Search

The article presents comparative analyses of the 1989 and 2022 revised editions of the "Oxford English Dictionary," focusing on the antedating of entries. It discusses the incidence of revised earliest dates of bibliographical adjustments, number of entries revised with near antedates, longer antedatings, antedatings attributed to the availability of high-quality historical text databases, and revisions to the 1989 edition earliest citations by quarterly update and original earliest date.

The article focuses on the cultural significance and diverse roles of the 1623 Folio edition of Shakespeare's works, exploring its representation of Shakespeare, its existence as a collection, and its widespread presence in institutional and personal collections worldwide. It delves into the book's multifaceted nature, discussing its functions as a symbolic representation of Shakespeare, a collection of plays, and a highly sought-after item in various collections globally.

This study employs a bibliography study method to evaluate 472 papers focused on Shewanella oneidensis biofilms. Biofilms, which are formed when microorganisms adhere to surfaces or interfaces, play a crucial role in various natural, engineered, and medical settings. Within biofilms, microorganisms are enclosed in extracellular polymeric substances (EPS), creating a stable working environment. This characteristic enhances the practicality of biofilm-based systems in natural bioreactors, as they are less susceptible to temperature and pH fluctuations compared to enzyme-based bioprocesses. Shewanella oneidensis , a nonpathogenic bacterium with the ability to transfer electrons, serves as an example of a species isolated from its environment that exhibits extensive biofilm applications. These applications, such as heavy metal removal, offer potential benefits for environmental engineering and human health. This paper presents a comprehensive examination and review of the biology and engineering aspects of Shewanella biofilms, providing valuable insights into their functionality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores datasets curated from the citation evidence in successive editions and revisions of the Oxford English Dictionary (1884–2022), which have been annotated to reflect the gender of the authors and other bibliographical metadata. This exploration aims both to supplement the historical account of the dictionary's uses of female-authored quotation sources, correcting and elaborating some figures which have previously been reported, and to provide a contemporary account of women's representation in OED Online , using the revision published in June 2022. In seeking to establish a more objective and empirical basis for judging 'representativeness', I treat the OED both as a self-contained bibliographical and lexicographical work, and comparatively, against other comprehensive or very large bibliographical corpora, namely the Garside et al. surveys of early English novels, the Library of Congress Catalog, and the HathiTrust Digital Library. The OED data studied here represents a significant (if restricted) subset, rather than a representative sample, of the OED corpus as a whole: modern (post-1700) quotations from books appearing with their author's name in the OED evidence are considered. While this approach does not claim to make an objectively complete tally of every woman-authored quotation collected in the OED, it does enable a more detailed and accurate account than has previously been possible, and allows for a number of consistent cross-comparisons. A companion document of Supplementary Data & Notes , available at The Review of English Studies online, describes in technical terms how the data was compiled and the processes and principles by which it was annotated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article centres on three passages about herbs and herb remedies (§91, §92 and §97) selected from the anonymous Syriac pharmacological book which Philippe Gignoux recently edited. It argues that all three passages have parallels in Galen’s On Simple Drugs, while the last section of §91 finds a parallel in Dioscorides’ De materia medica 1.107. The parallels not only help us to decipher several terms which remain unresolved in earlier research, but also facilitate a better understanding of some passages which are occasionally misleading due to the highly abbreviated character of the Syriac text. Furthermore, a comparison between the anonymous Syriac pharmacological text and earlier Syriac translations of Galen shows that our text is a multiple-layered pharmacopoeia which combines both earlier elements from Sergius of Rēš ͑ainā in the sixth century and new terminologies from Ḥunayn ibn Isḥāq in the ʿAbbāsid translation movement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The field of transplant infectious diseases is rapidly evolving, presenting a challenge for clinical practice and trainee education. Here we describe the construction of transplantid.net, a free online library, crowdsourced and continuously updated for the dual purpose of point-of-care evidence-based management and teaching. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Minoxidil solution is used for the treatment of androgenetic alopecia (AGA). Minoxidil 5% solution has been shown to have superior efficacy to minoxidil 2% solution, it is unknown whether concentrations of minoxidil > 5% provide additional clinical benefit. We performed a review of the literature to examine the evidence on the efficacy and safety of higher concentrations of minoxidil in AGA. A search of the PubMed database was performed using the keywords 'minoxidil', 'androgenic alopecia' and 'pattern hair loss'. Relevant articles, including clinical trials, other clinical studies, case series and case reports published in English were considered for review. In addition, relevant references from the bibliography section of the retrieved articles were also reviewed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dix's I Catalogue of Early Dublin-Printed Books, 1601-1700 i (Dublin, 18y8-1y12), probably because it is not focussed on publications in Irish; but it is relevant to the overall picture of printing in Ireland and about Ireland. Virtually no early Irish books were held in Irish institutions from the time of their first printing. Sharpe and Hoyne report that Wing says it was printed by Motte, but in fact printing by Motte is claimed in the book itself on sig. [Extracted from the article]

Indigenous Peoples (IP) face significant health disparities that stem from historical trauma (HT). This is the first systematic review to investigate mental health interventions that address HT in addition to treating mental health disorders among IP in the United States. The data search included seven databases for published studies, consultations with experts, hand searching journals, and reference list checking. Five studies met the inclusion criteria and were included in the review. In total, 608 clients were examined. Findings suggested that treatments that addressed HT had a marginally beneficial effect on psychological and HT symptom outcomes. However, one study found that the intervention was not successful at maintaining these gains. Due to the limited number of studies, and the heterogeneity of research findings and the methodological limitations suffered by included studies, no definite conclusions about mental health interventions that address HT can be drawn. Recommendations for practice, such as using traditional healing practices for IP in mental health interventions, and recommendations for future research are provided. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article centers on a handwritten account of the stillbirth of conjoined twins in eighteenth-century Mexico stitched into a book about natural history. Finding things in books as part of an accidental process of discovery in the present does not equal random acts by users in the past. Inserting documents and prints of various kinds into books represented for historical actors a distinct kind of archival practice that combined careful observation, deliberation, and a certain measure of dexterity to manipulate the physicality of a book. Examples of records and objects found in other titles from the same time period and region help to contextualize the way people used books and how they stored memories, as well as what we as researchers can learn when critically analyzing the materiality of print. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a previous review, the experiments of American chemist W.O. Atwater were critically examined, with the findings demonstrating certain weaknesses that could compromise the validity of the values currently used for metabolizable energy. An examination of published works on the heat of combustion of carbohydrates reveals 2 types of weaknesses: the inaccuracy and imprecision of the calorimetric data used, and the averaging procedure employed to estimate such representative values. The present review focuses on the first type of weakness, namely the inaccuracy and imprecision of the calorimetric data used in previous studies. An exhaustive bibliographic search yielded almost 100 heat of combustion values for some of the 6 main carbohydrates contained in plant-source foods (glucose, fructose, sucrose, maltose, starch, and cellulose). These heats of combustion were subjected to rigorous statistical analysis to propose the following for each carbohydrate: (1) an interval (termed a bibliographic interval) that very likely includes the actual heat of combustion value and (2) a "representative value" (calculated to produce the minimum level of inaccuracy). In addition, an estimation of the maximum level of inaccuracy that could be expected when using such a representative value is reported. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This bibliography provides a collection of references that documents the evolution of studies evidencing interbreeding among Canis species in North America. Over the past several decades, advances in biology and genomic technology greatly improved our ability to detect and characterize species interbreeding, which has significance for understanding species in a changing landscape as well as for endangered species management. This bibliography includes a discussion within each category of interbreeding, the timeline of developing evidence, and includes a review of past research conducted on experimental crosses. Research conducted in the early 20th century is rich with detailed records and photographs of hybrid offspring development and behavior. With the progression of molecular methods, studies can estimate historical demographic parameters and detect chromosomal patterns of ancestry. As these methods continue to increase in accessibility, the field will gain a deeper and richer understanding of the evolutionary history of North American Canis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives Manual systematic literature reviews are becoming increasingly challenging due to the sharp rise in publications. The primary objective of this literature review was to compare manual and computer software using artificial intelligence retrieval of publications on the cutaneous manifestations of primary SS, but we also evaluated the prevalence of cutaneous manifestations in primary SS. Methods We compared manual searching and searching with the in-house computer software BIbliography BOT (BIBOT) designed for article retrieval and analysis. Both methods were used for a systematic literature review on a complex topic, i.e. the cutaneous manifestations of primary SS. Reproducibility was estimated by computing Cohen's κ coefficients and was interpreted as follows: slight, 0–0.20; fair, 0.21–0.40; moderate, 0.41–0.60; substantial, 0.61–0.80; and almost perfect, 0.81–1. Results The manual search retrieved 855 articles and BIBOT 1042 articles. In all, 202 articles were then selected by applying exclusion criteria. Among them, 155 were retrieved by both methods, 33 by manual search only, and 14 by BIBOT only. Reliability (κ = 0.84) was almost perfect. Further selection was performed by reading the 202 articles. Cohort sizes and the nature and prevalence of cutaneous manifestations varied across publications. In all, we found 52 cutaneous manifestations reported in primary SS patients. The most described ones were cutaneous vasculitis (561 patients), xerosis (651 patients) and annular erythema (215 patients). Conclusion Among the final selection of 202 articles, 155/202 (77%) were found by the two methods but BIBOT was faster and automatically classified the articles in a chart. Combining the two methods retrieved the largest number of publications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and Objectives In long-term care (LTC) facilities, nursing staff are important contributors to resident care and well-being. Despite this, the relationships between nursing staff coverage, care hours, and quality of resident care in LTC facilities are not well understood and have implications for policy-makers. This systematic review summarizes current evidence on the relationship between nursing staff coverage, care hours, and quality of resident care in LTC facilities. Research Design and Methods A structured literature search was conducted using four bibliographic databases and gray literature sources. Abstracts were screened by two independent reviewers using Covidence software. Data from the included studies were summarized using a pretested extraction form. The studies were critically appraised, and their results were synthesized narratively. Results The systematic searched yielded 15,842 citations, of which 54 studies (all observational) were included for synthesis. Most studies (n = 53, 98%) investigated the effect of nursing staff time on resident care. Eleven studies addressed minimum care hours and quality of care. One study examined the association between different nursing staff coverage models and resident outcomes. Overall, the quality of the included studies was poor. Discussion and Implications Because the evidence was inconsistent and of low quality, there is uncertainty about the direction and magnitude of the association between nursing staff time and type of coverage on quality of care. More rigorously designed studies are needed to test the effects of different cutoffs of care hours and different nursing coverage models on the quality of resident care in LTC facilities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present an approach for automatic extraction of measured values from the astrophysical literature, using the Hubble constant for our pilot study. Our rules-based model – a classical technique in natural language processing – has successfully extracted 298 measurements of the Hubble constant, with uncertainties, from the 208 541 available arXiv astrophysics papers. We have also created an artificial neural network classifier to identify papers in arXiv which report novel measurements. From the analysis of our results we find that reporting measurements with uncertainties and the correct units is critical information when distinguishing novel measurements in free text. Our results correctly highlight the current tension for measurements of the Hubble constant and recover the 3.5σ discrepancy – demonstrating that the tool presented in this paper is useful for meta-studies of astrophysical measurements from a large number of publications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses various aspects of the bibliographical history of the late author William Shakespeare's play "The Taming of the Shrew," and it mentions a lack of proof regarding the dates of the conception of the play or the first performance. Shakespeare's literary sources are addressed, along with the late writer George Gascoigne's play "Supposes," adaptations of Shakepeare's work, and interventions by editors throughout history.

The article offers information on the Bibliographical Society, which support its work to promote the study of and research in historical, analytical, and descriptive and textual bibliography. It informs on Society's use of manuscripts, the history of printing, publishing and illustration. It also informs on Society's subscriptions, overseas membership, and meetings.

The article discusses George Eld for Thomas Thorpe's version of poem "Shakespeare's Sonnets." It informs that Carl D. Atkins declares that the Quarto was set by two compositors, accounting for some of the variability in punctuation, is not supportable from the bibliographical facts. It also informs that although some of the Quarto's spelling, punctuation, capitalization, and italicization may be Shakespeare's own, one cannot assume that it is so in any given instance.

The article reports that the manuscript presents a comparison of research paradigms and emphases during the first century of formalized mammalogy in North America. The advent of new technologies often allows the testing of more sophisticated hypotheses, which then leads to the next generation of research methods, hypotheses, and so on.

The article highlights the use of Early English Books Online (EEBO) among scholars of early modern English literature. Topics include the book collections that have been manipulated in various ways and does not reflect the original writings or meanings; and bibliographies that does not lead to the original book references.

This article provides an overview of national bibliographic databases that include data on research output within social sciences and humanities (SSH) in Europe. We focus on the comprehensiveness of the database content. Compared to the data from commercial databases such as Web of Science and Scopus, data from national bibliographic databases (e.g. Flemish Academic Bibliographic Database for the SSH (VABB-SHW) in Belgium, Current Research Information System in Norway (CRISTIN)) are more comprehensive and may, therefore, be better fit for bibliometric analyses. Acknowledging this, several countries within Europe maintain national bibliographic databases; detailed and comparative information about their content, however, has been limited. In autumn 2016, we launched a survey to acquire an overview of national bibliographic databases for SSH in Europe and Israel. Surveying 41 countries (responses received from 39 countries), we identified 21 national bibliographic databases for SSH. Further, we acquired a more detailed description of 13 databases, with a focus on their comprehensiveness. Findings indicate that even though the content of national bibliographic databases is diverse, it is possible to delineate a subset that is similar across databases. At the same time, it is apparent that differences in national bibliographic databases are often bound to differences in country-specific arrangements. Considering this, we highlight implications to bibliometric analyses based on data from national bibliographic databases and outline several aspects that may be taken into account in the development of existing national bibliographic databases for SSH or the design of new ones. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Whereas previous scholarship on the early eleventh-century Anglo-Saxon compilation known as Ælfwine’s Prayerbook has focused on particular kinds of material it contains, this article takes account of the full range of texts and images in the manuscript in order to understand it as a whole. To do so, the essay establishes a new theoretical framework based on a critique of ecocriticism. Bringing contemporary African environmental thinking into dialogue with Martin Heidegger’s account of human dwelling and his concept of the fourfold permits a broader and more historically appropriate conception of that which is other than human. An analysis of the contents of Ælfwine’s Prayerbook in terms of this framework is followed by a conclusion setting out the wider potential application of the approach developed in this essay. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article provides blurbs written for and by C. S. Lewis. added to the bibliography of author and philosopher C. S. Lewis.

The author focuses on translation of the surgical works of surgeon Giovanni da Vigo by writer Bartholomew Traheron published in 1543 and mentions development of post-medieval English medical vocabulary. Topics discussed include texts from Da Vigo which appeared in Latin with abridgement in 1517, correction to the English Short Title Catalogue for historical bibliography and history of lexicography.

The article revisits the belief by Sternean scholars that the annotation on "The Ballyspallan balad," a manuscript poem found in a collection of Irish literature, was penned by Laurence Sterne. Topics discussed include the extent to which Sterne's connection with his Irish heritage, the marginal note provided by donor Henry Bradshaw who called the collection as "my Sterne volume," and the suggestion that Bradshaw's "Sterne" was not as Laurence but as John Stearne, Bishop of Clogher.

The article investigates the printing method known as concurrent perfecting, as mentioned by bibliographers W. W. Greg and R. B. McKerrow in the 1920s, but was not raised by either author Loys le Roy in 1579 or English printer Joseph Moxon in 1683. Topics discussed include bibligrapher Philip Gaskell's dismissal of the practice in 1972, evidence that concurrent perfecting was practised in earlier books, and the recurrence of headlines and skeleton formes in the book "Pavier Quartos" of 1619.

Asteroseismology is witnessing a revolution, thanks to high-precise asteroseismic space data (MOST, COROT, Kepler, BRITE) and their large ground-based follow-up programs. Those instruments have provided an unprecedented large amount of information, which allows us to scrutinize its statistical properties in the quest for hidden relations among pulsational and/or physical observables. This approach might be particularly useful for stars whose pulsation content is difficult to interpret. This is the case of intermediate-mass classical pulsating stars (i.e. γ Dor, δ Scuti, hybrids) for which current theories do not properly predict the observed oscillation spectra. Here, we establish a first step in finding such hidden relations from data mining techniques for these stars. We searched for those hidden relations in a sample of δ Scuti and hybrid stars observed by COROT and Kepler (74 and 153, respectively). No significant correlations between pairs of observables were found. However, two statistically significant correlations emerged from multivariable correlations in the observed seismic data, which describe the total number of observed frequencies and the largest one, respectively. Moreover, three different sets of stars were found to cluster according to their frequency density distribution. Such sets are in apparent agreement with the asteroseismic properties commonly accepted for A-F pulsating stars. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The essay examines a digital archive of literary works by Charlotte Perkins Gilman managed by the Schlesinger Library on the History of Women In American. The author argues that such archival collections can inform the study of authorship and its relationship with linear continuity of historical narratives. Particular attention is given to how Gilman uses non narrative elements such as numbers, letters, and pages to develop her authorship.

The article examines the work of early 20th-century librarian Charles Evans to compile the first comprehensive bibliography of printed American texts up to 1820. It discusses the eventual digitization of Evans' bibliography and how this process informs the current perception of American literary history.

The article focuses on book history and cataloguing of manuscripts. Topics discussed include library collections, antiquarianism and bibliographies. Other topics which includes literary studies, scholar and librarian Henry Bradshaw and scholar Neil Ker are also discussed. In addition, new criticism is also mentioned.

During the 1920s and 1930s, the British surgeon Geoffrey Keynes (1887-1982) treated breast cancer with radium instead of the hegemonic radical mastectomy, while vehemently attacking the "radicalists" for mutilating women. Keynes was also a leading bibliographer of literary figures from Sir Thomas Browne to William Blake through Jane Austen. This article argues that these endeavors did not inhabit separate worlds, but rather his bibliographic methods of collecting and sorting were deeply interwoven with his therapeutic practices and medical ways of knowing. The article also examines the profound influence his engagement with the works of William Blake had on his battle against the reigning medical orthodoxy and on the humanity of his relationship with his patients. It concludes that Keynes' story sheds light on a now distant medico-cultural world where literary studies, often centered on book collecting and critique, were not only highly valued, but were influential in guiding the vision and behavior of a number of physicians. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents an approach to citation segmentation that addresses special challenges as typically found in Digital Humanities applications. We perform citation segmentation from Optical Character Recognition (OCR) input obtained from volumes of a printed bibliography, the Turkology Annual. This showcase application features serious difficulties for state-of-the-art techniques in citation segmentation: multilingual citation entries, lack of data redundancy, inconsistencies, and noise from OCR input. Our approach is based on Markov logic networks (MLN) (Richardson and Domingos, Markov logic networks. Machine Learning, 62(1): 107-36, 2006), a framework of statistical relational learning that combines first-order logic with probabilistic modeling. Formalization in first-order logic offers high expressivity and flexibility, and makes it possible to tailor segmentation to specific conventions of a given bibliography. We show that in face of the specific difficulties found with segmenting references from a digitized bibliography, our MLN formalizations outperform state-of-the-art statistical methods. We obtain 88% F1-score for exact field match, a 24.8% increase over a conditional random fields-based system baseline. In contrast to prior work, we address a data set featuring sparse and noisy data. Our method extends Poon and Domingos (Joint Inference in information extraction. In Proceedings of the Twenty-Second National Conference on Artificial Intelligence. Vancouver, Canada: AAAI Press, 2007)'s approach by applying joint inference at the field level. By this move, we are able to cope with the lack of citation redundancy and noise in the data. Our approach can be characterized as knowledge-based and hence does not rely on annotated training data. The rule sets we designed can be adapted to other bibliographies, or further types of digitized sources, such as historical dictionaries or encyclopedias. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We articulate a model of curatorship that emphasizes framing the character of the curated set as the focus of curatorial activity. This curatorial character is structured through the articulation, via mechanisms of selection, description and arrangement, of coherent classificatory principles. We describe the latest stage of a continuing project to examine the curatorial character of personal digital bibliographies, such as Pinterest boards, Flickr galleries and GoodReads shelves, and to support the design of such curatorially expressive personal collections. In the study reported here, 24 participants created personal bibliographies using either a structured design process, with explicit tasks for selecting, describing and arranging collection items, or an unstructured process that did not separate these activities. Our findings lead to amore complex understanding of personal collections as curatorial, expressive artifacts. We explore the role of cohesion as a quality that facilitates expression of the curatorial frame, and we find that when designers read source materials as a part of a set, they are more likely to write cohesive collections. Our findings also suggest that the curatorial act involves both the definition of abstract classificatory principles and their instantiation in a specific material environment. We describe various framing devices that facilitate these reading and writing activities, and we suggest design directions for supporting curatorial reading and writing tasks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the literary status of early English playbooks and the Stab-Stitching method that was used to bind these books together. Topics include the stab-stitching format of stationer Nathaniel Butter's publication of the play "The London Prodigal", reasons why very few copies of early stab- stitched playbook survive in original condition, and bibliographical discussions on these early English playbooks.

For an author who needs little introduction, the Marquis de Sade has in fact been introduced a great deal. Gilbert Lely's 1967 edition of Les 120 Journées de Sodome, for example, contains no fewer than five prefaces, including essays sexological, psychoanalytical and philosophical in scope. This article explores the ways in which editions of Sade's works have presented and packaged the so-called divin marquis and his oeuvre, from the early, privately circulated editions of the 1880s to the most recent paperbacks. In each case the process of introduction proves to be simultaneously one of appropriation, as Sade is transformed time and again into a figure with more than a passing resemblance to the editor or critic presenting him. Through such appropriations Sade becomes by turns bibliophile, sexologist, surrealist, philosopher and, finally, canonical author. As well as examining the editorial matter of various introductions, this article also explores the dubious seductions practised by the cover art of recent Sade editions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Barnard or Bernard Hampton is known from his inscription as the sixteenth-century owner of certain surviving Italian and Spanish books. Here, he is identified as a Clerk of the Council and Queen Mary's Spanish secretary, who died in 1572. The books that have so far been identified as his are listed and described. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Denis Janot (fl. 1529-1544), Parisian Printer and Bookseller: A Bibliography. These r eveal infor mat ion about t he new and second-hand book t r ade, gift ing, and annot at ion in what was, for S omner, cl ear l y a wor king l ibr ar y. As a publ ished aut hor, S omner per sonifies a man deepl y commit t ed t o his cit y of his bir t h, but one whose sociabl e connect ions l inked him t o nat ional concer ns. S tepheN RawleS, aft er submit t ing his PhD in 1976 on Denis Janot, kept wor king on t he compl et e bibl iogr aphy of books pr int ed by or for Janot for t he next for t y year s. As a r esul t, and wit h t he hel p of t he incr eased avail abil it y of cat al ogues and digit al copies, he has now been abl e t o ext end his cat al ogue by mor e t han t en per cent, fr om 350 t o 391 ent r ies, buil t on avail abl e infor mat ion and an in-dept h knowl edge of Janot 's pr int ing mat er ial s. But t his book is mor e t han a bibl iogr aphy. [Extracted from the article]

Background and Aims Throughout the history of fern classification, familial and generic concepts have been highly labile. Many classifications and evolutionary schemes have been proposed during the last two centuries, reflecting different interpretations of the available evidence. Knowledge of fern structure and life histories has increased through time, providing more evidence on which to base ideas of possible relationships, and classification has changed accordingly. This paper reviews previous classifications of ferns and presents ideas on how to achieve a more stable consensus. Scope An historical overview is provided from the first to the most recent fern classifications, from which conclusions are drawn on past changes and future trends. The problematic concept of family in ferns is discussed, with a particular focus on how this has changed over time. The history of molecular studies and the most recent findings are also presented. Key Results Fern classification generally shows a trend from highly artificial, based on an interpretation of a few extrinsic characters, via natural classifications derived from a multitude of intrinsic characters, towards more evolutionary circumscriptions of groups that do not in general align well with the distribution of these previously used characters. It also shows a progression from a few broad family concepts to systems that recognized many more narrowly and highly controversially circumscribed families; currently, the number of families recognized is stabilizing somewhere between these extremes. Placement of many genera was uncertain until the arrival of molecular phylogenetics, which has rapidly been improving our understanding of fern relationships. As a collective category, the so-called ‘fern allies’ (e.g. Lycopodiales, Psilotaceae, Equisetaceae) were unsurprisingly found to be polyphyletic, and the term should be abandoned. Lycopodiaceae, Selaginellaceae and Isoëtaceae form a clade (the lycopods) that is sister to all other vascular plants, whereas the whisk ferns (Psilotaceae), often included in the lycopods or believed to be associated with the first vascular plants, are sister to Ophioglossaceae and thus belong to the fern clade. The horsetails (Equisetaceae) are also members of the fern clade (sometimes inappropriately called ‘monilophytes’), but, within that clade, their placement is still uncertain. Leptosporangiate ferns are better understood, although deep relationships within this group are still unresolved. Earlier, almost all leptosporangiate ferns were placed in a single family (Polypodiaceae or Dennstaedtiaceae), but these families have been redefined to narrower more natural entities. Conclusions Concluding this paper, a classification is presented based on our current understanding of relationships of fern and lycopod clades. Major changes in our understanding of these families are highlighted, illustrating issues of classification in relation to convergent evolution and false homologies. Problems with the current classification and groups that still need study are pointed out. A summary phylogenetic tree is also presented. A new classification in which Aspleniaceae, Cyatheaceae, Polypodiaceae and Schizaeaceae are expanded in comparison with the most recent classifications is presented, which is a modification of those proposed by Smith et al. (2006, 2008) and Christenhusz et al. (2011). These classifications are now finding a wider acceptance and use, and even though a few amendments are made based on recently published results from molecular analyses, we have aimed for a stable family and generic classification of ferns. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Additional entries for the 1988 bibliographic book "The Library of Robert Burton," by Nicolas K. Kiessling, are presented which include the 1610 "Ornithologiae" by Aldrovandus, a 1638 presentation copy of "The Anatomy of Melancholy" by Robert Burton, and the 1610 "Pope Joane" by Alexander Cooke. Many of the additions were provided in articles found in the periodical "The Book Collector."

Background: Selection criteria for surgical training are not scientifically proven. There is a need to define which attributes predict future surgical performance. The aim of this study was to examine the predictive value of specific attributes that impact on surgical performance. Methods: All studies assessing the predictive power of specified attributes with regard to outcome measures of surgical performance in MEDLINE, Embase, the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials and Educational Resources Information Centre databases, and bibliographies of selected articles from 1950 to November 2010 were considered for inclusion by two independent reviewers. Information on study identifiers, participant characteristics, predictors assessed, evaluation methods for predictors, outcome measures, results and statistical analysis was collected. Quality assessment was carried out using the Hayden criteria. Results: Visual-spatial perception correlated with both subjective and objective assessments of surgical performance, including rate of skill acquisition. Visual-spatial perception did not correlate with operative ability in experts, although it did with operative ability at the end of a training programme. Psychomotor aptitude, assessed collectively, correlated with rate of skill acquisition. Academic achievement predicted completion of a training programme and passing end-of-training examinations, but did not predict clinical performance during the training programme. Conclusion: Intermediate- and high-level visual-spatial perception, as well as psychomotor aptitude, can be used as criteria for assessing candidates for surgical training. Academic achievement is an effective predictor of successful completion of training programmes and should continue to form part of the assessment of surgical candidates. Copyright © 2012 British Journal of Surgery Society Ltd. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Eliza Haywood (1693 - 1756) has gained more critical attention in recent years, but the bibliographical foundations for her canon largely remain unquestioned. Patrick Spedding, in his heavily documented 2004 bibliography, lists 72 works as ‘certainly by Haywood’. Of these 72 items, 42 were published during just seven years, from 1723 to 1729 inclusive. This represents some 330 sheets, equivalent to more than 5000 pages in octavo. Did Haywood really write all these texts? What is the basis for their attribution? The texts in Spedding's bibliography are attributed to Haywood on the basis of a wide variety of types of evidence, and Spedding's bibliography does not account for any measure of doubt in each attribution case: works are either by Haywood, or they are not. In this article, I will argue that 29 out of Spedding's 72 works are attributed based on less than satisfactory evidence -- including Bath-Intrigues (1724), The Opera of Operas (1733), and The History of Miss Betsy Thoughtless (1751). I am focusing primarily on external evidence, rather than internal, and I am purposely looking at the evidence skeptically in order to re-assess its validity. In many cases there may be suggestive internal evidence or biographical parallels that point towards Haywood as a likely author, but in the absence of solid proof such attributions must be considered warily. I am not suggesting that we de-attribute these works, but rather that we need to be more cautious in considering Haywood's authorship as certain. If we are to regard Haywood as an important writer whose works deserve close scrutiny, we need to be more scrupulous about the evidence we use to determine what she wrote, and to acknowledge degrees of confidence and doubt. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The Oxford edition of Ben Jonson (11 vols, 1925–52) was one of the landmark scholarly editions of the twentieth century. These days it is known familiarly as ‘Herford and Simpson’, but behind this simple designation there is a complex history involving the personal relationships of the editors, C. H. Herford, Percy Simpson, and Evelyn Simpson, and the institutional workings of Oxford University Press. The edition's distinctive achievements, pragmatic accommodations, and shortcomings document the emergence of new principles of textual analysis in this period, and the transformation of bibliography as a subject of academic study. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In 1602, the prolific Venetian printer-bookseller Giovanni Battista Ciotti (1562?-1627?) published a catalogue of books imported from beyond the Alps. This note endeavours to identify those books included which Ciotti declares to be in the Spanish language or printed in Spain. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

A recent discovery of a second example of a previously unknown London printer's device (an earlier version of McKerrow 57 used in Paris c. 1512) provides an opportunity to discuss the activity of Paris printers in providing specialist titles for the London market. The two books discussed are a Diurnale Sarum and an Alphabetum hebraicum et graecum printed in Paris for Henry Jacobi in London. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Jean de Gagny was a theologian with a special interest in early Christian texts. A prominent figure both at the Sorbonne and at court, he became almoner to François I about 1536 and chancellor of the University of Paris in 1546. Well read in Greek and Hebrew, he tried to maintain an Erasmian middle path between the need to extend knowledge of sacred texts and conservative orthodoxy. Encouraged by the king, he travelled extensively, searching for ancient manuscripts of the texts that interested him. He took a keen interest in the typography of those that he published, and Claude Garamont, the great punch-cutter, acknowledges the help given him by Gagny in 1545 with his first publication, David Chambellan's Pia et Religiosa Meditatio. In 1547 Gagny set up his own press under his nephew, Nicolas Le Riche, with special types cut in imitation of those of the Aldine press. With these Le Riche printed some 18 books for Gagny, some old Christian texts, others by contemporary humanists. Le Riche also became the agent in Paris for the Aldine books, when the previous agent, Jean Picard, absconded. Gagny was also a considerable patron of fine book-binding, and the surviving books bound for him evince his original taste in this respect. After his death in 1549, a substantial part of his library passed to the royal library, together with the catalogue (lost in the 17th century). The appendix lists books by or printed for Gagny. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

A list is presented of scholarly periodicals containing articles related to bibliography published in countries including Great Britain, France and Germany.