cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Differential Activation of Mitogen-Activated Protein Kinase Cascades and Apoptosis by Protein Kinase C ε and δ in Neonatal Rat Ventricular Myocytes

Protein kinase C (PKC) epsilon and PKCdelta translocation in neonatal rat ventricular myocytes (NRVMs) is accompanied by subsequent activation of the ERK, JNK, and p38(MAPK) cascades; however, it is not known if either or both novel PKCs are necessary for their downstream activation. Use of PKC inhibitors to answer this question is complicated by a lack of isoenzyme specificity, and the fact that many PKC inhibitors stimulate JNK and p38(MAPK) activity. Therefore, replication-defective adenoviruses (Advs) encoding constitutively active (ca) mutants of PKCepsilon and PKCdelta were used to test if either or both of these PKCs are sufficient to activate ERKs, JNKs, and/or p38(MAPK) in NRVMs. Adv-caPKCepsilon infection (1 to 25 multiplicities of viral infection (MOI); 4 to 48 hours) increased total PKCepsilon levels in a time- and dose-dependent manner, with maximal expression observed 8 hours after Adv infection. Adv-caPKCepsilon induced a time- and dose-dependent increase in phosphorylated p42 and p44 ERKs, as compared with a control Adv encoding beta-galactosidase (Adv-nebetagal). Maximal ERK phosphorylation occurred 8 hours after Adv infection. In contrast, JNK was only minimally activated, and p38(MAPK) was relatively unaffected. Adv-caPKCdelta infection (1 to 25 MOI, 4 to 48 hours) increased total PKCdelta levels in a similar fashion. Adv-caPKCdelta (5 MOI) induced a 29-fold increase in phosphorylated p54 JNK, and a 15-fold increase in phosphorylated p38(MAPK) 24 hours after Adv infection. In contrast, p42 and p44 ERK were only minimally activated. Whereas neither Adv induced NRVM hypertrophy, Adv-caPKCdelta, but not Adv-caPKCepsilon, induced NRVM apoptosis. We conclude that the novel PKCs differentially regulate MAPK cascades and apoptosis in an isoenzyme-specific and time-dependent manner.
Associations of Oral α-, β-, and γ-Human Papillomavirus Types With Risk of Incident Head and Neck Cancer

Importance Prospective studies are needed to examine the temporal relationship between oral human papillomavirus (HPV) detection and risk of head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC). Moreover, the oral cavity contains a wide spectrum of α-, β-, and γ-HPV types, but their association with risk of HNSCC is unknown. Objective To prospectively examine associations between α-, β-, and γ-HPV detection in the oral cavity and incident HNSCC. Design A nested case-control study was carried out among 96 650 participants, cancer free at baseline, with available mouthwash samples in 2 prospective cohort studies: (1) the American Cancer Society Cancer Prevention Study II Nutrition Cohort and (2) the Prostate, Lung, Colorectal, and Ovarian Cancer Screening Trial. Incident cases of HNSCC (n = 132) were identified during an average 3.9 years of follow-up in both cohorts. Three controls per case (n = 396) were selected through incidence density sampling and matched on age, sex, race/ethnicity, and time since mouthwash collection. Methods Through a next-generation sequencing assay, DNA from α-, β-, and γ-HPV types were detected. Conditional logistic regression models were used to estimate odds ratios (ORs) and 95% CIs, adjusting for smoking history, alcohol consumption, and detection of HPV-16 for β- and γ-HPVs. Main Outcomes and Measures Incident HNSCC, which includes cancers of the oropharynx, oral cavity, and larynx. Results A total of 132 participants developed HNSCC during the follow-up period (103 men and 29 women; average age at baseline, 66.5 years). Oral HPV-16 detection was associated with incident HNSCC (OR, 7.1; 95% CI, 2.2-22.6), with positive association for oropharyngeal SCC (OR, 22.4; 95% CI, 1.8-276.7), but not for oral cavity (OR, 4.5; 95% CI, 0.6-34.7) or laryngeal SCCs (OR, 0.11; 95% CI, 0.01-834.80). Detection of β1-HPV-5 and β2-HPV-38 types, as well as γ-11 and γ-12 species, had ORs for HNSCC that ranged from 2.64 to 5.45 ( P P = .054), oral cavity (OR, 5.34; 95% CI, 1.51-18.80; P = .01), and laryngeal SCCs (OR, 2.71; 95% CI, 1.00-7.43; P = .05), whereas γ11- and γ12-HPV species were associated with both oral cavity (OR, 7.47; 95% CI, 1.21-46.17; P = .03; and OR, 6.71; 95% CI, 1.47-30.75; P = .01, respectively) and laryngeal SCCs (OR, 7.49; 95% CI, 1.10-51.04; P = .04 and OR, 5.31; 95% CI, 1.13-24.95; P = .03, respectively). Conclusions and Relevance This study demonstrates that HPV-16 detection precedes the incidence of oropharyngeal SCC. Associations of other HPVs, including γ11- and γ12-HPV species and β1-HPV-5 type suggest a broader role for HPVs in HNSCC etiology.
Employee Tenure and Economic Losses in Wrongful Termination Cases: A Reply to Nicholas Coleman

Abstract In this issue of the Journal of Forensic Economics, Nicolas Coleman provides a critique of the model I developed (and presented in a recent issue of this journal) to predict the annual probabilities a worker would have stayed with a terminating employer absent the termination and its subsequent application. He then proposes an alternative approach, referred to as the Job-Specific Survival Method, when calculating economic losses in employment termination cases. In this note, I respond on Coleman’s critique.
Drying shrinkage prediction of paste containing meta-kaolin and ultrafine fly ash for developing ultra-high performance concrete

Abstract The drying shrinkage development of the paste fraction of ultra-high performance concrete containing binary and ternary blends of meta-kaolin, fly ash and cement were investigated and predicted. The test results showed that, compared with the use of pure cement, the binary use of silica fume and cement or the binary use of fly ash and cement resulted in an increase in the drying shrinkage of paste, and the binary use of meta-kaolin and cement resulted in a decrease in the drying shrinkage of paste. The ternary use of meta-kaolin, fly ash and cement could produce paste with lower drying shrinkage than the binary use of silica fume and cement at the same supplementary cementitious materials content. Modified Gardner model and modified Bazant–Baweja B3 model were developed to predict the drying shrinkage development of the paste fraction of ultra-high performance concrete.
Inhibition of development of sarcoma 180 by 4-amino-N10-methyl pteroylglutamic acid.

SummaryThe compound 4-Amino-N10-methyl pteroylglutamic acid, has shown the ability to inhibit the growth of the transplantable mouse Sarcoma 180 when administered intraperitoneally in concentrations of 1.5 mg/kg each day for 7 days. At this dosage very few mice died from drug toxicity. The inhibition is most apparent when the compound is administered early in the development of the tumor.
AFTER WISCONSIN: Registers of Sikh precarity in the alien-nation

At home and in my university town this summer, I was immediately struck by the way that media responses to the shootings of Sikhs in Oak Creek, Wisconsin underscored imperial dynamics of minoritization in the USA. Interviewed by journalists outside the gurudwara on August 6th, Sikh congregants seemed unable to define, guide, or control the anthropological discourse on Sikhs and Sikhi that began to emerge in the national public sphere. Institutionally categorized as ‘Asian American’, and more recently configured as ‘Arab’, the Sikhs in Oak Creek appeared to be an isolated and esoteric sect, a religious curiosity transplanted from another time–space into a leafy green Middle American town.
Nuclear Imaging for Assessment of Myocardial Perfusion, Metabolism, and Innervation in Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy

Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, the most common genetic disease of the heart, is characterized by diverse cardiac phenotypic expression, presentation, clinical course, response to therapy, and outcomes. Disease causing mutations, genetic modifiers, and environmental factors are responsible for the diversity of morphological and clinical manifestations of this disease. Over the last four decades, cardiac nuclear imaging has made crucial contributions to our current understanding of the pathophysiology of HCM and has provided clinical tools for targeted management of patients. The aim of this manuscript is to review the role of nuclear imaging in assessment of myocardial perfusion, metabolism, and autonomic innervation in HCM.
Terrorism Protection and Prevention Measures for Office Buildings

The events of September 11, 2001 in the United States have changed the perspective of owners and management companies towards the security of office buildings. The initial reaction, which included ...
Effect of F on Sintering and Leaching Properties of Calcium Aluminate in CaO-Al_2O_3-SiO_2 System

Calcium aluminate clinker containing different contents of F in CaO-Al2O3-SiO2 system was obtained with analytically pure reagents as raw materials. The self-disintegrating property,sintering and leaching properties of the clinker were studied by XRF,XRD and SEM-EDS methods. The results indicate that β-2CaO · SiO2 converts into γ-2CaO · SiO2 normally when clinker contains F,which has little effect on the self-disintegrating property of clinker. But F has significant effects on the phase composition of calcium aluminates. F promotes the formation of2CaO·Al2O3·SiO2and 11CaO·7Al2O3·CaF2while reduces the formation of 12CaO·7Al2O3and CaO · Al2O3. The Al2O3 leaching rate reduces with 2CaO · Al2O3·SiO2entering into clinker. The Al2O3 leaching rate of clinker decreases from 95. 01% to about 70% when the F addition increases from 0 to 2. 0%. The content of F should be less than 0. 5% in the clinker.
Monodeuterated methane: an isotopic probe to measure biological methane metabolism rates and track catabolic exchange reactions

Abstract. Biological methane oxidation is a globally relevant process that mediates the flux of an important greenhouse gas through both aerobic and anaerobic metabolic pathways. However, measuring the rates of these metabolisms presents many obstacles, from logistical barriers to regulatory hurdles and poor precision. Here we present a new approach for measuring rates of microbial methane metabolism that is non-toxic, rapid, and relatively high throughput, alleviating some of the current methodological challenges. Specifically, we tested the potential for using monodeuterated methane (CH3D) as a metabolic substrate for measuring the rate of methane activation by quantifying the change in the aqueous D / H ratio over time using a water isotope analyzer. This method represents a non-toxic, comparatively rapid and straightforward approach that is complementary to existing radio (14C)- and stable (13C) carbon isotopic methods; by probing hydrogen atom dynamics, it offers an additional dimension through which to examine the rates and pathways of methane metabolism. We provide direct comparisons between the CH3D procedure and the well-established 14CH4 radiotracer approach for several methanotrophic systems, including type I and type II aerobic methanotroph cultures, and methane seep sediment and carbonate rocks under anoxic and oxic incubation conditions. We also employ this method to investigate the role of pressure on methane oxidation rates in anoxic seep sediment, revealing an 80 % increase at the equivalent of ~ 900 m water depth (40 MPa). The monodeuterated methane approach offers a procedurally straightforward, reliable method that advances three specific aims: 1) the direct comparison of methane oxidation rates between different experimental treatments of the same inoculum; 2) the determination of an absolute scaling factor using paired CH3D and 14C-radiocarbon procedures for new systems of interest; and 3) a continued evaluation of C- and H-atom tracking through methanotrophic metabolisms, with specific foci on enzyme reversibility and anabolic/catabolic branch points. The procedural advantages, consistency, and novel research questions enabled by the monodeuterated methane method should prove useful in a wide range of culture-based and environmental microbial systems to further elucidate methane metabolism dynamics.
Isolation of Intracellular Protein – DNA Complexes Using HaloCHIP, an Antibody-Free Alternative to Chromatin Immunoprecipitation

Mapping of protein binding sites within the genome has been significantly advanced by microarray and sequencing technologies, yet the method traditionally used to isolate protein-DNA complexes, chromatin immunoprecipitation, has remained dependent of the use of antibodies. Furthermore, cross-linking is commonly used to trap protein-DNA complexes and the challenge of using antibodies has come in recognition of the cross-linked epitopes, sometimes limiting the success of the approach. Here we present a method, HaloCHIP, which utilizes a HaloTag protein fusion and corresponding interaction resin, HaloLink, for capture of cross-linked protein-DNA complexes directly from a cellular lysate. This process alleviates the need for using an antibody, yields the DNA fragments bound to a particular protein of interest, and allows for a variety of downstream analyses such as PCR, qPCR, microarrays, and sequencing.
Using Integrative Data Analysis to Examine Changes in Alcohol Use and Changes in Sexual Risk Behavior Across Four Samples of STI Clinic Patients.

Patients in sexually transmitted infection (STI) clinics report high levels of alcohol use, which are associated with risky sexual behavior. However, no studies have examined how changes in alcohol use relate to changes in sexual risk behavior. We used parallel process latent growth modeling to explore how changes in alcohol use related to changes in sexual behavior across four samples of clinic patients. Patients participating in HIV prevention trials from urban clinics in the Northeastern and Midwestern USA (N = 3761, 59 % male, 72 % Black) completed measures at 3-month intervals over 9–12 months. Integrative data analysis was used to create composite measures of alcohol use across samples. Sexual risk measures were counts of partners and unprotected sex acts. Parallel process models tested whether alcohol use changes were correlated with changes in the number of partners and unprotected sex. Growth models with good fit showed decreases that slowed over time in sexual risk behaviors and alcohol use. Parallel process models showed positive correlations between levels of (rs = 0.17–0.40, ps < 0.001) and changes in (rs = 0.21–0.80, ps < 0.05) alcohol use and number of sexual partners across studies. There were strong associations between levels of (rs = 0.25–0.43, ps < 0.001) and changes in (rs = 0.24–0.57, ps < 0.01) alcohol use and unprotected sex in one study recruiting hazardous drinkers. Across four samples of clinic patients, reductions in alcohol use were associated with reductions in the number of sexual partners. HIV prevention interventions may be strengthened by addressing alcohol use.
Holmium Laser Enucleation of the Prostate and Perioperative Diagnosis of Prostate Cancer: An Outcomes Analysis

Abstract Objective: Our objective is to assess the outcomes of patients with prostate cancer (PCa) diagnoses undergoing holmium laser enucleation of the prostate (HoLEP). Methods: From 2009 to 2012, 450 patients underwent HoLEP at our institution. We performed a retrospective review of these patients to identify those with PCa. Results: PCa was diagnosed in 57 (12.7%) HoLEP patients: 11 (19.2%) preoperatively, 43 (75.4%) in the operative specimen, and 3 (5.4%) during follow-up. Mean time to PCa development in the postoperative group was 16 months (9–23). There was no difference in patient characteristics for those diagnosed with PCa at the time of HoLEP or in the postoperative period. There were 5 patients with a Gleason score (GS)>8 and 52 with GS 8 intraoperatively or postoperatively had significantly elevated preoperative, postoperative, and pe...
Influence of Addition of Newly Drawn Milk and Fluctuating Temperatures of Farm Bulk Tanks on Growth of Mastitis-Causing Bacteria

Effect of addition of newly drawn fresh milk of consecutive milkings on growth of Staphylococcus aureus , Staphylococcus epidermidis , Streptococcus agalactiae , Streptococcus dysgalactiae , and Streptococcus uberis in milk held at fluctuating temperatures of a farm bulk tank for 48 h was studied. There was a statistically insignificant effect of the addition of newly drawn fresh milk of consecutive milkings on the growth rate of S. aureus , S. epidermidis , S. agalactiae and S. uberis but there was a significant (p<0.001) growth enhancing effect on S. dysgalactiae . However, all the bacteria grew significantly (p< 0.001) in milk held at fluctuating temperatures of farm bulk tank for 48 h.
Current indications for insertion of rotary pumps revisited.

Cardiovascular disease (CVD) remains the leading cause of death as well as morbidity in the world . While there has been continued progress in reducing the mortality of most forms of CVD, the prevalence, as well as mortality and morbidity from heart failure, continues to increase, making it a major health care problem world wide. This increase in prevalence is in part due to the correlation of increasing CVD with advancing age, but also to improved diagnostics and earlier detection as well as improved interventions for acute MI and medical management. Despite these advances, an increasing number of patients become unresponsive to therapy and progress to the advanced stage, which has a mortality as high as 70–80% at one year.
GeoTeCS: Exploiting Geographical, Temporal, Categorical and Social Aspects for Personalized POI Recommendation (Invited Paper)

The maturity of the smartphone and the World Wide Web (www) technologies have driven many social network applications which have facilitated people to share text and multimedia contents. The social networks that facilitate users to share the check-in (location visit) information are known as the location-based social networks (LBSN)s and provide various information for a recommendation problem that span beyond the user-location ratings, and comments. For instance, the time of the check-in, the category of the POI, the distance of POI from the user's home, the user's friends' visit to that place, and so forth. It's worthwhile to explore and efficiently integrate such information for the desired purpose. A Point of Interest (POI) recommendation system uses a user's historical check-in information from LBSNs and recommends the list of places that are potential for future visits. Many of the existing POI recommendation systems have focused on either of the temporal (time of the check-in), the geographical/spatial (distance between check-in locations), or the social (friendship, and trust based) aspects. Incorporation of all the major aspects (the categorical, the geographical, the social, and the temporal) of check-ins into a single model is barely explored by other studies. In this paper, we propose a fused model termed GeoTeCS (Geographical Temporal Categorical and Social) for personalized location recommendation. GeoTeCS uses the matrix factorization technique and an extension of the Multi-center Gaussian Model (MGM) to model the users' historical check-in behavior by fusing the major check-in aspects. The contributions of this paper are: (i) it proposes a matrix factorization based location recommender that incorporates all the major aspects-the categorical, the geographical, the social, and the temporal aspects into a single model and (ii) it extensively evaluates the proposed model against two real-world datasets - the Gowalla, and the Weeplaces, to illustrate its effectiveness.
MscS-like Mechanosensitive Ion Channels: Modular Sensors and Reporters of Membrane Tension

A long-standing question is how biological systems sense and perceive mechanical signals such as osmotic pressure, gravity, and touch. One well-established molecular mechanism for force sensing is the activation of mechanosensitive (MS) ion channels. The Mechanosensitive channel of Small conductance (MscS) from E. coli functions as a hypo-osmotic safety valve, opening in response to increased membrane tension and preventing cellular rupture. Genes predicted to encode MscS homologs are found in genomes from all three kingdoms of life. We have been characterizing the structure, function, and regulation of ten MscS-Like (MSL) proteins in the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana. Based on their modest homology to MscS and high topological diversity, we have proposed that MSLs might (1) sense and respond to sources of membrane tension other than environmental hypo-osmotic shock; (2) be regulated by mechanisms in addition to membrane tension; and (3) signal in ways that are separable from ion flux. Evidence in support of all three of these hypotheses will be presented. I will also discuss our current effort to engineer novel biosensors based on MSL proteins.
End of Life Care in the ICU

End of life care used to be a relatively simple practice for physicians, involving little more than comforting measures for dying patients. In the modern era it has become very complicated, driven by the creation and use of multiple lifesaving technologies. These technologies enable us to keep patients alive who would have died but often will not cure the patient’s illness. This puts new burdens on doctors and patients. Deciding when to use such therapies involves a balance between using the knowledge of the medical team alone for what is appropriate (paternalism) and honoring the patient’s rights to decide on medical care (autonomy).
Synthesis of Reversed C‐Acyl Glycosides through Ni/Photoredox Dual Catalysis

The incorporation of C-glycosides in drug design has become a routine practice for medicinal chemists. These naturally occurring building blocks exhibit attractive pharmaceutical profiles, and have become an important target of synthetic efforts in recent decades. Described herein is a practical, scalable, and versatile route for the synthesis of non-anomeric and unexploited C-acyl glycosides through a Ni/photoredox dual catalytic system. By utilizing an organic photocatalyst, a range of glycosyl-based radicals are generated and efficiently coupled with highly functionalized carboxylic acids at room temperature. Distinctive features of this transformation include its mild conditions, impressive compatibility with a wide array of functional groups, and most significantly, preservation of the anomeric carbon: a handle for further, late-stage derivatization.
The role of shrubs on the redistribution of mineral nutrients in soil in the Mojave Desert

Soil profiles underneath shrub clumps and bare desert pavement were examined at 62 study sites located in both open and closed drainage basins of the northern Mojave Desert. Highly significant differences occurred in the root zone underneath shrub clumps with higher concentrations of the following soil properties: electrical conductivity (EC25/sup 0/), Na, K/sup +/, Ca/sup + +/, Mg/sup + +/, Cl/sup -/, NO/sub 3//sup -/, and SO/sub 4//sup =/; exchangeable K/sup +/; cation exchange capacity; organic C and N; available P, and DTPA-extractable Fe and Mn. These differences reflect differential cycling caused by different plant species. The decomposition and mineralization of litter deposited underneath the perennial vegetation can account for these differences in soil properties which, collectively, increase the fertility of the soil underneath the vegetation canopy. Aboveground biomass of shrubs was measured and the nitrogen and mineral element composition of new photosynthetic tissue was determined. Estimates from a representative study site indicate that the reservoir of nitrogen and mineral nutrients in new leaf material of shrubs available for litter deposition could contribute 3.64 kg N, 0.31 kg P, 0.57 kg Na, 5.20 kg K, 4.95 kg Ca, 31.82 g Fe, and 4.30 g Mn per hectare. This source probablymore » represents about one-third of the total amount of nutrients involved in annual turnover for the study area during a normal production year. The remaining contribution would be supplied from the standing dead wood in shrubs and as litter from annual plant species.« less
News coverage and sales of products with trans fat: effects before and after changes in federal labeling policy.

Introduction The Food and Drug Administration mandated that food products list the amount of trans fat per serving on nutrition facts labels by January 1, 2006. There have been no coordinated efforts to raise awareness about trans fat since the policy went into effect, but news coverage may promote informed decisions about food purchases. This paper assesses whether news coverage influenced sales of products containing trans fat, between December 13, 2004, and June 24, 2007, both before and after the labeling policy went into effect. Methods Sales data for products containing trans fat from a major grocery store chain with stores throughout Los Angeles County were merged with news coverage data from LexisNexis ® and ProQuest. Cross-sectional time–series regression was conducted in 2008 to assess the effect of news coverage on weekly unit sales volume for seven trans-fat products across 11,997 store-weeks. Results News coverage effects were apparent for sales of two of the seven trans-fat products in the year before the trans-fat nutrition facts labeling policy went into effect ( p p Conclusions News coverage about trans fat, combined with labeling information, appears to influence consumer behavior in the short term. News coverage and product labeling may not be sufficient to promote sustained changes in trans-fat purchases.
Do women managers keep firms out of trouble? Evidence from corporate litigation and policies

Abstract We find that firms where women have more power in the top management team, measured by female executives’ plurality and pay slice, face fewer operations-related lawsuits. This effect is robust to several treatments of endogeneity and does not appear to be driven by female executives' greater willingness to settle the cases. Evidence from a simultaneous equations approach suggests that firms where women executives have more power avoid lawsuits partly by avoiding some risky but value-increasing firm policies, such as more aggressive R&D, intensive advertising, and policies inimical to other parties.
Health Fetishism among the Nacirema: A fugue on Jenny Reardon’s The Postgenomic Condition: Ethics, Justice, and Knowledge after the Genome (Chicago University Press, 2017) and Isabelle Stengers’ Another Science is Possible: A Manifesto for Slow Science (Polity Press, 2018)

Personalized medicine has become a goal of genomics and of health policy makers. This article reviews two recent books that are highly critical of this approach, finding their arguments very thoughtful and important. According to Stengers, biology’s rush to become a science of genome sequences has made it part of the “speculative economy of promise.” Reardon claims that the postgenomic condition is the attempt to find meaning in all the troves of data that have been generated. The current paper attempts to extend these arguments by showing that scientific alternatives such as ecological developmental biology and the tissue organization field theory of cancer provide evidence demonstrating that genomic data alone is not sufficient to explain the origins of common disease. What does need to be explained is the intransience of medical scientists to recognize other explanatory models beside the “-omics” approaches based on computational algorithms. To this end, various notions of commodity and religious fetishism are used. This is not to say that there is no place for Big Data and genomics. Rather, these methodologies should have a definite place among others. These books suggest that Big Data genomics is like the cancer it is supposed to conquer. It has expanded unregulated and threatens to kill the body in which it arose.
ACT UP For Evaluating Sources: Pushing Against Privilege

L ike most librarians, I teach one-shot instruction sessions for numerous departments across campus on myriad topics. Fortunately, most faculty give me the entire class period to go over research techniques and evaluating sources. Prior to 2017, my discussion around evaluating sources happened towards the end of the class period, after I had demoed a few databases and searched the library catalog. This worked until it didn’t anymore. After the 2017 presidential inauguration, faculty and students returned to a more complex classroom climate, accentuated by tension, fear, and sadness.
A Framework for Global Characterization of Soil Properties Using Repeat Hyperspectral Satellite Data

Imaging spectroscopy offers the potential to quantify the soil properties over large areas based on its reflectance spectra. Soils are heterogeneous mixtures of minerals, air, water, and organic matter leading to complex manifestations of reflectance in the different parts of the visible-shortwave infrared spectra. Due to this complexity, data-driven modeling approaches are found to be most suitable for characterizing the relationships between soil spectra and the corresponding soil properties. Proposed spaceborne hyperspectral missions, such as Hyperspectral Infrared Imager, offer the possibility of repeating global spectral measurements in a 16- to 20-day revisit period. Soil attributes on the landscape vary at different rates. In particular, the soil textural attributes (percentage of sand, silt, and clay) may be assumed to remain invariant compared to chemical constituents during multiple consecutive 16- to 20-day satellite revisit period. We present a theoretical retrieval framework for assimilating repeat spaceborne soil spectral measurements into a previously developed lasso algorithm-based ensemble modeling framework for the global-scale characterization of soil textural attributes. The repeat spectral assimilation with each overpass of the satellite leads to the development of an enriched “dynamic soil spectral library” which spatially propagates the improvement in the characterization of soil textural properties globally, given the uncertain variations in other auxiliary factors, such as moisture and organic matter, affecting soil reflectance.
Atomic layer deposition of cobalt oxide on oxide substrates and low temperature reduction to form ultrathin cobalt metal films

The authors report the deposition of 4.5-nm-thick cobalt (II) oxide on SiO2/Si(001) and MgO(001) substrates at 180–270 °C by atomic layer deposition using bis(N-tert-butyl-N′-ethylpropionamidinato) cobalt (II) and water as coreactants. The resulting CoO film is smooth and carbon-free. CoO can be reduced to Co metal using hydrogen or deuterium gas at 400–500 °C in a vacuum furnace, but the high temperature processing causes dewetting, leading to discontinuous Co metal islands rather than continuous films. Two low temperature (∼200 °C) reduction methods are reported: deuterium atom reduction and the use of an O-scavenging Al metal film. The low temperature methods can suppress dewetting to a large extent, and the resulting metallic cobalt film is smooth and continuous.The authors report the deposition of 4.5-nm-thick cobalt (II) oxide on SiO2/Si(001) and MgO(001) substrates at 180–270 °C by atomic layer deposition using bis(N-tert-butyl-N′-ethylpropionamidinato) cobalt (II) and water as coreactants. The resulting CoO film is smooth and carbon-free. CoO can be reduced to Co metal using hydrogen or deuterium gas at 400–500 °C in a vacuum furnace, but the high temperature processing causes dewetting, leading to discontinuous Co metal islands rather than continuous films. Two low temperature (∼200 °C) reduction methods are reported: deuterium atom reduction and the use of an O-scavenging Al metal film. The low temperature methods can suppress dewetting to a large extent, and the resulting metallic cobalt film is smooth and continuous.
Central Areolar Choroidal Dystrophy

Central areolar choroidal dystrophy presents with an abnormality in the patient’s central acuity. Usually the defect is mild, but it may progress to legal blindness. In its early stages the macular region has a pigment epithelial irregularity, and as the disease progresses, an oval or round region around the fovea becomes apparent. The pigment epithelium and choriocapillaris become atrophic, baring the larger choroidal vasculature. Some of the pigment epithelium may clump within this central area.
Statistical models of cell populations

Statistical models for the description of microbial population growth have been reviewed with emphasis on their features that make them useful for applications. Evidence is shown that the integrodifferential equations of population balance are solvable using approximate methods. Simulative techniques have been shown to be useful in dealing with growth situations for which the equations are not easily solved.
Skyline for Small Molecules: A Unifying Software Package for Quantitative Metabolomics

Vendor-independent software tools for quantification of small molecules and metabolites are lacking, especially for targeted analysis workflows. Skyline is a freely available, open-source software tool for targeted quantitative mass spectrometry method development and data processing with a 10 year history supporting six major instrument vendors. Designed initially for proteomics analysis, we describe the expansion of Skyline to data for small molecule analysis, including selected reaction monitoring, high-resolution mass spectrometry, and calibrated quantification. This fundamental expansion of Skyline from a peptide-sequence-centric tool to a molecule-centric tool makes it agnostic to the source of the molecule while retaining Skyline features critical for workflows in both peptide and more general biomolecular research. The data visualization and interrogation features already available in Skyline, such as peak picking, chromatographic alignment, and transition selection, have been adapted to support small molecule data, including metabolomics. Herein, we explain the conceptual workflow for small molecule analysis using Skyline, demonstrate Skyline performance benchmarked against a comparable instrument vendor software tool, and present additional real-world applications. Further, we include step-by-step instructions on using Skyline for small molecule quantitative method development and data analysis on data acquired with a variety of mass spectrometers from multiple instrument vendors.
17 – Vectors in Space

Publisher Summary This chapter focuses on vectors in space. The set of ordered triples of the form (a, b, c) is called real three-dimensional space and is denoted R3. The three axes, x-axis, y-axis, and z-axis, determine three coordinate planes that are called the xy-plane, the xz-plane, and the yz-plane. The xy-plane contains the x- and y-axes and is simply the plane. The xz- and yz-planes can be thought of in a similar way. The chapter presents two common ways to represent points in space: the cylindrical coordinates and the spherical coordinates. The first is the generalization of the polar coordinate system in the plane.
Osteocytes control myeloid cell proliferation and differentiation through Gsα-dependent and -independent mechanisms

Osteocytes, the bone cells embedded in the mineralized matrix, control bone modeling, and remodeling through direct contact with adjacent cells and via paracrine and endocrine factors that affect cells in the bone marrow microenvironment or distant organs. Osteocytes express numerous G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) and thus mice lacking the stimulatory subunit of G-protein (Gsα) in osteocytes (Dmp1-GsαKO mice) have abnormal myelopoiesis, osteopenia, and reduced adipose tissue. We previously reported that the severe osteopenia and the changes in adipose tissue present in these mice were mediated by increased sclerostin, which suppress osteoblast functions and promote browning of white adipocytes. Inversely, the myeloproliferation was driven by granulocyte colony-stimulating factor (G-CSF) and administration of neutralizing antibodies against G-CSF only partially restored the myeloproliferation, suggesting that additional osteocyte-derived factors might be involved. We hypothesized that osteocytes secrete Gsα-dependent factor(s) which regulate the myeloid cells proliferation. To identify osteocyte-secreted proteins, we used the osteocytic cell line Ocy454 expressing or lacking Gsα expression (Ocy454-Gsαcont and Ocy454-GsαKO ) to delineate the osteocyte "secretome" and its regulation by Gsα. Here we reported that factors secreted by osteocytes increased the number of myeloid colonies and promoted macrophage proliferation. The proliferation of myeloid cells was further promoted by osteocytes lacking Gsα expression. Myeloid cells can differentiate into bone-resorbing osteoclasts, therefore, we hypothesized that osteocyte-secreted factors might also regulate osteoclastogenesis in a Gsα-dependent manner. Conditioned medium (CM) from Ocy454 (both Gsαcont and GsαKO ) significanlty increased the proliferation of bone marrow mononuclear cells (BMNC) and, at the same time, inhibited their differentiation into mature osteoclasts via a Gsα-dependent mechanism. Proteomics analysis of CM from Ocy454 Gsαcont and GsαKO cells identified neuropilin-1 (Nrp-1) and granulin (Grn) as osteocytic-secreted proteins upregulated in Ocy454-GsαKO cells compared to Ocy454-Gsαcont , whereas semaphorin3A was significantly suppressed. Treatment of Ocy454-Gsαcont cells with recombinant proteins or knockdown of Nrp-1 and Grn in Ocy454-GsαKO cells partially rescued the inhibition of osteoclasts, demonstrating that osteocytes control osteoclasts differentiation through Nrp-1 and Grn which are regulated by Gsα signaling.
Beam Quality Studies for Intense Beam Free Electron Lasers

Free electron laser (FEL) experiments conducted to date using intense beams have incorporated cold-cathode, foil-less diodes for beam generation [1,2,3]. Although such beams have been sufficient to demonstrate the basic characteristics of stimulated backscattering, quantitative interpretation of the interaction has suffered from a lack of information concerning beam quality.
How Internet Platform Intermediaries Operate

This paper examines how Internet ventures operate as intermediaries serving both upstream sources of content and applications as well as downstream consumers. Alibaba, Baidu, Amazon, Facebook, Google, Netflix, Tencent and other Internet “unicorns” have exploited “winner take all” networking externalities quickly accruing billion-dollar valuations. Courts and regulatory agencies acknowledge the substantial market shares these ventures have acquired, but most refrain from imposing sanctions on grounds that consumers accrue ample and immediate benefits when platform operators use upstream revenues to subsidize downstream services. Consumers also gain when intermediaries eschew short term profits to acquire greater market share and “shelf space.” Governments may over-estimate the opportunities for consumers to migrate to alternatives but underestimate the harms to competition and consumers occurring on either, or both sides of an intermediary’s platform. The paper considers how governments can respond to the onset of price and quality of service discrimination within the Internet ecosystem. They can refrain from regulating access and tolerate market concentration as proper rewards to ventures offering desirable services. Alternatively, they can impose a variety of sanctions for competition policy violations, unfair trade practices, consumer harms and unreasonable access discrimination. Between these poles, courts or expert regulatory agencies can use a narrower focus providing remedies after considering the merits of complaints from aggrieved parties. The paper concludes that most governments have failed to revise and recalibrate tools that examine potential marketplace distortions and the potential for harm to competition and consumers. Regulatory agencies and courts have generated false positives, resulting in market intervention where no major problem exists, but also false negatives, where undetected major problems cause harm without remedy. The paper recommends a recalibration of market definition and analysis, including examination of both downstream and upstream impacts.
Leaflet Asymmetry Modeling in Lipid Composition of Escherichia coli Cytoplasmic Membrane

Lipid composition asymmetry between leaflets is important to cell function and plays a key role in the “positive inside” rule in transmembrane proteins. In this work, E. coli inner plasma membrane models reflecting this asymmetry have been investigated at the early-log and stationary stages during the bacterial lifecycle using all-atom molecular dynamics simulations. The CHARMM36 lipid force field is used, and selected membrane properties are tested for variations between two leaflets and whole membranes. Our models include bacterial lipids containing cyclopropane moiety on the sn-2 acyl chain in the stationary membrane. The PE:PG ratio in two leaflets reflects the “positive inside” rule of membrane proteins, set to 6.8 and 2.8 for the inner and outer leaflets of the two models. We are the first to model leaflet asymmetry in lipid composition on E. Coli cytoplasmic membrane and observe the effect on membrane properties in leaflets and whole membranes. Specifically, our results show that for the stationary phase bilayer, the surface area per lipid (SA/lipid) is larger, the thickness (2DC and DB) is thinner, the tilt angle is larger, the tilt modulus is smaller, and the deuterium order parameter (SCD) of sn-1 and sn-2 tails are lower, compared to the early-log stage. Moreover, the stationary stage bilayer has a negative spontaneous curvature while the early-log stage is near flat spontaneous curvature. For leaflet asymmetry, the inner leaflet has a larger SA/lipid, a smaller thickness, a smaller elastic tilt modulus (a larger tilt angle), and low SCD, compared to the outer leaflet in both stages. Moreover, asymmetric membrane involves a lipid tilt and a lateral extension, varying from a reference state of pre-equilibrium membrane. This work encourages a more profound exploration of leaflet asymmetry in various other membrane models and specifically how this might affect structure and function of membrane-associated peptides and proteins.
Lighting for Driving: Roads, Vehicles, Signs, and Signals

This book conveys the crucial role lighting plays in road safety and examines how it might be used more effectively, explains the thinking and scientific reasoning behind various forms of lighting, and analyzes the contribution of street lighting to the driver's understanding of real and potential road hazards. Filled with useful information, this resource straightforwardly addresses a wide range of safety factors encountered in actual driving situations, such as glare, inclement weather, complex signage, and driver age. It also deals with the often-ignored consequences of too much light, such as light trespass and sky glow. Organizing lighting requirements from the perspective of driving tasks rather than technology this book: details the effects of light spectrum; incorporates a coherent philosophy for lighting based on the supply of visual information; provides a review of the latest findings on the most effective use of lighting for road safety; and examines future trends in road, signal, and vehicle lighting.
Community Losses: The Costs of Education Reform

Philadelphia has been a hotspot for various methods of education reform since 2002 when the Philadelphia School District was taken over by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. It now has over 80 bricks and mortar charter schools and sends thousands of students to on line cyber charter schools. Many of the charter schools were formerly traditional public schools that were converted to charters. This article examines how the waves of education reform in Philadelphia have treated public education as a private good, to the exclusion of its role in promoting democratic equality and social efficiency. The article explores how this focus has costs, including the loss of community voice, the loss of effective parental choice for those parents who prefer public schools; economic costs in the negative impact of charter costs on the school district's budget; and loss of opportunities for other methods of education reform that treat public education as a public good.
Indiana University Health staffing model for neurotelemetry and epilepsy monitoring unit patient populations: Part 1.

ABSTRACT.This is part one of a two part series of articles describing the staffing model utilized for neurotelemetry and epilepsy unit monitoring. After peer review, many administrative and technical questions were left unanswered which will be addressed in the second article. Indiana University Health Neuroscience is a facility that provides all levels of care for adult and pediatric patients regarding their specific neurological needs. The facility currently has 24/7 monitoring at Methodist Hospital and Riley Hospital for Children, consisting of adult and pediatric patients for neurotelemetry and epilepsy unit monitoring. Each unit must have staffing models as well as specific protocols in order to adequately monitor each patient's EEG and maintain safety. Specific recommendations, protocols, and requirements have been drafted by administration to maintain a safe patient to neurodiagnostic technologist ratio of 4:1.
Chapter 25. Adjuvants to the Immune System

Publisher Summary This chapter elaborates characterization of immune adjuvants that are defined as substances or procedures, which aid in the development or manifestations of the immune system. The protection conferred by this system against material foreign to the host ranges from microorganisms to tumors. The very complexity of the immune system introduces the possibility of multiple ways and targets by which its activities might be assisted. Several substances were described that stimulated selectively either T or B cells to transform into large blast cells and divide. The lipid moiety of the lipopolysaccharides termed Lipid A, consisting of phosphorylated glucosamine dissacharide units with ester and amide linked fatty acids, when properly dispersed was shown to be one of the most powerful mitogens for antibody synthesizing B lymphocytes in vitro . The use of nucleic acids as adjuvants to the immune response was indicated in the demonstration of a restorative capacity of nucleic acid-rich tissues in animals rendered immunodeficient following X-irradiation.
NMDA-receptor-dependent synaptic plasticity in the visual cortex.

Publisher Summary N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptors also play an important role in synaptic long-term potentiation (LTP) and long term depression (LTD) that can be evoked using electrical stimulation in slices of visual cortex. The theoretical analysis of receptive field plasticity suggests a connection between these forms of NMDA receptor-dependent synaptic plasticity. The evidence obtained for NMDA receptor involvement in aspects of visual cortical plasticity is briefly reviewed along with the progress that has been made using theory-driven experimentation in brain slices to elucidate the mechanisms of synaptic modification that may underlie receptive field plasticity in visual cortex. Pharmacological manipulations in vivo show that NMDA receptor activation is required for normal receptive field plasticity in visual cortex, including the loss of responsiveness to inputs deprived of patterned stimulation and the acquisition of responsiveness to new stimulation patterns. The data from slice experiments suggest a precise role for NMDA receptors in receptive field plasticity. These data indicate that the NMDA receptor can serve as an analog detector of coincident pre- and postsynaptic activity, triggering synaptic depression when input activity coincides with low postsynaptic responses and triggering synaptic potentiation when input activity coincides with large postsynaptic responses. In conclusion, substantial progress has been made in refining our understanding of how NMDA receptors contribute to synaptic plasticity in the visual cortex.