Showing 691 - 700 of 733 Items

History lessons: The early development of intellectual property institutions in the United States

Date: 2001-01-01

Creator: B. Zorina Khan, Kenneth L. Sokoloff

Access: Open access



Political advertising in 2016: The presidential election as outlier?

Date: 2016-12-01

Creator: Erika Franklin Fowler, Travis N. Ridout, Michael M. Franz

Access: Open access

The 2016 presidential campaign broke the mold when it comes to patterns of political advertising. Using data from the Wesleyan Media Project, we show the race featured far less advertising than the previous cycle, a huge imbalance in the number of ads across candidates and one candidate who almost ignored discussions of policy. This departure from past patterns, however, was not replicated at the congressional level. We draw some lessons about advertising from the 2016 campaign, suggesting that its seeming lack of effectiveness may owe to the unusual nature of the presidential campaign with one unconventional candidate and the other using an unconventional message strategy, among other non-advertising related factors.


On the sign representations for the complex reflection groups G(r, p, n)

Date: 2016-11-01

Creator: Aba Mbirika, Thomas Pietraho, William Silver

Access: Open access

We present a formula for the values of the sign representations of a complex reflection group G(r, p, n) in terms of its image under a generalized Robinson–Schensted algorithm.


Structural strengthening of urchin skeletons by collagenous sutural ligaments

Date: 1998-01-01

Creator: Olaf Ellers, Amy S. Johnson, Philip E. Moberg

Access: Open access

Sea urchin skeletons are strengthened by flexible collagenous ligaments that bind together rigid calcite plates at sutures. Whole skeletons without ligaments (removed by bleaching) broke at lower apically applied forces than did intact, fresh skeletons. In addition, in three-point bending tests on excised plate combinations, sutural ligaments strengthened sutures but not plates. The degree of sutural strengthening by ligaments depended on sutural position; in tensile tests, ambital and adapical sutures were strengthened more than adoral sutures. Adapical sutures, which grow fastest, were also the loosest, suggesting that strengthening by ligaments is associated with growth. In fed, growing urchins, sutures overall were looser than in unfed urchins. Looseness was demonstrated visually and by vibration analysis: bleached skeletons of unfed urchins rang at characteristic frequencies, indicating that sound traveled across tightly fitting sutures; skeletons of fed urchins damped vibrations, indicating loss of vibrational energy across looser sutures. Furthermore, bleached skeletons of fed urchins broke at lower apically applied forces than bleached skeletons of unfed urchins, indicating that the sutures of fed urchins had been held together relatively loosely by sutural ligaments. Thus, the apparently rigid dome-like skeleton of urchins sometimes transforms into a flexible, jointed membrane as sutures loosen and become flexible during growth.


Dark breathers in granular crystals

Date: 2013-04-08

Creator: C. Chong, P. G. Kevrekidis, G. Theocharis, Chiara Daraio

Access: Open access

We present a study of the existence, stability, and bifurcation structure of families of dark breathers in a one-dimensional uniform chain of spherical beads under static load. A defocusing nonlinear Schrödinger equation (NLS) is derived for frequencies that are close to the edge of the phonon band and is used to construct targeted initial conditions for numerical computations. Salient features of the system include the existence of large amplitude solutions that emerge from the small amplitude solutions described by the NLS equation, and the presence of a nonlinear instability that, to the best of the authors' knowledge, has not been observed in classical Fermi-Pasta-Ulam lattices. Finally, it is also demonstrated that these dark breathers can be detected in a physically realistic experimental settings by merely actuating the ends of an initially at rest chain of beads and inducing destructive interference between their signals. © 2013 American Physical Society.


Effects of Arabidopsis wall associated kinase mutations on ESMERALDA1 and elicitor induced ROS

Date: 2021-05-01

Creator: Bruce D. Kohorn, Bridgid E. Greed, Gregory Mouille, Stéphane Verger, Susan L., Kohorn

Access: Open access

Angiosperm cell adhesion is dependent on interactions between pectin polysaccharides which make up a significant portion of the plant cell wall. Cell adhesion in Arabidopsis may also be regulated through a pectin-related signaling cascade mediated by a putative O-fucosyltransferase ESMERALDA1 (ESMD1), and the Epidermal Growth Factor (EGF) domains of the pectin binding Wall associated Kinases (WAKs) are a primary candidate substrate for ESMD1 activity. Genetic interactions between WAKs and ESMD1 were examined using a dominant hyperactive allele of WAK2, WAK2cTAP, and a mutant of the putative O-fucosyltransferase ESMD1. WAK2cTAP expression results in a dwarf phenotype and activation of the stress response and reactive oxygen species (ROS) production, while esmd1 is a suppressor of a pectin deficiency induced loss of adhesion. Here we find that esmd1 suppresses the WAK2cTAP dwarf and stress response phenotype, including ROS accumulation and gene expression. Additional analysis suggests that mutations of the potential WAK EGF O-fucosylation site also abate the WAK2cTAP phenotype, yet only evidence for an N-linked but not O-linked sugar addition can be found. Moreover, a WAK locus deletion allele has no effect on the ability of esmd1 to suppress an adhesion deficiency, indicating WAKs and their modification are not a required component of the potential ESMD1 signaling mechanism involved in the control of cell adhesion. The WAK locus deletion does however affect the induction of ROS but not the transcriptional response induced by the elicitors Flagellin, Chitin and oligogalacturonides (OGs).


Forces generated during stretch in the heart of the lobster Homarus americanus are anisotropic and are altered by neuromodulators

Date: 2016-01-01

Creator: E. S. Dickinson, A. S. Johnson, O. Ellers, P. S. Dickinson

Access: Open access

Mechanical and neurophysiological anisotropies mediate three-dimensional responses of the heart of Homarus americanus. Although hearts in vivo are loaded multi-axially by pressure, studies of invertebrate cardiac function typically use uniaxial tests. To generate whole-heart length-tension curves, stretch pyramids at constant lengthening and shortening rates were imposed uniaxially and biaxially along longitudinal and transverse axes of the beating whole heart. To determine whether neuropeptides that are known to modulate cardiac activity in H. americanus affect the active or passive components of these length-tension curves, we also performed these tests in the presence of SGRNFLRFamide (SGRN) and GYSNRNYLRFamide (GYS). In uniaxial and biaxial tests, both passive and active forces increased with stretch along both measurement axes. The increase in passive forces was anisotropic, with greater increases along the longitudinal axis. Passive forces showed hysteresis and active forces were higher during lengthening than shortening phases of the stretch pyramid. Active forces at a given length were increased by both neuropeptides. To exert these effects, neuropeptides might have acted indirectly on the muscle via their effects on the cardiac ganglion, directly on the neuromuscular junction, or directly on the muscles. Because increases in response to stretch were also seen in stimulated motor nerve-muscle preparations, at least some of the effects of the peptides are likely peripheral. Taken together, these findings suggest that flexibility in rhythmic cardiac contractions results from the amplified effects of neuropeptides interacting with the length-tension characteristics of the heart.


A super MHV vertex expansion for n=4 SYM theory

Date: 2009-07-06

Creator: Michael Kiermaier, Stephen G. Naculich

Access: Open access

We present a supersymmetric generalization of the MHV vertex expansion for all tree amplitudes in = 4 SYM theory. In addition to the choice of a reference spinor, this super MHV vertex expansion also depends on four reference Grassmann parameters. We demonstrate that a significant fraction of diagrams in the expansion vanishes for a judicious choice of these Grassmann parameters, which simplifies the computation of amplitudes. Even pure-gluon amplitudes require fewer diagrams than in the ordinary MHV vertex expansion. We show that the super MHV vertex expansion arises from the recursion relation associated with a holomorphic all-line supershift. This is a supersymmetric generalization of the holomorphic all-line shift recently introduced in arXiv:0811.3624. We study the large-z behavior of generating functions under these all-line supershifts, and find that they generically provide 1/z k falloff at (Next-to) kMHV level. In the case of anti-MHV generating functions, we find that a careful choice of shift parameters guarantees a stronger 1/z k+4 falloff. These particular all-line supershifts may therefore play an important role in extending the super MHV vertex expansion to = 8 supergravity. © SISSA 2009.


Perception is key? Does perceptual sensitivity and parenting behavior predict children's reactivity to others’ emotions?

Date: 2017-11-01

Creator: Joyce Weeland, Alithe Van den Akker, Meike Slagt, Samuel Putnam

Access: Open access

When interacting with other people, both children's biological predispositions and past experiences play a role in how they will process and respond to social–emotional cues. Children may partly differ in their reactions to such cues because they differ in the threshold for perceiving such cues in general. Theoretically, perceptual sensitivity (i.e., the amount of detection of slight, low-intensity stimuli from the external environment independent of visual and auditory ability) might, therefore, provide us with specific information on individual differences in susceptibility to the environment. However, the temperament trait of perceptual sensitivity is highly understudied. In an experiment, we tested whether school-aged children's (N = 521, 52.5% boys, Mage = 9.72 years, SD = 1.51) motor (facial electromyography) and affective (self-report) reactivities to dynamic facial expressions and vocalizations is predicted by their (parent-reported) perceptual sensitivity. Our results indicate that children's perceptual sensitivity predicts their motor reactivity to both happy and angry expressions and vocalizations. In addition, perceptual sensitivity interacted with positive (but not negative) parenting behavior in predicting children's motor reactivity to these emotions. Our findings suggest that perceptual sensitivity might indeed provide us with information on individual differences in reactivity to social–emotional cues, both alone and in interaction with parenting behavior. Because perceptual sensitivity focuses specifically on whether children perceive cues from their environment, and not on whether these cues cause arousal and/or whether children are able to regulate this arousal, it should be considered that perceptual sensitivity lies at the root of such individual differences.


Tree-based language complexity of Thompson's group F

Date: 2015-11-01

Creator: Jennifer Taback, Sharif Younes

Access: Open access

The definition of graph automatic groups by Kharlampovich, Khoussainov and Miasnikov and its extension to C-graph automatic by Elder and the first author raise the question of whether Thompson's group F is graph automatic. We define a language of normal forms based on the combinatorial "caret types", which arise when elements of F are considered as pairs of finite rooted binary trees. The language is accepted by a finite state machine with two counters, and forms the basis of a 3-counter graph automatic structure for the group.