Baffling Brevity

A BAFfling actin function

Research Roundup Research Roundup for example, two nearby cells can somehow tell which one is closer to the equator (middle) of the eye, and specify the R3 (equatorial) and R4 (polar) fates, accordingly. " This is one of the great puzzles of PCP, " says Simon. " The cells are reading the gradient rather than the absolute values, and sensing the smallest differences. " For that process to have a...

Baffling butadiene.

--The macrophage content of cell suspensions from naturally occurring mouse tumours has been assessed by the Fc-mediated phagocytosis assay, and the results compared with the individual tumour's capacity for spontaneous metastasis and with its pulmonary colonization potential after i.v. inoculation. It was found that these tumours differ in their properties from the transplantable fibrosarcomas...

Context, Compositionality, and Brevity

Because of “arguments from the infinity of language”, compositionality is often seen as a ‘non-negotiable’ feature of any theory of the semantics of natural language. But there are a number of features of “ordinary language discourse” that make it seem that compositionality is not true of natural language semantics. Some of these features are lumped together under the rubric of ‘context’, and i...

The value of brevity.

Baffling perforation of the colon

Idiopathic perforation of the colon is extremely unusual and unexpected, with a very limited number of published reports. The condition's definition depends on the absence of any detectable pathology in the bowel wall that could be responsible for the perforation. A 62-year-old male patient presented with acute thrombosis of the brachial artery. This was successfully treated with an open thromb...