cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Immunologic and pathologic responses of cows to naturally occurring Mycoplasma bovis mastitis

Abstract Systemic humoral and cell-mediated immune responses of four Holstein cows with natural Mycoplasma bovis mastitis were evaluated to determine whether a relationship exists between systemic cellular and humoral responses and the pathogenesis and resolution of infection. In vitro lymphocyte activation tests of peripheral blood lymphocytes and in vivo skin tests with M. bovis antigens provided evidence that cell-mediated immune responses against M. bovis may be involved in successful resolution or containment of infection. In several observation it appeared that viable M. bovis and their aqueous extracts are suppressive to cell-mediated responses. Humoral responses were determined by the serum indirect hemagglutination (IHA) test and the growth inhibition test. The IHA titers after approximately 2 weeks of infection were elevated; however, 75–87% of the IHA activity was in the IgM antibody class. The cell-mediated immune responses may be necessary for resolution of mycoplasmal mastitis both directly and via their helper cell function on antibody production. However, it appears that immune injury to mammary tissue results from the immunologic response to infective mycoplasma. Presence of locally secreted antibody and locally active immune cells may provide a better indication of those animals in the process of resolving the infection than was observed using systemic indicators of immune responsiveness such as indirect hemagglutination or growth inhibition tests.
A tissue culture model of murine gammaherpesvirus replication reveals roles for the viral cyclin in both virus replication and egress from infected cells.

Passage through the eukaryotic cell cycle is regulated by the activity of cyclins and their cyclin-dependent kinase partners. Rhadinoviruses, such as Kaposi’s sarcoma-associated herpesvirus (KSHV) and murine gammaherpesvirus 68 (MHV68), encode a viral homologue of mammalian D-type cyclins. In MHV68, the interaction of the viral cyclin with its CDK partners is important for acute replication in the lungs following low dose inoculation. Attempts to further study this requirement in vitro have been limited by the lack of available tissue culture models that mimic the growth defect observed in vivo. It is hypothesized that analysis of virus replication in a cell line that displays properties of primary airway epithelium, such as the ability to polarize, might provide a suitable environment to characterize the role of the v-cyclin in virus replication. We report here MHV68 replication in the rat lung cell line RL-65, a non-transformed polarizable epithelial cell line. These analyses reveal a role for the v-cyclin in both virus replication, as well as virus egress from infected cells. As observed for acute replication in vivo, efficient replication in RL-65 cells requires CDK binding. However, we show that the KSHV v-cyclin (K-cyclin), which utilizes different CDK partners (CDK4 and CDK6) than the MHV68 v-cyclin (CDK2 and CDC2), can partially rescue the replication defect observed with a v-cyclin null mutant – both in vitro and in vivo. Finally, we show that MHV68 is shed from both the apical and basolateral surfaces of polarized RL-65 cells. In summary, the RL-65 cell line provides an attractive in vitro model that mimics critical aspects of MHV68 replication in the lungs.
New records of the West Indian manatee (Trichechus manatus) from the Bahama Islands

Abstract The first positive sighting of a manatee ( Trichechus manatus ) in the Bahama Islands in more than 70 years was made on 12 September 1975 at West End, Grand Bahama Island. The only previous record was from the Bimini Island group in 1904 . A dead manatee was found near Freeport, Grand Bahama Island, in November 1975 . The skull, which was preserved, had a condylobasal length of 36·8 cm. Speculation concerning the origin of these animals is offered: a local population; immigration from Florida or other islands in the Bahamas; and importation by man. The manatee population in the Bahamas might be limited by freshwater sources. An aerial survey should be conducted to assess the manatee population, if any, in the Bahama Islands.
Comparative thermal properties of the monohydrates of sodium theophylline and theophylline

The thermal properties of sodium theophylline monohydrate, as determined by differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), thermogravimetric (TG) analysis and hot stage microscopy, were studied and compared with those of theophylline monohydrate. The onset of dehydration of sodium theophylline monohydrate varied between 170 and 264 degrees C depending on the atmospheric conditions surrounding the sample. Under similar conditions, dehydration of theophylline monohydrate occurred at 18 to 65 degrees C. Sodium theophylline melted with the onset of a DSC endotherm at 391 degrees C. Possible effects of the physicochemical properties of sodium theophylline monohydrate on its dosage forms and the expected superiority of the sodium salt over theophylline and aminophylline are discussed.
Coagulation Abnormalities in Acute Lung Injury and Sepsis

Intraalveolar and intravascular fibrin deposition is frequently found in the setting of acute lung injury (ALI) or acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) (1, 2). Fibrin deposits enhance inflammatory response by increasing vascular permeability, activating endothelial cells to produce proinflammatory cytokines and other mediators, inducing the accumulation of activated neutrophils, and modulating immunoregulatory responses in the lung. Infusions of endotoxin produce fibrin deposits in the lung and other organs, and these widespread intravascular alterations are postulated to contribute to multiple organ dysfunction in sepsis (3, 4, 5). Fan and colleagues now show that hemorrhagic shock can potentiate the effects of small doses of endotoxin, creating a procoagulant milieu in the lungs, in which reactive oxygen intermediates (ROI) and tumor necrosis factora (TNFa ) produced by alveolar macrophages have important roles (6). Procoagulant activity is enhanced in the lungs of patients with ARDS (7, 8). Levels of tissue factor, a pivotal mediator in the extrinsic coagulation pathway, are increased in ARDS bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) specimens, and tissue factor appears to occupy an important role in the ARDS-associated procoagulant state (9, 10). In addition, fibrinolytic processes are inhibited in ALI, as shown by increased BAL concentrations of plasminogen activator inhibitor 1 (PAI-1), and may also contribute to fibrin generation in ALI (11). In experimental models of endotoxemia, early increases in the anticoagulant tissue plasminogen activator are rapidly followed by sustained elevations in PAI-1, leading to a prolonged antifibrinolytic state (12).
Exploring access in the developing world: people, libraries and information technology in Morocco

Purpose – This paper aims to explore the information technology environment in a developing country, Morocco, through a discussion of the people, their information environment, and libraries. Concepts of modern library and information studies (LIS) education and the new role of the library professional in this context are also to be explored.Design/methodology/approach – Largely based on a review of literature on the people, their information environment, and technology in Morocco, this paper incorporates both synthesis and discussion from an LIS point‐of‐view.Findings – Basic elements of the culture make library work difficult in Morocco. In reflecting on other cultures and participating in the international LIS dialogue, librarians can develop new perspectives on difficulties they experience at their home institutions while contributing to solutions of problems abroad.Practical implications – By supporting library work in developing countries, western librarians can have a positive impact on users both ...
Effect of hindbrain lesions on conjugate horizontal eye movements in cats.

The present study was instigated to determine whether horizontal conjugate deviations of different origins are separately mediated, or whether all types of horizontal eye movements utilize one common anatomical substrate or “centre”. In addition, an attempt was made to gain information on oculomotor pathways between midbrain and medulla. Functional deficits in horizontal conjugate eye movements were assessed following placement of acute and chronic lesions in the hindbrain of cats. Sites in brain stem and cortex were stimulated unilaterally to evoke eye movements in the encephale isole preparation. Pre-lesion responses from the same sites served as controls for the effect of acute lesions, and responses evoked from homotopic sites served as controls for the effect of chronic (3-week) lesions. Acute or chronic destruction of an area in the postero-medial medulla depressed or abolished eye movements evoked from the contralateral superior colliculus without altering responses evoked from the occipital cortex. In contrast, destruction of an area 2–3 mm antero-lateral, just posterior to the level of the sixth nucleus, depressed cortically evoked movements without affecting those from the superior colliculus. Lesions in the lateral pontine tegmentum depressed or altered responses to stimulation in the contralateral superior colliculus and, rarely, in the occipital cortex. More lateral pontine lesions altered conjugate deviations evoked from stimulation in the ipsilateral medulla. Although the majority of hindbrain lesions were followed by a deficit in one or more types of evoked conjugate deviations to the right, no one lesion abolished all horizontal eye movements. The results indicate that there is no single supranuclear area in the hindbrain of the cat the removal of which abolishes all types of lateral gaze. Rather, mediation of conjugate horizontal deviations of occipital cortical origin appears to require the integrity of neuronal elements distinct from those mediating collicular responses, possibly reflecting differential mediation of “phasic” and “tonic” components of eye movements. Oculomotor pathways between midbrain and medulla in the cat include a lateral component through the pontine level, whose interruption in some cases resulted in loss of abduction with preservation of adduction rather than the more typical conjugate defect following a supranuclear lesion.
Choice behavior in dynamic environments

Abstract The effects of shifting ecological validities in two single-cue environments ( r e : .895 → .634 and .634 →. 895) on subjects' consistency and achievement were examined. The amount of information about the shift and the number of preshift trials were also varied. Results showed a significant order effect and that subjects probability matched under both preshift ecologies but highly overstructured in the .634 postshift ecology and understructured in the .895 postshift ecology. Differential performance across blocks was observed for the postshift ecologies. No systematic effects were obtained for the information and number of preshift trial variables. The results were discussed in the frameworks of the Brunswik normative lens model and the AB—BA transfer paradigm.
Hydromagnetic stability of dissipative flow between rotating permeable cylinders. Part 2. Oscillatory critical modes and asymptotic results

In considering the onset of instability of an electrically conducting fluid between rotating permeable perfectly conducting cylinders in an applied axial magnetic field, it is found that oscillatory axially symmetric modes occur at large values of Hartmann number, in addition to the usual stationary modes. Results are presented showing the effect of the oscillatory modes on the criterion of onset of instability.The asymptotic behaviour of the stability criterion is considered in the limit of very large radial Reynolds number, and also in the limit where both the radial Reynolds number and the Hartmann number are large.
Deep recombination centers in a-Si:H

Abstract The nature of the deep recombination centers in a-Si:H is still a matter of considerable uncertainty. We present results here of transient ESR arising from dangling bonds in doped and undoped material at temperatures, defect levels and/or excitation energies for which direct band edge recombination is negligible. The efficiency for spin creation by sub- and near-band edge light is determined in the linear response regime in doped samples and is found to be of order unity. Thus, almost all recombination proceeds via a dangling bond, directly for sub-gap excitation or by a Shockley-Read mechanism for band edge excitation. The rate-limiting process for recombination is capture by neutral dangling bonds, D 0 , of electrons in undoped and n-type samples and of holes in p-type material.
Peasant moorings: Village ties and mobility rationales in South India

Preface - J L Racine PART ONE To Migrate or Stay? - P D Mahadev and J L Racine Rural Systems Adapted to High Densities of Population - P J Roca Land and Men of South Karnataka Moorings and Mobility in an Indian Context - M A Kalam An Anthropological Perspective PART TWO Migration and Moorings in the Maidan - F Landy Mobility and Change in the Western Ghats - B N Shivalingappa Agrarian Structure and Patterns of Mobility - K Nagaraj A Case Study of Two Villages in Dakshina Kannada District Rural Non-Agricultural Employment and the Retention of Village Population - H Gu[ac]etat-Bernard A Case Study of Mysore and Mandya Districts PART THREE The Roots of Man - J L Racine
Mapping micro-urban heat islands using LANDSAT TM and a GIS

Abstract LANDSAT TM satellite data and GIS software were used to map micro-urban heat islands in a portion of Dallas, Texas. Unsupervised classifications were performed on a LANDSAT subscene to extract tree cover information which was merged with TM band 6 data (thermal) to make a map showing the location of micro-urban heat islands and wooded areas. Results indicate the presence of micro-urban heat islands are resulting from the lack of tree cover related to newly developed residential neighborhoods, parking lots, business districts, apartment complexes, and shopping centers. All micro-urban heat islands were radiative in nature, with highest temperatures in the center.
Analysis of blood and lymph vascularization patterns in tissue-engineered human dermo-epidermal skin analogs of different pigmentation

Bioengineered dermo-epidermal skin analogs containing melanocytes represent a promising approach to cover large skin defects including restoration of the patient’s own skin color. So far, little is known about the development of blood and lymphatic vessels in pigmented skin analogs after transplantation. In this experimental study, we analyzed the advancement and differences of host blood and lymphatic vessel ingrowth into light- and dark-pigmented human tissue-engineered skin analogs in a rat model. Keratinocytes, melanocytes, and fibroblasts from light- and dark-pigmented skin biopsies were isolated, cultured, and expanded. For each donor, melanocytes and keratinocytes were seeded in ratios of 1:1, 1:5, and 1:10 onto fibroblast-containing collagen gels. The skin analogs were subsequently transplanted onto full-thickness wounds of immuno-incompetent rats and quantitatively analyzed for vascular and lymphatic vessel density after 8 and 15 weeks. The skin analogs revealed a significant difference in vascularization patterns between light- and dark-pigmented constructs after 8 weeks, with a higher amount of blood vessels in light compared to dark skin. In contrast, no obvious difference could be detected within the light- and dark-pigmented group when varying melanocyte/keratinocyte ratios were used. However, after 15 weeks, the aforementioned difference in blood vessel density between light and dark constructs could no longer be detected. Regarding lymphatic vessels, light and dark analogs showed similar vessel density after 8 and 15 weeks, while there were generally less lymphatic than blood vessels. These data suggest that, at least during early skin maturation, keratinocytes, melanocytes, and fibroblasts from different skin color types used to construct pigmented dermo-epidermal skin analogs have distinct influences on the host tissue after transplantation. We speculate that different VEGF expression patterns might be involved in this disparate revascularization pattern observed.
Corticotropin (ACTH) in Heart Disease: Its Paradoxical Effect on Sodium Excretion in Resistant Congestive Failure

Since the spring of 1952 we have undertaken a clinical trial of corticotropin in 21 cardiac patients with resistant edema. Of these, there were eight with arteriosclerotic, eight with chronic rheumatic, and three with hypertensive heart disease, while two had cor pulmonale. Beneficial results were obtained in 17, or 81 per cent of the cases. These consisted of a spontaneous diuresis either during corticotropin administration or after its withdrawal, or an alteration of response to mercurials, the patients subsequently responding favorably, whereas they had previously been completely refractory to the mercurial diuretics.
Trends in Description of Saxophone Timbre

Three studies examined how listeners use adjectives to describe saxophone timbres. Descriptions were collected from 97 untrained non-musicians who were exposed to recorded tones of tenor saxophones of stylistically distinct jazz musicians. A lack of universality in characterizations of timbre was found when subjects were required to supply their own adjectives and when they were required to select from a list of 43 adjectives. Of course, considerable agreement among listeners occurred with respect to several timbres when the use of seven-point bipolar scales (hard/soft, rough/smooth, etc.) was required. Scale descriptions matched many ratings which are popularly applied by musicians and journalists. It was concluded that certain adjectives are particularly appropriate for describing saxophone timbres and that their appropriateness has led to their common use among musicians. It was also noted that the nature of these characterizations (calling a tone “hard” or “rough”, for example) is consistent with the ...
Comments on “Anonymous reviews”

I'd like to suggest that the recent letters complaining about reviewers' anonymity are on the wrong track. What we need is more anonymity, not less: we need double-blind mandatory anonymity. The main argument proposed so far is the unfairness of not being able to confront the reviewers' criticisms. But you don't need to know who someone is to be able to argue against their ideas. Reviewers' reports are spelled out clearly and can be rebutted without getting into personalities.
UNICEF and the UN Security Council

David Woodwards Comment "Vote buying in the UN Security Council" is based on a Harvard University study that displays a profound lack of understanding of the process by which UNICEF funds programmes on behalf of children and families in the worlds poorest countries. Had Woodward contacted us to respond we would have explained that UNICEF has very strict funding rules for countries based on specific indicators of childrens health and well-being. All contributions to UNICEF are divided into two categories. The first category consists of core resources which are allocated to country programmes in accordance with a board-approved formula based on under-5 mortality rates gross national income per head and then absolute size of the child population. These resources are distributed as part of multi-year plans that are developed with host governments and approved by our 36-member Executive Board to ensure the best results for children. The second category consists of earmarked resources generated for global development issues such as malaria polio or HIV/AIDS and for emergencies such as the 2004 tsunami. Most funds contributed by the USA to UNICEF are core funds and therefore cannot be earmarked for a particular country. None of the earmarked resources is attached in any way to whether or not a country has a seat on the UN Security Council. UNICEF has never been a channel through which any country can try to exercise influence over members of the Security Council. Our system of funding for children is as fair equitable and honest as our millions of generous supporters expect and deserve. (full text)
In the absence of ethnicity

A mong the reasons why so much confusion surrounds the interpretation of the African-American experience is the failure of scholars to properly understand the unique characteristics of AfricanAmerican culture. Or, put in a slightly different way, too many insist on treating the dominant Anglo-American culture, its many European-American ethnic variants, and African-American culture as though they exist at the same conceptual level. In the years before 1967, when I naively thought I might grow up to be a sociologist, I often taught a course called Race and Ethnicity. It was a standard course in American sociology departments, much like Social Problems, Sociological Theory, Marriage and the Family, and Introductory Sociology in that no self-respecting sociology department would have been without it. Of course, it was taught in different ways, but the underlying assumption wherever I studied and taught was that race and ethnicity were much the same and that the same theories used to study U.S. immigrant populations could also be applied to U.S. Negroes. Although I dutifully taught the course in this way, I never quite convinced myself that blacks fit this framework. I seemed to spend an inordinate amount of time reinterpreting the black experience in ways that were foreign to me as an African-American in order to make it fit the sociological assumptions of the time. Part of the problem was that so little was known of black history in white universities before the 1970s. Sociologists were theorizing about a people of whose past they knew little. Shortly after I finally realized I was never going to be smart enough to be a sociologist and enrolled in graduate school in history, a number of my fe l low graduate s tudents and I were discussing our research interests. When I said I wanted to study African-American history, one said in surprise, "Why I didn't realize you people had any history." This statement is actually not as racist as it sounds. What he meant was that, as historians largely rely on documents in their research and blacks had left few of them, there could be no black history. Of course, when scholars went looking for these documents they found far more than they could handle, but prior to the 1970s most sociologists knew little about black history and so found it easy to prune the black experience to fit their ethnicity model. There were few black sociologists around to correct them, although some, such as Oliver Cromwell Cox in his Caste, Class, and Race (1948), did their very best.
Body Composition Comparison: Bioelectric Impedance Analysis with Dual-Energy X-Ray Absorptiometry in Adult Athletes

The primary purpose of this study was to investigate the accuracy of the DF50 (ImpediMed Ltd, Eight Mile Plains, Queensland, Australia) bioelectrical impedance analysis device using dual-energy x-ray absorptiometry as the criterion in two groups: endurance athletes and power athletes. The secondary purpose was to develop accurate body fat percentage prediction equations for each group based on bioelectrical impedance analysis data and/or the combination of bioelectrical impedance analysis and anthropometric data. Eighty male athletes (40 elite endurance athletes and 40 were power athletes), age 19–48 with body mass indexes ranging from 18.9 to 37.4 were recruited. Anthropometric measurements were taken. Body composition was assessed by dual-energy x-ray absorptiometry and bioelectrical impedance analysis. An athlete-specific bioelectrical impedance analysis prediction equation was developed by stepwise regression analysis using dual-energy x-ray absorptiometry as the criterion and bioelectrical impedance ...
A Novel Sequence-Structure Approach for Accurate Prediction of Resistance to HIV-1 Protease Inhibitors

Phenotypic tests are useful for measuring the degree of resistance of HIV-1 protease mutants to commercially available inhibitors. However, these tests are expensive and time-consuming, and phenotyping has been performed on only a fraction of the nearly 400 distinct patient-derived protease mutants. We employed a computational mutagenesis methodology, incorporating both sequence and structure information, to generate a feature vector representation for each of the isolated protease mutants. Training sets were prepared for seven protease inhibitors, each consisting of protease mutants with known phenotypes. Four machine-learning algorithms were implemented, and random forest performed best at distinguishing between sensitive/resistant mutants based on area under the ROC curve (0.81 -0.92). Trained models were used to make predictions about recently assayed protease mutants and displayed 83% agreement with the experimental data. The results suggest that susceptibility of unassayed protease mutants to each inhibitor can be reliably predicted.
Relations between N=2 discrete-series supercurrents and lattice models

Abstract Bosonic realizations of supercurrents for some products of discrete-series representations of N=2 superconformal algebras are constructed. They are related to lattice models.
Income Inequality, Democracy, and Public Sector Size:

This study synthesizes and tests explanations of how public sector size and democracy affect income inequality. The results, based on unbalanced panel data for 64 developing and developed countries...
Comparison of photochemical behavior of various humic substances in water: I. Sunlight induced reactions of aquatic pollutants photosensitized by humic substances

Abstract Humic substances are shown to photosensitize transformations of several types of synthethic chemicals that do not photoreact when exposed to sunlight in distilled water. In most cases, photoproducts were the same in colored natural waters and in solutions of soil-derived humic substances, including those obtained commercially. Kinetic studies in sunlight indicated that the efficiencies of the reactions photosensitized by humic substances of various origins were the same within a factor of 2.
Simple guidelines for optimizing power splitter asymmetries in SOA-based Mach-Zehnder wavelength converters

We demonstrate that significant performance penalties will occur in SOA-based Mach-Zehnder wavelength converters when design optimization is limited solely to phase and current biases. We present simple design rules to optimize the optical power splitter asymmetries and validate them using pseudo-random code in a comprehensive numerical model. Dramatic improvements in eye margin and extinction are confirmed.
Flexible application for consolidation and presentation of intelligence, and surveillance reconnaissance data

Unattended Ground Sensors have found widespread usefulness in force and asset protection, border patrol and, drug enforcement. In recent years their application has extended into ground and air surveillance providing additional data from disparate networked Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance resources. The consolidation of this data and effective presentation through software applications efficiently communicates critical information that helps the analyst support persistent surveillance missions. This paper presents the interface such flexible applications with an emphasis on their presentation elements and information content.
Do Light Rail Transit Planning Decisions Affect Metropolitan Transit Performance? Examination of Eight U.S. Metropolitan Areas with Light Rail Transit Backbones

In 2011, light rail transit (LRT) in eight U. S. metropolitan areas—Phoenix, Arizona; Sacramento and San Diego, California; Denver, Colorado; Saint Louis, Missouri; Portland, Oregon; Dallas, Texas; and Salt Lake City, Utah—carried 20% or more of the metropolitan area's total fixed-route ridership. The study reported in this paper explored the role of socioeconomic, planning, and operational factors as influences on LRT and metropolitan fixed-route performance in these eight areas, where LRT might function as a backbone around which other transit services were organized. Of particular interest were the planning and operational decisions over which planners and policy makers exercised some control. With the use of a combination of national and agency data, the eight areas were ranked on criteria with a basis in the optimal conditions suggested by a review of the literature. These rankings were then related to performance. The results showed that although socioeconomic factors were important influences on pe...
Semantically-smart disk systems: past, present, and future

In this paper we describe research that has been on-going within our group for the past four years on semantically-smart disk systems. A semantically-smart system goes beyond typical block-based storage systems by extracting higher-level information from the stream of traffic to disk; doing so enables new and interesting pieces of functionality to be implemented within low-level storage systems. We first describe the development of our efforts over the past four years, highlighting the key technologies needed to build semantically-smart systems as well as the main weaknesses of our approach. We then discuss future directions in the design and implementation of smarter storage systems.
Coatings For Laser Fusion

Optical coatings are used in lasers systems for fusion research to control beam propagation and reduce surface reflection losses. The performance of coatings is important in the design, reliability, energy output, and cost of the laser systems. Significant developments in coating technology are required for future lasers for fusion research and eventual power reactors.
Towards a model of team learning

Team learning is not a well researched or examined phenomenon. This paper describes a team learning model that grew out of case study research in one company. The model is derived in part by drawing on the literatures of both group dynamics and adult learning. Team learning processes and phases are described and illustrated. The paper concludes with implications for adult educators who work with teams in organisations.
Castration‐like effects on the human prostate of a 5α‐reductase inhibitor, finasteride

Epidemiological studies strongly support the contention that surgical castration prior to age forty prevents both benign prostatic hypertrophy (BPH) and prostate cancer. 5 alpha-Reductase deficiency in humans, an experiment of nature, is an uncommon genetically transmitted disorder in which prostate size remains very small throughout adult life. A 5 alpha-reductase inhibitor, finasteride, has recently been shown in double-blind, placebo-controlled trials in patients with BPH to statistically decrease prostate size and improve clinical symptoms in comparison to placebo controls. In the untreated BPH prostate, tissue levels of dihydrotestosterone (DHT) and testosterone (T) averaged 4.2 and 0.2 ng/g, respectively. Following one week of finasteride therapy, T levels rose to a mean of 1.32 ng/g while DHT levels decreased to 0.62 ng/g. These values contrast with values in prostate tissue from surgical castrates in which DHT and T values average 1.14 ng/g and 0.1 ng/g, respectively. If we use the relative binding affinity of T and DHT to the androgen receptor as a criterion of biological androgen potency, T would appear to be one-fourth as potent as DHT. Using this 1:4 ratio to convert prostatic T to a biologically equivalent amount of prostatic DHT, the total biologically active DHT equivalent in the prostate following one week of finasteride averages 0.95 ng/g compared to a mean of 1.14 ng/g in surgical castrates.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
Using microgrids to integrate distributed renewables into the grid

This paper explores the structure, use, and value of microgrids as a device to better integrate into the electrical grid small quantities of local, distributed power generated from renewable resources like solar and wind. The paper describes the evolution of microgrids, their potential benefits, their design and structure, and their overall value in moving electricity generation toward a more sustainable model.
Effects of butanol isomers on dipalmitoylphosphatidylcholine bilayer membranes

Abstract Differential scanning calorimetry and 31P-NMR were used to study the effects of butanol isomers on the thermotropic phase behavior of dipalmitoylphosphatidylcholine (DPPC) bilayers. The threshold concentration for the onset of interdigitation for each isomer was determined by the disappearance of the pretransition and the onset of a large hysteresis between the heating and cooling scans of the gel-to-liquid main transition. The threshold concentration was found to correlate with increased solubility of the isomers in the aqueous phase, led by tert-butanol. However, as the solution concentration of tert-butanol increased, there was an abrupt shrinking of the hysteresis, initially with well-resolved shoulder peaks indicating mixed phases. The eventual disappearance of the shoulder peaks was correlated with a breakdown of the multilamellar structure identified using 31P-NMR.
Out of the Blue? Democracy and Privatization in Postcommunist Europe

This paper coins the term ‘privatization framework’ to capture postcommunist privatization's often neglected distributive dimension. Privatization frameworks are ranged from those that primarily reward political and enterprise insiders to those that reward outsiders. This paper then asks whether the choice and success of a privatization framework are related to political regime type. Illiberal democracies tend to choose privatization programs that reward insiders. This cements insiders' political influence and contributes to corrupt interaction between the public and private economic spheres. Subsequent poor economic performance combined with ongoing conflict over political institutions may produce a ‘break point’ at which societies can decide to move in a democratic direction. Liberal democracies, by contrast, have no predisposition to an outsider- or an insider-based privatization framework. Insiders will have more resources to bring to the fight over privatization programs where reform communists led or contributed to the ‘break’ from communism. Nevertheless, the competitive processes inherent to liberal democracies prevent even poorly managed insider privatization from prolonging destructive rent-seeking practices. As a result, liberal democratic regimes are likely to perform better than illiberal democratic and authoritarian regimes in implementing postcommunist structural reforms.
Magnetic frustrations and magnetic order in CeAl3 and related alloys

Abstract Pseudobinary Ce 1− x La x Al 3 and Ce 1− x Y x Al 3 alloys have been studied via X-ray diffraction, magnetic susceptibility and specific heat. The heavy fermion state in CeAl 3 is unstable toward local-moment antiferromagnetism. Our results imply the heavy fermion state and magnetic order are mutually exclusive in this compound.
Assessment of risk factors for oxacillin-resistant ocular flora in eyes having cataract surgery

Purpose To assess the risk factors for eyes of cataract surgery patients harboring oxacillin-resistant Staphylococcus species on the ocular surface. Setting Ambulatory surgical center, Saint Louis University, Saint Louis, Missouri, USA. Design Prospective in vitro laboratory study of a patient cohort. Methods Conjunctival cultures were obtained on the day of surgery from eyes scheduled for cataract surgery. Patients answered a questionnaire about risk factors that might lead to having oxacillin-resistant Staphylococcus organisms in their eyes. The factors tested were age, sex, race, recent systemic and topical antibiotic usage, recent hospitalization, and exposure to healthcare and institutional settings. Logistic regression analysis was performed. Results Of the 183 eyes cultured, 128 (70.0%) tested positive for Staphylococcus organisms, of which 70 (54.7%) were oxacillin-resistant. Only recent antibiotic usage was statistically significantly associated with the presence of oxacillin-resistant organisms (odds ratio, 8.2; 95% confidence interval, 2.2-30.5; P =.002). The other risk factors were not statistically significantly associated: age ( P =.06), sex ( P =.33), race ( P =.34), recent hospitalization ( P =.94), and exposure to healthcare and institutional settings ( P =.10). Conclusions Although the nonophthalmic literature has reported various risk factors for the harboring of oxacillin-resistant organisms, in the eyes in this study, only antibiotic usage within 30 days preoperatively was significantly associated with the colonization of oxacillin-resistant organisms on the ocular surface. This finding is important to ophthalmic surgeons when considering perioperative antibiotic prophylaxis. Financial Disclosure No author has a financial or proprietary interest in any material or method mentioned.
Structural implications of drug-resistant mutants of HIV-1 protease: high-resolution crystal structures of the mutant protease/substrate analogue complexes.

Emergence of drug-resistant mutants of HIV-1 protease is an ongoing problem in the fight against AIDS. The mechanisms governing resistance are both complex and varied. We have determined crystal structures of HIV-1 protease mutants, D30N, K45I, N88D, and L90M complexed with peptide inhibitor analogues of CA-p2 and p2-NC cleavage sites in the Gag-pol precursor in order to study the structural mechanisms underlying resistance. The structures were determined at 1.55-1.9-A resolution and compared with the wild-type structure. The conformational disorder seen for most of the hydrophobic side-chains around the inhibitor binding site indicates flexibility of binding. Eight water molecules are conserved in all 9 structures; their location suggests that they are important for catalysis as well as structural stability. Structural differences among the mutants were analyzed in relation to the observed changes in protease activity and stability. Mutant L90M shows steric contacts with the catalytic Asp25 that could destabilize the catalytic loop at the dimer interface, leading to its observed decreased dimer stability and activity. Mutant K45I reduces the mobility of the flap and the inhibitor and contributes to an enhancement in structural stability and activity. The side-chain variations at residue 30 relative to wild-type are the largest in D30N and the changes are consistent with the altered activity observed with peptide substrates. Polar interactions in D30N are maintained, in agreement with the observed urea sensitivity. The side-chains of D30N and N88D are linked through a water molecule suggesting correlated changes at the two sites, as seen with clinical inhibitors. Structural changes seen in N88D are small; however, water molecules that mediate interactions between Asn88 and Thr74/Thr31/Asp30 in other complexes are missing in N88D.
Relationship Between Reliability and Cost of Performance Assessment

Performance assessments have come upon two major roadblocks: low reliability coefficients and high cost. Recent speculation has posited that the two are directly related such that cost must rise in order to increase reliability. This understanding may be an oversimplification of the relationship. Two empirical demonstrations are offered to show that more than one combination of sources of error may result in a desired generalizability coefficient and that it is possible to increase the number of observations while also decreasing cost.
Symmetry and Local Mode Coupling in Absorption and Raman Spectroscopy of Intervalence Electronic Transitions

Intervalence electron transfer spectra in mixed-valence molecules are frequently modeled by an interacting pair of adiabatic potential energy surfaces. The presence or absence of a double minimum in the lower surface is correlated with trapped or delocalized charges, respectively. The coordinate involved in this interpretation is the asymmetric normal coordinate representing the nuclear motions taking the molecule from one extreme to the other. In this paper, a model is developed involving both a symmetric and an asymmetric coordinate on an equal footing. The time dependent theory of electronic spectroscopy is used to calculate both absorption and resonance Raman spectra. The model uses physically meaningful interactions in the mixed-valence molecule including the electronic coupling, vibrational coupling, vibrational force constants, and bond length changes as a result of the electron transfer. The effect of these interactions on the relative intensities of symmetric and asymmetric modes in both the absorption and resonance Raman spectra are examined. The quantitative calculations are discussed in parallel with the physical meaning. The calculations show how the spectra can smoothly go from domination by one type of mode to the other. The most important effects are caused by the bond length changes, the electronic coupling, and the force constant changes.
Comparison of tandem mass spectrometry search methods to identify neuropeptides

Tools to identify proteins in tandem mass spectrometry experiments are not optimized to identify neuropeptides due to complex processing, post-translational modifications and neuropeptide size. The complementary strengths of three widely-used protein identification tools to identify neuropeptides were assessed. OMSSA, X!Tandem and Crux were applied to identify simulated mass spectra on a database of 7857 mouse neuropeptides from 92 prohormones. For each peptide, spectra was simulated with either +1, +2 and +3 precursor charge states, +1 charged b and y product ions having single water and/or ammonia loss depending on amino acid composition. OMSSA and X!Tandem identified 83% of the peptides with an E-value or P-value < 10−9, while Crux detected 81% and 11% of the peptides with a P-value < 10−1 and < 10−2, respectively. Precursor charge states have minor effect on the detection of neuropeptides. The sensitivity of either tool to detect small neuropeptides (< 10 amino acids in length) was limited. Our results suggest that methods optimized to detect neuropeptides are required.
Nucleosomes, transcription, and probability

Speaking of current measurements on single ion channel molecules, David Colquhoun wrote in 2006, "Individual molecules behave randomly, so suddenly we had to learn how to deal with stochastic processes." Here I describe theoretical efforts to understand recent experimental observations on the chromatin structure of single gene molecules, a molecular biologist's path toward probabilistic theories.
Serum-Enzyme Changes in Newly Admitted Psychiatric Patients: Part I

INCREASED activity of the enzymes creatine phosphokinase (CPK) (E.C.2.7.3.2) and aldolase (E.C.4.1.2.7) has been reported in the serum of acutely psychotic patients of all diagnostic types: acute schizophrenic patients, manic-depressive patients, and patients with psychotic depression.1-5Chronically psychotic patients, schizophrenic or depressed, did not have any increase in the activity of these enzymes even when they were experiencing an exacerbation of their psychosis which necessitated rehospitalization.3-5Nonpsychotic severely anxious or depressed hospitalized psychiatric patients also had no increase in the activity of these enzymes. The increased activity of CPK or aldolase, or both, was generally present at the onset of a psychotic episode in the acute patients and lasted for five to ten days after hospitalization, but could be as brief as 1 day or, in one instance, as long as 51 days.3,4The increased enzyme activities ranged
Word-to-letter inhibition: Word-inferiority and other interference effects

Four experiments were run to determine whether the interactive activation model would more accurately reflect the effect of context in letter perception by including word-to-letter inhibition resulting from word-to-word inhibition produced when multiple word units become active. The first three experiments found less accurate target letter discrimination in word than in nonword strings when a string was altered halfway through the exposure through adding or dropping a nontarget letter. The alteration changed a word to a different word or a nonword to a different nonword.Unaltered strings produced the typical word-superiority effect. The last experiment found an inverse relationship between target discrimination performance and the number of word sub­ strings contained in each of a set of word quadrigrams that were individually exposed. A letter in a word can be identified more accurately than a letter in a string of letters that does not resemble a word (Reicher, 1969; Wheeler, 1970). Many possible expla­ nations that seem simple and straightforward have been proposed, investigated, and rejected. Differences in short­ term memory for word and nonword strings have been eliminated as a basis for the word-superiority effect by use of forced choice procedures in which two alternatives for the target letter are either precued or presented im­ mediately after the word or nonword string (Reicher, 1969). Familiar string shape is not a factor since strings are usually presented as uppercase block letters, and the effect has even been shown to persist with mixed upper­ and lowercase type (McClelland, 1976). Differences in processing strategies used by subjects for words and non­ words do not seem to be involved, because the word­ superiority effect is found whether or not subjects expect letter strings to be words (Carr, Davidson, & Hawkins, 1978). Differences in the frequency of letter clusters be­ tween written English word and nonword letter strings do not appear to provide the basis for the difference in accuracy with which target letters are identified in the two string types (McClelland & Johnston, 1977). Nor is tar­ get recognition accuracy related to word frequency un­ der the backward masking presentation conditions that characterize studies of context effects (Manelis, 1977; Paap & Newsome, 1980). Finally, sophisticated guess­ ing when context letters are perceived more clearly than the target does not seem to underlie the word advantage, because there is no relationship between the magnitude of the word superiority and the amount of constraint with respect to the target's possible identity provided by the word context (Johnston, 1978).
Study of plasma chemistry in wire chambers by GC/MS

An apparatus to allow systematic and detailed study of radiation-induced plasma-chemical reactions that may lead to wire aging has been constructed. A proportional counter tube irradiated by a /sup 55/Fe source is used as a model wire chamber. Less-volatile components in the tube effluent gas are concentrated by several orders of magnitude in a cryotrap to provide the sensitivity needed for detection. Separation and analysis are performed by gas chromatography/mass spectrometry (GC/MS). A study of the outgasses components from several different tubings has been made, and the observed products qualitatively identified. Two possible sources of silicon have been identified: incompletely cleaned parts that were once in contact with silicone oils or greases, and parts that may have had transient exposure to silicone vapors. A proportional tube has been used to model the plasma-chemical reactions that may occur in wire chambers, and a strong, reproducible signal has been observed. >