cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Conjugation Approach To Produce a Staphylococcus aureus Synbody with Activity in Serum

Synbodies show promise as a new class of synthetic antibiotics. Here, we explore improvements in their activity and production through conjugation chemistry. Maleimide conjugation is a widely used conjugation strategy due to its high yield, selectivity, and low cost. We used this strategy to conjugate two antibacterial peptides to produce a bivalent antibacterial peptide, called a synbody that has bactericidal activity against methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA). The synbody was prepared by conjugation of a partially d-amino acid substituted synthetic antibacterial peptide to a bis-maleimide scaffold. The synbody slowly degrades in serum, but also undergoes exchange reactions with other serum proteins, such as albumin. Therefore, we hydrolyzed the thiosuccinimide ring using a mild hydrolysis protocol to produce a new synbody with similar bactericidal activity. The synbody was now resistant to exchange reactions and maintained bactericidal activity in serum for 2 h. This work demonstrates th...
SU-F-J-124: Reduction in Dosimetric Impact of Motion Using VMAT Compared to IMRT in Hypofractionated Prostate Cancer Patients

Purpose: To quantify and compare the dosimetric impact of motion management correction strategies during VMAT and IMRT for hypofractionated prostate treatment. Methods: Two arc VMAT and 9 field IMRT plans were generated for two prostate cancer patients undergoing hypofractionated radiotherapy (7.5Gy × 5 and 8Gy × 5). 212 motion traces were retrospectively extracted from treatment records of prostate cancer patients with implanted Calypso beacons. Dose to the CTV and normal tissues was reconstructed for each trace and plan taking into account the actual treatment delivery time. Following motion correction scenarios were simulated: (1) VMAT plan – (a) No correction, (b) correction between arcs, (c) correction every 20 degrees of gantry rotation and (2) IMRT plan - (a) No correction,(b) correction between fields. Two mm action threshold for position correction was assumed. The 5–95% confidence interval (CI) range was extracted from the family of DVHs for each correction scenario. Results: Treatment duration for 8Gy plan (VMAT vs IMRT) was 3 vs 12 mins and for 7.5Gy plan was 3 vs 9 mins. In the absence of correction, the VMAT 5–−95% CI dose spread was, on average, less than the IMRT dose spread by 2% for CTVD95, 9% for rectalwall (RW) D1cc and 9% for bladderwall (BW) D53. Further, VMAT b/w arcs correction strategy reduced the spread about the planned value compared to IMRT b/w fields correction by: 1% for CTVD95, 2.6% for RW1cc and 2% for BWD53. VMAT 20 degree strategy led to greater reduction in dose spread compared to IMRT by: 2% for CTVD95, 4.5% for RW1cc and 6.7% for BWD53. Conclusion: In the absence of a correction strategy, the limited motion during VMAT’s shorter delivery times translates into less motion-induced dosimetric degradation than IMRT. Performing limited periodic motion correction during VMAT can yield excellent conformity to planned values that is superior to IMRT. This work was partially supported by Varian Medical Systems
Citizen monitoring during hazards: validation of Fukushima radiation measurements

Citizen-led movements producing scientific hazard data during disasters are increasingly common. After the Japanese earthquake-triggered tsunami in 2011, and the resulting radioactive releases at the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plants, citizens monitored on-ground levels of radiation with innovative mobile devices built from off-the-shelf components. To date, the citizen-led Safecast project has recorded 50 million radiation measurements worldwide, with the majority of these measurements from Japan. The analysis of data which are multi-dimensional, not vetted, and provided from multiple devices presents big data challenges due to their volume, velocity, variety, and veracity. While the Safecast project produced massive open-source radiation measurements at specific coordinates and times, the reliability and validity of the overall data have not yet been assessed. The nuclear disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear-power plant provides a case for assessing the Safecast data with official aerial remote sensing radiation data jointly collected by the governments of the United States and Japan. This study spatially analyzes and statistically compares the citizen-volunteered and government-generated radiation data. An assessment of the Safecast dataset requires several preprocessing steps. First, it was necessary to convert the data from the Safecast ionized radiation sensors since they were collected using different units of measure than the government data. Secondly, the normally occurring radiation and decay rates of cesium from deposition surveys were used to properly compare measurements in space and time. Finally, the GPS located points were selected within overlapping extents at multiple spatial resolutions. Quantitative measures were used to assess the similarity and differences in the observed measurements. Radiation measurements from the same geographic extents show similar spatial variations and statistically significant correlations. The results suggest that? actionable scientific data for disasters and emergencies can be inferred from non-traditional and not vetted data generated through citizen science projects. This project provides a methodology for comparing datasets of radiological measurements over time and space. Integrating data for assessment from different Earth sensing systems is paramount for societal and environmental problems.
LQ control for the NASA learn-to-fly free-to-roll project

Learn-To-Fly is a NASA program that attempts to significantly reduce the time it takes to design a new aircraft from concept to flight testing. To achieve this goal, NASA engineers have developed real-time nonlinear aerodynamic identification techniques. This paper presents the results of a wind tunnel experiment, where the roll dynamics of a Remotely-Controlled (RC) aircraft model in a free-to-roll rig are controlled with a controller designed in real-time using the identified aerodynamic model. The proposed controller uses the Linear-Quadratic optimal control method to design PID controller gains.
Associations between the Physical, Sociocultural, and Safety Environments and Active Transportation to School

ABSTRACTBackground: Understanding why youth actively transport to school (ATS) has important health, programming, and policy implications. A growing body of research has revealed that there are common factors that influence this behavior. Collectively, these influences can be categorized into 3 domains: the physical environment (PE), sociocultural environment (SCE), and safety environment (SE). Purpose: Although researchers largely agree that these constructs affect ATS, it is not clearly understood how they may interact and to what degree they may influence ATS behavior. Methods: A logistic regression analysis was performed to determine the influence of PE, SCE, and SE on the odds of walking or biking to school. Results: Both PE and SCE were directly associated with active travel, and the SE had an indirect effect. Discussion: A combination of elements from the PE and SCE significantly impacted the odds of using ATS. The impact of SE was significant enough to alter the direct influence of factors within ...
Parallel multi-splitting proximal method for star networks

We develop a parallel algorithm based on proximal method to solve the problem of minimizing summation of convex (not necessarily smooth) functions over a star network. We show that this method converges to an optimal solution for any choice of constant stepsize for convex objective functions. Under further assumption of Lipschitz-gradient and strong convexity of objective functions, the method converges linearly.
American Exceptionalism in Community Supervision

In recent years, increasing public attention has been drawn to the causes and consequences the rapid expansion of imprisonment in the U.S. to the point of mass incarceration. However, as numerous recent reports and academic articles have highlighted, the U.S. is “exceptional” not just for its massive prison population, but also for its rates of community supervision. In this review piece, we will detail these cross-national differences, concluding with a discussion of how community supervision practices are different in the U.S. as well. Our central conclusion is that the U.S. could have a much smaller population on community supervision (including both fewer admissions and shorter terms) with few public safety repercussions.
Construyendo utopías concretas: el movimiento comunero en Venezuela

Historically, utopias had an important role in the construction of social alternatives. This article analyzes Venezuelan communes, a mechanism of local self-government, as a utopic configuration or "concrete utopia". I discuss different Marxist and emancipatory concepts of utopia and connect them with the Latin American thought in order to show how the utopic preconfiguration has to be necessarily considered in the processes of revolutionary struggle. After summarizing the structure and functioning of the local self-government, I analyze how the utopian configuration is practiced in the communes. The communes have their roots in political and social traditions and connect with socialist and revolutionary experiences, as well as with the history of indigenous, afro and popular resistance. The structure and functioning of the local government shows that what happens in the communes is a utopian prefiguration. In the popular imaginary a Communal State will replace the bourgeois state.
Nanostructured Electrode Materials for Lithium-Ion Batteries

Electrochemical energy storage systems are becoming increasingly important with respect to their use in portable electronic devices, medical implant devices, hybrid electric and electric vehicles, and storage of solar and wind energies. Lithium-ion batteries are appealing for these needs because of their high energy density, wide range of operating temperatures, and long shelf and cycle life. However, further breakthroughs in electrode materials or improvements in existing electrode materials are critical to realize the full potential of the lithium-ion technology. Nanostructured materials present an attractive opportunity in this regard as they could offer several advantages such as fast reaction kinetics, high power density, good cycling stability with facile strain relaxation compared to their bulk counterparts. In this chapter, we present an overview of the latest progress on the nanostructured anode and cathode materials for lithium-ion batteries.
The Work of Imitation: Decadent Writing as Mimetic Labour

This chapter argues for regarding decadent writing as a sophisticated rethinking of the longstanding refusal in Western thought to treat mimesis as a form of work. From Plato to nineteenth-century social theorists like Gabriel Tarde, imitation is either a kind of game or an unconscious process, more child’s play or biological twitch than reasoned craft. Decadent writers instead see mimesis as a means of production, a way of creating something new through the reuse of older cultural materials. They reflect on their reworking of the idea of mimesis by contrasting the practices of decadent aesthetics with those of factory labour. While writers like Huysmans and Wilde associate the latter with mere repetition—a mechanized variation of Plato’s dismissal of mimesis as a reproduction of what already exists—they connect the former with aristocratic traditions of skilled craft.
Evaluation and Conclusions

We are finally at a point to bring the discussion of telecommunications demand to a close. Unlike in the 1980 monograph, I have not attempted in this book to provide an exhaustive exposition of the literature. My approach, rather, has been to review a selection of post-1980 studies, some of which I have been personally involved with, which in my view particularly add to our empirical understanding of the structure of telecommunications demand or involve the development or application of new theoretical models.
Faculty Development for Workplace Instructors

If the ultimate goal of workplace learning is to be successful teaching students who have been placed in the workplace setting to learn, then strategies that will help the instructors learn how to support the students are the goal of faculty development (also called staff development or educational development in different countries and disciplines) and its practitioners. To use the more familiar workplace learning denotation, faculty developers are the trainers who train the trainers. The focus of that training, and this chapter, is the workplace instructor and the goal of that training is to make the workplace instructors more effective when helping students. This chapter will identify evidence-based practices that can help instructors be more effective, while maintaining the integrity of the workplace activities.
License Update and Migration Processes in Open Source Software Projects

Open source software (OSS) has increasingly been the subject of research efforts. Central to this focus is the nature under which the software can be distributed, used, and modified and the causes and consequent effects on software development, usage, and distribution. At present, we have little understanding of, what happens when these licenses change, what motivates such changes, and how new licenses are created, updated, and deployed. Similarly, little attention has been paid to the agreements under which contributions are made to OSS projects and the impacts of changes to these agreements. We might also ask these same questions regarding the licenses governing how individuals and groups contribute to OSS projects. This paper focuses on addressing these questions with case studies of processes by which the Apache Software Foundation’s creation and migration to Version 2.0 of the Apache Software License and the NetBeans project’s migration to the Joint Licensing Agreement.
Environmental Civil Disobedience

Four views concerning environmental disobedience are discussed in this chapter, focusing on the moral justification of lawbreaking on behalf of natural environments. The traditional view suggests that accounts of ordinary civil disobedience understood through the Rawlsian tradition can be extended to capture cases of environmental disobedience. The revisionary view argues that the concept of civil disobedience needs to be revised in order to account for environmental disobedience, ecosabotage in particular. The radical view militates against basic assumptions of civil disobedience to argue that ecosabotage counts as forms of civil disobedience. The envisionary view suggests that environmental disobedience is best understood as a creative performance, a type of beautiful trouble or creative disruption that expresses environmental values that we must use the moral imagination to understand.
Art connections: An investigation of art education courses for preservice generalists

AbstractThis article discusses a mixed-methods study funded by the National Arts Education Foundation that investigated art education courses designed for preservice generalist teachers at universi...
19th annual TTRA conference

Abstract Cindy Guernsey, Gin Hayden, Sarah Richardson and C.R. Goeldner briefly summarize the 19th Annual Conference of the Travel and Tourism Research Association held in Montreal, Canada on 19–23 June 1988. The conference discussed a variety of research methods and applications, ways of improving demand for different attractions, and the future of tourism generally.
Discordant treatment response in primary tumors and lymph node metastases after four weeks of preoperative PD-1 blockade in head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC).

6016Background: Discordant radiographic responses are described in other tumor types in response to immunotherapy with response at some anatomic sites and progression in others. Here we determined ...
The Unique Nature of Depression and Anxiety among College Students with Adverse Childhood Experiences.

It is well established that adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) contribute to the development of mental disorders in adulthood. However, less is known about how childhood trauma impacts the mind and the body, whether the resulting mental disorders have different characteristics than those occurring without these antecedent conditions, and if treatment modalities need to reflect the unique nature of mental disorders rooted in trauma. Survey and biomarker data were gathered from a sample of college students (n = 93) to explore the relationship between childhood trauma and mental health. We examine how neuroimmune systems (inflammation and neuroplasticity) relate to depression and anxiety and whether these associations vary for those with and without a history of childhood trauma. Findings reveal that students with 4 or more ACEs are more likely to have depression and anxiety than students without these experiences. In addition, we find that inflammation (CRP) and neuronal health (BDNF) are associated with mental health disorders among students with four or more ACEs, but not for students without this history. These findings suggest that mental disorders associated with four or more ACEs may be uniquely tied to physiological processes, and consequently, warrant tailored treatments. The implications for mental health intervention include, 1) screening for childhood trauma, inflammation, and neuronal health and 2) referral to treatments which are theoretically and empirically tied to the root causes of mental disorders rather than those designed merely to suppress their symptoms.
Ultrafast photophysics of next generation single-photon efficient detectors (Conference Presentation)

The core of optical quantum information science is to use photonic quibits to encode, communicate, manipulate, and measure information, while single-photon efficient emitters (SPED) are one of the key devices to detect photonic qubits. Today, many SPED materials platforms, device architectures, and device performance are being actively explored.1 However, the fundamental study of ultrafast photophysics in situ devices remains a challenge. Another major challenge is current SPED devices rely on traditional semiconductor device physics. To break current device limitations, quantum materials including nanocrystal semiconductors and 2D semiconductors, may lead to novel device physics due to their unique ultrafast photophysics phenomena such as phonon bottleneck effect, multiple exciton interaction, and phase transition ultrafast locking. However, these phenomena are not fully understood. Therefore, in this talk we use a unique ultrafast photocurrent spectroscopy of sub-20 ps time resolution to study the in situ next generation SPED, which is on the platform of solution-processed PbS nanocrystals and 2D black phosphorus. We study the ultrafast photocurrent under various conditions such as temperature (80K to 450 K), laser flux, and electrical field dependence (up to 105 V/cm). We address the ultrafast photophysics dynamics including carrier photogeneration, recombination, transport, and trapping.2-4 References 1. R. H. Hadfield, “single-photon detectors for optical quantum information applications” Nat. Photonics, 3, 696 (2009) 2. J. Gao, et. al. “Carrier Transport Dynamics in High Speed BlackPhosphorus Photodetectors” ACS Photonics, 5, 1412 (2018) 3. J. Gao, et. al. “Solution-Processed, High-Speed, and High-Quantum-Efficiency Quantum Dot Infrared Photodetectors” ACS Photonics, 3, 1217 (2016) 4. J. Gao, et. al. “Solution-Processed single-photon efficient detectors” under preparation.
Leading Organizational Change: Semester-Long Project:

For organizational change to happen, people have to change their behaviors. Leaders of organizational change therefore need to develop their abilities to influence others, sell issues, and overcome...
Solid Pseudopapillary Tumor of Pancreas in a 15-year-old Female: A Case Report

Solid pseudopapillary tumor (SPT) is a very rare tumor accounting for only 1% of all pancreatic exocrine tumors. In this case, patient is a 15-year-old female with history of obesity and oligomenorrhea. She was admitted with a six-day history of severe upper abdominal pain, non-bloody vomiting and occasional diarrhea with no history of fever or sick contact. MRI abdominal examination with contrast showed a cystic 3.4 x 2.2 x 2.0 cm mass in the tail of the pancreas. Patient then underwent the distal pancreatectomy and splenectomy. Grossly, the tumor mass is well-circumscribed and has a tan/yellow cystic cut surface. Microscopically, most of the tumor tissue is necrotic. Sheets of cells demonstrate pseudopapillary arrangement in the preserved area. The nuclei are uniform without apparent mitotic figures and cytoplasm is moderate and eosinophilic. Immunohistochemistry study revealed that tumor cells are positive for CD10, progesterone receptor, synaptophysin and nuclear beta-catenin staining. Diagnosis of this case is challenging because extensive necrosis of the tumor tissue, however, the small areas of residual tumor still retain the pseudopapillary architecture and nested pattern. Individual tumor cells have monotonous low grade character. Immunoprofile also supports the diagnosis of solid pseudopapillary tumor. [N A J Med Sci. 2019;12(1):021-023. DOI: 10.7156/najms.2019.1201021]
Estimating Parameters of Structural Models Using Neural Networks

Machine learning tools such as neural networks are increasingly applied in marketing and economics to learn complex relations in data. The learned relations allow machines to perform various tasks, such as recognizing objects from images or recognizing emotions from speech. This paper explores using a neural net to learn the relation between data (moments) and the parameter values of a structural economic model, so that it can “recognize,” or estimate, these parameter values from the data (moments). We train the neural net with the datasets generated by the structural model under different parameter values. The neural net can be trained to give not only the point estimates of parameters but also their statistical accuracy. We show this Neural Net Estimator (NNE) converges to meaningful and well-known limits when the number of training datasets is sufficiently large. NNE does not require computing integrals over the unobservables in the structural model. Thus, it is suitable for models where such integrals are costly in MLE/GMM. We benchmark NNE in two Monte Carlo studies. NNE is able to achieve high estimation accuracies under very light estimation costs.
Spatial Planning Principles for Marine Ecosystem Restoration

Coastal and marine ecosystems characterized by foundation species, such as seagrass beds, coral reefs, salt marshes, oyster reefs, and mangrove swamps, are rich in biodiversity and support a range of ecosystem services including coastal protection, food provisioning, water filtration, carbon sequestration, recreational opportunities, cultural value, among others. These ecosystems have experienced degradation and a net loss of total area in regions around the world due to a host of anthropogenic stressors, resulting in declines in the associated ecosystem services they provide. Because of the extensive degradation in many locations, increasing attention has turned to ecosystem restoration of these marine habitats. Restoration techniques for marine and coastal ecosystems are generally more expensive when compared to terrestrial ecosystems, highlighting the importance of carefully selecting locations that will provide the largest return on investment, not only for the probability and magnitude of restoration success, but also for ecosystem service outcomes. However, site selection and spatial planning for marine ecosystem restoration receive relatively little attention in the scientific literature, suggesting a need to better articulate how spatial planning tools could be incorporated into restoration practice. To the degree that site selection has been formally evaluated, the criteria have tended to focus more on environmental conditions beneficial for the restored habitat, and less on ecosystem service outcomes once the habitat is restored, which may vary considerably from site to site, or with more complex landscape dynamics and spatial patterns of connectivity. Here we 1) review the recent scientific literature for several marine ecosystems (seagrass beds, salt marshes, and mangrove swamps) to investigate the degree to which site selection or spatial planning principles are applied for marine ecosystem restoration at different spatial scales, 2) provide a conceptual overview of the rationale for applying spatial planning principles to marine ecosystem restoration, and 3) highlight promising analytical approaches from the marine spatial planning and conservation planning literatures that could help improve restoration outcomes. We argue that strategic site selection and spatial planning for marine ecosystem restoration, particularly applied at larger spatial scales and accounting for ecosystem service outcomes, can help support more effective restoration.
Beyond Survival Debates: Addressing the Source-of-Psi Problem with the Multiple Sources of Psi Hypothesis (Part I)

Evidence from survival research has been supported by verified report data from reincarnation studies. Based on this collected evidence, supporters claim the survival hypothesis provides a better explanation for apparent post-mortem survival than the rival living agent psi hypothesis. There is no consensus on this issue, and many believe that efforts to bring empirical evidence to bear on survival debates have reached an impasse. An alternative psychic reservoir hypothesis proposes that information about the sentient experiences of intelligent organisms may be available to living and discarnate individuals with a certain level of psychic functioning. Studies analyzing mediumistic communications and psychic readings suggest that the source of psi cannot be unequivocally identified. A novel multiple sources of psi (MSoP) hypothesis is advanced, suggesting that aggregating diverse explanatory hypotheses with differing advantages may point the way toward some future solution in which current shortcomings may be overcome. This approach resolves the impasse between survival and living agent psi hypotheses, and has the advantage of compatibility with both reincarnation and psychic reservoir hypotheses. Part I of this two-part article includes: Introduction, The Survival Hypothesis, Survival and Reincarnation, Survival and Mediumship, Survival and NDEs, Survival and Apparitions of the Dead, The LAP Hypothesis, and The Psychic Reservoir Hypothesis.
A Dilemma for Tourists and Land Managers Alike: What Risks to Take?

Volcanoes and tourists are like magnets—they either attract or repel each other, with a force strongly dependent on proximity. Some tourists (let’s call them Group A), when nearing a volcano, are drawn ever more strongly to its summit or crater. Other tourists (Group B) are repulsed, stepping back from the volcano.
Technologies of the Virtual Other: Bodies, Users, and Avatars

Architecture today is most often produced and represented in virtual interfaces: proprietary apps, CAD/BIM programs, image editors, and scripting environments. But these instruments, designed for d...
Excision versus Ablation for Management of Minimal to Mild Endometriosis: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis.

ABSTRACT Objective The aim of this systematic review and meta-analysis was to perform an updated analysis of the literature in regard to the surgical management of minimal to mild endometriosis. This study evaluated women of reproductive age with superficial endometriosis to determine if the results of surgical excision compared with those of ablation in improved pain scores postoperatively. Data Sources The following databases were searched from inception to May 2020 for relevant studies: Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, PubMed (MEDLINE), Ovid (MEDLINE), Scopus, and Web of Science. Methods of Study Selection From our literature search, a total of 2633 articles were identified and screened. Ultimately, 4 randomized controlled trials were selected and included in our systematic review. The combined total number of subjects was 346 from these 4 studies, with sample sizes ranging from 24 to 170 participants. Data from 3 of the included studies were able to be compared and analyzed for a meta-analysis. The primary outcome was reduction in the visual analog scale (VAS) score for endometriosis-associated pain (dysmenorrhea, dyschezia, and dyspareunia), with follow-up time ranging from 6 to 60 months postoperatively. Tabulation, Integration, and Results Data extracted from each study included the mean reduction in the VAS score from baseline. A random-effects model was used owing to significant heterogeneity across the studies. Statistical analyses were performed using Review Manager 5.3 software (Cochrane Collaboration, London, United Kingdom). The meta-analyses showed no significant differences between the excision and ablation groups in the mean reduction in VAS scores from baseline to 12 months postoperatively for dysmenorrhea (mean difference [MD] –0.03; 95% confidence interval [CI], –1.27 to 1.22; p = .97), dyschezia (MD 0.46; 95% CI, –1.09 to 2.02; p = .56), and dyspareunia (MD 0.10; 95% CI, –2.36 to 2.56; p = .94). In addition, there were no significant differences between the excision and ablation groups in mean VAS scores at the 12-month follow-up and beyond for dysmenorrhea (MD –0.11; 95% CI, –2.14 to 1.93; p = .92), dyschezia (MD 0.01; 95% CI, –0.70 to 0.72; p = .99), and dyspareunia (MD 0.34; 95% CI, –1.61 to 2.30; p = .73). Conclusion On the basis of the data from our systematic review and pooled meta-analysis, no significant difference between laparoscopic excision and ablation was noted in regard to improving pain from minimal to mild endometriosis. However, to make definitive conclusions on this topic, larger randomized controlled trials are needed with longer follow-up.
The Surrounding Areas of Danish Cities and Towns on the Brink of Modernity

This article describes the urban system and the urban-rural and inter-urban relations between towns in four Danish regions, especially during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and with a focus on Copenhagen and the provincial centres Odense, Aalborg, and Aarhus. For centuries, the capital drew heavily on resources from many parts of the country, with the region extending roughly 30 kilometres outside of Copenhagen representing the most important catchment area during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Researchers have divided this area into several supply zones that provided different products to the capital. Like Copenhagen, Odense and Aalborg have been undisputed centres of their respective parts of the country since the Middle Ages. The regions surrounding both these cities have rather distinct and stable boundaries. For example, the northernmost part of Jutland, which includes the long river-like Limfjord, has always belonged to the hinterland of Aalborg even though several small market towns are likewise situated along the bay. By contrast, eastern Jutland possessed no provincial centre before Aarhus assumed the role in the nineteenth century. Until that time, many of the towns in this region had relatively well-defined catchment areas, and competition for rural customers was apparently less pronounced than in many other parts of Denmark.
Serum Testosterone to Androstenedione Ratio Predicts Metabolic Health in Normal-Weight Polycystic Ovary Syndrome Women

Context Increased aldo-keto reductase 1C3 (AKR1C3)-mediated conversion of androstenedione (A4) to testosterone (T) promotes lipid storage in subcutaneous (SC) abdominal adipose in overweight/obese polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) women. Objective This work examines whether an elevated serum T/A4 ratio, as a marker of enhanced AKR1C3 activity in SC abdominal adipose, predicts metabolic function in normal-weight PCOS women. Methods This prospective cohort study took place in an academic center and comprised 19 normal-weight PCOS women and 21 age- and body mass index-matched controls. Interventions included circulating hormone/metabolic determinations, intravenous glucose tolerance testing, total body dual-energy x-ray absorptiometry, and SC abdominal fat biopsy. Serum T/A4 ratios, hormone/metabolic measures, and AKR1C3 expression of adipocytes matured in vitro were compared between female types; serum T/A4 ratios were correlated with serum lipids, adipose insulin resistance (adipose-IR), homeostatic model assessment of insulin resistance (HOMA-IR) and insulin sensitivity (Si). Results Increased serum T/A4 ratios (P = .040) and log adipose-IR values (P = .002) in PCOS women vs controls were accompanied by AKR1C3 messenger RNA overexpression of PCOS adipocytes matured in vitro (P = .016). Serum T/A4 ratios in PCOS women, but not controls, negatively correlated with log triglycerides (TGs: R = -0.65, P = .002) and the TG index (R = -0.57, P = .011). Adjusting for serum free T, serum T/A4 ratios in PCOS women remained negatively correlated with log TG (R = -0.57, P = .013) and TG index (R = -0.50, P = .036), respectively, without significant relationships with other metabolic measures. Conclusion An elevated serum T/A4 ratio, as a marker of enhanced AKR1C3 activity in SC abdominal adipose, predicts healthy metabolic function in normal-weight PCOS women.
A comparison between liquid group A plasma and thawed group A plasma for massive transfusion activation in trauma patients.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES The use of group A thawed 24-h plasma when resuscitating haemorrhagic shock patients has become more common; however, limited data exist on the clinical use of liquid plasma (LP). Our aim is to determine whether LP is of clinical benefit to patients requiring massive transfusion. MATERIALS AND METHODS The objective of this retrospective study was to detect any difference in 24-h survival between patients receiving liquid or thawed plasma (TP) during their massive transfusion activation. Other objectives were to report any difference in hospital length of stay (LOS), intensive care unit (ICU) LOS and in-hospital survival. Data collected included gender, age, mechanism of injury, Injury Severity Score, Revised Trauma Score and Trauma Injury Severity Score. RESULTS A total of 178 patients received 1283 units of LP, median 4 and range (1-56), whereas 270 patients received 2031 units of TP, median 5 and range (1-87). The two study groups were comparable in terms of gender, age, mechanism of injury, whole blood, red blood cells, platelets and cryoprecipitate transfused. The use of LP during the massive transfusion activation in traumatically injured patients was not associated with increased 24-h survival compared to when using TP, p = 0.553. CONCLUSION Our study did not show a difference in 24-h or 30-day survival between the use of LP compared to TP in trauma patients. LP should be considered an alternative to TP in trauma patients requiring immediate plasma resuscitation.
Applications of Plaque Growth Theory and Immunological Implications

The ideas developed in the two previous chapters will now be applied to the analysis of hemolytic plaque data and the biological implications of the results discussed. Since many interesting experiments have been performed with IgM as well as IgG and little has been said of the former, I will begin by describing some general characteristics of its behavior in plaque experiments.
Abstract P2-12-10: Examining diagnostic and therapeutic delays using patient reported outcomes

Background: Diagnostic and treatment delays in cancer patients lead to poorer outcomes. African American and Latina women with breast cancer (BC) are more likely to experience delays. This study explores delays in African American and Latina breast cancer survivors (BCS) and association with physician-patient communication variables. Methods: A total of 320 BCS (88 African-American and 232 Latina-American)diagnosed with stage 0-3 BC were recruited from the California Cancer Registry and Hospitals. BCS completed a questionnaire assessing patient reported time to diagnosis and initiating treatment, and quality of care variables pertaining to physician-patient interaction. Results: The mean number of days waited after finding a lump or abnormality and seeking diagnostic care to obtaining a cancer diagnosis was 57.9 days in this cohort. Bivariate analysis revealed that Latina BCS were significantly more likely to wait longer to obtain diagnosis. ( p = .033). Once diagnosed, African-American BCS were more likely to report greater days delay to initiating treatment (p = .007). The mean number of days delayed for initiating treatment between African American and Latinas, however, was not significantly different, 35.3 v. 34.5 days (p=.107). We investigated the surgeon-patient dyad in influencing delays. The better patients rated the relationship, the fewer days in delayed treatment reported (p=0.038). Additionally, 11% of BCS (n=34) did not believe that their doctors gave them enough information regarding their treatment. The regression analysis showed that the patients’ evaluation of the adequacy of doctors’ information was a significant predictor of days delayed treatment (p However, the majority of patients (87%) reported a "good" or "very good" relationship with her surgeon. Although the majority of patients reported a "good" or "very good" relationship with her Oncologist (65%), the relationship was rated as "poor" or "very poor" by 23% of patients. There was no statistical difference in rating of relationship with providers between the ethnic groups (p=.865). Conclusions: Our results suggest that poor patient-physician interactions are associated with BC diagnostic and therapeutic care delays in both African American and Latina BCS. As healthcare shifts towards improving variables of quality of care and patient satisfaction, attention to improving these interactions and further exploration will be warranted. Further, improving timely access to diagnostic and therapeutic care may reduce BC disparity and improve cancer equity. Citation Format: Odicie Fielder-Kimbrough, Mayra Serrano, Kimlin T Ashing. Examining diagnostic and therapeutic delays using patient reported outcomes [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the Thirty-Seventh Annual CTRC-AACR San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium: 2014 Dec 9-13; San Antonio, TX. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2015;75(9 Suppl):Abstract nr P2-12-10.
A novel quantitative assessment method to detect effects of essential tremor on static handwriting

Essential Tremor (ET) manifests itself in people in the form of uncontrolled shaking, most notably during skeletal muscle usage. Severity of ET is commonly assessed through a set of clinical handwriting tests, the subjective analyses of which limit resolution and availability. To address this, our group is pursuing objective and computerized metrics to assess and quantify the extent of tremor in pre-existing static writing samples. In the current study, we tested these metrics by comparing unaffected writing samples with writing affected by artificially-induced tremor. Our findings suggest that these metrics can be utilized for assessment, leading to a toolset for objective monitoring of static handwriting changes associated with ET symptoms.
The Market for Conservation Law

This paper considers the extent to which there is, or should be, a market for environmental law. Conservation easements raise interesting issues for the law market because they resemble private arrangements through which property owners arrange their own property rights, and therefore arguably should be able to choose the law that applies to these rights. An important contribution of this paper is its treatment of a particular type of market for easement law – that is, a market for law unbundled from other attributes of the enacting jurisdiction. More generally, this paper adds to the literature on environmental law by showing how background legal institutions, including choice-of-law rules, can affect the law’s movement toward efficient enforcement of contracts and property rights.
An Efficient Algorithm for Determining 3-D Bi-plane Imaging Geometry

Biplane projection imaging is one of the primary methods for imaging and visualizing the cardiovascular systems in medicine. A key problem in such a technique is to determine the imaging geometry (i.e., the rotation and translation) of two projections so that the 3-D structure can be accurately reconstructed. Based on interesting observations and efficient geometric techniques, we present in this paper a new algorithmic solution for this problem. Comparing with existing optimization-based approaches, our technique yields better accuracy, has bounded execution time, and thus is more suitable for on-line applications. Our technique can easily deal with outliers for further improving the accuracy.
PaRSEC in Practice: Optimizing a Legacy Chemistry Application through Distributed Task-Based Execution

Task-based execution has been growing in popularity as a means to deliver a good balance between performance and portability in the post-petascale era. The Parallel Runtime Scheduling and Execution Control (PARSEC) framework is a task-based runtime system that we designed to achieve high performance computing at scale. PARSEC offers a programming paradigm that is different than what has been traditionally used to develop large scale parallel scientific applications. In this paper, we discuss the use of PARSEC to convert a part of the Coupled Cluster (CC) component of the Quantum Chemistry package NWCHEM into a task-based form. We explain how we organized the computation of the CC methods in individual tasks with explicitly defined data dependencies between them and re-integrated the modified code into NWCHEM. We present a thorough performance evaluation and demonstrate that the modified code outperforms the original by more than a factor of two. We also compare the performance of different variants of the modified code and explain the different behaviors that lead to the differences in performance.
Algorithm-agile cryptographic coprocessor based on FPGAs

This contribution describes the design and implementation of an algorithm-agile cryptographic co-processor board. The core of the board is an FPGA which can be dynamically configured with a variety of block ciphers. The FPGA is capable of encrypting data at high speed through an ISA bus interface. The board contains a RAM with a collection of FPGA configuration files. In addition, the algorithms can be added or deleted during operation. The co-processor board also contains other reconfigurable logic and a microprocessor for control functions, and high-speed FIFOs for data storage. We report about the general design, our experiences with this proof-of-concept implementation, and recommendations for future work.© (1999) COPYRIGHT SPIE--The International Society for Optical Engineering. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.
Constrained perturbative expansion of the DGP model

We address the vDVZ discontinuity of the 5D DGP model which consists of a 3-brane residing in a flat, infinite-volume bulk. Following a suggestion by Gabadadze [hep-th/0403161], we implement a constrained perturbative expansion parametrized by brane gauge parameters. We explore the parameter space and show that the DGP solution exhibiting the vDVZ discontinuity corresponds to a set of measure zero.
Vaccine injury--no reports.

To the Editor. In 1994 we published a letter in both Pediatrics (1994;93:351) and in the Canadian Medical Association Journal (1994;150:326) seeking brief reports of local, direct injury to the sciatic nerve associated …
Relationships between Steady-State Warfarin Concentrations and Anticoagulant Effect

We confirmed previous observations of a strong dependence of percentage free disopyramide on total drug concentration. Using ultrafiltration, the percentage free disopyramide increased from 22.2 to 54.2% as the total concentration of disopyramide, added to aliquots of a serum pool, was increased from 2 to 5 !J.g/ml. The variability of the binding of disopyramide to serum proteins was further established for 50 cardiac patients' sera with total disopyramide values ranging from 0.5 to 5.8 /lg/ml. Serum pH was adjusted to 7.4 just prior to preparation of the free drug fraction. The percentage free disopyramide ranged from 16.5 to 54%.
Intracellular symbiotes of the pea aphid, Acyrthosiphon pisum

Histological and ultrastructural studies on the mycetome of the pea aphid, Acyrthosiphon pisum, disclosed two types of symbiotes. The more common primary symbiotes were oval in shape and were found in large mycetocytes making up the bulk of the mycetome. The secondary symbiotes were smaller, rod-shaped, and were restricted to an apparently syncytial sheath partially enclosing the primary mycetocytes. Extensive rough endoplasmic reticulum and Golgi occurred in the sheath but not in the primary mycetocytes. Lysosomal breakdown occurred in both primary and secondary symbiotes but the two processes differed markedly. In the primary mycetocytes, a small number of symbiotes were broken down individually to form small, compact residual bodies. In the sheath, breakdown of secondary symbiotes was more extensive: large numbers were broken down within cytolysomes.
Advancements in hybrid dynamic models combining experimental and finite element substructures

Abstract This paper presents very practical enhancements to the transmission simulator method (TSM); also known as the Modal Constraints for Fixtures and Subsystems (MCFS). The enhancements allow this method to be implemented directly in finite element software, instead of having to extract the reduced finite element model from its software and implement the substructure coupling in another code. The transmission simulator method is useful for coupling substructures where one substructure is derived experimentally and the other is generated from a finite element model. This approach uses a flexible fixture in the experimental substructure to improve the modal basis of the substructure; thus, providing a higher quality substructure. The flexible fixture substructure needs to be removed (decoupled) from the experimental substructure to obtain the true system characteristics. A modified method for this removal and coupling of the experimental and analytical substructures is provided. An additional improvement guarantees that the experimental substructure matrices are positive definite, a requirement for many finite element codes. Guidelines for designing robust transmission simulator hardware are provided. The concepts are applied to two sample cases. The first case consists of a cylinder connected by eight bolts to a plate with a beam. The second example is an outer shell structure that is connected through a bolted flange to a complex internal payload structure.
Tyrosine hydroxylase gene expression in varying forms of human pheochromocytoma.

Abstract We performed a comparative study of catecholamine content, tyrosine hydroxylase (TH) activity, and TH mRNA levels in normal human adrenals and various clinical forms of human pheochromocytoma. We studied sporadic, benign intra-adrenal chromaffin tumors and other non-malignant intra-adrenal tumors associated with multiple endocrine neoplasia type 2B (MEN 2B) and von Hippel-Lindau disease along with one extra-adrenal malignant pheochromocytoma. Our findings suggest substantial differences in TH transcriptional rates or the stability of TH mRNA or both may contribute to altered TH expression in human chromaffin cells associated with “normal” adrenal tissues and various forms of pheochromocytoma and distinctive patterns of expression in the different settings in which these tumors arise.
Trapping of low energy neutrons

Abstract A brief review of recent work concerning the trapping of low energy neutrons is given. Particular emphasis is placed on magnetic confinement schemes which might also be applicable to neutral atoms. Important differences between the neutron and neutral atom cases are mentioned.