Describes the Personal Access Web Services (PAWS) at Louisiana State University, a portal application which offers enterprise, workgroup, and personal services. The paper highlights: PAWS project planning; PAWS as a portal; PAWS implementation; account accreditation; user authentication; legacy integration; mapping credentials; transmission of sensitive information; session management; PAWS personnel; PAWS growth and popularity; and PAWS' return on investment. (SM)

No summary available.

Mollusks are an extraordinarily diverse group of animals with an estimated 200,000 species, second only to the phylum Arthropoda. We conducted a comparative analysis of complete mitochondrial ribosomal large subunit sequences (LSU) of a chiton, two bivalves, six gastropods, and a cephalopod. In addition, we determined secondary structure models for each of them. Comparative analyses of nucleotide variation revealed substantial length variation among the taxa, with stylommatophoran gastropods possessing the shortest lengths. Phylogenetic analyses of the nucleotide sequence data supported the monophyly of Albinaria, Euhadra herklotsi + Cepaea nemoralis, Stylommatophora, Cerithioidea, and when only transversions are included, the Bivalvia. The phylogenetic limits of the mitochondrial LSU rRNA gene within mollusks appear to be up to 400 million years, although this estimate will have to be tested further with additional taxa. Our most novel finding was the discovery of phylogenetic signal in the secondary structure of rRNA of mollusks. The absence of entire stem/loop structures in Domains II, III, and V can be viewed as three shared derived characters uniting the stylommatophoran gastropods. The absence of the aforementioned stem/loop structure explains much of the observed length variation of the mitochondrial LSU rRNA found within mollusks. The distribution of these unique secondary structure characters within mollusks should be examined.

To provide a robust phylogeny of Pezizaceae, partial sequences from two nuclear protein-coding genes, RPB2 (encoding the second largest subunit of RNA polymerase II) and β-tubulin, were obtained from 69 and 72 specimens, respectively, to analyze with nuclear ribosomal large subunit RNA gene sequences (LSU). The three-gene data set includes 32 species of Peziza, and 27 species from nine additional epigeous and six hypogeous (truffle) pezizaceous genera. Analyses of the combined LSU, RPB2, and β-tubulin data set using parsimony, maximum likelihood, and Bayesian approaches identify 14 fine-scale lineages within Pezizaceae. Species of Peziza occur in eight of the lineages, spread among other genera of the family, confirming the non-monophyly of the genus. Although parsimony analyses of the three-gene data set produced a nearly completely resolved strict consensus tree, with increased confidence, relationships between the lineages are still resolved with mostly weak bootstrap support. Bayesian analyses of the three-gene data, however, show support for several more inclusive clades, mostly congruent with Bayesian analyses of RPB2. No strongly supported incongruence was found among phylogenies derived from the separate LSU, RPB2, and β-tubulin data sets. The RPB2 region appeared to be the most informative single gene region based on resolution and clade support, and accounts for the greatest number of potentially parsimony informative characters within the combined data set, followed by the LSU and the β-tubulin region. The results indicate that third codon positions in β-tubulin are saturated, especially for sites that provide information about the deeper relationships. Nevertheless, almost all phylogenetic signal in β-tubulin is due to third positions changes, with almost no signal in first and second codons, and contribute phylogenetic information at the “fine-scale” level within the Pezizaceae. The Pezizaceae is supported as monophyletic in analyses of the three-gene data set, but its sister-group relationships is not resolved with support. The results advocate the use of RPB2 as a marker for ascomycete phylogenetics at the inter-generic level, whereas the β-tubulin gene appears less useful.

The purpose of this study was to determine how many of the Junior Division students at the Baton Rouge Campus of Louisiana State University who had expressed an interest in majoring in education in 1975 had actually begun studies in 1976, had switched to other majors, or had not continued beyond the first year. Comparisons were made (1) between the American College Test (ACT) scores of students in the Junior Division in 1975 opting for education and the ACT scores of the Junior Division total population; (2) between the ACT scores of those who actually had enrolled in the College of Education and those who enrolled in other curriculum areas; and (3) between the ACT scores of students in various curriculum areas within the College of Education. Data from the study indicate that education majors enrolled in the Junior Division in fall 1975 who subsequently enrolled in the College of Education by fall 1976 had a mean ACT score (19.3) of 0.6 of a point above the 1975 national mean and 2.0 above the 1975 state mean. (MB)

Brian Kelly was fired by LSU on Sunday after starting the season 5-3. Who might be the next LSU head coach, and what's next for a college football world gone mad? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]