nils-herrmann/clean_scirepeval huggingface dataset:
Effect of deposition parameters on the electrical and metallurgical properties of Au-Zn contacts to p-type InP

The electrical and metallurgical properties of Au-Zn contacts to p-type InP, prepared by vacuum evaporation of Au-Zn (10 wt%) alloy, were investigated as a function of deposition parameters and annealing conditions. The deposition rate of Au-Zn alloy was found to be the major factor that strongly influences the properties of as-deposited and annealed p-InP/Au-Zn contacts. At a substrate temperature of about 150 degrees C, when a high deposition rate of about 16-25 nm s-1 was used, excellent homogeneous ohmic contacts could be formed after annealing with specific contact resistance values of about 1*10-8 Omega m2 (for NA-ND=(0.8-1.0)*1024m-3). In contrast, a low deposition rate of about 0.1 nm s-1 resulted in a large scattering of resistance values and non-ohmic behaviour of contacts. In this case, a much smaller amount of zinc and its non-uniform distribution in the Au-Zn layer, as well as strong InP/Au-Zn interfacial reactions, were detected by AES and SEM techniques. The electrical and metallurgical properties of slow-deposited Au-Zn contacts could be improved by use of a lower substrate temperature (in the range of 30-50 degrees C) during contact deposition.

Field of study: Materials science
STRUCTURE OF THE GLENARM SERIES IN CHESTER COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA

The Woodville structure is a hook-shaped belt of Baltimore Gneiss surrounded by Glenarm rocks. The hypothesis that the structure is a nappe, rather than an upwarp involving two gneiss-cored anticlines, is based primarily on the orientation of B lineation in the Glenarm rocks, taken in conjunction with the map pattern; the southwestward plunge of the Glenarm rocks under the gneiss along the northeastern side of the hook indicates that this segment of the border of the gneiss is the inverted limb of a recumbent fold.

Field of study: Geology
Economic crisis and communicable disease control in Europe: a scoping study among national experts.

The effects of the current global economic crisis on the spread and control of communicable diseases remain uncertain. This study aimed to explore experts' views about the impact of the current crisis and measures that have been undertaken by governments to mitigate an alleged adverse effect of the crisis on communicable diseases.



An online survey was conducted during November 2009-February 2010 among experts from national agencies for communicable disease control from European Union (EU) and European Free Trade Association (EFTA) countries.



There were few specific national policies and programmes aimed at mitigating the impact of the economic crisis. Prevention services were deemed particularly susceptible to budget cuts (68%) as a result of the economic crisis compared to primary care (28%), according to survey respondents. Services targeted at vulnerable and hard-to-reach population groups were perceived to be at particular risk of deterioration (67%) in contrast to travel medicine (11%), according to respondents.



There is a need for sustainability of financial resources, public health workforce and infrastructures to ensure that the services and programmes for the surveillance and control of the spread of communicable disease are maintained and developed. There is also a need to explore and foster better linkage in data on socioeconomic circumstances and communicable disease outcomes.

Field of study: Medicine, Political science
A coupled mechano-biochemical model for bone adaptation

Bone remodelling is a fundamental biological process that controls bone microrepair, adaptation to environmental loads and calcium regulation among other important processes. It is not surprising that bone remodelling has been subject of intensive both experimental and theoretical research. In particular, many mathematical models have been developed in the last decades focusing in particular aspects of this complicated phenomenon where mechanics, biochemistry and cell processes strongly interact. In this paper, we present a new model that combines most of these essential aspects in bone remodelling with especial focus on the effect of the mechanical environment into the biochemical control of bone adaptation mainly associated to the well known RANKL-RANK-OPG pathway. The predicted results show a good correspondence with experimental and clinical findings. For example, our results indicate that trabecular bone is more severely affected both in disuse and disease than cortical bone what has been observed in osteoporotic bones. In future, the methodology proposed would help to new therapeutic strategies following the evolution of bone tissue distribution in osteoporotic patients.

Field of study: Biology, Mathematics
Reconstruction of high-speed cam curve based on high-order differential interpolation and shape adjustment

Mathematical defects of general cam curves such as high-order discontinuity and overlarge peak values often bring excessive transmission errors and vibrations to high-speed cam-follower systems. A comprehensive method is proposed in this study to develop high-speed cam curves with preferable mathematical characteristics. A high-order differential interpolation curve is first constructed by using nodal basis functions to accurately match with the multi-order derivatives on multiple nodes. A flexible cam curve is then reconstructed by adding variable shape factors on critical nodes for further shape adjustments. Numerical cases indicate that the proposed method can not only help construct a faithful cam curve satisfying all the given constraints for displacement, velocity, acceleration and jerk, but also effectively reconstruct a high-order continuous cam curve with lower peak values for high-speed precision cam mechanisms. The proposed method has been demonstrated to be effective and applicable in user-oriented reverse design, modification, and optimization of high-speed cam curves.

Field of study: Mathematics
Reprogramming of Vibrio harveyi gene expression during adaptation in cold seawater.

The life and survival of the marine bacterium Vibrio harveyi during its adaptation in natural aquatic systems is highly influenced by the availability of nutrients and temperature. To learn about adaptation strategies evolved by this bacterium to cope with drastic temperature downshifts and nutrients depletion, we have studied the phenotypical and gene expression changes occurring in V. harveyi during its adaptation to cold seawater. We found that incubation in cold seawater up to 12 h did not cause any significant morphological changes in V. harveyi and had no effect on the number of viable and culturable cells. Microarray analysis revealed that the V. harveyi response to cold seawater leads to up- and downregulation of numerous genes controlling the central carbon metabolism, nucleotide and amino acid biosynthesis as well as DNA repair. In addition, expression of some genes controlling biosynthesis of lipids, molecular transport, and energy production was altered to likely affect the composition and properties of the V. harveyi cell envelope, thus implying the putative role of this compartment in adaptation to stress. Here, we discuss these results with regard to the putative adaptive responses likely triggered by V. harveyi to cope with environmental challenges in natural aquatic systems.

Field of study: Biology, Environmental science
CXCL12 Regulates the Cholinergic Locus and CHT1 Through Akt Signaling Pathway

CXCL12 is pivotal for cholinergic neurons, and it induces the expressions of several genes that are essential for synthesis and storage of acetylcholine(ACh), specifically choline acetyltransferase, vesicular ACh transporter (VAChT), and choline transporter. The present study explored the impact of pharmacological Akt inhibition upon cholinergic gene expression.  Western blotting was employed to determine the level of p-AKT, RT-PCR to check the mRNA levels of and CHT1(choline transporter1),VAChT and ChAT, ELISA to decipher the secretion of ACh and the activity of choline acetyltransferase.  Here we demonstrated, in the rat pheochromocytoma cell line PC12 and in primary rat neuronal cultures, that CXCL12-evoked up-regulation of CHT1, VAChT and ChAT was mediated by Akt. Inhibition of Akt by the pharmacological inhibitor GSK690693 eliminated CXCL12-stimulated increases in cholinergic gene expression. Moreover, treatment with GSK690693 reversed CXCL12-evoked increases in choline acetyltransferase activity and ACh production.  Our results suggest that CXCL12 contributes to cholinergic gene expression via Akt signaling pathway.

Field of study: Biology, Chemistry
Internal Motion of 6.7-GHz Methanol Masers in H II Region S269

We present the first internal motion measurement of the 6.7-GHz methanol maser within S269, a small HII region in the outer Galaxy, which was carried out in 2006 and 2011 using the Japanese VLBI Network (JVN). Several maser groups and weak isolated spots were detected in an area spanning by ~200 mas (1000 AU). Three remarkable maser groups are aligned at a position angle of 80 degree. Two of three maser groups were also detected by a previous observation in 1998, which allowed us to study a long-term position variation of maser spots from 1998 to 2011. The angular separation between the two groups increased ~10 mas, which corresponds to an expansion velocity of ~10 km s^{-1}. Some velocity gradient (~10^{-2} km s^{-1} mas^{-1}) in the overall distribution was found. The internal motion between the maser groups support the hypothesis that the methanol masers in S269 could trace a bipolar outflow.

Field of study: Physics
Kernel locality-constrained sparse coding for head pose estimation

In many situations, it would be practical for a computer system user interface to have a model of where a person is looking and what the user is paying attention to. In this study, the authors describe a novel feature coding method for head pose estimation. The widely-used sparse coding (SC) method encodes a test sample using a sparse linear combination of training samples. However, it does not consider the underlying structure of the data in the feature space. In contrast, locality-constrained linear coding (LLC) utilises locality constraints to project each input data into its local-coordinate system. Based on the recent success of LLC, the authors introduce locality-constrained sparse coding (LSC) to overcome the limitation of Sparse Coding. The authors also propose kernel locality-constrained sparse coding, which is a non-linear extension of LSC. By using kernel tricks, the authors implicitly map the input data into the kernel feature space associated with the kernel function. In experiments, the proposed algorithm was applied to a head pose estimation application. Experimental results demonstrated the increased effectiveness and robustness of the method.

Field of study: Computer science
The Future of the Arts College

JT N THE educational circles of America, great concern is being expressed for the future of the traditional four-year college of liberal arts. This institution, which has been the backbone of higher education in the United States for three centuries, the critics now tell us is a sick institution-sick unto death. Strong factors are at work in the field of higher education which are bringing into being a new type of educational organization for the future. Two of these factors which are fatal to the future of the liberal-arts college are: the making of the American university strictly a technical and professional institution, and the rise of the junior college whose major objectives are the completion of general education and the providing of professional training for the university. Thus the traditional liberal-arts college is caught between the upper and the nether millstones. Elsewhere in this issue Mr. Reeves, of the University of Chicago, gives his prediction for the future organization of American higher education. The plan outlined by Mr. Reeves concludes that the liberal-arts program offered by the traditional liberal-arts colleges will no longer be typical of American higher education and that professionalization and specialization will be its key, that there will be more technical and professional training and less strictly cultural and liberal training. In opposition to this view may be presented two facts vitally affecting the future of higher education. First, our system of secondary and higher education is not fully developed. For the United States as a whole we have enrolled in the secondary schools only approximately 53 per cent of the high-school population. The increase has been rapid since i910. In that year the percentage was only i2.66; in I9I5 it was I7.76; and in i920 it was 28.43. One state has now enrolled approximately 75 per cent of the secondary-school population; many of the states have less than 40 per cent. There is considerable expansion yet to be made in the field of secondary education. Where this expansion will reach its maximum no one can predict. The program of higher education is still more undeveloped. Ten per cent of the population beyond high-school age are enrolled in higher institutions, and that percentage has been increasing rapidly in recent years and is still increasing. The percentage was 3.68 in i910, 6.32 in i920, and I0.4I in i926, and no one can predict where it will reach its maximum. Second, the question arises, In what types of education will this expansion occur? A second question, In

Field of study: Education
Full effects of land use change in the representative concentration pathways

Future land use change (LUC) is an important component of the IPCC representative concentration pathways (RCPs), but in these scenarios' radiative forcing targets the climate impact of LUC only includes greenhouse gases. However, climate effects due to physical changes of the land surface can be as large. Here we show the critical importance of including non-carbon impacts of LUC when considering the RCPs. Using an ensemble of climate model simulations with and without LUC, we show that the net climate effect is very different from the carbon-only effect. Despite opposite signs of LUC, all the RCPs assessed here have a small net warming from LUC because of varying biogeophysical effects, and in RCP4.5 the warming is outside of the expected variability. The afforestation in RCP4.5 decreases surface albedo, making the net global temperature anomaly over land around five times larger than RCPs 2.6 and 8.5, for around twice the amount of LUC. Consequent changes to circulation in RCP4.5 in turn reduce Arctic sea ice cover. The small net positive temperature effect from LUC could make RCP4.5's universal carbon tax, which incentivizes retaining and growing forest, counter productive with respect to climate. However, there are spatial differences in the balance of impacts, and potential climate gains would need to be assessed against other environmental aims.

Field of study: Environmental science
Heart Rate Recovery Is Impaired in Patients with Psoriasis

The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between psoriasis and heart rate recovery (HRR) index.  A total of 50 patients with a diagnosis of psoriasis and 32 healthy volunteers were included in the study. In all patients, a stress test was performed to calculate the HRR index in a manner which aimed to reach the age-specific maximum heart rate. HRR indices were calculated in all patients and controls.  HRR (beats/minute) indices after the 1st (HRR1, 26 ± 10 vs. 33 ± 8, p = 0.002), 2nd (44 ± 11 vs. 50 ± 6, p = 0.002), 3rd (51 ± 7 vs. 63 ± 8, p < 0.001), 4th (54 ± 7 vs. 65 ± 8, p < 0.001) and 5th (57 ± 8 vs. 70 ± 10, p < 0.001) minutes of the recovery period were significantly lower in the psoriasis group compared to healthy controls. In addition, HRR1 was significantly correlated with duration of psoriasis (r = 0.541, p < 0.001) and psoriasis area and severity index score (r = 0.511, p < 0.001).  HRR was lower in patients with psoriasis. Given the prognostic value of this test, patients with psoriasis might be at risk for future cardiovascular events and cardiovascular mortality.

Field of study: Medicine
Timing of Sexual Maturation and Women’s Evaluation of Men

Many antecedents and consequences of an accelerated sexual maturation are associated with negative experiences with the opposite sex. Here we show a connection between menarcheal age, a salient sign of female sexual maturation, and the implicit attitude toward men in later adulthood. In Study 1, earlier age at first menstruation was associated with automatic negative evaluations of male faces but not female ones. Study 2 revealed a relationship between early age of menarche and an implicit association between the concepts male and danger. In Study 3, the earlier the menarche, the larger was the estimated egocentric distance of virtual male voices and the shorter the estimated distance of female voices. These results, obtained about a decade after onset of menstruation, suggest that apparently subtle differences in the onset of sexual maturation may have long-lasting implications for intersexual relationships.

Field of study: Psychology
Imaging by ultrasound.

Imaging by ultrasound has dramatically changed the investigation and management of many clinical problems. It is useful in many different parts of the body. In this brief discussion, the following topics are considered: hepatic lesions, bleeding in early pregnancy, gynecological pathology (adnexal lesions), aortic aneurysms, thyroid nodules and scrotal masses. The usefulness of duplex carotid sonography, which combines ultrasonic imaging and Doppler studies, is also discussed. Other topics (gallstones, biliary obstruction, renal calculi, hydronephrosis) are discussed in the appropriate sections.

Field of study: Medicine
Refrigerant circuitry design of fin-and-tube condenser based on entropy generation minimization

This study presents a numerical model that is applicable to fin-and-tube condensers with complex refrigerant circuitry, and can be used to describe the exergy loss on the refrigerant side. The model was validated by comparing numerical results with experimental data for an R410A multi-pass condenser. The modeled and measured heat transfer rates were observed to agree with an error of less than 10%. Refrigerant-side performance was analyzed according to the design parameters using the numerical model, and appropriate performance evaluation criteria (PEC) were established for the refrigerant side of the condenser. A methodology was developed for refrigerant circuitry design based on entropy generation minimization (EGM). The resulting refrigerant circuit design enhanced heat transfer performance and lowered entropy generation in comparison to simple refrigerant circuitries.

Field of study: Engineering
Thermoelectric Properties of Impurity-Doped Mg2Sn

The Hall effect and thermoelectric properties of impurity-doped semiconducting Mg2Sn, fabricated using a process combining chemical reduction and spark plasma sintering, were investigated. A small amount of the oxides, hydroxide, or carbonate of IA, IIIA, IB, IIIB, and VB group elements [Al2O3, Bi2O3, Sb2O3, La(OH)3, Li2CO3, Ag2O, CuO, Ga2O3, In2O3, Na2CO3, or Y2O3] were added to improve the thermoelectric performance of Mg2Sn. X-ray diffraction was used for phase identification, and the patterns revealed that the major phase was cubic Mg2Sn, while the minor phases were orthorhombic and trigonal Mg2Sn, MgO, Sn, and intermetallics obtained by the chemical reduction of the additives. The doping of Bi, Sb, Li, Na, and Ga elements into Mg2Sn was found to significantly affect the carrier transport properties. The maximum values of the dimensionless thermoelectric figure-of-merit (ZT) for the p-type Mg2Sn fabricated using Li2CO3 and Na2O3 were 0.25 at 674 K and 0.11 at 577 K, respectively. However, the ZT values for the n-type Mg2Sn fabricated using Bi2O3 and Sb2O3 were 0.057 at 476 K and 0.058 at 574 K, respectively.

Field of study: Materials science
Gender, Literacy and Empowerment in Rural Colombia

Empowerment, understood as a process by which women increase their capacity to reexamine their own lives and aid those around them, as well as to question their roles as social agents, becomes critical in relation to the complex processes of literacy. This study takes a phenomenological approach to exploring the perceptions of a group of rural Colombian women on the path to literacy via the program Alfabetizacion Virtual Asistida en la Educacion de Jovenes y Adultos (Virtually Assisted Literacy in Youth and Adult Education) and discusses the dynamics of empowerment in the daily lives of these women during and after the program. Using the concepts of critical social theory and critical theory as a theoretical framework, this study demonstrates that programs such as this help women to reveal and reinvent their previously hidden identities; however, they offer only limited opportunities to challenge a stubborn patriarchal culture that insists on placing them in the domestic realm. The importance of this study relies on the fact that it identifies specific issues with regard to constraints in rural women’s education; therefore, there is an urgent need for government, academia, international agencies, and civil society to jointly participate in the implementation and execution of adult literacy programs. These programs must imperatively focus on gender inclusion and continuing education past the elementary stages, as well as on functional literacy that effectively impacts the lives of rural women in terms of decision-making, personal and family health care, reproductive health, and entry into the labor market.  Adult literacy, Colombia, gender, rural women, empowerment, literacy programs.

Field of study: Education
Association of SGK1 Gene Polymorphisms with Type 2 Diabetes

The serum and glucocorticoid inducible kinase SGK1 is genomically upregulated by glucocorticoids and in turn stimulates a variety of carriers and channels including the renal epithelial Na+ channel ENaC and the intestinal Na+ glucose transporter SGLT1. Twin studies disclosed an association of a specific SGK1 haplotype with moderately enhanced blood pressure in individuals who are carrying simultaneously a homozygous genotype for a variant in intron 6 [I6CC] and a homozygous or heterozygous genotype for the C allele of a polymorphism in exon 8 [E8CC/CT] of the SGK1 gene. A subsequent study confirmed the impact of this risk haplotype on blood pressure. SGK1 knockout mice are resistant to the insulin and high salt induced increase of blood pressure, glucocorticoid induced increase of electrogenic glucose transport, and glucocorticoid induced suppression of insulin release. The present study explored whether the I6CC/E8CC/CT haplotype impacts on the prevalence of type 2 diabetes. The prevalence of the I6CC genotype was 3.1% in a healthy German, 2.4 % in a healthy Romanian and 11.6 % in a healthy African population from Ghana (p=0.0006 versus prevalence in Caucasians). Comparison of genotype frequencies between type 2 diabetic patients and the respective control groups revealed significant differences for the intron 6 T>C variant. Carriers of at least one T allele were protected against type 2 diabetes (Romanians: p=0.023; OR 0.29; 95% CI 0.09-0.89; Germans: p=0.01; OR 0.37; 95% CI 0.17-0.81). The SGK1 risk haplotype (I6CC/E8CC/CT) was significantly (p=0.032; OR 4.31, 95% CI 1.19-15.58) more frequent in diabetic patients (7.2 %) than in healthy volunteers from Romania (1.8%). The observations support the view that SGK-1 may participate in the pathogenesis of metabolic syndrome.

Field of study: Biology, Chemistry