cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Pandora's Loot Box

Virtual worlds are a frontier unlike any other. But as virtual worlds grow exponentially in the internet age, they find more overlap with the real world and the laws that govern it. One such emerging intersection is the advent of “loot boxes.” Borrowing their design from the gambling industry, loot boxes operate as a hybrid between slot machines and packs of trading cards. A consumer pays real-world money to buy a virtual box without knowing its contents. Upon opening the box, the consumer receives a virtual good that may be of great value, but may also be a common or duplicate virtual good of little to no value. Such is the gamble that fuels this troubling and addictive virtual gaming mechanism. While scholars and government agencies have considered differing views regarding the ownership, property, and sale of virtual goods, few have considered the gambling perspective brought on by loot boxes. This Article offers a unique legal exploration of the overlaps between loot boxes and gambling by proposing that state gambling laws be updated to include the social science concept of perceived value that explains consumer behavior. By examining the perceived value of loot box rewards, it becomes clear that consumers are driven to gamble for virtual goods based on the value they bestow in the virtual world—irrespective of any real-world value. This framework of virtual valuation is key in properly regulating loot boxes as a form of gambling, which plays on the same psychological triggers as do slot machines. This new framework carries important implications outside of gambling regulation in virtual worlds, while also contributing to the developing literature exploring the ethical and economic dilemmas when software is designed to increase user engagement by exploiting psychological weaknesses.
Sex Differences in the Association Between Stress, Loneliness, and COVID-19 Burden Among People with HIV in the United States.

Little is known about the psychological implications of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic on people with HIV. The purpose of this study was to assess the impact of COVID-19 among men and women with HIV in Miami, Florida. We hypothesized that the burden of the COVID-19 pandemic will be higher for women, and psychological factors will increase COVID-19 burden among them. People with (n = 231) and without HIV (n = 42) residing in Miami, Florida completed a survey assessing psychological outcomes such as loneliness, depression, and stress, as well as the burden of COVID-19, on their daily lives. t-Tests and chi-square analyses were used to assess sex differences in study variables. Logistic regression was used to compare the interaction effects predicting stress and loneliness by COVID-19 burden and sex. A total of 273 completed the survey; the outcomes of the study, loneliness, and stress did not differ by HIV status (p = .458 and p = .922). Overall, men and women reported similar prevalence of COVID-19 burden. However, a greater proportion of women reported losing childcare than men (18% vs. 9%, p = .029, respectively), as well as losing mental health care (15% vs. 7%, p = .049, respectively). There was a significant interaction between COVID-19 burden and sex for loneliness and stress such that the association between COVID-19 burden and loneliness was greater for women (p < .001) than for men (p = .353) and the association between COVID-19 burden and stress was greater for women (p = .013) than men (p = .628). Both men and women with HIV are impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, but women may experience higher levels of stress and loneliness than men. Sex differences may require tailored interventions to more effectively mitigate the impact of the pandemic on mental health.
Vaccinating Legal Scholarship from Distorted Science: Evidence from the Anti-GMO Movement

Scientific research has a profound impact on formulation of public policy. However, legal research, often dependent on intermediaries to communicate scientific knowledge, is all too vulnerable to accepting science fiction as science fact. Too few legal scholars have highlighted this vulnerability, leaving the academy vulnerable to promoting public policy solutions that contradict the best science available. The more awareness that exists about how science can be corrupted through dissemination, the more effectively the legal literature can filter it out, and thus base its science-relevant scholarship on only rigorous scientific research. Responding to this gap in the literature, this article explores how fact becomes fiction by analyzing a chain of citation alleging that GMO consumption is causally connected to the onset of autism. Beginning with a law review making this claim, this manuscript audits the publication’s source and the source’s source for veracity. This backwards citation analysis continues until the citation chain ends. The results are striking. Over just a few linked citations, misinterpretations pile up so rapidly that the law review’s GMO-causes-autism claim has almost nothing in common with the original source. The manuscript then offers recommendations for how law reviews can optimally vaccinate themselves from distorted scientific claims.
Assessing the Effects of Open Models of Learning and Enjoyment in a Digital Learning Game

Digital learning games are designed to foster both student learning and enjoyment. Given this goal, an interesting research topic is whether game mechanics that promote learning and those that promote enjoyment have different effects on students’ experience and learning performance. We explored these questions in Decimal Point, a digital learning game that teaches decimal numbers and operations to 5th and 6th graders, through a classroom study with 159 students and two versions of the game. One version encouraged playing and learning through an open learner model (OLM, N = 55), while one encouraged playing for enjoyment through an analogous open enjoyment model (OEM, N = 54). We compared these versions to a control version that is neutral with respect to learning and enjoyment (N = 50). While students learned in all three conditions, our results indicated no significant condition differences in learning outcomes, enjoyment, or engagement. However, the learning-oriented group engaged more in re-practicing, while the enjoyment-oriented group demonstrated more exploration of different mini-games. Further analyses of students’ interactions with the open learner and enjoyment models revealed that students who followed the learner model demonstrated better in-game learning and test performance, while following the enjoyment model did not impact learning outcomes. These findings indicate that emphasizing learning or enjoyment can lead to distinctive game play behaviors, and that open learner models can be helpful in a learning game context. In turn, our analyses have led to preliminary ideas about how to use AI to provide recommendations that are more aligned with students’ dynamic learning and enjoyment states and preferences.
Tissue Damage in Radiation-Induced Oral Mucositis Is Mitigated by IL-17 Receptor Signaling.

Oral mucositis (OM) is a treatment-limiting adverse side effect of radiation and chemotherapy. Approximately 80% of patients undergoing radiotherapy (RT) for head and neck cancers (HNC) develop OM, representing a major unmet medical condition. Our understanding of the immunopathogenesis of OM is limited, due in part to the surprising paucity of information regarding healing mechanisms in the oral mucosa. RNAseq of oral tissue in a murine model that closely mimics human OM, showed elevated expression of IL-17 and related immune pathways in response to head and neck irradiation (HNI). Strikingly, mice lacking the IL-17 receptor (IL-17RA) exhibited markedly more severe OM. Restoration of the oral mucosa was compromised in Il17ra-/- mice and components associated with healing, including matrix metalloproteinase 3, 10 and IL-24 were diminished. IL-17 is typically associated with recruitment of neutrophils to mucosal sites following oral infections. Unexpectedly, in OM the absence of IL-17RA resulted in excessive neutrophil recruitment and immunopathology. Instead, neutrophil activation was IL-1R-driven in Il17ra-/- mice. Blockade of IL-1R and depletion of neutrophils lessened the severity of damage in these mice. Overall, we show IL-17 is protective in OM through multiple mechanisms including restoration of the damaged epithelia and control of the neutrophil response. We also present a clinically relevant murine model of human OM to improve mechanistic understanding and develop rational translational therapeutics.
Ingredients for Criminality Require Genes, Temperament, and Psychopathic Personality

Abstract Background and method Recent and emerging research demonstrates the importance of genetic factors, temperament, and psychopathic personality for understanding criminality especially more severe forms of it. Drawing on diverse interdisciplinary research, we review recent studies in behavior genetics, child development, psychology, social work, criminology, and other areas that bear on serious criminality. Results We suggest that genes, temperament, and psychopathic personality are the root ingredients of criminality and underscore the importance of a wide range of topics including neurobehavioral disorders, personality disorder, aggression, violence, and crime. Conclusion Similar to debates in psychology and psychiatry, we encourage further research on the basic constitutional foundation of criminality as a means to guide theory and research in criminology and criminal justice.
Chapter 13 Land resources and land markets

Publisher Summary Land is a central concept not only in the technical sciences and in professions such as engineering, geology, agriculture, and forestry but also in law and in the social sciences. This chapter discusses the economics of land. There exists an ancient and persistent suspicion that land is not just any commodity or factor of production. Land has played a prominent role in the development of general economic theory, and it retains a special position in some current renditions thereof. There is recurrent debate whether any economic theory that treats land as nothing special can be valid. In the most general versions of the mainstream economic theory, land is treated as a factor of production, and the debate revolves around whether it is useful to reserve a special place for land in formulating the aggregate production function. Land and natural resource concepts remain important for many special purposes in economics. The Ricardian concept of economic rent remains durable and finds application in areas as diverse as land economics, location theory, and welfare change measurement. Agricultural economics, natural resource economics, urban economics, and regional economics are important areas of specialization within economics, and the classic concept of land, which is appropriately updated, plays an important role in each.
Solvent dependent difference in pK HB + behaviour in N‐methylaniline and N‐phenylhydroxylamine

The pK values of the conjugate acids of N-phenylhydroxylamines change drastically when the pK values are determined in dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO) rather than methanol. The Hammett ρ values change from −5·69 to −1·20 on going from methanol to DMSO for protonated N-phenylhydroxylamines, in contrast to a shift of −4·70 to −4·83 for protonated N-methylanilines in the same two solvents. This large change in susceptibility indicates that the species from which the proton departs is not the same for protonated N-phenylhydroxylamines in the two solvents. Experimental and computational evidence supports ionization of the H+ from the O atom for the protonated N-phenylhydroxylamines in DMSO.
Comparison of Mean Field Annealing and Multiresolution Analysis in Missing Data Estimation

The project we are working on is to help develop and test a low cost, large area, high resolution X-ray detection system with a high dynamic range. The large area is achieved by butting two or more scintillator/fiber/CCD combinations together. An algorithm is thus required to compensate the defects come from the detector induced errors including missing single pixel due to individual defective detectors or missing column(s)/row(s) due to misalignment of adjacent CCD's in the blurred and noise corrupted images. Mean field annealing, as a global optimization technique, is the proposed algorithm. This paper, however, proposes a new approach based on multiresolution analysis where the defect compensation is implemented by removing the characteristics created by the missing columns/rows from the detail images of lower resolution. Experiments will be carried out to compare the performance of these two approaches. Future research directions are discussed at last.
On the wintertime currents in the Florida Big Bend region

Abstract Moored current meter records and hydrographic sections obtained during the winter over 3 years on the inner shelf in the northeastern Gulf of Mexico indicate the following. The along-isobath flow component is primarily in the upper water column and directed towards the Florida Peninsula (eastward). Near the bottom the flow is primarily and consistently diabathic and shoreward. The eastward upper flow does not appear to be locally driven, but results from an offshore pressure gradient, the cause of which is not identified. The shoreward, near-bottom flow appears to result from the local offshore wind and from estuarine processes resulting from the freshwater input of rivers and springs. The former appears to dominate in the late fall and early winter, and the latter to take over in late winter or early spring, when the wind abates or is from the east. The hydrographic sections indicate that vertically mixed conditions resulting from passing cold fronts do occur, but are relatively short lived and that estuarine hydrographic conditions tend to arise in the intervals between the passages of cold fronts. The proximity of the inertial period to the diurnal tidal periods (the latitude of our moored measurements ≈ 30°N) did not result in the observation of pronounced inertial oscillations. It did result in reversal of the sense of rotation of the K1 and O1 tidal ellipses as the bottom was approached. The latter is explained in terms of concepts and a model used in Weatherly et al. (1980) (Journal of Physical Oceanography 10, 297–300). © 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd
Pacman: Tolerating asymmetric data races with unintrusive hardware

Data races are a major contributor to parallel software unreliability. A type of race that is both common and typically harmful is the Asymmetric data race. It occurs when at least one of the racing threads is inside a critical section. Current proposals that target them are software-based. They slow down execution and require significant compiler, operating system (OS), or application changes. This paper proposes the first scheme to tolerate asymmetric data races in production runs with negligible execution overhead. The scheme, called Pacman, exploits cache coherence hardware to temporarily protect the variables that a thread accesses in a critical section from other threads' requests. Unlike previous schemes, Pacman induces negligible slowdown, needs no support from the compiler or (in the baseline design) from the OS, and requires no application source code changes. In addition, its hardware is relatively unintrusive. We test Pacman with the SPLASH-2, PARSEC, Sphinx 3, and Apache codes, and discover two unreported asymmetric data races.
Knowledge-based 3D reconstruction from multiple segmented images

One of the purposes of computer vision is to reconstruct a three-dimensional description of the environment from multiple sensor images. Because no single image can show all salient features of a complex scene, an intelligently chosen set of images is needed to provide the complete description. Because the sensor data is generally incomplete and errorful, a priori knowledge about the scene and the sensors is used in the reconstruction process. This paper will describe methods for applying scene and sensor knowledge to the problem of three- dimensional reconstruction from multiple images. In particular, the geometric representation and reasoning techniques applied to 3D generic object recognition in the 3D FORM system [Walk88, Walk90] will be extended to reason about segmented 2D images. Knowledge about the sensors and objects in the scene will be represented as frames in the 3D FORM system. For each sensor, the geometric relationship between the sensor's pose, the image features and the world features is modeled, and for each object, the geometric relationships between the object and its parts are modeled. Three-dimensional reconstruction is performed by transforming each sensor image to a set of constraints on the world, and then combining the constraints from all sensors with constraints imposed by the object models to generate an interpretation that satisfies all constraints. The advantage of this method is that the resulting system is able to adjust itself to the available information without knowing in advance which constraints will be specified.© (1992) COPYRIGHT SPIE--The International Society for Optical Engineering. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.
Vaginal twin delivery: a survey and review of location, anesthesia coverage and interventions.

Abstract Background Twin pregnancies are associated with increased perinatal morbidity and mortality. No consensus exists whether vaginal twin delivery should take place in the labor room or operating room, or whether anesthesiologists should be present. We surveyed members of the California Society of Anesthesiologists (CSA) to review management of vaginal twin delivery, and examined anesthetic intervention retrospectively at our institution. Methods 230 CSA members were asked to complete an online survey on location of vaginal twin delivery in their institution and whether they were required to be present throughout. We then retrospectively reviewed charts of vaginal twin deliveries at our institution over a 36-month period to analyze frequency and type of anesthetic intervention. Results The online survey response rate was 58%; 64% of responders reported that vaginal twin deliveries were performed in the operating room and 55% that an anesthesiologist was present. There was a strong association between anesthesiologist's presence and delivery in the operating room (OR 7; 95% CI 3-20). We reviewed 81 charts of women who underwent vaginal twin delivery. The median (range) time that the anesthesiologist was present for each delivery was 60 (20-380) min. Of women undergoing vaginal twin delivery, 27% required anesthetic intervention during the second stage of labor with 6% having emergency cesarean delivery. Conclusion There is a lack of consensus regarding the appropriate location for vaginal twin delivery and the role of anesthesiologists. A significant percentage of women undergoing vaginal twin delivery in our institution received anesthetic intervention in the immediate delivery period.
Vaccines against avian influenza A H9N2 viruses

Abstract Background: Avian influenza A H9N2 viruses are now widespread in poultry and were recently isolated from children with influenza-like illness in Hong Kong. The development and evaluation of vaccines against H9N2 viruses is a priority for pandemic preparedness. Methods: The immunogenicity and protective efficacy of live and inactivated H9N2 viruses that represented two antigenically and genetically distinct sublineages of Eurasian H9N2 viruses, G1 and G9, were evaluated in BALB/c mice. Mice were either infected intranasally with live virus or vaccinated intramuscularly with formalin-inactivated purified virus and challenged with G1-like and G9 viruses. Results: Infection or vaccination of mice with a G1-like virus induced substantially lower serum antibody responses against homologous virus, compared with mice infected or vaccinated with a G9 virus. The G1-like inactivated vaccine, but not the G9 vaccine, induced modest levels of antibody that cross-reacted with the heterologous H9 virus. Mice infected with either G1-like or G9 viruses or vaccinated with inactivated G1-like vaccine were protected from challenge with either virus. However, mice immunized with G9 vaccine, although completely protected from homologous challenge, were only partially protected against challenge with the G1-like virus. Conclusions: This study has identified differences in immunogenicity between the G1 and G9 H9N2 virus sublineages that have consequences for the design of optimal vaccines against circulating H9 viruses.
Mars Pathfinder Rarefied Aerodynamics: Computations and Measurements

On July 4, 1997, after traveling close to 500 million km, the Pathfinder spacecraft successfully completed entry, descent, and landing at Mars. In the present paper, the focus is on the hypersonic rarefied portion of Pathfinder''s atmospheric entry where the synergy of flight measurements, aerodynamic calculations, and atmospheric modeling tools are used to extract Pathfinder''s attitude and the freestream density. Accuracy of the capsule aerodynamics directly impacts the inferred atmospheric properties extracted from deceleration measurements made by on-board accelerometers. The range of rarefaction considered in this study extends from the free molecular to continuum conditions and angles of attack from 0 to 30 deg. The aerodynamic computations are made with free-molecular and direct simulation Monte Carlo codes. The calculations show that Pathfinder is statically unstable for much of the transitional rarefied regime. Due to the relatively modest forces and the gyroscopic motion of the spacecraft, the angle of attack excursions were less than 5 deg as inferred from force measurements for the rarefied portion of entry and approached a nominal zero degree trim angle near hypersonic continuum conditions.
Wave-Nets: novel learning techniques, and the induction of physically interpretable models

A wavelet network, or Wave-Net is a connectionist network that combines the mathematical rigor and multiresolution character of wavelets with the adaptive learning of artificial neural networks. In this paper, we present some novel techniques for training and adaptation of Wave-Nets, and describe the induction of models that may be physically interpretable, and may provide useful insight into the system being modeled. Learning from empirical data is formulated as a constrained optimization problem. This formulation illustrates the complexity of the learning problem, and highlights the decision variables and the simplifying assumptions necessary for a practical learning methodology. Techniques for Wave-Net training and adaptation are developed for minimizing the L2 or L(infinity) norms. Minimizing the L(infinity) norm is particularly relevant for solving control problems. The connection between Wave-Net parameters, and the error of approximation is derived using the principles of frame theory. The performance of Wave-Nets for different training methodologies, and basis functions is compared via case studies. Wave-Nets with Haar wavelets as activation functions are well-suited for problems where the output consists of a finite set of discrete values, as in classification problems. The mapping learned by Haar Wave-Nets may be represented as simple if-then rules, which provide an explicit and physically meaningful relationship between inputs and outputs. The relationship of learning by Haar Wave-Nets with other rule induction techniques, such as decision trees is explored.© (1994) COPYRIGHT SPIE--The International Society for Optical Engineering. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.
Matrix assisted ionization: new aromatic and nonaromatic matrix compounds producing multiply charged lipid, peptide, and protein ions in the positive and negative mode observed directly from surfaces.

Matrix assisted inlet ionization (MAII) is a method in which a matrix:analyte mixture produces mass spectra nearly identical to electrospray ionization without the application of a voltage or the use of a laser as is required in laserspray ionization (LSI), a subset of MAII. In MAII, the sample is introduced by, for example, tapping particles of dried matrix:analyte into the inlet of the mass spectrometer and, therefore, permits the study of conditions pertinent to the formation of multiply charged ions without the need of absorption at a laser wavelength. Crucial for the production of highly charged ions are desolvation conditions to remove matrix molecules from charged matrix:analyte clusters. Important factors affecting desolvation include heat, vacuum, collisions with gases and surfaces, and even radio frequency fields. Other parameters affecting multiply charged ion production is sample preparation, including pH and solvent composition. Here, findings from over 100 compounds found to produce multiply charged analyte ions using MAII with the inlet tube set at 450 °C are presented. Of the compounds tested, many have –OH or –NH2 functionality, but several have neither (e.g., anthracene), nor aromaticity or conjugation. Binary matrices are shown to be applicable for LSI and solvent-free sample preparation can be applied to solubility restricted compounds, and matrix compounds too volatile to allow drying from common solvents. Our findings suggest that the physical properties of the matrix such as its morphology after evaporation of the solvent, its propensity to evaporate/sublime, and its acidity are more important than its structure and functional groups.
Response of diatom assemblages to 130 years of environmental change in Florida Bay (USA)

Coastal ecosystems around the world are constantly changing in response to interacting shifts in climate and land and water use by expanding human populations. The development of agricultural and urban areas in South Florida significantly modified its hydrologic regime and influenced rates of environmental change in wetlands and adjacent estuaries. This study describes changes in diatom species composition through time from four sediment cores collected across Florida Bay, for the purposes of detecting periods of major shifts in assemblage structure and identifying major drivers of those changes. We examined the magnitude of diatom assemblage change in consecutive 2-cm samples of the 210Pb-dated cores, producing a record of the past ~130 years. Average assemblage dissimilarity among successive core samples was ~30%, while larger inter-sample and persistent differences suggest perturbations or directional shifts. The earliest significant compositional changes occurred in the late 1800s at Russell Bank, Bob Allen Bank and Ninemile Bank in the central and southwestern Bay, and in the early 1900s at Trout Cove in the northeast. These changes coincided with the initial westward redirection of water from Lake Okeechobee between 1881 and 1894, construction of several canals between 1910 and 1915, and building the Florida Overseas Railroad between 1906 and 1916. Later significant assemblage restructurings occurred in the northeastern and central Bay in the late 1950s, early 1960s and early 1970s, and in the southwestern Bay in the 1980s. These changes coincide with climate cycles driving increased hurricane frequency in the 1960s, followed by a prolonged dry period in the 1970s to late 1980s that exacerbated the effects of drainage operations in the Everglades interior. Changes in the diatom assemblage structure at Trout Cove and Ninemile Bank in the 1980s correspond to documented eutrophication and a large seagrass die-off. A gradual decrease in the abundance of freshwater to brackish water taxa in the cores over ~130 years implies that freshwater deliveries to Florida Bay were much greater prior to major developments on the mainland. Salinity, which was quantitatively reconstructed at these sites, had the greatest effect on diatom communities in Florida Bay, but other factors—often short-lived, natural and anthropogenic in nature—also played important roles in that process. Studying the changes in subfossil diatom communities over time revealed important environmental information that would have been undetected if reconstructing only one water quality variable.
Organic monomeric glass formation by substituted ethylenediamine

Abstract Dibenzoyl N-alkyl ethylene diamine compounds were prepared and characterized to explore the effects of rotational isomerism and hydrogen bonding on organic monomeric glass formation. The compounds were R1CONHCH2CH2N(R)COR1 with R = −CH3 or −CH2CH3 and R1 = phenyl, 4-nitrophenyl, or 3,5-dinitrophenyl. Rotation takes place about the amide bonds, and the R substituent provides a steric barrier to rotation. Intermolecular hydrogen bonding takes place between the CO sdsdsd HN and NO sdsdsd HN groups which suppresses nucleation when R1 is nitro substituted. The undercooled melt viscosity and thermodynamic properties were used to compare the observed crystallization rate with that calculated from classical nucleation and growth theory. For R1 = phenyl, the crystallization rate is close to that expected from the classical theory. For R1 = 4-nitrophenyl or 3,5-dinitrophenyl, nucleation is suppressed through stabilization of rotational isomers by the network of hydrogen bonds in the quiescent state. The undercooled liquid of R1 = 4-nitrophenyl exhibited rapid shear-induced crystallization during viscosity measurement. This is interpreted as the result of coupling between rotational isomers and the external flow field through the network of hydrogen bonding. An additional frequency factor that takes into account the interaction between rotational isomerism and the external network through hydrogen bonding is needed to modify the pre-exponential term in the nucleation rate equation.
Design Method Selection to Satisfy Consumer Variation: A Meta-design Approach

Scientific fields typically have meta-heuristics that help scientists select appropriate modeling, analysis, or testing procedures based on problem parameters. For instance, the Reynolds number calculation dictates to fluid dynamicists the classification of the flow and subsequent modeling and analysis tools most appropriate to use. As engineering design matures into a field defined by scientific principles, there is a need for similar meta-heuristics to help designers select appropriate design tools and methods. There has been significant work developing design methods to support product development including robust design, product platforms, and reconfigurable design, among others. Many of these methods have matured into design paradigms but are still undergoing validation, exercise, and extension. However, when faced with a new product design (or re-design) problem, it is a challenging task to determine what methods or paradigms to subscribe to and implement; part of this decision involves whether to design a single product or a set of similar products (i.e., a product line). This is fundamentally a metadesign problem — the design of the design method. This paper proposes an approach to support this meta-design decision using market segmentation data and appropriate contextual information.Copyright © 2010 by ASME
Selecting the Brightest for Post Secondary Education in Colombia: The Impact on Equity.

Selection in post-secondary education is highly competitive in many developing countries. Ability is often an important criterion, but economic reasons may account for a bias against people from poor families. This paper uses Colombian data to examine the impact on equity if selection were based solely on ability. The resulting change indicates a significant increase in the share of lower income students at the expense of students from wealthier backgrounds. For such a shift to materialize, however, strengthening the availability of financial aid would be necessary to relieve economic constraints barring the access of bright students from poor families.
Equivalence of memory to Random Logic

A model of the design process for computer logic is used to estimate the number of bits of memory required to replace a so-called "random logic" circuit. The model can also be used to compare the respective time delays of array logic and random logic.
Deep seismic reflection characteristics of the continental crust

Four types of seismic reflection “fabrics” appear to characterize the continental crust: (1) a cratonic fabric dominated by diffractions and dipping reflections but lacking a pronounced reflection Moho; (2) regions of thin-skinned foreland deformation with abundant shallow but sparse deep reflections; (3) a unidirectional fabric that dips toward the hinterland and may represent a crustal-scale ramp zone; and (4) zones of highly layered lower crust and high-amplitude reflection Moho. The first three types are commonly observed in transects across single mountain belts, but the fourth appears to correspond to regions of elevated lower crustal temperatures such as those encountered in rift provinces and perhaps elsewhere.
Cellulolytic Enzymes and Antibacterial Activity of Auricularia polytricha

Auriculariu polytricha, an edible fungus, was grown in the laboratory and examined for composition and its ability to hydrolyze cellulose and hemicellulose. On a dry weight basis A. polytricha was highest in protein (7.59%), followed by fiber (3.69%) and lowest in fat (1.12%). Appreciable amounts of calcium and zinc were also present in the fruiting body of A. polyrricha. The fungus produced substantial amounts of cellulase and hemicellulase. The optimum conditions were pH 4 and 30°C for cellulase, and pH 6 and 60°C for hemicellulase. A. polyrricha also produced an antibacterial substance and inhibited the Gram positive bacteria, Bacillus subtillus, Bacillus cereus, Micrococcus luteus, and Staphylococcus nureus, but not Gram negative bacteria, Alcaligenes viscolactis, Escherichia coli, and Pseudomonas fluorescens.
Cats, coronaviruses and coronavirus antibody tests

Feline infectious peritonitis and other coronavirus infections of cats are briefly reviewed. Interpretation and applications of feline coronavirus antibody tests are described, and general recommendations are provided for practitioners. Some of the major unresolved questions regarding coronavirus infections of cats are delineated.
Variation in Soil-Catena Characteristics of Moraines with Time and Climate, South Island, New Zealand

Abstract Soil catenas on three moraines in each of two areas with different climate were studied to determine (a) downcatena soil differentiation with climate and time and (b) their usefulness in estimating the relative ages of the underlying deposits. In the dry area (mean annual precipitation (MAP), ca. 0.5 m) all soils have A/Bw/C profiles formed in loess/till. Their similarity in morphology and in most chemical characteristics with catena position and age suggests that the low MAP does not result in much redistribution of water, elements, or sediment downcatena. This similarity also suggests ages close to each other and correlation with the Otiran Glaciation (oxygen-isotope stages 2 and 4). In the wet area (MAP ca. 3 m) the soils also formed in loess/till and with time (a) soil morphology progresses from A/Bw/C to A/E/B/C, (h) reduced properties intensify, especially in the downcatena profiles, (c) citrate-bicarbonate-dithionite-extractable Fe displays accumulation in the youngest catena followed by loss in the older catenas, and (d) downcatena trends in total chemical data display marked losses of the more mobile elements. These data demonstrate that although catena development is rapid in a wet climate, the downcatena contrast can be muted with time due to a change from processes dominated by oxidation to those dominated by reduction. Soil catena properties in the wet area are sufficiently different to not refute age estimations suggested by Suggate (1990): youngest moraine, oxygen-isotope stage 2; intermediate moraine, isotope stage 4; and oldest moraine, isotope stage 10. An unresolved problem in both areas is the possibility of soil erosion to foul soil-age relations.
Use of immunoadsorbents for the study of antibody binding to sperm whale myoglobin and its synthetic antigenic sites

Conditions for preparing immunoadsorbents of sperm-whale myoglobin and its five synthetic antigenic sites and for desorption of radiolabeled antibodies from the immunoadsorbents were studied. In immunoadsorbent titration studies, the sum of the amounts of antibodies bound in the plateau (maximum binding) by the adsorbents of the five sites accounted quantitatively for the entire (100%) antibody response to sperm-whale myoglobin.
Frequency Stability Analysis of Transistorized Crystal Oscillator

This paper gives an analysis of a modified Pierce oscillator for frequency variation due to changes in the circuit or transistor. The magnitudes of the frequency shifts due to parameter changes are computed in relation to each other. The analysis has been verified by testing the oscillator circuit with several transistors which had significantly different measured parameters. Computed frequency shifts were compared with measured frequency shifts. The agreement between experimental and calculated data is ?8×10-9 with a 5 Mc, fifth overtone quartz crystal in the circuit. A general equation relating frequency changes to changes in circuit parameters has been derived and is applicable to any operating frequency as long as the y parameters of the transistor and the circuit elements of the oscillator are known.
Secretory phospholipase A2-IIa upregulates HER/HER2-elicited signaling in lung cancer cells

Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death worldwide. There is an urgent need for early diagnostic tools and novel therapies in order to increase lung cancer survival. Secretory phospholipase A2 group IIa (sPLA2-IIa) is involved in inflammation, tumorigenesis and metastasis. We were the first to uncover that cancer cells secrete sPLA2-IIa. sPLA2-IIa is overexpressed in almost all specimens of human lung cancers examined and is significantly elevated in the plasma of lung cancer patients. High levels of plasma sPLA2-IIa are significantly associated with advanced stage and decreased overall cancer survival. In this study, we further showed that elevated HER/HER2-PI3K-Akt-NF-κB signaling contributes to sPLA2-IIa overexpression in lung cancer cells. sPLA2-IIa in turn phosphorylates and activates HER2 and HER3 in a time- and dose-dependent manner in lung cancer cells. The structure and sequence-based docking analysis revealed that sPLA2-IIa β hairpin shares structural similarity with the corresponding EGF hairpin. sPLA2-IIa forms an extensive interface with EGFR and brings the two lobes of EGFR into an active conformation. sPLA2-IIa also enhances the NF-κB promoter activity. Anti-sPLA2-IIa antibody, but not the small molecule sPLA2-IIa inhibitor LY315920, significantly inhibits sPLA2-IIa-induced activation of NF-κB promoter. Our findings support the notion that sPLA2-IIa functions as a ligand for the EGFR family of receptors leading to an elevated HER/HER2-elicited signaling. Plasma sPLA2-IIa can potentially serve as lung cancer biomarker and sPLA2-IIa is a potential therapeutic target against lung cancer.
Polarity sensitivity as lexical semantics

Le phenomene de sensibilite a la polarite pose depuis 30 ans des problemes pour les theories de la representation grammaticale. L'A. propose ici de considerer ce phenomene comme un probleme emanant de la semantique lexicale. En s'appuyant sur des donnees issues de l'anglais et d'autres langues, il montre que les items sensibles a la polarite sont des operateurs scalaires et que deux traits semantiques motives independamment, la valeur quantitative et la valeur informative, rendent compte des distributions particulieres de ce phenomene. De plus, il montre qu'une analyse pragmatique scalaire permet d'expliquer d'une maniere plus precise ou et pourquoi les items sensibles a la polarite sont utilises
Age-related decrease in GABAB receptor binding in the Fischer 344 rat i inferior colliculus

Quantitative receptor autoradiography was used to assess GABAB receptor binding in three primary subdivisions of the inferior colliculus (IC): dorsal cortex (DCIC), external cortex (ECIC), and the central nucleus (CIC) of 3-, 18-20-, and 26-month-old Fischer 344 rats. GABAB binding sites were localized using [3H]GABA in the presence of a saturating concentration of isoguvacine, a selective GABAA receptor agonist, to displace [3H]GABA bound to GABAA receptor sites. In the three IC subdivisions examined, GABAB receptor binding was significantly reduced in 26-month-old rats when compared to 3-month-old rats (DCIC, -44%; ECIC, -36%; CIC, -32%; p < 0.05). For comparison, GABAB binding was determined in the portion of cerebellum located in the recess of the IC. In the molecular layer of this region, there was no statistically significant differences in receptor binding between 3, 18-20-, and 26-month-old rats. In addition, there was not a significant age-related change in the cross-sectional area of the IC. These findings provide additional evidence to support the existence of selective age-related changes in GABA neurotransmitter function in the rat IC.
War Summits: The Meetings That Shaped World War II and the Postwar World – By David Stone

This work, written by a British military historian, not only covers the proceedings of such Big Three meetings as Teheran, Yalta, and Potsdam, but of such significant encounters as the Moscow confe...
Correlations between the Psychological Inventory of Criminal Thinking Styles and World-View Rating Scale in male federal prisoners.

Introduction The lifestyle theory of criminal behaviour maintains that criminal thinking is hierarchically organized and that certain features of an individual's general world view should correspond with specific criminal thinking styles. Hypotheses It was predicted that the eight Psychological Inventory of Criminal Thinking Styles (PICTS) thinking style scales would correlate with the mechanism, fatalism, inequity and malevolence poles of the four World-View Rating Scale (WVRS) dimensions. Method A group of 140 male medium security prison inmates rated themselves on the four dimensions of the WVRS and completed the PICTS. Results All eight PICTS thinking style scales correlated with mechanism, inequity and malevolence, but only six of the eight PICTS scales correlated with fatalism. In addition, two of four correlations specified a priori (i.e. between mollification and inequity and between power orientation and malevolence) proved significant in this study. Discussion The present findings suggest that two levels of a cognitive system held to be instrumental in maintaining a criminal lifestyle – criminal thinking styles and global belief systems – may be meaningfully linked. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Multivariate statistical analysis of solids mixing

Abstract The applicability of multivariate statistics to the analysis of mixing processes and mixtures of multicomponent solid particles in a drum mixer has been successfully demonstrated. The applications include (1) test of sampling techniques, (2) test of the completely random state, (3) test of the completely segregated state, and (4) definition of a mixing index for a multicomponent mixture.
Power, Growth, and the Voracity Effect

Why is it that resource-rich countries tend to have lower growth rates than resource-poor countries? And why is it that many countries that enjoy terms-of-trade windfalls end up with lower growth rates? To explain these puzzles, we extend the neoclassical growth model by replacing the representative agent with multiple powerful groups and by introducing a new concept, the voracity effect—a more than proportional increase in redistribution in response to an increase in the raw rate of return. We show that, in an economy with powerful groups and weak institutions, the voracity effect operates if the elasticity of intertemporal substitution is high enough. That is, there exists a negative relationship between the growth rate and the raw rate of return, which is positively related to the terms of trade. We provide some empirical evidence in support of the mechanism we propose.
Conditions of vein formation in the southern Appalachian foreland : constraints from vein geometries and fluid inclusions

Abstract The Nolichucky Shale in the Whiteoak Mountain thrust sheet of the southern Appalachian foreland contains four coeval bed-normal calcite vein sets that trended 015°, 055°, 090° and 320° before thrusting. The pretectonic veins were displaced by syn-tectonic bed-parallel slickensided calcite veins during local Alleghanian thrusting. Fluid inclusion thermometry indicates precipitation of both bed-normal and bed-parallel veins from NaCl-CaCl2 brines (27 wt% NaCl-equiv. salinity), at 80–110°C for bed-normal veins and 110°C for bed-parallel veins. These temperatures correspond to burial depths of 2.4–3.6 km, which were attained after the middle Mississippian. These pressure-corrected homogenization temperatures are comparable to time-temperature indicators, such as CAI and illite crystallinity, and indicate that inclusions were trapped near-maximum burial conditions and were not deformed after trapping. This conclusion is supported by the absence of petrographic evidence for inclusion failure and a worst-case mechanical analysis that indicates a lack of brittle deformation to inclusions after trapping. The four coeval bed-normal vein sets could not be formed by one simple stress field, nor by the development of a single structure, but required the interaction of at least two stress components or structures. It is proposed that the interaction of the Alleghanian and Ouachita orogenic stress components, beyond the limits of thrusting, produced the sets as coeval Alleghanian orthogonal (055°,320°) and Ouchita sub-orthogonal (015°, 090°) mode I fractures.
Blow-off momentum from melt and vapor in nuclear deflection scenarios

Abstract For Earth-impacting objects that are large in size or have short warning times nuclear explosives are an effective threat mitigation response. Nuclear-based deflection works by means of conservation of momentum: as material is heated by incoming photons and neutrons it is ejected from the body which imparts momentum to the remaining mass of the asteroid. Predicting the complete response of a particular object is difficult, since the ejecta size and velocity distributions rely heavily on the unknown, complicated internal structure of the body. However, lower bounds on the blow-off momentum can be estimated using the melted and vaporized surface material. In this paper, we model the response of a one-dimensional SiO2 surface to monoenergetic soft X-ray, hard X-ray and neutron sources using Arbitrary Lagrangian–Eulerian radiation/hydrodynamic simulations. Errors in the blow-off momentum due to our hydrodynamic mesh resolution are quantified and inform zone sizing that balances numerical discretization error with computational efficiency. We explore deposited energy densities ranging from 1.1 to 200 times the melt energy density for SiO2, and develop an approximate relation that gives the mesh resolution needed for a desired percent error in the blow-off momentum as a function of deposited energy density and melt depth. Using these mesh constraints, the response of our one-dimensional SiO2 surface to the energy sources is simulated, and lower bounds are placed on the melt/vapor blow-off momentum as a function of deposited energy density and source energy type.