cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
The calcium-sensing receptor (CaR) and its disorders.

The system that regulates extracellular calcium (Ca2+o) homeostasis maintains a nearly constant level of Ca2+o so as to ensure the availability of calcium for its numerous intra- and extracellular roles. The molecular cloning and characterization of a G protein-coupled, Ca2+o-sensing receptor has elucidated the mechanism through which parathyroid cells and other cell types involved in calcium homeostasis sense Ca2+o and initiate the homeostatic responses that maintain Ca2+o at its normal level. The identification of the CaR has also proven unequivocally that extracellular calcium ions serve in an informational capacity. Furthermore, the identification of inherited human disorders resulting from inactivating and activating mutations of the CaR that produce hyper- and hypocalcemia, respectively, has provided physiological proof of the essential role of the CaR in mineral ion metabolism. Finally, selective activators of the CaR, so-called calcimimetics, are in clinical trials for the treatment of primary and uremic hyperparathyroidism and will likely provide the first truly effective medical treatment of hyperparathyroidism. CaR antagonists (calcilytics) may also prove to be of clinical utility in settings where inhibition of the receptor would be desirable.Calcium-Sensing Reseptor, hypocalcemia, Hypercalcemia
LEP Higgs boson searches beyond the standard model and minimum supersymmetric standard model

Ever since the center-of-mass energy was increased in 1995 above the Zℴ resonance, the four LEP experiments (ALEPH, DELPHI, OPAL and L3) have renewed their effort to search for the Higgs boson. Data taking ended in the year 2000 with about 130 pb−1 of data collected per experiment above 206 GeV ine+e−1 collisions but the data analysis is still very active. Most recently, the wealth of theoretical models and predictions has stimulated new analyses and model interpretations which go beyond the standard model and minimal supersymmetric standard model. These include the searches for charged Higgs bosons, models with two Higgs field doublets, searches for ‘fermiophobic’ Higgs decay, invisible Higgs boson decays, decay-mode independent searches, and limits on Yukawa and anomalous Higgs couplings. I review the searches done by the four LEP experiments and present the LEP combined results when they exist.
Angiotensin II releases catecholamines in dogfish.

Abstract 1. It has been suggested that the pressor response to angiotensin II in dogfish (Squalus acanthias) is due solely to catecholamine release from chromaffin bodies. 2. The concentration of plasma epinephrine and nonepinephrine was measured before and after injection of AII. 3. Large increases in the titer of both epinephrine and nonepinephrine were observed within 1 min of AII injection in each trial. 4. The promptness and magnitude of the increase in plasma epinephrine and nonepinephrine level is adequate to account for the pressor response to angiotensin II in dogfish.
Civic Discipline: Geography in America, 1860–1890

Karen M. Morin Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2011., xi+245 pp., US$89.95 hardback, (ISBN 978-1-4094-0143-8) Civic Discipline is the first contribution to Ashgate's new Studies in Historical Geography se...
Encoded Archival Description as a Halfway Technology

In the mid 1990s, Encoded Archival Description (EAD) appeared as a revolutionary technology for publishing archival finding aids on the Web. The author explores whether or not, given the advent of Web 2.0, the archival community should abandon EAD and look for something to replace it.
Sensitivity analysis of ordinary differential equation systems—A direct method

Given a system of time dependent ordinary differential equations, dotyi = fi(c1, c2, …, y1, y2, …, t), where ck are rate parameters, we simultaneously solve for both yi and a set of sensitivity functions, ϱyiϱck, over all times t. These partial derivatives measure the sensitivity of the solution with respect to changes in the parameters ck. Often these parameters are not accurately known. An example is given from atmospheric chemical kinetics using constant as well as time varying (diurnal) rate parameters. For the purposes of this paper, our calculations considered both first- and second-order contributions to Δy with respect to Δc. It is found that second-order sensitivity terms can be highly significant, but tend to be too costly for present widespread application.
The C Proteins of Human Parainfluenza Virus Type 1 (HPIV1) Control the Transcription of a Broad Array of Cellular Genes That Would Otherwise Respond to HPIV1 Infection

Human parainfluenza virus type 1 (HPIV1) is an important respiratory pathogen in children and the most common cause of viral croup. We performed a microarray-based analysis of gene expression kinetics to examine how wild-type (wt) HPIV1 infection altered gene expression in human respiratory epithelial cells and what role beta interferon played in this response. We similarly evaluated HPIV1-P(C-), a highly attenuated and apoptosis-inducing virus that does not express any of the four C proteins, and HPIV1-C(F170S), a less attenuated mutant that contains a single point mutation in C and, like wt HPIV1, does not efficiently induce apoptosis, to examine the role of the C proteins in controlling host gene expression. We also used these data to investigate whether the phenotypic differences between the two C mutants could be explained at the transcriptional level. Mutation or deletion of the C proteins of HPIV1 permitted the activation of over 2,000 cellular genes that otherwise would be repressed by HPIV1 infection. Thus, the C proteins profoundly suppress the response of human respiratory cells to HPIV1 infection. Cellular pathways targeted by the HPIV1 C proteins were identified and their transcriptional control was analyzed using bioinformatics. Transcription factor binding sites for IRF and NF-kappaB were overrepresented in some of the C protein-targeted pathways, but other pathways were dominated by less-known factors, such as forkhead transcription factor FOXD1. Surprisingly, the host responses to the P(C-) and C(F170S) mutants were very similar, and only subtle differences in the expression kinetics of caspase 3 and TRAIL receptor 2 were observed. Thus, changes in host cell transcription did not reflect the striking phenotypic differences observed between these two viruses.
Inhibition of the synthesis of nuclear RNA by urethan in regenerating liver.

Abstract Treatment of partially hepatectomized male rats with urethan 6 hr after operation resulted in 50–55% inhibition of the incorporation of orotic acid-5-3H into nuclear ribosomal RNA and heterogeneous RNA 18 hr later. Neither partially hepatectomized female rats similarly treated with urethan nor operated male animals treated with an equitoxic dose of butyl carbamate presented evidence of an impairment of nuclear RNA synthesis.
Global phase diagrams for dipolar fluids

Fluids of molecules or particles interacting through dipole forces describe polar liquids and colloidal suspensions such as ferrofluids and electrorheological fluids. Phase diagrams for systems with strong dipolar coupling are not precisely known. Possible liquid state phase transitions include phase separation and spontaneous polarization. We present a set of generic phase diagrams for the fluid states of dipolar spheres and spheroids, focusing on the interplay of polarization and phase separation.
The effect of radiation on the IRAS all-sky survey

The Infrared Astronomical Satellite (IRAS) is in a sun synchronous, 'near' polar orbit at an altitude of 900 km. The primary objective of IRAS is related to the conduction of an all-sky survey in the wavelength range from 8 microns to 120 microns. The present investigation is concerned with three components of the radiation environment encountered by IRAS, taking into account the high energy protons in the South Atlantic Anomaly, high energy electrons in the horns of the Van Allen belts, and cosmic rays. The effect of radiation on the returned data stream is studied, and attention is given to the steps which were taken to minimize the impact of radiation on the completeness of the survey.
Aluminum interaction with human brain tau protein phosphorylation by various kinases.

Abstract Phosphorylation is an indispensable process for energy and signal transduction in biological systems. AlCl3 at 10 nM to 10 uM range activated in‐vitro [γ‐32P)ATP phosphorylation of the brain (tau) T protein in both normal human or E.coli expressed T forms; in the presence of the kinases P34, PKP, and PKC. However, higher concentrations of ALCl3 inhibited the T phosphorylation with P34, PKP, and PKC to a maximum at 1 mM level. AlCl3 at 100 uM to 500 uM range induced non‐enzymatic phosphorylation of T with γ‐ATP, γ‐GTP, and α‐GTP. AlCl3 activated histone phosphorylation by P34 in a similar pattern. The hyperphosphorylation of T by Al3+ was accompanied by molecular shift and mobility retardation in SDS‐PAGE. This may demonstrate the mechanism of the longterm neurological effect of Al3+ in human brain leading to the formation of the neurofibrillary tangles related to Alzeheimer's disease.
On the transient response of cross-ply laminated circular cylindrical shells

Abstract Transient response of simply-supported circular cylindrical shells is investigated using a higher-order shear deformation theory (HSDT). The theory is a modification of the Sanders' shell theory and accounts for parabolic distribution of the transverse shear strains through thickness of the shell and tangential stress-free boundary conditions on the bounding surfaces of the shell. The results obtained using the classical shell theory (CST) and the first-order shear deformation theory (FSDT) are compared with those obtained using the higher-order theory. The state-space approach is used to develop the analytical solutions to the equations of motion of the three theories.
Spotlight on the county manager plan

Continued success of the council-manager plan in counties in Virginia, California and New York advances it far from the category of experiment to a method of proved worth.
Facial EMG activity levels predict treatment outcome in depression

Higher electromyographic (EMG) activity levels of corrugator and zygomatic face muscles have been reported to be pretreatment predictors of better clinical outcome in depressed patients. We tested this possibility in 29 drug-free, rigorously diagnosed subjects by measuring low-level EMG activity of corrugator and zygomatic muscles during resting and three imagery states (happy, typical day, sad). All patients had major depressive disorder, endogenous subtype. Good responders had significantly higher pretreatment EMG zygomatic values and different EMG profiles. Our findings replicate and expand prior reports.
Ocean microbial metagenomics

Technology for accessing the genomic DNA of microorganisms, directly from environmental samples without prior cultivation, has opened new vistas to understanding microbial diversity and functions. Especially as applied to soils and the oceans, environments on Earth where microbial diversity is vast, metagenomics and its emergent approaches have the power to transform rapidly our understanding of environmental microbiology. Here we explore select recent applications of the metagenomic suite to ocean microbiology.
Using Structural and Functional Information in Diagnostic Design

We wish to design a diagnostic for a device from knowledge of its structure and function. The diagnostic should achieve both coverage of the faults that can occur in the device, and should strive to achieve specificity in its diagnosis when it detects a fault. A system is described that uses a simple model of hardware structure and function, representing the device in terms of its internal primitive functions and connections. The system designs a diagnostic in three steps. First, an extension of path sensitization is used to design a test for each of the connections in the device. Next, the resulting tests are improved by increasing their specificity. Finally the tests are ordered so that each relies on the fewest possible connections. We describe an implementation of the first of these steps and show an example of the results for a simple device.
Demo abstract: Design and implementation of a web service for liteos-based sensor networks

We design and implement a web service for LiteOS-based wireless sensor networks (WSNs). LiteOS is a newly developed operating system for the sensor networks. Taking advantage of UNIX-like shell commands and C programming language supported by LiteOS, we implement a web service middleware which interacts with the front-end web application as well as the WSNs such that users can remotely request and view the sensor readings. Our web service system is equipped with secure membership, a visualizer for sensor readings, and accepts parameterized queries from multiple users simultaneously. We also address the issues of improving user perceived response time and energy efficiency of sensor nodes in the web service.
Climate, phylogeny and the ecological distribution of C4 grasses

'C4 photosynthesis' refers to a suite of traits that increase photosynthesis in high light and high temperature environments. Most C4 plants are grasses, which dominate tropical and subtropical grasslands and savannas but are conspicuously absent from cold growing season climates. Physiological attributes of C4 photosynthesis have been invoked to explain C4 grass biogeography; however, the pathway evolved exclusively in grass lineages of tropical origin, suggesting that the prevalence of C4 grasses in warm climates could be due to other traits inherited from their non-C4 ancestors. Here we investigate the relative influences of phylogeny and photosynthetic pathway in determining the ecological distributions of C4 grasses in Hawaii. We find that the restriction of C4 grasses to warmer areas is due largely to their evolutionary history as members of a warm-climate grass clade, but that the pathway does appear to confer a competitive advantage to grasses in more arid environments.
Groups as Galois groups : an introduction

Part 1. The Basic Rigidity Criteria: 1. Hilbert's irreducibility theorem 2. Finite Galois extensions of C (x) 3. Descent of base field and the rigidity criterion 4. Covering spaces and the fundamental group 5. Riemann surfaces and their functional fields 6. The analytic version of Riemann's existence theorem Part II. Further Directions: 7. The descent from C to k 8. Embedding problems: braiding action and weak rigidity Moduli spaces for covers of the Riemann sphere Patching over complete valued fields.
Anticonvulsants in bipolar disorder

Objective: To review the literature on the effectiveness of anticonvulsant drugs in the management of bipolar disorder.Methods: A selective review of the literature.Results: Valproate is an effective drug, alone or in combination, for mania, but has limited benefit in bipolar depression. Although valproate is widely used in maintenance therapy of bipolar disorder, and secondary analyses suggest benefit, in the largest randomised maintenance trial there was only a trend favouring valproate. Lamotrigine has benefit in bipolar depression and maintenance, but not in mania. Carbamazepine is effective in mania. Other anticonvulsant drugs have been tried in mania, but with mixed results.Conclusions: Valproate, lamotrigine and carbamazepine have a valuable place in the management of bipolar disorder.
Critical Charge Characterization for Soft Error Rate Modeling in 90nm SRAM

Due to continuous technology scaling, the reduction of nodal capacitances and the lowering of power supply voltages result in an ever decreasing minimal charge capable of upsetting the logic state of memory circuits. In this paper the authors investigate the critical charge (Qcrit) required to upset a 6T SRAM cell designed in a commercial 90nm process. The authors characterize Qcrit using different current models and show that there are significant differences in Qcrit values depending on which models are used. Discrepancies in critical charge characterization are shown to result in under-predictions of the SRAM's associated soft error rate as large as two orders of magnitude. For accurate Qcrit calculation, it is critical that 3D device simulation is used to calibrate the current pulse modeling heavy ion strikes on the circuit, since the stimuli characteristics are technology feature size dependant. Current models with very fast characteristic timing parameters are shown to result in conservative soft error rate predictions; and can assertively be used to model ion strikes when 3D simulation data is not available.
Accommodation to simulations of defocus and chromatic aberration in the presence of chromatic misalignment

Previous studies have demonstrated that accommodation will respond to sine gratings in which the relative modulations of red, green and blue image components have been altered to simulate the effects of defocus and longitudinal chromatic aberration. The present study aimed to determine the tolerance of the accommodative system to relative phase shifts in those components induced by chromatic misalignment. It was found that accommodation can tolerate moderate amounts of chromatic misalignment (6'), but responds adversely when misalignments are large. Applications to visual display terminals and spectacle lens and instrument design are discussed.
The Use of קנה in Connection with Marriage

Proponents of the view that marriage by purchase existed in ancient Israel point, in affirmation of their thesis, to Ruth 4:10, “And also Ruth the Moabitess, wife of Mahlon, קניתי to be my wife.” Specifically, they point to the use of the verb קנה. In the Bible, when not in connection with God or wisdom (the latter exclusively in Proverbs), it implies purchase. Basing themselves on the passage in Ruth, such lexicographers as Gesenius — Buhl and Koehler — Baumgartner list “eine Frau kaufen” or ”purchase to be one's wife” as one of the meanings of the verb קנה.
Start-up research universities, high aspirations in a complex reality: a Russian start-up university case analysis using stakeholder value analysis and system dynamics modeling

There have been several initiatives by the governments in different parts of the world to establish world-class universities (WCUs). Such initiatives have been attempted only several times and yielded varied results. This article contributes to the existing body of research in architecting WCUs by presenting an operational strategic modeling framework that is grounded in the existing body of literature for developing WCUs (Salmi 2009) which can be used to test assumptions, reveal strategic levers, and analyze dynamic complexity inherent in a task of scaling a start-up university. We present a research study that leveraged stakeholder analysis and system dynamics modeling to architect and test a long-term strategic plan of scaling a newly created Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology (SkolTech) in Moscow, Russia. We find that the existence of patient capital and favorable governance is conditional on university leadership's ability to effectively manage stakeholder expectations, maintain high-quality standards of its faculty and student population, and protect its brand of a world-class institution. We argue that the operational framework and findings derived from the case of SkolTech can be generalized and applied to other efforts in that area.
JVIR Celebrates 25 Years of Innovation. Part 3: 2001-2005.

The Journal has survived the severing of its umbilical cord to the [Radiological Society of North America], the destruction of the editorial office in Miami by Hurricane Andrew, and times of personal tragedy. Its meteoric rise is due almost entirely to the efforts of its first two editors, Gary Becker and Dan Picus, and its long-standing managing editor, Cathy Mendelsohn. Their vision, dedication, and seemingly indefatigable energy are largely responsible for the high regard of JVIR both inside and outside the interventional radiology community. It is a distinct honor to follow these giants in our field and guide the Journal into the 21st century.
Immune-Enhancing Enteral Diet Selectively Augments Ileal Blood Flow in the Rat

Background. Clinical studies show that immuneenhancing enteral diets (IED; with L-arginine, fish oil, and RNA fragments) decrease the rate of sepsis and shorten the length of hospital stay after the start of enteral feeding. These beneficial effects are dependent on the route of administration (enteral vs parenteral) and on the nutrient composition (IED vs standard diets). Gut exposure to an IED seems to preserve and/or augment intestinal mucosal immunity. However, nutrient absorption stimulates gut blood flow in a nutrient-specific manner (i.e., postprandial hyperemia). We hypothesized that an IED would initiate a different pattern of whole organ blood flow compared to a standard diet. This suggests that a mechanism for the protective effect of IED might be the preferential augmentation of gut blood flow to gut-associated lymphoid tissue (GALT) or mucosa-associated lymphoid tissue (MALT). Methods. Male Sprague‐Dawley rats (200 ‐225 g) were anesthetized and cannulated for colorimetric microsphere determination of blood flow distribution (with the phantom organ technique). Animals received gastric gavage (2 ml) of an IED (Impact; Novartis) or an isocaloric, isonitrogenous control diet (Boost; Mead‐Johnson). Blood flow to the antrum, duodenum, jejunum, ileum, colon, liver, kidneys, and spleen was determined at baseline and 30, 60, 90, and 120 min after gavage. Results. Baseline blood flows to the left and right kidneys were within 10%, indicating the technical integrity of the microsphere technique and assay. Control diet augmented blood flow compared to IED in the antrum, duodenum, jejunum, and spleen. Conversely, IED gavage stimulated a delayed and sustained hyperemic response in the ileum. IED also increased hepatic blood flow early (30 min). IED increased blood glucose levels compared to control diet at 30, 60, and 90 min, suggesting enhanced nutrient absorption. Conclusions. These data show that blood flow distribution depends on nutrient composition and that IED preferentially augments blood flow to the ileum. Since the terminal jejunum and ileum contain much of the GALT, our data suggest that a mechanism for enterally stimulated mucosal immunity involves selective perfusion of the terminal ileum during IED nutrient absorption. © 2002 Elsevier Science (USA)
On the cause of the reversal of the normal fractionation trend; an addendum to the paper by E. N. Cameron, Evolution of the Lower Critical Zone, central sector, eastern Bushveld Complex, and its chromite deposits

From phase equilibrium studies of silicate systems that are similar but simpler than the Bushveld Complex magma, it seems unlikely that a reversal of the normal fractionation trend of decreasing Mg/Fe for bronzite and olivine could occur in the closed system at constant or increasing pressure. If the pressure on the magma is decreasing, however, such a reversal in the normal direction of compositional change of the precipitating bronzite and olivine is possible, as shown schematically by a model. The reversal is related to a greater steepening of the slope of the solidus curve than of the liquidus curve near the high-temperature end of the temperature-composition phase diagrams when pressure is decreased. A further effect of decreasing pressure is expansion of the olivine primary phase volume, relative to the bronzite volume. A period of sustained pressure decrease during bronzite precipitation could, therefore, lead to the initiation of olivine coprecipitation.
Automatic identification of methotrexate-induced liver toxicity in patients with rheumatoid arthritis from the electronic medical record.

Objectives To improve the accuracy of mining structured and unstructured components of the electronic medical record (EMR) by adding temporal features to automatically identify patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) with methotrexate-induced liver transaminase abnormalities. Materials and methods Codified information and a string-matching algorithm were applied to a RA cohort of 5903 patients from Partners HealthCare to select 1130 patients with potential liver toxicity. Supervised machine learning was applied as our key method. For features, Apache clinical Text Analysis and Knowledge Extraction System (cTAKES) was used to extract standard vocabulary from relevant sections of the unstructured clinical narrative. Temporal features were further extracted to assess the temporal relevance of event mentions with regard to the date of transaminase abnormality. All features were encapsulated in a 3-month-long episode for classification. Results were summarized at patient level in a training set (N=480 patients) and evaluated against a test set (N=120 patients). Results The system achieved positive predictive value (PPV) 0.756, sensitivity 0.919, F1 score 0.829 on the test set, which was significantly better than the best baseline system (PPV 0.590, sensitivity 0.703, F1 score 0.642). Our innovations, which included framing the phenotype problem as an episode-level classification task, and adding temporal information, all proved highly effective. Conclusions Automated methotrexate-induced liver toxicity phenotype discovery for patients with RA based on structured and unstructured information in the EMR shows accurate results. Our work demonstrates that adding temporal features significantly improved classification results.
How the Power to Regulate Commerce Among the Several States Became the Interstate Commerce Power: A Content Analysis of Supreme Court Opinions

The term "interstate commerce" was invented in the 1840's and first used in a Supreme Court majority opinion in 1869. Since then it has largely displaced usage of the original language of the constitution, i.e., the regulation of "commerce among the several states." This paper presents data showing the rise of 'interstate commerce" since 1869 over the language of the constitution, along with related data concerning use of the phrase "between the several states." The paper argues that the dominant usage of "interstate commerce" has not been neutral, but has accompanied and reinforced a narrower view of the power to regulate commerce among the several states as limited to activities crossing state boundaries, and has resulted in the Court adopting additional doctrines to allow it to regulate activity inside states. In addition to the data on usage by the Court, the paper also surveys early Court interpretation of "among the several states" in Gibbons v. Ogden, explores the origins of the term "interstate commerce," surveys academic literature relating to the reasons for the use of the term and its implications, and reviews recent use of the term "interstate commerce" by the Court, especially in the Lopez decision.
Reducing the Social Costs of (Some) Priors

Law and economics holds that people are rational maximizers of their own self-interest. What people regard as being in their interest turns enormously on their priors -- which include, among other things, their beliefs, temperaments, sense of identity and identification, values, and other aspects of their mental states -- as does how they should act to pursue their self-interest. The priors of most interest to law are, of course, those that are societally problematic (consider, for instance, a prior that no matter what one does, one will be accused and convicted of a crime, or a prior that one is entitled to “take advantage” no matter what the cost is to others). How can they be changed? Priors are, unsurprisingly, sticky. Constantly revisiting one’s priors is completely untenable, if only because of the cognitive resources it would require. But might it be possible to change problematic priors by increasing the (internal psychic, and external, especially reputational) costs to retaining them when they are not sufficiently well-supported? My account of priors owes much to a long tradition in various fields in the social sciences and the humanities. Akerlof & Kranton’s work on identity is of particular relevance. But thus far, with the notable exception of Yale’s Cultural Cognition project, there has not been much consideration of the extent to which law-related inquiries, particularly within a law and economics/behavioral law and economics framework, could benefit from a consideration of priors. An inquiry into priors risks being about nothing -- and everything. It is far easier to make the case that incorporating priors into behavioral law and economics will significantly aid realism (or predictive or explanatory power) than to know how to do so parsimoniously. Here, I seek to make the case that the importance of the task warrants taking up that challenge.
Is it asthma

The presentation, investigation and management of reactive airways dysfunction syndrome following, in this case, exposure to chlorine fumes inside a car are discussed. (non-author abstract)
Effect of Epoxyaurapten on the Function of Myosin and the Contractility of Intestinal Smooth Muscle

Objective:To investigate the effects of epoxyaurapten on the function of smooth muscle myosin and the contractility of isolated intestinal smooth muscle strips.Method: Mg2+-ATPase activity and phosphorylation of myosin and contractility of isolated intestinal smooth muscle strips were chosen to determine the effects of epoxyaurapten on the activity of smooth muscle myosin and smooth muscle contractility.Result: Epoxyaurapten(40-320 μmol·L-1) exerted inhibitory effects on myosin Mg2+-ATPase activity in the presence of Ca2+/calmodulin and in a dose-dependent manner;and epoxyaurapten(40-320 μmol·L-1) exerted inhibitory effects on myosin phosphorylation in the presence of Ca2+/calmodulin and in a dose-dependent manner.Epoxyaurapten inhibited the muscle contraction of isolated rat intestinal strips in a dose-dependent manner,antagonized the stimulation induced by neostigmine and acetylcholine.Synergy inhibition on contractile activity was induced by concurrent use of atropine.Conclusion: Epoxyaurapten has prominent inhibition on the contractile activity of isolated rat intestine strips,which may be related to inhibition of the function of smooth muscle myosin.
Anti-Infective Therapy of Infectious Endocarditis

Because of its high morbidity and mortality, endocarditis will remain an important pediatric problem. Obtaining adequate culture information prior to starting antibiotics to ensure an accurate early diagnosis coupled with aggressive medical and surgical management is likely to give the best outcome. These patients are generally best handled by a team approach with the child's primary physician, cardiologist, infectious disease consultant, and cardiovascular surgeon working in close harmony.
An outbreak of septic endometritis in the Arctic blue fox (Alopex lagopus) caused by Clostridium carnis.

An outbreak of endometritis and septicaemia in farms that raise Arctic blue foxes is described. Eleven animals from eight different farms were examined, most of them pregnant or with newly delivered litters. Pathological examination indicated inflammation of the uterus, and focal necrotic changes in the liver. In some animals evidence of hemorrhaging was found in the anterior part of the small intestine. Bacteriological examination revealed abundant growth from different organs of the animals of a pure culture of a small, slender, Gram-variable, sporeforming rod, which was identified phenotypically as aerotolerant Clostridium carnis. This identification was confirmed by DNA hybridization. The organism caused death in mice 1–2 days after intraperitoneal inoculation, and killed an Arctic blue fox which was inoculated intracervically. Two foxes, pretreated with diethyl-stilboestrol, became seriously ill after intrauterine inoculation, but survived. The spontaneous outbreak of the disease was characterized by sudden onset of septicaemia with few or no clinical symptoms before the animals succumbed.
Collaborative Control of Active Cameras in Large-Scale Surveillance

A system that controls a set of pan-tilt-zoom (PTZ) cameras for acquiring closeup views of subjects in a surveillance site is presented. The PTZ control is based on the output of a multi-camera, multi-target tracking system operating on a set of fixed cameras, and the main goal is to acquire views of subjects for biometrics purposes, such as face recognition and nonfacial identification. For this purpose, this chapter introduces an algorithm to address the generic problem of collaboratively controlling a limited number of PTZ cameras to capture an observed number of subjects in an optimal fashion. Optimality is achieved by maximizing the probability of successfully completing the addressed biometrics task, which is determined by an objective function parameterized on expected capture conditions, including distance at which a subject is imaged, angle of capture, and several others. Such an objective function serves to effectively balance the number of captures per subject and their quality. Qualitative and quantitative experimental results are provided to demonstrate the performance of the system, which operates in real time under real-world conditions on four PTZ and four static CCTV cameras, all of which are processed and controlled via a single workstation.
Getting Better: The Beatles and the Angry Young Men

“Me used to be angry young man,” sang Paul McCartney in “Getting Better,” evoking the literary and artistic movement that—along with rock ‘n’ roll—swept across Great Britain in 1956. Though largely supplanted by the British satire boom of the 1960s, the Angry Young Men’s (AYM) Anglophone existentialism resonated through the Beatles’ golden decade, patterning their evolution from cheery pop stars to socially conscious rock poets. While the Beatles never acknowledged any direct influence by the AYM, the band’s post-1966 turn toward avant-garde experimentalism and darker lyrical subject matter bears the imprint of central AYM figures such as Kingsley Amis, Philip Larkin, and John Braine. This essay traces the AYM’s indirect influence on the Beatles, recounting how teenaged John, Paul, George, and Ringo would have experienced the Angry Young Men in 1950s Liverpool. As Humphrey Carpenter has written, the AYM—in their disgust at the “worn out and conservative mores of the society in which they found themselves”—established the keynote of the 1960s satirists, whose tone and style the Beatles increasingly adopted. Though conventionally credited with having created the hippie ethic of the 1960s, the Beatles were just as much a musical, artistic, and cultural product of the “angry decade” of the 1950s.
A Simple, Practical and Complete O(\frac{n^3}{ \log n})-Time Algorithm for RNA Folding Using the Four-Russians Speedup

The problem of computationally predicting the secondary structure (or folding) of RNA molecules was first introduced more than thirty years ago and yet continues to be an area of active research and development. The basic RNA-folding problem of finding a maximum cardinality, non-crossing, matching of complimentary nucleotides in an RNA sequence of length n, has an O(n 3)-time dynamic programming solution that is widely applied. It is known that an o(n 3) worst-case time solution is possible, but the published and suggested methods are complex and have not been established to be practical. Significant practical improvements to the original dynamic programming method have been introduced, but they retain the O(n 3) worst-case time bound when n is the only problem-parameter used in the bound. Surprisingly, the most widely-used, general technique to achieve a worst-case (and often practical) speed up of dynamic programming, the Four-Russians technique, has not been previously applied to the RNA-folding problem. This is perhaps due to technical issues in adapting the technique to RNA-folding.
Career desires and expectations of event management students

Abstract This study measured the factors that undergraduate event management (EM) students perceive to be important in choosing a career, determine the expectations of an event career by EM students, and compare importance and expectation factors. Drawing on Social Cognitive Career Theory, this study surveyed 525 students from five U.S. universities. The most important attributes for choosing a career in EM were: an enjoyable job, pleasant working environment, and an exciting job. For expectations of a career in EM, students felt an EM career most highly offered: interaction with others, an enjoyable job, responsibility, excitement, and transferable skills. In general, students reported desired importance factors which exceeded expectation levels. However, findings indicate students are aware of weaknesses of EM careers. Implications for students, educators, universities, and industry are discussed.
Brand Storytelling on Instagram: How Do Pictures Travel to Millennial Consumers' Minds?

This study examines how a brand story in a pictorial form only creates mental stimulation and travels in a viewer's psychological mechanism. Specifically, through experimental manipulation, this study examines how different types of pictorial narratives (i.e., story-focused vs. product-focused) influence transportation of a brand story, which, then, enhances attitudinal and relational outcomes on Instagram. Results demonstrate that story-focused images created greater levels of transportation compared to product-focused images. Transportation enhanced attitudes towards a brand's Instagram, brand evaluation, and self-brand connection, and these relationships were mediated by positive emotional responses.
Cicero’s Rhetoric of Terror

In the first three Catilinarians, Cicero defines the nebulous crisis facing the Roman state in specific and concrete terms. I argue that his description of Catiline’s activity can be understood as ...
CHALLENGING INTERVENTION IN A PATIENT PRESENTING WITH RECURRENT PULMONARY EMBOLISM

We present a patient with acute Pulmonary Embolism (PE), who underwent emergent combined Coronary Artery Bypass Grafting (CABG) & pulmonary thromboendarterectomy for Chronic Thromboembolic Pulmonary Hypertension (CTEPH). 57 year old male with history of myocardial infarction, stroke, diabetes
Controlling epidemics with transmissible vaccines.

As the density of human and domestic animal populations increases, the threat of localized epidemics and global pandemics grows. Although effective vaccines have been developed for a number of threatening pathogens, manufacturing and disseminating vaccines in the face of a rapidly spreading epidemic or pandemic remains a formidable challenge. One potentially powerful solution to this problem is the use of transmissible vaccines. Transmissible vaccines are capable of spreading from one individual to another and are currently being developed for a range of infectious diseases. Here we develop and analyze mathematical models that allow us to quantify the benefits of vaccine transmission in the face of an imminent or ongoing epidemic. Our results demonstrate that even a small amount of vaccine transmission can greatly increase the rate at which a naive host population can be protected against an anticipated epidemic and substantially reduce the size of unanticipated epidemics if vaccination is initiated shortly after pathogen detection. In addition, our results identify key biological properties and implementation practices that maximize the impact of vaccine transmission on infectious disease.
Effects of source and level of copper on performance and liver copper stores in weanling pigs.

Five 28- to 33-d experiments involving 460 crossbred pigs weaned at 28 +/- 2 d of age (initial weight, 6.7 to 8.1 kg) were conducted to determine the effects of feeding high dietary levels of Cu sulfate (CuSO4) or Cu oxide (CuO) on rate and efficiency of gain and liver Cu stores of weanling pigs. The pigs were housed in groups of five to six/pen and fed a fortified, unmedicated, corn-soybean meal-dried whey basal diet (1.1% lysine, 30 ppm Cu). In Exp. 1 and 2, pigs (eight replicates) were fed the basal or the basal plus 125 or 250 ppm Cu from CuSO4 or CuO for 28 d. In Exp. 3 and 4, four replications were fed the same diets as in Exp. 1 and 2 plus two additional diets (500 ppm Cu from CuSO4 or CuO). In Exp. 5, dietary levels of 0, 125, 250, 375 or 500 ppm Cu from CuSO4 were evaluated using four replications. At the end of each experiment, the liver from one pig in each pen was collected for Cu analysis. Overall, rate and efficiency of gain were improved (P less than .01) by feeding 125 or 250 ppm Cu as CuSO4, with the 125 ppm dietary level being about 75% as effective in stimulating growth as 250 ppm. Performance of pigs was not different from controls when the highest (500 ppm) level of Cu (from CuSO4) was fed. Liver Cu increased 10- to 70-fold when 250 to 550 ppm Cu from CuSO4 was included in the feed.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
Modal Impact Testing of Ground Vehicle Enabling Mechanical Condition Assessment

Military tactical wheeled vehicles must operate on wide ranging terrains under varying payload driving conditions, which lead to high dynamic loads in the wheels and suspension. High loads can, in turn, lead to mechanical and structural failures. The ability to quickly detect damage in a vehicle in the field can be extremely advantageous for condition-based maintenance. In this paper, the use of modal impact testing to characterize the modal properties of an H1 chassis in its healthy and faulty conditions was studied. The results show that five modes of vibration – bounce, pitch, roll and two flexible body modes of the frame – can be identified using the Complex Mode Indicator Function. Frequency response functions are measured by applying modal impacts to the chassis and measuring the response using a roving set of accelerometers on the wheel, body, and chassis. The frame of the vehicle was impacted at three locations and response accelerations were measured at 19 points on the chassis, vehicle body, suspension and wheels. The sprung mass vibrations in roll, bounce, pitch, beaming and torsional shake were estimated to have modal frequencies of 2.0 Hz, 3.5 Hz, 4.1 Hz, 9.8 Hz and 13 Hz, respectively. The experiments also indicated that modal impact testing has the ability to detect faults in the vehicle, such as low tire pressure. The results suggest that modal impact testing on ground vehicles is a feasible means of identifying the operational deflection shapes and certain types of mechanical damage. Furthermore, this knowledge could be used by onboard structural health monitoring systems to effectively analyze operational data to identify damage in operation.
Borrowed Knowledge: Pedagogy and Student Debt in the Neoliberal University

This chapter uses Marx’s credit theory in Comments on James Mill and Freire’s theory of the banking model of education from Pedagogy of the Oppressed to argue that the confluence of massive student debt and structures of “banking” pedagogy in contemporary American higher education places many university students in a unique position of dehumanization. The material limitations brought about by the loan are compounded by the social limitations of a resulting push toward productivity in education. Students with loan debt are driven in the direction of business and pre-professional majors and away from the humanities and other fields which would facilitate students’ abilities to critically question the dehumanizing aspects of their situation.
Design of a Haptic-Gripper Virtual Reality System (Hg) for Analyzing Fine Motor Behaviors in Children with Autism

Fine motor skills, including grasping, manipulating, and reaching for objects, are a documented weakness for many children with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD). However, relatively less research has attempted to address these motor deficits, especially by taking advantage of advanced technology. To explore potential mechanisms for expanding accessibility to fine motor intervention for people with ASD, we present the design and implementation of a feasibility study of a novel Haptic-Gripper Virtual Reality System (Hg). Hg is capable of providing analysis and practice opportunities of fine motor skills in an adaptive and low-cost virtual environment with real-time auditory, visual, and haptic feedback. The Haptic Gripper in Hg can detect a user's grip force and hand location and provide haptic feedback to guide hand movement and grip control while completing several simple and engaging virtual fine motor tasks. We conducted a feasibility study with six children with ASD and six typically developing (TD) children and found that participants were interested in using the Haptic Gripper and could quickly get used to the system. Although the results are preliminary and limited, we observed medium to strong correlations between the proposed fine motor skill metrics and the scores achieved with a standardized fine motor skill test and improvements of participants in accuracy and steadiness of movement and force control. This study provides important guidance for future investigations of the Hg's potential for assessing and improving fine motor manipulation skills.
Electrophysiological and pupillometric measures of inner retina function in nonproliferative diabetic retinopathy

To evaluate three measures of inner retina function, the pattern electroretinogram (pERG), the photopic negative response (PhNR), and the post-illumination pupil response (PIPR) in diabetics with and without nonproliferative diabetic retinopathy (NPDR). Fifteen non-diabetic control subjects and 45 type 2 diabetic subjects participated (15 have no clinically apparent retinopathy [NDR], 15 have mild NPDR, and 15 have moderate/severe NPDR). The pERG was elicited by a contrast-reversing checkerboard pattern, and the PhNR was measured in response to a full-field, long-wavelength flash presented against a short-wavelength adapting field. The PIPR was elicited by a full-field, 450 cd/m2, short-wavelength flash. All responses were recorded and analyzed using conventional techniques. One-way ANOVAs were performed to compare the pERG, PhNR, and PIPR among the control and diabetic groups. ANOVA indicated statistically significant differences among the control and diabetic subjects for all three measures. Holm-Sidak post hoc comparisons indicated small, nonsignificant reductions in the pERG (8%), PhNR (8%), and PIPR (10%) for the NDR group compared to the controls (all p > 0.25). In contrast, there were significant reductions in the pERG (35), PhNR (34%), and PIPR (30%) for the mild NPDR group compared to the controls (all p < 0.01). Likewise, there were significant reductions in the pERG (40%), PhNR (32%), and PIPR (32%) for the moderate/severe NPDR group compared to the controls (all p < 0.01). Abnormalities of the pERG, PhNR, and PIPR suggest inner retina neural dysfunction in diabetics who have clinically apparent vascular abnormalities. Taken together, these measures provide a noninvasive, objective approach to study neural dysfunction in these individuals.