crop growth resulting in reduced rice productivity. Mapping of the chromosomal regions controlling cold tolerance will accelerate marker-assisted breeding of cold tolerant rice varieties. A recombinant inbred line mapping population involving a US weedy rice accession ‘PSRR-1’ and a rice cultivar ‘Bengal’ was evaluated for germinating ability and seedling vigor under low temperature (13 °C) and optimum temperature (28 °C). ‘PSRR-1’ performed better than ‘Bengal’ under cold stress. Forty-nine QTL distributed over ten chromosomes were identified for 11 traits. The number of QTL varied from one to nine with phenotypic variability of each QTL ranging from 3.5 to 12.7 %. For 18 QTL, ‘Bengal’ alleles were desirable, whereas ‘PSRR-1’ allele improved germination and seedling vigor under cold stress in 31 QTL. Three major QTL were observed for coleoptile length and seedling shoot length. The QTL were clustered in six chromosomal regions. The congruency of QTL cluster on chromosome 11 with earlier studies suggests a potential target for cloning cold tolerance genes at germination and seedling stages. This study demonstrated that weedy rice can be a valuable donor for desirable alleles to improve germination and seedling stage cold tolerance in rice.
Mortality of Red Flour Beetle Adults Fed Insecticide-Treated Indian Meal Moths ,

The red flour beetle, Tribolium castaneum (Herbst), and the Indian meal moth, Plodia interpunctella (Hubner). are important pests of stored products (USDA 1965). Recent studies at the Savannah, Ga., Stored-Product Insects Research and Development Laboratory showed that the red flour beetle feeds on dead or moribund adults of the Indian meal moth (G. L. LeCato and B. R. Flaherty, unpublished). They have shown also that such feeding increased progeny production and rate of development and thus led to larger populations of the red flour beetle.
Effects of metoprolol on left ventricular function in rats with myocardial infarction

To study the effect of beta-receptor-blocking agents in an animal model of left ventricular (LV) dysfunction, we measured LV performance in vivo and in vitro in 69 rats with or without metoprolol (M) treatment 3 wk after left coronary arterial ligation or sham operation. Rats were divided into six groups including control (C) and M noninfarct (C-N and M-N), C and M small infarct (C-S and M-S), and C and M large infarct (C-L and M-L). LV function was measured as slope of change in systolic vs. diastolic pressure (pressure-function curve) during pressor response after administration of a bolus of phenylephrine (5 micrograms/kg i.v.). Reduction of LV function was noted in C-L compared with C-N and C-S (slope of pressure-function curve 3.3 +/- 0.3 vs. 11.0 +/- 1.9 and 11.9 +/- 2.3, respectively) and in M-L compared with M-N and M-S rats (slope of 5.5 +/- 1.4 vs. 11.3 +/- 2.0 and 12.1 +/- 1.4, respectively). There was no significant difference between C and M rats, although there was a trend toward partial correction of the pressure-function curves in M-L compared with C-L rats. In muscle bath preparations the uninfarcted LV posterior papillary muscle from shams and rats with small infarcts showed a dose-related increase in peak rate of tension development with isoproterenol stimulation, but this response was lacking in both C-L and M-L. Tissue assays showed no change in beta-receptor number.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
Status-Congruence in Request E-Mail Discourse of Professional Secretaries in a University of Taiwan

This study investigated the status-congruence of request e-mails composed by professional secretaries serving in a private university departmental office in Taiwan. It first explored the degree of directness and internal and external modification used in their discourse, and then examined the politeness standards of ‘cultural insiders.’ The results showed that senior professionals tended to use more direct strategies and more internal and external modification devices, while a novice professional used more conventionally indirect strategies and fewer modifiers. The difference in choice of request strategies revealed that senior professionals take for granted the right to make requests for information or action on behalf of the administrative body, thus giving faculty the impression of having no choice in matters. Relative to the interactional function of request e-mails, conventionally indirect expressions which showed regard for them as persons were favored by the faculty. The study also made evident the novice professional’s lack of assurance in her identity as a practicing professional in the asymmetrical academic context.
Analysis of health knowledge level and its influencing factors among permanent residents in Beijing

Objective To understand the health knowledge level and its influencing factors among permanent residents in Beijing. Methods With multi-stage stratified cluster sampling method,a questionnaire survey was conducted about health knowledge among 16 249 permanent residents aged 18- 79 years old. Results The overall awareness rate of health knowledge among permanent residents in Beijing was 73. 7%,the correct answer rate of"safety and first aid","healthy lifestyle","infectious diseases prevention","basic medical and health care","chronic diseases prevention"were 79. 3%, 74. 8%,74. 1%,73. 0% and 67. 6%,respectively. Multivariate analysis showed urban and female were the protective factors of health knowledge,OR values were 1. 168,1. 227,respectively. Compared to family average monthly income with 1000 yuan,the OR values for 1000- 1999 yuan,2000- 2999 yuan were 1. 290,1. 247,respectively. Compared to population aged 18- 24 years,the OR values for other age group were 1. 142- 1. 718. The correct answer rate of health knowledge was increased along with the increasing of educational background,the OR values were 1. 685- 6. 762 compared to primary school education. The educational background was the main impact factor of health knowledge score. Conclusion Various popularization activities focus on chronic disease prevention knowledge should be implemented and targeted on rural areas,low educational and male.
Surgical treatment of thrombosed Björk-Shiley aortic valve prosthesis.

Massive thrombosis of a Bjork-Shiley aortic valve prosthesis occurs with significant frequency when adequate anticoagulation has not been attained. The converse is also true: This complication is extremely rare in patients receiving anticoagulant therapy. Therefore, we recommend anticoagulants for all patients with Bjork-Shiley aortic valve prostheses. Once a diagnosis of a thrombosed prothesis is made, however, immediate operation is indicated. Declotting of the valve without removal of the disc is adequate treatment. After thrombectomy, it is extremely important to evaluate the entire prosthesis critically, with particular attention to the area of the hinge and the occluder. If any wear is observed, the entire prosthesis should be replaced. Excellent long-term results can be expected if the patient is maintained on adequate anticoagulation postoperatively.
Three new sex-linked mutants in Culex tarsalis and their relationships in linkage group I

Three sex-linked mutants are described for the mosquito, Culex tarsalis, Charcoal, char, and ebony, eb, affect body-scale pigment in the adult; wide-wing, ww, gives abnormal wing size and affects the palps in adults. A preliminary map of linkage group I is offered from recombination data involving the sex-linked mutants.
Anger, Sadness, and Fear in Response to Breaking Crime and Accident News Stories: How Emotions Influence Support for Alcohol-Control Public Policies via Concern About Risks

Prior research shows that discrete emotions, notably anger and fear, can explain effects of news articles on health and alcohol-control policy support. This study advances prior work by coding expressed emotional responses to messages (as opposed to directly manipulated emotions or forced responses), incorporating and controlling for central thoughts, including sadness (a particularly relevant response to tragic stories), and examining concern's mediating role between emotion and policy support. An experiment with a national online adult panel had participants read one of 60 violent crime or accident news stories, each manipulated to mention or withhold alcohol's causal contribution. Multi-group structural equation models suggest that stories not mentioning alcohol had a direct effect on policy support via fear and central thoughts, unmediated by concern. When alcohol was mentioned, sadness and anger affects alcohol-control support through concern. Findings help confirm that emotional responses are key in determining news story effects on public support of health policies.
Thermal Modeling of Supercapacitors

The previous chapter reviewed the experimentally observed variations in electrochemical performance with temperature. The performance of supercapacitors depends strongly on operating temperature; therefore it is necessary to model temperature variations inside a supercapacitor. The major advantage of theoretical models is that they provide an opportunity to avoid time-consuming and expensive experiments by predicting performance in a wide range of applications and then building guidelines based on those predictions (Ike et al. in J Power Sources 273:264–277, 2015 [13]). Models can be used to study the thermal behavior of supercapacitors and thereby to develop new thermal management strategies. In this chapter, fundamentals of thermal modeling and various modeling approaches for temperature evolution are discussed from a theoretical standpoint.
The Ambiguities of Commitment

More than that of most decades, British literature of the 1930s is insistently topical, both in reference to a world outside literature and in its sense of immediacy. In part an inheritance from an earlier literary modernism that wanted to deny, question or reconstruct its connections with the past, and in part a response to an external world that seemed to be breaking down, literature for most audiences conveyed an obligation to deal with the immediate and contemporary. The writing had a tone of urgency—not always an implicit message that something need be done now, but at least a recognition that the conditions of experience had drastically changed. Historical complacency was impossible for any thoughtful writer, as were assurances that some permanent perspective could tie past, present and future together. The Jarrow march of the unemployed, the searing divisions of class and region, the attraction of intellectuals to communism and fascism, wars in China, Africa and Spain, and the apparent sterile stasis of the British government were all reflected in literature and journalism of panic, fracture and despair, in the decade’s language of social and international concern.
Gaze Prediction for Recommender Systems

As users browse a recommender system, they systematically consider or skip over much of the displayed content. It seems obvious that these eye gaze patterns contain a rich signal concerning these users' preferences. However, because eye tracking data is not available to most recommender systems, these signals are not widely incorporated into personalization models. In this work, we show that it is possible to predict gaze by combining easily-collected user browsing data with eye tracking data from a small number of users in a grid-based recommender interface. Our technique is able to leverage a small amount of eye tracking data to infer gaze patterns for other users. We evaluate our prediction models in MovieLens -- an online movie recommender system. Our results show that incorporating eye tracking data from a small number of users significantly boosts accuracy as compared with only using browsing data, even though the eye-tracked users are different from the testing users (e.g. AUC=0.823 vs. 0.693 in predicting whether a user will fixate on an item). We also demonstrate that Hidden Markov Models (HMMs) can be applied in this setting; they are better than linear models in predicting fixation probability and capturing the interface regularity through Bayesian inference (AUC=0.823 vs. 0.757).
AED-Associated Major Congenital Abnormalities

The risk of major congenital abnormalities associated with maternal antiepileptic drug (AED) therapy during the first trimester of pregnancy was determined in 1,411 children born between 1972 and 1992 in four provinces in the Netherlands, and compared to 2000 nonepileptic matched controls.
No safe passage: ‘the mapping journey project’

ABSTRACTThis essay examines ‘The Mapping Journey Project’ (2008–2011), an installation artwork by Bouchra Khalili. It consists of eight large video screens and headsets. In each video, a migrant draws a map of her/his journey to and in Europe and narrates her/his route (subtitled in English). In collaboration with Khalili, I argue, these storyteller/draftspersons create a dissident cartography that superimposes their lived geography on the background of legal geography. Thus, ‘The Mapping Journey Project’ is a work of art that is also a work of advocacy and provocation. Rather than advocating particular policies, however, it advocates in the sense of affirming the dignity of the subjects of the videos and their right to speak the truth of their lives. Moreover, it provokes by elucidating the moral stakes of the current political and economic order and by issuing a pointed demand for humane solutions. So long as vast global disparities of wealth and political power persist, it is no wonder that people who ...
Is Race Walking Lower Impact Than Running

Race walking has grown over the past decade because it provides exercise without the high impact loads of running. However, whether race walking is truly a lower impact sport remains to be tested. Fifteen competitive race walkers ran and race walked over a force plate. The loading rate of the vertical ground reaction force was 46% lower for race walking in comparison to running. This suggests race walking is a lower impact exercise safer for the joints. This may be advantageous for people who would like to exercise at a higher intensity that walking provides but have joint problems, e.g. those with osteoarthritis.Copyright © 2016 by ASME
Quantifying Blast Effects on Constructed Facilities behind Blast Walls

AbstractExplosive attacks on constructed facilities are a significant threat worldwide, producing devastating consequences including loss of life, property damages, and economic losses. This paper ...
Deconvoluting Cyclic Voltammograms To Accurately Calculate Pt Electrochemically Active Surface Area

An accurate measure of the electrochemically active surface area (ECSA) of an electrode is necessary to quantify electrocatalytic activity. Herein, we develop a method to deconvolute experimental cyclic voltammograms measured on platinum electrodes which predominately contain 111 terraces with 110 and 100 steps. We define simple functions that can be fit to experimental data to represent various contributions to the total voltammogram, including hydrogen adsorption on 111 terraces and competitive hydrogen and hydroxide adsorption on 110 and on 100 steps. We use our prior density functional theory insight to accurately calculate the ECSA and the proportion of 111, 100, and 110 sites. We validate this method for experimental cyclic voltammograms measured on single-crystal stepped platinum surfaces (with 111 terraces), where the surface area is known, then extend to polycrystalline and nanoparticle platinum electrodes.
Clinical utility of patiromer, sodium zirconium cyclosilicate, and sodium polystyrene sulfonate for the treatment of hyperkalemia: an evidence-based review.

Introduction Hyperkalemia is a serious medical condition that often manifests in patients with chronic kidney disease and heart failure. Renin-angiotensin-aldosterone system inhibitors are known to improve outcomes in these disease states but can also cause drug-induced hyperkalemia. New therapeutic options exist for managing hyperkalemia in these patients which warrant evidence-based evaluation. Aim The objective of this article was to review the efficacy and safety evidence for patiromer, sodium zirconium cyclosilicate (ZS9), and sodium polystyrene sulfonate (SPS) for the treatment of hyperkalemia. Evidence review Current treatment options to enhance potassium excretion are SPS and loop diuretics, which are complicated by ambiguous efficacy and known toxicities. Patiromer and ZS9 are new agents designed to address this treatment gap. Both unabsorbable compounds bind potassium in the gastrointestinal (GI) tract to facilitate fecal excretion. The capacity to bind other medications in the GI tract infers high drug-drug interaction potential, which has been demonstrated with patiromer but not yet investigated with ZS9 or SPS. Phase II and III clinical trials of patiromer and ZS9 demonstrated clear evidence of a dose-dependent potassium-lowering effect and the ability to initiate, maintain, or titrate renin-angiotensin-aldosterone system inhibitors. There is limited evidence base for SPS: two small clinical trials indicated potassium reduction in chronic hyperkalemia. All agents may cause adverse GI effects, although they are less frequent with ZS9. Concerns remain for SPS to cause rare GI damage. Electrolyte abnormalities occurred with patiromer and SPS, whereas urinary tract infections, edema, and corrected QT-interval prolongations were reported with ZS9. Conclusion Patiromer and ZS9 have improved upon the age-old standard SPS for the treatment of hyperkalemia. Additional research should focus on drug-drug interactions in patients on multiple medications, incidence of rare adverse events, and use in high-risk populations.
Taking the First Bite: Who Should Tax Apple’s $187 Billion in Ireland?

On December 19, 2016, the European Commission (hereinafter “Commission”) published its final decision in the Apple State aid case. The Commission concluded that two tax rulings granted in 1991 and 2007 on the allocation of profits to the Irish branches of Apple Sales International (ASI) and Apple Operations Europe (AOE) amounted to illegal state aid, and ordered Ireland to immediately recover this aid from Apple. The key issue in the Apple decision is where Apple’s foreign income ($187 billion, as of 2016) should be regarded as being generated. In the authors’ opinion, there is almost no basis for any argument that two-thirds of the profits of Apple Inc. were generated by functions performed, assets used and risks assumed in Ireland, where only 4 percent of its global workforce and approximately 1 percent of its customers are located. Indeed, under traditional principles, profits originate and taxes are due where value is created – that is, where the research and development is conducted. Accordingly, since almost all of Apple’s research activity takes place in the United States, Apple should remit most of its taxes there. Such view that was recently upheld by Jacob Lew, Neelie Kroes and Pascal Saint-Amans, does not take into account that 60 percent of Apple’s total net sales occurs overseas and the significance of customer market in value creation. In addition, it is also inconsistent with the position taken by the Internal Revenue Service in the Glaxo case, i.e., intangibles derive their value primarily in the country where marketing activities are carried out and not where research and development activity is performed. This paper discusses how the arguments presented by the IRS in Glaxo can be used by high-tax EU countries to justify locating extra profits to sales and marketing support operations performed by Apple Europe retail subsidiaries. While ordering Ireland to recover €13 billion in illegal tax benefits, the Commission left the door open for other tax authorities to claim for Apple’s commercial risks, sales and other activities that might have taken place in their countries.
Sex-specific effects of developmental alcohol exposure on cocaine-induced place preference in adulthood

Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS) is associated with high rates of drug addiction in adulthood. One possible basis for increased drug use in this population is altered sensitivity to drug-associated contexts. This experiment utilized a rat model of FASD to examine behavioral and neural changes in the processing of drug cues in adulthood. Alcohol was given by intragastric intubation to pregnant rats throughout gestation and to rat pups during the early postnatal period (ET group). Controls consisted of a non-treated group (NC) and a pair-fed group given the intubation procedure without alcohol (IC). On postnatal day (PD) 90, rats from all treatment groups were given saline, 0.3mg/kg, 3.0mg/kg, or 10.0mg/kg cocaine pairings with a specific context in the conditioned place preference (CPP) paradigm. While control animals of both sexes showed cocaine CPP at the 3.0 and 10.0mg/kg doses, ET females also showed cocaine CPP at 0.3mg/kg. This was accompanied by a decrease in c-Fos/GAD67 cells in the nucleus accumbens (NAc) shell and GAD67-only cells in the NAc shell and PFC at this 0.3mg/kg dose. ET males failed to show cocaine CPP at the 3.0mg/kg dose. This was associated with an increase in c-Fos only-labeled cells in the NAc core and PFC at this 3.0mg/kg dose. These results suggest that developmental alcohol exposure has a sexually-dimorphic effect on cocaine's conditioning effects in adulthood and the NAc.
Robotic Liver Resection and Biliary Reconstruction

Robotic assistance offers several advantages for certain surgical procedures. Its use is being investigated for its application in hepatobiliary surgery. This chapter describes techniques for various robotic-assisted liver resections and biliary surgery.
Food Fight: The Effect of Food Availability on the Probability of Violent Conflict Onset

International agencies, nonprofits and governments have maintained that food insecurity is a significant driver of violent intrastate conflict. This paper tests this popular assumption with a model drawn from Azar's Theory of Protracted Social Conflict and a fixed effects logistic regression and finds that food availability has no significant effect on the probability of violent civil conflict onset. However, other factors such as a country's level of integration into the international system of states and economic growth are likely to be more effective at maintaining global stability. The policy implications are that efforts to promote peace can be more effective by focusing on integration into the world community and economic growth than by focusing exclusively on food availability.
Splicing QTL of human adipose-related traits

Recently, genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have identified 11 loci associated with adipose-related traits across different populations. However, their functional roles still remain largely unknown. In this study, we aimed to explore the splicing regulation of these GWAS signals in a tissue-specific fashion. For adipose-related GWAS signals, we selected six adipose-related tissues (adipose subcutaneous, artery tibial, blood, heart left ventricle, muscle-skeletal, and thyroid) with the sample size greater than 80 for splicing quantitative trait loci (QTL) analysis using GTEx released datasets. We integrated GWAS summary statistics of nine adipose-related traits (an average of 2.6 million SNPs per GWAS), and splicing QTLs from 6 GTEx tissues with an average of 337,900 splicing QTL SNPs, and 684,859 junctions. Our filtering process generated an average of 86,549 SNPs and 162,841 exon-exon links (junctions) for each tissue. A total of seven exon-exon junctions in four genes (AKTIP, DTNBP1, FTO and UBE2E1) were found to be significantly associated with four SNPs that showed genome-wide significance with body fat distribution (rs17817288, rs7206790, rs11710420 and rs2237199). These splicing events might contribute to the causal effect on the regulation of ectopic-fat, which warrants further experimental validation.
Laminin β2 Chain Regulates Retinal Progenitor Cell Mitotic Spindle Orientation via Dystroglycan.

Vertebrate retinal development follows a pattern during which retinal progenitor cells (RPCs) give rise to all retinal cell types in a highly conserved temporal sequence. RPC proliferation and cell cycle exit are tightly coordinated to ensure proper and timely production of each of the retinal cell types. Extracellular matrix (ECM) plays an important role in eye development, influencing RPC proliferation and differentiation. In this study, we demonstrate that laminins, key ECM components, in the inner limiting membrane, control mitotic spindle orientation by providing environmental cues to the RPCs. In vivo deletion of laminin β2 in mice of both sexes results in a loss RPC basal processes and contact with the ECM, leading to a shift of the mitotic spindle pole orientation toward asymmetric cell divisions. This leads to decreased proliferation and premature RPC pool depletion, resulting in overproduction of rod photoreceptors at the expense of bipolar cells and Muller glia. Moreover, we show that deletion of laminin β2 leads to disruption and mislocalization of its receptors: dystroglycan and β1-integrin. Addition of exogenous β2-containing laminins to laminin β2-deficient retinal explants stabilizes the RPC basal processes and directs their mitotic spindle orientation toward symmetric divisions, leading to increased RPC proliferation, as well as restores proper receptor localization at the retinal surface. Finally, functional blocking of dystroglycan in wild-type retinal explants phenocopies laminin β2 ablation. Our data suggest that dystroglycan-mediated signaling between RPCs and the ECM is of key importance in controlling critical developmental events during retinogenesis.SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT The mechanisms governing retinogenesis are subject to both intrinsic and extrinsic signaling cues. Although the role of intrinsic signaling has been the subject of many studies, our understanding of the role of the microenvironment in retinal development remains unclear. Using a combination of in vivo and ex vivo approaches, we demonstrate that laminins, key extracellular matrix components, provide signaling cues that control retinal progenitor cell attachment to the basement membrane, mitotic axis, proliferation, and fate adoption. Moreover, we identify, for the first time, dystroglycan as the receptor responsible for directing retinal progenitor cell mitotic spindle orientation. Our data suggest a mechanism where dystroglycan-mediated signaling between the cell and the extracellular matrix controls the proliferative potential of progenitors in the developing CNS.
Two-Scale Stochastic Optimization for Controlling Distributed Storage Devices

This paper is motivated by a power system with storage devices at multiple locations which need to be controlled at a much finer timescale than that necessary for conventional generation units. We present a stochastic optimization model of the power system which captures interactions of decisions at these two timescales through a novel state-variable formulation. The model also includes transmission constraints approximated by a linearized dc network, fast response operating reserves, and renewable generation. To tackle this high-dimensional multistage stochastic optimization problem, we present a sequential sampling method which we refer to as the stochastic dynamic linear programming. This algorithm is a dynamic extension of regularized two-stage stochastic decomposition for stagewise independent multistage stochastic linear programs, and is targeted at the class of problems where decisions are made at two different timescales. We compare our algorithm with the stochastic dual dynamic programming (SDDP) which has been effectively applied in planning power systems operations. Our computational results show that our sequential Monte-Carlo approach provides prescriptive solutions and values which are statistically indistinguishable from those obtained from SDDP, while improving computational times significantly.
Automated Separation of Uranium and Plutonium from Environmental Swipe Samples for Multiple Collector Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometry

A fully automated method for the separation of low-concentration uranium from plutonium in environmental swipe samples has been developed. The offline chromatography system features renewable 1 mL Eichrom TEVA and UTEVA column generation from bulk resin slurry. Discrete fractions of the separated actinides are delivered into user defined vials for future analysis. Clean room background levels were achieved outside of a cleanroom environment with this method. Purification of uranium and plutonium from various sample matrixes and at various concentrations was successful. Major and minor isotope ratios for both elements were measured via multiple collector inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry and were in good agreement with certified reference values. Validation of the separation method was conducted on archived environmental samples and agreed with values previously reported using standard column chemistry.
The Use of Choice in Existence Proofs

In this section we shall give full discussions and furnish some proofs, because we shall be dealing not with the substance of topology but with various fine points in what one might call Applied Mathematical Logic.
Wittgenstein : time for a new philosophical practice

This essay gathers Wittgenstein's comments and considerations concerning the philosophical investigation of time. Time here serves as an exemplary instance of Wittgenstein's manner of philosophical critique and his turn to a new practice of philosophy. His comments on time demonstrate this two-fold movement. On the one hand, he concerns himself with pointing out the“wrong turns”philosophers take when they ask:“What is time?”These include a semantic error, the over reliance on figurative language, the felt need for definitions, and a mistaken assumption about the task of philosophy that underlies these problems. On the other hand, he concerns himself with dwelling upon and describing time as an intricate and dynamic interweaving, a manifold and ongoing entanglement of human practices.
Power Counting Theorem in Euclidean Space

Consider integrals whose integrands are products of functions bounded near zero by powers of affine functionals and near infinity by different powers of the same functionals. The power counting theorem provides conditions for integrability.
Health-related Quality of Life Among Black Sexual Minority Women.

Introduction It is well established that socially marginalized groups experience worse health than dominant groups. However, many questions remain about the health of members of multiple marginalized groups, such as black sexual minority women. The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between health-related quality of life (HRQOL), race, and sexual orientation identity among a general population sample of black and white women and to assess additive interaction between sexual orientation identity and race. Methods This study used cross-sectional 2014 and 2015 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System data from 154,995 women residing in 20 U.S. states. G-computation was used to estimate age-adjusted prevalence differences for nine dichotomized measures of HRQOL. The HRQOL of black sexual minority women was compared with the HRQOL of black heterosexual women, white sexual minority women, and white heterosexual women. Analyses were conducted in 2017. Results Age-adjusted prevalence differences for all measures suggested worse HRQOL among black sexual minority women, compared with most of the other groups (e.g., frequent poor mental health comparing black lesbian and heterosexual women: 0.083, 95% CI= –0.017, 0.183); HRQOL among black bisexual women was often similar to or worse than white bisexual women. Most prevalence differences comparing black sexual minority women with white heterosexual women suggested additive interaction that led to stronger or weaker associations than expected. Although many point estimates suggested meaningful differences, many 95% CIs for prevalence differences, and when assessing for interaction, included 0. Conclusions Having two marginalized identities compared with one is often associated with worse HRQOL. In addition, race and sexual orientation identity may interact in their relationship to HRQOL, such that black sexual minority women have worse or better HRQOL than expected.
Investing upstream: Watershed protection in Piura, Peru

Abstract As the world is increasingly urbanized and climate change presents new uncertainties, urban water supply management needs to be flexible and adaptable. This includes reaching beyond city limits to include water supply and watershed management, as well as working with stakeholders outside the boundaries of the city, across the urban/rural divide. Bringing together diverse stakeholders to collaborate on management strategies entails bringing together multiple knowledge systems that interact, compete, and reshape water systems. Large cities located within Peru’s arid coast provide important opportunities to examine these knowledge dynamics, as urban water supplies depend on actions within the rural watersheds. These watersheds, which originate high in the Andes mountains, are populated primarily by campesino communities, who have been marginalized from state-led water governance for centuries. With Peru’s adoption of the 2009 Water Resources Law, campesino communities were brought into management through multi-stakeholder river basin councils. These councils ideally provide a space for stakeholders to deliberate and reach agreements on sustainable water management. Yet, despite the critical importance of upper watershed protection for ensuring water supplies for the large coastal cities, few efforts have resulted in watershed protection. Here, I examine one successful case, where the stakeholders in Piura agreed on a program to protect critical upper basin ecosystems. This study uses a process tracing approach to analyze the knowledge dynamics that led to the agreement and initial implementation. Based on ethnographic research including 112 interviews between 2015 and 2017, I argue that the interaction between knowledge and belief systems needs to be taken into account. I find that stakeholders’ seemingly incongruent worldviews and epistemologies were bridged, enabling them to reach agreement on an ecosystem-based technique for watershed protection. Further, strong leadership and active support of the knowledge and preferences of the historically-marginalized campesino communities was critical for the inclusion of their views and agreement upon watershed protection. Where urban water supplies rest on actions of non-state actors, such as is the case with watershed protection, the ability of stakeholders to voluntarily reach and implement agreements is critical, especially given increased variability and uncertainties associated with climate change.
CBPR Pilot Intervention: Understanding Social Health Determinants of Mental Health in Rural Latinos

The purpose of this study is to identify challenges and facilitators for interventions on determinants of mental health in the literature and to analyze themes and coping strategies of psychosocial health determinants described by rural Latinos in a church-based intervention. This study was a review of literature and secondary data analysis of an arm of a larger Community-Based Participatory Research (CBPR) on the mental well-being of rural Latinos in North Florida - a CBPR pilot intervention. It was developed to respond to and prevent social stressors by creating a space where rural Latinos can help one another by sharing their experiences; empowering people to address health determinants that affect their well-being. All data from the pilot intervention was thematically analyzed using NVivo11. Psychosocial determinants of mental health identified in the CBPR intervention were: social environment factors (discrimination, family conflict, social isolation, undocumented status) and health services (uninsured & poor health literacy). Positive coping strategies described by rural Latinos were: avoiding conflictive relationships, alternative medicine, exercise, family & peer support, health education, community social support, instillation of hope, learn English, spirituality and religiosity. Negative coping strategies described were: categorical thinking, isolation, substance abuse.
Influenza virus-related critical illness: pathophysiology and epidemiology

Influenza virus affects the respiratory tract by direct viral infection or by damage from the immune system response. In humans, the respiratory epithelium is the only site where the hemagglutinin (HA) molecule is effectively cleaved, generating infectious virus particles. Virus transmission occurs through a susceptible individual’s contact with aerosols or respiratory fomites from an infected individual. The inability of the lung to perform its primary function of gas exchange can result from multiple mechanisms, including obstruction of the airways, loss of alveolar structure, loss of lung epithelial integrity from direct epithelial cell killing, and degradation of the critical extracellular matrix. Approximately 30–40% of hospitalized patients with laboratory-confirmed influenza are diagnosed with acute pneumonia. These patients who develop pneumonia are more likely to be 65 years old, Caucasian, and nursing home residents; have chronic lung or heart disease and history of smoking, and are immunocompromised. Influenza can primarily cause severe pneumonia, but it can also present in conjunction with or be followed by a secondary bacterial infection, most commonly by Staphylococcus aureus and Streptococcus pneumoniae. Influenza is associated with a high predisposition to bacterial sepsis and ARDS. Viral infections presenting concurrently with bacterial pneumonia are now known to occur with a frequency of 30–50% in both adult and pediatric populations. The H3N2 subtype has been associated with unprecedented high levels of intensive care unit (ICU) admission. Influenza A is the predominant viral etiology of acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) in adults. Risk factors independently associated with ARDS are age between 36 and 55 years old, pregnancy, and obesity, while protective factors are female sex, influenza vaccination, and infections with Influenza A (H3N2) or Influenza B viruses. In the ICU, particularly during the winter season, influenza should be suspected not only in patients with typical symptoms and epidemiology, but also in patients with severe pneumonia, ARDS, sepsis with or without bacterial co-infection, as well as in patients with encephalitis, myocarditis, and rhabdomyolysis.
Soft-sediment community stability across years in San Francisco Bay

Abstract Macrobenthos is used commonly in disturbance-related studies of coastal ecosystems, including those that evaluate invasions by non-native species (NIS), but still little is known about temporal variation in community characteristics, especially in bays and estuaries. In this study we investigated inter-annual changes in the soft-sediment benthic communities of San Francisco Bay over a period of five years, evaluating the contribution of NIS vs. native species to community attributes (species richness, abundance) and the efficacy of sampling (percent richness detected for each NIS and native species). Benthic macrofauna were collected, identified, and quantified from 10 stations (48–50 replicate samples) per year across the high salinity region of the Bay. A total of 36,872 individuals belonging to 126 morphospecies were collected; 61 species were native, accounting for 22% of total abundance, and 31 species were NIS, which reached 74% of total abundance. The other 34 species were either cryptogenic or unresolved taxa. Soft-sediment communities were mainly comprised of amphipods (Ampelisca abdita, Sinocorophium heteroceratum, Monocorophium acherusicum), polychaetes (Sabaco elongatus, Euchone limnicola) and bivalves (Venerupis philippinarum). Community structure and composition were stable across years during the period of the study, despite a major marine heat wave and a record-breaking drought that raised average salinity levels for several years. The sampling was effective, especially for NIS, detecting a higher proportion (94–100%) of estimated richness for NIS compared to native species (74–89%) across the five year period, suggesting NIS were more evenly distributed in space and time and many native species occurred more patchily and less frequently.
Diabetic Wound Segmentation using Convolutional Neural Networks

Image segmentation is a common goal in many medical applications, as its use can improve diagnostic capability and outcome prediction. In order to assess the wound healing rate in diabetic foot ulcers, some parameters from the wound area are measured. However, heterogeneity of diabetic skin lesions and the noise present in images captured by digital cameras make wound extraction a difficult task. In this work, a Deep Learning based method for accurate segmentation of wound regions is proposed. In the proposed method, input images are first processed to remove artifacts and then fed into a Convolutional Neural Network (CNN), producing a probability map. Finally, the probability maps are processed to extract the wound region. We also address the problem of removing some false positives. Experiments show that our method can achieve high performance in terms of segmentation accuracy and Dice index.