Gender pluralism in problem-solving software

Although there has been significant research into gender regarding educational and workplace practices, there has been little awareness of gender differences as they pertain to software tools, such as spreadsheet applications, that try to support end users in problem-solving tasks. Although such software tools are intended to be gender agnostic, we believe that closer examination of this premise is warranted. Therefore, in this paper, we report an end-to-end investigation into gender differences with spreadsheet software. Our results showed gender differences in feature usage, feature-related confidence, and tinkering (playful exploration) with features. Then, drawing implications from these results, we designed and implemented features for our spreadsheet prototype that took the gender differences into account. The results of an evaluation on this prototype showed improvements for both males and females, and also decreased gender differences in some outcome measures, such as confidence. These results are encouraging, but also open new questions for investigation. We also discuss how our results compare to generalization studies performed with a variety of other software platforms and populations.     

Cognitive functioning in older depressed outpatients: Relationship of presence and severity of depression to neuropsychological test scores.

Neuropsychological evaluation of 73 older healthy, unmedicated outpatients with major depression and 110 controls suggested that relatively distinct cognitive profiles may correspond to the presence vs. severity of depression. Specifically, the presence of depression was associated with subtle weaknesses in visual memory and nonverbal intelligence, with sparing of verbal skills (verbal intelligence, language, and verbal memory), constructional ability, attention, information processing speed, and executive functions. In contrast, increasing severity of depression was associated with mild weaknesses, primarily in information-processing speed and executive skills, but was essentially unrelated to memory (verbal or visual), intelligence, language skills, constructional ability, or basic attention. Findings are discussed in terms of a possible state vs. trait model of depression. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The effect of dietary arachidonic acid on platelet function, platelet fatty acid composition, and blood coagulation in humans

Arachidonic acid (AA) is the precursor of thromboxane and prostacyclin, two of the most active compounds related to platelet function. The effect of dietary AA on platelet function in humans is not understood although a previous study suggested dietary AA might have adverse physiological consequences on platelet function. Here normal healthy male volunteers (n=10) were fed diets containing 1.7 g/d of AA for 50 d. The control diet contained 210 mg/d of AA. Platelet aggregation in the platelet-rich plasma was determined using ADP, collagen, and AA. No statistical differences could be detected between the aggregation before and after consuming the high-AA diet. The prothrombin time, partial thromboplastin time, and the antithrombin III levels in the subjects were determined also. There were no statistically significant differences in these three parameters when the values were compared before and after they consumed the high-AA diet. The in vivo bleeding times also did not show a significant difference before and after the subjects consumed the high-AA diet. Platelets exhibited only small changes in their AA content during the AA feeding period. The results from this study on blood clotting parameters and in vitro platelet aggregation suggest that adding 1.5 g/d of dietary AA for 50 d to a typical Western diet containing about 200 mg of AA produces no observable physiological changes in blood coagulation and thrombotic tendencies in healthy, adult males compared to the unsupplemented diet. Thus, moderate intakes of foods high in AA have few effects on blood coagulation, platelet function, or platelet fatty acid composition.     

Small‐Molecule Proteomimetic Inhibitors of the HIF‐1α–p300 Protein–Protein Interaction

The therapeutically relevant hypoxia inducible factor HIF‐1α–p300 protein–protein interaction can be orthosterically inhibited with α‐helix mimetics based on an oligoamide scaffold that recapitulates essential features of the C‐terminal helix of the HIF‐1α C‐TAD (C‐terminal transactivation domain). Preliminary SAR studies demonstrated the important role of side‐chain size and hydrophobicity/hydrophilicity in determining potency. These small molecules represent the first biophysically characterised HIF‐1α–p300 PPI inhibitors and the first examples of small‐molecule aromatic oligoamide helix mimetics to be shown to have a selective binding profile. Although the compounds were less potent than HIF‐1α, the result is still remarkable in that the mimetic reproduces only three residues from the 42‐residue HIF‐1α C‐TAD from which it is derived.     

Eutectic Combinations as a Pathway to the Formation of Substrate‐Based Au‐Ge Heterodimers and Hollowed Au Nanocrescents with Tunable Optical Properties

Pairs of immiscible elements with deep eutectics are used to synthesize periodic arrays of heterodimers and hollowed metal nanocrescents. In the devised route, substrate‐immobilized Au or Ag nanostructures act as heterogeneous nucleation sites for Ge adatoms. At elevated temperatures the adatoms collect in sufficient quantities to transform each site into a AuGe liquid alloy which, upon cooling, phase separates into elemental components sharing a common interface. The so‐formed Au‐Ge and Ag‐Ge heterodimers exhibit a complex morphology characterized by a noble metal nanocrescent which partially encapsulates one end of the Ge domain. Through the use of a selective etch the Ge component is removed, leaving behind a periodic array of hollow noble metal nanocrescents on the surface of the substrate. Optical characterization of both the heterodimers and nanocrescents indicates that the presence of Ge gives rise to a relative blue‐shift in the localized surface plasmon peak, a result that is in stark contrast to the red‐shifts typically observed when plasmonic nanostructures are in contact with a dielectric medium. Simulations are used to both rationalize the observed shift and show the potential for deriving unexpected behaviors when semishell‐like noble metal structures are in contact with high permittivity dielectric mediums.