The Effect of Comparative Fault on California Contribution/Indemnification Rights: How to Employ and Avoid the New Tortious Quicksand

This Article discusses the effect of comparative fault principles upon contribution rights in California, including the impact on settlement and releases between the plaintiff and one of several joined concurrent tortfeasors. Using simple hypothetical case situations, the author emphasizes decisions and tactics that should be made by litigators in response to a variety of important contribution issues

Drinking Water Issues in the Pacific Northwest

This article contains drinking water information from a region-wide survey designed to collect base line data about water issues in the Pacific Northwest. The major findings were: (1) over 90% of survey respondents feel that their home drinking water is safe for consumption, (2) minerals were the most often cited pollutants in drinking water supplies, (3) approximately 25% of residents have installed filters on their sink faucets to improve water quality, and (4) over 25% of residents use bottled water for drinking purposes. These survey results will be used to develop relevant drinking water educational programs for citizens of the Pacific Northwest

Minimum Fee Schedules: Guides or Strait Jackets

Several states have minimum fee schedules that set the least amount of compensation a lawyer should charge for a specific legal service. There has been much confusion in bar associations across the country as to the application of minimum fee schedules and the consequences of non-compliance. The American Bar Association has published both formal and informal opinions in an attempt to clearly define the functions of the schedules. In view of the opinions, interviews and statistical studies on the subject of minimum fee schedules, it is apparent that they are too rigid to cope with the practical needs of the profession but are valuable resources where their function is viewed as a guide. Under the Kansas Relative Value System the lawyer is given a more flexible system that allows him to take into consideration all the necessary factors in arriving at a fair and just fee

Minimum Fee Schedules: Guides or Strait Jackets

Several states have minimum fee schedules that set the least amount of compensation a lawyer should charge for a specific legal service. There has been much confusion in bar associations across the country as to the application of minimum fee schedules and the consequences of non-compliance. The American Bar Association has published both formal and informal opinions in an attempt to clearly define the functions of the schedules. In view of the opinions, interviews and statistical studies on the subject of minimum fee schedules, it is apparent that they are too rigid to cope with the practical needs of the profession but are valuable resources where their function is viewed as a guide. Under the Kansas Relative Value System the lawyer is given a more flexible system that allows him to take into consideration all the necessary factors in arriving at a fair and just fee

Using Updates to Educate Policy Makers About Water Programs at Land-Grant Institutions

We developed a regional two-page color newsletter called PNWWATER UPDATE that focuses on specific water resource issues in the Pacific Northwest to meet the needs of our stakeholders. This newsletter is distributed to our congressional delegation and all state legislators serving on education, environment, or agriculture committees. Fifty-seven policy makers on our mailing list for the last 2 years evaluated the value of this newsletter. In general, policy makers found the newsletter to be of high quality, timely, and informative, and thought that it addressed the water quality priorities in the region

Priority Water Issues in the Pacific Northwest

We developed and conducted a region-wide survey to collect base line information documenting public awareness, attitudes, and priorities about water issues in the Pacific Northwest. The vast majority (over 90%) of survey respondents considered clean drinking water, clean groundwater, and clean rivers very or extremely important issues. Over two-thirds of survey respondents considered having enough water for economic development, prevention of salmon extinction, wetland protection, watershed restoration, water for power generation, and water for agriculture to be high priority issues. The results from this survey will be used to target our regional programming efforts over the next 5 years

An Innovative Interprofessional Course: Cultural Humility and Competence

As we tackle the disproportionate burden of chronic illness and access to quality health care of an increasingly diverse population, it is critical to infuse cultural and linguistic competence in all sectors of health care training. To reach the Healthy People 2020 goal of eliminating health disparities, health and human services education must provide the knowledge and experience to understand the root causes of health disparities, as well as strategies to advance ongoing cultural and linguistic competence

Leaf-Encapsulated Vaccines: Agroinfiltration and Transient Expression of the Antigen Staphylococcal Endotoxin B in Radish Leaves.

Transgene introgression is a major concern associated with transgenic plant-based vaccines. Agroinfiltration can be used to selectively transform nonreproductive organs and avoid introgression. Here, we introduce a new vaccine modality in which Staphylococcal enterotoxin B (SEB) genes are agroinfiltrated into radishes (Raphanw sativus L.), resulting in transient expression and accumulation of SEB in planta. This approach can simultaneously express multiple antigens in a single leaf. Furthermore, the potential of high-throughput vaccine production was demonstrated by simultaneously agroinfiltrating multiple radish leaves using a multichannel pipette. The expression of SEB was detectable in two leaf cell types (epidermal and guard cells) in agroinfiltrated leaves. ICR mice intranasally immunized with homogenized leaves agroinfiltrated with SEB elicited detectable antibody to SEB and displayed protection against SEB-induced interferon-gamma (IFN-γ) production. The concept of encapsulating antigens in leaves rather than purifying them for immunization may facilitate rapid vaccine production during an epidemic disease

UV Imaging Polarimetry of the peculiar Seyfert 2 galaxy Mrk 477

We present the results of UV imaging polarimetry of the Seyfert 2 galaxy Mrk 477 taken by the Faint Object Camera onboard the Hubble Space Telescope (HST). From a previous HST UV image (lambda ~ 2180A), Mrk 477 has been known to have a pointlike bright UV hotspot in the central region, peculiar among nearby Seyfert 2 galaxies. There are also claims of UV/optical variability, unusual for a Seyfert 2 galaxy. Our data show that there is an off-nuclear scattering region ~ 0."6 (~ 500 pc) NE from the hotspot. The data, after the subtraction of the instrumental effect due to this bright hotspot region, might indicate that the scattered light is also detected in the central 0."2 radius region and is extended to a very wide angle. The hotspot location is consistent with the symmetry center of the PA pattern, which represents the location of the hidden nucleus, but our data do not provide a strong upper limit to the distance between the symmetry center and the hotspot. We have obtained high spatial resolution color map of the continuum which shows that the nuclear spiral arm of 0."4 scale (~ 300pc) is significantly bluer than the off-nuclear mirror and the hotspot region. The nature of the hotspot is briefly discussed.Comment: To appear in Ap

Percolation Crossing Formulas and Conformal Field Theory

Using conformal field theory, we derive several new crossing formulas at the two-dimensional percolation point. High-precision simulation confirms these results. Integrating them gives a unified derivation of Cardy's formula for the horizontal crossing probability $\Pi_h(r)$, Watts' formula for the horizontal-vertical crossing probability $\Pi_{hv}(r)$, and Cardy's formula for the expected number of clusters crossing horizontally $\mathcal{N}_h(r)$. The main step in our approach implies the identification of the derivative of one primary operator with another. We present operator identities that support this idea and suggest the presence of additional symmetry in $c=0$ conformal field theories.Comment: 12 pages, 5 figures. Numerics improved; minor correction