We present the results of two studies investigating gaze behaviors of a robot receiving an object from a human. Robot gaze is an important nonverbal behavior during human-robot handovers, yet prior work has only studied robots as givers. From a frame-by-frame video analysis of human-human handovers, we identified four receiver gaze behaviors: gazing at the giver's hand, gazing at their face, and two kinds of face-hand transition gazes. We implemented these behaviors on a robot arm equipped with an anthropomorphic head. In Study 1, participants compared videos of a handover from a human actor to a robot exhibiting these four gaze behaviors. We found that when the robot transitions its head gaze from the giver's face to the giver's hand, participants consider the handover to be more likable, anthropomorphic, and communicative of timing (<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">$p< 0.0001$</tex-math></inline-formula>). In Study 2, participants physically performed object handovers with the robot and rated their experiences of the handovers for each of the four gaze behaviors of the robot. We found weaker effects with face gaze rated the most likable (<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">$p=0.01$</tex-math></inline-formula>) and anthropomorphic (<inline-formula><tex-math notation="LaTeX">$p=0.03$</tex-math></inline-formula>) behavior. In contrast to previous studies, we found no evidence that the robot's gaze affected the start time of the human's handover.


Endocrine therapy resistance is a primary cause of clinical breast cancer treatment failure. The p38 mito- gen activated protein kinase (MAPK) signaling pathway is known to promote ligand independent tumor growth and resistance to endocrine therapy. In this study, we investigated the therapeutic potential of the p38 inhibitor RWJ67657 in the treatment of tamoxifen resistant MDA-MB-361 cells. RWJ67657 dose-dependently decreased both basal and stimulated activation of p38 MAPK signaling in this drug resistant cell system. Decreased activation of p38 by RWJ67657 resulted in inhibition of the downstream p38 targets hsp27 and MAPKAPK. Diminished p38 signaling resulted in inhibition of p38-medated gene transcription. Furthermore, pharmacological inhibition of p38 by RWJ67657 decreased biological effects of p38, including ER-mediated gene expression and clonogenic survival in a dose-dependent manner. Animal studies revealed significantly decreased p38 signaling in vivo following exposure to RWJ67657. Treatment with the inhibitor markedly decreased phosphorylation of p38 in MDA-MB-361 tumors, leading to decreased transcription of both Fra-1 and progesterone receptor. Utilizing well-established xenograft tumor mod- els, we demonstrated that RWJ67657 exhibits potent anti-tumor properties. Treatment with RWJ67657 markedly decreased tamoxifen resistant tumor growth, both in the presence and absence of estrogen. Taken together, our findings demonstrate the therapeutic potential of targeting the p38-MAPK signaling cascade in the treatment of en- docrine resistant breast cancer.


OBJECTIVES
The prevalence of dementia varies geographically in the United States. However, the extent to which this variation reflects contemporary place-based experiences versus embodied exposures from earlier in the life course remains unclear, and little is known regarding the intersection of place and subpopulation. This study therefore evaluates whether and how risk for assessed dementia varies by place of residence and birth, overall and by race/ethnicity and education.

METHODS
We pool data from the 2000-2016 waves of the Health and Retirement Study, a nationally representative panel survey of older U.S. adults (n=96,848 observations). We estimate the standardized prevalence of dementia by Census division of residence and birth. We then fit logistic regression models of dementia on region of residence and birth, adjusting for sociodemographic characteristics, and examine interactions between region and subpopulation.

RESULTS
The standardized prevalence of dementia ranges from 7.1% to 13.6% by division of residence and from 6.6% to 14.7% by division of birth, with rates highest throughout the South and lowest in the Northeast and Midwest. In models accounting for region of residence, region of birth, and sociodemographic covariates, Southern birth remains significantly associated with dementia. Adverse relationships between Southern residence or birth and dementia are generally largest for Black and less educated older adults. As a result, sociodemographic disparities in predicted probabilities of dementia are largest for those residing or born in the South.

DISCUSSION
The sociospatial patterning of dementia suggests its development is a lifelong process involving cumulated and heterogeneous lived experiences embedded in place.


Piper betle (PB) leaves have been traditionally used in many Asian countries for the healing of wounds and other ailments. The aim of this study was to examine the wound healing effect of PB on skin injury-inflicted Sprague-Dawley rats. Eighteen male Sprague-Dawley rats were inflicted with wounds and then divided into three groups consisting of a control (normal wound healing without dressing), saline (wound healing aided by gauze soaked in saline) and PB (gauze impregnated with PB paste) dressings. Wounds were created on the back of rats with 6-mm sterilized punch biopsy needle. Wounds were examined on days 3, 5, 7, 9, 11 and 13 for dryness, exudation, and scar formation. Rats were sacrificed on day 14 and the granulation tissue formed on the wound was then excised for histological examination using Hematoxylin and Eosin staining. The formation of granulation tissue in rats treated with PB showed higher progress to wound closure with shorter days (on day 3) compared to the control and saline group (on day 5). PB dressing minimized the formation of scar tissue significantly (p<0.05) compared to the control and saline groups. In conclusion, our results suggest that PB has good wound healing effect with less scarring and perhaps it can be used to treat wound complementary to the present method.


The problems of this research is the students are difficult to find the information from the text. The objective of this class action research are: (1) to know how far Think-aloud strategy can improve the students' reading comprehension and; (2) to know how the process of teaching reading by using Think-Aloud Strategy at eleventh grade of SMK Kartikatama Metro in academic year 2017/2018. The method of this research is clasroom action research that consist of two cycles. The subject of this research is the students of Accounting Class eleventh grade of SMK Kartikatama Metro that consist of 30 students. The research instruments in this research are observation, interview sheets, and test. The result of the data analysis in this research are pre-test until post-test 2 that the average of pre-test was 60.93. Then, the implementation of think-aloud strategy in teaching, there is an increase of 3.65 become 64.58. Then, in the cycle 2 the average of students' score is 80.17. Based on the teaching and learning activities, pre-test until post-test 2 are increased. From the cycle 2, It is about 80 % of the students can achieve the minimum passing criteria (KKM), so this research is success. The conclusion is the implementation of  think-aloud strategy can improve students' reading comprehension.


Abstract Introduction There is a lack of evidence on the adverse effects of air pollution on cognition for people with air quality-related health conditions. We propose that educational attainment, as a proxy for cognition, may increase with improved air quality. This study will explore whether asthma and seasonal allergic rhinitis, when exacerbated by acute exposure to air pollution, is associated with educational attainment. Objective To describe the preparation of individual and household-level linked environmental and health data for analysis within an anonymised safe haven. Also to introduce our statistical analysis plan for our study: COgnition, Respiratory Tract illness and Effects of eXposure (CORTEX). Methods We imported daily air pollution and aeroallergen data, and individual level education data into the SAIL databank, an anonymised safe haven for person-based records. We linked individual-level education, socioeconomic and health data to air quality data for home and school locations, creating tailored exposures for individuals across a city. We developed daily exposure data for all pupils in repeated cross sectional exam cohorts (2009-2015). Conclusion We have used the SAIL databank, an innovative, data safe haven to create individual-level exposures to air pollution and pollen for multiple daily home and school locations. The analysis platform will allow us to evaluate retrospectively the impact of air quality on attainment for multiple cross-sectional cohorts of pupils. Our methods will allow us to distinguish between the pollution impacts on educational attainment for pupils with and without respiratory health conditions. The results from this study will further our understanding of the effects of air quality and respiratory-related health conditions on cognition. Highlights This city-wide study includes longitudinal routinely-recorded educational attainment data for all pupils taking exams over seven years; High spatial resolution air pollution data were linked within a privacy protected databank to obtain individual exposure at multiple daily locations; This study will use health data linked at the individual level to explore associations between air pollution, related morbidity, and educational attainment.


A systematic review of international evidence on housing retrofit supply chains was undertaken for the UK government: a Rapid Evidence Assessment (REA) summarised the most relevant research from outside the UK; key emerging themes were examined via analysis of 10 expert interviews with European and UK stakeholders, selected for the depth and breadth of their experience in developing retrofit business models. Market development requires concerted efforts from industry and policy, including the regulation of minimum standards. Conservatism in the industry means that opportunities for retrofit will be ignored in preference for the less risky, more familiar repair, maintenance and improvement (RMI) market. Successful retrofit involves customer engagement and after-care, which is outside customary practice. Financing mechanisms are important for firms' cashflow and for customer acceptance. Skills governance needs to take account of national vocational education systems, and is more complex than simply providing a few new courses. Local partnerships are needed to mobilise and organise the supply chain, whether through local government involvement or new business models enshrining collaborative quality assurance. More formal quality assurance implies some consolidation of supply chains. All these elements must be integrated into a service package, whose overall purpose is to minimise the risks of retrofit for supply chains and customers. Policy relevance A functioning, large-scale energy-efficiency retrofit market needs to have some of the attributes of the existing RMI market, with energy performance grafted on. When compared with the ideal requirements for effective policy, existing policy support is inadequate, being too short-lived, too inconsistent and too easily sidelined by market realities. Retrofit requires high-quality outcomes achieved through integrated service, but construction industry business culture is focused on inputs (not outcomes) and the service is fragmented. Policy must help deliver a cultural shift, which no country has yet succeeded in bringing about. The task may be slow as it entails coordination and change across policy, education and vocational training, and industry practices.


Performance of fingerprint recognition systems is heavily influenced by the quality of fingerprints provided by the user. Image quality analysis is traditionally performed using local and global structures of fingerprint images like ridge flow, analysis of ridge-valley structures, contrast ratios etc. With large scale deployment of fingerprint recognition in systems like US VISIT program, image quality issues of fingerprint images from extreme age groups becomes even a more important issue. The impact of image quality on performance of fingerprint recognition systems should be a positive one i.e. higher image quality should lead to better overall performance of the system, and removal of lower quality images should improve performance of the system. This research study studied the impact of fingerprint image quality of two different age groups: 18-25, and 62 and above on overall performance using two different matchers. The difference in image quality between the two age groups was analyzed, and then the impact of image quality on performance of fingerprint matchers between the two groups was analyzed. Image quality analysis was performed using NFIQ which is part of NIST Fingerprint Image Software (NFIS). Neurotechnologija VeriFinger and bozorth3 (NFIS) matchers were used to assess overall performance. For the purposes of the research study, overall performance was measured using False Non Matches.


The study conducted in the state of Manipur, has identified the factors affecting monocropping of rice as the cropping intensity of the state is only 107 per cent. Multistage random sampling has been followed to select the districts, blocks, villages and finally the farmers and logit model has been used for the analysis. The study has observed that availing of institutional credit and educational level are among the important factors which decrease monocropping. The study has highlighted the need for focus on crop diversification and increasing cropping intensity. Strengthening of co-operative societies, increasing availability and accessibility to credit facilities, increasing awareness about new technologies, etc. will help in increasing the cropping intensity, thereby using the available rich resources to the optimum level in the state.


Microdeletions at exon 19 are the most frequent genetic alterations affecting the Epidermal Growth Factor Receptor (EGFR) gene in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) and they are strongly associated with response to treatment with tyrosine kinase inhibitors. A series of 116 NSCLC DNA samples investigated by Sanger Sequencing (SS), including 106 samples carrying exon 19 EGFR deletions and 10 without deletions (control samples), were subjected to deep next generation sequencing (NGS). All samples with deletions at SS showed deletions with NGS. No deletions were seen in control cases. In 93 (88%) cases, deletions detected by NGS were exactly corresponding to those identified by SS. In 13 cases (12%) NGS resolved deletions not accurately characterized by SS. In 21 (20%) cases the NGS showed presence of complex (double/multiple) frameshift deletions producing a net in-frame change. In 5 of these cases the SS could not define the exact sequence of mutant alleles, in the other 16 cases the results obtained by SS were conventionally considered as deletions plus insertions. Different interpretative hypotheses for complex mutations are discussed. In 46 (43%) tumors deep NGS showed, for the first time to our knowledge, subpopulations of DNA molecules carrying EGFR deletions different from the main one. Each of these subpopulations accounted for 0.1% to 17% of the genomic DNA in the different tumors investigated. Our findings suggest that a region in exon 19 is highly unstable in a large proportion of patients carrying EGFR deletions. As a corollary to this study, NGS data were compared with those obtained by immunohistochemistry using the 6B6 anti-mutant EGFR antibody. The immunoreaction was E746-A750del specific. In conclusion, NGS analysis of EGFR exon 19 in NSCLCs allowed us to formulate a new interpretative hypothesis for complex mutations and revealed the presence of subpopulations of deletions with potential pathogenetic and clinical impact.


This paper explores the household behavior that underlies the link between wealth and consumption at the aggregate level. One possibility is that changes in wealth directly cause changes in consumption through their effect on households' contemporaneous budget sets; another possibility is that they merely predict changes in consumption because they signal changes in future income. Based on analysis of household-level data from the Consumer Expenditure Survey, we find that direct wealth effects begin to show up relatively quickly and continue to boost consumption growth for a number of quarters, in line with aggregate estimates. In contrast, we find that the indirect wealth channel is not an important determinant of consumption growth. We also estimate that an additional dollar of wealth leads households with moderate securities holdings to increase consumption between 5 cents and 15 cents, with the most likely gain in the lower part of this range.


This article presents a comparison between the Olympian Greek religious environment (as presented in the Theogony esiodea and in the Catalogue of Women works from the VIIth to the VIth century BC) and that of the first Jewish Apocalyptic (as appears in the most ancient strata of Enoch's Book of Vigilants, chpts. 6-7.) It refers to the common reasons for mixed marriages between gods and humans in the Greek environment; and between angels and women in that of the Jewish. The aim is verify, if it can be verified, whether the Greek material had some influence on the Jewish and, consequently, whether Greek thought may have contributed in some way to the formation of specifically apocalyptic thought. At the conclusion of the comparison, therefore, one can affirm that, if there was a "passage" of Greek material relative to mixed marriages and to the offspring generated in the Jewish environment, nevertheless, the author of the first chapters of the most ancient apocalyptic writing known to us, the Book of Vigilants, has re-elaborated and transformed such material in a unique way. From the ambivalence of the Greek mixed marriages he has, in fact, passed to the ambiguity of Jewish ones. This, in order to respond both to internal needs of the Jewish spirit of the time and probably, also, to actively confront the danger that through mixed marriages between Jews and Greeks, there might have begun a slow infiltration of Greek customs and religion. Such an infiltration would have gradually brought about a true and proper hellenisation of the Jewish religion.


In this conceptual paper, a theoretical framework is formulated and introduced to address the problem with application of a multichannel vision model based perceptual distortion measure to the rate-perceptual-distortion optimisation process for inter-frame and inter-view coding in a perceptually lossless video coder for high quality, e.g., full HD (high definition), stereo 3-D video communications, broadcasting and entertainment services and applications. It aims at enhancing and achieving the ultimate viewing experience at home for users to enjoy these aforementioned services and applications. The approach also offers backward compatibility from stereo 3-D video compression systems to standard video compression systems.


Background. The burden of paediatric HIV is unacceptably high in Nigeria. Prevention of mother-to-child transmission (PMTCT) of HIV represents a critical opportunity for reducing the burden of paediatric HIV. Objectives. To determine risk factors of MTCT of HIV following PMTCT interventions. Methods. This was a prospective study over a 12-month period, involving HIV-positive pregnant mothers in their third trimester. A structured, interviewer-administered questionnaire was used to obtain relevant information about mothers and their babies. Maternal HIV RNA levels (viral load) and CD4 counts were also obtained. DNA polymerase chain reaction (PCR) testing was done for all the infants. Data analysis was with SPSS version 15 (Chicago, USA). Results. There was a total of 210 infants, comprising 198 singletons and 6 sets of twins. Two infants had a positive DNA PCR, giving an MTCT rate of 1%. There was significant association between MTCT of HIV and maternal HIV RNA levels ( p =0.009) and mixed feeding ( p <0.001). None of the other risk factors studied, namely maternal CD4 count, mode of delivery and duration of rupture of fetal membrane before delivery, had any influence on MTCT. Conclusion. The rate of MTCT can be reduced markedly if there is strict adherence to PMTCT strategies. It is therefore recommended that there be increased access to PMTCT programmes and full participation of mothers in Nigeria.


The overall performance of Multi-Processor System-on-Chip (MPSoC) platforms depends highly on the efficient communication among their cores in the Network-on-Chip (NoC). Routing algorithms are responsible for the on-chip communication and traffic distribution through the network. Hence, designing efficient and high-performance routing algorithms is of significant importance. In this paper, a deadlock-free and highly adaptive path-based routing method is proposed without using virtual channels. This method strives to exploit the maximum number of minimal paths between any source and destination pair. The simulation results in terms of performance and power consumption demonstrate that the proposed method significantly outperforms the other adaptive and non-adaptive schemes. This efficiency is achieved by reducing the number of hotspots and smoothly distributing the traffic across the network.


The rates of oxidative addition of phenyl bromide to [Pd(BINAP)2] have been measured in the presence and absence of added amine to assess a previous hypothesis that addition to [Pd(BINAP)(amine)] is faster than addition to [Pd(BINAP)]. These data show that addition to the amine complex is not faster than addition to [Pd(BINAP)]. Instead, they are consistent with oxidative addition, even in the presence of amine, to [Pd(BINAP)] as the major pathway. These data underscore the value of studying the stoichiometric reactions of isolated complexes when assessing the mechanism of a catalytic process.


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The cytoadhesin family consists of platelet glycoprotein (GP) IIb-IIIa and the endothelial vitronectin receptor. The beta subunit (GP IIIa) of these complexes expresses the alloantigen Zwa (or PIA1). This alloantigen is not expressed by members of other integrin subfamilies. By using immunoprecipitation and immunoblot techniques, we found that the beta subunit of a heterodimer, expressed by cultured human arterial smooth muscle cells and cultured foreskin fibroblasts, carries the Zwa antigenic determinant. Furthermore, the mobilities of the alpha and beta subunits of these two heterodimers are indistinguishable from those of the alpha and beta subunits of the endothelial vitronectin receptor. Therefore, we propose that the smooth muscle cell and fibroblast heterodimer are members of the cytoadhesin family. In Glanzmann's thrombasthenia, platelet GP IIb-IIIa is absent or severely reduced. Previously, we showed that endothelial cells from a thrombasthenic patient normally synthesize and express a GP IIb-IIIa- related molecule (the vitronectin receptor). Here we show that arterial smooth muscle cells, obtained from the same patient, express a surface molecule indistinguishable from the endothelial vitronectin receptor. We also demonstrate that both the endothelial and the smooth muscle cell GP IIIa-related molecule in this Glanzmann patient express Zwa. Our data indicate that (a) GP IIb-IIIa-related molecules on cell types other than platelets and endothelial cells can express Zwa in vitro, and (b) patients with Glanzmann's disease can express the Zwa antigen. This study substantiates our view that the defect in Glanzmann's disease is restricted to the megakaryocytes/platelets.


To meet the demand of the next generation power system, renewable energy resources can be the fuel of choice because it is easily available, free of cost, environment-friendly, and the renewable energy-based generation is cost effective in all manners. There are several types of renewable energy resources such as solar, wind, geothermal, tides, and biomass. In this paper, the concentration is limited to the solar energy resources, solar plants, and storage system to provide required power support. In particular, this letter is associated with the mathematical modeling of the solar plants and simulation for the different aspects and cases of the system. Besides that, the Zinc Bromide Battery and Li-ion Battery are delineated with the explanations on their performance and related simulations. After that, both for the cases of islanded mode and grid-tied mode operation, the performance of the microgrid systems along with the storage unit are analyzed for different parameters. All the results are verified by Matlab simulations meticulously.


Acknowledgments Introduction - F. Michael Connelly, Ming Fang He, JoAnn Phillion, Candace Schlein PART I. CURRICULUM IN PRACTICE SECTION A: MAKING CURRICULUM 1. Curriculum Policy and the Politics of What Should Be Learned in Schools - Benjamin Levin 2. Curriculum Planning: Content, Form,and the Politics of Accountability - Michael Apple 3. Making Curricula: Why Do States Make Curricula, and How? - Ian Westbury 4. Subject Matter: Defining and Theorizing School Subjects - Zongyi Deng and Allan Luke SECTION B: MANAGING CURRICULUM 5. Structuring Curriculum: Technical, Normative, and Political Considerations - Kevin G. Welner and Jeannie Oakes 6. Curriculum Implementation and Sustainability - Michael Fullan 7. Technology's Role in Curriculum and Instruction - Barbara Means PART II. CURRICULUM IN CONTEXT Introductory Essay - Allan Luke SECTION C: DIVERSIFYING CURRICULUM 8. Curriculum and Cultural Diversity - Gloria Ladson-Billings, Keffrelyn D. Brown 9. Identity, Community, and Diversity: Retheorizing Multicultural Curriculum for the Postmodern Era - Sonia Nieto, Patty Bode, Eugenie Kang, and John Raible 10. Students' Experience of School Curriculum: Everday Circumstances of Granting and Withholding Assent to Learn - Frederick Erickson with Rishi Bagrodia, Alison Cook-Sather, Manuel Espinoza, Susan Jurow, Jeffrey Shultz, and Joi Spencer 11. Immigrant Students' Experience of Curriculum - Ming Fang He, JoAnn Phillion, Elaine Chan, and Shijing Xu 12. Teaching for Diversity: The Next Big Challenge - Mel Ainscow SECTION D: TEACHING CURRICULUM 13. Teacher Education as a Bridge? Unpacking Curriculum Controversies - Marilyn Cochran-Smith and Kelly Demers 14. Cultivating the Image of Teachers as Curriculum Makers - Cheryl J. Craig and Vicki Ross 15. Teachers' Experience of Curriculum: Policy, Pedagogy, and Situation - William Ayers, Therese Quinn, David Stovall, and Libby Scheiern SECTION E: INTERNATIONALIZING CURRICULUM 16. Indigenous Resistance and Renewal: From Colonizing Practices to Self-Determination - Donna Deyhle, Karen Swisher, Tracy Stevens, and Ruth Trinidad 17. Globalization and Curriculum - Kathryn Anderson-Levitt 18. Community Education in Developing Countries: The Quiet Revolution in Schooling - Joe Farrell PART III. CURRICULUM IN THEORY Part III Introductory Essay - William Schubert SECTION F: INQUIRING INTO CURRICULUM 19. Curriculum Inquiry - William Schubert 20. Curriculum Policy Research - Edmund Short 21. Hidden Research in Curriculum - Robin Enns 22. Reenvisioning the Progressive Tradition in Curriculum - David T. Hansen, Rodino Anderson, Jeffrey Frank, and Kiera Nieuwejaar 23. What the Schools Teach: A Social History of the American Curriculum Since 1950 - Barry Franklin, and Carla Johnson 24. Curriculum Development in Historical Perspective - J. Wesley Null 25. Curriculum Theory Since 1950: Crisis, Reconceptualization, Internationalization - William F. Pinar 26. The Landscape of Curriculum and Instruction: Diversity and Continuity - F. Michael Connelly, Shi Jing Xu Author Index Subject Index About the Editors About the Part Editors About the Consulting Authors About the Contributing Authors


INTRODUCTION. The radiological clearance of cervical spine injuries is a part of Advanced Trauma Life Support protocols. However the value of different methods, plane radiographs versus CT scaning is still discussed. MATERIAL AND METHODS. The study is a retrospective analysis of cervical spine injuries diagnostics in 109 multiply injured patients based on experience of the Emergency Department of Regional Hospital in Sosnowiec. Authors evaluated the result of 48 cases combining head CT imaging with cervical spine examination down to the Th1 level. RESULTS. Following this protocol 5 cervical spine fractures were identified. Among them 3 had no preexisting neurological deficits. DISCUSSION. Results confirmed the value of standard C-spine immobilization and necessity of early radiological clearance. CONCLUSIONS. Joint examination of cervical spine in head trauma diagnosing is proved to be the good standard in multiply injured patients, however it's use is limited to haemodynamicaly stable patients.


The products of the oxidative degradation of tryptophan via the kynurenine pathway were quantitatively determined in the urine of ten untreated patients with phenylketonuria, aged 4--35 years. All the patients were sevrely mentally retarded. The results of the analysis suggest a division of the patients into two groups, A and B. The patients of group A showed a basal urinary excretion of kynurenine, kynurenic acid, 3-hydroxykynurenine and xanthurenic acid which lies in the lower part of the normal range. The increase in excretion of tryptophan metabolites under tryptophan loading was, however, significantly less than in controls. On the average, only 0.63 % of the load was excreted in the form of these assayed metabolites; in contrast, the control value is 1,13 %. In group B, the rate of excretion was higher than normal under basal and loading conditions. The post-tryptophan excretion was four times greater than that of controls (4.64 %). 3-hydroxyanthranilic acid could only be detected in group B after loading. The metabolite 8-hydroxyquinaldic acid, which is supposed to be an abnormal metabolic product of tryptophan, was excreted in milligram amounts. The analysis of the metabolites of 3-hydroxyanthranilic acid showed that the excretion of N1-methylnicotinamide and N1-methyl-2-pyridone-5-carboxamide was within the normal range. The excretion of nicotinic acid and its amide was sporadic in both the patients and controls. Other theoretically possible metabolites in the pathway could not be found. A number of unidentified metabolites could be detected by thin-layer chromatography in the basal state. The excretion of these metabolites was greatly augmented after tryptophan loading. Other substances which were not detectable in the basal state became evident on loading. A number of these metabolites are characteristic either of group A or B. The structural identification of one of the new products has been hindered by its instability. A stable cleavage product was identified as omicron-aminoacetophenon by mass-spectroscopy. This metabolite its typical for group B. The possible influence of the blood phenylalanine on the metabolism of tryptophan in phenylketonuria is discussed.


Guy Wallace's new book is for the many sportsmen who would rather shoot wild game. In it he discusses dogs for grouse, snipe, woodcock, falconry and stalking. With advice on breeding or choosing a puppy, he sets out a basic training programme and in addition covers advanced training which will benefit every gundog owner.


Representative molecules from 10 classes of prohibited substances were taken from the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) list, augmented by molecules from corresponding activity classes found in the MDDR database. Together with some explicitly allowed compounds, these formed a set of 5245 molecules. Five types of fingerprints were calculated for these substances. The random forest classification method was used to predict membership of each prohibited class on the basis of each type of fingerprint, using 5-fold cross-validation. We also used a k-nearest neighbors (kNN) approach, which worked well for the smallest values of k. The most successful classifiers are based on Unity 2D fingerprints and give very similar Matthews correlation coefficients of 0.836 (kNN) and 0.829 (random forest). The kNN classifiers tend to give a higher recall of positives at the expense of lower precision. A naïve Bayesian classifier, however, lies much further toward the extreme of high recall and low precision. Our results suggest that it will be possible to produce a reliable and quantitative assignment of membership or otherwise of each class of prohibited substances. This should aid the fight against the use of bioactive novel compounds as doping agents, while also protecting athletes against unjust disqualification.


The ability of the news media to mobilize voters during an election campaign is not well understood. Most extant research has been conducted in single-country studies and has paid little or no attention to the contextual level and the conditions under which such effects are more or less likely to occur. This study tests the mobilizing effect of conflict news framing in the context of the 2009 European Parliamentary elections. The unique multi-method and comparative cross-national study design combines a media content analysis (N 5 48,982) with data from a two-wave panel survey conducted in twenty-one countries (N 5 32,411). Consistent with expectations, conflict framing in campaign news mobilized voters to vote. Since the effect of conflict news was moderated by evaluations of the EU polity in the general information environment, conflict framing more effectively mobilized voters in countries where the EU was evaluated more positively.


Adaptive adversaries are a primary concern in several domains, including cyber defense, border security, counterterrorism, and fraud prevention, and consequently there is great interest in developing defenses that maintain their effectiveness in the presence of evolving adversary strategies and tactics. This paper leverages the coevolutionary relationship between attackers and defenders to derive two new approaches to predictive defense, in which future attack techniques are anticipated and these insights are incorporated into defense designs. The first method combines game theory with machine learning to model and predict future adversary actions in the learner's "feature space"; these predictions form the basis for synthesizing robust defenses. The second approach to predictive defense involves extrapolating the evolution of defense configurations forward in time, in the space of defense parameterizations, as a way of generating defenses which work well against evolving threats. Case studies with a large cyber security dataset assembled for this investigation demonstrate that each method provides effective, scalable defense against current and future attacks, outperforming gold-standard techniques. Additionally, preliminary tests indicate that a simple variant of the proposed design methodology yields defenses which are difficult for adversaries to reverse-engineer.


The purpose of this study is to develop an analytical solution for modal analysis of actively damped orthotropic composite plates in bending and to verify it with experimental analysis. The analytical modal analysis solution for composite plate dynamics is derived using Euler theory. This analysis applies to structures with orthotropic lamina of uniform material properties at any lamination angle. The bending-extensional coupling can be neglected for plates that are symmetric or approximately symmetric, which allows an exact solution for natural frequency and mode shape to be obtained. An exact solution can be found for natural vibration and in general. The active control is modeled analytically by combining the Lagrange equation with the Ritz Assumed Mode method. This analysis produces a generalized coordinate vector that correlates the assumed mode to the particular amplitude of a particular case. The kinetic energy dissipated by the piezoelectric actuator from the system over one oscillation can be calculated from the generalized coordinate vector and the assumed mode. The equivalent damping ratio of the active control system is calculated as the ratio between the kinetic energy absorbed by the piezoelectric actuator from the system in one oscillation and the maximum strain energy of the system during that oscillation. A point mass on the plate, such as an accelerometer mass, can also be modeled as a single layer of uniform mass, that is an isotropic layer, by equating the potential energy of the point mass with the potential energy of the uniform mass layer. It is important to note that the mass of the isotropic layer is frequency dependent, and it has no effect on the plate stiffness. The analytical model is validated by comparison to experimental work. The samples studied were aluminum and composite plates of various lengths. The active control predictions were also validated using previous experimental work completed at California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo. These cases included active control of an aluminum beam with a patch of piezoelectric material and an aluminum sailplane with a patch of piezoelectric material. v Results indicate that while the analytical mode solutions are in good agreement with the experimental results, they are also systematically higher than the experimental results. The analytical active control solutions match previous work when the piezoelectric effects are linear. The main result of adding an active control system is approximately a 5-10% increase in modal frequencies and a 200-800% increase of …


Cell biology spans among the widest diversity of methods in the biological sciences. From physical chemistry to microscopy, cells have given up with secrets only when the questions are asked in the right way! This new volume of "Methods in Cell Biology" covers laboratory methods in cell biology, and includes methods that are among the most important and elucidating in the discipline, such as transfection, cell enrichment and magnetic batch separation. It covers the most important laboratory methods in cell biology and includes chapters written by experts in their fields.


The N-propionylated pyrrolidine derivative and chiral auxiliary, (S)-(−)-2-(pyrrolidin-2-yl)propan-2-ol, was synthesised and used in stereoselective aldol reactions with benzaldehyde. Differences in stereoselectivity were investigated as a function of temperature, solvent, chelating agent and the amount of the chelating agent used by monitoring the 1H NMR spectra of the aldol adducts that were obtained. Among the additives that were investigated, Cp2ZrCl2 induced higher anti-selectivity, while SnCl2 induced higher syn-selectivity respectively. TMSCl was found to induce high selectivity for one syn- and one anti-diastereomer. Varying the ligand sets on titanium additives was found to induce differences in selectivity, with (i-PrO)3TiCl exhibiting syn-selectivity and Cp2TiCl2 exhibiting anti-selectivity. Differences in reactivity and stereoselectivity were also found to depend upon the amount of Lewis acid that was added. Methods for removal of the auxiliary were also investigated. Acidic hydrolysis was used successfully to obtain the desired 3-hydroxy-2-methyl-3-phenylpropionic acids, but was found to give low yields and resulted in a large amount of epimerisation. Furthermore, the ethyl esters of these hydroxy acids are easy to separate into pure syn- and anti-diastereomers by LC.


Measurement of monocarboxylate transport kinetics in a range of cell types has provided strong circumstantial evidence for a family of monocarboxylate transporters (MCTs). Two mammalian MCT isoforms (MCT1 and MCT2) and a chicken isoform (REMP or MCT3) have already been cloned, sequenced and expressed, and another MCT-like sequence (XPCT) has been identified. Here we report the identification of new human MCT homologues in the database of expression sequence tags and the cloning and sequencing of four new full-length MCT-like sequences from human cDNA libraries, which we have denoted MCT3, MCT4, MCT5 and MCT6. Northern blotting revealed a unique tissue distribution for the expression of mRNA for each of the seven putative MCT isoforms (MCT1-MCT6 and XPCT). All sequences were predicted to have 12 transmembrane (TM) helical domains with a large intracellular loop between TM6 and TM7. Multiple sequence alignments showed identities ranging from 20% to 55%, with the greatest conservation in the predicted TM regions and more variation in the C-terminal than the N-terminal region. Searching of additional sequence databases identified candidate MCT homologues from the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae, the nematode worm Caenorhabditis elegans and the archaebacterium Sulfolobus solfataricus. Together these sequences constitute a new family of transporters with some strongly conserved sequence motifs, the possible functions of which are discussed.


It has been proposed that human immunodeficiency virus type 2 (HIV-2) originated from simian immunodeficiency viruses (SIVs) that are natural infections of sooty mangabeys (Cercocebus torquatus atys). To test this hypothesis, SIVs from eight sooty mangabeys, including six new viruses from West Africa, were genetically characterized. gag and env sequences showed that while the viruses of all eight sooty mangabeys belonged to the SIVsm/HIV-2 family, each was widely divergent from SIVs found earlier in captive monkeys at American primate centers. In two SIVs from sooty mangabeys discovered about 100 miles (ca. 161 Km) from each other in rural West Africa, the amino acids of a conserved gag p17-p26 region differed by 19.3%, a divergence greater than that in four of five clades of HIV-2 and in SIVs found in other African monkey species. Analysis of gag region sequences showed that feral mangabeys in one small troop harbored four distinct SIVs. Three of the newly found viruses were genetically divergent, showing as much genetic distance from each other as from the entire SIVsm/HIV-2 family. Sequencing and heteroduplex analysis of one feral animal-derived SIV showed a mosaic genome containing an env gene that was homologous with other feral SIVsm env genes in the troop but having a gag gene from another, distinct SIV. Surprisingly a gag phylogenetic tree based on nucleotide sequences showed that the African relatives closest to all three household-derived SIVs were HIV-2 subtypes D and E from humans in the same West African areas. In one case, the SIV/HIV-2 cluster was from the same village. The findings support the hypothesis that each HIV-2 subtype in West Africans originated from widely divergent SIVsm strains, transmitted by independent cross-species events in the same geographic locations.


Abstract Objectives We aimed to examine change over time in self-rated quality of life (QoL) in people with mild-to-moderate dementia and identify subgroups with distinct QoL trajectories. Methods We used data from people with mild-to-moderate dementia followed up at 12 and 24 months in the Improving the experience of Dementia and Enhancing Active Life (IDEAL) cohort study (baseline n = 1,537). A latent growth model approach examined mean change over time in QoL, assessed with the QoL-AD scale, and investigated associations of baseline demographic, cognitive, and psychological covariates with the intercept and slope of QoL. We employed growth mixture modeling to identify multiple growth trajectories. Results Overall mean QoL scores were stable and no associations with change over time were observed. Four classes of QoL trajectories were identified: 2 with higher baseline QoL scores, labeled Stable (74.9%) and Declining (7.6%), and 2 with lower baseline QoL scores, labeled Stable Lower (13.7%) and Improving (3.8%). The Declining class had higher baseline levels of depression and loneliness, and lower levels of self-esteem and optimism, than the Stable class. The Stable Lower class was characterized by disadvantage related to social structure, poor physical health, functional disability, and low psychological well-being. The Improving class was similar to the Stable Lower class but had lower cognitive test scores. Discussion Understanding individual trajectories can contribute to personalized care planning. Efforts to prevent decline in perceived QoL should primarily target psychological well-being. Efforts to improve QoL for those with poorer QoL should additionally address functional impairment, isolation, and disadvantage related to social structure.


Marine magnetotelluric measurements using "free‐fall'' instruments without effective compasses suffer from the problem of unknown orientation of the receivers at the seafloor. While past works indicate that marine magnetotelluric orientation of the instruments can be estimated by reference to land deployments of known orientation using the transfer tensor method, there is limited published information on how this is implemented in practice. We document this method and propose a set of new time‐ and frequency‐domain approaches to solve this orientation problem of the seafloor receivers. We test these methodologies in onshore and offshore magnetotelluric data whose orientations are well known and apply these techniques to marine magnetotelluric data with unknown orientation. For the controlled tests, both time‐ and frequency‐domain approaches produce overall comparable results. To investigate the effects of the subsurface structure distribution on the orientation process, a dimensionality analysis of a controlled dataset is carried out. In subsequent analysis using the available disoriented marine magnetotelluric data from offshore Brazil and from the Vassouras magnetic observatory on the mainland for remote referencing, frequency‐domain methods yield approximate orientation angles among themselves with low standard deviation each. Time‐domain results are consistent for most cases but differ from frequency‐domain results for some situations.


In a laboratory investigation using tunable picosecond lasers in a pump-probe configuration, lifetimes of the E 1u, v = 0 and v = 1 states of CO are experimentally determined. For E 'D, v = 1, the lifetime is found to vary significantly for the isotopomers. Combining the data with existing oscillator strengths, predissociation probabilities within the range of 93.6%-98.6% result for 12C16O, 13C16O, and 13C18O in the case of the E 1u, v = I state, which is the state that predominantly influences the isotopic fractionation of CO in interstellar clouds.


This article refers to the "Mathematics of Harmony" by Alexey Stakhov in 2009, a new interdisciplinary direction of modern science. The main goal of the article is to describe two modern scientific discoveries–New Geometric Theory of Phyllotaxis (Bodnar's Geometry) and Hilbert's Fourth Problem based on the Hyperbolic Fibonacci and Lucas Functions and "Golden" Fibonacci λ-Goniometry (λ > 0 is a given positive real number). Although these discoveries refer to different areas of science (mathematics and theoretical botany), however they are based on one and the same scientific ideas-the "golden mean," which had been introduced by Euclid in his Elements, and its generalization—the "metallic means," which have been studied recently by Argentinian mathematician Vera Spinadel. The article is a confirmation of interdisciplinary character of the "Mathematics of Harmony", which originates from Euclid's Elements.


Studies about the effects of war and migration on the mental health of children lead these conditions to various mental health disorders and disrupt psychosocial development in children. There is no relevant study about psychological problems in children living in conflict areas in Azerbaijan. The aim of this study is to examine the emotional and behavioral problems of children who have been lived in the conditions of war and have been forced to migrate for decades. The study was carried out within the scope of the project "Psychological Support to Children Living in the Conflict Areas" that developed and implemented by the author. The sample of the study consisted of 617 children living in the war zone and studying in the 1-4 classes of primary education. The students with age range 7-11 (M = 8.9, SD = 1.24) n = 314 (50.9%) were female, n = 303 (49.1%) were male. Azeri version of the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) was used to determine the behavioral and emotional problems of the students. As a result of descriptive analysis, 32.7% of the children were evaluated as abnormal and 21.4% of the children as borderline according to total difficulties score. In addition, 19.4% of the children had emotional, 20.3% were conduct, 12.2% were hyperactivity, 31.1% had peer relationship problems and 13.1% were abnormal in the pro-social behavior subtests. For independent samples as a result of the Independent Samples T Test analysis, it was found that male students had higher difficulty degree than female students (p<.01). The mean score average of female students was significantly higher than male students in the emotional symptoms subtest (p <.05), but the average of behavioral problems in male student was significantly higher than female students (p<.01). The mean scores of male students were significantly higher than female students in the hyperactivity, peer problems subtest (p <.01). However, pro-social behavior scores were significantly higher in female students than in male students (p <.01). As a result of the One-Way ANOVA test was observed that the students with poor school success had the high average of difficulty score than students with medium average and above average school success (p<.001). This difference was statistically significant for behavioral, hyperactivity and peer problems (p<.001).


According to the characteristics of configuration software and process control course, the configuration software is applied to teaching practice of process control. Configuration software can realize the mathematical model and the design of the digital controller of the controlled object in the process control, and can build different process control system. In the teaching practice of process control, the combination of theory and simulation practice not only makes the boring process control theory more vivid and helps students to understand and remember the theoretical knowledge easily, but also improves the students' learning interest, efficiency and enthusiasm. Practices prove that this method is an effective way to teach process control system. And it also provides a new idea for such kind of control courses.


We have succeeded to prepare a hgh quality silicon nitride gate insulator with lower gate leakage current in three orders of magnitude compared to that of conventional thermal oxide film, by using a Kr/NH3 mixed gas microwave-excited highdensity plasma with metal (TaN/Ta/TaN) gate. Moreover, we have evaluated the current drive capability dependence on the silicon surface orientation and found that the channel hole mobility on (110) surface at the channel-width direction of 13 5 degree from the (111) cut plane was 2.4 times hlgher than that of (100) surface. The CMOS transistor with the silicon nitride gate insulator formed by the microwave-excited plasma and TaN/Ta/TaN metal gate on (110) surface orientation silicon having a higher current drive capability and high integration density is the most practical candidate for lOOnm technology node and beyond.


The recovery of rare earth metals (REMs) from end-of-life products, such as Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE), is drawing great attention as an attractive strategy for promoting the sustainable development. The hydrometallurgical technique of solvent extraction has been reported to be one of the most interesting method to recover REMs. However, when applied to WEEE, this process is challenged by the heterogeneous composition of electronic waste, completely different from other solid matrices, and it still has much rooms of improvements. This study investigated the extraction, stripping and recovery of REMs from a WEEE leaching solution using Versatic 10 as carrier in the organic phase and oxalic acid as stripping agent. A factorial design was carried out to evaluate the simultaneous effects of factors as the feed phase pH and the concentrations of both extractant and organic phase modifier in the extraction process. Cerium, lanthanum and yttrium were extracted at high percentages using 200 mM of Versatic 10, loaded by 100 mM of TBP in kerosene at pH 7. Moreover, 750 mM of oxalic acid successfully stripped and recovered 7.63 and 13.82 mg/kg of lanthanum and yttrium, respectively.


As enterprises embrace mobile technologies and enable their employees to bring their own devices, traditional security mechanisms are challenged by the col-location of personal and business activities on employee-owned mobile devices on the enterprise network. This presents a new risk to enterprises as employee-owned devices can now be used as stepping stones for bypassing traditional enterprise perimeter security. Current Bring Your Own device (BYOD) programs usually either do not manage employee-owned devices or are limited by self-enrollment and device heterogeneity challenges. In this paper, we introduce a novel, nonintrusive big data analytics methodology to obtain visibility into mobile device usage. At the heart of the methodology is an inference algorithm that uses a dynamic decision tree in near real-time to fingerprint mobile devices and their usage by analyzing passively collected network data. Information, such as device type, device model, and operating systems/versions, as well as applications and their patch level, can be inferred—all without an agent installed on the devices. We correlate such information with supplemental security intelligence (e.g., vulnerability information) to discover previously unknown mobile devices on an organization's network and to establish their security posture and risk. Our evaluation on a major corporate network indicates that mobile devices can be reliably identified while mitigating their potential threats, thus demonstrating that our methodology provides valuable insights to enterprise security administrators


Background
Dietary habits established in infancy may persist into adulthood and determine long-term health.

Objectives
The aims of this work were to describe dietary patterns, predictors of adherence to them, and their tracking from ages 1 to 8 y in European children.

Methods
Three-day food diaries were prospectively collected at ages 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 8 y. Foods were allocated to 1 of 29 food groups, which were included in exploratory factor analyses at each children's age. The tracking of patterns through childhood was assessed by an estimated general equation model.

Results
At age 1 y (n = 633), 2 patterns were identified. One was labeled "core foods" (CORE), since it was positively loaded for vegetables, fish, olive oil, and white and red meat, and negatively loaded for ready-to-eat infant products, sugar, and confectioneries. The other was positively loaded for saturated spreads, sugar, fruit juices, and confectioneries, and negatively loaded for olive oil, fish, and cow milk; this was labeled as the "poor-quality fats and added sugars" (F&S) pattern. From ages 2 to 8 y, 3 patterns were repeatedly identified: CORE, F&S, and a "high protein sources" (PROT) pattern that was positively loaded for milk, flavored milks, fish, eggs, white and processed meat, chips, and olive oil, and negatively loaded for fresh fruits at almost all time points. Of those children in the highest quartiles of the CORE, F&S, and PROT patterns at 2 y, 45%, 72%, and 36%, respectively, remained in the highest quartile at 8 y [OR = 2.01 (1.08, 3.8), OR = 3.6 (1.5, 8.4) and OR = 0.80 (0.4,1.6), respectively; P = 0.510].

Conclusions
Dietary patterns are established between 1 and 2 y of age and track into mid-childhood. A dietary pattern characterized by added sugars, unhealthy fats, and poor consumption of fish and olive oil was the most stable throughout childhood. Further analyses will reveal whether those dietary patterns are associated with metabolic disease risk.


We study online prediction where regret of the algorithm is measured against a benchmark defined via evolving constraints. This framework captures online prediction on graphs, as well as other prediction problems with combinatorial structure. A key aspect here is that finding the optimal benchmark predictor (even in hindsight, given all the data) might be computationally hard due to the combinatorial nature of the constraints. Despite this, we provide polynomial-time \emph{prediction} algorithms that achieve low regret against combinatorial benchmark sets. We do so by building improper learning algorithms based on two ideas that work together. The first is to alleviate part of the computational burden through random playout, and the second is to employ Lasserre semidefinite hierarchies to approximate the resulting integer program. Interestingly, for our prediction algorithms, we only need to compute the values of the semidefinite programs and not the rounded solutions. However, the integrality gap for Lasserre hierarchy \emph{does} enter the generic regret bound in terms of Rademacher complexity of the benchmark set. This establishes a trade-off between the computation time and the regret bound of the algorithm.


ABSTRACT The newly identified type III interferon (IFN-λ) has antiviral activity against a broad spectrum of viruses. We thus examined whether IFN-λ has the ability to inhibit human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) infection of blood monocyte-derived macrophages that expressed IFN-λ receptors. Both IFN-λ1 and IFN-λ2, when added to macrophage cultures, inhibited HIV-1 infection and replication. This IFN-λ-mediated anti-HIV-1 activity is broad, as IFN-λ could inhibit infection by both laboratory-adapted and clinical strains of HIV-1. Investigations of the mechanism(s) responsible for the IFN-λ action showed that although IFN-λ had little effect on HIV-1 entry coreceptor CCR5 expression, IFN-λ induced the expression of CC chemokines, the ligands for CCR5. In addition, IFN-λ upregulated intracellular expression of type I IFNs and APOBEC3G/3F, the newly identified anti-HIV-1 cellular factors. These data provide direct and compelling evidence that IFN-λ, through both extracellular and intracellular antiviral mechanisms, inhibits HIV-1 replication in macrophages. These findings indicate that IFN-λ may have therapeutic value in the treatment of HIV-1 infection.


Abstract
Special education in the USA is, in most respects, a 20th century phenomenon and is now governed primarily by federal legislation first enacted in 1975. The federal law in its most recent reauthorization (2004) continues to require a free appropriate public education (FAPE) for all students with disabilities, a full continuum of alternative placements (CAP) ranging from residential or hospital care to inclusion in general education, an individual education plan or program (IEP) for each student identified as needing special education, and placement in the least restrictive environment (LRE) that is thought best for implementing the IEP. Parents must be involved in the special education process. Approximately 14 percent of public school students were identified for special education in 2004–2005, but the number and percentage of students identified in most high-incidence categories as needing special education have declined in recent years (the total for all categories was about 8.5 percent of public school students in 2010). A variety of evidence-based interventions can be used to address the wide range of instructional and behavioral needs of students with disabilities and their families, including transition to further education or work, family services, and teacher education. Special education in the USA may find new sources of support and thrive or may become less common or be abandoned entirely due to criticism and withdrawal of support for social welfare programs of government.


OBJECTIVE
The aim of this study was to explore the expression of microRNA-106a in breast cancer (BC) and to further investigate its role in BC development and the potential regulatory mechanism.

PATIENTS AND METHODS
72 pairs of BC tissues and para-cancerous tissues were collected, and microRNA-106a expression was detected by quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR). The relationship between microRNA-106a expression and BC pathological parameters was analyzed. Meanwhile, the expression of microRNA-106a in BC cells was verified by qRT-PCR as well. In addition, microRNA-106a knockdown model was constructed by transfecting small interfering RNA in BC cell lines including MCF-7 and SKBR3. Subsequently, the effects of microRNA-106a on biological functions of BC cells were analyzed by cell counting kit-8 (CCK-8), 5-ethynyl-2'-deoxyuridine (EDU), and transwell invasion and migration assays, respectively. Finally, the underlying mechanism was explored by cellular rescue experiment.

RESULTS
QRT-PCR results illustrated that microRNA-106a expression in BC tissues was markedly higher than that of normal tissues. Patients with high expression of microRNA-106a exhibited significantly higher tumor stage as well as higher incidence of lymph node metastasis and distant metastasis when compared with those with low expression. Cell proliferation, invasion, and migration abilities in microRNA-106a inhibitor group were markedly decreased when compared with control group. Subsequent experiments demonstrated that DAX-1 expression was reduced in BC cell lines and tissues. Moreover, DAX-1 expression was negatively correlated with microRNA-106a expression. In addition, a recovery experiment found that microRNA-106a and DAX-1 had mutual regulation, which could affect the malignant progression of BC.

CONCLUSIONS
We found that the expression of microRNA-106a was significantly increased in BC. Meanwhile, microRNA-106a expression was closely related to BC stage, distant metastasis, lymph node metastasis, and poor prognosis. Therefore, microRNA-106a promoted the invasion, migration, and proliferation of BC by targeting DAX-1.


Inflammatory breast cancer (IBC) comprises only 2.0% of all breast cancer cases; however it accounts for 8.0% of breast cancer-specific deaths. IBC is highly aggressive, appears at a younger age, and is more difficult to treat than the common forms of breast cancer. By the time the disease is diagnosed, IBC is usually stage 3 and has already metastasized to neighboring lymphatics. Though many tumors are p53 wild type and/or Her2 positive, the median overall survival among women with IBC is less than 4 years even with aggressive multimodal therapy. To develop IBC-specific therapies, we have compared the effects of two hydroxamic acid histone deacetylase (HDAC) inhibitors, Trichostatin A (TSA) and CG-1521 on the biology of the triple negative SUM149PT IBC cell line. In these cells, CG-1521 and TSA induce dose (0–10 µM) and time dependent (0–96 h) increases in the proportion of cells undergoing cell cycle arrest and cell death, in the presence or absence of 17β-estradiol. To identify the genomic targets of CG-1521, we have performed concurrent microarray analyses of mRNA and miRNA expression followed by qPCR validation. In SUM149PT cells, CG-1521 modulates the expression of approximately 935 transcripts: 341 of these transcripts are up-regulated and 594 are down-regulated after 48h of treatment. Gene ontology analysis demonstrates that many of the down-regulated mRNA transcripts encode proteins that are associated with the spindle assembly checkpoint, chromosome segregation and microtubule based processes including KIF4, PRC1, AURKB and KIF23 (MKLP-1). Strikingly, many genes in these ontologies are potentially targeted by a small number of miRNAs (miR-22, miR-1207-5p & miR-494) which are significantly up-regulated by CG-1521, suggesting that the ability of CG-1521 to down-regulate the transcripts associated with spindle formation and cytokinesis may be significantly modulated by miRNA expression. Immunofluorescence microscopy demonstrates that treatment of SUM149PT cells with CG-1521 results in the appearance of elongated midzone structures visualized by phalloidin staining, similar to the phenotype seen by others after siRNA-mediated knockdown of KIF4 in HeLa cells. These data suggest that CG-1521 affects the central mitotic spindle formation, disrupts furrow formation and abscission, arresting the cells in cytokinesis ultimately leading to cell death. Whether these effects are solely mediated through transcriptional mechanisms or whether CG-1521 also directly affects the activity of these proteins through acetylation remains to be determined. Nevertheless, the data show that histone deacetylase inhibitors induce cell death in IBC cells, and suggest that these small molecules may be useful addition to the armamentarium as adjuvants for the treatment of IBC. Citation Information: Cancer Res 2012;72(24 Suppl):Abstract nr P3-10-02.


The cascading of H-bridges, with different DC-link potentials and power devices, to implement modular hybrid binary, quasilinear and trinary multilevel inverters has been a recent research area. To achieve true modular implementation of a hybrid inverter, it is important to design each H-bridge as a stand-alone power bridge with its own integrated controller. Various three-level hysteresis controllers suitable for integrating with an H-bridge inverter to form a stand-alone power bridge are presented. The hysteresis current controllers on multiple power bridges can be co-ordinated to implement a modular hysteresis-controlled hybrid multilevel inverter with robust reference tracking and fast dynamic performance. Digital logic synthesised to ensure equal switch utilisation within each of the power bridges is also presented. Simulation and experimental results verify the performance and practicality of the proposed modular hysteresis control of hybrid multilevel inverters.


We developed a system based on site-directed mutagenesis that allows a precise comparison of SHV enzymes under isogenic conditions. In addition, the influences of two different, naturally occurring promoters were examined for each SHV derivative. The system comprised two separately cloned DNA fragments, each the size of 3.6 kb. Both fragments encoded an SHV gene originating from clinical isolates but with different promoters. The structural genes were made identical by site-directed mutagenesis. Other mutations were then introduced into both fragments by means of site-directed mutagenesis, resulting in the SHV derivatives SHV-1, SHV-2, SHV-2a, SHV-3, and SHV-5. The amino acid exchange of glutamic acid at position 235 for lysine in SHV-5 resulted in the highest resistance levels. SHV-3, differing from SHV-2 by the exchange of arginine at position 201 for leucine and previously described as indistinguishable from SHV-2, was shown to cause slightly higher resistance to ceftazidime and lower resistance to ceftriaxone, cefotaxime, and cefepime than SHV-2. The point mutation in SHV-2a, with the leucine-to-glutamine replacement at the unusual position 31, previously considered almost insignificant, proved to increase resistance to ceftazidime but reduced the MICs of all other cephalosporins tested when compared with those for SHV-2. For all clones harboring SHV derivatives, resistance was increased by a stronger promoter, in some cases masking the effect of the point mutation itself and demonstrating the importance of regulatory mechanisms of resistance.


Nuclear DNA content and ploidy have been determined at different stages of the life cycle of the Colonia strain of the myxomycete Physarum polycephalum. Analyses at the plasmodial stage showed that (a) Burton and Fuelgen DNA analyses agreed within 15% with strains which ranged from 0-6 to 3-6 pg of DNA per nucleus; (b) S-phase in Colonia is during the early part of interphase as in the Wisconsin strain; (c) in heterothallic and heterothallic x Colonia crossed strains there are 1-0-1-2 pg of DNA and 70 chromosomes per nucleus and in Colonia 0-6 pg of DNA and 40 chromosomes. Germinating spores of all strains contained one population of cells with about 0-5 pg of DNA and 40 chromosomes and another of larger cells with up to 2-5 pg of DNA and 200 chromosomes. The polyploid nuclei comprised 2-20% of the total in heterothallic strains, 2-65% in heterothallic x Colonia crosses and 25-75% in Colonia. A method was devised for making chromosome spreads of amoebae grown on bacterial lawns. Cells were first exposed to dilute formaldehyde at 26 degrees C for 30 min, then spread on slides with hot lactic acid and strained. Such spreads of CLd (Colonia) and RSD4 (heterothallic) amoebae both contained about 40 chromosomes. The data are consistent with the view that Colonia is haploid throughout its life cycle and that chromosome number is neither halved during sporulation nor doubled during plasmoidal formation. However, the possibility exists that an alternance of ploidy occurs by way of the few diploid nuclei present in the plasmodium.


The traditional production data analysis (PDA) techniques for gas wells largely relied on the implement of pseudo-functions and related type curve methods. Recently, Ye and Ayala (2012 "A Density Diffusivity Approach for the Unsteady State Analysis of Natural Gas Reservoirs," J. Nat Gas Sci. Eng., 7, pp. 22–34.) proposed a new rescaled exponential method which can successfully capture the behavior of gas well under boundary-dominated flow (BDF) conditions with the density-based parameters. In this paper, this rescaled exponential method is extended in coalbed methane (CBM) reservoirs by accounting for the two-phase flow behavior, and the variable permeability characteristics in the coal seams that caused by mechanical compression, desorption shrinkage, and the desorption effect. The two-phase rescaled exponential solution for CBM reservoir is derived by modifying the definition of two-phase pseudo-pressure and total compressibility. The proposed rescaled method can evaluate reserve in a convenient and accurate way. Results show that the proposed modification of the original rescaled exponential approach can successfully predict the production of CBM reservoirs compared with the results of commercial numerical simulator (GEM-CMG) and production data of the field cases on the condition of constant bottom hole pressure.


Background It is increasingly recognized that intestinal cells can store lipids after a meal, yet the effect of this phenomenon on lipid absorption patterns in insulin resistance remains unknown. Methods The kinetics of meal fat appearance were measured in insulin-sensitive (IS, n = 8) and insulin-resistant (IR, n = 8) subjects after sequential, isotopically labeled lunch and dinner meals. Plasma dynamics on triacylglycerol-rich (TAG-rich) lipoproteins and plasma hormones were analyzed using a nonlinear, non–steady state kinetic model. Results At the onset of dinner, IS subjects showed an abrupt plasma appearance of lunch lipid consistent with the "second-meal effect," followed by slower appearance of dinner fat in plasma, resulting in reduced accumulation of dinner TAG of 48% compared with lunch. By contrast, IR subjects exhibited faster meal TAG appearance rates after both lunch and dinner. This effect of lower enterocyte storage between meals was associated with greater nocturnal and next-morning hyperlipidemia. The biochemical data and the kinetic analysis of second-meal effect dynamics are consistent with rapid secretion of stored TAG bypassing lipolysis and resynthesis. In addition, the data are consistent with a role for the diurnal pattern of plasma leptin in regulating the processing of dietary lipid. Conclusion These data support the concept that intestinal lipid storage may be physiologically beneficial in IS subjects. Trial registration ClinicalTrials.gov NCT02020343. Funding This study was supported by a grant from the American Diabetes Association (grant 1-13-TS-12).


We here strove to overcome the limitations of expression analyses such as PCR and IHC, based on molecular recognition between target and probe molecules, by designing synthetic substrates specific to the target molecules to directly estimate the enzymatic functionality in situ. The specific substrate contains a probing unit, which is an organic fragment for specific enzyme binding, and a reactive unit, which is a natural peptide subject to catalysis. In this study, the activation of plasminogen to plasmin was examined in MDA‐MB231 breast cancer cells using the plasmin‐specific synthetic substrates designed from their inhibitors. The localization and function of the activated plasmin were successfully visualized by fluorophore combined with the specific substrate concurrently. This would be the first time for activated plasmin at work in situ by direct observation. Our concept to directly monitor the functionality of target enzymes can be used straightforwardly for other proteases such as cathepsins or caspases. Also, this substrate concept as a 'tailor‐made substrate' would be utilized as a novel functional molecular probe in vivo with appropriate detectable probes.


We describe a method of segmenting musical audio into structural sections based on a hierarchical labeling of spectral features. Frames of audio are first labeled as belonging to one of a number of discrete states using a hidden Markov model trained on the features. Histograms of neighboring frames are then clustered into segment-types representing distinct distributions of states, using a clustering algorithm in which temporal continuity is expressed as a set of constraints modeled by a hidden Markov random field. We give experimental results which show that in many cases the resulting segmentations correspond well to conventional notions of musical form. We show further how the constrained clustering approach can easily be extended to include prior musical knowledge, input from other machine approaches, or semi-supervision.


Sir I read with interest the article by Dr Olsen and colleagues on the value of laparoscopy before appendicectomy in women (Br J Surg 1993; 80: 922-3). The use of laparoscopy in the diagnosis and treatment of acute appendicitis is becoming widespread in this country and elsewhere in the world. Although this technique is very useful in confirming acute appendicitis and also in diagnosing other pathologies (especially gynaecological ones), practising surgeons must be wary of the 'laparoscopically normal' appendix. Dr Olsen and colleagues used the criterion that appendicitis could be excluded 'if a normal appendix could be seen throughout its length'. However, a recent study by Grunewald and Keating' showed that, at open operation, surgeons diagnosed a normal appendix incorrectly in 26 per cent of patients when it was subsequently checked histologically. Furthermore, when the appendix appeared normal and no other pathology could be found, the false-reassurance rate rose to 29 per cent. The laparoscope affords excellent views of much of the peritoneal cavity and allows visualization of the pelvic organs while causing minimal morbidity to the patient. It also magnifies the appendix, allowing very close inspection of this structure. Unfortunately, there are no data to show conclusively that laparoscopic assessment of the 'normal' appendix is any more accurate than inspection at open operation. My own attempts at assessing the turgidity of the 'normal' looking appendix via the laparoscope (the 'wobbly' sign) and comparing this with subsequent histological findings in an attempt to identify the hidden inflammation has shown no correlation. TherefoJe, in the face of such a high false-reassurance rate it is inadvisable at present to leave a laparoscopically normal appendix, especially if the clinical picture is suspicious of appendicitis and no other cause of pain can be identified.


Background: Wilm's tumor is the most frequent primary renal neoplasma in pediatric age group. Classically it is composed of three histologic parts: Blastemal, Epithelial and stromal. Different factors are implicated as prognostic determinants. Nowadays special attention is paid to proliferation markers for determining the biologic behavior of tumors. In this study we tried to ascertain the proliferative index of 22 cases of Wilm's tumor in our center who have had rather good follow up (at least two years).
Materials and Methods: After reviewing the H and E slides, we stained sections with PCNA and ki67 and scanned them by image cytomertry. Then the proliferative indices for each histological part was determined.
Results: We resuted that proliferative indices of blastemal and epithelial parts have significant (P< 0.0002) difference (increment) from that of stromal part. Also the patients were divided into those with recurrence (within two ys of primary surgery) and recurrence. The profileration indices of PCNA for those recurring tumors was significantly higher (PCNA= 22.3%) (P= 0.0015).
Conclusion: Finally we concluded that using proliferative markers in Wilm's tumor is useful as an effective prognostic factor.


Mammography is used to screen a large fraction of the population for breast cancer, and mammography quality X rays are speculated to be more damaging than the higher energy X rays used for other diagnostic procedures. The radiation dose delivered to breast cells as a result of these screening exposures may be a concern. The purpose of this current study was to determine the relative biological effectiveness (RBE) of low-energy mammography X rays for radiation-induced DNA double-strand breaks evaluated using a highly sensitive automated 53BP1 assay. Automation of the 53BP1 assay enabled the quantification and analysis of meaningful image-based features, including foci counting, within the cell nuclei. Nontumorigenic, human breast epithelial MCF-10A cells were irradiated in the low-dose range with approximately 3–30 mGy of 29 kVp mammography X rays or 137Cs (662 keV) gamma rays. The induction and resolution of the 53BP1 foci did not differ significantly between exposures to 137Cs gamma rays and 29 kVp X rays. The RBE was calculated to be 1.1 with a standard deviation of 0.2 for the initial number of radiation-induced double-strand breaks. The radiation dose from a single mammogram did not yield a significant change in the number of detectable foci. However, analysis of additional features revealed subtle differences in the distribution of 53BP1 throughout the nuclei after exposure to the different radiation qualities. A single mammogram was sufficient to alter the distribution of 53BP1 within the nuclear area, but not into discrete foci, while a dose-matched gamma exposure was not sufficient to alter the distribution of 53BP1. Our results indicate that exposure to clinically relevant doses of low-energy mammography quality X rays does not induce more DNA double-strand breaks than exposure to higher energy photons.


The design of the literature curriculum in the Albanian pre-university education level presents complex problems. Such issues are reflected in the results of literature State Matura exams. The purpose of this study is to analyze the design of literature curriculum and its implementation and evaluation. The focus is in identifying these issues and in proposing a suitable solution geared towards eliminating them. This study tries to give an answer to the question: What are some of the design, implementation, and evaluation issues that are present in the Albanian preuniversity literature curriculum? To achieve the purpose of this study, curriculum documents, such as school programs, teaching plans, textbooks, items from the literature State Matura exams, and official students results data in these exams were analysed. The findings of this study clearly show that, despite the efforts of the working groups, there are certain gaps in the design, implementation, and evaluation process of the literature curriculum. Based on these findings, recommendations will be given on improving of the content and the process of literature curriculum development, which takes into consideration the Albanian tradition and history, but is also intuned with the most updated trends in curriculum design and implementation.


Corrugated paperboard is the primary material used in the transportation, distribution and storage of many products, particularly horticultural produce. Corrugated paperboard packages provide protection to packed produce against mechanical loadings at all phases of distribution. These packages filled with produce are exposed to different hazards such as being dropped from height, transportation shocks, compression during stacking and exposure to the weight of other packed produce, all of which can damage produce. This review discusses performance testing of corrugated paperboard packaging, and highlights the manufacturing process and cold chain environment factors affecting the strength of corrugated paperboard packaging. The performance requirements for corrugated paperboard packages include appearance, structural stability and protection of contents. Testing the quality of corrugated paperboard and its various components, maintaining good control of manufacturing operations and environmental factors such as moisture, humidity and temperature are necessary for better understanding the performance of corrugated paperboard packaging. Advances in numerical techniques such as finite element analysis (FEA) offer new prospects and opportunities for replacing tedious, time-consuming and expensive experiments to improve the performance of corrugated paperboard packaging.


ABSTRACT The E1B-55-kDa protein of adenovirus type 5 and the p53 tumor suppressor gene product form a complex that localizes to the cytoplasm, thereby downregulating p53's transcriptional activity. The E4orf6 protein binds and relocalizes E1B-55-kDa, and the proteins act synergistically to inactivate p53. We show that another adenovirus E4 gene product, E4orf3, is also sufficient to relocalize E1B-55-kDa from the cytoplasm to the nucleus. Both proteins are then found in discrete nuclear structures (tracks) that are known to contain components of the promyelocytic leukemia-associated nuclear structure. Simultaneously, p53 is dissociated from E1B-55-kDa and is found evenly distributed over the nucleoplasm. In the presence of E4orf3, p53-dependent transcriptional activity is no longer repressed by E1B-55-kDa. When E1B-55-kDa is coexpressed with E4orf3 and E4orf6, E1B-55-kDa is found to colocalize with E4orf6 rather than E4orf3. In parallel, p53 is inhibited and degraded by the combination of E1B-55-kDa and E4orf6, regardless of coexpressed E4orf3. This suggests that the effects of E4orf6 on E1B-55-kDa overrule the actions of E4orf3. When cells are infected with virus expressing E4orf3 but not E4orf6, E1B is found in the cell nucleus and p53 enters the virus replication centers. After infection with wild-type adenovirus, E4orf3 is expressed before E4orf6 and E1B temporarily colocalizes with E4orf3 in nuclear tracks before associating with E4orf6. We propose that during adenovirus infection, the E4orf3 protein transiently liberates p53 from its association with E1B-55-kDa. Subsequently, p53 is inactivated and degraded by the combination of E1B-55-kDa and E4orf6.


We have previously shown that PKC inhibitors interfere with the Ets1/Smad3-dependent regulation of parathyroid hormone-related protein (PTHrP) P3 promoter activity by TGFbeta in invasive MDA-MB-231 breast cancer cells. By examining PKC expression in a variety of breast cancer cell lines, the protein level of PKCalpha was found to be much higher in Ets1-expressing MDA-MB-231 and MDA-MB-435 breast cancer cells than in Ets1-deficient MCF-7 and SK-BR3 cells. No correlation of Ets1 expression with the expression of other PKC subtypes (PKCbeta1, PKCbeta2, PKCdelta or PKCepsilon) could be observed. In contrast to MDA-MB-231 cells, PKCalpha-deficient MCF-7 cells do not support Ets1-induced activation of the PTHrP P3 promoter suggesting that PKCalpha may be important for Ets1 activity. A constitutively active form of PKCalpha was found to potentiate the P3 promoter activation by Ets1 alone and in synergy with Smad3. PKCalpha, but not PKCepsilon, also induced phosphorylation of the Ets1 protein. Both PKCalpha effects on Ets1 depended on the exon VII domain of Ets1. Using verapamil and ionomycin, we could show that PKCalpha induces Ets1 phosphorylation independent of calcium mobilization. Collectively, our data suggest that PKCalpha may regulate Ets1 activity in invasive breast cancer cells.


The graphite-like carbon (GLC) coating was deposited onto high-speed steel (HSS) twist drills by magnetron sputter ion plating technique. The drilling tests were performed on the ferrous metal under dry cutting conditions. By the analysis and comparison of the flank wear and the drilling forces on drills, the cutting performance of GLC coated HSS tools was researched. The results show that GLC coating with high hardness and low friction coefficient, due to its good adhesion and match with HSS substrate, can significantly improve the cutting performance of HSS twist drills, prolong the tool life, decrease the drilling forces in drilling the ferrous metal. And its cutting performance is better than the hard coated drills in the lower speed, but its thermal stability is inferior to the hard coated drills in the higher speed.


Abstract This study integrated flow theory and reversal theory perspectives to investigate a potential range of flow states amongst adventure participants in a sequence of two studies. Study one was conducted with expert (n = 6) adventure participants via retrospective interviews, while study two collected prospective data from novice whitewater riversurfers (n = 10) via waterproof-surveys and head-mounted video cameras. These methods were used to evaluate previous conjectures that distinct 'serious' (telic) and 'playful' (paratelic) flow states may occur in adventure activities and to identify key characteristics which may underpin distinct flow states. Results highlighted qualitative differences amongst flow states, as well as suggesting that flow research in adventurous pursuits could benefit from the integration of reversal theory constructs.


A polynya that forms each winter south of St. Lawrence Island in the Bering Sea is located near very high standing stocks of macrobenthic invertebrates on this Arctic continental shelf. Sampling during or just after the ice melt in 1990, 1993, and 1994 revealed water-column, sediment particle and chemical distributions that were consistent with a high flux of organic materials to the sediments during the ice retreat. In contrast, lower phytoplankton biomass observed in late summer and fall of 1993, 1998, and 1999 was associated with seasonal declines in sedimentation indicators such as chlorophyll a in the water column and deposited on the surface sediments, lower occurrences of an atmospherically derived radionuclide beryllium-7 ( 7 Be) in surface sediments, and lower sedi- ment oxygen demand. Moreover, observations under late-winter conditions in April 1999 did not support a direct, continuous linkage between water-column production when the winter polynya is active and the very high benthic biomass and productivity observed on this shallow (30 to 60 m) shelf. For example, deposition of recent water-column production to the sediments in April was signifi- cantly lower than that during and just after the ice retreat in May and June. This lower rate of depo- sition in April was inferred from proxy indicators including photosynthetically-competent chlorophyll extractable from surface sediments, the presence of 7 Be in surface sediments, and sediment oxygen demand. Despite high nutrient concentrations, water-column chlorophyll a concentrations were also uniformly lower (0.5 to 2 mg m -3 ) in April than in May and June. Measurements of the underwater light and ultraviolet radiation field and analysis of DNA damage to dosimeters indicated that the low chlorophyll a biomass is probably not influenced by UV radiation in late winter and early spring. The stable carbon isotope composition of organic carbon in surface sediments suggests that open-water production in the polynya, relative to the adjacent production of sea-ice algae, is not large enough to influence the isotopic composition of organic materials in surface sediments near the polynya.


This paper presents optimal parameter selection and preconditioning of the alternating direction method of multipliers (ADMM) algorithm for a class of distributed quadratic problems, which can be formulated as equality-constrained quadratic programming problems. The parameter selection focuses on the ADMM step-size and relaxation parameter, while the preconditioning corresponds to selecting the edge weights of the underlying communication graph. We optimize these parameters to yield the smallest convergence factor of the iterates. Explicit expressions are derived for the step-size and relaxation parameter, as well as for the corresponding convergence factor. Numerical simulations justify our results and highlight the benefits of optimal parameter selection and preconditioning for the ADMM algorithm.


Shiva Naipaul was the brother of V. S. Naipaul and author of "Fireflies" and "The Chip-Chip Gatherers". "The Chip-Chip Gatherers", his second novel, was winner of the Whitbread Literary Award in 1973 and is set in Naipaul's native Trinidad. It includes a new foreword by Amit Chaudhuri. The crowded, ramshackle community of the Settlement in Trinidad is at the mercy of a tyrant. Egbert Ramsaran, the proud owner of the Ramsaran Transport Company, who has become the richest man in town through sheer strength of will, is a capricious, eccentric despot who loves nobody and whom nobody can afford to ignore. There is his son Wilbert, bullied into passivity and failure; Vishnu the downtrodden grocer without grace or hope; the beautiful, unpredictable Sushila, who tries to wield her seductive powers over Ramsaran; and her daughter, Sita, intelligent enough to know that escape is possible. Their intricately woven lives are perfectly captured in all their pathos, comedy and humanity.


PURPOSE
To establish the accuracy and speed ofbGPUMCD, a GPU-oriented Monte Carlo code used for high dose rate brachytherapy dose calculations. The first objective is to evaluate the time required for dose calculation when full Monte Carlo generated dose distribution kernels are used for plan optimization. The second objective is to assess the accuracy and speed when recalculating pre-optimized plans, consisting of many dwell positions.

METHODS
bGPUMCD is tested with three clinical treatment plans : one prostate case, one breast case, and one rectum case with a shielded applicator. Reference distributions, generated with GEANT4, are used as a basis of comparison. Calculations of full dose distributions of pre-optimized treatment plans as well as single dwell dosimetry are performed. Single source dosimetry, based on TG-43 parameters reproduction, is also presented for the microSelectron V2 (Nucletron, Veenendaal, The Netherlands).

RESULTS
In timing experiments, the computation of single dwell position dose kernels takes between 0.25 and 0.5 s.bGPUMCD can compute full dose distributions of previously optimized plans in ∼2 s. bGPUMCD is capable of computing pre-optimized brachytherapy plans within 1% for the prostate case and 2% for the breast and shielded applicator cases, when comparing the dosimetric parameters D90 and V100 of the reference (GEANT4) and bGPUMCD distributions. For all voxels within the target, an absolute average difference of approximately 1% is found for the prostate case, less than 2% for the breast case and less than 2% for the rectum case with shielded applicator. Larger point differences (>5%) are found within bony regions in the prostate case, where bGPUMCD underdoses compared to GEANT4. Single source dosimetry results are mostly within 2% for the radial function and within 1%-4% for the anisotropic function.

CONCLUSIONS
bGPUMCD has the potential to allow for fast MC dose calculation in a clinical setting for all phases of HDR treatment planning, from dose kernel calculations for plan optimization to plan recalculation.


An interview in May 1984 with Seth Neddermeyer, emeritus professor of physics at the University of Washington, in Seattle. After receiving a BA from Stanford in 1929, Dr. Neddermeyer took his PhD at Caltech in 1935 with Carl D. Anderson. With Anderson, he discovered the muon, an unstable negatively charged elementary particle, in 1936. During World War II, he worked on the Manhattan Project at Los Alamos, where he proposed using implosion to compress radioactive material to a critical mass in order to make a workable bomb. For these two accomplishments, he would receive the 1982 Enrico Fermi Award.
After the war, he went to the University of Washington, where this interview took place four years before his death. In the interview, he describes his early education in his hometown of Richmond, Michigan; his first two years of undergraduate education at Olivet College and his interest in chemistry; his two years at Stanford; and his years at Caltech (1930-1941) as a graduate student, then a research fellow, working with Anderson. He offers recollections of Robert Andrews Millikan, whose interest in cosmic rays was closely bound to the work he and Anderson were doing; of Fritz Zwicky, Richard C. Tolman, and Harry Bateman; and of J. Robert Oppenheimer, both at Los Alamos and at Caltech, where he was a visiting professor in the spring term in the 1930s. He recalls receiving the Fermi award and discusses his negative feelings about his work on the atomic bomb.


Platelet transfusions can be necessary during treatment of patients with thrombocytopenia or impaired platelet function. Platelet function in platelet concentrates (PC) deteriorate with storage time. Studying swirling is often used to control the quality of PC's before transfusion but the method has some disadvantages. Therefore other methods can be useful, for example impedance aggregometry (IA, Multiplate® Analyzer) to measure platelet function. In this study the change in platelet function over time was examined in buffy coat and apheresis platelets with IA where aggregation had been induced with adenosine diphosphate (ADP) and collagen. PC's were tested on day 1, 4 and 7 after donation. One of the main aims of this study was to evaluate if dilution to a standardized platelet concentration (800x109 platelets/L) for IA of PC's could be used, since platelet concentration has been shown to influence aggregation. The effect of pathogen inactivation (INTERCEPT) on platelet function and the importance of fibrinogen for aggregation were also studied. The dilution of platelet samples reduced the range of measured values and was suitable to use with collagen but not ADP. The platelet function decreased significantly over time with both agonists. There was a significant difference between pathogen inactivated and gamma irradiated PC's with collagen activation on day 1. Fibrinogen was shown to be of importance for platelet aggregation, but other factors in plasma seem to be necessary too. In conclusion, IA is a suitable method for following change in aggregability over time in PC's and sample dilution reduced variation in results.


A senior-graduate level course is described in which some of the material of traditional bioinstrumentation courses is presented in conjunction with laboratory applications of a minicomputer. During the course each student 1) learns aspects of the fundamental properties of bioelectrodes, transducers, and safe human biopotential measurement techniques, 2) uses a minicomputer as a laboratory instrument, and 3) initiates and completes two projects that require independent thinking, initiative, and careful execution. In the course of the computer applications the students 1) learn to use elements of a fairly sophisticated operating system (OS/8), 2) master a simple but powerful higher level computer language (Basic), 3) apply one or more sophisticated signal analysis programs to their biological data (time averaging, correlation, spectral analysis, time and post stimulus interval anaylsis), and 4) solve a "real world" problem that requires a nonsystem interface to the computer. The heavy emphasis on the laboratory portion of the course provides the opportunity for practical "hands-on" experience with bioinstrumentation and with computer based data acquisition, processing, and display techniques.