'If I had a hedge fund, I would cure diabetes': endogenous mechanisms for creating public goods.

We consider the problem of organizing capital to produce public goods with broad societal value. We review why market corrections via government subsidies or philanthropic initiatives are inadequate, in addition to considering the paradox of patents. Our proposed mechanism (an Ever-growing Prize and a Patent Repository) directs capital towards two innovation problems routinely overlooked: (1) problems for which the reward is insufficient even with established mechanisms (e.

Automated Factor Slice Sampling.

Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) algorithms offer a very general approach for sampling from arbitrary distributions. However, designing and tuning MCMC algorithms for each new distribution, can be challenging and time consuming. It is particularly difficult to create an efficient sampler when there is strong dependence among the variables in a multivariate distribution.

Unique features of the loblolly pine (Pinus taeda L.) megagenome revealed through sequence annotation.

The largest genus in the conifer family Pinaceae is Pinus, with over 100 species. The size and complexity of their genomes (∼20-40 Gb, 2n = 24) have delayed the arrival of a well-annotated reference sequence. In this study, we present the annotation of the first whole-genome shotgun assembly of loblolly pine (Pinus taeda L.

Decoding the massive genome of loblolly pine using haploid DNA and novel assembly strategies.

Background: The size and complexity of conifer genomes has, until now, prevented full genome sequencing and assembly. The large research community and economic importance of loblolly pine, Pinus taeda L., made it an early candidate for reference sequence determination.

The evolutionary genetics of the genes underlying phenotypic associations for loblolly pine (Pinus taeda, Pinaceae).

A primary goal of evolutionary genetics is to discover and explain the genetic basis of fitness-related traits and how this genetic basis evolves within natural populations. Unprecedented technological advances have fueled the discovery of genetic variants associated with ecologically relevant phenotypes in many different life forms, as well as the ability to scan genomes for deviations from selectively neutral models of evolution. Theoretically, the degree of overlap between lists of genomic regions identified using each approach is related to the genetic architecture of fitness-related traits and the strength and type of natural selection molding variation at these traits within natural populations.

Contrasting patterns of nucleotide diversity for four conifers of Alpine European forests.

A candidate gene approach was used to identify levels of nucleotide diversity and to identify genes departing from neutral expectations in coniferous species of the Alpine European forest. Twelve samples were collected from four species that dominate montane and subalpine forests throughout Europe: Abies alba Mill, Larix decidua Mill, Pinus cembra L., and Pinus mugo Turra.

DnaSAM: Software to perform neutrality testing for large datasets with complex null models.

Patterns of DNA sequence polymorphisms can be used to understand the processes of demography and adaptation within natural populations. High-throughput generation of DNA sequence data has historically been the bottleneck with respect to data processing and experimental inference. Advances in marker technologies have largely solved this problem.

PineSAP--sequence alignment and SNP identification pipeline.

Unlabelled: The Pine Alignment and SNP Identification Pipeline (PineSAP) provides a high-throughput solution to single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) prediction using multiple sequence alignments from re-sequencing data. This pipeline integrates a hybrid of customized scripting, existing utilities and machine learning in order to increase the speed and accuracy of SNP calls. The implementation of this pipeline results in significantly improved multiple sequence alignments and SNP identifications when compared with existing solutions.

Multilocus patterns of nucleotide diversity and divergence reveal positive selection at candidate genes related to cold hardiness in coastal Douglas Fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii var. menziesii).

Forest trees exhibit remarkable adaptations to their environments. The genetic basis for phenotypic adaptation to climatic gradients has been established through a long history of common garden, provenance, and genecological studies. The identities of genes underlying these traits, however, have remained elusive and thus so have the patterns of adaptive molecular diversity in forest tree genomes.

Attention switching during scene perception: how goals influence the time course of eye movements across advertisements.

Eye movements across advertisements express a temporal pattern of bursts of respectively relatively short and long saccades, and this pattern is systematically influenced by activated scene perception goals. This was revealed by a continuous-time hidden Markov model applied to eye movements of 220 participants exposed to 17 ads under a free-viewing condition, and a scene-learning goal (ad memorization), a scene-evaluation goal (ad appreciation), a target-learning goal (product learning), or a target-evaluation goal (product evaluation). The model reflects how attention switches between two states--local and global--expressed in saccades of shorter and longer amplitude on a spatial grid with 48 cells overlaid on the ads.

Caring for those without words: a perspective on aphasia.

A technical grasp of a medical condition does not always give a person a sense of the emotions behind the disease. Medical professionals, of course, cannot afford to be emotionally invested in every illness they see. Some amount of distance is needed for them to maintain their own emotional health and to give good care to patients.

Loss and hope: strategies for coping with aphasia.

Speaking from almost 30 years of experience living with aphasia, the author offers suggestions for health care professionals who relate to persons with this disorder. Persons with aphasia should be involved in meaningful activities, learn to accept limitations, build trusting relationships, strengthen social support, and find tools that facilitate communication.

The sounds of silence: relating to people with aphasia.

For people with aphasia, the struggle to communicate creates powerful emotions, such as anger and frustration, and feelings of isolation and depression. The author, who has had aphasia for more than 25 years, calls on health care professionals to relate to people with aphasia with patience, active listening, and motivation for success.