cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Anatomic asymmetric prostheses: shaping the breast.

Over more than 50 years the manufacturers of mammary prostheses have offered implants of two basic shapes, sphere or teardrop, and always unilateral (symmetric). In the year 2001 Poly Implants Prothese invited us to participate in the development of a device that, in our opinion, was going to change the conceptual design for mammary augmentation and reconstruction: the asymmetric anatomical prosthesis (AAP). On December 10, 2001 we performed, via the transareolaris inferior [1, 2, 3, 4], the first breast augmentation using a prototype of anatomic, asymmetric, cohesive silicone implants. The result was pleasing in all aspects. The prostheses were capable to reproduce faithfully, in all dimensions, the anatomy of the female breasts, including the differences between each side. Since then, we have used the AAP with two different contents, silicone cohesive gel and Hidrogel, this last model in which we are currently experimenting. We utilized either a transareolar or submammary approach, according to the case (atrophy, ptosis, tuberous breast, etc.). We present in this paper the features of this new prosthesis, the procedures used for their implant, and a comparative analysis of our results.
Examining the Picture Superiority Effect in Prospective Memory, Including the Factors of Age and Attention Load:

Numerous studies have demonstrated the existence of the picture superiority effect (i.e. better memory for pictures than words) in retrospective memory, but the examination of whether the picture s...
Case series on the safe use of buprenorphine/naloxone in individuals with acute hepatitis C infection and abnormal hepatic liver transaminases.

Background: Hepatitis C virus (HCV) is the most prevalent chronic viral illness in the United States. Many individuals with virus HCV are opioid dependent requiring treatment with opiate substitution treatment such as buprenorphine. Previous reports in the literature have suggested hepatotoxicity with buprenorphine tempering initial enthusiasm of the safety of buprenorphine in HCV-infected patients. Methods: As part of an ongoing SAMHSA-funded grant to expand opiate substitution therapy with buprenorphine, all opioid-dependent patients seeking treatment with buprenorphine undergo a laboratory evaluation including transaminases (AST/ALT) as well as laboratory evaluation for acute and chronic hepatitis. Results: Of the 121 patients screened for entry into buprenorphine treatment, 4 patients had evidence of acute HCV infection. Conclusions: Despite markedly elevated transaminases in the setting of acute hepatitis C infection, these patients tolerated buprenorphine treatment with improvement in their transami...
Reduced Arylsulfatase B activity in leukocytes from cystic fibrosis patients.

The enzyme Arylsulfatase B (ARSB; N-acetylgalactosamine-4-sulfatase) removes 4-sulfate groups from chondroitin-4-sulfate and dermatan sulfate and is required for the degradation of these sulfated glycosaminoglycans (sGAGs). Since these GAGs accumulate in patients with Cystic Fibrosis (CF), we investigated the activity of ARSB in leukocytes of patients with CF, to consider if reduced activity of ARSB might contribute to the pathophysiology of CF. Previous cell-based experiments had demonstrated that when the deficiency of the cystic fibrosis transmembrane regulator (CFTR) was corrected in bronchial epithelial cells, the ARSB activity increased significantly. De-identified, citrated blood samples were collected from 16 children with CF and 31 control subjects, seen in the Pediatric Clinic at Rush University Medical Center. Polymorphonuclear leukocytes (PMN) and mononuclear cell (MC) populations were separated by density gradient, and blinded determinations of ARSB activity were performed using the exogenous substrate 4-methylumbilliferyl sulfate. Interleukin-6 was measured in the plasma samples by ELISA. ARSB activity was significantly less in the PMN and MC from the CF patients than controls (P < 0.0001, unpaired t-test, two-tailed). Interleukin-6 levels in plasma were significantly greater in the CF population (P < 0.001). Mean age, age range, and male:female ratio of CF patients and controls were similar, and no association of ARSB activity with age, gender, or CFTR genotype was evident. Since recombinant human ARSB is used successfully for replacement therapy in Mucopolysaccharidosis VI, it may be useful to restore ARSB activity to normal levels and increase degradation of sulfated GAGs in CF patients. Pediatr Pulmonol. 2013; 48:236–244. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
A Lively Class Session for the Adult Education Second‐Language Course

The typical adult education foreign language class is made up of students of varying ages, interests, abilities, and linguistic backgrounds. Despite their apparent diversity, these students are united by the wish to develop those linguistic skills necessary for dealing effectively with real-life situations. To this end, the lesson described here will introduce some practical vocabulary of potential use in a variety of real-life contexts. Adult students will respond with enthusiasm to these lively classroom exercises. Although originally developed for use with a specific audience, this lesson can readily be modified for use in more conventional settings, such as high school or college language classrooms.
Marijuana and immunity : tetrahydrocannabinol-mediated inhibition of growth and phagocytic activity of the murine macrophage cell line, P388D1

Abstract The effects of delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) on the growth, DNA synthesis and phagocytic activity of P388D1, a murine macrophage cell line, were investigated. Incubating cell cultures with THC resulted in a dose-dependent inhibition of cell propagation and DNA synthesis. The magnitude of these effects was dependent upon the number of cells in the culture as well as the protein content in the culture medium. As the cell number increased, the THC effect decreased. Using cell cultures in which the cell concentration was standardized, THC (⩾ 5 μg/ml) produced pronounced inhibitions of cell growth and DNA synthesis, while lower THC concentrations (⩽ 3 μg/ml) were less effective. Studies examining the phagocytic activity of the P388D1 cells indicated exposure to THC (5 μg/ml for 2 h) only marginally affected the association of latex beads with the external surface of the plasma membrane. However, the ability of these THC-treated cells to internalize the latex particles was severely depressed. Thus, the data indicate that THC inhibited the growth and functional activity of murine macrophages in vitro and suggests that the P388D1 cell line is a useful model to study the effects of cannabinoids on the phagocytic process.
The First Textbook on Technical Writing

Richard W. Schmelzer, the author of this article on the first textbook written for technical writing classes, knows his subject from firsthand experience. He was one of the first teachers assigning...
Alternative snack system for children and teenagers with diabetes mellitus.

Abstract An alternative snack system facilitates diabetes management and provides a teaching tool for age-appropriate nutrition education of children and teenagers with diabetes mellitus. The system consists of four snack sizes: Mini—7 to 10 g available glucose, Little—15 to 20 g, Big—30 to 35 g, and Super-Big— 50 to 55 g. Within each category, several snack patterns are equivalent to each other in terms of available glucose and energy. By using this system, a child or teenager can eat snacks that contain different food groups and still adhere to the overall meal plan. When additional carbohydrate is needed for exercise or the prevention of nighttime hypoglycemia, a snack from the next largest category will increase available glucose by approximately 15 g and energy intake by approximately 100 kcal. Generally, for every hour of extra physical activity, a Little snack is added. When blood glucose concentrations before a nighttime snack are 4.4 to 6.7 mmol/L, a Little Snack is added to the usual bedtime snack, and when levels are less than 4.4 mmol/L, a Big snack is added. Further adjustments are made for children younger than 5 years old. The alternative snack system is a valuable nutrition education tool for the management of diabetes in children and teenagers.
DIII-D edge plasma simulations with UEDGE code including non-diffusive anomalous cross-field transport

Recently, both Alcator C-Mod and DIII-D tokamaks observed fast anomalous cross-field plasma transport in the SOL. These observations supported by theoretical studies have indicated that such transport is essentially non-diffusive and intermittent. We present the results of macroscopic plasma simulations with the UEDGE transport code including anomalous cross-field outward-directed convection for a series of low-power DIII-D shots. Our analysis of experimental and simulation data supports the view that non-diffusive transport is important for the entire edge plasma behavior in both L- and H-mode discharges.
Observational Evidence of the Kink Instability in Solar Filament Eruptions and Sigmoids

Two lines of observational evidence are used to infer that the MHD helical kink instability is associated with solar eruptions. The senses of twist and writhe are determined in images of seven erupting filaments obtained at 10830, 1600, 195, and 171 ?. In every case the sense of twist is the same as the sense of writhe, as required for a kink. From images in the soft X-ray and EUV spectrum, measurements of the height/width ratio of 623 sigmoids show a mean value of 5.47, which is the ratio expected for kinked flux ropes.
Metabolically Linked Changes in Fluorescence Emission Spectra of Cortex of Rat Brain, Kidney and Adrenal Gland

Metabolically Linked Changes in Fluorescence Emission Spectra of Cortex of Rat Brain, Kidney and Adrenal Gland
Author retrospective for characterizing processor architectures for programmable network interfaces

Our investigation into architectural support for networking tasks began in late 1998, and it began with something of a coincidence. Fiuczynski was an active graduate student participant in the SPIN project at UW [2,3]. He had been writing a SPIN driver for a high-speed network interface card (NIC), and visited Crowley (at the time, a graduate student investigating the relationships between processor & memory architectures and desktop computer applications [4]) one afternoon to discuss the NIC's processor. Had either Fiuczynksi or Crowley been out of the office on that particular day, it is not clear that this collaboration would have emerged. As it happened, both were in the office that day and the NIC processor was very interesting: a dual-core MIPS-like processor built specifically for the NIC. In ensuing discussions, it became clear that-despite the simplicity of its instruction set and microarchitecture-the NIC processor was as a whole more interesting than the much larger and complex x86 processor of the host system. It was more interesting because, as a dual-core processor, it was different and in no way an incremental improvement upon the deeply pipelined CPUs that dominated computing at the time. (They still dominate PCs and servers, of course, but mobile, graphics and embedded chips represent a huge swath of relevant computing platforms today.) It represented evidence of a combination of commercial and technical justification for designing a new and different processor to handle networking tasks.
SVM-based target recognition from synthetic aperture radar images using target region outline descriptors

Abstract The work in this paper explores the discriminatory power of target outline description features in conjunction with Support Vector Machine (SVM) based classification committees, when attempting to recognize a variety of targets from Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) images. In specific, approximate target outlines are first determined from SAR images via a simple mathematical morphology-based segmentation approach that discriminates target from radar shadow and ground clutter. Next, the obtained outlines are expressed as truncated Elliptical Fourier Series (EFS) expansions, whose coefficients are utilized as discriminatory features and processed by an ensemble of SVM classifiers. In order to experimentally illustrate the merit of the proposed scheme, this work reports classification results on a 3-class target recognition problem using SAR intensity imagery from the well-known Moving and Stationary Target Acquisition and Recognition (MSTAR) dataset. The novel approach was compared to selected methods mentioned in the literature in terms of classification accuracy. The results illustrate that only a small amount of EFS coefficients is necessary to achieve recognition rates that rival other established methods and, thus, target outline information can be a powerful discriminatory feature for automatic target recognition applications relevant to SAR imagery.
GEO-BOTANICAL EVIDENCE OF LATE QUATERNARY MASS WASTING IN BLOCK FIELD AREAS OF VIRGINIA

Studies of block fields at Massanutten Mountain, Virginia, document and provide information on the magnitude and frequency of mass movement on these coarse-grained slopes. Block fields, which traditionally have been considered relicts of Pleistocene climate, occur on and downslope from resistant Massanutten Sandstone in Passage Creek basin. Slopes are strewn with boulders and vegetative cover on the open block fields is absent to sparse. Several block fields were investigated for evidence of recent movement using the degree of lichen growth, differences in block weathering, and rock-fall damaged trees. Temporal and spatial aspects of geomorphic processes can be inferred through dendrogeochronology. Corrasion scars and stem ages infer a minimum age for a geomorphic or hydrologic event. High flows on Passage Creek coincided with tree-ring determined dates of block-field movement. Although, Pleistocene periglacial climate may have facilitated original formation of block fields, some block fields now continue to spread downslope during intense runoff events. Present block-field mass wasting may be the principal erosional process in these areas of resistant rock.
An exploratory analysis of the determinants of cooperative advertising participation rates

The paper offers an exploratory empirical investigation of the determinants of cooperative advertising participation rates. Using data for 2,286 brands, we examine the relationship of participation rates to national advertising expenditures by brand. We also consider how participation rates vary with average manufacturers’ margins by industry, average retail margins by category, and additional category-level variables. Reflecting the discrete nature of the dependent variable, the analysis employs discrete choice estimation techniques instead of OLS regression. The results reveal a significant quadratic relationship between advertising and participation rates. We interpret this and other significant findings in the context of existing work.
Comparison of effects of dual transporter inhibitors on monoamine transporters and extracellular levels in rats

Compounds that block both serotonin (5-HT) and norepinephrine (NE) transporters have been proposed to have improved antidepressant efficacy. We compared the ability of four dual transporter inhibitors-chlorimipramine, duloxetine, milnacipran and venlafaxine-to block monoamine transporters in vitro and in vivo and increase extracellular monoamines in rat brain. Inhibition of radioligand binding to clonal human monoamine transporters in vitro and in vivo in rats was determined. Extracellular concentrations of 5-HT and NE in rat prefrontal cortex (PFC) were quantified using the microdialysis technique. All compounds blocked binding to human 5-HT and NE transporters, although chlorimipramine and venlafaxine had markedly greater affinity for 5-HT than NE transporters. In vivo, chlorimipramine and duloxetine potently blocked both transporters, milnacipran blocked both with lower potency and venlafaxine only blocked the 5-HT transporter. Chlorimipramine and duloxetine increased robustly and approximately equally monoamine extracellular concentrations. Milnacipran produced only small increases in NE, whereas venlafaxine increased 5-HT markedly at the lower doses and both monoamines at high doses. Thus, the dual transporter inhibitors blocked 5-HT and NE transporters in vitro and in vivo with varying potency. Chlorimipramine, duloxetine, and high dose venlafaxine acted as dual transporter inhibitors in rat PFC and increased extracellular concentrations of the monoamines, indicating functional dual transporter inhibition.
Inertial microfluidics for continuous separation of cells and particles

In this work we describe the use of inertial microfluidics for continuous multi-particle separation in a simple spiral microchannel. The inertial forces coupled with the rotational Dean drag force in the spiral microchannel geometry cause neutrally-buoyant particles and cells to occupy a single equilibrium position near the inner microchannel wall. This position is strongly dependent on the particle/cell diameter. Based on this concept, a 5-loop Archimedean spiral microchannel chip was used to demonstrate for the first time focusing and separation of four particles simultaneously. The polystyrene particles (7.32 μm, 10 μm, 15 μm, 20 μm in diameter) were selected for this work since they are compatible to the size of blood cells. The device exhibited an average 87% separation efficiency, which is comparable to that of other microfluidic separation systems. The simple planar structure and high sample throughput offered by this passive microfluidic approach makes it attractive for lab-on-a-chip integration in hematology applications.
Embedding Multi-Bit Message in the Joint Time-Frequency Domain

In this paper, we introduce a new multi-bit watermarking method in the joint time-frequency domain. The Wigner distribution for the edges of an image is computed and the time-frequency cells in the Wigner domain that are robust to attacks are used for watermark embedding. The error introduced by the inversion of the watermarked distribution is quantized and used as a key for watermark extraction. The performance of the proposed watermarking algorithm under possible attacks, such as noise, rotation, filtering, and JPEG compression is illustrated.
Gangsta Rap and Adult Education.

Adult education instructors and administrators, who typically are not members of the hip-hop generation, have little or no background, sensitivity, or understanding of the influence and significance of black popular culture and music for young African American and white adult learners.
Effect of increasing patient age on complication rates following intact abdominal aortic aneurysm repair in the United States

Abstract Introduction Advanced age is generally acknowledged as a risk factor for adverse surgical outcomes, but little information exists to define the magnitude of this association from a population-based perspective. This study was undertaken to determine the relation of patient age to complications following abdominal aortic aneurysm (AAA) repair in a population-based experience. Methods This study was based upon data from 6397 patients with a primary diagnosis of intact AAA and a procedure code for repair of AAA from the Nationwide Inpatient Sample (NIS) in 2000. The NIS is a 20% stratified random sample representative of all United States hospitals. Primary outcome variables were postoperative complications determined from secondary diagnostic codes. Adjustment for confounding variables was performed using multiple logistic regression. Results At least one complication affected 29% of patients. Increasing age correlated with a higher risk of having one or more complications (51–60 years, 18.8%; 61–70 years, 27.3%; 71–80 years, 31.2%; >80 years, 34.3%; P Conclusions Older patient age is independently associated with an increased risk of major postoperative complications after AAA repair. The increasing age of the United States population will compound this healthcare problem. Quality improvement efforts must focus on minimizing complication rates in elderly patients undergoing common vascular surgical procedures including AAA repair.
Relationship of air temperature, relative humidity, precipitation, photoperiod, wind speed and solar radiation with serum insulin-like growth factor I (IGF-I) concentration in angus beef cattle

Eight paternal half-sib Angus calves born in late April and early May, 1988 were used to investigate the potential relationship of serum IGF-I concentration with photoperiod and various weather variables including minimum, maximum and average air temperatures, relative humidity, precipitation, wind speed and solar radiation. To determine IGF-I concentration, blood samples were obtained at birth and then weekly until the calves reached 1 mo of age and bi-weekly thereafter. Blood sampling continued until the calves reached puberty as determined by progesterone and testosterone assays. Photoperiod and each weather variable were averaged over the 3 d prior to and including the day of blood sampling (4-d average). Data were divided into two periods: (1) birth through the end of the postweaning period and (2) postweaning period only. Serum IGF-I concentrations were analyzed using a model which included the fixed effects of sex and sample number, the random effect of calf nested within sex and the fixed interaction of sex x sample number, in addition to covariates for weight, photoperiod and weather variables. From birth through the end of the postweaning test, none of the weather variables or photoperiod had significant effects on serum IGF-I concentrations when each was fitted separately. For the postweaning period only, cubic regression coefficients for minimum and average temperatures were .0962 +/- .0325 ng/ml/degrees C3 and .0976 +/- .0272 ng/ml/degrees C3, respectively (P < .01). The quadratic regression coefficient for relative humidity during the postweaning period was -.2991 +/- .1142 ng/ml/%2 (P < .05). The quartic regression coefficient for wind speed during the postweaning period was -36.435 +/- 13.00 ng/ml/(km/hr)4 (P < .01). Maximum temperature, precipitation, solar radiation and photoperiod did not have significant effects on postweaning serum IGF-I concentrations. Based on these data, we conclude that temperature, humidity and wind speed were contributing factors to variation in serum IGF-I concentrations in postweaned beef calves.
Tropical Climate Instability: The Last Glacial Cycle from a Qinghai-Tibetan Ice Core

An ice core record from the Guliya ice cap on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau provides evidence of regional climatic conditions over the last glacial cycle. 36 Cl data suggest that the deepest 20 meters of the core may be more than 500,000 years old. The δ 18 O change across Termination I is ∼5.4 per mil, similar to that in the Huascaran (Peru) and polar ice cores. Three Guliya interstadials (Stages 3, 5a, and 5c) are marked by increases in δ 18 O values similar to that of the Holocene and Eemian (∼124,000 years ago). The similarity of this pattern to that of CH 4 records from polar ice cores indicates that global CH 4 levels and the tropical hydrological cycle are linked. The Late Glacial Stage record contains numerous 200-year oscillations in δ 18 O values and in dust, NH 4 + , and NO 3 − levels.
Influence of Panax ginseng on Cytochrome P450 (CYP)3A and P‐glycoprotein (P‐gp) Activity in Healthy Participants

A number of herbal preparations have been shown to interact with prescription medications secondary to modulation of cytochrome P450 (CYP) and/or P-glycoprotein (P-gp). The purpose of this study was to determine the influence of Panax ginseng on CYP3A and P-gp function using the probe substrates midazolam and fexofenadine, respectively. Twelve healthy participants (8 men) completed this open-label, single-sequence pharmacokinetic study. Healthy volunteers received single oral doses of midazolam 8 mg and fexofenadine 120 mg, before and after 28 days of P ginseng 500 mg twice daily. Midazolam and fexofenadine pharmacokinetic parameter values were calculated and compared before and after P ginseng administration. Geometric mean ratios (postginseng/preginseng) for midazolam area under the concentration-time curve from zero to infinity (AUC(0-∞)), half-life (t(1/2)), and maximum concentration (C(max)) were significantly reduced at 0.66 (0.55-0.78), 0.71 (0.53-0.90), and 0.74 (0.56-0.93), respectively. Conversely, fexofenadine pharmacokinetics were unaltered by P ginseng administration. Based on these results, P ginseng appeared to induce CYP3A activity in the liver and possibly the gastrointestinal tract. Patients taking P ginseng in combination with CYP3A substrates with narrow therapeutic ranges should be monitored closely for adequate therapeutic response to the substrate medication.
Investigation into the Thin-Film Fabrication of Intermetallic NiTi

Thin-films of Ni and Ti were formed by sputter co-deposition of Ni and Ti onto amorphous SiO 2 and single crystal NaCl and Sapphire substrates. Films were characterized as follows: a) The chemical composition of the films was analysed by EDAX b) The gross morphology was examined by Scanning Electron Microscopy. c) The crystal phases were indentified by X-ray diffraction and Electron diffraction. Intermetallic NiTi has been identified in samples annealed in vacuo at 850°C. Annealing at 500°C in vacuum produced chemical separation of the Ni and Ti. This effect may be due to a narrow solidus region for the existence of NiTi and inhomogeneities due to uneven deposition of the Ni and Ti.
Closed-Loop Perching and Spatial Guidance Laws for Bio-Inspired Articulated Wing MAV

This paper presents the underlying theoretical developments and successful experimental demonstrations of perching of an aerial robot. The open-loop lateral-directional dynamics of the robot are inherently unstable because it lacks a vertical tail for agility, similar to birds. A unique feature of this robot is that it uses wing articulation for controlling the flight path angle as well as the heading. New guidance algorithms with guaranteed stability are obtained by rewriting the flight dynamic equations in the spatial domain rather than as functions of time, after which dynamic inversion is employed. It is shown that nonlinear dynamic inversion naturally leads to proportional-integral-derivative (PID) controllers, thereby providing an exact method for tuning the gains. The effectiveness of the proposed bio-inspired robot design and its novel closed-loop perching controller has been successfully demonstrated with perched landings on a human hand.
UNIFORM CONVERGENCE OF SERIES ESTIMATORS OVER FUNCTION SPACES

This paper considers a series estimator of E[α(Y)|λ(X) = λ], (α,λ) ∈ 𝛢 × Λ, indexed by function spaces, and establishes the estimator's uniform convergence rate over λ ∈ R, α ∈ 𝛢, and λ ∈ Λ, when 𝛢 and Λ have a finite integral bracketing entropy. The rate of convergence depends on the bracketing entropies of 𝛢 and Λ in general. In particular, we demonstrate that when each λ ∈ Λ is locally uniformly ℒ2-continuous in a parameter from a space of polynomial discrimination and the basis function vector pK in the series estimator keeps the smallest eigenvalue of E[pK(λ(X))pK(λ(X))‼] above zero uniformly over λ ∈ Λ, we can obtain the same convergence rate as that established by de Jong (2002, Journal of Econometrics 111, 1–9).
Java+ITP: A Verification Tool Based on Hoare Logic and Algebraic Semantics

Java+ITP is an experimental tool for the verification of properties of a sequential imperative subset of the Java language. It is based on an algebraic continuation passing style (CPS) semantics of this fragment as an equational theory in Maude. It supports compositional reasoning in a Hoare logic for this Java fragment that we propose and prove correct with respect to the algebraic semantics. After being decomposed, Hoare triples are translated into semantically equivalent first-order verification conditions (VCs) which are then sent to Maude's Inductive Theorem Prover (ITP) to be discharged. The long-term goal of this project is to use extensible and modular rewriting logic semantics of programming languages, for which CPS axiomatizations are indeed very useful, to develop similarly extensible and modular Hoare logics on which generic program verification tools can be based.
Overview of CBA and CEA Methods

Cost-benefit analysis (CBA) and cost-effectiveness analysis (CEA) are formal analytic techniques for comparing the positive and negative consequences of alternative uses of resources. Both CBA and ...
INCOHERENT DICTIONARIES AND THE STATISTICAL RESTRICTED ISOMETRY PROPERTY

In this paper we formulate and prove a statistical version of the restricted isometry property (SRIP for short) which holds in general for any incoherent dictionary D which is a disjoint union of orthonormal bases. In addition, we prove that, under appropriate normalization, the spectral distrib- ution of the associated Gram operator converges in probability to the Sato-Tate (also called semi-circle) distribution. The result is then applied to various dic- tionaries that arise naturally in the setting of …nite harmonic analysis, giving, in particular, a better understanding on a conjecture of Calderbank concerning RIP for the Heisenberg dictionary of chirp like functions.
The effect of short term incubation in vitro on the RNA content of regenerating mouse epidermis

The effect of short term incubation in vitro on RNA content in regenerating and normal epidermis has been investigated. Regenerating mouse epidermis was incubated for three hours, either attached to its underlying dermis or by itself, in either buffered sucrose or Roswell Park Memorial Institute culture medium at 26 degrees C or at 37 degrees C. There is a significant loss of RNA when regenerating epidermis is incubated without being attached to its underlying dermis, at either 26 degrees C or 37 degrees C, although there was little loss of DNA, good incorporation of (3H) orotic acid into RNA, as well as good preservation of epidermal histological details. In contrast, when regenerating epidermis was incubated attached to its dermis, little loss of RNA occurred. Similarly, incubating normal epidermis attached to its dermis results in no loss of RNA. These conditions also result in no significant loss of DNA, good incorporation of (3H) orotic acid into RNA, and preservation of epidermal histological details.
Distinct Regulation of Hepatic Nuclear Factor 1α by NKX6.1 in Pancreatic Beta Cells

Hepatic nuclear factor 1α (HNF1α) is a key regulator of development and function in pancreatic beta cells and is specifically involved in regulation of glycolysis and glucose-stimulated insulin secretion. Abnormal expression of HNF1α leads to development of MODY3 (maturity-onset diabetes of the young 3). We report that NK6 homeodomain 1 (NKX6.1) binds to a cis-regulatory element in the HNF1α promoter and is a major regulator of this gene in beta cells. We identified an NKX6.1 recognition sequence in the distal region of the HNF1α promoter and demonstrated specific binding of NKX6.1 in beta cells by electrophoretic mobility shift and chromatin immunoprecipitation assays. Site-directed mutagenesis of the NKX6.1 core-binding sequence eliminated NKX6.1-mediated activation and substantially decreased activity of the HNF1α promoter in beta cells. Overexpression or small interfering RNA-mediated knockdown of the Nkx6.1 gene resulted in increased or diminished HNF1α gene expression, respectively, in beta cells. We conclude that NKX6.1 is a novel regulator of HNF1α in pancreatic beta cells. This novel regulatory mechanism for HNF1α in beta cells may provide new molecular targets for the diagnosis of MODY3.
A caching file system for a programmer's workstation

This paper describes a file system for a programmer's workstation that has access both to a local disk and to remote file servers. The file system is designed to help programmers manage their local naming environments and share consistent versions of collections of software. It names multiple versions of local and remote files in a hierarchy. Local names can refer to local files or be attached to remote files. Remote files also may be referred to directly. Remote files are immutable and cached on the local disk. The file system is part of the Cedar experimental programming environment at Xerox PARC and has been in use since late 1983.
The Molecular Basis of T-Cell Specificity

Studies of TCR expression in antigen-specific immune responses have provided a large body of information correlating the primary structure of the TCR with specificity. Much has been learned regarding the mechanisms for the generation of TCR diversity and the selection of TCR V elements in immune responses. However, the exact nature of the trimolecular complex found during the TCR/antigen/MHC interaction awaits the structural characterization of the TCR by crystallography. Just as describing the three-dimensional structure of MHC molecules and defining their putative antigen-binding site have made it possible to interpret with fresh insight the wealth of functional data regarding antigen/MHC binding and alloreactivity, similar characterization of the TCR structure will allow more definitive interpretation of all the current data with respect to TCR usage in antigen-specific immune responses. It should also facilitate the study of the molecular basis of positive and negative TCR selection during thymic ontogeny. Finally, the identification of T-cell superantigens and their ability to stimulate T cells on the basis of TCR V beta expression alone has defined a new and distinct type of TCR/ligand interaction. The fact that bacterial products such as staphylococcal and streptococcal toxins as well as the mitogenic moiety produced by some mycoplasma are included within this class of antigens suggests that TCR recognition of superantigens may have major clinical significance. It is important to determine the structural basis of T-cell activation by these antigens.
Precomputing search features for fast and accurate query classification

Query intent classification is crucial for web search and advertising. It is known to be challenging because web queries contain less than three words on average, and so provide little signal to base classification decisions on. At the same time, the vocabulary used in search queries is vast: thus, classifiers based on word-occurrence have to deal with a very sparse feature space, and often require large amounts of training data. Prior efforts to address the issue of feature sparseness augmented the feature space using features computed from the results obtained by issuing the query to be classified against a web search engine. However, these approaches induce high latency, making them unacceptable in practice.In this paper, we propose a new class of features that realizes the benefit of search-based features without high latency. These leverage co-occurrence between the query keywords and tags applied to documents in search results, resulting in a significant boost to web query classification accuracy. By pre-computing the tag incidence for a suitably chosen set of keyword-combinations, we are able to generate the features online with low latency and memory requirements. We evaluate the accuracy of our approach using a large corpus of real web queries in the context of commercial search.
Design guidelines for wireless sensor networks: communication, clustering and aggregation

Abstract When sensor nodes are organized in clusters, they could use either single hop or multi-hop mode of communication to send their data to their respective cluster heads. We present a systematic cost-based analysis of both the modes, and provide results that could serve as guidelines to decide which mode should be used for given settings. We determine closed form expressions for the required number of cluster heads and the required battery energy of nodes for both the modes. We also propose a hybrid communication mode which is a combination of single hop and multi-hop modes, and which is more cost-effective than either of the two modes. Our problem formulation also allows for the application to be taken into account in the overall design problem through a data aggregation model.
Economic Valuation of Ecosystem Services Provided by Oyster Reefs

Valuation of ecosystem services can provide evidence of the importance of sustaining and enhancing those resources and the ecosystems that provide them. Long appreciated only as a commercial source of oysters, oyster reefs are now acknowledged for the other services they provide, such as enhancing water quality and stabilizing shorelines. We develop a framework to assess the value of these services. We conservatively estimate that the economic value of oyster reef services, excluding oyster harvesting, is between $5500 and $99,000 per hectare per year and that reefs recover their median restoration costs in 2–14 years. In contrast, when oyster reefs are subjected to destructive oyster harvesting, they do not recover the costs of restoration. Shoreline stabilization is the most valuable potential service, although this value varies greatly by reef location. Quantifying the economic values of ecosystem services provides guidance about when oyster reef restoration is a good use of funds.
Retinoic acid-induced AP-1 transcriptional activity regulates B16 mouse melanoma growth inhibition and differentiation.

Retinoic acid (RA) inhibits growth and induces differentiation of B16 mouse melanoma cells. These effects are accompanied by a large increase in PKCα mRNA and protein levels and surprisingly an increase in activating protein-1 (AP-1) transcriptional activity. To further investigate the RA-induced AP-1 activity we established clones of B16 cells stably expressing an AP-1-luciferase reporter gene. Treatment of these clones with phorbol dibutyrate increased AP-1 activity which peaked at 2–4 h and returned to baseline level by 24 h. In contrast, RA treatment resulted in a slow increase in AP-1 activity that reached a maximum level at 48 h and was maintained for the duration of the treatment. We tested the importance of the RA-induced AP-1 activity by establishing clones which stably express a dominant negative fos gene (A-fos) and have greatly diminished AP-1 activity. Growth rates of untreated A-fos expressing cells were similar to wt B16 and clones not expressing A-fos. However, clones expressing the dominant-negative fos had a markedly decreased sensitivity to RA-induced inhibition of anchorage-dependent and -independent growth. Treatment of wt B16 cells for 48 h with RA increased melanin production by two to fourfold, but this effect was completely lost in the A-fos clones. The ability of RA to induce RARβ and PKCα expression was retained in A-fos clones, suggesting that A-fos was not interfering with RAR transcription activation functions. We tested whether the RA-induced AP-1 activity might be mediated by the ERK1/2 MAPK pathway. Inhibition of ERK1/2 phosphorylation stimulated AP-1 activity, which was not additive to that induced by RA. This finding raises the possibility that this MAPK pathway may be a target of retinoid action. Our observations suggest that AP-1 transcriptional activity induced by RA likely plays an important role in the biological changes mediated by this retinoid in B16 melanoma cells. © 2002 Wiley-Liss, Inc.
Hepatitis B and C virus hepatocarcinogenesis: Lessons learned and future challenges

Worldwide, hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is one of the most common cancers. It is thought that 80% of hepatocellular carcinomas are linked to chronic infections with the hepatitis B (HBV) or hepatitis C (HCV) viruses. Chronic HBV and HCV infections can alter hepatocyte physiology in similar ways and may utilize similar mechanisms to influence the development of HCC. There has been significant progress towards understanding the molecular biology of HBV and HCV and identifying the cellular signal transduction pathways that are altered by HBV and HCV infections. Although the precise molecular mechanisms that link HBV and HCV infections to the development of HCC are not entirely understood, there is considerable evidence that both inflammatory responses to infections with these viruses, and associated destruction and regeneration of hepatocytes, as well as activities of HBV- or HCV-encoded proteins, contribute to hepatocyte transformation. In this review, we summarize progress in defining mechanisms that may link HBV and HCV infections to the development of HCC, discuss the challenges of directly defining the processes that underlie HBV- and HCV-associated HCC, and describe areas that remain to be explored.
Management Briefs: Effects of Electroshocking on the Sexual Behavior of Goldfish and Brook Trout

Abstract I investigated the effect of electroshocking on the reproductive behavior of goldfish Carassius auratus and brook trout Salvelinus fontinalis. In the laboratory, 24 h after being stunned by 400-V pulsed DC, male and female goldfish spawned normally with sexually active conspecifics. Similarly, in an uncontrolled field study, nearly half of male and female brook trout collected by DC electroshocking on their spawning redds and subsequently released were later seen spawning. Although these results suggest that electroshocking does not have long-lasting effects on the behavior of two species of sexually mature fish, caution is still advised when using electroshocking to sample wild spawning fish.
Arabic: Non-root/pattern morphology and the Arabic lexicon

The Arabic lexicon The Arabic lexicon, the word-stock of the language, consists primarily of words derived through the dominant paronymic root/pattern system of derivational morphology. However, a substantial segment of the lexicon consists of non-root/pattern-based lexemes. These items include solid stems that date back to the earliest forms of Arabic (such as laa ‘no,’ or hum ‘they m.’), borrowed foreign words and expressions, and the results of non-root/pattern processes such as suffixation and compounding for word-creation and lexical expansion. This chapter examines both solid stems and the processes for expansion of the lexicon which supplement the richness of root/pattern Arabic morphology. Solid stems Solid stems are words which cannot be reduced morphologically or analyzed in the typical root-and-pattern system. They consist of primarily four sets in Arabic: function words, pronouns, adverbs, and loanwords. Unlike words based on lexical roots, solid-stem words are normally listed according to their orthography in Arabic dictionaries.
Generation and Characterization of Complex Gas and Particle Mixtures for Inhalation Toxicologic Studies

Laboratory toxicology studies of the relative potencies of complex, polluted urban atmospheres have been surprisingly slow in confirming results observed by epidemiologists, that is that air pollution can seriously affect human health. The responses of human volunteers and laboratory animal models after exposure to single compounds and simple mixtures of compounds observed in plumes and ambient air are not sufficiently intense to explain the respiratory morbidity and mortality associated with serious air pollution exposure excursions. Yet there is little doubt that during severe episodes such as those that occurred in London in 1952 or in Donora, PA in 1948 some components present in the air were responsible for the observed respiratory- related illnesses and deaths.
Leadership Practices of Clinical Trials Office Leaders in Academic Medical Centers

Academic medical centers (AMCs) play a significant role in society as center staff and leadership fulfill their commitment to advancing research, promoting education, and improving patient care.[1][1] AMCs also promote a culture of discovery, which drives missions of treating and eliminating
Noise Radiation from High-Speed Jets: Some Insights from Numerical Simulations

The noise emanating from high-speed jets consists of jet mixing noise and shockassociated noise with its tonal and broadband components. This paper summarizes well-known features of high-speed jet flows and their relationship to the noise radiated by the jet. Open issues on which different opinions exist are also noted. In this context key findings from numerical simulations of jet flows, and model problems related to jet flows are highlighted. The mechanism responsible for the generation of strong screech noise is discussed, and the role of large-scale structures in jet mixing noise and broadband shock-associated noise are stressed. Implications of a new analytical model of shock-cell noise generation are discussed, and in particular the scaling of shock-associated noise from heated jets.
Quantitative studies of Japanese B encephalitis virus in hamster kidney cell cultures.

SummaryJapanese B encephalitis virus on hamster kidney cell cultures has been studied by the plaque method, and the following results obtained. 1. The effect of some environmental variables on plating efficiency: a. Maximum adsorption was obtained by 120 minutes incubation at 35°C. b. Optimal conditions for initiating plaques were obtained by seeding the virus in a small volume of lactalbumin medium containing bovine albumin. c. Cations were required for maximum virus adsorption but plaques were produced in the absence of added Ca++ and Mg++. d. Washing cultures with phosphate-buffered saline (pH 7.0) before and after exposure to virus was not required, and it was shown that plaques developed only from virus adsorbed on cells before agar was applied. 2. The titers obtained by plaque assay were in almost all instances similar to those of the tube culture method and varied with the mouse titer as might be expected on the basis of the passage level in mice or in HKC. 3. Hamster kidney cells proved slightly m...
Plasma actuator simulation: Force contours and dielectric charging characteristics

We have discussed the force contours produced during dielectric barrier discharge on a plasma actuator. There is asymmetry in the direction and magnitude of forces during cathode directed and anode directed discharges. This can be attributed to the difference in the dielectric charging characteristics during positive and negative pulses. Accurate modeling of surface processes on the dielectric is essential to understanding the working of the actuator. Nomenclature n p e n n n , , = densities of electrons, positive ions, and negative ions n p e D D D , , = species diffusivities n p e µ µ µ , , n p e v v v    , , = species mobility = species velocity r e e , 0
Ultra-sensitive Magnetic Microscopy with an Optically Pumped Magnetometer.

Optically pumped magnetometers (OPMs) based on lasers and alkali-metal vapor cells are currently the most sensitive non-cryogenic magnetic field sensors. Many applications in neuroscience and other fields require high-resolution, high-sensitivity magnetic microscopic measurements. In order to meet this demand we combined a cm-size spin-exchange relaxation-free (SERF) OPM and flux guides (FGs) to realize an ultra-sensitive FG-OPM magnetic microscope. The FGs serve to transmit the target magnetic flux to the OPM thus improving both the resolution and sensitivity to small magnetic objects. We investigated the performance of the FG-OPM device using experimental and numerical methods and demonstrated that an optimized device can achieve a unique combination of high resolution (80 μm) and high sensitivity (8.1 pT/ ). In addition, we also performed numerical calculations of the magnetic field distribution in the FGs to estimate the magnetic noise originating from the domain fluctuations in the material of the FGs. We anticipate many applications of the FG-OPM device such as the detection of micro-biological magnetic fields; the detection of magnetic nano-particles; and non-destructive testing. From our theoretical estimate, an FG-OPM could detect the magnetic field of a single neuron, which would be an important milestone in neuroscience.