cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Spectroscopic Characterization and O2 Reactivity of the Trinuclear Cu Cluster of Mutants of the Multicopper Oxidase Fet3p

Fet3p is a multicopper oxidase that uses four copper ions (one type 1, one type 2, and one type 3 binuclear site) to couple substrate oxidation to the reduction of O 2 to H2O. The type 1 Cu site shuttles electrons between the substrate and the type 2/type 3 Cu sites which form a trinuclear Cu cluster that is the active site for O 2 reduction. This study extends the spectroscopic and reactivity studies that have been conducted with type 1-substituted Hg (T1Hg) laccase to Fet3p and a mutant of Fet3p in which the trinuclear Cu cluster is perturbed. To examine the reaction between the trinuclear Cu cluster and O 2, the type 1 Cu Cys484 was mutated to Ser, resulting in a type 1-depleted (T1D) form of the enzyme. Additional His to Gln mutations were made at the trinuclear cluster to further probe specific contributions to reactivity. One of these mutants (His 126Gln) produces the first stable but perturbed trinuclear Cu cluster (T1DT3' Fet3p). Spectroscopic characterization (absorption, circular dichroism, magnetic circular dichroism, and electron paramagnetic resonance) of the resting trinuclear sites in T1D and T1DT3' Fet3p reveal that the His126Gln mutation changes the electronic structure of both the type 3 and type 2 Cu sites. The trinuclear clusters in T1D and T1DT3' Fet3p react with O2 to produce peroxide intermediates analogous to that observed in T1Hg laccase. Spectroscopic data on the peroxide intermediates in the three forms provide further insight into the structure of this intermediate. In T1D Fet3p, the decay of this peroxide intermediate is pH-dependent, and the rate of decay is 10-fold higher at low pH. In T1DT3' Fet3p, the decay of the peroxide intermediate is pH-independent and is slow at all pH's. This change in the pH dependence provides new insight into the mechanism of intermediate decay involving reductive cleavage of the O-O bond.
Electrorheological properties of anisotropically filled elastomers

We report the results of numerical simulations for the change of both mechanical and electrical properties of elastomers with anisotropically filled polarizable particles under capacitively graded electric and mechanical fields. Such composites have potential applications in electromechanical control. We have used numerical techniques to study the effect of particle shape, permittivity/conductivity ratio, and spatial arrangement on the shear modulus as a function of the electric field. We also investigated the influence of the high field and nonlinear conductivity in the polymer matrix. The results indicate that electrostatic energy and changes therein, which result in electro-rheological effects, are concentrated between particles, and that the electrostatic interaction between the particles is concentrated in a very narrow regime at the tip of the particles, The interaction increases with the electric field intensity until the field between the particles is high enough to cause nonlinear electrical conduction in the polymer, resulting in a redistribution of the electric field and electrostatic energy.
Factors of Successful Self-Employment Through Vocational Rehabilitation for Individuals With Disabilities

A review of empirical research on self-employment of individuals with disabilities in the United States found that success appears to be influenced most by three factors: accountability systems, level of supports, and individual characteristics. In the present study, a conceptual framework based on that review was tested on federal data on individuals with disabilities who had become successfully self-employed through Vocational Rehabilitation (VR) services. Data from all 50 states and the District of Columbia were analyzed using structural equation modeling. The initial model did not converge to an admissible solution; therefore, it was respecified. The subsequent model converged to an admissible solution, however, model fit varied across location and time. A number of factors yet remain to be uncovered and tested to explain these variations. The study concludes with a discussion of limitations, recommendations for further research, and implications for researchers, VR agencies, and policy makers.
Colonoscopy with polypectomy in anticoagulated patients.

Background According to current practice guidelines for performance of colonoscopy in patients requiring long-term anticoagulation, polypectomy is considered a high-risk procedure for which anticoagulation must temporarily be discontinued. However, these guidelines are based on expert opinion, and the bleeding risk after polypectomy in anticoagulated patients is not known. Objective Measure the risk of postpolypectomy bleeding in patients who undergo colonoscopic polypectomy while anticoagulated. Design Retrospective review of patients who underwent polypectomy without discontinuation of anticoagulation. Setting Veterans Administration Palo Alto Health Care System. Patients Forty-one polypectomies were performed in 21 patients. All patients had been receiving long-term anticoagulation with warfarin; the average international normalized ratio was 2.3 (range 1.4-4.9; normal 0.9-1.2). To prevent supratherapeutic anticoagulation, warfarin was withheld for 36 hours before the procedure while the patients were on a liquid diet. The average polyp size was 5 mm (range 3-10 mm). Interventions All patients underwent polypectomy followed immediately by prophylactic application of one or two clips to prevent bleeding. Main Outcome Measurements Rate of postpolypectomy bleeding. Results There were no episodes of postpolypectomy bleeding. The 95% CI for the risk of bleeding was 0% to 8.6% when analyzed per polypectomy and 0% to 15% when analyzed per patient. Limitations Small single-center retrospective study. Conclusions Our experience suggests that small polyps can be removed with a very low risk of bleeding when clips are applied immediately after polypectomy. If these results can be confirmed in a larger multicenter study, our protocol may become an alternative to withholding anticoagulation in patients at high risk of thrombosis.
Vimentin Enhances Cell Elastic Behavior and Protects against Compressive Stress

Vimentin intermediate filament expression is a hallmark of epithelial-to-mesenchymal transitions, and vimentin is involved in the maintenance of cell mechanical properties, cell motility, adhesion, and other signaling pathways. A common feature of vimentin-expressing cells is their routine exposure to mechanical stress. Intermediate filaments are unique among cytoskeletal polymers in resisting large deformations in vitro, yet vimentin’s mechanical role in the cell is not clearly understood. We use atomic force microscopy to compare the viscoelastic properties of normal and vimentin-null (vim−/−) mouse embryo fibroblasts (mEFs) on substrates of different stiffnesses, spread to different areas, and subjected to different compression patterns. In minimally perturbed mEF, vimentin contributes little to the elastic modulus at any indentation depth in cells spread to average areas. On a hard substrate however, the elastic moduli of maximally spread mEFs are greater than those of vim−/−mEF. Comparison of the plastic deformation resulting from controlled compression of the cell cortex shows that vimentin’s enhancement of elastic behavior increases with substrate stiffness. The elastic moduli of normal mEFs are more stable over time than those of vim−/−mEFs when cells are subject to ongoing oscillatory compression, particularly on a soft substrate. In contrast, increasing compressive strain over time shows a greater role for vimentin on a hard substrate. Under both conditions, vim−/−mEFs exhibit more variable responses, indicating a loss of regulation. Finally, normal mEFs are more contractile in three-dimensional collagen gels when seeded at low density, when cell-matrix contacts dominate, whereas contractility of vim−/−mEF is greater at higher densities when cell-cell contacts are abundant. Addition of fibronectin to gel constructs equalizes the contractility of the two cell types. These results show that the Young’s moduli of normal and vim−/−mEFs are substrate stiffness dependent even when the spread area is similar, and that vimentin protects against compressive stress and preserves mechanical integrity by enhancing cell elastic behavior.
The molecular evolution of the immune response

In recentyears the molecular basis of immunoglobulin diversity has been uncovered. Little is known, however, about its significance and the mechanisms that generate it in the whole organism. In this article Tim Manser and his colleagues discuss ways in which this diversity is used in the establishment of immunity, and seek to explain how genetically identical individuals generate widely diverse immune responses to the same antigen and some antigens reproducibly elicit similar immune responses (recurrent idiotypes) in all individuals.
ethnic identity, history, and “tribe” in the Middle Zambezi Valley1

In rural Africa, as in American cities, numerous competing ethnic identities may be found sheltered together under the dominant structural umbrella provided by political hierarchy and centralization; individual ethnic factions may play important but, in most cases, secondary roles in the over-all life of the polity. In non-centralized African polities a common sense of overriding ethnic identity may assume the dominant structural role in place of permanent political centrality, symbolizing the people's collective world view, sense of relevant history, and relations with the world around them. As all these factors are likely to change through time, the collective identity holding sway in stateless areas is likely to be as evanescent, subject to reinterpretation, and as indeterminant around the edges as the loosely organized, weakly bounded sociopolitical (or tribal) field it represents. A diachronic approach, illustrated here, enables us to make these general suggestions about the role and nature of ethnic identity or tribal label in stateless societies. The local view of the past is obviously an essential cultural matrix we need to appreciate in order to enrich our understanding of the ethnographic situation.
Gene Family Content-Based Phylogeny of Prokaryotes: The Effect of Criteria for Inferring Homology

A number of recent papers have suggested that gene family content can be used to resolve phylogenies, particularly in the case of prokaryotes, in which extensive horizontal gene transfer means that individual gene phylogenies may not mirror the organismal phylogeny. However, no study has yet examined how sensitive such analyses are to the criterion of homology assessment used to assemble multigene families. Using data from 99 completely sequenced prokaryotic genomes, we examined the effect of homology criteria in phylogenetic analyses wherein presence or absence of each family in the genome was used as a cladistic character. Different criteria resulted in evidence for contradictory tree topologies, sometimes with high bootstrap support. A moderately strict criterion seemed best for assembling multigene families in a biologically meaningful way, but it was not necessarily preferable for phylogenetic analysis. Instead, a very strict criterion, which broke up gene families into smaller subfamilies, seemed to have advantages for phylogenetic purposes. The poor performance of gene family content-based phylogenetic analysis in the case of prokaryotes appears to reflect high levels of homoplasy resulting not only from horizontal gene transfer but also, more importantly, from extensive parallel loss of gene families in certain bacteria genomes.
Economic Integration in Tanzania (1970–2011): A Biophysical Assessment

This article assesses the impact of economic integration on Tanzania's sociometabolic profile for the years 1970-2011, which witnessed an opening and further integration of Tanzania's economy through increased trade and foreign investment, through a time-series economy-wide material flows analysis (EW-MFA). The EW-MFA results show that contrary to the trade patterns of many developing countries, increased economic integration has resulted in Tanzania becoming a net importer of resources across all material categories when measured by the physical trade balance indicator. Additionally, the article discusses the conceptual and empirical challenges of measuring ecologically unequal exchange with EW-MFAs for developing countries whose export profiles are dominated by lightweight, high-value precious stones and metals. It also assesses the degree to which the Tanzanian economy has undergone dematerialization over the past 40 years of economic integration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
Investigation into Building an Invariant Surface Model from Sparse Data

This paper addresses the problem of forming surface depth estimates from sparse information, which are invariant to three-dimensional rotations and translations of the surface in the chosen coordinate system. We begin this investigation by examining a simplified version of this problem, that of forming invariant curve estimates from sparse data, to help gain insight into the more complex problem in higher dimensions. Two new algorithms are proposed and studied in detail, and several examples are presented to demonstrate their effectiveness. The extension of these algorithms to surfaces in threedimensional space is also briefly discussed.
What Do You Mean, “Epigenetic”?

Interest in the field of epigenetics has increased rapidly over the last decade, with the term becoming more identifiable in biomedical research, scientific fields outside of the molecular sciences, such as ecology and physiology, and even mainstream culture. It has become increasingly clear, however, that different investigators ascribe different definitions to the term. Some employ epigenetics to explain changes in gene expression, others use it to refer to transgenerational effects and/or inherited expression states. This disagreement on a clear definition has made communication difficult, synthesis of epigenetic research across fields nearly impossible, and has in many ways biased methodologies and interpretations. This article discusses the history behind the multitude of definitions that have been employed since the conception of epigenetics, analyzes the components of these definitions, and offers solutions for clarifying the field and mitigating the problems that have arisen due to these definitional ambiguities.
Experimental transmission of Enterobacteriaceae by insects. I. Fate of Salmonella fed to the hide beetle Dermestes maculatus and a novel method for mounting insects.

Abstract A method of mounting insects was devised. The procedure is simple to perform and facilitates quantitative bacteriological studies of feces with a minimal possibility of cross contamination. By this method, it was observed that approximately 107 cells of Salmonella were required for passage through the intestinal tract. Multiple doses of this magnitude were necessary to initiate intestinal infection. The numerical considerations cast doubt that Dermestes is involved significantly in the dissemination of Salmonella in the environment of food and feed plants.
Cambodian Bon Om Touk stampede highlights preventable tragedy

The tragic nature of the human stampede that took place in Phnom Penh, Cambodia on November 22, 2010 claimed the lives of 347 people during the three-day-long Water Festival, known as Bon Om Touk. Described as the greatest tragedy that Cambodia has experienced since the collapse of the Khmer Rouge, the Bon Om Touk stampede ranks among the deadliest human stampede disasters during the past 30 years, a Class IV event exceeding 100 fatalities according to a recently proposed scale.1 From the perspective of global health, the event shares many characteristics with preceding major crowd disasters and failures in event planning. It is essential for the international community to officially monitor human stampedes as it does other major disasters. Additional research on human stampedes is needed to improve our collective understanding of the causes of crowd disasters and how best to prevent them. Hsu EB, Burkle FM Jr. Cambodian Bon Om Touk stampede highlights preventable tragedy. Prehosp Disaster Med. 2012;27(5):1-2. Language: en
The role of test expectancy in the build-up of proactive interference in long-term memory

We examined the hypothesis that interpolated testing in a multiple list paradigm protects against proactive interference by sustaining test expectancy during encoding. In both experiments, recall on the last of 5 word lists was compared between 4 conditions: a tested group who had taken tests on all previous lists, an untested group who had not taken any tests on previous lists, and 2 other groups (one tested and the other untested) who were warned about the upcoming test prior to study of the fifth list. In both experiments, the untested/warned group performed significantly better than the untested/unwarned group on both correct recall and prior list intrusions but did not achieve the same recall accuracy as tested groups. In Experiment 2, an instruction manipulation check further narrowed the gap between the untested/warned group and the tested groups. In addition, we verified that a reduction in test expectancy indeed occurred in the untested group compared with the tested group by asking participants to indicate how likely they believed they were to receive a test on each studied list. These findings suggest that testing protects against proactive interference largely via attentional processes and/or more effective encoding.
What's Basic about Basic Emotions?.

A widespread assumption in theories of emotion is that there exists a small set of basic emotions. From a biological perspective, this idea is manifested in the belief that there might be neurophysiological and anatomical substrates corresponding to the basic emotions. From a psychological perspective, basic emotions are often held to be the primitive building blocks of other, nonbasic emotions. The content of such claims is examined, and the results suggest that there is no coherent nontrivial notion of basic emotions as the elementary psychological primitives in terms of which other emotions can be explained. Thus, the view that there exist basic emotions out of which all other emotions are built, and in terms of which they can be explained, is questioned, raising the possibility that this position is an article of faith rather than an empirically or theoretically defensible basis for the conduct of emotion research. This suggests that perhaps the notion of basic emotions will not lead to significant progress in the field. An alternative approach to explaining the phenomena that appear to motivate the postulation of basic emotions is presented.
Stable Hilbert series as related to the measurement of quantum entanglement

We compute a stable formula for the Hilbert series of the invariant algebra of polynomial functions on @?"i"="1^rC^n^"^i under the action of U(n"1)x...xU(n"r), when viewed as real vector space. This situation has a physical interpretation as it is the quantum analog of an r-particle classical system in which the ith particle has n"i classical states. The stable formula involves only elementary combinatorics, while its derivation involves the representation theory of the symmetric group. In particular, the Kronecker coefficients play an important role.
Ordering Sex in Cyberspace: A Content Analysis of Escort Websites

Research studies on prostitution, more specifically escort services, have neglected the use of the internet as a method of solicitation and advertisement. The current study is an exploratory analysis of the content of 76 escort websites, located using online search engines. The purpose of this study was to uncover information about the escort agencies and escorts that utilize the internet for advertisement purposes. One of the goals of this research study was to describe the `typical' escort website from the potential customer perspective and includes information on individual escorts, prices, payment options and reviews.
Fabrication of silicon strip detectors using a step-and-repeat lithography system

The author describes the use of a step-and-repeat lithography system (stepper) for the fabrication of silicon strip detectors. Although the field size of the stepper is only 20 mm in diameter, much larger detectors have been fabricated by printing a repetitive strip detector pattern in a step-and-repeat fashion. The basic unit cell is 7 mm in length. The stepper employs a laser interferometer for stage placement, and the resulting high precision allows one to accurately place the repetitive patterns on the wafer. A small overlap between the patterns ensures a continuous strip. A detector consisting of 512 strips on a 50 mu m pitch has been fabricated using this technique. The dimensions of the detector are 6.3 cm by 2.56 cm. Yields of over 99% have been achieved, where yield is defined as the percentage of strips with reverse leakage current below 1 nA. >
Effect on cardiovascular function and iron metabolism of the acute removal of 2 units of red cells.

BACKGROUND: The collection from a donor of 2 red cell units at one time would decrease recipient exposure to viruses and alloantigens. If the donor is a large person, the blood volume lost and the postdonation hemoglobin and/or hematocrit should be within acceptable limits. If the donor is a large person, the blood volume lost and the postdonation hemoglobin and/or hematocrit should be within acceptable limits. The effect on cardiovascular function and iron metabolism requires description. STUDY DESIGN AND METHODS: Manual 2-unit erythropheresis was performed on eight donors, with the plasma returned. Donors had treadmill testing of maximum aerobic power (VO2max) before donation, 24 hours after, and 8 to 11 weeks after. Serial samples were drawn for iron metabolism studies. RESULTS: Donors weighed 61.2 to 74.8 kg, and 9.6 to 11.4 percent of their blood volume was removed. Mean VO2max decreased from 84 percent of that predicted before donation to 74 percent 24 hours afterward. By 8 to 11 weeks, hemoglobin returned to acceptable donor levels and mean VO2max was 92 percent of that predicted. Mean hemoglobin fell from 14.4 to 11.7 g per dL (144 to 117 g/L) and rose to 13.9 g per dL (139 g/L) at 16 weeks. At 16 weeks, serum iron (120 ± 47 vs. 83 ± 33 micrograms/dL [21 ± 8 vs. 15 ± 6 mumol/L]), ferritin (40 ± 24 vs. 18 ± 10 ng/mL [40 ± 20 vs. 20 ± 10 micrograms/L]), and free erythroprotoporphyrin (19 ± 5 vs. 28 ± 5 micrograms/dL [0.34 ± 0.09 vs. 0.50 ± 0.09 mumol/L]) differed significantly from baseline levels. No major donor symptoms occurred. CONCLUSION: Two-unit erythropheresis was done with blood volume loss and postdonation hemoglobin no worse than those that would occur in a 50-kg donor donating 450 mL. Cardiovascular effects and donor symptoms were mild. Two-unit red cell donations would be clinically advantageous, and they warrant further studies of both utility and donor safety.
Mutational Analysis of Measles Virus Suggests Constraints on Antigenic Variation of the Glycoproteins

SUMMARY Measles virus undergoes error-prone replication like other RNA viruses, but over time, it has remained antigenically monotypic. The constraints on the virus that prevent the emergence of antigenic variants are unclear. As a first step in understanding this question, we subjected the measles virus genome to unbiased insertional mutagenesis, and viruses that could tolerate insertions were rescued. Only insertions in the nucleoprotein, phosphoprotein, matrix protein, as well as intergenic regions were easily recoverable. Insertions in the glycoproteins of measles virus were severely under-represented in our screen. Host immunity depends on developing neutralizing antibodies to the hemagglutinin and fusion glycoproteins; our analysis suggests that these proteins occupy very little evolutionary space and therefore have difficulty changing in the face of selective pressures. We propose that the inelasticity of these proteins prevents the sequence variation required to escape antibody neutralization in the host, allowing for long-lived immunity after infection with the virus.
Pragmatism and the Philosophy of Chemistry

Charles Sanders Peirce (1840–1908) is generally recognized as the founder of ‘Pragmatism’—a distinctively American philosophical approach that is relevant to major unsolved problems of current philosophy. Peirce did his graduate studies in chemistry and he identified himself as a chemist throughout his career, but his work is seldom cited in current philosophy of chemistry. Following Peirce, pragmatists hold that philosophy and science are closely-related human evolutionary adaptations and that neither attains to certainty—but rather that either may result in understanding that is adequate for specific purposes. Peirce made major contributions to the logic of relations and the theory of signs (‘semiotic’) and vigorously rejected ‘nominalism,’ the doctrine (often tacitly assumed) that characteristics of composite entities can be understood solely in terms of the properties of their components. With respect to the determination of outcomes of irreversible (“finious”) processes, Peirce understood causality in an unusually broad sense. Additional attention to the work of Peirce and later pragmatists would be helpful for philosophy of chemistry. For instance, Process Structural Realism (PSR) combines aspects of pragmatism with other approaches to understand how closure of networks of dynamic processes leads to far-from-equilibrium coherences that exert significant influence. Such understanding is critically important for problems of present philosophic and practical interest.
Angiogenesis and ophthalmic disease.

Ocular angiogenesis is responsible for the majority of irreversible blindness in the developed world [1]. This debilitating complication affects all age groups and characterizes such diverse and widespread diseases as trachoma, retinopathy of prematurity, diabetic retinopathy, neovascular glaucoma and age-related macular degeneration. Although numerous relatively rare conditions also exhibit ocular angiogenesis, the aim of this review will be to briefly summarize our current knowledge regarding the clinical and laboratory findings of the most epidemiologically significant diseases. We will also describe current concepts regarding the pathogenesis of ocular angiogenesis. In this review the term ‘neovascularization’, which is more prevalent in the ophthalmic literature, will be used to describe the development of pathological new vessels and should be considered synonymous with ‘angiogenesis’.
Aspects of Tourism in Kenya

Tourism in Kenya dates back to the colonial era. Tourists have invented a map of Kenya that comprises mainly the Rift Valley and the Indian Ocean coast; and they divide the population into ‘noble’ pastoralists and less noble agriculturalists and urban dwellers. Tourists came originally to see and kill wild animals; most were members of ‘big game safaris’ organised by ‘White Hunters’, reportedly often the sexual targets of women tourists. Shooting is now prohibited, but tourists shoot with cameras: they now come to see both animals and ‘exotic’ Africans. Sexual relations with local inhabitants are often part of ‘capturing’ them.Tourists resemble pilgrims, in search of the sacred and the purity of the exotic and wild; many also see themselves as successors to the formerly dominant settlers of colonial Kenya. Local inhabitants compete with the tourists by dominating them and by forming new social categories of entrepreneurs in the modern Kenyan economy.
The Use of Peer Evaluations in Group Projects: Benefits, Applications, and What Students Think of Them

(1996). The Use of Peer Evaluations in Group Projects: Benefits, Applications, and What Students Think of Them. Hospitality & Tourism Educator: Vol. 8, No. 4, pp. 44-46.
A Call to Action to Prevent Cardiovascular Disease in Women

reat news has been sounded over the Ghealth care airwaves: overall, rates of mortality from coronary heart disease in the United States have declined, as is apparent in the 68% decrease in age-adjusted mortality rates for men and women from 1979 to 2011 (Wilmot, O’Flaherty, Capewell, Ford, & Vaccarino, 2015). The greatest decline was in men and women older than 65 years, and the least decline was in women younger than 55 years (Mozaffarian et al., 2015; Wilmot et al., 2015). Wilmot et al. (2015) found that for young women, there was essentially no improvement in rates between 1990 and 1999 and only a 1% estimated annual percentage change since 2000. When these rates were stratified by race, similar trends were found for Black men and women—that is, flattened trends in mortality in the age group younger than 55 years and more marked improvements in older age groups (Wilmot et al., 2015).
Secure Computation from Millionaire

The standard method for designing a secure computation protocol for function f first transforms f into either a circuit or a RAM program and then applies a generic secure computation protocol that either handles boolean gates or translates the RAM program into oblivious RAM instructions. In this paper, we show a large class of functions for which a different iterative approach to secure computation results in more efficient protocols. The first such examples of this technique was presented by Aggarwal, Mishra, and Pinkas J. of Cryptology, 2010 for computing the median; later, Brickell and Shmatikov Asiacrypt 2005 showed a similar technique for shortest path problems. We generalize the technique in both of those works and show that it applies to a large class of problems including certain matroid optimizations, sub-modular optimization, convex hulls, and other scheduling problems. The crux of our technique is to securely reduce these problems to secure comparison operations and to employ the idea of gradually releasing part of the output. We then identify conditions under which both of these techniques for protocol design are compatible with achieving simulation-based security in the honest-but-curious and covert adversary models. In special cases such as median, we also show how to achieve malicious security.
Mechanical Behavior and Constitutive Modeling During High Temperature Deformation of Al Laminated Metal Composites

A constitutive model for deformation of a novel laminated metal composite (LMC) which is comprised of 21 alternating layers of Al 5182 alloy and Al 6090/SiC/25p metal matrix composite (MMC) has been proposed. The LMC as well as the constituent or neat structures have been deformed in uniaxial tension within a broad range of strain-rates (i.e. 10−5 to 100 s−1) and homologous temperatures (i.e. 0.8 ≥ 0.95 Tm). The results of these experiments have led to a thorough characterization of the mechanical behavior and a subsequent semiempirical constitutive rate equation for both the Al 5182 and Al 6090/SiC/25p when tested monolithically. These predictive relations have been coupled with a proposed model which takes into account the dynamic load sharing between the elastically stiffer and softer layers when loaded axially during isostrain deformation of the LMC. This model has led to the development of a constitutive relationship between flow stress and applied strain-rate for the laminated structure.
Neoadjuvant Chemotherapy in Invasive Bladder Cancer: The Evolving Role of Surgery

The role of an operation in patients receiving neoadjuvant chemotherapy for clinically localized but invasive transitional cell carcinoma of the bladder currently is evolving. An operation is essential for case selection and evaluation of local response but it also contributes to bladder preservation and survival. The procedure that is necessary to select for and assess response to chemotherapy may itself alter the actual or proceed to evolution of invasive bladder cancer. Neoadjuvant chemotherapy is a reasonable therapeutic strategy in selected patients but it remains to be seen whether the results will prove to be superior to those achieved with standard endoscopic and open operations.
Be Careful What You Wish For The Learning Imperative in Postindustrial Work

Learning at work is usually seen as beneficial for the professional and personal lives of workers. In this article, we propose that learning’s relationship to worker well-being may be more complica...
Role of bradykinin B2 receptors in the developmental changes of renal hemodynamics in the neonatal rat.

The present study was performed to evaluate the role of bradykinin, acting via B2 receptors, in the developmental rise in renal blood flow (RBF) and glomerular filtration rate (GFR) in the rat. New...
COMPASS Practice Outcome: Idiographic Assessment and Development of a Measure

One critical challenge to educators and to researchers is how to assess progress for group comparison designs when children have different goals, different stating baseline levels, and different intervention plans and, therefore, different milestones for what constitutes success. Evaluation of Individual Education Program (IEP) outcomes at the student level requires an idiographic measure of change. Idiographic assessment approaches are ideal for evaluating special education outcomes as IEPs require strict individualization of student goals. In this chapter we describe our approach for measuring COMPASS outcomes. We chose Goal Attainment Scaling as our answer for a sensitive, idiographic approach for measuring individual student outcomes. Because we also needed to ensure psychometric equivalence for group comparisons, we developed templates to help create equivalent goals as well as tools to evaluate the comparability of different goals by rating the (a) measurability of the goal; (b) level of difficulty of the goal; and (c) equidistance of goal. We then report our findings that we could develop templates with reliability and that scores from teacher-made videotapes that were used to score child progress during the coaching sessions were similar to tapes collected by researchers. Overall, our data suggests that GAS can be a valid and sensitive idiographic approach for use in group design experimental studies.
Disaster Declarations and Transportation Grants

In the previous chapter, we searched for evidence of presidential particularism in military base closings and trade policy. In both cases, we found that presidents favored the interests of some Americans over others. In some cases, presidents sought to court key swing voters; in others, they endeavored to protect their partisan allies from economic pain and instead concentrate it in constituencies that backed the partisan opposition. This stands in stark contrast to the conventional wisdom of presidential universalism, where presidents eschew parochialism and instead pursue policies that maximize outcomes for the nation as a whole. In this chapter, we look for further evidence of presidential particularism by analyzing presidential disaster declarations and executive influence over the allocation of transportation grants. Presidential decisions concerning whether or not to issue a federal disaster declaration present an ideal venue to examine presidential motivations because the stimulus (severe weather) is determined outside the political system and creates a direct need for relief. As a result, we can assess whether – after controlling for storm damage and objective economic need – political factors influence the allocation of federal disaster aid. Although need is the preeminent determinant of presidential disaster declarations, our data unambiguously show that these presidential directives are also influenced by whether the affected area is in a battleground state or a core partisan constituency. Shifting focus to the politics of transportation grants affords us an opportunity to look for evidence of presidential particularism in a realm where presidents do not have unilateral authority over policymaking. Indeed, transportation funding is a policy realm long held to be dominated not by the president but by Congress. As a result, transportation grants serve as a critical test for our argument; if we find evidence of presidential particularism here, there are strong reasons to expect to find it in a myriad of other policy realms as well. Presidential Disaster Declarations Disaster declarations are opportunities for presidents to make unilateral decisions about distributive politics. Moreover, in this policy realm we are able to measure accurately and objectively economic need – the dollar amount of damage caused by the severe weather.
Provisions for Implementing Decisions

Protocols for the elective use of life-sustaining treatment establish a framework to promote the proper implementation of treatment decisions (Hastings Center, 1987; Kapp, 1987; Office of Technology Assessment, 1987; President’s Commission, 1983). Provisions for proper treatment plan implementation should: (1) establish treatment assumptions that safeguard against the unintended withholding of life-sustaining treatment; (2) maintain accountability of staff for decision making and the provision of treatment; (3) provide for accurate communication of treatment intentions; and (4) promote compliance with mandated procedures of outside agencies. Finally, protocols should provide for proper implementation and updating of the protocol itself.
Using Pedometers to Increase the Non-Workday Steps of Hospital Nursing and Support Staff: A Pilot Study:

Nursing is a physically active profession; however, nurses and nursing support staff may limit their physical activity (PA) on non-workdays. The purpose of this pilot study was to examine the effects of a 12-week pedometer-based PA intervention on daily steps of hospital nursing and support staff from two departments, emergency (ED) and oncology (ONC). The 12-week minimal-contact, self-managed intervention was designed to increase total and non-workday PA. Twenty participants with an average age of 47.6 ± 7.1 years completed the intervention. Significant differences were found between total daily steps at baseline (8,446) and at 12 weeks (10,655; p = .014), and between workday steps at baseline (10,398) and at 12 weeks (13,056; p = 0.005). Oncology unit participants significantly increased their non-workday steps from baseline (5,850) to 12 weeks (9,829; p = .003). As part of a comprehensive intervention, pedometers can promote total and non-workday PA of nursing and support staff.
Your substance abuse disorder is an open secret! Gleaning sensitive personal information from templates in an EEG-based authentication system

Given the task of designing an authentication system that uses brain waves as input, researchers typically focus on the sole objective of maximizing authentication accuracy. In this paper we challenge this common wisdom and argue that because brain waves encode a lot of other (potentially sensitive) information about the user, this single-pronged, privacy-agnostic approach can have significant privacy implications. Based on a publicly accessible dataset, we rigorously analyze two EEG-based authentication systems built in accordance with this philosophy and show that such designs could potentially divulge more of the users sensitive personal information than that regarding the intended authentication functionality. The paper argues for privacy-aware designs for systems which take brain signals as input.
Assessing the Medication Adherence App Marketplace From the Health Professional and Consumer Vantage Points

Background: Nonadherence produces considerable health consequences and economic burden to patients and payers. One approach to improve medication nonadherence that has gained interest in recent years is the use of smartphone adherence apps. The development of smartphone adherence apps has increased rapidly since 2012; however, literature evaluating the clinical app and effectiveness of smartphone adherence apps to improve medication adherence is generally lacking. Objective: The aims of this study were to (1) provide an updated evaluation and comparison of medication adherence apps in the marketplace by assessing the features, functionality, and health literacy (HL) of the highest-ranking adherence apps and (2) indirectly measure the validity of our rating methodology by determining the relationship between our app evaluations and Web-based consumer ratings. Methods: Two independent reviewers assessed the features and functionality using a 4-domain rating tool of all adherence apps identified based on developer claims. The same reviewers downloaded and tested the 100 highest-ranking apps including an additional domain for assessment of HL. Pearson product correlations were estimated between the consumer ratings and our domain and total scores. Results: A total of 824 adherence apps were identified; of these, 645 unique apps were evaluated after applying exclusion criteria. The median initial score based on descriptions was 14 (max of 68; range 0-60). As a result, 100 of the highest-scoring unique apps underwent user testing. The median overall user-tested score was 31.5 (max of 73; range 0-60). The majority of the user tested the adherence apps that underwent user testing reported a consumer rating score in their respective online marketplace. The mean consumer rating was 3.93 (SD 0.84). The total user-tested score was positively correlated with consumer ratings (r=.1969, P=.04). Conclusions: More adherence apps are available in the Web-based marketplace, and the quality of these apps varies considerably. Consumer ratings are positively but weakly correlated with user-testing scores suggesting that our rating tool has some validity but that consumers and clinicians may assess adherence app quality differently. [JMIR Mhealth Uhealth 2017;5(4):e45]
Toward an Evangelical Identity

Hatcher’s exploration of the politics of British Evangelicals yields some important conclusions. First, British Evangelicals are not ripe for political mobilization because they lack the means, motive, and opportunity required of social movements. Second, the biggest hindrance to mobilization is that being Evangelical is not, for them, a social identity . Third , because the same religious tradition can work differently according to national, political, and cultural contexts, political science needs to broaden and deepen its study of religion . Furthermore, American Evangelicals can learn a new way of tempered engagement from their British counterparts, but most importantly, British Evangelicals should form a group identity to give greater coherence to their religious and civic selves. British politics would benefit from their social justice imperative.
HIV Knowledge Mediates the Relationship between HIV Testing History and Stigma in College Students.

Objective: HIV-related stigma is one of the strongest barriers to prevention and treatment. HIV prevalence in U.S. college students is estimated around 0.02%, but is thought to be drastically under...
DNA Methylation and retrovirus expression

The methylation of cytosine in mammalian DNA has proven to be an enigma to scientists since its discovery more than 30 years ago. There are several apparent roles for the methylation of DNA in eukaryotic cells, the exceptions being Drosophila yeast. The absence of DNA methylation in the latter two examples suggests that the fundamental mechanisms of DNA metabolism can exist without modification of cytosine. Probably the most common phenomenon ascribed in DNA methylation is the control of gene activity at the level of transcription (Bird, 1986; Lindsay and Bird, 1988). Methylation of key cytosine moieties is mediated by the mammalian DNA cytosine-5-methyltransferase (MeTase), and is specific for the dinucleotide sequence CpG (Bestor et al., 1988; Doerfler, 1983; Santi et al., 1983; Smith et al., 1991). The CpG sequences are often found localized in clusters and are referred to as “CpG islands” (Bird, 1986). Gene promoters which occupy such islands are susceptible to inactivation, but the process which determines what genes are to be selectively inactivated is currently unknown. A key feature of the regulation of gene activity by hypermethylation of CpG sequences is the epigenetic manner by which the cell strictly maintains DNA methylation patterns. The term “epigenetic” was introduced to permit the addition of another level of information, separate from alteration of the actual gene sequence, to allow the stable inheritance of, in this case, gene activity patterns (Holliday, 1990). The breakdown in the relaying of epigenetic information would result in the disarray of gene expression and ultimately cellular dysfunction.
Embedded 'Liberalism'? Retesting Individual Implications of the Compensation Hypothesis

Do an individual's trade policy preferences reflect those predicted by economic theory and do they respond to government policy? To test this broad theoretical question, I propose a more precise interpretation of the compensation hypothesis. That social programs decrease protectionism, but are not alone sufficient to increase support for free trade among self-interested individuals. If individual level trade policy preferences are based on exposure to international risk, government policies that mitigate risk should affect trade policy preferences. Based on the predictions of the Embedded Liberalism thesis and the compensation hypothesis, prior studies have argued that compensation fosters support for free trade among the public. However, this claim is problematic for two reasons. First, earlier research has assumed that macro level predictions of lowered (pressure for) trade barriers translates to micro level incentives which rally support for free trade. Second, the compensation hypothesis speaks specifically to offsetting losses for those who are harmed by globalization, not the subsidization of those groups unaffected or gain from trade. The results suggest that some individuals become more indifferent between protection and free trade, while some others do in fact become pro-free trade. However, with one caveat: for individuals who become or start as indifferent, compensation has no effect. Individuals do not necessarily think of trade along a linear policy dimension from open economy to autarky but instead are protectionist, free traders or indifferent.
Attaining Critical Appreciation through Art

In this theoretical inquiry, it is argued that developing general critical appreciation is among the highest goals of general education and that one of the strongest justifications for art's equal inclusion in the curriculum lies in its ability to foster such appreciation. Art education's potential contribution to critical appreciation is examined in light of art's unique content and approaches to knowledge. Finally, a structure is suggested for integrating art production, art criticism, art history, and aesthetics in a model fostering general critical appreciation.
Theory and Empiricism in Intervention Research: A Dialectic to Be Avoided

Abstract It has been my pleasure to read and comment on the article by Hughes on “The Essential Role of Theory in the Science of Treating Children: Beyond Empirically Supported Treatments” [this issue]. This article has all of the commendable qualities that make for a useful and important critique of our current practice in a certain area; in this case, in the use of empirically supported treatments (ESTs) with children and adolescents. Hughes' article has excellent reviews of the current literature in several key areas. In the style of a useful critique designed to stimulate discussion of a topic that might otherwise be placidly accepted, the article raises important issues and concludes that intervention researchers have become “enamored of facts and distrustful of theory” and that the current zeitgeist favors empiricism.
Multisensory Influences on Driver Steering During Curve Navigation.

Objective:The effects of inertial (vestibular and somatosensory) information on driver steering during curve navigation were investigated, using an electric four-wheel mobility vehicle outfitted wi...
An Automatable Method for Determining Adequacy of Thyroid Fine-Needle Aspiration Samples

Context.— Thyroid nodules are a common clinical problem. Cytologic evaluation via fine-needle aspiration is often employed in the diagnostic workup, and rapid on-site assessment of adequacy can hel...