Edward Belcher (1799-1877)

Prominent in the important but routine survey work undertaken by the British Navy around the globe after the Napoleonic wars, a spectacular failure as an arctic explorer, and most unpopular officer in the fleet, Sir Edward Belcher remains today in relative, perhaps deserved, obscurity. ... In February 1837, he replaced the ailing Captain Beechey on a survey of the Pacific Coast. Taking command at Panama of H.M.S. Sulphur and Starling, he sailed to the Sandwich (Hawaiian) Islands, thence to Prince William Sound and along the south coasts of Russian America (Alaska), and from there south to San Francisco and again to waters off Central America. In 1839 he retraced the same route. During the two voyages he surveyed many ports and islands, fixed the position of Mount St. Elias, and made the first scientific survey of Nootka Sound, settling questions outstanding since the voyages of Cook and Vancouver. However, these achievements were marred by Belcher's consistent "bad temper, caprice, and malice", which made him detested by his officers and men. ... In 1852, in spite of his poor reputation as a commander and his lack of experience handling vessels in ice, Belcher was placed in charge of the largest in the series of expeditions which the British government sent out to seek Sir John Franklin. Five ships were given him for the task: the Assistance (Belcher, and Commander G.N. Richards), the steam tender Pioneer (Osborn), the Resolute (Kellett), the Intrepid (M'Clintock), and the North Star (Pullen). Leaving the North Star at Beechey Island as a base, Belcher sent the Resolute and the Intrepid westward to Melville Island, while he took the Assistance and Pioneer northward up to Wellington Channel. As it turned out, they were too far north to find traces of Franklin, but Belcher and Osborn discovered Belcher Channel, explored the north coast of Bathurst Island, and Belcher himself discovered and visited North Cornwall Island. Belcher and Osborn spent the winter of 1852-1853 in Northumberland Sound, while the Resolute and the Intrepid, under Kellett, wintered at Melville Island. In the course of long sledge expeditions, Kellett and his men completed the exploration of Melville and Prince Patrick islands, and found and rescued the men of a previous expedition on the Investigator (McClure), locked in the ice of Mercy Bay. In the summer of 1853, both divisions failed to extricate themselves, so had to spend a second winter in the ice. By the summer of 1854, Belcher had had enough. Convinced of the impossibility of getting free, unwilling to risk yet a third winter, he disregarded the protests of his subordinates, and ordered the four ships to be abandoned. He and his men made it to the base vessel North Star, and in August set out on the return voyage to England. Court-martialled, Belcher was able to prove that he had acted within his orders. ... He was cleared, but his sword was handed back to him in silence. ... He passed his remaining years in literary and scientific amusements, and died on 18 March 1877

Bats of Missouri : information for homeowners (2003)

This publication provides some answers for Missouri homeowners on managing bat problems. It also provides information on how to attract bats to your property.New 9/93, Revised 8/03/5M

An Empirical Study of Judicial Review of Agency Interpretations of Agency Rules

In this essay, Pierce and Weiss report the results of a study of judicial review of agency interpretations of agency rules. Prior studies found that, while courts at all levels uphold about 70% of agency actions, the Supreme Court upholds 91% of agency interpretations of agency rules. Pierce and Weiss find that lower courts do not confer this type of super deference on agency interpretations of agency rules. District courts and circuit courts uphold 76% of such agency actions. That is within the range of the findings of prior studies of judicial review of other types of agency actions and much lower than the rate at which the Supreme Court upholds agency interpretations of agency rules. Pierce and Weiss also find no evidence that judges are influenced by their political or ideological preferences when they review agency interpretations of agency rules. That finding is consistent with the findings of a prior study of judicial review of agency findings of fact, but it is inconsistent with the findings of several studies of judicial review of agency interpretations of agency-administered statutes and of judicial review of agency policy decisions

Noninvasive imaging of focal atherosclerotic lesions using fluorescence molecular tomography

Insights into the etiology of stroke and myocardial infarction suggest that rupture of unstable atherosclerotic plaque is the precipitating event. Clinicians lack tools to detect lesion instability early enough to intervene, and are often left to manage patients empirically, or worse, after plaque rupture. Noninvasive imaging of the molecular events signaling prerupture plaque progression has the potential to reduce the morbidity and mortality associated with myocardial infarction and stroke by allowing early intervention. Here, we demonstrate proof-of-principle in vivo molecular imaging of C-type natriuretic peptide receptor in focal atherosclerotic lesions in the femoral arteries of New Zealand white rabbits using a custom built fiber-based, fluorescence molecular tomography (FMT) system. Longitudinal imaging showed changes in the fluorescence signal intensity as the plaque progressed in the air-desiccated vessel compared to the uninjured vessel, which was validated by ex vivo tissue studies. In summary, we demonstrate the potential of FMT for noninvasive detection of molecular events leading to unstable lesions heralding plaque rupture

Cyberinfrastructure, Science Gateways, Campus Bridging, and Cloud Computing

Computers accelerate our ability to achieve scientific breakthroughs. As technology evolves and new research needs come to light, the role for cyberinfrastructure as “knowledge” infrastructure continues to expand. This article defines and discusses cyberinfrastructure and the related topics of science gateways and campus bridging; identifies future challenges in cyberinfrastructure; and discusses challenges and opportunities related to the evolution of cyberinfrastructure, “big data” (datacentric, data-enabled, and data-intensive research and data analytics), and cloud computing.This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under grants 0504075, 0451237, 0723054, 1062432, 0116050, 0521433, 0503697, and 1053575, and several IBM Shared University Research grants and support provided by Lilly Endowment, Inc. for the Indiana University Pervasive Technology Institute. Any opinions, findings and conclusions or recommendations expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the supporting agencies

MetaIPM: Placing Integral Projection Models Into a Metapopulation Framework

1. Metapopulation models include spatial population dynamics such as dispersion and migration between subpopulations. Integral projection models (IPMs) can include demographic rates as a function of size. Traditionally, metapopulation models do not included detailed populaiton models such as IPMs. In some situations, both local population dynamics (e.g. size-based survival) and spatial dynamics are important. 2. We present a Python package, MetaIPM, which places IPMs into a metapopulation framework, and allow users to readily construct and apply these models that combine local population dynamics within a metapopulation framework. 3. MetaIPM includes an IPM for each subpopulation that is connected to other subpopulations via a metapopulation movement model. These movements can include dispersion, migration or other patterns. The IPM can include for size-specific demographic rates (e.g. survival, recruitment) as well as management actions, such as length-based harvest (e.g. gear specific capture sizes, varying slot limits across political boundaries). The model also allows for changes in metapopulation connectivity between locations, such as a fish passage ladders to enhance movement or deterrents to reduce movement. Thus, resource managers can use MetaIPM to compare different management actions such as the harvest gear type (which can be length-specific) and harvest locations. 4. We demonstrate how MetaIPM may be applied to inform managers seeking to limit the spread of an invasive species in a system with important metapopulation dynamics. Specifically, we compared removal lengths (all length fish versus longer fish only) for an invasive fish population in a fragmented, inland river system. MetaIPM allowed users to compare the importance of harvesting source populations away from the invasion front, as well as species at the invasion front. The model would also allow for future comparisons of different deterrent placement locations in the system. 5. Moving beyond our example system, we describe how MetaIPM can be applied to other species, systems and management approaches. The MetaIPM packages includes Jupyter Notebooks documenting the package as well as a second set of JupyterNotebooks showing the application of the package to our example system

Accuracy of In Vivo Multimodal Optical Imaging for Detection of Oral Neoplasia

If detected early, oral cancer is eminently curable. However, survival rates for oral cancer patients remain low, largely due to late-stage diagnosis and subsequent difficulty of treatment. To improve cliniciansﾒ ability to detect early disease and to treat advanced cancers, we developed a multimodal optical imaging system (MMIS) to evaluate tissue in situ, at macroscopic and microscopic scales. The MMIS was used to measure 100 anatomic sites in 30 patients, correctly classifying 98% of pathologically confirmed normal tissue sites, and 95% of sites graded as moderate dysplasia, severe dysplasia, or cancer. When used alone, MMIS classification accuracy was 35% for sites determined by pathology as mild dysplasia. However, MMIS measurements correlated with expression of candidate molecular markers in 87% of sites with mild dysplasia. These findings support the ability of noninvasive multimodal optical imaging to accurately identify neoplastic tissue and premalignant lesions. This in turn may have considerable impact on detection and treatment of patients with oral cancer and other epithelial malignancies

The Ursa Major Cluster of Galaxies. I. Cluster Definition and Photometric Data

The Ursa Major Cluster has received remarkably little attention, although it is as near as the Virgo Cluster and contains a comparable number of HI-rich galaxies. In this paper, criteria for group membership are discussed and data are presented for 79 galaxies identified with the group. Of these, all 79 have been imaged at B,R,I bands with CCDs, 70 have been imaged at K' with a HgCdTe array detector, and 70 have been detected in the HI 21cm line. A complete sample of 62 galaxies brighter than M(B)=-16.5 is identified. Images and gradients in surface brightness and color are presented at a common linear scale. As has been seen previously, the galaxies with the reddest global colors are reddest at the centers and get bluer at large radii. However, curiously, among the galaxies with the bluest global colors there are systems with very blue cores that get redder at large radii.Comment: A LATEX file without figures. The postscript version (7.1Mb in gzipped format) including all the tables, figures and scanned versions of the plates can be retrieved as preprint no.208 from http://www.astro.rug.nl:80/~secr/ Accepted for publication in The Astronomical Journa