cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
H I Lyman-alpha Equivalent Widths of Stellar Populations

We have compiled a library of stellar Lyman-alpha (Lyα) equivalent widths in O and B stars using the model atmosphere codes CMFGEN and TLUSTY, respectively. The equivalent widths range from about 0 to 30 A in absorption for early-O to mid-B stars. The purpose of this library is for the prediction of the underlying stellar Lyα absorption in stellar populations of star-forming galaxies with nebular Lyα emission. We implemented the grid of individual equivalent widths into the Starburst99 population synthesis code to generate synthetic Lyα equivalent widths for representative star formation histories. A starburst observed after 10 Myr will produce a stellar Lyα line with an equivalent width of ~ – 10 ± 4 A in absorption for a Salpeter initial mass function. The lower value (deeper absorption) results from an instantaneous burst, and the higher value (shallower line) from continuous star formation. Depending on the escape fraction of nebular Lyα photons, the effect of stellar Lyα on the total profile ranges from negligible to dominant. If the nebular escape fraction is 10%, the stellar absorption and nebular emission equivalent widths become comparable for continuous star formation at ages of 10-20 Myr.
Estimation of x-ray radiation related cancers in US dental offices: Is it worth the risk?

Objectives The objective of this study was to estimate the possible number of cancer cases produced during 2019 in US dental offices from radiography, estimate the possible reduction in those rates resulting from use of intraoral rectangular collimation and selection criteria, and determine the frequency and quality of website radiation risk information and informed consent forms. Study Design An analysis of dental radiation examinations in 2014 to 2015 US national survey data, Nationwide Evaluation of X-ray Trends, and National Council on Radiation Protection and Measurements surveys was performed, in addition to an analysis of 2008 to 2020 Journal of Clinical Orthodontics national orthodontic surveys for radiographic examination frequencies. Lifetime attributable cancer risk estimates from US and European studies were used to generate the total dental and orthodontic office cancer totals. In total, 150 offices were examined online for the quality and frequency of risk information in websites and consent forms. Results The 2019 estimate for all office cancers is 967. Collimation and selection criteria could reduce this to 237 cancer cases. Most cancers arise from intraoral and cone beam computed tomography examinations, with 135 orthodontic cancers over 21 months (average treatment time). Collimation and selection criteria could reduce this to 68. Only 1% of offices use collimators or informed consent for radiography. The website and consent information were of poor quality. Conclusions Dentists are not following selection criteria or using collimators according to guidelines. Up to 75% of cancer cases could be avoided.
Family engagement of Nepali parents of dual language learners at Head Start

This study explored the experiences and perceptions of family engagement of Nepali-speaking parents of dual language learners at Head Start. Using the Head Start family engagement framework and an equitable collaboration perspective, the interviews with 10 families who are Nepali-speaking parents with refugee backgrounds were analyzed. The parents benefited from family engagement at Head Start in particular ways (e.g., positive parent–child relationship, lifelong educators and learners). However, collaboration of teacher and parents was not always equitable. Parents reported that their weak English language competency discouraged their role as advocates and leaders and that teachers’ passive approach to bilingual development limited the promotion of inclusiveness and cultural and linguistic responsiveness in the program. Possible resources and strategies towards equitable collaboration are discussed.
Artifact: reducing DNN properties to enable falsification with adversarial attacks

We present an artifact to accompany Reducing DNN Properties to Enable Falsification with Adversarial Attacks which includes the DNNF tool, data and scripts to facilitate the replication of its study. The artifact is both reusable and available. DNNF is available on Github, and we provide an artifact to reproduce our study as a VirtualBox virtual machine image. Full replication of the study requires 64GB of memory and 8 CPU cores. Users should know how to use VirtualBox, as well as have basic knowledge of the bash shell.
Western diet increases COVID-19 disease severity in the Syrian hamster

Pre-existing comorbidities such as obesity or metabolic diseases can adversely affect the clinical outcome of COVID-19. Chronic metabolic disorders are globally on the rise and often a consequence of an unhealthy diet, referred to as a Western Diet. For the first time in the Syrian hamster model, we demonstrate the detrimental impact of a continuous high-fat high-sugar diet on COVID-19 outcome. We observed increased weight loss and lung pathology, such as exudate, vasculitis, hemorrhage, fibrin, and edema, delayed viral clearance and functional lung recovery, and prolonged viral shedding. This was accompanied by an increased trend of systemic IL-10 and IL-6, as well as a dysregulated serum lipid response dominated by polyunsaturated fatty acid-containing phosphatidylethanolamine, recapitulating cytokine and lipid responses associated with severe human COVID-19. Our data support the hamster model for testing restrictive or targeted diets and immunomodulatory therapies to mediate the adverse effects of metabolic disease on COVID-19.
Towards Adaptive, Self-Configuring Networked Unmanned Aerial Vehicles

Networked drones have the potential to transform various applications domains; yet their adoption particularly in indoor and forest environments has been stymied by the lack of accurate maps and autonomous navigation abilities in the absence of GPS, the lack of highly reliable, energy-efficient wireless communications, and the challenges of visually inferring and understanding an environment with resource-limited individual drones. We advocate a novel vision for the research community in the development of distributed, localized algorithms that enable the networked drones to dynamically coordinate to perform adaptive beam forming to achieve high capacity directional aerial communications, and collaborative machine learning to simultaneously localize, map and visually infer the challenging environment, even when individual drones are resource-limited in terms of computation and communication due to payload restrictions.
Immunology of M. tuberculosis and Other Mycobacteria

More than 25% of the world’s population has been infected with Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Initial infection with M. tuberculosis is usually self-limited and inap-parent. It is associated with the subsequent acquisition of tuberculin skin test reactivity in vivo, blastogenic T-cell responses to mycobacterial proteins in vitro, and the coincident development of protective immunity. Nonetheless, from 6 to 8 million new cases of tuberculosis arise worldwide each year, with 2 to 3 million fatalities, making M. tuberculosis the most common identifiable cause of death of any infectious agent. In the developing world, tuberculosis accounts for 6.7% of all deaths, and an estimated 26% of avoidable adult deaths.1 This occurs despite the availability of antituberculous chemotherapy and the widespread use of vaccination with BCG.
Calcium as an Intracellular Second Messenger: Mediation by Calcium-Binding Proteins

Calcium (Ca 2+ ) is an abundant element found throughout nature and in all living tissues. It is considered the primordial second messengers since, unlike other second messengers, such as cyclic nucleotides, steroids or nitric oxide, it is not synthesized or degraded. Intracellular Ca 2+ is maintained at levels lower than extracellular by sequestration within membrane compartments and regulation of membrane permeability via membrane channels, pumps and ion exchangers. An increase in intracellular Ca 2+ [Ca 2+ ] i levels can be initiated by factors such as hormones, neurotransmitters, growth factors, cytokines or changes in membrane potential. The transient rise in [Ca 2+ ] i , visualized by fluorescent indicator dyes, may be a localized unitary spark, a wave or may oscillate the frequency and amplitude modulating the response. The biological action of Ca 2+ is mediated by high affinity, specific binding proteins that are differentially located and expressed. Calmodulin is the most ubiquitous Ca 2+ mediator protein. Ca 2+ -bound calmodulin interacts with and activates enzymes by displacing the pseudosubstrate region from the active site. Metabolic sculpturing of CaMKII, for example, can generate a dynamic range in enzyme activity that modulates neurotransmission and cardiac function. Annexins are Ca 2+ -dependent phospholipid binding proteins that are found in animals and higher plants. Although they do not possess enzymatic activity, they form interlocking Ca 2+ -dependent complexes on specific membranes thereby modifying both membrane fluidity and the activity of membrane-associated protein complexes. Members of the protein kinase C family are activated by Ca 2+ and diacylglycerol. Collectively, effective translation of the Ca 2+ signal is conveyed through a diverse array of mediator proteins.
Optical power-scavenging system for fluidic microsensors

An extremely compact optical power-scavenging system is presented providing onboard power for an autonomous remote metal-ion sensor. The total volume of the sensor system including power supply is below 0.046 mm3 and with a short circuit current of 0.51 muA under sunlight conditions. To the authors' knowledge this is the smallest autonomous micromachined power supply and device ever built
Human Cytomegalovirus: Propagation, Quantification, and Storage

Human cytomegalovirus (HCMV) is the largest and perhaps the most structurally complex member of the family of human herpesviruses. It is the prototypic virus of the beta-herpesvirus subfamily. As with other cytomegaloviruses, HCMV is exquisitely species specific and undergoes lytic replication only in cells of human origin. In addition, its replication is limited almost entirely to primary cells and a limited number of transformed cell lines. Together with its prolonged replicative cycle of approximately 48 hr, the propagation and quantification of HCMV can present technical challenges. In this brief set of protocols, the propagation of laboratory strains of HCMV and their quantitation is described. In a third series of protocols, the concentration and gradient purification of HCMV for more specialized downstream applications is described.
Pathogens as Causes of Genetic Diversity in their Host Populations

Sex is likely to be an adaptation that enables large multicellular long-lived organisms to resist exploitation by specialized smaller shorter-lived organisms — that is, by parasites/pathogens. Antagonistic coadaptation of genotypes between such species tends to entrain limit cycles or else repeating and largely nonprogressive situations of counter-transience of new defense and attack alleles. Models on these lines can account for (a) correlation of stable sexual reproduction with size and longevity and with biotic complexity of habitat, (b) abundance of protein polymorphism, (c) diversity of adaptive linkage values, (d) common linkage disequilibria in multi-locus genotypes, and (e) “good genes” mate choice and the excesses of sexual selection. Through parasites, frequency-dependent selection may account for much more variation than has been credited while immediate heterozygote advantage may account for much less. Through frequency-dependent selection, polymorphism based even on generally concave fitness profiles may be common.
Toba: Java For Applications: A Way Ahead of Time (WAT) Compiler

Toba is a system for generating efficient standalone Java applications. Toba includes a Java-bytecode-to-C compiler, a garbage collector, a threads package, and Java API support. Toba-compiled Java applications execute 1.5-4.2 times faster than interpreted and Just-In-Time compiled applications.
Predamage Threshold Electron Emission from Insulator and Semiconductor Surfaces

Predamage electron emission shows a dependence on fluence, bandgap and wavelength consistent with multiphoton excitation across the bandgap and inconsistent with avalanche ionization and thermionic emission models. The electron emission scales with pulselength as 1/..sqrt..T. 6 references, 8 figures, 1 table.
A middleware architecture to facilitate distributed programming DAROC: data-activated replicated object communications

Programming distributed computer systems is difficult because of complexities in addressing remote entities, message handling, and program coupling. As systems grow, scalability becomes critical, as bottlenecks can serialize portions of the system. When these distributed system aspects are exposed to programmers, code size and complexity grow, as does the fragility of the system. This paper describes a distributed software architecture and middleware implementation that combines object-based blackboard-style communications with data-driven and periodic application scheduling to greatly simplify distributed programming while achieving scalable performance. Data-Activated Replication Object Communications (DAROC) allows programmers to treat shared objects as local variables while providing implicit communications.
Activation of the JAK-STAT pathway by reactive oxygen species

Reactive oxygen species (ROS) play an important role in the pathogenesis of many human diseases, including the acute respiratory distress syndrome, Parkinson’s disease, pulmonary fibrosis, and Alzh...
Expression and transgenic studies of the mouse agouti gene provide insight into the mechanisms by which mammalian coat color patterns are generated

Expression of the agouti gene from two different promoters, one active at the midpoint of the hair cycle and the other specific for the ventrum, is responsible for generating a range of mammalian pigmentation patterns. We demonstrate that in postnatal mice transcripts from both promoters are confined to the dermal papilla of hair follicles, as predicted by classical transplantation experiments. Transcripts from the hair cycle promoter are detected in the embryonic whisker plate but not in other regions of the body before birth, whereas ventral-specific transcripts are detected in the ventral trunk of the embryo as well as ventral whisker plate. To investigate further the embryonic origins of adult pigmentation patterns, we carried out a detailed analysis of agouti expression in the embryo. The ventral-specific agouti isoform is first expressed at E10.5 in neural crest-derived ventral cells of the second branchial arch, in anterior regions of the forelimb buds and in a narrow stripe of ventral mesenchyme. By E14.5 a continuous layer of expression is observed in the upper cells of the dermis, including cells of the developing dermal papillae, and covering the entire ventral surface of the head and trunk and dorsal surfaces of the distal forelimb and hindlimb. This expression pattern reflects the domain of yellow coloration evident in adult animals and suggests that the agouti gene is regulated in part by factors responsible for establishing differences between the dorsal and ventral surfaces of the body during embryogenesis. To test the hypothesis that agouti is a paracrine signaling molecule that can influence pigment production by hair follicle melanocytes when expressed by either dermis or epidermis, as suggested by recombination and transplantation experiments, we created transgenic animals in which agouti is expressed in basal cells of the epidermis. These animals display stripes of yellow hairs corresponding to regions of epidermal agouti expression, confirming that agouti signals melanocytes to synthesize yellow pigment and providing direct evidence that it functions in a paracrine manner with a restricted radius of action.
A routing algorithm for row-based FPGAs

Abstract A row-based Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) consists of rows of identical processing modules separated by segmented tracks that are used for routing nets between specified module pins. The problem of finding a feasible routing of a given set of nets onto a set of segmented tracks is NP-complete. We present an enumeration algorithm for the problem that uses matching arguments to improve the time complexity while requiring polynomial space. The algorithm serves as the basis of powerful practical heuristics and its additional advantage is that it is directly parallelizable.
Cutaneous phototoxicity of tetracycline antibiotics: generation of free radicals and singlet oxygen during photolysis as measured by spin-trapping and the phosphorescence of singlet molecular oxygen.

Chlortetracycline (CTC) generated an aryl radical in aqueous buffer (pH 7.4) during near UV irradiation, as evidenced by the formation of 2-methyl-2-nitrosopropane spin adducts. The radical was produced via dechlorination, a photoprocess not previously reported for tetracyclines. Demeclocyc-line (DEM), another chlorinated tetracycline, did not produce detectable aryl radicals. Relative 1O2 yields obtained by direct luminescence measurements at 1268 nm for five tetracyclines in alkaline ethanol (demeclocycline · tetracycline · chlortetracycline · doxycycline · minocycline) showed that DEM produced approximately three times as much singlet oxygen as CTC. This constitutes direct evidence that tetracyclines sensitize both Type I and Type II photoreactions.
Pancreaticobiliary carcinoma associated with a large choledochal cyst: role of MRI and MR cholangiopancreatography in diagnosis and preoperative assessment

The role of magnetic resonance (MR) imaging and MR cholangiopancreatography is demonstrated in a case of pancreaticobiliary carcinoma associated with a large choledochal cyst. The size of the cyst presented considerable difficulty in evaluation with both endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography and computed tomography.
Controlled Experiment on Wave–Particle Interactions in the Ionosphere

THE electron echo experiment1 has provided a unique opportunity to study wave particle interactions in conditions of controlled beam energy and beam flux in an essentially infinite plasma without the disturbing effects of walls and probes. We therefore designed a companion experiment to study the electric component of waves generated by the electron beam and this is a preliminary report of the observations.
Interactions of 85-Mev Positive Pions with Deuterons

Collision processes of pions with deuterium have been observed in a diffusion cloud chamber. The use of positive pions rendered visible all of the possible reactions at 85 Mev. Total cross sections and angular distributions for elastic and inelastic scattering, charge exchange scattering, and absorption have been determined from 272 collisions in the deuterium gas. The results are compared with the phenomenological impulse-approximation theory.
Ascaridoid Nematodes and Associated Lesions in Stomachs of Subadult Male Northern Fur Seals (Callorhinus Ursinus) on St. Paul Island, Alaska: (1987—1999)

Stomachs from subadult male northern fur seals (SAMs) (Callorhinus ursinus) (n = 5,950) from St. Paul Island, Alaska, were examined from 1987 to 1999 for lesions and parasites. On gross examination of these stomachs, parasite nodules were evident in 92% of the stomachs and active and healing ulcers were found in 14% and 10%, respectively. Prevalence of nematodes from 1987 to 1997 was 88% for 5,700 SAMs for which numbers of parasites were estimated but not identified to the genus level. All nematodes recovered from 250 SAMs examined in 1998 (n = 124; 99% infected) and in 1999 (n = 126; 91% infected) were identified and counted. Prevalences in 1998 and 1999 were 5% and 0% for Anisakis spp., 52% and 18% for Contracaecum spp., and 96% and 89% for Pseudoterranova spp., respectively.
Future Directions and Industrial Perspectives Micro- and macro-kinetics: Their relationship in heterogeneous catalysis

Attempts to model macroscopic steady-state rates of catalytic reactions on the basis of microscopic kinetic parameters for elementary steps, determined independently from transient kinetic data on model, single-crystal metal catalysts, will be reviewed. The methods used in getting microkinetic parameters will be discussed. Recent studies which determine microkinetics for more complex model catalysts consisting of vapor-deposited metal islands on single-crystal oxides will also be outlined. Finally, thedegree of rate control of a step will also be mathematically defined. This new concept is useful in kinetic modeling, and in putting terms such asrate-controlling step andrate-limiting step into a more rigorous framework.
Evidence for gene-environment interaction in the development of adolescent antisocial behavior

Data from three adoption studies are used to test for gene-environment interaction in the development of adolescent antisocial behaviors. Results indicate significant increases in antisocial behaviors when an adoptee has both a genetic factor and an adverse environmental factor present. The increase in number of antisocial behaviors due to both genetic and environmental factors acting together is far greater than the predicted increase from either factor acting alone.
Networked control of spatially distributed processes using an adaptive communication policy

This work presents a model-based networked control structure with a feedback-based communication policy for spatially distributed processes modeled by highly-dissipative nonlinear PDEs with measurement sensors that transmit their data to the controller/actuators over a resource-constrained wireless sensor network. Initially, a finite-dimensional system that captures the slow dynamics of the PDE is derived and used to design a stabilizing Lyapunov-based nonlinear feedback controller. To reduce the frequency at which sensor measurements are transmitted over the network, a model of the slow subsystem is included in the control system to provide estimates of the slow states of the PDE when communication over the network is suspended. To determine when communication must be reestablished, the evolution of the Lyapunov function is monitored such that if it begins to breach a certain stability threshold at any time, the sensors are prompted to send their data over the network to update the model. Communication is then suspended for as long as the Lyapunov function continues to decay. The underlying idea is to use the Lyapunov stability constraint as the basis for switching on or off the communication between the sensors and the controller. A singular perturbation formulation is used to analyze the implementation of the networked control structure on the infinite-dimensional system. Finally, the results are illustrated through an application to a representative nonlinear diffusion-reaction process.
Integrative Medicine: Incorporating Medicine and Health into the Canon of Medieval European History

Hitherto peripheral (if not outright ignored) in general medieval historiography, medieval medical history is now a vibrant subdiscipline, one that is rightly attracting more and more attention from ‘mainstream’ historians and other students of cultural history. It does, however, have its particular characteristics, and understanding its source materials, methods, and analytical limitations may help those not trained in the field better navigate, explore and potentially contribute to its possibilities for illuminating the intersections of medicine and health with other aspects of medieval culture. Although this article focuses primarily on western Europe, many of its observations are also relevant to the Islamic world and Byzantium precisely because all three cultures shared many of the same intellectual traditions and social structures. The attached bibliography serves as a general introduction to the current state of the field.
Security in Cloud Computing: An Analysis of Key Drivers and Constraints

In the emerging computing paradigm known as cloud computing, there are significant issues that need to be addressed in order for cloud computing to be adopted as universally as the Internet. Among these issues, the societal and technological issues around security for cloud computing are some of the most important and will act as both drivers and constraints for mass adoption of cloud computing. The goal of cloud computing is to share data and services transparently among users of a massive grid referred to generically as “the cloud.” The promise of the cloud is in achieving significant cost savings and information technology agility. This paper examines some of the more important key drivers and constraints for secure cloud computing from a societal and technological perspective. The societal issues addressed involved trust, privacy, and user behavior and how security affects these factors. The technological issues include scalability, reliability, encryption, data rights, and transparency. Transparency is a constraint for cloud computing today, and a case can be made that this is one of the most important issues needing resolution before corporations will move their computing infrastructure to the cloud.
Altruism in science: A sociobiological model of co-operative behaviour among scientists

Abstract Just as organisms compete with each other to pass on their genes, scientists compete with each other to pass on their ideas. The institutional structure of science is explained in terms of the transmission of ideas. Scientists behave as selflessly as they do because it is in their own best self-interest to do so. Science works as well as it does because the selfish goals of individual scientists happen to coincide with the manifest goal of the institution, the increase of empirical knowledge.
East asia and cross-Taiwan strait relations

The evolution of the Taiwan issue has been closely linked to the interaction of China and other countries including Japan, Russia, and especially the United States. It is important to examine the great power interaction in East Asia and its effect on the cross-strait relations. Japanese policy toward the Taiwan issue will be a critical indicator of the nature of Sino-Japanese relations. One issue is Japan’s expanding role in the U.S.-Japanese security relations and the implication of such relations for East Asian security. Russia has consistently supported Beijing’s policy on Taiwan. Since the return of Hong Kong to China on July 1, 1997, the policy of “one country, two systems” has been put into practice. If Hong Kong can continue to enjoy a high degree of autonomy and prosperity, valuable lessons might be gained for resolving issues in cross-Taiwan Strait relations.
Thickening of the Ross Ice Shelf and equilibrium state of the West Antarctic ice sheet

Data from the south-east quadrant of the Ross Ice Shelf, Antarctica indicate that, near the grounding line, the ice shelf is growing thicker by almost 1 m yr−1. This thickening rate implies an advance of 1 km yr−1 of the grounding line between the West Antarctic ice sheet and the Ross Ice Shelf. It can be reconciled with independent evidence for current thinning of the West Antarctic ice sheet if the latter is a delayed response to an earlier retreat of the ice shelf grounding line. The high rates of ice shelf thickening may be due to an increase in the resistance to ice shelf movement caused by localised ice shelf grounding following isostatic uplift of the sea bed.
The Role of Oxazolidinones in l -Proline-Assisted Aldol-Type Reactions

In this study, the formation of oxazolidinone intermediates along the reaction coordinates of two l-proline-catalyzed reactions was investigated using high-level quantum mechanical calculations. Our results suggest that the final product is produced via routes other than the currently-adopted catalytic cycle for l-proline, including routes where oxazolidinones are directly involved.
Impact of waveband on target-to-background contrast of camouflage

The purpose of military camouflage is to make an object hard to see, or to confuse a hostile observer as to its true nature. Perfect camouflage would do this by making itself invisible against its surroundings. Currently, the best camouflage attempts to make the target appear to be a natural part of the background. An imperfect but still very useful metric of this similarity between target and background is the at-range contrast difference between them, and the smaller that is, the harder it is to discern the camouflaged object and the longer it takes to determine its true nature. The intrinsic contrast difference in the reflective wavebands (i.e., visible through short wave infrared), is a function of the spectral nature of the scene illumination and the spectral reflectivity of the camouflage and background. Until recently, military camouflages have been typically designed to work best in the visible band against one of the generic background types such as woodland, desert, arctic, etc., without significant attention paid to performance against a different background, type of scene illumination, or different waveband. This paper documents an investigation into the dependence of the contrast difference behavior of camouflage as a function of waveband, background, and scene illumination using battle dress uniforms (BDU) as material.
Rate constants from Monte Carlo quasi-classical trajectory calculations. A procedure for importance sampling

The use of importance sampling as a variance reduction technique is applied to the direct Monte Carlo quasi-classical trajectory (MCQT) calculation of bimolecular gas phase rate constants. A general importance sampling function for the collision energy having a single (integer) parameter which characterizes the distribution of collision energies to be sampled is proposed and used in calculations of rate constants for three chemical reactions (F + H/sub 2/, Cl + H/sub 2/, and O(/sup 3/P) + H/sub 2/) at several temperatures. Results are compared with regard to accuracy and efficiency with rate constants obtained directly or indirectly using other MCQT approaches and the same potential energy surfaces. The importance sampling calculations are found to be more efficient over the entire range of reactivity studied, and provide statistically valid estimates of the errors in the computed rate constants. 8 figures, 3 tables.
Divalent cations inhibit IsK/KvLQT1 channels in excised membrane patches of strial marginal cells

The IsK/KvLQT1 K+ channel in the apical membrane of strial marginal cells and vestibular dark cells is an essential ion transport pathway for the secretion of K+ into the endolymph of the inner ear. Study of this control point has been impeded by rundown of channel activity upon excision into commonly used cytosolic solutions. This paper describes conditions under which patches of apical membrane of strial marginal cells and vestibular dark cells from gerbil containing this channel can be excised, retaining its characteristic voltage dependence, kinetic properties, ion permeability sequence and pharmacological sensitivity, similar to those found during on-cell and perforated-patch whole cell recordings (Shen et al., Audit. Neurosci. 3 (1997) 215-230). Those excised-patch conditions include removal of Mg2+ from the cytosolic solution and use of a K+-rich pipette electrolyte. The inhibition of channel activity by Mg2+ was found to be a general feature of divalent cations; the channel was also inhibited by Ca2+, Ba2+ and Sr2+. The concentrations causing 50% inhibition of IsK/KvLQT1 channel current were 7 x 10(-5) M, 6 x 10(-6) M, 3 x 10(-4) M and 7 x 10(-5) M, respectively. It was also found that a chemical cross-linking agent, 3,3'-dithio-bis(sulfosuccinimidyl propionate) (DTSSP), which was previously shown to persistently activate IsK/KvLQTI channels expressed in Xenopus oocytes, maintained in excised patches channel activity which retained voltage dependence and pharmacological sensitivity. These data demonstrate that (1) the channel complex is inhibited by Ca2+, Mg2+ and other divalent cations, (2) the activation by Ca2+ observed previously in whole-cell preparations was due to action via other cellular pathways. These findings must be taken into account when considering the action of receptors which alter the cytosolic Ca2+ activity.
Orientation Order of Dipole Molecules in the Surface of Embryonic Droplets

During the growth of embryonic droplets in an imperfect vapor the surface polar molecules pass from a disordered orientation state to an ordered orientation state, the transition size being on the order of 100 molecules. This transition poses an interesting model problem in the study of order-disorder transitions in the thermodynamics of small systems.
Estimation of the reciprocal of the density quantile function at a point

Consistent estimators for the reciprocal of the density at a quantile point, which is the derivative of the quantile function, are considered. Rates of convergence of these estimators, depending on the smoothness properties of the density, are obtained. Two different, but natural, estimators of the reciprocal of the density at a quantile point, based on several samples from a location parameter family with unknown and possibly different location parameters are proposed. An important multivariate application is the estimation of the asymptotic dispersion matrix of several sample quantiles, as they involve reciprocals of the density at the corresponding population quantiles.
Comparison of two liposome fusion assays monitoring the intermixing of aqueous contents and of membrane components

Abstract Divalent cation-induced fusion of large unilamellar vesides (approx. 0.1 μm diameter) made of phosphatidylserine (PS) or phosphatidylglycerol (PG) has been studied. Intermixing of aqueous contents during fusion was followed by the Tb/dipicolinic acid fluorescence assay, and intermixing of membrane components by resonance energy transfer between fluorescent lipid probes. Both assays gave identical threshold concentrations for Ca + , which were 2 mM for PS and 15 mM for PG. The dependencies of the initial rate of fusion on the concentration of PG vesicles determined by either assay were identical, the order of this dependence being 1.2 in the concentration range of 5–200 μM lipid. For PS liposomes, this order was found to be 1.5 in the fluorescent lipid assay. No leakage of contents was detected during the fusion of PG vesicles. Mg 2+ inhibited the Ca 2+ -induced fusion of PS vesicles, but did not cause any fusion by itself, consistent with previous results with the Tb/dipicolinic acid assay.
APOE and BCHE as modulators of cerebral amyloid deposition: a florbetapir PET genome-wide association study.

APOE and BCHE as modulators of cerebral amyloid deposition: a florbetapir PET genome-wide association study
Direct Spectrophotometric Analysis of Cr(VI) Using a Liquid Waveguide Capillary Cell

Hexavalent chromium Cr(VI) is a notorious ground water contaminant toxic to humans and animals. Assessment of an exposure risk for aquatic receptors necessitates frequent Cr(VI) concentration data from a range of surface and groundwater locations at Cr(VI) contamination sites. In this work, we demonstrate that enhanced ultraviolet-visible (UV-vis) spectroscopy using a liquid waveguide capillary cell (LWCC) offers an easy-to-use and economical methodology for the determination of chromate anion CrO(4)(2-) in Hanford natural waters without chemical pretreatment and generation of hazardous waste. Direct determination of CrO(4)(2-) in actual surface and ground water samples with the complexities of competing ions, dissolved organics, and other potential interfering agents was achieved by measuring the chromate optical absorbance at 372 nm. For a 100 cm path length LWCC, the detection limit for chromate was found to be as low as 0.073 ppb. A quantitative relationship between the intensity of the absorbance signal and water pH allowed for the straightforward calculation of total Cr(VI) content in natural water. The described method is applicable for in-field monitoring of Cr(VI) in environmental water samples at trace levels.
Sleepless in the sea.

![Figure][1] CREDIT: JUPITER IMAGES In their Research Article “Identification of sleepless, a sleep-promoting factor” (18 July, p. [372][2]), K. Koh et al. note that “[s]leep is an essential process conserved from flies to humans.” This is not quite true. Many piscine species are
Toward Compositional Software Product Lines

Software product lines (SPLs) were introduced over the last two decades as a mechanism for dealing with the complexities of software systems' ever-increasing size by exploiting the commonalities among the company's different products or systems. By standardizing the software components sourced from the outside and sharing domain specific software assets the company develops among different product teams, you can significantly reduce the per-product R&D cost, which improves the company's competitive position. This can be achieved through a richer product portfolio, a harmonized look-and-feel across the product portfolio, or a significantly higher degree of customer configurability. Companies that successfully deploy SPL technology can achieve order-of magnitude growth over a decade and reach major business milestones.
Primary seronegative but molecularly evident hepadnaviral infection engages liver and induces hepatocarcinoma in the woodchuck model of hepatitis B.

Hepadnavirus at very low doses establishes in woodchucks asymptomatic, serologically undetectable but molecularly evident persistent infection. This primary occult infection (POI) preferentially engages the immune system and initiates virus-specific T cell response in the absence of antiviral antibody induction. The current study aimed to determine whether POI with time may culminate in serologically identifiable infection and hepatitis, and what are, if any, its pathological consequences. Juvenile woodchucks were intravenously injected with inocula containing 10 or 100 virions of woodchuck hepatitis virus (WHV) to induce POI and followed for life or up to 5.5 years thereafter. All 10 animals established molecularly detectable infection with virus DNA in serum (<100–200 copies/mL) and in circulating lymphoid cells, but serum WHV surface antigen and antibodies to WHV core antigen remained undetectable for life. By approximately 2.5–3.5 years post-infection, circulating virus transiently increased to 103 copies/mL and virus replication became detectable in the livers, but serological markers of infection and biochemical or histological evidence of hepatitis remained undetectable. Nonetheless, typical hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) developed in 2/10 animals. WHV DNA integration into hepatic and lymphatic system genomes was identified in 9/10 animals. Virus recovered from the liver virus-negative or virus-positive phases of POI displayed the wild-type sequence and transmitted infection to healthy woodchucks causing hepatitis and HCC. In summary, for the first time, our data demonstrate that an asymptomatic hepadnaviral persistence initiated by very small amounts of otherwise pathogenic virus, advancing in the absence of traditional serological markers of infection and hepatitis, coincides with virus DNA integration into the host's hepatic and immune system genomes, retains liver pro-oncogenic potency and is capable of transmitting liver pathogenic infection. This emphasizes the role for primary occult hepatitis B virus infection in the development of seemingly cyptogenic HCC in seronegative but virus DNA reactive patients.
Mood and Likeability: The Impact of Two Affect Types on Tax Judgment

Abstract This study investigates processing influences of two types of affect, general (mood) and targeted (likeability), on professional tax judgment. Tax research has investigated client preference bias, but has not considered the affect's influence. Affect may exacerbate or mitigate this bias, even though affect should be irrelevant to professional judgment. Considerable accounting research, unrelated to tax, supports the importance of understanding affective inputs in professional judgment, primarily because such influence unknowingly leads to irrational economic judgments. Our results indicate that affect impacts tax judgments, and that affect type influences how evidence is processed. Targeted affect influences judgments and evidence evaluation more toward the client preference when the client is likeable rather than dislikeable. Evidence evaluation moderates the impact of likeability on the judgments. Mood also impacts judgments. However, mood influences judgments directly, with no impact on the evaluation of specific evidence cues. Implications are discussed for practice and future research.
Thin film solar cells

This paper summarizes the principles which govern selection of semiconductors for thin film solar cells and the current status of thin film cells including their fabrication by vacuum evaporation, sputtering and chemical sprav pyrolysis.
Adversarial detection as a zero-sum game

We propose a new game theoretic approach to estimate a binary random variable based on a vector of sensor measurements that may be corrupted by an adversary. The problem is formulated as a zero-sum partial information game in which a detector attempts to minimize the probability of error and an attacker attempts to maximize this probability. Explicit mixed policies are computed using the matrix form of the game and exploiting sensor symmetry to reduce complexity and find closed-form solutions.
Modified Higgs boson phenomenology from gauge or gaugino mediation in the next-to-minimal supersymmetric standard model

In the next-to-minimal supersymmetric standard model (NMSSM), the presence of light pseudoscalars can have a dramatic effect on the decays of the standard model-like Higgs boson. These pseudoscalars are naturally light if supersymmetry breaking preserves an approximate U(1){sub R} symmetry, spontaneously broken when the Higgs bosons take on their expectation values. We investigate two classes of theories that possess such an approximate U(1){sub R} at the mediation scale: modifications of gauge and gaugino mediation. In the models we consider, we find two disjoint classes of phenomenologically allowed parameter regions. One of these regions corresponds to a limit where the singlet of the NMSSM largely decouples. The other can give rise to a standard model-like Higgs boson with dominant branching into light pseudoscalars.
On the aerothermodynamic study of the SSME HPOTP ball bearing inside a vapor film

In order to predict ball bearing temperature in the Space Shuttle Main Engine (SSME) high-pressure oxidizer turbopump (HPOTP), knowledge of ball bearing heat transfer coefficients is important. To understand the heat transfer behavior of a ball bearing operating under a two-phase environment, a flow simulation model of a rotating sphere inside a vapor film has been developed to determine the effects of rotational speed and vapor film thickness on ball heat transfer. The calculated Nusselt number is compared with experimental data for a rotating ball in liquid nitrogen.
Relative contributions of the components of the American College of Rheumatology 20% criteria for improvement to responder status in patients with early seropositive rheumatoid arthritis.

Objective. To evaluate factors that influence the responses defined by the American College of Rheumatology (ACR) 20% criteria for improvement in rheumatoid arthritis (RA). Methods. ACR 20% and 50% response rates were calculated from data collected for the intervals 0-6, 0-12, and 0-24 months for 180 RA patients participating in the Western Consortium of Practicing Rheumatologists long-term observational study of early seropositive RA (mean ± SD duration of RA at study entry 6.0 ± 3.4 months). Analyzable cases were patients with paired data for tender and swollen joint counts plus at least 3 of the following criteria: physician's and patient's global assessments of disease activity and patient's score for pain (by visual analog scale), physical function score on the Health Assessment Questionnaire (HAQ), and levels of an acute-phase reactant. Response rates were then recalculated by 3 different methods: 1) using only cases with complete paired data for all criteria, 2) sequentially assuming no improvement in each of the 5 secondary criteria, and 3) substituting grip strength for HAQ scores. Results. Using 464 paired observations for all analyzable cases, ACR 20% (50%) improvement rates were 52.6% (33.0%), compared with 55.6% (34.8%) for 365 paired observations from the cases with complete data. Decreases in ACR response rates when secondary criteria were sequentially set at no improvement ranged from 11.7% (pain at 0-6 months) to 1.2% (C-reactive protein at 0-12 months), but these were not statistically different by the kappa statistic. Overall numerical rankings of the relative contributions of the secondary criteria to the ACR 20% or 50% response rates were physician's global assessment, pain, HAQ, patient's global assessment, and acute-phase reactant. Only 7.8% of paired grip strength observations showed ≥20% improvement, compared with 71% of paired HAQ observations. Conclusion. The use of all analyzable cases (paired data for tender and swollen joint counts plus ≥3 of the 5 secondary criteria) increases the number of subjects and only slightly decreases the ACR response rate compared with analyses limited to cases with complete data. The contributions of the secondary criteria are not statistically different, supporting their equal weighting in the ACR definition of improvement. The ACR 20% response rates are higher when the HAQ, rather than grip strength, is used to measure physical function.
Surgical infections: Prevention and treatment—1965 to 1995

During the 30 year period from 1965–1995, signifcant advances have been made in the prevention, diagnosis, and management of surgical infections. To a great degree these advances have been provided by surgeons who developed a primary interest in this area. The Surgical Infection Society (SIS) was established in 1980 for surgeons and other physicians and scientists in order to better coordinate efforts in education and research concerning the infected surgical patient. The most significant of these advances were initially the accurate microbiologic definition of the human endogenous microflora in health and disease. Improvements in the techniques utilized to isolate and identify anaerobic microorganisms were of paramount importance. These lead to improvements in the choice of antibiotic agents for prophylaxis and treatment which resulted in improved clinical results. Most recently, emphasis has been placed on the perioperative identification of the high-risk patient who is more likely to develop infection in the postoperative period. By separating high-risk from low-risk patients in each operative procedure, rather than assuming their risk based on the traditional classification of surgical procedure, a more rationale plan of prospective alterations of treatment can be offered.
The Role of Maternal Psychological Adjustment in the Measurement of Children's Functional Status

Studied the ways that mothers interpret illness behavior in their children to assess whether maternal psychological adjustment predicts maternal perceptions of children's behavioral limitations and attribution of these behaviors to chronic illness. Functional status ratings and attributions to illness by 365 mothers of 5- to 8-year-old children with chronic illnesses were associated with children's overall adjustment but not with mothers' own psychological distress. Illness attributions also were related to the child's medical visits and hospitalizations. Thus, mother's illness attributions are related to her perceptions of the child's health and more general behavioral adjustment, but not to her own mental health. Results support the validity of the FS II(R) as a measure of functioning related to children's health status that is not influenced by maternal psychological adjustment.