cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
In Our Lives and Under Our Skin: An Investigation of Specific Psychobiological Mediators Linking Family Relationships and Health Using the Biobehavioral Family Model.

The objective of this study was to use the Biobehavioral Family Model (BBFM) to delineate which psychophysiological variables link romantic and family relationship satisfaction variables to health outcomes. Data from individuals who reported being partnered from the second wave of the National Survey of Midlife Development in the United States (MIDUS II), Project 4 (n = 812) were used to test a structural equation model which explored which psychophysiological variables potentially mediated associations between positive and negative family emotional climate variables and disease activity. This model found that current and past family variables had larger associations with the psychophysiological variables than romantic partner variables; depressive symptoms, anxiety, and inflammation partially mediated associations between family relationships and health; and, contrary to the hypotheses, romantic partner and family support were linked to worse health outcomes. However, the findings should be viewed with regard to the cross-sectional design of the study. Overall, the findings support the use of the BBFM as a model that can guide clinical interventions.
Immune Homeostasis of the Gut

Immune responses in the gastrointestinal tract are highly regulated to prevent inappropriate responses to the gut microbiota and food antigens while protecting the host from invasive infections. The following chapter describes the unique physiological adaptations in the intestine that allow for the appropriate induction of immune responses and the effector sites where these responses take place. Homeostasis is described as a process that involves the compartmentalization, monitoring, and selection of the members of the gut microbial ecosystem. The roles of the barrier and the microbiome as active participants in this process are highlighted. The role of important molecules such as retinoic acid, TGF-β, and microbiota-derived signals in directing tolerogenic responses is also discussed. Examples of disease states associated with alterations in the microbiome are used to emphasize the importance of maintaining a well-balanced gut microbial ecosystem. Together these mechanisms maintain the immune balance in the gastrointestinal tract that is essential for health.
Process evaluation of counseling delivered by a patient navigator in an efficacious smoking cessation intervention among low-income primary care patients.

Introduction This exploratory study examined the relationship between receipt of counseling by a patient navigator and socio-demographic characteristics of primary care patients enrolled in a smoking cessation trial. Methods We grouped intervention participants (n = 177) into two categories: 1) no or some contact with the navigator or 2) minimum counseling intervention dose or higher delivered. Results In logistic regression analyses, controlling for patient race/ethnicity, education, age, gender, household annual income, stress/chaos/hassles composite score, heavy smoking, and substance use, non-Hispanic white participants had lower odds (aOR 0.30; 95% CI 0.13-0.70, p < 0.01) of receiving the minimum intervention dose or higher compared to all other race/ethnicity categories. There was also effect modification such that patients aged 50 or younger who were non-Hispanic white were less likely (aOR 0.09, 95% CI: 0.02-0.54, p < 0.01) to receive the minimum intervention dose compared to older patients from all other race/ethnicity groups. Conclusions Future research should explore issues such as acceptability of the intervention to white and younger age participants, and the potential impact of co-occurring substance use disorders on intervention uptake.
An Empirical Investigation of Structured Output Modeling for Graph-based Neural Dependency Parsing

In this paper, we investigate the aspect of structured output modeling for the state-of-the-art graph-based neural dependency parser (Dozat and Manning, 2017). With evaluations on 14 treebanks, we empirically show that global output-structured models can generally obtain better performance, especially on the metric of sentence-level Complete Match. However, probably because neural models already learn good global views of the inputs, the improvement brought by structured output modeling is modest.
Unhealthy and unaware? Misjudging social comparative standing for health-relevant behavior

Abstract People sometimes modify their behavior based on whether they believe they do more or less of that behavior than others. But are people's perceptions of their social-comparative status for behaviors generally accurate? The current research assessed accuracy and bias in perceived social-comparative status for a number of health-related behaviors. In two studies, participants estimated their social-comparative percentile regarding behavior frequency for 20 behaviors—pre-classified according to a 2 (healthy or unhealthy) × 2 (generally common or uncommon) design. Participants also reported their absolute frequency of engagement for the behaviors, and these reports were used to approximate people's actual percentiles. Subjective percentile estimates were overly favorable for both healthy and unhealthy behaviors and were biased by a behavior's general commonness/rarity. People who were least healthy regarding a behavior tended to be the most miscalibrated in their percentile estimation for that behavior. There was also support for a noise-plus-bias model of people's percentile estimates.
The Policy Basis of Measured Partisan Animosity in the United States

Understanding and addressing the consequences of partisan animosity requires knowledge of its foundations. To what extent is animosity between partisan groups motivated by dislike for partisan outgroups per se, policy disagreement, or other social group conflicts? In many circumstances, including extant experimental research, these patterns are observationally equivalent. In a series of vignette evaluation experiments, we estimate effects of shared partisanship when additional information is or is not present, and we benchmark these effects against shared policy preference effects. Partisanship effects are about 71% as large as shared policy preference effects when each is presented in isolation. When an independently randomized party and policy position are presented together, partisanship effects decrease substantially, by about 52%, whereas policy effects remain large, decreasing by about 10%. These results suggest that common measures of partisan animosity may capture programmatic conflict more so than social identity–based partisan hostility.
Discharge to a Post-Acute Care Facility after Emergent Femoral Artery Repair is Not Protective Against Wound Complications

Abstract Introduction Access site complication is the most common adverse event following endovascular intervention and when emergent operative repair of the common femoral artery (CFA) is needed, patient morbidity can be significantly increased. The intent of this project was to identify predictors of wound events after emergent operative repair of the CFA due to an access site complication. It was hypothesized that patients discharged to a facility would benefit from an ongoing relationship with health care professionals as evidenced by more consistent follow-up and lower wound complication rates. Methods Patients who had a percutaneous CFA access complication and required emergent open CFA repair at an academic medical institution between 2015 and 2018 were included and the charts were reviewed retrospectively. Primary outcomes included wound complication and outpatient compliance with Vascular Surgery clinic visit. Dichotomous groups were evaluated by Chi-square test and continuous variables were evaluated by Student’s T-test. Univariate and multivariate regression analyses were completed to assess risk factors contributing to wound event or failure of clinic follow up. Results Forty-four patients were identified with emergent CFA repair due to an access complication between July 2015 and June 2018. Among this population, 33% of patients had wound complications and 27% were discharged to a facility. Among those discharged to a facility, the rate of follow-up to the vascular surgeon’s clinic was significantly lower compared to those discharged to home (40% vs 85%, p Discussion Despite the availability of medical personnel to arrange transportation and provide wound care in post-acute care facilities, patients who were discharged to a facility after CFA injury requiring emergent repair experienced lower compliance with clinic follow-up and may have suffered more wound complications. Strategies to improve compliance with patient follow-up and wound healing in patients sent to post-acute care facilities are warranted.
The Value of Intravenous Immunoglobulin Therapy in Idiopathic Inflammatory Myositis in the Current Transformed Era of Biologics.

The understanding of etiology and pathogenesis of idiopathic immune myositis is fast evolving, and so is the classification of myositis subtypes. The diversity in genetics, major histocompatibility complex expressions, immunohistochemical, and specific and associated autoantibodies not only explains the individual variability in response to therapies but also begs for subtype-specific treatments. With the evolution of the new biological therapies, the treatment of idiopathic immune myositis (IIM) has greatly transformed in recent years. This article appraises the current therapeutic value of intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIg) in idiopathic immune myopathy patients in the era of transformed treatment options. This article argues why the IVIg therapy still retains its value as an unreplaceable treatment option in certain specific subtypes of idiopathic immune myositis patients as well as in certain specific clinical idiopathic immune myositis scenarios.
Poultry waste valorization via pyrolysis technologies: economic and environmental life cycle optimization for sustainable bioenergy systems.

This article addresses the life cycle optimization (LCO) of the poultry litter supply chain considering pyrolysis technologies that aim to sustainably convert poultry waste into biofuel and biochar...
Ventricular Tachycardia in Sarcoidosis

A 48-year-old man with history of pulmonary sarcoidosis and Mobitz II second-degree atrioventricular (AV) block status-post dual-chamber pacemaker implantation presents with dizziness and ventricular tachycardia (VT) requiring external cardioversion. Case discussion focuses on steps in diagnosis and management, including catheter ablation, of ventricular arrhythmias in cardiac sarcoidosis.
Increasing Trustworthiness of Deep Neural Networks via Accuracy Monitoring

Inference accuracy of deep neural networks (DNNs) is a crucial performance metric, but can vary greatly in practice subject to actual test datasets and is typically unknown due to the lack of ground truth labels. This has raised significant concerns with trustworthiness of DNNs, especially in safety-critical applications. In this paper, we address trustworthiness of DNNs by using post-hoc processing to monitor the true inference accuracy on a user's dataset. Concretely, we propose a neural network-based accuracy monitor model, which only takes the deployed DNN's softmax probability output as its input and directly predicts if the DNN's prediction result is correct or not, thus leading to an estimate of the true inference accuracy. The accuracy monitor model can be pre-trained on a dataset relevant to the target application of interest, and only needs to actively label a small portion (1% in our experiments) of the user's dataset for model transfer. For estimation robustness, we further employ an ensemble of monitor models based on the Monte-Carlo dropout method. We evaluate our approach on different deployed DNN models for image classification and traffic sign detection over multiple datasets (including adversarial samples). The result shows that our accuracy monitor model provides a close-to-true accuracy estimation and outperforms the existing baseline methods.
Little Power Struggles Everywhere: Attacks on the Administrative State at the Securities and Exchange Commission

This Article describes the power struggles among the three branches of the federal government and Democrats and Republicans to control rulemaking and other activities at the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Although the SEC was designed to be an independent and non-partisan agency where Commissioners and staff exercised independent judgment and expertise to protect the investing public from Wall Street depredations, partisan struggles have undermined the agency’s work. Instead of protecting the SEC from these ideological power plays, the courts have also upended SEC rules in decisions that appear to be more political than respectful of governmental efficiency and integrity and have resulted in regulatory ossification. Developments that have impacted the SEC’s effectiveness are the imposition of cost benefit regulations, skepticism about deference and the erosion of independence.
Empirical analysis of term structure shifts

Principal component analysis and factor analysis of term structure movements shows that between 80 and 90% of term structure shifts can be explained by a uniform shift that is roughly parallel. In contrast, our analysis of term structure data from 1986 to 2016 reveals that only 57% of the shifts have been uniform. Twist- and butterfly-type shifts accounted for 28 and 10%, respectively, of all shifts. Remarkably, these frequency results are roughly the same for uniform and twist shifts determined on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis over the entire sample and over three subperiods. Based on historical data, an investor should expect a uniform shift in the term structure about 57% and a twist 28% of the time.
A Real-Time and Low-Cost Flash Flood Monitoring System to Support Transportation Infrastructure

When a disaster strikes, such as a flood, it is difficult, even impossible for transportation authority and first responders to get access to real-time information of every structure (highway bridges and connected roads) in a timely fashion. The information is needed to perform short-term predictions and support emergency/rescue activities. To mitigate the challenge, the proposed research aims to develop an autonomous and real-time structural health monitoring system (SHM) using low cost off-the-shelf wireless sensors. The wireless sensors upon deployment will collaborate to form an autonomous wireless sensor network (WSN) and relay a high-resolution structural health data to transport engineers in real-time. Such up-to-date information can assist the department of transportation (DOT), the city, first responders as well as rescues authorities such as 911 to determine the sensitive spots and prioritize recovery activities intended to rescue lives, restore essential services and identify repair damages requiring an emergency fix
All-Electric Subsea Control Systems and the Effects on Subsea Manifold Valves

Subsea development is moving constantly toward simplification, digitalization, and cost-out strategies because the exploration and production of hydrocarbons are moving toward deeper and remote sea water areas. Usage of all-electric subsea technology instead of hydraulic technology is growing and will be the future of subsea systems due to the former’s environmental and functional advantages and reduced costs. The benefits of all-electric subsea systems are health, safety, and environment (HSE) and improved reliability, flexibility, and functionality compared with traditional hydraulic-electrical systems. Existing electrohydraulic technology for a typical subsea system, hydraulic and electric actuators, and subsea manifold valves including valve types and selection philosophy have been reviewed in this paper. Some major worldwide oil companies such as Equinor and Schlumberger have successful experiences with subsea electric actuators. Considering the benefits of all-electric technology especially in terms of cost and HSE, as well as successful experiences of two major oil companies, further research in this area is warranted. One of the gaps in existing reviewed literature is the effect of using all-electric actuators for manifold valves. Thus, three main questions related to electric actuator selection, requirement of safety integrity level (SIL), and effect of using electric actuators on manifold valve selection have been addressed and answered. Forty hydraulic actuated manifold valves from nine past subsea projects in different parts of the world, mainly Africa and Australia, have been selected for the analysis of all-electric actuators. Results show that 93% of the valves require spring-return electric actuators, whereas 7% can be operated with conventional electric actuators without any spring. The manifold valves do not require SIL certification because they are not connected to an emergency shut down system. Introducing the electric actuators to the manifold valve will not change the valve selection philosophy.
Cancer patient's attitudes of using medicinal cannabis for sleep.

Poor sleep is one of the most common side effects of cancer treatment. One increasingly popular approach to manage side effects of cancer treatment is use of medicinal cannabis (MC).Cancer patients...
The chartered financial analyst university affiliation program: Explicit and implicit benefits

The authors present the results of a global survey of chartered financial analyst (CFA) university-affiliated programs (UAPs) on the nature of academic-professional collaboration between the CFA In...
The Moral Obligation to Perform Contracts

There is a well-established literature about whether, when, or to what extent citizens have a moral obligation to obey the law. That discussion looks at various possible justifications for a prima facie moral obligation to obey; the best-known proffered justifications range across argument based on consequences, consent, gratitude, fair play/reciprocity, and the role of government in distributing benefits and burdens across society. The literature regarding the moral obligation to obey particular categories of obligations is significantly less well developed. The present article considers whether and when there might be a moral obligation to perform one’s contractual obligations. Part of the complexity of the analysis will come from the fact that these questions arise in particular social and relational contexts, and the background justice or injustice seems relevant to the existence of a moral obligation to keep a contract, or its absence. Ultimately, it seems likely that one’s obligation to keep a contract will vary with its circumstances. Injustice in society, in the underlying relationship, in the negotiation of the agreement, or in the agreement’s terms would work against any such moral obligation. Thus, the starting point of discussions about the moral obligation to keep contracts varies from the starting point of discussions about the moral obligation to obey the law. On the latter topic, for a long time it was assumed that, at least for generally just legal systems, a moral obligation applied equally to all laws, though one might then argue about the defeasibility of that obligation in particular cases. With contracts, people seem less inclined to assume that all contracts bind equally (or, as they say regarding legal rules and commands, in a “content-independent way”). There remain questions of what the content of the obligation to keep one’s contract would be, assuming that there is one. Most of us would assume that it is an obligation actually to perform (unless there are good reasons not to), but some would argue merely for an obligation to perform or pay damages. Though the prompt payment of damages -- without disputing the breach, claiming a lower amount of damages, or threatening protracted and expensive litigation – would already be a significant advance on current common commercial practices.
Racial disparities in alcohol-related liver disease mortality in a 75 year follow-up study of Michigan autoworkers.

Abstract Background Suicide, drug overdose, and alcohol-related liver disease (ALD) mortality have been rising in the United States. While suicide and overdose have received a great deal of attention, far less public health concern has focused on chronic ALD. To address this gap, we examine ALD mortality rates, by race, in a cohort of autoworkers to describe trends over the past 75 years, from the peak in automobile manufacturing employment through its decline. Methods Based on the United Autoworkers-General Motors (UAW-GM) cohort we estimated temporal trends in age-adjusted ALD mortality rates from 1941 through 2015 at three automobile manufacturing plants in Michigan. We compared these rates to county, state, and U.S. rates, directly standardized to the 2000 U.S. census, to assess the roles of race and employment on ALD mortality. Results The overall age-adjusted ALD mortality rate among 41,097 male autoworkers peaked at 46.1 per 100,000 in the 1970s, followed by a gradual decline and a recent rise. Rates were slightly higher for black than white men until early 2000s, when rates increased only for white men. ALD mortality rates in the study cohort tracked national, state, and county rates for white men until the most recent time period, but were lower throughout the study period for black men, especially in the 1970s and 1980s. Conclusions Employment in automobile manufacturing may have offered some protection against death from ALD for black men, and loss of those manufacturing jobs may have impacted white men without a college degree more in recent decades.
Wind farms in weak grids stability enhancement: SynCon or STATCOM?

Abstract Reactive power compensation is an effective method to enhance stability of a power system. Synchronous condenser (SynCon) and static synchronous compensator (STATCOM) are widely used for reactive power compensation. They have the capability of increasing system stability and efficiency by absorbing or generating reactive power. This paper presents a comparison of SynCon and STATCOM under the condition of zero reactive power injection. The two devices are integrated into a grid-connected type-4 wind farm to examine their effects on system stability. It is found that SynCon is more capable in stability enhancement compared to STATCOM. To explain the difference, we measure the d q -frame admittance frequency-domain responses of the two devices using frequency scans. Vector fitting method is then utilized to convert the admittance frequency-domain measurements to an s -domain model. The s -domain admittance-based eigenvalue analysis further confirms that SynCon is advantageous in stability enhancement. The difference of SynCon and STATCOM can be summarized as SynCon providing a steady-state reactance while STATCOM acting as a current source at steady state.
Ease of adoption of clinical natural language processing software

Display Omitted The first study to assess the ease of adoption of the state-of-the-art clinical NLP systems.Five clinical NLP systems were carefully examined by four expert evaluators and eight end user evaluators.The results show that the adoptability of clinical NLP systems is generally unsatisfactory. ObjectiveIn recognition of potential barriers that may inhibit the widespread adoption of biomedical software, the 2014 i2b2 Challenge introduced a special track, Track 3 - Software Usability Assessment, in order to develop a better understanding of the adoption issues that might be associated with the state-of-the-art clinical NLP systems. This paper reports the ease of adoption assessment methods we developed for this track, and the results of evaluating five clinical NLP system submissions. Materials and methodsA team of human evaluators performed a series of scripted adoptability test tasks with each of the participating systems. The evaluation team consisted of four "expert evaluators" with training in computer science, and eight "end user evaluators" with mixed backgrounds in medicine, nursing, pharmacy, and health informatics. We assessed how easy it is to adopt the submitted systems along the following three dimensions: communication effectiveness (i.e., how effective a system is in communicating its designed objectives to intended audience), effort required to install, and effort required to use. We used a formal software usability testing tool, TURF, to record the evaluators' interactions with the systems and 'think-aloud' data revealing their thought processes when installing and using the systems and when resolving unexpected issues. ResultsOverall, the ease of adoption ratings that the five systems received are unsatisfactory. Installation of some of the systems proved to be rather difficult, and some systems failed to adequately communicate their designed objectives to intended adopters. Further, the average ratings provided by the end user evaluators on ease of use and ease of interpreting output are -0.35 and -0.53, respectively, indicating that this group of users generally deemed the systems extremely difficult to work with. While the ratings provided by the expert evaluators are higher, 0.6 and 0.45, respectively, these ratings are still low indicating that they also experienced considerable struggles. DiscussionThe results of the Track 3 evaluation show that the adoptability of the five participating clinical NLP systems has a great margin for improvement. Remedy strategies suggested by the evaluators included (1) more detailed and operation system specific use instructions; (2) provision of more pertinent onscreen feedback for easier diagnosis of problems; (3) including screen walk-throughs in use instructions so users know what to expect and what might have gone wrong; (4) avoiding jargon and acronyms in materials intended for end users; and (5) packaging prerequisites required within software distributions so that prospective adopters of the software do not have to obtain each of the third-party components on their own.
Entering a New Phase: Using Solvent Halide Ions in Protein Structure Determination

Halide ions present in the cryo-solution in molar or near submolar concentrations are able to rapidly diffuse into protein crystals and adopt ordered, albeit partially occupied, sites within the first solvent shell. The anomalous scattering signal within the diffraction data collected from such crystals can be utilized for structure solution. Bromides are appropriate for MAD phasing, iodides can be used for SIRAS and all halides, including chlorides, can be used for SAD phasing.The number of sites accepted for phasing can be selected arbitrarily from initial direct methods or Patterson search procedure and from successive anomalous difference syntheses, as long as the new sites improve the phasing process.This approach is quick and requires little effort. It can be proposed as an alternative way to prepare derivatives when a protein does not bind heavy-metal atoms or is not amenable to the preparation of a SeMet variant. Because it is easy and rapid, this method is likely to be of particular relevance for high-throughput structural genomics projects.
The Eskimo Storyteller: Folktales from Noatak, Alaska

Reviewed Medium: book Authors: Edwin S. Hall Jr Year: 1998 Pages: xi + 491 Details: Drawings by Claire Fejes Publisher: University of Alaska Press Prices: $24.95 US (soft cover).
Pathogenesis of Escherichia Coli O157:H7 in Weaned Calves

Cattle are an important reservoir of Shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli O157:H7 and other enterohemorrhagic E. coli (EHEC) that cause diarrhea, hemorrhagic colitis, and hemorrhagic uremic syndrome in humans. One strategy for reducing human foodborne EHEC infections is to reduce the levels of EHEC in cattle. Bovine O157:H7 infection models will facilitate identification of virulence factors involved in bovine infections. O157:H7 cause severe diarrhea and attaching and effacing (A/E) mucosal lesions in colostrum-deprived neonatal (< 2h) calves. We hypothesized that O157:H7 also cause A/E lesions in older calves, but these were not detected in earlier studies because intestinal levels of O157:H7 were too low (<106 CFU/g of tissue) for detection of focally distributed microscopic lesions. Weaned 3- to 4-month-old calves were fasted 48 h, inoculated via stomach tube with 1010 CFU of O157:H7 or nonpath-ogenic E. coli, necropsied 4d pi and examined histologically. Calves inoculated with O157:H7 had higher intestinal levels of inoculated E. coli than control animals. The rectum was the major site of colonization. A/E lesions were seen in the rectum and cecum of calves with high levels of O157:H7. Weaned calves, like neonatal calves, are susceptible to intestinal damage induced by EHEC O157:H7. The rectum and cecum may be principal sites of EHEC O157:H7 colonization during the carrier-shedder state in cattle.
Relativistic ponderomotive Hamiltonian of a Dirac particle in a vacuum laser field

Here, we report a point-particle ponderomotive model of a Dirac electron oscillating in a high-frequency field. Starting from the Dirac Lagrangian density, we derive a reduced phase-space Lagrangian that describes the relativistic time-averaged dynamics of such a particle in a geometrical-optics laser pulse propagating in vacuum. The pulse is allowed to have an arbitrarily large amplitude provided that radiation damping and pair production are negligible. The model captures the Bargmann-Michel-Telegdi (BMT) spin dynamics, the Stern-Gerlach spin-orbital coupling, the conventional ponderomotive forces, and the interaction with large-scale background fields (if any). Agreement with the BMT spin precession equation is shown numerically. The commonly known theory in which ponderomotive effects are incorporated in the particle effective mass is reproduced as a special case when the spin-orbital coupling is negligible. This model could be useful for studying laser-plasma interactions in relativistic spin-1/2 plasmas.
Why Can't Israel Win Wars Any More?

With its basic security against non-nuclear threats now essentially ensured, Israel should develop a greater ability to live with the pain inflicted by Hizbullah, Hamas and others like them.
Microsatellite deoxyribonucleic acid analysis to detect bladder cancer in bladder exstrophy

While it is recognized that bladder exstrophy is associated with an increased risk of bladder cancer, it is unclear whether this increased risk exists in all patients with an exstrophic bladder or merely in those with an exstrophic bladder that was not closed early in infancy. To our knowledge a rational schedule for surveillance of this population to monitor for bladder cancer has not been developed. Newly emerging in vitro technologies, such as microsatellite deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) analysis, may assist in the development of such surveillance protocols. To assess this potential we performed microsatellite analysis on an exstrophic bladder cancer specimen to search for evidence of genetic abnormalities that may be documented using this technique.
Harvesting social knowledge from folksonomies

Collaborative tagging systems, or folksonomies, have the potential of becoming technological infrastructure to support knowledge management activities in an organization or a society. There are many challenges, however. This paper presents designs that enhance collaborative tagging systems to meet some key challenges: community identification, ontology generation, user and document recommendation. Design prototypes, evaluation methodology and selected preliminary results are presented.
A Look at Web-based Instruction Today: An interview with Badrul Khan, Part 2

In part two of our interview with Badrul Khan, Ann Taylor and Badrul examine Web-based instruction in relation to Khan's "Framework for e-Learning." They also discuss Badrul's interviews with visionaries leading the way in technology-based education, and he shares advice for those just entering the Web-based instruction realm.
Prairie rattlesnake envenomation in 27 New World camelids.

Background Morbidity and case fatality from rattlesnake envenomation is regionally specific because of variability in relative toxicity of the species of snake encountered. A previous report of rattlesnake envenomation in New World camelids (NWC) from the western coastal United States documented high case fatality rates and guarded prognosis for survival. Hypothesis/Objectives To describe clinical findings, treatments, and outcome of NWC with prairie rattlesnake (Crotalus viridis viridis) envenomation in the Rocky Mountain region of the United States. Animals Twenty-seven NWC admitted to the Colorado State University Veterinary Teaching Hospital for evaluation of acute rattlesnake envenomation between 1992 and 2012. Methods Medical records of NWC evaluated for rattlesnake envenomation as coded by the attending clinician and identified by a database search were reviewed retrospectively. Month of admission, signalment, area of bite, clinical and clinicopathologic data, treatments, and outcome were recorded. Results Twenty-five llamas and 2 alpacas were admitted for envenomation. Llamas were overrepresented compared to hospital caseload. The face was the most common site of envenomation, observed in 96% of recorded cases. Presenting clinical signs included fever, tachypnea, tachycardia, and respiratory distress. Nine animals required a tracheotomy. Median hospitalization time was 3 days and overall survival rate was 69%. Conclusions and Clinical Importance Case fatality rate for prairie rattlesnake envenomation in NWC was lower than that reported in the Western coastal region of the United States and similar to that reported for prairie rattlesnake envenomation in horses.
The Call of the Sacred and the Language of Deterritorialization

The sacred exceeds our understanding and compels us to respond. I intend to broaden a definition of the sacred so that we can begin to see how it functions in less mystical and more mundane circumstances. The sacred call troubles, rather than easily calls forth, a rhetorical response, a reasonable discourse, or even an autonomous interlocutor or a stable ground from which to speak, and is distinguished from what Michael Hyde and others have described as the “call of conscience.” I then examine the call of the sacred in a Biblical text well known in the Christian, Jewish, and Islamic traditions (the Akedah), and in a contemporary text (Caryl Churchill's very recent and very brief Seven Jewish Children: A Play for Gaza) whose topic—the violence in Israel and Palestine—is decidedly political rather than religious but whose call, I will argue, is excessive, sacred, and unavoidable.
Investments in Infrastructure for Diverse Research Resources and the Health of the Public

Active surveillance of drugs and devices in the postmarket setting is an essential component of the lifecycle approach to drug evaluation. The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Amendments Act of 2007 (PL 110-85) required the agency to develop �a postmarket risk identification and analysis system.� In response, scientists from the FDA and investigators from collaborating institutions have been actively and productively engaged in the creation of the Sentinel Initiative, including the Mini-Sentinel pilot program,1 which has become an exciting and powerful research resource.
v-Abl Signaling Disrupts SOCS-1 Function in Transformed Pre-B Cells

The v-Abl oncogene activates Jak-Stat signaling during transformation of pre-B cells in mice. Disrupting Jak activation by deleting the Jak binding domain of v-Abl or by expressing a dominant-negative Jak1 decreases v-Abl transformation efficiency. As SOCS-1 is a known potent inhibitor of Jak kinases, the mechanism by which v-Abl bypasses SOCS-1 regulation to constitutively activate Jak kinases was investigated. SOCS-1 is expressed in v-Abl-transformed cells but is unable to inhibit v-Abl-mediated Jak-Stat signaling. In v-Abl transformants, SOCS-1 can inhibit cytokine signals, but it is more efficient at doing so when the cells are treated with STI571, an Abl kinase inhibitor. Downstream effects of v-Abl signaling include phosphorylation of SOCS-1 on nontyrosine residues, disruption of the interaction between SOCS-1 and the Elongin BC complex, and inhibition of SOCS-1-mediated proteasomal targeting of activated Jaks. These findings reveal a mechanism by which Jak-dependent oncogenes may bypass SOCS-1 inhibition.
Electron ionization-induced loss of a methyl radical from 1-cyclopropyl-4-substituted-1,2,3,6 tetrahydropyridine derivatives

The electron ionization mass spectra of 1-cyclopropyl-4-substituted-1,2,3,6-tetrahydropyridine derivatives are characterized by a base peak corresponding to [M-15]+. Evidence is presented to support a fragmentation process involving an initial cyclopropyl ring opening of the parent cyclopropylaminyl radical cation followed by intramolecular transfer of a hydrogen atom from the ring carbon atoms α to nitrogen to the primary carbon-centered radical and finally a fragmentation step proceeding by loss of a methyl radical and formation of a stable N-ethenyldihydropyridinium ion, the [M-15]+ fragment.
The Ethics of Species: An Introduction

Ronald L. Sandler's The Ethics of Species: An Introduction offers rich and carefully constructed views about crucial issues bearing on his topic: the nature and value of species and their members; ...
The antigenic determinant that defines thymic nurse cells is expressed by thymic epithelial progenitor cells

Stromal thymic epithelial cells with the multicellular structure unique to thymic nurse cells (TNCs) express the pH91 antigen on their cell surfaces. The multicellular TNC-complexes develop through an intimate association between αβTCR+CD4+CD8+ thymocytes and pH91-expressing cortical epithelial cells. TNCs participate in MHC-restriction and exhibit epithelial cell progenitor characteristics. In this report, we show that as early as E11.5 stage of thymus development, the pH91 antigen is expressed in association with K8, K5, Foxn1 and p63. The expression of these epithelial progenitor markers along with the pH91 antigen persists throughout thymic development in the murine thymus. At E13.5, pH91+ cells express relatively low levels of MHC class II. After E17.5, the first multicellular TNC complexes are recognizable along with increased cell surface expression of MHC class II. Our data suggest that epithelial cells bearing the “progenitor phenotype” develop into the multicellular TNCs.
Flow cytometric evaluation of epithelial ovarian cancer

We investigated the prognostic significance of deoxyribonucleic acid content and proliferative activity of tumor cell populations as measured by flow cytometry of the tumor specimens from 115 women with epithelial ovarian cancer. Deoxyribonucleic acid aneuploidy was found in 87 of 115 (76%) of these cancers with a mean deoxyribonucleic acid index of 1.6 and S-phase fraction of 14.7%. The S-phase fraction of the 28 (24%) diploid tumors was 7.0%. Deoxyribonucleic acid ploidy was significantly correlated with survival. S-phase fraction was significantly correlated with ploidy, residual tumor, histology, grade, ascites, time to recurrence, and survival. Diploidy versus aneuploidy were the best discriminating values for deoxyribonucleic acid index and an S-phase fraction of greater or less than 18% for that parameter. Multivariate analysis revealed stage, S-phase fraction, residual tumor, and grade to be independently associated with time to recurrence, and stage, age, S-phase fraction, and largest metastases were factors associated with survival. Deoxyribonucleic acid ploidy did not significantly improve either model. These results suggest that abnormalities of deoxyribonucleic acid content and the proliferative activity of tumor cell populations are reflective of their biologic activity.
Distributed extremum seeking and cooperative control for mobile communication

In this paper, the integrated control and optimization problem of mobile cooperative communication clusters is considered. Each communication channel is modeled by its Shannon capacity outage probability. Hence, connectivity is maintained if the outage probability is less than a certain threshold. The objective of the communication network is to not only maintain communication quality but also extend the coverage. An information theory based performance index is defined to quantify this control objective. Unlike most of the existing results, the proposed cooperative control design does not assume the knowledge of any gradient (of the performance index). Rather, a distributed extremum seeking cooperative control is designed to optimize the connectivity and coverage of each of mobile communication nodes by feeding back only the motion information of its neighboring nodes and by measuring the current performance of its communication channel(s). The proposed approach retains all the advantages of cooperative control (such as requiring only local feedback and tolerating switching topologies) and searches autonomously for the optimal spacings based on typical communication models. Simulation results demonstrate effectiveness of the proposed methodology.
Mid- to Late Pleistocene Ice Drift in the Western Arctic Ocean: Evidence for a Different Circulation in the Past

The provenance of ice-rafted debris (IRD) in four Arctic sediment cores implies that icebergs from the northwestern Laurentide ice sheets drifted across the western Arctic Ocean along the 180°–0° meridian toward Fram Strait during mid- to late Pleistocene deglaciations within the last 700,000 years. This iceberg drift was different from the present-day Beaufort Gyre circulation and resembled a dislocated transpolar drift (TPD). Sea ice mainly followed the iceberg trajectories but also frequently drifted from the Russian shelves eastward into the Amerasian Basin.
A directed DNA sequencing strategy based upon Tn3 transposon mutagenesis: application to the ADE1 locus on Saccharomyces cerevisiae chromosome I

Abstract We have developed a directed DNA sequencing strategy based upon the Escherichia coli transposon Tn3. This transposon displays little sequence specificity for transposition and is thus well suited to this task. Both mini-Tn3 transposons and sequencing vectors bearing the phage f1 single stranded origin of replication have been constructed. Upon mutagenesis of a target sequence, a population is produced in which each clone has two f1 origins of replication, one of which is at a variable position depending upon the transposon insertion site. When helper phage is added to the mutagenised population, the two f1 origins present on each clone are nicked, dividing the packaged strand into two segments, each of which is packaged into a separate phage particle. One of these segments contains no resistance markers and is lost, whilst the other is recovered as a deleted clone with a single chimeric f1 origin. A unidirectionally, variably-deleted set of sequencing clones is produced, and appropriately sized clones are sequenced using a primer complimentary to the transposon end. In addition to being inexpensive, the method does not require the same degree of technical expertise needed for many in vitro, enzymatically based methods. The strategy has been used to determine 2.6 kilobases of nucleotide sequence in the Saccharomyces cerevisiae ADE 1 locus.
Current Switching in MgO-Based Magnetic Tunneling Junctions

Spin-transfer induced magnetization switching in a MgO-based magnetic tunneling junction (MTJ) has been measured over a wide time range. It was found that the switching current response is asymmetric going from the high resistance state to the low resistance state and vice versa. This asymmetry must be taken into consideration to optimize the read-write margin for a 1T1R (single transistor, single MTJ) memory device design, especially since the driving current that the transistor can supply is also asymmetric. The MTJ and the transistor characteristics need to be adjusted so that the spin-transfer switching current asymmetry matches the transistor driving current asymmetry at the desired operating speed. A new device configuration is proposed to achieve this optimization.
Development of potentially degradable materials for marine applications. III. Polyethylene‐polyethylene oxide blends

The effect of a simulated marine environment on unstabilized polyethylene-polyethylene oxide blends, having varying polyethylene oxide content (up to 40% by weight), with or without a metal catalyst (e.g., cobalt (III) acetylacetonate) and a metal containing plasticizer (e.g., aluminum stearate), has been studied for 10 weeks exposure time. In the absence of metal catalyst and plasticizer, phase separation of polyethylene oxide was quite evident visually after melt mixing and subsequent regular compression molding of polyethylene-polyethylene oxide blends. However, these blends rendered better and uniform mixing in the presence of metal catalyst and plasticizer. Since polyethylene oxide is a water soluble component of the system, % weight loss increased significantly with increase in its content after exposure to brine. These blends have been further characterized by tensile properties, optical and scanning electron microscopy, and thermal analysis in order to monitor mechanical as well as morphological changes.
On the Discriminability of the Handwriting of Twins

Abstract: As handwriting is influenced by physiology, training, and other behavioral factors, a study of the handwriting of twins can shed light on the individuality of handwriting. This paper describes the methodology and results of such a study where handwriting samples of twins were compared by an automatic handwriting verification system. The results complement that of a previous study where a diverse population was used. The present study involves samples of 206 pairs of twins, where each sample consisted of a page of handwriting. The verification task was to determine whether two half-page documents (where the original samples were divided into upper and lower halves) were written by the same individual. For twins there were 1236 verification cases—including 824 tests where the textual content of writing was different, and 412 tests where it was the same. An additional set of 1648 test cases were obtained from handwriting samples of nontwins (general population). To make the handwriting comparison, the system computed macro features (overall pictorial attributes), micro features (characteristics of individual letters), and style features (characteristics of whole-word shapes and letter pairs). Four testing scenarios were evaluated: twins and nontwins writing the same text and writing different texts. Results of the verification tests show that the handwriting of twins is less discriminable than that of nontwins: an overall error rate of 12.91% for twins and 3.7% for nontwins. Error rates with identical twins were higher than with fraternal twins. Error rates in all cases can be arbitrarily reduced by rejecting (not making a decision on) borderline cases. A level of confidence in the results obtained is given by the fact that system error rates are comparable to that of humans (lower than that of lay persons and higher than that of questioned document examiners [QDEs]).