nils-herrmann/clean_scirepeval huggingface dataset:
TU‐G‐110‐05: Efficacy of Fixed Filtration for Rapid KVp‐Switching Dual Energy X‐Ray Systems

Dose efficiency of dual kVp imaging can be improved if the beams are filtered to remove photons in the common part of their spectra, thereby increasing spectral separation. While there are a number of advantages to rapid kVp‐switching for dual energy, it may not be feasible to have two different filters for the two spectra. Therefore, we are interested in whether a fixed added filter can improve the dose efficiency of kVp‐switching dual energy x‐ray systems. Simulations were done to decompose known phantoms into basis materials of aluminum and water, using 80 and 140 kVp x‐ray spectra. Precision of the decomposition was evaluated based on the propagation of the Poissonnoise in the detected intensities through the decomposition function. We hypothesized that a K‐edge filter would provide the energy selectivity needed to remove overlap of the spectra and hence increase the precision at constant dose. When optimizing the filter design, we considered filtration material (Z), filter thickness, and the relative power allocated to the two beams. We imposed a constraint of 30% at fixed dose (or lower dose for the same precision) was achieved with optimal filtration. The optimal filter material depends somewhat on the phantom composition and ranges across the lanthanide series. Increasing filtration thickness increases the average spectral separation. When ignoring tube power limitations, the precision improvement with increasing filtration continues increasing, although sublinearly.  This study demonstrates the potential of fixed filtration to improve the dose efficiency and material decomposition precision for rapid kVp‐switching dual energy systems. GE Healthcare

Field of study: Medicine, Physics
Effects of ischaemia on metabolite concentrations in rat liver.

1. Changes in the concentrations of ammonia, glutamine, glutamate, 2-oxoglutarate, 3-hydroxybutyrate, acetoacetate, alanine, aspartate, malate, lactate, pyruvate, NAD(+), NADH and adenine nucleotides were measured in freeze-clamped rat liver during ischaemia. 2. Although the concentrations of most of the metabolites changed rapidly during ischaemia the ratios [glutamate]/[2-oxoglutarate][NH(4) (+)] and [3-hydroxybutyrate]/[acetoacetate] changed equally and the value of the expression [3-hydroxybutyrate][2-oxoglutarate][NH(4) (+)]/[acetoacetate][glutamate] remained approximately constant, indicating that the 3-hydroxybutyrate dehydrogenase and glutamate dehydrogenase systems were at near-equilibrium with the mitochondrial NAD(+) couple. 3. The value of the expression [alanine][oxoglutarate]/[pyruvate][glutamate] was about 0.7 in vivo and remained fairly constant during the ischaemic period of 5min, although the concentrations of alanine and oxoglutarate changed substantially. No explanation can be offered why the value of the ratio differed from that of the equilibrium constant of the alanine aminotransferase reaction, which is 1.48. 4. Injection of l-cycloserine 60min before the rats were killed increased the concentration of alanine in the liver fourfold and decreased the concentration of the other metabolites measured, except that of pyruvate. During ischaemia the concentration of alanine did not change but that of aspartate almost doubled. 5. After treatment with l-cycloserine the value in vivo of the expression [alanine][oxoglutarate]/[pyruvate][glutamate] rose from 0.7 to 2.4. During ischaemia the value returned to 0.8. 6. The effects of l-cycloserine are consistent with the assumption that it specifically inhibits alanine aminotransferase. 7. Most of the alanine formed during ischaemia is probably derived from pyruvate and from ammonia released by the deamination of adenine nucleotides and glutamine. The alanine is presumably formed by the combined action of glutamate dehydrogenase and alanine aminotransferase. 8. The rate of anaerobic glycolysis, calculated from the increase in the lactate concentration, was 1.3mumol/min per g fresh wt. 9. Although the concentrations of the adenine nucleotides changed rapidly during ischaemia, the ratio [ATP][AMP]/[ADP](2) remained constant at 0.54, indicating that adenylate kinase established near-equilibrium under these conditions.

Field of study: Biology, Computer science
Top-down and bottom-up control on bacterial diversity in a western Norwegian deep-silled fjord.

We investigated the relationship between viruses and co-occurring bacterial communities in the Sognefjord, a deep-silled fjord in Western Norway. A combination of flow cytometry and automated ribosomal intergenic spacer analysis (ARISA) was used to assess prokaryote and viral abundances, and bacterial diversity and community composition, respectively, in depth profiles and at two different sampling seasons (November and May). With one exception, bacterial diversity did not vary between samples regardless of depth or season. The virus and prokaryote abundances as well as bacterial community composition, however, varied significantly with season and depth, suggesting a link between the Sognefjord viral community and potential bacterial host community diversity. To our knowledge, these findings provide the first description of microbial communities in the unique Sognefjord ecosystem, and in addition are in agreement with the simple model version of the 'Killing the Winner' theory (KtW), which postulates that microbial community diversity is a feature that is essentially top-down controlled by viruses, while community composition is bottom-up controlled by competition for limiting growth substrates.

Field of study: Biology, Environmental science
Programs in American Civilization

D URING the winter of I952-53, preparatory to the organization of an undergraduate program in American Civilization at the University of Kansas, the writer made a study of American Civilization programs elsewhere. A grant from the Fund for the Advancement of Education made possible visits varying in length from a day to several weeks to study representative programs at thirteen institutions in the Northeast and Middle West, including large and small, public and private, rural and urban, men's, women's, and coeducational institutions. Catalogues of other colleges were studied, and correspondence followed when a visit was impossible.' The present notes are based on this survey. They represent an attempt, not to describe fully current thought and practice in the field, a task already performed by Tremaine

Field of study: Education
Helping patients with localized prostate cancer reach treatment decisions.

To highlight the role of psychosocial variables in treatment decision making for patients with localized prostate cancer and how family physicians can be of most help to such patients in facilitating good treatment choices.



PubMed was searched, and articles relevant to the psychosocial aspects of localized prostate cancer treatment decision making were included. Articles were excluded when they clearly specified inclusion of men with metastatic disease. This is not a systematic review, and recommendations made are drawn from studies of level II or III evidence.


MAIN MESSAGE
The optimal strategy for managing localized prostate cancer has not been established and currently includes a number of potential options: active surveillance, radical prostatectomy, external beam radiotherapy, brachytherapy, and cryoablation. Consequently, men often struggle during the decision-making process, and some later regret their decisions. With an increased awareness of the psychosocial aspects of patient decision making, family physicians can help patients make better decisions.



Family physicians can help minimize the decisional regret experienced by patients after treatment by encouraging patients to consider their values and social supports, as well as the accuracy and appropriateness of the information used in the decision-making process.

Field of study: Medicine
SB7: the new bending-magnet double-headed dragon beamline at SuperACO.

A new beamline is now operational at LURE on bending-magnet 7 of the SuperACO storage ring in Orsay. The monochromator is of the ;dragon' type, designed to work in the energy range 150-1500 eV, and is equipped with a double vertical focusing mirror in order to allow for fast switching of light polarization. In this paper the results of photoion-yield experiments performed on N(2), Ar and Ne gases are presented. The observed resonance structures enable us to determine the available energy resolution: a resolving power higher than 8500 is obtained at the Ar 2p, N 1s and Ne K-edges when using all the optical elements at full aperture. The total flux as a function of the measured photon energy resolution and the characterization of the double-head behaviour in delivering circularly polarized light are reported.

Field of study: Physics
A CO J=1-0 Survey of common optical/uv absorption sightlines

Over the past thirty years a wealth of observations of CO and other molecules in optical/uv absorption in diffuse clouds has accumulated for which no comparable CO emission line data exist.  To acquire mm-wave J=1-0 CO emission line profiles toward a substantial sample of commonly-studied optical/uv absorption line targets and to compare with the properties of the absorbing gas, especially the predicted emission line strengths.  Using the ARO 12m telescope we observed mm-wavelength J=1-0 CO emission with spectral resolution R ~ 3x10^6 and spatial resolution 1' toward a sample of 110 lines of sight previously studied in optical/uv absorption lines of CO, \HH, CH, etc.  Interstellar CO emission was detected along 65 of the 110 lines of sight surveyed and there is a general superabundance of CO emission given the distribution of galactic latitudes in the survey sample. Much of the emission is optically thick or very intense and must emanate from dark clouds or warm dense gas near HII regions.  Judging from the statistical superabundance of CO emission, seen also in the total line of sight reddening, the OB star optical/uv absorption line targets must be physically associated with the large quantities of neutral gas whose CO emission was detected, in which case they are probably influencing the absorbing gas by heating and/or photoionizing it. This explains why CO/H2 and 12CO/13CO ratios differ somewhat between $uv$ and mm-wave absorption line studies. Because the lines of sight have been preselected to have AV < 1 mag, relatively little of the associated material actually occults the targets, making it difficult for CO emission line observations to isolate the foreground gas contribution.

Field of study: Physics
Determination of 2,4-Dichlorophenoxyacetic acid in food and water samples using a modified graphene oxide sorbent and high-performance liquid chromatography

In the present work, dispersive micro-solid phase extraction (D-μ-SPE) method using magnetic graphene oxide tert-butylamine (GO/Fe3O4/TBA) nanocomposite, as an efficient sorbent, was applied for determining 2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid (2,4-D) in water and food samples. Detection was carried out using high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) instrument. Influential parameters of D-μ-SPE such as sorbent and its amount, elution solvent and its volume, adsorption and desorption times and pH of sample solution were investigated and optimized. Under the optimized conditions, limit of detection and quantitation values were 0.007 and 0.02 μg/mL, respectively. Recovery data for several real samples were obtained within the range of 88.0–94.0% with a relative standard deviation (RSD) less than 7.5%. The proposed method was successfully applied to quantitative determination of 2,4-D in several vegetables and water samples.

Field of study: Agricultural and Food sciences
An Efficient Leaching of Palladium from Spent Catalysts through Oxidation with Fe(III)

Reclamation of spent catalysts for the efficient recovery of palladium (Pd) is gaining growing attention due to its scarcity and high supply risk. Currently Pd extraction from spent catalysts through an efficient, economical, and green method has remained a challenge. In this study, Fe3+ is utilized for leaching through oxidation of Pd in a mild condition. Before leaching, distillation was proposed to remove and recover the organics from spent catalysts. The effects of HCl concentration, Fe3+ concentration, NaCl concentration, leaching time, and temperature on the leaching efficiency of Pd were investigated to determine the optimum leaching conditions. The results show that Pd extraction and dissolution of Al2O3 increase with higher HCl concentration. The effect of NaCl on Pd leaching efficiency is significant at low acid concentration (2.0 mol/L HCl). The leaching efficiency was 99.5% for Pd under the following conditions: 2.0 mol/L HCl, 4.0 mol/L NaCl, and 0.67 mol/L Fe3+ at 80 °C for 90 min. The leaching kinetics fits best to the shrinking-core model of surface chemical reaction. The activation energy for the leaching of Pd was 47.6 kJ/mol. PdCl42− was selectively adsorbed by anion exchange resin. The filtrate containing adequate H+, Cl-, and Fe3+ was reused as leaching agent. Pd leaching efficiency was over 96% after five cycle times. This study provides an efficient process for recovery of Pd from spent catalysts.

Field of study: Materials science
L'infamia e il perdono: Tributi, pene e confessione nella teologia morale della prima età moderna (review)

receive in the introductory pages any explanation as to why its publication was delayed during half a decade, in a time when the requirements of scientific or scholarly communication call for results to be quickly made public. Horace’s “nonumque prematur in annum” is always a wise piece of advice; nevertheless, Ferrer has obviously not taken advantage of these five years of delay to improve her edition: the bibliography was not updated (except for Ferrer’s own publications), the presentation of footnotes is sometimes tediously repetitive, and the editor seems to ignore even the rudiments of physical bibliography, in so far as she mistook title page for flyleaf (16). With or without the help of collating machines, she has not compared the few remaining copies of these Petites Œuvres meslées (the copy of the Public Library of Besançon, shelfmark 206.065, must be added to her list), in spite of the fact that this comparison may have provided valuable elements of analysis, for the book was printed, if not directly under d’Aubigné’s eyes, at least under the control of his heirs, and corrections during the process of printing cannot be excluded without a close and careful examination. Ferrer’s commentaries are not devoid of approximations (Geneva is not the capital of Switzerland, as stated on 440) and she also seems to ignore that some pieces of poetry were printed during d’Aubigné’s lifetime, so the variants provided by anthologies are not taken into account in the critical apparatus (F. Lachèvre, Bibliographie des recueils collectifs de poésies publiés de 1597 à 1700, Paris, 1901–05, t. I, p. 154–156). For the sake of scholarship, the 115-page long introduction is more accurate when dealing with the poetical, rhetorical, or theological trends of d’Aubigné’s prose and poetry. The Petites Œuvres meslées are clearly divided in two parts: the first one contains d’Aubigné meditative prose on six Psalms, a devotional exercise especially illustrated by Protestant writers (Théodore de Bèze, Philippe Duplessis-Mornay, or Jean de Sponde); the second one gathers poetry written during a lifetime, from the last Valois court to the Genevan exile. Some pieces of L’Hyver are gems of genuine baroque poetry, worthy to be compared to Donne or Vaughan. Ferrer’s edition has its qualities, but also some disturbing blemishes, and even the most benevolent reader may not be benevolent enough to wait until a hypothetical third set of complete works. The easiest solution is a second printing of the book, with corrections and emendations. This volume needs (and deserves) it. GILLES BANDERIER Taylor Institution Basle, Switzerland

Field of study: History
Surface-entropy reduction approaches to manipulate crystal forms of beta-ketoacyl acyl carrier protein synthase II from Streptococcus pneumoniae.

A series of experiments with beta-ketoacyl acyl carrier protein synthase II (FabF) from Streptococcus pneumonia (spFabF) were undertaken to evaluate the capability of surface-entropy reduction (SER) to manipulate protein crystallization. Previous work has shown that this protein crystallizes in two forms. The triclinic form contains four molecules in the asymmetric unit (a.u.) and diffracts to 2.1 A resolution, while the more desirable primitive orthorhombic form contains one molecule in the a.u. and diffracts to 1.3 A. The aim was to evaluate the effect of SER mutations that were specifically engineered to avoid perturbing the crystal-packing interfaces employed by the favorable primitive orthorhombic crystal form while potentially disrupting a surface of the protein employed by the less desirable triclinic crystal form. Two mutant proteins were engineered, each of which harbored five SER mutations. Extensive crystallization screening produced crystals of the two mutants, but only under conditions that differed from those used for the native protein. One of the mutant proteins yielded crystals that were of a new form (centered orthorhombic), despite the fact that the interfaces employed by the primitive orthorhombic form of the native protein were specifically unaltered. Structure determination at 1.75 A resolution reveals that one of the mutations, E383A, appears to play a key role in disfavouring the less desirable triclinic crystal form and in generating a new surface for a packing interaction that stabilizes the new crystal form.

Field of study: Chemistry
Sectoral contributions to surface water stress in the coterminous United States

Here, we assess current stress in the freshwater system based on the best available data in order to understand possible risks and vulnerabilities to regional water resources and the sectors dependent on freshwater. We present watershed-scale measures of surface water supply stress for the coterminous United States (US) using the water supply stress index (WaSSI) model which considers regional trends in both water supply and demand. A snapshot of contemporary annual water demand is compared against different water supply regimes, including current average supplies, current extreme-year supplies, and projected future average surface water flows under a changing climate. In addition, we investigate the contributions of different water demand sectors to current water stress. On average, water supplies are stressed, meaning that demands for water outstrip natural supplies in over 9% of the 2103 watersheds examined. These watersheds rely on reservoir storage, conveyance systems, and groundwater to meet current water demands. Overall, agriculture is the major demand-side driver of water stress in the US, whereas municipal stress is isolated to southern California. Water stress introduced by cooling water demands for power plants is punctuated across the US, indicating that a single power plant has the potential to stress water supplies at the watershed scale. On the supply side, watersheds in the western US are particularly sensitive to low flow events and projected long-term shifts in flow driven by climate change. The WaSSI results imply that not only are water resources in the southwest in particular at risk, but that there are also potential vulnerabilities to specific sectors, even in the ‘water-rich’ southeast.

Field of study: Environmental science
Enhancing the Utilization of Information Communication Technology (ICT) among Home Economics Lecturers in South Eastern Nigeria

The study was on enhancing the utilization of information communication Technology (ICT) among Home Economics lecturers in south Eastern Nigeria. The study adopted a survey method. The area of the study is south eastern Nigeria. Three research questions guided the study. The population was made up of 63 Home Economics lecturers from the six colleges of education that offer Home Economics in the area of the study. There was no sampling. Questionnaire was used for data collection. Data were analyzed using means and standard deviation. The findings include that there were low extent utilization of ICT in lesson preparation and presentation. The finding also reveals 10 challenges of ICT utilization and 15 measures for enhancing ICT utilization. It was recommended that workshops, conferences, seminars, in-service training and improvement programs should be organized by schools to train lecturers on ICT utilization among others.  ICT, Home Economics, Lecturers, Nigeria.

Field of study: Education
Families, Partnerships and Law Reform in the European Union: Balancing Disciplinarity and Liberalisation

Carl Stychin's Governing Sexuality The Changing Politics of Citizenship and Law Reform, is a collection of essays on the general theme of sexual citizenship and law reform in Europe.' The essays, published elsewhere over the previous four to five years and reworked for publication in this book, are theoretically informed studies of 'law reform and legal struggle' (p 5). Stychin challenges assumptions about the value of 'liberal law reforms' which promote partnership and other 'family' rights and expresses concerns about the disciplinary nature of rights discourse and the ways in which rights 'govern' our sexuality and ways of living. Stychin's analysis is perceptive, provocative and demands careful consideration. The aim of this review, however, is to suggest that while we must take heed of Stychin's concerns, we must also recognise the value of progressive law reform in expanding the concept of family, reworking its meanings and associations, and embracing the diverse nature of family practices. This argument will be made with a particular focus on the laws of the European Union, a field of scholarship in which Stychin's theoretical and thought-provoking arguments are much needed. Before expanding on this argument in more detail, the following section outlines Stychin's analysis.

Field of study: Law
Characteristics of a novel monoclonal antibody against interleukin-14alpha.

Interleukin-14alpha is cytokine encoded by the plus strand of il-14 gene using exons 3-10. It has been demonstrated in an IL-14-transgenic mice model that IL-14alpha could enhance an immune response to both TD and TI antigens and induce a phenotype that is very similar to SLE and Sjögren's syndrome, indicating that IL-14alpha may play an important role in autoimmune disease. To further study the role of IL-14alpha in human immune diseases, there is an urgent need to generate specific anti-human IL-14alpha monoclonal antibodies. In this study, we immunized BALB/c mice with synthesized human IL-14alpha-C polypeptide and obtained a novel monoclonal antibody, the anti-IL-14alpha-C antibody. Analysis by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), spot-ELISA, Western blot, and immuoprecipitation revealed that the MAb were specifically against recombinant human IL-14alpha protein, and its subtype and affinity constant (K(aff)) were IgG2a/kappa and 1.007 x 10(8) M(-1), respectively. This antibody might facilitate studies for pathophysiology of autoimmune disease.

Field of study: Biology
Existence of equilibrium for walrasian endowment games

This work deals with no-destruction Walrasian endowment games, where agents can manipulate by declaring false initial endowments. The existence theorem of non-trivial Nash equilibrium (NE) for large economies is the main purpose of the paper. This theorem also implies (1) the existence of nontrivial NE for Walrasian preference games, and (2) the existence of NE allocations which are almost efficient. It is also shown that under some regularity conditions, and when the economy gets large, every sequence of NE allocations converges to a true Walrasian allocation.

Field of study: Economics