Stimulated emission pumping-population transfer spectroscopy (SEP-PTS) has been used to directly measure the energy threshold to isomerization between the two conformational isomers of bis(2-hydroxyphenyl)methane. These conformers have been shown in the preceding paper (DOI 10.1021/jp8098686) to be an OH...O H-bonded structure (conformer A) and a doubly OH() ...pi H-bonded conformer (conformer B). Lower and upper bounds on the energy threshold for A-->B isomerization are at 1344 and 1399 cm(-1), respectively, while the corresponding bounds on the B-->A isomerization are 1413 and 1467 cm(-1). The difference between these thresholds provides a measure of the relative energies of the two minima, with DeltaE(AB) = E(A) - E(B) = 14-123 cm(-1). The transition-state structure responsible for this energy threshold has been identified using DFT B3LYP, DFT M05-2X, and MP2 calculations, all with a 6-31+G* basis set. Only the DFT M05-2X calculations correctly reproduce both the energy ordering of the two minima and the magnitude of the barrier separating them. Below the energy threshold to isomerization, we have used the extensive Franck-Condon progressions present in the SEP spectrum of conformer A to undertake an SEP-PT study of its vibrational relaxation rate, as a function of internal energy over the 0-1200 cm(-1) region. The position of SEP excitation in the expansion was systematically varied in order to change the rate and number of cooling collisions that occur between SEP excitation and probe steps and the initial temperature at which SEP occurs. From this data set, three energy regimes were identified, each with a unique value of the average energy lost per collision with helium (region 1: 13 cm(-1)/collision for E = 300-1200 cm(-1), region 2: 0.6 cm(-1)/collision for E = 200-300 cm(-1), and region 3: 7 cm(-1)/collision for E < 200 cm(-1)). In region 1, the vibrational density of states is sufficient to support efficient loss of energy via Deltav = -1 collisions, involving the lowest-frequency vibrations of the molecule (with a frequency of 26 cm(-1)). In region 2, the vibrational energy levels are sufficiently sparse that energy gaps exist, reducing the efficiency of relaxation. In region 3, a combination of the quantum nature of the helium, attractive forces, and orbiting resonances may be responsible for the increased efficiency at lowest-energy regime.


Patients with short stature have a high incidence of voice and laryngeal abnormalities. In sixteen patients with short stature of various etiologies, these abnormalities appeared to be unrelated to hearing loss or other otolaryngologic problems. However, in many patients they were associated with typical symptoms and signs of voice abuse. Physicians and speech-language pathologists caring for patients with short stature should be alert for voice problems, and should consider instituting early voice education, diagnosis and treatment.


Two recently published peer reviewed articles in the SADA Journal are of concern to the South African Society of Orthodontists (SASO). The first, "An introductory report on a new cephalometric method: the Dawjee analysis" (Dawjee SM., Oberholzer TG., and Hlongwa P., SADJ November 2005 pp 444-447) presents a "new" cephalometric method.


E-commerce (electronic commerce or EC) is the buying and selling of goods and services, or the transmitting of funds or data, over an electronic network, primarily the Internet. These business transactions occur business-to-business, business-to-consumer, consumer-to-consumer or consumer-to-business. The success of electronic commerce depends upon effective electronic payment systems. The Internet and on-line businesses are growing exponentially. Due to this explosive growth, electronic commerce on the Internet uses various electronic payment mechanisms that can cater for much diversity of applications. Electronic payments are financial transactions made without the use of paper documents such as cheques. Electronic payments include debit card, credit card, smart card, e-wallet, e-cash, electronic cheques etc. E-payment systems have received different acceptance level throughout the world; some methods of electronic payments are highly adopted while others are relatively low. The present paper is focused on the issues and challenges in e payment and to examine the problems faced by consumers during e payments.


Low-power wide-area network (LPWAN) multi-radio access technology (RAT) devices promise enabling Internet of Things (IoT) use-cases that simultaneously require high coverage and data rates, and low energy consumption. For such devices, active probing is usually used for discovering if communication between a mobile terminal (MT) and a base station (BS) or a handover of the MT across LPWAN technologies should be initiated. Because of continuous probing, this procedure increases signaling overhead and energy consumption of the MT. Assuming that the location information of the MT is required for enabling an IoT use-case, this information can potentially also be used for enhancing the discovery and vertical handover procedures in heterogeneous LPWANs. Hence, we propose a location-based mechanism for making discovery and handover decisions in outdoor LPWANs. We do that under the assumption that the location of the MT can be estimated with a certain level of localization errors, while the perfectly accurate location information of the BSs are known to the MT. The mechanism grounds the decisions on the expected SNR between the MT and the BS, which removes the need for continuous probing. If the location information of the MT can be estimated with GPS-like accuracy, we demonstrate that the mechanism can achieve more than 90% correct discovery decisions. We also show that the mechanism is highly accurate in determining if a handover between technologies should be initiated. For an order of magnitude less accurate location information (e.g., for SigFox-based fingerprinting), we show that the mechanism can still make reasonable discovery decisions.


A correlational descriptive study of 86 first-time mothers examined the relationships among employment status, role conflict, marital satisfaction, employment role attitude, and ease of transition to the maternal role. Interview and questionnaire data were collected 5 to 18 months after the birth of the first child. No significant differences were observed between employed and unemployed mothers in relation to role conflict. Mothers with careers tended to experience more role conflict between their worker, self, and spouse roles than mothers with jobs. Mothers who experienced more role conflict, regardless of their work status, had more difficulty in making the transition to the maternal role. Marital satisfaction was found to be positively correlated with ease in transition to the maternal role. No significant correlation was observed between employment role attitude and ease of transition to the maternal role. Mothers who reported a more positive attitude toward employment reported significantly less conflict between spouse and parent roles. Mothers who had attended a parent support group, regardless of their work status, experienced more conflict between the parent and self roles; these mothers also tended to have greater difficulty in making the transition to the maternal role.


In this article new results are presented for the zero-temperature ground-state properties of the spin-half transverse Ising model on various lattices using three different approximate techniques. These are, respectively, the coupled cluster method, the correlated basis function method, and the variational quantum Monte Carlo method. The methods, at different levels of approximation, are used to study the ground-state properties of these systems, and the results are found to be in excellent agreement both with each other and with results of exact calculations for the linear chain and results of exact cumulant series expansions for lattices of higher spatial dimension. The different techniques used are compared and contrasted in the light of these results, and the constructions of the approximate ground-state wave functions are especially discussed.


The qualitative research tradition draws on a number of intellectual disciplines, including psychology, history, journalism, sociology, and political science to note a few (see Denzin & Lincoln, 2000). For researchers, the depth and variety of qualitative traditions to draw upon in informing research programs provides a sense of flexibility and excitement about the research endeavor (Ponterotto, 2005). On the other hand, the flexible and discovery-oriented nature of some (e.g., constructivist-interpretivist) qualitative approaches can prove confusing to novice researchers given the perceived lack of specific and structured methodological guidelines (Guba & Lincoln, 1994: Ponterotto, 2005). Recently, Hiller (2011) writing in The Qualitative Report, introduced the Multi-Layered Chronological Chart (MLCC) methodology as an organizing framework for single and multiple case study research across intellectual disciplines. Hiller's innovative work coalesces research traditions hailing from history, political science, psychology, and sociology. The Multi-Layered Chronological Chart (MLCC) methodology was designed particularly for use in biographical studies, and Hiller (2011) provided a number of examples of its application for such purposes. In the present article, the MLCC methodology was adapted for use in psychobiography. Psychobiography can be defined simply as "biography that makes substantial use of psychological theory and knowledge" (Elms, 1994, p. 4). As both a topical focus and research approach, psychobiography holds a revered position in the history of psychology. Freud's (1910/1957) psychoanalytic profile of Leonardo da Vinci is often cited as the birth of the psychobiography emphasis in psychology, while Erikson's (1958, 1969) psycho-social profiles of Martin Luther and Mahatma Gandhi, respectively, are considered defining classics in the field (Elms, 1994; Runyan, 1982). More recent approaches to psychobiography have expanded both the theoretical anchors and methodological tools of the researcher (McAdams & Ochberg, 1988; Schultz, 2005). Examples of recent methodologically diverse psychobiographical studies include psychological profiles of George W. Bush (McAdams, 2011), Barack Obama (Sharma, 2011), Truman Capote (Schultz, 2011), and John Lennon (Kasser, 2013). Psychobiography represents an important approach to the study of individual persons, particularly those who can be perceived as "outliers" on the spectrum of personality development (Howe, 1997; Kovary, 2011). Thus in both the study of "genius" and "mental illness" psychobiography can inform educators, administrators, policy makers, and mental health practitioners who work with both youth prodigy and youth at risk (Howe, 2007). The psychobiographical subject of interest to the present authors is Robert (Bobby) James Fischer (1943-2008), the eleventh (and the U.S.'s first) World Chess Champion. Fischer represents a good example of the intersection of the gifted prodigy at risk of developing mental illness (Chun, 2002; Kasparov, 2003; Ponterotto, 2012). September, 2012 marked the 40 year anniversary of Bobby Fischer's World Chess Champion victory, and interest in his life appears unabated as reflected in new biographies (Brady, 2011; Ponterotto & Reynolds, 2013a), oral histories (Olafsson, 2012; Stankovic, 2010), psychobiographies (Ponterotto, 2012; Ponterotto & Reynolds, 2013b), documentary films (Garbus, 2011; Land, Proud, & Tarshis, 2004), Hollywood films (Chapa, 2009; Knight, Katz, McGuire, & Topping, 2010), and theatre productions (Ward, 2012). The present authors are both biographers and psychobiographers of Bobby Fischer, and in this article we demonstrate the value of Hiller's (2011) Multi-Layered Chronological Chart (MLCC) methodology in providing a fuller socio-cultural context to understand the conditions influencing Bobby Fischer's psychological development. This article begins with a brief snapshot of the life of Bobby Fischer for those readers unfamiliar with his historical significance in chess and Cold War history. …


Dibromochloropropane, DBCP, has had a seminal role in our current understanding of how to prevent chemical risks to health. Early toxicological studies showed its special impact on the testes, and detection of its mutagenic potency was soon followed by demonstration of its carcinogenicity to animals. Its commercial use as a useful nematocide ignored, at first, these warnings from the laboratory. When production workers, first in California and then in Israel, found they were sterile as a result of their exposure, this was convincing evidence that prevention had failed. The evidence, azospermia, oligospermia, and gonadotrophin response to testicular damage, were found first in production workers. In agricultural applicators in California who used the material, decreased sperm count and increased gonadotrophin levels were found. While production in California, Texas, and Israel was halted, studies continued and so, it seems, did use. Our first Israeli study was of workers on banana crops, and we found convincing evidence of increased spontaneous abortion in their family histories. Follow-up studies among production workers in Israel showed that some recovered testicular function, but among their offspring, otherwise in good health, there was a predominance of females. Those who did not recover from azospermia were those with high levels of follicle stimulating hormone. However data for production workers did not show increased spontaneous abortion. Nor have any studies so far shown increased birth defects or increased infant mortality. Unfavorable reproductive outcomes can be due to other agents, as shown by sprayers in Dutch orchards having hypofecundity (increased interpregnancy period) and sex ratio changes; but the agents responsible have not yet been identified. These experiences have lead to the general acceptance of some implications: (1) Paternal exposures can lead to a variety of unfavorable effects on reproductive outcome, including infertility, spontaneous abortion, and altered sex ratio. (2) Patterns of effects of potent agents in production workers and in applicators or users of chemicals may differ. (3) Although human carcinogenesis has not yet been confirmed, unfavorable reproductive outcomes are a reasonable early indicator of such risk. (4) Shifts in sex ratios of populations may be a subtle sign of more serious risks. (5) Continued use of an agent such as this under circumstances in which these UROs cannot be prevented is unconscionable.


An analysis is made of the screening of low-frequency magnetic fields by high-Tc superconductors. Screening can occur either through the cumulative effective of a composite of isolated diamagnetic particles, or by the induction of bulk transport currents if the particles are connected. In the former case it is possible to define a screening parameter s=t/ mu a where t is the screen thickness, mu the permeability and a the size of the system. There is only significant screening if the parameter is large. Even when screening is significant demagnetising effects put a rather low limit on the maximum field that can be screened so the conclusion is that screens made up of insulated superconducting particles are likely to be of very limited application.


On April 29, 1996, Dr. Quill offered testimony at an Oversight Hearing on "Assisted Suicide in the United States," before the Subcommittee on the Constitution of the House of Representatives Committee on the Judiciary. That testimony is reproduced here, with permission of the author.


PURPOSE
To determine the capacity of bone marrow-derived cells in the anterior segment of the eye to capture a fluorescence-labeled antigen (Ag) injected into the anterior chamber (AC).

METHODS
Uveal tract and corneoscleral tissues from Lewis rats were cultured in vitro, with or without FITC-dextran (4 microg/mL final concentration), for 48 hours and examined by confocal microscopy. To investigate antigen uptake in vivo 2 microL (20 microg) of Cascade Blue-labeled dextran (CB-Dx) was injected into the right AC of Lewis rats. The density of Ag-positive cells in the iris at 1, 3, 5, or 12 days after injection was examined by in vivo video fluorescence microscopy. The distribution and phenotype of Ag-positive cells in frozen and paraffin-embedded sections of ocular tissues and in iris wholemounts from animals killed at 24 hours and day 7 were analyzed by fluorescence and confocal microscopy.

RESULTS
In organ culture conditions numerous cells in the iris, ciliary body, choroid, and corneal limbus were capable of capturing fluorescence-labeled Ag. In vivo observations and microscopic examination of experimental eyes at days 1 and 7 after AC injection revealed Ag-positive cells within the iris, iridocorneal angle, the suprachoroidal space and around limbal-episcleral vessels. Ag-bearing cells in the iris express combinations of macrophage markers but rarely expressed major histocompatibility complex (MHC) class II molecules. A reduced number of Ag-bearing cells were still present in the iris at day 12.

CONCLUSIONS
Potential antigen-presenting cells (APCs) in the iris and ciliary body are capable of internalizing intracameral Ag. The characteristics of these cells in the iris are consistent with a predominantly macrophage phenotype. These observations also suggest that the Ag leaving the eye through both the conventional and nonconventional aqueous outflow pathways may be captured by potential APCs in the episcleral tissues.


GERRARD WINSTANLEY'S ICONOCLASM AS IMMANENT UTOPIA | In this article I analyse the utopian discourse of Gerrard Winstanley as an example of how utopia functions as a social fiction. Winstanley was part of the radical Digger movement in the English Revolution in the mid-17th century, and he has been regarded both as a religious mystic and as a precursor of later communist thinkers. His last published text, The Law of Freedom in a Platform (1652), presents an egalitarian utopian program based on democracy and collective ownership of land. It has been argued that this text represents a break from Winstanley's earlier religious and political writings because of its focus on the institutional framework of the proposed utopian model. I argue, however, that it is generally more productive to focus on the function of utopia and to see utopia as both a figurative and conceptual discourse which combines a deconstruction of ideological contradictions with a production of new sociopolitical representations. This approach allows us to analyse how Winstanley creates a utopian discourse based on a "materialistic" iconoclasm which produces a dynamic, immanent utopia. Rather than being a totalitarian vision, as some have argued, Winstanley's egalitarian and immanent utopia dismantles the distinction between state and society. Utopia should be seen as a discourse which, through its use of sociopolitical fictions, is able to bring out different sociopolitical dimensions and potentials of a specific historical conjuncture by articulating the non-realized futures of history.


Climatic changes have resulted in negative impacts across the globe. Few industries are immune to these impacts, the buildings energy sector being no exception. While the entire envelope contributes to the energy demands of a typical building, the attic space proves to be unique. These unique spaces experience complex heat and mass transfer phenomena due to its contents, structure, as well as construction materials and the associated properties. Significant heat loss or gain occurs at the interface of the attic floor and ceiling of an occupied space; therefore, it has become imperative to understand the energy characteristics of attic spaces. Even more so now since climatic changes are causing higher outside temperatures. This work examines the impacts of climate trends on the energy performance of attic spaces over the next thirty years. Considering six unique attic geometries, configured to architectural standards, analyses are performed against four climatic scenarios within six major United States cities. Investigating three thermal characteristics: attic air temperatures, peak roof deck temperatures, and thermal loads this work is able to explore the design robustness of each geometric configuration across several climate zones. While this work can be conducted and/or validated through experimental work and field tests, it was done using a novel numerical framework. Results from this work show that with a general increase among attic surface temperatures and surface fluxes which results in higher attic air temperatures, peak roof deck temperatures, and larger thermal loads, specifically cooling loads. Additionally, despite differences in attic geometries, similar light weight construction shows that the average peak times were similar for all structures located within the same geographical location.


This is the second of two closely related articles that together describe how results from research can be used as a guide for curriculum development. The first article shows how the investigation of student understanding of electric circuits by the Physics Education Group has contributed to the building of a research base. This second article describes how the group has drawn on this resource both in developing a curriculum for laboratory‐based instruction and in adapting this curriculum to fit the constraints of a traditional introductory course. Also discussed is how, in turn, development and implementation of the curriculum have enriched the research base.


The "Оne Вelt, Оne Road" policy has brоught ecоnоmic and trаde relаtiоns between Chinа аnd Kаzаkhstаn closer in the field of agricultural products, adding new opportunities for development, and the volume of tradе has bеcomе stаblе and grоwing. Bilateral trade between China and Kazakhstan has shown new positive dynamics, where a unified trade structure is also noted. There are great development prospеcts in the field of agricultural products of the two countries. In this regard, the author points to a mega-project called the Belt and Road Initiative, which focuses on the current situation and characteristics of Sino-Kazakh agricultural trade. The article indicates some problems in the bilateral cooperation of the two states. Among these problems, the most important are noted. For example, the author notes that the situation with a large number of trade barriers prevents more Chinese and Kazakh enterprises from entering the market. As a starting point based on an analysis of the obstacles facing the development of bilateral agricultural trade, countermeasures should be taken to further deepen bilateral cooperation in agricultural trade. A set of proposals to mitigate the problems of economic cooperation between Kazakhstan and China are offered in the conclusion of the article. Key words: trade and economic cooperation, agrarian complex, dynamics of agricultural production growth, trade volume, trade turnover, trade barriers, RK, PRC.


The use of the neutral wedge for the determination of the relative intensities of spectrum lines has been investigated by J. W. Nicholson and the writer,* and similar methods have been used by a number of other investigators. The wedge consists of a neutral glass wedge cemented to a similar wedge of clear glass so as to form a parallel plate, which is mounted immediately in front of the slit of the spectrograph, or a Goldberg wedge, which is made of gelatine containing carbon in a fine state of division, may be used. With this arrangement a photograph of a spectrum shows lines which are black at one end, corresponding to the thin edge of the wedge, and which fade away with increasing density of the wedge. The photographic intensities are determined from the lengths of the lines. The density of the wedge at any point is defined as log10 (IO/I), where IO and I, respectively, are the intensities of the light incident on the wedge at that point and of the light after passing through the wedge. We require to know the density gradient of the wedge as a function of the wave-length. If the density gradient Dλ be the change in density per millimetre on the wedge at wave-length λ, and h1 and h2 the lengths of the lines on two photographs (taken, for example, under different conditions of excitation), the intensities will be proportional to log10 -1 (h1)Dλ/ m ) and log10-1(h2Dλ m ) where m is the magnification of the slit on the photographic plate. Methods of determining the density gradient of the wedge as a function of the wave-length have been described in previous communications ( loc. cit .). The relative intensities of lines of different wave-length can be measured by comparison with a source of light giving a continuous spectrum, in which the distribution of intensity is known. For this purpose a black body at a known temperature would be ideal, but its use is attended with considerable experimental difficulties, and in the investigation referred to ( loc . cit .) the positive crater of the carbon arc was used as a standard source and was assumed to give the distribution of intensity appropriate to a black body at a temperature of 3760 K. Let us suppose that two photographs are taken through the wedge, one of a discontinuous spectrum under investigation and one of the continuous spectrum of the carbon arc. Considering now two lines in the discontinuous spectrum 'λ1 and λ2, a measurement is made of the lengths h1 h.2 of these two lines on the plate, and also the heights h3 h4 of the blackened image given by the continuous spectrum at these wave-lengths. Let the relative intensities in the continuous spectrum at λ1 and λ2 (calculated from Planck's law on the above assumptions) be c1 and c2. It has been shown ( loc . cit .) that the relative intensities affecting the plate in the case of the continuous spectrum at λ1 and λ2 will be c1 (λ1 — λ)2 and c2 (λ2 — λ)2, -where λ is the constant in the Hartmann formula λ = λ C /(n + no), which relates the wave-lengths and the measured positions of the lines on the photographic plate. Defining the photographic intensity pλ as log10-1 (hλ)Dλ/m), the true relative intensities of the two lines are proportional to c1p1(λ1 — λ)2/ p1 are and c2p 2 (λ2 — λ)2/ p2 are. This method is independent of the relation between the density of the image on a photographic plate and the various conditions which affect it, and involves only a measurement of the lengths of the lines* which can, by suitable photographic technique, be made with considerable accuracy on the original photographic plate without recourse to processes of successive copying to increase the contrast. This technique, however, involves very considerable exposures, which may, indeed, in the case of faint lines become prohibitively long, and the measurement of the lengths of the lines is necessarily a somewhat laborious process, and is particularly troublesome in the case of spectra which are so complex that the identification of lines cannot be carried out by inspection, but must depend on micrometric measurement. It is believed that the method described in the present communication is a considerable improvement on the procedure described above, and is particularly suitable in the investigation of faint and complex spectra. In recent years a number of instruments have been designed for the determination of the densities of images on photographic plates,f and these instruments, with which a very high degree of precision is attained, have been applied to the determination of the relative intensities of spectrum lines. It is not proposed to discuss these methods in the present communication, but it must be stated that the procedure of deducing the intensities of the lines from the densities on the photographic plate is complicated and indeed precarious, since two sources of light of the same wave-length can only beconsidered to be of the same intensity when they produce the same density on the same photographic plate with the same time of exposure. The difficulties involved have been discussed by Toy,* who emphasises the desirability of using the blackening of the photographic plate as a null method only. The method here described does not attain to the accuracy of these instruments in so far as density measurements are concerned, but it enables the relative intensity of a line to be determined directly in terms of a standard continuous source of radiation. The spectrum under investigation is photographed without the interposition of the wedge or any other device, the exposure being thereby shortened, the only restriction being that a specified slit-width must be used. This slit-width is slightly greater than would be used under ordinary circumstances, but not so great as to diminish the purity of the spectrum to any serious extent. The standard continuous spectrum, e. g ., that of the positive crater of a carbon arc or of a standardised incandescent lamp, is photographed on an adjacent portion of the same plate, and for the same exposure time through a wedge system, the width of slit being set at such a value that with this exposure an image of appropriate density is obtained. In place of the wedge used in previous investigations the following arrangement has been adopted. A plate of very thin glass was coated with a black medium and ruled on a dividing engine with lines 0·2 mm. apart and 0·03 mm. wide. It is essential that the medium should be completely opaque, and the ruled lines completely transparent and of uniform width. A good deal of experiment was required to attain this result, and deposits of carbon, metallic deposits of silver and platinum, and a large number of varnishes were tried. Rulings through metallic films were either too transparent or else invariably showed a serrated edge when examined under a high power. A varnish known as " Cellire (Black),"f which is a quick-drying cellulose varnish, was the only medium which gave satisfactory results. This medium is poured on to the plate, and the excess is quickly shaken off, the plate being then set aside in an inclined position to dry. The time of drying depends, of course, on the temperature, but at a certain stage the surface can be ruled through with a hard steel tool so as to give perfectly clear and uniform lines, which show no trace of irregularity.


The major challenge when integrating information s ystems in any domain such as e-Government is the challenge of Int eroperability. One can distinguish between three aspects of Interoperabili ty; technical, semantic, and organizational. The technical aspect has been widel y tackled especially after the ubiquity of internet technologies. The semantic and organizational aspects deal with sharing the same understanding (semantics) of exchanged information among all applications and services, in addition to modeling and re-engineering governmental processes to facilitate process cooper ation that provision seamless e-government services. In this paper, we present th e case of the Palestinian Interoperability Framework 'Zinnar', which is a use case of using ontology in egovernment (i.e., data and process governance) to t ackle the issues of semantic and organizational interoperability. The followed m ethodology resulted in a success story within a very short time and has prod uce a framework that is intuitive, elegant, and easy to understand and impl e ent.


Over the past decade there has been a concerted attempt among a growing group of authors to bring together the political science subfields of urban politics and American political development (APD). In this paper, I look at specifically how the comparative study of different cities and urban areas might contribute to this intellectual project, beginning with a brief illustrative comparison of Philadelphia and Montreal. I then place that comparison in the larger context of recent literature in postcolonialism, assemblage, and planetary urbanization, which I use to establish what I call an aggregation strategy for constructing variables—or, alternately, for denying the very existence of variables. I then suggest how my aggregation strategy could improve upon urban regime analysis, and inform new directions in studies at the intersection of urban politics and APD.


Abstract Service learning is spreading rapidly across the nation. The class I teach. Sociology 4430—"The Community" at my non-traditional southeastern university, regularly partners with the Central Alabama Fair Housing Center (CAFHC) to provide student service learning experiences. In a Fall 2010 class, after training by the executive director that included an introduction to fair housing laws, protected groups and discrimination cases, the class created a questionnaire, interviewed a convenience sample of residents, analyzed the data and provided reports to CAFHC Students learned about respondents' personal experiences involving discrimination against protected groups (race, ethnicity, religion, sex, disability, and familial), steering, housing segregation, and difficulties in attaining home loans and insurance. Although not randomly selected, the sample still provided a snapshot of the respondents' knowledge, perceptions, and experiences. The data analyses and student papers were provided to CAFHC for use in reports and proposals. Data suggested that housing segregation and discrimination continue to exist in this small section of the southern U.S. Responses to open-ended questions regarding racial steering and discrimination further provided evidence that perceptions and the reality of discrimination continue to exist. Service learning provided the perfect forum for students to explore the community and learn firsthand about residents' housing knowledge, continued segregation, discrimination, and other housing related issues.


The zebrafish is a social vertebrate and an excellent translational model for a variety of human disorders. Abnormal social behavior is a hallmark of several human brain disorders. Social behavioral problems can arise as a result of adverse early social environment. Little is known about the effects of early social isolation in adult zebrafish. We compared zebrafish that were isolated for either short (7 days) or long duration (180 days) to socially housed zebrafish, testing their behavior across ontogenesis (ages 10, 30, 60, 90, 120, 180 days), and shoal cohesion and whole-brain monoamines and their metabolites in adulthood. Long social isolation increased locomotion and decreased shoal cohesion and anxiety in the open-field in adult. Additionally, both short and long social isolation reduced dopamine metabolite levels in response to social stimuli. Thus, early social isolation has lasting effects in zebrafish, and may be employed to generate zebrafish models of human neuropsychiatric conditions.


Abstract Multiple studies have elucidated the antioxidant properties of Se, which are now well known among the nutrition and biomedical science communities. Recently, considerable interest has been focused on the possible association between Se exposure and risk of metabolic disease, such as lipid dysregulation; however, there is limited epidemiological data on this topic. The present study aimed to investigate associations between toenail Se levels and dyslipidaemia or individual lipid levels, and to examine the effect of dietary supplement use on these associations. We analysed baseline data from a cohort in the Yeungnam area, including 232 men and 269 women. Information on demographic, dietary and lifestyle characteristics was obtained through a self-reported questionnaire. Se levels in toenail specimens were measured using neutron activation analysis. Fasting blood lipid levels were measured during medical examinations. After adjusting for multiple confounding variables, we observed no association between toenail Se levels and dyslipidaemia or individual lipid profiles. However, the association was modified by dietary supplement use. Among the supplement users, higher toenail Se levels were associated with a higher prevalence of lipid dysregulation, whereas non-users exhibited a lower prevalence of lipid dysregulation. Associations between toenail Se levels, lipid levels and dyslipidaemia may be influenced by taking dietary supplements. Future large-scale, prospective cohort studies should be conducted to further evaluate the association between Se levels in the body and metabolic health effects in light of increasing rates of dietary supplement use.


Proceedings: AACR 103rd Annual Meeting 2012‐‐ Mar 31‐Apr 4, 2012; Chicago, IL

Some of the most promising signaling pathways for breast cancer treatment include the PKC family, involved in proliferation and apoptosis, and the retinoid system mainly involved in differentiation. In this work we have developed a murine model of mammary adenocarcinoma-derived cells (LM3) that overexpress α or ≤ PKC isoforms in order to analyze whether elevated levels of these kinases alter cell sensitivity to retinoid treatment (ATRA). LM3 cells are poorly responsive to ATRA. The overexpression of PKCα induced alterations in LM3 in vitro behavior that could be associated with tumor progression. In this sense, PKCα increased proliferation and motility (wound coverage: 69.3±8.3% vs 41.2±5.1% in control cells p<0.05) of the transfected LM3 cells. Interestingly, at the same time PKCα sensitized LM3 cells to ATRA treatment as evidenced by a significant reduction in both parameters. Upon othotopic inoculation into syngeneic mice LM3-PKCα cells formed tumors with higher growth rate and metastatic potential than LM3-vector cells. In vivo treatment with an ATRA pellet reduced both the local tumor growth and the number of spontaneous lung metastases (Md [Range]: 9 [0-27] vs 55 [20-75] for LM3-PKCα treated or not respectively p<0.05). On the contrary PKC ≤ overexpression did not affect LM3 cells behavior either in vitro or in vivo. LM3 cells response to ATRA was not modulated by PKC∈ either. However, through a RARE-luciferase gene reporter assay, we could determine that the overexpression of PKC∈ increased the activity of the retinoic acid receptors. Our results show that PKCα overexpression induced a more aggressive phenotype but also conferred ATRA sensitivity to mammary tumor cells. On the other side high PKC∈ levels increased the activity of retinoid receptors but did not modulate biological cell responses to retinoids. We believe that the use of retinoids may be beneficial in patients with aggressive breast tumors associated with high PKCα expression levels.

Citation Format: {Authors}. {Abstract title} [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 103rd Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2012 Mar 31-Apr 4; Chicago, IL. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2012;72(8 Suppl):Abstract nr 172. doi:1538-7445.AM2012-172


This study aimed to investigate the relationship between the corticospinal tract (CST) and limb length discrepancy (LLD) in patients with hemiplegic cerebral palsy (CP). Using diffusion tensor tractography, a retrospective study on 92 pediatric patients with hemiplegic CP who visited our hospital from May 2017 to the end of 2020 was conducted. Limb length was measured by anthropometry to calculate LLD. The functional level of hemiplegia scale (FxL), modified Ashworth scale, and manual muscle test (MMT) were evaluated for clinical function. Patients were classified into two groups according to the presence or absence of disruption of the affected CST: disruption (A) and preservation (B) groups. Fractional anisotropy (FA) and mean diffusivity (MD) of the affected CSTs were measured and correlated with LLD. The results of the independent t-test and chi-square test did not show significant differences between the two groups, except in the FxL and finger extensor of MMT (p < 0.05). For the LLD, there were no significant differences in total upper, total lower, and foot limb lengths. A significant difference was observed only in hand LLD (p < 0.05) from ANCOVA. Hand LLD was significantly correlated with FA (r = −0.578), MD (r = 0.512), and degree of CST disruption (r = −0.946) from the Pearson correlation test. The results of this study suggested that patients with hemiplegic CP would likely have LLD especially in the hand, and that CST evaluation using diffusion tensor tractography might be helpful in assessing and predicting LLD in hemiplegic CP.


International examinations are increasingly being used by local élites to reproduce their advantage in the face of growing educational competition and the changing economic order associated with globalisation and 'post-Fordism'. Evidence from opportunity samples of students taking these examinations in five countries suggests how this may be working in practice. The evidence indicates that the patterns of use are various and are influenced both by local educational cultures and by broader considerations of location in relation to global economic 'cores'. International credentials bring a qualitatively new dimension to the issue of credentialism and credential inflation as they exclude the majority from participation in the new competition for access to the most advantageous occupational opportunities.


Explaining Samnite success: settlement organization and demography in an 'anti-classical' Mediterranean society Tesse D. Stek (Leiden) Urbanism has been seen as central to the success of many states and empires around the globe, and particularly so for the Greco-Roman world. But there are exceptions to 'the urban rule'. Such exceptions are important, because they question the automatic connection between societal success and urbanism. A non-urban society par excellence is the Italic tribe of the Samnites in South-Italy. Although not based in towns or organised in city-states, the Samnites were remarkably successful in demographic and military terms in the 4th-3rd centuries BC, when they managed to resist and defeat Roman armies time and again. The staggering Samnite success is something of a conundrum in ancient studies. One recent solution to the problem has been sought in downplaying the Samnite role in history by questioning the literary sources, to the point that the Samnites are now sometimes regarded as a scarcely organized series of separate and miscellaneous rural communities. In this paper, an alternative solution is explored. Using primarily archaeological data, Samnite societal organization and, importantly, demography is reviewed on the basis of both old and new archaeological data, and set against our evidence for early Roman societal organization and expansionist strategies. How does it feel to be on your own, with no direction but Rome? Making sense of the surface record of proto-urban, urban and/or sub-urban Crustumerium. Jorn Seubers (Groningen) Urbanization and city-state formation are theoretically well defined mechanisms, which were in motion all over Iron Age Italy. However, there are relatively few complete archaeological studies that have captured the details of the process in action. The main reason for this is that the archaeological settlement record of proto-historical phases is notoriously difficult to read. Nonetheless, Italian archaeologists have found ways to work around the patchy nature of the evidence and to steer past the biases of the data by defining a number of interpretative rules. The critical review of the raw archaeological data of Crustumerium questions the theoretical basis of this paradigm and reveals that, in this case, a much broader range of possible interpretations is in fact viable. The case study presented in this paper will show how prevailing theories and actual data can misalign as archaeological knowledge increases and new methods are being developed. As such it stresses the importance of restudying existing data sets from the bottom up, instead of perpetuating the interpretation of older studies that simply had less information to work with. Complex societies and Urbanization: The Mesopotamian Case Olivier Nieuwenhuijse (Leiden) Early state formation is perhaps THE most fundamental research theme guiding archaeological research in the ancient Middle East, rivalled only by the other Big Theme of Neolithic domestication and sedentarization. Its importance, obviously, is due to its relevance for understanding our modern world but also to the circumstance that complex societies arose very early in the Middle East and without external influences. Socio-economically differentiated, literate, urbanized societies were firmly in place by the later fourth millennium BC in the Uruk period. Interpretive perspectives have focused heavily on the southern Mesopotamian plains and the city of Uruk itself. Urbanization and centralization are aspects easily identified in the Uruk phenomenon; interpretations have involved central place theory and various core-periphery perspectives. However, moving away from the Uruk heartland these traditional theoretical models fit much less easily. On the Upper Mesopotamian plains and, especially, the Taurus and Zagros foothills different societal forms existed. Combining institutionalized centralizing institutions and state-organized religious ideologies but lacking the huge population centres typical for southern Mesopotamia, these 'Late Chalcolithic' societies invite interpretative directions ranging from neo-evolutionist to heterarchical approaches. I will review the debate and discuss problems and prospects for future work. Urbanization processes in the Iberian peninsula during the Iron Age Jesús García-Sánchez (Leiden) The process to complexity in the Iberian Peninsula is a heterogeneous mixture of influences and local developments. The Argar culture in the Bronze Age of South East coast seems to be one of the earliest examples of complex societies in Spain and Tartesos societal organization with temples playing the role of central places (Cancho Roano). Orientalizing settlement here was clearly influenced by the contacts with Levant. Other areas developed their "paths to complexity" much later, in the Early Iron Age. The most interesting cases are the Iberians whose earliest contacts to the Mediterranean world flourished with the arrival of Greek traders and colonist. On the North and Southern plateaus, a large process of settlement concentration in hill forts takes place in the Second Iron Age. Is it assumed that all the population was concentrated in those large hill forts with a very scarce or inexistent network of secondary settlements. That situation contradicts the requirements for considering a hill fort/ oppida a central place according to Woolf 1993. This paper offers a comprehensive look at the phenomenon in the Iberian Peninsula and in particular explores the model of social organization in large hill forts presented by Sacristán de Lama 1989. It reflects about the process of concentration, its development through the Second Iron Age and its final phase, caused by the Roman imposed decision of abandoning the fortified settlements and organizing new settlements in low lands. Sacristán de Lama, J.D. 1989. Vacíos vacceos Arqueología Espacial 13: 77–88. Woolf, G. 1993. Rethinking the Oppida Oxford Journal of Archaeology 12: 223–34. Shadows show the past – studying Amerindian settlement configuration in northern Hispaniola Till Sonnemann (Leiden) Typical for pre-colonial settlements in the Caribbean, most structural features have long disappeared; what remains are small mounds mostly made of midden, ceramic and lithic assemblages, and slight topographic modifications like platforms that were created for the now decayed wooden buildings. On their own, multispectral, SAR and topographic data sets are of limited use to detect archaeological evidence. Local scale UAS surveys have mapped several sites in high resolution, the outcome provides an overview of size and distribution of mounds and platforms. After digital clearing of vegetation and extraction of the topography and orthophoto to GIS, filtering and enhancing the results provides the opportunity to analyse the site further, calculating the actual extent of living space and defining more likely zones of habitats. For a regional perspective, multispectral data (Worldview-, LandSAT), may provide information on archaeological potential through environmental analysis (e.g. NDVI, EVI). UAVSAR L-band data has shown different reflection parameters from vegetation-free archaeological sites, to their surroundings, using e.g. Pauli Decomposition. The reflection from shell midden therefore provides a structural difference to the neighbouring fields. As high resolution topography can indicate pre-colonial settlement, however, regionally available topographic data is SRTM. All this information can however be combined, and cross-correlated, using various data sets in a semi-automatic direct detection approach, analyzing the probability of archaeological evidence on pixel base, developed at CSRM and Johns Hopkins University, a process that requires supercomputing. A statistical analysis can better define the areas for archaeological study and heritage management. Contextualizing complexity in the Samnite world Marleen Termeer (Leiden) Samnite society is an interesting case study for forms of social complexity beyond urbanization. The prominent role of the Samnites as one of the main adversaries of Rome in accounts of early Roman expansion in Italy implies that they must have been centrally organized somehow, at least in terms of military organization. At the same time, the Samnite world is traditionally famous for its lack of cities: most people lived in villages, and sanctuaries and hill forts are thought to have performed various centralizing and military functions. Indeed, other than the Samnites' military successes against Rome, there are more indications in the archaeological record for the development of social complexity. In this paper, I would like to single out two specific social contexts in which this happens. The first is the inhabited hill fort. At least some hill forts in the Samnite world seem to have been permanently settled, but the character of social organization in these places is still poorly understood. Based on published material and new data gathered during a field campaign last summer, I will discuss elements of social complexity in this context. Second, I will focus on the military context which led to the production of coinage by some Samnite communities. What do these coinages, which can only be explained as a response to developments external to local communities, tell us about the (social) organization of the Samnite world?


With the development of satellite technology, it is feasible to take some photos of the satellites in flight from the space angle. Edge detection is the base of many image processing technologies such as region-of-interest (ROI) compression. Because of the particularity like noisy and complicated background, detecting the edge of space images is different to detect the edge of normal photo. In this paper, several filters and edge detecting operators are applied combinedly in the experimentations to validate the performances. After the study and experiments, the assembly with median filter and Canny operator is introduced to detect the edge of space image because it is more mature, more steady, less computational quantity and easier to be implemented in hardware. Keywords-space image; edge detection; image filter; Canny operator


We demonstrate a thermo optic wavelength tunable filter (TOWTF) with a tuning range of > 25 nm that covers the gain-shifted EDFA band (L band, 1570-1610 nm), where our polymer has a low transmission loss. We achieved this by employing more heater power than previously reported. We fabricated the arrayed waveguide grating (AWG) demultiplexer on a silicon substrate using silicone resin as the waveguide material.


The incorporation of dynamic covalent bonds has been an attractive strategy to synthesize adaptive solid polymer electrolytes (SPEs). Here, we present molecular dynamics results concerning the relationship between ion transport and segmental dynamics for dynamic covalent cross-linked PEO-Li+ SPEs. To dissolve LiPF6 into PEO, a 1/r4-form approximation of ion-dipole interactions is employed as the solvation potential. Its parameters are estimated with the assistance of the Bayesian optimization algorithm and validated by comparing the resulting behaviors of PEO/LiPF6 with experimental observations. The dynamic associations of EO with Li+ and PF6- significantly reduce the segmental mobility of PEO, verifying the coupling of PEO segmental dynamics with ion transport. In order to reproduce the unique behaviors of associative covalent adaptive networks (CANs), the bond-exchange reaction is controlled by the collision probability and the user-defined activation energy (Ea ≥ 0) based on a hybrid of molecular dynamics and Monte Carlo methods. The dynamics of network topology, facilitated by the reshuffling of dynamic covalent bonds, is analyzed using graph theory. The network mesh size varies with time, which can be considered as one of the characteristics for associative CANs. The reshuffling of dynamic bonds releases the constraint from cross-linked structures, and enhances the long-range segmental mobility as well as the mobilities of Li+ and PF6-. By drawing comparisons with its conventionally cross-linked counterpart, the effect of dynamic-bond reshuffling on ion transport is studied for the dynamic covalent cross-linked PEO16-LiPF6 electrolyte in terms of self-diffusivities, cation transference number, and ionic conductivity.


Fairy tales play a vital role in fostering early childhood development. Learning to create fairy tales, especially fairy tales that can promote morality and ethics for early childhood children, will result in appropriate and sustainable social development for children. As well as resulting in pre-service teachers learning meaningfully and valuablely. Able to innovate on their own individual potential with a backward design learning model that encourages pre-service teachers and educators to know and understand common goals. This study aims to investigate the effectiveness of using a backward design learning approach to teach moral-ethical storytelling to pre-service teachers in early childhood education. Specifically, it seeks to compare the story-building skills of such pre-service teachers before and after the application of the aforementioned approach. The study sample comprises 36 second-year early childhood education students from the 2021 academic year. The literature and tales used in the study were selected via cluster random sampling. The research instruments employed included backward design learning plans and a morality-ethical storytelling test, with data analyzed through average and standard deviation statistics. The findings indicate that the backward design learning approach can develop the creation of moral and ethical tales for pre-service teacher s and the students had higher ethical storytelling skills after the backward design learning management than before the experiment in all aspects. Develop learning skills that can be applied in real life And see the results that can be used in the future, along with cultivating early childhood children to grow up to be good citizens of society with quality.


Cement industry is the second most important primary and basic industry for the economic development of India, second only after iron and steel industry the cement industry is basic industry and makes an important contribution to the development of the other factory industry, to the construction and even to the development of agriculture. Cement is required by every industry cement is an important part of industrial infrastructure. The present study is undertaken for the period of 5 years from 2014 to 2018 and the necessary data has been taken from the published annual reports of the company. Measuring the financial soundness of a company has become a significant due to the emerging globalization. Hence the current study is undertaken to evaluate the profitability, liquidity and operational position of The Ramco Cements Limited.


Epithelial-myoepithelial carcinoma (EMC) is a biphasic tumor and classified as a low-grade tumor of the salivary glands. EMC commonly occurs in the parotids with a reported incidence of around 1% out of all neoplasms of the salivary glands and it is a rare tumor of the minor salivary glands in the oral cavity, especially on the lower alveolus. A 48-year-old male patient presented with a rapidly progressive ulcer-infiltrative growth on the lower alveolus with involvement of the overlying cheek skin in a short span of period. We describe here a case of locally advanced EMC of the lower alveolus, its diagnosis by histopathological examination and immunohistochemical staining, and management by surgery and local external beam radiotherapy (EBRT). In our limited experience in the treatment of EMC on the lower alveolus, wide local excision of the tumor, followed by EBRT had resulted in a good therapeutic outcome at the 3 years posttreatment follow-up. In conclusion, EMC of the lower alveolar mucosa is extremely rare, and patients should also be advised close follow-up for the detection of loco-regional recurrences after treatment.


Background: The fourth survey of the surveillance system named "childhood and adolescence surveillance and prevention of adult non-communicable disease" (CASPIAN-IV study), was conducted among a national representative sample of Iranian students. This paper describes the methods and early findings of this survey. Methods: This nationwide school-based study was conducted in 2011-2012 in 30 provinces of Iran among 13,486 students, 6-18 years (6640 girls, 75.6% from urban areas) and one of their parents. Results: Mean age of students was 12.5 years. Based on the World Health Organization growth curves, 12.2% were underweight, 9.7% overweight and 11.9% were obese. Abdominal obesity was observed in 19.1% of students. The dominant type of cooking oil in urban families was liquid oil and hydrogenated fat (39% and 32%), most rural families used hydrogenated fat (53%), respectively. A total of 18% of students had at least 30 min of daily physical activity; 41% of students used computer in weekdays and 44% used it in weekends. Almost 34.5% of students reported to have at least one cigarette smoker and 21.5% reported to have a waterpipe smoker in their relatives. Moreover, 20.3% of students reported that they had suffered an injury needing the help of school health providers during the year prior to the study. Conclusions: Current evidence on the health risky behaviors among Iranian children and adolescents confirms the importance of conducting comprehensive surveillance surveys to identify health risk behaviors. Data of this survey and the trend of variables provide necessary information for health policy makers to implement action-oriented interventions.


We investigate the instabilities of a flat elastic ribbon subject to twist under tension and develop an integrated phase diagram of the observed shapes and transitions. We find that the primary buckling mode switches from being localized longitudinally along the length of the ribbon to transverse above a triple point characterized by a crossover tension that scales with ribbon elasticity and aspect ratio. Far from threshold, the longitudinally buckled ribbon evolves continuously into a self-creased helicoid with focusing of the curvature along the triangular edges. Further twist causes an anomalous transition to loops compared with rods due to the self-rigidity induced by the creases. When the ribbon is twisted under high tension, transverse wrinkles are observed due to the development of compressive stresses with higher harmonics for greater width-to-length ratios. Our results can be used to develop functional structures using a wide range of elastic materials and length scales.


BACKGROUND
Multifunctional Y-box Binding Protein-1 (YB1) is correlated with a poor outcome in breast cancer. We found YB1 expression to be regulated by antiestrogens commonly used in the hormonal therapy of breast cancer and known as activators of Transforming Growth Factor-β (TGFβ). Thus, a putative influence of YB1 on TGFβ signaling should be investigated.

MATERIALS AND METHODS
The effect of YB1 on TGFβ signaling was monitored by expression analysis and reporter gene assays in breast cancer cells overexpressing YB1 and treated with antiestrogens.

RESULTS
Antiestrogen-mediated inhibition of estrogen receptor-α led to a suppression of YB1 protein synthesis. On the other hand, YB1 was found to be an enhancer of TGFβ signaling.

CONCLUSION
High levels of YB1 expression lead to a stimulation of TGFβ pathways, thereby counteracting antihormonal breast cancer therapy and representing a putative resistance mechanism.


Stereotactic body radiotherapy (SBRT) is an advanced form of radiotherapy (RT) with a growing interest on its application in the treatment of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). It can deliver ablative radiation doses to tumors in a few fractions without excessive doses to normal tissues, with the help of advanced modern RT and imaging technologies. Currently, SBRT is recommended as an alternative to curative treatments, such as surgery and radiofrequency ablation. This review discusses the current status of SBRT to aid in the decision making on how it is incorporated into the HCC management.


Discussion and Summary
Comparison of experimentally induced lymphogranuloma inguinale in animals with the disease in the human leads us to assume properly, we believe, that generalized infections in man are possible, such infections probably depending principally upon the route of entry of the virus. However, since clinical experience shows the mucous membrane of the genitalia to be the most frequent portal of infection in the human, it is justifiable to theorize, as is actually the case, that the localized type of infection should be more frequently observed in man than the generalized type.
The severe constitutional symptoms so frequently encountered, even though evanescent, certainly suggest widespread invasion. Such symptoms often overshadow the local manifestations of the disease and are of the same character as those seen in generalized invasions by infectious agents.
Extragenital lesions, widespread in distribution and protean in character, undoubtedly occur during the course of lymphogranuloma inguinale infections and are possibly due to the action of the virus. Unfortunately definite proof of this is lacking. Such occurrences have led many authors to postulate the existence of various types of lymphogranuloma inguinale viruses or to designate the virus as "lymphotropic," "dermotropic," etc. We are most emphatic in disagreeing with such views. A virus which may be responsible for the production of adenitis, dermatitis, pelvic peritonitis, arthritis, stomatitis, meningoencephalitis, etc., can hardly be spoken of as having "certain affinities." We believe that dissemination, when and if such occurs, and localization of the virus is dependent essentially upon the same well-known factors responsible for such with any infectious agent—the portal of entry, the invasive character of the agent, the host resistance. Variations in these account for the varying clinical pictures encountered. We do agree, however, with Remlinger and Bailley that there can exist differences in the "agressiveness" of viruses. These views naturally place us in disagreement with Coutts who postulates the existence of two viruses, A and B, responsible for localized and generalized manifestations of lymphogranuloma inguinale respectively. While some of the cases in our series showed the classical symptoms described by this Chilean investigator as ascribable to the A virus and some of those ascribable to the B virus, we encountered many cases showing features of both groups, such as primary lesions with bilateral adenitis and severe constitutional symptoms, or unilateral suppurating buboes without demonstrable primary lesions and no constitutional symptoms. The viruses recovered from cases presenting these various syndromes produced no histological differences when injected into experimental animals. Investigation of the antigenic properties, as regards the diagnostic cutaneous test, of virus material secured from such different types of cases showed some differences in degree of reactivity in infected patients. This observation, however, certainly does not allow us logically to postulate biological differences in the infectious agent.
As a result of our studies of the experimental production, symptomatology and pathology of lymphogranuloma inguinale we believe it logical to conclude that there are many indications pointing to frequent general dissemination of the virus during the early stages of the infection. In most instances, however, the virus is soon destroyed or neutralized and only the local lesions develop. Certainly the possibility of a severe generalized infection should always suggest itself when considering this disease.


During the past 1,500 yr Mount St. Helens, Washington, has repeatedly erupted dacite domes, tephra, and pyroclastic flows as well as andesite lava flows and tephra. Two periods of activity prior to 1980, each many decades long, were both initiated by eruptions of volatile-rich dacite which were followed by andesite, then by dacite. A third eruptive period was characterized by the eruption of volatile-poor dacite that formed a dome and minor pyroclastic flows. The prolonged duration of some previous eruptive periods suggests that the current activity could continue for many years. The volatile-rich dacite that has been erupted to date probably will be followed by gas-poor magma, but it cannot yet be predicted whether a more mafic magma will be extruded during the current eruptive period.


Multipath (MP) interference in urban canyons is one of the major sources of the positioning error. Among different methods for MP mitigation, vectorised receiver (VR) is a promising one in which channels can share their information, and as a result the stronger channels can aid the weaker or affected ones to be tracked more accurately. This study proposes a weighted VR (WVR) with the strategy of giving more weights to the observations with lower vulnerability to MP. To increase the number of immune satellites to MP, global positioning system, and global navigation satellite system integration in WVR has been discussed. The performance is also compared with conventional VR. The experimental results show that the proposed method both in a static mode under an exaggerated MP condition and in a drive through an urban canyon could find the position, respectively, with about 10 and 13% improvements.


In order to develop a vaccine against cryptosporidiosis in cattle, we constructed a recombinant bovine herpesvirus-1 (BHV-1) expressing an immunodominant surface protein, p23, of Cryptosporidium parvum sporozoites. In the recombinant virus, the p23 gene under the control of a CAG promoter and a gene coding for an enhanced green fluorescent protein were integrated into the gG gene of BHV-1. Despite a low frequency of homologous recombination, cloning of the recombinants was easy because of the specific fluorescence of the plaques formed by recombinants. These plaques were among the plaques of the nonfluorescent parental virus. All clones selected for fluorescence also contained the p23 gene. In MDBK cells infected with the recombinant BHV-1, the antibody against the p23 protein recognized the p23 protein as an approximately 23-kDa specific band in Western blotting analysis. Rabbits immunized with the recombinant produced IgG against the p23 protein. It was also demonstrated that the sera of immunized rabbits reduced infection of C. parvum sporozoites in HCT-8 cells. The serum of an immunized rabbit reduced infection compared with the normal rabbit serum control. These results indicate that the recombinant BHV-1 induces neutralizing antibodies in rabbits.


The Petascale Cray XT5 system at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) Leadership Computing Facility (LCF) shares a number of system and software features with its predecessor, the Cray XT4 system including the quad-core AMD processor and a multi-core aware MPI library. We analyze performance of scalable scientific applications on the quad-core Cray XT4 system as part of the early system access using a combination of micro-benchmarks and Petascale ready applications. Particularly, we evaluate impact of key changes that occurred during the dual-core to quad-core processor upgrade on applications behavior and provide projections for the next-generation massively-parallel platforms with multi-core processors, specifically for proposed Petascale Cray XT5 system. We compare and contrast the quad-core XT4 system features with the upcoming XT5 system and discuss strategies for improving scaling and performance for our target applications.


EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: There is currently a limited understanding of how visitors travel within and through a destination. Understanding what influences visitor travel patterns is an important aspect of tourism and recreation. Spacetime visitor travel patterns have been examined in a number of tourism studies; however, limited studies have focused on nature-based or trail system settings. Global Positioning System (GPS) tracking has been identified as an effective means of measuring visitor travel patterns. However, most GPS studies within these natural settings have focused on the utility of the method, not exploring the contribution that GPS can make to understanding what influences visitor travel patterns, practically and theoretically. Additionally, the examination of GPS data has rarely extended beyond visual analysis such as point densities and overlays. To better understand what influences visitor travel patterns, more in-depth analysis of these spatial data is needed, including identifying techniques for cleaning GPS data for more detailed level of analyses, operationalizing travel patterns (i.e. defining and measuring travel patterns), and examining variables that might influence travel patterns. The study first examined statistical differences between cleaned and uncleaned GPS data, finding that significant differences were present. Specifically, uncleaned data were found to report a significantly longer total distance traveled. Visitor reported total distance travel was also more similar to cleaned data. Travel patterns were then examined and tested using four different spatio-temporal operations: total distance traveled, number of zones (areas) encountered, distance from starting points, and time spent. The four different measures were found to measure conceptually and statistically different travel pattern aspects. Results generally suggest a more-toless order of mountain bikers, horseback riders, runners, then hikers with respect to total distance traveled, number of zones encountered, and distance from start. Knowledge of destination, visitor personal characteristics, and motivations were also examined for their influence on travel patterns. While each of these variables was found to predict travel patterns, generally each predictor was dependent on activity type with runners and mountain bikers providing the major contributions of these effects. In other words, these variables were good predictors of the spatio-temporal behavior of runners and mountain bikers, but less effective for horseback riders and hikers. The exception was knowledge of destination; higher knowledge results in greater use distribution regardless of activity type. These findings can assist trail managers in directing the spatial distribution of visitors and adapting visitor education and trail management policies to meet management directives.


We wanted to analyse the binding mode of small anion inhibitors to the zinc enzyme carbonic anhydrase in order to explore the binding of substrates and the catalytic mechanism of the enzyme. This was started by recording two data-sets by Laue diffraction to obtain the wanted structural information. In addition we wanted to test the capacity of the Laue method to show the small structural changes that are often associated with the catalytic activity of m any enzymes. To be able to exploit fully time-resolved crystallography the method should be able to detect such minor structural changes. The obtained Laue results did not agree with the expected molecular structures. Thus we needed to record monochromatic data-sets of the same states of the enzyme to confirm our results. All major findings from the Laue data agree with the monochromatic data. Stimulated by the unexpected findings we have continued the investigations of anion binding to carbonic anhydrase. We have studied both the zinc enzyme and replaced the native metal by cobalt which also yields an active enzyme. The accumulated picture of the ligand binding to the enzyme sheds new light on the substrate binding and on the catalytic mechanism.


The ostreid herpesvirus (OsHV-1) is one of the major diseases that affect the Pacific oyster Crassostrea gigas. Selective breeding programs were recently shown to improve resistance easily to OsHV-1 infections in spat, juvenile and adult oysters. Nevertheless, this resistance has never been investigated in larvae, whereas this developmental stage has crucial importance for the production of commercial hatcheries, as well as explaining the abundance of spatfall. A first trial tested several viral suspensions at several concentrations using contaminated water with OsHV-1 in four-day-old and ten-day-old larvae that were produced from an unselected broodstock. In follow up on the results, one viral suspension at a final concentration of 10+6 OsHV-1 DNA copies per L was used to assess resistance to OsHV-1 infection in C. gigas larvae that were produced from selected and unselected broodstock. A second trial evaluated OsHV-1 resistance in larvae from both broodstocks in trials 2a, 2b and 2c with 4, 10 and 16-day-old larvae for 7 days, which corresponded to post D larvae, umbo larvae and eyed larvae, respectively. The mortality of unchallenged larvae for both stocks were low (<15%) at day 7 in trials 2a and 2b, whereas it ranged from 48 to 56% in trial 2c. More interestingly, selected larvae had significantly lower mortality than unselected larvae when exposed to OsHV-1 in all of the trials. Thus, the mortality was 11% and 49% for the selected larvae at day 7 post-exposure in trials 2a and 2c, respectively, in comparison with 84% and 97% for the unselected larvae. Although this difference in mortality was observed at day 5 in trial 2b, it was reduced at day 7, to 86% and 98% for the selected and unselected larvae, respectively. For the first time in the literature, the difference in mortality or the delayed onset of mortality between selected and unselected larvae have indicated a genetic resistance to OsHV-1 infection at the larval stage. Such finding should facilitate the selective breeding programs focusing on resistance to OsHV-1 infection by reducing the span of the genetic evaluation, and thus decreasing its cost


OBJECTIVES
Genetic modifications are related to genesis and development of cancer. Neoplasias in various organs express the c-erbB-2 oncogene. In intraductal proliferations of the breast it has been assessed as a risk factor for subsequent development of carcinoma. The c-erbB-2 immunoexpression in intraductal epithelial proliferations and the relationship with histopathological characteristics of ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS) were evaluated.

METHODS
File material from 88 women, which were tissue samples formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded blocks, was used. Of these 51 presented with DCIS and 37 with ductal hyperplasia without atypia. Ages of the women ranged from 35 to 76 years. All cases were reviewed and nuclear grade, presence of necrosis, preponderance of histological subtype and its extension were verified. Specimens were obtained for the c-erB-2 immunohistochemical study of 84 of the women in question.

RESULTS
No expression of the oncogene was verified in the hyperplasias without atypias and in tissues adjacent to all tissue samples. Expression of c-erbB-2 was verified in 9 (19.1%) of the DCIS (p = 0.0001). Immunoexpression was not related to the extension of the lesions. The c-erbB-2 immunoexpression in DCIS was correlated to the histological subtype (p = 0.019), necrosis (p = 0.0066), nuclear grade (p = 0.0084) and Van Nuys Classification (p = 0.039).

CONCLUSIONS
Expression of c-erbB-2 was significant in proliferative lesions with risk (DCIS) and was correlated to histopathological characteristics: high nuclear grade, presence of necrosis and comedy subtype. There was no expression in the hyperplasias without atypias and adjacent tissues.


Careful monitoring of harmonically bound (or as a limiting case, free) masses is the basis of current and future gravitational wave detectors, and of nanomechanical devices designed to access the quantum regime. We analyse the effects of stochastic localization models for state vector reduction, and of related models for environmental decoherence, on such systems, focusing our analysis on the non-dissipative forced harmonic oscillator and its free mass limit. We derive an explicit formula for the time evolution of the expectation of a general operator in the presence of stochastic reduction or environmentally induced decoherence, for both the non-dissipative harmonic oscillator and the free mass. In the case of the oscillator, we also give a formula for the time evolution of the matrix element of the stochastic expectation density matrix between general coherent states. We show that the stochastic expectation of the variance of a Hermitian operator in any unraveling of the stochastic process is bounded by the variance computed from the stochastic expectation of the density matrix, and we develop a formal perturbation theory for calculating expectation values of operators within any unraveling. Applying our results to current gravitational wave interferometer detectors and nanomechanical systems, we conclude that the deviations from quantum mechanics predicted by the continuous spontaneous localization (CSL) model of state vector reduction are at least five orders of magnitude below the relevant standard quantum limits for these experiments. The proposed LISA gravitational wave detector will be two orders of magnitude away from the capability of observing an effect.


Crisscross heart, or superoinferior ventricles, is a complex and often confusing congenital anomaly. We report a heretofore unreported presentation of "isolated" crisscross heart in situs inversus levocardia, which allows us to more clearly define the typical features of crisscross ventricles. The case of this 41-year-old woman, who had a peculiar coronary anatomy, underscores the concept that coronary artery anatomy is strictly related to the myocardial mass served. In complex congenital heart defects, development of an anterior descending artery is possible (as a primary artery, along with the circumflex and right coronary arteries) only if the ventricular septum develops properly and is aligned with the semilunar valves. We use the present case of crisscross heart to illustrate the spectrum of anomalies that can occur during formation of the cardiac apex; this spectrum ranges from a normal apex, to a diverted apex (as in dextroversion in situs solitus), to a crisscross anomaly.


Background We consider both univariate- and multivariate-based feature selection for the problem of binary classification with microarray data. The idea is to determine whether the more sophisticated multivariate approach leads to better misclassification error rates because of the potential to consider jointly significant subsets of genes (but without overfitting the data). Methods We present an empirical study in which 10-fold cross-validation is applied externally to both a univariate-based and two multivariate- (genetic algorithm (GA)-) based feature selection processes. These procedures are applied with respect to three supervised learning algorithms and six published two-class microarray datasets. Results Considering all datasets, and learning algorithms, the average 10-fold external cross-validation error rates for the univariate-, single-stage GA-, and two-stage GA-based processes are 14.2%, 14.6%, and 14.2%, respectively. We also find that the optimism bias estimates from the GA analyses were half that of the univariate approach, but the selection bias estimates from the GA analyses were 2.5 times that of the univariate results. Conclusions We find that the 10-fold external cross-validation misclassification error rates were very comparable. Further, we find that a two-stage GA approach did not demonstrate a significant advantage over a 1-stage approach. We also find that the univariate approach had higher optimism bias and lower selection bias compared to both GA approaches.


Patients with cirrhosis have substantial circulatory imbalance between vasoconstrictive and vasodilating forces. The study of circulatory vasoactive peptides may provide important pathophysiological information. This study aimed to assess concentrations, organ extraction and relations to haemodynamic changes in the pro‐peptides copeptin, proadrenomedullin and pro‐atrial natriuretic peptide (proANP) in patients with cirrhosis.


The human person makes great demands on the physician and calls for unique attention. Hence the doctor-patient relationship calls for the highest ideals of kindness, patience, trustworthiness, generosity and skill. The Catholic physician brings to these demands a specific meaning: ministering to the sick is to see Christ in them and to show Him to them.


In this brief work I will propose ten guidelines or criteria to assist in interpreting human and fundamental rights norms in a way that is correct (as much as is reasonable) and that is in line with the perspective of the constitutional court. To do so, I will work from a series of premises to help locate these guidelines within the context of a theory of interpretation. As might be expected, this theory is itself based on a theory of law. In what follows, I will provide an account of some of the characteristic dimensions of the interpretation of rights norms. Finally I will present the ten guidelines that in fact constitute what I have elsewhere termed as main criteria of interpretation.


Digital preservation is one of the ways to make tou rism of a nation keeps alive. The tourism of a nation rooted in its cultur e and nature. The wealth of this tourism spread in many entities and areas such as cultures and natures. Information and Communication Technology role as key enabler to preserve this cultures and natures tourism. In this paper we proposed a Web Portal following e-Cultural Heritage and Natural History Fr amework. This portal is to increase accessibility, provide viability and co mpiled multi-content for culture and nature tourism of North Sulawesi. We us ed Pusilkom Agile Unified Process Methodology to develop this web portal to emphasize useroriented and object-oriented development paradigm. This agile-characteristic would produce web-based applications that meet user expectations and needs.


Information concerning the classification of soils and their properties under cacao agroforestry systems of the Atlantic rain forest biome region in the Southeast of Bahia, Brazil is largely unknown. Soil and climatic conditions in this region are favorable for high soil carbon storage. This study is aimed to classify soils under cacao agroforestry and further, to quantify carbon stocks in these soil profiles. Soil classification was performed, and the amount of C stored was estimated, based on the thickness of the soil horizons, their bulk density, and total organic carbon stored. In the sites studied under cacao, four general classes of soils were identified: Ultisols, Oxisols, Alfisols, and Inceptisols. Carbon stocks in these soil profiles showed wide variation, ranging from 719.24 to 2089.93 Mg ha−1. Carbon stocks in soil surface and subsurface layers in different agroforestry systems with cacao (cacao cabruca, cacao × rubber tree, and cacao × erythrina) were comparable; however, total storage of organic C in these soils was higher than expected, compared to values reported for the International Soil Reference and Information Center (ISRIC), based on the FAO-UNESCO database, and were also higher than estimated regional soil data.


We introduce the concept of community-driven ontology management and demonstrate the added value to conventional ontology management of being community-driven. Further, we present an implementation of an infrastructure supporting community-driven ontology management. The implemented infrastructure was deployed as a part of the intranet at DERI - Digital Enterprise Research Institute, and the community's response and behavior were observed. The results obtained prove feasibility and advantages of community-driven ontology management.


Pulmonary alveolar derecruitment is a process of alveolar collapse that occurs in critically ill patients. While the entity and its physiological manifestations are described in the anesthesiology and critical care literature, the radiographic manifestations of alveolar derecruitment have not yet been thoroughly described. This phenomenon can have a similar appearance to pulmonary edema; however, patients often have severe intravascular volume depletion. As the treatment for these 2 entities is essentially contradictory, it is important to be familiar with alveolar derecruitment and consider it as a differential diagnosis when clinically appropriate.


Proceedings: AACR 102nd Annual Meeting 2011‐‐ Apr 2‐6, 2011; Orlando, FL

Our knowledge of how cells move in 3D in tissues is limited due to the lack of imaging methods that can produce 3D images fast enough and with sufficient resolution. Cancer cells migrate in 3D by forming adhesion points at the end of very long cellular protrusions. These protrusions are very thin and it is difficult to visualize adhesions along the protrusion surface. Conventional 3D stack reconstruction has relatively low resolution unless it is done using many frames. This results in a very slow acquisition in 3D confocal microscopy. Faster methods of 3D data acquisition (spinning disk microscopy) cannot be easily implemented since there is significant amount of scatter in tissues. A major obstacle in imaging adhesions is to find and track them so that they will not go out of focus. We are developing a new method which is based on orbiting imaging around cellular protrusions to visualize protein dynamics during extravasation. A feedback mechanism controls the center of the orbit to be at the center of the fluorescence distribution. A program reconstructs the shape of the protrusions in 3D. The fluorescence intensity in one or more channels is also simultaneously measured. The fluorescence intensity of one channel is used to paint the protrusion shape, which results in the 3D reconstruction of the protrusion. During the orbit, the second channel of the microscope measures the second harmonic generation (SHG) signal. We then correlated the appearance of bright fluorescence spots on the protrusion surface with the points of contact of the protrusion. This method will enable imaging of cancer cell invasion in 3-dimentions in live mice in real time.

Citation Format: {Authors}. {Abstract title} [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the 102nd Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research; 2011 Apr 2-6; Orlando, FL. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2011;71(8 Suppl):Abstract nr 4750. doi:10.1158/1538-7445.AM2011-4750


Regulation
of sialic acids by human neuraminidase (hNEU) enzymes is important to many biological
processes. Defining hNEU substrate tolerance can help to elucidate the roles of
these enzymes in regulating sialosides in human health and disease. Polysialic
acid (polySia) is a polyanion of α(2→8) linked sialic acids with roles in nervous,
reproductive, and immune systems and is dysregulated in some malignancies and
mental disorders. The unique chemical properties of this polymer, which include
an enhanced susceptibility to acid-catalyzed hydrolysis, have hampered its
study. Herein we describe the first systematic study of hNEU isoenzyme
activity towards polysialic acid in vitro. The experimental design allowed
us to study the impact of several factors that may influence polysialic acid
degradation including pH, polymer size, and the relative ionic strength of the
surrounding media. We report that short chains of polysialic acid (degree of
polymerization, DP 3-8) were substrates of NEU3 and NEU4 at acidic pH, but not
at neutral pH. No hNEU-catalyzed hydrolysis of longer polymers (DP 10-20) was
detected. These findings suggest a neuraminidase-independent mechanism for
polysialic acid turnover such as internalization and degradation in endosomes
and lysosomes.


Similar to many Machine Learning models, both accuracy and speed of the Cluster weighted models (CWMs) can be hampered by high-dimensional data, leading to previous works on a parsimonious technique to reduce the effect of "Curse of dimensionality" on mixture models. In this work, we review the background study of the cluster weighted models (CWMs). We further show that parsimonious technique is not sufficient for mixture models to thrive in the presence of huge high-dimensional data. We discuss a heuristic for detecting the hidden components by choosing the initial values of location parameters using the default values in the "FlexCWM" R package. We introduce a dimensionality reduction technique called T-distributed stochastic neighbor embedding (TSNE) to enhance the parsimonious CWMs in high-dimensional space. Originally, CWMs are suited for regression but for classification purposes, all multi-class variables are transformed logarithmically with some noise. The parameters of the model are obtained via expectation maximization algorithm. The effectiveness of the discussed technique is demonstrated using real data sets from different fields.


The discussion about the correlation of diversity and ecosystem functioning in marine systems is long and ongoing, but empirical studies are scarce. Especially the Arctic is widely unexplored in that context, although the shift towards a seasonally ice-free Arctic Ocean raises many questions relating to the future of diversity and function of the Arctic ecosystems. We use biological trait analysis (BTA) to tackle these questions as it links species, environment and ecosystem processes (Bremner 2005). We examined how taxonomic diversity and the potential of function in macrozoobenthic communities are changing along a gradient of increasing water depth, latitude and sea ice cover. The dataset based on modeled production data comprises ten sample stations ranging from the productive shelf area down to the permanently ice covered and food limited Arctic Basin. Although the number of species per station decreased down to 4% towards the Arctic basin we did not find such a pronounced trend in functional richness which remained comparatively high. We conclude that benthic communities in the Basins are well adapted to food limitation by covering all potential niches and thus maintaining ecosystem functioning.


Ten mongrel dogs (mean weight: 27 kg) awake and with an implanted femoral catheter have been maintained for three days in a controlled chamber (10% CO2 and 21% O2). Arterial blood samples, taken before admission and after one, two, four, six, 24, 48 and 72 hours of exposure, allowed to study blood gases and acid-base equilibrium. Glycemia, phosphatemia, erythrocyte concentration of glucose-6-phosphate (G-6-P), fructose-6-phosphate (F-6-P), fructose-1,6-diphosphate (F-1,6-DP), 2,3-diphosphoglycerate (2,3-DPG), pyruvate, lactate and ATP were also titrated by various enzymatic methods. In addition, nine reference subjects were studied in air (without CO2). During the hypercapnia, [H+] rapidly increases to 70 nmol/1, then progressively decreases after 24 hours, while [HCO3-] slowly rises. The glycemia stays high during the whole exposure. There is also an increase in inorganic phosphate, G-6-P and F-6-P, but during the first 24 hours only. F-1,6-DP, pyruvate and lactate remain lowered during the whole exposure. The 2,3-DPG diminishes after the sixth hour. These phenomena, related to the acidosis and probably to the phosphofructokinase inhibition don't arise in the reference subjects. However the latter present after a two and four hour-stay in the chamber a small decrease in pyruvicemia and lactacidemia.


Background and objectives : The Clinical-year medical students who are working closely with the patients should have a working knowledge of blood donation. This study  aims  to determine the proportion of the clinical - year medical students on their general and clinical knowledge of blood donation and to determine the relationship between general and clinical knowledge of blood donation . Methods: This was a descriptive study,  setting  in  the Faculty of  Medicine , Khon   Kaen University, Thailand. The study population was 113 clinical-year medical students, randomly sampling from the total number of 441and self-administered questionnaire were used. Results were presented as descriptive statistics and inferential statistics included Pearson Chi-Square, Linear by Linear Association and Kruskal-Wallis test. Results: Response rate was 100%. The survey showed, proportion of good knowledge on general knowledge about blood donation was 74.3% (95%CI: 65.1, 81.9). There was  7.1% of sample had good level, 76.1 % had fair level and 16.8 % had poor level of knowledge on clinical knowledge about blood donation. There was 54% of sample blood donation.  This study found statistically significant between knowledge on general blood donation (p 0.05) Conclusions : Most of the clinical - year medical students known general knowledge and fair level in clinical knowledge of blood donation. Level of general knowledge of blood donation was significantly associated with donating, but no statistical significant between clinical knowledge about blood donation. Keyword: knowledge, blood donation, medical students


The abundance of plants on the earth's surfaces has led to an increasing interest in traditional medicines as remedies to various ailments and potential sources of new drugs. In Africa, particularly Nigeria, the standards of nutrition, health infrastructure and environmental sanitation are relatively low; contributing significantly to the intensity of the damages caused by diseases. This has made communities in these societies seek herbal drug alternatives that are affordable, and quite available. This article provides an overview of some commonly used herbal medicines in Nigeria, their local names and general traditional uses. As it is usually conveniently assumed that naturally sourced drugs are completely harmless, this review also discusses the need for caution and scientific interventions in the use of herbal medicines as they can be potentially dangerous if wrongly used or handled.


Scavenger receptor class B type I (SR-BI) has been established as the primary mediator of the selective transfer of lipids from HDL to mammalian cells. In addition to its role in cholesterol metabolism, SR-BI has been shown to bind apoptotic cells and thus could in theory also function as a scavenger receptor. We now show that SR-BI binds oxidized LDL (OxLDL) with high affinity (K(d) of 4.0 +/- 0.5 microg/ml) and mediates internalization and degradation to an extent comparable to that of other scavenger receptors, when normalized to binding activity. The best competitors for OxLDL binding to SR-BI were oxidized lipoproteins, whereas native or acetylated lipoproteins only competed for a small fraction of OxLDL binding. Both the isolated lipids and the isolated protein from OxLDL bound with high affinity to SR-BI and showed partial reciprocal competition. Monoclonal antibody EO6, an antibody against oxidized phospholipids, and 1-palmitoyl-2-(5-oxovaleroyl) phosphatidylcholine (POVPC) both competed effectively with intact OxLDL and with isolated lipids from OxLDL for SR-BI binding.Together, these results demonstrate a potential function of SR-BI, in addition to its role in selective uptake of lipids, to mediate internalization of OxLDL by macrophages and suggest a central role for oxidized phospholipids in this process.


Microcolumn high pressure liquid chromatography (micro-HPLC) is rapidly gaining recognition as a practical separation tool for organometallic compounds. The use of the inductively coupled plasma (ICP) as a detector for micro-HPLC is studied. Several miniaturized glass-frit nebulizers are investigated as interfaces between the output of the microbore column and the ICP torch. Their performance with aqueous and methanolic solutions is evaluated by direct nebulization and flow injection analysis. The most efficient of these nebulizers is used in the micro-HPLC/ICP study of some Cd, Pb, and Zn organometallic compounds. Detection limits of 1.92 ng of Pb for tetramethyllead and 5.01 ng of Pb for tetraethyllead are obtained and compared with regular HPLC/ICP of these same compounds. Approximately equivalent detection limits were obtained when using a microwave induced plasma as an alternate plasma source.


Investigation with the crude methanol extract of Allamanda cathartica leaves and its different fractions were carried out to evaluate its possible thrombolysis and cytotoxic activities. A quick & rapid methodology (In-vitro Thrombolytic model) was applied to find out their thrombolytic potential where streptokinase and water were employed as a positive and negative controls, respectively. Among the extractives, the chloroform (CSF) and hexane (HSF) soluble fractions showed 34.51±0.669% and 32.179±0.581% clot lysis activity respectively compared to standard streptokinase which exhibited 61.5% lysis of clot. In brine shrimp lethality bioassay method, the LC50 values of the test samples of A. cathartica leaves were assayed where DMSO and Vincristine sulphate were used as solvent & as positive control respectively. The chloroform, hexane and carbon tetrachloride soluble fractions showed significant cytotoxic activity against brine shrimp nauplii and LC50 values were 1.45, 5.00 and 5.24 μg/ml respectively.