cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
The Gifted Child: Perceived Competence, Prosocial Moral Reasoning, and Charitable Donations

Abstract Higher levels of cognitive functioning in intellectually gifted children suggest a potential for higher functioning in other domains as well. Thirty-eight children ages 4 to 7 years were administered a perceived competence scale, prosocial moral reasoning stories, and a measure of charitable donation behavior. The results indicated that gifted children perceived themselves as more competent than their agemates in the cognitive domain, although perceived social competence results were equivocal. Gifted 4- and 5-year-old children used significantly less hedonistic reasoning and significantly more mutual needs reasoning than did their age-mates; gifted 6- and 7-year-old children showed less frequent use of direct reciprocity and stereotypic reasoning and greater use of abstract internalized reasoning than did their age-mates. Charitable donation behavior occured at a high frequency, with both age and sex affecting the apparent motivations for donation behavior. The lack of a contingent relationship ...
High-efficiency broad-band transmission through a double-60/spl deg/ bend in a planar photonic Crystal single-line defect waveguide

We present two designs to improve the transmission of a conventional double-60/spl deg/ bend in a single-line defect planar photonic crystal waveguide by locally optimizing the shape and the size of air holes of a photonic crystal lattice at the corners. We fabricate these devices on a silicon-on-insulator substrate and characterized them using tunable laser sources over a wavelength range from /spl lambda/=1.259 /spl mu/m to /spl lambda/=1.641 /spl mu/m. As we show, over a 9% bandwidth, less than 1-dB loss/bend was observed. In order to theoretically validate these experimental results, the three-dimensional finite-difference time-domain simulations are performed and found to agree with the experimental results.
Longitudinal response functions for 40Ca from quasi-elastic electron scattering

Abstract Longitudinal response functions were extracted from quasi-elastic electron scattering data on 40 Ca at angles of 45.5°, 90°, and 140° with bombarding energies ranging from 130 to 840 MeV and for constant three-momentum transfers of 300, 330, 370, 410 and 450 MeV/ c . Contrary to previously reported results, the present longitudinal response functions show no more than 20% missing strength when compared to the relativistic Fermi gas model. Calculations employing wavefunctions generated from a relativistic Hartree potential and using an effective momentum approximation yield results that are in much closer agreement with the experimental data and indicate essentially no longitudinal suppression.
Investigation of the enhancing effects of sulfur and/or oxygen functional groups of nanoporous carbons on adsorption of dibenzothiophenes

Abstract Adsorption of dibenzothiophene (DBT) and 4,6-dimethyldibenzothiophene (DMDBT) from simulated diesel fuel with 20 ppm w total concentration of sulfur was investigated on polymer-derived carbon containing various amounts of oxygen and sulfur incorporated to the surface. Initial and exhausted carbons were characterized using adsorption of nitrogen, thermal analysis, potentiometric titration, XPS, mass spectroscopy and elemental analysis. Selectivities for DBT and DMDBT adsorption were calculated with reference to naphthalene. It was found that both the capacity and selectivity for DBT and DMDBT removal from model diesel fuel were affected by the content and arrangement of heteroatoms. Although both oxygen and sulfur containing groups enhance the capacity, the enhancing effects of surface chemistry were more pronounced on the carbon with sulfur incorporated to its matrix. This is linked to sulfur–sulfur interactions.
Post-Keynesian methodology: an assessment ∗

The purpose of this article is to offer a preliminary assessment of post-Keynesian methodology. This is undertaken by initially defining and developing the methodological perspective known as critical pluralism. It is argued that post-Keynesians might well benefit from a better understanding of the methodological views of other groups within economics.
Conflict Engagement and Conflict Disengagement During Interactions Between Adults and Their Parents

Objectives. This study examined generational, ethnic, and gender differences in conflict behaviors during interactions between adults and their parents. We considered associations between observed conflict engagement and conflict disen gagement behaviors and participant-rated relationship quality. Method. Participants included 155 African American and European American women and men (aged 22–49 years), their mothers and their fathers (N = 465). Adult children were videotaped separately with their mother and their father discussing relationship problems. Independent raters coded the conversations for conflict engagement (e.g., pressuring for change) and disengagement (e.g., withdrawing) behaviors. Results. In African American families, parents displayed more conflict engagement and adult children displayed more conflict disengagement, whereas European American parents and adult children did not differ in their conflict behaviors. Mothers, fathers, and adult children reported poorer relationship quality when they engaged in more conflict engagement behaviors. Adult children also reported poorer quality relationships when their mothers displayed more conflict engage ment behaviors. Mothers reported poorer quality relationships when their adult children engaged in more conflict disen gagement.
Cultural, Ethical, and Spiritual Competencies of Health Care Providers Responding to a Catastrophic Event

Compassion is a language that is understood across cultures, religions, and nations. Being compassionate and empathetic is a basic responsibility of health care providers responding to disasters. Compassion and empathy cannot be operationalized unless providers show culturally competent, ethically right, and spiritually caring behavior. In addition to being accepting of cultures other than their own, providers must read literature and familiarize themselves with the predominant cultures of the affected population. Ethically right decision making is essentially an act of balancing the risks and benefits to the entire society. Spiritual care is an important dimension of total health, and therefore recognition and resolution of the spiritual needs of disaster victims is an essential role of health care providers. Disaster management is teamwork and therefore requires that health care providers draw on the expertise and support of other team members; coordinating efforts with local religious, social governmental organizations, and NGOs to deal with the intangible effects of the cultural and spiritual impact of a disaster and to prevent further demoralization of the affected community is imperative. Disasters occur, and the only thing that can ameliorate their devastating effects is to improve disaster preparedness and respond collectively and courageously to every catastrophic event.
Toward an Understanding of Self-Defeating Responses Following Victimization

Victims—of crime, violence, abuse, disease, serious accidents, natural disasters—generally experience considerable psychological distress. It is not difficult to comprehend common victim reactions such as disbelief, confusion, fear, anxiety, and hypervigilance. Typically, we recognize that bad things happen, but we never truly believe they will happen to us; when misfortune strikes, we are shocked, confused, and anxious. In addition to these “comprehensible” reactions, victims also often manifest responses, generally patterns of thought, that appear far more incomprehensible to others. The victim appears to be adding insult to injury, to be choosing to suffer even more than appears warranted by the actual victimization.
Acupuncture for knee osteoarthritis--a randomised trial using a novel sham.

Background Evidence on the efficacy of acupuncture for reducing the pain and dysfunction of osteoarthritis is equivocal. Objective To determine whether acupuncture provides greater pain relief and improved function compared with sham acupuncture or education in patients with osteoarthritis of the knee. Design Randomised, controlled trial. Setting Two outpatient clinics (an integrative medicine facility and a rheumatology facility) located in academic teaching hospitals and one clinical trials facility. Patients 570 patients with osteoarthritis of the knee (mean age [±SD], 65.5 ± 8.4 years). Intervention 23 true acupuncture sessions over 26 weeks. Controls received 6 two-hour sessions over 12 weeks or 23 sham acupuncture sessions over 26 weeks. Measurements Primary outcomes were changes in the Western Ontario and McMaster Universities Osteoarthritis Index (WOMAC) pain and function scores at 8 and 26 weeks. Secondary outcomes were patient global assessment, 6-minute walk distance, and physical health scores of the 36-Item Short-Form Health Survey (SF-36). Results Participants in the true acupuncture group experienced greater improvement in WOMAC function scores than the sham acupuncture group at 8 weeks (mean difference, –2.9 [95% CI, –5.0 to –0.8]; P=0.01) but not in WOMAC pain score (mean difference, –0.5 [CI, –1.2 to 0.2]; P=0.18) or the patient global assessment (mean difference, 0.16 [CI, –0.02 to 0.34]; P> 0.2). At 26 weeks, the true acupuncture group experienced significantly greater improvement than the sham group in the WOMAC function score (mean difference, –2.5 [CI, –4.7 to –0.4]; P=0.01), WOMAC pain score (mean difference, –0.87 [CI, –1.58 to –0.16]; P=0.003), and patient global assessment (mean difference, 0.26 [CI, 0.07 to 0.45]; P=0.02). Limitations At 26 weeks, 43% of the participants in the education group and 25% in each of the true and sham acupuncture groups were not available for analysis. Conclusions Acupuncture seems to provide improvement in function and pain relief as an adjunctive therapy for osteoarthritis of the knee when compared with credible sham acupuncture and education control groups.
Make‐Over or Tune‐Up: Every Student Needs Religious Instruction

The assumption of our roundtable is that an increasing number of students are in need of religious instruction because they come from a secularized society, meaning a society no longer imbued with Judeo-Christian values. I respond by acknowledging that there is a great need for providing information about the way Christianity (and Judaism and Islam) functioned in the Middle Ages, while emphasizing that every student needs it: not only just secularized Jews and Christians but also the large number of non-Western students (particularly those from Asia) who have other religious traditions, and also those students who have had a thorough religious upbringing, because their ideas can seriously lead them astray when applied to medieval societies.
Estimating the abundance of Long-billed Curlews in Nebraska

Long-billed Curlews (Numenius americanus) are shorebirds of high conservation concern in North America. Populations have de- clined in the last 150 yr primarily due to habitat loss and conversion. We conducted a 2-yr study to estimate the density and state- wide abundance of breeding Long-billed Curlews in Nebraska during 2008 and 2009. Surveys were conducted during the prenest- ing period in April when Long-billed Curlews were likely to be detected. We used a simple random sample of roadside survey routes (N = 39), each consisting of 40 5-min point-counts at 800-m intervals. We modeled detection probability and found that wind speed negatively affected detectability, but found no evidence of either year effects or observer bias. We estimated there were 0.0038 Long-billed Curlews per hectare (0.38 Long-billed Curlews per km 2 ) along survey routes and, by extrapolation, esti- mated there were 23,909 (SE = 1685; 95% CI: 20,810—27,471) Long-billed Curlews in Nebraska. Our population estimate suggests that ~15 to 22% of the United States population of Long-billed Curlews is found in Nebraska. Curlews were not evenly distrib- uted within our survey area, with the highest densities in the central Sandhills, an area dominated by grass-stabilized sand dunes and shallow wetlands, and the lowest densities in predominantly agricultural areas. Because Long-billed Curlews in Nebraska face many potential threats resulting from land-use changes, monitoring of the breeding population should be continued. Our survey method was efficient and yielded interpretable results; other states or regions should consider adopting this approach for estimating curlew abundance.
Anticonvulsant Toxicity: Clinical and EEG Effects

ABSTRACT.Epilepsy has been known since antiquity, however, there was no satisfactory treatment until the discovery of bromides in 1857 which was the beginning of the modern era of anticonvulsant treatment for seizure disorder. Despite the most serious side effects of psychosis and skin rashes, bromides remained the mainstay of treatment until phenobarbital was introduced in 1912. The bromides were then replaced by phenobarbital. The most significant development is the introduction of diphenylhydantoin (phenytoin) in 1938. The other milestones in the development of anticonvulsant treatment for epilepsy consist of introduction of trimethadione in 1946, primidone (mysoline) in 1954, ethosuximide (zarontin) in 1960, carbamazepine (tegretol) in 1974, clonazepam (clonopin) in 1975 and valproic acid (depakote) in 1978.The first and foremost task before treatment of epilepsy is to make the diagnosis. Does the patient have true seizures and if so, what type of seizure? The answers to these questions are important ...
TTIP and the ‘finance exception’: Venue-shopping and the breakdown of financial regulatory coordination

This article asks why financial market regulatory coordination did not form a major part of the US and EU negotiations on the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP). Given the highly interconnected nature of transatlantic financial services, common experiences of insufficient regulation exposed by the global financial crisis, the G20 commitments made by both blocs, and the awareness that uncoordinated re-regulation could threaten global financial stability, the United States and the EU arguably had every incentive to make financial services a central pillar of the TTIP. Yet financial services coordination is conspicuous by its absence. We argue that the breakdown in financial coordination was driven by the fact that US authorities moved more quickly and in ways less appreciated by major actors in the financial sector than their EU counterparts in implementing the G20 agenda. This has given rise to ‘venue-shopping’ on the part of the largest financial firms. Rather than try to tackle US regulatory agencies head-on, they hope to gain traction on the US regulatory process by influencing how European partners approach contentious issues. We conclude that where we used to worry that firms would shop the lightest regulatory environment, now there is concern that they will shop the most porous lobbying arena.
Design and Assessment of a High Speed Low Torque Joint Transmission for Use in a Partial Hand, Powered Finger Prosthesis

This paper presents the design and assessment results of two types of miniature, high speed, low torque transmissions to be used in a partial hand, powered finger prosthesis. Transmissions enabling torque transfer across varied flexion angles of a finger joint can allow placement of a motor and a gearbox in adjacent phalanges, significantly decreasing space requirements for partial hand prostheses. Bevel gear-based and cable-based transmission designs for a variety of flexion angles are implemented and tested in comparison with a direct cascaded motor and gearbox (benchmark) configuration. The miter-gear transmission provided consistent operation at tested flexion angles, but demonstrated reduced efficiency in comparison with the benchmark configuration. Cable transmission matched efficiency of the benchmark configuration at low flexion angles but lacked mechanical durability at high loads and flexion angles. The designs presented complementary strengths and weaknesses, with the miter-gear design demonstrating better overall mechanical reliability, while the cable transmission excelled in secondary characteristics.Copyright © 2015 by ASME
Segregation of histone fractions from purified rat pancreas nuclei by isoelectric focusing.

SummaryThe present report describes the purification of nuclei from rat pancreas and the use of isoelectric focusing for the segregation of histone fractions, a heterogeneous mixture with respect to charge. This procedure employs gels of 5% polyacrylamide as support matrices, in 6.25 M urea, and spans a pH range of 7.5-10.8. It was, therefore, found adequate for study of the microheterogeneity of histones. The banding pattern of histone fractions in pancreas development using electrofocusing is presented.
Monitoring southwest Greenland’s ice sheet melt with ambient seismic noise

The Greenland ice sheet presently accounts for ~70% of global ice sheet mass loss. Because this mass loss is associated with sea-level rise at a rate of 0.7 mm/year, the development of improved monitoring techniques to observe ongoing changes in ice sheet mass balance is of paramount concern. Spaceborne mass balance techniques are commonly used; however, they are inadequate for many purposes because of their low spatial and/or temporal resolution. We demonstrate that small variations in seismic wave speed in Earth’s crust, as measured with the correlation of seismic noise, may be used to infer seasonal ice sheet mass balance. Seasonal loading and unloading of glacial mass induces strain in the crust, and these strains then result in seismic velocity changes due to poroelastic processes. Our method provides a new and independent way of monitoring (in near real time) ice sheet mass balance, yielding new constraints on ice sheet evolution and its contribution to global sea-level changes. An increased number of seismic stations in the vicinity of ice sheets will enhance our ability to create detailed space-time records of ice mass variations.
Influence of post-welding heat treatment on impact property of P92 steel welding seam

The impact property of P92 steel welding seam after post-welding heat treatment was studied.The cross section hardness results of P92 steel weld joint show that there is gradient of temperature which is in the thick wall of P92 steel pipe welds during post-welding heat treatment.The temperature of outer layer is higher than that of inner layer.The impact absorbed energy of outer layer of the test specimen is higher than that of inner layer.After the second high-temperature tempering,the toughness difference between outer and inner layers disappears basically and there is improvement of toughness average value.The results show that the gradient of temperature has important influence on groove-weld's impact absorbed energy of P92 steel.
Optimal sample cost residues for differential database batch query problems

In many computing applications, there are several equivalent algorithms capable of performing a particular task, and no one is the most efficient under all statistical distributions of the data. In such contexts, a good heuristic is to take a sample of the database and use it to guess which procedure is likely to be the most efficient. This paper defines the very general notion of a differentiable query problem and shows that the ideal sample size for guessing the optimal choice of algorithm is O(N2/3) for all differential problems involving approximately N executing steps.
Adenoidectomy for otitis media with effusion

The efficacy of adenoidectomy in the surgical treatment of children with otitis media with effusion (OME) persisting after adequate medical therapy has been established in three independent randomized clinical trials. Although each of these studies used a different experimental design, all showed significant reductions in morbidity from OME after adenoidectomy as compared to the control groups. Subsequent application of these findings in formulating clinical guidelines for the use of adenoidectomy has yet to be realized, and recommendations to parents for or against the procedure appear to vary more with the surgeon's philosophy than with the condition of the child. This discussion examines the effectiveness and cost of adenoidectomy for the treatment of children with chronic OME and addresses the question of whether adenoidectomy should be used as a primary or a secondary surgical therapy. The argument is made to use adenoidectomy as a primary therapy in selected cases on the basis of patient age, type of OME, and patient preference, and to base the decision not on the size of the adenoid, but on its known pathophysiology.
The knowledge gradient for sequential decision making with stochastic binary feedbacks

We consider the problem of sequentially making decisions that are rewarded by "successes" and "failures" which can be predicted through an unknown relationship that depends on a partially controllable vector of attributes for each instance. The learner takes an active role in selecting samples from the instance pool. The goal is to maximize the probability of success, either after the offline training phase or minimizing regret in online learning. Our problem is motivated by real-world applications where observations are time consuming and/or expensive. With the adaptation of an online Bayesian linear classifier, we develop a knowledge-gradient type policy to guide the experiment by maximizing the expected value of information of labeling each alternative, in order to reduce the number of expensive physical experiments. We provide a finite-time analysis of the estimated error and demonstrate the performance of the proposed algorithm on both synthetic problems and benchmark UCI datasets.
In vitro association of selective tRNA species with 28S RNA of mouse cells

Abstract 28S RNA prepared either from the poly(A) RNA-depleted fraction of mouse embryo culture cells or from 60S ribosome subunits of adult mouse liver is able to bind selective species of tRNAs in an in vitro hybridization reaction. The bound tRNA consists predominantly of proline tRNA and, in minor amounts, glycine, alanine, and aspartic acid tRNAs. Quantitative analysis revealed that the hybridization of tRNA may involve a 28S RNA subpopulation, which is present in higher quantity in embryo cells than in adult liver of the mouse.
Galois representations and cohomology of GL(n, ℤ)

Since Serre [Se3] first conjectured the possibility of attaching Galois representations to higher weight modular forms for GL(2), and Deligne [D] proved it, this notion has been expanded to apply to a large class of automorphic forms on more general reductive groups. Clozel [Cl1], following Langlands [La], has given a precise conjecture for GL(n), recalled below. I shall refer to it as the “central conjecture”. Further discussion of the history, which should be traced backwards at least to work of Eichler, Shimura, and Weil, may be found in the last section of [Se3] and the introduction to [Cl1]. One should add the remark that Serre [Se4] seems to have been the first to propose that all L-functions of motives might be L-functions of automorphic forms.
Mental Health Services Use Among Medical Students: Perceived Stigma and Barriers to Care

Medical students experience significant rates of depression, anxiety, and burnout during their training, yet they are often reluctant to seek mental health treatment. This study evaluated the use of mental health services among University of Vermont (UVM) medical students, identified barriers to use, including perceptions of stigma, and compared to the previous literature on utilization at other institutions. A cross-sectional online survey was administered to all enrolled University of Vermont medical students in the spring of 2016. Outcome measures included use of mental health services, barriers to use, and items exploring attitudes toward seeking care and perceived stigma. Of the 44.8% (202 of 463) students who participated in the study, 42.1% reported using mental health services in the past 12 months. The most commonly reported barriers to use of mental health services were lack of time (72.8%), lack of convenience (48.5%), and concerns about what supervisors (45%) and other students (41.1%) would think. More than one in ten students indicated that they would not seek mental health treatment even if needed. These students were more likely to have indicated that they believe other students would view them less favorably if they sought treatment. UVM medical students use mental health services at a high rate, relative to reports from previous studies. Nevertheless, their beliefs and attitudes suggest that there remain significant barriers to the use of mental health services, including perceptions of stigma and negative impact on their careers.
Asset Pricing Implications of Hiring Demographics

This paper documents that U.S. industries that shift their skilled workforce toward young employees exhibit higher expected equity returns. The young-minus-old (YMO) hiring return spread comoves negatively with value-minus-growth while being significantly positive on average. Exposure to the YMO spread accounts for a significant portion of annual momentum profits at the industry level. I find that an adjustment of the skilled workforce toward young employees is associated with greater productivity in new capital inputs of an industry. This motivates a risk-based explanation for the YMO spread, and its interaction with value and momentum. A model of investment and hiring where young and experienced employees are equipped with differential roles in production and investment can account for the empirical findings.
T-helper immune phenotype may underlie 'paradoxical' tumour necrosis factor-α inhibitor therapy-related psoriasiform dermatitis.

SummaryBackground Therapeutics targeting tumour necrosis factor (TNF)-α are effective for psoriasis; however, in patients treated for other disorders, psoriasis may worsen and psoriasiform dermatitis (PsoD) may arise. T helper (Th) cytokines in psoriasis upregulate keratin (K)17, which modulates TNF-α transduction, leading to vascular adhesion molecule upregulation and lymphocytic extravasation. Aim We investigated Th phenotype and expression of K17, intercellular adhesion molecule (ICAM)-1 and vascular adhesion molecule (VCAM)-1 in psoriasis and anti-TNF-α-related PsoD. Methods Skin biopsies from patients with psoriasis unresponsive to TNF-α inhibitor therapy (n = 11), PsoD-related to TNF-α inhibition (n = 9), untreated psoriasis (n = 9) or atopic dermatitis (AD; n = 9) were immunohistochemically analysed for Th1, Th2, Th17 and Th22. Expression of K17, ICAM-1 and VCAM-1 was also examined. Results Anti-TNF-α-unresponsive psoriasis and anti-TNF-α-related PsoD showed decreased Th1 : Th2 raio and increased Th17 : Th1 ratio compared with untreated psoriasis. Anti-TNF-α-unresponsive psoriasis had significantly fewer Th1 (4% vs. 12%) and more Th17 (51% vs. 20%) cells than untreated psoriasis. No difference in Th22 cells was identified. K17 was present in all cases of untreated psoriasis and anti-TNF-α-related PsoD, 91% of anti-TNF-α-unresponsive psoriasis, and only 22% of AD. VCAM-1 and ICAM-1 in anti-TNF-α-related PsoD was akin to untreated psoriasis, but decreased in anti-TNF-α-unresponsive psoriasis. Conclusions These findings further the current understanding of the anti-TNF-α-related psoriasiform phenotype and support a rationale for therapeutic targeting of interleukin-17 and TNF-α in combination.
Cancer gene profiling in non-small cell lung cancers reveals activating mutations in JAK2 and JAK3 with therapeutic implications

Next-generation sequencing (NGS) of cancer gene panels are widely applied to enable personalized cancer therapy and to identify novel oncogenic mutations. We performed targeted NGS on 932 clinical cases of non-small-cell lung cancers (NSCLCs) using the Ion AmpliSeq™ Cancer Hotspot panel v2 assay. Actionable mutations were identified in 65% of the cases with available targeted therapeutic options, including 26% of the patients with mutations in National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) guideline genes. Most notably, we discovered JAK2 p.V617F somatic mutation, a hallmark of myeloproliferative neoplasms, in 1% (9/932) of the NSCLCs. Analysis of cancer cell line pharmacogenomic data showed that a high level of JAK2 expression in a panel of NSCLC cell lines is correlated with increased sensitivity to a selective JAK2 inhibitor. Further analysis of TCGA genomic data revealed JAK2 gain or loss due to genetic alterations in NSCLC clinical samples are associated with significantly elevated or reduced PD-L1 expression, suggesting that the activating JAK2 p.V617F mutation could confer sensitivity to both JAK inhibitors and anti-PD1 immunotherapy. We also detected JAK3 germline activating mutations in 6.7% (62/932) of the patients who may benefit from anti-PD1 treatment, in light of recent findings that JAK3 mutations upregulate PD-L1 expression. Taken together, this study demonstrated the clinical utility of targeted NGS with a focused hotspot cancer gene panel in NSCLCs and identified activating mutations in JAK2 and JAK3 with clinical implications inferred through integrative analysis of cancer genetic, genomic, and pharmacogenomic data. The potential of JAK2 and JAK3 mutations as response markers for the targeted therapy against JAK kinases or anti-PD1 immunotherapy warrants further investigation.
In-hospital outcomes of transcatheter versus surgical aortic valve replacement in end stage renal disease.

BACKGROUND Transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) is an alternative to surgical aortic valve replacement (SAVR) for patients with severe symptomatic aortic stenosis (AS) who are at intermediate and high risk for surgery. Commercial use of TAVR has expanded to patients with end stage renal disease (ESRD). OBJECTIVES Compare in-hospital outcomes of TAVR versus SAVR in ESRD patients requiring hemodialysis (HD). METHODS ESRD patients on HD undergoing TAVR (n = 328) or SAVR (n = 697) between 2012 and 2014 were identified in the National Inpatient Sample (NIS). Propensity-score matching method was used to minimize selection bias. Baseline characteristics and in-hospital outcomes were compared. RESULTS TAVR patients were older (75.3 vs. 61.6 years, P < 0.001) and had more comorbidities, including congestive heart failure (16.2% vs. 7.5%), diabetes mellitus (28.4% vs. 22.5%), chronic lung disease (27.7% vs. 20.4%), and peripheral vascular disease (35.1% vs. 21.2%). Propensity-score matching yielded 175 pairs of patients matched on 30 baseline covariates. Overall in-hospital mortality was high (9.9%) and similar between TAVR and SAVR (8% vs. 10.3%, P = 0.58). TAVR was associated with shorter length of stay (LOS) (8 vs. 14 days, P < 0.001), lower hospitalization cost ($276,448 vs. $364,280, P = 0.01), lower in-hospital complications (60.6% vs. 76%, P = 0.003), and higher rate of home discharge (31.4% vs. 17.7%, P = 0.004) compared with SAVR. CONCLUSIONS Regardless of treatment modality, patients with AS on HD have high in-hospital mortality. TAVR and SAVR have comparable in-hospital mortality in this population. However, TAVR is associated with shorter LOS, lower hospitalization costs, lower in-hospital complications, and higher rates of home discharge.
Minimum area thresholds for rattlesnakes and colubrid snakes on islands in the Gulf of California, Mexico.

We expand a framework for estimating minimum area thresholds to elaborate biogeographic patterns between two groups of snakes (rattlesnakes and colubrid snakes) on islands in the western Gulf of California, Mexico. The minimum area thresholds for supporting single species versus coexistence of two or more species relate to hypotheses of the relative importance of energetic efficiency and competitive interactions within groups, respectively. We used ordinal logistic regression probability functions to estimate minimum area thresholds after evaluating the influence of island area, isolation, and age on rattlesnake and colubrid occupancy patterns across 83 islands. Minimum area thresholds for islands supporting one species were nearly identical for rattlesnakes and colubrids (~1.7 km2), suggesting that selective tradeoffs for distinctive life history traits between rattlesnakes and colubrids did not result in any clear advantage of one life history strategy over the other on islands. However, the minimum area threshold for supporting two or more species of rattlesnakes (37.1 km2) was over five times greater than it was for supporting two or more species of colubrids (6.7 km2). The great differences between rattlesnakes and colubrids in minimum area required to support more than one species imply that for islands in the Gulf of California relative extinction risks are higher for coexistence of multiple species of rattlesnakes and that competition within and between species of rattlesnakes is likely much more intense than it is within and between species of colubrids.
Male-dominated stem disciplines: How do we make them more attractive to women?

Despite women's relatively recent entrance into many male-dominated fields, women currently make up 17 percent of the engineering workforce, with as few as 8 percent in mechanical engineering and as many as 34 percent in environmental engineering [1]. Of the 17 percent of the engineering workforce that are women, 68 percent are White women [2]. Why does the male-domination of engineering persist? And, why do some fields within engineering remain more male-dominated than others? While there have not been enough systematic studies across engineering fields to determine why some are more male-dominated than others, there is a body of research examining how some STEM fields remain male-dominated (e.g., computer science, engineering, and physics) while other fields have become more gender-balanced (e.g., biology, chemistry, and math) (see [3] for a review). Essentially, the answer is that fields remain dominated by White men because the culture of the field is "masculinized" and excludes women [3]. In this article, I will discuss a few of the underlying assumptions that make up the masculinized culture that excludes women [3], [4]. I focus my review on scholarship focusing on beliefs about women's competence, commitment, and leadership. Next, I illustrate how individuals enact masculinized cultures in their everyday interactions and practices as well as how underlying assumptions of masculinized cultures are embedded in policies and procedures. Then, I discuss strategies for making changes to masculinized cultures. I conclude by providing examples of policy changes that facilitate culture changes and equitable work outcomes.
Measures of Value-Added Information in Hydrocarbon Exploration Projects:

This paper shows that use solely of the expected value for an exploration project does not include any aspects concerning the risk of the project. Three additional measures, involving the variance ...
Computer graphics: tools for visualization

Featuring an emphasis on visualization and an extensive use of object-oriented programming and abstraction, the approach taken by the author is to give algorithms and discuss tools for producing high-level graphics on machines available to every college student.
Immunopathology of Malignant Disease in Mice Leukemias and Lymphomas, Stalking-Horses for Human Counterparts

The last 20 years have seen a veritable explosion in our knowledge about both animal and human tumors of the lymphoid and hemopoietic systems. Today, a bewildering amount of detailed information is available about the causes, varieties, and therapies of these tumors. The challenge for us all is to obtain a coherent overview of this forest of information, which will allow us to recognize individual trees as members of a particular grove, and to know the location of the empty tracts in which future generations may plant their trees.
Abstract 549: ABCA1 Expression Promotes ApoAI Acidification on the Plasma Membrane via Recruitment of Vacuolar ATPase

Objective: We have shown that ABCA1 mediates unfolding of apoAI N-terminal helical hairpin on the cell surface. Others have shown that acidic pH exposes apoAI’s hydrophobic surfaces. We postulated ...
Stability and change in emotional processing across development: A 6‐year longitudinal investigation using event‐related potentials

ERPs reveal the temporal dynamics of emotional processing and are easily assessed in children. Yet, little longitudinal research has examined ERPs sensitive to emotion across development. We aimed to systematically identify timing and spatial distributions of ERPs sensitive to emotion in a longitudinal sample of youth (N = 62) using principal component analysis (PCA) and evaluate stability and change in emotional responses across development. Participants completed an emotional interrupt paradigm in childhood (Mage = 9.38, SD = 0.42), early adolescence (Mage = 13.03, SD = 0.24), and midadolescence (Mage = 15.16, SD = 0.17). ERPs were recorded to unpleasant, pleasant, and neutral images. Participants were instructed to respond to a target while viewing images. Two components sensitive to emotion emerged across development: P300/early late positive potential (LPP) and late LPP. The P300/early LPP component was characterized by an enhanced positivity for unpleasant compared to pleasant and neutral images. The late LPP was enhanced for both unpleasant and pleasant compared to neutral images, and more positive for unpleasant compared to pleasant images. The components showed moderate to strong stability. Overall LPP magnitude decreased from childhood into adolescence. There was a developmental shift in distributions from occipital sites in childhood to centroparietal sites in midadolescence. Results support use of PCA to inform scoring windows and electrode selection. The shift in distribution may reflect developmental focalization in underlying neural circuitry. Future work is needed using multimodal approaches to further understand the relationship between ERPs and changes in neural circuitry across development.
The Patient's Voice: Development of an Adolescent Hospital Quality of Care Survey (AHQOCS)

Abstract Purpose To develop an adolescent determined hospital quality of care survey. Background Adolescents do not currently evaluate their quality of hospital care. Hospital satisfaction surveys are mailed following discharge to parents, and parental input may not reflect adolescent perception. Design and methods This exploratory, descriptive study utilizing Q-sort methodology, investigated 60 adolescents/young adults' (ages 12–21) perception of hospital care. A comprehensive, peer-reviewed journal search conducted 1998–2017 explored adolescent perception of hospital care. Themes emerging from adolescent's perception of care were developed into 56 statements for relevance sorting. Results Excellent content validity of the care domains was established at 0.982 (utilizing the universal agreement). After placement of all 56 cards, items were correlated in order to reveal similarities in perspectives. Items of greatest importance to adolescents included ‘able to tell the doctor what was wrong with you’, ‘having family stay’, ‘trust in nurse to take care of you’, ‘able to ask the doctor to explain what they said’, ‘nurse clearly told you what would happen to you’, and ‘a clean room’. Little variation in response occurred across the variables of age, gender, length of stay, or diagnosis. Conclusions Given the opportunity to relate autonomously to health services, adolescents are able to determine quality preferences and should be contributory in determining hospital care. Practice implications Based on adolescent preferences demonstrated in this study, satisfaction with pediatric care delivery should be improved with attention tailored to adolescent wishes.
Contribution of low-cost sensor measurements to the prediction of PM2.5 levels: A case study in Imperial County, California, USA

Regulatory monitoring networks are often too sparse to support community-scale PM2.5 exposure assessment while emerging low-cost sensors have the potential to fill in the gaps. To date, limited studies, if any, have been conducted to utilize low-cost sensor measurements to improve PM2.5 prediction with high spatiotemporal resolutions based on statistical models. Imperial County in California is an exemplary region with sparse Air Quality System (AQS) monitors and a community-operated low-cost network entitled Identifying Violations Affecting Neighborhoods (IVAN). This study aims to evaluate the contribution of IVAN measurements to the quality of PM2.5 prediction. We adopted the Random Forest algorithm to estimate daily PM2.5 concentrations at a 1-km spatial resolution using three different PM2.5 datasets (AQS-only, IVAN-only, and AQS/IVAN combined). The results show that the integration of low-cost sensor measurements is an effective way to significantly improve the quality of PM2.5 prediction with an increase of cross-validation (CV) R2 by ~0.2. The IVAN measurements also contributed to the increased importance of emission source-related covariates and more reasonable spatial patterns of PM2.5. The remaining uncertainty in the calibrated IVAN measurements could still cause apparent outliers in the prediction model, highlighting the need for more effective calibration or integration methods to relieve its negative impact.
Inside the Wuhan cabin hospital: Contending narratives during the COVID-19 pandemic

This article examines the making and circulation of vlogs on the Chinese platform Douyin during the Wuhan lockdown. We specifically draw attention to vlogs made in mobile cabin hospitals. Construct...
Tourism Service Auction Market for Saudi Arabia

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is a country that contains many historical places for tourists to visit. Moreover, the Kingdom has announced it is opening the door for tourism in Saudi Arabia under the 2030 Vision. An electronic market can provide service providers and tourists a more efficient way to fulfill tourists’ desired activities in Saudi Arabia at a minimum price. This paper proposed and tested a mathematical model and a heuristic algorithm using Java to match service providers’ consortia with tourists’ wanted activity lists. The result of this proposed model and its heuristic algorithm demonstrated a feasible solution for an electronic market for Saudi Arabia’s growing tourism industry.
A randomized trial comparing continence pessary to continence device (Poise Impressa®) for stress incontinence.

To conduct a multi-centered randomized trial evaluating stress urinary incontinence (SUI) treatment based on the Patient Global Impression of Improvement score after 4 weeks using a continence pessary (CP) or a disposable intravaginal continence device (DICD). The null hypothesis is no difference in treatment success between cohorts. This parallel group, active treatment comparative effectiveness trial randomized women with SUI to either CP or DICD for 4 weeks in a 1:1 allocation ratio. Exclusion criteria included pregnancy, UTI, postmenopausal bleeding, neurogenic bladder, urinary retention, prolapse, contraindication to or prior treatment with CP/DICD, and prior SUI surgery. Assuming an 80% power, an alpha of 5% and 20% dropout, we needed 138 participants to detect 50% success with CP versus 25% with DICD. Due to slow enrollment, the study was stopped after 16 months with 50 participants enrolled. Of the 50 women enrolled, 25 (50%) were randomized to CP and 25 (50%) to DICD. Thirty-five of 50 (70%) completed a fitting, and 22/50 (44%) completed 4-week and 17/50 (34%) completed 6-month follow-up. Baseline characteristics were similar, and there was high treatment success in each cohort [80% (8/10) CP vs. 75% (9/12) DICD; p = 1.0]. DICD patients showed improvement on all questionnaires but had higher use of other therapies over 6 months. CP patients showed improvements except for lower sexual function scores at 4 weeks. No serious adverse events occurred. Most women fitted with a CP/DICD experienced treatment success after 4 weeks without serious adverse events.
Interface Geometry for Two-Layered Stratified Flow

Several flow situations exist involving density difference in which vertical density gradients are much larger than those in the horizontal direction. In the analysis of such flows, a common approach schematizes the flow as two distinct homogeneous layers. For example, in the case of an arrested wedge of warm water overlying cooler water in the vicinity of a power plant outlet, the interface is generally defined such that the vertically averaged velocity in the warm upper layer is zero, unless recirculation is occurring. For recirculation of cooling water, the discharges in both layers are nonzero. There are numerous other situations in which discharges in both layers are nonzero; e.g., thermally driven exchange flows, exchange flows as a result of differences in salt concentration, and buoyancy driven side-arm circulations to name a few.
Applications of Infinite Sums and Products

First we need means for manipulating the zeros of a holomorphic function on the disc. What we want is an analogue for the disc of the factors (z — a) that are used when we study polynomials on ℂ. The necessary device is what are called the Blaschke factors: If a ∈ D(0, 1), then we define the Blaschke factor $${{B}_{a}}(z) = \frac{{z - a}}{{1 - \bar{a}z}}.$$ (9.1.1.1) Observe that we have seen these functions before in the guise of Mobius transformations (§§5.5.1, §§6.2.2).
Exotic topology in complex dynamics

Abstract We describe three different exotic topological objects that arise as Julia sets for complex maps, namely, Cantor bouquets, indecomposable continua, and Sierpinski curves.
Epistemic Contextualism: Justification via the Unjustified

Wittgenstein sets forth a central tenet of epistemic contextualism when he claims that “at the foundation of well-founded belief lies belief that is not founded”.1 If we construe Wittgenstein’s claim as stating that at the foundation of justified beliefs lie beliefs that are unjustified, then we have the first purported solution to the epistemic regress problem. The contextualist solution, like the foundationalist solution, proposes that evidence chains terminate, but unlike the foundationalist solution, it ordinarily proposes that the foundations of justification are themselves unjustified.
Nucleotide sequence and expression of kerA, the gene encoding a keratinolytic protease of Bacillus licheniformis PWD-1

Bacillus licheniformis PWD-1 (ATCC 53757) secretes keratinase, a proteolytic enzyme which is active on whole feathers. By amino acid sequence similarity and phenylmethylsulfonyl fluoride inhibition, the keratinase was demonstrated to be a serine protease. The entire nucleotide sequence of the coding and flanking regions of the keratinase structure gene, kerA, was determined. A fixed oligonucleotide primer derived from the N-terminal sequence of the purified enzyme and a second random oligonucleotide primer were used in a procedure called PCR walking, which was developed to amplify and sequence the upstream and downstream regions of kerA. Another method, PCR screening, was conducted with a lambda phage vector with inserted PWD-1 genomic DNA fragments as templates and with the known sequences of the vector arms and the N-terminal sequence of the enzyme as primers. PCR amplification and sequence analysis of the lambda library completed the entire kerA sequence and established a set of gene deletions. The kerA gene shares a 97% sequence identity with the gene encoding subtilisin Carlsberg from B. licheniformis NCIMB 6816. The putative promoters, ribosome binding sites, and transcriptional terminators are also similar in these two bacteria. The deduced amino acid sequences indicate only three amino acid differences between the two mature proteases. Northern (RNA) analysis demonstrates that transcriptional regulation controls kerA expression on different growth media.