cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
The Impact of Mergers on Performance in the US Telecommunications Industry, 1988 to 2001

Mergers and acquisitions in the Telecommunications industry have become a distinctive trend of the U.S. economy, with steady consolidation of carriers to head off or take on the competition. While the wealth effects of mergers have been extensively analyzed in prior literature, previous studies fail to correctly relate the causes of such phenomena to ex-post performance. This study elaborates on the consequences of mergers and acquisitions in the telecommunications industry using statistics of communications common carriers for the period 1988 to 2001. Using a dynamic panel data analysis estimation technique - Arellano-Bond (1991) estimation -, which outperforms the event studies methodology used predominantly in prior research, we examine the synergistic effects and success factors of mergers over time with an exhaustive set of financial, operational and technological performance measures that capture profitability, growth, efficiency, productivity, economies of scale and scope, and technology progressiveness. We control for critical periods that constitute structural shift in telecommunications merger and acquisitions activity, and account for many mergers with huge welfare implications. The results of this study will serve to project the future structure of the telecommunications industry. We find significant evidence that mergers are followed by substantial deterioration in profitability and operational performance, in addition to a significant decrease in the investment on new technology.
Ventilatory stability to transient CO2 disturbances in hyperoxia and normoxia in awake humans

Lai, Jie, and Eugene N. Bruce. Ventilatory stability to transient CO2 disturbances in hyperoxia and normoxia in awake humans. J. Appl. Physiol. 83(2): 466–476, 1997.—Modarreszadeh and Bruce (J. App...
Impairment of the Birth Mechanism Due to Hormones from the Anterior Hypophysis.

It has been shown in this laboratory1 that the administration of the hypophyseal growth hormone (alkaline extracts of bovine hypophysis) during the last week of pregnancy in some way injures the birth mechanism. Treatment is stopped on day 21. There is then a characteristic prolongation of pregnancy of from 2 to 3 days, with final birth of dead or living foetuses. There are also instances of complete failure even to give birth to dead foetuses and of the consequent resorption of the latter. The effect has been shown to be due in all probability to changes which the treatment provokes in the ovaries of the pregnant animal, more especially to the formation of fresh lutein tissue there.2Now another hormone of the anterior hypophysis, one of the outstanding characteristics of which is the production of precocious maturity in young female rodents, strangely enough, in addition to its marked stimulation of the follicular apparatus also causes the luteinization of follicle walls, a point strongly emphasized by Z...
Low-Coverage Laser Desorption of Ions on Chlorinated Copper Surfaces

Experiments were performed to investigate the pulsed excimer laser etching of a chlorinated copper substrate. Time-of-flight mass spectrometric techniques were employed to characterize the mass and velocity distributions of both neutral and ionic species that desorb at laser fluences less than that required to melt bulk Cu or CuCl substrates. The presence of positively charged ions in this work is examined in terms of both photon and electron mediated desorption mechanisms.
Rearing the Carpenterworm, Prionoxystus robiniae, in the Forest (Lepidoptera: Cossidae)

A very successful method has been developed for rearing experimental quantities of the carpenterworm, Prionoxystus robiniae Peck, on natural hosts in the forest. It is based upon studies at Stoneville, Miss., with about 1300 caged insects on 50 trees.
Key considerations in assessing young children’s emotional competence

AbstractRecent years have witnessed a surge in evidence on preschoolers’ emotional development as crucial for both concurrent and later well-being and mental health, and for learning and academic success. Given the importance of building such strengths, assessing emotional competence skills is important to aid early childhood educators in focusing programming for individuals and classrooms. Based on these assertions, this article is structured as follows: (1) outline important issues regarding developmentally appropriate early childhood assessment, particularly of emotional competence; (2) discuss use of culturally relevant standards of attainment of such skills in assessing student progress; (3) define the skills of emotional competence; (4) describe a model leading from developmentally appropriate emotional competence skills to assessment and programming; (5) suggest some possible tools for schools to use in assessing emotional competence of young children; (6) give guidance for new measurement developm...
THE MECHANISM AND THE EVALUATION METHOD OF PILLING TENDENCY

For the purpose of improvement of pilling tendency of acritic fiber, many studies have been reported. However they seem not to be successful due to poor testing method at the stage of staple fiber. In this work the new pill-testing method of staple fiber (SF-pill-test) is proposed as a useful technique to estimate the pilling tendency of woven and knitted fabrics.If pill formation and wearing-off process proceeds as shown below, theoretical equation may be introduced.k1: rate constant of pill formationk2: rate constant of pill wearing-offBy application of the data from SF-pill-test to the equation, k2 and HWT can be calculated. Improvement of pilling tendency will be expected from larger k2 and smaller HWT.
A Monté Carlo Comparison of Estimators for the Multinomial Logit Model

Marketing researchers use the multinomial logit (MNL) model to analyze discrete choice, and estimate parameters either by maximum likelihood (ML) or minimum logit chi square (MLCS). Some controvers...
An Analysis of 404 Cases of Child Adverse Drug Reactions

Objective:To study the occurrence of children adverse drug reactions(ADR) in our hospital and its relevant factors in order to improve the rational drug use in the clinic practice.Methods:Four hundred and four ADR cases collected in our hospital during 2007~2009 were categorized and a statistical analysis was performed.Results:Two hundred and seventy-five males took the majority of the total 404 ADR cases(68.1%),and only 129 cases(31.9%) were female.Three hundred and twenty-seven cases(80.9%) were induced by chemical drugs,and the other 77 cases(19.1%) were induced by traditional Chinese drugs.Most of the 404 ADR cases were induced by intravenous injection,which occupied 89.4%(361 cases).Antimicrobial drugs were the first category of drugs to cause ADR,for 274 cases(67.8%) were induced by 41 antimicrobials.ADR most commonly manifested themselves in the injury of skin and its appendants,which accounted for 61.6%(249 cases).Conclusions:Male cases account for the majority of ADR in children.The occurrence of ADR was related to many factors,such as administration route and drug varieties.Strictly monitoring and promoting of ADR knowledge could reduce and avoid the occurrence of ADR.
Claudia Jones speaks to “half the world”: gendering Cold War politics in the Daily Worker, 1950–1953

AbstractAs feminist scholarship has illustrated, historical resurgences of global migration raise questions about the intersections between war politics, persecution of activists, and its gendered implications. Informed by a new historicist approach, this article seeks to contextualize contemporary scholarly conversations on journalism, migration, and feminist studies by conducting a historical analysis of a bi-weekly column entitled “Half the World.” This column was published in the Daily Worker and was written by little-known Caribbean activist and journalist Claudia Jones. A close reading of all printed columns between 1950 and 1953 illustrate that despite Jones’ tendency to reinforce gendered dichotomies of war discourse, where women represented peace and men violence, she also placed women as the creators of a national and transnational movement against US intervention in Korea. Jones’ story, therefore, contributes to previous feminist histories on the role female journalists and activists have playe...
The British New Wave Screens Ireland: Desmond Davis’s The Girl with Green Eyes (1964)

The paradoxical truth, John Hill rightly observes, is that “Ireland has held a special place in the cinematic imagination, but its representation in film has, until relatively recently, been left to the British and American cinemas,” with overseas Irish communities frequently the focus and even supplying the filmmakers (Hill 1994, 3; and see the various essays in Barton 2009). One can even argue, as does Michael Patrick Gillespie, that the idea of an Irish cinema is more myth than reality, a concept lacking a “stable denotation” that is “more misleading than illuminating”; what Gillespie terms “Irish-themed” films have long been a feature of anglophone cinema, giving rise to complex, often compromised forms of representation, but Ireland itself for decades hardly offered much of a home to commercial filmmaking, never developing a consistently profitable and artistically successful production sector, while failing to nourish an urbane, engaged cinema culture (such as had appeared elsewhere throughout Europe by the end of the 1920s), which might have become an intellectual engine driving industrial change (xi; see Pettitt Chaps. 1–6 for full details).
Evaluation of an asymmetric stent patch design for a patient specific intracranial aneurysm using computational fluid dynamic (CFD) calculations in the computed tomography (CT) derived lumen

Stenting may provide a new, less invasive therapeutic option for cerebral aneurysms. However, a conventional porous stent may be insufficient in modifying the blood flow for clinical aneurysms. We designed an asymmetric stent consisting of a low porosity patch welded onto a porous stent for an anterior cerebral artery aneurysm of a specific patient geometry to block the strong inflow jet. To evaluate the effect of the patch on aneurysmal flow dynamics, we "virtually" implanted it into the patient's aneurysm geometry and performed Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) analysis. The patch was computationally deformed to fit into the vessel lumen segmented from the patient CT reconstructions. After the flow calculations, a patch with the same design was fabricated using laser cutting techniques and welded onto a commercial porous stent, creating a patient-specific asymmetric stent. This stent was implanted into a phantom, which was imaged with X-ray angiography. The hemodynamics of untreated and stented aneurysms were compared both computationally and experimentally. It was found from CFD of the patient aneurysm that the asymmetric stent effectively blocked the strong inflow jet into the aneurysm and eliminated the flow impingement on the aneurysm wall at the dome. The impact zone with elevated wall shear stress was eliminated, the aneurysmal flow activity was substantially reduced, and the flow was considerably reduced. Experimental observations corresponded well qualitatively with the CFD results. The demonstrated asymmetric stent could lead to a new minimally invasive image guided intervention to reduce aneurysm growth and rupture.
A 65-nm CMOS Wideband TDD Front-End With Integrated T/R Switching via PA Re-Use

Time-division duplex (TDD) systems rely on off-chip transmit/receive (T/R) switches to isolate the RX from the high-output power of the TX, while existing on-chip T/R switching solutions are narrow-band or high loss. This paper presents a wideband integrated T/R switching technique that eliminates the conventional, lossy series T/R switch from the signal path. The system reconfigures the PA as an LNA during the receive mode, and utilizes only DC mode control switches to enable TDD co-existence. To demonstrate this technique, a polar transmitter that can be re-purposed into a common-gate LNA is implemented in 65-nm CMOS. With an integrated front-end balun transformer, the transmitter achieves 20-dBm peak output power with 32.7% peak drain efficiency. In the receive mode, the PA is reconfigured into a wideband 3.4–5.4-GHz LNA achieving −6.7-dBm P1dB, and 5.1-dB noise figure.
Systematic analysis of atx-2 suppressors reveals a novel regulator of PAR-5/14-3-3sigma function during mitosis in Caenorhabditis elegans

RNA regulation plays a critical role in mitosis, yet the mechanisms remain unclear. Our lab recently identified that the conserved RNA-Binding Protein (RBP), ATX-2, regulates cytokinesis by regulating the targeting of ZEN-4 to the spindle midzone through a conserved translation regulator, PAR-5/14-3-3sigma (Gnazzo et al., 2016). While co-depletion of ATX-2 and PAR-5 restored ZEN-4 targeting to the spindle midzone, it did not rescue cell division. To identify factors that may work in concert with ATX-2 to regulate cell division, we conducted a two-part, candidate RNAi suppressor and visual screen to identify factors that are important for cell division and also mediate the targeting of ATX-2 to the centrosomes and the spindle midzone. Using this approach, we identified ten genes that suppress the embryonic lethality defect observed in atx-2 mutant embryos. These ten genes, including act-2, cgh-1, cki-1, hum-6, par-2, rnp-4, vab-3, vhl-1, vps-24, and wve-1, all have some role regulating RNA or the cell cycle. Five of these genes (cgh-1, cki-1, vab-3, vhl-1, vps-24) fail to target ATX-2 to the centrosomes and midzone when depleted. The strongest suppressor of the atx-2 phenotype is the DEAD-box RNA helicase CGH-1/DDX6, which has been implicated in cell division, RNA processing and translation, and neuronal function. Loss of CGH-1 rescued the cytokinesis defect and also restored ZEN-4 localization to the spindle midzone. ATX-2 and CGH-1 are mutually required for their localization to centrosomes and the spindle midzone. Our findings provide the first functional evidence that CGH-1/DDX6 regulates ATX-2 function during mitosis to target ZEN-4 to the spindle midzone via PAR-5/14-3-3sigma. We suggest that RNA machinery is necessary for the completion of cytokinesis.
Data mining based on random forest model to predict the California ISO day-ahead market prices

In this paper, an ensemble learning model, namely the random forest (RF) model, is used to predict both the exact values as well as the class labels of 24 hourly prices in the California Independent System Operator (CAISO)'s day-ahead electricity market. The focus is on predicting the prices for the Pacific Gas and Company (PG&E) default load aggregation point (DLAP). Several effective features, such as the historical hourly prices at different locations, calender data, and new ancillary service requirements are engineered and the model is trained in order to capture the best relations between the features and the target electricity price variables. Insightful case studies are implemented on the CAISO market data from January 1, 2014 to February 28, 2016. It is observed that the proposed data mining approach provides promising results in both predicting the exact value and in classifying the prices as low, medium and high.
Whiteboard Video Summarization via Spatio-Temporal Conflict Minimization

Lecture videos are a valuable resource for students, and thanks to online sources they have become widely available. The ability to find videos based on their content could make them even more useful. Methods for automatic extraction of this content reduce the amount of manual effort required to make indexing and retrieval of such videos possible. We present a method that generates static image summaries of handwritten whiteboard content from lecture videos recorded with still cameras. We generate a spatio-temporal index for the handwritten content in the video, and we use it for temporal segmentation by detecting and removing conflicts between content regions. Resulting segments are used to produce key-frame based summaries. Our method has been tested on a video collection showing promising results for automatic lecture video summarization with good compression ratios and 96.28% recall of connected components in test videos.
A technique for accurate characterization of adhesion between incompatible polymers

Abstract This paper describes an application of the blister test to the measurement of fracture energies, Ga, of incompatible polymer interfaces. In this test a fluid is injected at constant rate at the interface between a solid substrate and a thin flexible coating to create a “blister”. The fluid pressure and blister geometry are measured as functions of time. An energy balance analysis gives three independent methods for the calculation of Ga from the data. The technique is applied to the system polyisoprene(NR)/poly(methyl-methacrylate)(PMMA). With the use of a sequential debonding procedure, the test is found to be very sensitive and reproducible; it allows the accurate determination of small adhesion energies (on the order of 1.0 N/m) inaccessible in conventional peel tests, to within a few % relative error. The self-consistency of Ga calculated by the three independent methods indicates that adhesion energies can be calculated reliably from pressure data alone, without measuring the blister geometry. Using this method, we report a preliminary study of the effects on Ga of annealing for the NR/PMMA system.
Fifty Years of Studying Economics

I have studied economics for more than 50 years and have always considered myself an econometrician in the original sense of econometrics, as “The use of mathematical and statistical methods to quantify the laws of economics.” Over this time, I have, inter alia, estimated huge numbers of demand equations for the purpose of acquiring estimates of price and income elasticities, played around with nonleast-squares methods of estimation, puzzled over what capital is and how money comes into being, and thought long and hard about how one might ground the theory of consumer choice in the neurosciences.
Afterword: Archaeologies of Movement

Movement—the mobile intersection of the time-space continuum—has been a perennial topic in archaeology in the form of diffusion theory, culture histories of migration (of both pots and people, sometimes together), and accounts of settlement patterns. “Circulation” and “global/local flows” have been central themes in anthropology in recent years (“circulations” was the theme of the 2010 American Anthropological Association meeting in New Orleans). The stage was set for this interest by Wallerstein’s world systems theory (e.g., 1980) and the stimulation of globalization studies by Appadurai (1986) and others in the 1980s. But the scale of these “systemic” studies was mammoth, their concerns structural, and the phenomena highly impersonal, such as how cloth made in India responded to British demand and ended up in the far-flung shops of the Empire. Cloth travelled by itself and moved by the faceless forces of an ineluctable capitalism. These studies sought to trace a circulation system as mappable as the veins and arteries of a mammalian body.
Putative nuclease-sensitive control element in unfertilized eggs of the sea urchin Lytechinus pictus

Abstract Very limited nuclease-treatment of actively translating lysates from unfertilized eggs of the sea urchin Lytechinus pictus results in activation of the lysates. This activation is reflected by the ability of the nuclease-treated (or ‘nuclease-activated’) lysates to more efficiently utilize exogenous added RNAs. The activation may be reversed by adding small aliquots of untreated lysate to the nuclease-activated lysates. These results suggest that a nuclease-sensitive negative control element may be involved in the translational repression of unfertilized eggs, and that a deactivation of this control element is partially responsible for the dramatic activation of protein synthesis following fertilization in sea urchin eggs.
Cardiac ageing: extrinsic and intrinsic factors in cellular renewal and senescence

Cardiac ageing manifests as a decline in function leading to heart failure. At the cellular level, ageing entails decreased replicative capacity and dysregulation of cellular processes in myocardial and nonmyocyte cells. Various extrinsic parameters, such as lifestyle and environment, integrate important signalling pathways, such as those involving inflammation and oxidative stress, with intrinsic molecular mechanisms underlying resistance versus progression to cellular senescence. Mitigation of cardiac functional decline in an ageing organism requires the activation of enhanced maintenance and reparative capacity, thereby overcoming inherent endogenous limitations to retaining a youthful phenotype. Deciphering the molecular mechanisms underlying dysregulation of cellular function and renewal reveals potential interventional targets to attenuate degenerative processes at the cellular and systemic levels to improve quality of life for our ageing population. In this Review, we discuss the roles of extrinsic and intrinsic factors in cardiac ageing. Animal models of cardiac ageing are summarized, followed by an overview of the current and possible future treatments to mitigate the deleterious effects of cardiac ageing.
Higher-order temporal integration for the incompressible Navier–Stokes equations in bounded domains

Author(s): Minion, ML; Saye, RI | Abstract: This paper compares and contrasts higher-order, semi-implicit temporal integration strategies for the incompressible Navier–Stokes methods based on spectral deferred corrections applied to certain gauge or auxiliary variable formulations of the equations. Particular focus is placed on the imposition of boundary conditions in the semi-implicit formulation, the accurate treatment of the pressure term, and the smoothness of the numerical solution for different formulations. The main result presented here is the formulation and numerical validation of a single-step, semi-implicit method called spectral deferred pressure corrections, which can in theory obtain arbitrary formal order of accuracy in time. Numerical results demonstrate up to eighth-order accuracy, scenarios where optimal temporal accuracy is attained, and scenarios where order reduction is observed due to time-dependent boundary conditions.
Applications of Multivariate Normal Bayesian Models in Nuclear Engineering

AbstractA general Bayesian framework for best-estimate plus uncertainty predictions of multidimensional continuous observables is presented. Parameterizing uncertainties in terms of multivariate no...
Air-Based Cooling in High Porosity, Aluminum Foams for Compact Electronics Cooling

An experimental study was carried out to evaluate heat transfer and pressure drop performance of high porosity (93%) aluminum foams with pore densities 5 pores per inch (PPI), 20 PPI and 40 PPI. Tests were run with air as the working fluid in a rectangular channel of aspect ratio 8:3. The metal foam samples were 50.8 mm ( $W$ ), 20 mm ( $H$ ) and 254 mm ( $L$ ). A smooth channel without metal foam was tested to establish baseline performance curves. Studies were undertaken to investigate the distribution of local Nusselt number along the streamwise direction as a function of metal foam pore density. All foam samples exhibited short thermal developing length of $x/D_{h}\sim 4.2$ after which the heat transfer converged to almost constant value. As expected, heat transfer performance improved with increase in foam pore density, however, accompanied by higher pressure drop. For a given pumping power, the 40 PPI foam sample showed the highest heat transfer performance. Heat transfer with the 40 PPI foam was found to be 27.5 higher than the baseline smooth surface. Metal foams showed excellent promise in high heat flux cooling applications like electronics cooling.
The Implement of Reciting and Turn-Page in Making Multi-Media Software

The principle and methods of realizing multi-text reciting line by line, auto or non-auto turn-page, and reciting from any line clicked with using SyncPoint( ) SyncWaif( ) and WavePlay( ) functions etc. is introduced in this paper. It was successfully applied to making Mid - old Age Health Protection Handbook CD software
Biomarkers and surrogate endpoints in kidney disease

Kidney disease and its related comorbidities impose a large public health burden. Despite this, the number of clinical trials in nephrology lags behind many other fields. An important factor contributing to the relatively slow pace of nephrology trials is that existing clinical endpoints have significant limitations. “Hard” endpoints for chronic kidney disease, such as progression to end-stage renal disease, may not be reached for decades. Traditional biomarkers, such as serum creatinine in acute kidney injury, may lack sensitivity and predictive value. Finding new biomarkers to serve as surrogate endpoints is therefore an important priority in kidney disease research and may help to accelerate nephrology clinical trials. In this paper, I first review key concepts related to the selection of clinical trial endpoints and discuss statistical and regulatory considerations related to the evaluation of biomarkers as surrogate endpoints. This is followed by a discussion of the challenges and opportunities in developing novel biomarkers and surrogate endpoints in three major areas of nephrology research: acute kidney injury, chronic kidney disease, and autosomal dominant polycystic kidney disease.
Parametric optimization for enhanced sensitivity in a colorimetric chemical sensory

Big Data processing tools have become increasingly powerful and have been applied to the area of personal chemical monitoring by companies such as Plume Labs and Rubix, requiring low-cost, capable sensors. The ubiquity of cell phone imagers has allowed for a revisiting of colorimetry as a viable chemical detection method. There has been a great deal of effort put into making colorimetric sensor arrays that can discriminate between a variety of analytes, but mainly in a qualitative sense with limited discussion regarding improving the performance of the sensor as a whole. However, these imaging devices have inherent limitations on their ultimate sensitivity. Other sensor configurations are being evaluated that can greatly enhance the sensitivity to a color change. Dye development continues in an effort to increase the specificity of the sensing event using currently available readout mechanisms, but what has been lacking has been a critical analysis of the readout mechanism for these molecular transducers. This work takes a quantitative approach to encourage a more rational design of colorimetric sensors with specific targets.
Sacubitril/Valsartan Improves Left Ventricular Function in Chronic Pressure Overload Independent of Intact Cyclic Guanosine Monophosphate-dependent Protein Kinase I Alpha Signaling.

Abstract Background Combined angiotensin receptor/neprilysin inhibition with sacubitril/valsartan (Sac/Val) has emerged as a therapy for heart failure. The presumed mechanism of benefit is through prevention of natriuretic peptide degradation, leading to increased cyclic guanosine monophosphate (cGMP)-dependent protein kinase (PKG) signaling. However, the specific requirement of PKG for Sac/Val effects remains untested. Methods and Results We examined Sac/Val treatment in mice with mutation of the cGMP-dependent protein kinase I (PKGI)α leucine zipper domain, which is required for cGMP-PKGIα antiremodeling actions in vivo. Wild-type (WT) or PKG leucine zipper mutant (LZM) mice were exposed to 56-day left ventricular (LV) pressure overload by moderate (26G) transaortic constriction (TAC). At day 14 after TAC, mice were randomized to vehicle or Sac/Val by oral gavage. TAC induced the same degree of LV pressure overload in WT and LZM mice, which was not affected by Sac/Val. Although LZM mice, but not WT, developed LV dilation after TAC, Sac/Val improved cardiac hypertrophy and LV fractional shortening to the same degree in both the WT and LZM TAC mice. Conclusion These findings indicate the beneficial effects of Sac/Val on LV structure and function in moderate pressure overload. The unexpected finding that PKGIα mutation does not abolish the Sac/Val effects on cardiac hypertrophy and on LV function suggests that signaling other than natriuretic peptide– cGMP–PKG mediates the therapeutic benefits of neprilysin inhibition in heart failure.
Evolving Paradigms in the Pathogenesis and Management of Periodontitis

The premise for periodontal therapy is to control deregulated immune response and dysbiotic microbiome to sustain a balanced tissue homeostasis and achieve regeneration of the lost tissues. Over the years, our understanding of the pathogenesis of periodontitis changed from one being an infectious disease of solely bacterial origin to the one being a non-resolving inflammatory process to a diverse group of dysbiotic microbial species which is driven by genetic, environmental, local, and systemic factors. This paradigm shift from infectious to inflammatory diseases combined with rising concerns for antibiotic resistance worldwide changed the philosophy of periodontal patient management from one treatment for all approach and fostered research to identify more individualized strategies to control the inflammatory component of the disease either through targeting host immune response and/or modulating microbiome. Similarly, considerable progress has been made in periodontal regenerative medicine through promising research on protein and cell-based therapies, 3D printing, and laser therapy. Clinicians and researchers are now facing a new challenge as the increased lifespan and the growing number of implant-supported restorations change the clinical landscape which demands more investigations toward understanding the physiology of aging and defining the pathogenesis and risk for implant diseases. The era of “precision periodontics” will include personalized strategies for the prevention of periodontal and peri-implant diseases and tailored therapies toward individuals’ unique biology and risk profiles, which will take into consideration many elements in clinical decision making including changes in microbiome, genetic and epigenetic factors, environmental and systemic perturbations, and lifestyle preferences.
Interiors, Affect, and Use: How Does an Academic Library’s Learning Commons Support Students’ Needs?

Abstract Objective – This study sought to identify the learning needs, satisfaction levels, and preferences of students using an academic library’s learning commons. A particular focus was understanding whether the socio-collaborative environment facilitated by the learning commons was aligned with the institutional objectives of supporting intensive study and scholarly work. Methods – A mixed methods sequential explanatory study design was used, in which quantitative findings were supplemented by qualitative findings. Data for the study were drawn from 59 hours of observations documenting behaviors of 9,249 individuals, as well as survey responses from 302 students. Three semi-structured focus groups with 10 students were held to discuss and clarify findings. Results – Behavior mapping and survey data showed that students were largely satisfied with the learning commons and that it was considered a supportive environment for them to complete their stated tasks. Incongruity was observed between the learning commons’ intended and actual use; although 75% of spaces were designated for collaboration, 50% of survey respondents identified independent work as their primary task and 76% of individuals were observed working independently. In focus group discussions, students praised the space for its vibrant ambiance and facilitation of social connections, but acknowledged that more serious study required retreat into quieter spaces found elsewhere in the library. Conclusion – The learning commons is an important and desirable space for students, providing a safe and community-oriented environment that is located in the center of campus. While students deemed the atmosphere successful for fostering social relationships and creating an overall sense of belonging, care needs to be taken to maintain a proper balance between quiet and collaborative spaces. The methods used in this study underscore the importance of gathering data from multiple sources, offering guidance to other libraries seeking to create, re-envision, and assess their learning spaces.
General and own-species attentional face biases

Humans demonstrate enhanced processing of human faces compared with animal faces, known as own-species bias. This bias is important for identifying people who may cause harm, as well as for recognizing friends and kin. However, growing evidence also indicates a more general face bias. Faces have high evolutionary importance beyond conspecific interactions, as they aid in detecting predators and prey. Few studies have explored the interaction of these biases together. In three experiments, we explored processing of human and animal faces, compared with each other and to nonface objects, which allowed us to examine both own-species and broader face biases. We used a dot-probe paradigm to examine human adults' covert attentional biases for task-irrelevant human faces, animal faces, and objects. We replicated the own-species attentional bias for human faces relative to animal faces. We also found an attentional bias for animal faces relative to objects, consistent with the proposal that faces broadly receive privileged processing. Our findings suggest that humans may be attracted to a broad class of faces. Further, we found that while participants rapidly attended to human faces across all cue display durations, they attended to animal faces only when they had sufficient time to process them. Our findings reveal that the dot-probe paradigm is sensitive for capturing both own-species and more general face biases, and that each has a different attentional signature, possibly reflecting their unique but overlapping evolutionary importance.
Lack of dynamic balance between vesicle transport and microtubule growth in neurite outgrowth enables formation of dystrophic bulbs

Whole cell responses involve multiple subcellular processes (SCPs). To understand how balance between SCPs controls the dynamics of whole cell responses we studied neurite outgrowth in rat primary cortical neurons in culture. We used a combination of dynamical models and experiments to understand the conditions that permitted growth at a specified velocity and when aberrant growth could lead to the formation of dystrophic bulbs. We hypothesized that dystrophic bulb formation is due to quantitative imbalances between SCPs. Simulations predict redundancies between lower level sibling SCPs within each type of high level SCP. In contrast, higher level SCPs, such as vesicle transport and exocytosis or microtubule growth characteristic of each type need to be strictly coordinated with each other and imbalances result in stalling of neurite outgrowth. From these simulations, we predicted the effect of changing the activities of SCPs involved in vesicle exocytosis or microtubule growth could lead to formation of dystrophic bulbs. siRNA ablation experiments verified these predictions. We conclude that whole cell dynamics requires balance between the higher-level SCPs involved and imbalances can terminate whole cell responses such as neurite outgrowth.
Neurovascular venous anatomy: Brain, head, and neck

Abstract The venous anatomy of the brain, head, and neck is essential to endovascular diagnosis and therapy. This chapter provides an overview of the venous system.
Shelby D. Hunt: Contributions of a pioneer in marketing ethics and macromarketing

This article is a rendering of the contributions of a Marketing Legend, Shelby D. Hunt, in the field of macromarketing in general, and most specifically in the marketing ethics area. The article hi...
Biallelic ASCC1 variants including a novel intronic variant result in expanded phenotypic spectrum of spinal muscular atrophy with congenital bone fractures 2 (SMABF2).

Spinal muscular atrophy with congenital bone fractures 2 (SMABF2), a type of arthrogryposis multiplex congenita (AMC), is characterized by congenital joint contractures, prenatal fractures of long bones, and respiratory distress and results from biallelic variants in ASCC1. Here, we describe an infant with severe, diffuse hypotonia, congenital contractures, and pulmonary hypoplasia characteristic of SMABF2, with the unique features of cleft palate, small spleen, transverse liver, and pulmonary thromboemboli with chondroid appearance. This infant also had impaired coagulation with diffuse petechiae and ecchymoses which has only been reported in one other infant with AMC. Using trio whole genome sequencing, our proband was identified to have biallelic variants in ASCC1. Using deep next generation sequencing of parental cDNA, we characterized alteration of splicing encoded by the novel, maternally inherited ASCC1 variant (c.297-8 T > G) which provides a mechanism for functional pathogenicity. The paternally inherited ASCC1 variant is a rare nonsense variant (c.466C > T; p.Arg156*) that has been previously identified in one other infant with AMC. This report extends the phenotypic characteristics of ASCC1-associated AMC (SMABF2) and describes a novel intronic variant that partially disrupts RNA splicing.
Socially-Distant Hands-On Labs for a Real-time Digital Signal Processing Course

Due to the pandemic, the vast majority of courses taught in the second half of 2020 proceeded online. We discuss the conversion of a Real-time Digital Signal Processing (DSP) course with traditional in-person hands-on labs to a hybrid (in-person and online) setting. This senior-level undergraduate course is built around the development and testing of DSP software. In the online version of the course, students use a small microcontroller kit and a USB oscilloscope, and they work in online teams. We describe the lab projects and we highlight the mechanisms that enable the students to collaborate on labs. We provide early feedback from students from the first offering of the modified course, and conclude with a list of planned improvements.
Towards Generating Real-World Time Series Data

Time series data generation has drawn increasing attention in recent years. Several generative adversarial network (GAN) based methods have been proposed to tackle the problem usually with the assumption that the targeted time series data are well-formatted and complete. However, real-world time series (RTS) data are far away from this utopia, e.g., long sequences with variable lengths and informative missing data raise intractable challenges for designing powerful generation algorithms. In this paper, we propose a novel generative framework for RTS data - RTSGAN to tackle the aforementioned challenges. RTSGAN first learns an encoder-decoder module which provides a mapping between a time series instance and a fixed-dimension latent vector and then learns a generation module to generate vectors in the same latent space. By combining the generator and the decoder, RTSGAN is able to generate RTS which respect the original feature distributions and the temporal dynamics. To generate time series with missing values, we further equip RTSGAN with an observation embedding layer and a decide-and-generate decoder to better utilize the informative missing patterns. Experiments on the four RTS datasets show that the proposed framework outperforms the previous generation methods in terms of synthetic data utility for downstream classification and prediction tasks.
A report of the cesarean sections done at the Philadelphia Lying-in-Pennsylvania Hospital

Abstract The tables and discussions have been given with an idea of showing the number, incidence, method, and results of 1,322 cesarean sections done in a large clinic during the past ten years. Two five-year periods of work have been compared with the idea of seeing what changes occurred. 1. 1. The report has demonstrated that the private service has increased during the second five-year period, and that the incidence of cesarean section has dropped on the private service. 2. 2. The chief indications for cesarean sections have remained about the same. 3. 3. The types of cesarean section have varied considerably but the tendency is toward the classical operation. There seems to have been no maternal mortality or morbidity which could be directly ascribed to the type of operation performed. 4. 4. The maternal mortality rate was low for the 1,322 cases, an incidence of 1.96 per cent. During the second period of this report, it was 1.37 per cent for both private and ward services and during the second period of this report it was 0.65 per cent for 460 private patients. 5. 5. The infant mortality rate was high during the first period of this report and showed considerable droup in the second period. 6. 6. Finally, this report shows that the attitude toward cesarean section has changed some during two five-year periods, and that the results from the work have improved but still leaves something to attain.
Small diurnal and episodic fluctuations of the plasma free testosterone level in normal women

Abstract Five normal adult females were studied in order to determine the degree of fluctuation in plasma testosterone levels throughout the day. A small degree of diurnal variation was observed in total and free plasma testosterone levels, 8 p.m. levels averaging 80 per cent of those at 8 a.m. . The diurnal variation in total plasma 17-hydroxysteroids was more marked. Superimposed upon this cortisol-like diurnal rhythm was a small random fluctuation in testosterone levels. These latter changes were not related to plasma cortisol levels and are presumed to result from episodic ovarian secretion. In spite of the diurnal rhythm and episodic changes in plasma testosterone levels, the concentration of plasma free testosterone consistently fell within the relatively narrow range of normal for the menstrual cycle. These data indicate that an accurate, single, elevated free plasma testosterone level is indicative of hyperandrogenism.
Imagine that: examining the influence of sport‐related imagined contact on intergroup anxiety and sexual prejudice across cultures

The purpose of this study was to examine (a) the relationship among sport-related imagined intergroup contact, intergroup anxiety, and sexual prejudice, and (b) how these relationships varied across cultures. Students enrolled at major public universities in South Korea (n = 100) and the United States (n = 100) participated in an experiment in which they imagined playing basketball and then engaging in a conversation with a gay man or with a friend. They then responded to a post-experiment questionnaire. South Koreans' intergroup anxiety significantly decreased when they imagined contact with a gay man, but the same was not necessarily the case for Americans. Intergroup anxiety mediated the relationship between imagined contact and sexual prejudice for Americans, but not for Koreans.
Management support system effectiveness: further empirical evidence

Modern research has engendered frameworks, such as the management support system (MSS), that are designed to provide comprehensive and integrated support for the decision making process. While one recent study has empirically measured the effects of these frameworks on decision making, there have been few, if any, corroborating or deprecating investigations. This article offers further empirical evidence on MSS effectiveness.
Modeling and Enactment of Workflow Systems

Petri net models and variants thereof have primarily been used to model structured systems such as computer programs, factory production lines, and engineering hardware. In contrast, this paper discusses the issues and challenges in the modeling of human activity in the workplace. This type of activity frequently has a large component that is unstructured, creative work. It is dynamic and difficult to capture via traditional Petri nets. Our research group at the University of Colorado has been investigating Information Control Nets (ICNs), derived from high level Petri nets, as a tool for modeling office workflow. After carefully explaining the notion of Workflow, this paper presents a formal (and also an informal) definition of ICN. We illustrate the utility of ICNs via an office analysis example.
When Can the Baseball Writers For the Hall of Fame Consider Cheating Through PED Use, Or Not?

When the 2013 MLB Hall of Fame Ballot was released this past November, the heated discussion began about which controversial candidates, if any at all, would be inducted into Cooperstown (HOF). while isolated athletes have come up in previous years, this year represents a first real tension between the modern ear of baseball - the "steroid era" - and traditional standards for admission into the Hall. The 537 baseball writers are, and should be, entrusted to weigh cheating and use of PEDs against the HOF's criteria of "character," "sportsmanship" and "upholding the integrity of the game." These writers each will struggle, however, with a preliminary question that falls outside of their expertise: under which circumstances may a HOF voter consider, at all, a candidate's connection to cheating and performance-enhancing drugs.
How do the poor cope with shocks in Bangladesh ? evidence from survey data

This paper uses household survey data collected in September-October 2009 on a nationally representative sample of 2,000 households in Bangladesh to examine the nature of shocks experienced by households over the preceding 12 months and the type of coping mechanisms that were adopted. The analysis finds that more than half the sample claimed to have faced a shock -- economic, health, climatic, or asset related -- over the previous year. Surprisingly, the non-poor face a larger share of these shocks compared with the poor. A closer look at this result shows that the non-poor report a significantly larger share of "asset-related" shocks, which is consistent with the fact that the poor have fewer assets to lose. Health-related shocks dominate and households appear to have coped with these shocks through savings and loans, help from friends, and depletion of assets. The results show that households, when faced with covariate shocks due to climatic reasons, are less able to cope. As would be expected, the poor are less able to cope with shocks compared with the non-poor; the poor are more likely to use coping mechanisms that could have negative welfare implications in the longer term, including the depletion of assets, reduction of essential consumption, and use of high-interest loans. Econometric analysis suggests that geographical location, socio-economic status, and access to microfinance all affect the ability to cope with shocks. Policy implications include the importance of developing safety nets that take into account the vulnerability to climate-related shocks and further developing the links between micro-finance and safety net programs.