Current Status of Fractional Laser Resurfacing

Fractional lasers were first developed based on observations of lasers designed for hair transplantation. In 2007, ablative fractional laser resurfacing was introduced. The fractionation allowed deeper tissue penetration, leading to greater tissue contraction, collagen production and tissue remodeling. Since then, fractional erbium:YAG resurfacing lasers have also been introduced. These lasers have yielded excellent results in treating photoaging, acne scarring, and dyschromia. With the adjustment of microspot density, pulse duration, number of passes, and fluence, the surgeon can adjust the treatment effects. These lasers have allowed surgeons to treat patients with higher Fitzpatrick skin types (types IV to VI) and greater individualize treatments to various facial subunits. Immunohistochemical analysis has demonstrated remodeling effects of the tissues for several months, producing longer lasting results. Adjuvant treatments are also under investigation, including concomitant face-lift, product deposition, and platelet-rich plasma. Finally, there is a short recovery time from treatment with these lasers, allowing patients to resume regular activities more quickly. Although there is a relatively high safety profile for ablative fractionated lasers, surgeons should be aware of the limitations of specific treatments and the associated risks and complications

A Case Study of a Christian Alternative School

The purpose of this case study was to understand the decisions and life choices of students who attended East Coast Christian Alternative School (ECCAS; pseudonym). An alternative school is generally defined as a school set aside for students who are at-risk of failing (Foley & Pang, 2006). ECCAS is a Christian educational setting designed to accommodate educational, behavioral, spiritual, and medical needs of students which cannot be addressed in a traditional school setting as prescribed by local and school officials which includes the participants of the study. The theories guiding this study are Bronfenbrenner’s (1994) ecological systems theory in that a child’s development is based on a system of layers with their environment and the social cognitive theory by Bandura (2001) as it pertains to keeping the student in a social and educational atmosphere rather than removing the student entirely from a school setting. The school’s population ranges from 7 to 15 students per semester and includes both genders. The grade level ranges from middle school to twelfth grade. A criterion sample was selected, and the information gleaned represents themes from five nested studies of the participants based on synthesized information and themes from students, parents, teachers and administrators. The question guiding this case study is, how does a Christian alternative school influence the lives of students attending the program? Three areas of the student’s life were studied: spiritual, social, and academic. This information will be used to help future alternative schools. You will see in chapters four and five that a Christ-centered approach to education in the alternative school led to restoration and ultimately made a significant difference in the lives of each of the participants

Redundant Information And Predictable Stock Price Returns

How well do investors distinguish information that already is priced from genuinely novel and ex- clusive private information? This paper examines whether investors misweight information that already is in stock prices (“redundant information”) in making their trading decisions, and whether this misweighting is associated with investors’ information processing frictions or behavioral biases. I extend the Kyle (1985) model to allow for non-Bayesian updating and transaction costs. The model predicts that price changes exhibit a state space process, in which the parameter for investors’ non- Bayesian weighting of redundant information is estimable distinctly from information asymmetry and transaction costs. Using this model, I estimate a firm-quarter measure of investors’ misweighting of redundant information. I find that, on average, investors behave as if the information content in the immediately prior price change is private information. This overweighting of redundant infor- mation appears higher when investors have less time to process information, stock prices are less informative, and industry-wide information is less costly to obtain. Overall, these results suggest one way that information processing frictions contribute to momentum and mean reversion in stock price returns

Developing an Adaptable NextGen Interface for the UAS Ground Control Station

Presently a significant number of unmanned aircraft are not included in the existing National Airspace System surveillance system. This is due to many reasons including an inability to carry Automatic Dependent Surveillance Broadcast equipment for weight or power consumption deficiencies, legacy equipment usage, and the experimental nature of unmanned aircraft. In addition, pilots on the ground do not have the situation awareness to proximal aircraft pilots in the cockpit have. However, many unmanned aircraft utilize a link between the aircraft and ground control station that includes periodic updates to the aircraft position. Technologies have been developed to provide the existing national surveillance system with the location of the aircraft while at the same time providing the ground pilot a display with aircraft that are in the aircrafts proximity, thus expanding the national surveillance data as well as provide increased pilot situation awareness

Wideband Josephson Parametric Isolator

The cryogenic hardware required to build a superconducting qubit based quantum computer demands a variety of microwave components. These elements include microwave couplers, filters, amplifiers, and circulators/isolators. Traditionally implemented as discrete components, integration of this peripheral hardware, in an effort to reduce overall footprint, thermal load, and added noise, is a key challenge to scaling modern quantum processors with qubit counts climbing over the 100+ mark. Ferrite--based microwave isolators, generally employed in the readout chain to decouple qubits and resonators from readout electronics, persist as one of the volumetrically largest devices still utilized as discrete components. Here we present an alternative two--port isolating integrated circuit derived from the DC Superconducting Quantum Interference Device (DC--SQUID). Non--reciprocal transmission is achieved using the three--wave microwave mixing properties of a flux-modulated DC--SQUID. We show that when multiple DC--SQUIDs are embedded in a multi--pole admittance inverting filter structure, the three--wave mixing derived from the flux pumping of the DC--SQUIDs can provide directional microwave power flow. For a three--pole filter device, we experimentally demonstrate a directionality greater than 15 dB over a 600 MHz bandwidth.Comment: 16 pages, 10 figure

Charge and current-sensitive preamplifiers for pulse shape discrimination techniques with silicon detectors

New charge and current-sensitive preamplifiers coupled to silicon detectors and devoted to studies in nuclear structure and dynamics have been developed and tested. For the first time shapes of current pulses from light charged particles and carbon ions are presented. Capabilities for pulse shape discrimination techniques are demonstrated.Comment: 14 pages, 12 figures, to be published in Nucl. Inst. Meth.

High-Quality Draft Genome Sequences of 28 Enterococcus sp. Isolates

The enterococci are low-GC Gram-positive bacteria that have emerged as leading causes of hospital-acquired infection. They are also commensals of the gastrointestinal tract of healthy humans and most other animals with gastrointestinal flora and are important for food fermentations. Here we report the availability of draft genome sequences for 28 enterococcal strains of diverse origin, including the species Enterococcus faecalis, E. faecium, E. casseliflavus, and E. gallinarum