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1,294,896 | In 2018 Willerslev lead an international research team sequencing 26 ancient human genome sequences from across Southeast Asia, some dating back 8 thousand years, 4 thousand years earlier than previous sequences from the region. This was made possible by a modified whole genome capture approach. They used this data to test two hypotheses on southeast Asian population history: One theory argues that the indigenous Hòabìnhian hunter-gatherers who populated Southeast Asia from 44,000 years ago adopted agricultural practices independently, without the input from early farmers from East Asia. A second theory, referred to as the ‘two-layer model’ favours the view that migrating rice farmers from what is now China replaced the indigenous Hòabìnhian hunter-gatherers. They determined that neither interpretation fits the complexity of Southeast Asian history and that contemporary Southeast Asians have been influenced by at least four migration waves. The first wave is represented by Hòabìnhian hunter-gatherers who were closely genetically related to traditional hunter-gatherers in Malaysia, the Philippines, and the Andaman Islands (so-called “negritos”). The second wave derived from mainland China and brought with them farming economies such as rice 4000 years ago and mixed with the Hòabìnhians. These were followed by two additional migration waves; by 2 thousand years ago, Southeast Asian individuals carried additional East Asian ancestry components. One component likely represents the introduction of ancestral Kradai languages in Mainland southeast Asia, and another the Austronesian expansion reaching Indonesia by 2.1 thousand years ago and the Philippines by 1.8 thousand years ago. Among their genomes was also an ancient Jōmon genome from Japan that showed shared genetic history with the Hòabìnhians. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=19136941 | 1,294,185 |
1,139,851 | Although proposed as a means of increasing efficiency, in recent years, interest has been shown in CLC as a carbon capture technique. Carbon capture is facilitated by CLC because the two redox reactions generate two intrinsically separated flue gas streams: a stream from the air reactor, consisting of atmospheric and residual , but sensibly free of ; and a stream from the fuel reactor predominately containing and with very little diluent nitrogen. The air reactor flue gas can be discharged to the atmosphere causing minimal pollution. The reducer exit gas contains almost all of the generated by the system and CLC therefore can be said to exhibit 'inherent carbon capture', as water vapor can easily be removed from the second flue gas via condensation, leading to a stream of almost pure . This gives CLC clear benefits when compared with competing carbon capture technologies, as the latter generally involve a significant energy penalty associated with either post combustion scrubbing systems or the work input required for air separation plants. This has led to CLC being proposed as an energy efficient carbon capture technology, able to capture nearly all of the CO, for example, from a Coal Direct Chemical Looping (CDCL) plant. A continuous 200-hour demonstration results of a 25 kW CDCL sub-pilot unit indicated nearly 100% coal conversion to CO with no carbon carryover to the air reactor. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=13676918 | 1,139,257 |
169,818 | In addition to his seminal work on the amino acid sequence of insulin, Frederick Sanger and his colleagues played a key role in the development of DNA sequencing techniques that enabled the establishment of comprehensive genome sequencing projects. In 1975, he and Alan Coulson published a sequencing procedure using DNA polymerase with radiolabelled nucleotides that he called the "Plus and Minus technique". This involved two closely related methods that generated short oligonucleotides with defined 3' termini. These could be fractionated by electrophoresis on a polyacrylamide gel (called polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis) and visualised using autoradiography. The procedure could sequence up to 80 nucleotides in one go and was a big improvement, but was still very laborious. Nevertheless, in 1977 his group was able to sequence most of the 5,386 nucleotides of the single-stranded bacteriophage φX174, completing the first fully sequenced DNA-based genome. The refinement of the "Plus and Minus" method resulted in the chain-termination, or Sanger method (see below), which formed the basis of the techniques of DNA sequencing, genome mapping, data storage, and bioinformatic analysis most widely used in the following quarter-century of research. In the same year Walter Gilbert and Allan Maxam of Harvard University independently developed the Maxam-Gilbert method (also known as the "chemical method") of DNA sequencing, involving the preferential cleavage of DNA at known bases, a less efficient method. For their groundbreaking work in the sequencing of nucleic acids, Gilbert and Sanger shared half the 1980 Nobel Prize in chemistry with Paul Berg (recombinant DNA). | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=55170 | 169,728 |
984,528 | Wild-type AAV has attracted considerable interest from gene therapy researchers due to a number of features. Chief amongst these is the virus's apparent lack of pathogenicity. It can also infect non-dividing cells and has the ability to stably integrate into the host cell genome at a specific site (designated AAVS1) in the human chromosome 19. This feature makes it somewhat more predictable than retroviruses, which present the threat of a random insertion and of mutagenesis, which is sometimes followed by development of a cancer. The AAV genome integrates most frequently into the site mentioned, while random incorporations into the genome take place with a negligible frequency. Development of AAVs as gene therapy vectors, however, has eliminated this integrative capacity by removal of the "rep" and "cap" from the DNA of the vector. The desired gene together with a promoter to drive transcription of the gene is inserted between the inverted terminal repeats (ITRs) that aid in concatemer formation in the nucleus after the single-stranded vector DNA is converted by host cell DNA polymerase complexes into double-stranded DNA. AAV-based gene therapy vectors form episomal concatemers in the host cell nucleus. In non-dividing cells, these concatemers remain intact for the life of the host cell. In dividing cells, AAV DNA is lost through cell division, since the episomal DNA is not replicated along with the host cell DNA. Random integration of AAV DNA into the host genome is detectable but occurs at very low frequency. AAVs also present very low immunogenicity, seemingly restricted to generation of neutralizing antibodies, while they induce no clearly defined cytotoxic response. This feature, along with the ability to infect quiescent cells present their dominance over adenoviruses as vectors for human gene therapy. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=1883421 | 984,014 |
1,471,929 | "Discovery" lifted off successfully at 06:21 EDT, making this launch as the last night launch in the Space Shuttle program. After the eight and a half-minute ride to space, "Discovery"'s seven person crew began configuring the orbiter from a launch vehicle to an orbital vehicle. Commander Alan Poindexter and pilot Jim Dutton, with help from mission specialist 2 Dorothy Metcalf-Lindenburger, also performed a series of engine firings or burns to adjust their speed and refine their path to the International Space Station. While the engine burns were going on, the rest of the crew opened the payload bay doors, set up the computers and K band antenna. The antenna suffered a failure during normal checkout and setup on orbit. Due to the failure, the normal downlink of imagery of the external tank was not completed. The crew on board will monitor the inspections of the thermal protection system (TPS) in real time and will note any spots of interest and let the ground know while downlinking the imagery after docking. The dish antenna also serves as a radar antenna, measuring the distance to the space station. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=6002628 | 1,471,100 |
1,221,301 | When the Nazis seized power, Ley's situation became increasingly desperate. He was horrified by National Socialism, its ideology and its style of violent politics. His perception of political events can be inferred from a short science fiction story called "Fog," which Ley wrote in 1940 under the pen name of Robert Wiley. It is a biographical narrative about an office manager dealing with the everyday effects of totalitarianism. Although the story is set in New York City during a failed Communist revolution, it is clear that Ley is retelling his personal experiences in Berlin. In fact, John Campbell, the editor of "Astounding", requested that Ley center the narrative on his personal experience. Ley not only disliked the irrational nature of German politics, but he also associated the Nazis with the rise of "Pseudo-science." To make matters worse, Ley had an established reputation as an international scientist, who openly shared and popularized technical information about rocketry, while his articles continued to be republished by foreign newspapers throughout 1934. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=421035 | 1,220,643 |
963,673 | In order to service new and larger aircraft like the Nakajima B6N "Jill" torpedo bomber and the Yokosuka D4Y "Judy" dive bomber, the flight deck was extended over at each end to a total length of from 27 March to 26 April 1944. "Hōshō" also received new arresting gear and a new crash barrier. The additional weight high up in the ship adversely affected her stability and she was restricted from operations in bad weather lest she capsize. At some point during the war the ship's 14 cm guns were removed and she received about twenty 25-millimeter Type 96 autocannons in single mounts. They fired projectiles at a muzzle velocity of ; at 50°, this provided a maximum range of , and an effective ceiling of . The 15-round magazines needed to be changed frequently, and the maximum effective rate of fire was only between 110 and 120 rounds per minute. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=494604 | 963,164 |
820,696 | The Sommerfeld–Zenneck wave or Zenneck wave is a non-radiative guided electromagnetic wave that is supported by a planar or spherical interface between two homogeneous media having different dielectric constants. This surface wave propagates parallel to the interface and decays exponentially vertical to it, a property known as evanescence. It exists under the condition that the permittivity of one of the materials forming the interface is negative, while the other one is positive, as for example the interface between air and a lossy conducting medium such as the terrestrial transmission line, below the plasma frequency. Its electric field strength falls off at a rate of e/√d in the direction of propagation along the interface due to two-dimensional geometrical field spreading at a rate of 1/√d, in combination with a frequency-dependent exponential attenuation (α), which is the terrestrial transmission line dissipation, where α depends on the medium’s conductivity. Arising from original analysis by Arnold Sommerfeld and Jonathan Zenneck of the problem of wave propagation over a lossy earth, it exists as an exact solution to Maxwell's equations. The Zenneck surface wave, which is a non-radiating guided-wave mode, can be derived by employing the Hankel transform of a radial ground current associated with a realistic terrestrial Zenneck surface wave source. Sommerfeld-Zenneck surface waves predict that the energy decays as R because the energy distributes over the circumference of a circle and not the surface of a sphere. Evidence does not show that in radio space wave propagation, Sommerfeld-Zenneck surfaces waves are a mode of propagation as the path-loss exponent is generally between 20 dB/dec and 40 dB/dec. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=41763 | 820,255 |
2,215,898 | After his departure from Wimpey Dwyer was appointed chairman of the Liverpool Vision urban regeneration company. This company was established to provide an economic stimulus for the regeneration of the city which had declined in population from one million people to around 400,000 and gained a reputation for high unemployment and crime rates. Dwyer was responsible for bringing Tesco CEO Terry Leahy onto the board and led a £2 billion programme of capital investment. Under his leadership Liverpool Vision refurbished Lime Street station, regenerated King's Dock and established a training scheme to accommodate 2,000 apprentices a year. Dwyer was responsible for the cancellation of the Fourth Grace landmark building scheme, designed by Will Alsop, on cost grounds. This decision led to the resignation of Labour politician Joe Anderson from the board of Liverpool Vision. Dwyer was also responsible for the decision not to proceed with the construction of a new stadium for Everton F.C. at King's Dock. Dwyer believed the stadium should have been owned and operated by the public sector and also had concerns that Everton could not raise the necessary capital investment to proceed with the scheme. He instead proceeded with a project to construct the Liverpool Arena on the site as a venue for smaller sporting and musical events. Dwyer was made a Knight Bachelor in the 2001 Birthday Honours for his services to Liverpool Vision. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=61959129 | 2,214,638 |
183,919 | In September 2020, research studies led by Cardiff University using the James Clerk Maxwell and ALMA radio telescopes noted the detection of phosphine in Venus's atmosphere that was not linked to any known abiotic method of production present, or possible under Venusian conditions. It is extremely hard to make, and the chemistry in the Venusian clouds should destroy the molecules before they could accumulate to the observed amounts. The phosphine was detected at heights of at least 48 km above the surface of Venus, and was detected primarily at mid-latitudes with none detected at the poles of Venus. Scientists note that the detection itself could be further verified beyond the use of multiple telescopes detecting the same signal, as the phosphine fingerprint described in the study could theoretically be a false signal introduced by the telescopes or by data processing. The detection was later suggested to be a false positive or true signal with much over-estimated amplitude, compatible with 1 ppb concentration of phosphine. The re-analysis of ALMA dataset in April 2021 have recovered the 20 ppb phosphine signal, with signal-to-noise ratio of 5.4, and by August 2021 it was confirmed the suspected contamination by sulfur dioxide was contributing only 10% to the tentative signal in phosphine spectral line band. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=6410946 | 183,822 |
1,875,651 | Nineteenth century anthropologists focused on technology as a mechanism for classifying and ranking human societies. A common assumption was that inventions and discoveries served to elevate societies from primitive, simple, and “savage” conditions to complex civilizations, as exemplified by the work of Lewis Henry Morgan. Debate focused on whether a specific technical practice was acquired through invention, diffusion, or migration. Ethnology museums acquired artifacts to demonstrate the stages of cultural evolution. Early twentieth century anthropologists disputed this view, noting the complexity of non-state societies in northwest Canada and the Trobriand Islands. Bronislaw Malinowski decried the “technological enthusiasms” of ethnologists, insisting that technologies in such societies should be studied holistically, as part of a complex, interdependent formation, in order to put anthropology on a more scientific footing. Nevertheless, the decades to follow in English-speaking countries saw the relegation of material culture studies to museums of ethnology, as anthropologists preferred to study cultures as mental creation. Technology was seen as a sphere largely divorced from the cultural. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=71498816 | 1,874,574 |
794,214 | On 16 December 2002, US President George W. Bush signed National Security Presidential Directive which outlined a plan to begin deployment of operational ballistic missile defense systems by 2004. The following day, the US formally requested from the UK and Denmark use of facilities in RAF Fylingdales, England and Thule, Greenland, respectively, as a part of the NMD Program. The administration continued to push the program, but received pushback from multiple fronts. Firstly, some scientists opposed the program and raised ethical objections. Secondly, some trial-and-error technical failures during development became highly publicized, though from a technical standpoint they were unsurprising and even expected. The projected cost of the program for the years 2004 to 2009 was 53 billion US dollars, making it the largest single line in The Pentagon's budget. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=2380807 | 793,789 |
357,359 | In response to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, France performed two deployments of Mirage F1s to the Persian Gulf. In October 1990, 12 Mirage F1Cs were dispatched to Doha, Qatar in order to boost air defences, while a further four Mirage F1CRs of ER 33 were deployed to Saudi Arabia as part of Operation Daguet in September 1990. To avoid the risk of being mistaken for hostile Iraqi Mirage F1s, all of the French F1CRs were grounded during the first few days of the Allied air attacks, flying their first combat mission on 26 January 1991; an additional reason for their initial grounding was the lack of compatible night vision equipment. They were used in the fighter bomber role, using their more capable navigation systems to lead formations of French Jaguar fighter bombers, as well as to fly reconnaissance missions; in this capacity, 114 sorties had been flown by the end of hostilities. Following the end of the Gulf War, France deployed a number of Mirage F1CRs to bases in neighbouring Turkey as part of Operation Provide Comfort to protect Kurds from Iraqi aggression. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=377985 | 357,173 |
244,472 | In 1890, Édouard Branly demonstrated what he later called the "radio-conductor," which Lodge in 1893 named the coherer, the first sensitive device for detecting radio waves. Shortly after the experiments of Hertz, Branly discovered that loose metal filings, which in a normal state have a high electrical resistance, lose this resistance in the presence of electric oscillations and become practically conductors of electricity. This Branly showed by placing metal filings in a glass box or tube, and making them part of an ordinary electric circuit. According to the common explanation, when electric waves are set up in the neighborhood of this circuit, electromotive forces are generated in it which appear to bring the filings more closely together, that is, to cohere, and thus their electrical resistance decreases, from which cause this piece of apparatus was termed by Sir Oliver Lodge a coherer. Hence the receiving instrument, which may be a telegraph relay, that normally would not indicate any sign of current from the small battery, can be operated when electric oscillations are set up. Branly further found that when the filings had once cohered they retained their low resistance until shaken apart, for instance, by tapping on the tube. The coherer, however, was not sensitive enough to be used reliably as radio developed. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=3800477 | 244,345 |
1,397,525 | The acoustic mismatch theory predicted a very high thermal resistance (low thermal conductance) at solid-helium interfaces. This is problematic for researchers working at ultra-cold temperatures because it greatly impedes cooling rates at low temperatures such as in dilution refrigerators. Fortunately such a large thermal resistance was not observed due to many mechanisms which promoted phonon transport. In liquid helium, Van der Waals forces actually work to solidify the first few monolayers against a solid. This boundary layer functions much like an anti-reflection coating in optics, so that phonons which would typically be reflected from the interface actually would transmit across the interface. This also helps to understand the pressure independence of the thermal conductance. The final dominant mechanism to anomalously low thermal resistance of liquid helium interfaces is the effect of surface roughness, which is not accounted for in the acoustic mismatch model. For a more detailed theoretical model of this aspect see the paper by A. Khater and J. Szeftel. Like electromagnetic waves which produce surface plasmons on rough surfaces, phonons can also induce surface waves. When these waves eventually scatter, they provide another mechanism for heat to transfer across the interface. Similarly, phonons are also capable of producing evanescent waves in a total internal reflection geometry. As a result, when these waves are scattered in the solid, additional heat is transferred from the helium beyond the prediction of the acoustic mismatch theory. For a more complete review on this topic see the review by Swartz. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=22902373 | 1,396,752 |
673,048 | Bessie Coleman was the first African American woman to become a licensed airplane pilot in 1921. That same year, Annie Langstaff, first law graduate of McGill University began taking flying lessons and in 1922 was proclaimed in an article in "Maclean's Magazine", as Canada's first woman to fly. It was Eileen Vollick who was the first women in Canada to obtain a Pilots License in 1928. That year, Japan's first woman pilot Tadashi Hyōdō earned her license. Kwon Ki-ok of Korea became the first female licensee of that country in 1925 and after World War II, became instrumental in helping establish the Republic of Korea Air Force. German Marga von Etzdorf was the first woman to fly for an airline when she began co-piloting for Lufthansa in 1927 and piloting solo on commercial Junkers F13 on 1 February 1928. In the late 1920s, women continued to compete in air races and contests related to flying. In 1929, Pancho Barnes moved to Hollywood to work as the first woman stunt pilot. Besides working on such films as Howard Hughes' "Hell's Angels" (1930), she also founded the Associated Motion Pictures Pilots Union in 1931. The first Women's Air Derby or Powder Puff Derby, an official women-only race from Santa Monica, California to Cleveland, Ohio, was held as part of the 1929 National Air Races and was won by Louise Thaden. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=47210395 | 672,696 |
263,406 | In joint study published in 2016 by Genome Biology and Evolution, a group of geneticists and linguists from the UK, Czech Republic, Russia and Lithuania, dismissed both the genetic and linguistic components of Elhaik's 2016 study. As for the genetic component, the authors argued that using a genetic "GPS tool" (as used by Elhaik et al.) would place Italians and Spaniards into Greece, all Tunisians and some Kuwaitis would be placed in the Mediterranean Sea, all Greeks were positioned in Bulgaria and in the Black Sea, and all Lebanese were scattered along a line connecting Egypt and the Caucasus; "These cases are sufficient to illustrate that mapping of test individuals has nothing to do with ancestral locations" the authors wrote. As for the linguistic component, the authors stated "Yiddish is a Germanic language, leaving no room for the Slavic relexification hypothesis and for the idea of early Yiddish-Persian contacts in Asia Minor. The study concluded that 'Yiddish is a Slavic language created by Irano-Turko-Slavic Jewish merchants along the Silk Roads as a cryptic trade language, spoken only by its originators to gain an advantage in trade' (Das et al. (2016) remains an assertion in the realm of unsupported speculation", the study concluded. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=26118437 | 263,263 |
441,709 | Today neurosurgeons are very proud to use microscopes in their procedures. But it was not always so: many prestigious centers did not accept that idea and it had to be developed in relative isolation. In the late 1950s William House began to explore new techniques for temporal bone surgery. He developed the middle fossa approach and perfected the translabyrinthine approach and began to use these techniques to remove acoustic nerve tumors. The first neurosurgeon to make use of the surgical microscope was a Turkish emigrant, Gazi Yasargil. In 1953 he studied neurovascular surgery during work with Prof. Hugo Krayenbühl in Switzerland. His ideas interested Dr. Pete Donaghy, who invited Yasargil to his microvascular laboratory in Burlington, Vermont. After his return to Zürich in 1967 Yasargil concentrated on discovering clinical applications to their novel inventions. Publications on that topic: "Micro-Vascular Surgery" and "Microsurgery Applied to Neurosurgery" won him international recognition. His lifelong experiences with microsurgery were recapitulated in the four-volume textbook entitled simply "Microneurosurgery". | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=1439268 | 441,494 |
844,238 | The remaining component of Marignac's ytterbia also proved to be a composite. In 1907, French scientist Georges Urbain, Austrian mineralogist Baron Carl Auer von Welsbach, and American chemist Charles James all independently discovered a new element within ytterbia. Welsbach proposed the name "cassiopeium" for his new element (after Cassiopeia), whereas Urbain chose the name "lutecium" (from Latin Lutetia, for Paris). The dispute on the priority of the discovery is documented in two articles in which Urbain and von Welsbach accuse each other of publishing results influenced by the published research of the other. In 1909, the Commission on Atomic Mass, which was responsible for the attribution of the names for the new elements, granted priority to Urbain and adopting his names as official ones. An obvious problem with this decision was that Urbain was one of the four members of the commission. In 1949, the spelling of element 71 was changed to lutetium. Later work connected with Urbain's attempts to further split his lutecium however revealed that it had only contained traces of the new element 71, and that it was only von Welsbach's cassiopeium that was pure element 71. For this reason many German scientists continued to use the name "cassiopeium" for the element until the 1950s. Ironically, Charles James, who had modestly stayed out of the argument as to priority, worked on a much larger scale than the others, and undoubtedly possessed the largest supply of lutetium at the time. Lutetium was the last of the stable rare earths to be discovered. Over a century of research had split the original yttrium of Gadolin into yttrium, scandium, lutetium, and seven other new elements. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=306609 | 843,788 |
489,712 | Compared to other phagocytes, the respiratory burst in AM is of a greater magnitude. Oxygen-independent microbicidal mechanisms are based on the production of acid, on the secretion of lysozymes, on iron-binding proteins, and on the synthesis of toxic cationic polypeptides. Macrophages possess a repertoire of antimicrobial molecules packaged within their granules and lysosomes. These organelles contain a myriad of degradative enzymes and antimicrobial peptides that are released into the phagolysosome, such as proteases, nucleases, phosphatases, esterases, lipases, and highly basic peptides. Moreover, macrophages possess a number of nutrient deprivation mechanisms that are used to starve phagocytosed pathogens of essential micronutrients. Certain microorganisms have evolved countermeasures which enable them to evade being destroyed by phagocytes. Although lysosomal-mediated degradation is an efficient means by which to neutralize an infection and prevent colonization, several pathogens parasitize macrophages, exploiting them as a host cell for growth, maintenance and replication. Parasites like Toxoplasma gondii and mycobacteria are able to prevent fusion of phagosomes with lysosomes, thus escaping the harmful action of lysosomal hydrolases. Others avoid lysosomes by leaving the phagocytic vacuole, to reach the cytosolic matrix where their development is unhindered. In these instances, macrophages may be triggered to actively destroy phagocytosed microorganisms by producing a number of highly toxic molecules and inducing deprivational mechanism to starve it. Finally, some microbes have enzymes to detoxify oxygen metabolites formed during the respiratory burst. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=8129870 | 489,459 |
1,604,336 | The institute plans to use a $14.9 million stimulus grant to create "The Integrative Phenotyping Center for Neuropsychiatry", a new interdisciplinary research center focused on the role of genetic and environmental factors in neuropsychiatric and behavioral disorders. This center is in the design phase and is expected to be under construction in 2011 and ready for occupancy in late 2012. It will employ around 180 employees and it will be housed in a space covering three renovated floors of the current Semel Institute tower. It will use a National Institutes of Health grant, funded through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, for research on autism, attention deficit disorder, schizophrenia, major depressive disorder, bipolar disorder, and Alzheimer's disease and other dementias. The facility will enable large-scale studies, including studies of personality, cognition, and brain activity and structure. "This project is completed." | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=26903241 | 1,603,435 |
1,914,557 | The origins of the ISMB conference lie in a workshop for artificial intelligence researchers with an interest in molecular biology held in November 1991. The workshop was organised by American researcher Lawrence Hunter, then director of the Machine Learning Project at the United States National Institutes of Health's National Library of Medicine (NLM) in Bethesda, Maryland. A subsequent workshop on the same topic held in 1992, hosted by the NLM and the National Science Foundation, made it clear that a regular international conference for the field was required. Such a conference would be dedicated to molecular biology as a rapidly emerging application of artificial intelligence. Having successfully applied for grants from AAAI, NIH and the Department of Energy Office of Health and Environmental Research, the first ISMB conference was held in July 1993, at the NLM. The conference was chaired by Hunter, David Searls (research associate professor at University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine) and Jude Shavlik (assistant professor of computer science at University of Wisconsin–Madison) and attracted over 200 attendees from 13 countries, submitting 69 scientific papers. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=9943124 | 1,913,458 |
1,463,010 | The project's management was transferred from NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, to its Lewis Research Center in Ohio in October 1962, and Abe Silverstein, a strong advocate of liquid hydrogen, took charge. He insisted on a thorough testing regime, which both identified problems and suggested solutions to them. The technical problems of the Centaur project were gradually overcome. The design notably included the weight-saving features pioneered by the Atlas rocket family: a monocoque steel shell that held its shape only when pressurized, hydrogen and oxygen tanks separated by a common bulkhead, and no internal bracing or insulation surrounding the propellant tanks. The technology for handling liquid hydrogen in Centaur was also used the S-II and S-IVB upper stages of the Saturn V rocket, and later by the Space Shuttle external tank and Space Shuttle main engines (SSME). | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=65467235 | 1,462,187 |
1,732,449 | The mantle length of "Stauroteuthis syrtensis" is about and its width about . The fins are some in width. The eight arms are of unequal length, the longest extending to about . These are joined for two-thirds of their length by two webs, a dorsal complete membrane and a ventral partial one, giving the animal an umbrella-like shape. The number of adhesive suckers ranges from 55 to 65. These suckers vary in size and distance among males and females. However, suckers generally decrease in diameter and distance as they extend down the arm. Female suckers reach a maximum diameter of 6.5 mm at suckers 1 to 3 while male suckers, on the other hand, are relatively larger. Between suckers 8 to 25 there are conspicuous cirri. These are elongate, fleshy tendrils borne on the sides of the oral surface of the arms, the longest being at sucker 20 which can be up to 50 mm in length. The oral cavity and mouth area are pink or purple in color that extends towards the arms and lightens as it reaches the tips. The general texture is gelatinous and the animal is reddish-brown and translucent, with the internal organs being visible through the skin. A vestigial, U-shaped, internal shell supports the fins, the only other hard part of the animal being the two-part beak. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=26142806 | 1,731,473 |
1,449,880 | The lack of distinct latitudinal gradients in soil biodiversity contrasts with those clear global patterns observed for plants above ground and has led to the assumption that they are indeed controlled by different factors. For example, in 2007 Lozupone and Knight found salinity was the major environmental determinant of bacterial diversity composition across the globe, rather than extremes of temperature, pH, or other physical and chemical factors. In another global scale study in 2014, Tedersoo "et al". concluded fungal richness is causally unrelated to plant diversity and is better explained by climatic factors, followed by edaphic and spatial patterns. Global patterns of the distribution of macroscopic organisms are far poorer documented. However, the little evidence available appears to indicate that, at large scales, soil metazoans respond to altitudinal, latitudinal or area gradients in the same way as those described for above-ground organisms. In contrast, at local scales, the high diversity of microhabitats commonly found in soils provides the required niche portioning to create “hot spots” of diversity in just a gram of soil. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=4807406 | 1,449,064 |
1,916,344 | Possibly the university's most notable symbol is the Memorial Tower, which is situated on the northeast corner of North Campus at the intersection of Hillsborough Street and Pullen Road. The bell tower was completed in 1937 and appears on NCSU's official seal. Its blending of Romanesque features and Gothic verticality are reminiscent of the towers of West Point. The monument, called "a legend in stone" contains 1,400 tons of stone set on a 700-ton concrete base, and exceeded $150,000 in cost. Although 33 alumni died in World War I, the memorial plaque contains 34 names. Before the armistice ended the war, the name G. L. Jeffers, Class of '13, was wrongly reported killed in action. Many years later, however, when the memorial plaque was made, a list was furnished to the manufacturer from which Jeffers' name had never been removed. When the error was noted on the finished plaque, a decision was made to alter the extra name beyond recognition. It was therefore changed to G. E. Jefferson, a symbol of unknown soldiers from State and elsewhere. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=8235183 | 1,915,245 |
414,435 | AHUS is usually caused by chronic, uncontrolled activation of the complement system, a branch of the body's immune system that destroys and removes foreign particles. The disease affects both children and adults and is characterized by systemic thrombotic microangiopathy (TMA), the formation of blood clots in small blood vessels throughout the body, which can lead to stroke, heart attack, kidney failure, and death. The complement system activation may be due to mutations in the complement regulatory proteins (factor H, factor I, or membrane cofactor protein), or is occasionally due to acquired neutralizing autoantibody inhibitors of these complement system components, for example anti–factor H antibodies. Prior to availability of eculizumab (Soliris) and ravulizumab (Ultomiris), an estimated 33–40% of patients died or developed end-stage renal disease (ESRD) (despite the use of supportive care, e.g. plasmapheresis) with the first clinical bout of aHUS. Including subsequent relapses, a total of approximately two-thirds (65%) of patients died, required dialysis, or had permanent renal damage within the first year after diagnosis despite plasma exchange or plasma infusion (PE/PI). | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=38187439 | 414,232 |
831,675 | The term "user friendly" is often used as a synonym for "usable", though it may also refer to accessibility. Usability describes the quality of user experience across websites, software, products, and environments. There is no consensus about the relation of the terms ergonomics (or human factors) and usability. Some think of usability as the software specialization of the larger topic of ergonomics. Others view these topics as tangential, with ergonomics focusing on physiological matters (e.g., turning a door handle) and usability focusing on psychological matters (e.g., recognizing that a door can be opened by turning its handle). Usability is also important in website development (web usability). According to Jakob Nielsen, "Studies of user behavior on the Web find a low tolerance for difficult designs or slow sites. People don't want to wait. And they don't want to learn how to use a home page. There's no such thing as a training class or a manual for a Web site. People have to be able to grasp the functioning of the site immediately after scanning the home page—for a few seconds at most." Otherwise, most casual users simply leave the site and browse or shop elsewhere. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=288276 | 831,226 |
1,620,841 | In 2006, there was a large outbreak in India. States affected by the outbreak were Andhra Pradesh, Andaman & Nicobar Islands, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Kerala and Delhi. The initial cases were reported from Hyderabad and Secunderabad as well as from Anantpur district as early as November and December 2005 and is continue unabated. In Hyderabad alone an average practitioner saw anywhere between 10 and 20 cases every day. Some deaths have been reported but it was thought to be due mainly to the inappropriate use of antibiotics and anti-inflammatory tablets. The major cause of mortality is due to severe dehydration, electrolyte imbalance and loss of glycemic control. Recovery is the rule except for about 3 to 5% incidence of prolonged arthritis. As this virus can cause thrombocytopenia, injudicious use of these drugs can cause erosions in the gastric epithelium leading to exsanguinating upper GI bleed (due to thrombocytopenia). Also the use of steroids for the control of joint pains and inflammation is dangerous and completely unwarranted. On average there are around 5,300 cases being treated every day. This figure is only from public sector. The figures from the private sector combined would be much higher. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=7149912 | 1,619,926 |
1,809,236 | Holgate's research interests include immunopharmacology, allergy, asthma and pollution. In 1980, after completing a 2 year post doctoral fellowship with K Frank Austen at the Robert Brigham Hospital and Harvard University, Boston provided by the Dorothy Temple Cross MRC endowment and the Wellcome Trust he returned to the University of Southampton to pursue a research career in asthma and allied disorders. This was focused on the causes of human asthma and its treatment. After establishing the key role that mast cells and other key effector cells play in triggering the acute allergic inflammatory response in asthma, he pursued the mechanisms of asthma chronicity and variability across the lifecourse. He has utilised many approaches to study asthma including epidemiology, genetics, pathology, microbiology and immunology, pharmacology and experimental medicine. This research has informed guidelines on asthma management and has identified and validated novel therapeutic targets. When joined by Donna Davies, a particular focus has been the important role that the epithelium plays in orchestrating both chronic airway inflammation as well as airway wall remodelling. The concept emerged that in severe asthma, the airways behaved like a chronic wound with impaired epithelial repair and underlying tissue remodelling involving the deposition of new matrix, mucous metaplasia and proliferation of smooth muscle. In a collaboration with Genome Therapeutics Corporation in Waltham, Mass, USA, this approach led to the discovery of the first novel asthma susceptibility gene in 2002 of ADAM33 that encodes a metalloprotease linked to airway hyperresponsiveness and remodelling. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=55597956 | 1,808,215 |
51,074 | Amphibians are ectothermic (cold-blooded) vertebrates that do not maintain their body temperature through internal physiological processes. Their metabolic rate is low and as a result, their food and energy requirements are limited. In the adult state, they have tear ducts and movable eyelids, and most species have ears that can detect airborne or ground vibrations. They have muscular tongues, which in many species can be protruded. Modern amphibians have fully ossified vertebrae with articular processes. Their ribs are usually short and may be fused to the vertebrae. Their skulls are mostly broad and short, and are often incompletely ossified. Their skin contains little keratin and lacks scales, apart from a few fish-like scales in certain caecilians. The skin contains many mucous glands and in some species, poison glands (a type of granular gland). The hearts of amphibians have three chambers, two atria and one ventricle. They have a urinary bladder and nitrogenous waste products are excreted primarily as urea. Most amphibians lay their eggs in water and have aquatic larvae that undergo metamorphosis to become terrestrial adults. Amphibians breathe by means of a pump action in which air is first drawn into the buccopharyngeal region through the nostrils. These are then closed and the air is forced into the lungs by contraction of the throat. They supplement this with gas exchange through the skin. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=621 | 51,054 |
16,840 | In 1966, Sagan and Shklovskii speculated that technological civilizations will either tend to destroy themselves within a century of developing interstellar communicative capability or master their self-destructive tendencies and survive for billion-year timescales. Self-annihilation may also be viewed in terms of thermodynamics: insofar as life is an ordered system that can sustain itself against the tendency to disorder, Stephen Hawking's "external transmission" or interstellar communicative phase, where knowledge production and knowledge management is more important than transmission of information via evolution, may be the point at which the system becomes unstable and self-destructs. Here, Hawking emphasizes self-design of the human genome (transhumanism) or enhancement via machines (e.g., brain–computer interface) to enhance human intelligence and reduce aggression, without which he implies human civilization may be too stupid collectively to survive an increasingly unstable system. For instance, the development of technologies during the "external transmission" phase, such as weaponization of artificial general intelligence or antimatter, may not be met by concomitant increases in human ability to manage its own inventions. Consequently, disorder increases in the system: global governance may become increasingly destabilized, worsening humanity's ability to manage the possible means of annihilation listed above, resulting in global societal collapse. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=11579 | 16,835 |
1,769,945 | He and his group have developed several areas and concepts in the fields of metamaterials and plasmonic optics, including, (1) ‘extreme-parameter metamaterials’ and 'epsilon-near-zero (ENZ) metamaterials'; (2) the concept of Omega structures, as one of the building blocks of structured materials,; (3) ultrathin cavities and waveguides, with sizes beyond diffraction limits, providing possibilities for unprecedented miniaturization of devices; (4) supercoupling phenomena between waveguides using low-permittivity ENZ metamaterials,; (5) extended Purcell effects in nano-optics using the ENZ phenomena, in which enhanced photon density of states occurs in a relatively large area with essentially uniform phase; (6) far-field subwavelength imaging lens based on ENZ hyperbolic metamaterials; (7) scattering-cancellation-based plasmonic cloaking and transparency,; (8) merging the field of graphene with the field of metamaterials and plasmonic optics in infrared regime, providing the roadmaps for one-atom-thick optical devices and one-atom-thick information processing,; (9) microwave artificial chirality; (10) “signal-processing” metamaterials and “meta-machine”, and (11) “digital” metamaterials. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=8203821 | 1,768,950 |
444,755 | According to Grand View Research, during the race to develop therapeutics and vaccines against the SARS-CoV-2 virus, the value of biologics became even more evident. The demand for both high-volume and high-quality CGMP drug substance and drug product manufacturing services has risen dramatically, especially for CDMOs capable of providing a broad range of COVID-19 vaccine technologies and, to a smaller extent, therapeutic monoclonal antibody products. However, to combat the pandemic, new technologies were adopted and implemented in distribution logistics, vaccine production, monoclonal antibody manufacturing, and diagnostic testing. The pandemic highlighted the importance of more local, U.S.-based contract pharma services, as well as intimately aligning academia, manufacturers, drug innovators, and regulatory agencies to deliver treatments to patients. The global large molecule drug substance CDMO market size was valued at USD 10.7 billion in 2021. [32] | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=61516243 | 444,540 |
143,863 | Calculating electronic properties of metals by solving the many-body wavefunction is often computationally hard, and hence, approximation methods are needed to obtain meaningful predictions. The Thomas–Fermi theory, developed in the 1920s, was used to estimate system energy and electronic density by treating the local electron density as a variational parameter. Later in the 1930s, Douglas Hartree, Vladimir Fock and John Slater developed the so-called Hartree–Fock wavefunction as an improvement over the Thomas–Fermi model. The Hartree–Fock method accounted for exchange statistics of single particle electron wavefunctions. In general, it is very difficult to solve the Hartree–Fock equation. Only the free electron gas case can be solved exactly. Finally in 1964–65, Walter Kohn, Pierre Hohenberg and Lu Jeu Sham proposed the density functional theory (DFT) which gave realistic descriptions for bulk and surface properties of metals. The density functional theory has been widely used since the 1970s for band structure calculations of variety of solids. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=5387 | 143,805 |
1,018,038 | The DEW Line was proposed as a solution to both of these problems, using conventional radar systems that could both detect and characterise an attack, while being located far to the north where they would offer hours of advance warning. This would not only provide ample time for the defences to prepare, but also allow the Strategic Air Command to get its active aircraft airborne long before Soviet bombers could reach their targets. The need was considered critical and the construction was given the highest national priorities. Advance site preparation began in December 1954, and the construction was carried out in a massive logistical operation that took place mostly during the summer months when the sites could be reached by ships. The 63-base line reached operational status in 1957. The MCL was shut down in the early 1960s, and much of the Pinetree Line was given over to civilian use. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=614142 | 1,017,514 |
1,145,151 | In 1929 Huberman first visited Palestine and developed his vision of establishing classical music in the Promised Land. In 1933, during the Nazis' rise to power, Huberman declined invitations from Wilhelm Furtwängler to return to preach a "musical peace", but wrote instead an open letter to German intellectuals inviting them to remember their essential values. In 1936 he founded the "Palestine Symphony Orchestra" (which upon the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 was renamed the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra). For the orchestra, Huberman recruited leading Jewish musicians from Europe, showing "the prescience to realize that far more than a new job was at stake for these artists" — for "if it hadn't been for Huberman, dozens of musicians and their families — nearly 1000 people in all — would nearly certainly have died if they had stayed in countries including Germany, Austria, Poland and Hungary." He was assisted by violinist Jacob Surowicz. Conductor William Steinberg, then known as Hans Wilhelm Steinberg, trained the orchestra. The first concert, on 26 December 1936, was conducted by Arturo Toscanini; Huberman had invited the Italian maestro when he heard of his refusing to perform in Germany to protest the Nazi takeover. The 2012 documentary film "Orchestra of Exiles" by writer, director and producer Josh Aronson recreates Huberman's work creating the orchestra through interviews and reenactments. Featuring interviews with Zubin Mehta, Pinchas Zukerman, Joshua Bell, and many other notable musicians, the film details how Huberman rescued nearly 1000 Jewish musicians and their families and created the Palestine Symphony Orchestra. The film also details how famous Jews and leading historical figures, such as Albert Einstein, were vital in creating the orchestra. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=2260845 | 1,144,550 |
1,453,943 | Following the 2011–12 season, the team lost graduating senior captains Zack Novak and Stu Douglass, who moved on to professional basketball careers in Europe. The incoming class of Mitch McGary, Glenn Robinson III and Nik Stauskas was ranked among the best classes in the nation by the media. With its new lineup, the team matched the greatest starts in school history. Starting the season with 11 consecutive wins matched the best start since Michigan's 1989 national champions, the 1988–89 team. At 16–0, Michigan matched its best start since the last repeat Big Ten Regular season championship, the 1985–86 team, tying a school record. Reaching 19–1 set a record for the best start in school history. The team also reached the number one position in the AP Poll for the first time since the Fab Five 1992–93 team. The team entered February with a 20–1 record (7–1 Big Ten), but with an injury to eventual B1G All-Defensive selection Jordan Morgan and a stretch of games against its strongest conference opponents, Michigan lost three out of four games. The team closed the season with a 5–5 run to finish tied for fourth in the conference and won one game in the Big Ten tournament before being eliminated. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=33786844 | 1,453,125 |
498,605 | The nanostructure layers of CsCO can be used as cathodes for organic electronic materials due to its capacity to increase the kinetic energy of the electrons. The nanostructure layers of caesium carbonate had been probed for various fields using different techniques. The fields include such as photovoltaic studies, current-voltage measurements, UV photoelectron spectroscopy, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, and impedance spectroscopy. The n-type semiconductor produced by thermal evaporation of CsCO reacts intensively with metals like Al, and Ca in the cathode. This reaction will cut down the work the cathode metals. Polymer solar cells based on solution process are under extensive studies due to their advantage in producing low cost solar cells. Lithium fluoride has been used to raise the power conversion efficiency of polymer solar cells. However, it requires high temperatures (> 500 degree), and high vacuum states raise the cost of production. The devices with CsCO layers have produced equivalent power conversion efficiency compared with the devices that use lithium fluoride. Placing a CsCO layer in between the cathode and the light-emitting polymer improves the efficiency of the white OLED. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=5086731 | 498,348 |
329,038 | "Prey" came out of Arkane Studios' own ideas; as explained by Colantonio, after they finished "Dishonored", roughly around 2014, they split their team to work on two projects, one being "Dishonored 2" and the other a new intellectual property based on similar gameplay ideas which would be "in first-person, with depth and simulation and narration". According to lead designer Ricardo Bare, Colantonio had suggested they look back towards what they had done with "Arx Fatalis", a fantasy title produced by Arkane in 2002 which featured "this big, inter-connected dungeon that the player could roam so long as they could unlock everything". They took this "mega-dungeon" concept, but set it as a space station filled with hostile aliens, and would require the player to consider the "full ecology" of the game's world to overcome obstacles. They did not want the player to solve singular-solution puzzles, such as simply finding a key for a locked door, but instead "think of this as a living, dynamic world, where there are tons of solutions possible", according to Bare. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=11718979 | 328,864 |
2,117,336 | Stellacyanin’s spectroscopic properties help us differentiate it from plastocyanin, which is another monocopper blue protein found in plants. It is a 20kDa protein whose structure is made up of beta strands forming two beta sheets to form a Greek key beta barrel with variable alpha helical structure. The copper binding domain of the protein is located at the amino-terminal end, while the carboxyl-terminal end is rich in hydroxyproline and serine residues, typical of proteins associated with cell walls of plants. In addition, it is also heavily glycosylated. The copper is tetrahedrally coordinated by a cysteine, 2 histidines, and a glutamine residue. The glutamine residue takes place of a methionine ligand typically found in other blue copper proteins. In addition, electron transfer rates for stellacyanin are faster than for other type I copper proteins suggesting stellacyanin is more solvent accessible at the active site. The exact function of stellacyanin is unknown. However, given the fact that type I copper proteins are involved in electron transfer and stellacyanin appears to be associated with the plant cell wall, it is suggested that it is involved in oxidative cross-linking reactions to build polymeric material making up the cell wall. Cell wall structural glycoproteins contain hydroxyproline and serine-rich sequence domains which are found in stellacyanins. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=10918229 | 2,116,118 |
1,916,264 | There are many great projects related to wearable technology or wearable power generation. One concept, for example, is an article of clothing that has the ability to convert the movements of the wearer into electricity using nano-ion pumps. It is based on nanotechnology and has the ability to generate electricity for the purposes of building muscle mass and improving coordination. Emergency workers like firemen and paramedics could use chest-implanted sensors to create a floor plan of unfamiliar buildings; making a rookie perform his job as efficiently as a veteran. With cameras becoming cheaper and smaller, wearable generators may also serve as a quick method to recharge the batteries on those devices. The environmental burden of disposing used batteries has contributed to e-waste; something that wearable generators may drastically reduce. Enough energy can theoretically be harnessed from a person's body heat to power a smartphone or tablet. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=39533958 | 1,915,165 |
1,079,365 | His colleague's interest in the new flash apparatus soon provoked Edgerton to improve upon the design. The mercury lamp's efficiency was limited by the coolest part of the lamp, causing them to perform better when very hot but poorly when cold. Edgerton decided to try a noble gas instead, feeling that it would not be as temperature dependent as mercury, and, in 1930, he employed the General Electric company to construct some lamps using argon instead. The argon tubes were much more efficient, were much smaller, and could be mounted near a reflector, concentrating their output. Slowly, camera designers began to take notice of the new technology and began to accept it. Edgerton received his first major order for the strobes from the Kodak company in 1940. Afterward, he discovered that xenon was the most efficient of the noble gases, producing a spectrum very close to that of daylight, and xenon flashtubes became standard in most large photography sets. It was not until the 1970s that strobe units became portable enough to use in common cameras. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=387514 | 1,078,810 |
709,751 | From 1958 to 1964, some 14 players made the trek from Regina, Saskatchewan to Ann Arbor, including one Red Berenson. While still in high school, Berenson had already become a highly touted major junior player, one good enough to join the Montreal Canadiens system straight out of high school, but he had other ideas. A serious student, Berenson became aware of the world of American college hockey when Regina Pats high-profile coach Murray Armstrong went south of the border in 1956 to accept the head coaching job at University of Denver. Berenson visited North Dakota in 1958 and was favorably impressed at the caliber of players the former coach, a man named Al Renfrew, had lured to Grand Forks before Ranfrew returned to Michigan the year before. But soon after Berenson's visit to North Dakota, Dale MacDonald, a Saskatchewan native playing for Renfrew at Michigan, told his coach that Berenson was the rare player worth going out of his way to get. Renfrew scraped together enough money to fly the young phenom to Michigan, thereby making him the first hockey player ever to receive a free recruiting trip to Ann Arbor. The extra effort was worth it, for both parties. Once he was on campus, they didn't have to sell him on it. "After I came down on a visit," Berenson confirms, "I came back and told the other guys. "This is where we're going." And just like that, a pipeline of hockey talent was created between Regina and Ann Arbor. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=22165661 | 709,380 |
1,882,615 | It is here, as in other related methods, that Monte Carlo enters the game in the guise of importance sampling: the large sum over auxiliary-field configurations is performed by sampling over the most important ones, with a certain probability. In classical statistical physics, this probability is usually given by the (positive semi-definite) Boltzmann factor. Similar factors arise also in quantum field theories; however, these can have indefinite sign (especially in the case of Fermions) or even be complex-valued, which precludes their direct interpretation as probabilities. In these cases, one has to resort to a reweighting procedure (i.e., interpret the absolute value as probability and multiply the sign or phase to the observable) to get a strictly positive reference distribution suitable for Monte Carlo sampling. However, it is well known that, in specific parameter ranges of the model under consideration, the oscillatory nature of the weight function can lead to a bad statistical convergence of the numerical integration procedure. The problem is known as the numerical sign problem and can be alleviated with analytical and numerical convergence acceleration procedures (Baeurle 2002, Baeurle 2003a). | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=5474018 | 1,881,534 |
1,162,602 | The nomadic nature of the Bedouin tribe demanded the need for light disposable materials that could be found along coastal lines. In contrast, permanent houses inland were constructed with a mud mixture formed into bricks, strengthened using stones bonded together with a mixture of red clay and manure. The geographical context of a tribe or group determined the type of materials that were used in the construction of buildings, meaning that most structures were made of materials drawn from the surrounding environment. These ranged from coral, mud and stone through to palm fronds and animal hair. The harsh climate of the United Arab Emirates created a need for ventilation due to high temperature periods of the year. This resulted in the introduction of Iranian windtowers, known as "barjeels". These vertical shafts allow for a downward flow of cool air and a distribution of water to become available at the bottom of the structure, allowing for the inside temperature of the building to be cooled. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=60447339 | 1,161,985 |
1,068,809 | The republished version enjoyed greater success than the original. Although, by the time of his death in 1968, Steinbeck's reputation was at an all-time low owing to his mediocre output during the last decades of his life and his support for American involvement in Vietnam, his books have slowly regained their popularity. "The Log from the Sea of Cortez" became an important work within his oeuvre, not only as an interesting travelogue and work of non-fiction, but for its first-hand account of Ed Ricketts, the man whose thinking had so much influence on the course of Steinbeck's writing and on whom he had based so many of his pivotal characters. Whereas earlier critics mostly assumed that "Mr. Ricketts contributed some of the biology, and Mr. Steinbeck all of the prose", the publication of Ricketts' rediscovered original notes in 2003 has revealed how closely Steinbeck followed Ricketts' journal. This has forced a re-evaluation of how far it is fair to attribute authorship of the narrative portion of "Sea of Cortez" to Steinbeck, and has caused critics to view the removal of Ricketts' name from the cover as reflecting badly on Steinbeck. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=5553778 | 1,068,255 |
873,713 | During January 2007, European Space Agency (ESA) announced that the agency was studying the use of Global Positioning System (GPS) navigation in order to support launches of the Vega and Ariane. At the 2009 Paris Air Show, it was revealed that the adoption of more cost-effective engine to replace the upper stages of the Vega have been postponed due to a failure to reduce the overall costs of the launcher, making it much less worthwhile to pursue. Despite this finding, efforts to improve the efficiency of the third stage continued. At this point, the certification of all four stages of the Vega launch was anticipated to be achieved prior to the end of 2009, while the first launch was scheduled to take place during 2010. The first flight was intended to be flown with a scientific payload, rather than a "dummy" placeholder; but had intentionally avoided a costly commercial satellite. By late 2010, the first flight had been delayed into 2011. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=436518 | 873,251 |
284,167 | As part of the post-September 11 drive towards increased capability in homeland security and public health preparedness, traditional GC-MS units with transmission quadrupole mass spectrometers, as well as those with cylindrical ion trap (CIT-MS) and toroidal ion trap (T-ITMS) mass spectrometers have been modified for field portability and near real-time detection of chemical warfare agents (CWA) such as sarin, soman, and VX. These complex and large GC-MS systems have been modified and configured with resistively heated low thermal mass (LTM) gas chromatographs that reduce analysis time to less than ten percent of the time required in traditional laboratory systems. Additionally, the systems are smaller, and more mobile, including units that are mounted in mobile analytical laboratories (MAL), such as those used by the United States Marine Corps Chemical and Biological Incident Response Force MAL and other similar laboratories, and systems that are hand-carried by two-person teams or individuals, much ado to the smaller mass detectors. Depending on the system, the analytes can be introduced via liquid injection, desorbed from sorbent tubes through a thermal desorption process, or with solid-phase micro extraction (SPME). | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=846892 | 284,014 |
528,849 | This is defined as a device that reflects and absorbs waves of oscillatory energy, extending from a piece of working machinery or electrical equipment, and with the desired effect being vibration insulation. The goal is to establish vibration isolation between a body transferring mechanical fluctuations and a supporting body (for example, between the machine and the foundation). The illustration shows a vibration isolator from the series «ВИ» (~"VI" in Roman characters), as used in shipbuilding in Russia, for example the submarine "St.Petersburg" (Lada). The depicted «ВИ» devices allow loadings ranging from 5, 40 and 300 kg. They differ in their physical sizes, but all share the same fundamental design. The structure consists of a rubber envelope that is internally reinforced by a spring. During manufacture, the rubber and the spring are intimately and permanently connected as a result of the vulcanization process that is integral to the processing of the crude rubber material. Under action of weight loading of the machine, the rubber envelope deforms, and the spring is compressed or stretched. Therefore, in the direction of the spring's cross section, twisting of the enveloping rubber occurs. The resulting elastic deformation of the rubber envelope results in very effective absorption of the vibration. This absorption is crucial to reliable vibration insulation, because it averts the potential for resonance effects. The amount of elastic deformation of the rubber largely dictates the magnitude of vibration absorption that can be attained; the entire device (including the spring itself) must be designed with this in mind. The design of the vibration isolator must also take into account potential exposure to shock loadings, in addition to the routine everyday vibrations. Lastly, the vibration isolator must also be designed for long-term durability as well as convenient integration into the environment in which it is to be used. Sleeves and flanges are typically employed in order to enable the vibration isolator to be securely fastened to the equipment and the supporting foundation. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=4449103 | 528,575 |
1,250,254 | Explosive detection using ion mobility spectrometry (IMS) is based on velocities of ions in a uniform electric field. There are some variant to IMS such as Ion trap mobility spectrometry (ITMS) or Non-linear dependence on ion mobility (NLDM) which are based on IMS principle. The sensitivity of devices using this technology is limited to pg levels. The technology also requires the ionization of sample explosives which is accomplished by a radioactive source such as nickel-63 or americium-241. This technology is found in most commercially available explosive detectors such as the GE VaporTracer, Smith Sabre 4000 and Russian built MO-2M and MO-8. The presence of radioactive materials in these equipments cause regulatory hassles and requires special permissions at customs ports. These detectors cannot be field serviced and may pose radiation hazard to the operator if the casing of the detector cracks due to mishandling. Bi-yearly checks are mandatory on such equipment in most countries by regulating agencies to ensure that there are no radiation leaks. Disposal of these equipments is also controlled owing to the high half-life of the radioactive material used. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=4679720 | 1,249,578 |
1,218,522 | The limits of specific approaches continue to be tested, as boundaries are reached through large scale experiments, e.g., in 2011 IBM ended its participation in the Blue Waters petaflops project at the University of Illinois. The Blue Waters architecture was based on the IBM POWER7 processor and intended to have 200,000 cores with a petabyte of "globally addressable memory" and 10 petabytes of disk space. The goal of a sustained petaflop led to design choices that optimized single-core performance, and hence a lower number of cores. The lower number of cores was then expected to help performance on programs that did not scale well to a large number of processors. The large globally addressable memory architecture aimed to solve memory address problems in an efficient manner, for the same type of programs. Blue Waters had been expected to run at sustained speeds of at least one petaflop, and relied on the specific water-cooling approach to manage heat. In the first four years of operation, the National Science Foundation spent about $200 million on the project. IBM released the Power 775 computing node derived from that project's technology soon thereafter, but effectively abandoned the Blue Waters approach. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=34609979 | 1,217,868 |
2,145,532 | The race started at 10:05 CEST with a field of 64 taking to the start line. It was run in hot conditions with the temperature at the start of the race and the humidity rated at 74 per cent. The early pace was set by Russian Yuriy Abramov, winner of the 2010 Moscow Marathon. However, when he fell back, Röthlin was among the leading pack. The Swiss runner set a pace that the rest of the field could not compete with and he ran the final quarter of the race by himself to win by two minutes 19 seconds on Swiss National Day. Second place was home runner Martínez, who said he could not compete with Röthlin's pace so instead decided to hold a steady rhythm and not get involved in any counter-attacks. Bronze medal winner was Russian Dmitriy Safronov. Röthlin's victory was only the fourth gold for Switzerland at the European championships and their first since shot putter Werner Günthör won in the 1986 championships. Baldini's attempt to defend his title ended when he pulled out half-way through the race. Only 45 of the athletes finished the race. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=27607207 | 2,144,301 |
1,745,545 | Werner Karl Dahm was born on Feb. 16, 1917 in Lindenthal near Köln, Germany, the son of Anton Dahm and Maria Morkramer. The family moved to Bonn later that year. His father was the first engineer in a long line of merchants. After graduating from the Beethoven School in Bonn in 1936, he studied aerodynamics and aircraft design at the Technical University in Aachen, and later in Munich when the Nazis had closed other technical universities. In Munich he was one of just four students, out of several hundred, who refused to join the Nazi student club. He said he first simply pretended not to find it, and then since it was formally listed as a dueling club he avoided it by claiming religious objections. For this he was denied access to certain advanced aircraft courses, so he focused on courses relevant to rocketry. Before completing his degree he was drafted at the end of 1939, and sent with a signal corps unit to France and then to Czechoslovakia. In between, he was granted a one-semester break to complete the major part of his aerodynamics degree. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=22824006 | 1,744,561 |
1,593,523 | The KSR systems ran a specially customized version of the OSF/1 operating system, a Unix variant, with programs compiled by a KSR-specific port of the Green Hills Software C and FORTRAN compilers. The architecture was shared memory implemented as a cache-only memory architecture or "COMA". Being all cache, memory dynamically migrated and replicated in a coherent manner based on the access pattern of individual processors. The processors were arranged in a hierarchy of rings, and the operating system mediated process migration and device access. Instruction decode was hardwired, and pipelining was used. Each KSR1 processor was a custom 64-bit reduced instruction set computing (RISC) CPU clocked at 20 MHz and capable of a peak output of 20 million instructions per second (MIPS) and 40 million floating-point operations per second (MFLOPS). Up to 1088 of these processors could be arranged in a single system, with a minimum of eight. The KSR2 doubled the clock rate to 40 MHz and supported over 5000 processors. The KSR-1 chipset was fabricated by Sharp Corporation while the KSR-2 chipset was built by Hewlett-Packard. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=17339 | 1,592,626 |
1,381,590 | Initial V-2 assembly efforts produced 25 rockets available for launch. The Army assembled an Upper Atmosphere Research Panel of representative from the Air Materiel Command, Naval Research Laboratory (NRL), Army Signal Corps, Ballistic Research Laboratory, Applied Physics Laboratory, University of Michigan, Harvard University, Princeton University, and General Electric Company. German rocket scientists of Operation Paperclip arrived at Fort Bliss in January 1946 to assist the V-2 rocket testing program. After a static test firing of a V-2 engine on 15 March 1946, the first V-2 rocket launch from Launch Complex 33 was on 16 April 1946. As the possibilities of the program were realized, GE personnel built new control components to replace deteriorated parts and used replacement parts with salvaged materials to make more than 75 V-2 sounding rockets available for atmospheric and solar investigation at WSMR. Approximately two V-2 launches per month were scheduled from Launch Complex 33 until the supply of V-2 sounding rockets was exhausted. A reduced frequency of V-2 sounding rocket investigations from Launch Complex 33 continued until 1952. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=39134574 | 1,380,827 |
1,169,087 | In 1973, thanks in part to the influence of his mentor, General William W. Dunn, the Commander, Lt-Gen Kenneth Schultz, assigned Parkinson to a floundering Air Force program called Project 621B. This program had been trying to gain approval for a new satellite-based navigation system concept. Strong technical support was rendered by The Aerospace Corporation. Parkinson quickly recruited a small cadre of highly competent Air Force Officer-Engineers, with Masters and PhDs from top universities. After initially failing to gain approval in August 1973, Parkinson called a remote site meeting in The Pentagon over Labor Day 1973 called the "Lonely Halls Meeting." At that meeting, attended only by his officer-engineers and two people from the Aerospace Corporation, he led the re-architecture of the concept. He then assumed lead responsibility to sell the new configuration to the Air Force and to top Pentagon Officials. By December 1973 he gained approval and budget for a four satellite, live demonstration of the new idea. This included the concept of flying Atomic clocks in high orbits that had been advocated by both the Naval Research Laboratory and an earlier USAF Aerospace study by J. B. Woodford and H. Nakamura. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=2410578 | 1,168,469 |
1,156,769 | The more recently developed laser peening process, the Toshiba LPwC process, varies in significant ways from the process described above. The LPwC process utilizes low energy, high frequency producing pulse energies of and pulse durations of , using spot sizes diameter. Because the process originally was intended to operate in large water-filled vessels, the wave frequency was doubled to halve the wavelength to 532 nm. The shorter wavelength decreases the absorption of beam energy while traveling through water to the target. Due to access constraints, no opaque overlay is applied to the target surface. This factor, combined with the small spot size, requires many shots to achieve a significant surface compressive stress and depths of 1 mm. The first layers applied produce a tensile surface stress due to surface melting, although a compressive stress is developed below the melt layer. However, as more layers are added, the increasing subsurface compressive stress "bleeds" back through the melted surface layer to produce the desired surface compressive stress. Depending on material properties and the desired compressive stresses, generally about 18 spots/mm to 70 spots/mm or greater spot densities are applied, about 100 times the spot densities of the high pulse energy process. The effects of the higher spot densities on processing times are compensated for in part by the higher pulse frequency, 60 Hz, of the low energy lasers. Newer generations of these laser systems are projected to operate at higher frequencies. This low energy process achieves compressive residual stress magnitudes and depths equivalent to the high energy process with nominal depths of . However, the smaller spot size will not permit depths deeper than this. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=7465720 | 1,156,158 |
725,675 | The history of metatherians (the clade containing marsupials and their extinct, primitive ancestors) provides an example of how evolutionary theory and the movement of continents can be combined to make predictions concerning fossil stratigraphy and distribution. The oldest metatherian fossils are found in present-day China. Metatherians spread westward into modern North America (still attached to Eurasia) and then to South America, which was connected to North America until around 65 mya. Marsupials reached Australia via Antarctica about 50 mya, shortly after Australia had split off suggesting a single dispersion event of just one species. Evolutionary theory suggests that the Australian marsupials descended from the older ones found in the Americas. Geologic evidence suggests that between 30 and 40 million years ago South America and Australia were still part of the Southern Hemisphere super continent of Gondwana and that they were connected by land that is now part of Antarctica. Therefore, when combining the models, scientists could predict that marsupials migrated from what is now South America, through Antarctica, and then to present-day Australia between 40 and 30 million years ago. A first marsupial fossil of the extinct family Polydolopidae was found on Seymour Island on the Antarctic Peninsula in 1982. Further fossils have subsequently been found, including members of the marsupial orders Didelphimorphia (opossum) and Microbiotheria, as well as ungulates and a member of the enigmatic extinct order Gondwanatheria, possibly "Sudamerica ameghinoi". | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=2339577 | 725,294 |
2,069,492 | Robonaut 2 is a highly dexterous anthropomorphic humanoid robot built and designed at NASA Johnson Space Center. Robonaut 2 is employed in situations where risk factors are too high and thus endanger human life. The development of Robonaut 2, and future prospects of other dexterous humanoid robots, are meant to enhance human capabilities for exploration and construction in space; by allowing the utilization of robots with greater mobility than suited astronauts to complete complicated missions or venture into environments not safe for humans. Robonaut 2 has the distinction of being the first of its kind (there are four similar robots) to not only go into space, but also perform tasks aboard the International Space Station (ISS). Robonaut 2, commonly referred to as R2, is the first U.S. robot to board ISS. The value of being a "dexterous humanoid" robot as opposed to any other design, is that R2 can use the same tools used by humans and work beside them in the same spaces. This is incredibly efficient as there will be no need to create new tools to facilitate Robonaut 2's missions. For the development of R2, NASA is partnering with General Motors (GM) and Oceaneering Space Systems (OSS). These partnerships will aid in the acceleration of R2 as a new technology, with the goal of helping the robot match and eventually exceed human dexterity before being employed in both the aerospace and automotive industry. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=27743621 | 2,068,301 |
1,958,572 | Lavik created polymer scaffolds were seeded with neural stem cells, and implanted them in to paralysed rats. These spinal implants were developed whilst Lavik was a graduate student at MIT, mimicking the anatomy of the spine by binding a porous piece of polymer fabric and a plastic cylinder and including narrow channels for axons. Lavik conducted the experiment on 50 female paraplegic rats, and 7 out of 10 rats fitted with Lavik's scaffold-stem cell design could walk again. She was awarded the John Wuff Award for Excellence in Teaching. In 2003, two years after graduating her PhD, she was nominated to the TR100 list. Lavik was an assistant professor at Yale University, where she developed polymer scaffolds that imitate the spinal cord. She was nominated for a 2004 WIRED RAVE Award. In 2004 Lavik wrote the play "Galileo Walking among the Stars", a play where Galileo, Kepler and Gene Kelly build a spaceship. She was selected as one of the Connecticut Technology Council's top women in innovation in 2008. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=59760845 | 1,957,445 |
1,729,491 | The pallidonigral set comprises the direct targets of the striatal axons: the two nuclei of the pallidum, and the pars compacta (SNpc) and pars reticulata (SNpr) of the substantia nigra. One character of this ensemble is given by the very dense striato-pallidonigral bundle giving it its whitish aspect (pallidus means pale). After Foix and Nicolesco (1925) and some others, Cécile and Oskar Vogt (1941) suggested the term pallidum - also used by the Terminologia Anatomica (1998). They also proposed the term nigrum for replacing nigra, which is indeed not a substance; but this is generally not followed. The whole pallidonigral set is made up the same neuronal components. The majority is made up of very large neurons, poorly branched, strongly stained for parvalbumin, having very large dendritic arborisations (much larger in primates than in rodents) with straight and thick dendrites. Only the shape and direction of the dendritic arborizations differ between the pallidum and the SN neurons. The pallidal dendritic arborisations are very large flat and disc-shaped. Their principal plane is parallel to the others and also parallel to the lateral border of the pallidum; thus perpendicular to the axis of the afferences. Since the pallidal discs are thin, they are crossed only for a short distance by striatal axons. However, since they are wide, they are crossed by many striatal axons from wide striatal parts. Since they are loose, the chances of contact are not very high. Striatal arborisations emit perpendicular branches participating in flat bands parallel to the lateral border, which increases the density of synapses in this direction. This is true for not only for the striatal afferent but also for the subthalamic (see below). | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=5166384 | 1,728,517 |
377,010 | Doudna's first marriage was in 1988 to a fellow graduate student at Harvard named Tom Griffin, but his interests were more broad and less focused on research than hers and they divorced a few years later. Griffin wanted to move to Boulder, Colorado, where Doudna was also interested in working with Thomas Cech. As a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Colorado, Doudna met Jamie Cate, then a graduate student; they worked together on the project to crystallize and determine the structure of the Tetrahymena Group I intron P4-P6 catalytic region. Doudna brought Cate with her to Yale, and they married in Hawaii in 2000. Cate later became a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Doudna followed him to Boston at Harvard, but in 2002 they both accepted faculty positions at Berkeley and moved there together; Cate preferred the less formal environment on the West Coast from his earlier experiences at the University of California, Santa Cruz and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and Doudna liked that Berkeley is a public university. Cate is currently a Berkeley professor and works on gene-editing yeast to increase their cellulose fermentation for biofuel production. Doudna and Cate have a son born in 2002 who now attends the University of California, Berkeley and is studying Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=36836014 | 376,815 |
1,778,348 | Potomac Creek complex on the "Neck of the Potomac" valley may date as early as 1200 CE, although clearly by the late 14th century. Their house shape seems to be rectangular with the one example having a round end. (Schmitt 1965:8) A longhouse was clearly defined at two different villages. Their obtuse-angle clay pipes are similar to those found on the various "Delmarva Peninsula complexes" of coastal Maryland and Virginia, to northeast North Carolina. Schmitt had earlier defined this kind of pipe to this particular complex and maintained this position in 1963. Another early Schmitt assigned supposedly unique trait of the later Potomac Creek was the human style shell maskettes having the "weeping eye" motif. "Shell mask gorgets with weeping eye designs are commonly found in East Tennessee, northeast Arkansas, and the middle Ohio Valley on sites dating to the Protohistoric period or "just prior to it", quoting David Pollack, Kentucky Heritage Council. Potomac Creek dates from 1300–1700 CE. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=17254851 | 1,777,346 |
306,043 | Ice Lake features Intel's Gen11 graphics, increasing the number of execution units to 64, from 24 or 48 in Gen9.5 graphics, achieving over 1 TFLOPS of compute performance. Each execution unit supports 7 threads, meaning that the design has 512 concurrent pipelines. Feeding these execution units is a 3 megabyte L3 cache, a four-fold increase from Gen9.5, alongside the increased memory bandwidth enabled by LPDDR4X on low-power mobile platforms. Gen11 graphics also introduces tile-based rendering and Coarse Pixel Shading (CPS), Intel's implementation of variable-rate shading (VRS). The architecture also includes an all-new HEVC encoder design. On August 1, 2019, Intel released the specifications of Ice Lake -U and -Y CPUs. The Y-series CPUs lost their -Y suffix and m3 naming. Instead, Intel uses a trailing number before the GPU type to indicate their package power; "0" corresponds to 9W, "5" to 15W, and "8" to 28W. Furthermore, the first two numbers in the model number correspond to the generation of the chip, while the third number dictates the family the CPU belongs to (i3, i5, etc.); thus, a 1035G7 would be a 10th generation Core i5 with a package power of 15 watts and a G7 GPU. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=50140927 | 305,879 |
744,811 | In 1988, the Brazilian Army Aviation Command took delivery of its first Panther helicopter, which was produced locally by Helibras. In January 2010, Helibras was awarded a contact to upgrade 34 AS365K Panthers to the new AS365 K2 standard. Changes on the Panther K2 include new Turbomeca Arriel 2C2CG engines which produce 40% more power, a glass cockpit containing new avionics and radio systems, a four-axis autopilot, a new weather radar, NVG-compatibility, and measures to reduce pilot workload, and shall extend the airframe's service life for a further 25 years. In March 2014, the first two Panther K2 rotorcraft were delivered to the Brazilian Army. In September 2014, the Panther K2 passed its technical operation evaluation, having reportedly demonstrated a 98% availability rating throughout the trial period, clearing the way for the full modernisation program to proceed. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=535824 | 744,417 |
1,068,427 | Superregeneration is most valuable above 27 MHz, and for signals where broad tuning is desirable. The superregen uses many fewer components for nearly the same sensitivity as more complex designs. It is easily possible to build superregen receivers which operate at microwatt power levels, in the 30 to 6,000 MHz range. It removes the need for the operator to manually adjust regeneration level to just below the point of oscillation - the circuit automatically is taken out of oscillation periodically, but with the disadvantage that small amounts of interference may be a problem for others. These are ideal for remote-sensing applications or where long battery life is important. For many years, superregenerative circuits have been used for commercial products such as garage-door openers, radar detectors, microwatt RF data links, and very low cost walkie-talkies. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=343276 | 1,067,873 |
1,230,425 | With today's technology, a system that has a well characterised qubit can be created, but it is a challenge to create a system that has an arbitrary number of well-characterised qubits. Currently, one of the biggest problems being faced is that we require exponentially larger experimental setups to accommodate a greater number of qubits. The quantum computer is capable of exponential speed-ups in computing classical algorithms for prime factorisation of numbers; but if this requires an exponentially large setup, then our advantage is lost. In the case of using liquid-state nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR), it was found that increased macroscopic size led to system initialisation that left computational qubits in a highly mixed state. In spite of this, a computation model was found that could still use these mixed states for computation, but the more mixed these states are the weaker the induction signal corresponding to a quantum measurement is. If this signal is below the noise threshold, a solution is to increase the size of the sample to boost the signal strength; and this is the source of the non-scalability of liquid-state NMR as a means for quantum computation. One could say that as the number of computational qubits increases they become less well characterised until a threshold is reached at which they are no longer useful. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=50111809 | 1,229,763 |
2,239,039 | Outside of academia, Brown was a member of the SATCOM task group for the 'Interchange of Scientific and Technical Information in Machine Language (ISTIM)' established in 1969 by the President's Special Assistant for Science and Technology (precursor to the modern-day Office of Science and Technology Policy). Brown was an early and important member of EDUCOM (Interuniversity Communication Council, a precursor to the modern Educause] which championed the idea of connected computing and network information sharing (read: early internet) for the university computing systems of the day. In 1966 Brown organized the 'Summer Study on Information Networks' in Boulder, Colorado as EDUCOM's first major project. The result of this workshop was the publication of EDUNET (by Brown, James Grier Miller, and Thomas A. Keenan), a master plan for a communications network linking universities and colleges through the US. From the modern perspective EDUNET is seen a prophetic landmark, but never achieved the funding necessary to implement, and the ideas expressed in the paper would take several more decades to be fully realized. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=52398019 | 2,237,768 |
524,237 | One way to rigorously analyze such systems is by studying the stability of the system far from equilibrium. Close to equilibrium, one can show the existence of a Lyapunov function which ensures that the entropy tends to a stable maximum. Fluctuations are damped in the neighborhood of the fixed point and a macroscopic description suffices. However, far from equilibrium stability is no longer a universal property and can be broken. In chemical systems, this occurs with the presence of autocatalytic reactions, such as in the example of the Brusselator. If the system is driven beyond a certain threshold, oscillations are no longer damped out, but may be amplified. Mathematically, this corresponds to a Hopf bifurcation where increasing one of the parameters beyond a certain value leads to limit cycle behavior. If spatial effects are taken into account through a reaction–diffusion equation, long-range correlations and spatially ordered patterns arise, such as in the case of the Belousov–Zhabotinsky reaction. Systems with such dynamic states of matter that arise as the result of irreversible processes are dissipative structures. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=237587 | 523,965 |
1,284,522 | Before the Wyoming delegates assembled in Cheyenne in October 1869, woman suffrage bills in three Western legislatures had been narrowly defeated—Washington in 1854, Nebraska in 1856, and Dakota in 1869—and Utah and Colorado lawmakers would soon be considering the issue. In the years after the Civil War, the two major political parties had battled over expanding voting rights. A particularly fierce battle over suffrage for women and for Black men emerged in Kansas, where national suffrage organizations invested a lot of time and money. The effort failed in 1867 when the new state legislature, mostly Republican, voted down woman suffrage, but supported suffrage for black men. The Republican Party had made suffrage for black men the heart of its political activity, but not all voters supported their views. During the Civil War, northern Democrats were uncertain that the killing was worth the cost. Many would have preferred some kind of compromise with the South instead of the pursuit of the fight to the bloody end. After the war, Democrats continued to oppose some of the most important changes the war had brought about. In particular, they opposed full citizenship and voting rights for black people—both the recently freed slaves and northern blacks who had been more or less free already. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=60959180 | 1,283,823 |
670,802 | In many respects, the foundational concepts of Earth System science can be seen in the holistic interpretations of nature promoted by the 19th century geographer Alexander von Humboldt. In the 20th century, Vladimir Vernadsky (1863–1945) saw the functioning of the biosphere as a geological force generating a dynamic disequilibrium, which in turn promoted the diversity of life. In the mid-1960s, James Lovelock first postulated a regulatory role for the biosphere in feedback mechanisms within the Earth system. Initially named the "Earth Feedback hypothesis", Lovelock later renamed it the Gaia hypothesis, and subsequently further developed the theory with American evolutionary theorist Lynn Margulis during the 1970s. In parallel, the field of systems science was developing across numerous other scientific fields, driven in part by the increasing availability and power of computers, and leading to the development of climate models that began to allow the detailed and interacting simulations of the Earth's weather and climate. Subsequent extension of these models has led to the development of "Earth system models" (ESMs) that include facets such as the cryosphere and the biosphere. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=21902683 | 670,450 |
365,833 | There is evidence from mitochondrial DNA that modern humans have passed through at least one genetic bottleneck, in which genome diversity was drastically reduced. Henry Harpending has proposed that humans spread from a geographically restricted area about 100,000 years ago, the passage through the geographic bottleneck and then with a dramatic growth amongst geographically dispersed populations about 50,000 years ago, beginning first in Africa and thence spreading elsewhere. Climatological and geological evidence suggests evidence for the bottleneck. The explosion of Toba, the largest volcanic eruption of the Quaternary, may have created a 1,000 year cold period, potentially reducing human populations to a few tropical refugia. It has been estimated that as few as 15,000 humans survived. In such circumstances genetic drift and founder effects may have been maximised. The greater diversity amongst African genomes may reflect the extent of African refugia during the Toba incident. However, a recent review highlights that the single-source hypothesis of non-African populations is less consistent with ancient DNA analysis than multiple sources with genetic mixing across Eurasia. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=14821485 | 365,642 |
1,718,048 | In early July 2003, 1st Platoon, Charlie Company of the 203rd was investigating whether weapons of mass destruction were located at Al-Taqaddum Air Base, 75 miles west of Baghdad. During the search of the facility, a soldier spotted the vertical stabilizer of an aircraft poking out of a sand dune. The group excavated the site, and in turn located several buried MiG-25R and Su-25 aircraft. One MiG became known for a photograph taken as it was extricated from the sand. In it, members of the 203rd were towing the aircraft with an M1070 tractor that had "let's roll", the last reported words of United Airlines Flight 93 victim Todd Beamer, written on the cab. That aircraft, identifiable by its missing wings which were never recovered, was later restored by the National Museum of the United States Air Force for display at their facility at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio. According to the museum, part way through the excavation the site was abandoned for a night because of particularly severe heat, and upon returning the following day, the wings were gone. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=67447284 | 1,717,078 |
1,600,345 | The EUVE Spectrometer incorporated plane diffraction gratings with continuously varying line spacing, placed in the converging beam of the telescope to diffract the light as it approached the focus. Like concave gratings, they obviate the use of other focusing optics after dispersion. Unlike uniformly spaced rulings, variable line space gratings can produced nearly stigmatic spectra using straight, conventionally ruled grooves. The gratings are blazed for use in the first inside order. "Inside" was used to mean diffracted orders at angles between the surface normal and the specular direction, and was referred to with a minus sign when represented numerically, e.g. -1st order. The gratings cover three overlapping bandpasses; short wavelengths from 70 to 190 A, medium wavelengths from 140 to 380 A, and long wavelengths from 280 to 760 Å. The groove densities range from 415 to 3550 grooves/mm. The gratings were ruled by Hitachi, Inc. at the Naka optical works in Japan. The short wavelength grating is coated with rhodium to optimize the reflectivity between 70 and 190 Å. The medium and long wavelength gratings have platinum surface coatings. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=8984536 | 1,599,444 |
330,650 | Cognitive neuroscience addresses the questions of how psychological functions are produced by neural circuitry. The emergence of powerful new measurement techniques such as neuroimaging (e.g., fMRI, PET, SPECT), EEG, MEG, electrophysiology, optogenetics and human genetic analysis combined with sophisticated experimental techniques from cognitive psychology allows neuroscientists and psychologists to address abstract questions such as how cognition and emotion are mapped to specific neural substrates. Although many studies still hold a reductionist stance looking for the neurobiological basis of cognitive phenomena, recent research shows that there is an interesting interplay between neuroscientific findings and conceptual research, soliciting and integrating both perspectives. For example, neuroscience research on empathy solicited an interesting interdisciplinary debate involving philosophy, psychology and psychopathology. Moreover, the neuroscientific identification of multiple memory systems related to different brain areas has challenged the idea of memory as a literal reproduction of the past, supporting a view of memory as a generative, constructive and dynamic process. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=21245 | 330,475 |
1,831,387 | Hall was born in Sidcup, England and studied civil engineering at the University of Bristol, with a stage at the Ecole Nationale des Ponts et Chausses before graduating in 1990. He was a civil engineer with Taylor Woodrow Construction from 1987 to 1990 and then served with VSO in Guyana from 1991 to 1993 working on flood protection and drainage projects. He worked with water specialist HR Wallingford from 1993 to 1995 before returning to Bristol University to undertake a PhD in engineering systems and uncertainty analysis which he completed in 1999. He was awarded a Royal Academy of Engineering Post-doctoral Research Fellowship from 1999 to 2004 and became reader in civil engineering systems at the University of Bristol. In 2004, he was appointed as the inaugural Professor of Earth Systems Engineering at Newcastle University where he served until 2011. He represented Newcastle University as a member of the Tyndall Centre Consortium, leading the centre's cities research programme and became deputy director of the Tyndall Centre. He was appointed director of the Environmental Change Institute at Oxford University and was instrumental in the establishment of the Oxford Networks for the Environment (ONE) which bring together research in the University of Oxford on energy, climate, water, biodiversity and food. In 2018, he stood down as director of the Environmental Change, and in 2020 he became director of research in the School of Geography and the Environment. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=65028789 | 1,830,340 |
859,840 | A minority hypothesis to explain the first burst has been proposed by Philip Ball, Adrian L. Melott, and Brian C. Thomas, suggesting that the initial extinctions could have been caused by a gamma-ray burst originating from a hypernova in a nearby arm of the Milky Way galaxy, within 6,000 light-years of Earth. A ten-second burst would have stripped the Earth's atmosphere of half of its ozone almost immediately, exposing surface-dwelling organisms, including those responsible for planetary photosynthesis, to high levels of extreme ultraviolet radiation. Under this hypothesis, several groups of marine organisms with a planktonic lifestyle were more exposed to UV radiation than groups that lived on the seabed. It is estimated that 20% to 60% of the total phytoplankton biomass on Earth would have been killed in such an event because the oceans were mostly oligotrophic and clear during the Late Ordovician. This is consistent with observations that planktonic organisms suffered severely during the first extinction pulse. In addition, species dwelling in shallow water were more likely to become extinct than species dwelling in deep water, also consistent with the hypothetical effects of a galactic gamma-ray burst. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=425753 | 859,382 |
945,625 | As these previous checkpoints are assessed, G2 protein accumulation serves to activate cyclinB-Cdk1 activity via multiple mechanisms. CyclinA-Cdk2 activates Cdc25, an activator of cyclinB-Cdk1, which then deactivates the cyclinB-Cdk1 inhibitor, Wee1. This results in a positive feedback loop, significantly increasing cyclinB expression and Cdk1 activation. As the cell progresses through G2 and reaches the G2/M transition, the kinase Plk1 phosphorylates Wee1, which targets Wee1 for degradation via the SCF ubiquitin ligase complex. An additional function of Plk1 is to activate Cdc25 through phosphorylation. The compound effect of Wee1 degradation and Cdc25 activation is the net removal of inhibitory phosphorylation from cdc2, which activates cdc2. Plk1 is activated at the G2/M transition by the Aurora A and Bora, which accumulate during G2 and form an activation complex. The Plk1-Cdc2-cdc25 complex then initiates a positive feedback loop which serves to further activate Cdc2, and in conjunction with an increase in cyclin B levels during G2, the resulting cdc2-cyclin B complexes then activate downstream targets which promote entry into mitosis. The resultant Cdk1 activity also activates expression of Mem1-Fkh, a G2/M transition gene. The rapid surge in cyclinB-Cdk1 activity is necessary, as M phase initiation is an all-or-nothing event engaging in hysteresis. Hysteresis of Cdk1 activity via cyclin B drives M phase entry by establishing a minimum threshold of cyclinB concentration. This exists at a level higher than the minimum needed for the continuation of M phase after entry, acting to safeguard the all-or-nothing event. This entry concentration is further increased in the case of incomplete DNA replication, adding another regulatory mechanism at the G2/M transition point. The presence of hysteresis allows for M phase entry to be highly regulated as a function of cyclinB-Cdk1 activity. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=3730562 | 945,123 |
1,498,842 | The ‘930’ is a large machine as well (49×39×17.5 centimeters), that maintains all the functional characteristics of the larger brother in a more compact package. Its very sturdy cast-metal frame, ‘"Kunststoff’" (Bakelite) main board and idler-wheel drive to the internal rim of its heavy platter gives it peerless sonic qualities. The drive system, start/stop system, brake and speed control are exactly as on the 927. Its bearing, though of a slightly reduced diameter than the 927’s, is on par for quality, and it is a ‘wet’ bearing too: it contains 25 cc of special EMT oil, that must be changed every time the turntable is serviced. The preamplifier of the monophonic 930 was the tube ‘139’. The quality and reliability of the EMT machines became rapidly legendary and the 'arrowhead' logo became a symbol of German engineering at its best in professional studio audio equipment, the only possible choice for top radio stations and the phonographic industry. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=7933660 | 1,497,998 |
49,442 | Such differences in form and reproductive roles often cause differences in behavior. As previously stated, males and females often have different roles in reproduction. The courtship and mating behavior of males and females are regulated largely by hormones throughout a bird's lifetime. Activational hormones occur during puberty and adulthood and serve to 'activate' certain behaviors when appropriate, such as territoriality during breeding season. Organizational hormones occur only during a critical period early in development, either just before or just after hatching in most birds, and determine patterns of behavior for the rest of the bird's life. Such behavioral differences can cause disproportionate sensitivities to anthropogenic pressures. Females of the whinchat in Switzerland breed in intensely managed grasslands. Earlier harvesting of the grasses during the breeding season lead to more female deaths. Populations of many birds are often male-skewed and when sexual differences in behavior increase this ratio, populations decline at a more rapid rate. Also not all male dimorphic traits are due to hormones like testosterone, instead they are a naturally occurring part of development, for example plumage. In addition, the strong hormonal influence on phenotypic differences suggest that the genetic mechanism and genetic basis of these sexually dimorphic traits may involve transcription factors or cofactors rather than regulatory sequences. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=197179 | 49,422 |
302,763 | Formally, the algorithm defines a value called "badness" associated with each possible line break; the badness is increased if the spaces on the line must stretch or shrink too much to make the line the correct width. Penalties are added if a breakpoint is particularly undesirable: for example, if a word must be hyphenated, if two lines in a row are hyphenated, or if a very loose line is immediately followed by a very tight line. The algorithm will then find the breakpoints that will minimize the sum of squares of the badness (including penalties) of the resulting lines. If the paragraph contains formula_1 possible breakpoints, the number of situations that must be evaluated naively is formula_2. However, by using the method of dynamic programming, the complexity of the algorithm can be brought down to formula_3 (see Big O notation). Further simplifications (for example, not testing extremely unlikely breakpoints such as a hyphenation in the first word of a paragraph, or very overfull lines) lead to an efficient algorithm whose running time is formula_4, where formula_5 is the width of a line. A similar algorithm is used to determine the best way to break paragraphs across two pages, in order to avoid widows or orphans (lines that appear alone on a page while the rest of the paragraph is on the following or preceding page). However, in general, a thesis by Michael Plass shows how the page-breaking problem can be NP-complete because of the added complication of placing figures. TeX's line-breaking algorithm has been adopted by several other programs, such as Adobe InDesign (a desktop publishing application) and the GNU fmt Unix command line utility. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=30065 | 302,602 |
784,964 | James D. Watson served as the Laboratory's director and president for 35 years. Upon taking charge in 1968, he focused the Laboratory on cancer research, creating a tumor virus group and successfully obtaining federal funds for an expansion of cancer research capabilities. Watson placed CSHL on a firm financial footing. Inspired by his Nobel collaborator, Francis Crick, Watson initiated a major push to scale-up CSHL research on the brain and psychiatric disorders, beginning in the late 1980s. In 1990, work was completed on the Arnold and Mabel Beckman Laboratory, and the Marks Neuroscience Building was opened in 1999. In 1994, Watson ceased being director of the Laboratory and assumed the title of president. In 2004 he was named chancellor, a position he held until October 2007, when he retired at the age of 79 after views attributed to him on race and intelligence appeared in the British press. In January 2019, CSHL severed all ties with Watson—and revoked his honorary titles—after he unequivocally restated these views in an American Masters television profile. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=441300 | 784,544 |
409,148 | Born on November 14, 1933, and raised in Biloxi, Mississippi, to Fred Wallace Haise Sr. (1903–1960) and Lucille ( Blacksher) Haise (1913–2005). He attended Biloxi High School, from which he graduated in 1950, and Perkinston Junior College (now Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College), with original aims of a career in journalism, receiving an Associate of Arts degree in 1952. He was a Boy Scout, earning the rank of Star Scout. Eligible for the draft and despite being apprehensive of flying, he joined the Naval Aviation Cadet (NAVCAD) training program. Haise underwent Naval Aviator training from 1952 to 1954. He served as a U.S. Marine Corps fighter pilot, with VMF-533, then VMF-114 on the F2H-4 Banshee and F9F-8 Cougar at MCAS Cherry Point, North Carolina, from March 1954 to September 1956. Haise also served as a tactics and all-weather flight instructor in the U.S. Navy Advanced Training Command at NAS Kingsville, Texas. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=366161 | 408,947 |
1,698,645 | In November 2019, the university faced financial trouble and was unable to pay the salaries of faculty members and the scholarships of students despite its revenue of millions of dollars. The reason was a freeze on its assets imposed by a court order, after a year-long trial, on request for an arrestment of funds by the state-owned Halkbank, which had concerns regarding the pay back of a US$70 million credit. A real estate, which belonged to the state-owned monopoly company Tekel, was transferred free of charge to the university as campus ground, and became subject of security for a credit from the Halkbank. The real estate lost its security status when the Council of State ruled at the last instance in favor of the Chamber of Architects branch of the Union of Chambers of Turkish Engineers and Architects (TMMOB) overturning the court's decision in the case. It was claimed by university representatives that the measure was of a political rather than technical nature due to the political fallout between Erdoğan and Ahmet Davutoğlu, the latter being a co-founder of the university. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=29096295 | 1,697,691 |
960,029 | The first woman faculty member of the Michigan College of Mines came in 1927, her name was Ella Wood and was hired as an assistant professor for the Humanities department. She was made an associate professor by 1928, a full professor by 1935 and the head of geography and languages by 1937. Professor Wood was accepted into the university five years before women were allowed to pursue degrees. She also worked in the library and taught meteorology to assist with pilot training sessions to students during WWII. Her presence encouraged many young ladies to apply for special student status and take classes at the school and ultimately allowed women to receive degrees at this school. As co-ed enrollment increased, she promoted women involvement on campus and co-educational programs. She also became the academic advisor to all female students and thoroughly enjoyed the role of "mother" that she was able to play here to all of her students. Dr. Wood also held the title "Dean of Women", making her the first woman to receive the title Dean at the university. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=45893 | 959,521 |
1,639,537 | Graph based approaches have been criticized for several shortcomings. They fail to account for manufacturability of the recognized features due to their strong reliance on topological patterns rather than geometry. The intersection of features causes an explosion in the number of possible feature patterns that spoils any attempt to formulate feature patterns. To address these difficulties, Vandenbrande and Requicha. proposed to search for "minimal indispensable portion of a feature's boundary", called hints, rather than complete feature patterns. For example, presence of two opposing planar faces is a hint for potential existence of a slot feature. Hints are not necessarily restricted to the part geometry. They can be extracted form tolerances and design attributes as well. For example, "a thread attribute may be taken as a hole hint". This approach has been more successful in recognizing intersecting features. However, the efficiency of the approach has been argued, as there could be a huge number of traces that won't lead to valid features. Some authors have been in favor of using a hybrid of graph based and hint based FR to improve the efficiency of hint-based reasoning. In the hybrid approach, graph-based reasoning is used to find out those regions of the part that certainly lead to valid features when used by the hint based reasoner. Other existing FR approaches are volumetric decomposition, Artificial Neural Networks, and expert systems Babic et al. briefly introduces many of them. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=11235056 | 1,638,612 |
893,725 | The following explains some HMU functions for fuel control systems in the 1960's. The fuel flow depends on the area of a variable restriction in a fuel tube (a throttle valve which has its area adjusted by the pilot) and the pressure drop across it. The pressure drop has to be maintained by the HMU if the pilot's throttle valve is to control the fuel flow. The fuel must be reduced with altitude to maintain the same a/f ratio as the lower ambient pressure means less weight of air entering the engine (early engine controls used a Barostat or Barometric Pressure Control depending on the type of fuel pump, fixed or variable displacement). When the pilot wants more thrust the rate of increase in fuel flow that comes with moving the thrust lever (throttle) must not be too great but at the same time must be enough to accelerate the engine quickly without stalling the compressor. When reducing thrust the rate at which the fuel decreases must not be too quick or a flame-out will occur. At high engine speeds over-speeding and over-temperaturing (going beyond the maximum allowable) must be prevented to avoid turbine blade damage. An example of an HMU, although called a Constant All Speed Control (CASC), was the Rolls-Royce/Lucas fuel control used on the Rolls-Royce Spey. It performed all the above functions as well as maintaining the HP shaft speed (being the basic control parameter) selected by the pilot for most subsequent flight conditions, the LP shaft speed was prevented from exceeding its aerodynamic speed (N/sqrtT) limit which occurs at low inlet temperatures, the maximum pressure in the engine, which occurred on cold days, to preserve the fatigue life of the casings. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=21146024 | 893,255 |
1,168,210 | The pectoral girdle is discussed by Chatterjee as being highly derived in "Protoavis", displaying synapomorphies of avialans more derived than "Archaeopteryx", including the presence of a hypocleidium-bearing furcula, and a hypertrophied, carinate sternum. Chatterjee's interpretation of the fossils identified as such in his reviews of the "Protoavis" material are open to question due to the preservation quality of the elements and as of this time, it is not clear whether either character was in fact present in "Protoavis". The glenoid appears to be oriented dorsolaterally permitting a wide range of humeral movement. Chatterjee implies that this is a highly derived trait which allies "Protoavis" to Aves, but why this should be so is not clearly discussed in the descriptions of the animal. In and of itself, the orientation of the glenoid is not a sufficient basis for placing "Protoavis" within Aves. The scapular blade is far broader than illustrated by Chatterjee in his 1997 account, and not particularly avian in its gross form. The coracoid, identified by Chatterjee as strut-like and retroverted, is, like the supposed furcula and sternum, too poorly preserved to permit accurate identification. Moreover, the original spatial relationship of the alleged coracoid to the scapula is entirely unknown. Uncinate processes and sternal ribs are missing. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=672740 | 1,167,592 |
1,215,916 | A key step in managing weeds in any pasture system is identification. Once the undesired species in a pasture system are identified, an integrated approach of management can be implemented to control weed populations. It is important to recognize that no single approach to weed management will result in weed free pastures; therefore, various cultural, mechanical, and chemical control methods can be combined in an weed management plan. Cultural controls include: avoiding spreading manure contaminated with weed seeds, cleaning equipment after working in weed infested areas, and managing weed problems in fencerows and other areas near pastures. Mechanical controls such as repeated mowing, clipping, and hand weeding can also be used to effectively manage weed infestations by weakening the plant. These methods should be implemented when weed flower buds are closed or just starting to open to prevent seed production. Although these first two methods reduce need for herbicides, weed problems may still persist in managed grazing systems and the use of herbicides may become necessary. Use of herbicides may restrict the use of a pasture for some length of time, depending on the type and amount of the chemical used. Frequently, weeds in pasture systems are patchy and therefore spot treatment of herbicides may be used as a least cost method of chemical control. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=231237 | 1,215,264 |
940,377 | Parvovirus infection in pregnant women is associated with hydrops fetalis due to severe fetal anemia, sometimes leading to miscarriage or stillbirth. This is due to a combination of hemolysis of the red blood cells, as well as the virus directly negatively affecting the red blood cell precursors in the bone marrow. The risk of fetal loss is about 10% if infection occurs before pregnancy week 20 (especially between weeks 14 and 20), but minimal after then. Routine screening of the antenatal sample would enable the pregnant mother to determine the risk of infection. Knowledge of her status would allow the mother to avoid contact with individuals suspected or known to have an ongoing infection, however, at the present time, antenatal testing for immunity is not recommended, since there is no good means to prevent the infection, there is no specific therapy and there are no vaccines available. It may increase maternal anxiety and fear without proven benefit. The best approach would be to recommend all pregnant women to avoid contact with children with current symptoms of infection, as described above. The risk to the fetus will be reduced with correct diagnosis of the anemia (by ultrasound scans) and treatment (by blood transfusions). There is some evidence that intrauterine parvovirus B19 infection leads to developmental abnormalities in childhood. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=639222 | 939,876 |
315,179 | The Board of Regents selected West Virginia University president Chauncey Samuel Boucher to replace Burnett. The Depression was still unfolding, and in response to a rising level of failing students at the university, Boucher instituted NU's first admission standards. At the outset of World War II in Europe, Boucher urged neutrality among students and faculty; even after the United States entered the war, he encouraged the university to "carry on" as normal. However, plummeting enrollment and intense national fervor meant the school could not stay "neutral" for long, and began offering vacant university buildings to the United States Army for training and shelter. Nebraska soon joined the Army Specialized Training Program and the campus became disorganized and chaotic as soldiers "studied very casually while in residence" before being deployed overseas. More than 13,000 soldiers received language, medical, or engineering training before the program was shut down in 1944 to allow for the opening of Love Library, which had been used as a barracks. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=323058 | 315,010 |
1,779,159 | Word that Lewis was developing his own solutions to the minimum range problem reached the AI team at St Athan some time in early 1940. Bowen was extremely upset. He had become used to the way the researchers had been put into an ill-advised attempt at production but now Rowe was directly removing them from the research effort as well. Tizard heard of the complaints and visited Dundee in an attempt to smooth them over, which evidently failed. On 29 March 1940 a memo from Watt's DCD office announced a reorganization of the Airborne Group. Gerald Touch would move to the RAE to help develop production, installation and maintenance procedures for the Mk. IV, several other members would disperse to RAF airfields to help train the ground and air crews directly on the units, while the rest of the team, including Lovell and Hodgkin, would re-join the main radar research teams in Dundee. Bowen was notably left out of the reorganization; his involvement in AI ended. In late July, Bowen was invited to join the Tizard Mission, which left for the US in August 1940. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=43239543 | 1,778,157 |
1,081,194 | Chemokines and chemokine receptors, of which CXCR stands out, regulate multiple processes such as morphogenesis, angiogenesis, and immune responses and are considered potential targets for drug development. It is indicated by clinical samples that a high expression level of CXCR4 in idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis lungs. Experimental evidence further indicate that CXCR4/CXCR12 is associated with the pathogenesis of lung fibrosis. In the gastrointestinal tract system, the CXCL12-CXCR4 axis is under investigation as an anti-fibrotic therapy in the treatment for chronic pancreatitis. For instance, blocking CXCR4, the receptor for CXCL12, with Plerixafor (AMD-3100) increased the effectiveness of combretastatin in a mouse model of breast cancer, presumably by preventing macrophages from being recruited to tumours.[15][16] AMD-3100 is also widely used in combination with G-CSF for mobilizing hematopoietic stem cells into the blood stream, allowing collection for bone marrow transplant. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=960559 | 1,080,638 |
989,100 | Pathfinding, another common use for AI, is widely seen in real-time strategy games. Pathfinding is the method for determining how to get a NPC from one point on a map to another, taking into consideration the terrain, obstacles and possibly "fog of war". Commercial videogames often use fast and simple "grid-based pathfinding", wherein the terrain is mapped onto a rigid grid of uniform squares and a pathfinding algorithm such as A* or IDA* is applied to the grid. Instead of just a rigid grid, some games use irregular polygons and assemble a navigation mesh out of the areas of the map that NPCs can walk to. As a third method, it is sometimes convenient for developers to manually select "waypoints" that NPCs should use to navigate; the cost is that such waypoints can create unnatural-looking movement. In addition, waypoints tend to perform worse than navigation meshes in complex environments. Beyond static pathfinding, navigation is a sub-field of Game AI focusing on giving NPCs the capability to navigate in a dynamic environment, finding a path to a target while avoiding collisions with other entities (other NPC, players...) or collaborating with them (group navigation). Navigation in dynamic strategy games with large numbers of units, such as Age of Empires (1997) or Civilization V (2010), often performs poorly; units often get in the way of other units. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=1654769 | 988,584 |
20,209 | For the US, the very concept of self-defending bombers was called into question, but instead of abandoning daylight raids and turning to night bombing, as the RAF suggested, they chose other paths; at first, bombers converted to gunships (the Boeing YB-40) was believed to be able to escort the bomber formations, but when the concept proved to be unsuccessful, thoughts then turned to the Lockheed P-38 Lightning. In early 1943, the USAAF also decided that the Republic P-47 Thunderbolt and P-51B be considered for the role of a smaller escort fighter, and in July, a report stated that the P-51B was "the most promising plane" with an endurance of 4 hours 45 minutes with the standard internal fuel of 184 gallons plus 150 gallons carried externally. In August, a P-51B was fitted with an extra internal 85-gallon tank but problems with longitudinal stability occurred so some compromises in performance with the tank full were made. Since the fuel from the fuselage tank would be used during the initial stages of a mission, the fuel tank would be fitted in all Mustangs destined for VIII Fighter Command. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=24710 | 20,201 |
1,165,998 | In the 1970s, problems with the emphasis on attachment as a trait (a stable characteristic of an individual) rather than as a type of behaviour with important organising functions and outcomes, led some authors to consider that "attachment (as implying anything but infant-adult interaction) [may be said to have] outlived its usefulness as a developmental construct..." and that attachment behaviours were best understood in terms of their functions in the child's life. Children may achieve a given function, such as a sense of security, in many different ways and the various but functionally comparable behaviours should be categorized as related to each other. This way of thinking saw the secure base concept (the organisation of exploration of an unfamiliar situation around returns to a familiar person) as "central to the logic and coherence of attachment theory and to its status as an organizational construct." Similarly, Thompson pointed out that "other features of early parent-child relationships that develop concurrently with attachment security, including negotiating conflict and establishing cooperation, also must be considered in understanding the legacy of early attachments." | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=18756845 | 1,165,381 |
609,597 | Identification of major forces is critical to understanding insect flight. The first attempts to understand flapping wings assumed a quasi-steady state. This means that the air flow over the wing at any given time was assumed to be the same as how the flow would be over a non-flapping, steady-state wing at the same angle of attack. By dividing the flapping wing into a large number of motionless positions and then analyzing each position, it would be possible to create a timeline of the instantaneous forces on the wing at every moment. The calculated lift was found to be too small by a factor of three, so researchers realized that there must be unsteady phenomena providing aerodynamic forces. There were several developing analytical models attempting to approximate flow close to a flapping wing. Some researchers predicted force peaks at supination. With a dynamically scaled model of a fruit fly, these predicted forces later were confirmed. Others argued that the force peaks during supination and pronation are caused by an unknown rotational effect that fundamentally is different from the translational phenomena. There is some disagreement with this argument. Through computational fluid dynamics, some researchers argue that there is no rotational effect. They claim that the high forces are caused by an interaction with the wake shed by the previous stroke. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=3409272 | 609,286 |
238,948 | They further argue that this raises questions about the significance of the social environment on sexual orientation, stating, "If one cannot reliably make a male human become attracted to other males by cutting off his penis in infancy and rearing him as a girl, then what other psychosocial intervention could plausibly have that effect?" It is further stated that neither cloacal exstrophy (resulting in a malformed penis), nor surgical accidents, are associated with abnormalities of prenatal androgens, thus, the brains of these individuals were male-organized at birth. Six of the seven identified as heterosexual males at follow up, despite being surgically altered and reared as females, with researchers adding: "available evidence indicates that in such instances, parents are deeply committed to raising these children as girls and in as gender-typical a manner as possible." Bailey et al. describe these sex reassignments as 'the near-perfect quasi-experiment' in measuring the impact of 'nature' versus 'nurture' with regards to male homosexuality. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=51614 | 238,828 |
1,627,624 | When the building opened the ground floor contained: the main hall; main office; various laboratories and associated facilities including a mortuary. The library, laboratories, lecture rooms, associated offices and equipment rooms occupied the first floor. The second floor accommodated the main galleried lecture theatre, museum, two laboratories and associated support rooms. An animal house stood on the flat roof to the west. Consideration had been given to the provision of services and use of suitable materials to facilitate the effective operation of the building. All windows except those on the south-east were glazed with anti-actinic glass of a soft bluish-green to counteract the glare and reduce heat transmission. Other services and fittings included sound-proofing, ventilating systems, refrigeration, stainless steel and chromium-plated fittings, and specialised electrical and drainage systems. A double wall running the length of the building to the rear corridor houses horizontal and vertical service ducts. Furniture and fittings throughout the building are of Queensland timbers and were constructed in the Government's Ipswich Road Workshop. | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki?curid=44463368 | 1,626,706 |
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