101,748 research outputs found

    The European Union and the South Caucasus; Three Perspectives on the Future of the European Project from the Caucasus. Europe in Dialogue 2009/1

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    Tigran Mkrtchyan singles out three main factors that determine Armenia’s rather positive attitude to and interest in EU policies in the Caucasus region. Firstly, further cooperation with the EU could guarantee a democratically stable future for the country. Secondly, Armenia would benefit from increased economic cooperation with the EU. Thirdly, to a large extent the population feels that it belongs to Europe. However, some critics, mostly from the ranks of the intelligentsia, have expressed concern that too much Europeanization constitutes a threat to national identity.///// Tabib Huseynov agrees with Mkrtchyan in calling for a more active EU role in the region and most notably in the resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. This would lay the foundations for the ongoing development of the region. Huseynov outlines factors contributing to or impeding regional cooperation in the South Caucasus and cooperation between the EU and Azerbaijan. Whereas Georgia and Armenia are seeking EU membership in the long term and financial assistance in some areas, Azerbaijan remains financially independent on account of its oil revenues and is not interested in EU membership in the near future. It is far more interested in increased economic and trade cooperation./// Kakha Gogolashvili, Director of EU Studies at the Georgian Foundation for Strategic and International Studies (GFSIS), describes the level of acceptance for EU policies in Georgia. To a large extent the general goals of Georgian policy-makers are aligned with those of the EU, and this facilitates cooperation in implementing reforms in the country

    Algorithmic bias in social research: A meta-analysis

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    Replication material for Thiem, A., L. Mkrtchyan, T. Haesebrouck and D. Sanchez. 2020. "Algorithmic bias in social research: A meta-analysis." PLoS ONE 15(6): e0233625. DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.023362

    Letter, [Author unclear] to Paulina T. Merritt

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    Handwritten letter to Paulina Merritt from an unknown author, October 1, 1876.

    Handwritten biographical information on Paulina T. McClung Merritt

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    A handwritten biography of Paulina T. McClung Merritt by an unknown author, 1892.

    Heterogeneous and tissue-specific regulation of effector T cell responses by IFN-gamma during Plasmodium berghei ANKA infection.

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    IFN-γ and T cells are both required for the development of experimental cerebral malaria during Plasmodium berghei ANKA infection. Surprisingly, however, the role of IFN-γ in shaping the effector CD4(+) and CD8(+) T cell response during this infection has not been examined in detail. To address this, we have compared the effector T cell responses in wild-type and IFN-γ(-/-) mice during P. berghei ANKA infection. The expansion of splenic CD4(+) and CD8(+) T cells during P. berghei ANKA infection was unaffected by the absence of IFN-γ, but the contraction phase of the T cell response was significantly attenuated. Splenic T cell activation and effector function were essentially normal in IFN-γ(-/-) mice; however, the migration to, and accumulation of, effector CD4(+) and CD8(+) T cells in the lung, liver, and brain was altered in IFN-γ(-/-) mice. Interestingly, activation and accumulation of T cells in various nonlymphoid organs was differently affected by lack of IFN-γ, suggesting that IFN-γ influences T cell effector function to varying levels in different anatomical locations. Importantly, control of splenic T cell numbers during P. berghei ANKA infection depended on active IFN-γ-dependent environmental signals--leading to T cell apoptosis--rather than upon intrinsic alterations in T cell programming. To our knowledge, this is the first study to fully investigate the role of IFN-γ in modulating T cell function during P. berghei ANKA infection and reveals that IFN-γ is required for efficient contraction of the pool of activated T cells

    Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts

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    We conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more sophisticated methods

    Pelevin’s Trinity in the novel “t”: author – protagonist – reader

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    The article attempts to interpret Pelevin's artistic strategy in the novel "T" by exploring its subject organization and addressing the key problems of the author, the protagonist, and the reader as they are seen by the researcher. The article analyzes the peculiarities of constructing the narrative reality in the novel "T", and goes on to discuss Pelevin's philosophic models of the development of the humankind, and the emergence of his new anthropology

    Measuring industry-science links through inventor-author relations: A profiling method

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    In this pilot study we examine the performance of text-based profiling in recovering a set of validated inventor-author links. In a first step we match patents and publications solely based on their similarity in content. Next, we compare inventor and author names on the highest ranked matches for the occurrence of name matches. Finally, we compare these candidate matches with the names listed in a validated set of inventor-author names. Our text-based profile methodology performs significantly better than a random matching of patents and publications, suggesting that text-based profiling is a valuable complementary tool to the name searches used in previous studies.innovation; industry-science links; text-based profiling;

    Wave turbulence of a rotating array of quantized vortices in the T → 0 temperature limit

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    The dynamics of quantized vortices in the zero temperature limit T0T \rightarrow 0 is currently of great interest, particularly in the case of the Fermi superfluid 3^3He-B. Here we study wave turbulence, generated by the librating motion of a rotating cylindrical container filled with 3^3He-B, in the limit of vanishing viscous forces at temperatures T0.2TcT \leq 0.2 T_{c}. The polarization of the quantized vortices with respect to the axis of rotation is measured using non-invasive NMR techniques. We observe a decrease of the polarization when the librating motion is started, and a two-stage relaxation process when the modulation of the rotation velocity is stopped. The first relaxation process is associated with the dissipation of large-scale flow stored in inertial waves and the solid body rotation of the vortex array. From the decay of these energy reservoirs we determine the rate of energy dissipation of large-scale flow. The later second process is related to the relaxation of Kelvin waves on individual vortices. This process is monitored by the recovery of the polarization. The existence of a Kelvin wave cascade at the lowest temperatures is currently a central open question. We supply some evidence for the cascade

    DNA fusion gene vaccination mobilizes effective anti-leukemic cytotoxic T lymphocytes from a tolerized repertoire

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    The majority of known human tumor-associated antigens derive from non-mutated self proteins. T cell tolerance, essential to prevent autoimmunity, must therefore be cautiously circumvented to generate cytotoxic T cell responses against these targets. Our strategy uses DNA fusion vaccines to activate high levels of peptide-specific CTL. Key foreign sequences from tetanus toxin activate tolerance-breaking CD4+ T cell help. Candidate MHC class Ibinding tumor peptide sequences are fused to the C terminus for optimal processing and presentation. To model performance against a leukemia-associated antigen in a tolerized setting, we constructed a fusion vaccine encoding an immunodominant CTL epitopederived from Friend murine leukemia virus gag protein (FMuLVgag) and vaccinated tolerant FMuLVgag-transgenic (gag-Tg) mice. Vaccination with the construct induced epitopespecificIFN-c-producing CD8+ T cells in normal and gag-Tg mice. The frequency and avidity of activated cells were reduced in gag-Tg mice, and no autoimmune injury resulted. However, these CD8+ T cells did exhibit gag-specific cytotoxicity in vitro and in vivo. Also, epitope-specific CTL killed FBL-3 leukemia cells expressing endogenous FMuLVgag antigen and protected against leukemia challenge in vivo. These results demonstrate a simple strategy to engage anti-microbial T cell help to activate epitope-specific polyclonal CD8+ T cell responses from a residual tolerized repertoire
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