AUTOMATING NETWORK DEVICE CONFIGURATION TEMPLATE DISCOVERY

Establishing network device golden configuration templates typically relies on largely manual efforts and a dialogue between network consulting engineers and customers. Techniques are presented herein that streamline the process of discovering and baselining network standards by examining underlying themes and relationships between micro-templates in customer environments. Aspects of the presented techniques employ a Masked-Language Model (MLM), in a way that an MLM was not necessarily intended, to detect locally significant attributes in network device configurations for the express purpose of identifying structures that are common across a set of devices. Under further aspects of the presented techniques, the creation of association rules between configuration blocks and the devices on which they are found allows for the identification of underlying themes in configurations that form the basis of network standards and platform-based templates

Wireless Kick Pedal

The goal of the project is to build a wireless kick pedal that allows accessibility to drummers that have leg or foot disabilities and add versatility to multi-instrumentalists looking to add percussion while playing another instrument. The proposed pedal is designed in two main parts, a wearable band that tracks the player’s movement, and a hammer mechanism that receives actuation commands from the wearable band to move the hammer and deliver a drumbeat. The band is designed to be worn on several parts of the body, including the ankle, knee, thigh, or even the arm depending on the user’s situation. This is to allow compatibility for musicians of differing ability. The team plans to communicate from the band to the hammer mechanism over a short-range wireless communication protocol, so that the response time to deliver a beat is as close to human response time as possible. The hammer mechanism for physically delivering the drumbeat is to be designed such that the hammer strikes the drum similarly to how a commercial pedal would. With this pedal design, the team hopes to invite more people to play the drums and spark new ideas in the future of instrument innovations

Opioids depress cortical centers responsible for the volitional control of respiration

Respiratory depression limits provision of safe opioid analgesia and is the main cause of death in drug addicts. Although opioids are known to inhibit brainstem respiratory activity, their effects on cortical areas that mediate respiration are less well understood. Here, functional magnetic resonance imaging was used to examine how brainstem and cortical activity related to a short breath hold is modulated by the opioid remifentanil. We hypothesized that remifentanil would differentially depress brain areas that mediate sensory-affective components of respiration over those that mediate volitional motor control. Quantitative measures of cerebral blood flow were used to control for hypercapnia-induced changes in blood oxygen level-dependent (BOLD) signal. Awareness of respiration, reflected by an urge-to-breathe score, was profoundly reduced with remifentanil. Urge to breathe was associated with activity in the bilateral insula, frontal operculum, and secondary somatosensory cortex. Localized remifentanil-induced decreases in breath hold-related activity were observed in the left anterior insula and operculum. We also observed remifentanil-induced decreases in the BOLD response to breath holding in the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, anterior cingulate, the cerebellum, and periaqueductal gray, brain areas that mediate task performance. Activity in areas mediating motor control (putamen, motor cortex) and sensory-motor integration (supramarginal gyrus) were unaffected by remifentanil. Breath hold-related activity was observed in the medulla. These findings highlight the importance of higher cortical centers in providing contextual awareness of respiration that leads to appropriate modulation of respiratory control. Opioids have profound effects on the cortical centers that control breathing, which potentiates their actions in the brainstem

Constraints on the Ionizing Efficiency of the First Galaxies

Observations of the Lyman-alpha forest and of high-redshift galaxies at z~5-10 imply that there were just enough photons to maintain the universe in an ionized state at z~5-6, indicating a "photon-starved" end to reionization. The ionizing emissivity must have been larger at earlier times in order to yield the extended reionization history implied by the electron scattering optical depth constraint from WMAP. Here we address the possibility that a faint population of galaxies with host halo masses of ~1e8-1e9 Msun dominated the ionizing photon budget at redshifts of about z>9, due to their much higher escape fractions. Such faint, early galaxies, would not have formed in ionized regions due to suppression by heating from the UV background (UVB), and would therefore not contribute to the ionizing background at z<6, after reionization is complete. Our model matches: (1) the low escape fractions observed for high-redshift galaxies, (2) the WMAP constraint of tau_es~0.09, (3) the low values for the UVB at z<6, and (4) the observed star formation rate density inferred from Lyman-break galaxies. A top heavy IMF from Pop III stars is not required in this scenario. We compare our model to recent ones in the literature that were forced to introduce an escape fraction that increases strongly towards high redshift, and show that a similar evolution occurs naturally if low mass galaxies possess high escape fractions.Comment: 5 pages, 1 figure, submitted to ApJ Letter

Prazosin Reduces Alcohol Intake in an Animal Model of Alcohol Relapse

BACKGROUND: Many alcoholics and heavy drinkers undergo repeated cycles of alcohol abstinence followed by relapse to alcohol drinking; a pattern that contributes to escalated alcohol intake over time. In rodents, alcohol drinking that is interspersed with periods of alcohol deprivation (imposed abstinence) increases alcohol intake during reaccess to alcohol. This is termed the "alcohol deprivation effect" or "ADE" and is a model of alcohol relapse in humans. We have previously reported that prazosin reduces alcohol drinking during both brief and prolonged treatment in rats selectively bred for alcohol preference ("P" rats). This study explores whether prazosin prevents alcohol "relapse" in P rats, as reflected by a reduced or abolished ADE. METHODS: Adult male P rats were given 24-hour access to food and water and scheduled access to alcohol (15 and 30% v/v solutions presented concurrently) for 2 h/d. After 5 weeks, rats underwent imposed alcohol deprivation for 2 weeks, followed by alcohol reaccess for 2 weeks, and this pattern was repeated for a total of 3 cycles. Rats were injected with prazosin (0, 0.5, 1.0, or 2.0 mg/kg body weight, intraperitoneally) once a day for the first 5 days of each alcohol reaccess cycle. RESULTS: Alcohol intake increased on the first day of each alcohol reaccess cycle, demonstrating the formation of an ADE. The ADE was short-lived, lasting only 1 day, during each of the 3 cycles. Prazosin, in all doses tested, prevented the expression of an ADE in all 3 alcohol reaccess cycles. CONCLUSIONS: Prazosin decreases alcohol intake in P rats even in a situation that would be expected to increase alcohol drinking, namely following periods of alcohol deprivation. This suggests that prazosin may be effective in reducing alcohol relapse that often occurs during attempts to achieve permanent alcohol abstinence in treatment-seeking alcoholics and heavy drinkers

The role of inflammation in age-related disease.

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) Geroscience Interest Group (GSIG) sponsored workshop, The Role of Inflammation inAge-Related Disease, was held September 6th-7th, 2012 in Bethesda, MD. It is now recognized that a mild pro-inflammatory state is correlated with the major degenerative diseases of the elderly. The focus of the workshop was to better understand the origins and consequences of this low level chronic inflammation in order to design appropriate interventional studies aimed at improving healthspan. Four sessions explored the intrinsic, environmental exposures and immune pathways by which chronic inflammation are generated, sustained, and lead to age-associated diseases. At the conclusion of the workshop recommendations to accelerate progress toward understanding the mechanistic bases of chronic disease were identified

Radiant ignition of a reactive solid with in-depth absorption

An asymptotic analysis of the limit of large activation energy is presented for radiant ignition of a solid that experiences a one-step Arrhenius reaction in the condensed phase. Both constant and time-dependent radiant-energy fluxes arc considered, and the complete range of values is covered for the absorption coefficient ji. It is shown that as » increases, the structure of the transition stage, which follows the inert heat-conduction stage, passes from a thermal explosion without heat conduction, to a single transient heat-conduction zone with distributed chemical heat release, to a two-zone structure composed of a reactive-diffusive-absorptive zone near the surface and a transient-diffusive zone in the interior. For very high values of u, the reactive-diffusive-absorptive zone further splits into a surface absorption zone and an interior reactive-diffusive zone, thereby reproducing results obtained previously for ignition by a surface-applied energy flux. The analysis shows that contrary to earlier expectation, the nondimensional absorption coefficient must be at least as large as the nondimensional activation energy for in-depth absorption to affect the ignition time negligibly

The association of parity with osteoarthritis and knee replacement in the Multicenter Osteoarthritis Study

SummaryObjectiveWe evaluated the association of parity to both risk of knee replacement (KR) and knee osteoarthritis (OA).DesignThe NIH-funded Multicenter Osteoarthritis Study (MOST) is a longitudinal observational study of persons age 50–79 years with either symptomatic knee OA or at elevated risk of disease. Baseline and 30-month knee radiographic OA (ROA) was defined as Kellgren/Lawrence (K/L) grade ≥2 or KR. Women were grouped based by number of births: 0; 1 (reference group); 2; 3; 4; and 5 or more. We examined the relation of parity to the incidence over 30 months of ROA and KR using a Poisson regression model. Generalized estimating equations (GEE) were used to control for correlation between two knees within a subject. We adjusted for age, BMI, race, education, occupation, baseline estrogen use, clinical site, injury, and for KR analyses WOMAC pain and use of pain medication.ResultsAmong 1618 women who reported parity information, mean age was 62.6 years, mean BMI 30.7 kg/m2, mean WOMAC pain subscale score 3.7 at baseline. There were 115 KRs and 134 cases of incident knee ROA over 30 months. The relative risk of incident KR was 2.7 times as high (95% CI: 1.0, 7.3) and relative risk of incident knee ROA was 2.6 times as high (95% CI: 1.2, 5.3) among women with five to 12 children compared with those with one birth.ConclusionParity in women at risk for OA is associated with both incident ROA and KR, particularly for those with more than four children

Pathotype Diversity of Phytophthora sojae in Eleven States in the United States

Pathotype diversity of Phytophthora sojae was assessed in 11 states in the United States during 2012 and 2013. Isolates of P. sojae were recovered from 202 fields, either from soil samples using a soybean seedling bioassay or by isolation from symptomatic plants. Each isolate was inoculated directly onto 12 soybean differentials; no Rps gene or Rps 1a, 1b, 1c, 1k, 3a, 3b, 3c, 4, 6, 7, or 8. There were 213 unique virulence pathotypes identified among the 873 isolates collected. None of the Rps genes were effective against all the isolates collected but Rps6 and Rps8 were effective against the majority of isolates collected in the northern regions of the sampled area. Virulence toward Rps1a, 1b, 1c, and 1k ranged from 36 to 100% of isolates collected in each state, while virulence to Rps6 and Rps8 was less than 36 and 10%, respectively. Depending on the state, the effectiveness of Rps3a ranged from totally effective to susceptible to more than 40% of the isolates. Pathotype complexity has increased in populations of P. sojae in the United States, emphasizing the increasing importance of stacked Rps genes in combination with high partial resistance as a means of limiting losses to P. sojae