The So-Called Mixed Text: an Examination of the Non-Alexandrian and Non-Byzantine Text-Type in the Catholic Epistles

Problem. Since the eighteenth century, textual scholars have been grouping New Testament Greek manuscripts into groups called text-types in order to evaluate the thousands of variant readings found in these manuscripts. These text-types form the basis for determining the earliest form of the text--the primary goal of New Testament Textual Criticism. Almost all textual critics recognize three main text types: Alexandrian, Western, and Byzantine. However, in recent times, W. Larry Richards and his followers identified a mixed text-type in six books of the Catholic Epistles that is distinguishable from the already established text-types. This text-type if supported by empirical investigation to be more original than the Alexandrian ant Byzantine texts, could necessitate the re-evaluation of these established text-types, and also the reevaluation of the designation \u27mixed\u27 attributed to this group. Purpose. The purpose of this study was to do a more complete identification of this supposed mixed text-type in the Catholic Epistles and to determine the weighted value of these mixed manuscripts. Method. Two hundred and twenty manuscripts were classified using the two-tiered process of Factor Analysis and a modified form of the Claremont Profile Method. (An additional 187 manuscripts already classified were also studied.) The distinctive readings of the mixed manuscripts that were classified as a result of this process were then evaluated using the canons of textual criticism. Results. In addition to a more comprehensive picture of these mixed manuscripts, it was confirmed that the weighted value of this mixed category was negligible in terms of uncovering the earliest original, as only thirteen (18.5%) of seventy-two unique readings were confirmed to be the earliest form of the text. Probably the most significant fact that these mixed manuscripts affirm is that the evolution of the New Testament text that began in the early centuries continued in the Middle Ages. Conclusion. The distinctive readings of the mixed text-type do not make a significant contribution to uncovering the earliest form of the text. Recommendation. It would be worthwhile to ascertain whether this mixed phenomenon also exists in other parts of the New Testament and what is the weighted value that it carries in these other places in all factors that surround the history of the text

Influential Article Review- Effects of the Open Collaboration Workspace

This paper examines interaction in workspace We present insights from a highly influential paper. Here are the highlights from this paper: Organizations’ pursuit of increased workplace collaboration has led managers to transform traditional office spaces into ‘open’, transparency-enhancing architectures with fewer walls, doors and other spatial boundaries, yet there is scant direct empirical research on how human interaction patterns change as a result of these architectural changes. In two intervention-based field studies of corporate headquarters transitioning to more open office spaces, we empirically examined— using digital data from advanced wearable devices and from electronic communication servers—the effect of open office architectures on employees' face-to-face, email and instant messaging (IM) interaction patterns. Contrary to common belief, the volume of face-to-face interaction decreased significantly (approx. 70%) in both cases, with an associated increase in electronic interaction. In short, rather than prompting increasingly vibrant face-to-face collaboration, open architecture appeared to trigger a natural human response to socially withdraw from officemates and interact instead over email and IM. This is the first study to empirically measure both face-to-face and electronic interaction before and after the adoption of open office architecture. The results inform our understanding of the impact on human behaviour of workspaces that trend towards fewer spatial boundaries. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Interdisciplinary approaches for uncovering the impacts of architecture on collective behaviour’. For our overseas readers, we then present the insights from this paper in Spanish, French, Portuguese, and German

Session 1B: An Exploration of the Factors that Motivate Gifted and Talented Students from Underrepresented Populations to Engage in STEM

The purpose of this study is to examine rural Presenters at the Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy to identify their motivation to engage in STEM education. Dr. Adrienne Coleman, the Multicultural Education Specialist at IMSA, was the primacy researcher, along with five IMSA Presenters, who conducted a qualitative study. According to research, rural Presenters are less likely to attend selective colleges and can lose interest in STEM during the transition from middle to high school. Also, rural communities face the additional obstacles of poorly funded school operations, as well as poverty, higher cost of living, geographic remoteness, and drug use and violence. In order to entice talented youth to take over hard-to-fill jobs in these communities, this study sought to use IMSA rural Presenters\u27 motives in pursuing STEM to inform the development of STEM enrichment programs for URP Presenters. Besides gathering Presenter perspectives in focus groups, we interviewed IMSA alumni and parents of rural origins about their thoughts on STEM motivation and achievement. By learning about factors that push disadvantaged Presenters to engage in math and science, we can increase inclusivity and enhance URP Presenters\u27 motivation at IMSA, as well as at National Consortium of Specialized STEM Schools (NCSSS) affiliates

Clustering by genetic ancestry using genome-wide SNP data

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Population stratification can cause spurious associations in a genome-wide association study (GWAS), and occurs when differences in allele frequencies of single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) are due to ancestral differences between cases and controls rather than the trait of interest. Principal components analysis (PCA) is the established approach to detect population substructure using genome-wide data and to adjust the genetic association for stratification by including the top principal components in the analysis. An alternative solution is genetic matching of cases and controls that requires, however, well defined population strata for appropriate selection of cases and controls.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We developed a novel algorithm to cluster individuals into groups with similar ancestral backgrounds based on the principal components computed by PCA. We demonstrate the effectiveness of our algorithm in real and simulated data, and show that matching cases and controls using the clusters assigned by the algorithm substantially reduces population stratification bias. Through simulation we show that the power of our method is higher than adjustment for PCs in certain situations.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>In addition to reducing population stratification bias and improving power, matching creates a clean dataset free of population stratification which can then be used to build prediction models without including variables to adjust for ancestry. The cluster assignments also allow for the estimation of genetic heterogeneity by examining cluster specific effects.</p

An Exploration of the Factors that Motivate Gifted and Talented Rural Students to Engage in STEM

Research Questions: What motivates rural students to pursue STEM? How can we use these factors to engage more rural students in STEM

Lack of association between angiotensin-converting enzyme and dementia of the Alzheimer’s type in an elderly Arab population in Wadi Ara, Israel

The angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE), a protease involved in blood pressure regulation, has been implicated as an important candidate gene for Alzheimer’s disease (AD). This study investigated whether the ACE gene insertion–deletion (ID) polymorphism is associated with risk of developing dementia of Alzheimer’s type (DAT) in an Arab–Israeli community, a unique genetic isolate where there is a high prevalence of DAT. In contrast to several other studies, we found no evidence of an association between this polymorphism and either DAT or age-related cognitive decline (ARCD)

Imputation of missing genotypes: an empirical evaluation of IMPUTE

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Imputation of missing genotypes is becoming a very popular solution for synchronizing genotype data collected with different microarray platforms but the effect of ethnic background, subject ascertainment, and amount of missing data on the accuracy of imputation are not well understood.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We evaluated the accuracy of the program IMPUTE to generate the genotype data of partially or fully untyped single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). The program uses a model-based approach to imputation that reconstructs the genotype distribution given a set of referent haplotypes and the observed data, and uses this distribution to compute the marginal probability of each missing genotype for each individual subject that is used to impute the missing data. We assembled genome-wide data from five different studies and three different ethnic groups comprising Caucasians, African Americans and Asians. We randomly removed genotype data and then compared the observed genotypes with those generated by IMPUTE. Our analysis shows 97% median accuracy in Caucasian subjects when less than 10% of the SNPs are untyped and missing genotypes are accepted regardless of their posterior probability. The median accuracy increases to 99% when we require 0.95 minimum posterior probability for an imputed genotype to be acceptable. The accuracy decreases to 86% or 94% when subjects are African Americans or Asians. We propose a strategy to improve the accuracy by leveraging the level of admixture in African Americans.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Our analysis suggests that IMPUTE is very accurate in samples of Caucasians origin, it is slightly less accurate in samples of Asians background, but substantially less accurate in samples of admixed background such as African Americans. Sample size and ascertainment do not seem to affect the accuracy of imputation.</p

The Dopamine D 3 Receptor Gene and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/108358/1/jts21937.pd

A Novel Strategy for Development of Recombinant Antitoxin Therapeutics Tested in a Mouse Botulism Model

Antitoxins are needed that can be produced economically with improved safety and shelf life compared to conventional antisera-based therapeutics. Here we report a practical strategy for development of simple antitoxin therapeutics with substantial advantages over currently available treatments. The therapeutic strategy employs a single recombinant ‘targeting agent’ that binds a toxin at two unique sites and a ‘clearing Ab’ that binds two epitopes present on each targeting agent. Co-administration of the targeting agent and the clearing Ab results in decoration of the toxin with up to four Abs to promote accelerated clearance. The therapeutic strategy was applied to two Botulinum neurotoxin (BoNT) serotypes and protected mice from lethality in two different intoxication models with an efficacy equivalent to conventional antitoxin serum. Targeting agents were a single recombinant protein consisting of a heterodimer of two camelid anti-BoNT heavy-chain-only Ab VH (VHH) binding domains and two E-tag epitopes. The clearing mAb was an anti-E-tag mAb. By comparing the in vivo efficacy of treatments that employed neutralizing vs. non-neutralizing agents or the presence vs. absence of clearing Ab permitted unprecedented insight into the roles of toxin neutralization and clearance in antitoxin efficacy. Surprisingly, when a post-intoxication treatment model was used, a toxin-neutralizing heterodimer agent fully protected mice from intoxication even in the absence of clearing Ab. Thus a single, easy-to-produce recombinant protein was as efficacious as polyclonal antiserum in a clinically-relevant mouse model of botulism. This strategy should have widespread application in antitoxin development and other therapies in which neutralization and/or accelerated clearance of a serum biomolecule can offer therapeutic benefit