Ribosome Biogenesis Modulates Ty1 Copy Number Control in Saccharomyces cerevisiae.

Transposons can impact the host genome by altering gene expression and participating in chromosome rearrangements. Therefore, organisms evolved different ways to minimize the level of transposition. In Saccharomyces cerevisiae and its close relative S. paradoxus, Ty1 copy number control (CNC) is mediated by the self-encoded restriction factor p22, which is derived from the GAG capsid gene and inhibits virus-like particle (VLP) assembly and function. Based on secondary screens of Ty1 cofactors, we identified LOC1, a RNA localization/ribosome biogenesis gene that affects Ty1 mobility predominantly in strains harboring Ty1 elements. Ribosomal protein mutants rps0bΔ and rpl7aΔ displayed similar CNC-specific phenotypes as loc1Δ, suggesting that ribosome biogenesis is critical for CNC. The level of Ty1 mRNA and Ty1 internal (Ty1i) transcripts encoding p22 was altered in these mutants, and displayed a trend where the level of Ty1i RNA increased relative to full-length Ty1 mRNA. The level of p22 increased in these mutants, and the half-life of p22 also increased in a loc1Δ mutant. Transcriptomic analyses revealed small changes in the level of Ty1 transcripts or efficiency of translation initiation in a loc1Δ mutant. Importantly, a loc1Δ mutant had defects in assembly of Gag complexes and packaging Ty1 RNA. Our results indicate that defective ribosome biogenesis enhances CNC by increasing the level of p22, and raise the possibility for versatile links between VLP assembly, its cytoplasmic environment, and a novel stress response

Fluctuations in the Site Disordered Traveling Salesman Problem

We extend a previous statistical mechanical treatment of the traveling salesman problem by defining a discrete "site disordered'' problem in which fluctuations about saddle points can be computed. The results clarify the basis of our original treatment, and illuminate but do not resolve the difficulties of taking the zero temperature limit to obtain minimal path lengths.Comment: 17 pages, 3 eps figures, revte

Factors Associated with Unplanned Conversion to Open in Nephrectomy for Kidney Cancer

Minimally invasive surgery (MIS) has been adopted as an approach in kidney surgery. Laparoscopic kidney surgery has been introduced in the 1990s with robotics emerging a decade after. The minimally invasive approach has been technically feasible and has been shown to be noninferior with preserved oncology standards to open surgery. The ubiquitous use of MIS for kidney cancer has been standard of practice; however, unplanned conversion to open kidney surgery has been characterized at 4.9% for laparoscopic radical nephrectomy compared to 6.0% in robotic radical nephrectomy. Another analysis of 54,246 patients undergoing partial nephrectomy for kidney cancer observed an unplanned open conversion rate of 2.87% for cT1 renal masses. Furthermore, the unplanned conversion to open radical or partial nephrectomy after an attempted minimally invasive approach has been an independent predictor of increased risk of 30-day hospital readmission. Currently, the relative risk factors to predict unplanned conversion to open surgery has not been well characterized. Greater understanding of risk factors for unplanned open conversion has clinical implications to reduce intraoperative and postoperative outcomes. The early recognition of nationwide risk and predictors may aid in identifying patients for planned open kidney surgery. We aim to use the American College of Surgeons National Surgical Quality Improvement Program (ACS-NSQIP) database to identify predictors and outcomes in a contemporary cohort

Pulling Back the Curtain on the Wizards of Oz

The Wizard of Oz method is an increasingly common practice in HCI and CSCW studies as part of iterative design processes for interactive systems. Instead of designing a fully-fledged system, the ‘technical work’ of key system components is completed by human operators yet presented to study participants as if computed by a machine. However, little is known about how Wizard of Oz studies are interactionally and collaboratively achieved in situ by researchers and participants. By adopting an ethnomethodological perspective, we analyse our use of the method in studies with a voice-controlled vacuum robot and two researchers present. We present data that reveals how such studies are organised and presented to participants and unpack the coordinated orchestration work that unfolds ‘behind the scenes’ to complete the study. We examine how the researchers attend to participant requests and technical breakdowns, and discuss the performative, collaborative, and methodological nature of their work. We conclude by offering insights from our application of the approach to others in the HCI and CSCW communities for using the method

Prenatal Insecticide Exposures and Birth Weight and Length among an Urban Minority Cohort

We reported previously that insecticide exposures were widespread among minority women in New York City during pregnancy and that levels of the organophosphate chlorpyrifos in umbilical cord plasma were inversely associated with birth weight and length. Here we expand analyses to include additional insecticides (the organophosphate diazinon and the carbamate propoxur), a larger sample size (n = 314 mother–newborn pairs), and insecticide measurements in maternal personal air during pregnancy as well as in umbilical cord plasma at delivery. Controlling for potential confounders, we found no association between maternal personal air insecticide levels and birth weight, length, or head circumference. For each log unit increase in cord plasma chlorpyrifos levels, birth weight decreased by 42.6 g [95% confidence interval (CI), −81.8 to −3.8, p = 0.03] and birth length decreased by 0.24 cm (95% CI, −0.47 to −0.01, p = 0.04). Combined measures of (ln)cord plasma chlorpyrifos and diazinon (adjusted for relative potency) were also inversely associated with birth weight and length (p < 0.05). Birth weight averaged 186.3 g less (95% CI, −375.2 to −45.5) among newborns with the highest compared with lowest 26% of exposure levels (p = 0.01). Further, the associations between birth weight and length and cord plasma chlorpyrifos and diazinon were highly significant (p ≤ 0.007) among newborns born before the 2000–2001 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s regulatory actions to phase out residential use of these insecticides. Among newborns born after January 2001, exposure levels were substantially lower, and no association with fetal growth was apparent (p > 0.8). The propoxur metabolite 2-isopropoxyphenol in cord plasma was inversely associated with birth length, a finding of borderline significance (p = 0.05) after controlling for chlorpyrifos and diazinon. Results indicate that prenatal chlorpyrifos exposures have impaired fetal growth among this minority cohort and that diazinon exposures may have contributed to the effects. Findings support recent regulatory action to phase out residential uses of the insecticides

Seeing the way: visual sociology and the distance runner's perspective

Employing visual and autoethnographic data from a two‐year research project on distance runners, this article seeks to examine the activity of seeing in relation to the activity of distance running. One of its methodological aims is to develop the linkage between visual and autoethnographic data in combining an observation‐based narrative and sociological analysis with photographs. This combination aims to convey to the reader not only some of the specific subcultural knowledge and particular ways of seeing, but also something of the runner's embodied feelings and experience of momentum en route. Via the combination of narrative and photographs we seek a more effective way of communicating just how distance runners see and experience their training terrain. The importance of subjecting mundane everyday practices to detailed sociological analysis has been highlighted by many sociologists, including those of an ethnomethodological perspective. Indeed, without the competence of social actors in accomplishing these mundane, routine understandings and practices, it is argued, there would in fact be no social order

Connections Between the Spring Breakup of the Southern Hemisphere Polar Vortex, Stationary Waves, and Air-sea Roughness

A robust connection between the drag on surface-layer winds and the stratospheric circulation is demonstrated in NASA's Goddard Earth Observing System Chemistry-Climate Model (GEOSCCM). Specifically, an updated parameterization of roughness at the air-sea interface, in which surface roughness is increased for moderate wind speeds (4ms to 20ms), leads to a decrease in model biases in Southern Hemispheric ozone, polar cap temperature, stationary wave heat flux, and springtime vortex breakup. A dynamical mechanism is proposed whereby increased surface roughness leads to improved stationary waves. Increased surface roughness leads to anomalous eddy momentum flux convergence primarily in the Indian Ocean sector (where eddies are strongest climatologically) in September and October. The localization of the eddy momentum flux convergence anomaly in the Indian Ocean sector leads to a zonally asymmetric reduction in zonal wind and, by geostrophy, to a wavenumber-1 stationary wave pattern. This tropospheric stationary wave pattern leads to enhanced upwards wave activity entering the stratosphere. The net effect is an improved Southern Hemisphere vortex: the vortex breaks up earlier in spring (i.e., the spring late-breakup bias is partially ameliorated) yet is no weaker in mid-winter. More than half of the stratospheric biases appear to be related to the surface wind speed biases. As many other chemistry climate models use a similar scheme for their surface layer momentum exchange and have similar biases in the stratosphere, we expect that results from GEOSCCM may be relevant for other climate models

The Claims Culture: A Taxonomy of Industry Attitudes

This paper presents an analysis of a familiar aspect of construction industry culture that we have dubbed 'the claims culture'. This is a culture of contract administration that lays a strong emphasis on the planning and management of claims. The principal elements of the analysis are two sets of distinctions. The first comprises economic and occupational orders, referring to two kinds of control that are exercised over the construction process; predicated respectively on economic ownership and occupational competence. The second refers to contrasting attitudes towards relationships and problem solving within these orders: respectively 'distributive' and 'integrative'. The concepts of economic and occupational order entail further sub-categories. The various attitudes associated with these categories and sub-categories are described. They are assessed as to their consequences for change initiatives in the industry