The Effect of 24-Hour Television News on American Democracy and The Daily Show as a Counterbalance to 24-Hour News: A History

This work examines the historical implications of 24-hour television news on elections and policy in America. In two moments, the 2000 presidential election and the 2003 invasion and occupation of Iraq, the 24-hour news medium shaped the course of American history. 24-Hour news had such influence because of the psychological power of the television medium combined with its broad audience; it created, spread, and solidified beliefs based on untruths that ultimately interfered with an American election and the implementation of major American foreign policy. The work also explores the most effective counterbalance to 24-hour news: the satirical comedy program The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. By highlighting 24-hour news\u27 lack of journalistic integrity in its own medium, The Daily Show helped dilute the strong psychological influences of 24-hour news and expose its economic incentives, pursued in lieu of democratic ones, which guided the vast majority of the networks\u27 reporting. This shifting emphasis by 24-hour news channels away from civic discourse unequivocally influenced American history and presented a dire challenge - yet unsolved - to American democracy

South Carolina Department of Transportation and the United States Department of Agriculture, Partnering for Success in Migratory Bird Treaty Act Compliance: A Case Study

The South Carolina Department of Transportation (SCDOT) is responsible for maintaining over 8,400 bridges statewide and several species of migratory birds use these structures as nesting locations. These birds, including their nests and eggs, are protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act (MBTA). During a review of MBTA compliance in 2014, SCDOT concluded that they had no procedures in place to allow take to occur when active migratory bird nests were found within project limits. Project delays were the only management method available when active nests were found. SCDOT entered a Cooperative Service Agreement with USDA Wildlife Services (WS) in 2016 to address MBTA compliance on SCDOT projects. The agreement called for WS to manage migratory birds at bridge projects to prevent project delays. WS would repeatedly visit bridge projects, survey the bridges for nests, and remove the nests before they became active. Since 2016, WS has inspected 233 bridges and migratory birds were present at approximately 66% of those bridges with a total of 9,250 inactive nests being removed using a variety of methods. Since the partnership’s inception, construction delays due to migratory birds have been completely avoided with an average cost per project of $1,525. With the passage of a new motor fuel user fee in South Carolina, SCDOT plans to replace 465 bridges over the next 10 years. This increase in work will require continued development and implementation of the partnership to effectively meet the rapidly growing transportation needs while minimizing impacts to species protected under the MBTA

Two-dimensional tetramer-cuprate Na5RbCu4(AsO4)4Cl2: phase transitions and AFMorder as seen by 87Rb NMR

We report the Rb nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) results in a recently synthesized Na5RbCu4(AsO4)Cl2. This complex novel two-dimensional (2D) cuprate is an unique magnetic material, which contains layers of coupled Cu4O4 tetramers. In zero applied magnetic field, it orders antiferromagnetically via a second-order low-entropy phase transition at TN = 15(1) K. We characterise the ordered state by 87Rb NMR, and suggest for it a noncollinear rather than collinear arrangement of spins. We discuss the properties of Rb nuclear site and point out the new structural phase transition(s) around 74 K and 110 K.Comment: 2 pages, 2 figures, Proceedings of SCES'05, Vienna 200

A Mouse Monoclonal Antibody Against a Newly Discovered Basement Membrane Component, the Epidermolysis Bullosa Acquisita Antigen

A mouse monoclonal antibody, H3a, directed against the newly described epidermolysis bullosa acquisita (EBA) antigen was obtained using hybridoma techniques. The distribution of the monoclonal antibody is identical to that of the polyclonal serum antibody of patients with EBA. By immunofluorescence, a linear band is seen at the dermal-epidermal junction and, by immunoelectron microscopy, immune reaction products are present in the lamina densa and sublamina densa regions. Sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis followed by Western immunoblot analysis shows that the monoclonal antibody recognizes 290 and 145 kilodalton proteins present in the immunizing junctional extract, identical with the newly discovered EBA antigen. This monoclonal antibody should be useful in the further isolation and characterization of the EBA antigen

Toward a unified description of hadro- and photoproduction: S-wave pi- and eta-photoproduction amplitudes

The Chew-Mandelstam parameterization, which has been used extensively in the two-body hadronic sector, is generalized in this exploratory study to the electromagnetic sector by simultaneous fits to the pion- and eta-photoproduction S-wave multipole amplitudes for center-of-mass energies from the pion threshold through 1.61 GeV. We review the Chew-Mandelstam parameterization in detail to clarify the theoretical content of the SAID hadronic amplitude analysis and to place the proposed, generalized SAID electromagnetic amplitudes in the context of earlier employed parameterized forms. The parameterization is unitary at the two-body level, employing four hadronic channels and the gamma-N electromagnetic channel. We compare the resulting fit to the MAID parameterization and find qualitative agreement though, numerically, the solution is somewhat different. Applications of the extended parameterization to global fits of the photoproduction data and to global fits of the combined hadronic and photoproduction data are discussed.Comment: 9 pages, 9 figures; added figures and tex

E-Cigarette Availability, Price Promotions and Marketing at the Point-of Sale in the Contiguous United States (2014-2015): National Estimates and Multilevel Correlates

Electronic cigarette (e-cigarette) sales and use have increased rapidly, yet point-of-sale e-cigarette availability and marketing is understudied. We estimated changes in e-cigarette availability and marketing among tobacco retailers in the U.S., and associations with neighborhood characteristics. A national sample of tobacco retailers in the Contiguous U.S. was audited in 2014 and 2015 (n = 1,905 and n = 2,126, respectively) to observe e-cigarette availability and marketing (signs, ads, displays and promotions) and generate national prevalence estimates. Store, neighborhood and state level correlates of 2015 e-cigarette availability, price promotions and exterior advertising were analyzed using multilevel mixed-effects generalized linear models. E-cigarettes were sold at 72.0% of retailers in 2014 and at 79.2% in 2015. Price promotions increased from 11.9% to 20.2% of retailers. Among retailers that did not previously sell e-cigarettes in 2012, availability in 2015 was greater for retailers in neighborhoods with the highest proportion of Black residents (vs. lowest). E-cigarette price promotions were more prevalent in neighborhoods with more Hispanic residents, while exterior e-cigarette marketing was more prevalent in neighborhoods with more Black residents. State smoking prevalence was positively associated with e-cigarette availability, promotions and advertising. E-cigarette point-of-sale availability and marketing increased between 2014 and 2015 and expanded to neighborhoods with a higher proportion of Black residents between 2012 and 2015. Retailers located within states with high smoking prevalence appear to be targeted by e-cigarette marketing. As e-cigarettes become the target of more regulations, understanding changes in the e-cigarette retail environment is critical to inform potential policies regulating their sale and marketing

Aerocapture Systems Analysis for a Titan Mission

Performance projections for aerocapture show a vehicle mass savings of between 40 and 80%, dependent on destination, for an aerocapture vehicle compared to an all-propulsive chemical vehicle. In addition aerocapture is applicable to multiple planetary exploration destinations of interest to NASA. The 2001 NASA In-Space Propulsion Program (ISP) technology prioritization effort identified aerocapture as one of the top three propulsion technologies for solar system exploration missions. An additional finding was that aerocapture needed a better system definition and that supporting technology gaps needed to be identified. Consequently, the ISP program sponsored an aerocapture systems analysis effort that was completed in 2002. The focus of the effort was on aerocapture at Titan with a rigid aeroshell system. Titan was selected as the initial destination for the study due to potential interest in a follow-on mission to Cassini/Huygens. Aerocapture is feasible, and the performance is adequate, for the Titan mission and it can deliver 2.4 times more mass to Titan than an all-propulsive system for the same launch vehicle

Postpartum Depression and HIV Infection Among Women in Malawi

HIV-infected women face several risk factors for postpartum depression (PPD). We aimed to describe the prevalence and cumulative incidence of PPD in the low-income setting of Malawi, and to determine the association between maternal and infant HIV and PPD

Antikaon Production in Proton-Nucleus Reactions and the K−K^- properties in nuclear matter

We calculate the momentum-dependent potentials for $K^+$ and $K^-$ mesons in a dispersion approach at nuclear density $\rho_0$ using the information from the vacuum $K^+ N$ and $K^- N$ scattering amplitudes, however, leaving out the resonance contributions for the in-medium analysis. Whereas the $K^+$ potential is found to be repulsive ($\approx$ + 30 MeV) and to show only a moderate momentum dependence, the $K^-$ selfenergy at normal nuclear matter density turns out to be $\approx$ - 200 MeV at zero momentum in line with kaon atomic data, however, decreases rapidly in magnitude for higher momenta. The antikaon production in p + A reactions is calculated within a coupled transport approach and compared to the data at KEK including different assumptions for the antikaon potentials. Furthermore, detailed predictions are made for $p + ^{12}C$ and $p + ^{207}Pb$ reactions at 2.5 GeV in order to determine the momentum dependent antikaon potential experimentally.Comment: 27 pages, LaTeX, including 14 ps-figures, UGI-98-1