News of the death of biomedical journals seem premature. Revamped traditional scientific journals remain highly valued sources and vehicles of information, critical debate, and knowledge. Some analyses seem to place a disproportionate emphasis on technological and formal issues, as compared to the importance ascribed to matters of power. Not all journals must necessarily have a large circulation. There are many examples of efficient, high-quality journals with a great impact on relatively small audiences for whom the journal is thought-provoking, useful, and pleasant to read. How can we achieve a better understanding of an article’s spectrum of impacts? A certain mixing of three distinct entities (journals, articles, and authors) has often pervaded judgments. Data used by the Institute for Scientific Information present weaknesses in their accuracy. The two-year limit for citations to count towards the bibliographic impact factor favors "fast-moving", "basic" biomedical disciplines and is less appropriate for public health studies. Increasing attention is given to the specific number of citations received by each individual article. It is possible to make progress towards more valid, accurate, fair, and relevant assessments.

The definition of a "review article" is examined from the viewpoints of the National Library of Medicine and of the patron. Implications of the differing interpretations of "review article" are discussed and possible alternative online search strategies are presented.

Journal article overlap is defined as the same journal article being indexed by two or more services. Using journal references from seventy dissertations written in the preclinical sciences, the extent of journal article overlap among Index Medicus, Science Citation Index, Biological Abstracts, and Chemical Abstracts was examined. Of the 7,969 journal references cited, 92% were indexed by at least two of these services; 591 articles were covered by only one of the services, and 55 articles were not indexed. A discussion of the advantages and costs of journal article overlap is presented.

This column highlights recently published articles that are of interest to the readership of this publication. We encourage ABRF members to forward information on articles they feel are important and useful to Clive Slaughter, Hartwell Center, St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, 332 North Lauderdale St., Memphis TN 38105-2794. Tel: (901) 495-4844; Fax: (901) 495-2945; email: Clive.Slaughter@stjude.org or to any member of the editorial board. Article summaries reflect the reviewer’s opinions and not necessarily those of the Association.

We analyze the online response to the preprint publication of a cohort of 4,606 scientific articles submitted to the preprint database arXiv.org between October 2010 and May 2011. We study three forms of responses to these preprints: downloads on the arXiv.org site, mentions on the social media site Twitter, and early citations in the scholarly record. We perform two analyses. First, we analyze the delay and time span of article downloads and Twitter mentions following submission, to understand the temporal configuration of these reactions and whether one precedes or follows the other. Second, we run regression and correlation tests to investigate the relationship between Twitter mentions, arXiv downloads, and article citations. We find that Twitter mentions and arXiv downloads of scholarly articles follow two distinct temporal patterns of activity, with Twitter mentions having shorter delays and narrower time spans than arXiv downloads. We also find that the volume of Twitter mentions is statistically correlated with arXiv downloads and early citations just months after the publication of a preprint, with a possible bias that favors highly mentioned articles.

The article by Brzag and coauthors in this issue of Journal of Diabetes Science and Technology reports a competitive accuracy performance study for a branded meter in comparison with six low-cost meters currently available in the United States. It highlights several important topics: (1) the need for more stringent post-marketing requirements for blood glucose meters after launch and (2) low-cost meters use older technologies and their manufacturers do not usually seriously invest in new technology or constant quality assurance efforts. This may explain the study results, which show superior performance of the branded meter. Finally, the article pinpoints to the “quality versus price” dilemma faced by the prescribing physician and their patients in daily routine, which may be additionally aggravated by budget constraints and prescription rules in reimbursed markets.

We recently designed and deployed a metasearch engine, Metta, that sends queries and retrieves search results from five leading biomedical databases: PubMed, EMBASE, CINAHL, PsycINFO and the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials. Because many articles are indexed in more than one of these databases, it is desirable to deduplicate the retrieved article records. This is not a trivial problem because data fields contain a lot of missing and erroneous entries, and because certain types of information are recorded differently (and inconsistently) in the different databases. The present report describes our rule-based method for deduplicating article records across databases and includes an open-source script module that can be deployed freely. Metta was designed to satisfy the particular needs of people who are writing systematic reviews in evidence-based medicine. These users want the highest possible recall in retrieval, so it is important to err on the side of not deduplicating any records that refer to distinct articles, and it is important to perform deduplication online in real time. Our deduplication module is designed with these constraints in mind. Articles that share the same publication year are compared sequentially on parameters including PubMed ID number...

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a chronic auto-immune disease. Most therapeutic strategies for treatment of this disease direct immune modulation and control of inflammatory processes. First-line therapeutic agents showed moderate efficacy and frequent side-effects with moderate efficacy in trials. Their parental administration and limited long-term adherence restrict their efficacy compared with second-line therapies. Fingolimod as a second-line therapeutic agent has been shown to reduce annualized relapse rate, risk of disability progression and inflammatory activity of relapsing MS. Safety and efficacy FTY720: Safety and efficacy issues are the main metrics for judgment of drug efficacy. In this article, we focus on cardiovascular effects of FTY720 treatment. Effect of FTY720 on rate and rhythm, impact of FTY720 on endothelial cells, its atheroprotective effects, its effects on cardiac transplantation outcomes, vascular complications of FTY720, effects of FTY720 on endocrine functions and interaction of FTY720 with cardioactive agents are explained in this review article.

“Unfortunately, Stern v. Marshall has become the mantra of every litigant who, for strategic or tactical reasons, would rather litigate somewhere other than the bankruptcy court.” I. INTRODUCTION Quite aptly, the United States Supreme Court borrowed the words of Charles Dickens to describe the life of the case that ultimately resulted in Stern v. Marshall : “This suit has, in the curse of time, become so complicated, that . . . no two . . . lawyers can talk about it for five minutes, without coming to a total disagreement as to all the premises.’” Ironically, even after the Court’s decision, the “curse” has continued and many, especially those of the bankruptcy bar, are in disagreement as to the ultimate outcome and unforeseen consequences of Stern. The “big fuss” arose out of the Court’s holding that bankruptcy courts do not have constitutional authority to enter final judgment on a state law counterclaim “that is not resolved in the process of ruling on a creditor’s proof of claim.” The Court stated that common law claims, as well as suits in equity and admiralty, fall within the province of Article III courts, and Congress cannot “chip away at the authority of the judicial branch” by enacting statutes delegating such power to non-Article III judges. The Constitution grants judicial power to courts whose judges enjoy tenure during good behavior and salary protections. Article III provisions are safeguards against intrusion by other branches of government and they ensure that judicial decisions are being made with “[c]lear heads . . . and honest hearts.” A different outcome would have been likely if the case involved a ‘public right’ because the Court has recognized that Congress has the authority to adjudicate in suits involving that exception. The public rights exception applies in cases where a “right is integrally related to particular federal government action.” Other than the obvious limiting effect that Stern will have on bankruptcy courts with regards to adjudicating common law claims...

Article III:4 of the GATT requires the Members of the WTO to accord imported products treatment no less favourable than that accorded to like domestic products. Article 2.1 of the TBT Agreement imposes the same obligation in respect of technical regulations. In a series of cases, the Appellate Body has ruled in essence that imported and domestic products are ‘like products’ within the meaning of Article III:4 of the GATT if they directly compete in the market and that the imported product is accorded ‘less favourable treatment’ within the meaning of that provision if it is accorded less favourable competitive opportunities. Regulations that distinguish between different types of products and accord one of them less favourable treatment are typically adopted precisely because the market does not make the distinction that the regulator considers necessary. Many, if not most, regulations are thus likely to be inconsistent with Article III:4 according to the Appellate Body’s jurisprudence. The ten policy goals listed in Article XX of the GATT do not comprise all legitimate policy goals that Members pursue through measures covered by Article III. There is consequently a range of perfectly legitimate internal regulations that are not applied so as to afford protection but are nevertheless not justifiable under Article XX. This includes all regulations that distinguish between competing products for the purpose of harmonising standards...

Approved for public release, distribution is unlimited; This thesis analyzes various interpretations of Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty since 1949. These variations reflect the evolving conceptions of the national security interests of the NATO Allies. Three historical periods are studied: the Cold War, 1949 to 1989; the post-Cold War, 1989 to 10 September 2001; and since 11 September 2001. The collective defense commitment in Article 5 was the foundation principle of the Alliance. During the Cold War, however, interpretations of collective defense necessarily required adaptation to remain relevant. The adaptability constructed during the Cold War yielded to broader concepts of threats and risks in the post-Cold War period. Following the first invocation of Article 5 due to the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States, the actions taken by NATO and the individual Allies demonstrate the value of NATO's collective defense principles. The adaptability of Article 5 throughout NATO's history thus far suggests that in the future it will remain a highly valued and integral component of the Alliance's approach to security.; Lieutenant, United States Navy

A revised and enlarged version of this EUI Working Paper has in August 2015 been accepted for publication in European constitutional law review (EuConst), 2015, Vol. 11, (No. 3).; This paper provides a detailed analysis of two institutional reforms, respectively put forward by the European Commission in March 2014 and by the Council of the EU in December 2014 – on how to tackle the problem of Member States’ non-compliance with the principle of the rule of law, which is one of the fundamental values of the Union according to Article 2 TEU. It is submitted that while both proposals definitely represent a timid step in the right direction, the Commission’s ‘light-touch’ proposal falls short of what is required to effectively address ongoing and serious threats to the rule of law within the EU but is however clearly preferable to the Council’s alternative proposal to hold an annual rule of law dialogue among all Member States within the Council itself.

The English article system is actually so complex that it presents many challenges for most non-native learners of English. The main difficulty of Portuguese learners, despite the numerous similarities between the two article systems, is noticeable in a marked tendency to produce the definite article where native speakers of English would not use it. This article reports the results of a cross-sectional study which examined the English definite article overproduction by a group of 12 Portuguese EFL learners with at least seven years of English instruction. The prediction is that these learners will exhibit evidence of transferring L1 features to their interlanguage when they overuse the definite article. The data were collected by means of a gap-filling task and a composition. The results found, as predicted, that these learners overused the in generic contexts. It is argued that this overuse is directly tied to and can be explained by transfer to somewhere and conceptual transfer principles.; A utilização correcta do artigo definido em Inglês revela-se de alguma complexidade para a generalidade dos aprendentes de Inglês não nativos. A principal dificuldade para os portugueses, apesar das muitas semelhanças entre os dois sistemas...

Biomedical literature is an essential source of biomedical evidence. To translate the evidence for biomedicine study, researchers often need to carefully read multiple articles about specific biomedical issues. These articles thus need to be highly related to each other. They should share similar core contents, including research goals, methods, and findings. However, given an article r, it is challenging for search engines to retrieve highly related articles for r. In this paper, we present a technique PBC (Passage-based Bibliographic Coupling) that estimates inter-article similarity by seamlessly integrating bibliographic coupling with the information collected from context passages around important out-link citations (references) in each article. Empirical evaluation shows that PBC can significantly improve the retrieval of those articles that biomedical experts believe to be highly related to specific articles about gene-disease associations. PBC can thus be used to improve search engines in retrieving the highly related articles for any given article r, even when r is cited by very few (or even no) articles. The contribution is essential for those researchers and text mining systems that aim at cross-validating the evidence about specific gene-disease associations.

 Este artigo busca compreender as operações de construção discursiva de um gêneroespecífico, o artigo de opinião. Com base no Modelo de Análise Modular do Discurso, mostramosque, na tentativa de convencer o leitor sobre um determinado ponto de vista, o autor de umartigo é levado a realizar diferentes manobras linguageiras, que se refletem na forma como asporções do discurso se articulam hierarquicamente, uma porção assumindo diversas funções emrelação à outra, como as funções de argumento, preparação, comentário etc. Para isso, descrevemosas relações que os constituintes de um artigo específico estabelecem entre si, abordando,inicialmente, como o autor organiza as porções maiores do discurso e, em seguida, como essaorganização se dá no interior dessas porções. O estudo permitiu verificar que, embora o gêneroartigo de opinião seja monologal, o processo de sua produção implica o diálogo constante como outro, o que tem como consequência a grande complexidade de sua organização discursiva.; This article aims to bring an understanding of how discourse construction functions in a specific genre, the opinion article. Based on the Model of Modular Discourse Analysis, we show that, in the attempt to convince the reader of a determined point of view...

http://dx.doi.org/10.5007/2175-7968.2016v36n1p155The present article is concerned with the specificity of translations for children with an emphasis on the cultural dimension to be preserved in the target text. Following a brief historical and theoretical overview on the issue of translating texts for children, we undertake a succint analysis on a corpus made up of tales which display an overtness to the other while treating the identity-alterity issue. Starting from our own translation practice, we will insist upon those strategies and techniques fit to render the cultural dimension of the source text in order to give young readers access to a foreign culture. Translational strategies are analysed along editorial and pedagogical strategies, with a special focus on the paratext which aims at satisfying the readers’ curiosity and contributing to the development of their encyclopedic competence.;  http://dx.doi.org/10.5007/2175-7968.2016v36n1p155Dans le présent article  nous prenons pour objet la spécificité de la traduction de jeunesse, en mettant l’accent sur la dimension culturelle à préserver dans le texte cible. Après un bref regard historique et théorique sur la traduction du texte pour enfants, nous présentons quelques analyses sommaires sur un corpus de contes pour enfants qui privilégient le rapport entre identité et altérité...

O trabalho revisa a literatura de Ciência Política brasileira sobre a nãoregulamentação  do Artigo 192 da Constituição Federal e temas pertinentes a essa problemática – como as relações entre Autoridade Monetária e Legislativo e entre sistema político e grupos de interesse financeiro. Após mapear quatro hipóteses explicativas, faz uma investigação empírica preliminar de ações, decisões e não-decisões do Congresso e do Poder Executivo, relacionadas à normatização e regulamentação do Sistema Financeiro Nacional, para avaliar as hipóteses mapeadas. Conclui considerando que as hipóteses da não-decisão e da captura têm forte poder explicativo, que a hipótese da condução centrada no Executivo exagera na dose da autonomia do Estado e que a hipótese do presidencialismo de coalizão é excessivamente formalista e não explica as mudanças institucionais.; The article reviews Brazilian Political Science literature on the non-regulation of the Federal Constitution (Article 192) and related themes...

The Security Council of the United Nations has the obligation and the power to determine under Article 39 of the Charter of the United Nations "the existence of any threat to the peace, breach of peace or act of aggression" (in this article the author will only analyze the concept of "threat to the peace"). However, the Charter does not contain explicitly the limits to the Security Council for the interpretation of the concept. In accordance with the author, that interpretation must be undertaken in conformity with the rules of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties of 1969 and in accordance with the principles and purposes of the United Nations Charter.

News of the death of biomedical journals seem premature. Revamped traditional scientific journals remain highly valued sources and vehicles of information, critical debate, and knowledge. Some analyses seem to place a disproportionate emphasis on technological and formal issues, as compared to the importance ascribed to matters of power. Not all journals must necessarily have a large circulation. There are many examples of efficient, high-quality journals with a great impact on relatively small audiences for whom the journal is thought-provoking, useful, and pleasant to read. How can we achieve a better understanding of an article’s spectrum of impacts? A certain mixing of three distinct entities (journals, articles, and authors) has often pervaded judgments. Data used by the Institute for Scientific Information present weaknesses in their accuracy. The two-year limit for citations to count towards the bibliographic impact factor favors "fast-moving", "basic" biomedical disciplines and is less appropriate for public health studies. Increasing attention is given to the specific number of citations received by each individual article. It is possible to make progress towards more valid, accurate, fair, and relevant assessments.