653 research outputs found
Disjunctivism and the possibility of perceptual knowledge
This thesis is about one of John McDowell’s epistemic arguments for perceptual
disjunctivism. According to the argument in question we can know things on the basis
of perception only if perceptions provide us with different epistemic reasons than
phenomenally indistinguishable hallucinations and this is possible only if perceptions
have mind-independent states of the world as constituents and are hence a different
kind of experiential state from hallucinations, as the perceptual disjunctivist suggests.
I argue against some detractors that there is an argument with this structure to be
found in McDowell’s writings. I then argue that McDowell’s own version of the
argument fails because it relies on commitments to certain theses which generate
problems for the argument. I then describe an alternative version of the argument. The
alternative version of the argument relies on a distinctive theory of what it is for
perceptions to provide their subjects with epistemic reasons. According to this theory,
perceptions are not themselves reasons to believe things about the world but enable us
to possess reasons which are then thought of as the states of the world they relate us
to: perceptions are not reasons but are ways of possessing reasons. I attempt to
develop this theory, defend it against some objections, and I argue that if it is correct
then the epistemic argument can be got to work without any commitment to the
problematic theses McDowell’s version of the argument commits itself to
Separability of Rotational Effects on a Gravitational Lens
We derive the deflection angle up to due to a Kerr gravitational
lens with mass and specific angular momentum . It is known that at the
linear order in and the Kerr lens is observationally equivalent to the
Schwarzschild one because of the invariance under the global translation of the
center of the lens mass. We show, however, nonlinear couplings break the
degeneracy so that the rotational effect becomes in principle separable for
multiple images of a single source. Furthermore, it is distinguishable also for
each image of an extended source and/or a point source in orbital motion. In
practice, the correction at becomes for the
supermassive black hole in our galactic center. Hence, these nonlinear
gravitational lensing effects are too small to detect by near-future
observations.Comment: 12 pages (RevTeX); accepted for publication in Phys. Rev.
Cloud-Based Speech Technology for Assistive Technology Applications (CloudCAST)
The CloudCAST platform provides a series of speech recognition services that can be integrated into assistive technology applications. The platform and the services provided by the public API are described. Several exemplar applications have been developed to demonstrate the platform to potential developers and users
Elite male Flat jockeys display lower bone density and lower resting metabolic rate than their female counterparts: implications for athlete welfare
To test the hypothesis that daily weight-making is more problematic to health in male compared with female jockeys, we compared the bone-density and resting metabolic rate (RMR) in weight-matched male and female Flat-jockeys. RMR (kcal.kg-1 lean mass) was lower in males compared with females as well as lower bone-density Z-scores at the hip and lumbar spine. Data suggest the lifestyle of male jockeys’ compromise health more severely than females, possibly due to making-weight more frequently
Emergence of Anti-Cancer Drug Resistance: Exploring the Importance of the Microenvironmental Niche via a Spatial Model
Practically, all chemotherapeutic agents lead to drug resistance. Clinically,
it is a challenge to determine whether resistance arises prior to, or as a
result of, cancer therapy. Further, a number of different intracellular and
microenvironmental factors have been correlated with the emergence of drug
resistance. With the goal of better understanding drug resistance and its
connection with the tumor microenvironment, we have developed a hybrid
discrete-continuous mathematical model. In this model, cancer cells described
through a particle-spring approach respond to dynamically changing oxygen and
DNA damaging drug concentrations described through partial differential
equations. We thoroughly explored the behavior of our self-calibrated model
under the following common conditions: a fixed layout of the vasculature, an
identical initial configuration of cancer cells, the same mechanism of drug
action, and one mechanism of cellular response to the drug. We considered one
set of simulations in which drug resistance existed prior to the start of
treatment, and another set in which drug resistance is acquired in response to
treatment. This allows us to compare how both kinds of resistance influence the
spatial and temporal dynamics of the developing tumor, and its clonal
diversity. We show that both pre-existing and acquired resistance can give rise
to three biologically distinct parameter regimes: successful tumor eradication,
reduced effectiveness of drug during the course of treatment (resistance), and
complete treatment failure
Biosynthesis of ganglioside mimics in Campylobacter jejuni OH4384. Identification of the glycosyltransferase genes, enzymatic synthesis of model compounds, and characterization of nanomole amounts by 600-mhz (1)h and (13)c NMR analysis.
We have applied two strategies for the cloning of four genes responsible for the biosynthesis of the GT1a ganglioside mimic in the lipooligosaccharide (LOS) of a bacterial pathogen,Campylobacter jejuni OH4384, which has been associated with Guillain-Barre syndrome. We first cloned a gene encoding an α-2,3-sialyltransferase (cst-I) using an activity screening strategy. We then used nucleotide sequence information from the recently completed sequence from C. jejuni NCTC 11168 to amplify a region involved in LOS biosynthesis from C. jejuni OH4384. The LOS biosynthesis locus from C. jejuni OH4384 is 11.47 kilobase pairs and encodes 13 partial or complete open reading frames, while the corresponding locus in C. jejuni NCTC 11168 spans 13.49 kilobase pairs and contains 15 open reading frames, indicating a different organization between these two strains. Potential glycosyltransferase genes were cloned individually, expressed in Escherichia coli, and assayed using synthetic fluorescent oligosaccharides as acceptors. We identified genes encoding a β-1,4-N-acetylgalactosaminyl-transferase (cgtA), a β-1,3-galactosyltransferase (cgtB), and a bifunctional sialyltransferase (cst-II), which transfers sialic acid to O-3 of galactose and to O-8 of a sialic acid that is linked α-2,3- to a galactose. The linkage specificity of each identified glycosyltransferase was confirmed by NMR analysis at 600 MHz on nanomole amounts of model compounds synthesized in vitro. Using a gradient inverse broadband nano-NMR probe, sequence information could be obtained by detection of3J(C,H) correlations across the glycosidic bond. The role of cgtA and cst-II in the synthesis of the GT1a mimic in C. jejuni OH4384 were confirmed by comparing their sequence and activity with corresponding homologues in two relatedC. jejuni strains that express shorter ganglioside mimics in their LOS
The relationship between adiposity and cognitive function in a large community-dwelling population: data from the Trinity Ulster Department of Agriculture (TUDA) ageing cohort study
Giant magnetoresistance of multiwall carbon nanotubes: modeling the tube/ferromagnetic-electrode burying contact
We report on the giant magnetoresistance (GMR) of multiwall carbon nanotubes
with ultra small diameters. In particular, we consider the effect of the
inter-wall interactions and the lead/nanotube coupling. Comparative studies
have been performed to show that in the case when all walls are well coupled to
the electrodes, the so-called inverse GMR can appear. The tendency towards a
negative GMR depends on the inter-wall interaction and on the nanotube le ngth.
If, however, the inner nanotubes are out of contact with one of the electrodes,
the GMR remains positive even for relatively strong inter-wall interactions
regardless of the outer nanotube length. These results shed additional light on
recently reported experimental data, where an inverse GMR was found in some
multiwall carbon nanotube samples.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figure
Impact of the common MTHFR 677C→T polymorphism on blood pressure in adulthood and role of riboflavin in modifying the genetic risk of hypertension: evidence from the JINGO project
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