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Mediated intimacy: Sex advice in media culture
The bold argument of Mediated Intimacy (Barker et al., 2018)1 is that media of various kinds play an increasingly important role in shaping people’s knowledge, desires, practices and expectations about intimate relationships. While arguments rage about the nature and content of sex and relationship education in schools, it is becoming clear that more and more of us – young and old – look not to formal education, or even to our friends, for information about sex, but to the media (Albury, 2016; Attwood et al., 2015). This is not simply a matter of media ‘advice’ in the form of self-help books, magazine problem pages, or online ‘agony’ columns – though these are all proliferating and are discussed at length in the book. It is also about the wider cultural habitat of images, ideas and discourses about intimacy that circulate through and across media: the ‘happy endings’ of romantic comedies; the ‘money shots’ of pornography; the celebrity gossip about who is seeing whom, who is ‘cheating’, and who is looking ‘hot’; the lifestyle TV about ‘embarrassing bodies’ or being ‘undateable’; the newspaper features on how to have a ‘good’ divorce or ‘ten things never to say on a first date’; the new apps that incite us to quantify and rate our sex lives, and so forth. These constitute the ‘taken for granted’ of everyday understandings of intimacy, and they are at the heart of Mediated Intimacy
Rotorcraft convertible engine study
The objective of the Rotorcraft Convertible Engine Study was to define future research and technology effort required for commercial development by 1988 of convertible fan/shaft gas turbine engines for unconventional rotorcraft transports. Two rotorcraft and their respective missions were defined: a Fold Tilt Rotor aircraft and an Advancing Blade Concept (ABC) rotorcraft. Sensitivity studies were conducted with these rotorcraft to determine parametrically the influence of propulsion characteristics on aircraft size, mission fuel requirements, and direct operating costs (DOC). The two rotorcraft were flown with conventional propulsion systems (separate lift/cruise engines) and with convertible propulsion systems to determine the benefits to be derived from convertible engines. Trade-off studies were conducted to determine the optimum engine cycle and staging arrangement for a convertible engine. Advanced technology options applicable to convertible engines were studied. Research and technology programs were identified which would ensure technology readiness for commercial development of convertible engines by 1988
Is the transition redshift a new cosmological number?
Observations from Supernovae Type Ia (SNe Ia) provided strong evidence for an
expanding accelerating Universe at intermediate redshifts. This means that the
Universe underwent a transition from deceleration to acceleration phases at a
transition redshift of the order unity whose value in principle depends
on the cosmology as well as on the assumed gravitational theory. Since
cosmological accelerating models endowed with a transition redshift are
extremely degenerated, in principle, it is interesting to know whether the
value of itself can be observationally used as a new cosmic
discriminator. After a brief discussion of the potential dynamic role played by
the transition redshift, it is argued that future observations combining SNe
Ia, the line-of-sight (or "radial") baryon acoustic oscillations, the
differential age of galaxies, as well as the redshift drift of the spectral
lines may tightly constrain , thereby helping to narrow the parameter
space for the most realistic models describing the accelerating Universe.Comment: 12 pages, 5 figures. Some discussions about how to estimate the
transition redshift have been added. New data by Planck and H(z) data have
been mentioned. New references have been adde
Estimation of Parameters in DNA Mixture Analysis
In Cowell et al. (2007), a Bayesian network for analysis of mixed traces of
DNA was presented using gamma distributions for modelling peak sizes in the
electropherogram. It was demonstrated that the analysis was sensitive to the
choice of a variance factor and hence this should be adapted to any new trace
analysed. In the present paper we discuss how the variance parameter can be
estimated by maximum likelihood to achieve this. The unknown proportions of DNA
from each contributor can similarly be estimated by maximum likelihood jointly
with the variance parameter. Furthermore we discuss how to incorporate prior
knowledge about the parameters in a Bayesian analysis. The proposed estimation
methods are illustrated through a few examples of applications for calculating
evidential value in casework and for mixture deconvolution
Postcard: I\u27m on the Hike to the Barbecue at Carlton, Kansas
This black and white printed postcard features an illustration of a man walking along railroad tracks towards a town. Text is printed on the top right of the card. Handwriting is on the bottom and back of the card.https://scholars.fhsu.edu/tj_postcards/1543/thumbnail.jp
Ground state of two electrons on concentric spheres
We extend our analysis of two electrons on a sphere [Phys. Rev. A {\bf 79},
062517 (2009); Phys. Rev. Lett. {\bf 103}, 123008 (2009)] to electrons on
concentric spheres with different radii. The strengths and weaknesses of
several electronic structure models are analyzed, ranging from the mean-field
approximation (restricted and unrestricted Hartree-Fock solutions) to
configuration interaction expansion, leading to near-exact wave functions and
energies. The M{\o}ller-Plesset energy corrections (up to third-order) and the
asymptotic expansion for the large-spheres regime are also considered. We also
study the position intracules derived from approximate and exact wave
functions. We find evidence for the existence of a long-range Coulomb hole in
the large-spheres regime, and infer that unrestricted Hartree-Fock theory
over-localizes the electrons.Comment: 10 pages, 10 figure
Connecting species’ geographical distributions to environmental variables: range maps versus observed points of occurrence
Connecting the geographical occurrence of a species with underlying environmental variables is fundamental for many analyses of life history evolution and for modeling species distributions for both basic and practical ends. However, raw distributional information comes principally in two forms: points of occurrence (specific geographical coordinates where a species has been observed), and expert-prepared range maps. Each form has potential short-comings: range maps tend to overestimate the true occurrence of a species, whereas occurrence points (because of their frequent non-random spatial distribution) tend to underestimate it. Whereas previous comparisons of the two forms have focused on how they may differ when estimating species richness, less attention has been paid to the extent to which the two forms actually differ in their representation of a species’ environmental associations. We assess such differences using the globally distributed avian order Galliformes (294 species). For each species we overlaid range maps obtained from IUCN and point-of-occurrence data obtained from GBIF on global maps of four climate variables and elevation. Over all species, the median difference in distribution centroids was 234 km, and median values of all five environmental variables were highly correlated, although there were a few species outliers for each variable. We also acquired species’ elevational distribution mid-points (mid-point between minimum and maximum elevational extent) from the literature; median elevations from point occurrences and ranges were consistently lower (median −420 m) than mid-points. We concluded that in most cases occurrence points were likely to produce better estimates of underlying environmental variables than range maps, although differences were often slight. We also concluded that elevational range mid-points were biased high, and that elevation distributions based on either points or range maps provided better estimates
Effects of diabetes family history and exercise training on the expression of adiponectin and leptin and their receptors
The daughters of patients with diabetes have reduced insulin sensitivity index (ISI) scores compared with women with no family history of
diabetes, but their ISI increase more in response to exercise training(1). The present study aimed to determine whether differences between
these groups in exercise-induced changes in circulating adiponectin and leptin concentrations and expression of their genes and receptors
in subcutaneous adipose tissue (SAT), could explain differences in the exercise-induced changes in ISI between women with and without
a family history of diabetes
Cell Junction Remodeling in Gingival Tissue Exposed to a Microbial Toxin
The gingival epithelium plays a key role in protecting the supporting structures of the teeth from bacteria and their products. In ex vivo experiments, we recently showed that the cytolethal distending toxin (Cdt) from the periodontal pathogen Aggregatibacter actinomycetemcomitans causes extensive damage to gingival tissue. Morphological changes included detachment of the keratinized outer layer, distention of spinous and basal cells in the oral epithelium, disruption of rete pegs, and apparent dissolution of cell junctions. Adherens junctions (zonula adherens) are essential for maintaining barrier function and integrity of gingival epithelium. Therefore, immunohistochemical and RT-PCR analyses of human gingival explants (HGX) and human gingival epithelial cells (HGEC) were utilized for a closer examination of the effects of the Cdt on E-cadherin, the key membrane component of adherens junctions. Although there was some variability among tissue donors, exposure of gingival tissue or isolated epithelial cells to the toxin generally resulted in a pronounced increase in the expression and cytosolic distribution of E-cadherin, accompanied by an increase in levels of the intracellular scaffolding proteins β-catenin and β-actin. These results indicate that the Cdt induced substantial remodeling of adherens junctions, with a potential impact on the barrier function of gingival epithelium.
Abbreviations: cytolethal distending toxin (Cdt), 4′,6-diamidino-2-phenylindole (DAPI), human gingival epithelial cells (HGEC), human gingival explants (HGX), human gingival fibroblasts (HGF), transepithelial resistance (TER)
Optimal full estimation of qubit mixed states
We obtain the optimal scheme for estimating unknown qubit mixed states when
an arbitrary number N of identically prepared copies is available. We discuss
the case of states in the whole Bloch sphere as well as the restricted
situation where these states are known to lie on the equatorial plane. For the
former case we obtain that the optimal measurement does not depend on the prior
probability distribution provided it is isotropic. Although the
equatorial-plane case does not have this property for arbitrary N, we give a
prior-independent scheme which becomes optimal in the asymptotic limit of large
N. We compute the maximum mean fidelity in this asymptotic regime for the two
cases. We show that within the pointwise estimation approach these limits can
be obtained in a rather easy and rapid way. This derivation is based on
heuristic arguments that are made rigorous by using van Trees inequalities. The
interrelation between the estimation of the purity and the direction of the
state is also discussed. In the general case we show that they correspond to
independent estimations whereas for the equatorial-plane states this is only
true asymptotically.Comment: 19 pages, no figure
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