The Expansion of Statutory Subject Matter Under the 1952 Patent Act

It is quite surprising that a mere four words were sufficient to establish a fundamental framework for defining the categories of patentable inventions. This framework has successfully stood for a period of more than 200 years. The 1793 Patent Act defined the four classes of statutory subject matter as “art, machine, manufacture, or composition.” The 1952 Patent Act (“Patent Act” or “1952 Act”) replaced the term “art” with “process,” resulting in the current language of 35 U.S.C. § 101. The legislative history of the Patent Act states that “art” as used in § 101: “is interpreted by the courts to be practically synonymous with process or method. The word ‘process’ has been used to avoid the necessity of explanation that the word ‘art’ as used in this place means ‘process or method.’” Despite the absence of any substantial change in the statutory language, there has been a substantial expansion of the subject matter being claimed in issued U.S. patents over the last 50 years. This expansion is the result of judicial interpretation of the essentially unchanged language of the Patent Act, and administrative guidelines from the United States Patent and Trademark Office

Optimal processing and performance evaluation of passive acoustic system

Thesis (M. Eng.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, 1997.Includes bibliographical references (leaf 83).by Peter Lawrence Greene.M.Eng

D-Brane Gauge Theories from Toric Singularities and Toric Duality

Via partial resolution of Abelian orbifolds we present an algorithm for extracting a consistent set of gauge theory data for an arbitrary toric variety whose singularity a D-brane probes. As illustrative examples, we tabulate the matter content and superpotential for a D-brane living on the toric del Pezzo surfaces as well as the zeroth Hirzebruch surface. Moreover, we discuss the non-uniqueness of the general problem and present examples of vastly different theories whose moduli spaces are described by the same toric data. Our methods provide new tools for calculating gauge theories which flow to the same universality class in the IR. We shall call it ``Toric Duality.''Comment: 38 pages, 6 figures, 2 references added and 1 equation correcte

An Epidemiological Examination of the Subluxation Construct Using Hill’s Criteria of Causation

Background Chiropractors claim to locate, analyze and diagnose a putative spinal lesion known as subluxation and apply the mode of spinal manipulation (adjustment) for the correction of this lesion. Aim The purpose of this examination is to review the current evidence on the epidemiology of the subluxation construct and to evaluate the subluxation by applying epidemiologic criteria for it's significance as a causal factor. Methods The databases of PubMed, Cinahl, and Mantis were searched for studies using the keywords subluxation, epidemiology, manipulation, dose-response, temporality, odds ratio, relative risk, biological plausibility, coherence, and analogy. Results The criteria for causation in epidemiology are strength (strength of association), consistency, specificity, temporality (temporal sequence), dose response, experimental evidence, biological plausibility, coherence, and analogy. Applied to the subluxation all of these criteria remain for the most part unfulfilled. Conclusion There is a significant lack of evidence to fulfill the basic criteria of causation. This lack of crucial supportive epidemiologic evidence prohibits the accurate promulgation of the chiropractic subluxation

Instanton sums and five-dimensional gauge theories

We analyze the vector multiplet prepotential of d=4, N=2 type IIA compactifications. We find that the worldsheet instanton corrections have a natural interpretation as one-loop corrections in five dimensions, with the extra dimension being compactified on a circle of radius $g_{s}\ell_{s}$. We argue that the relation between spacetime and worldsheet instantons is natural from this point of view. We also discuss the map between the type IIA worldsheet instantons and the spacetime instantons in the heterotic dual.Comment: 33 pages, uses harvmac.tex; four-dimensional limit in sec. 3.2 corrected, correct hyphenation in titl

An epidemiological examination of the subluxation construct using Hill's criteria of causation

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Chiropractors claim to locate, analyze and diagnose a putative spinal lesion known as subluxation and apply the mode of spinal manipulation (adjustment) for the correction of this lesion.</p> <p>Aim</p> <p>The purpose of this examination is to review the current evidence on the epidemiology of the subluxation construct and to evaluate the subluxation by applying epidemiologic criteria for it's significance as a causal factor.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>The databases of PubMed, Cinahl, and Mantis were searched for studies using the keywords subluxation, epidemiology, manipulation, dose-response, temporality, odds ratio, relative risk, biological plausibility, coherence, and analogy.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The criteria for causation in epidemiology are strength (strength of association), consistency, specificity, temporality (temporal sequence), dose response, experimental evidence, biological plausibility, coherence, and analogy. Applied to the subluxation all of these criteria remain for the most part unfulfilled.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>There is a significant lack of evidence to fulfill the basic criteria of causation. This lack of crucial supportive epidemiologic evidence prohibits the accurate promulgation of the chiropractic subluxation.</p

Distributed Ledger Technology and the Securities Markets of the Future: A Stakeholder Survey

This Article evaluates the implications of distributed ledger technology (DLT) for the securities markets of the future and their regulation. DLT is an integral part of the larger revolution in computing, communication and data storage capacity that has transformed securities markets over the last few decades and promises further radical change in the years to come. The potential of DLT, if it can be realized, could improve the functioning of our securities markets while at the same time sharply reducing costs. Based on an interview survey of about 100 persons who play prominent roles in actually making these markets work or in regulating them, this Article reports on the most important topics and themes that have emerged from the wide range of interviewees’ opinions about the extent to which DLT will affect the future of securities markets and their regulation. A significant number saw the potential for DLT to transform securities markets and market structure, from the possibility of stock trading on DLT to the potential impact on intermediaries, the ordinary retail investor, and on preventing wrongdoing in the stock market. However, key questions remain about implementation and the appetite for making DLT-based changes among both market participants and regulators

Analysis of a human brain transcriptome map

BACKGROUND: Genome wide transcriptome maps can provide tools to identify candidate genes that are over-expressed or silenced in certain disease tissue and increase our understanding of the structure and organization of the genome. Expressed Sequence Tags (ESTs) from the public dbEST and proprietary Incyte LifeSeq databases were used to derive a transcript map in conjunction with the working draft assembly of the human genome sequence. RESULTS: Examination of ESTs derived from brain tissues (excluding brain tumor tissues) suggests that these genes are distributed on chromosomes in a non-random fashion. Some regions on the genome are dense with brain-enriched genes while some regions lack brain-enriched genes, suggesting a significant correlation between distribution of genes along the chromosome and tissue type. ESTs from brain tumor tissues have also been mapped to the human genome working draft. We reveal that some regions enriched in brain genes show a significant decrease in gene expression in brain tumors, and, conversely that some regions lacking in brain genes show an increased level of gene expression in brain tumors. CONCLUSIONS: This report demonstrates a novel approach for tissue specific transcriptome mapping using EST-based quantitative assessment

Multinationals Do It Better: Evidence on the Efficiency of Corporations’ Capital Budgeting

This paper examines the effectiveness of multinational enterprises’ capital budgeting decisions as compared to the decisions of purely domestic enterprises. This is an important question because of multinationals’ role in allocating capital globally. Answering this question may also shed light on whether multinationals are indeed better managed than are purely domestic firms. We examine this question empirically using the deviation of a firm’s estimated marginal Tobin’s q from an appropriate benchmark as an indicator of effective resource allocation. We find that multinationals make more efficient capital budgeting decisions than do purely domestic firms. The result stems from multinational enterprises’ exercising greater restraint on over-investment, but is not due to looser liquidity constraints. In obtaining the result, we account for the impact of institutional ownership, managerial ownership, and managerial entrenchment. We also test whether multinationals’ greater capital budgeting efficiency might be due to their investment locations, since they might thereby be monitored by more agents and also may be more successful in resisting pressures from special interest groups and governments to adopt practices that are not consistent with firm value maximization. We do not find support for the monitoring and bargaining hypotheses. Our observations therefore suggest that multinationals may be intrinsically better managed firms than are purely domestic firms