cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Analysis and improvement of defectivity in immersion lithography

In this paper, we report results of comprehensive studies of defects originating in immersion photolithography clusters comprising immersion volume production tool (S609B, NA=1.07) and engineering evaluation tool (EET, NA=0.85). Defectivity of S609B was very low, 0.013 /cm2; it attained dry exposure level successfully. Defectivity results using EET were also very promising in all three major resist processes including solvent soluble topcoat, developer soluble topcoat and topcoat-less resist. Defectivity did not show any scan speed dependency and target size dependency, showing the extendibility of our immersion technology to future mass production phase. In particular, we found that for 50 ml water droplets, receding angle larger than about 70 degree provides immersion process free of immersion-specific defects. We successfully demonstrated very effective defect analysis technique named DSA (defect source analysis) to show what defects are immersion-specific. We also revealed the defect generation mechanism of each defect types. Deep understanding of defectivity behavior leads to a conclusion that immersion lithography is viable for IC manufacture at 45 nm node.
Limb-darkened angular diameters of stars with combined infrared and optical interferometry

We present the angular diameters, physical radii, and effective temperatures of five stars observed using both the Palomar Testbed Interferometer (PTI) and the Navy Prototype Optical Interferometer (NPOI). These preliminary results are part of a larger project focused on measuring the angular diameters of the 62 stars that have been observed with both instruments. We plan to achieve diameter accuracies of 0.5% or better through the combination of infrared- and visible-wavelength data from PTI and the NPOI, respectively. The difference in limb-darkening effects between the two wavelength regimes, together with other external parameters, will allow us to test the atmospheric models on which the limb-darkening corrections are based. High quality angular diameters for these stars will also lead to more accurate physical diameter measurements and effective temperature determinations.
Health Information Privacy: A Disappearing Concept

Rapid advances and exponential growth in computer and telecommunications technology have taken individual records and papers revealing the most intimate details of one’s life, habits, and genetic predisposition from the private sector into the public arena in derogation of privacy considerations. Although computerized medical information offers a means of streamlining and improving the health care delivery system through speed and enormous storage capacity, it also presents new challenges as it affects the right of privacy and expectation of confidentiality, creating serious ethical and legal issues. Other considerations include constitutional matters such as loss of liberty when one is compelled to remain in an undesirable or unsuitable job so that insurance will not be canceled or the inability to secure another more suitable position due to genetic predisposition and denial of equal protection of the laws if one is stigmatized because one belongs to a certain ethnic or racial group that exhibits a part...
c-sis/PDGF-B Promoter Transactivation by the Tax Protein of Human T-cell Leukemia Virus Type 1

The human c-sis proto-oncogene promoter is transactivated by the human T-cell leukemia virus type 1 Tax protein in human Jurkat T-cells. Transactivation was >7-fold in Jurkat cells stably expressing the Tax protein (Jurkat-Tax) than in Jurkat E6.1 cells and was further enhanced in Jurkat-Tax cells stimulated with 12-O-tetradecanoylphorbol-13-acetate and the calcium ionophore, ionomycin. Deletion analysis showed that a 167-base pair promoter fragment retained full Tax responsiveness. Insertion of this minimal Tax-responsive region into a heterologous, minimal promoter resulted in approximately a 7-fold increase of transcriptional activation in the presence of Tax. Linker-scanning insertion analysis of this region identified Tax-responsive elements at nucleotides -64 to -45 (TRE1) and -34 to -15 (TATA box region). TRE1 contains a consensus binding site for the Sp family of transcription factors. The TATA box region corresponds to the TATA box and its 3'-neighboring sequence. Gel-shift and antibody supershift analysis of TRE1-binding proteins in unstimulated Jurkat E6.1 and Jurkat-Tax nuclear extracts identified Sp1 and Sp3 as the main TRE1 binding factors. Nuclear extracts from stimulated Jurkat E6.1 and Jurkat-Tax cells identified an additional TRE1 binding factor, Egr-1. These studies define a novel mechanism whereby Tax transactivates the c-sis promoter.
Uncoupling and charge transfer in submitochondrial particles.

Abstract Loss of respiratory control can be obtained in submitochondrial particles when a combination of K + , nigericin and valinomycin, or NH 4 Cl and valinomycin, is present. When permeant anions such as NO 3 or tetraphenylboron are present, valinomycin is not required in either case. It is suggested that valinomycin acts by permitting an electrophoretic efflux of K + or NH 4 + , and that the penetration of permeant anions into the particle can substitute for this efflux in the uncoupling effect. Comparisons are made between these results obtained in SMP and similar effects described in chromatophores and chloroplasts.
Lack of platelet endothelial cell adhesion molecule-1 attenuates foreign body inflammation because of decreased angiogenesis

Platelet endothelial cell adhesion molecule-1 (PECAM-1, CD31) is a 130-kd member of the immunoglobulin superfamily of proteins, expressed on endothelial cells, leukocytes, and platelets. Antibody-blocking studies have implicated it in modulating leukocyte transmigration and angiogenesis. However, the generation of the PECAM-1 knockout mouse has shown that its function can be compensated for by similarly acting proteins because most acute inflammatory models proceed in a comparable manner in wild-type and knockout animals. We decided to examine the function of PECAM-1 in the chronic process of foreign body inflammation. We show that PECAM-1-deficient mice exhibit attenuated neutrophil infiltration in and around a subcutaneous polyvinyl acetyl implant. Bone marrow engraftment studies indicate that the lack of CD31 expression on the endothelium determines the diminished leukocyte accumulation in the knockout implants. Specifically, we find that decreased angiogenesis (as manifested by lower vessel density, decreased hemoglobin content, and less laminin deposition) correlates with lower neutrophil accumulation in the knockout animals. This study indicates that the absence of endothelial PECAM-1 results in decreased angiogenesis and therefore in diminished delivery of leukocytes to the foreign body implants.
Glycogen deposits in the pyloric gland of the ascidian Styela clava (Urochordata).

The pyloric gland of Styela clava contains large glycogen deposits that are digested by treatment with alpha amylase and depleted by 15 days starvation. The deposits are surrounded by cytoplasmic regions containing smooth endoplasmic reticulum and mitochondria. The cells also have rough endoplasmic reticulum, Golgi cisterns, lysosomes, microvilli, cilia, and lateral infoldings of the plasma membrane. The fine structure of the pyloric cells and the position of tubules between the absorptive epithelium and general circulation suggest that the gland functions as the vertebrate liver in carbohydrate metabolism. The pyloric cells of Styela do not appear to be excretory in a ‘renal’ sense, since there is no infolding of the basal plasmalemma and mitochondria are usually associated only with the glycogen deposits. However, a hepatic-like excretory role is consistent with current findings. In light of the phylogenic affinities of vertebrates and ascidians, it is possible that the pyloric gland is homologous to the liver.
Use of isopycnic plots in designing operations of supercritical fluid chromatography: I. The critical role of density in determining the characteristics of the mobile phase in supercritical fluid chromatography.

In Supercritical Fluid Chromatography (SFC), the key chromatographic parameters of any compound, its retention and efficiency, are known to strongly depend on the density of the mobile phase. This indicates that iso-density, also called isopycnic, plots drawn on the pressure–temperature plane can provide an effective tool to analyze how SFC systems may operate under different combinations of inlet and outlet pressures and column temperature. To effectively use these isopycnic plots in designing the operations of SFC systems, however, a deeper understanding of the factors behind the dependence of the performance of these systems on the mobile phase density is required. The nature of this density dependence is explored with reference to the key physical properties of the mobile phase, its viscosity, diffusivity and solubility. This study is focused on the use of pure carbon dioxide as the mobile phase, but this method of investigation is applicable for other mobile phase combinations as well.
Performance comparison of the shearing interferometer and Hartmann wavefront sensor

The resolution of optical imaging systems is severely degraded from the diffraction limit by the random effects of the atmosphere. Techniques exist to compensate for the atmospheric turbulence, one of which is adaptive optics. A critical component in the adaptive optics system is the wavefront sensor. Presently, two types of sensors are being used--the Hartmann-Shack Wavefront Sensor and the Shearing Interferometer. Previous studies have compared these two sensors and found them to perform identically for point source beacons. However, to date, no comparison has been performed for an extended beacon and subaperture spacing larger than the correction length of the atmosphere, ro. This paper examines this problem and compares these two sensors for the above conditions. Results indicate that the sensors have comparable performance when an infinite number of photons are available. However, the photon limited cases indicate superior performance by the Hartmann Sensor.© (1994) COPYRIGHT SPIE--The International Society for Optical Engineering. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.
Guidelines for the advertising of services

D espite the growth and impor tance of service industries, there has been little work published specifically on the advertising of services. Given this lack of attention, one might conclude, incorrectly, that the problems of services advertising are no different from the problems of goods advertising. But, in some basic ways, goods and services are different and the advertising of each must reflect these differences. This article presents six guidelines for services advertising based on some of the special characteristics of services. Service industries are of course quite heterogeneous and the intention is to present guidelines that will have relevance to a wide range of service industries, but not necessarily to all of them.
History of mechanical circulatory support

End-stage heart failure exerts a tremendous impact on individuals and society in terms of personal and economic suffering. The development of mechanical circulatory support devices has been driven by the shortage of donor organs for heart transplantation. Collaborative efforts in the fields of surgery, medicine, and biomedical engineering, sponsored by both government and industry, have led to devices capable of providing reliable circulatory support. Future mechanical cardiac assist devices will likely play an important role in the treatment of an ever-growing population of patients with end-stage heart failure.
On the performance of serial networks in distributed detection

Distributed detection on the serial (or tandem) topology is considered with the probability of error performance criterion. Previously published efforts, while presenting probability of detection versus false alarm results, limited the number of array elements to two or three. For the detection of known, equally likely signals in additive, symmetric noise, the author presents simple recursive expressions for the threshold values and the performance of the system. Examples for known signals in Gaussian and Laplacian noise show the degradation in performance due to the array structure. >
Liquid-solid phase transition detection with acoustic plate mode sensors: Application to icing of surfaces

Abstract An acoustic plate mode (APM) device operating at 158 MHz has been used to monitor liquid-to-solid phase transitions. Shear-horizontal plate modes propagating in a quartz plate probe the phase of a medium in contact with the plate. When liquid contacts the device, viscous damping of the APM is the dominant means of energy transfer, with the resulting APM attenuation serving as a measure of liquid viscosity. When the liquid freezes, acoustic energy is mechanically coupled from the plate into the adjacent solid, leading to a dramatic increase in APM propagation loss. Because effective coupling of acoustic energy from the plate into the adjacent medium depends on continuity of shear displacement across the solid/ solid interface, the magnitude of the propagation loss is an indication of the intimacy of contact between the solid and the APM surface. Possible applications of this sensor include a monitor for airplane wing icing.
Young Children's Imaginative Play: Is It Valued in Montessori Classrooms?.

The main purpose of this article is to describe the nature of imaginary play in Montessori classrooms. A transcript from a train ride shows how young children imagine and recreate ideas from their real world experiences and weave them into original new accounts. The author discusses how the play-like action of dramatizing The Caboose Who Got Loose is highly motivating for young children. An informal analysis provides the reader with important insights into the way children see and think about the world. The play episode observed in this study appears as a microcosm of the larger Montessori culture, reflecting the spirit of kindness and respect that permeates Montessori Schools.
Terrorism by another name

The noted linguist and social critic Noam Chomsky likes to quote the famous story told by St. Augustine about a notorious pirate who was brought to the emperor after his capture. When the emperor asked him why he engaged in such theft and pillage, the pirate replied that his actions were no different from the crimes committed by the empire; they merely went by another name. As Chomsky observes, the analogy perfectly describes U.S. policy towards terrorism in the Middle East, and elsewhere. The policy promotes a double standard that narrowly defines terrorism to include only the killings of innocent people by individuals or small groups while ignoring the more widespread killings by state agents of equally innocent people. The U.S. also routinely ignores its own role in encouraging terrorism, including terrorism committed in reaction to its foreign policies and terrorism the U.S. itself commits as a way of implementing its policies.
Traumatic Bereavement and Mindfulness: A Preliminary Study of Mental Health Outcomes Using the ATTEND Model

This article presents a quasi-experimental study of a mindfulness-based intervention for traumatically bereaved individuals using a single group with pre-test and post-test design. The intervention consists of the ATTEND model, which is comprised of the following elements practiced by the clinician: attunement, trust, therapeutic touch, egalitarianism, nuance, and death education. The study is based on the charts of 42 clients seeking grief counseling at a mental health agency viewed retrospectively. Participants’ intake scores on the Impact of Event Scale-Revised (IES-R), which measures trauma symptoms, and 25-item Hopkins Symptom Checklist (HSCL-25), which measures depressive and anxious symptoms, were compared to their scores after an average of 14.64 hours of counseling. Paired samples t tests showed a statistically significant decline in trauma symptoms on the IES-R, and in anxious and depressive symptoms on the HSCL-25. These results provide preliminary support for the use of this mindfulness-based approach for difficulties associated with traumatic bereavement, though more extensive research is needed to determine the effectiveness of this approach.
Coevolution and subsite decomposition for the design of resistance-evading HIV-1 protease inhibitors.

Drug resistance sharply limits the effectiveness of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) protease inhibitors in acquired immunodeficiency syndrome therapy. In previous work, we presented methods for design of resistance-evading inhibitors using a computational coevolution technique. Here, we report subsite decomposition experiments that examine the relative importance and roles of each subsite in HIV protease, and the constraints on robust inhibitor design that are imposed by possible resistance mutations in each subsite. The results identify several structural features of robust resistance-evading inhibitors for use in drug design, and show their basis in the constraints imposed by the range of allowable mutation in the protease. In particular, the results identify the P3 and P3' sites as being particularly sensitive to protease mutation: inhibitors designed to fill the S3 and S3' sites of the wild-type protease will be susceptible to viral resistance, but inhibitors with side-chains smaller than a phenylalanine residue at P3 and P3', preferably medium-sized amino acids in the range from valine to leucine and isoleucine residues, will be more robust in the face of protease resistance mutation.
Collisionality Scaling of Main-ion Toroidal and Poloidal Rotation in Low Torque DIII-D Plasmas

In tokamak plasmas with low levels of toroidal rotation, the radial electric field Er is a combination of pressure gradient and toroidal and poloidal rotation components, all having similar magnitudes. In order to assess the validity of neoclassical poloidal rotation theory for determining the poloidal rotation contribution to Er, Dα emission from neutral beam heated tokamak discharges in DIII-D (Luxon 2002 Nucl. Fusion 42 614) has been evaluated in a sequence of low torque (electron cyclotron resonance heating and balanced diagnostic neutral beam pulse) discharges to determine the local deuterium toroidal rotation velocity. By invoking the radial force balance relation the deuterium poloidal rotation can be inferred. It is found that the deuterium poloidal flow exceeds the neoclassical value in plasmas with collisionality , being more ion diamagnetic, and with a stronger dependence on collisionality than neoclassical theory predicts. At low toroidal rotation, the poloidal rotation contribution to the radial electric field and its shear is significant. The effect of anomalous levels of poloidal rotation on the radial electric field and cross-field heat transport is investigated for ITER parameters.
Passive and active adaptive management: Approaches and an example

Adaptive management is a framework for resource conservation that promotes iterative learning-based decision making. Yet there remains considerable confusion about what adaptive management entails, and how to actually make resource decisions adaptively. A key but somewhat ambiguous distinction in adaptive management is between active and passive forms of adaptive decision making. The objective of this paper is to illustrate some approaches to active and passive adaptive management with a simple example involving the drawdown of water impoundments on a wildlife refuge. The approaches are illustrated for the drawdown example, and contrasted in terms of objectives, costs, and potential learning rates. Some key challenges to the actual practice of AM are discussed, and tradeoffs between implementation costs and long-term benefits are highlighted.
Evaluation of a Reverse Oscillatory Flow Microreactor Design for the Synthesis of Uniformly-Sized Nanoparticles

Computational fluid dynamics is used to refine the operating parameters of a Reverse Oscillatory Flow (ROF) microreaction system for the synthesis of uniformly-sized nanoparticles. The ROF mixing system uses highly advective flow regions to achieve high quality mixing over short mixing lengths. The mixing system is further enhanced by sinusoidal inlet flow conditions which create plugs having reduced diffusional lengths. Flow conditions leading to plug creation were found to be chiefly responsible for shorter mixing times. Residence time distributions (of simulated inert particles) were found to decrease with increasing pump displacement. It is expected that these conditions will lead to smaller particle size distributions. Mixing quality and residence time distribution are not captured well by Reynolds or Strouhal numbers; however the maximum inlet Reynolds number does correlate well with mixing time trends. Implications for flow conditions are discussed.Copyright © 2011 by ASME
Wiener's Polynomial Chaos for the Analysis and Control of Nonlinear Dynamical Systems with Probabilistic Uncertainties [Historical Perspectives]

One purpose of the "Historical Perspectives" column is to look back at work done by pioneers in control and related fields that has been neglected for many years but was later revived in the control literature. This column discusses the topic of Norbert Wiener's most cited paper, which proposed polynomial chaos expansions (PCEs) as a method for probabilistic uncertainty quantification in nonlinear dynamical systems. PCEs were almost completely ignored until the turn of the new millennium, when they rather suddenly attracted a huge amount of interest in the noncontrol literature. Although the control engineering community has studied uncertain systems for decades, all but a handful of researchers in the systems and control community have ignored PCEs. The purpose of this column is to present a concise introduction to PCEs, provide an overview of the theory and applications of PCE methods in the control literature, and to consider the question of why PCEs have only recently appeared in the control literature.
Use of Synthetic Ground Covers to Control Weeds in Blackberries

Weed control in blackberries (Rubus spp.) is a serious problem for organic producers and those who wish to reduce their reliance on herbicides. Three landscape fabrics and one industrial grade white on black plastic were evaluated for weed control in conjuction with newly planted ‘Kiowa’ root cuttings in Feb. 2006 at a site near Monte Alto, Texas (26°N Lat.). In the no-fabric treatment, weeds were controlled mechanically by hand. The reflectant white plastic and weave weed barriers reduced mid-summer soil temperatures at 10 cm and reduced the magnitude in soil temperature fluctuation. Field plant vigor and plant height measured in 2007 (only) were improved by use of weed barriers. The time required for plot weed removal was shortest for white plastic and longest for bare soil. White plastic improved the average cumulative season yields in both years (6.46 t/ha) compared to yields from plants grown in bare soil (4.58 t/ha), P = 0.003, and also when contrasted against all other weed control methods (P = 0.0...
Testing and numerical modeling of hypervelocity impact damaged Space Station multilayer insulation

Results are presented of experiments measuring the degradation of the insulating capabilities of the multilayer insulation (MLI) of the Space Station Freedom, when subjected to hypervelocity impact damage. A simple numerical model was developed for use in an engineering design environment for quick assessment of thermal effect of the impact. The model was validated using results from thermal vacuum tests on MLI with simulated damage. The numerical model results agreed with experimental data.
The effect of men’s breadwinner status on their changing gender beliefs

I use longitudinal data from a national sample of married men with a panel design to examine men's changing beliefs about gender over a twelve-year period and the impact of men's breadwinner status on men's change in beliefs. The majority of the sample are white (including Hispanic origin), with 3. 7% African Americans and 1.2% other racial~ethnic groups. The data indicate a positive move of men toward egalitarianism over time with the younger men homing more egalitarian beliefs. Nevertheless, although that men tend to approve women's sharing of the provider role, some still maintain that homework primarily belongs to women and want to make more money than their spouses. The present study has found that the men with lower breadwinner status are more likely to hoM egalitarian beliefs. One of the major contributions of sociology in masculinity study in the past two decades is the advancement of the notion of social construction of gender. Instead of seeing gender as being innate or fixed, sociologists view it as an accomplishment achieved through interactional processes in
Auditory cortex phase locking to amplitude-modulated cochlear implant pulse trains

Cochlear implant speech processors transmit temporal features of sound as amplitude modulation of constant-rate electrical pulse trains. This study evaluated the central representation of amplitude...
Organization of flint sickle blade production at an early bronze age workshop in Anatolia

A specialized workshop for the manufacture of flint sickle blades has recently been excavated at the site of Titris Hoyuk in southeastern Anatolia [1]. This paper will examine the sequence of production for the blades as well as the social context of this craft within the site. The workshop is the first example found containing evidence of the complete sequence of production for the ‘Canaanean blade,’ a type commonly used across the Near East in this period [2]. Since bronze was still new and relatively expensive, high-quality flint was used to manufacture sickle blades. Tabular flint was imported in the form of large slabs from several sources in the nearby hills. Specialists then prepared the blade cores, removed the blades, and then traded the final products to local farmers. A range of manufacturing debris has been found to illustrate the production sequence, including chunks of raw flint, core-shaping pieces, debitage pits, and stacks of exhausted and used cores. The large sample of over 1000 blade cores collected ensures a sizable data set for statistical analyses. Several types of raw flint were utilized for making the blades and production appears to vary slightly by these material types. The workshop is located within a household setting and is the only area within the excavated site containing debris from this craft. Spatial analyses of the types of flint used within the household workshop reveal its division into largely distinct areas for domestic versus specialist craft activities. The placement of the workshop in the suburbs far from the site’s administrative center may indicate that its activities were independent of any elite. An estimate of the volume of blades produced combined with the location of the workshop at a major regional center suggest that it also supplied blades to other sites in the region.
Coupling of CO2 asymmetric stretching in dimers photogenerated within long-chain diacyl peroxide single crystals

Low-temperature photolysis of single crystals of long-chain diacyl peroxides produces long-lived aggregates of two alkyl radicals separated by two CO2 molecules. IR spectroscopy of asymmetric stretching modes in CO2 dimers formed within unlabeled and 13C-labeled crystals reveals intermolecular Davydov or resonant coupling of 0.5–9.0 cm−1 for three differently arranged pairs. Frequency and intensity patterns are in quantitative agreement with first-order perturbation theory.
Macromolecular synthesis in cells infected with herpes simplex virus.

A REPORT from this laboratory1 has shown that in HEp-2 cells infected with herpes simplex virus the incorporation of nucleosides into cellular DNA progressively decreases with time after infection. The purpose of this communication is to report on two other aspects of macromolecular synthesis, namely RNA and protein, in infected HEp-2 cells.
Molecular Cloning and Expression of ps20 Growth Inhibitor A NOVEL WAP-TYPE “FOUR-DISULFIDE CORE” DOMAIN PROTEIN EXPRESSED IN SMOOTH MUSCLE

Abstract We previously reported the purification of ps20 (Rowley, D. R., Dang, T. D., Larsen, M., Gerdes, M. J., McBride, L., and Lu, B. (1995) J. Biol. Chem.270, 22058–22065), a urogenital sinus mesenchymal cell secreted protein having growth-inhibitory properties. We report here cloning of the 1.03-kilobase rat ps20 cDNA clone from the PS-1 (adult rat prostate smooth muscle) cDNA library. Partial clones were obtained by nested polymerase chain reaction with degenerate primers, and full-length ps20 cDNA clones were isolated by plaque hybridization. Sequence analysis revealed that ps20 protein contains a WAP-type “four-disulfide core” motif and is a novel member of the WAP signature protein family composed primarily of secreted serine protease inhibitors. Native ps20 immunoprecipitated from smooth muscle cells and recombinant ps20 both resolved on SDS-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis with apparent molecular mass of 27–29 kDa under reducing conditions and 21–23 kDa under non-reducing conditions, respectively. Stable ps20-transfectant COS-7 cell lines secreted ps20 and were growth-inhibited relative to mock transfectants. In addition, COS-7 and prostate carcinoma PC-3 cells were growth-inhibited by bacterially expressed ps20. Northern analysis indicated differential expression by tissue with highest expression in the heart. Immunohistochemical localization of ps20 protein showed cell-specific expression by both visceral and vascular smooth muscle in all tissues, including the prostate gland. These results indicate ps20 is a novel growth-regulatory member of the WAP signature family expressed by smooth muscle cells.
Genetic heterogeneity in a natural population of Acanthamoeba polyphaga from soil, an isoenzyme analysis

Acanthamoeba polyphaga, a free-living, bacterial feeder found in freshwater and soil, reproduces asexually and is morphologicaly distinguishable from other acanthamoebae. Isoenzyme analyses were done on 15 random, clonal isolates from soil. Electrophoretic patterns indicated that enzyme bands occurred in clusters consistent with that of a diploid organism. The data indicates that natural populations of A. polyphaga have a greater genetic diversity than laboratory isolates of other amoebae, resembling the heterogeneity observed for natural populations of bacteria.
General theory of discrete Gabor expansion

We present a new and more general theory of discrete Gabor expansions for arbitrary dimensional spaces. We show that a discrete Gabor expansion is in fact a general frame decomposition. We provide a complete characterization of all possible discrete Gabor expansions. We reveal an intrinsic dimension invariance property of the (discrete) Gabor expansion. We derive a parametric algorithm for computing all analysis waveforms that are dimension independent. We shall also consider the issue of optimum Gabor expansion and the construction of non-separable 2D discrete Gabor expansions.© (1994) COPYRIGHT SPIE--The International Society for Optical Engineering. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.
Protective and vulnerability factors predicting new-onset depressive episode in a representative of U.S. adolescents.

Abstract Purpose Depressive episodes cause considerable morbidity and mortality in adolescents. We sought to identify factors predicting new onset depressive episode in a representative sample of U.S. adolescents. Methods We conducted logistic regression analyses to identify baseline individual, family, school/peer and community factors predicting new-onset depressive episode at a 1-year follow-up in a longitudinal cohort study of 4791 U.S. adolescents. Potential protective and vulnerability factors included individual (sociodemographics, general health and maturity, coping behavior, self-concept, and affect regulation), family (connectedness and conflict), school/peers (acceptance and performance), and community (engagement, delinquency, and adverse events). Results African American and Hispanic ethnicity, female gender, and low-income status predicted higher risk of onset of a depressive episode. Active coping and positive self-concept, predicted lower risk, whereas poor affect regulation and greater depressed mood predicted higher risk. Family “connectedness,” parental warmth, peer acceptance, better school performance, and religious activities were protective, whereas parental conflict, delinquent activities, and greater numbers of adverse events increased risk of depressive episodes. Conclusions Female gender, nonwhite ethnicity, low-income status, poor health, and parental conflict, increase risk of a depressive episode. Physicians should consider recommending behaviors that enhance perceived fitness, favorable self-concept, family connectedness, peer acceptance, and community engagement to youth as means a of mitigating this risk for developing a depressive episode.
Role of hydrophobic force in the thinning of foam films containing a nonionic surfactant

The thin film pressure balance (TFPB) technique was used to study the kinetics of film thinning at various concentrations of a non-ionic surfactant, methyl isobutyl carbinol (MIBC), in the presence of 0.1 M sodium chloride (NaCI). The experimental data were compared with the predictions from the Reynolds equation to determine the contributions from hydrophobic force to film thinning. Despite the high electrolyte concentration employed, the hydrophobic force was 15-90 times stronger than the van der Waals force over the MIBC concentrations investigated. It was found that the hydrophobic force decreased with increasing MIBC concentration, which corroborated well with the changes in film lifetime, foam lifetime, and the critical rupture thickness. On the other hand, both surface tension and film elasticity change little at low surfactant concentrations, particularly at the concentrations where the non-ionic surfactant is used for flotation. It is, therefore, suggested that at relatively low MIBC concentrations foams are destabilized by the hydrophobic force, which is dampened by the surfactant. (c) 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Explicitly constructed extensions of the rational function field with prescribed splitting

Given a finite set of places S, we provide techniques to explicitly construct extensions of the rational function field over a non-prime finite field of constants in which all places in S split completely. Our techniques do not rely on class field theory. We then explore connections to the theory of function fields with many rational places for their genus.
Identifying Attributes of High Quality Special Education Teachers

Using a nationally representative sample of 1,475 special education teachers, researchers used factor analysis to test five teacher quality factors with empirical and theoretical grounding in general education research: experience, credentials, self-efficacy, professional activities, and selected classroom prac- tices. These factors were combined to create an aggregate teacher quality measure. All five factors emerged as viable components of an aggregate teacher quality measure, although some modest factor loadings suggested a need for further research into the precise nature of these teacher quality dimensions and the best ways to measure them.
Incidence of surgical site infection associated with robotic surgery.

Objective.Robot-assisted surgery is minimally invasive and associated with less blood loss and shorter recovery time than open surgery. We aimed to determine the duration of robot-assisted surgical procedures and the incidence of postoperative surgical site infection (SSI) and to compare our data with the SSI incidence for open procedures according to national data.Design.Retrospective cohort study.Setting.A 689-bed academic medical center.Patients.All patients who underwent a surgical procedure with use of a robotic surgical system during the period from 2000-2007.Methods.SSIs were defined and procedure types were classified according to National Healthcare Safety Network criteria. National data for comparison were from 1992-2004. Because of small sample size, procedures were grouped according to surgical site or wound classification.Results.Sixteen SSIs developed after 273 robot-assisted procedures (5.9%). The mean surgical duration was 333.6 minutes. Patients who developed SSI had longer mean surgical duration than did patients who did not (558 vs 318 minutes; P<.001). The prostate and genitourinary group had 5.74 SSIs per 100 robot-assisted procedures (95% confidence interval [CI], 2.81–11.37), compared with 0.85 SSIs per 100 open procedures from national data. The gynecologic group had 10.00 SSIs per 100 procedures (95% CI, 2.79–30.10), compared with 1.72 SSIs per 100 open procedures. The colon and herniorrhaphy groups had 33.33 SSIs per 100 procedures (95% CI, 9.68–70.00) and 37.50 SSIs per 100 procedures (95% CI, 13.68–69.43), respectively, compared with 5.88 and 1.62 SSIs per 100 open procedures from national data. Patients with a clean-contaminated wound developed 6.1 SSIs per 100 procedures (95% CI, 3.5–10.3), compared with 2.59 SSIs per 100 open procedures. No significant differences in SSI rates were found for other groups.Conclusions.Increased incidence of SSI after some types of robot-assisted surgery compared with traditional open surgery may be related to the learning curve associated with use of the robot.
Facile fabrication of an interface for online coupling of microchip CE to surface plasmon resonance

Background: The aim was to develop a simple route to coupling microchip CE (MCE) to surface plasmon resonance (SPR). MCE is a microfluidic technology that utilizes microfabrication techniques to connect interacting fluid reservoirs. Its advantages include rapid analysis (typically seconds), easy integration of multiple analytical steps and parallel operation. SPR detects changes in refractive index within a short distance from the surface of a thin metal film as variations in light intensity reflected from the back of the film and, thus, does not require labeling. There is a great demand for developing hyphenated techniques like MCE–SPR that are fast, sensitive and inexpensive to analyze biological materials. Materials & Methods: The separation channel and flow cell exist as overlapping regions constructed during the microchip production and buffer solution was delivered mechanically. Such a design has successfully isolated the electrical field inherent in the MCE from the SPR detector. Consequently, the potential interference to the SPR signal (or modulation of the density of surface plasmons at the gold chip) is circumvented. Results: The limits of detection for bovine serum albumin and sodium fluorescein were determined to be 7.5 µM and 3.1 mM, respectively. Conclusion: The technique described, herein, has been successfully applied in the separation of two species. The method offers the advantages of a near zero connection dead volume, electrical shielding from the separation voltage and minimization of the mass transfer effect.
Children's understanding of physical possibility constrains their belief in Santa Claus

Abstract What role does children's understanding of physical possibility play in their acceptance of adults’ testimony about Santa? This question was addressed by comparing children's ability to differentiate events that do and do not violate physical laws to their skepticism toward Santa. Children aged 3–9 (n = 47) were asked (a) to generate information-seeking questions for Santa in a letter-writing task, (b) to explain how Santa accomplishes some of the feats he is purported to accomplish, and (c) to assess the possibility of various physically extraordinary events (unrelated to Santa), some possible and some impossible. Children who were better at differentiating possible events from impossible events had also begun to engage with the mythology surrounding Santa at a conceptual level, questioning the feasibility of Santa's extraordinary activities while also positing provisional explanations for those activities in the absence of a known answer. These findings suggest that children's acceptance of testimony about Santa – and possibly other forms of counterintuitive testimony – depends not only on the testimony they receive but also on the child's own understanding of physical possibility.
The Female Register: An Empirical Study of Lakoff's Hypotheses.

Sociolinguists (e.g. Swacker 1975) and anthropologists (e.g. Hall 1959) are increasingly aware of the fact that sex, like social class or subcultural group, is a variable which strongly affects speech (Thorne & Henley 1975). While sexexclusive differentiation (i.e. separate male and female languages) now appears to be an almost nonexistent phenomenon, sex-preferred differentiation seems to be widespread across a number of languages and language families (Bodine 1975). In particular, recent studies indicate that syntax (Labov 1966), intonation (Brend 1972), and pronunciation(Trudgill 1972) in spoken English all vary as a function of the sex of the speaker.
Rapgef2 Connects GPCR-Mediated cAMP Signals to ERK Activation in Neuronal and Endocrine Cells

G protein (heterotrimeric guanine nucleotide–binding protein)–coupled receptor (GPCR)–mediated increases in the second messenger cyclic adenosine monophosphate (cAMP) activate the mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) extracellular signal–regulated kinase (ERK), and in neuroendocrine cells, this pathway leads to cAMP-dependent neuritogenesis mediated through Rap1 and B-Raf. We found that the Rap guanine nucleotide exchange factor Rapgef2 was enriched from primary bovine neuroendocrine cells by cAMP-agarose affinity chromatography and that it was specifically eluted by cAMP. With loss-of-function experiments in the rat neuronal cell line Neuroscreen-1 (NS-1) and gain-of-function experiments in human embryonic kidney 293T cells, we demonstrated that Rapgef2 connected GPCR-dependent activation of adenylate cyclase and increased cAMP concentration with the activation of ERK in neurons and endocrine cells. Furthermore, knockdown of Rapgef2 blocked cAMP- and ERK-dependent neuritogenesis. Our data are consistent with a pathway involving the cAMP-mediated activation of Rapgef2, which then stimulates Rap1, leading to increases in B-Raf, MEK, and ERK activity.
Contribution to the theory of positive muon diffusion in metals at low temperature

We study the temperature dependence of theμ+ diffusion in a metal within the small polaron theory. The geometry of the strain field due to an impurity is shown to strongly influence theμ+ diffusion properties. We reanalyzed part of the Al data.
Ethical School Leadership: Defining the Best Interests of Students

This article explores the alternate ways ethical school leadership in the best interests of students is conceptualized in the educational leadership literature from several foundational perspectives including philosophy, psychology, critical theory and case law. Perspectives which are grounded solely in theory are differentiated from those grounded in research and practical field applications. An argument is made for the merits of applying multiple ethical perspectives. The findings of existing research on the valuation processes of school principals and their ethical leadership practices are also discussed with a particular focus on their explicit or implicit interpretations of the meaning of `best interests of students'. A genuine regard for student best interests emerges as a major influence on principal leadership practices in two ways: principal valuation processes are heavily oriented towards rational consequentialist orientations; the best interests of students figures prominently as a meta-organiz...
A defect tolerant self-organizing nanoscale SIMD architecture

The continual decrease in transistor size (through either scaled CMOS or emerging nano-technologies) promises to usher in an era of tera to peta-scale integration. However, this decrease in size is also likely to increase defect densities, contributing to the exponentially increasing cost of top-down lithography. Bottom-up manufacturing techniques, like self assembly, may provide a viable lower-cost alternative to top-down lithography, but may also be prone to higher defects. Therefore, regardless of fabrication methodology, defect tolerant architectures are necessary to exploit the full potential of future increased device densities.This paper explores a defect tolerant SIMD architecture. A key feature of our design is the ability of a large number of limited capability nodes with high defect rates (up to 30%) to self-organize into a set of SIMD processing elements. Despite node simplicity and high defect rates, we show that by supporting the familiar data parallel programming model the architecture can execute a variety of programs. The architecture efficiently exploits a large number of nodes and higher device densities to keep device switching speeds and power density low. On a medium sized system (~1cm2 area), the performance of the proposed architecture on our data parallel programs matches or exceeds the performance of an aggressively scaled out-of-order processor (128-wide, 8k reorder buffer, perfect memory system). For larger systems (>1cm2), the proposed architecture can match the performance of a chip multiprocessor with 16 aggressively scaled out-of-order cores.
D-Glucose Modulates Intestinal Niemann-Pick C1 Like 1 (NPC1L1) Gene Expression via Transcriptional Regulation

The expression of intestinal Niemann-Pick C1-like 1 (NPC1L1) cholesterol transporter has been shown to be elevated in patients with diseases associated with hypercholesterolemia such as diabetes me...
Role of CD8+ and CD8- Cytolytic Effectors in IL2 Reversal of Cyclosporin-Inhibited EBV-B-Cell Cytotoxicity

Organ transplant recipients treated with the immunosuppress-ive drug Cyclosporin A (CsA) are at increased risk for reactivation infection with Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) and development of EBV+ malignant lymphoma (1). Under normal circumstances suppressor/cytotoxic T cells are activated in cultures containing proliferating EBV-infected B cells (EBV-B) which limit their growth in a process termed regression (2). Inhibition of regression by CsA can be overcome by interleukin 2 (IL2) (3). We have recently shown that CsA acts by blocking both T and NK cell cytotoxicity and that recombinant IL2 restores both forms of cytotoxicity (4). We now present data defining the effector phenotypes responsible for EBV-B cytotoxicity, their sensitivity to CsA, and response to recombinant IL2 and gamma-interferon. Peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBM) from 5 EBV seropositive healthy adults(KT,NF,FF, EZ,JEM) were exposed to B95–8 EBV and cultured for 3–21 days in the presence or absence of 400 ng/ml CsA and recombinant lymphokines IL2 500 u/ml or gamma-interferon(IFN) 100 u/ml. At various times B cell depleted cells were used as cytolytic effectors against51 chromium-labelied autologous EBV-B.
Functional and Aesthetic Information Needs Underlying The Pleasure Travel Experience

Consumer information acquisition has largely focused on decision-making or functional needs. Recently, a set of complementary information needs (i.e., hedonic, aesthetic, and social) have been introduced I the consumer behavior literature. This study examines functional and aesthetic information needs in a tourism consumption context, specifically pre-trip information needs are shown to be at the core of information acquisition with product knowledge, aesthetic imagery and planning efficiency needs at the “periphery.” Suggestions for destination marketing communication strategies and future research are presented.