A Comparative Negligence Checklist to Avoid Future Unnecessary Litigation

Systems of comparative negligence, whereby the negligence of a plaintiff serves to reduce rather than to preclude tort recovery in negligence, have been adopted in thirty-nine states. The common law rule that contributory negligence is an absolute bar to recover is still the law in Kentucky, although modified by the doctrine of “last clear chance.” Kentucky may soon join the trend toward comparative negligence, however. In the last legislative session, bills to adopt comparative negligence were introduced in both the House of Representatives and the Senate. A hearing on this subject was held by the Interim Judiciary and Civil Procedure Committee in March, 1983, and it is likely that a comparative negligence bill will again be introduced in the 1984 session of the General Assembly. Although most states have adopted comparative negligence statutorily, a few have done so by court decision. Kentucky courts will soon have the opportunity to adopt comparative negligence. The Kentucky Supreme Court has recently granted discretionary review in a case in which the only issue preserved for appeal is the denial of the plaintiff’s request for a comparative negligence instruction to the jury. This Article will not attempt to assess the relative merits of contributory and comparative negligence. Presumably, those issues will be aired thoroughly before the legislature and the courts. However, many states which have decided either legislatively or judicially to adopt comparative negligence have failed to resolve in advance a number of accompanying issues. This failure has resulted in extensive litigation to “fill the gaps.” Such litigation can be avoided by anticipating issues likely to arise when the doctrine is adopted, and resolving the issues by careful statutory drafting or considered judicial opinion. This Article will examine several of the more important issues that should be addressed when comparative negligence is adopted. The issues to be discussed are: (1) how to apportion liability among multiple tortfeasors; (2) whether to retain the doctrine of last clear chance; (3) whether to permit setoff; and (4) what limits to put on jury instructions. Reasonable alternatives for each issue will be set out, with possible statutory language for the adoption of each alternative. The relative advantages and disadvantages of each alternative will then be discussed in light of the current state of Kentucky tort law, the underlying rationale for the adopting comparative negligence, and the type of comparative negligence system—pure or modified—adopted

A Comparative Negligence Checklist to Avoid Future Unnecessary Litigation

Systems of comparative negligence, whereby the negligence of a plaintiff serves to reduce rather than to preclude tort recovery in negligence, have been adopted in thirty-nine states. The common law rule that contributory negligence is an absolute bar to recovery is still the law in Kentucky, although modified by the doctrine of last clear chance. Kentucky may soon join the trend toward comparative negligence, however. In the last legislative session, bills to adopt comparative negligence were introduced in both the House of Representatives and the Senate. A hearing on this subject was held by the Interim Judiciary and Civil Procedure Committee in March, 1983, and it is likely that a comparative negligence bill will again be introduced in the 1984 session of the General Assembly. Although most states have adopted comparative negligence statutorily, a few have done so by court decision. Kentucky courts will soon have the opportunity to adopt comparative negligence. The Kentucky Supreme Court has recently granted discretionary review in a case in which the only issue preserved for appeal is the denial of the plaintiff\u27s request for a comparative negligence instruction to the jury. This Article will examine several of the more important issues that should be addressed when comparative negligence is adopted. The issues to be discussed are: (1) how to apportion liability among multiple tortfeasors; (2) whether to retain the doctrine of last clear chance; (3) whether to permit setoff; and (4) what limits to put on jury instructions. Reasonable alternatives for each Issue will be set out, with possible statutory language for the adoption of each alternative. The relative advantages and disadvantages of each alternative will then be discussed in light of the current state of Kentucky tort law, the underlying rationale for adopting comparative negligence, and the type of comparative negligence system-pure or modified-adopted

Pan-cancer Alterations of the MYC Oncogene and Its Proximal Network across the Cancer Genome Atlas

Although theMYConcogene has been implicated incancer, a systematic assessment of alterations ofMYC, related transcription factors, and co-regulatoryproteins, forming the proximal MYC network (PMN),across human cancers is lacking. Using computa-tional approaches, we define genomic and proteo-mic features associated with MYC and the PMNacross the 33 cancers of The Cancer Genome Atlas.Pan-cancer, 28% of all samples had at least one ofthe MYC paralogs amplified. In contrast, the MYCantagonists MGA and MNT were the most frequentlymutated or deleted members, proposing a roleas tumor suppressors.MYCalterations were mutu-ally exclusive withPIK3CA,PTEN,APC,orBRAFalterations, suggesting that MYC is a distinct onco-genic driver. Expression analysis revealed MYC-associated pathways in tumor subtypes, such asimmune response and growth factor signaling; chro-matin, translation, and DNA replication/repair wereconserved pan-cancer. This analysis reveals insightsinto MYC biology and is a reference for biomarkersand therapeutics for cancers with alterations ofMYC or the PMN

Genetic correlation between amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and schizophrenia

A. Palotie on työryhmän Schizophrenia Working Grp Psychiat jäsen.We have previously shown higher-than-expected rates of schizophrenia in relatives of patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), suggesting an aetiological relationship between the diseases. Here, we investigate the genetic relationship between ALS and schizophrenia using genome-wide association study data from over 100,000 unique individuals. Using linkage disequilibrium score regression, we estimate the genetic correlation between ALS and schizophrenia to be 14.3% (7.05-21.6; P = 1 x 10(-4)) with schizophrenia polygenic risk scores explaining up to 0.12% of the variance in ALS (P = 8.4 x 10(-7)). A modest increase in comorbidity of ALS and schizophrenia is expected given these findings (odds ratio 1.08-1.26) but this would require very large studies to observe epidemiologically. We identify five potential novel ALS-associated loci using conditional false discovery rate analysis. It is likely that shared neurobiological mechanisms between these two disorders will engender novel hypotheses in future preclinical and clinical studies.Peer reviewe

The James Webb Space Telescope Mission

Twenty-six years ago a small committee report, building on earlier studies, expounded a compelling and poetic vision for the future of astronomy, calling for an infrared-optimized space telescope with an aperture of at least $4m$. With the support of their governments in the US, Europe, and Canada, 20,000 people realized that vision as the $6.5m$ James Webb Space Telescope. A generation of astronomers will celebrate their accomplishments for the life of the mission, potentially as long as 20 years, and beyond. This report and the scientific discoveries that follow are extended thank-you notes to the 20,000 team members. The telescope is working perfectly, with much better image quality than expected. In this and accompanying papers, we give a brief history, describe the observatory, outline its objectives and current observing program, and discuss the inventions and people who made it possible. We cite detailed reports on the design and the measured performance on orbit.Comment: Accepted by PASP for the special issue on The James Webb Space Telescope Overview, 29 pages, 4 figure

Finishing the euchromatic sequence of the human genome

The sequence of the human genome encodes the genetic instructions for human physiology, as well as rich information about human evolution. In 2001, the International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium reported a draft sequence of the euchromatic portion of the human genome. Since then, the international collaboration has worked to convert this draft into a genome sequence with high accuracy and nearly complete coverage. Here, we report the result of this finishing process. The current genome sequence (Build 35) contains 2.85 billion nucleotides interrupted by only 341 gaps. It covers ∼99% of the euchromatic genome and is accurate to an error rate of ∼1 event per 100,000 bases. Many of the remaining euchromatic gaps are associated with segmental duplications and will require focused work with new methods. The near-complete sequence, the first for a vertebrate, greatly improves the precision of biological analyses of the human genome including studies of gene number, birth and death. Notably, the human enome seems to encode only 20,000-25,000 protein-coding genes. The genome sequence reported here should serve as a firm foundation for biomedical research in the decades ahead

A Comparative Negligence Checklist to Avoid Future Unnecessary Litigation

Systems of comparative negligence, whereby the negligence of a plaintiff serves to reduce rather than to preclude tort recovery in negligence, have been adopted in thirty-nine states. The common law rule that contributory negligence is an absolute bar to recover is still the law in Kentucky, although modified by the doctrine of “last clear chance.” Kentucky may soon join the trend toward comparative negligence, however. In the last legislative session, bills to adopt comparative negligence were introduced in both the House of Representatives and the Senate. A hearing on this subject was held by the Interim Judiciary and Civil Procedure Committee in March, 1983, and it is likely that a comparative negligence bill will again be introduced in the 1984 session of the General Assembly. Although most states have adopted comparative negligence statutorily, a few have done so by court decision. Kentucky courts will soon have the opportunity to adopt comparative negligence. The Kentucky Supreme Court has recently granted discretionary review in a case in which the only issue preserved for appeal is the denial of the plaintiff’s request for a comparative negligence instruction to the jury. This Article will not attempt to assess the relative merits of contributory and comparative negligence. Presumably, those issues will be aired thoroughly before the legislature and the courts. However, many states which have decided either legislatively or judicially to adopt comparative negligence have failed to resolve in advance a number of accompanying issues. This failure has resulted in extensive litigation to “fill the gaps.” Such litigation can be avoided by anticipating issues likely to arise when the doctrine is adopted, and resolving the issues by careful statutory drafting or considered judicial opinion. This Article will examine several of the more important issues that should be addressed when comparative negligence is adopted. The issues to be discussed are: (1) how to apportion liability among multiple tortfeasors; (2) whether to retain the doctrine of last clear chance; (3) whether to permit setoff; and (4) what limits to put on jury instructions. Reasonable alternatives for each issue will be set out, with possible statutory language for the adoption of each alternative. The relative advantages and disadvantages of each alternative will then be discussed in light of the current state of Kentucky tort law, the underlying rationale for the adopting comparative negligence, and the type of comparative negligence system—pure or modified—adopted