The absolute position of a resonance peak

It is common practice in scattering theory to correlate between the position of a resonance peak in the cross section and the real part of a complex energy of a pole of the scattering amplitude. In this work we show that the resonance peak position appears at the absolute value of the pole's complex energy rather than its real part. We further demonstrate that a local theory of resonances can still be used even in cases previously thought impossible

When Are Vaccine Mandates Appropriate?

Vaccine refusal is a serious public health problem, especially in the context of diseases with potential to spark global pandemics, such as Ebola virus disease in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. This article examines whether and when compelling vaccination through mandates and criminalization, for example, are appropriate. It argues that some legal approaches are ethical when they preserve social stability, trust in government, therapeutic research opportunities, or when they diminish disease severity

The Obesity Paradox in Cancer—Moving Beyond BMI

Body mass index (BMI) and simple counts of weight are easy and available tools in the clinic and in research. Recent studies have shown that cancer patients with low-normal BMI (or those with weight loss) have worse outcomes than obese patients. These results suggest that obesity has a protective effect and has been termed the ‘obesity paradox’. In this commentary, we discuss hypothetical explanations and take a step beyond BMI or simple weights alone to present other useful and more specific body composition metrics such as muscle tissue mass, visceral, and subcutaneous fat mass. Body composition is highly variable between individuals with significant differences seen between various races and ages. Therefore, it is critical to consider that patients with the exact same BMI can have significantly different body compositions and different outcomes. We encourage further studies to examine body composition beyond BMI and to use other body composition metrics to develop individualized treatments and intervention strategies

Network Architecture, Salience and Coordination

This paper reports the results of an experimental investigation of monotone games with imperfect information. Players are located at the nodes of a network and observe the actions of other players only if they are connected by the network. These games have many sequential equilibria; nonetheless, the behavior of subjects in the laboratory is predictable. The network architecture makes some strategies salient and this in turn makes the subjects’ behavior predictable and facilitates coordination on efficient outcomes. In some cases, modal behavior corresponds to equilibrium strategies

COVID-19 Antibody Testing as a Precondition for Employment: Ethical and Legal Considerations

Employers and governments are interested in the use of serological (antibody) testing to allow people to return to work before there is a vaccine for SARS-CoV-2. We articulate the preconditions needed for the implementation of antibody testing, including the role of the U.S. Food & Drug Administration

Induced pluripotent stem cells from hair follicles as a cellular model for neurodevelopmental disorders

AbstractDisease-specific induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSC) allow unprecedented experimental platforms for basic research as well as high-throughput screening. This may be particularly relevant for neuropsychiatric disorders, in which the affected neuronal cells are not accessible. Keratinocytes isolated from hair follicles are an ideal source of patients' cells for reprogramming, due to their non-invasive accessibility and their common neuroectodermal origin with neurons, which can be important for potential epigenetic memory. From a small number of plucked human hair follicles obtained from two healthy donors we reprogrammed keratinocytes to pluripotent iPSC. We further differentiated these hair follicle-derived iPSC to neural progenitors, forebrain neurons and functional dopaminergic neurons.This study shows that human hair follicle-derived iPSC can be differentiated into various neural lineages, suggesting this experimental system as a promising in vitro model to study normal and pathological neural developments, avoiding the invasiveness of commonly used skin biopsies

Targeting of P-Element Reporters to Heterochromatic Domains by Transposable Element 1360 in Drosophila melanogaster

Heterochromatin is a common DNA packaging form employed by eukaryotes to constitutively silence transposable elements. Determining which sequences to package as heterochromatin is vital for an organism. Here, we use Drosophila melanogaster to study heterochromatin formation, exploiting position-effect variegation, a process whereby a transgene is silenced stochastically if inserted in proximity to heterochromatin, leading to a variegating phenotype. Previous studies identified the transposable element 1360 as a target for heterochromatin formation. We use transgene reporters with either one or four copies of 1360 to determine if increasing local repeat density can alter the fraction of the genome supporting heterochromatin formation. We find that including 1360 in the reporter increases the frequency with which variegating phenotypes are observed. This increase is due to a greater recovery of insertions at the telomere-associated sequences (∼50% of variegating inserts). In contrast to variegating insertions elsewhere, the phenotype of telomere-associated sequence insertions is largely independent of the presence of 1360 in the reporter. We find that variegating and fully expressed transgenes are located in different types of chromatin and that variegating reporters in the telomere-associated sequences differ from those in pericentric heterochromatin. Indeed, chromatin marks at the transgene insertion site can be used to predict the eye phenotype. Our analysis reveals that increasing the local repeat density (via the transgene reporter) does not enlarge the fraction of the genome supporting heterochromatin formation. Rather, additional copies of 1360 appear to target the reporter to the telomere-associated sequences with greater efficiency, thus leading to an increased recovery of variegating insertions

Weather conditions and voter turnout in Dutch national parliament elections, 1971–2010

While conventional wisdom assumes that inclement weather on election day reduces voter turnout, there is remarkably little evidence available to support truth to such belief. This paper examines the effects of temperature, sunshine duration and rainfall on voter turnout in 13 Dutch national parliament elections held from 1971 to 2010. It merges the election results from over 400 municipalities with election-day weather data drawn from the nearest weather station. We find that the weather parameters indeed affect voter turnout. Election-day rainfall of roughly 25 mm (1 inch) reduces turnout by a rate of one percent, whereas a 10-degree-Celsius increase in temperature correlates with an increase of almost one percent in overall turnout. One hundred percent sunshine corresponds to a one and a half percent greater voter turnout compared to zero sunshine