cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
R&D and quality assurance partnership

Complex R&D programs, such as end-product oriented VLSI developments, require utilization and integration of teams consisting of individuals representing a wide variety of different areas of expertise. The needed expertise can be provided by a highly professional quality assurance team equipped with state-of-the-art analytical instrumentation. Its integration into the total program team with additional program and market-oriented objectives can provide an increased overall effectiveness. Successful experience with the combined team strategy, as applied during a 32-bit VLSI development program, is described here in terms of the program environment, conditions leading to the decision to invite the quality assurance team to participate, changes introduced, and specialized knowledge contributed. Results of this strategy are evaluated in the context of program and project management.
Algebric Decision Diagrams and Their Applications

In this paper we present theory and experimental results on Algebraic Decision Diagrams. These diagrams extend BDDs by allowing values from an arbitrary finite domain to be associated with the terminal nodes of the diagram. We present a treatment founded in Boolean algebras and discuss algorithms and results in several areas of application: Matrix multiplication, shortest path algorithms, and direct methods for numerical linear algebra. Although we report an essentially negative result for Gaussian elimination per se, we propose a modified form of ADDs which appears to circumvent the difficulties in some cases. We discuss the relevance of our findings and point to directions for future work.
Cluster approximations for statistical image processing

A disadvantage of using discrete-state Markov random field models of images is that optimal estimators for reconstruction problems require excessive and typically random amounts of computation. In one approach the key task is the computation of the conditional mean of the field given the data or equivalently the unconditional mean of the a posteriori field. In this paper we describe a hierarchy of deterministic parallelizable methods for such computations.
Abnormalities of diastolic function precede dilated cardiomyopathy associated with Duchenne muscular dystrophy.

taDuchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD), an X-linked recessive myopathy with an incidence of 1 in 3500 male births, is caused by a mutation that results in the absence of the cytoskeletal protein dystrophin. 1,2 The lack of dystrophin causes mechanical weakening of the sarcolemma, which results in loss of membrane integrity, an inappropriate influx of calcium, and altered cell signaling leading to activation of degradative pathways. Thus, the dystrophin-deficient myoca dium provides the biologic substrate for the ultimate development of cardiac dysfunction. With a shift in the heart failure management paradigm to earlier diagnosis and treatment in at-risk groups, DMD is a disease to be classified as stage A (high risk), if not stage B (presence of structural heart disease) according to recent guidelines. Reports have described cardiac abnormalities from DMD diagnosis through the first decade of life before the onset of heart failure. 7-10 However, heart failure from dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) has not typically been observed until relatively late in the disease process. 11,12 Improvements in pulmonar support and the addition of steroid therapy have impacted positively the function of skeletal muscles used in respiration and ambulation, and the morbidity and mortality associated with this diseas 13
Medical management of glaucoma: Principles and practice

Glaucoma care is more an art than science. The introduction of several new classes of glaucoma medications and the completion of many large randomized clinical trials have not changed this fact. While we now have better choices when initiating glaucoma therapy relative to our predecessors, the principles of glaucoma therapy have not changed much during this period. Debates continue regarding the utility of concepts such as “the monocular therapeutic trial,” “target intraocular pressure (IOP),” and “maximal medical therapy.” Our tools for detecting and following glaucomatous disease have improved but are not precise enough for us to prospectively predict which patients will do better or worse than others. Much attention has been given to disease stage, rate of progression, and compliance with medications but regular patient follow-up, an area that has received little attention, may be among the most important predictors of patient outcomes.
Beam feedback electronics for the spear storage ring

Abstract The two beams of the 2 GeV Stanford electron-positron storage ring can exhibit, under certain modes of operation, coherent oscillations which have a rate of growth proportional to the beam current. Since this rate is much slower than the machine revolution frequency, it is possible to produce damping by means of negative feedback, the beam itself being part of the feedback loop. Three systems have been built, two for the damping of transverse oscillations at the betatron frequency, and one for the damping of longitudinal oscillations at the synchrotron frequency. The electronics for these systems require wide band high power amplifiers and nanosecond circuitry.
Book Reviews: A Guide to Mobile Human-Computer Interaction

This little gem of a book introduces the key aspects of mobile technology affecting human-computer interaction, which could dramatically transform our day-to-day lives. It also provides general guidance on research methods, including data analysis, and plenty of external references. This book could serve as a supplemental text for an undergraduate class in psychology, information systems, or the social sciences. Steve Love conveys the mobile technology’s strong impact on HCI by presenting issues from three main disciplines—cognitive psychology, application design, and the social sciences—and he uses cell phones and PDAs as his main example devices. The book doesn’t cover computer science issues or mobile HCI theory in great detail but discusses issues pertinent to research projects.
Infection and prematurity and the role of preventive strategies

This article reviews the role of infection in spontaneous premature parturition, the pathways of ascending intrauterine infection, microbiology, and the frequency of intra-amniotic infection in obstetrical complications leading to premature delivery. The evidence that infection is causally linked to premature birth is critically examined, as is the relationship between urogenital tract infection/colonization with microorganisms and the risk of preterm birth. The effect of antibiotic administration in perinatal outcome in patients with preterm labor and intact membranes, preterm premature rupture of membranes, asymptomatic bacteriuria, Group B streptococcus and genital mycoplasmas of the lower genital tract, and bacterial vaginosis are critically examined.
El mercado del tabaco en España durante el siglo XVIII: fiscalidad y consumo . Edited by Santiago de Luxán Meléndez, Sergio Solbes Ferri, and Juan José Laforet. Las Palmas: Fundación Altadis, Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, and Real Sociedad Económica de Amigos del País de Gran Canaria, 2000. Pp. vi, 311.

In 1636 the Kingdom of Castile implemented a royal monopoly that made the manufacture, sale, and distribution of tobacco the exclusive, though alienable, prerogative of the Crown. This new device—politically palatable because it was not levied on a “necessity of life,” and fiscally attractive because tobacco seemed to enjoy inelastic and ever-expanding demand—soon extended to the other kingdoms in Spain and throughout Europe. So it is not surprising that most of the nine essays in this collection concern how the renta de tabaco , as the royal monopoly was known by the eighteenth century, affected the behavior of consumers, suppliers, investors, and royal officials in Spain and beyond.
Interferon action: inhibition of vesicular stomatitis virus RNA synthesis induced by virion-bound polymerase.

The particle-bound RNA polymerase activity of vesicular stomatitis virus (VSV) can be demonstrated in vivo. Linear synthesis of viral RNA persists for 5 to 6 hours at 34°C in infected monolayers of chick embryo cells treated with cycloheximide and actinomycin D to block synthesis of protein and cell-specific RNA. At least 55 percent of the RNA made under these conditions is complementary to virion RNA. RNA synthesis mediated by VSV polymerase activity is inhibited in cells first treated with chick-derived interferon or polyriboinosinate• polyribocytidylate, but not by mouse interferon. The RNA product of VSV polymerase activity is present throughout the cytoplasm, and its synthesis is inhibited by the interferon system, as judged by autoradiographs that show the physical distribution, in cells, of RNA produced by virion polymerase in the absence of translation—a demonstration of the transcription product of the viral genome.
Fourier-Based Reconstruction of Coherent Ultrasonic Array Data

This paper provides results on processing a coherent bistatic ultrasonic array database that is collected at the University of Michigan. In this work, we use a scheme to synthesize the beam-steered and depth-focused array data of the target under study from its measured bistatic data. We also study the merits of processing these synthesized database via Fourier-based array imaging methods.
A study of OP and OSI cancellations in an academic library

This paper describes a study which examined 26,826 book orders placed by the State University of New York at Stony Brook from 1988 through 1990. Specifically, the paper studies the 467 out-of-print (OP) and out-of-stock-indefinitely (OSI) cancellations among these orders. OP and OSI cancellation rates and average life spans of the OP and OSI books were analyzed in 15 subject areas within three groups for these three years. Results indicated that there were no significant differences in OP & OSI cancellation rates for the humanities, social sciences, and sciences. The average in-print life span of a book was six years for the humanities and seven years for both the social sciences and the sciences. It was also found that in most of the subject areas, mean prices for OP cancellations were lower than for those titles that could be acquired.
Human Rights as a Dimension of CSR: The Blurred Lines Between Legal and Non-Legal Categories

At the UN, important projects laying down transnational corporations’ (TNCs) human rights responsibilities have been launched without ever clarifying the relevant theoretical foundations. One of the consequences is that the human rights principles in projects like the 2000 UN Global Compact and the 2003 Norms on the Responsibilities of Transnational Corporations and Other Business Enterprises with Regard to Human Rights can be understood in different ways, which should not cause surprise given that their authors come from diverse backgrounds, including economics and public policy. An examination of these projects and the views of their authors reveals that, although they are superficially linked to international human rights law, they go well beyond it and attempt to deal with corporate social responsibility issues in ways that elude neat classification as fitting neatly in either legal or non-legal categories. Too little attention has been paid to how in the course of developing these projects the legal and ethical dimensions have become entwined and how lines have gotten blurred. Meanwhile, there has been recognition that these UN projects have emerged simply as ad hoc responses to practical concerns about the sustainability of globalization. The lack of any foundational theory or normative framework should be addressed; it is time to bring together specialists from different fields concerned with the human rights responsibilities of corporations to see if it is possible to define a coherent overarching theory for these UN projects.
Elemental balances in obese women fed a hypocaloric dietary regimen

Abstract Nine moderately obese college women were fed unrestricted, self-selected diets for eight days followed by 37 days of moderately restricted caloric intake which met most recommended dietary allowances. Ingesta and excreta were collected during three seven-day intervals and were analyzed for potassium, magnesium, zinc, copper, and nitrogen. During the unrestricted interval, mean apparent retention of each element was slightly positive. Mean apparent retention of nitrogen, copper and magnesium remained near zero during the restricted intervals. Although potassium intakes were within recommended range, mean apparent retention of potassium became negative during restricted intervals. Mean urinary potassium was significantly greater during the fifth week of restriction than during the unrestricted interval. Mean zinc intake decreased and excretion increased significantly during restriction such that mean zinc retention was apprecably negative by week five. Throughout the study, there was no significant change in mean urinary nitrogen or creatinine, suggesting that lean body mass did not change. Mean weight loss was 7.01 kg. In summary, body potassium and zinc seemed to be preferentially depleted under dietary conditions which promoted nitrogen balance and moderate weight loss.
A new role for IP3 receptors: Ca2+ release during nuclear vesicle fusion.

Abstract During nuclear assembly, vesicles derived from the mitotic disassembly of the nuclear membranes reform the nuclear envelope. The vesicles first bind to chromosomes, specifically recognize other nuclear vesicles and then fuse to enclose the chromosomes. The proteins that mediate these events are largely unknown. Using reconstituted extracts of Xenopus eggs, we found that nuclear vesicle fusion required elevated (μM) concentrations of free Ca 2+ [Sullivan KMC. Busa WB. Wilson KL. (1993) Cell, 73, 1411–1422]. Our data suggest that Ca 2+ is released from the vesicle lumen by the activation of IP 3 receptors (ligand-gated Ca 2+ channels). We propose that the role of IP 3 receptors during nuclear assembly may be analogous to that of voltage-gated Ca 2+ channels during regulated secretion: to provide a microdomain of high cytosolic Ca 2+ that triggers fusion. In this article, we will briefly describe current ideas about nuclear assembly and disassembly, and summarize the evidence that IP 3 receptors are required for nuclear vesicle fusion. We will discuss parallels between our results and the role of voltage-gated Ca 2+ channels, and Ca 2+ , in regulated exocytosis. Finally, we will address the question of how IP 3 receptors are activated during nuclear vesicle fusion: is there a signal that stimulates IP 3 production, or is the channel activated directly?
Hybridization in carbon monoxide

Abstract Qualitative molecular orbital descriptions of N 2 and CO are given and compared, with special emphasis on hybridization of s and p σ orbitals. The principle that orbitals combining to form a strong bond must have comparable energies makes it likely that the atomic orbital of carbon involved in the σ bond in CO has predominantly s character, and leads to a lone pair on carbon with predominant p character. These arguments lead to a straightforward interpretation of the chemical properties of CO and N 2 , and are in agreement with conclusions implied in, but not specifically brought out by more elaborate MO treatments.
Improvement of non-negative matrix factorization based language model using exponential models

This paper describes the use of exponential models to improve non-negative matrix factorization (NMF) based topic language models for automatic speech recognition. This modeling technique borrows the basic idea from latent semantic analysis (LSA), which is typically used in information retrieval. An improvement was achieved when exponential models were used to estimate the a posteriori topic probabilities for an observed history. This method improved the perplexity of the NMF model, resulting in a 24% perplexity improvement overall when compared to a trigram language model.
Enlargement of Crystal Grain Size and Significant Inclusion of Hexagonal Diamond Phase in Ultra Pure Microcrystalline Silicon

We have shown significant effects of atmospheric impurities on crystal grain sizes of hydrogenated microcrystalline Si (μc-Si:H), the growth surface of which is totally covered by hydrogen. By reducing impurity concentrations, two growth modes emerge, bordered at 250°C. In particular, at higher temperature growth mode, strong (220) preferential growth takes place, resulting in increased grain size. Appearance of this growth mode seems to be related to surface monohydride. Sharp x-ray diffraction peak in lower angle than (111) is observed, which stems from (10-10) crystal plane of hexagonal diamond Si. Its formation is related to (220) oriented crystallites. Implication of these results is the possibility of Si polytype control.
Efficient retiming and unfolding

Data-flow graphs (DFGs) can be used to represent a signal-flow graph, a synchronous system or digital circuitry. Retiming and unfolding are two useful techniques which have been effectively applied to optimize the realization of DFGs. The retiming technique reorganizes an iteration; the unfolding technique schedules several iterations together. These two techniques can be combined to schedule DFGs optimally. The authors present a very efficient algorithm to combine these two techniques. They also present simple methods for examining an unfolded graph by simulating it on the original DFG. >
Un planteamiento estratégico de la inspección del trabajo

Resumen. La OIT, en un informe publicado en 2006, puso de relieve los problemas con que tropezaba la inspeccion del trabajo en los Estados Miembros y propugno diversas medidas para hacerla mas eficaz. El autor sostiene que los organismos de inspeccion deben ir mas alla de las peticiones de aumento del numero de inspectores, e idear una estrategia capaz de atender las quejas que les llegan y de planear y seleccionar los objetivos de sus investigaciones. Solo asi lograran la maxima eficiencia de sus recursos, que son de por si limitados. Para ello, su labor debe regirse por cuatro principios: establecimiento de prioridades, disuasion, perdurabilidad y actuaciones «sistemicas». En la parte de conclusiones se esbozan los requisitos que debe satisfacer una estrategia de inspeccion coherente. os gobiernos nacionales se enfrentan a problemas colosales para reglar y L fiscalizar las condiciones de trabajo. Es frecuente que sus politicas en materia de seguridad y salud, discriminacion y condiciones laborales basicas den cobertura a millones de trabajadores en cientos de miles de centros ubicados en regiones muy alejadas entre si. Las condiciones varian mucho de unos lugares a otros —incluso dentro de un mismo sector—, y los empleadores suelen tener interes en hacerlas tan poco transparentes como les sea posible. Los sindicatos, aliados tradicionales de los organismos estatales a la hora de orientar y realizar las inspecciones, padecen un acusado declive en muchos paises desarrollados y en desarrollo. Ademas, y ello constituye el reto mas arduo, estos organismos han de funcionar con un presupuesto y un personal cada vez mas exiguos y en un entorno cada vez mas complejo.
Development of a Web GIS Application for Visualizing and Analyzing Community Out of Hospital Cardiac Arrest Patterns

Improving survival rates at the neighborhood level is increasingly seen as a priority for reducing overall rates of out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA) in the United States. Since wide disparities exist in OHCA rates at the neighborhood level, it is important for public health officials and residents to be able to quickly locate neighborhoods where people are at elevated risk for cardiac arrest and to target these areas for educational outreach and other mitigation strategies. This paper describes an OHCA web mapping application that was developed to provide users with interactive maps and data for them to quickly visualize and analyze the geographic pattern of cardiac arrest rates, bystander CPR rates, and survival rates at the neighborhood level in different U.S. cities. The data comes from the CARES Registry and is provided over a period spanning several years so users can visualize trends in neighborhood out-of-hospital cardiac arrest patterns. Users can also visualize areas that are statistical hot and cold spots for cardiac arrest and compare OHCA and bystander CPR rates in the hot and cold spots. Although not designed as a public participation GIS (PPGIS), this application seeks to provide a forum around which data and maps about local patterns of OHCA can be shared, analyzed and discussed with a view of empowering local communities to take action to address the high rates of OHCA in their vicinity.
Context, culture and (non-verbal) communication affect handover quality

Background: Transfers of care, also known as handovers, remain a substantial patient safety risk. Although research on handovers has been done since the 1980s, the science is incomplete. Surprisingly few interventions have been rigorously evaluated and, of those that have, few have resulted in long-term positive change. Researchers, both in medicine and other high reliability industries, agree that face-to-face handovers are the most reliable. It is not clear, however, what the term face-to-face means in actual practice. Objectives: We studied the use of non-verbal behaviours, including gesture, posture, bodily orientation, facial expression, eye contact and physical distance, in the delivery of information during face-toface handovers. Methods: To address this question and study the role of non-verbal behaviour on the quality and accuracy of handovers, we videotaped 52 nursing, medicine and surgery handovers covering 238 patients. Videotapes were analysed using immersion/crystallisation methods of qualitative data analysis. A team of six researchers met weekly for 18 months to view videos together using a consensus-building approach. Consensus was achieved on verbal, non-verbal, and physical themes and patterns observed in the data. Results: We observed four patterns of non-verbal behaviour (NVB) during handovers: (1) joint focus of attention; (2) ‘the poker hand’; (3) parallel play and (4) kerbside consultation. In terms of safety, joint focus of attention was deemed to have the best potential for high quality and reliability; however, it occurred infrequently, creating opportunities for education and improvement. Conclusions: Attention to patterns of NVB in face-toface handovers coupled with education and practice can improve quality and reliability.
Assessment of Trabecular Bone Yield and Post-yield Behavior from High-Resolution MRI-Based Nonlinear Finite Element Analysis at the Distal Radius of Premenopausal and Postmenopausal Women Susceptible to Osteoporosis

Rationale and Objectives To assess the performance of a nonlinear microfinite element model on predicting trabecular bone yield and post-yield behavior based on high-resolution in vivo magnetic resonance images via the serial reproducibility. Materials and Methods The nonlinear model captures material nonlinearity by iteratively adjusting tissue-level modulus based on tissue-level effective strain. It enables simulations of trabecular bone yield and post-yield behavior from micro magnetic resonance images at in vivo resolution by solving a series of nonlinear systems via an iterative algorithm on a desktop computer. Measures of mechanical competence (yield strain/strength, ultimate strain/strength, modulus of resilience, and toughness) were estimated at the distal radius of premenopausal and postmenopausal women (N = 20, age range 50–75) in whom osteoporotic fractures typically occur. Each subject underwent three scans (20.2 ± 14.5 days). Serial reproducibility was evaluated via coefficient of variation (CV) and intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC). Results Nonlinear simulations were completed in an average of 14 minutes per three-dimensional image data set involving analysis of 61 strain levels. The predicted yield strain/strength, ultimate strain/strength, modulus of resilience, and toughness had a mean value of 0.78%, 3.09 MPa, 1.35%, 3.48 MPa, 14.30 kPa, and 32.66 kPa, respectively, covering a substantial range by a factor of up to 4. Intraclass correlation coefficient ranged from 0.986 to 0.994 (average 0.991); CV ranged from 1.01% to 5.62% (average 3.6%), with yield strain and toughness having the lowest and highest CV values, respectively. Conclusions The data suggest that the yield and post-yield parameters have adequate reproducibility to evaluate treatment effects in interventional studies within short follow-up periods.
Nomination Politics and Ideological Polarization: Assessing the Attitudinal Effects of Campaign Involvement

Many critics of the open presidential nomination system have faulted the democratic reforms of the 1960s and 1970s for increasing the tendency toward ideological polarization within each partisan bloc. Several recent studies, however, downplay the ideological component of nomination campaign mobilization. In contrast to these later revisionists, I find much evidence to support the original charge of ideological polarization during nomination politics. I do so by respecifying the connection between political attitudes and political involvement; activists who worked for one of the more ideologically extreme candidates in 1988 became more committed ideologues themselves as a consequence of their participation. However, rather than damaging the partisan blocs, involvement in an ideologically charged campaign reinforced the activist's commitment to his or her party.
Effect of melatonin on the reproductive systems of male and female Syrian hamsters: a diurnal rhythm in sensitivity to melatonin.

Hamsters were maintained on a long photoperiod (14L:10D) and were injected once daily with melatonin (10-25 mug) or sesame oil. Males which received melatonin during the afternoon (e.g., 6.5-13.75 h after lights-on) showed regressed testes and decreased levels of serum LH and FSH after several weeks of treatment. Injections of the oil vehicle or injections of melatonin given in the morning (3 h after lights-on) had no detectable effect on testicular size or on serum gonadotropins. Females which received melatonin during the afternoon became acyclic after several weeks of treatment and showed a diurnal pattern of LH secretion. The acyclic females required 4-6 weeks to resume estrous cyclicity following termination of the melatonin injections. The effects of melatonin on gonadal function and on serum gonadotropin concentrations in both sexes were similar to the previously observed effects of prolonged exposure to short photoperiods. These results indicate that chronic daily injections of melatonin can depress reproductive function in hamsters and that the effectiveness of the injections is dependent upon the time of day at which they are administered.
HaTS: large-scale in-product measurement of user attitudes & experiences with ha ppiness t racking s urveys

With the rise of Web-based applications, it is both important and feasible for human-computer interaction practitioners to measure a product's user experience. While quantifying user attitudes at a small scale has been heavily studied, in this industry case study, we detail best Happiness Tracking Surveys (HaTS) for collecting attitudinal data at a large scale directly in the product and over time. This method was developed at Google to track attitudes and open-ended feedback over time, and to characterize products' user bases. This case study of HaTS goes beyond the design of the questionnaire to also suggest best practices for appropriate sampling, invitation techniques, and its data analysis. HaTS has been deployed successfully across dozens of Google's products to measure progress towards product goals and to inform product decisions; its sensitivity to product changes has been demonstrated widely. We are confident that teams in other organizations will be able to embrace HaTS as well, and, if necessary, adapt it for their unique needs.
The class of robot manipulators with bounded Jacobian of the gravity vector

In order to successfully implement several control laws, a uniform upper bound for the Jacobian of the gravity vector is necessary. However, not all joint configurations of robot manipulators insure the existence of such a bound. In this paper we fully characterize the class of robot manipulators for which the Jacobian of the gravity vector is uniformly bounded. The results in this paper can be easily extended to derive an explicit expression for such a bound in terms of the link parameters.
Intensity diffraction tomography with fixed detector plane

Intensity diffraction tomography (IDT) is an imaging method for reconstructing the complex refractive index distribution of a weakly scattering three-dimensional object. Unlike classic diffraction tomography, which requires measurement of the transmitted wave-field phase, IDT accomplished this reconstruction from knowledge of wave-field intensity measurements on parallel detector planes at each tomographic view angle. In this work, novel scanning protocols and reconstruction algorithms for IDT are proposed that require two intensity measurements on a single detector plane positioned at a fixed distance from the object. Each measurement corresponds to a probing spherical wave field that possesses a distinct curvature. Accordingly, the form of the incident wavefield, rather than the detector position, represents the degree of freedom in the imaging system that is varied for acquisition of the necessary measurement data. Computer simulation studies are conducted to investigate the developed data acquisition and image reconstruction algorithms.
Water funds and payments for ecosystem services: practice learns from theory and theory can learn from practice

Payments for ecosystem services (PES) are emerging worldwide as important mechanisms to align investments in human and natural well-being. PES projects are often defined as voluntary transactions where well-defined environmental/ecosystem services (or land uses likely to secure those services) are bought by a minimum of one service buyer, from a minimum of one service provider, if and only if the service provider continuously secures service provision (conditionality). Further criteria of PES include limiting additional objectives and ensuring that payments reward behaviour that would otherwise not occur (additionality). Together these best practices for PES are increasingly accepted as the most efficient means to achieve desired outcomes and are guiding funding for PES projects. We used a series of water funds (watershed-oriented PES projects based on a trust fund model) to examine how theoretical best practices could inform and improve practice and also how theory could learn from practical efforts. We conclude that thoughtful consideration is required when evaluating the promise of a PES approach against a theoretical ideal. We found that requiring conditionality may limit the use of creative finance mechanisms such as trust funds that can provide long-term benefits for conservation and human well-being, and that requiring additionality can exclude benefits from social diffusion and result in the inefficient targeting of PES funds. Finally, public–private partnerships in water funds lead to multiple additional/side objectives but partnerships are likely to lower transaction costs and provide transparent, long-term landscape-scale watershed management.
Emphasizing social features in information portals: Effects on new member engagement

Many information portals are adding social features with hopes of enhancing the overall user experience. Invitations to join and welcome pages that highlight these social features are expected to encourage use and participation. While this approach is widespread and seems plausible, the effect of providing and highlighting social features remains to be tested. We studied the effects of emphasizing social features on users' response to invitations, their decisions to join, their willingness to provide profile information, and their engagement with the portal's social features. The results of a quasi-experiment found no significant effect of social emphasis in invitations on receivers' responsiveness. However, users receiving invitations highlighting social benefits were less likely to join the portal and provide profile information. Social emphasis in the initial welcome page for the site also was found to have a significant effect on whether individuals joined the portal, how much profile information they provided and shared, and how much they engaged with social features on the site. Unexpectedly, users who were welcomed in a social manner were less likely to join and provided less profile information; they also were less likely to engage with social features of the portal. This suggests that even in online contexts where social activity is an increasingly common feature, highlighting the presence of social features may not always be the optimal presentation strategy. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Hierarchical Bayes Estimation of Unemployment Rates for the States of the U.S.

Abstract Under a federal-state cooperative program, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) publishes monthly unemployment rate estimates for its 50 states and the District of Columbia. The primary source of data for this estimation problem is the Current Population Survey (CPS). However, the CPS state unemployment rate estimates are unreliable, because the survey provides relatively few observations per state. Various federal agencies use state-level unemployment rate estimates for policy making and fund allocation. Thus it is important to improve on the CPS estimates. For this, we propose a hierarchical Bayes (HB) method using a time series generalization of a widely used cross-sectional model in small-area estimation. The proposed method is compared in detail with the corresponding HB method, which uses the HB analog of the well-known Fay-Herriot cross-sectional model. A third model based on a time series approach to repetitive surveys is found to be very hard to implement for these data; the resulti...
Evaluating Biological Claims to Enhance Critical Thinking through Position Statements

Critical thinking is an important skill for undergraduates to learn, yet rarely is it formally taught in the classroom. Here we explain how critical thinking can be fostered within an undergraduate biology course by encouraging students to evaluate biological claims related to current topics within the course. We found that with the completion of two writing assignments within a four-week period, students demonstrated a significantly greater ability to analyze the evidence within the claims. These results support the notion that even short-term learning experiences focused upon critical thinking can enhance students’ skills beyond discipline-specific knowledge.
Orff Ensembles Benefits, Challenges, and Solutions

Playing Orff instruments provides students with a wide variety of opportunities to explore creative musicianship. This article examines the benefits of classroom instrument study, common challenges...
HIV seropositive drug users' attitudes towards partner notification (PCRS): results from the SHIELD study in Baltimore, Maryland.

Objective To assess the attitudes of HIV seropositive current or former drug users towards HIV partner counseling and referral services (PCRS) and to determine if opinion varies by partner type.
Equations for time-dependent wear and induced concentration profiles in particle-filled polymer composites

A time-dependent description of the sliding wear behavior of hard particle-filled polymer composites is developed. The description is based upon the accumulation of wear-resistant filler particles in the surface region, and development of wear-induced subsurface concentration profiles. Descriptive expressions for wear volume and induced filler volume fraction profile are functions of sliding distance as well as composite characteristics such as filler and matrix bulk volume fractions and specific wear rates. An experimental demonstration validates filler surface accumulation phenomenon as a basis for this model of time-dependent polymer composite wear. The demonstration also supports the feasibility of engineering composite materials with near-surface graded volume fraction profiles, resisting run-in wear contributions at the onset of sliding. Model predictions of steady-state volume fraction profile may guide design of such graded composite bearing surfaces.
Recognition and elongation of telomeres by telomerase.

Telomeres stabilize chromosomal ends and allow their complete replication in vivo. In diverse eukaryotes, the essential telomeric DNA sequence consists of variable numbers of tandem repeats of simp...
Effectiveness of the U.S. Regulatory Approach to Air Quality Management: Stationary Sources

The focus of the discussion herein is the effectiveness of regulatory implementation incentives in air quality management with respect to stationary sources. However, before it is possible to evaluate effectiveness, some terms must be defined and the setting of the implementation problem must be delineated.
Benefits, Problems, and Characteristics of Home Aquarium Owners:

Although tank fish are currently the most popular “pets” in the USA, literature reporting studies on the benefits, problems, and characteristics of home aquarium ownership is extremely limited. Because it seemed important to learn more about people who enjoy owning and caring for home aquaria, 50 men and 50 women were interviewed in several area stores which provide and sell living fish and adjunct products necessary for maintaining good home aquarium environments. Major problems reported by home aquarium owners were the expensive equipment, especially the tanks and controls for water temperature, circulation, and chemical balances, the tank maintenance, and tank cleanliness. Major benefits mentioned by such owners were the calming, relaxation, and stress-reduction effects of just watching fish which lessened anxieties and created a sense of serenity. These findings help to explain the current popularity of the live inhabitants of home aquaria.
Lung protective ventilatory strategies in very low birth weight infants

Respiratory distress syndrome (RDS) is the most common respiratory diagnosis in preterm infants. Surfactant therapy and mechanical ventilation using conventional or high-frequency ventilation have been the standard of care in the management of RDS. Bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD) continues to remain as a major morbidity in very low birth weight infants despite these treatments. There is no significant difference in pulmonary outcome when an optimal lung volume strategy is used with conventional or high-frequency ventilation. Lung injury is directly related to the duration of invasive ventilation via the endotracheal tube. Studies using noninvasive ventilation, such as nasal continuous positive airway pressure and noninvasive positive pressure ventilation, have shown to decrease postextubation failures as well as a trend toward reduced risk of BPD. Lung protective ventilatory strategy may involve noninvasive ventilation as a primary therapy or following surfactant administration in very preterm infants with RDS. Initial steps in the management of preterm infants may also include sustained inflation to establish functional residual capacity, followed by noninvasive ventilation to minimize lung injury and subsequent development of BPD.
Jointly Labeling Multiple Sequences: A Factorial HMM Approach

We present new statistical models for jointly labeling multiple sequences and apply them to the combined task of part-of-speech tagging and noun phrase chunking. The model is based on the Factorial Hidden Markov Model (FHMM) with distributed hidden states representing part-of-speech and noun phrase sequences. We demonstrate that this joint labeling approach, by enabling information sharing between tagging/chunking subtasks, out-performs the traditional method of tagging and chunking in succession. Further, we extend this into a novel model, Switching FHMM, to allow for explicit modeling of cross-sequence dependencies based on linguistic knowledge. We report tagging/chunking accuracies for varying dataset sizes and show that our approach is relatively robust to data sparsity.
A radix-8 CMOS S/390 multiplier

The multiplier of a S/390 CMOS microprocessor is described. It is implemented in an aggressive static CMOS technology with a 0.20-/spl mu/m effective channel length. The multiplier has been demonstrated in a single-image shared-memory multiprocessor at frequencies up to 400 MHz. The multiplier requires three machine cycles for a total latency of 7.5 ns, though the design can support a latency of 4.0 ns if the latches are removed. The design goal was to implement a versatile S/980 multiplier with reasonable performance at a very aggressive cycle time. The multiplier implements a radix-8 Booth algorithm and is capable of supporting S/390 floating-point and fixed-point multiplications, and also divisions and square roots. Logic design and physical design issues are discussed relating to the Booth decoding and counter tree implementations.
Why? Why not?

When I discovered that my mother had saved many of my elementary school report cards, I was shocked for two reasons. First, we had made several major moves and subsequently my mother had thrown out most of our family records without the family’s knowledge. This didn’t seem to be a concern to me at the time. I hadn’t particularly enjoyed growing up and I had spent a great deal of time and energy in distancing myself from it.
A Preliminary Analysis of Individuals With Serious Mental Illness and Comorbid Diabetes.

Abstract Objective To understand factors related to managing illness in older individuals with serious mental illness (SMI). Methods Baseline data from 200 individuals with SMI and diabetes enrolled in a study were used to compare characteristics between older (age > 55) vs. younger (age ≤ 55) individuals. Results Older individuals had better diabetes control compared to younger individuals, those with major depressive disorder had diabetes for a longer duration, worse diabetic control, and more emergency department encounters. Conclusions Helping younger individuals with SMI learn to manage their mental and physical health early-on might minimize the negative and cumulative effect of diabetes.
Orchestrated regulation of energy supply and energy expenditure: Transcriptional coexpression of metabolism, ion homeostasis, and sarcomeric genes in mammalian myocardium.

Background During the development of heart failure, the myocardium undergoes profound electrical remodeling, characterized by prolongation of action potential duration, changes in Ca 2+ homeostasis, and slowing of conduction. Objective We tested the hypothesis that the electrical remodeling, indexed by the expression of ion channel and transporter genes, occurs in the context of a coordinated regulation of metabolism and signaling processes observed in heart failure. Methods A meta-analysis of myocardial murine and human microarray data sets was performed. Results We identified transcripts that were coordinately expressed with 132 myocardial ion channel and transporter genes in 18 murine and human myocardial microarray data sets. The genes coexpressed with ion channels were subsequently grouped into Gene Ontology (GO) categories, revealing 4 major, mutually exclusive GO clusters: 55 ion channel and transporter genes were coexpressed with major bioenergetic pathways (oxidative phosphorylation, citric acid cycle, glycolysis, and fatty acid metabolism) and contractile processes (muscle contraction, sarcomere, and Z disc), while 36, 16, and 25 ion channel transcripts were associated with the GO clusters of signal transduction, transcription/translation, and a nonspecified cluster, respectively. Myocardial expression of ion channel genes coexpressed with metabolic processes was >10-fold higher than that of ion channels associated with the other 3 clusters. In addition to transcriptional coexpression, major myocardial ion channels were found to physically interact with metabolic pathways based on protein-protein interaction data. Conclusion Electromechanical and metabolic remodeling processes are intricately linked at the transcriptional level, suggesting an orchestrated regulation of energy supply (metabolism) and energy expenditure (muscle contraction and ion homeostasis) in mammalian myocardium.
Evaluating Diagnostic Tests with Imperfect Standards

New diagnostic tests frequently are evaluated against gold standards that are assumed to classify patients with unerring accuracy according to the presence or absence of disease. In practice, gold standards rarely are perfect predictors of disease and tend to misclassify a small number of patients. When an imperfect standard is used to evaluate a diagnostic test, many commonly used measures of test performance are distorted. It is not widely appreciated that these distortions occur in predictable directions and that they may be of considerable magnitude, even when the gold standard has a high degree of accuracy. The diagnostic powers of clinical tests will be more accurately reported if consideration is given to the types of biases that result from the use of imperfect standards. Several different approaches may be used to minimize these distortions when evaluating new tests.
In a fit of pique: Analyzing microbial ChIP-Seq data with Pique

While numerous effective peak finders have been developed for eukaryotic systems, we have found that the approaches used can be error prone when run on high coverage bacterial and archaeal ChIP-Seq datasets. We have developed Pique, an easy to use ChIP-Seq peak finding application for bacterial and archaeal ChIP-Seq experiments. The software is cross-platform and Open Source, and based on only freely licensed dependencies. Output is provided in standardized file formats, and may be easily imported by the Gaggle Genome Browser Bare et al. (2010) for manual curation and data exploration, or into statistical and graphics software such as R R Core Team (2013) for further analysis. The software is available under the BSD-3 license, and tutorial and test data are included with the documentation. http://github.com/ryneches/pique
Desire and Technology: An Interview with Atom Egoyan

Armenian Canadian director Atom Egoyan9s recent films, Adoration (2006) and Chloe (2009), and his art installations, pursue and complicate his career-long interest in technology and its intersections with desire and fantasy. In an interview with Emma Wilson, Egoyan discusses these works and reflects more broadly on filmmaking in the digital age.
Valproate-Induced Congenital Malformations

The risk of congenital malformations in infants of women with epilepsy treated with antiepileptic drugs (AEDs) during the first trimester of pregnancy and in those whose mothers had discontinued AEDs before pregnancy was compared in a study at the Universities of Tampere and Oulu, Finland.
Optimally solving Markov decision processes with total expected discounted reward function

Compared computational performance of linear programming and the policy iteration.Considered only discrete-time infinite-horizon MDPs with discounted reward.Used randomly generated test problems and a real-life health-care problem.Showed that, unlike previously reported, barrier methods for LP provide a viable tool.LP is more effective when the transition probability matrix has a diagonal structure. We compare the computational performance of linear programming (LP) and the policy iteration algorithm (PIA) for solving discrete-time infinite-horizon Markov decision process (MDP) models with total expected discounted reward. We use randomly generated test problems as well as a real-life health-care problem to empirically show that, unlike previously reported, barrier methods for LP provide a viable tool for optimally solving such MDPs. The dimensions of comparison include transition probability matrix structure, state and action size, and the LP solution method.