Author: engeladmin

Is artificial intelligence a good servant but a bad master?

Featured Database

Author: Lakhtakia, Akhlesh; Lakhtakia, Natalya S. Description: Artificial intelligence (AI) is rapidly moving from a specialized research topic into a widely deployed general-purpose technology, driven by advances in transformer-based architectures, convincing enough productivity gains, large private investment, geopolitical competition, and expanding educational adoption. AI comprises two distinct sets of methodologies: (i) predictive AI, which is grounded in statistical inference and aims to model measurable physical reality, and (ii) generative AI, which produces plausible synthetic content without intrinsic verification against physical reality. Whereas predictive AI can strengthen human decision-making through rigorously…

See more and a link to full text

The Dark Side of AI: A Human and Societal Perspective

Featured Database

Author: Shafik, Wasswa Description: This book addresses how the growth of AI could undermine fundamental human values such as privacy, security, employment, and democracy. It emphasizes the critical challenges that arise when artificial intelligence technologies operate without proper ethical oversight or regulation. Key topics include AI’s potential for surveillance, the manipulation of media through deepfakes, autonomous weapons, and job displacement, as well as the growing concerns around algorithmic biases that may perpetuate social inequalities and harm marginalized communities. It offers insights into how AI can be integrated into society responsibly,…

See more and a link to full text

A Comparison of Frugivory and Scatter-Hoarding Seed-Dispersal Syndromes

Student Database

Author: Vander Wall, Stephen B.; Beck, Maurie J. Description: Frugivory (animals ingest all or part of fleshy-fruits and defecate or regurgitate seeds) and scatter-hoarding (animals store seeds in small caches in soil) are two important vertebrate-mediated seed dispersal syndromes. In both instances, there is an exchange of food for seed transport, but there are many important differences. For example, the seeds of frugivore-dispersed plants are often clumped in feces or under roosts and the microsite of depostion is often unsuitable for seedling establishment. However, frugivores can transport seeds long distances…

See more and a link to full text

Community-level assisted migration for climate-appropriate prairie restoration

Student Database

Author: McKone, Mark J.; Hernandez, Daniel L. Description: Climate change threatens the long-term survival of highly fragmented habitats such as North American tallgrass prairie. De novo plantings into former agricultural sites can contribute to efforts to conserve prairie biodiversity, but past planting practice (including our own) has focused on the use of local species and genotypes. Climate change makes this “local-only” practice obsolete because of rapidly shifting species’ ranges. We propose that new prairie plantings incorporate assisted migration at the community level; all species and genotypes that are viable in…

See more and a link to full text

Climate and Developmental Plasticity: Interannual Variability in Grapevine Leaf Morphology

Student Database

Author: Chitwood, DH; Rundell, SM; Li, DY; Woodford, QL; Yu, TT; Lopez, JR; Greenblatt, D; Kang, J; Londo, JP Description: The shapes of leaves are dynamic, changing over evolutionary time between species, within a single plant producing different shaped leaves at successive nodes, during the development of a single leaf as it allometrically expands, and in response to the environment. Notably, strong correlations between the dissection and size of leaves with temperature and precipitation exist in both the paleorecord and extant populations. Yet, a morphometric model integrating evolutionary, developmental, and…

See more and a link to full text

Estimating the capacity of Chamaecrista fasciculata for adaptation to change in precipitation

Student Database

Author: Peschel, AR; Boehm, EL; Shaw, RG Description: Adaptation through natural selection may be the only means by which small and fragmented plant populations will persist through present day environmental change. A population’s additive genetic variance for fitness (V(A) (W)) represents its immediate capacity to adapt to the environment in which it exists. We evaluated this property for a population of the annual legume Chamaecrista fasciculata through a quantitative genetic experiment in the tallgrass prairie region of the Midwestern United States, where changing climate is predicted to include more variability…

See more and a link to full text

Predicting species’ maximum dispersal distances from simple plant traits

Student Database

Author: Tamme, R; Gotzenberger, L; Zobel, M; Bullock, JM; Hooftman, DA; Kaasik, A; Partel, M Description: Many studies have shown plant species’ dispersal distances to be strongly related to life-history traits, but how well different traits can predict dispersal distances is not yet known. We used cross-validation techniques and a global data set (576 plant species) to measure the predictive power of simple plant traits to estimate species’ maximum dispersal distances. Including dispersal syndrome (wind, animal, ant, ballistic, and no special syndrome), growth form (tree, shrub, herb), seed mass, seed…

See more and a link to full text

A review of oxycodone’s clinical pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics

Student Database

Author: Poyhia, R; Vainio, A; Kalso, E Description: Oxycodone (14-hydroxy-7,8-dihydrocodeinone) is a strong opioid agonist that is available alone or in combination with mild analgesics. It is suitable for oral administration due to high bioavailability (60%), and may also be given intramuscularly, intravenously, subcutaneously, and rectally; it is not recommended for spinal administration. In analgesic potency, oxycodone is comparable to morphine. With the exception of hallucinations, which may occur more rarely after oxycodone than after morphine, the side effects of these drugs are closely related. The abuse potential of oxycodone…

See more and a link to full text

The use of the elevated plus maze as an assay of anxiety-related behavior in rodents

Student Database

Author: Walf, AA; Frye, CA Description: The elevated plus maze is a widely used behavioral assay for rodents and it has been validated to assess the anti-anxiety effects of pharmacological agents and steroid hormones, and to define brain regions and mechanisms underlying anxiety-related behavior. Briefly, rats or mice are placed at the junction of the four arms of the maze, facing an open arm, and entries/duration in each arm are recorded by a video-tracking system and observer simultaneously for 5 min. Other ethological parameters (i.e., rears, head dips and stretched-attend…

See more and a link to full text

Pair-housing of male and female rats during chronic stress exposure results in gender-specific behavioral responses

Student Database

Author: Westenbroek, C; Snijders, TA; den Boer, JA; Gerrits, M; Fokkema, DS; Ter Horst, GJ Description: Social support has a positive influence on the course of a depression and social housing of rats could provide an animal model for studying the neurobiological mechanisms of social support. Male and female rats were subjected to chronic footshock stress for 3 weeks and pair-housing of rats was used to mimic social support. Rats were isolated or housed with a partner of the opposite sex. A plastic tube was placed in each cage and…

See more and a link to full text
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.