cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Downregulation of Adiponectin/AdipoR2 is associated with steatohepatitis in obese mice.

Recent evidence suggests that obesity is associated with hypo-adiponectinmia and chronic inflammation. Adiponectin regulates fat storage, energy expenditure, and inflammation. We propose that high fat diet induces steatohepatitis, reduces serum adiponectin, and liver adiponectin receptors. A 4-week-old C57BL male mice were fed high fat diet (n = 8) or regular chow (control; n = 6) for 7 weeks. Body weight, liver weight, and serum adiponectin were measured. Liver sections were stained with hematoxylin and eosin and oil red for fat content. Liver homogenates were used for protein (immunoblotting) and mRNA (reverse transcription PCR) of Toll-like receptor 4 (TLR4), tumor necrosis factor alpha (TNF-α), interleukin (IL)-6, sterol regulatory element-binding proteins (SREBP)-1c, and adiponectin receptors (AdipoR1/AdipoR2) in addition to nuclear phorsphorylated p65NF-κB. Gels were quantified using densitometry; t test was used, and p < 0.05 was significant. High fat diet increased body (50%) and liver weight (33%), as well as hepatocyte fat content and ballooning. Mice fed high fat diet exhibited reduced serum adiponectin and liver AdipoR2. High fat diet increased hepatic levels of SREBP-1c, TLR4, TNF-α, and IL-6 protein and mRNA and increased activation of p65NF-κB. Diet-induced liver steatosis is associated with increased lipogensis, upregulation of pro-inflammatory cytokines, and transcription factors as well as downregulation of AdipoR2. Reduction in serum adiponectin suggests that adiponectin signaling may be the crosslink between high fat diet, hepatic inflammation, and nonalcoholic fatty liver disease.
The Logic of Explanation in Psychoanalysis. Michael Sherwood. Academic Press, New York, 1969. x + 278 pp. $9.50

A line was omitted from J. Loeviniger's review of The Logic of Explanation in Psychoanalysis on page 1389 of the 12 December issue. The passage should have read: "In sum, Sherwood argues for the possibility of a science of human behavior and against the thesis of a separate domain...."
The expected value of perfect information: cardiac catheterization after thrombolysis-is the value added greater than the cost?

To test the use of the concept of expected value of perfect information (EVPI), the role of catheterization after thrombolysis was addressed since this topic remains controversial. A decision tree was made to compare a strategy of catheterization to a strategy, of exercise testing followed by catheterization if the treadmill test was abnormal. The EVPI for both arms was similar at 0.95 years and represents the uncertainty in life expectancy between 1, 2, and 3 vessel disease. The catheterization arm cost an additional $232000 per year of life saved. In subtree analysis, the EVPI in the catheterization arm was 0.07 years, and increased to 0.13 years for an abnormal treadmill. If 1 life treadmill was normal, the EVPI was 0.01 years. If 1 life-year equals $35000 then one would be willing to spend only $300 to learn if he has 3 vessel disease after a normal treadmill test after thrombolysis. >
Surgical Prevention of Cancer

There have been many recent advances in cancer prevention, including improved understanding of cancer biology, better characterization of premalignant disease, significant advances in cancer surveillance, and identification of effective chemoprevention regimens. Despite this, surgery remains the best option for many individuals at high risk of cancer. Like all prevention modalities, surgical prevention involves balancing the factors governing cancer risk with the benefits and risks of treatment. The issues governing decision making for surgical prevention vary widely among different cancer types, and include consideration of the age and level of cancer risk of the individual, the effectiveness of cancer surveillance for the particular organ at risk, the aggressiveness of the cancer once present, and the morbidity of surgery. This article briefly reviews the use of surgery to prevent some of the most common epithelial malignancies, as well as some of the genetic cancer syndromes for which surgery plays an important role in improving survival.
Right Sensory Alien Hand Phenomenon from a Left Pontine Hemorrhage

BACKGROUND Acute onset of a sensory alien hand phenomenon has been observed only from a supratentorial lesion involving the non-dominant hand, mostly from a right posterior cerebral artery infarction. A single acute vascular lesion resulting in a dominant hand sensory alien hand syndrome has not been previously documented. CASE REPORT A 78-year old right-handed woman exhibited right sensory alien hand phenomenon from a left pontine hemorrhage. Disturbance of proprioceptive input and visuospatial perception are likely to play a role in manifesting the sign. CONCLUSIONS Dominant-hand sensory alien hand phenomenon may occur in an acute setting from a left pontine hemorrhage.
Response to "France and the German Question, 1945-1955," by Michael Creswell and Marc Trachtenberg

Three scholars offer separate responses to the article by Michael Creswell and Marc Trachtenberg. The responses include some common points, but they diverge sharply in other respects. The first two respondents generally agree with the conclusions reached by Creswell and Trachtenberg, but one of them believes that the article goes too far (in its contention that France's anxiety about the Soviet Union eclipsed its concerns about Germany), whereas the other argues that the article does not go far enough in showing how the United States adapted its policy to accommodate French leaders. The second respondent also questions whether Creswell and Trachtenberg have added anything new to the latest “revisionist” works on French-German relations in the first decade of Cold War. The third respondent, unlike the first two, rejects the main thrust of the article by Creswell and Trachtenberg and seeks to defend the traditional view that France was very reluctant to go along with U.S. and British policies on the German ...
Integrated Sensing for IPMC Actuators Using Strain Gages for Underwater Applications

Ionic polymer-metal composite (IPMC) actuators have many advantages, for instance, they: 1) can be driven with low voltages (<;5 V); 2) are soft, flexible, and easily shaped; and 3) can operate in an aqueous environment (such as water). Important applications for IPMCs include active catheter devices for minimally invasive surgery, artificial muscles, and sensors and actuators for biorobotics. Due to inherent nonlinear behavior, dynamic effects, and external disturbances, sensing and feedback control are required for precision operation. A new method to sense the displacement of an IPMC actuator using resistive strain gages is proposed. The sensing scheme is low cost, practical, effective, and importantly, compact compared to existing methods such as lasers and charge-coupled device (CCD) cameras. The strain-to-displacement relationship is developed and experimental results are presented to demonstrate the effectiveness of the sensing scheme. Furthermore, the sensor signal is used as feedback information in a repetitive controller to improve the tracking of periodic motion. The stability condition for the controller is presented, and the sensing scheme and feedback control approach are applied to a fabricated perfluorinated ion-exchange-membrane-based IPMC actuator with lithium as its counterion. Experimental results show that the tracking error can be reduced by approximately 50% compared to PID control for tracking of periodic signals, including sinusoidal and triangular wave forms.
Plant defence suppression is mediated by a fungal sirtuin during rice infection by Magnaporthe oryzae

Crop destruction by the hemibiotrophic rice pathogen Magnaporthe oryzae requires plant defence suppression to facilitate extensive biotrophic growth in host cells before the onset of necrosis. How this is achieved at the genetic level is not well understood. Here, we report that a M. oryzae sirtuin, MoSir2, plays an essential role in rice defence suppression and colonization by controlling superoxide dismutase (SOD) gene expression. Loss of MoSir2 function in Δsir2 strains did not affect appressorial function, but biotrophic growth in rice cells was attenuated. Compared to wild type, Δsir2 strains failed to neutralize plant-derived reactive oxygen species (ROS) and elicited robust defence responses in rice epidermal cells that included elevated pathogenesis-related gene expression and granular depositions. Deletion of a SOD-encoding gene under MoSir2 control generated Δsod1 deletion strains that mimicked Δsir2 for impaired rice defence suppression, confirming SOD activity as a downstream output of MoSir2. In addition, comparative protein acetylation studies and forward genetic analyses identified a JmjC domain-containing protein as a likely target of MoSir2, and a Δsir2 Δjmjc double mutant was restored for MoSOD1 expression and defence suppression in rice epidermal cells. Together, this work reveals MoSir2 and MoJmjC as novel regulators of early rice cell infection.
Effect of residual stress on the surface flashover of alumina ceramics

The influence of surface residual stress on the surface flashover behavior of polycrystalline alumina in vacuum is investigated. The samples for the present investigation were prepared by using SiC and diamond abrasives of particle size ranging from 268 to 0.25 /spl mu/m. Two types of polishing procedures, namely forward and reverse sequence polishing, are adopted in the present work. The surface residual stress of the specimens is determined by the two-exposure X-ray diffraction method. The flashover strength and the surface stress of the samples, subjected to forward sequence polishing (i.e., coarse to fine finish), are found to exhibit a random behavior with respect to the surface finish. Interestingly, a linear dependence between flashover strength and surface stress with respect to the surface finish is observed for the samples subjected to reverse sequence polishing (i.e., fine to coarse finish). The observed dependence between the residual stress and the flashover strength is discussed in terms of the high energy defect centers (e.g., deep traps) formed within the forbidden gap of the alumina insulator. >
Psychological, Philosophical, and Educational Criticisms of Harry Frankfurt’s Concept of and Views about “Bullshit” in Human Discourse, Discussions, and Exchanges

Princeton University Press recently published the American moral philosopher Harry Frankfurt’s book On Bullshit, which quickly made the New York Times best seller list. Originally published in the journal Raritan in 1986, Frankfurt’s book has been heralded as an important theoretical development in the study of what he (and society) colloquially refer to as “bullshit.” Frankfurt formally defines BS as a situation where ones inclination and obligation to speak about a topic or concept far exceeds one’s knowledge of the topic, which most certainly has been a rising problem for a number of reasons over the past 20 years. However, Frankfurt’s book, which purports to be a moral victory of sorts, and despite its popularity, is not only severely flawed and outdated from an educational, cognitive, and philosophical perspective, but it is also highly oppressive in several different but very important ways. Because this book and its main arguments are being cited favorably in a number of different academic circles (including the science education community), this paper highlights the limitations and flaws of this book and develops a counter-argument and model of BS that has important implications for science, mathematics, philosophy, and educational theory and research.
Synaptogenesis in the photoreceptor terminal of the mouse retina.

Observations are presented of a combined light and electron microscopic study of synaptogenesis in the photoreceptor terminal of visuallycompetent mice. Our study suggests that photoreceptor synaptogenesis in these retina progresses through a sequence of postnatal changes which leads to the ordered arrangement of processes within the adult photoreceptor terminal. On the 5th postnatal day, neuronal processes from synaptic contacts with a photoreceptor terminal, usually in the vicinity of a synaptic ribbon. Following the formation of synaptic contacts, the processes invaginate into the photoreceptor terminal, maintaining their position, lateral to a synaptic ribbon. Beginning on about the 10th day, a central process enters the terminal to yield a triad configuration which is a characteristic of a mature photoreceptor terminal. The formation of triads is essentially complete by the 14th postnatal day. Our observations suggest that horizontal cell processes form synaptic contacts with the photoreceptor terminal before bipolar cell dendrites, implying that the horizontal cells mature in advance of the bipolar cells. This possibility is discussed in terms of the appearance of the electroretinogram (ERG) in the developing mouse retina.
Overcoming degradation in organic photovoltaics: Illuminating the role of fullerene functionalization

Photobleaching rates are investigated for thin films of poly(3-hexylthiophene) (P3HT) blends employing either an indene-C 60 bisadduct (ICBA) or [6,6]-phenyl-C 61 -butyric acid methyl ester (PCBM) as the electron acceptor. Relative to the bisindene, PCBM significantly enhances resistance to photobleaching of the P3HT donor polymer. We tentatively attribute a decrease in the charge transfer rate as the mechanism responsible for the more rapid photobleaching in the sample containing the bisindene adduct. In order to elucidate the influence of the photobleaching rate on the initial performance of unencapsulated devices, we also monitored the time-dependent behavior for P3HT:fullerene inverted devices. Under conditions of constant illumination, we observe essentially identical behavior in device performance parameters regardless of the energy levels of the electron acceptor. We conclude that over the time frame measured for these devices, the primary degradation mechanism of the active layer is independent of the electron acceptor, despite the enhanced tolerance to photobleaching it may impart to the donor material.
Efficient simulation of switch-level circuits in a hierarchical simulation environment

Switch-level simulation provides a good level of abstraction for simulating digital MOS circuits. For handling large circuits, it is often necessary to represent parts of the circuit by high-level software models, in order to speed up the simulation process. This paper, considers hierarchical switch-level circuits, and investigates the use of extracted functional models at different levels in the hierarchy to increase the efficiency of simulation. A comparative study, on some sample circuits, is used to determine the ideal size of a module that should be simulated using its functional model. >
Rossby Waves and the Interannual and Interdecadal Variability of Temperature and Salinity off California

Abstract Previous work has shown that large-scale interannual Rossby waves, largely remotely generated by equatorial winds, propagate westward from the coast off southern California. These waves have a large-scale anomalous alongshore velocity field that is proportional to the time derivative of the interannual sea level anomaly. Using these results, a theory is developed for interannual perturbations to a mean density field that varies both vertically and alongshore, like that for the California Current region off southern California. Because both the anomalous vertical and alongshore currents are proportional to the time derivative of the interannual sea level, the theory suggests that the anomalous currents associated with the Rossby waves, acting on the mean temperature field, should induce temperature fluctuations proportional to the anomalous dynamic height. The alongshore and vertical advections contribute to the temperature fluctuations in the same sense, a higher-than-normal sea level, for exampl...
Patterns of induced and constitutive monoterpene production in conifer needles in relation to insect herbivory

Studies were conducted to determine whether herbivore-induced synthesis of monoterpenes occurs in the needles of ponderosa pine (Pinus ponderosa Lawson), lodgepole pine (P. contorta Douglas var. latifolia Engelmann), white fir (Abies concolor Lindl. and Gordon) and Engelmann spruce [Picea engelmanii (Parry) Engelm.]. In the needles of all species except Engelmann spruce, simulated herbivory significantly induced the activity of monoterpene cyclases 4–8 days after wounding. In ponderosa pine, real herbivory by last-instar tiger moth larvae (Halisdota ingens Hy. Edwards: Lepidoptera) induced a significantly larger response (4.5-fold increase in monoterpene cyclase activity) than did simulated herbivory (2.5-fold increase). To our knowledge, this is the first report of herbivore-induced increases in monoterpene synthesis in needle tissue. Despite this increase in monoterpene synthesis, we observed no significant increase in total monoterpene pool size in wounded needles compared to controls. Large increases in the rate of monoterpene volatilization were observed in response to wounding. We conclude that the volatile losses caused by tissue damage compensate for herbivore-induced monoterpene synthesis, resulting in no change in pool size. Tiger moth larvae consume ponderosa pine needles in a pattern that begins at the tip and proceeds downward to midway along the needle, at which point they move to an undamaged needle. Constitutive monoterpene concentrations and monoterpene cyclase activities were highest in the lower half of ponderosa pine needles. The monoterpene profile also differed between the upper and lower needle halves, the lower half possessing an additional one to four monoterpene forms. We propose that the increasing gradient in monoterpene concentrations and number of monoterpenes along the needle from tip to base deters feeding beyond the midway point and provides time for the induction of increased cyclase activity and production of new monoterpenes. The induction of new monoterpene synthesis may have a role in replacing monoterpenes lost through damage-induced volatilization and preventing extreme compromise of the constitutive defense system.
Postpneumonectomy and Postlobectomy Empyema

Although similar strategies are used in the management of PPE and PLE, these conditions need to be viewed as two separate entities. For the purpose of devising the appropriate management strategy, PPE should be divided into early and late, with and without mediastinal induration and extensive pleural space contamination. If at all possible, PLE should be managed as a postpneumonic empyema with prolonged chest tube drainage. The key to these conditions is prevention.
The Value of Verification in Debt Financing: Evidence from Private U.S. Firms

I examine how verification of financial statements influences debt pricing. I use a large proprietary database of privately-held U.S. firms, an important business sector in which the information environment is opaque and financial statement audits are not mandated. I find that audited firms have a significantly lower cost of debt and that lenders place more weight on audited financial information in setting the interest rate. Further, I provide evidence of a mechanism for this increased financial statement usefulness: accruals from audited financial statements are better predictors of future cash flows. Collectively, I provide novel evidence that audited financial statements are more informative and that this significantly influences lenders’ decisions.
Random fluctuation of selection coefficients and the extent of nucleotide variation in human populations

It is well known that the selection coefficient of a mutant allele varies from generation to generation, and the effect of this factor on genetic variation has been studied by many theoreticians. However, no consensus has been reached. One group of investigators believes that fluctuating selection has an effect of enhancing genetic variation, whereas the other group contends that it has a diversity-reducing effect. In recent years, it has become possible to study this problem by using single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) as well as exome sequence data. In this article we present the theoretical distributions of mutant nucleotide frequencies for the two models of fluctuating selection and then compare the distributions with the empirical distributions obtained from SNP and exome sequence data in human populations. Interestingly, both SNP and exome sequence data showed that the neutral mutation model fits the empirical distribution quite well. Furthermore, the mathematical models with diversity-enhancing and diversity-reducing effects also fit the empirical distribution reasonably well. This result implies that there is no need of distinguishing between the diversity-enhancing and diversity-reducing models of fluctuating selection and the nucleotide polymorphism in human populations can be explained largely by neutral mutations when long-term evolution is considered.
NK-1 receptor desensitization and neutral endopeptidase terminate SP-induced pancreatic plasma extravasation

Substance P (SP) induces plasma extravasation and neutrophil infiltration by activating the neurokinin-1 receptor (NK1-R). We characterized the mechanisms regulating this response in the rat pancre...
Vertebral body fracture after TLIF: a new complication

The transforaminal posterior approach (TLIF) procedure was first described in 1982. Current literature indicates its equality in outcomes for fusion constructs as other anterior-posterior procedures. As a procedure becomes more popular and is more frequently performed the types and number of complications that occur increase. We report on a two case series that underwent TLIF. Both patients had satisfactory postoperative imaging, but presented later with coronal plane vertebral body fractures in the caudal vertebral body of the TLIF construct. We believe the complication may be related to: (a) unrecognized fracture of the endplate during cage impaction; (b) overloading the endplates by maximizing the lordosis achieved by using the reverse jackknife position on a Jackson table; (c) underlying mineral bone disease in patients. As the TLIF procedure increases in popularity, caution should be exercised to avoid the same potential complications. To describe a potential complication with the TLIF procedure. Case report. 2. Revision surgery. Case series. Caudal vertebral body fracture is a potential complication after TLIF. TLIF procedures can result in an unstable vertebral body fracture potentially necessitating revision decompression & stabilization. We recommend extra caution in patients with mineral bone disease, as technical errors can be magnified.
Do 18F-FDG PET/CT parameters in oropharyngeal and oral cavity squamous cell carcinomas indicate HPV status?

OBJECTIVE The aim of this study was to explore the relationship of PET/CT parameters with human papillomavirus (HPV) status of oropharyngeal (OP) and oral cavity (OC) squamous cell carcinomas (SCCs). PATIENTS AND METHODS We retrospectively reviewed 39 patients with OC and OP-SCC who underwent staging 18F-FDG PET/CT. PET/CT parameters were measured for the primary tumor and the hottest involved node, including SUV max, SUV mean, SUV peak, metabolic tumor volume, total lesion glycolysis, standardized added metabolic activity (SAM), and normalized SAM. Patient characteristics were compared between HPV positive (HPV+) and negative (HPV-) groups. Receiver operating characteristic analysis was used to dichotomize PET/CT parameters into high and low. Logistic regression models predicting HPV status were fit for each PET/CT parameter. RESULTS The HPV+ group was composed of 18 patients all with OP-SCC; the HPV- group consisted of 21 patients, 4 OP cancer patients and 17 OC cancer patients. The HPV+ group had a higher proportion of N2 stage (94% vs 43%; P < 0.001). Nodal PET/CT parameters were higher in the HPV+ group (P < 0.01); this difference was not present for the primary lesion. After adjusting for sex and age, the association of higher nodal SUV max (odds ratio [OR], 9.67), SUV mean (OR, 10.48), SUV peak (OR 9.67), metabolic tumor volume (OR, 14.52), total lesion glycolysis (OR, 11.84), and SAM, normalized SAM (OR, 16.21) with HPV+ status remained statistically significant (P < 0.05). CONCLUSIONS Nodal PET/CT parameters predict HPV status. High nodal FDG uptake should raise suspicion for positive HPV status in the evaluation of the primary lesion.
Relationship between immunity and circulating antibodies, complement and tuberculopolysaccharide in tuberculosis.

able antibodies only to tuberculoprotein or only to polysaccharide were not immune, whereas those sensitized with BCG organisms which had antibodies to both did survive challenge for a longer time. The present experiments were undertaken to test this hypothesis by maintaining high antibody titers before and after challenge by various treatments and then correlating the results with the fate of the animals.
Aristotle’s Nominalism

Aristotle seeks to determine what it is to be a substance. He ends up concluding that it is to be its essence or form. The definition of an essence is stated all in universal terms. Yet Aristotle insists that no universal is a substance. These claims can be made consistent if a definition is taken as a statement of the essence, in the sense of predicating something of it. For Aristotle predicates are typically more general than their subjects. In this way Aristotle can have a science about individuals consisting of universal statements.
Quorum Sensing in Marine Microbial Environments

Quorum sensing (QS) is a form of chemical communication used by certain bacteria that regulates a wide range of biogeochemically important bacterial behaviors. Although QS was first observed in a marine bacterium nearly four decades ago, only in the past decade has there been a rise in interest in the role that QS plays in the ocean. It has become clear that QS, regulated by signals such as acylated homoserine lactones (AHLs) or furanosyl-borate diesters [autoinducer-2 (AI-2) molecules], is involved in important processes within the marine carbon cycle, in the health of coral reef ecosystems, and in trophic interactions between a range of eukaryotes and their bacterial associates. The most well-studied QS systems in the ocean occur in surface-attached (biofilm) communities and rely on AHL signaling. AHL-QS is highly sensitive to the chemical and biological makeup of the environment and may respond to anthropogenic change, including ocean acidification and rising sea surface temperatures.
Learning Transferrable Representations for Unsupervised Domain Adaptation

Supervised learning with large scale labelled datasets and deep layered models has caused a paradigm shift in diverse areas in learning and recognition. However, this approach still suffers from generalization issues under the presence of a domain shift between the training and the test data distribution. Since unsupervised domain adaptation algorithms directly address this domain shift problem between a labelled source dataset and an unlabelled target dataset, recent papers have shown promising results by fine-tuning the networks with domain adaptation loss functions which try to align the mismatch between the training and testing data distributions. Nevertheless, these recent deep learning based domain adaptation approaches still suffer from issues such as high sensitivity to the gradient reversal hyperparameters and overfitting during the fine-tuning stage. In this paper, we propose a unified deep learning framework where the representation, cross domain transformation, and target label inference are all jointly optimized in an end-to-end fashion for unsupervised domain adaptation. Our experiments show that the proposed method significantly outperforms state-of-the-art algorithms in both object recognition and digit classification experiments by a large margin. We will make our learned models as well as the source code available immediately upon acceptance.
Surgical Treatment of Adrenal Gland Tumors

The adrenal gland is an important structure both anatomically and physiologically. To properly diagnose and treat adrenal disorders, one must have a thorough understanding of the anatomy, the normal physiology, and the pathophysiology of the gland. Adrenal tumors comprise an interesting spectrum of benign and malignant diseases. The most common tumors involving the adrenal gland are metastatic lesions to the adrenal. Management of these metastatic lesions is dependent upon the primary disease entity. The major primary adrenal disorders discussed in this chapter will include: Cushing’s syndrome, hyperaldosteronism, pheochromocytoma, an incidentally discovered adrenal mass, and adrenal cortical carcinoma. These tumors can present with a variability of clinical signs and symptoms which often overlap, making the differentiation on the basis of symptoms and physical examination both difficult and unreliable.
JUDICIAL ROTATION AS CENTRIPETAL FORCE: SENTENCING IN THE COURT COMMUNITIES OF SOUTH CAROLINA*

Courts as communities theory emphasizes the sentencing differences that can arise between localities within a single state. The results of published studies have highlighted how local differences emerge based on informal sociological and political processes defined by the communities perspective. The findings from recent quantitative studies from South Carolina have revealed notably less county variation in sentencing than has been observed elsewhere. I use qualitative interviews with 13 South Carolina trial judges to investigate sentencing processes and to shed light on these findings. The interviews explore the state's legal structure and culture, including the practice of circuit rotation in which judges travel among counties holding court. The results suggest rotation serves as a centripetal force of sentencing culture, homogenizing what might otherwise be a more varied collection of county-specific norms. Rotation leads to increased uniformity through judge shopping and the cross-pollination of ideas and norms. Defendants can strategically judge shop and plead in front of a lenient judge—a process that gives rise to the term “plea judge,” which is a label for the most lenient judges who sentence a large number of defendants. Rotation also increases the interactions among judges and prosecutors, expanding networks and grapevines, and leading to cross-pollination and the sharing of ideas.
Evidence-Based Management of Breast Cancer

The magnitude of the worldwide breast cancer burden is substantial and is increasing. Known to be a disease of greatest prevalence in heavily industrialized nations, its incidence and mortality rates are rising internationally as the populations of relatively less developed countries adopt the lifestyle and commercialism that characterize Western communities. Breast cancer has therefore been the subject of numerous clinical trials designed to improve our ability to screen for, to treat, and even to prevent the disease. This chapter reviews the highest levels of evidence that have been published for the major categories of interest in the contemporary management of breast cancer:
Cracks in the Profession’s Monopoly Armor

* Professor of Law and Faculty Director of the Miller-Becker Center for Professional Responsibility at the University of Akron School of Law. The author would like to thank Art Garwin, Director of the American Bar Association Center for Professional Responsibility, Professors Stefan Padfield and Joann Sahl of the University of Akron School of Law, Frank E. Quirk, Director of the Miller-Becker Center, and Steve Crossland, Chair of the Washington State Bar Association's Limited License Legal Technician (LLLT) Board, for their helpful comments. I am especially indebted to Joseph Manno for his excellent research and assistance. My thanks to Professor Bruce A. Green, Director of the Louis Stein Center for Law and Ethics, for inviting me to participate in this Colloquium, The Legal Profession's Monopoly on the Practice ofLaw, 82 FORDHAM L. REv. 2563 (2014). 1. See CHARLES W. WOLFRAM, MODERN LEGAL ETHICS 824-27 (1986) (highlighting how the lawyer monopoly over much of the legal process today results from the combination of courts and lawyers controlling bar admission and state courts enforcing "common-law and statutory prohibitions against the unauthorized practice [of law]" (UPL), and noting that a "vigorous and expansive doctrine" of UPL did not occur in America until "sometime after the First World War"); Deborah L. Rhode, Policing the Professional Monopoly: A Constitutional and Empirical Analysis of Unauthorized Practice Prohibitions, 34 STAN. L. REV. 1, 4 (1981) ("[T]he profession has engaged in disturbingly little introspection concerning the proper scope of its monopoly."). 2. WOLFRAM, supra note 1, at 24; see, e.g., NISHA, LLC v. TriBuilt Constr. Grp., LLC, 388 S.W.3d 444, 447 (Ark. 2012) (reversing a court ruling that a hearing's arbitrator could decide who would represent the parties and holding that the state supreme court has "exclusive authority" to regulate the practice of law); id. at 451 ("[A] nonlawyer's representation of a corporation in arbitration proceedings constitutes [UPL]."); Cleveland Metro. Bar Ass'n v. Davie, 977 N.E.2d 606, 616 (Ohio 2012) (holding that the state supreme court "has exclusive power to regulate, control, and define the practice of law in Ohio" and "if a statute or administrative rule purports to permit laypersons to practice law before a board or an administrative agency, this court retains the ultimate authority to determine what activities a layperson" may undertake before committing UPL); see also MODEL RULES OF PROF'L CONDUCT pmbl. para. 10 (2013) ("The legal profession is largely self-governing.... [U]ltimate authority over the legal profession is vested largely in the courts."); WOLFRAM, supra note 1, at 79 ("The history of the regulation of the legal profession in the United States and England is primarily that of supervision by courts."); cf Brown v. Gerstein, 460 N.E.2d 1043, 1052 (Mass. App. Ct. 1984) (holding that the practice of law is a practice or trade and thus subject to consumer protection statutes); In re Burson, 909 S.W.2d 768, 777 (Tenn. 1995) (deciding that the state legislature may authorize nonlawyer tax agents).
Intrafirm Incentives and Supply Chain Performance

Companies in many industries have begun to realize that conflicts of interest among the various parties in a supply chain can engender operationally inefficient behavior. Consequently, many researchers have become interested in identifying and evaluating methods of coordinating supply chains in which multiple decision makers pursue individual agendas (cf. [32]). The typical approach in the OM literature is to partition a traditional inventory model into a number of subproblems, each representing the decisions and objectives of a distinct organization. Most commonly, the supply chain is assumed to contain just two firms, e.g., a manufacturer and a retailer. The analysis then proceeds to pinpoint the root causes of inefficiency, and recommend mechanisms for appropriately adjusting individual incentives.
Super-resolution chromatin tracing reveals domains and cooperative interactions in single cells

The spatial organization of chromatin is pivotal for regulating genome functions. We report an imaging method for tracing chromatin organization with kilobase- and nanometer-scale resolution, unveiling chromatin conformation across topologically associating domains (TADs) in thousands of individual cells. Our imaging data revealed TAD-like structures with globular conformation and sharp domain boundaries in single cells. The boundaries varied from cell to cell, occurring with nonzero probabilities at all genomic positions but preferentially at CCCTC-binding factor (CTCF)- and cohesin-binding sites. Notably, cohesin depletion, which abolished TADs at the population-average level, did not diminish TAD-like structures in single cells but eliminated preferential domain boundary positions. Moreover, we observed widespread, cooperative, multiway chromatin interactions, which remained after cohesin depletion. These results provide critical insight into the mechanisms underlying chromatin domain and hub formation.
Deployment of Field Hospitals to Sudden Onset Disasters

National or International deployments of field hospitals to sudden onset disasters (SOD), such as natural disasters, may be necessary when the event occurs in remote areas, with scarce medical support or when the local medical facilities are overwhelmed, destroyed, or damaged.
Day of Reckoning: Output Losses from Fiscal Stabilizations

We derive the quantitative implications of reducing sustained budget deficits (labeled fiscal stabilizations) in the context of a general equilibrium model of innovation-led growth. In the model, innovation comes from entrant firms creating new products and incumbent firms improving own existing products. We discipline parameters using post-war observations for the U.S. economy. We find that fiscal stabilizations achieved via labor tax rate hikes permanently lower the equilibrium path of aggregate output. Output losses are sizable. For example, stabilizing the government debt-to-GDP ratio after 10 consecutive years of approximately 5% deficit-to-GDP ratios, entails a nearly 2% permanent loss in income per capita.
Gulllain-Barre Syndrome after trivalent influenza vaccination in adults

Lines of evidence suggest trivalent influenza vaccination may be associated with Guillain-Barre syndrome (GBS), an immune-mediated acute inflammatory neuropathy. On the other hand, this vaccination protects against influenza infection, which has been demonstrated as a trigger of GBS. To clarify the net effect of trivalent influenza vaccines on GBS, we conducted a retrospective nationwide nested case-control study using the database of the Taiwan National Health Insurance program. We identified 182 hospitalized patients with GBS aged ≥50 years from 2007 to 2015 as the cases, and 910 hospitalized patients, matched by gender, age, date of hospitalization, comorbidities, and medications, as the control subjects. Nearby and remote exposures of vaccination were defined as subjects who had received trivalent influenza vaccine 42 (nearby exposure) and 90 days (remote exposure) before the date of hospitalization, respectively. We found 7 (3.85%) GBS patients and 26 (2.86%) matched control subjects who demonstrated nearby exposures of influenza vaccine (odds ratio: 1.46, 95% confidence interval: 0.56-3.78). Seventeen (9.34%) GBS patients were exposed to influenza vaccines remotely, while the number of remote exposure of influenza vaccines in matched control subjects was 72 (7.91%, odds ratio: 1.26, 95% confidence interval: 0.67-2.38). These results do not support an association between trivalent influenza vaccine and GBS among the patients aged ≥50 years.
Creating Union Democracy, Workers' Consciousness and Solidarity: Decision-Making Process, Election, and Education in Korean Unions

This paper examines how different the two Korean national union federations create and consolidate union democracy according to their organizational characteristics and how the difference in union democracy between these two federations affects movement activities of their local unions. The Federation of Korean Trade Unions (FKTU), which has cooperated with the authoritarian state power and hegemony of capital, rarely challenges the fundamentals of the capitalist system and seldom encourages the full democratic participation of its members. In contrast, the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions (KCTU), a group of independent unions which is familiar with a wide range of political radicalism, always challenges the hegemony of global capitalism. Compared to FKTU-affiliated unions, KCTU-affiliated unions, which have been historically more involved in 'insurgent political practices,' have developed internal democracy, especially participatory democracy. In addition, the KCTU and its constituents have tried to resist 'the hegemony of capital in the sphere of politics' through participating in the political party system while continuously challenging 'the hegemony of capital in the sphere of production' through their union actions. To examine differences in union democracy between the two federations and their constituents I compare various union activities, including the decision-making process, elections and education, by focusing on 1) how historical experiences affect union leaders’ political consciousness about creating union democracy, 2) how both federations and their affiliated unions create union democracy, and 3) what kind of outcomes are produced from the process of building union democracy.
Devastating Vertebral Osteomyelitis After Epidural Steroid Injection: A Case Report.

Case A 62-year-old man with no comorbidities presented with back and bilateral leg pain and progressive paraplegia that developed over a 1-week period. He had received 2 lumbar epidural steroid injections (LESIs) for lumbar stenosis 39 and 25 days before presentation. Workup revealed osteomyelitis of L4 and L5 with epidural abscesses. He ultimately underwent all-posterior L4 and L5 corpectomy with reconstruction and L1-pelvis arthrodesis, followed by 8 weeks of intravenous antibiotics. His weakness improved, but neurological deficits persisted. Conclusions This case illustrates a catastrophic complication after LESI, resulting in permanent neurological injury in a patient with no apparent risk factors.
Donor considerations in pediatric kidney transplantation

This article reviews kidney transplant donor options for children with end-stage kidney disease (ESKD). Global access to kidney transplantation is variable. Well-established national policies, organizations for organ procurement and allocation, and donor management policies may account for higher deceased donor (DD transplants) in some countries. Living donor kidney transplantation (LD) predominates in countries where organ donation has limited national priority. In addition, social, cultural, religious and medical factors play a major role in both LD and DD kidney transplant donation. Most children with ESKD receive adult-sized kidneys. The transplanted kidney has a finite survival and the expectation is that children who require renal replacement therapy from early childhood will probably have 2 or 3 kidney transplants in their lifetime. LD transplant provides better long-term graft survival and is a better option for children. When a living related donor is incompatible with the intended recipient, paired kidney exchange with a compatible unrelated donor may be considered. When the choice is a DD kidney, the decision-making process in accepting a donor offer requires careful consideration of donor history, kidney donor profile index, HLA matching, cold ischemia time, and recipient's time on the waiting list. Accepting or declining a DD offer in a timely manner can be challenging when there are undesirable facts in the donor's history which need to be balanced against prolonging dialysis in a child. An ongoing global challenge is the significant gap between organ supply and demand, which has increased the need to improve organ preservation techniques and awareness for organ donation.
Impact of school-entry vaccination requirement changes on clinical practice implementation and adolescent vaccination rates in metropolitan Philadelphia

In 2017, Pennsylvania amended school-entry vaccination requirements including reduction of the provisional period from eight months to the first five days of school and requirement of meningococcal...
Capturing temporal heterogeneity in soil nitrous oxide fluxes with a robust and low-cost automated chamber apparatus

Abstract. Soils play an important role in Earth's climate system through their regulation of trace greenhouse gases. Despite decades of soil gas flux measurements using manual chamber methods, limited temporal coverage has led to high uncertainty in flux magnitude and variability, particularly during peak emission events. Automated chamber measurement systems can collect high-frequency (subdaily) measurements across various spatial scales but may be prohibitively expensive or incompatible with field conditions. Here we describe the construction and operational details for a robust, relatively inexpensive, and adaptable automated dynamic (steady-state) chamber measurement system modified from previously published methods, using relatively low cost analyzers to measure nitrous oxide ( N2O ) and carbon dioxide ( CO2 ). The system was robust to intermittent flooding of chambers, long tubing runs ( >100 m), and operational temperature extremes ( −12 to 39 ∘ C) and was entirely powered by solar energy. Using data collected between 2017 and 2019 we tested the underlying principles of chamber operation and examined N2O diel variation and rain-pulse timing that would be difficult to characterize using infrequent manual measurements. Stable steady-state flux dynamics were achieved during 29 min chamber closure periods at a relatively low flow rate (2 L min −1 ). Instrument performance and calculated fluxes were minimally impacted by variation in air temperature and water vapor. Measurements between 08:00 and 12:00 LT were closest to the daily mean N2O and CO2 emission. Afternoon fluxes (12:00–16:00 LT) were 28 % higher than the daily mean for N2O (4.04 vs. 3.15 nmol m −2 s −1 ) and were 22 % higher for CO2 (4.38 vs. 3.60 µ mol m - 2 s - 1 ). High rates of N2O emission are frequently observed after precipitation. Following four discrete rainfall events, we found a 12–26 h delay before peak N2O flux, which would be difficult to capture with manual measurements. Our observation of substantial and variable diel trends and rapid but variable onset of high N2O emissions following rainfall supports the need for high-frequency measurements.
Improving Student Study Choices in CS1 with Gamification and Flipped Classrooms

Recent research has explored flipped classrooms, lightweight teams, and gamification to improve the CS1 student learning and social experience. In this paper, we expand upon this research by implementing a flipped classroom with team-based gamification of student study choices. We designed and implemented a Moodle plugin for gamification to reward students for practicing "good" study habits, such as turning in assignments early and re-taking quizzes for extra practice. To evaluate our approach, we analyzed data collected from three consecutive semesters of CS1: one semester without gamification, one with gamification, and one with gamification tied to a small grade incentive. Based on log data from our plugin and student survey responses, we found students did make better study choices, including submitting programming assignments and online quizzes significantly earlier; however, these improved study choices did not lead to higher final exam scores. Overall, students enjoyed and were motivated to improve their study habits due to our flipped, team-based, gamified CS1 course.