cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Cognitive challenges, aging, and neuromuscular fatigue

Cognitive challenges, such as concurrent cognitive demands or prior cognitive fatigue, have shown to adversely impact neuromuscular fatigue, specifically in younger adults. Whether these relationships are similar for the aging population remains unclear. The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of different cognitive challenges on handgrip fatigue with aging. Ten younger (24.10 (1.79) years) and ten older (75.90 (7.80) years) females attended three experimental conditions (control, i.e., exercise only, cognitive fatigue prior to exercise, and concurrent mental arithmetic during exercise) on different days. The exercise required them to grip intermittently at 30% maximum handgrip strength until voluntary exhaustion. Endurance time, strength loss, force steadiness, muscle activity, cardiovascular responses, perceptions of cognitive fatigue, mental demand, and discomfort were obtained. While endurance time was similar across age groups and conditions, older adults demonstrated ~35% reduced endurance than younger adults (46.96 (13.08) min.), but this was observed only in the concurrent cognitive demand condition. This was also accompanied with a decrease in force steadiness. No endurance differences between age groups were found during the control and cognitive fatigue condition. The findings indicate that the relationship between cognitive challenges and neuromuscular fatigue depends on age, the type of cognitive challenge imposed, and the type of exercise performed.
Shell-Model Study of Mn 55

A shell model caiculation for Mn/sup 55/ is carried out which inciudes interactions among all neutrons and protons not in closed shells. It is shown that the inclusion of the neutronproton interactions gives good agreement with the experimental data for several sets of exchange parameters and reasonable values of the two-particle force range. The magnetic moment and quadrupole moment are also calculated and are in satisfactory agreement with experiment. (auth)
Epinephrine-induced pulmonary edema during hip arthroscopy: a report of two cases and a review of the literature

ABSTRACTObjectives: Hip arthroscopy utilization has significantly increased in recent years. While it is a relatively safe procedure, it is not without risk. Life-threatening complications, albeit rare, can potentially occur and must be appropriately recognized and treated. We describe 2 cases in which patients’ undergoing hip arthroscopy developed pulmonary edema and their respective courses of treatment.Methods: Both patients were being treated for symptomatic femoroacetabular impingement (FAI), with labral tears, requiring operative management after a failed trial of conservative management. The complication occurred during a primary hip arthroscopy procedure and a retrospective review of their clinical records and intra-operative notes was performed.Results: Hip arthroscopy was performed under spinal anesthetic in the supine position in both patients. In both procedures, patients developed severe hypertension and tachycardia, with subsequent oxygen desaturations with noted pulmonary edema. The postula...
Using SOMbrero to examine the economic convergence of European countries from 2001–2013

This paper uses SOMbrero visualizations to examine two socio-economic dimensions of European states, generated by a factor analysis of time-series data from 2001–2013. We analyze SOMs for 41 countries with regard to “Old Capital” and “New Capital”, two factors that are generated from 12 variables. SOMbrero reveals evidence of various convergence paths over time for these two factors. This approach also clearly uncovers the differential impacts of the European recession upon clusters of European countries. In conclusion, we demonstrate that SOMs are a useful tool for better understanding European convergence.
Aging in Bilinguals: Normal and Abnormal

In bilinguals, changes in language abilities across the adult lifespan are not necessarily parallel in both languages. Language use in both normal and abnormal aging is not static, and this can affect and interact with language changes due to aging. In normal aging, difficulties with language skills such as lexical retrieval are further confounded in bilinguals by differences in language proficiency and dominance, age of acquisition and language use, as well as the types of assessments and stimuli used to test them. In abnormal aging, such as dementia, Parkinson’s disease or stroke, these changes in language use and abilities become highly variable and often more extreme than in normal aging. They need to be carefully considered in clinical assessments and treatment. The advantages of bilingualism in older adults extend well beyond the ability to communicate with more people, and include many cognitive and linguistic advantages, as well as providing a protective factor against the onset and progress of dementia and the cognitive impairments after stroke.
Planetary Theories and Cosmology, Islamic Theories

Following Ptolemy’s instructions in the Almagest that “he who comes after us throughout the epochs take measurements as we have done, and if they find an imperfection, they should correct,” Islamic works of astronomy were motivated in part with this process of minor rectifications, along with two other lines of inquiry: creation of astronomical tables (zij) and timekeeping, on the one hand, and planetary theories on the other. Ptolemy’s Almagest remained the more influential text in medieval Islamic astronomy, along with Aristotle’s De Caelo. The Almagest provided astronomers with important tools to solve their different practical problems, and its explanations of planetary movement were sufficiently viable to allow for its continual usage. De Caelo presented a robust philosophical system explaining planetary movement but without a viable practical model. The first class of Islamic authors included al-Kindi (d. 873; explained Almagest’s first book and wrote on Platonic cosmological theories), Thābit ibn Qurra (d. 901; addressed transfer of motion across orbs), and al-Battānī (d. 929; composed one of the earliest zijs). The contradictions between Ptolemy and Aristotle motivated a number of responses through history, such as those of Ibn Tufayl and his students in al-Andalus, and of the “Maragha School.” Ibn Sīnā (Avicenna; d. 1037) and his student al-Juzjānī (d. 1070) objected to Ptolemy’s eccentrics, as they violated Earth’s centrality. Avicenna claimed to have reached a solution to this problem, but only after so much effort that he was not willing to share it. Juzjānī proposed an alternative to the Ptolemaic model that proved unsuccessful. In Andalusia, Ibn Tufayl (d. 1185), sharing the same objections, claimed to have found an alternative solution, but never wrote it. His more famous student, Ibn Rushd (Averroes; d. 1189) proposed that Aristotle’s solutions were lost and should be rediscovered but left the task of rediscovery to his younger students. Another student of Ibn Tufayl, al-Bitruji (Alpetragius; d. 1204), proposed a solution that avoided eccentrics by employing only concentric orbits around the earth and suggesting the possibility of the orbs’ poles circling other orbs. The contributions of these Andalusian scholars had little influence on other Islamic astronomers. However, these views carried more influence with renowned Jewish astronomers such as Yosef Nahmias and Levi Ben Greson. The Maragha School, led by al-Ṭūsī (d. 1274), al-Shīrāzī (d. 1311) and al-ʿUrdī (d. 1266), took to rectifying Ptolemaic models without attempting to overrule them as did their Andalusian predecessors. One of the more famous accomplishments of this school is the Tusi couple, which was a geometrical device that transformed circular movement into linear one. The goal of al-Tūsī’s work was to explain orbital movements in relation to the different physical principles. The Maragha scholars were rooted in a tradition of criticizing Ptolemy and uncovering the problems with his model that started with Ibn
Peptide amphiphile delivery of sonic hedgehog protein promotes neurite formation in penile projecting neurons.

Abstract Erectile dysfunction (ED) critically impacts quality of life in prostatectomy, diabetic and aging patients. The underlying mechanism involves cavernous nerve (CN) damage, resulting in ED in 80% of prostatectomy patients. Peptide amphiphile (PA) nanofiber hydrogel delivery of sonic hedgehog (SHH) protein to the injured CN, improves erectile function by 60% at 6 weeks after injury, by an unknown mechanism. We hypothesize that SHH is a regulator of neurite formation. SHH treatment promoted extensive neurite formation in uninjured and crushed CNs, and SHH inhibition decreased neurites >80%. Most abundant neurites were observed with continuous SHH PA treatment of crushed CNs. Once induced with SHH, neurites continued to grow. SHH rescued neurite formation when not given immediately. SHH is a critical regulator of neurite formation in peripheral neurons under uninjured and regenerative conditions, and SHH PA treatment at the time of injury/prostatectomy provides an exploitable avenue for intervention to prevent ED.
Snake Skin: Small Scales with a Large Scale Impact

Despite subjecting their scales to constant friction and contact with surfaces, snakes’ skin remains remarkably intact. This resistance to wear and tear is a subject of many researchers’ interest. This chapter’s focus will be on the tribological properties of snake scales, in particular the ventral scales on the underside of the snake, as they are the most critical to movement and display an important characteristic that scientists call frictional anisotropy. Frictional anisotropy can be thought of as directional friction, or varying coefficients of friction based on orientation (Vogel, Slithering snakes: research shows snakes use friction and weight redistribution to glide on flat terrain, http://www.gtresearchnews.gatech.edu/snakes/, 2009). The two general strata that make up snake skin are called the dermis and epidermis. The outermost layer is called the Oberhautchen and is in direct contact with the environment (Abdel-Aal 2011). Frictional anisotropy can in part be attributed to the wide overlapping of the ventral scales on the Oberhautchen layer; these overlaps snag on asperities—or roughness and unevenness—on the surface in the direction of the scale, creating varying coefficients of friction in certain directions (Hu et al., Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 106(25):10081–10085, 2009). In addition to the overlapping of scales, micro-hairs known as microfibrils and their orientation and upward slope are also responsible for frictional anisotropy (Hazel et al., J Biomech 32(5):477–484, 1999). Snake scales are microscopically adapted to resist wear, which can be seen in the double-ridge design of their microfibrils (Abdel-Aal, J Mech Behav Biomed Mater 22:115–135, 2013). Furthermore, a system of evenly distributed micropits reduces friction forces up to ten times, enhancing wear resistance (Hazel et al., J Biomech 32(5):477–484, 1999). Snake skin, with its natural ability to endure such high levels of abrasion, sliding, and rubbing, is naturally a source of inspiration for researchers aiming to design cylinder-piston systems for internal combustion engines (ICEs) that are textured in a way to optimize efficiency and performance. Plateau honing is one such process that may optimize a cylinder and piston’s sliding performance (Abdel-Aal and El Mansori, Reptilian skin as a biomimetic analogue for the design of deterministic tribosurfaces. In: Gruber P, Bruckner D, Hellmich C, Schmiedmayer H, Stachelberger H, Gebeshuber I (eds) Biomimetics—materials, structures, and processes. Springer, Heidelberg, pp 51–79, 2011).
Negative Binomial Optimization for Biomedical Structural Variant Signal Reconstruction

Structural variants (SVs) - novel adjacencies in an individual's genome – lead to genomic diversity across all organisms. When DNA fragments of an unknown genome are compared to a reference genome, errors in sequencing and mapping obscure true genomic rearrangements. When the sequencing coverage is low, this may lead to high false positive rates in predicted SVs. In this paper, we propose a novel maximum likelihood approach to SV prediction incorporating low-coverage sequencing data and coverage distribution. Specifically, we address mean and variance assumptions proposed by Poisson models and develop a Negative Binomial framework which reflects a more accurate representation of DNA fragments in an individual's genome. We incorporate both sparsity and inheritance in our model with an $\ell_{1}$ penalty and linear constraints, respectively. We validate our model on both simulated and real genomic data of related individuals. Moreover, our results indicate an improvement on thresholding observations of candidate variants.
CAR-Based Approaches to Cutaneous T-Cell Lymphoma

Cutaneous T cell lymphomas (CTCL) are a heterogeneous group of malignancies characterized by the expansion of a malignant T cell clone. Chimeric Antigen Receptor (CAR) T cell therapy has shown impressive results for the treatment of B-cell tumors, but several challenges have prevented this approach in the context of T cell lymphoma. These challenges include the possibilities of fratricide due to shared T-cell antigens, T cell immunodeficiency, and CAR transduction of malignant cells if CAR T are manufactured in the autologous setting. In this review, we discuss these and other challenges in detail and summarize the approaches currently in development to overcome these challenges and offer cellular targeting of T cell lymphomas.
Everything Here is Fine: Protective Buffering by Military Spouses During a Deployment

To minimize potential distractions for deployed military service members (SMs), some nondeployed romantic partners have reported engaging in protective buffering, or intentionally withholding information or concerns to protect their deployed partner. This study assessed the associations of protective buffering and psychological distress and marital satisfaction for military couples during and after deployment. Additionally, the study explored whether protective buffering was related to SM reports of being distracted during deployment by family matters. A total of 54 couples provided data before, during, and after an Army deployment. In multilevel models, higher protective buffering by partners was associated with higher psychological distress and lower marital satisfaction for both SMs and partners during, but not after, deployment. Additionally, partners reported frequent use of protective buffering during deployment; however, protective buffering was not significantly correlated with family related distraction for SMs during deployment. Limitations and implications of these findings are discussed.
Postpartum Nurses' Experience Caring for Infants With Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome.

OBJECTIVES: In previous years, otherwise healthy infants with neonatal abstinence syndrome (NAS) in our hospital were transferred to the NICU and frequently treated with medication. Currently, infants with NAS room-in with their mothers and rarely require medication. We sought to understand the lived experience of nurses on maternity and well-newborn units caring for infants with NAS. METHODS: We conducted focus groups of registered nurses on postpartum units at 2 hospitals using qualitative methodology. Themes were identified through consensus, and the focus groups were stopped when no new themes were identified. RESULTS: Seventeen postpartum nurses participated in 5 focus groups. The following major themes emerged: (1) managing the expectations of parents of newborns with NAS, (2) current NAS protocol (positive aspects of rooming-in and challenges with withdrawal scoring tool), (3) inconsistencies in care and communication, (4) perceived increase in nursing workload on the postpartum unit, and (5) nurses’ emotional response to the care of infants with NAS. CONCLUSIONS: We highlight the perspectives of nursing staff on the well-newborn unit who were previously unaccustomed to caring for infants with NAS. With increasing numbers of infants with NAS and longer stays on the well-newborn unit, hospitals must prepare to better support staff and implement protocols that offer consistency in practice.
Nonvocal Communication Augmentation Using Microcomputers.

Microcomputers are being used with increasing frequency to enhance communication effectiveness for individuals who are unable to speak. As components of commercially available augmentative communic...
Scholarship Does Not Have to Be Hard.

Scholarship is an important part of the academic environment. It’s one of three main areas used to evaluate faculty for promotion and tenure, but the idea of a scholarly mindset touches multiple elements of academic pharmacy for both faculty and students. American Council for Pharmacy Education (ACPE) Accreditation Standards 2016 include an expectation of faculty scholarship, saying “The college or school creates an environment that both requires and promotes scholarship and also develops mechanisms to assess both the quantity and quality of faculty scholarly productivity.” 1 The 2011-12 American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy Academic Affairs Standing Committee report advocated a scholarly approach to teaching, defined as “...[going] beyond content knowledge and preparing and delivering lecture content to include evidencebased practice and pedagogical knowledge of teaching and motivation best practices.” 2 ACPE’s Standards 2016 also support the importance of a scholarly mindset for students, saying they should be prepared for “Evaluation of research methods and protocol design required to conduct valid and reliable studies to test hypotheses or answer research questions, and to appropriately evaluate the validity and reliability of the conclusions of published research studies.” 1 The Pharmacists Patient Care Process, widely endorsed and supported by professional pharmacy organizations, can be described as a scholarly approach to patient care, with data collection and assessment steps familiar to anyone experienced with experimental design.3
Psychotropic medication use during pregnancy and gestational age at delivery

Abstract Purpose The purpose of this study was to evaluate the association between psychotropic medication use during pregnancy and gestational age at delivery, after adjusting for depressive symptom and perceived stress severity. Methods We analyzed data on singleton live births from 2914 female Pregnancy Study Online participants, aged 21 to 45, with a reported conception from 6/2013 to 6/2018. Women reported psychotropic medication use at 8 to 12 weeks' and ~32 weeks’ gestation. We measured depressive symptoms using the Major Depressive Inventory and perceived stress using the 10-item Perceived Stress Scale. Data on gestational age at delivery were based on self-reports and/or birth certificates. We used restricted mean survival time models, stratifying by severity of depressive symptoms (Major Depression Inventory Results Two hundred and ten (7.2%) participants reported using psychotropic medications during pregnancy. Mean gestational age at delivery among women who never used psychotropic medications was 38.2 weeks (95% confidence interval: 37.7, 38.7), whereas it was 37.3 weeks (95% confidence interval: 36.7, 37.9) among women who used psychotropic medications during pregnancy. Results were similar across strata of depressive symptoms and perceived stress. Conclusions Our data indicate that the association between psychotropic medication use and gestational age at delivery is not confounded by indication.
Polydisperse Polymer Melts: An Adaptive Time-step Algorithm for a Slip Link Model

For ecoSLM -an ultra coarse-grained slip link model -the ability to use a time-step that increases with chain molecular weight is an important source of efficiency in modeling the linear rheology of monodisperse chains. This feature is labeled "temporal coarse-graining" in this paper. It is compromised for blends of linear chains, where the time-step is set by the short chains, but the length of the simulation run is determined by the long chains. The problem is present for any polydisperse sample, and is particularly acute for binary blends with widely separated molecular weights. To recover temporal coarse-graining, we propose an adaptive time-step algorithm, where the time-step is determined by the shortest unrelaxed chains in the ensemble, which increases as the simulation proceeds. It involves two additional steps: recalibration, which is triggered when any component relaxes completely, and re-equilibration, in which slip links on completely relaxed components are renewed. We obtain reasonable settings for these steps, and validate the the adaptive time-step algorithm by comparing it with the original, constant time-step ecoSLM for binary, ternary, and polydisperse blends. Speedups ranging from 50% to 1500% are obtained when molecular weights of the components are widely separated, without a significant loss of accuracy. Conversely, the adaptive time-step algorithm is not recommended when molecular weights are not well-separated, since it can be slower than the constant time-step method.
Design Verifiably Correct Model Patterns to Facilitate Modeling Medical Best Practice Guidelines With Statecharts

Improving patient care safety is an ultimate objective for medical cyber-physical systems. A recent study shows that the patients’ death rate can be significantly reduced by computerizing medical best practice guidelines. To facilitate the development of computerized medical best practice guidelines, statecharts are often used as a modeling tool because of their high resemblances to disease and treatment models and their capabilities to provide rapid prototyping and simulation for clinical validations. However, some implementations of statecharts, such as Yakindu statecharts, are priority-based and have synchronous execution semantics which makes it difficult to model certain functionalities that are essential in modeling medical guidelines, such as two-way communications and configurable execution orders. Rather than introducing new statechart elements or changing the statechart implementation’s underline semantics, we use existing basic statechart elements to design model patterns for the commonly occurring issues. In particular, we show the design of model patterns for two-way communications and configurable execution orders and formally prove the correctness of these model patterns. We further use a simplified airway laser surgery scenario as a case study to demonstrate how the developed model patterns address the two-way communication and configurable execution order issues and their impact on validation and verification of medical safety properties.
Fluoroscopy and Radiation Safety

Interventional pain providers have become reliant upon fluoroscopy in daily practice. Understanding fluoroscopy and radiation can help providers reduce use of ionizing radiation to themselves, patients, and involved personnel. Knowledge of fluoroscopy can also help providers optimize images improving safety and efficiency of procedures. Understanding medications and procedures thoroughly can also assist in effectively and safely performing procedures.
Who Benefits from Student Debt Cancellation

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused historic levels of unemployment and economic hardship while student debt balances are also at record levels. We use administrative banking and credit bureau data to estimate how the benefits of different debt cancellation scenarios would be distributed by household income, borrowers’ remaining time to pay off their debt, and borrower race and ethnicity. We examine four scenarios: (1) universal cancellation of up to $10,000 of every debtor’s balance; (2) cancellation of up to $50,000 of debt for people earning less than $125,000; (3) cancellation of up to $25,000 for people earning less than $75,000 and phasing out at $100,000; and (4) cancellation of up to $50,000 with the same income phase-out as scenario 3. We find that income cut offs significantly reduce the total amount of debt forgiven and make cancellation less regressive, while all cancellation scenarios we examine distribute forgiveness across borrowers by race in roughly the same way. In general, cancellation disproportionately benefits middle- and high-income families, though income targeting makes cancellation less regressive. Most notably, the $25,000 cancellation with income phase-out cancels the same amount of debt as the $10,000 universal cancellation while completely wiping out debt for a higher fraction of low-income borrowers.
Protecting the Rights and Wellbeing of People with Disabilities during the COVID-19 Pandemic (preprint)

The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed and exacerbated significant inequities experienced by people with disabilities. It has also emphasized the value of legal protections against discrimination based on disability. The Americans with Disabilities Act was enacted 30 years ago to eliminate discrimination against people with disabilities and ensure equal opportunity across major areas of American life (ADA, 2008). Together with an earlier law, the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 Rehabilitation Act, 2012), this landmark civil rights law impacts a broad range of issues raised by the COVID-19 pandemic and protects a large and growing number of Americans. This Chapter focuses on application of these laws to health care and employment during the pandemic. These laws are powerful tools to protect the rights and well-being of people with disabilities, but they require robust enforcement. Enforcing agencies have provided COVID-19-specific guidance on the application of the laws to health care and employment. Further action is needed, as unresolved legal questions, gaps in protections, lack of knowledge of and noncompliance with disability rights laws, and a lack of data limit the impact of these laws. Recommendations for policymakers to ensure COVID-19 responses respects the rights and wellbeing of people with disabilities include: robust enforcement of the laws; clear and current agency guidance on how to comply with the laws; education about the requirements of the laws, especially in health care settings; and improved data collection and reporting. This paper was prepared as part of COVID-19 Policy Playbook: Legal Recommendations for a Safer, More Equitable Future, a comprehensive report published by Public Health Law Watch in partnership with the de Beaumont Foundation and the American Public Health Association.
Validity of the WISC-V in Youth with Autism Spectrum Disorder: Factor Structure and Measurement Invariance.

Objective: Assessment of intellectual abilities in individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a core component of a comprehensive diagnostic evaluation. However, relatively limited informat...
Influence of Menstrual Cycle Estradiol-β-17 Fluctuations on Energy Substrate Utilization-Oxidation during Aerobic, Endurance Exercise

This study examined the effect of estradiol-β-17 across the menstrual cycle (MC) during aerobic exercise on energy substrate utilization and oxidation. Thirty-two eumenorrheic (age = 22.4 ± 3.8 y (mean ± SD)), physically active women participated in two steady-state running sessions at 65% of VO2max, one during the early follicular and one during the luteal phase of the MC. Blood samples were collected at rest before each exercise session and analyzed for Estradiol-β-17 to confirm the MC phase. Carbohydrate (CHO) utilization and oxidation values were significantly lower (p < 0.05) in the luteal (utilization: 51.6 ± 16.7%; oxidation: 1.22 ± 0.56 g/min; effect size (ES) = 0.45, 0.27) than follicular phase (utilization: 58.2 ± 15.1%; oxidation: 1.38 ± 0.60 g/min) exercise sessions. Conversely, fat utilization and oxidation values were significantly (p < 0.05) higher in the luteal (utilization: 48.4 ± 16.7%; oxidation: 0.49 ± 0.19 g/min; ES = 0.45,0.28) than follicular phase (utilization: 41.8 ± 15.1%; oxidation: 0.41 ± 0.14 g/min). Estradiol-β-17 concentrations were significantly (p < 0.01) greater during the luteal (518.5 ± 285.4 pmol/L; ES = 0.75) than follicular phase (243.8 ± 143.2 pmol/L). Results suggest a greater use of fat and reduced amount of CHO usage during the luteal versus follicular phase, directly related to the change in resting estradiol-β-17. Future research should investigate the role these changes may play in female athletic performance.
Disparities in Adolescents' Obesogenic Behaviors, 2005-2017

Objectives: Given the increasing national-level efforts to reduce disparities in obesogenic behaviors in youth, in this paper, we assessed the change in disparities in meeting guidelines for fruits and vegetables intake (FV), physical activity (PA), and sedentary behavior (SB) among adolescents in the United States in the last 13 years. Methods: Using the Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System (2005-2017), overall and characteristic-specific (sex, age, race/ethnicity) disparities ratios for meeting FV, PA, and SB guidelines were calculated using the Extended Gastwirth Index Method. Linear regressions, one-way analysis of variance, and posthoc tests assessed change in characteristic-specific disparities over the years. Linear and quadratic trends assessed change in characteristic-specific contributions to overall disparities. Results: Sex-specific and age-specific disparities increased for meeting FV and PA and decreased for meeting SB guidelines. Race/ethnicity-specific disparities decreased for meeting FV and SB guidelines. Characteristics-specific contributions to overall disparities for each behavior changed over the years. Conclusions: Disparities in obesogenic behaviors are still an ongoing concern despite national-level efforts to improve adolescents' behaviors. The methodology allowed for meaningful disparities ratios that facilitated comparison of categorical demographic characteristics across the years and identifying targetable intervention groups to reduce disparities.
Kanatlanmis Kadinlar: Osmanlı ve Avrupalı Kadin Yazarlarin Dostlugu

Kanatlanmis Kadinlar: Osmanli ve Avrupali Kadin Yazarlarin Dostlugu (Women with Wings: The Friendship of Ottoman and European Women Writers), published in Turkish, sheds light on Turkish women writ...
The Medieval Consolation of Philosophy: An Annotated Bibliography

Essays and accompanying bibliographies survey recent (to 1990) studies of Boethius' 6th-century Latin work as it was translated into Old English (primarily King Alfred), medieval German, medieval French, and Middle English (primarily Chaucer). Each of the four chapters is an independent treatment, b
Assessing oral presentations and writing skills

At the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology, engineering, science, social sciences, and humanities programs have been working jointly toward a convincing, effective, and practical means of assessing oral presentation and writing skills. In 2002-03, our faculty developed writing and oral presentation rubrics as well as a digital archival tool to help our institution achieve those goals. In this interactive session, presenters describe and define the digital archival tool and assessment rubrics used at SDSMT (2) learn about the construction and use of rubrics; (3) assess writing samples using a rubric; (4) learn about cross-disciplinary collaboration, classroom application, and campus wide assessment; and (5) discuss their concerns, experiences, and observations relating to assessment as an instructional method to increase student learning. Participants leave with experienced advice on creating assessment tools, insights into the advantages and pitfalls of cross-campus faculty collaboration, and examples of how one rubric can be used in a variety of disciplinary settings.
Does Macroeconomics Need Microfoundations

As I observed in the first lecture, I chose Pissarides's model as a paradigm of the modern macroeconomic model for a variety of reasons: the clarity of its goals and exposition; the manner in which it attempted to relate its theoretical construction to empirical facts (at least in principle); and, by no means the least important reason, because it was the model that Nancy Cartwright held up as an example of a nomological machine in economics. A number of fellow economists, however, question whether Pissarides's model really is a macroeconomic model. Because it appears to model the decision problem of the individual worker and the individual firm, some economists regard it as a microeconomic model. But this is all the better for my purposes because there is a persistent refrain in recent macroeconomics that the only acceptable macroeconomic models are those that have adequate microfoundations . The idea of microfoundations did not originate with the new classical macroeconomics, but the manner in which the new classical macroeconomics has dominated the agenda of macroeconomics over the past quarter century has firmly cemented it in the minds of virtually all economists. Lucas puts it clearly when he longs for an economics that does not need the prefixes “micro” or “macro” – sound economics is held to be microeconomics, and any macroeconomics that is not just a shorthand for the manner in which microeconomics is applied to certain problems is held to be bad economics.
Design of a fully passive prosthetic knee mechanism for transfemoral amputees in India

An estimated 230,000 above-knee amputees are in need of prosthetic devices in India with a majority of them facing severe socio-economic constraints in their daily lives. However, only a few affordable, passive prosthetic knee devices in the market have been designed to enable normative gait and to meet the unique daily life needs of above-knee amputees in the developing world. This paper builds upon our past study, which established optimal mechanical component coefficients in prosthetic knee function required for achieving able-bodied kinematics. We present a mechanism for the design of a fully passive prosthetic knee device, which aims to facilitate able-bodied kinematics at a low metabolic cost. The mechanism is implemented using an automatic early stance lock for stability, a linear spring for early stance flexion-extension and a differential friction damping system for late stance and swing control. For preliminary validation of the knee mechanism, we carried out a field trial on two above-knee amputees in India, which showed satisfactory performance of the early stance lock and enabled smooth stance to swing transition by timely initiation of late stance flexion.
Tunneling Under the Digastricus Muscle Increases Salivary Duct Exposure and Completeness of Excision in Mandibular and Sublingual Sialoadenectomy in Dogs

Objective To document the extent of rostral salivary duct and glandular tissue excision achieved through a conventional lateral approach before and after tunneling under the digastricus muscle. Study Design Experimental cadaveric study. Animals Dog cadavers (n = 8). Methods Bilateral mandibular and sublingual sialoadenectomy was performed in 8 cadavers using a conventional lateral approach and the point of proposed salivary duct transection was marked with Evans blue dye. Remaining salivary duct was then tunneled under the digastricus muscle and dissection continued rostrally. The most rostral point of the gland/duct complex was marked before transection of the salivary duct. Once removed, the distance between the 2 marks was measured and recorded. Completeness of glandular tissue excision was confirmed by dissection and gross examination. Results The tunneling technique improved rostral exposure and increased the median (IQR) length of salivary duct excision by 1.8 (0.35) cm. Residual polystomatic sublingual salivary tissue remained in all cadavers after simulated resection without tunneling under the digastricus muscle. After tunneling, complete removal of rostral salivary tissue was achieved in 13 of 15 procedures. Conclusions Tunneling under the digastricus muscle increases the length of rostral salivary duct and glandular tissue that can be removed through a conventional lateral approach.
Vascular Development for Climate Control

Early anatomists noted the close juxtaposition of arteries and veins, which modern physiologists proposed aided temperature regulation. In this issue of Developmental Cell, Kidoya and colleagues (2015) demonstrate that the secreted protein Apelin and hematopoietic-endothelial cell interactions create this arrangement, providing genetic evidence for its function as a heat-exchange mechanism.
Cytochalasin B and Embryonic Heart Muscle: Contractility, Excitability and Ultrastructure

The effect of cytochalasin B (CB) on beating, electrical activity and cytological ultrastructure of embryonic hearts and tissue-cultured heart preparations was investigated. The inhibition of spontaneous pulsation and the subsequent recovery after drug washout were found to be dose-dependent and to be a function of the type of preparation. In the presence of CB, spontaneous action potentials can be recorded from all three (intact hearts, isolated myocytes, reaggregated cells) after cessation of all visible contractions, although the action potential duration is reduced. CB at 0.5-10 µg/ml was found not to uncouple heart cells electrically nor to prevent cells from aggregating and establishing new electrical coupling. In all 3 systems, however, CB does result in disruption of myofibrillar organization. After 30 h in CB (2,µg/ml) bundles of myofilaments are found to be randomly oriented, with Z-band material condensed into amorphous bodies, no longer aligned with the myofibril, but remaining in register between the A-bands. Within the bundles the normal hexagonal cross-section of thick and thin filaments is maintained. The unaligned Z-bodies, however, demonstrate attached thin filaments of very reduced length. Following washout of the drug, normal sarcomeric organization is restored in parallel with resumption of spontaneous beating. The present data, therefore, are consistent with the hypothesis that one major effect of CB is an alteration in myofibril (myofilament) stability, and that this effect alone is sufficient to account for the observed inhibition of contractility.
The safe and rational children’s playground: Strategies and technologies since the nineteenth century

Between the late nineteenth and early twenty-first centuries the evolution of playgrounds in the United States was shaped by both ideology and technology. Advocates agreed that playgrounds should control and instruct children, but disagreed on the way to accomplish those goals: the extreme positions marked by a commitment to the principles of ‘Efficiency’ or the ideal of recreation. The technology of playgrounds, both the sites and the equipment, changed only slowly, but both steel and wooden devices of traditional design and newer forms of sculptural modernism became central to a developing discourse over dangers to users. Ironically, playgrounds had initially been touted as safe alternatives to play on city streets. After World War II they too were overtaken by the larger risk-aversion that came to mark American culture.
Ancylostoma caninum Anticoagulant Peptide: A novel inhibitor of coagulation factor Xa with potent antimetastatic activity. • 650

Although complications related to activation of the coagulation cascade are common in patients with cancer, the role of individual clotting factors in tumorigenesis and metastasis remains unknown. We have identified a novel anticoagulant with potent antimetastatic activity. This molecule, named Ancylostoma caninum Anticoagulant Peptide (AcAP), is a specific inhibitor of coagulation factor Xa (Ki = 265 pM) and has been previously isolated from bloodfeeding hookworms. Subcutaneous injection of SCID mice with recombinant AcAP (rAcAP) (0.01-0.2 mg/mouse) prior to tail vein injection of 105 highly metastatic LOX human melanoma cells resulted in a dose dependent reduction in pulmonary macro-metastases. In order to investigate the mechanism of this protection, as well as to further understand the role of coagulation proteases in tumor cell biology, LOX cells were assayed for the ability to bind factor Xa in vitro. Using biotinylated factor Xa, we found that the protease binds to LOX monolayers in a specific and saturable fashion, with a KD of 15 nM. Increasing concentrations of rAcAP maximally inhibited labelled factor Xa binding by approximately 90%. The LOX cells also supported formation of the clot-forming prothrombinase complex, whose catalytic activity was effectively blocked in the presence of equimolar concentrations of rAcAP. Competition binding studies revealed that an excess of active site blocked factor Xa (EGR-Xa) successfully inhibited prothrombinase activity by 98%, while causing only a minimal reduction in total biotinylated Xa binding. These data suggest that the majority of factor Xa (>80%) binds to the surface of LOX cells at its active-site, rendering it unavailable for prothrombinase complex formation and thrombin generation. Therefore, in addition to its well recognized function in clot formation, factor Xa may play a role in promoting LOX metastasis via previously uncharacterized active site mediated interactions with the tumor cell membrane. rAcAP, by inhibiting both the binding of factor Xa as well as its catalytic activity, represents a potentially valuable therapeutic agent for the prevention of tumor metastasis.
Concentrations of free amino acids in blood plasma of rats force-fed L-glutamic acid, L-glutamine or L-alanine.

Abstract The concentrations of glutamic acid, glutamine, alanine, proline, threonine, glycine, valine, leucine-isoleucine, phenylalanine, and lysine were measured in the portal and systemic plasma of rats that had been forced-fed l -glutamic acid, l -glutamine, or l -alanine. The administration of glutamic acid resulted in a marked rise in the concentration of this amino acid in the portal plasma and a smaller one in the systemic plasma. It also caused the concentration of alanine to increase in the portal and to a lesser extent in the systemic plasma and the concentration of glutamine to increase substantially in both. Administration of glutamine (same molar quantity as for glutamic acid) resulted in greater increases in portal and systemic plasma concentrations of glutamine than were observed for glutamic acid after glutamic acid administration. It also caused the concentration of glutamic acid to increase in the portal and to a lesser extent in the systemic plasma, and the alanine concentration to increase markedly in both. Administration of alanine (1.6× the molar quantity used for glutamic acid or glutamine) resulted in a maximum increase in the portal plasma concentration of alanine which was 8× (on a molar basis) that observed for glutamic acid and 3× that observed for glutamine in the previous experiments. The systemic plasma alanine concentration also rose but much less than the portal concentration. The concentration of glutamic acid increased measurably in the portal plasma while the concentration of glutamine increased more in the systemic than in the portal plasma. The plasma concentrations of the other amino acids tested were not significantly altered in any of the experiments.
A structural model of dropout behavior: a longitudinal analysis

Using four wave panel data, a theoretically informed structural model of junior high school antecedents of high school dropout behavior is estimated, using LISREL VII. The model specifies a linkage between negative school experiences, both academic and disciplinary, and later dropout behavior that is mediated by self-derogation in a school context and contranormative behavior including both avoidant/withdrawal and deviant acting out behavior. Subjects (n= 1,714) were tested three times as junior high school students and were later interviewed as adults. Results provided strong support for the predicted relationship between students' feelings of self-rejection in a school setting, stimulated by negative academic experiences reported during junior high school, and their likelihood of dropping out of high school with truancy behavior during junior high school as a mediating variable. Implications for future research and dropout prevention programs are explored.
Shear-Enhanced Oral Microbial Adhesion

Shear-enhanced adhesion, although not observed for fimbria-mediated adhesion of oral Actinomyces spp., was noted for Hsa-mediated adhesion of Streptococcus gordonii to sialic acid-containing receptors, an interaction implicated in the pathogenesis of infective endocarditis.
Four casein kinase I isoforms are differentially partitioned between nucleus and cytoplasm.

Abstract The casein kinase I (CKI) family consists of at least seven vertebrate genes, some of which can be alternatively spliced. Previously, we have studied the four splice variants of the chicken CKIα gene. The four proteins differ only by the presence or absence of two peptides, a 28-amino-acid “L” insert in the catalytic domain and a 12-amino-acid “S” insert near the extreme C-terminus. Here cells were transfected with DNA encoding all four isoforms fused to the green fluorescent protein (GFP) and the localization of each protein was examined. We noted that the L insert includes the sequence P VG KRKR , which has the characteristics of a nuclear localization signal (NLS), and we show that the CKIαL and CKIαLS isoforms which contain this sequence are targeted to the nucleus, where a fraction becomes associated with nuclear speckles. In contrast the two isoforms lacking the L insert remain predominantly cytoplasmic. Mutation of the first lysine in the putative NLS to asparagine prevented the nuclear entry of GFP–CKIαL. Therefore different CKIα isoforms are targeted to different cellular compartments in a fashion modulated by alternate transcription and in these locations presumably phosphorylate and regulate different cellular substrates.
Evolving Epidemiology and Definitions of the Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome and Early Acute Lung Injury

This article reviews the evolving definitions and epidemiology of the acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) and highlights current efforts to improve identification of high-risk patients, thus to target prevention and early treatment before progression to ARDS. This information will be important for general practitioners and intensivists interested in improving the care of patients at risk for ARDS, and clinical researchers interested in designing clinical trials targeting the prevention and early treatment of acute lung injury.
China's Modernization and the Decline of Communitarianism The Control of Sex Crimes and Implications for the Fate of Informal Social Control

Although modernization has brought a level of prosperity to China that could hardly have been imagined two decades ago, other by-products of rapid social change have proved less beneficial. It is a...
A Soldier-Robot Ad Hoc Network

The mobility and convenience of wireless LANs have resulted in a proliferation of IEEE 802.11 a/b/g devices. However, their capabilities depend on a network infrastructure which military operations cannot reliably obtain in a battlefield environment. The U.S. Army Research Laboratory (ARL) has researched mobile ad hoc networks (MANET) which do not depend on an infrastructure but possess ad hoc routing capabilities that allow mobile nodes to self-configure and adapt to changes in network topology in order to sustain connectivity. This paper presents and discusses an implementation of a soldier-robot ad hoc network to support reconnaissance, surveillance and target acquisition (RSTA) capabilities. The realization of this wireless MANET was achieved by using commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) wireless network hardware and open-source software. We will describe the seamless integration of MANET capability into a soldier system used to remotely control a small unmanned ground vehicle (SUGV). We will explain the use of MANET technology in extending the operational range of the robot in both line-of-sight and non-light-of-sight environments, such as in buildings, using intermediate MANET nodes