Smart Growth, State Policy and Public Process in Maine: The Dunstan Crossing Experience

Sprawling development in Maine’s growth areas continues in spite of the state’s emphasis on comprehensive planning over the past 20 years. In this article, the authors present some lessons to be learned from Scarborough’s Dunstan Crossing project, a planned development which would have incorporated many of the goals of the national “smart growth” movement. The project was approved by the elected town council (one of whom is co-author Sylvia Most), and it was in compliance with Scarborough’s town comprehensive plan. Nonetheless, the project for now has effectively been blocked after a lengthy period, described here, that saw a citizen referendum, lawsuits, mediation, and many kinds of public participation. Based on the Dunstan Crossing experience, the authors make recommendations regarding the state’s Growth Management Act, about more effective regional planning, and more generally about how to structure public participation in potentially contentious projects

Formation of Multipartite Entanglement Using Random Quantum Gates

The formation of multipartite quantum entanglement by repeated operation of one and two qubit gates is examined. The resulting entanglement is evaluated using two measures: the average bipartite entanglement and the Groverian measure. A comparison is made between two geometries of the quantum register: a one dimensional chain in which two-qubit gates apply only locally between nearest neighbors and a non-local geometry in which such gates may apply between any pair of qubits. More specifically, we use a combination of random single qubit rotations and a fixed two-qubit gate such as the controlled-phase gate. It is found that in the non-local geometry the entanglement is generated at a higher rate. In both geometries, the Groverian measure converges to its asymptotic value more slowly than the average bipartite entanglement. These results are expected to have implications on different proposed geometries of future quantum computers with local and non-local interactions between the qubits.Comment: 7 pages, 5 figure

Exploring Stakeholder Priorities for Recent MLIS Graduates and Early Career Librarians

A multi-phase research project was conducted to understand the future skills and competencies expected of new MLIS-degreed librarians. Phase one found the two largest categories of challenges include understanding the mission of the library and funding issues, with other categories including staff skills, hiring and retaining staff, technology, operations and policies, and outreach. Phase two explored stakeholder priorities for competences expected of new MLIS graduates and librarians finishing their first five years of employment. The highest priorities for new MLIS graduates are related to skills and basic knowledge, while areas such as management and leadership, lifelong learning, and information resources were highly prioritized for early career librarians

Crustal magnetic fields do not lead to magnetar-strength amplifications in binary neutron-star mergers

The amplification of magnetic fields plays an important role in explaining numerous astrophysical phenomena associated with binary neutron-star mergers, such as mass ejection and the powering of short gamma-ray bursts. Magnetic fields in isolated neutron stars are often assumed to be confined to a small region near the stellar surface, while they are normally taken to fill the whole stars in the numerical modelling. By performing high-resolution, global, and high-order general-relativistic magnetohydrodynamic simulations we investigate the impact of a purely crustal magnetic field and contrast it with the standard configuration consisting of a dipolar magnetic field with the same magnetic energy but filling the whole star. While the crust-configurations are very effective in generating strong magnetic fields during the Kelvin-Helmholtz-instability stage, they fail to achieve the same level of magnetic-field amplification of the full-star configurations. This is due to the lack of magnetized material in the neutron-star interiors to be used for further turbulent amplification and to the surface losses of highly magnetized matter in the crust-configurations. Hence, the final magnetic energies in the two configurations differ by more than one order of magnitude. We briefly discuss the impact of these results on astrophysical observables and how they can be employed to deduce the magnetic topology in merging binaries.Comment: 10 pages, 5 figures, videos of the simulations available on https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLlETUkKHxhvxmRan-H8rZL45cNdZw0uC

Toward automatic reconstruction of a highly resolved tree of life

Contains fulltext : 51078.pdf (publisher's version ) (Closed access)We have developed an automatable procedure for reconstructing the tree of life with branch lengths comparable across all three domains. The tree has its basis in a concatenation of 31 orthologs occurring in 191 species with sequenced genomes. It revealed interdomain discrepancies in taxonomic classification. Systematic detection and subsequent exclusion of products of horizontal gene transfer increased phylogenetic resolution, allowing us to confirm accepted relationships and resolve disputed and preliminary classifications. For example, we place the phylum Acidobacteria as a sister group of delta-Proteobacteria, support a Gram-positive origin of Bacteria, and suggest a thermophilic last universal common ancestor

S100A1: A Multifaceted Therapeutic Target in Cardiovascular Disease

Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death worldwide, showing a dramatically growing prevalence. It is still associated with a poor clinical prognosis, indicating insufficient long-term treatment success of currently available therapeutic strategies. Investigations of the pathomechanisms underlying cardiovascular disorders uncovered the Ca2+ binding protein S100A1 as a critical regulator of both cardiac performance and vascular biology. In cardiomyocytes, S100A1 was found to interact with both the sarcoplasmic reticulum ATPase (SERCA2a) and the ryanodine receptor 2 (RyR2), resulting in substantially improved Ca2+ handling and contractile performance. Additionally, S100A1 has been described to target the cardiac sarcomere and mitochondria, leading to reduced pre-contractile passive tension as well as enhanced oxidative energy generation. In endothelial cells, molecular analyses revealed a stimulatory effect of S100A1 on endothelial NO production by increasing endothelial nitric oxide synthase activity. Emphasizing the pathophysiological relevance of S100A1, myocardial infarction in S100A1 knockout mice resulted in accelerated transition towards heart failure and excessive mortality in comparison with wild-type controls. Mice lacking S100A1 furthermore displayed significantly elevated blood pressure values with abrogated responsiveness to bradykinin. On the other hand, numerous studies in small and large animal heart failure models showed that S100A1 overexpression results in reversed maladaptive myocardial remodeling, long-term rescue of contractile performance, and superior survival in response to myocardial infarction, indicating the potential of S100A1-based therapeutic interventions. In summary, elaborate basic and translational research established S100A1 as a multifaceted therapeutic target in cardiovascular disease, providing a promising novel therapeutic strategy to future cardiologists