Abstract Heeding the call of the special issue, we look at the past decade's advances in public opinion studies of our understanding of the relationship between white racial identities, attitudes, and presidential voting preferences. Following a short review of developments in the literature during the Obama years, we critically evaluated four theories explaining whites' support for Trump: racial resentment, xenophobia, sexism, and white identity. Using data from three ANES studies, we test the relative explanatory power of all four approaches in predicting a vote for Trump during the 2016 Republican primary, the 2016 election, and intent to vote for him in 2020. The results suggest that xenophobia had the most consistent effect across all models, followed by racial resentment and sexism. White identity appears to have influenced voting for Trump in the primary and it could also have an impact in the 2020 election, but its effect in the 2016 general election does not appear to have been consistent with theoretical expectations. Finally, we use these results to think critically about the state of the field and propose new questions and challenges for research.


Irresponsible production and consumption of products are the main reason for environmental decimation. To mitigate this alarming burden on the environment, a new approach has been proposed, called "The Circular Economy". The main objective of this system is to introduce new systems of production, consumption, and disposal, for growing global prosperity. This philosophy is also aligned with the United Nations goals of sustainability, commonly known as SDGs, particularly, the goal of responsible production and consumption (SDG No. 12). Circular economy from a marketing perspective has been hardly explored and/or investigated. This research, therefore, attempts to extract and empirically investigate those critical factors related to the circular economy that have an impact on consumer behaviour in general, and consumer purchase intention in particular. For this purpose, the theory of planned behaviour is adapted with the addition of two more factors related to the circular economy, which are convenience/ availability, and environmental impact, as extracted from the literature to examine their effect on consumer purchase intention. Data were collected from two countries; Malaysia and Turkey, to undertake the comparative analysis. A total of 377 consumers of circular products from Malaysia, and 351 consumers from Turkey, were used for data analyses. Complex statistical techniques like exploratory factor analysis and structural equation modelling with confirmatory factor analysis and hypotheses testing were used to analyse the data. Comparative analyses were undertaken, where each finding from Malaysia and Turkey were compared, including structural model comparison. Interesting findings emerged, which will certainly contribute to helping policy-makers devise strategies that are not only sustainable and aligned with the philosophy of the circular economy but will also ensure positive consumer behaviour.


BT-R(1) is a member of the cadherin superfamily of proteins and is expressed in the midgut epithelium of Manduca sexta during larval development. Previously, we showed that calcium ions influence the structure and stability of BT-R(1) on brush border membrane vesicles (BBMVs) prepared from M. sexta midgut epithelium. In the present study, the effects of calcium and Cry1Ab toxin, produced by Bacillus thuringiensis, on the adhesive properties of BBMVs were investigated. Addition of calcium to a suspension of BBMVs promoted adhesion and aggregation of the vesicles. Treatment of BBMVs with trypsin or lowering the pH (pH 4.0) of the BBMV suspension abolished calcium-induced vesicle aggregation, whereas treatment with deglycosylating enzymes did not affect the aggregation of vesicles, indicating that adhesion and clustering of BBMVs involves protein-protein interactions. Preincubation of BBMVs with Cry1Ab toxin, which specifically binds to BT-R(1) with high affinity and disrupts the midgut epithelium of M. sexta, caused a 50% decrease in calcium-induced vesicle aggregation. The inhibitory effects of the Cry1Ab toxin on BBMV aggregation was blocked completely when the toxin was preincubated with a peptide containing the toxin-binding site of BT-R(1). Cry3A toxin, which is similar in molecular structure to Cry1Ab but does not bind to BT-R(1) and is not toxic to M. sexta larvae, did not affect BBMV aggregation. The results of this study demonstrate that the adhesive function of BT-R(1) is compromised by the Cry1Ab toxin, which acts as a selective antagonist, and supports the notion that BT-R(1) is critical in preserving the integrity of larval midgut epithelium in M. sexta.


This study reviews the impacts of climate change on human health and presents corresponding adaptation strategies in South China.The daily mean surface air temperatures above or below 26.4 C increase the death risk for the people in Guangzhou,especially the elderly are vulnerable to variations in temperature.Heat waves can cause insomnia,fatigue,clinical exacerbation,or death from heatstroke etc.,while cold spells show increases in patients with fractures.During a cold spell period,the rates of both on-site emergency rescues and non-implementable rescues increase,and the risk of non-accidental deaths and respiratory disease deaths significantly rise as well.Both time series of hazy days and ozone concentrations have significant positive correlations with the number of patients with cardiovascular diseases.Both malaria and dengue fever reach higher altitudes and mountainous areas due to climate warming.Climate change is likely to bring stronger heat waves in the future,thereby increasing heat wave-related illnesses and deaths,particularly in the metropolitan areas of the Pearl River Delta.The projected increase of continuous cold days in Guangdong province and parts of northern Guangxi province will afect residents' health in the future.The rising temperature exaggerates ozone pollution,but it is not clear whether climate change is aggravating or mitigating haze pollution.The transmission potential of malaria in South China will increase by 39%–140% and the transmission season will extend by 1–2 months with an air temperature increase of 1–2 C.By 2050,most areas in Hainan province are projected to convert from non-endemic dengue into endemic dengue areas.The aging population will cause more vulnerable people.To mitigate the adverse impacts of climate change on human health,sound and scientific adaptation strategies must be adopted in advance,such as strengthening the surveillance of epidemic diseases in potential transmission areas,conducting timely weather forecasting for human health,evaluating health vulnerability to climate change,improving environmental and health education,and strengthening hazard management and the cooperation between meteorological and health departments.


Graphene, a superior 2D material with high carrier mobility, has limited application in electronic devices due to zero band gap. In this regard, boron and nitrogen atoms have been integrated into the graphene lattice to fabricate 2D semiconducting heterostructures. It is an intriguing question whether oxygen can, as a replacement of nitrogen, enter the sp2 honeycomb lattice and form stable B-C-O monolayer structures. Here we explore the atomic structures, energetic and thermodynamic stability, and electronic properties of various 2D B-C-O alloys using first-principles calculations. Our results show that oxygen can be stably incorporated into the graphene lattice by bonding with boron. The B and O species favor forming alternate patterns into the chain- or ring-like structures embedded in the pristine graphene regions. These B-C-O hybrid sheets can be either metals or semiconductors depending on the B : O ratio. The semiconducting (B2O)nCm and (B6O3)nCm phases exist under the B- and O-rich conditions, and possess a tunable band gap of 1.0-3.8 eV and high carrier mobility, retaining ∼1000 cm2 V(-1) s(-1) even for half coverage of B and O atoms. These B-C-O alloys form a new class of 2D materials that are promising candidates for high-speed electronic devices.


The objective of this study is to investigate the presence of autoantibodies cross-reacting with the NR2 subunit of the N-methyl-d-aspartate (NMDA) glutamate receptor in plasma samples of patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), in their healthy first-degree relatives and in healthy unrelated individuals and to determine whether these autoantibodies are specific for lupus patients in general or for the subgroup of SLE patients with neuropsychiatric (NP) manifestations. Plasma samples were collected from 51 lupus patients (19 with and 32 without NP manifestations), 161 first-degree relatives and 55 healthy unrelated controls. Antibodies to a linear peptide of the NR2 subunit of the NMDA receptor were determined by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. A significant difference in mean antibody reactivity between SLE patients and healthy unrelated controls (P < 0.01) and between firstdegree relatives and healthy unrelated controls (P < 0.001) was found. No difference was found between lupus patients and their first-degree relatives or between lupus patients with and without NP symptoms. In this study, anti-NMDA receptor autoantibodies show more specificity for lupus patients (but not for selected patients with NP symptoms) and their first-degree relatives than for healthy controls, indicating a familial basis to mount an immune response to this peptide. Lupus (2007) 16, 329—334.


The homecare detergent industry has now been dominated by some brands only and thus has made this industry a very interesting one to penetrate. Women's perceptions on the products in this industry are also challenging to be studied since they are influenced by difference of needs, experiences, and understandings. This study aims to investigate the buying decision of housewives in Surabaya in choosing homecare detergent product, in order to determine appropriate production strategy and marketing strategy for enduser. The populations were all 25-64 years old productive housewives in Surabaya. The samples were selected by conducting proportionate stratified random sampling. Isaac and Michael's formula was used to select the samples of 96 housewives. This study uses conjoint analysis, where there were four attributes of homecare detergent product became the variables, namely product effectiveness, thickness, foam and package or wrapping. The data obtained through questionnaire distributed to all respondents, by asking them to order the combination of stimuli given to them based on their preferences. The findings showed that the most prioritized attribute was effectiveness factor with importance value 35.943%, followed by wrapping factor 27.845%, foam factor 23.925%, and lastly by thickness factor 12.288%. The effectiveness factor has become the most prioritized attribute for the respondents in buying homecare detergent product. The Third International Conference on Entrepreneurship Book Two` 262


At present, immunotherapy in urological malignancy is experiencing a renaissance, particularly with the emergence of a host of innovative cancer vaccines. Herein, we will review promising immunotherapeutic approaches and evaluate the data supporting their inclusion in novel combination strategies.


Americans with no religious affiliation (aka religious "Nones") are not a politically homogeneous community. Just as there are political differences between groups of Christians, there are political differences between groups of religious Nones. I use nationally representative survey data to examine the political activities and perspectives of atheists, agnostics, and those who are "nothing in particular." Results show that Americans who report that their religion is nothing in particular are relatively uninterested in politics and unlikely to be politically active; atheists are relatively liberal and likely to experience political conflict and follow political news; and agnostics are particularly likely to vote and feel politically isolated from their families. In many ways, the "softer" secularism of those who are nothing in particular is politically more similar to religious affiliates than the "harder" secularism of agnostics and especially atheists. These results have important implications for the future of American politics as Nones now have the potential to rival evangelical Protestants as a politically relevant constituency.


Although the universal presence of KRAS mutations and their critical role in human pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) designates it as an ideal therapeutic target, oncogenic KRAS (KRAS*) is still regarded as 'undruggable' to date. Therefore, to identify therapeutic points of intervention, it is critical to understand the impact of KRAS*-mediated pathways on in vivo tumor pathogenesis. We have recently generated an inducible KrasG12D-driven (iKRAS*) mouse PDAC model and established a critical role for sustained KRAS* activity in tumor maintenance, providing a model to characterize pathways required for KRAS*-dependent tumorigenicity. Cell surface proteins are relatively accessible and can not only provide candidates for biomarker discovery, but also be utilized as therapeutic targets. To characterize the KRAS*-specific organization of cell surface proteins for the development of possible diagnostic or therapeutic tools, we conducted an unbiased surfaceome analyses of tumor cells in the presence and absence of KRAS* signaling using the iKRAS* mouse PDAC model. Syndecans (SDC), a family of heparin sulfate proteoglycans, were identified as candidates whose membrane expression is correlated with KRAS* activity. SDC1 expression is increased in premalignant and malignant pancreatic lesions of primary human PDAC and various KRAS*-driven pancreatic cancer mouse models. In addition, SDC1 expression is specifically upregulated in response to KRAS* induction in acinar-ductal metaplasia (ADM) and early pancreatic intraepithelial neoplasia (PanIN), but not in cerulin-induced chromic pancretitis. Moreover, SDC1 membrane expression was abolished upon KRAS* extinction in PDAC cells and our data indicated that MAPK pathway, but not PI3K pathway, is important for KRAS*-mediated SDC1 surface localization. To further study the role of SDC1 in KRAS*-driven pancreatic cancers, SDC1 knockout mouse model was generated and crossed with LSL-KrasG12D-PDAC models. Our preliminary data indicated that genetic ablation of SDC1 expression effectively suppressed KRAS*-driven PDAC initiation and progression. The mechanisms of KRAS*-mediated SDC1 membrane localization and its impact on PDAC initiation and progression is being further explored. SDC1 might potentially be the drug target and diagnostic marker for PDAC. Citation Format: Wantong Yao, Haoqiang Ying, Giulio Draetta. Syndecan1 is required for oncogenic Kras-driven PDAC tumorigenesis and maintenance. [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the AACR-NCI-EORTC International Conference: Molecular Targets and Cancer Therapeutics; 2015 Nov 5-9; Boston, MA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Mol Cancer Ther 2015;14(12 Suppl 2):Abstract nr C157.


Decoupling capacitors are widely used in power delivery network (PDN) design to mitigate switching noise from the integrated circuit (IC). Besides, they also provide a low-impedance path to shunt the transient energy to ground at the IC source. Since a real capacitor includes both parasitic inductance and resistance associated with the interconnection and package of the capacitor resulting in an increase in impedance, adequate decoupling capacitances in a PDN design are essential. Often, a capacitor is represented with a higher order model (HOM) of resistance, inductance and capacitance in power delivery simulation. This paper presents the findings from an investigation into the PDN performance using various HOM decoupling capacitors of the same capacitance. The reasons for the different HOM values with the same capacitance include the form factor, manufacturing processes and the operating temperature of the capacitors. From the study, it was found that both the form factor and the differences in the capacitors manufacturing process can cause a significant difference in the impedance profile as well as the voltage droop whereas the operating temperature has a much less impact on the PDN performance.


Nearly 2D diamond, or diamane, is coveted as an ultrathin sp3 -carbon film with unique mechanics and electro-optics. The very thinness (≈h) makes it possible for the surface chemistry, for example, adsorbed atoms, to shift the bulk phase thermodynamics in favor of diamond, from multilayer graphene. Thermodynamic theory coupled with atomistic first principles computations predicts not only the reduction of required pressure (p/p∞  > 1 - h0 /h) but also the nucleation barriers, definitive for the kinetic feasibility of diamane formation. Moreover, the optimal adsorbent chair-pattern on a bilayer graphene results in a cubic diamond lattice, while for thicker precursors the adsorbent boat-structure tends to produce hexagonal diamond (lonsdaleite), if graphene is in AA' stacking to start with. As adsorbents, H and F are conducive to diamond formation, while Cl appears sterically hindered.


The mutant line of Brown-midrib sorghum has lower lignin content than conventional sorghum. The objectives of this research were to investigate the effects of plant maturity stages at harvest times on nutrient, fiber fraction, tannin content, volatile fatty acids (VFA) production, and in vitro fiber digestibility of mutant lines of Brown Midrib (BMR) sorghum. This research was arranged into a complete block design with a factorial arrangement in three replications. The first factor was a line of BMR sorghum consisted of 3 levels, i.e., Patir 3.1 (non-BMR line/control), Patir 3.2 (BMR line), and Patir 3.7 (BMR line). The second factor was the generative stages of sorghum consisted of 3 levels, i.e., flowering stage, soft-dough stage, and hard-dough stage. The observed variables were nutrient, fiber fraction, tannin content, in vitro rumen fluid characteristics, VFA proportion, acetate: propionate (A:P) ratio, and in vitro fiber-fraction digestibility (IVFFD). Data were analyzed by Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) and Duncan's Multiple Range Test (DMRT). No interaction between sorghum-mutant lines and harvest time on nutrient contents, except on total digestible nutrients (TDN), tannin, and VFA. The factor of sorghum-mutant line affected (p<0.01) crude protein (CP), crude fiber (CF), acid detergent fiber (ADF), lignin, neutral detergent fiber digestibility (NDFD), NH 3 , butyrate, isovalerate, and valerate. Maturity stages affected dry matter (DM), CF, ash, crude fat, fiber, and fraction, except hemicellulose, acid detergent fiber digestibility (ADFD), and NDFD, NH 3, isovalerate, and valerate. Patir 3.7 at the hard-dough stage produced the highest TDN, but the highest VFA was produced by Patir 3.1 at flowering stages. BMR sorghum-mutant lines produced higher ADF digestibility than non-BMR sorghum-mutant lines. The increasing NDF digestibility was significantly influenced by both sorghum-mutant lines and maturity stages (p<0.01). It is concluded that BMR sorghum-mutant lines at the hard-dough stage produce better nutrient and in vitro digestibility, but the butyric acid is higher in non-BMR sorghum-mutant lines.


Bacterial infection of the tracheobronchial tree is a frequent, serious complication in patients receiving treatment with oxygen and mechanical ventilation, resulting in increased morbidity and mortality. Using human airway epithelial cell culture models, we examined the effect of hyperoxia on bacterial adherence and the expression of interleukin-8 (IL-8), an important mediator involved in the inflammatory process. A 24-h exposure to 95% O(2) increased Pseudomonas aeruginosa (PA) adherence 57% in A549 cells (P < 0.01) and 115% in 16HBE cells (P < 0.01) but had little effect on Staphylococcus aureus (SA) adherence. Exposure to hyperoxia, followed by a 1-h incubation with SA, further enhanced PA adherence (P < 0.01), suggesting that hyperoxia and SA colonization may enhance the susceptibility of lung epithelial cells to gram-negative infections. IL-8 expression was also increased in cells exposed to both hyperoxia and PA. Stable or transient overexpression of manganese superoxide dismutase reduced both basal and stimulated levels of PA adherence and IL-8 levels in response to exposure to either hyperoxia or PA. These data indicate that hyperoxia increases susceptibility to infection and that the pathways are mediated by reactive oxygen species. Therapeutic intervention strategies designed to prevent accumulation of intracellular reactive oxygen species may reduce opportunistic pulmonary infections.


The classic constant false alarm rate edge detector with a rectangle-shaped filter has been proven to be effective and widely used in polarimetric synthetic aperture radar (PolSAR) images. However, in practical use, the assumption of complex Wishart distribution is often not respected, particularly in heterogeneous urban areas. In addition, as a simple smoothing filter, the rectangle-shaped window is often shown to be easy to incur false edge pixels near true edges. Therefore, its performance is limited. To overcome this restriction, we propose a new edge detector for PolSAR images, which utilizes the spherically invariant random vector product model to estimate the normalized covariance matrix for each pixel, and then replace the rectangle-shaped filter with a Gauss-shaped filter. The performance of our proposed methodology is presented and analyzed on two real PolSAR data sets, and the results show that the new edge detector attains better performance than the classic one, particularly for urban areas.


Aim. To investigate the correlation between Sirtuin 3 (SIRT3) expression and the clinical outcome of patients with colon cancer. Methods. The tumor specimens from 127 patients with colon cancer were obtained for SIRT3 immunohistochemical staining. Patients were followed up. In in vitro study, SIRT3 gene was inhibited to observe the effects of SIRT3 on the biological behavior of cultured colon cells. Results. The SIRT3 expression level was found to be significantly associated with the lymph node metastasis (P < 0.001) and tumor stages (P < 0.001). The colon cancer-specific survival was 64.6% among patients with high SIRT3 expressions and 88.6% among patients with low SIRT3 expressions (log-rank P = 0.016). The overall survival was 80.2% among patients with low SIRT3 expressions and 55.9% among patients with high SIRT3 expressions (log-rank P = 0.002). In vitro study showed that silencing of SIRT3 gene inhibited the proliferation, invasion, and cells migration but increased the apoptosis in the cultured colon cell lines. Conclusion. This study provides evidence supporting that SIRT3 is closely associated with the clinical outcomes of colon cancer. SIRT3 may be considered as a marker for colon cancer.


Mistakes/uncertainties in object detection could lead to catastrophes when deploying robots in the real world. In this paper, we measure the uncertainties of object localization to minimize this kind of risk. Uncertainties emerge upon challenging cases like occlusion. The bounding box borders of an occluded object can have multiple plausible configurations. We propose a deep multivariate mixture of Gaussians model for probabilistic object detection. The covariances help to learn the relationship between the borders, and the mixture components potentially learn different configurations of an occluded part. Quantitatively, our model improves the AP of the baselines by 3.9% and 1.4% on CrowdHuman and MS-COCO respectively with almost no computational or memory overhead. Qualitatively, our model enjoys explainability since the resulting covariance matrices and the mixture components help measure uncertainties.


The data equation in subspace identification relates Hankel matrices constructed from input and output data. The matrices in this equation, which are derived from the system matrices of the unknown system, contain important structural information. Such information is the low rank property of the product between the extended observability matrix and the state sequence, and the Toeplitz structure of the matrix of Markov parameters of the system in innovation form. We will show that nuclear norm subspace identification makes it possible to formulate these structural properties as constraints in a single convex multi-criteria optimization problem. This problem seeks a trade-off between a nuclear norm minimization problem to retrieve the subspace of interest and a prediction error criterium to find an optimal match between the measured and predicted output. The advantage of our method over existing unconstrained and nuclear norm constrained subspace identification methods is that the structural constraints are in general improving the estimates when dealing with short data sets, i.e. where the number of measurements is a small multiple of the system order. This advantage is demonstrated in a validation study making use of data sets from the DaSIy library.


Dynamic characteristics including relative displacements and vibrating frquencies,which are key to assessing drift and stress conditions of large structures such as tall buildings, [FK(W39。40ZQ]longspan suspension and cable_stayed bridges and tall chimneys,are difficult to measure directly,especially under the condition of earthquakes and strong winds or typhoons.In general,laser collimator,total station and accelerometers are the most common instruments used to monitor the response of structural systems,but can not work properly during earthquakes and strong winds or typhoons,and in most cases do not take place in real_time or near real_time yet.Until recently,there are no efficient or feasible methods to measure displacements during an earthquake or severe wind.Therefore there is a great need for developing new method or technology to monitor the dynamic characteristics of large structures precisely in real_time or near real_time during very bad conditions. Fortunately,recent advances in Global Positioning System (GPS) technology allow reliable monitoring of above_mentioned long_period structures.GPS units with a capability of resolving motion at the centimeter or sub_centimeter level with sampling frequency 10Hz or even 20Hz are now available from several manufacturers.This provides a great opportunity to monitor long_period structures reliably.To the authors' best knowledge,the capability of identifying vibration characteristics from GPS observations has not been widely verified.For the scientific justification and feasibility of using kinematic GPS technology to identify the dynamic characteristics of tall buildings,some vibrating experiments are designed to simulate the movements of tall buildings in the paper,especially under the condition of earthquakes and strong winds or typhoons.The experimental equipment consists of:①NovAtel_Outrider_DL_RT2 dual frequency GPS receivers with sampling frequency of 10Hz; ②vibrating unit,which is composed of power amplifier,signal generator,signal analyzer,regulator,exciter,displacement sensor,mass block and rigid beam or elastic beam,and which can supply simple harmonic vibration environment or damped simple harmonic vibration environment,and corresponding precise basis of vibrating frequency and amplitude.The intrinsic frequency supplied by vibrating unit is jointly determined by the mass of GPS antenna,the material and geometrical dimensions (length,width and height) of rigid or elastic beam.The paper also discusses in detail how GPS data are recorded,processed and analyzed.With post_process version of NovAtel's Softsurv software and auto_regressive (AR) spectral analysis method,relative displacements and corresponding vibrating frequencies can be derived from GPS observations.The results indicate that clear and accurate dynamic characteristics such as relative displacements and at least low frequencies can be identified by kinematic GPS technology.Moreover,with future advances in GPS technology and improvements in sampling capability,it will be possible to monitor short_period structures as well.This capability can be very useful to be used for the health monitoring purposes of large structures such as tall buildings and long_span or cable_stayed bridges.Considering the practical purposes,some suggestion is also given in the paper.Requisite procedures and software should be developed to permanently deploy GPS units on tall buildings,and to assess and mitigate the natural hazards such as typhoon,flood and earthquake affecting the structures,and methodologies on how the findings can be incorporated into useful practical design procedures.


Photoinduced single-electron-transfer promoted oxidation of 2,5-diphenyl-1,5-hexadiene by using N-methylquinolinium tetrafluoroborate/biphenyl co-sensitization takes place with the formation of an intense electronic absorption band at 476 nm, which is attributed to the 1,4-diphenylcyclohexane-1,4-diyl radical cation. The absorption maximum (lambda(ob)) of this transient occurs at a longer wavelength than is expected for either the cumyl radical or the cumyl cation components. Substitution at the para positions of the phenyl groups in this radical cation by CH(3)O, CH(3), F, Cl, and Br leads to an increasingly larger redshift of lambda(ob). A comparison of the rho value, which was obtained from a Hammett plot of the electronic transition energies of the radical cations versus sigma(+), with that for the cumyl cation shows that the substituent effects on the transition energies for the 1,4-diarylcyclohexane-1,4-diyl radical cations are approximately one half of the substituent effects on the transition energies of the cumyl cation. The observed substituent-induced redshifts of lambda(ob) and the reduced sensitivity of lambda(ob) to substituent changes are in accordance with the proposal that significant through-space and -bond electronic interactions exist between the cumyl radical and the cumyl cation moieties of the 1,4-diphenylcyclohexane-1,4-diyl radical cation. This proposal gains strong support from the results of density functional theory (DFT) calculations. Moreover, the results of time-dependent DFT calculations indicate that the absorption band at 476 nm for the 1,4-diphenylcyclohexane-1,4-diyl radical cation corresponds to a SOMO-3 --> SOMO transition.


Simultaneous measurements have been, made of the friction and adhesion of steel sliding on indium in air. The results show that both the normal and tangential stresses play a part in the deformation of the metallic junctions formed at the interface. When the surfaces are first placed in contact, a minute tangential force is required to initiate relative motion between the slider and the indium surface, since the junctions are already plastic under the applied load. As relative motion proceeds, the region of contact grows with a corresponding increase in the tangential force and the adhesive force. An upper steady state is reached where the tangential force increases more rapidly than the rate of growth of the region of contact and sliding on a macroscopic scale occurs. The detailed behaviour of the junctions during the early stages of the sliding process may be expressed quantitatively in terms of von Mises's criterion for plastic deformation under combined normal and tangential stresses, and there is good agreement between the theoretical relation and the experimental observations. The results emphasize the reality of the cold welding process which occurs at the points of intimate contact when metal surfaces are placed together. The metallic junctions so formed are responsible both for the friction and the adhesion observed. Lubricant films diminish the amount of metallic contact and so lead to a reduction in the friction and adhesion.


Advanced display devices are in greater demand due to their large color gamut, high color purity, ultrahigh visual resolution, and small size pixels. All-inorganic lead halide perovskite (AILHP) nanocrystals (NCs) possess inherent advantages such as narrow emission width, saturated color, and flexible integration, and have been developed as functional films, light sources, backlight components, and display panels. However, some drawbacks still restrict the practical application of advanced display devices based on AILHP NCs, including working stability, large-scale synthesis, and cost. In this review, we focus on AILHP NCs, review the recent progress in materials synthesis, stability improvement, patterning techniques, and device application. We also highlight the important role of materials systems in creating advanced display devices, followed by the challenges and opportunities in industrial processes. This review provides beneficial inspiration for the future development of AILHP NCs in colorful and white backlight, as well as high resolution full-color displays.


The way a song sounds depends on, among other things, what instruments are audible to the listener. We document the systematic relationship between instrumentation, or the particular combination of instruments audible in a hit song, and its relative market appeal vis-à-vis its place on the charts. This is accomplished using mixed analytical methods under ecologically valid conditions. The data come from Billboard's Hot 100 weekly popularity rankings from the past 55 years. We compare number 1 singles with songs that never climbed above number 90. First, using Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA), we identify two configurations of core instruments that result in a song being more popular such that these configurations are present far more consistently among the set of number 1 hit songs. We also identify three configurations of core instruments that result in a song being less popular such that these configurations are present far more consistently among songs that stagnate at the bottom of the charts. What stands out is popular (less popular) configurations always include (exclude) background vocals. Further, our qualitative results reveal number 1 songs tend to include a greater number of instruments. Second, we utilize logit regression to document how the absolute number of distinct instrument types perceptible in a song affects the chances it will be a number 1 hit as opposed to stay at or below number 90. Our results suggest songs that do not follow conventional instrumentation and instead include an atypically low or high number of instruments are more likely to stand out, becoming number 1 hits. Looking across time, a greater number of instruments increased the chances of being a number1 song during mid-1970s, the 1980s and the 1990s, while fewer instruments increased the chances during the 1960s and in the late 2000s.


Of 2649 patients with strabismic amblyopia who attended clinics between 1941 and 1978, 1904 patients were reviewed. Of these, 115 patients had transfer of fixation after occlusion. These were analysed according to the type of transfer of fixation and relation to occlusion and age. The period of maximum sensitivity to short periods of occlusion extended to 18 months, declining to about 30 months of age. Sensitivity to occlusion reaches low levels about the age of 5 to 51/2 years, though it is still present to some degree, especially in patients with relatively good visual acuity of 6/36 or better. The upper limit of the sensitive period was found to be about the end of the seventh year of age.


the mundane, addressing sequential contrast in "The Tunnel" and making a random concurrence significant in "Dad's Closet." Miller's hand-printed monotypes are, logically, black and white themselves; while draftsmanship is sometimes stiff, textures range from smudgy and mottled to linear strokes resembling scratchboard, and their treatment of contrast is intriguingly ambiguous, with smoky shadows in their whites and highlights on their blacks. Despite the book's drawbacks, the slenderness of the volume will reassure readers with little poetic stamina, while young writers may be inspired to write black and white verses of their own. DS


Abstract : This paper describes an approach for developing a three-dimensional (3D) landscape signature computer model. Primary focus is on thermal image generation using material temperature models and environment models for energy budget calculations. Current landscape signature models utilize one-dimensional conduction-calculations and constant meteorological data over large terrain areas. The model described here would compute thermal and other signatures using advanced 3D techniques where necessary to simulate higher resolution details necessary for such applications as sensor system evaluation. Computer graphics, Radiosity, Energy budget, Ray tracing, Mesoscale, Thermal modeling.


Chlorpyrifos (CPF), an organophosphorous pesticide, can be found in aquatic ecosystems at concentrations of up to several hundred nanograms per liter because of water runoff from treated crops. While some studies have shown that low concentrations of CPF may have adverse effects on aquatic species, comparatively little is known about its effect on fish embryos and larvae. To investigate the developmental effects of CPF, rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) eyed‐stage embryos were exposed in semistatic conditions to 0.3 and 3 µg/L of CPF up to the end of the sac‐fry stage, 3 weeks, at 12 °C. Several endpoints were analyzed including survival, hatching delay, hatching success, biometry, swimming activity, DNA damage, lipid peroxidation, protein carbonyl content, acetylcholinesterase (AChE) activity, and gene expression. At the end of the 3‐week exposure, larvae exposed to the highest concentration of CPF were less mobile compared to the control and the lowest CPF conditions. No significant differences in AChE activity were observed in either set of CPF conditions compared to control, but it was significantly reduced for larvae exposed to 3 µg/L compared to those exposed to 0.3 µg/L of CPF. Expression of genes that encoded estrogen receptor beta was downregulated for larvae exposed to both CPF concentrations. Expression of cytochrome P450 family 19 subfamily A member 1 was also significantly repressed but only on larvae exposed to the highest concentration of CPF. Our results indicated that subchronic exposure to environmental concentrations of CPF could lead to sublethal effects on early‐life stages of rainbow trout, especially effects on swimming activity that could affect foraging activity and escaping from predators. Environ Toxicol Chem 2021;40:3092–3102. © 2021 SETAC


Distributed hash tables (DHTs) have been actively studied in literature and many different proposals have been made on how to organize peers in a DHT. However, very few DHTs have been implemented in real systems and deployed on a large scale. One exception is KAD, a DHT based on Kademlia, which is part of eDonkey, a peer-to-peer file sharing system with several million simultaneous users. We have been crawling a representative subset of KAD every five minutes for six months and obtained information about geographical distribution of peers, session times, daily usage, and peer lifetime. We have found that session times are Weibull distributed and we show how this information can be exploited to make the publishing mechanism much more efficient. Peers are identified by the so-called KAD ID, which up to now was assumed to be persistent. However, we observed that a fraction of peers changes their KAD ID as frequently as once a session. This change of KAD IDs makes it difficult to characterize end-user behavior. For this reason we have been crawling the entire KAD network once a day for more than a year to track end-users with static IP addresses, which allows us to estimate end-user lifetime and the fraction of end-users changing their KAD ID.


BACKGROUND
Analysis of the major breast cancer (BC) predisposition genes BRCA1 and BRCA2 enables identification of high-risk individuals. Specialized programs enrolling the carriers of BRCA1/2 mutations facilitate an improvement in prevention and early diagnostics in asymptomatic individuals and rationalize the selection of individualized treatment in case of a BC onset. However, the carriers of mutations in the major predisposition genes represent only approximately 25% of cases among high-risk BC patients. Numerous candidate predisposing genes for breast and other cancers have recently been identified. The risk of cancer development associated with alterations in these genes is lower, and there is a considerable population variability in different regions worldwide.

AIM
We have performed mutation analyses of moderate-risk cancer susceptibility genes to evaluate their clinical importance for genetic counseling in high-risk patients suffering from breast and other cancers in the Czech population.

RESULTS
Czech oncological patients were analysed for mutation in ATM, CHEK2, NBS1 (NBN) and PALB2 genes. The majority of analyzed individuals represent the population of high-risk BRCA1/2-negative BC patients.

CONCLUSIONS
Based on results of this study, we recommend an analysis of recurrent truncating mutations in the CHEK2 gene (the c.1100delC mutation and a large deletion affecting exons 9-10) in BRCA1/2-negative patients from high-risk BC families. A clinical assessment of missense variants in CHEK2 is not suitable. A routine mutation analysis of the ATM and NBS1 (NBN) genes is not recommended in BC patients due to the low frequency of alterations in these genes in the Czech Republic. An identification of truncating mutations in the PALB2 gene is important in BRCA1/2-negative BC patients from families with a strong history of BC (HBC families). The frequency of PALB2 mutations may be comparable to the frequency of mutations in the BRCA2 gene in Czech HBC families.


The Based upon state space approach, this paper presents a Matlab model which may be used to describe the transient behaviour of self-excited induction generator. An attempt has been made to design an electronic load controller with resistive as well as inductive elements as dump load to absorb excessive real and reactive power during mismatch of power generated and power required by the consumers. These It has also been observed that terminal voltage of the machine may be maintained, even in the absence of excitation and speed controllers.


Abstract The detection of chromosomal damage serves as a tool for the verification of the genotoxic effects of chemical substances in vitro. We used conventional cytogenetic analysis in order to test for the potential genotoxic action of the insecticide thiacloprid (the active ingredient in commercial preparation CALYPSO 480 SC). The test cultures of bovine lymphocytes obtained from the peripheral blood were incubated with the insecticide in concentrations of: 30, 120, 240 and 480 μg.ml−1 for 24 and 48 hours. After 24 hours of incubation, we observed that the increasing concentrations resulted in a significant (P < 0.05; P < 0.01) increase in the frequency of DNA damage. Our experiments showed the presence of aberrations of a non-stable type (chromatid and chromosome breakage). The conventional chromosome analysis was supplemented with fluorescence in situ hybridization for the detection of numeric and stable structural aberrations. Whole chromosome probes for bovine chromosomes 1, 5 and 7 (BTA 1, BTA 5 and BTA 7) were used in the experiments.


Background and aims: Maternal primary and recurrent infection of cytomegalovirus (CMV) may be transmitted to the fetus during pregnancy and may have complications such as death or growth, along with the development retardation of the fetus and infant. The aim of this study was to determine the prevalence of immunoglobulin G (IgG) and immunoglobulin M (IgM) antibodies against CMV in young women, Sanandaj, Iran. Methods: To this end, 90 women (15-40 years old) referring to a clinical laboratory were randomly selected and announced their informed consent to participate in this cross-sectional study. Demographic information and women's data were collected, including pregnancy, history of abortion, and history of blood transfusion. Then, women's sera were measured for CMV IgG and IgM antibodies using the electrochemiluminescence technique. Finally, the data were analyzed by SPSS statistical software. Results: The prevalence of IgG and IgM antibodies against CMV in women was 92.2% (95% CI = 86.5-97.8) and 0%, respectively. In addition, the average CMV IgG antibody level was about 137.52 ± 85.215 SD IU/mL. The results revealed a significant statistical association between IgG antibody and pregnancy (P value = 0.012) while there was no association between CMV IgG antibody and other demographic data. Conclusions: In general, high percentages of women had CMV IgG antibody whereas 7.8% of them were susceptible. They are expected to acquire CMV primary infection, and therefore, the screening of antibodies to CMV is suggested for prenatal care.


In this review, we discuss the evolution of xylem structure in the context of our current understanding of the biophysics of water transport in plants. Water transport in land plants occurs while water is under negative pressure and is thus in a metastable state. Vessels filled with metastable water are prone to dysfunction by cavitation whenever gas-filled voids appear in the vessel lumen. Cavitated vessels fill with air and are incapable of water transport until air bubbles dissolve. We know much more about how cavitations occur and the conditions under which air bubbles (embolisms) dissolve. This gives us an improved understanding of the relations hip between xylem structure and function.


Urodynamic testing before surgery Women presenting with urinary stress incontinence are frequently subjected to urodynamic testing before surgery. This would appear to be a logical approach but if stress incontinence is demonstrable on clinical evaluation— does the addition of dynamics make any difference to the eventual outcome of the management? If not, can the tests be safely omitted, saving the woman time, money and the risk of instrumentally introduced infection? Specifically to address this questions a trial was conducted on the use of urodynamic testing in 11 different centres in the USA, allocating half of the women to evaluation only, and the other half to evaluation plus urodynamic testing according to standardised protocols (Nager et al. N Engl J Med 2012;366:1987–97). The end point was the percentage of each group in whom the treatment was successful, with the principle of non-inferiority being set in advance. Over 600 women were randomly entered into the trial and reviewed 1 year after surgery. Both groups had 77% successful outcomes, allowing the researchers to assert that in women with uncomplicated, demonstrable stress urinary incontinence, preoperative urodynamic testing does not affect the result and is therefore unnecessary.


Data envelopment analysis based on linear programming model, is a scientific approach, which evaluates the efficiency of organisations and units which use multiple inputs in order to produce multiple outputs. Data envelopment analysis models presented by Charnes, Cooper and Rhodes have intentional deficiencies, one of which is relying on data from periods of time that decision making units have passed. Therefore the results are based on past data. This is especially significant when the goal is to evaluate the current efficiency of units and forecast their future performance. On the other hand, classic DEA modes, such as BCC and CCR are based on the assumption that the precise and definite numerical value of all inputs and outputs are in hand, while in real world this is not always the case; specifically when the decision maker intends to evaluate the performance in long period of time in which values are definitively imprecise and inputs and outputs come as time series. The purpose of this article is to present an approach composing of DEA and Monte Carlo simulation which enables the decision maker to find the most efficient organisation in a given period of time, considering imprecise time series of data and also helps with forecasting and estimating the efficiency of companies in the future for a safe investment.


Abstract The effects of cold atmospheric plasma (CAP) of dielectric barrier discharges on the wettability, imbibition and germination of Leucaena leucocephala were investigated. It was established that CAP treatment markedly hydrophilized the seed coat, especially at longer treatment times. From the profile of the imbibition curve and visual observation, it was possible to verify that there are two resistance barriers to water penetration: integument surface and region of the macrosclereid cell wall (light line). Although the plasma interacts only in the integument, increasing the density of hydrophilic sites increases the capacity of water absorption, producing enough driving force to overcome the second resistance barrier. The existence of these two barriers changes the three-phase pattern generally observed during seed germination. Despite an increase in imbibition, the plasma treatment conditions used in this work, were not enough to overcome completely the dormancy barrier.


Background Radiotherapy (RT) may enhance the systemic antitumor reaction to immunotherapy (IT). Currently, the effect of RT in stage IV non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients treated with IT is uncertain. This study aimed to confirm the role of RT in these patients. Methods We enrolled 120 stage IV NSCLC patients who had been treated with IT and had received external beam radiation therapy (EBRT) or radioactive particle implantation (RPI) at 3 oncology centers in Shandong province between 2019 and 2021. We assessed relevant clinical factors and regular follow-up was conducted via electronic medical records and telephone. The primary endpoint was overall survival (OS). Different combination models in various populations were compared by generating Kaplan-Meier curves and Cox regression analysis. Results The OS for the overall population was 5 months (range, 0–31 months) and the overall survival rate was 47.5%. Patients receiving IT with RPI had the least favorable prognostic trend (median survival: 2 months) compared to those receiving IT without RT (median survival: 9 months) and IT with EBRT (median survival: 10 months), but this difference was not significant (P=0.148). In subgroup analysis, patients treated with IT with RPI appeared to have a worse prognosis in some specific cohorts, such as males [hazard ratio (HR) =2.433, P=0.031], non-squamous carcinoma histologies (HR =2.680, P=0.034), patients with oligometastases (HR =7.967, P=0.024), patients with liver metastases (HR =10.808, P=0.011) or brain metastases (HR =20.087, P=0.005), and those with Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group (ECOG) performance score ≥2 (HR =2.769, P=0.043). Multivariate Cox analysis of total population revealed that ECOG score and IT stage were the independent prognostic factors. IT combined with EBRT did not have a significant survival benefit in all subgroups. Concurrent IT with RT and first-line and second-line IT combined with RT trended toward improved long-term prognosis. Conclusions While the robustness of the present conclusions is limited by relatively small sample size and retrospective nature of this research, the addition of EBRT or RPI to IT did not significantly improve patients' OS in stage IV NSCLC. Early combination IT after RT may benefit patients with long-term survival.


Introduction Although biosolids supply some of all of the essential plant nutrients and soil property-enhancing organic matter, land application programs are designed chiefly for their nitrogen-, phosphorus-, and (in the case of alkaline stabilized materials) lime-supplying capabilities. The general approach for determining biosolid application rates on agricultural land can be summarized as follows: 1) Determine nutrient needs for expected crop yield and soil test levels. 2) Calculate biosolids agronomic rates based on crop nitrogen (N) needs, soil test phosphorus (P) needs, or soil lime requirement. 3) Calculate supplemental fertilizer needs by subtracting the amount of plant-available N, P, and potassium (K) supplied by biosolids from the crop N, P, and K needs.


We calculate fusion rules for the admissible representations of the affine superalgebra sl(2|1;C) at fractional level k=-1/2 in the Ramond sector. By representing 3-point correlation functions involving a singular vector as the action of differential operators on the sl(2|1;C) invariant 3-point function, we obtain conditions on permitted quantum numbers involved. We find that in this case the primary fields close under fusion.


This meta-analysis study aims to determine the background of collaborative learning in science learning. The sample used was purposive sampling related to research on the background of collaborative learning in natural science teaching and learning processwith seventeen research samples. Six classes actions will be used as samples to find the background for the application of collaborative learning in science learning, while the other 11 plus 6 existing classroom action studies were used as supporting materials for the background. Results based on a meta-analysis study, it was found that 29.40% of collaborative learning was motivated by the lack of students' social skills. In addition, there were also 6 problems that underlie related or emerging studies, including the lack of absorption and mastery of student learning, passive students, low student motivation, lack of innovative learning strategies, lack of innovative learning media, lack of social skills of students, low critical thinking skills of students.


This article highlights the potential spiritual effects of a popular anesthetic, ketamine, and how these spiritual effects can be used to help promote the reconciliation of spiritual and physical health. Ketamine, like the prominent psychedelic, psilocybin, has reportedly caused feelings of spiritual revelation and "out of body experiences" that many physicians may not feel qualified to discuss with their patients. This reluctance to address ketamine-induced spiritual experiences may affect the health outcomes of the patient. The primary goal of this project is to bring academic validity to considerations of the spiritual health of patients. This paper (1) investigates the extent that ketamine-induced, non-ordinary experiences can help bring awareness to the compatibility of spiritual and physical health and (2) compares the mechanisms of ketamine and psilocybin, as well as their value to the medical community due to the spiritual experiences that they catalyze. Thus, this research seeks to demonstrate that understanding the spiritual value of ketamine may encourage better communication between the physician and patient and promote more holistic healthcare approaches.


Web forums have become an important data resource for many web applications, but extracting structured data from unstructured web forum pages is still a challenging task due to both complex page layout designs and unrestricted user created posts. In this paper, we study the problem of structured data extraction from various web forum sites. Our target is to find a solution as general as possible to extract structured data, such as post title, post author, post time, and post content from any forum site. In contrast to most existing information extraction methods, which only leverage the knowledge inside an individual page, we incorporate both page-level and site-level knowledge and employ Markov logic networks (MLNs) to effectively integrate all useful evidence by learning their importance automatically. Site-level knowledge includes (1) the linkages among different object pages, such as list pages and post pages, and (2) the interrelationships of pages belonging to the same object. The experimental results on 20 forums show a very encouraging information extraction performance, and demonstrate the ability of the proposed approach on various forums. We also show that the performance is limited if only page-level knowledge is used, while when incorporating the site-level knowledge both precision and recall can be significantly improved.


The proposed paper aims at designing a real time precision positioning control circuitry for a numerical control device used to control a machine tool with encoder type feedback. More particularly it is intended to design a digital compensating circuit for modifying a position control signal to effect a correction for repeatable linear errors such as the dimensional changes in the machine structure due to changes induced into the structure by operating temperature ranges. The error correction is performed by modifying encoder type position feedback signals supplied to the machine tool controller. This provides real time compensation for thermal errors in positioning of computer numerically controlled machine tools, coordinate measuring machines (CMMs), robots, assembly systems, and the like. The error correction being accomplished by the Error Correction Circuit(ECC), which adds or subtracts a predetermined number of pulses to the pulses coming from a feedback device such as encoder to compensate for over shoot or under shoot of the machine tool respectively.


This work develops techniques for modeling and distributed simulation of complex situated multi-agent systems, which are highly dynamic and possess an intrinsic spatial character. Each agent owns its spatial coordinates and acts and interacts with its peers in a hosting territory. In a distributed/parallel scenario of a typical situated agent model, the territory represents a huge shared variable. Frequent access by agents to territory information easily becomes a bottleneck degrading system performance and scalability. This paper proposes an original approach and supporting API to distributing situated multi-agent models using actors. The approach exploits time management for resolving conflicts and to achieve data consistency. Approach contribution is twofold: (a) it simplifies M&S tasks by making the modeler unaware of distribution concerns, (b) it is capable of ensuring good model scalability and simulation performance. Practical aspects of the approach are demonstrated by a Tile-World model and its distributed simulation experiments.


A new method for measuring "free" acetaldehyde in plasma, the author's procedure avoids the precipitation of protein and almost completely eliminates the spontaneous formation of acetaldehyde from ethanol.


Multilevel regression and poststratification (MRP) is a method to estimate public opinion across geographic units from individual-level survey data. If it works with samples the size of typical national surveys, then MRP offers the possibility of analyzing many political phenomena previously believed to be outside the bounds of systematic empirical inquiry. Initial investigations of its performance with conventional national samples produce generally optimistic assessments. This article examines a larger number of cases and a greater range of opinions than in previous studies and finds substantial variation in MRP performance. Through empirical and Monte Carlo analyses, we develop an explanation for this variation. The findings suggest that the conditions necessary for MRP to perform well will not always be met. Thus, we draw a less optimistic conclusion than previous studies do regarding the use of MRP with samples of the size found in typical national surveys.


This research was conducted in order to obtain information system cropping patterns and farming in the District Loa Janan to increase cropping intensity in order to support the development of site-specific dryland farming insightful agribusiness. This research is also expected to result in the value of R / C ratio greater than 1 so that it is economically feasible to be implemented at the farm level. This study aims to conduct inventory of characteristics of land such as: climate, relief, topography, soil type, and land use, mengidentivikasi pattern of farmers planting dragon fruit and pepper in the village Batuah, knowing the cost and farm income commodity dragon fruit and pepper, as well as determine the feasibility of farming based on the analysis of R / C ratio. This research uses descriptive method with interviews with respondents sampled, namely farmers dragon fruit and pepper farmers in the village of Loa Janan Regency. The results showed by climatic conditions, topography and land more feasible to develop commodity pepper from the dragon fruit, both in monoculture and mixed farms. Overall analysis of farm commodities and pepper dragon fruit has a value of R / C ratio> 1, which means that the commodity still worth to be cultivated. Based on the analysis of capital productivity (π / C ratio) commodity pepper is more feasible to be developed because it is larger than bank interest, while the dragon fruit is smaller than bank interest. Based on the factors of production of farm commodities dragon fruit significant influence, such as land, seed and fertilizer.


Salt significantly changes the backscattering coefficient of wet soil. This is easily observed on RADARSAT-1 synthetic aperture radar (SAR) images acquired over a salty depression located in the Egyptian desert. The aim of this paper is to use backscattering models to understand the behavior of the backscattering coefficient over salt-affected soils and to evaluate the possibility of monitoring the salt content. Simulations conducted over salt-affected soils show a lower sensitivity of these models to soil moisture compared to nonaffected soils. Besides, there is no model suitable to represent the variation of the backscattering coefficient due to changes in soil salinity. These results are discussed with regard to the magnitude of the two components of the dielectric constant (epsiv' and epsiv''). Based on a series of relationships, we propose a parametric formulation that allows us to determine the salinity acting on RADARSAT-1 SAR images without any use of backscattering models


Background. The level of personality's empathy largely determines altruistic behaviour and the quality of interpersonal relationships rendering the relevance of research indubitable. In psychology, empathy is classified into emotional/affective, cognitive and predictive. This study analyses affective empathy and aims to find out which personality traits related to self-perception, effectiveness in interpersonal relationships and sociodemographics are linked to empathy. Methods. Research participants were schoolchildren, students, unemployed and employed individuals, inmates of imprisonment institutions and other young people. The target group was youth from 17 to 27 years of age, M =19.7, N =1400. An original measurement technique the psychometric quality indicators of which were sufficient (Cronbach's alpha reached .81) was used to research empathy. Results. The means of Spearman's correlation coefficients revealed that empathy was related to self-irony (r = .19, p ≤ .001), externality (r = .14; p ≤ .05), positive self-evaluation (r = .47; p ≤ .001), leadership disposition (r = .17; p ≤ .05), etc. Mann-Whitney and Kruskal-Wallis tests revealed that women (Mean Rank = 274.88) were more empathic than men (Mean rank = 139.78; p ≤ .001), young people with higher education (Mean Rank = 234.62) were more empathic than those with no or some education (Mean Rank = 161.06; p ≤ .001), etc. Conclusion. Research revealed that empathy was related to personal-psychological traits: self-irony, externality, positive self-evaluation, leadership disposition, general state of health, etc. The research highlighted the differences of empathy in different genders and revealed that women were more empathic than men. The research participants with high educational achievements exhibited the highest level of empathy.


Modern orthopaedic surgery provides a variety of techniques for cartilage repair. The Autologous Matrix-Induced Chondrogenesis (AMIC) procedure is a single-step technique with a collagen I/III scaffold for the treatment of full-thickness cartilage lesions. The aim of the study was to analyze the outcome of the AMIC procedure in overweight patients with knee cartilage defects. Overweight patients treated with AMIC surgery were followed up by clinical and MRI examination. 9 patients with a cartilage defect of the knee with a mean lesion size of 2.1 ± 1.2 cm2 and an average body mass index (BMI) of 29.3 were available for the follow-up. The Lysholm Score was significantly improved by the AMIC procedure (38 to 67, p ≤ 0.008). The VAS Score was significantly lower after the procedure (9 to 3, p ≤ 0.018). In the postoperative MOCART Scale, the scaffold reached defect covering of 80%. However, 2 patients had to be revised due to persisting knee pain. The AMIC procedure enhances pain reduction and gain of knee function for cartilage defects of overweight patients. However, in cases of an increased BMI, the patient had to be informed that success rate is reduced despite good defect covering.


Optical investigations are presented of the filled skutterudites AFe4Sb12 with divalent cations A=Yb, Ca, Ba. For each of these compounds a very similar pseudogap structure in the optical conductivity develops in the far-infrared spectral region at temperatures below 90 K. Highly accurate local-density approximation electronic band structure calculations can consistently explain the origin of the pseudogap structure generated largely by transition metal 3d states. In particular, a 4f-conduction electron hybridization or strong correlations can be ruled out as origin for the pseudogap.


Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), a high mortality malignancy, has become a worldwide public health concern. Acquired resistance to the multikinase inhibitor sorafenib challenges its clinical efficacy and the survival benefits it provides to patients with advanced HCC. This study aimed to identify critical genes and pathways associated with sorafenib resistance in HCC using integrated bioinformatics analysis. Differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were identified using four HCC gene expression profiles (including 34 sorafenib-resistant and 29 sorafenib-sensitive samples) based on the robust rank aggregation method and R software. Gene ontology (GO) functional annotation and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) pathway analysis were performed using the Database for Annotation, Visualization and Integrated Discovery (DAVID) online tool. A protein–protein interaction (PPI) network was constructed using the Search Tool for the Retrieval of Interacting Genes (STRING), and small molecules reversing sorafenib resistance were searched for using the connectivity map (CMAP) database. Pearson correlation and survival analyses of hub genes were performed using cBioPortal and Gene Expression Profiling and Interactive Analysis (GEPIA). Finally, the expression levels of hub genes in sorafenib-resistant HCC cells were verified using quantitative polymerase chain reaction (q-PCR). A total of 165 integrated DEGs (66 upregulated and 99 downregulated in sorafenib resistant samples compared sorafenib sensitive ones) primarily enriched in negative regulation of endopeptidase activity, extracellular exosome, and protease binding were identified. Some pathways were commonly shared between the integrated DEGs. Seven promising therapeutic agents and 13 hub genes were identified. These findings provide a strategy and theoretical basis for overcoming sorafenib resistance in HCC patients.


: Background: Prayer is a means of restraining the self-esteem and comfort of believers . Resilience is seen as a capacity to withstand stress and disaster, the purpose of this study was to determine the relationship between attitude and practical commitment to prayer with health promotion and resiliency behaviors among students of Kashan University of Medical Sciences. Methods: This cross-sectional study was performed on all students of Kashan University of Medical Scienc . Inclusion criteria were education, employment and willingness and informed consent to participate in the study , Random multi-stage data collection was used for sampling. Data were collected using a questionnaire: Practical attitude and commitment to prayer, Health Promotion Lifestyle (HPLPII), and Connor-Davidson Resiliency (CD-RIS). Data were analyzed by SPSS software version 16 using descriptive and analytical statistics. Results: 42.5% of the students (170 students) were male. The mean and standard deviation of the students' age was 22.53±1.73. Mean score of attitude and practical commitment of students to prayer was (52.1±10.11), health promotion behaviors (126.18±21.11), and resilience (88.98±14.71); There was a significant relationship between the mean score of students' attitude and practical commitment to prayer and the mean score of health promoting and resilience behaviors ( P <0.05). Conclusion: Considering the statistical correlation between attitude and practical commitment to prayer with health-promoting behaviors and resiliency; Behavioral implications of practical attitude and commitment to prayer can be used to improve and promote resilience and health promotion behaviors of students.


The evidence that short sleep duration is a determinant of obesity is accumulating (1–3). Prospective cohort studies have repeatedly shown that short sleep duration is associated with weight gain and an increased incidence of obesity in children and adults. Intervention studies have provided a mechanistic explanation, i.e. that sleep restriction impacts hormonal regulation of appetite. Ongoing research is assessing whether sleep extension in sleep deprived obese individuals can influence appetite control and/or reduce body fat (4). Given that chronic sleep restriction is highly tied to the modern way of living, studies aiming to investigate the possible causal association between short sleep duration and obesity are of particular importance from a public health standpoint. In this issue of Obesity Reviews, Professor Jim Horne critically addressed the link between habitual short sleep duration and obesity from a sleep perspective (5). The author argued that the clinical significance of short sleep as a risk factor for obesity is very little, with weight gains attributed to short sleep of <2 kg over a year. Additionally, the author mentioned that the growing interest in short sleep as a determinant of obesity has the potential to focus attention on sleep rather than to exercise and diet as behaviours to promote weight loss and healthy body weight. Globally, the review paper is interesting and provides a different view point that can generate new studies on the field. However, some aspects need to be put into perspective. First, many people fail to realize that obesity has a complex causation. The underlying causes and paths to obesity are manifold and one should thus expect the effect of any single factor to be relatively small. In this context, I would rather argue that a weight gain of as little as 1 kg over a year attributed to short sleep is clinically important on a population level. Second, it is important to realize that the main issue is not to determine whether or not short sleep is a cause of obesity (likely impossible to prove), but to understand the implications of chronic short sleep duration on energy balance. Time pressure is a reality of the modern way of living and many people prefer to reduce the time allocated to sleep in order to improve their quality of life. Such a strategy is understandable, but few realize that there might be a price to pay in the long run. Any influence of short sleep duration on food intake and physical activity participation is of importance in our understanding of the different pathways to obesity. Additionally, recent results have shown that sleep might be an important factor in successful weight loss, emphasizing that a narrow focus on diet and exercise might not be enough (6). Third, the objective in studying the association between short sleep duration and obesity should not be to neglect diet and physical activity in promoting healthy body weights, but rather to understand the interactions between short sleep duration and energy balance. In particular, we have recently realized that many factors (e.g. vitamins and minerals, chemical pollutants, sleep duration, etc.) can influence energy balance despite the fact that they do not have any caloric value per se (7,8). Finally, the author elegantly indicated in its review that 'sleep-related obesity might even be protective'. This argument is interesting and agrees with the physiological perception of obesity that considers fat gain as a biological adaptation that ultimately permits the person gaining weight to reach a new homeostatic state (9). For the short sleeper, adipose tissue may at least provide an increased leptinemia. It is obvious that the causal relation between short sleep duration and obesity will be difficult to obtain, if at all possible. Experimental evidence that sleep restriction induces obesity is not possible in humans for both ethical and logistic reasons. The best evidence would be to conduct a randomized-controlled trial in which we would have to restrict sleep duration in a group of lean people in order to be able to compare them with a control group. However, the slow development of obesity implies that such a study would have to run for years in a large sample of individuals. This means that we need to rely on short-term intervention studies and longitudinal studies. As recently addressed (2), short-term experiments may elucidate biological mechanisms supposedly inducing continuous weight gain, but whether they do produce obesity in the long run is unknown. Likewise, observations of obesity development in non-obese population groups over time after exposure to short sleep duration can be addressed with the use of various epidemiological methods, each of which have pros and cons. As mentioned by Professor Horne in his article, 'the case for short sleep as a cause rather than just a correlate of obesity has yet to be established'. This is perhaps true, but the main message is that sleep obesity reviews doi: 10.1111/j.1467-789X.2010.00848.x


Low-impact development (LID) structures are combined with traditional measures to manage stormwater and cope with increased runoff rates originating from heavy urbanization and climate change. As the use of LIDs for climate adaptation increases, practitioners need more knowledge on LID performance in future climates for successful planning and implementation. In this study, temporal downscaling of regional climate projections for three cities in Norway is performed, using the concept of scale invariance to downscale the distribution of extreme precipitation from daily to sub-daily timescales. From this, local-scale intensity-duration-frequency (IDF) curves for future precipitation were obtained. Using climate projections of daily temporal resolution as input to water balance models and the obtained IDF relationships as input to event-based models allowed for assessing the retention capacity, peak flow reduction potential and pollution control of three different types of LIDs: green roofs, bioretention cells, and detention basins. The downscaling resulted in large local variations in presumed increase of both precipitation amount and intensity, contradicting current design recommendations in Norway. Countrywide, a decrease in the overall LID performance was found, although some positive effects of temperature rises were detected. The study illustrated the importance of evapotranspiration- and infiltration-based processes in future stormwater management and how coupling of LID structures in series can significantly reduce required detention volumes.


Summary: The ``shifting of the burden of proof'' is at the heart of the debate on European chemicals law reform which was started by the European Commission's White Paper ``Strategy for a future chemicals policy.'' This article analyses the allocation of the burden of proof in existing legislation on chemicals and the White Paper's approach within the framework of Registration Evaluation Authorisation of Chemicals (REACH). It also deals with the legal aspect of the authorisation concept in the White Paper, in particular from the viewpoint of the principle of proportionality.


This paper reports the progress that has been made towards the development of a mobile application to enable people to learn more about natural history by helping them to identify observations of nature as part of the iSpot project (www.ispot.org.uk). The paper identifies relevant research in mobile learning within the field of science and the challenges faced when designing and developing a mobile application for participatory science including the user-centred design approach and evaluation process that were adopted for the development. The paper includes lessons learned when adopting an agile and iterative approach to mobile application development. Author


Objective Saccule predilation has been an essential device during percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). We evaluate the ischaemic preconditioning effect of repeated myocardial ischaemia during predilations. Methods Thirty one patients who were ready to undergoing PCI were randomly selected. And we choosed the new biochemical indicator ischaemia modified albumin (IMA) as a sensitive index, and the IMA were detected with ACB (albumin cobalt binding) test before saccule dilations, after dilations and after stent implantation. To analyse the data, we used Paired-Sample T test in the SPSS statistics software to investigate the change of the IMA level, and if the change had statistical significance. Results The data was signed by means of (mean±SD), the IMA level were (77.03±13.82) U/ml, (90.06±23.58) U/ml and (82.43±21.87) U/ml before saccule predilation, after predilations and after stent implantation. We found the IMA level was lower after stent implantation than that after saccule predilations, and the variance had statistical significance (p=0.031,<0.05). We also found that the IMA level after intervention was equal with that before dilations (p>0.05). Conclusion The degree of myocardial ischaemia was relieved during saccule predilations, even can neutralise the ischaemic effect that dilations causing. We can suppose the intrinsic mechanism which we called ischaemic preconditioning effect that pretected the myocardium.


Art teachers are renowned for their claims that the creative properties of their senior secondary pupils' artworks occur as a result of the realisation of a creative process. Drawing on my recent ethnographic studies in senior art classrooms in Sydney, Australia, and Illinois, USA, I uncover a sociological, rather than a psychological explanation of creativity, which ironically, appears to satisfy the creative process claims of teachers. This article reveals how social tact in teacher–pupil exchanges has a function in bolstering the quality of the pupils' performances and their artworks while repressing the teacher's pedagogical role. The design and methodologies of the studies are outlined and two grounded narratives characterise cases of social tact between art teachers and pupils. A brief account is provided on the socio-cultural framework of these studies, informed by Bourdieu's theories of the habitus, symbolic capital and misrecognition. Bourdieu's theories offer a robust conceptual apparatus which helps to explain how the sociality of classroom exchanges, with all of their ambiguities in practice, are a necessity in the realisation of creative ends.


Percutaneous endoscopic gastrostomy (PEG) is a commonly performed procedure in patients with upper aerodigestive tract malignancies as well as in a range of other swallowing disorders. This is generally regarded as a safe intervention to enable long-term enteral feeding. The procedure is simple and quick to complete. Procedure related mortality is reported at around 1% and incidence of life threatening complications is low. We describe the management of a life threatening complication following gastrostomy tube insertion. A 68 year old Caucasian male was diagnosed with an advanced stage right supraglottic squamous cell carcinoma with metastasis to right neck. The patient underwent debulking of tumour and post-operative radical radiotherapy. To facilitate feeding, the patient required percutaneous endoscopic gastrostomy (PEG) tube insertion (15 Fresenius) which was accomplished without any difficulty. Six months after the insertion of PEG, the patient was admitted to the general surgeons with an acute abdomen. Investigations revealed displacement of the PEG tube with a perforated stomach. The patient required a laparotomy and partial gastrectomy. We conclude that the patients need to be thoroughly counselled about the possible complications related to PEG tube insertion. A high index of suspicion is required to identify PEG related peritonitis early to avoid any delay in its management.


We consider the problem of growing the largest supermassive black holes from stellar mass seeds at high redshift. Rapid growth without violating the Eddington limit requires that most mass is gained while the hole has a low spin and thus a low radiative accretion efficiency. If, as was formerly thought, the black hole spin aligns very rapidly with the accretion flow, even a randomly oriented sequence of accretion events would all spin up the hole and prevent rapid mass growth. However, using the recent result that the Bardeen‐Petterson effect causes counteralignment of hole and disc spins under certain conditions, we show that holes can grow rapidly in mass if they acquire most of it in a sequence of randomly oriented accretion episodes whose angular momenta J d are no larger than the angular momentum of the hole, J h. Ultimately the hole has total angular momentum comparable with the last accretion episode. This points to a picture in which the accretion is chaotic on a lengthscale of order the disc size, that is, 0.1 pc.


Knowledge awareness refers to one's awareness of the other group learners' domain knowledge. CSCL researchers maintain that knowledge awareness is an important aspect to the outcome of collaborative learning activities. Interested in groupware design to support knowledge awareness, I investigated how a shared rationale space affected one's knowledge awareness in virtual collaborative learning environment through a classroom study. In the investigation, a rationale is a learner's reasoning behind his/her decision of the tasks in the learning activity. The findings show that one's awareness of the other group learners' rationales, namely, rationale awareness, enhances one's knowledge awareness. The study suggests several design implications to support knowledge awareness, including sharing one's contextual information that reveals one's domain knowledge, highlighting the association between the knowledge awareness information and the learners who provided the information, and supporting utilization of knowledge awareness information at both individual and group levels.


Background: Approximately 50% of pediatric B-ALL patients treated with clinically approved CD19-targeting CAR-T cells do not remain in remission one year after therapy. CD22-targeting CAR-T cells appear to be curative in only a small fraction of CD19-refractory patients and this therapeutic strategy is primarily used as a bridge to stem cell transplant. Additional immunotherapeutic targets thus remain urgently needed. Our laboratory recently used cell surface proteomics to identify CD72 as a B-cell specific marker especially upregulated on poor prognosis, KMT2A/MLL-rearranged B-ALL (Nix et al., Cancer Discovery (2021)). In this published work, we used a best-in-class nanobody library displayed on yeast to develop binders to CD72. We demonstrated for the first time that fully synthetic nanobodies can generate CAR-T cells that are highly potent in vitro and in vivo. While we previously focused on these "nanoCARs" in KMT2A/MLLr B-ALL, in this follow-up study we aimed to 1) further expand our nanoCAR indications to other CD72-expressing B-cell malignancies; 2) biophysically characterize our synthetic nanobodies; 3) evaluate the potential for further humanization of the nanobody binder amino acid sequence while retaining anti-tumor efficacy; and 4) characterize the potency and T-cell immunophenotypes in the context of our lead nanobody binder ("NbD4") placed on different CAR backbones.
 Methods: Flow cytometry of primary patient samples for CD72 was performed in a CLIA-certified laboratory. NbD4 nanobody was recombinantly expressed in E. coli and biolayer interferometry was used to determine the binding affinity to recombinantly-expressed CD72 extracellular domain. CAR-T cells were generated from peripheral blood donor CD4+ and CD8+ cells (1:1) ratio via lentiviral transduction. In vitro cytotoxicity assays were performed at a range of effector:tumor ratios. In vivo studies were performed in human cell line orthotopic xenografts in NSG mice. 1e6 luciferase-labeled Jeko cells were implanted at Day 0 followed by administration of 4e6 CAR-T cells at Day 6. Tumor burden was assessed by bioluminescence.
 Results: Flow cytometry on primary non-Hodgkin B-cell lymphoma obtained from fine needle aspiration biopsy (n = 5) confirmed CD72 surface expression (not shown), consistent with RNA-seq across larger cohorts. Biolayer interferometry demonstrated that NbD4 bound with surprisingly low affinity to recombinant CD72 (K D ~800 nM) (Fig. 1A), with both slow on rate (k on 8.38e4 M -1s -1) and rapid off rate (k off 6.82e-2 s -1). This affinity stands in contrast to that reported for FMC63 single chain variable fragment (scFv) used in clinically approved CD19-targeting CAR-T cells (K D 0.3-5 nM), despite similar in vitro and in vivo efficacy of both products. Our NbD4 framework region shows ~82% homology to a human IgG variable heavy domain, significantly higher than FMC63 (~59% homology). We made additional substitutions in the framework domain to increase human homology up to 89%. In vitro cytotoxicity assays with SEM B-ALL cells showed several humanized variants with similar efficacy to NbD4 (Fig. 1B). We further evaluated the impact of placing NbD4 on different CAR backbones, including combinations of CD28 or 4-1BB costimulatory domains and CD8 or IgG4-based transmembrane and hinge regions (Fig. 1C). In vivo, CD72 nanoCARs with Backbone 3 showed significantly increased potency (Fig. 1D). Indeed, tumors treated with Backbone 3 CAR-Ts showed complete tumor clearance and did not develop new tumors even after re-challenge with 1e6 Jeko cells at Day 52 (Fig. 1D). Preliminary characterization of effector and memory CAR-T cell phenotypes before exposure to tumor suggested that Backbone 3 had an increased number of naïve T cells compared to empty CAR and CD19 CAR-T cells (data not shown).
 Conclusions: Our results demonstrate that our fully synthetic CD72 nanoCARs can effectively eliminate CD72-expressing B-cell malignancy models despite low nanobody binding affinity. Humanized NbD4 variants may serve as clinical candidates with even further reduction in possible immunogenicity of the llama amino acid framework. Alterations to the CAR backbone have a major impact on anti-tumor efficacy and phenotypes of our synthetic nanobodies. CD72-targeting therapies may be effective therapeutics not only KMT2A/MLLr B-ALL but also across a broader spectrum of refractory B-cell malignancies.
 Figure 1 Figure 1.

 No relevant conflicts of interest to declare.


The relation between performance on the digit symbol substitution test and subsequent 5-year mortality was examined in 1,118 male participants in the Western Collaborative Group Study (mean age at time of examination = 70.6 years). Cox regression analyses revealed that the unadjusted relative risk from all-cause mortality was 1.79 (95% confidence interval 1.45-2.21) for subjects who scored 10 points (1 standard deviation) lower on the digit symbol substitution test. The relative risk remained significant at 1.44 (95% confidence interval 1.12-1.86) after adjustment for age, education, baseline serum cholesterol, and systolic blood pressure levels and for the prevalence of cancer, cardiovascular/cerebrovascular disease, and ever smoking. Tree-structured survival analysis revealed the presence of a subgroup of subjects (n = 130) with low digit symbol substitution performance (mean = 26.3) who experienced a mortality rate of 34.9 deaths per 1,000 person-years. This mortality rate was not significantly different from that encountered by another subgroup of subjects with a history of cancer (n = 128; 45.7 deaths per 1,000 person-years). If age-related slowing of information processing is a marker for aging of the central nervous system, then people with lower digit symbol scores may be "older" physiologically than similarly aged persons with higher digit symbol scores. Aging of the central nervous system might be expected to reduce adaptive capacity in a general way, thereby increasing susceptibility to death from a variety of causes.


Exoplanet detection with precise radial velocity (RV) observations is currently limited by spurious RV signals introduced by stellar activity. We show that machine-learning techniques such as linear regression and neural networks can effectively remove the activity signals (due to starspots/faculae) from RV observations. Previous efforts focused on carefully filtering out activity signals in time using modeling techniques like Gaussian process regression. Instead, we systematically remove activity signals using only changes to the average shape of spectral lines, and use no timing information. We trained our machine-learning models on both simulated data (generated with the SOAP 2.0 software) and observations of the Sun from the HARPS-N Solar Telescope. We find that these techniques can predict and remove stellar activity both from simulated data (improving RV scatter from 82 to 3 cm s−1) and from more than 600 real observations taken nearly daily over 3 yr with the HARPS-N Solar Telescope (improving the RV scatter from 1.753 to 1.039 m s−1, a factor of ∼1.7 improvement). In the future, these or similar techniques could remove activity signals from observations of stars outside our solar system and eventually help detect habitable-zone Earth-mass exoplanets around Sun-like stars.


Background Cell signaling mediated by the JAK2-STAT (Janus kinase 2-signal transducer and activator of transcription) pathway plays a critical role in hematopoiesis, and its aberrant activation is associated with the progression of hematological malignancies. For instance, somatic mutations in the JAK2 gene that lead to constitutive activation of STATs are involved in the pathogenesis of myeloproliferative neoplasms (MPN) and refractory anemia with ringed sideroblasts with thrombocytosis, one of the myelodysplastic/myeloproliferative neoplasms, unclassifiable (MDS/MPN, U). In addition, insufficient inactivation of the JAK-STAT pathway due to repression of SOCS-1 (suppressor of cytokine signaling 1) through hypermethylation of the SOCS-1 gene is involved in the disease progression of high-risk myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS) and acute myeloid leukemia (AML) (Brakensiek et al.; Br. J. Haematol. 2005;130:209). These observations prompted us to investigate the effect of the JAK2-selective inhibitor NS-018, which is in an early-phase clinical trial for MPN, on the colony formation by bone marrow hematopoietic progenitor cells from high-risk de novo MDS patients and the phosphorylation status of STAT3 in these cells. Methods Bone marrow mononuclear cells (BMMNCs) from six MDS patients and three healthy volunteers were collected with informed consent in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki and with the approval of the Institutional Review Board. The MDS subtypes of the six patients included two RCMD, three RAEB-1 and one RAEB-2 according to the WHO classification. All MDS patients had complex cytogenetic abnormalities and their prognostic risks were defined to be high (N=1) or very high (N=5) in the IPSS-R. Commercially available normal human CD34+ BM cells were also examined for comparison. Cells were incubated in methylcellulose medium containing cytokines with or without NS-018. Burst forming unit-erythroid (BFU-E) and colony forming unit-granulocyte/macrophage (CFU-GM) were scored on day 14 of culture. Colony-forming cells were then collected and subjected to western blotting analysis. Results We first examined the colony-formation capacity of MDS-derived BMMNCs. CFU-GM colony formation was observed in four of six MDS samples, although the absolute CFU-GM numbers from MDS BMMNCs were less than those from normal BMMNCs and normal CD34+BM cells. MDS-derived BMMNCs produced larger numbers of CFU-GM colonies (78–99% of total colonies) than BFU-E, similar to the findings usually observed in AML, whereas normal BMMNCs and normal CD34+BM cells formed virtually the same numbers of CFU-GM colonies and BFU-E colonies. These results suggest that BMMNCs from four of the MDS patients enrolled in this study had characteristics similar to AML BMMNCs, although they showed less proliferation than AML BMMNCs. We next examined the effect of NS-018 on CFU-GM colony formation. NS-018 treatment decreased the numbers of CFU-GM colonies from MDS-derived BMMNCs in a dose-dependent manner, and this effect was significantly more potent against MDS-derived than against normal cells (57.2% inhibition in MDS cells vs. 12.8% inhibition in normal cells at 0.5 mM NS-018; see Figure). These results indicate that NS-018 is preferentially efficacious in inhibiting CFU-GM formation from BMMNCs from high risk MDS. In addition, the level of phospho-STAT3 in MDS-derived colony-forming cells was twice as high as in colony-forming cells from normal BMMNCs, and 1.0 mM NS-018 completely suppressed the phosphorylation of STAT3 in CFU-GM colony-forming cells from MDS. Conclusion Our results show for the first time that a JAK2 inhibitor, NS-018, potently suppresses the formation of MDS colonies. NS-018 could be a new therapeutic option for high-risk MDS patients. Disclosures: Kodama: Nippon Shinyaku: Employment. Naito: Nippon Shinyaku: Employment. Nakaya: Nippon Shinyaku: Employment. Taniwaki: Novartis: Honoraria.


Five dogs with idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura were successfully treated with vincristine alone or in combination with a glucocorticoid. Glucocorticoid therapy alone appeared ineffective in increasing the platelet count. Four dogs were effectively treated after a single dose of vincristine, but the remaining dog required an additional dose. Vincristine, although effective, is not recommended as the primary therapy of idiopathic thrombocytopenia in the dog. High cost and potential side effects should make its use restricted to cases in which glucocorticoid therapy is either ineffective or contraindicated.


It is in no boastful spirit and it is without exaggeration that we venture to claim that the tremendous advances in surgery in recent years parallel directly the advances in anesthesia and the care of patients before and after operation. The development of new methods and new agents and the constantly increasing knowledge of human physiology have made many modern surgical procedures not only possible but practicable. STUDIES PRIOR TO ANESTHESIA When a patient comes to the hospital prepared to undergo surgical intervention, a careful history and physical examination will normally be adequate in the assessment of his physical status. Some of the simpler laboratory investigations are considered necessary. If the surgical or anesthetic procedure which is contemplated is likely to place undue stress on the patient, it is necessary to conduct investigations in greater detail. These, with the newer methods, are valuable in estimating a patient's tolerance to the


Using a mixed method approach, this article investigates growth management policy in the American states, presenting an event history analysis of state growth management policy adoptions, supplemented by a case study of growth management's evolution in the state of Maryland. Empirical results from the event history analysis suggest that growth pressures, the countervailing forces of state environmentalism and building interests, stronger gubernatorial powers, and citizen liberalism are all important factors associated with state adoptions of growth management. The Maryland case triangulates and contextualizes these key empirical findings, demonstrating the importance of those variables in a state-specific context. Beyond triangulating the empirical results, Maryland's legislative history with growth management highlights the importance of civic engagement as a means to both formulate and build sustained support for state growth management policy, even in the face of significant opposition from development interests.


This is a report of a retained epidural catheter segment after placement of 20-G polyethylene catheter (Hakko Medical) through 17-G Tuohy needle and 25-G spinal needle (Top Company) for a patient receiving combined spinal-epidural anesthesia. Retained catheter fragment (approximately 10.6 cm) was removed easily with small incision under local anesthesia. Electron microscopic findings of the catheter showed that the catheter might have been traumatized by the Tuohy needle through which the catheter was placed or by the spinal needle for intrathecal anesthesia, resulting in having been sheared off.


In this paper, a frequency-multiplier-based radio frequency (RF) beamforming architecture suitable for the generation/transmission of high-frequency vector-modulated signals is proposed. The proposed architecture incorporates a single-input-single-output digital predistortion function that has been carefully synthesized to guarantee excellent error vector magnitude (EVM) and adjacent channel power ratio (ACPR) for the signals received in the far-field. A 2×2 beamforming array was built using off-the-shelf frequency doublers and printed circuit board based patch antennas, all operating at 28 GHz, to serve as the device-under-test in the validation experiments. Over-the-air experiments confirmed the ability of the proposed architecture to successfully generate orthogonal frequency division multiplexed (OFDM) signals. For instance, EVMs as low as 0.9% and 2.5% and ACPRs equal to 52 dBc and 47 dBc, were obtained for modulation bandwidths equal to 100 MHz and 400 MHz, respectively.