Forecasting Hourly Peak Call Volume for a Rural Electric Cooperative Call Center

This research forecasts peak call volume of a centralized after‐hours call center for rural electric cooperatives to help the call center determine staffing levels. A Gaussian copula is used to capture the dependence among non‐normal distributions. Using a centralized call center reduces costs by approximately 75% compared to having individual call centers at each cooperative. Adding cooperatives to the centralized call center is projected to further decrease costs per member. An out‐of‐sample forecasting exercise after the call center expanded validated the model's forecast that additional cooperatives could be added without a proportional increase in the peak number of calls. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Subtractive proteomic mapping of the endothelial surface in lung and solid tumours for tissue-specific therapy

The molecular complexity of tissues and the inaccessibility of most cells within a tissue limit the discovery of key targets for tissue-specific delivery of therapeutic and imaging agents in vivo. Here, we describe a hypothesis-driven, systems biology approach to identifying a small subset of proteins induced at the tissue-blood interface that are inherently accessible to antibodies injected intravenously. We use subcellular fractionation, subtractive proteomics and bioinformatics to identify endothelial cell surface proteins exhibiting restricted tissue distribution and apparent tissue modulation. Expression profiling and gamma-scintigraphic imaging with antibodies establishes two of these proteins, aminopeptidase-P and annexin A1, as selective in vivo targets for antibodies in lungs and solid tumours, respectively. Radio-immunotherapy to annexin A1 destroys tumours and increases animal survival. This analytical strategy can map tissue- and disease-specific expression of endothelial cell surface proteins to uncover novel accessible targets useful for imaging and therapy.     

奇异的农作物

大家还记得芹菜事件的教训么？80年代中期,美国的芹菜培植者曾推崇过一种他们认为非常好的新品种,不仅抗虫性强,而且可以使产量显著提高。但是有一个小问题,触弄过此芹菜梗的人不久就开始为发生严重皮疹而抱怨。皮肤病学家发现,这种芹菜会不断分泌出扫若仑（psoralen）,一种在阳光下会变成刺激物和诱变物的天然化学物质。实际上,人们全都搞错了,许多生物技术业内人士和政府食品管理机构官员（尤其是美国）如是说。到“基因食品”上了人们餐桌的时候,它并非只是同传统食物一样没有危险,而且在某些方面其实还更安全,因为有管理部门…     

Nitrogen cycle: what governs nitrogen loss from forest soils?

Nitrogen is lost as dissolved organic compounds in stream waters from unpolluted South American forests, but it is lost mainly as inorganic nitrate in streams flowing from North American forests that suffer nitrogen deposition from the atmosphere. From this it has been inferred that the standard thinking about how nature deals with nitrogen in soils and waters needs to be re-evaluated and that the conventional wisdom of how nitrogen is absorbed and released by plants must be wrong. We disagree, however, on the grounds that there are other, more likely interpretations of the new results.     

Water alteration of rocks and soils on Mars at the Spirit rover site in Gusev crater

Gusev crater was selected as the landing site for the Spirit rover because of the possibility that it once held a lake. Thus one of the rover's tasks was to search for evidence of lake sediments. However, the plains at the landing site were found to be covered by a regolith composed of olivine-rich basaltic rock and windblown 'global' dust. The analyses of three rock interiors exposed by the rock abrasion tool showed that they are similar to one another, consistent with having originated from a common lava flow. Here we report the investigation of soils, rock coatings and rock interiors by the Spirit rover from sol (martian day) 1 to sol 156, from its landing site to the base of the Columbia hills. The physical and chemical characteristics of the materials analysed provide evidence for limited but unequivocal interaction between water and the volcanic rocks of the Gusev plains. This evidence includes the softness of rock interiors that contain anomalously high concentrations of sulphur, chlorine and bromine relative to terrestrial basalts and martian meteorites; sulphur, chlorine and ferric iron enrichments in multilayer coatings on the light-toned rock Mazatzal; high bromine concentration in filled vugs and veins within the plains basalts; positive correlations between magnesium, sulphur and other salt components in trench soils; and decoupling of sulphur, chlorine and bromine concentrations in trench soils compared to Gusev surface soils, indicating chemical mobility and separation.