Use of vinorelbine in non-small-cell lung cancer. Provincial Lung Disease Site Group

The best known of the nation's welfare programs, Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), has from its inception reflected a tension between the desire to support children in poor, lone-parent families and the belief that parents should be held responsible for providing for themselves and their children. Against that backdrop, this article reviews the history of the AFDC program and traces the emergence of policies and programs intended to encourage employment of the parents (almost exclusively mothers) who receive benefits. The article examines in detail the Work Incentive Program (WIN) launched in 1967 and the Family Support Act of 1988, comparing these to each other and to the outlines of welfare reform signed into law in 1996. The article emphasizes the importance of sustained attention to the implementation of policy goals in concrete programs and shows that the merits of those early programs have not been fully tested because they were never funded or implemented at the scale intended. The article also outlines ways in which welfare-to-work programs can be used to assist children as well as parents, and urges that children's well-being remain the core purpose of welfare policy.     

Analyzing the start-up effects of new patients on an ambulatory care program

Holmes County, Mississippi was the site of a pilot study to develop a community-based program to combat hypertension, the primary health problem in the rural black community. Using experience gained during the pilot program, a model was developed that computes, over a sequence of planning periods, the personnel utilization and the treatment status of the patients as functions of treatment protocols, allocations of procedures to personnel, and the additions of new patients. The model can be used to study the impact of new patients on any ambulatory care program or any health maintenance organization in which there is unusually high personnel resource utilization during a patients first visit.     

Activation of phospholipase C gamma by PI 3-kinase-induced PH domain-mediated membrane targeting

Signaling via growth factor receptors frequently results in the concomitant activation of phospholipase C gamma (PLC gamma) and phosphatidylinositol (PI) 3-kinase. While it is well established that tyrosine phosphorylation of PLC gamma is necessary for its activation, we show here that PLC gamma is regulated additionally by the lipid products of PI 3-kinase. We demonstrate that the pleckstrin homology (PH) domain of PLC gamma binds to phosphatidylinositol 3,4,5-trisphosphate [PdtIns(3,4,5)P3], and is targeted to the membrane in response to growth factor stimulation, while a mutated version of this PH domain that does not bind PdtIns(3,4,5)P3 is not membrane targeted. Consistent with these observations, activation of PI 3-kinase causes PLC gamma PH domain-mediated membrane targeting and PLC gamma activation. By contrast, either the inhibition of PI 3-kinase by overexpression of a dominant-negative mutant or the prevention of PLC gamma membrane targeting by overexpression of the PLC gamma PH domain prevents growth factor-induced PLC gamma activation. These experiments reveal a novel mechanism for cross-talk and mutual regulation of activity between two enzymes that participate in the control of phosphoinositide metabolism.     

Intellectual sequelae of hemophilus influenzae meningitis.

10 6-15 yr. old patients who had experienced hemophilus-influenzae (H-flu) meningitis and 10 matched controls were administered 3 tests designed to measure various cognitive abilities. Significant differences were obtained on 5 of the 10 WISC subtests. No differences were found on 6 variables from Frostig's Developmental Test of Visual Perception or on the Bender-Gestalt Test. It is concluded that the effects of H-flu meningitis might be greatest in the area of perceptual-motor functioning and abstract thinking ability. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

InGaAsP/InGaAs heterojunction p-i-n detectors with low dark current and small capacitance for 1.3?1.6 ?m fibre optic systems

A new long wavelength p-i-n photodetector, consisting of an In0.53 Ga0.47 As absorbing layer and an adjacent InGaAsP p-n junction is demonstrated. These diodes exhibit dark currents as low as 0.2 nA and a capacitance < 0.5 pF at ? 10 V for a device area of 1.3 × 10?4 cm2. The external quantum efficiency is ? 60% at ? = 1.3 ?m for front illumination. A systematic study of the background doping of the quaternary layers using different InP sources is also reported.     

Diversity as a Measure of Alewife (Alosa Pseudoharengus) Dominance in Southeastern Lake Ontario

Nearshore fish assemblages at Nine Mile Point, Lake Ontario, were sampled with gill nets twice a month from April to December in 1974 and 1975. Seasonal fluctuations in diversity (H’) were compared with and without the presence of alewife (Alosa pseudoharengus), which comprised about 75% of the total number of individuals. Because H’ was highly correlated with the proportional contribution (p_i log p_i) of alewife abundance, fairly large temporal changes in composition of the remainder of the fish community were masked. This effect was explained by certain properties of the H’ index; i.e., once a species has a dominance greater than about 70%, it influences H’, not only through its own contribution, but also by restricting p_i values for all other species below 0.30, the region where the index is most sensitive to change.     

Electrooptic polarization modulation in multielectrode AlxGa1-xAs rib waveguides

A single mode rib waveguide (RWG) polarization modulator is described with a measured extinction ratio ≳27 dB, a power conversion ≈0.99, and a switching voltage of 12.5 V atlambda = 1.064 mum. The modulator is based on a modified stepDeltabeta-reversal configuration. Contact with CdO and an Au overlay ensures low optical losses (lsim1cm^-1) for both polarizations.