Great strides have been made in drilling during the nineties, but many operators are unaware of many of the exciting capabilities and potential offered by today` drilling technology. As people move toward the year 2000, they see drilling providers refine these capabilities, broaden their applications, and increase operator awareness of their availability and usefulness. Thus, to see where drilling will be in the year 2000, people need to look at where the drilling forefront lies today. This paper discusses the trends in technology associated with horizontal drilling, re-entry techniques, coiled-tubing, extended-reach drilling, multilateral drilling and general well development technologies.


The objective of the research was to analyze the family conflict that was reflected in the novel Rich People Promblem.  This research used a sociological approach and social action theory. This research used a qualitative research.  This research was taken from the novel "Rich People Problem" written by Kevin Kwan's. This research rose the following problems: 1).  The type of family conflict reflected in Kevin Kwan's novel "rich people problem.? 2).  What was the cause of family conflict in the novel Rich people problem.?.  So that it can be known the causes and types of family conflicts contained in the novel Rich people problem.The result of the research was that there were two kind family conflicts,first types of family conflict was the internal and external, second cause of family conflict was the language difference and tradition and heritage.


The propagation of intensity-modulated signal in an cascaded optical amplifier conventional simple mode fiber system is numerically analyzed, taking self-phase modulation (SPM), group-velocity dispersion (GVD), amplifier spontaneous emission (ASE) into account. The effect of GVD and SPM are reduced by dispersion compensation fibers (DCF's). The simulation show if dispersion is well-compensated and amplifier spacing is decreased to 50 km, the distance 2 050 km is possible with errorfree.


The isothermo-remanent magnetic moment M IR of YBaCuO thin films is investigated by a SQUID magnetometer. In low magnetizing fields (H 0 150 Oe). The dependence of the relaxation rate of M IR on H 0 is discussed.


Germinable seed numbers in the surface soil were estimated across three snowbank gradients in montane tundra of interior Alaska. Vegetation, productivity, and disturbance change with distance across these gradients. Seed densities are in the range 500 to 1800 seeds m-2 in the upper 5 cm of soil. An earlier study in Eriophorum tussock tundra nearby revealed over 2000 seeds m~2 in the upper 5 cm of soil. These results show that tundra seed banks (and presumably seed rain) are relatively larger than expected. Published reports do however suggest that seed bank size decreases with latitude in montane grassland, heath and tundra vegetations. Contrary to published theories, there was no significant relation between seed bank size and disturbance. Seed bank size increased with above ground vascular plant productivity. This is most simply explained by the conjecture that reproduction and seed rain increase with productivity. The relative abundance of graminoids in the seed bank is higher (and that of dicots, less) than what would be expected from their relative cover in the vegetation.


Purpose: Among many central and peripheral causes of vertigo, one of the factors whose pathophysiology is not yet understood is cervicogenic dizziness (CD). There are studies reporting that CD may benefit from facet joint medial bundle branch block (MBB). The purpose of our study was to share our experiences of MBB application using ultrasonography (USG) in patients diagnosed with CD. Materials and Methods: After physical examination and necessary cervical imaging, C1, C2 and C3 cervical facet joint MBB and ozone injection were performed using USG for patients who had vertigo and accompanying cervical pathology and neck pain. In order to evaluate the effectiveness of the treatment, pain levels with the Visual Analog Scale (VAS) and the effect of vertigo on the quality of life with the "Dizziness Handicap Inventory (DHI)" Turkish validation questionnaire were documented. Results: Thirty-five patients who met the criteria were included in the study. The mean age of the patients was 50.8 ± 10.7. Of the 35 patients, 10 (28.6%) were male and 25 (71.4%) were female. There was a significant difference between the preoperative period and the postoperative 1st, 2nd, and 6th week VAS scores. A significant difference was found between the preoperative and the postoperative 2nd and 6th week DHI questionnaire survey results as well. Conclusions: In the follow-up after the procedures, it was observed that vertigo complaints of the patients decreased significantly.


Light rare‐earth metals are not assumed to form compounds of the CaCu5‐type structure with iron. When zirconium was not added, the Th2Zn17‐type rhombohedral structure existed in the samples of nominal composition SmFe5 and SmFe7. Samples of nominal composition (Sm1−xZrx)Fe5 and (Sm0.65Zr0.35)Fey were studied by x‐ray diffraction and thermomagnetic analyses. Thermomagnetic analyses showed the existence of a new phase besides Sm2Fe17. X‐ray diffraction analyses showed the new phase has a CaCu5‐type structure. Lattice parameters and Curie temperatures of these samples were measured.


The paper has presented the results of theoretical studies and experimental tests of the plastic deformation of two-layered Mg/Al specimens. Theoretical studies were carried out using the Forge2011® computer program. Physical modeling, on the other hand, was performed using the Gleeble3800 simulator.Cuboidal specimens with dimensions of 10x15x20 mm and a cladding layer thickness of 1.5 mm were cut off from the sheets obtained in the explosive welding method. The theoretical studies and experimental tests were carried out for the temperature range from 300 to 400°C and for different strain rates. Based on the obtained investigation results it has been found that the main parameters influencing the formability of two-layered Mg/Al materials are temperature and the strain rate.


AbstractCampylobacter fetus is an emerging human pathogen that causes a systemic febrile illness in patients with underlying medical conditions. Bacteremia is frequent and associated with a mortality rate of 17% to 43%, making proper diagnosis imperative. We present an unusual and rare manifestation


The United States' 1993 Climate Change Action Plan called upon the forestry sector to sequester an additional 10 million metric tons/yr by the year 2000. Forests are currently sequestering carbon and may provide opportunities to mitigate fossil fuel emissions in the near-term until fossil fuel emissions can be reduced. Using the analysis of carbon budgets based on forest inventories, we analyze the impact of forest management activities on carbon storage at the state and national level.


A golf ball washer has a cylindrical bristle brush rotatably supported in a rectangular tank to move the balls along a zig-zag dual track defined in the tank cover and in an insert provided in the tank. The balls move downwardly through a top opening in the cover and enter the dual track in end-to-end relationship. The track has segments oriented at oppositely inclined angles to abruptly shift the direction of motion of each ball and to accelerate each ball away from those following it.


In an automated container terminal, automated stacking cranes(ASCs) take charge of handling of containers in a block of the stacking yard. This paper proposes a multi-criteria strategy to solve the problem of job dispatching of twin ASCs which are identical to each another in size and specification. To consider terminal situation from different angles, the proposed method evaluates candidate jobs through various factors and it dispatches the best score job to a crane by doing a weighted sum of the evaluated values. In this paper, we derive the criteria for job dispatching strategy, and we propose a genetic algorithm to optimize weights for aggregating evaluated results. Experimental results are shown that it is suitable for real time terminal with lower computational cost and the strategy using various criteria improves the efficiency of the container terminal.


In the era of digital economy, the platform economy has developed rapidly and has gradually become an important growth point of the market economy. The resulting platform monopoly problem is also a global challenge to anti-monopoly regulation. This paper takes the e-commerce platform of Alibaba Group as the case study object, and deeply thinks about the current state of the platform economy and the necessity of the platform economy regulation. Discuss how Alibaba's e-commerce platform can achieve sustainable development in the future under the background of anti-monopoly, hoping to enhance the adaptability of e-commerce enterprises to anti-monopoly law, strengthen industry self-discipline, drive optimization and upgrade through competition, achieve innovative development, and promote a win-win situation for harmonious development trend.


It has been reported that aqueous indirect carbonation process of calcium silicate mineral could be one of the most promising methods for CO 2 sequestration. The process consists of two main steps, extraction of Ca from calcium silicate and carbonation of the extracted solution by CO 2 . Many types of acids such as HCl and HNO 3 can be used in the extraction step of the process. In the case of using aqueous acetic acid solution as the extraction solvent, acetic acid can be reproduced at the carbonation step of the extracted solution by CO 2 and recycled to extraction step for reuse it. Industrial by-products such as iron and steel slags are potential raw materials of the indirect carbonation process due to their high contents of calcium silicate. In this study, in order to examine the extraction efficiency of domestic electric arc furnace steel slag by aqueous acetic acid solution, extraction exper-iments of the slag were performed by using the aqueous acetic acid solutions of varying extraction conditions ; acetic acid concentrations, extraction temperatures and times.


The research combined column centrifugal method and TRIzol reagent to extract high quality total RNA with good integrity and high purity from grape juvenile leaves. RT - PCR technique was used to clone the conserved domain (494bp) of squalene synthase (SQS) gene.


Objective To observe the clinical efficacy of modified "Mahuang Fuzi Xixin Decoction" in the treatment of obstinate myasthenia gravis.Methods Thirty-one subjects were treated by this Decoction for three months.Results 19 cases were clinically cured,10 cases markedly improved and 2 cases improved;the total effective rate was 100%.Conclusion Modified "Mahuang Fuzi Xixin Decoction" has good effects on obstinate myasthenia gravis.


This study aimed to investigate the effects of witnessing an event on recognition-related ERP components (FN400 & LPC) when the stimuli are presented in the form of sentences in a recognition task. The subjects were shown a video that re-enacted an eyewitness account of a crime scene, then were presented with sentences describing what the perpetrator was wearing. ERP analysis revealed that the early old-new effect was present across right-frontal regions surrounding FC4 and Fz electrodes when the irrelevant and target stimuli were compared. However, the same effect was not observed between the target and lure stimuli. Moreover, the late old-new effect was present across right and mid-parietal regions surrounding CP4 and Pz electrodes when the irrelevant and lure stimuli were compared to the target stimuli. Such results suggest that sentences can be used to present stimuli within the eyewitness-memory evaluation protocol, and by doing so contribute to the increasing utilization of scientific evidence under investigative circumstances.


BACKGROUND?To discuss the treatment and prevention of dehiscence of abdominal incisions.?CASE REPORT? Out of 32 cases of dehiscence of abdominal incisions, 8 cases were malignant tumor, 6 cases intestinal obstruction, 4 cases gastrointestinal perforation and 4 cases appendiceal perforation, and 5 cases had obvious intestinal gassiness and 4 cases had obvious infection of incision. ?DISCUSSION? The malnutrition of whole body and topical agent were the main reason of dehiscence of abdominal incisions. It could effectively decrease the dehiscence of abdominal incisions and increase the success rate of abdominal operation that improving the nutritional status, paying attention to technique of suture, increasing the strength of the tissue anti tension and avoiding and managing dehiscence risk factors during preoperative and postoperative care.


With magnetic resonance (MR) imaging, brain water self‐diffusion was measured in 17 healthy volunteers 22–76 (mean, 44.6) years old. The calculated values for the apparent diffusion coefficients (ADCs) ranged from 0.58 × 10−9 to 1.23 × 10−9 m2/sec in cerebral white matter. A significant correlation was found between the ADC in white matter and age (r =.7069, P <.01). The calculated values for ADC in cortical gray matter ranged from 1.06 × 10−9 to 1.72 × 10−9 m2/sec no correlation was found between ADCs in gray matter and age. The increased ADC in white matter may be caused by an increase in the extracellular volume due to age‐dependent neuronal degeneration or to changes in myelination. These findings have implications for future clinical investigations with diffusion MR imaging techniques in patients with neurologic diseases, and stress the importance of having an agematched group of healthy volunteers for comparison.


An experimental investigation of a sonic underexpanded jet injected normally into a Mach 2.25 crossflow is reported. The jet exit geometry was circular and was operated at a jet-to-crossflow momentum flux ratio of 1.7. The unperturbed flowfield was analyzed with schlieren imaging, particle image velocimetry velocity data, surface oil flow visualizations, and pressure-sensitive paint measurements. As a means of excitation to the flowfield, an energy pulse from a Q-switched neodymium-doped-yttrium-aluminum-garnet laser was focused in the center of the jet exit at three different vertical locations. The focused laser pulse resulted in the induced optical breakdown of air, creating a plasma to perturb the flowfield. The perturbed resulting flowfield was analyzed with schlieren photography and particle image velocimetry. Analysis of phase-averaged schlieren images suggested that the resulting blast wave from the laser pulse disrupted the structure of the barrel shock and Mach disk. The two-component velocity field data revealed that the excitation pulse also caused a perturbation to the jet-shear layer and induced the formation of vortices that convect downstream.


BY CHRIS CHORBA, BLAINE EVANSON, BABAK LALEZARI, AND BRANDON STOKER I n the last few years, the U.S. Supreme Court has removed several roadblocks to business efforts to require individual (as opposed to classwide) dispute resolution. Beginning with Stolt-Nielsen S.A. v. AnimalFeeds International Corp. in 2010, the Court limited plaintiffs' ability to pursue class arbitrations without a specific agreement to classwide adjudication: ''[A] party may not be compelled under the [Federal Arbitration Act] to submit to class arbitration unless there is a contractual basis for concluding that the party agreed to do so.'' Then, one year later, the Court decided AT&T Mobility LLC v. Concepcion, a watershed decision that breathed new life into class action waivers by holding that the Federal Arbitration Act preempts state laws that stand as an impediment to enforcing commercial class action waivers, such as a California rule that had deemed such agreements unconscionable and unenforceable. Along the way, the Court has expressed its displeasure with the flood of class action litigation clogging federal court dockets. Even after Concepcion, the plaintiffs' bar pressed forward, arguing that ''public policy'' concerns prevent ar-


1 We compared sarcomere length (SL) dependence of the Ca2+‐force relation of detergent‐extracted bundles of fibres dissected from the left ventricle of wild‐type (WT) and transgenic mouse hearts expressing slow skeletal troponin I (ssTnI‐TG). Fibre bundles from the hearts of the ssTnI‐TG demonstrated a complete replacement of the cardiac troponin I (cTnI) by ssTnI. 2 Compared to WT controls, ssTnI‐TG fibre bundles were more sensitive to Ca2+ at both short SL (1.9 ± 0.1 μm) and long SL (2.3 ± 0.1 μm). However, compared to WT controls, the increase in Ca2+ sensitivity (change in half‐maximally activating free Ca2+; ΔEC50) associated with the increase in SL was significantly blunted in the ssTnI‐TG myofilaments. 3 Agents that sensitize the myofilaments to Ca2+ by promoting the actin‐myosin reaction (EMD 57033 and CGP‐48506) significantly reduced the length‐dependent ΔEC50 for Ca2+ activation, when SL in WT myofilaments was increased from 1.9 to 2.3 μm. 4 Exposure of myofilaments to calmidazolium (CDZ), which binds to cTnC and increases its affinity for Ca2+, sensitized force developed by WT myofilaments to Ca2+ at SL 1.9 μm and desensitized the WT myofilaments at SL 2.3 μm. There were no significant effects of CDZ on ssTnI‐TG myofilaments at either SL. 5 Our results indicate that length‐dependent Ca2+ activation is modified by specific changes in thin filament proteins and by agents that promote the actin‐myosin interaction. Thus, these in vitro results provide a basis for using these models to test the relative significance of the length dependence of activation in situ.


For the specific issues, this paper, based on all kinds of seismic attributes, using the technology of the forward modeling, analysis the sensitive attributes of various types of sand body development model, select the seismic attributes which can reflects the reservoir development best and optimalize the seismic attributes. Based on this optimization, letting those seismic attributes doing cluster analysis attributes fusion. It overcomes the one-sidedness of the single seismic attribute for reservoir prediction. Because of this, it achieved the fine characterization of channel sand body in the layer of H22 in the area of Gu109 and it is confirmed by seismic data, forward modeling, log data and sedimentary facies and so on. Finally, through the analysis of the sand body of the different kinds of the reservoir, achieving the fine characterization of channel sand body under the controlling of combination of seismic and logging data, it gives the actual geological significance for the different kinds of seismic attributes, identifying, predicting and describing the situation of the reservoir.


Solar cell according to the embodiment includes a substrate; The back electrode layer formed on an upper surface of the substrate; The light absorption layer is formed in the upper surface of the back electrode layer; A buffer layer formed on the upper surface of the light absorbing layer; And a front electrode layer formed on an upper surface of the buffer layer, the substrate is formed in the rear portion are formed in a pattern a plurality of projections. Solar cell manufacturing method according to an embodiment includes the steps of forming a bottom electrode on a substrate; Forming a light absorption layer on said rear electrode layer; Forming a buffer layer on the light absorption layer; And the step comprising the slow step of forming a front electrode layer on the buffer layer and the substrate rear side is formed with a plurality of projections formed portion pattern forming a light absorption layer on the backside electrode layer, the above becomes a substrate wherein the projections are in direct contact with the drive roller to move.


In a mobile positioning system, mobile user devices carry out data validation on locally stored positioning data, regulating the positioning data provided to a positioning module and selectively requesting updated positioning data from a central database. A controller receives requests for updated positioning data and selectively responds with updates. The mobile user devices store observations data concerning measurements of signals from electromagnetic signal sources and transmit data about the locally stored observations data to the controller. The controller then selectively requests transmission of the locally stored observations data and the mobile user device determines when and whether to transmit that data. The amount of positioning data which must be transmitted to and from the mobile user device and the overall power consumption of the mobile user device is reduced. The decision as to what observations data to transmit to the controller is distributed between the mobile user device and the controller.


Rose Bengal (RB) is a halogenated xanthene dye that has been used to mediate antimicrobial photodynamic inactivation. While highly active against Gram-positive bacteria, RB is largely inactive in killing Gram-negative bacteria. We have discovered that addition of the non-toxic salt potassium iodide (100mM) potentiates green light (540nm)-mediated killing by up to six extra logs with Gramnegative bacteria Escherichia coli and Pseudomonas aeruginosa,Gram-positive methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus, and fungal yeast Candida albicans. The mechanism is proposed to be singlet oxygen addition to iodide anion to form peroxyiodide, which decomposes into radicals, finally forms hydrogen peroxide and molecular iodine. The effects of these different bactericidal species can be teased apart by comparing killing in three different scenarios: (1) cells+RB+KI are mixed together then illuminated with green light; (2) cells+RB are centrifuged then KI added then green light; (3) RB+KI+green light then cells added after light. We showed that KI could potentiate RBPDT in a mouse model of skin abrasions infected with bioluminescent P.aeruginosa.


The invention concerns a prosthesis wherein the contact surfaces of the femoral part (1), the insert (3) and the knee joint are defined by the combination of two curves, a spiral-type curve in the saggital plane following an undulating curve (sinusoidal) in the frontal plane. The latter comprises two concave lateral parts and a central dome-shaped convex part, the three parts being connected without any angulation, protuberance, or flat parts or bends and providing continuous medio-lateral contact on the three zones, from complete extension to complete bending, and a concave-convex nesting in the central zone.


This paper presents Co-Arg, a new type of cognitive assistant to an intelligence analyst that enables the synergistic integration of analyst imagination and expertise, computer knowledge and critical reasoning, and crowd wisdom, to draw defensible and persuasive conclusions from masses of evidence of all types, in a world that is changing all the time. Co-Arg's goal is to improve the quality of the analytic results and enhance their understandability for both experts and novices. The performed analysis is based on a sound and transparent argumentation that links evidence to conclusions in a way that shows very clearly how the conclusions have been reached, what evidence was used and how, what is not known, and what assumptions have been made. The analytic results are presented in a report describes the analytic conclusion and its probability, the main favoring and disfavoring arguments, the justification of the key judgments and assumptions, and the missing information that might increase the accuracy of the solution.


s of recently accepted papers The TW Hya Disk at 870 μm: Comparison of CO and Dust Radial Structures Sean M. Andrews, David J. Wilner, A. M. Hughes, Chunhua Qi, Katherine A. Rosenfeld, Karin I. Öberg, T. Birnstiel, Catherine Espaillat, Lucas A. Cieza, Jonathan P. Williams, Shin-Yi Lin and Paul T. P. Ho 1 Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, 60 Garden Street, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA 2 University of California at Berkeley, Department of Astronomy, 601 Campbell Hall, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA 3 Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, University Observatory Munich, Scheinerstrasse 1, D-81679 Munich, Germany 4 University of Hawaii Institute for Astronomy, 2680 Woodlawn Drive, Honolulu, HI 96822, USA 5 Center for Astrophysics & Space Science, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093, USA 6 Academia Sinica Institute of Astronomy and Astrophysics, P.O. Box 23-141, Taipei 106, Taiwan E-mail contact: sandrews at cfa.harvard.edu We present high resolution (0.3 = 16AU), high signal-to-noise ratio Submillimeter Array observations of the 870μm (345GHz) continuum and CO J=3−2 line emission from the protoplanetary disk around TW Hya. Using continuum and line radiative transfer calculations, those data and the multiwavelength spectral energy distribution are analyzed together in the context of simple two-dimensional parametric disk structure models. Under the assumptions of a radially invariant dust population and (vertically integrated) gas-to-dust mass ratio, we are unable to simultaneously reproduce the CO and dust observations with model structures that employ either a single, distinct outer boundary or a smooth (exponential) taper at large radii. Instead, we find that the distribution of millimeter-sized dust grains in the TW Hya disk has a relatively sharp edge near 60AU, contrary to the CO emission (and optical/infrared scattered light) that extends to a much larger radius of at least 215AU. We discuss some possible explanations for the observed radial distribution of millimeter-sized dust grains and the apparent CO-dust size discrepancy, and suggest that they may be hallmarks of substructure in the dust disk or natural signatures of the growth and radial drift of solids that might be expected for disks around older pre-main sequence stars like TW Hya. Accepted by Astrophysical Journal http://arxiv.org/abs/1111.5037 Runaway massive stars from R136: VFTS 682 is very likely a 'slow runaway' Sambaran Banerjee, Pavel Kroupa and Seungkyung Oh 1 Argelander-Institut für Astronomie, Auf dem Hügel 71, D-53121, Bonn, Germany E-mail contact: sambaran at astro.uni-bonn.de, pavel at astro.uni-bonn.de, skoh at astro.uni-bonn.de We conduct a theoretical study on the ejection of runaway massive stars from R136 — the central massive, star-burst cluster in the 30 Doradus complex of the Large Magellanic Cloud. Specifically, we investigate the possibility of the very massive star (VMS) VFTS 682 being a runaway member of R136. Recent observations of the above VMS, by virtue of its isolated location and its moderate peculiar motion, have raised the fundamental question whether isolated massive star formation is indeed possible. We perform the first realistic N-body computations of fully mass-segregated R136-type star clusters in which all the massive stars are in primordial binary systems. These calculations confirm that the dynamical ejection of a VMS from a R136-like cluster, with kinematic properties similar to those of VFTS


Researchers are persistently searching for ways to enhance the success of regeneration of periodontium. In studying the dynamics of cellto-cell and cell-to-tissue interaction, scientists discovered the presence of growth factors. Platelet-rich plasma (PRP) was first introduced, followed by Platelets-rich fibrin. The studies have proved that "through activation of the platelets and the resultant release of growth factors, enhanced wound healing should be expected. This paper aims through a clinical case to demonstrate the efficiency and the facility of use of the modified


A clip-cage is made from plastic cup with cap, barrette and stainless steel mesh. The cage measures 30 mm in diameter, 35 mm in height and about 5 g in weight. A small hole is made on the openable bottom of the cage for inoculation of whitefly adults. Using this clip-cage, whiteflies can be conveniently reared and observed in enclosure, either singly or in small cohorts, on plant leaves. This clip-cage can be used in various experimental studies of whiteflies, such as observations on basic biology, host suitability and mating behaviour as well as acquisition and transmission of plant viruses.


AbstractMunicipal solid waste (MSW) landfills are regarded as one of the major sources of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions across the world. An innovative and sustainable biogeochemical cover system ...


It was 1916, and at the Royal Arsenal in Woolwich, London, over 30,000 women were recruited to handle explosives, work on the cranes and assemble weapons. In Barrow, Vickers employed more than 7,000 female workers under well-paid female superintendents. In Tongland, a tiny village in the south-west of Scotland, at a factory dubbed The Feminist Munition Factory, women were making shells. The world was at war, and the whole of British society was pulling together. Women were manning the Home Front, producing the munitions, driving the transport and helping construct the machinery that would lead to victory. Yet just two years earlier, even a few hundred women having these roles would have been inconceivable. Before 1914, the main purpose of a woman in engineering was as a mere ornament. In early 20th Century Mazda advertisements, a brightly smiling woman holds up the lightbulb. That was thought to be the limits of her technical capabilities. It would take a cataclysm for women to enter technical fields in large numbers.


The orderly transition of the current electricity grid to a smarter grid facilitates the demand side to increasingly play a proactive role. Enabling technologies within the smart grid framework play a crucial role in alleviating systemic risks associated with capacity shortages, electricity price volatility and congestion by controlling end user electricity consumption through demand response (DR). With the impending large scale adoption of Plug-in Electric Vehicles (PEVs), DR becomes even more important to ensure the utilities are adequately prepared to manage the incremental demand imposed by PEV (Plug in hybrid and pure electric vehicle) charging. This paper evaluates the impact of scheduling the incremental demand imposed by the PEV on day ahead market operations. The objective function is to maximize the ISO (Independent System Operator) net surplus. Standard DC optimal power flow (DCOPF) for the ISO managed day ahead market operations is formulated subject to generation capacity, power balance and transmission line constraints. In the base case simulations, the impact of demand bid elasticity on locational marginal prices (LMPs) and ISO net surplus is evaluated for a 5 bus system. For two PEV penetration (10000 and 50000 PEVs) scenarios and three charging profiles (evening, off-peak and uniform), the impact of PEV charging on LMP, GENCO revenues and LSE payments are evaluated. Preliminary results indicate that percentage increment of the LSE payment vary from 0.6% to 12% over the baseline and LMP increment varies between 0.3 to 10%, depending on the time of charging and the size of the PEV fleet. It was also observed that by incorporating demand bid elasticity, more PEVs can be charged without causing an appreciable increase in the LMPs.


In this study radiation protection shields have been prepared consist of composite materials have epoxy as a basis material and different reinforcing materials C Ni PbO and Bi with various reinforcing ratios 10 20 30 40 50 % and dimensions 1 × 10 × 10 cm. For examination the suitability of using this shields to protect from gamma ray some shielding parameters were calculated like: Linear attenuation coefficient μ, effective atomic number Zeffe, heaviness and half value thickness X1/2 for energy rang 1218 – 1480 KeV. These parameters have been measured by using sodium iodide system NaITI with deferent radiation sources 152Eu 60Co and 137Cs. The results show that these parameters are effected by the reinforcing ratio and gamma ray energy, it is found that the linear attenuation coefficient and atomic effective number increases with reinforcing ratio increases and decreased with energy increasing especially with high concentrations 40 50 % and at low energies Eγ < 0662 MeV with certain energy while the values of X1/2 decrease with reinforcing ratio increases. Heaviness was calculated too for all shields, with respect to lead from its values we found that this shields lighter than lead, which make it preferable to traditional material such as lead and concrete.


Significance Spatial memory is critical to every facet of our lives. The hippocampus is known to play a prominent role in the formation and retrieval of spatial memories; however, the exact mechanisms remain elusive. Using electrophysiology recordings from presurgical epilepsy patients implanted with depth electrodes, we measured high-frequency neural activity from the CA1 region of the hippocampus and the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. We found associations between increased high-frequency activity and the precision of spatial memory retrieval. These data suggest that local processing within the CA1 subfield and the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex underlie the quality of retrieved spatial memories. The hippocampus plays a critical role in spatial memory. However, the exact neural mechanisms underlying high-fidelity spatial memory representations are unknown. We report findings from presurgical epilepsy patients with bilateral hippocampal depth electrodes performing an object-location memory task that provided a broad range of spatial memory precision. During encoding, patients were shown a series of objects along the circumference of an invisible circle. At test, the same objects were shown at the top of the circle (0°), and patients used a dial to move the object to its location shown during encoding. Angular error between the correct location and the indicated location was recorded as a continuous measure of performance. By registering pre- and postimplantation MRI scans, we were able to localize the electrodes to specific hippocampal subfields. We found a correlation between increased gamma power, thought to reflect local excitatory activity, and the precision of spatial memory retrieval in hippocampal CA1 electrodes. Additionally, we found a similar relationship between gamma power and memory precision in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and a directional relationship between activity in this region and in the CA1, suggesting that the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex is involved in postretrieval processing. These results indicate that local processing in hippocampal CA1 and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex supports high-fidelity spatial memory representations.


With the increasing cost of power generation, the economic load dispatching has been paid more and more attention. Considering the environmental temperature as the influencing factor of the economic dispatch of power plant load, it has a stronger adaptability to the working condition than the study that only considers the total load. In this paper, the application of particle swarm optimization in load economic scheduling was introduced. And combined with the actual operation data on two typical units, a comparative analysis was made on the load economic scheduling with and without environmental temperature. It was shown in the analysis results that the unit heat consumption rate decreases with the increase of total load and increases with the increase of temperature when the ambient temperature is taken into account or not. The unit heat consumption rate considering ambient temperature was always lower than that without ambient temperature. And as the temperature drops, the difference got bigger and bigger. The conclusion of the analysis has certain reference significance to the current load economic dispatching of power plants.


A series of departure from nucleate boiling (DNB) tests for pressurized water reactors (PWRs) was performed at the Nuclear Power Engineering Test Center. The objective was to prove the reliability of fuel assembly design by confirming the thermal margin of heat transfer. The present method for evaluating the DNB ratio in a Japanese 17 x 17 PWR core is adequate according to the newly obtained DNB test data.


continue to show a definite association be tween cancer of the lung and smoking. Twelve different and independent investi gations covering more than 4500 lung cancer patients have now been conducted in five different countries and the conclu sion has been reached that the risk of de veloping lung cancer increases with the amount smoked. The statistical association has gained considerably in etiological significance be cause the tobacco data are compatible with the existing incidence data on lung cancer. The great rise in lung cancer is compatible with the increased tobacco consumption. The tobacco data are com patible with the present predominant male ratio on the basis of the long-term habits of the two sexes; they are compatible with the fact that lung cancer occurs most com monly in cities where smoking habits, par ticularly that of cigarette smoking, are more extensive than in rural areas. They are also compatible with the fact that can cer of the lung is most pronounced in the younger age groups that have more exten sive smoking habits than the older age groups. Thus, because the results of the clinical studies fit in with these different phases of lung-cancer incidence, con siderably greater importance is given to tobacco as a causative factor in lung can cer. While cigarette smoking is most mark edly associated with lung cancer, a posi tive association is also found with cigar and pipe smoking. The reasons for the different degree of association are cur rently being investigated. At present it seems likely that the greater practice of inhalation among cigarette smokers ac counts for the greater association with lung cancer among cigarette smokers. While certain occupations are asso ciated with greater susceptibility to lung cancer, the occupational data cannot ac count for the great increase in lung cancer. City smoke, while containing known car cinogenic elements, also cannot account for the range of incidence data, particu larly in regard to the sex difference. Large-scale experimental studies in various laboratories in the United States are now being carried out to identify the suspected carcinogen(s) in tobacco tar. The presence of such agents seems well established on the basis of recent experi ments by Wynder, Graham, and Cronin ger of Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, in which 44 per cent of eighty one mice painted with cigarette tar, pre pared in a manner closely simulating human smoking habits, developed histo logically proved epidermoid cancer upon application of the material to the skin. So far no known carcinogens in tobacco tar have been identified. It is suspected that the identification will bring forth an agent or agents as yet unknown as a carcinogen in cancer research. These studies are now being carried out on a broad front in com bined chemical and biological investiga tion. Two steps could be taken that should lead toward the prevention of lung can cer: I. Moderation of smoking habits; this measure seems advisable in as much as it has been established that the risk of developing lung cancer increases with the amount of tobacco smoked. 2. Reduction or removal of carcinogens from tobacco; removal of possible carcinogenic agents from tobacco might be the most far-reach ing preventive measure if practical and possible. It is along these line@that much research is being directed now, a research


where the function f(x, y) in (1) has an unknown for the user analytical representation, i.e., is a "Black-box" function, very often can be found in practice. In the literature, there exist numerous numerical methods proposed to solve (1) (see, e.g., [1,2,5,6,10]). Usually, the accuracy of methods depends on the value of the integration step h. Since traditional computers are able to work numerically with finite numbers only, finite values of h are applied. In this talk, several new methods for solving (1) developed for the new kind of a computer – the Infinity Computer – that is able to work numerically with finite, infinite and infinitesimal numbers (see, e.g., [11,14,16,18]) are discussed. This new computational methodology is actively studied by logicians (see, e.g., [7-9]) and practical applications in several fields have been already found: numerical differentiation and optimization (see [15,17,3]), fractals (see [20,12]), percolation (see [20]), Turing machines and the First Hilbert problem (see [13,19]), cellular automata (see, e.g., [4]), etc. Since the Infinity Computer allows one to work numerically with infinities and infinitesimals, with respect to the ODEs it becomes possible:


To assess speech disturbances caused by newly made prostheses, visual and acoustical methods, palatograms, sound spectrograms, etc., have been used. But the analysis and assessment requires somewhat professional knowledge and experience and much time, so such methods are not necessarily easier, and have the defect of being somewhat subjective. The purpose of this study is to develop a new speech test that is easy to use and more objective using the speech recognition unit. First, experimental palatal plates were made for a dentulous subject, and the utility of the speech recognition unit was estimated. The speech recognition unit and ordinary hearing were compared in utterance of ten Japanese monosyllables,/sa/,/ta/,/ki/,/hi/,/si/,/ci/,/ni/,/mi/,/ri/,/cu/. Results: 1. The speech recognition unit made mistakes similar to ordinary hearing. 2. The recognition point that is output by the speech recognition unit corresponded well to speech clarity except some cases. 3. The speech recognition unit could detect the changes of consonant frequencies relatively well.


Abstract : A full-scale four-bladed UH-60 rotor system was tested in the NASA Ames 80- by 120-Foot Wind Tunnel. A quality data set at low forward speed, 0 to 80 knots, has been obtained to support future rotor developments and analysis improvements. To evaluate the NASA Ames 80- by 120- Foot Wind Tunnel as a hover testing facility, rotor performance data were compared with predictions, UH-60 aircraft flight test data, and UH-60 model-scale data from other test facilities. Results indicate that valid hover data for this size rotor can be obtained from this facility at low to medium thrust conditions. Comparisons with flight test and model-scale data demonstrate the variability between existing data sets. Predictions show good agreement with full-scale data. To evaluate the analytical modeling in the 0 to 80 knot speed range, forward flight rotor performance data were acquired and compared with predictions. Comparisons were also made with existing model-scale and flight test data. Power calculations show fair to good agreement with full-scale wind tunnel data at advance ratios between 0.10 to 0.19 and poor agreement at advance ratios below 0.10. Comparisons with flight test and model-scale data show good agreement at all advance ratios tested. Propulsive force calculations show good correlation with full-scale wind tunnel data at advance ratios of 0.10 to 0.19.


We consider the problem of joint estimation of states and some constant parameters for a class of nonlinear discrete- time systems. This class contains those systems that could be transformed into a quasi-LPV (Linear Parameter Varying) polytopic model in Takagi-Sugeno (T-S) form. Such systems could have unmeasured premise variables, a case usually overlooked in the observer design literature. We assert that for such systems in discrete-time, the current literature lacks design strategies for a joint state and parameter estimation. To this end, we adapt the existing literature for continuous-time linear systems for joint state and time-varying parameter estimation. We first develop the discrete-time version of this result for linear system. Lyapunov approach is used to illustrate stability and bounds for the estimation error are obtained through the Bounded Real Lemma. We use this result to achieve our objective for a design procedure for a class of nonlinear system with constant parameters. This results in less conservative conditions and a simplified design procedure. A simplified waste water treatment plant simulation example is given to illustrate the design procedure.


Increased exposure of human to RF fields has raised concerns for its potential adverse effects on our health. To address the biological effects of RF radiation, we used genome wide gene expression as the indicator. We exposed normal WI-38 human fibroblast cells to 1763 MHz mobile phone RF radiation at a specific absorption rate (SAR) of 60 W/kg with an operating cooling system for 24 h. There were no alterations in cell numbers or morphology after RF exposure. Through microarray analysis, we identified no differentially expressed genes (DEGs) at the 0.05 significance level after controlling for multiple testing errors with the Benjaminiochberg false discovery rate (BH FDR) method. Meanwhile, 82 genes were differentially expressed between RF-exposed cells and controls when the significance level was set at 0.01 without correction for multiple comparisons. We found that 24 genes (0.08% of the total genes examined) were changed by more than 1.5-fold on RF exposure. However, significant enrichment of any gene set or pathway was not observed from the functional annotation analysis. From these results, we did not find any evidence that non-thermal RF radiation at a 60-W/kg SAR significantly affects cell proliferation or gene expression in WI-38 cells.


Fix the measuring system on the cross-section to test the temperature information in the experimental greenhouse. Another temperature distribution condition was drawn by FLUENT. The data were agreed with the simulation results within 1.5 degrees. Isothermal line which is close to the real fact was obtained. Vector drawing and temperature gradient were the basic research for the controlling function.


Temperature measurement on deforming aeroshell model was performed in hypersonic test flow. Temperature Sensitive Paint (TSP) was used to measure surface temperature on the model. Generally, TSP is not available on flexible surface due to a problem in normalization procedure of images. Present paper describes the improved methodology of TSP which is able to apply to flexible and deforming model surface. For the improved TSP, two different kinds of luminophore, namely Ruphen and Fluorescein, are employed to observe reference image and test image simultaneously. An optical system is produced to detect the luminescence from Ruphen and Fluorescein separately. Results indicate that temperature rise caused by aerodynamic heating is observed, and the temperature distribution measured by the improved TSP method on flexible model shows qualitative agreement with the one obtained by conventional TSP measurement on rigid model which simulates deformed model configuration. Furthermore, the temperature measurement by this method shows good capability to follow model deformation.


This Bachelor thesis deals with measuring of circular interpolation a measuring devices, which uses this principle. The ballbar measurement is performed and the measurement is listed here. The therotical part deals with errors themselves, which are divided by influencing factors. The following part describes the selected measuring instruments, which uses circular interpolation to measure accuracy and error detection. Practical part of the thesis deals with machine-tool testing and evaluation of measured values in individual planes. At the same time, compensation is proposed to increase machine accuracy.


The Laplace transform of $|\zeta(1/2+it)|$ is investigated, for which a precise expression is obtained, valid in a certain region in the complex plane. The method of proof is based on complex integration and spectral theory of the non-Euclidean Laplacian.


The purpose of this article is to discuss the possibilities of the method of associative perception of terminology in the process of translating scientific and technical literature. In the process of work, authors used traditional research methods along with experimental ones. Translation of scientific and technical texts requires certain skills and competencies from specialists of this type of activity. Perfect command of the terminology of a particular language, knowledge of its features and structure enables the translator to convey the content of the original text as accurately as possible without distorting the meaning. Authors conclude that it is necessary that the translator of scientific and technical texts must be aware of the latest technical innovations and discoveries in a particular field of technology.


Performance is a pivot point in the design of anonymity overlays. Due to their growing popularity, they are faced with increasing load, which makes design problems imminent. The special requirements and complex architecture of anonymity overlays renders the topic a challenging but likewise inspiring object of research. In this work, we discuss the design of low-latency anonymous communication systems in general and the Tor network as the de-facto standard in particular. We develop solutions to a number of research questions, all collectively following the aim of enhancing and securing such networks. By doing this we create a fundamental technical understanding of networking aspects in anonymity overlays and tackle the most prevalent performance issue experienced today: network congestion. To this end, we systematically explore the design space of data transport in anonymity overlays and reveal serious performance issues. This exploration provides insights in how (not) to design a transport protocol for anonymity overlays. In order to support future design decisions, we additionally present a methodology to measure networks in a privacy-preserving manner. The fundamental results of this thesis include the discovery of a destructive denial of service attack and the associated design flaw of performing hop-by-hop reliability and end-to-end flow control. Moreover, we emphasize the central role of fairness. In particular, we show that gross unfairness between circuits may arise and lead to poor performance. While these kind of issues are difficult to fix, we provide respective security measures and a fully distributed scheduling algorithm that implicitly achieves global fairness. These issues clearly demonstrate the inadequacy of currently employed congestion control in anonymity overlays. In particular, we identify a feedback "gap" between incoming and outgoing connections as the primary cause of performance issues. Aware of the requirements and the problems of anonymity overlays, we develop a tailored transport protocol. It combines congestion control with a backpressure-based flow control mechanism. The resulting overlay is able to react locally and thus rapidly to varying network conditions. It yields superior performance and a resilient overlay network. With our work, we contribute an integral perspective on networking aspects of anonymity overlays and tackle the root cause of performance issues.


(156.3, 312.5, 625.0), CWB (78.1, 156.3, 312.5), SB (156.3, 312.5, 625.0), and CPX (312.5, 625.0, 1250.0) for 24 h. Root tips were cut, fixed, hydrolyzed in 1 N hydrochloric acid, stained, squashed and observed microscopically. Cytotoxicity and genotoxicity induction at each treatment was compared with the negative control using t-test. WO (78.1, 156.3, and 312.5), KOG (312.5, 625.0) and CWB (312.5) were cytotoxic, (P < 0.05). WO (78.1, 312.5), CWB (156.3, 312.5), SB (625.0) and CPX (1250.0) induced genotoxicity (P < 0.05), mostly, sticky chromosomes. The genotoxic pesticides have potential to cause adverse environmental and health effects, because most adverse effects by genotoxins result from genetic damage and genotoxicity of chemicals is likely to result from cell division abnormalities.


Good afternoon. My remarks today on the occasion of this timely conference will focus on the major developments occurring in the European financial sector. Specifically, I will offer my thoughts on how these developments are affecting the banking structure in Europe. And, perhaps most importantly, I will reflect on the implications of these financial system changes for the supervision of financial institutions. TRENDS IN THE EUROPEAN FINANCIAL SECTOR The European financial sector has been experiencing several major developments: deregulation, the introduction of the euro, the internationalization of the financial markets, disintermediation, and rapid technological change. I would like to speak on a few of these issues. I will begin with deregulation. Compared with the regulated European financial systems of the postwar period, most European countries have been liberalizing their financial services sectors. This trend began in the mid-1960s and accelerated in the 1980s and 1990s. At the same time, European countries have progressively opened their financial markets to foreign competition. These actions came about through independent national legislation as well as from the dynamics of the Treaty of Rome, which received a renewed impetus from the single market program. Furthermore, the Second Banking Coordination Directive--implemented on January 1, 1993--introduced the single banking license, which allows credit institutions to establish branches or to supply cross-border services to all European Economic Area countries without prior approval from the authorities of a particular country. The European Union is aiming for a fully liberalized European market for financial services by the year 2005. On the surface, this open legislative environment looks good, but in practice it has been frustrated by infrastructural impediments, which are still prevalent in some countries. Notably, government ownership has prevented liberalization for a long time, although over the past few years there has clearly been improvement, especially in southern European countries such as Spain and Italy. In Germany, however, the local government's ownership of savings banks and so-called landerbanken still stands in the way of a more market-oriented development. Disintermediation, too, has had an impact on the European financial sector. The introduction of the euro has stimulated the internationalization of the capital markets, thereby making these markets deeper, more transparent, and more liquid than the previously existing national capital markets. It has forced banks to reassess their position in the market. In most institutions, including mine, net income from interest has declined, reflecting the shift from the role of traditional credit intermediary to that of fee-based income generator. It will be interesting to see whether the Capital Accord redesign affects this development. Another development--technological change--has been present in the European financial sector since the 1960s and 1970s. At that time, banks began to reduce the costs of their information processing capabilities by replacing paper- and labor-intensive operations with computers. However, the impact of computerization is small compared with the impact of network technology. For example, the interlinking of realtime gross settlement systems through the European TARGET system has greatly stimulated the development of a single European money market. But the mark made by network technology will be even more profound because the Internet will alter the ground rules of our economy, as the classic tradeoff between richness of information and reach of information will end, and communications costs will decrease and eventually disappear. U.S. companies, supported by a more flexible labor market, have been able to adapt their organizations and strategies to these technological changes more effectively than European companies. …


Pneumatosis Intestinalis is a rare condition characterized by the presence of gas within the intestinal wall. We describe a case of a 33-year-old woman with acute promyelocytic leukemia who developed nausea and nonbloody diarrhea. CT showed intramural air in transverse and descending colon. Patient clinically improved with conservative management.


Since China's reform and opening-up,China has started its revival of Confucianism. From 1978 to 2008,204 conferences were held to discuss Confucian thoughts of the past,and considerable academic achievements were made. Furthermore,the International Association of Confucianism launched the movement of spreading Confucian ideas and sponsored summit forums on Confucianism. Since 2004,many Confucius institutes have been established throughout the world,which have popularized Chinese language education and promoted cultural exchange; many Confucian classics have been published and the project for the Confucian work collection,Ruzang,has started; Chinese universities have developed forums and training courses for Chinese traditional culture; and the academic activities in different areas also have enjoyed great success. Looking forward to the future,China's revival movement of Confucianism will be a systematic,modern,popular,informationalized and institutionalized one.


The discovery that the most widespread bat in Europe comprises cryptic species, Pipistrellus pipistrellus (Schreber, 1774) (common pipistrelle) and Pipistrellus pygmaeus (Leach, 1825) (soprano pipistrelle), provides a great opportunity to look at the mechanism of species coexistence. Based on eight nuclear microsatellite loci (n = 353), we observed similarities between the species in Poland with respect to heterozygosity, allelic richness, mean relatedness, and inbreeding coefficients. However, pronounced differences in migratory patterns (shown by assignment tests) suggest that P. pygmaeus is the more migratory species. The proportion of bats migrating between colonies differed significantly, with 17.1% and 41.8% individuals of P. pygmaeus and P. pipistrellus, respectively, confidently assigned to colonies of origin. Both species demonstrated a more migratory character in central Europe compared with the populations from the British Isles. Given the cryptic nature of the examined taxa, we also assessed w...


Emerging standards in the area of mobile services, such as Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access (WiMAX) and Universal Mobile Telecommunication System (UMTS), require new capabilities from mobile devices. As a result, these devices should know how to download and correctly install reconfigurable modules. For this purpose, the Software Defined Radio (SDR) technology is used at present. SDR allows co-existence of different independent standards, protocols, and services. This signal processing approach is widespread due to the great importance of reprogramming and reconfiguring of mobile devices. Because of the availability of SDR technique in device architecture, a user can update and replace necessary services without changing hardware. In this paper, we present a new solution of SDR implementation for UMTS/WiMAX system. Furthermore, we consider common blocks in our system in detail and demonstrate the implementation of the framework model in object-oriented style using SystemC.


Objective: To understand the efficacy of polyethylene glycol drops combined with modified meibomian gland dredge in treatment youth meibomian gland dysfunction with dry eye. Methods: Select 92 eyes,from 46 young patients with dry eye associated with meibomian gland dysfunction,were randomly divided into experiment group and control group. 23 patients in experiment group were given polyethylene glycol drops combined with modified meibomian gland dredge,meibomian gland dredging methods were improved guidance,and meibomian gland compression themselves at home,three times a day,four weeks after the referral. Another 23 cases in control group were only given polyethylene glycol drops. Two polyethylene glycol drops were four times a day. The treatment is keep four weeks and review. Record Schirmer Ⅰ test( SⅠt),tear film breakup time( BUT),corneal fluorescein staining( CFL) in the two groups before / after treatment. Results: Before and after treatment,our data showed that there are significant differences in BUT and CFL( P 0. 05). S Ⅰ t was slightly improved after treatment,but no significant difference( P 0. 05). There are significant difference in BUT and CFL in the two groups after treatment( P 0. 05). Conclusion: Polyethylene glycol drops combined with modified meibomian gland dredge in treatment youth meibomian gland dysfunction with dry eye have significant effects. Morever,modified meibomian gland dredge operation is simple. The patients can dredge by themselves after the master method.


The present state of the Earth evolved from energetic events that were determined early in the history of the solar system. A key process in reconciling this state and the observable mantle composition with models of the original formation relies on understanding the planetary processing that has taken place over the past 4.5Ga and the range of most relevant P-T conditions governing primary segregation and mixing. Recent developments with the laser-heated diamond anvil cell have made possible extension of the conventional pressure limit for solubility and partitioning experiments as well as the direct study of volatile trace elements. In particular, selected results of liquid–liquid, metal–silicate (M–Sil) partitioning are presented for several noble gas and molecular elements in a synthetic chondritic mixture, spanning a wide range of atomic number helium to iodine The application of these methods is new and allows extension of geochemical studies performed in larger-volume apparatus. Not only is the attainment of uniform and equilibrium mixing important in this small-sample environment (perhaps 10-100 micrometers in linear dimension depending on the pressure), but also the microanalysis of quenched samples to determine the distribution of minor and trace elements. Systematic results on the solubility of He, Ne and Ar suggests that their incompatibility in solid silicate and metallic phases may not have been as great as previously thought -- and hence are candidates for storage in the deep Earth. Helium solubility in the metal phase relative to that of the silicate suggests the core should be considered a deep Earth reservoir for example. If the core is a reservoir, then the mechanisms for interaction with the lower mantle become important requiring examination of the processes of material exchange at the core-mantle boundary. The interpretation of the results depended on precise microanalysis of LHDAC samples, and the application of UV laser ablation, mass-spectrometric techniques that provided for the first time a spatially resolved depth profile in samples. Attention needs to be paid to the likely mode of solubility - entrapment versus bonded and non-bonded host environments for example - and we attempt to consider the real implications for the Earth in either case. Noble gases,


In this paper some improved estimators for the measure of dispersion of an inverse Gaussian distribution have been obtained. If some guessed value of λ is available in the form of a point esitmate λ0 the shrikage technique has been applied and an estimator has been proposed which has smaller mean squared error than the usual estimator. Since the shrinkage estimator has better performance if the guessed value is in the vicinity of the true value, a shrinkage testimator has also been proposed and compared with the usual estimator.


Wood formation or xylogenesis is a fundamental process for so diverse issues as industry, shelter and a sustainable environment. Wood is comprised of secondary xylem, rigid large cells with thick c ...


Purpose – Does leadership style affect absenteeism in a company? The purpose of this paper is to contrast the effects of two leadership styles – transformational and passive avoidant – on absenteeism, both legitimate and illegitimate, as mediated by job satisfaction.Design/methodology/approach – A self‐report questionnaire was completed by a sample of 120 employees of a national mail delivery company. Hierarchical regressions were used to analyze the data.Findings – It was found that transformational leadership decreases illegitimate absenteeism, while passive avoidant leadership increases it. In regard to legitimate absenteeism, transformational leadership is shown to have no effect, while passive avoidant leadership is shown to be negatively related to it. Together, the findings regarding passive avoidant leaders suggest their subordinates tend to come to work when ill (presenteeism), but stay away from work when well (illegitimate absenteeism).Practical implications – For managers trying to reduce the ...


A catalytic spectrophotometric method for the determination of trace iron(Ⅲ) has been established .It is based on the catalytic effect of iron(Ⅲ) on the oxidation of xylene cyanol FF by Hydrogen peroxide and potassium periodate in nitric acid medium. The optimum conditions were studied. The limit of detection is 2.0×10-10g iron(Ⅲ)?mL~(-1).Iron(Ⅲ) can be determined accurately in the range of 0.0 ~0.2μg? 25ml-1.The method has been applied for the determination of trace iron(Ⅲ) in environmental water with satisfactory results.


The literature survey for the fractional crystallization study of material from tank 241-S-112 is completed, fulfilling the requirements of the Test Plan for Tank 241-S-112 Fractional Crystallization Study (Herting 2003). Crystallization involves the formation of one or more solid phases from a fluid phase or an amorphous solid phase. It is applied extensively in the chemical industry, both as a purification process and a separation process. The main advantage of crystallization over distillation is the production of substances with a very high purity, at a low level of energy consumption, and at relatively mild process conditions. Crystallization is one of the older operations in the chemical industry; therefore, practical experience can usually be used for the design and operation of industrial crystallizers. In addition, advances in the understanding of crystallization kinetics can be useful in the control, design, and scale-up of industrial crystallizers. Research work is currently underway; e.g., the CrysCODE (Crystallizer Control & Design) project, littu://www.aui.tudelft.nl/uroiect/Cn/scode/crvscode.htm, at the Delft University of Technology, with the goal of improving the performance and controllability of industrial crystallizers by means of better control and improved design methodologies. Recent developments in fluid dynamics and reactor technology (e.g., compartment approaches) have led to a bettermore » understanding of processes and scale-up phenomena. The ultimate aim of such research is to develop a knowledge-based design frame for optimization of industrial crystallization units. Development work is in progress on a rigorous design analysis model for the description of the crystallization process as a function of the reactor geometry, crystallization kinetics, and operating conditions. One modeling effort is aimed at improving the predictive crystallizer model by implementing a population balance equation that depends on two variables: the size and strain of the crystal. Both the crystal size and the strain in the crystal lattice have a pronounced effect on the growth rate of the individual crystals (Menon 2003). This report is organized into six sections. Section 1 summarizes reports on the design principles for separations by crystallization. Section 2 discusses the fractional crystallization in the NaNO{sub 3}-CH{sub 3}COONa-H{sub 2}O system presented in RPP-18541, ''Test Plan for Tank 241-S-112 Fractional crystallization Study,'' dated 2003. Section 3 summarizes reports on crystallization in the Na{sub 2}CO{sub 3}-Na{sub 2}SO{sub 4}-H{sub 2}O system, which includes the effects of the burkeite double salt (Na{sub 2}CO{sub 3} {center_dot} 2Na{sub 2}SO{sub 4}). Section 4 summarizes solubility data for sodium compounds and presents two miscellaneous topics. Section 5 is excerpted from the internet to show applications of thermodynamic calculations. Section 5.1 compares results and calculations for the NaNO{sub 3}-Na{sub 2}SO{sub 4}-H{sub 2}O system, and Section 5.2 shows the use of the calculations to optimize flowsheets. Flowsheets are given for two examples: (1) the production of KNO{sub 3} from NaNO{sub 3} and KCl (including the effects of having Na{sub 2}SO{sub 4} in the initial material) and (2) the production of K{sub 2}SO{sub 4} and NaCl from Na{sub 2}SO{sub 4} and KCl. Section 6 is excerpted from the internet to show some examples of the information available on crystallizers.« less


It is determined a participation of mechanisms of congenital and adoptive immunity in providing a functional condition and physical working capacity of sportsmen.


We analyze dynamics of the AdS$_{N+1}$ particle realized on the coset SO$(2,N)/$SO$(1,N)$. Hamiltonian reduction provides the physical phase space in terms of the coadjoint orbit obtained by boosting a timelike element of ${\frak so}(2,N)$. We show equivalence of this approach to geometric quantization and to the SO$(N)$ covariant oscillator description, for which the boost generators entail a complicated operator ordering. As an alternative scheme, we introduce dual oscillator variables and derive their algebra at the classical and the quantum level. This simplifies the calculations of the commutators for the boost generators and leads to unitary irreducible representations of ${\frak so}(2,N)$ for all admissible values of the mass parameter. We furthermore discuss an SO$(N)$ covariant supersymmetric extensions of the oscillator quantization, with its realization for superparticles in AdS$_2$ and AdS$_3$ given by recent works.


Foods play an important role in preparing the health of body. Foods and nutrients are effective in increasing health and regulating the immune system as well as in prevention of different diseases such as cardiovascular diseases. In the past few years, the prevalence of cardiovascular disease is progressively increasing. Change in lifestyle and dietary pattern of the societies plays an important role in inducing cardiovascular diseases. Studies have shown that the risk of cardiovascular disease among people consuming more vegetables is lower. Recent findings suggest that foods rich in omega-3, vitamins, antioxidants and fibers are useful for the health of cardiovascular system and such nutrition, in addition to disease prevention, reduces the cost and side effects of chemical treatments. In this article, different clinical trials introducing beneficial dietary approaches in preventing cardiovascular diseases are reviewed.


The theory of a class of spectral methods is extended to Volterra integro-differential equations which contain a weakly singular kernel ( t - s )->* with 0 1. In this work, we consider the case when the underlying solutions of weakly singular Volterra integro-differential equations are sufficiently smooth. We provide a rigorous error analysis for the spectral methods, which shows that both the errors of approximate solutions and the errors of approximate derivatives of the solutions decay exponentially in L °°-norm and weighted L 2 -norm. The numerical examples are given to illustrate the theoretical results.


Aims. We present the results of a spectroscopic analysis of three young embedded sources (HH26 IRS, HH34 IRS, and HH46 IRS) belonging to different star-forming regions and displaying well-developed jet structures. The aim is to investigate the source accretion and ejection properties and their connection. Methods. We used VLT-ISAAC near-IR medium resolution (R ∼ 9000) spectra (H and K bands) to derive, in a self-consistent way, parameters like the star luminosity, accretion luminosity, and the mass accretion rate. Mass ejection rates have also been estimated from analysing different emission features. Results. The spectra present several emission lines but no photospheric features in absorption, indicating a large veiling in both the H and K bands. In addition to features commonly observed in jet driving sources ([Fe ii], H2 ,H i, CO), we detect a number of emission lines due to permitted atomic transitions, such as Na i and Ti i that are only 2−5 times weaker than the Brγ line. Some of these features remain unidentified. Emission from Na i 2.2 µm doublet is observed along with CO(2−0) band-head emission, indicating a common origin in an inner gaseous disc heated by accretion. We find that accretion provides about 50% and 80% of the bolometric luminosity


New Yorks metallic hardcore torchbearers, INCENDIARY, are releasing their highly anticipated new full length, Thousand Mile Stare, on Friday via Closed ...


Fluorine is an extremely chemically active element, which has a considerable impact on the entire ecosystem. Its influence may be both beneficial and harmful. This paper describes the biological significance of fluorine. It points out the sources of fluorine in the environment, paying particular attention to the part played by chemical plants producing phosphoric acid and phosphate fertilizers. The article contains the results of selected research, carried out on the area of impact of Zaklady Chemiczne "Police" S.A, concerning the following items: the monitoring of air and rainwater pollution by fluorine compounds, as well as the impact of fluorine and its compounds on plants, animals and human beings. The article also presents the effects posed by excess supply of this element.


The level of contamination by the fluorouracil in drug preparation was determined in six hospital pharmacies, three using hoods and three using isolators for the preparation of antineoplastic agents. Contamination by 5-fluorouracil of the work environment as well as the protective shield was mesured by high-performance liquid chromatography with UV detection. Extraction was realized from 1 mL sample with 2 mL mixture. Measurable amounts of 5-fluorouracil were detected in 83 % (10/12) of the samples in protective shield for isolator against 8.3 % (1/12) for hood. The protective shields of isolators were contaminated even after cleaning. Contamination of the work environment was found for three samples among 75 for hood and 35 samples among 72 for isolators. The isolator gloves (Neoprene), the manipulator suit and the sleeve were potentially permeable. This type of study shows that exposure of manipulators to cytotoxic agents can be controlled only if all the possible sources of contamination are identified and if suitable systems of protection are used. Analysis of surface samples of work environment and of the surface of preparations should be inclued in the validation procedure.


: Water deficit is responsible for a negative impact on agricultural systems. Several physiological, biochemical, and molecular processes are initiated as a response to water-deficit stress. Quantifying the differential expression of the genes involved in the response to water-deficit stress plays a key role in the development of molecular strategies for engineering water-stress tolerance in plants. Therefore, the present study aims to evaluate the expression of key genes involved in the water-deficit response process in peach trees cv. Chimarrita grafted onto two different rootstocks. The experimental design was completely randomized, with four treatments that correspond to the evaluation periods: day zero (control), the fourth, seventh, and ninth days of water-deficit stress. Leaf samples of each Chimarrita/rootstock combination were analyzed separately. The


The aim of this paper is to present and clearly explain how it is possible to use problem-processing system, proven measures for disinfection, disinsection and deratization (DDD) of the competent local self-government units. Through the paper, the technologies in which it is made are presented. Through various chapters, the complete architecture of the application is explained, and also various diagrams show the interaction between the user and the application itself. At the end of the paper, parts of the program code and the interfaces of the mobile and web application are shown.


Suggested by numerical simulations, recent experiments have shown that a significant guiding force is exerted by a reduced-density channel on electron beams propagating through initially un-ionized air. A theoretical analysis of this guiding force had been given that assumed uniform beam and channel and small beam-channel offset. From a 2-D model, relative to a beam slice, the guiding force is calculated in this article for arbitrary beamchannel offset and for various smooth beam and channel profiles. This calculation confirms the above-quoted experimental evidence of a guiding force significant with respect to the deflection force exerted by the earth's magnetic field. It also confirms the crucial role played by the secondary electron temperature distribution. Finally, it suggests optimal values for the ratio between channel and beam rms radii.


In the numerical solution of Maxwell's equations, we usually consider only Faraday's and Ampere's laws, and assume the two Gauss' laws are satisfied automatically. This will cause a significant numerical error in a self-consistent simulation of a particle-wave interaction. To remove the numerical error that comes from the violation of Gauss' laws, divergence cleaning techniques have been introduced. In this paper, the purely hyperbolic Maxwell (PHM) equations that can eliminate the numerical errors of both Gauss' laws are presented. The discontinuous Galerkin time-domain method is then applied to the numerical solution of the PHM equations, with the intermediate states and the numerical fluxes derived by solving the Riemann problem.


Measuring the concentration of nitric oxide (NO) and methylnedioxyamphetamine(MDA) of lungs with chronic bronchitis in rats and analyzing the roles of NO and oxidative stress in pathogenesis of chronic bronchitis. The rats were treated with lipopolysaccharide(LPS) intratracheally at day 1,4 and cigarette-smoke exposure daily for 28 days, control group of normal rats were not treated. The concentration of NO(nitrate reductase method)and MDA of lung homogenate and the concentration of NO of bronchoalveolar lavage fluid(BALF) were measured by microplate reader. The concentration of NO of lung homogenate of rats with chronic bronchitis was lower than that of normal rats, value A was 0.050 and 0.126 ( P 0.05), the concentration of MDA of lung homogenate of rats with chronic bronchitis was higher than that of normal rats, value A was 0.023 and 0.016,respectively ( P 0.05 ).The difference in the concentration of NO of BALF was not significant between two groups,value A in rats with chronic bronchitis was 0.225 , A value in normal rats was 0.268 ( P 0.05). [Conclusion] Oxidation stress and NO play an important role in pathogenesis of chronic bronchitis by cigarette-smoke and LPS exposure.


An understanding of interfacial stability in diffusion-bonded structures is necessary to ex plain the origin of multiphase products, e0g., as in the formation of 5-NiA1 and i'-Ni3A1 intermediate phases during pack aluninization of Ni-based (i-solid solution) superalloys. In the present study, the electron microprobe analyzer was used to examine the morphological stability of 5-y phase interfaces in Ni-Cr-Al alloys at 1150 C. Exper-imenta 1 Solid-solid diffusion couples consisting of a common terminal 5-NiA1 (Ni-SO a/o Al) end member and a series of-alioys nominally containing Ni-lO,20,30,40 a/o Cr and pure Ni were fabricated. The Ni-SO Al alloy was directionally solidified and y-alloys were cast in Cu-molds, and subsequently homogenized at 1000-1200 C for more than 5 days. Disks were section ed out of the rods and polished down to 025 or 1 urn diamond polish The disks were held to gether in a stainless-steel clamp and the assembly was encapsulated in fused silica capsules backfilled with argon. All diffusion couples were isothermally heat treated at 1150 C for 49 h. In order to retain the high temperature structures the annealed capsules were quenched into water and immediately broken The couples were sectioned parallel to the direction of diffusion by a slow-speed diamond saw, polished, and examined metallographically. Quantitative wavelength-dispersive x-ray microanalyses were performed with a JEOL 733 Superprobe operating at an accelerating voltage of 15 kV and 10 nA beam current. Spectral intensities were reduced to quantitative compositional values using the Tracor Northern ZAF matrix correction procedure which utilizes the Magic IV program developed by Colby.' Pure-element standards were employed during the analyses. The beam voltage of 15 Ky gives a sat isfactory overvoltage for Ni; however, it is quite high for Al. The resultant strong absorp tion for Al Ku in Ni is significant. A compromise was therefore made in choosing the given operating conditions without the loss of spatial resolution attendant on higher beam cur rents. An absorption correction2 of 80-120% was necessary for the conversion of Al inten sities with use of the ZAF program. Counting times of 20-60 s were employed. The precision specimen stage of the microprobe was used for locating the sample under a stationary beam. In the vicinity of interfaces and within intermediate phases, step sizes of 1 pm were used; they were increased to 5 or 20 pm away from these regions of the diffusion couples Results and Discussion Microstructures typical of the …


The case is argued for exterior ballistics to be considered as a suitable subject for showing undergraduate students some of the many applications of mathematical methods and techniques. A course is outlined with comments on the value of each of the topics studied. Various methods used in the presentation and assessment of this exterior ballistics course are discussed, while a number of suggestions are made about research problems and practical applications of the subject.


Abstract The linear polarization technique in principle is a convenient and rapid way for determining corrosion rates. In practice, one finds that it is often applied under conditions alien to the ...


Amh is a single copy gene which is expressed in different ways during mammalian development. Several potential promoter elements have been identified using physiological experimentation and on the basis of interspecific sequence comparison. The role of putative promoter elements in controlling gene expression has been investigated by many workers over the last two decades and here by individually mutating each element. Expression was measured in vitro in cells of Sertoli descent by flowcytometry using EGFP as a reporter gene. Three lines of murine cells were used; pre- and post-pubertal Sertoli and granulosa cells. Differences between the three lines of cells, support the view that differentiation in this in vitro model system is likely to be at the level of available transcription factors at given points in development.


A locking access plug for a valve return spring for a beverage dispensing gun handle is disclosed. The locking access plug enables the compression and retention of the valve return spring and enables the retention of the locking access plug in the body of the handle until it is acted upon for the purpose of its removal; for example, for the servicing of the handle. A beverage dispensing gun having such a locking access plug can both keep a valve return spring in compression as well as interface with a sealing o-ring that seals between the locking access plug and the beverage dispensing gun handle.


Objective To evaluate the efficacy and safety of piperacillin/tazobactam in the treatment of bacterial infections. Methods A randomized controlled clinical trial was performed and imipenem/cilastain was employed as the control drug. An open trial on piperacillin/tazobactam for 13 patients was conducted. Results The efficacious rates of piperacillin/tazobactam and imipenem/cilastain were 93.75% and 87.50% respectively. The bacterial clearance rate was 85.7% in piperacillin/tazobactam group and 75% in imipenem/cilastain group. No significant difference was found between the 2 groups. The clinical efficacy of piperacillin/tazobactam was 84.62%, while the adverse reaction rate was 3.45%. Conclusion Piperacillin/tazobactam is a high efficient and safe broard-spectrum antibacterial agent.


ABSTRACT Following the dismantling of the state socialist bloc, the new independent states sought a place in the world order in different contexts and state combinations. The paper considers different possibilities and outlines the formation of regional post-socialist regions. The Russian Federation's past, present, and possible future regional alliances are discussed. Russia's economic synergy is considered to be with the European Union. It is contended that Russia has been pushed towards the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation and the BRICS by misguided Western policy. A movement to a more pluralistic world system is compared to the unitary paradigm of Wallerstein. The rise of a 'counterpoint' (a semi-core) to the hegemonic core is considered to be a geo-political alternative.


Guided wave–based structural health monitoring is a promising technology to continuously monitor aircraft and to identify damage. The simulation of such structures is still a numerically challenging task due to their size and complexity. In this article, a minimal model approach is proposed to allow an approximate but very fast calculation of the wave propagation. The properties being relevant to the propagation of Lamb waves or in general guided waves are determined as part of the preprocessing. These include phase velocities as well as interaction parameters of all discontinuities. The minimal model consists of two steps to calculate a time signal at specific locations. First, a ray tracing algorithm determines suitable wave paths between two points in the reduced model of the structure. Second, wave packets of every incident ray are superimposed to synthesize a time signal. The obtained results are compared with both finite element simulations and experimental measurements.


Concerns over greenhouse gas emissions are driving governments and the automotive industry to seek out ways of reducing vehicle CO2 emissions. Engine friction reduction is one means of reducing CO2 emissions, through fuel consumption improvements. Of the different systems within the engine, the camshaft timing drive can contribute around 5 to 10% of the overall engine friction. It is therefore a system that can benefit from careful optimisation. MAHLE has undertaken a motored friction-testing program on a 2.2 litre turbocharged diesel engine with the following different types of camshaft timing drive:  Chain drive with hydraulic tensioner. This is the standard configuration for this engine.  Chain drive with friction tensioner  Wet belt drive  Dry belt drive Testing was conducted to allow the differences in friction between the different drive configurations to be calculated, by comparing each camshaft drive against the standard chain drive system. Using the frictional differences as a basis, the changes in fuel consumption from the standard configuration were predicted for a drive cycle. Changes in CO2 emissions were then calculated. Experimental uncertainty levels were assessed during the analysis of the results. This paper considers the approach to the testing, the testing process and the test results.


Multi-view multi-instance multi-label learning (M3L) can model complex objects (bags) that are composed of multiple instances, represented with heterogeneous feature views and annotated with multiple related semantic labels. Although significant progress has been made toward M3L tasks, the current solutions still focus on a single-type of complex objects, and cannot effectively mine the widely-witnessed interconnected objects of multi-types. To bridge this gap, we propose a Deep Multi-type objects Multi-view Multi-instance Multi-label Learning solution (DeepM4L) based on heterogeneous network embedding. DeepM4L first encodes the interand intra-relations among multi-type objects using a heterogeneous network, and performs instance neighbor embedding to learn the representation vectors of instances. Next, it obtains the instance-label score tensor for each view and uses a max pooling operation to induce the bag-label score tensor for each bag. After that, it combines bag-label scores by multi-view learning to guarantee the semantic consistency between bags of different views. Our empirical study on benchmark datasets shows that DeepM4L is significantly superior to the recent advanced baselines.


Based on the geomagnetic data at 426 geomagnetic sites and the geomagnetic data calculated at the 28 IGRF points for 1936.0, the surface Spline models for various components of the geomagnetic field and the geomagnetic anomalous field are calculated, and the corresponding geomagnetic charts and the geomagnetic anomaly charts are drawn. According to the secular variation charts of the geomagnetic declination D for 1909~1915, 1915-1920, 1920~1930 and 1930~1936, the horizontal intensity H for 1908~1917, 1917~1922 and 1922~1936, and the vertical intensity Z for 1908~1922 and 1922~1936 in China (a part), the surface Spline models of the secular variations are respectively calculated for D, H and Z for the above-mentioned 9 periods by using the surface Spline method, and the corresponding secular variation charts are drawn. According to these secular variation models, the absolute values of the three components at 426 sites for 1936.0 are reduced to the data for 1940, 1930, 1920, 1910 and 1900. These data have laid a solid foundation of calculating the geomagnetic field models for these 5 epochs.


Ridge gourd/phenolic and ridge gourd/phenolic/glass hybrid composites were prepared using resol resin PF-108 as the matrix, the twin layered vegetable fabric ridge gourd (without and with alkali treatment) as the reinforcement and glass fabric as a co-reinforcement. The compressive strength, the modulus of untreated and alkali treated ridge gourd fabric reinforced phenolic composites and the ridge gourd and glass fabric reinforced phenolic hybrid composites in the absence and presence of two coupling agents were also determined. The interfacial bonding between the components of these composites was examined by scanning electron microscopy.


The present investigation was conducted on 1138 HF × Gir and 301 Jersey × Gir halfbreds to study the effect of genetic group and stage of lactation oh milk yield, fat, SNF and T.S. content in milk. The results obtained revealed that 90 days milk yield declined with the advancement of stage of lactation in both the groups. However, fat, SNF and T.S. content in milk increased linearly with increase in stage of lactation.


During the past 30 years, Japanese tourists has been the first major market to Korea and the percent of international tourist arrivals from Japan is 49.4% in 1990 and 42.0% in 2004 by the publications on Korea National Tourism Organization. In the period 1975 to 2004, the number of Japanese tourists to Korea increased 5.67 times. Figure 1. shows the number of Japanese tourist arrivals in Korea during the period 1975-2004. At the same time, according to Japanese official publications, Korea has been the second tourism destination for Japanese after America since 1997.


The disruptive technologies that are currently emerging across the semi-conductor and electronics industries demand the need for a continual focus on decreasing the size of integrated circuits and renewable energy technology devices. To support this demand requires comprehensive research into understanding the functional properties of materials at an atomic level across a three-dimensional space. These functional properties of materials originate from atomic level properties such as structural, optical and electronic properties, all of which can be modified to optimise the functionality of a material. This is the reason why these atomic level properties were comprehensively studied and reported in this thesis. The introduction of atomic level impurities, via the phenomena of doping, has helped to modify the structural, optical and electronic properties of the materials investigated in this thesis. An insight into the effect and potential that high temperature solid-state doping can bring towards improving the functional properties of three materials namely titania-rutile (single crystal substrates), titanates (powders) and Magnesium Silicon Nitrides MgSiN2 (powders), were gained from the experiments and results reported in this thesis. NB: titanates studied include sodium and potassium hexatitanates, sodium trititanate and caesium titanate. Chapters 3-8 of this thesis were written with a specific focus on the spatial arrangement of dopant atoms (such as B, C, S and N) introduced into photocatalytic titania-rutile and the associated influence it has on bonding, diffusion behaviours as well as structural and electronic properties. The insight gained about these properties of titania-rutile are essential when working on an industrial scale to optimise the performance of renewable energy devices, or to at least match with that of fossil fuels. The choice of anionic dopant introduced into the titania-rutile can help to vary the structural or electronic properties in titania-rutile. Additionally, the unit cell structure that determines the surface and bulk structure of the titania-rutile single crystal substrate that was chosen was observed to also help modify the structural or electronic properties. While the carbon, sulphur and nitrogen anions were predominantly incorporated as surface dopants in titania-rutile, this was not the case with boron anions, which also showed results that were dependent on the orientation of the titania-rutile. Boron incorporation in (110)-titania-rutile led to the formation of a TiBO3 surface layer, approximately 120 nm thick as per XPS data. This TiBO3 layer, as per XRD data, is epitaxially arranged on the rutile (110) surface along the (108), (118) and (018) planes. While this layer was also seen on the rutile (100) surface, no XRD evidence of TiBO3 was found with the rutile (001) surface. As well as observing a shift in the XPS valence band onset, the emergence of new states and O2p orbital mixing was also observed upon anion incorporation into rutile. This study, reporting the structural and electronic effects observed as a result of doping, will be crucial when working with photocatalysts that are widely studied for the water splitting process, used to produce hydrogen, which is a 'clean' energy fuel. The main insight gained from chapter 9 is about making use of the structure of titanate materials (e.g. in open layered and tunnelled titanates) as a scaffold, to control the spatial distribution of any given dopant. This is particularly relevant when the material being investigated is in its powdered form, with no well-defined surface or a bulk. Chapter 9 was written with a specific focus on the effect of doping temperature on the location of the incorporated nitrogen dopant (aka. structural properties), electronic and optical properties in the open layered and tunnelled titanates. While these relationships are widely reported in the literature already, the challenge that this study addresses are about carrying out nitrogen doping at three different temperatures in the same system to ensure the same ammonia flow rate, which is a parameter that is often very challenging to reproduce. This ensures reproducibility of results and therefore reliability in the conclusions. Also, this study is also more comprehensive than that reported in literature the and discusses samples that are fully characterised. The preferential incorporation of nitrogen into the Ti-O-Ti bonds than the Na-O-Ti bonds was observed in the tunnelled titanates, Na2Ti6O13 and K2Ti6O13, and (not in the open layered titanates Na2Ti3O7 and Cs0.68Ti1.825O4), is potentially what led to the creation of Ti3+ defects as observed in their optical absorption spectrum. The resulting Ti 3d and N 1s states observed in the XPS valence band spectrum is potentially what caused the observed band gap narrowing. The modification of the electronic, optical and structural properties of the titanates using nitrogen doping can be used to optimise the functionality of titanates e.g. when it is used as photocatalysts or as battery materials. The main insight gained from chapter 10 is about exploring the alternative material that can replace the expensive aluminium nitride, which is known to be a promising substrate material with ideal thermal conductivity and minimal dissipation of heat. This was done by studying the change in structural properties including associated unit cell volume. The effect of the addition of varying amounts of aluminium as a dopant into the MgSiN2 structure, helped to find that the phase transformation from MgSiN2 to AlN-wurtzite structure is observed between 30% and 50% aluminium dopant introduction, as per XPS and XRD. While the doubling of the magnesium reactant mass led to a single phase MgSiN2, it can potentially affect particle size properties, as hinted by the XRD peak broadening observed. Increasing the aluminium content to above 50% led to unit cell volume contraction as Al3+ ions are smaller than the lattice Mg2+ ions they are substituting. These findings can help gain an understanding of the fundamental chemistry underpinning the development of cheaper, alternative materials for any applications.


A new design of a solar box cooker is presented where the bottom flat absorption plate is eliminated. In its place solar radiation is directly absorbed by the cooking vessel, ideally reflected by CPC shaped mirrors placed inside the box. This CPC type optics is specifically designed for the shape of the cooking vessel. The design procedure is presented and also the measurements made with the prototype developed. These show that the behavior of the cooker is greatly improved over that of conventional solar box cookers.


Large-scale clinical studies in neuro-imaging are hampered by several factors including variances in acquisition techniques, quality assurance and access to remote datasets. The Neurogrid project will build on the experience of other UK e-science projects to assemble a grid infrastructure, and apply this to three exemplar areas: stroke, dementia and psychosis, to conduct collaborative neuroscience research.