The Penn State ORSER system for processing and analyzing ERTS and other MSS data

The author has identified the following significant results. The office for Remote Sensing of Earth Resources (ORSER) of the Space Science and Engineering Laboratory at the Pennsylvania State University has developed an extensive operational system for processing and analyzing ERTS-1 and similar multispectral data. The ORSER system was developed for use by a wide variety of researchers working in remote sensing. Both photointerpretive techniques and automatic computer processing methods have been developed and used, separately and in a combined approach. A remote Job Entry system permits use of an IBM 370/168 computer from any compatible remote terminal, including equipment tied in by long distance telephone connections. An elementary cost analysis has been prepared for the processing of ERTS data

The role of worldviews in the governance of sustainable mobility

Sustainable development aims for a viable interaction between human and physical nature. However, how do we perceive the social and natural world, rationalize our behavior, and modify our ways of life? Here, we apply the idea of worldviews to cognition and rationality in transport since a transition to sustainable mobility is crucial in dealing with global climate change. We utilize Cultural Theory and the British Social Attitudes survey (N = 1,120) to study how three worldviews—egalitarianism, hierarchy, and individualism—relate to people’s attitudes to sustainable mobility. First, we use factor analysis to extract the three worldviews or ways of life in Great Britain. Second, we construct hypotheses concerning the correlations between the worldviews and social attitudes to sustainable mobility. Our statistical analysis of 11 mobility issues in the survey confirms our hypotheses, elucidating the cultural cognition or rationality that underlies people’s transport decision-making. Egalitarianism favors demand control, environmental friendliness, and action driven by inner conviction; hierarchy privileges conformity, order, and security; and individualism embraces freedom, speed, and external incentives. The findings show that the worldviews have a systematic and comprehensive impact on how people assess sustainable mobility debates. Moreover, we perform regression analysis to investigate how these cultural styles are associated with British people’s sociodemographics and political party identification, which can help identify the characteristics of stakeholders in sustainability planning and engagement. We conclude that the worldviews form the bedrock of individual decisions on sustainable mobility and have a wider significance for holistic sustainability governance

Ecological comparison of the risks of mother-to-child transmission and clinical manifestations of congenital toxoplasmosis according to prenatal treatment protocol

We compared the relative risks of mother-to-child transmission of Toxoplasma gondii and clinical manifestations due to congenital toxoplasmosis associated with intensive prenatal treatment in Lyon and Austria, short term treatment in 51% of Dutch women, and no treatment in Danish women. For each cohort, relative risks were standardized for gestation at seroconversion. In total, 856 mother–child pairs were studied: 549 in Lyon, 133 in Austria, 123 in Denmark and 51 in The Netherlands. The relative risk for mother-to-child transmission compared to Lyon was 1·24 (95% CI: 0·88, 1·59) in Austria; 0·59 (0·41, 0·81) in Denmark; and 0·65 (0·37, 1·01) in The Netherlands. Relative risks for clinical manifestations compared with Lyon (adjusted for follow-up to age 3 years) were: Austria 0·19 (0·04, 0·51); Denmark 0·60 (0·13, 1·08); and The Netherlands 1·46 (0·51, 2·72). There was no clear evidence that the risk of transmission or of clinical manifestations was lowest in centres with the most intensive prenatal treatment

Does Lipoprotein(a) Inhibit Elastolysis in Abdominal Aortic Aneurysms?

AbstractPurpose: to test the hypothesis that there is a negative association between serum levels of lipoprotein(a) (Lp(a)) and elastin-derived peptides (EDP) as well as matrix metalloproteinase (MMP)-9 activation in the aneurysm wall in patients with asymptomatic abdominal aortic aneurysms (AAA).Material and Methods: from 30 patients operated for asymptomatic AAAs, preoperative serum samples and AAA biopsies were collected. Lp(a) (mg/L) and EDP (ng/ml) in serum were measured by enzyme linked immunosorbent assays. MMP-9 activity (arbitrary units) in the AAA wall was measured by gelatin zymography and the ratio: active MMP-9/total MMP-9 were calculated.Results: there was a significant negative correlation (Spearman's rho) between serum levels of Lp(a) and EDP (r=−0.707, p<0.001), as well as the share of activated MMP-9 (r=−0.461, p=0.01) in the AAA wall.Conclusion: this preliminary study indicate that Lp(a) inhibit elastolysis in asymptomatic AAA

Dissipative Dynamics of Matter Wave Soliton in Nonlinear Optical Lattice

Dynamics and stability of solitons in two-dimensional (2D) Bose-Einstein condensates (BEC), with low-dimensional (1D) conservative plus dissipative nonlinear optical lattices are investigated. In the case of focusing media (with attractive atomic systems) the collapse of the wave packet is arrested by the dissipative periodic nonlinearity. The adiabatic variation of the background scattering length leads to metastable matter-wave solitons. When the atom feeding mechanism is used, a dissipative soliton can exist in focusing 2D media with 1D periodic nonlinearity. In the defocusing media (repulsive BEC case) with harmonic trap in one dimension and one dimensional nonlinear optical lattice in other direction, the stable soliton can exist. This prediction of variational approach is confirmed by the full numerical simulation of 2D Gross-Pitaevskii equation.Comment: 9 pages, 8 figure

DNA ploidy and morphology of colon tumors in the adenoma - carcinoma sequence

Introduction. Chromosomal changes are widespread in the vast majority of colon carcinomas and aneuploidy is an established prognostic factor. However, this knowledge so far has no influence on tumor classification. We reported a morphology-based classification scheme, the core classification, that correlates with DNA ploidy. In particular, tripolar mitoses were identified as surrogate markers of a near triploid DNA content. In addition, a survey on chromosome numbers and survival rates in carcinomas suggested that triploidy as a particular state of aneuploidy may be correlated with a more aggressive tumor phenotype. We therefore aimed to analyse DNA ploidy in the colorectal adenoma–carcinoma sequence. Material and methods. The study collection consisted of 15 adenomas and 15 adenocarcinomas of 10 patients. Some of them showed a morphological transition between benign and malignant tumor components which were selectively analysed by DNA measurements. In addition, we assessed the morphological parameters of the core classification. Results. The main findings of the study may be summarized as follows. 1) DNA ploidy changes are already consistently detectable in colon adenomas. They are usually associated with hyperdiploidy. 2) Adenoma tissue adjacent to carcinomas, however, may carry a hypodiploid DNA content while the nearby carcinoma samples were hyperdiploid. Hypodiploidy may thus represent a transition state to near triploid carcinomas. 3) The size of tumor nuclei and mitoses usually reflects the ploidy level of colon tumors. Specifically, triploid mitoses may point to a near triploid DNA content. 4) Triploidy per se cannot be equated with tumor aggressiveness as it may already be found in adenocarcinoma in situ. 5) Tripolar and tetrapolar mitoses in invasive colon cancer, however, are potential indicators of an advanced chromosomal instability and seemed to be associated with advanced tumor stages. Conclusions. We present data that hypodiploidy may represent a transition state from adenoma to carcinoma in a subset of colorectal tumors and that near-triploidy may be associated with a more aggressive course of the disease. However, the interpretation of tripolar mitoses and triploidy is largely dependent on the cell type (benign vs. malignant) and tissue context (invasive vs. non-invasive cancer). Furthermore, its interpretation may be distinct for different tumor stages and histotypes. Aneuploidy and multipolar mitoses are frequent findings in cancer cells. Their relevance for tumor biology deserves further studies