Regional patterns of affirmative action compliance costs

In this paper we estimate the amount by which firms' labor costs are increased by compliance with affirmative action regulations imposed on federal contractors for 160 SMSAs in 1980. The paper focuses on determining the cause(s) for variation in these compliance costs across SMSAs and in identifying areas of high and low compliance cost. We find that compliance costs are lower in larger SMSAs, more rapidly growing SMSAs, and SMSAs that have relatively large proportions of minorities and females in the labor market.The authors would like to thank Fred Wildes and Long Gen Ying, both of San Diego State University, for their assistance on this project. In addition, support for Prof. Getis' work was provided by the National Science Foundation, Grant No. SES-9123832.This paper was presented at the annual conference of the Western Regional Science Association in Tucson, Arizona.     

Transient response in doped germanium photoconductors under very low background operation

Doped germanium photoconductors are the most sensitive detectors for astronomy in the wavelength range 40-240 μm. Under the extremely low background conditions encountered in cooled satellite instruments, these devices exhibit a number of transient effects, such as slow relaxation after a step change in illumination or bias, and spontaneous spiking at high signal levels. Such behavior can degrade the excellent instantaneous sensitivity of these detectors and create calibration uncertainties. These effects have been observed in the Ge:Be photoconductors and the stressed and unstressed Ge:Ga photoconductors in the Long Wavelength Spectrometer, one of the instruments on the Infrared Space Observatory. A systematic investigation of the transient response of the Long Wavelength Spectrometer detectors to a step change in illumination as a function of operating temperature, bias electric field, and illumination step size has been carried out to determine operating conditions that minimize the effects of this behavior. The transient effects appear to be due primarily to carrier sweep out, but they are not fully explained by existing models for transient response.     

Analogues of capsaicin with agonist activity as novel analgesic agents: structure-activity studies. 4. Potent, orally active analgesics

Structural features of three regions of the capsaicin molecule necessary for agonist properties were delineated by a previously reported modular approach. These in vitro agonist effects were shown to correlate with analgesic potency in rodent models. Combination of optimal structural features from each of these regions of the capsaicin molecule have led to highly potent agonists (eg., 1b). Evaluation in vivo established that 1b had analgesic properties but poor oral activity, short duration of action, and excitatory side effects which precluded further development of this compound. Preliminary metabolism studies had shown that the phenol moiety of 1b was rapidly glucuronidated in vivo, providing a possible explanation for the poor pharmacokinetic profile. Subsequent specific modification of the phenol group led to compounds 2a-j, which retained in vitro potency. The in vivo profiles of two representatives of this series, 2a,h, were much improved over the "parent" phenol series, and they are candidates for development as analgesic agents.     

Roald Amundsen--a study of personality

Roald Amundsen is the most famous of the Norwegian polar explorers. His ancestors came from a group of islands south-east of the Oslofjord. From being fishermen and sailors, they progressed to becoming captains and shipowners in the course of two generations. Amundsen's father, Jens, stayed at sea until his ship went down with all the crew. Roald was 14 years of age at the time, the youngest of four competing brothers. Jens had left the close-knit local family community before that, and bought a flat in the capital, Oslo, so that his sons could get a better education. Roald's mother wanted him to study medicine. He did as she wished for a time, but was not at all interested. When his mother died, he abruptly left the university and went to sea, which had been the tradition in his family for decades. As a young boy he was an admirer of Sir John Franklin and his explorers of the Northwest Passage. Fridtjof Nansen became his ideal. The biographies about Roald Amundsen are very diverging--some hold him a hero, others reflect a strongly critical attitude. Here, the author tries to define his personality and places him firmly within the narcissistic domain. His tendency to seek the company of married women, but to take immediate flight when they really became interested reflects an Oedipus complex from before puberty. The tragic death of his father, the sea captain, may have been a supposition; puberty can be seen as a period of coping with ambivalence towards an earlier idealized father. His genius combined ambitious goals with a sharp eye for details as regards the equipment used in his expeditions. In his travels in the Arctic and the Antartic he was driven forward by the energy of the nation. His heroic death, trying to save his earlier "enemy", Nobile, was probably caused by an urge for self-destruction.     

CHL1 encodes a component of the low-affinity nitrate uptake system in Arabidopsis and shows cell type-specific expression in roots

The Arabidopsis CHL1 (AtNRT1) gene confers sensitivity to the herbicide chlorate and encodes a nitrate-regulated nitrate transporter. However, how CHL1 participates in nitrate uptake in plants is not yet clear. In this study, we examined the in vivo function of CHL1 with in vivo uptake measurements and in situ hybridization experiments. Under most conditions tested, the amount of nitrate uptake by a chl1 deletion mutant was found to be significantly less than that of the wild type. This uptake deficiency was reversed when a CHL1 cDNA clone driven by the cauliflower mosaic virus 35S promoter was expressed in transgenic chl1 plants. Furthermore, tissue-specific expression patterns showed that near the root tip, CHL1 mRNA is found primarily in the epidermis, but further from the root tip, the mRNA is found in the cortex or endodermis. These results are consistent with the involvement of CHL1 in nitrate uptake at different stages of root cell development. A functional analysis in Xenopus oocytes indicated that CHL1 is a low-affinity nitrate transporter with a K(m) value of approximately 8.5 mM for nitrate. This finding is consistent with the chlorate resistance phenotype of chl1 mutants. However, these results do not fit the current model of a single, constitutive component for the low-affinity uptake system. To reconcile this discrepancy and the complex uptake behavior observed, we propose a "two-gene" model for the low-affinity nitrate uptake system of Arabidopsis.     

Polarized light imaging of white matter architecture

Polarized light imaging (PLI) is a method to image fiber orientation in gross histological brain sections based on the birefringent properties of the myelin sheaths. The method uses the transmission of polarized light to quantitatively estimate the fiber orientation and inclination angles at every point of the imaged section. Multiple sections can be assembled into a 3D volume, from which the 3D extent of fiber tracts can be extracted. This article describes the physical principles of PLI and describes two major applications of the method: the imaging of white matter orientation of the rat brain and the generation of fiber orientation maps of the human brain in white and gray matter. The strengths and weaknesses of the method are set out.     

The second order local-image-structure solid

Characterization of second order local image structure by a 6D vector (or jet) of Gaussian derivative measurements is considered. We consider the affect on jets of a group of transformations-affine intensity-scaling, image rotation and reflection, and their compositions-that preserve intrinsic image structure. We show how this group stratifies the jet space into a system of orbits. Considering individual orbits as points, a 3D orbifold is defined. We propose a norm on jet space which we use to induce a metric on the orbifold. The metric tensor shows that the orbifold is intrinsically curved. To allow visualization of the orbifold and numerical computation with it, we present a mildly-distorting but volume-preserving embedding of it into euclidean 3-space. We call the resulting shape, which is like a flattened lemon, the second order local-image-structure solid. As an example use of the solid, we compute the distribution of local structures in noise and natural images. For noise images, analytical results are possible and they agree with the empirical results. For natural images, an excess of locally 1D structure is found.     

Analogues of capsaicin with agonist activity as novel analgesic agents; structure-activity studies. 3. The hydrophobic side-chain "C-region"

Structural variants of the hydrophobic side chain ("C region") of the capsaicin molecule have been incorporated into a series of vanillylamides and vanillylthioureas. These compounds have been tested in an in vitro assay for agonism (45Ca2+ influx into dorsal root ganglia neurones), previously shown to be predictive of analgesic activity. The results of this study have established the requirement for a hydrophobic substituent of limited size (molar refractivity, MR, < 55) in order to obtain high potency. Combination of the information gained here about the "C-region" of the capsaicin molecule with the studies described in the preceding two papers provides a rational basis for the design of compounds of increased potency.     

The dielectric formalism for3He-4He mixtures

The microscopic theory of³He-⁴He mixtures with a Bose condensate is formulated in terms of the dielectric formalism. By expressing all correlation functions in terms of proper, irreducible contributions, one sets the stage for approximate calculations that will be consistent with various exact sum rules and Ward identities, just as in the case of pure⁴He. The present analysis includes a symmetry-breaking term that allows us to deal with the continuity equations properly, and is valid at finite temperature. As a specific application, we express the normal fluid density _N in terms of the static⁴He current-current correlation function. We also give the first formal proof that in the presence of a moving condensate, the³He atoms make no direct contribution to the superfluid flow.