Electronic excitations of benzene from the equations of motion method

We have used the equations of motion method to calculate the excitation energies and intensities of several transitions in benzene. The ordering of the singlet and triplet states of B_(2u), B_(1u), and E_(1u) symmetry agrees with experiment and the error in the calculated frequencies ranges from 3% to 25%. This error range is reasonable considering the relatively small basis set used. The most extensive calculation included 10 hole and 28 particle states and shows the effect of changes in the sigma core for each transition. The calculated transition moment of 1.74 a.u. for the ^1A_(1g)→^1E_(1u) transition agrees well with the experimental value of 1.61 a.u

Human Papillomavirus (HPV) Vaccination Status Among University Freshmen in Hawai‘i

Purpose/Background: The HPV vaccine provides immunity against nine HPV strains that cause cancer and genital warts. It is recommended for 11 to 12 year olds, and catch-up immunization is recommended for females 13 to 26 years old and males 13 to 21 years old. College students represent an important population for HPV vaccination due to their increased risk for HPV infection. Despite the benefits of the HPV vaccine, its coverage rates are low in Hawaii. Hawai‘i is the home of two large universities on two islands that are representative of Hawai‘i’s populations, including Native Hawaiians, Filipinos, and Pacific Islanders. The purpose of this study was to assess the current HPV and HPV vaccine knowledge, barriers and beliefs among incoming Freshmen university students at University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa and University of Hawai‘i at Hilo. Materials & Methods: In 2016, 200 University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa (UHM) and University of Hawai‘i at Hilo (UHH) Freshmen students responded to a survey that assessed their knowledge and awareness of HPV, the HPV vaccine, their current vaccination status, and barriers and motivators to vaccination. Descriptive statistics were used to summarize each survey variable first for all students and then separately for each campus. Results: Overall 76% of Freshmen from both campuses heard of the HPV vaccine and 54% reported hearing it from their health care provider. Only 28% UHM and 23% UHH Freshmen students have received partial (1-2 shots) or completed doses of the HPV vaccine. For those who received the vaccine, 45% reported that they were told by their parent and 43% were told by their doctor. For the 147 students who did not receive the vaccine, 28% reported that they are still not sure to get it and 20% need more information. Their main reasons for not receiving the HPV vaccine were: their doctor did not mention the vaccine to him/her (44%), he/she never knew about the vaccine (18%), and they don\u27t know enough about the vaccine (17%). Discussion/Conclusion: Although the HPV vaccine has been available for 13 years, young adults remain unvaccinated. Freshmen students reported that they are informed about the vaccine, but were not vaccinated because of the lack of parental and/or healthcare provider recommendation. With no active education campaigns in Hawaii promoting the HPV vaccine at college campuses, a first step to increasing vaccination rates is to develop a health education campaign to inform students of the HPV vaccine and its availability at campus clinics and neighboring pharmacies

Converting Faculty Performance Evaluations Into Merit Raises: A Spreadsheet Model

One of the most important, yet difficult tasks of any academic department chairperson is to evaluate the annual performance of individual faculty members and then to convert the array of performance evaluations into a structure of merit raises.  Building on previous literature, this paper presents a spreadsheet model to convert qualitative performance evaluations into merit raises subject to 1) a limited pool of funds for salary adjustments and 2) a requirement that the relative structure of percentage raises match the relative structure of performance evaluations as defined by a linear evaluation scale.  The contribution of the paper is its practical nature in that the proposed spreadsheet can immediately be put to use by academic chairpersons, is readily understandable by the faculty, and is useful for all institutions with various combinations of teaching, research, and service expectations for the faculty.   To match the structure of raises with that of performance evaluations, qualitative evaluations in each of the three areas of faculty performance—teaching, research, and service—are first converted into numeric equivalents based on a linear evaluation key.  Next, the numeric equivalents are weighted according to a weighting scheme dependent on the amount of release time provided to the faculty member for research and/or service, in order to generate an overall numeric evaluation for each faculty member.  Finally, the weighted numeric evaluations are converted into percentage merit raises subject to a finite salary adjustment pool using the Goal Seek function in Microsoft Excel.  The model is illustrated using a hypothetical department of ten faculty members with varying teaching loads and thus different amounts of release time for research and/or service.&nbsp

Screening of a HUVEC cDNA library with transplant-associated coronary artery disease sera identifies RPL7 as a candidate autoantigen associated with this disease.

A HUVEC cDNA library was screened with sera from two patients who had developed transplant-associated coronary artery disease (TxCAD) following cardiac transplantation. A total of six positive clones were isolated from a primary screen of 40 000 genes. Subsequent DNA sequence analysis identified these to be lysyl tRNA synthetase, ribosomal protein L7, ribosomal protein L9, beta transducin and TANK. Another gene whose product could not be identified showed homology to a human cDNA clone (DKFZp566M063) derived from fetal kidney. Full-length constructs of selected genes were expressed as his-tag recombinant fusion proteins and used to screen a wider patient base by ELISA to determine prevalence and association with TxCAD. Of these ribosomal protein L7 showed the highest prevalence (55.6%) with TxCAD sera compared to 10% non-CAD

Should Congress Pass the Employee Free Choice Act? Some Neighborly Advice

American labour law is broken. As many as 60 percent of American workers would like to have a union, yet only 12 percent actually do. This is largely due to systematic employer interference, often in violation of existing laws. The Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA), currently before Congress, contains provisions to rectify this problem. Canada's experience with similar provisions can be helpful in evaluating the arguments surrounding this act. It suggests that the reforms proposed in EFCA can be expected to safeguard rather than deny employees' free choices. They will not alter the balance of power in collective bargaining, but only help to ensure that workers can exercise their basic right to meaningful representation at work and, potentially, to win gains that could help to reduce inequality and return America to prosperity

Ethnopharmacological study of the Selected Tribal Medicinal Plants of the Tboli People in Lake Sebu, South Cotabato

Around 80% of people around the world have practiced the use of ethnopharmacological medicine. Tboli tribe of Lake Sebu, South Cotabato, Philippines recognized medicinal plants for healing. There were two identified plants by the Tboli people, the Bulok bukay (Stachytarpheta jamaicensis) and Kluonmabu (Ageratum conyzoides L.) as a potential medicine for wound healing. The plants underwent antimicrobial analysis, phytochemical screening, and functional groups detection through FTIR. The zone of inhibition for Bulok bukay showed antimicrobial potential in all concentrations. Kluonmabu observed as not as effective as the other plant against S. aureus. With the p = 0.0641 at 0.05 level of significance, Bulok bukay showed to be effective against bacteria and comparable with a commercial antibiotic. Furthermore, phytochemical properties for both plants have been observed with more components of alkaloids and terpenoids in Bulok bukay. FTIR confirmed as well that two plants have the potential presence of functional groups against bacteri

Applicability of SCF Theory to Some Open-Shell States of CO, N2, and O2

By working with the real functions pix and piy instead of pi+ and pi–, we show how to express the SCF Hamiltonians for the Sigma states of the configurations (piu)3(pig),(piu)3(pig)3, and (1pi)3 (2pi) of diatomic molecules in terms of the Coulomb and exchange operators only. With these results, we have used conventional SCF programs to solve for the wavefunctions of many interesting states of N2, O2, and CO, e.g., the B 3Sigmau– state of O2. For many states, the SCF results are in good agreement with experiment. However, SCF theory runs into serious trouble if electron correlation is important in determining the relative locations of excited states

Promising Practices and Unfinished Business: Fostering Equity and Excellence for Black and Latino Males

Boston Public Schools (BPS) commissioned companion studies as part of its efforts to address achievement gaps for Black and Latino males. The first study revealed the increasing diversity of Black and Latino males and stark opportunity gaps throughout the system that contribute in large part to wide attainment gaps for these students. We hypothesized that in schools doing comparatively better with Black or Latino males than their counterparts, educators would be strategically and comprehensively implementing evidence-based cultural, structural, and instructional practices tailored to meet their the needs and aspirations of these students. Through qualitative case studies of four schools, we identified several cross-cutting themes that provide the district and school leaders with some positive news about effective practices found in all good schools: strong school cultures, professional collaboration, differentiated instruction, and, in the elementary schools, family engagement. While we observed pockets of best practices specific to Black and Latino male education, we also brought to light unfinished business, in that none of the four case study schools had an intentional and comprehensive schoolwide approach to educating Black and Latino males. This lack of intentionality resulted in a paucity of evidence that the school administration and faculty as a whole: (a) know and value students' cultural and linguistic backgrounds; (b) adopt explicit and responsive approaches to race and gender; and (c) develop and implement a comprehensive approach to culturally responsive curriculum and instruction. We posit that lack of knowledge, intentionality, and coherence impedes further progress in educating Black and Latino males, and has implications for educators in schools, for staff members in community partner organizations, and for family members of BPS students

Sociology of low expectations: Recalibration as innovation work in biomedicine

"This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License (http://www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/) which permits any use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access page (http://www.uk.sagepub.com/aboutus/openaccess.htm). "Social scientists have drawn attention to the role of hype and optimistic visions of the future in providing momentum to biomedical innovation projects by encouraging innovation alliances. In this article, we show how less optimistic, uncertain, and modest visions of the future can also provide innovation projects with momentum. Scholars have highlighted the need for clinicians to carefully manage the expectations of their prospective patients. Using the example of a pioneering clinical team providing deep brain stimulation to children and young people with movement disorders, we show how clinicians confront this requirement by drawing on their professional knowledge and clinical expertise to construct visions of the future with their prospective patients; visions which are personalized, modest, and tainted with uncertainty. We refer to this vision-constructing work as recalibration, and we argue that recalibration enables clinicians to manage the tension between the highly optimistic and hyped visions of the future that surround novel biomedical interventions, and the exigencies of delivering those interventions in a clinical setting. Drawing on work from science and technology studies, we suggest that recalibration enrolls patients in an innovation alliance by creating a shared understanding of how the “effectiveness” of an innovation shall be judged.This project was funded by the Wellcome Trust (Wellcome Trust Biomedical Strategic Award 086034)

Stacked Tracking for CMS at Super-LHC

We report recent work on the design of a pixel detector for CMS at the Super-LHC. This work builds on previous studies of a tracking detector capable of providing track stubs to be used in the Level-1 Trigger (L1T). We now focus on the use of two ‘superlayers’ of tracking; each comprising a pair of pixel sensors with 50×50×50μm3 pitch (z×φ×r) separated by a few millimetres. Preliminary work on track reconstruction in Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs) is also presented