Hawking Neighborhood Justice: Unlicensed Vending in the Midtown Community Court

The New York City Criminal Court (the Criminal Court) is the busiest criminal court in the world. It operates in all five city boroughs and serves as the administrative starting point for nearly all criminal cases, including felonies, misdemeanors, and violations. In theory, the New York Supreme Court handles felony cases, and the Criminal Court hears misdemeanors. In fact, however, crime levels in New York City have reached such levels that over fifty percent of all felony arrests are reduced by the prosecutor to misdemeanors so that they may be addressed in the Criminal Court, Thus, as the processing of these felony-type crimes has been accommodated in the Criminal Court, many low-level quality-of-life crimes have been bumped out of the system for lack of time, space, and resources. In Manhattan, the quality-of-life crimes comprise five general categories: prostitution, subway fare-beating, minor drug offenses, unlicensed street peddling, and petit larceny/criminal possession of stolen property

On the Emergent Spectra of Hot Protoplanet Collision Afterglows

We explore the appearance of terrestrial planets in formation by studying the emergent spectra of hot molten protoplanets during their collisional formation. While such collisions are rare, the surfaces of these bodies may remain hot at temperatures of 1000-3000 K for up to millions of years during the epoch of their formation. These object are luminous enough in the thermal infrared to be observable with current and next generation optical/IR telescopes, provided that the atmosphere of the forming planet permits astronomers to observe brightness temperatures approaching that of the molten surface. Detectability of a collisional afterglow depends on properties of the planet's atmosphere -- primarily on the mass of the atmosphere. A planet with a thin atmosphere is more readily detected, because there is little atmosphere to obscure the hot surface. Paradoxically, a more massive atmosphere prevents one from easily seeing the hot surface, but also keeps the planet hot for a longer time. In terms of planetary mass, more massive planets are also easier to detect than smaller ones because of their larger emitting surface areas. We present preliminary calculations assuming a range of protoplanet masses (1-10 M_\earth), surface pressures (1-1000 bar), and atmospheric compositions, for molten planets with surface temperatures ranging from 1000 to 1800 K, in order to explore the diversity of emergent spectra that are detectable. While current 8- to 10-m class ground-based telescopes may detect hot protoplanets at wide orbital separations beyond 30 AU (if they exist), we will likely have to wait for next-generation extremely large telescopes or improved diffraction suppression techniques to find terrestrial planets in formation within several AU of their host stars.Comment: 28 pages, 6 figures, ApJ manuscript format, accepted into the Ap

Intrauterine Exposures and Maternal Health Status during Pregnancy in Relation to Later Child Health: A Review of Pregnancy Cohort Studies in Europe

We show a description of pregnancy cohorts in the European region. Our investigation identified 66 pregnancy cohorts, mostly hosted in Western Central Europe. Among these 66 cohorts, 24 began recruitment before the year 2000, while six cohorts are still enrolling. The most common topics were lifestyle, environment and nutrition with allergies and neurodevelopment being a minority. We observed a pattern of positive correlations between data collected using medical records, structured interviews, and the collection of biological samples. Objectively assessed data were negatively correlated with self-administered questionnaires. Eight cohorts addressed intrauterine exposure, focusing on environmental pollutants such as endocrine-disrupting chemicals. The effects of these compounds on the developing foetus have been studied greatly, but more research on their effects is still needed. Many cohorts investigated genetics through the collection of biological samples from the mothers and children, to improve knowledge on the mother-to-child transmission of genetic information, antibodies, microbiota, etc. Paediatric epidemiology represents an important field of research since preserving healthy lives from conception onwards is the most efficient way to improve population health. According to our report, it seems that this field of research is well developed in Europe, where numerous high profile studies are currently ongoing

Cholesterol granulomas nasal polyp in sphenoethmoid recess. An atypical aspect in a common lesion

Nasal polyp is a non neoplastic lesion of the respiratory mucosa. In few cases, it can be possible to detech the presence of cholesterolgranuloma. We present the case of a 55 year-old patient affected by a nasal lesion, localized in sphenoethmoidal recess, with particular microscopic feature and a review of the literature

Case-based learning. A formal approach to generate health case studies from electronic healthcare records

There is an increasing social pressure to train medical students with a level of competency sufficient to face clinical practice already at the end of their curriculum. The case-based learning (CBL) is an efficient teaching method to prepare students for clinical practice through the use of real or realistic clinical cases. In this regard, the Electronic Healthcare Record (EHR) could be a good source of real patient stories that can be transformed into educative cases. In this paper a formal approach to generate Health Case Studies from EHR is defined

Tailoring FPOX enzymes for enhanced stability and expanded substrate recognition

Abstract Fructosyl peptide oxidases (FPOX) are deglycating enzymes that find application as key enzymatic components in diabetes monitoring devices. Indeed, their use with blood samples can provide a measurement of the concentration of glycated hemoglobin and glycated albumin, two well-known diabetes markers. However, the FPOX currently employed in enzymatic assays cannot directly detect whole glycated proteins, making it necessary to perform a preliminary proteolytic treatment of the target protein to generate small glycated peptides that can act as viable substrates for the enzyme. This is a costly and time consuming step. In this work, we used an in silico protein engineering approach to enhance the overall thermal stability of the enzyme and to improve its catalytic activity toward large substrates. The final design shows a marked improvement in thermal stability relative to the wild type enzyme, a distinct widening of its access tunnel and significant enzymatic activity towards a range of glycated substrates

Outdoor exposure to formaldehyde (CH2O) is associated with an increased risk of hospitalization for respiratory diseases in children

Background and aims: Children living near wood industries have an increased risk of developing respiratory diseases. We aimed at assessing if residential outdoor exposure to NO2 and CH2O was associated with the risk of hospitalization for respiratory diseases in children. Methods: In 2006, all the children (3-14 years) living in the Viadana district (the largest wood manufacturing areas in Northern Italy) were surveyed through a parental questionnaire (n=3854) and their home addresses were geocoded. Their history of hospitalization for respiratory diseases (ICD-IX: 460-519) was assessed from January 2007 to December 2009, using discharge records obtained from the local Health Unit. To assess the outdoor exposure to NO2 and CH2O, 63 passive samplers were installed in the area using a Partitioning Around Medoids (PAM) algorithm. Pollutants were monitored twice, both in winter and in summer 2010. Kriging interpolation was used to attribute the average annual concentration of pollutants to each child. Poisson regression models were used to assess the association between the hospitalization rates (HR) and the average concentration of pollutants. Results: By December 2010, 3798 (98.5%) children had been traced. During the 3 years of follow-up, 121 hospital admissions, caused by respiratory diseases, occurred (annual HR = 10.8/1000/year). The HR for respiratory diseases slightly increased with increasing outdoor exposure to NO2 (µg/m3 ) (RR:1.02; 95%CI: 0.95-1.10), while they were strongly associated to CH2O outdoor concentration (µg/m3 ) (RR:2.41; 95%CI: 1.07-5.43). Conclusions: Emissions from wood industries apparently have a serious impact on children's healt

Regulation of the Immune System Development by Glucocorticoids and Sex Hormones

Through the release of hormones, the neuro-endocrine system regulates the immune system function promoting adaptation of the organism to the external environment and to intrinsic physiological changes. Glucocorticoids (GCs) and sex hormones not only regulate immune responses, but also control the hematopoietic stem cell (HSC) differentiation and subsequent maturation of immune cell subsets. During the development of an organism, this regulation has long-term consequences. Indeed, the effects of GC exposure during the perinatal period become evident in the adulthood. Analogously, in the context of HSC transplantation (HSCT), the immune system development starts de novo from the donor HSCs. In this review, we summarize the effects of GCs and sex hormones on the regulation of HSC, as well as of adaptive and innate immune cells. Moreover, we discuss the short and long-term implications on hematopoiesis of sex steroid ablation and synthetic GC administration upon HSCT

BAT AGN Spectroscopic Survey I: Spectral Measurements, Derived Quantities, and AGN Demographics

We present the first catalog and data release of the Swift-BAT AGN Spectroscopic Survey (BASS). We analyze optical spectra of the majority of AGN (77%, 641/836) detected based on their 14-195 keV emission in the 70-month Swift BAT all-sky catalog. This includes redshift determination, absorption and emission line measurements, and black hole mass and accretion rate estimates for the majority of obscured and un-obscured AGN (74%, 473/641) with 340 measured for the first time. With ~90% of sources at z<0.2, the survey represents a significant census of hard-X-ray selected AGN in the local universe. In this first catalog paper, we describe the spectroscopic observations and datasets, and our initial spectral analysis. The FWHM of the emission lines show broad agreement with the X-ray obscuration (~94%), such that Sy 1-1.8 have NH10^21.9 cm^-2. Seyfert 1.9 show a range of column densities. Compared to narrow line AGN in the SDSS, the X-ray selected AGN have a larger fraction of dusty host galaxies suggesting these types of AGN are missed in optical surveys. Using the most sensitive [OIII]/Hbeta and [NII]/Halpha emission line diagnostic, about half of the sources are classified as Seyferts, ~15% reside in dusty galaxies that lack an Hbeta detection, but for which the line upper limits imply either a Seyfert or LINER, ~15% are in galaxies with weak or no emission lines despite high quality spectra, and a few percent each are LINERS, composite galaxies, HII regions, or in known beamed AGN.Comment: Accepted ApJ, see www.bass-survey.com for dat