Nonconsensual Pornography and the First Amendment: A Case for a New Unprotected Category of Speech

Nonconsensual pornography, or the distribution of sexually graphic images of individuals without their consent, is not illegal at the federal level, nor is it illegal in the majority of states. Failure to pass laws prohibiting nonconsensual pornography, commonly referred to as “revenge porn,” leaves many victims without recourse. Opponents of legislation regulating revenge porn claim that it cannot be banned because it constitutes speech that is protected by the First Amendment. This Comment argues that nonconsensual pornography should be considered an unprotected category of speech, which would enable it to be prohibited without triggering First Amendment concerns. The method of regulating revenge porn (i.e., through particular torts or criminal prohibitions) is beyond the scope of this Comment; instead, it focuses on why this speech should be unprotected, opening the door for legislatures to regulate it as they see fit. Nonconsensual pornography should not be protected by the First Amendment because of its similarities to existing unprotected categories of speech: namely, public disclosure of private fact, defamation, and child pornography. Part I presents the three theories often articulated for why the First Amendment protects speech: to create a marketplace of ideas, facilitate participatory democracy, and promote individual autonomy. Part II explains why certain types of speech are unprotected: because their minimal value towards advancing these free speech goals is outweighed by the significant harm they cause. Part III discusses three current unprotected categories: public disclosure of private fact, defamation, and child pornography. For each, it explains why they have been found to be unprotected – balancing their contribution to promoting free speech values against the harms they cause. Part IV argues for revenge porn as a new unprotected category, first defining the parameters of the category, discussing what the category should encompass in order to ensure it is not overbroad. It then highlights nonconsensual pornography’s low free speech value and analogous harms to the existing three categories— showing it is indistinguishable from speech that has already been deemed unprotected

High Pressure Effects on Thermal Properties of MgO

Using the non-empirical Variational Induced Breathing (VIB) model, the thermal properties of periclase (MgO) under high pressures and temperatures are investigated using molecular dynamics, which includes all anharmonic effects. Equations of state for temperatures up to 3000K and pressures up to 310 GPa were calculated. Bulk modulus, thermal expansivity, Anderson-Gruneisen parameter, thermal pressure, Gruneisen parameter and their pressure and temperature dependencies are studied in order to better understand high pressure effects on thermal properties. The results agree very well with experiments and show that the thermal expansivity decreases with pressure up to about 100 GPa ($\eta$=0.73), and is almost pressure and temperature independent above this compression. It is also effected by anharmonicity at zero pressure and temperatures above 2500K. The thermal pressure changes very little with increasing pressures and temperatures, and the Gruneisen parameter is temperature independent and decreases slightly with pressure.Comment: Geophys. Res. Lett., in press, 7 pages, 4 figures, uuencoded ps fil

Signaling through three chemokine receptors triggers the migration of transplanted neural precursor cells in a model of multiple sclerosis

AbstractMultiple sclerosis (MS) is a multifocal disease, and precursor cells need to migrate into the multiple lesions in order to exert their therapeutic effects. Therefore, cell migration is a crucial element in regenerative processes in MS, dictating the route of delivery, when cell transplantation is considered. We have previously shown that inflammation triggers migration of multi-potential neural precursor cells (NPCs) into the white matter of experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE) rodents, a widely used model of MS. Here we investigated the molecular basis of this attraction.NPCs were grown from E13 embryonic mouse brains and transplanted into the lateral cerebral ventricles of EAE mice. Transplanted NPC migration was directed by three tissue-derived chemokines. Stromal cell-derived factor-1α, monocyte chemo-attractant protein-1 and hepatocyte growth factor were expressed in the EAE brain and specifically in microglia and astrocytes. Their cognate receptors, CXCR4, CCR2 or c-Met were constitutively expressed on NPCs. Selective blockage of CXCR4, CCR2 or c-Met partially inhibited NPC migration in EAE brains. Blocking all three receptors had an additive effect and resulted in profound inhibition of NPC migration, as compared to extensive migration of control NPCs. The inflammation-triggered NPC migration into white matter tracts was dependent on a motile NPC phenotype. Specifically, depriving NPCs from epidermal growth factor (EGF) prevented the induction of glial commitment and a motile phenotype (as indicated by an in vitro motility assay), hampering their response to neuroinflammation.In conclusion, signaling via three chemokine systems accounts for most of the inflammation-induced, tissue-derived attraction of transplanted NPCs into white matter tracts during EAE

Overfitting for Fun and Profit: Instance-Adaptive Data Compression

Neural data compression has been shown to outperform classical methods in terms of $RD$ performance, with results still improving rapidly. At a high level, neural compression is based on an autoencoder that tries to reconstruct the input instance from a (quantized) latent representation, coupled with a prior that is used to losslessly compress these latents. Due to limitations on model capacity and imperfect optimization and generalization, such models will suboptimally compress test data in general. However, one of the great strengths of learned compression is that if the test-time data distribution is known and relatively low-entropy (e.g. a camera watching a static scene, a dash cam in an autonomous car, etc.), the model can easily be finetuned or adapted to this distribution, leading to improved $RD$ performance. In this paper we take this concept to the extreme, adapting the full model to a single video, and sending model updates (quantized and compressed using a parameter-space prior) along with the latent representation. Unlike previous work, we finetune not only the encoder/latents but the entire model, and - during finetuning - take into account both the effect of model quantization and the additional costs incurred by sending the model updates. We evaluate an image compression model on I-frames (sampled at 2 fps) from videos of the Xiph dataset, and demonstrate that full-model adaptation improves $RD$ performance by ~1 dB, with respect to encoder-only finetuning.Comment: Accepted at International Conference on Learning Representations 202

Risk of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder in children with atopic dermatitis

Atopic dermatitis (AD) is a common, chronic, inflammatory, pruritic skin disorder that affects up to 20% of the children in Western countries. Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) has been reported to be more frequent in children with AD. The purpose of this study was to explore the risk for ADHD in our population of patients with AD. A population-based case-control study, using the medical database of Clalit Health Services (CHS), the largest healthcare provider organization in Israel. The study included 840 patients with AD between the age of 0-18 years and 900 age and gender frequency-matched patients without AD. The proportion of ADHD in patients with AD was 7.1% as compared to 4.1% in controls. ADHD was more frequent in boys with AD (9.6% vs. 5.2%, odds ratio (OR) 1.9, 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.1-3.2) but not in girls with AD (4.6% vs. 2.9% OR 1.5). In multivariate analyses, AD was associated with ADHD (OR 2.1, 95% CI 1.3-3.4). The current study demonstrated an association between AD and ADHD. This report and earlier observations emphasize the need for detection and treatment of ADHD in atopic patients.  </p

Identification of a cytoplasmic motif in the erythropoietin receptor required for receptor internalization

AbstractErythropoietin (EPO) promotes the viability, proliferation and differentiation of mammalian erythroid progenitor cells via its specific cell surface receptor. The EPO receptor (EPO-R) is a member of the cytokine receptor superfamily and is comprised of one identified subunit which homodimerizes upon ligand binding. To study the role of the intracellular domain of the EPO-R in the endocytosis of EPO, we compared the rate and extent of 125I-EPO endocytosis by wild type (wt) EPO-R and five cytoplasmically truncated EPO-Rs: 1–251 EPO-R, 1–257 EPO-R, 1–267 EPO-R, 1–276 EPO-R and 1–306 EPO-R which contain 4, 10, 20, 29 or 59 amino acids of the cytoplasmic domain, respectively. We also studied an EPO-R mutant (PB) which lacks amino acid residues 281–300 of the cytoplasmic domain. The experiments were conducted in COS 7 cells transfected with the EPO-R cDNAs and in Ba/F3 cells stably expressing the wt EPO-R, 1–251 or 1–257 EPO-R. Cells expressing wt EPO-R, PB EPO-R (Δ281–300), 1–276 EPO-R or 1–306 EPO-R internalized approximately 50% of 125I-EPO bound to the cell surface, while cells expressing 1–251, 1–257 or 1–267 EPO-R internalized only 25% of the bound 125I-EPO. The steady-state expression levels of these latter receptors on the cell surface were typically 2–5-fold higher than wt EPO-R. Our data indicate that amino acid residues 267–276 (FEGLFTTHK) of the EPO-R cytoplasmic domain may have a role in receptor internalization. Metabolic labeling experiments suggest that in transiently transfected COS 7 cells most of the wt EPO-R and 1–257 EPO-Rs do not exit the ER and may be degraded there. The half-life of both receptors was essentially similar and was in the range of 1 h. In Ba/F3 cells the mature Golgi processed 1–257 EPO-R was more stable than the corresponding form of the wt EPO-R, possibly contributing to its higher cell surface expression

Controllable Sonar Lenses and Prisms Based on ERFs

Sonar-beam-steering devices of the proposed type would contain no moving parts and would be considerably smaller and less power-hungry, relative to conventional multiple-beam sonar arrays. The proposed devices are under consideration for installation on future small autonomous underwater vehicles because the sizes and power demands of conventional multiple-beam arrays are excessive, and motors used in single-beam mechanically scanned systems are also not reliable. The proposed devices would include a variety of electrically controllable acoustic prisms, lenses, and prism/lens combinations both simple and compound. These devices would contain electrorheological fluids (ERFs) between electrodes. An ERF typically consists of dielectric particles floating in a dielectric fluid. When an electric field is applied to the fluid, the particles become grouped into fibrils aligned in rows, with a consequent increase in the viscosity of the fluid and a corresponding increase in the speed of sound in the fluid. The change in the speed of sound increases with an increase in the applied electric field. By thus varying the speed of sound, one varies the acoustic index of refraction, analogously to varying the index of refraction of an optical lens or prism. In the proposed acoustic devices, this effect would be exploited to control the angles of refraction of acoustic beams, thereby steering the beams and, in the case of lenses, controlling focal lengths

Improving stress echocardiography accuracy for detecting left circumflex artery stenosis: A new echocardiographic sign?

SummaryBackgroundThe accuracy and reproducibility of stress echocardiography (SE) for the detection of coronary artery lesions requires improvement, particularly in the left circumflex artery (LCx).AimsTo evaluate the feasibility and diagnostic value of a new sign: Rise of the Apical lateral wall and/or Horizontal displacement of the Apex toward the septum (“RA-HA”) in apical echocardiographic views.MethodsConsecutive patients with normal left ventricular function at rest, positive SE and an indication for coronary angiography were included. SEs were analysed blindly by three independent cardiologists: two seniors (S1 and S2) and one junior (J).ResultsOf 81 patients, 58 had an exercise SE and 23 had a dobutamine SE. Significant coronary stenosis was found in 59 of 77 patients who underwent coronary angiography (76.6%). Interobserver reproducibility for the presence of RA-HA was very good between S1 and S2 (κ=0.86), and good between S1 and J (0.67) and S2 and J (0.70). The sensitivity, specificity and positive and negative predictive values of RA-HA for the detection of significant coronary artery stenosis were, respectively, 39–41%, 83–89%, 88–92% and 29–31% for S1/S2; and 29%, 83%, 85% and 26% for J. To predict LCx stenosis (single or multivessel): 67–70%, 89%, 80–81% and 80–82% for S1/S2, respectively, and 50%, 89%, 75% and 74% for J.ConclusionWith a short learning curve, RA-HA is easily diagnosed with a very good interobserver reproducibility. It has high specificity and PPV for the detection of a coronary artery stenosis, particularly in the LCx artery, during exercise or dobutamine SE

The Cytoskeletal System of Nucleated Erythrocytes. I. Composition and Function of Major Elements

We have studied the dogfish erythrocyte cytoskeletal system, which consists of a marginal band of microtubules (MB) and trans-marginal band material (TBM). The TBM appeared in whole mounts as a rough irregular network and in thin sections as a surface-delimiting layer completely enclosing nucleus and MB. In cells incubated at 0 degrees C for 30 min or more, the MB disappeared but the TBM remained. MB reassembly occurred with rewarming, and was inhibited by colchicine. Flattened elliptical erythrocyte morphology was retained even when MBs were absent. Total solubilization of MB and TBM at low pH, or dissolution of whole anucleate cytoskeletons, yielded components comigrating with actin, spectrin, and tubulin standards during gel electrophoresis. Mass-isolated MBs, exhibiting ribbonlike construction apparently maintained by cross-bridges, contained four polypeptides in the tubulin region of the gel. Only these four bands were noticeably increased in the soluble phase obtained from cells with 0 degrees C-disassembled MBs. The best isolated MB preparations contained tubulin but no components comigrating with high molecular weight microtubule-associated proteins, spectrin, or actin. Actin and spectrin therefore appear to be major TBM constituents, with tubulin localized in the MB. The results are interpreted in terms of an actin- and spectrin-containing subsurface cytoskeletal layer (TBM), related to that of mammalian erythrocytes, which maintains cell shape in the absence of MBs. Observations on abnormal pointed erythrocytes containing similarly pointed MBs indicate further that the MB can deform the TBM from within so as to alter cell shape. MBs may function in this manner during normal cellular morphogenesis and during blood flow in vivo