Age-differential motivational consequences of optimization versus compensation focus in younger and older adults.

Four studies investigated age-related differences in goal focus in younger and older adults. Studies 1 and 2 confirmed the hypothesis that younger adults are more persistent when the same sensorimotor task offers possibility for optimizing performance than when the task requires counteracting a loss in performance (compensation). In contrast, older adults were more persistent in the compensation than in the optimization condition. Study 3 showed that the age-differential effects of goal focus on persistence were not simply due to perceiving the 2 conditions as easy versus difficult. Study 4 ruled out that the age differences were due to differences in the 2 tasks themselves. Taken together, the studies underscore the importance of situating motivational research into a life span context. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Radiation protection systems for the final focus test beam at SLAC

The Final Focus Test Beam (FFTB) is a new beam line at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center designed to test new beam optics concepts, hardware, and techniques necessary to achieve and measure the small spot sizes required for future generations of high-energy e+e- linear colliders. The FFTB takes a 47 GeVc-1, 1 kW electron beam at the end of the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center linear accelerator and transports it to the FFTB beam dump. A radiation protection system was designed and installed for the FFTB with the primary goal that the integrated dose equivalent outside the shielding resulting from beam loss would not exceed 10 mSv y-1. This system is comprised of shielding, a beam containment system and a personnel protection system. This paper presents various aspects of radiation safety at Stanford Linear Accelerator Center that were considered in the design of the FFTB radiation protection system. Beam tests were conducted in which the performance of various beam containment devices and the shielding effectiveness were evaluated. Preliminary results from these tests are presented.     

Trouble at the top: Causes and consequences of managerial incompetence.

Analyzes the causes and consequences of managerial incompetence (i.e., those cases where managers with excellent social skills ultimately derail, usually because they are unable to build a team) and presents empirical findings that are important for consultants who advise organizations about leadership problems. Topics addressed are effectiveness, personality from the perspective of the actor and from the perspective of the observer, personality and leader effectiveness, key tasks of leadership, determining the base rate of flawed leadership, the dark side of charisma, how to detect flawed managers, and what to do about flawed managers. It is argued that short-term interventions will not have enduring effects in terms of improving a manager's performance; it is necessary to continue intervention for a prolonged period of time. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

覆膜机在开发彩涂家电板中的应用

本文从攀钢开发家电彩涂覆膜板的必要性出发,着重见绍了开发覆膜家电彩涂板覆膜机改造的设备选型,并分析了覆膜机张力控制策略和实现自动控制恒张力的过程。     

A new look at the consequences of attitude certainty: The amplification hypothesis.

It is well established that increasing attitude certainty makes attitudes more resistant to attack and more predictive of behavior. This finding has been interpreted as indicating that attitude certainty crystallizes attitudes, making them more durable and impactful. The current research challenges this crystallization hypothesis and proposes an amplification hypothesis, which suggests that instead of invariably strengthening an attitude, attitude certainty amplifies the dominant effect of the attitude on thought, judgment, and behavior. In 3 experiments, the authors test these competing hypotheses by comparing the effects of attitude certainty manipulations on univalent versus ambivalent attitudes. Across experiments, it is demonstrated that increasing attitude certainty strengthens attitudes (e.g., increases their resistance to persuasion) when attitudes are univalent but weakens attitudes (e.g., decreases their resistance to persuasion) when attitudes are ambivalent. These results are consistent with the amplification hypothesis. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A review of selected microstomia prevention appliances

This new technique uses helical computed tomography data and computer-aided design and manufacturing for preoperative fabrication of individual mandibular prostheses together with corresponding resection templates. Coherent 3D geometries for computer-based models are the basis for the construction of prostheses and provide data for a computerized numerical control fabrication. Fixation plates are fabricated with the titanium prostheses. The identical data of these plates are used for the computer-aided design and manufacturing of resection templates, which guide an oscillating saw in a precisely determined resection plane. This plane again is identical with the prostheses' margins for mandibular body replacement. The use of this technique in four patients is reported on: after temporary insertion of the templates for resection and after resection, the prostheses were stabilized with the same screws in the same screw-holes where the templates had been. Resection and reconstruction were thus highly precise, safe and fast and primarily led to excellent aesthetic and functional results. Wound-healing depends on a safe soft-tissue reconstruction over these large prostheses. Coverage with flaps seems obligatory. In spite of the superior technical aspects, the clinical long-term results of this new technique were poor.     

Change in neutrophils in liquidators of the consequences of the accident at the Chernobyl Atomic Electric Power Station

In result of own researches and analysis of the literature? the information about high sensitivity of neutrophils of peripheric blood to infringements of constancy of internal state of body, arising as reply to radiating influence, are received. Ionized radiation modulates greatly properties and functions of neutrophilic granulocytes, which are the most sensitive and high-modulated cells of non-specific resistance system. The changes of the functional-metabolic status of neutrophils in participants of liquidation of consequences of Chernobyl disaster have been saving during 10 years after influence of the extreme, including radiating, factors of failure.     

Correction of mesiolinguoversion of the upper lateral incisors with lingual appliances

The genotoxic potentials of boric acid in Escherichia coli PQ37 was assessed along in the presence of aflatoxin B1 using SOS chromotest. Boric acid induced beta-galactosidase synthesis on the tester bacteria both on the presence and absence of S9 activation mixture. Therefore, the inorganic acid may not require metabolic activation to be genotoxic for this bacteria. When present together with aflatoxin B1 in the assay medium, boric acid increased the degree of beta-galactosidase synthesis induced by the maximal inducing concentration of aflatoxin B1 before the toxin's activation. However, the degree of enzyme synthesis induced was significantly decreased when boric acid was present after aflatoxin activation. This suggests that boric acid may not interfere with nor block the expoxidation of aflatoxin B1. It may however interact with the expoxide thereby inhibiting its activity. Boric acid may be a genotoxin and could possibly act as a syngenotoxic and/or a cogenotoxic agent.     

The spatial focus of attention is controlled at perceptual and cognitive levels.

Selective attention has been hypothesized to reduce distractor interference at both perceptual and postperceptual levels (Lavie, 2005), respectively, by focusing perceptual resources on the attended location and by blocking at postperceptual levels distractors that survive perceptual selection. This study measured the impact of load on these selection mechanisms using a flanker paradigm (Eriksen & St. James, 1986) and indexing distractor interference as a function of separation. It distinguished changes in the extent of focus of the distractor-interference function of separation (reflecting perceptual selection) from changes in the amplitude of distractor interference not accompanied by changes in focus (reflecting postperceptual selection). It showed that: (1) the spatial profile of perceptual resources is shaped like a “Mexican hat” (Müller et al., 2005); (2) increasing perceptual load focuses perceptual resources (Caparos & Linnell, 2009); (3) increasing cognitive load defocuses perceptual resources; and (4) participants with reduced working-memory span show reduced postperceptual blocking of distractors. While these findings are consistent with two levels of selective attention, they show that the first perceptual level is affected not only by perceptual but also by cognitive-control mechanisms. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Research training in forensic psychology: National survey of forensic facilities.

A survey was sent to the 103 directors of public forensic facilities in the United States. Responses were received from 68, a response rate of 66%. Information on the facilities' involvement in training and research in forensic psychology was obtained. A number of facilities reported involvement in psychology training at different levels; graduate practicum (43%) and predoctoral internship (41%) were among the most common. Forensic psychological research was either "encouraged" or "strongly encouraged" by 59% of responding facilities. Some institutional support was also available for research. Results suggest that forensic facilities have a largely untapped potential for helping to meet the growing research and training needs in forensic psychology. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Critical incidents and chronic stressors at work: Their impact on forensic doctors.

Workers in medium- or high-risk professions are often confronted with critical incidents at the workplace. The impact of these acute stressors may be serious and enduring. Many workers also experience chronic job stressors, such as work overload or role conflicts. This study examined the frequently neglected relationship of acute and chronic stressors with self-reported health symptoms, such as posttraumatic responses, fatigue, and burnout. This association was investigated in a sample of forensic doctors in the Netherlands (N = 84). It was found that the more traumatic events the respondents experienced, the more problems they reported in coping with the traumatic events. Chronic job stressors were associated with posttraumatic responses (intrusions and avoidances) and with burnout and fatigue. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Functional consequences of monoglucosylation of Ha-Ras at effector domain amino acid threonine 35

Monoglucosylation of low molecular mass GTPases is an important post-translational modification by which microbes interfere with eukaryotic cell signaling. Ha-Ras is monoglucosylated at effector domain amino acid threonine 35 by Clostridium sordellii lethal toxin, resulting in a blockade of the downstream mitogen-activated protein kinase cascade. To understand the molecular consequences of this modification, effects of glucosylation on each step of the GTPase cycle of Ras were analyzed. Whereas nucleotide binding was not significantly altered, intrinsic GTPase activity was markedly decreased, and GTPase stimulation by the GTPase-activating protein p120(GAP) and neurofibromin NF-1 was completely blocked, caused by failure to bind to glucosylated Ras. Guanine nucleotide exchange factor (Cdc25)-catalyzed GTP loading was decreased, but not completely inhibited. A dominant-negative property of modified Ras to sequester exchange factor was not detectable. However, the crucial step in downstream signaling, Ras-effector coupling, was completely blocked. The Kd for the interaction between Ras.GTP and the Ras-binding domain of Raf was 15 nM, whereas glucosylation increased the Kd to >1 mM. Because the affinity of Ras.GDP for Raf (Kd = 22 microM) is too low to allow functional interaction, a glucose moiety at threonine 35 of Ras seems to block completely the interaction with Raf. The net effect of lethal toxin-catalyzed glucosylation of Ras is the complete blockade of Ras downstream signaling.