Jack W. Jones in a Faculty Recital

This is the program for the faculty recital featuring organist Jack. W Jones. This recital took place on October 27, 1975

Pre-exposure prophylaxis as a prevention strategy for HIV seroconversion in the men who have sex with men population with comparison of its effectiveness in other at-risk groups

Since the beginning of the United States AIDS epidemic in the early 1980s, the medical community has overcome significant challenges in the diagnosis and treatment of Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) infections. Many advancements in suppressing HIV viral loads and maintaining healthy immune system function in HIV positive patients have been achieved with antiretroviral therapy (ART). Moreover, these drugs have been shown to be effective for preventing HIV infections. Once-daily Truvada (emtricitabine/tenofovir disoproxil fumarate) has been approved by the FDA for this purpose. The availability of this preventive therapy, commonly known as preexposure prophylaxis (PrEP), necessitates educating at-risk patient populations about its prophylactic benefits. In order to select appropriate candidates for PrEP prophylaxis, its efficacy in different at-risk populations needs to be determined. This investigation examines disparities in PrEP’s efficacy among at-risk groups and proposes explanations that may guide the medical provider in offering PrEP therapy to patients who could benefit. Additionally, current clinical trials and studies with alternative PrEP options will be explored

Dimensional Reduction in Non-Supersymmetric Theories

It is shown that regularisation by dimensional reduction is a viable alternative to dimensional regularisation in non-supersymmetric theories.Comment: 13 pages, phyzzx, LTH 32

The Fayet-Iliopoulos D-term and its renormalisation in softly-broken supersymmetric theories

We consider the renormalisation of the Fayet-Iliopoulos D-term in a softly-broken abelian supersymmetric theory, and calculate the associated beta-function through three loops. We show that there exists (at least through three loops) a renormalisation group invariant trajectory for the coefficient of the D-term, corresponding to the conformal anomaly solution for the soft masses and couplings.Comment: 30 pages, Revtex, 15 Figures. Minor changes, and inadvertent omission of author from this abstract correcte

Sharp-Wave Ripples Orchestrate the Induction of Synaptic Plasticity during Reactivation of Place Cell Firing Patterns in the Hippocampus

SummaryPlace cell firing patterns reactivated during hippocampal sharp-wave ripples (SWRs) in rest or sleep are thought to induce synaptic plasticity and thereby promote the consolidation of recently encoded information. However, the capacity of reactivated spike trains to induce plasticity has not been directly tested. Here, we show that reactivated place cell firing patterns simultaneously recorded from CA3 and CA1 of rat dorsal hippocampus are able to induce long-term potentiation (LTP) at synapses between CA3 and CA1 cells but only if accompanied by SWR-associated synaptic activity and resulting dendritic depolarization. In addition, we show that the precise timing of coincident CA3 and CA1 place cell spikes in relation to SWR onset is critical for the induction of LTP and predictive of plasticity generated by reactivation. Our findings confirm an important role for SWRs in triggering and tuning plasticity processes that underlie memory consolidation in the hippocampus during rest or sleep

Debra Franks and Karen Claiborne in a Joint Junior Recital

This is the program for the joint junior recital of Debra Franks and Karen Claiborne. Pianist Jane Chu accompanied Franks, who performed on the flute; pianist Dr. Jack W. Jones accompanied Claiborne, who performed on the alto saxophone. The recital took place on December 4, 1975, at 5:00, in the Mabee Fine Arts Center Recital Hall

TB117: Techniques for Using the Growth and Behavior of Imprinted Ducklings to Evaluate Habitat Quality

We developed a technique for evaluating duckling habitat quality that is based on two assumptions. In good habitat young birds (1) grow rapidly and thus are better able t o survive stresses such as inclement weather, and (2) spend relatively less time moving about in search of food and more time resting and thus are less conspicuous to predators. We imprinted artificially incubated and hatched ducklings by being present at the time of hatching; i.e., the ducklings thought we were their mother. Ducklings were split into broods and placed on ponds where their growth was measured and their behavior monitored for several days. Comparisons of growth rates and behavioral time budgets allowed us to determine which ponds were better habitat. This paper describes techniques for imprinting, duckling husbandry, and measurement of growth and behavior.https://digitalcommons.library.umaine.edu/aes_techbulletin/1077/thumbnail.jp

Dark Ages Radio Explorer Mission: Probing the Cosmic Dawn

The period between the creation of the cosmic microwave background at a redshift of ~1000 and the formation of the first stars and black holes that re-ionize the intergalactic medium at redshifts of 10-20 is currently unobservable. The baryonic component of the universe during this period is almost entirely neutral hydrogen, which falls into local regions of higher dark matter density. This seeds the formation of large-scale structures including the cosmic web that we see today in the filamentary distribution of galaxies and clusters of galaxies. The only detectable signal from these dark ages is the 21-cm spectral line of hydrogen, redshifted down to frequencies of approximately 10-100 MHz. Space-based observations of this signal will allow us to determine the formation epoch and physics of the first sources of ionizing radiation, and potentially detect evidence for the decay of dark matter particles. JPL is developing deployable low frequency antenna and receiver prototypes to enable both all-sky spectral measurements of neutral hydrogen and ultimately to map the spatial distribution of the signal as a function of redshift. Such observations must be done from space because of Earth's ionosphere and ubiquitous radio interference. A specific application of these technologies is the Dark Ages Radio Explorer (DARE) mission. This small Explorer class mission is designed to measure the sky-averaged hydrogen signal from the shielded region above the far side of the Moon. These data will complement ground-based radio observations of the final stages of intergalactic re-ionization at higher frequencies. DARE will also serve as a scientific percursor for space-based interferometry missions to image the distribution of hydrogen during the cosmic dark ages.Comment: 2015 IEEE Aerospace Conferenc

Ripples Make Waves: Binding Structured Activity and Plasticity in Hippocampal Networks

Establishing novel episodic memories and stable spatial representations depends on an exquisitely choreographed, multistage process involving the online encoding and offline consolidation of sensory information, a process that is largely dependent on the hippocampus. Each step is influenced by distinct neural network states that influence the pattern of activation across cellular assemblies. In recent years, the occurrence of hippocampal sharp wave ripple (SWR) oscillations has emerged as a potentially vital network phenomenon mediating the steps between encoding and consolidation, both at a cellular and network level by promoting the rapid replay and reactivation of recent activity patterns. Such events facilitate memory formation by optimising the conditions for synaptic plasticity to occur between contingent neural elements. In this paper, we explore the ways in which SWRs and other network events can bridge the gap between spatiomnemonic processing at cellular/synaptic and network levels in the hippocampus