Active Response Gravity Offload and Method

A variable gravity field simulator can be utilized to provide three dimensional simulations for simulated gravity fields selectively ranging from Moon, Mars, and micro-gravity environments and/or other selectable gravity fields. The gravity field simulator utilizes a horizontally moveable carriage with a cable extending from a hoist. The cable can be attached to a load which experiences the effects of the simulated gravity environment. The load can be a human being or robot that makes movements that induce swinging of the cable whereby a horizontal control system reduces swinging energy. A vertical control system uses a non-linear feedback filter to remove noise from a load sensor that is in the same frequency range as signals from the load sensor

Stakeholder Relationships and Social Welfare: A Behavioral Theory of Contributions to Joint Value Creation

Firms play a crucial role in furthering social welfare through their ability to foster stakeholders’ contributions to joint value creation, i.e., value creation that involves a public-good dilemma due to high task and outcome interdependence - leading to what economists have labeled the ‘team production problem’. We build on relational models theory to examine how individual stakeholders’ contributions to joint value creation are shaped by stakeholders’ mental representations of their relationships with the other participants in value creation, and how these mental representations are affected by the perceived behavior of the firm. Stakeholder theory typically contrasts a broadly-defined ‘relational’ approach to stakeholder management with a ‘transactional’ approach based on the price mechanism - and has argued that the former is more likely to contribute to social welfare than the latter. Our theory supports this prediction for joint value creation, but also implies that the dichotomy on which it is based is too coarse-grained: there are three distinct ways to trigger higher contributions to joint value creation than through a ‘transactional’ approach. Our theory also helps explain the tendency for firms and their stakeholders to converge on ‘transactional’ relationships, despite their relative inefficiency in the context of joint value creation

Walking the fine line: Self-reported reasons for substance use in persons with severe mental illness

Many theoretical models have been proposed to explain the relationship between severe mental illness (SMI) and substance use. Because many of these are contradictory quantitative American studies, a qualitative, exploratory study of a Scandinavian sample may offer a new perspective. The aim of the study is to explore reasons for substance use through analysis of the participants’ experiences. A qualitative study with semistructured interviews was used. Purposeful sampling (N=11) of patients with substance use disorder (SUD) and SMI, who were included in assertive community treatment teams, was completed. Inclusion criteria are increased quality of life or increased general functioning, and decreased substance use, after a minimum of 12 months in treatment. Reasons given for using substances were categorized as (a) controlling the symptoms of mental illness, (b) counteracting medication side effects, or (c) balancing the ambiguity. The conclusion is that the study findings mainly support secondary substance use models in explaining the comorbidity of SMI and substance use. However, there is some support for the traditional self-medication hypothesis (SMH), iatrogenic vulnerability, and the supersensitivity model. This may be because the majority of the study participants reported having a mental illness with subsequent substance use. The expressed ambivalence to substance use also lends some support to bidirectional models

Cycles in spatial and temporal chromosomal organization driven by the circadian clock

Dynamic transitions in the epigenome have been associated with regulated patterns of nuclear organization. The accumulating evidence that chromatin remodeling is implicated in circadian function prompted us to explore whether the clock may control nuclear architecture. We applied the 3C-derived 4C technology (Chromosome Conformation Capture on Chip) in mouse embryonic fibroblasts (MEFs) to demonstrate the presence of circadian long-range interactions, using the clock-controlled Dbp gene as bait. The circadian genomic interactions with Dbp are highly specific and are absent in MEFs whose clock is disrupted by ablation of the Bmal1 gene. We establish that the Dbp circadian interactome contains a wide variety of genes and clock-related DNA elements. These findings reveal a previously unappreciated circadian and clock-dependent shaping of the nuclear landscape