University of Houston

About: University of Houston is a education organization based out in Houston, Texas, United States. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Poison control. The organization has 23074 authors who have published 53903 publications receiving 1641968 citations.

Irish setter dogs affected with rod/cone dysplasia contain a nonsense mutation in the rod cGMP phosphodiesterase beta-subunit gene.

Abstract: Irish setter dogs affected with a rod/cone dysplasia (locus designation, rcd1) display markedly elevated levels of retinal cGMP during postnatal development. The photoreceptor degeneration commences approximately 25 days after birth and culminates at about 1 year when the population of rods and cones is depleted. A histone-sensitive retinal cGMP phosphodiesterase (PDE; EC 3.1.4.35) activity, a marker for photoreceptor PDEs, was shown previously to be present in retinal homogenates of immature, affected Irish setters. Here we report that, as judged by HPLC separation, this activity originates exclusively from cone photoreceptors, whereas rod PDE activity is absent. An immunoreactive product the size of the PDE alpha subunit, but none the size of the beta subunit, can be detected on immunoblots of retinal extracts of affected dogs, suggesting a null mutation in the PDE beta-subunit gene. Using PCR amplification of Irish setter retinal cDNA, we determined the complete coding sequence of the PDE beta subunit in heterozygous and affected animals. The affected PDE beta-subunit mRNA contained a nonsense amber mutation at codon 807 (a G-->A transition converting TGG to TAG), which was confirmed to be present in putative exon 21 of the affected beta-subunit gene. The premature stop codon truncates the beta subunit by 49 residues, thus removing the C-terminal domain that is required for posttranslational processing and membrane association. These results suggest that the rcd1 gene encodes the rod photoreceptor PDE beta subunit and that a nonsense mutation in this gene is responsible for the production of a nonfunctional rod PDE and the photoreceptor degeneration in the rcd1/rcd1 Irish setter dogs.

The ‘preferred mode’ of the axisymmetric jet

Abstract: Detailed distributions of different time-average and phase-average flow properties for an axisymmetric free jet under controlled perturbation at the jet preferred mode are explored. The data are compared with the corresponding unexcited jet data. It is found that the effect of the perturbation is to increase jet spread and mean velocity decay, as well as to increase the peak values of the time-average fluctuation intensities and Reynolds stress in the axisymmetric mixing layer.

Highly active catalyst derived from a 3D foam of Fe(PO3)2/Ni2P for extremely efficient water oxidation

Abstract: Commercial hydrogen production by electrocatalytic water splitting will benefit from the realization of more efficient and less expensive catalysts compared with noble metal catalysts, especially for the oxygen evolution reaction, which requires a current density of 500 mA/cm 2 at an overpotential below 300 mV with long-term stability. Here we report a robust oxygen-evolving electrocatalyst consisting of ferrous metaphosphate on self-supported conductive nickel foam that is commercially available in large scale. We find that this catalyst, which may be associated with the in situ generated nickel–iron oxide/hydroxide and iron oxyhydroxide catalysts at the surface, yields current densities of 10 mA/cm 2 at an overpotential of 177 mV, 500 mA/cm 2 at only 265 mV, and 1,705 mA/cm 2 at 300 mV, with high durability in alkaline electrolyte of 1 M KOH even after 10,000 cycles, representing activity enhancement by a factor of 49 in boosting water oxidation at 300 mV relative to the state-of-the-art IrO 2 catalyst.

Device Fingerprinting in Wireless Networks: Challenges and Opportunities

Abstract: Node forgery or impersonation, in which legitimate cryptographic credentials are captured by an adversary, constitutes one major security threat facing wireless networks. The fact that mobile devices are prone to be compromised and reverse engineered significantly increases the risk of such attacks in which adversaries can obtain secret keys on trusted nodes and impersonate the legitimate node. One promising approach toward thwarting these attacks is through the extraction of unique fingerprints that can provide a reliable and robust means for device identification. These fingerprints can be extracted from transmitted signal by analyzing information across the protocol stack. In this paper, the first unified and comprehensive tutorial in the area of wireless device fingerprinting for security applications is presented. In particular, we aim to provide a detailed treatment on developing novel wireless security solutions using device fingerprinting techniques. The objectives are three-fold: (i) to introduce a comprehensive taxonomy of wireless features that can be used in fingerprinting, (ii) to provide a systematic review on fingerprint algorithms including both white-list based and unsupervised learning approaches, and (iii) to identify key open research problems in the area of device fingerprinting and feature extraction, as applied to wireless security.

Influence of formalization on the organizational commitment and work alienation of salespeople and industrial buyers.

Abstract: A model is investigated in which organizational formalization influences work alienation through role ambiguity, role conflict, and organizational commitment. Interrelationships are tested with dat...