Fermilab is executing Laboratory Directed Research and Development (LDRD) as outlined by order DOE O 413.2B in order to enhance and realize the mission of the laboratory in a manner that also supports the laboratory's strategic objectives and the mission of the Department of Energy. LDRD funds enable scientific creativity, allow for exploration of "high risk, high payoff" research, and allow for the demonstration of new ideas, technical concepts, and devices. LDRD also has an objective of maintaining and enhancing the scientific and technical vitality of Fermilab. LDRD is able to fund employee-initiated proposals that address the current strategic objectives and better position Fermilab for future mission needs. The request for such funds is made in consideration of the investment needs, affordability, and directives from DOE and Congress. Review procedures of the proposals will insure that those proposals which most address the strategic goals of the DOE and the Laboratory or which best position Fermilab for the future will be recommended to the Laboratory Director who has responsibility for approval. The execution of each approved project will be the responsibility of the Principal Investigator, PI, who will follow existing Laboratory guidelines to ensure compliance with safety, environmental, and quality assurancemore » practices. A Laboratory Director-appointed LDRD Coordinator will work with Committees, Laboratory Management, other Fermilab Staff, and the PI's to oversee the implementation of policies and procedures of LDRD and provide the management and execution of this Annual Program Plan. FY16 represents third fiscal year in which LDRD has existed at Fermilab. The number of preliminary proposals (117) submitted in response to the LDRD Call for Proposals indicates very strong interest of the program within the Fermilab community. The first two Calls have resulted in thirteen active LDRD projects – and it is expected that between five and seven new projects will be approved in response to the FY16 Call for Proposals. The implementation of the program compared with FY15 is mostly unchanged except that the program is on the expected normal fiscal year calendar cycle with new projects starting at the beginning of the fiscal year. Because of this, there is some expanded discussion that the Laboratory Director may decide to initiate mid-year Late Start or Strategic- Hire LDRD projects.« less


INTEREST in ACSR for railroad signal and communications circuits was stimulated by the copper shortage which occurred during the Korean War and has continued since that time. Because such circuits may be used for communications frequencies up to 150 kc per second as well as for 60-cycle power and direct current, lack of information regarding the communications characteristics of ACSR has retarded its use. In addition, there has been need for accessories and connectors considered suitable and for information regarding mechanical installation and performance. Progress in overcoming these obstacles has now been made to the extent that a test section of line has been constructed by the St. Louis and San Francisco Railway Company.


To compile historical records of a place is a fine tradition of Chinese people. In 1980s, Gansu Province developed a new start of historical records compile in the whole province, and it was nearly finished in the year 2000 and "Historical record of Qin An" is among the excellent fruit. To sum up the course of compiling and realization of it is to conclude the lesson and experience. To compile a historical record of a place, we should pay strict attention to the number of articles, material, writing and examination and pay attention to local characteristics so as to compile excellent records.


Background:  Chronic noninfectious, nonallergic rhinitis (NINAR) is a complex syndrome with a principally unknown pathophysiology. New technology has made it possible to examine differentially expressed genes and according to network theory, genes connected by their function that might have key roles in the disease.


We show that black hole high-mass X-ray binaries (HMXBs) with O- orB-type donor stars and relatively short orbital periods, of order oneweek to several months may survive spiral-in, to then form Wolf-Rayet(WR) X-ray binaries with orbital periods of order a day to a few days;while in systems where the compact star is a neutron star, HMXBs withthese orbital periods never survive spiral-in. We therefore predict thatWR X-ray binaries can only harbour black holes. The reason why blackhole HMXBs with these orbital periods may survive spiral-in is: thecombination of a radiative envelope of the donor star and a high mass ofthe compact star. In this case, when the donor begins to overflow itsRoche lobe, the systems are able to spiral in slowly with stable Rochelobe overflow, as is shown by the system SS433. In this case, thetransferred mass is ejected from the vicinity of the compact star(so-called isotropic re-emission mass-loss mode, or SS433-likemass-loss), leading to gradual spiral-in. If the mass ratio of donor andblack hole is ≳3.5, these systems will go into common-envelopeevolution and are less likely to survive. If they survive, they produceWR X-ray binaries with orbital periods of a few hours to one day.Several of the well-known WR+O binaries in our Galaxy and the MagellanicClouds, with orbital periods in the range between a week and severalmonths, are expected to evolve into close WR-black hole binaries, whichmay later produce close double black holes. The galactic formation rateof double black holes resulting from such systems is still uncertain, asit depends on several poorly known factors in this evolutionary picture.It might possibly be as high as ˜10-5 yr-1.


Two-mode entanglement of superposition states from several two-mode coherent states is investigated according to the entanglement criterion.9 The dependence of entanglement on relative phase angle, coherent amplitude of each mode and phase angle is discussed. It is shown that under certain conditions the superposition states can exhibit entanglement properties.


A novel small-size LTE/WWAN two-strip monopole exciter antenna integration with metal covers for ultrabook computer applications is presented. The monopole exciter antenna is placed in the hinge slot between metal covers and hinges. By integrating the monopole exciter antenna with the metal covers and hinges, not only several modes of the monopole structure but those of the hinge slot are also excited to cover the desired eight-band LTE/WWAN operation (LTE700/GSM850/900 and GSM1800/ 1900/UMTS/LTE2300/2500 bands). The exciter antenna comprises a feeding strip and a folded strip to form a two-strip monopole structure. The proposed exciter antenna can be integrated with the surrounding metal planes (metal covers) to enhance the operating bandwidth to cover LTE/WWAN band with good radiation efficiency. The exciter antenna has a simple two-strip structure that is easy to be fabricated on a 0.8-mm thin FR4 substrate with a small area of only 25 × 8 mm2. Over the lower and upper bands, the antenna efficiencies are about 65%-88% and 55%-78%, respectively.


war period casts further doubt on the 'reserve army' thesis. Likewise, her account ofa recent study of the process of job loss, and of the debate over separate organisations for women trade unionists were very enlightening. Covering such a long sweep of history, the three case studies presented in this book demonstrate how patterns of job segregation produced at one historical moment develop out of and build on previous patterns. Indeed this book's real strength is the richness of the empirical material and the skill with which the author constructs her arguments through and from it.


We do not have a lot of choice in this life, wether we like it or not, we have to choose some alternatives sometimes only two. So it`s like a dilema for us. That`s what happens in the short story Bartleby, the Scrivener written by Herman Melville, an American writer in the 19 century.
Melville tries to show us that a new development does not always give good impacts. In order
to survive, we should be open to new ideas and keep abreast with developmenl, .for instance in
technologv or industrialization.This kind of modernizalion leads us to a better living or a w0r.w one
even to our death The story presents us two choices. The successful one is represented by the
narrator staff who take the modernization and life style in Wall Street and the other one is
represented by Bartleby who rejects and eventually brings him to his death. By giving the words
Ah, humanity nt the end of ilte stor? Melville elicits our sympathy and emphaty.


Mass-analyzed threshold ionization has been used to prepare vibrationally state-selected phenol cations, that were then reacted with methylamine at collision energies ranging from 0.1 to 2 eV. Integral cross sections and product recoil velocity distributions are reported. Ab initio calculations of stationary points on the surface and RRKM (Rice–Ramsperger–Kassel–Marcus) analysis of complex lifetimes are also presented for comparison. The only reaction observed over the entire energy range is exoergic proton transfer (PT). For ground-state reactants, the PT cross section is reduced by increasing collision energy, such that the reaction efficiency declines from ∼71% at low Ecollision to ∼50% at 2 eV. Excitation of either v6a or v12 vibrations inhibits reaction over the entire collision energy range, with the effect being somewhat mode-specific and increasing with increasing Ecollision. At low Ecollision, both vibrational and collision energy inhibit reaction with similar efficiency. Collision energy effects...


Well-dispersed Pd nanoparticles supported on lowdefect carbon nanotube (Pd-LCNT) are successfully prepared by a soft chemical method. Our approach ca n efficiently avoid damaging the CNT framework in the composite because it does not require cumbersome oxidation of CNT in advance and needs no subsequent reduction of the low-defect carbon nanotube due to the lower oxidation degree. Morphology observations show that the Pd nanoparticles with diameters ranging from 3 to 4 nm are evenly deposited on graphene sheets (Fig.1A). While in the case of Pd supported on acid-treated carbon nan otube (Pd-ACNT), it is evident that the particle size dis tribution is much broader than Pd-LCNT with a significant fra ction of Pd particles larger than 10 nm (Fig. 1B). Raman spectroscopic analysis results reveals a lower I D/IG intensity in Pd-LCNT's spectrum, which means there is only a very small amount of CNT defects in the Pd-L CNT compared with Pd-ACNT (Fig. 1C). This can be explained by that, the unsaturated C–C bonds (C π sites) are actually more efficient sites for anchoring the Pd particles and play a critical role in the formation f Pd–C hybrids. Also, the CV test shows the as-prepared hy brid exhibited significant catalytic activity for formic acid oxidation (Fig. 1D).


The capstone design sequence is ofien selected as the site for addressing ABET criteria a through k Increasingly, capstone design is designated as writing- intensive, serving to fulJi11 students' baccaloureote writing requirements and address ABET criterion (g). Yet assigning capstone design the responsibility of fulJilling communicorion requirements presents the challenge of understanding what and how these future engineers will be writing. A study of current communication practices of working engineers, with particular focus on these engineers' capstone design communication experiences as preparation for engineering practice, was completed in 2001 and is currently being analyzed.


141 Astrategies in the World Health Organization Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (http:// www.who.int/fctc/en). The Australian adult daily smoking prevalence is 14% compared with 31% in 1986, with a government goal to reduce this prevalence to 10% by 2020. Recently employed tobacco control strategies include increased taxation and plain cigarette pack legislation, supported by strong legislative, economic and community commitment to significantly reduce tobacco use in our society. These strategies motivate smokers to quit. For example, data from the 2007 National Drug Strategy Household Survey indicate that high cigarette prices are a key motivator to attempt to quit or reduce the number of cigarettes smoked.


The introduction discusses Gloria Richardson's social, economic, and political philosophies, particularly her secular humanism, on which her human rights activism was based. Attention is paid to how scholars have discussed and interpreted Richardson's activism in the Cambridge movement and her philosophies, and why it is important to expand those interpretive frameworks, specifically with regard to gender dynamics as they pertain to her role as a civil rights leader of national stature.


The branch structure of the tunnel significantly affects the overpressure characteristics of combustible gas explosions in confined space. However, most of previous studies involved explosions in branch vessels were limited to single branch structure, effects of the distribution form and location of the branch structure were rarely considered. In order to explore the influence of various branch distribution forms and locations on overpressure characteristics of vented gasoline-air mixture explosion in closed vessels, the experiments were carried out using three kinds of branch tunnel distribution forms (linear/staggered/symmetrical) and three kinds of branch tunnel locations (near to the spark plug/far from the spark plug/evenly distributed along the main tunnel), under the condition of the same tunnel volume (0.24m3), initial fuel volume concentration (1.2%) and ignition energy (5J). The maximum explosion overpressure pmax, the time to reach maximum explosion overpressure, the maximum rates of pressure rise (dp/dt)max, and the deflagration index KG were examined. Moreover, the effects of distribution form and location of branch tunnels on overpressure characteristics were discussed. Results show that explosion overpressure characteristics are strongly influenced by branch tunnels' distribution form and location. In terms of the symmetrical distribution, the maximum explosion overpressure, the maximum rates of pressure rise, and the deflagration index KG are the lowest among the three types of distribution forms of branch tunnel. Linear and staggered distributions have similar overpressure characteristics, whose explosion overpressure, maximum rates of pressure rise, deflagration index KG are 1.14,1.52and 1.52 times of those in the symmetrical situation respectively. Time to reach the maximum explosion overpressure and time to reach the maximum rates of pressure rise in the symmetrical situation are delayed, which are 1.31 and 1.30 times of those in the linear and staggered situations respectively. The maximum rates of pressure rise and the deflagration index KG descend in the following distribution locations: far from the spark plug, near to the spark plug, evenly distributed along the main tunnel. The results indicate that the farther the branch tunnel from the ignition end, the larger the explosion intensity index, and the closer the branch tunnel from the ignition end, the earlier the time to reach the maximum explosion overpressure rising rate.


It is necessary to find new work mechanism for building up good criminal operation rules and improving juveniles' procuratorial system.the juveniles' legal rights will be protected in separate case procedure;the integrate mechanism include arrest,lawsuit and defendant will protect their at most.


We prove the Gallavotti-Cohen fluctuation theorem for a model of heat conduction through a chain of anharmonic oscillators coupled to two Hamiltonian reservoirs at different temperatures.


This invention discloses an authority authentication method including: A, a UE starts up a registration request to call a CSCF entity to decide a suggested authority authentication mode and send it to a HSS, which selects a selected authentication mode according to the signed mode kept by itself and the received mode and informs the CSCF entity about it, B, the CSCF entity determines the applied mode according the selected mode by the HSS to authentuicate the UE and get the result of this time. This invention also discloses a system of authority authentication including a CSCF entity and a HSS.


The Vulsini Mts. volcanic region (central Italy) has been studied extensively from geological, petrological and volcanological points of view (e.g. FUNICIELLO et alii, 1977; BARTON et alii, 1982; HOLM et alii, 1982; DE RITA et alii, 1983; BARBERI et alii, 1984; PEC-CERILLO, 1985; PECCERILLO et alii, 1987; NAPPI et alii, 1987). The area has suffered the Apennine orogeny in the Tortonian. During the compressional phase the allochthonous geological units (Ligurides) were thrust upon the «Tuscan and Umbrian Series», the latter forming the backbone of the Apennine belt. During the «late Miocene-Pliocene» an extensional tectonic regime originated several NNW-SSE oriented marine and continental sedimentary basins that characterise central Italy (e.g. ABBATE et alii, 1970; DALLAN NARDI & NARDI, 1972; BOCCALETTI et alii, 1980; LA VECCHIA & STOPPA, 1989). The magmatic events that occurred between 0.85 and 0.06 Ma (FUNICIELLO et alii, 1977; NICOLETTI et alii, 1979, 1981; DE RITA et alii, 1983) mainly consisting of potassic and high potassic volcanic products (e.g. CONTICELLI et alii, 1986, 1987) can be referred to this extensional phase (e.g. AMODIO et alii, 1987). An anomalous heat flow developed as a consequence of this magmatic activity (e.g. CALAMAI et alii, 1976), producing two geothermal fields at depth (Latera and Torre Alfina) discovered in the past 25 years. A geochemical survey on gas (16 samples) and water (95 samples) discharges from the Mts. Vulsini volcanic area was carried out in order both to under stand their genesis and evolution and to propose a theoretical model for fluid circulation. The meteoric waters, infiltrating from permeable terrains, feed aquifers located at different depths; in the volcanic rocks at least two main reservoirs have been recognised. The shallower one consists of relatively cold and low salinity waters that, in the hydrological basin of Bolsena Lake, assumes a centripetal circulation towards the lake, although in the southernmost part the main water flow is mainly directed towards its outflow (Marta River). The deeper aquifer, confined between the impermeable formations (Ligurides and Neogene marine sediments) underlying the volcanic products and the less permeable volcanic rocks, is represented by relatively high salinity thermal waters uprising through the main fault systems along with deep-originated gas phases (mainly CO 2 ). These fluids tend to affect the shallow aquifer close to their discharge areas mainly in terms of temperature and salinity. In the case of waters that interacted with recent marine sediments, B and Cl were also involved. However the main chemical features of the waters contained in the volcanic rocks do not change since both aquifers are bicarbonate-rich waters. The Ca(Mg) to Na(K)-HCO 3 chemistry is related to the water-rock interaction processes affecting the silicate minerals hosted in the volcanic rocks. Such a process is enhanced when the thermal waters contain a CO 2 -rich gas phase that decreases the pH, provoking a higher alteration rate. When H 2 S occurs, even at low content, it tends to oxidise at surface producing colloidal sulphur and H 2 SO 4 and if the gas/water ratio is relatively high, the resulting water discharges assume a sulphate-rich character.


Mr Lister exhibited an extremely fine example of mixed aortic aneurism? from a man about thirty years of age, who had been lately under Mr Syme's care at the Royal Infirmary. The true sac extended in the longitudinal direction from 2h inches below the arch of the aorta to 1J inch above the bifurcation of the common iliac arteries, and was about 4 inches in greatest breadth. The false sac reached from the' diaphragm to Poupart's ligament on the left side, occupying inferiorly the whole iliac fossa, the peritoneal lining of which


ABSTRACT In this work, equation systems for RRSS motion generation and RRSS axode generation are applied to produce a concept above the transfemoral amputation prosthetic knee. First, an RRSS linkage is synthesized to approximate a series of tibial positions during knee flexion. Next, the fixed and moving axodes of the synthesized RRSS linkage are generated. Because the coupler motion of an RRSS linkage can be replicated by rolling its moving axode over its fixed axode, the axodes for the synthesized RRSS linkage are incorporated as gears to produce a concept prosthetic knee. The resulting prosthetic knee approximates the natural spatial motion of the tibia during knee flexion and extension (unlike prosthetic knee designs that include simple pin joints).


sign system and grammatical rules), social reality (application of language rules, social rank of interlocutor and intentions of speaker). Men's verbal behavior is realized simultaneously in three areas of reality: biological and physical reality (working of the speech production and perception systems governed by brain centers), mental reality (functioning of an abstract sign system and grammatical rules in the mind), and social reality (application of language rules defining the ways in which texts are executed adequately to the situation, social rank of the interlocutor and intentions of the speaker). The aphasia requires data from numerous fields used for the diagnosis, clinical description and therapy. These fields comprise: neurology (organic and local diagnosis), psychology (functional diagnosis), linguistics (the description of linguistic behavior) and sociology (age, sex, social background, etc). Speech is a complex, structured and controlled process. The course of the successive stages of forming an utterance is controlled by linguistic knowledge, depending on the character of linguistic reflection, of two types: "the knowledge how..." (metalinguistic competence), and "the knowledge that..." (linguistic-competence). In conclusion, results point to the importance of factors such as social context, pre and post morbid language skills and systematic analysis of bilingual's languages in different communicative contexts as important factors in evaluating code switching. Research indicate clinical necessity of modifying existing methods of description and therapy to suit them the needs of bilingual aphasics, considering the heterogeneous nature of the phenomena. AFAZJA A BILINGWIZM


• In infants, gastroesophageal reflux (GER) and regurgitation are most commonly self-resolving conditions that do not require treatment or ancillary testing • GER disease (GERD) in infants may be indistinguishable from milk protein allergy; therefore, if troublesome symptoms persist in an infant, the possibility of allergy should be considered • Assessment of nutritional status must be undertaken concomitantly with the investigation and treatment of GERD in order to refrain from either suboptimal or excessive intake • If prolonged medical treatment is deemed necessary, proton pump inhibitors are the treatment of choice, whereas conservative measures are adequate to treat mild GERD symptoms


The topological phase of a silicene nanoribbon holding edge states in the bulk energy gap can be easily broken by an external electric field. Here, we show through low-energy Green's function calculations that it is possible to localize conducting channels anywhere in a silicene nanoribbon by applying an inhomogeneous electric field. The spin degeneracy of these channels can also be broken in the same manner, allowing conduction of spin as well as charge. On this basis, we suggest design of a ternary logic device, which could be used in low-power circuits. Our study demonstrates that silicene and related group IV elements with honeycomb structure could provide a platform for efficient manipulation of spin currents via external electric fields, without the need to switch magnetic fields for spintronics applications.


By the Climate trend coefficients and accumulative anomaly,the article analyzed the spatial and temporal variations character,based on the sunshine duration and air temperature data of 34 meteorological stations and global radiation data of Shapingba in Chongqing,The results showed that: 1) The air temperature in Chongqing has the ascendant trend while the global radiation has the downtrend and the two had significant positive correlation in interannual variation. The space variation was showed that the air temperature was raised significantly,in west,south- east southerly regions as well as the most areas of northeastern in Chongqing. 2) The analysis based Shapingba meteorological stations showed that the clearness index is highly correlated with the percentage of sunshine duration and the global radiation of station can be calculated for study based on sun duration.


Although there are elements for political development in Iraq ,The aggravation of the situation and the failure to implement foundations, which led to problems and obstacles to achieving political development.
There are ways to solve these obstacles, including: applying consensual democracy, abolishing the principle of quotas, expanding political participation, implementing transitional justice, eliminating corruption in all its forms, achieving national unity, activating the national reconciliation project, strengthening the role of civil society institutions, achieving national integration and reducing poverty, and eliminating justice on unemployment.


Abstract Recent petrologic, chemical, and isotopic analyses of mesosiderite clasts and whole rocks allow reconstruction of the evolutionary history of the mesosiderite parent body (MPB). Chronologic measurements indicate that initial melting of the MPB occurred shortly after accretion ∼4.56 Ga ago, at about the same time that the eucrites and angrites formed. Significant crustal remelting ≥4.47 Ga ago, probably associated with metal-silicate mixing, is responsible for forming abundant gabbroic clasts with extreme positive Eu anomalies. Localized impact melting 4.5-3.9 Ga ago produced quench-textured clasts and matrices and may be responsible for causing mesosiderite metamorphism as well as the extensive melting of type-4 mesosiderites. Collisional disruption and gravitational reassembly ∼3.9 Ga ago is indicated by thorough Ar degassing at this time. Metallographic cooling rates of ∼1°C/Ma were likely initiated by this event; the history of higher temperature events measured by thermoluminescence was annealed out. Impact excavation and ejection of deeply buried breccias occurred ⪡3.9 Ga ago; the ∼10-160 Ma cosmic-ray-exposure ages of mesosiderites represent the epoch when individual mesosiderites were excavated from the MPB or from a ≥10-m-size fragment. It is unlikely that mesosiderites and HED (howardite-eucrite-diogenite) samples come from the same parent body. There is no evidence for metal-silicate mixing (with attendant redox effects) or major crustal remelting on the HED body. Bulk howardites have flat chondrite-normalized rare-earth-element (REE) patterns, whereas many bulk mesosiderites have REE patterns with positive Eu anomalies and relative enrichments in light REE. The nature of the heating mechanism which caused the initial differentiation of mesosiderites and howardites is problematic.


To the Editor: We read the article by Rosenfeld and colleagues with great interest and applaud the authors for investigating the predictive value of decline in (observed) lung function on subsequent decline in lung function in patients with cystic fibrosis (CF). As the authors indicated, there is a dearth of literature on this particular research question, although it is of great CF clinical and epidemiological interest. The authors utilized a large data source to examine the predictive value for a variety of spirometric variables; they clearly defined their calculations and statistical approach. We focus on one of the spirometric variables presented in the study, forced expiratory volume in one second of percent predicted (hereafter, FEV1%p); however, the comments may be generalized to the other spirometric variables that the authors examined. The authors calculated a two-point slope for each CF patient over a two-year interval by taking the difference between maximum FEV1%p for a given year of age and the subsequent two-year value. The authors used the magnitude of the estimated Pearson correlation coefficient to quantify the extent towhich reference slopes were predictive of subsequent two-year slopes; these correlations were performed overall and by defined age strata. Correlations between reference slopes and follow-up levels (as opposed to slopes) were also estimated. Contrary to what they had anticipated, the authors found low correlation estimates for associations between reference and subsequent slopes; the authors found moderate correlation between reference slopes and subsequent level (as opposed to slope). The statistical approach and findings raise questions regarding how to best assess the potential prognostic utility of FEV1%p decline. Patient-specific predictions can be made using a selected statistical model or summary measure, such as the two-point FEV1%p slopes used by the authors. Clinicians and researchers in CF have often operationalized rate of decline in lung function as a slope, which intuitively corresponds to rise over run. The authors' illustrations and plots of median two-year slopes depict nonlinear age-related FEV1%p progression across CF patients. Their results suggest the need to characterize individual rates of decline in terms of derivatives using quantities related to velocity and acceleration. A previous study of the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation Patient Registry revealed similar trends in age-related FEV1%p decline, as well as acceleration and deceleration, using flexible (nonlinear) modeling via semiparametric regression. The two-point slopes provide an easily interpretable approximation to how the population progresses with regard to FEV1%p decline, but statistical models that can incorporate the aforementioned nonlinearity, as well as covariate information (e.g., weight-for-age percentile), between-subject variation and longitudinal correlation, are needed to characterize observed FEV1%p decline in the individual patient and forecast disease progression. Although such models require assumptions, insights may be gained about individualized fluctuations in FEV1%p and predictions, possibly improving the ability to forecast subsequent FEV1%p decline. A previous study of the Danish Cystic Fibrosis Patient Registry, which the authors cited, incorporated stochastic variation in FEV1%p response in the form of model covariance to improve predictive accuracy. The authors' work provides new epidemiological insight into the population-based predictive utility of observed lung function decline. To gain understanding of how this work could be translated into clinical settings or used to plan clinical trials, it may be helpful to consider


In this issue of the Journal, Koutsky et al.1 complete a 20-year odyssey that began with the isolation of the cancer-causing human papillomaviruses (HPVs).2,3 In 1983, investigators in zur Hausen's...


AbstractThis paper aims to empirically explore political determinants of the magnitude of financial reforms, namely, under which conditions a country is more likely to choose a 'big-bang' type of financial reform versus a gradual financial reform. Especially, how the International Monetary Fund's (IMF's) effect on the magnitude of financial reforms is conditioned by political institutions is quantitatively examined using 30 developing countries' data from 1973 to 2002. Results demonstrate that the IMF's effect on facilitating a big-bang type of financial reforms is contingent upon the number of veto players in the case of a democratic government. Also, a non-democratic government is more likely to engage in big-bang type of financial reforms than a democratic government, holding other conditions constant.


In this paper, based on a presentation I made at the 2010 Annual CIT (Center for the Improvement of Teaching) Conference held at UMass Boston, I will describe two activities that I use each semester in Expository Writing 101 at Bentley University. The two activities are almost totally unrelated, but the advantage of discussing them together is that they potentially shed light on certain beliefs I have about my subject, the advantages of teaching that subject with passion at the forefront, and the urgency of recognizing that one's pedagogy must adapt when one's field--and right now, I'm speaking of the field of literature in English--is endangered and in crisis. Though journals, books, and conferences have exhaustively identified the problems I am alluding to here, the coherence of this discussion still merits and perhaps even compels a brief and very general review. Within the academy, the humanities in general and languages in particular, have been endlessly handicapped by the various ways in which our work is discredited by the larger culture, for reasons so varied that they even begin to contradict one another. For instance, unlike medicine or the law, students sometimes disregard English professors because the field is not seen as challenging. They tend to believe that the study of literature involves just sitting around and talking about books and what they mean, which anyone can do. ("Those who can, do. Those who can't, teach.") On the other hand, these same scholars are discredited when their work becomes an internal theoretical dialogue, seen as a deliberate gesture of exclusion, a private and hyperintelligible and therefore unintelligible conversation among overeducated people with too much free time. And in the current economic climate, where everything expensive is expendable, there is an ongoing necessity to demonstrate one's usefulness. Sadly, we live in a material culture, not a spiritual culture, and that materialism has a firm grasp on all social institutions including higher education. Contemplation, self-reflection, deep thought--these practices are seen as borderline irresponsible in a society where people have no homes, no food, no medical care. The fact that people are now literally screaming at one another at town hall meetings should be an opportunity for us to recognize that the study of language, texts and contexts, is needed more than ever. (1) Meanwhile, as we charge forward into the technological age, the question of whether or not books and newspapers will even exist in ten years gives a subliterate public further fallacious reasons for downsizing the babies with the bathwater in a variety of industries tied to "old fashioned" publication. My challenge, then, is to use the space of the classroom to share the reasons why books still matter to me personally, despite the fact that my relationship to them is "professional" in every sense. Presently, I will give an overview of the two teaching activities that are the subject of this paper before discussing the philosophies behind them. But the impulse behind both activities is to connect the professional to the personal through my own passion for language, a passion that I know can be taught because it was taught to me. For Expository Writing 101 "Lab," a double-length class (160 minutes twice weekly), I have designed an activity for which we use a couple of class meetings simply for reading and writing in silence. (2) Students at Bentley are placed in lab sections when they have been identified as needing more sustained instruction in reading and writing, based on test scores and other diagnostic instruments, giving us a unique opportunity to engage in what amounts to a monastic experience with this two-part activity. I also create a discussion board forum where, after completing the Read-In and the Write-In, the students post messages describing what they were reading or what they were writing, and how they felt about the experience. …


Teachers report that children exposed prenatally to cocaine display unique academic, social, and conduct problems in the school setting. No measure nor data exist that specifically identify these alleged behaviors. Experienced teachers (N = 24) participated in a consensus process to identify first-grade student behaviors considered specific to prenatal cocaine exposure. The Problem Behavior Scale (PROBS-14), a 14-item, visual analogue scale, was developed from the beliavior classifications generated Teachers then recalled the behaviors of students (N = 140) from the previous semester and scored the PROBS-14 and the Conners' Teacher Rating Scale (CTRS-39). Concurrent validity was established between the PROBS-14 and the CTRS with factor analysis. The analysis yielded a hyperactivity-impulsivity factor, composed of both CTRS and PROBS items, and a central processing factor, composed of only PROBS items. Assessment of behavioral outcomes of prenatal exposure will require specialized instruments responsive to empirical data. Ongoing instrument development is addressing predictive validity of the PROBS-14 in identifying cocaine-exposed children.


Conventional factory productivity measures discount experiments as inefficient. Motivated by the research and development environment of semiconductor manufacturing, this work proposes a complementary factory metric, potential information. The proposal adapts and modifies somewhat the Doptimal criterion of experimental design theory. Desirable properties include additivity, concavity, and boundedness. Key challenges revolve around disparate models, non-experimental batches, and strongly suboptimal experimental plans. Also sketched is the implementation into a factory information system. 1. Balanced Scorecards in R&D This work is motivated by the change in mission of a wafer fabrication plant—from manufacturing salable product to a more ambiguous research and development (R&D) role. In semiconductor manufacturing, work material is grouped into production batches ("wafer lots") of about 24 thin wafers of silicon crystal. Each wafer is layered, patterned, and cleaned; after some 300 such steps, per wafer 100-1000 integrated circuits (ICs) are produced. In research and development, the production material consists of two categories: a low volume of nonexperimental material ("vanilla") to facilitate process control, and a larger volume of lots, each of which has its unique experimental plan. The latter try out alternative manufacturing process architectures, assess particular machine and/or process capabilities, and test selected product designs. In manufacturing, the typical measures of productivity are die yield (the fraction of working ICs per wafer), line yield (the fraction of properly processed wafers), and cycle time (average time to process a wafer lot). In research and development, these same measures remain relevant, but if used exclusively they can have perverse consequences. For example, at any given manufacturing step with a queue of inventory, cycle time is maximized by giving priority to nonexperimental lots, which require less setup. Yet the facility's success is tied to the experimental lots. Another consequence of directing priority away from experimental material is sub rosa processing. Outside the visibility of factory inventory control systems, experimenters can reassert priority by running them as catch-all engineering tests. Such practices essentially transform project-specific costs into general overhead, making the facility's benefit less visible, its maintenance appear more costly, and the incremental costs from adding projects seem small. Nowadays, sets of organizational performance measures are called scorecards, and those spanning several perspectives are called balanced (Kaplan and Norton, 1996; Lawton, 2002). The goal here is to develop a useful measure ("information") to add to the scorecard of a semiconductor fabrication facility. Such a measure would aid an R&D factory by aligning its scorecard to its mission. In a manufacturing context, the benefit of production is tangible product for sale; in an R&D setting, the benefit of similar activity can only be new knowledge—information. In both manufacturing and R&D, production costs are the price paid to achieve this benefit. The classical accounting approach assesses R&D efforts as overhead costs, creating an asymmetry between production and R&D cost accounting systems. By adding an information measure, R&D productivity is measured directly, and the need to measure such productivity by traditional cost methods is eliminated. 2. General Notions Classic information theory (e.g. Hansen and Yu, 2001) measures the information of complete datasets, i.e. those with both responses and factors. In the present context, it is far more convenient to measure information based on factors only. This allows common comparisons across unrelated experiments, most notably those with unrelated primary responses and different purposes. To emphasize this focus on factors only, the measure is called potential information. Also shaping this work is the audience consuming it, senior engineering management. General goals are for the measure to be simple, in some sense additive, and in reasonably tangible units. The relevance of the latter cannot be overemphasized, since it excludes most, but not all, power transformations. 3. A Simple Example Consider an unreplicated 2x2 design. Coding the factor's levels at ±1, and including the intercept term, the left hand side of the normal equations, XX, equals 4 I3, where In is the identity matrix of order n. Including also the interaction term, XX = 4 I4. The optimal design literature proposes many figures of merit, most a function only of the eigenvalues of the matrix XX. The most common is the determinant, usually denoted det(XX), and referred to as D-optimality (Atkinson and Donev, 1993). Another candidate is the matrix trace, denoted here trace(XX), Joint Statistical Meetings Section on Physical & Engineering Sciences (SPES)


ABSTRACT This study examined the relationships between parenting and adolescent social support, retrospectively. From a more complex point-of-view, the predictive nature of various social supports was examined in relation to Baumrind's traditional parenting typologies. It was hypothesized that authoritarian or neglectful parenting styles would predict low perceived social support and that authoritative parenting styles would predict higher levels of perceived social support. To obtain information pertaining to adolescent development, a sample of 73 first and second year university students completed two questionnaires (Parental Authority Questionnaire, The Social Support Scale for College Students) that required them to think back to their adolescent years (on average five years in the past). Results revealed multiple simple and complex associations. For example, adolescents with authoritative mothers and fathers are more likely to seek social support from family and other adults and adolescents whose fathers employed an authoritarian style possess low perceived social support. Results are discussed in terms of the links between various parenting styles and specific developmental outcomes. Furthermore, the application of the current findings to family functioning is explored.


Serangan Island is the only one of the largest reclamation in Bali which until now still exists as one of the favorite tourist destinations in Denpasar because of the island's location with an international airport, complete infrastructure and coastal tourism attractions that Serangan Island offers. On the other hand, Serangan Island is predicted to be one of the areas with the threat of an earthquake accompanied by a tsunami because the island is located in the ring of fire and the island's topography is relatively parallel to sea level. This research will examine the extent to which the tsunami disaster response architectural concept has been applied to the coastal area of Serangan Island and is integrated with the image area concept, and hope that Serangan Island remains one of the favorite tourist destinations in Denpasar while still providing a sense of security for tourists. This study uses a qualitative phenomenological approach, data collection techniques by observation and interviews, the results of which are associated with relevant theories for interpretation which results in research conclusions.


During the last year the Tevatron Collider has been running not only with two new low beta insertions and electrostatic separators to keep the protons and p-bars from colliding anywhere except where desired, but also with a new collimator system. We report on this system, including sensitivity of halo evolution to Tevatron operating point.<<ETX>>


The invention provides an excretion aid robot which comprises an excreta collection device and a wheeled base, wherein the excreta collection device is arranged on the wheeled base to form a main framework. A medical care robot is a product of combination of an industrial robot and medical care needs and aims to help or replace nurses to finish medical care tasks according to robot principles. Research on medical care robots involves a lot of fields such as rehabilitation medicine, biomechanics, mechanics, electronics, material science, computer science and robotics and becomes a research hotspot in the international robot field.


We apply a recently formulated quantum theory of diatom–diatom reactions [Q. Sun and J. M. Bowman, Int. J. Quant. Chem., Quant. Chem. Symp. 23, 9 (1989)] to a model collinear H2+A2→H+HA2 reaction, where A has the mass of a hydrogen atom. The theory assumes one diatom bond is nonreactive, and the reactive scattering Hamiltonian is written in terms of hyperspherical and cylindrical coordinates. The potential‐energy surface used is the PK2 H+H2 surface augmented by a harmonic degree of freedom describing the nonreactive A2. Details of the formulation and solution of the coupled‐channel equations are given, along with convergence tests, and a discussion of the new state‐to‐state transition probabilities. In particular, the partial quenching of the well‐known collinear H+H2 resonances is noted.


To the Editor: —I observe in a recent number ofThe Journala statement that a University under British tuition has been established at Pekin, China, with a medical department in working order. The Pekin University has been organized in that city for a number of years, under the direction of the Rev. Dr, L. W. Pilcher. The medical department has been in active operation for several years and is doing excellent work. This institution, however, is under American control, and the majority of its faculty are Americans.


The regional and interanual variability of daily extreme temperature frequencies in Argentina from 1959 to 1998 was analysed. Maximum and minimum daily temperature series from more than 60 weather stations of all the country were used for this purpose. A quality control of the data was previously done. The results pointed out an important diminution of cold minimum temperature frequencies in summer that begun at the end of 70's and an increase of warm maximum temperature frequencies in winter in the last decade. Predominant time scales of the extreme temperatures variability were studied with harmonic analysis. It wasn't found a unique dominant wave, except in the case of the summer minimum temperature frequencies. In this case, with a prevalent negative tendency, the longest wave (40 years) explain between 15% and 35% of the variance. Dividing by periods it was observed that the longest waves (longer than 10 years) dominate the variability of extremely cold days frequencies at East of the country (specially in summer). The medium waves (between 3 and 10 years) dominate in the centre and North and the short waves (less than 3 years) dominate in coastal areas.


Photoenergy migration and hole transfer in a bilayer membrane composed of amphiphilic compounds carrying an N-ethylcarbazolyl group (5Cz18) were investigated. Photoenergy migration was evaluated by...


Introduction: Adoptive transfer of T cells genetically engineered to express chimeric antigen receptors (CARs) has begun to show impressive clinical results. The efficacy of T cell therapy is dependent not only on tumor recognition, but also on the survival and expansion of T cells following infusion. T cells modified with CAR constructs encoding costimulatory domains such as CD28 or 4-1BB have the capacity to rapidly proliferate in vivo, but severe toxicities have been observed due to unchecked T cell activation. Thus, strategies to regulate T cell activation in vivowould allow physicians to prevent toxicities and maximize anti-tumor efficacy. Here, we describe a novel T cell costimulation switch, inducible MyD88/CD40 (iMC), that can be activated by a small molecule chemical inducer of dimerization, AP1903, to enhance survival and drive T cell proliferation. Methods: T cells were activated with anti-CD3/28 antibodies and subsequently transduced with a biscistronic retrovirus encoding myristolated tandem AP1903 binding domains (FKBPv36), cloned in-frame with MyD88 and CD40 cytoplasmic signaling molecules, and truncated CD19 to identify transduced T cells (SFG-iMC.2A.ΔCD19). Control vectors without signaling elements, or with only MyD88 or cytoplasmic CD40 were also used to generate gene-modified T cell lines. iMC activation was measured by treating T cells with and without AP1903 and measuring cytokine production by ELISA, and assessing cell surface activation markers by flow cytometry. Co-activation of T cells through CD3ζ in combination with iMC was accomplished using anti-CD3 antibodies, or by co-transducing T cells with first generation CAR constructs recognizing prostate stem cell antigen or CD19 (PSCA.ζ or CD19.ζ, respectively), and coculturing T cells with PSCA+ (Capan-1) or CD19+ tumor cell lines (Raji, Daudi and Nalm-1) with and without AP1903. Efficacy of iMC-modified CAR T cells were assessed using NOD scid gamma (NSG) immune deficient mice engrafted with tumor cell lines followed by intravenous injection of T cells. The iMC costimulatory molecule was subsequently activated in vivo by intraperitoneal injection of AP1903 (5 mg/kg). Tumor burden was assessed and T cell expansion in vivowas measured by bioluminescent imaging using an IVIS instrument. Results: T cells transduced with iMC produce cytokines (e.g. IFN-γ, TNF-α, IL-6) in response to AP1903. iMC activation permits T cell survival in the absence of growth cytokines, such as IL-2, but by itself is not sufficient to induce IL-2 production or autonomous growth. Interestingly, AP1903-induction of MyD88 or cytoplasmic CD40 alone showed minimal T cell activation, suggesting potential synergy of the two signaling molecules. However, co-activation of the T cell receptor (TCR) with soluble anti-CD3 and iMC with AP1903 upregulated CD25 expression, induced IL-2 production and promoted T cell expansion. Importantly, endogenous TCR signaling could be substituted by a PSCA-specific CAR linked to the CD3 ζ endodomain (PSCA.ζ CAR), where co-activation of iMC by AP1903, and CAR by tumor cells expressing PSCA (Capan-1) induced high levels of IL-2 secretion, CD25 upregulation and rapid T cell proliferation. Similar results were achieved using T cells transduced with iMC-enabled CD19 CAR (SFG-iMC.2A.CD19.ζ) when cocultured with CD19+lymphoma cell lines. Treatment of tumor bearing immunodeficient mice with T cells modified with iMC and PSCA.ζ CAR showed enhanced antitumor efficacy when mice were administered with AP1903 dimerizer. Bioluminescence imaging also demonstrated marked proliferation and persistence of iMC-transduced T cells in response to AP1903 administration. Following AP1903 withdrawal, T cell levels declined, consistent with the requirement for costimulation in combination with CAR activation. Summary: Inducible MyD88/CD40 represents a novel activation switch that can be used to provide a controllable costimulatory signal to T cells transduced with a first generation CAR. The separation of the cytolytic signal 1 (CD3 ζ) domain from signal 2 costimulation (iMC) provides a unique mechanism by which T cells can be expanded only in response to both AP1903 and tumor antigen, or reduced in number by withdrawal of AP1903-induced iMC costimulation. Disclosures Foster:Bellicum Pharmaceuticals: Employment, Patents & Royalties. Mahendravada:Bellicum Pharmaceuticals: Employment. Chang:Bellicum Pharmaceuticals: Employment. Shinners:Bellicum Pharmaceuticals: Employment. Slawin:Bellicum Pharmaceuticals: Employment, Equity Ownership, Patents & Royalties. Spencer:Bellicum Pharmaceuticals: Employment, Equity Ownership, Patents & Royalties.


In this note we deal with the stochastic difference equation of the form Y,+1 = A,Y, + Bn, n Z, where the sequence TP = {(A,, B,,)}n=_~ is assumed to be strictly stationary and ergodic. By means of simple arguments a unique stationary solution {y,,(W)}n==_ of this equation is constructed. The stability of the stationary solution is the second subject of investigation. It is shown that under some additional assumptions


Simple Summary Chlamydia psittaci, an obligate, intracellular, Gram-negative bacterium and economically relevant pathogen in poultry and pet bird, could cause psittacosis/ornithosis, and is also a human pathogen causing atypical pneumonia after zoonotic transmission. H9N2 influenza virus, a low pathogenic avian influenza viruses' subtype, has become endemic in different types of domestic poultry in lots of countries, resulting in great economic loss due to reduced egg production or high mortality associated with coinfection with other pathogens. These two pathogens are easily mixed with other pathogens to aggravate the disease, and often cause mixed infection in clinics. Co-infection of C. psittaci with H9N2 commonly induces severe pneumonia and high mortality in specific pathogen-free (SPF) chickens. According to previous studies, we postulated that C. psittaci infection may beneficial for the replication of H9N2 in HD11. Consequently, in this study, we clarify the pathogenic mechanism of coinfection with C. psittaci and H9N2 in the chicken macrophage cell line HD11, which is the first study of the coinfection of C. psittaci and H9N2 in vitro. Abstract In a pilot study, simultaneous infection with Chlamydia psittaci (C. psittaci) and H9N2 virus induced 20% mortality and severe avian airsacculitis, shedding light on animal models of poultry respiratory diseases. However, the pathogenesis is still unclear. In the current study, we hypothesized that C. psittaci infection execrates macrophage function and facilitates H9N2 infection. To explore the potential mechanism, we studied the effect of C. psittaci and H9N2 on the functions of HD11 cells in vitro by simultaneous infection of C. psittaci and H9N2. At the same time, we used infection with C. psittaci or H9N2 alone as the control groups. The results showed that coinfection with C. psittaci and H9N2 could significantly aggravate the mortality of HD11 cells compared to C. psittaci or H9N2 infection alone. In addition, coinfection with C. psittaci and H9N2 did not induce high C. psittaci loads compared to C. psittaci infection alone at 12- and 24-hours post-inoculation (hpi), but coinfection with C. psittaci and H9N2 could increase the loads of H9N2 compared to H9N2 alone in HD11 cells at 12 hpi. More importantly, inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS) expression levels, enzyme activity, nitric oxide (NO) production, and phagocytosis were reduced significantly in the group with C. psittaci and H9N2 coinfection compared to those of H9N2 or C. psittaci alone at 24 hpi. Finally, C. psittaci infection induced robust expressions of type Th2 cytokines interleukin (IL)-4 and IL-10, while interferon gamma (IFN-γ) and tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α) displayed a significant decrease compared to H9N2 infection alone at 24 hpi. All the above data indicate that C. psittaci infection can facilitate H9N2 invasion and to aggravate severe avian airsacculitis by impairing macrophage functions.


The paper takes a actual gear transmission system with original motor and working machine as studying object. A dynamic model of eight-mass gear transmission system is established. The paper showes both the simulated results of computer and experrimental results about torsional vibration with changing gears moment of inertia.


The "Flexible Liquid Damper" (FLD) is a new concept of a vibration control device. The damper is composed of only two parts, a flexible ball and liquid filling in the flexible ball. The damper design is simple, but the mechanism underlying its significant damping capacity has not been clarified. Two kinds of tests are conducted to investigate the characteristics of the damper in this study. One is the sinusoidal sweep test, while the other is the free decay test. First, several parameters of the damper are investigated, such as its size, material and the properties of the liquid itself. As a result, it is found that the case of around 50% volume is the most effective rather than the case where the ball is 100% filled with liquid. Moreover, other conditions have some effect, such as the wall thickness of the ball, and the liquid viscosity. Both the free vibration and the sinusoidal sweep tests show its great damping capacity. The damping effect obtained in free vibration tests is higher than that by the sinusoidal sweep tests. In some test cases, two dominant peaks are observed; the peaks only appear in the case of some combinations of the damper parameters. An attempt is made to analyze the damping mechanism using the general-purpose computational tool "ANSYS", by creating an analytical model of the damper to simulate the test results. From the numerical results, it is found that the vibration control mechanism of this damper is mainly similar to the mechanism of the dynamic vibration absorber. However, the numerical results also show that the damper is not a simple dynamic vibration absorber and may include some other energy dissipation or energy transfer mechanism.Copyright © 2010 by ASME


An investigation of green synthesis of titanium dioxide nanoparticles using Spirulina platensis algae extract was undertaken in the Department of Sericulture, Forest College and Institute, Mettupalayam. The nanoparticles formation, particle size, exterior morphology and shape of synthesized TiO 2 NPs were analyzed through UV-Vis absorbance spectroscopy, X-Ray diffraction and Scanning electron microscope (SEM) respectively. The results showed that the absorbance spectra of synthesized NPs were observed at 300nm. X-Ray diffraction analysis revealed that the formation of good crystalline TiO 2 NPs with anatase phase. The synthesised NPs were in spherical shape and dispersed irregularly. The green synthesised of TiO 2 NPs is a simple approach, inexpensive and eco-friendly process which having potential applications in various fields.


Chemistry and microstructure of steel reinforcement bars play an important role to control the corrosion in concrete environments. In present study, we have chosen two different microstructure of steel rebars produced from companies and assessed their corrosion characteristics in simulated concrete pore (SCP) solution with prolonged exposure periods. Hot rolled steel rebar showed more corrosion resistance compare to thermo-mechanically treated (TMT) one. The growth of passive is greater in hot rolled (A) than TMT (B) due to orientation of microstructure. TMT steel rebar exhibit distorted microstructure with many micro cells which enhances the galvanic coupling and induce the deterioration while on the other hand hot rolled rebars exhibit fine grain boundary which responsible in growth of uniform, adherent and protective passive film resultant improved impedance was observed.


We report an 81-year-old male who developed severe interstitial pneumonitis on maintenance intravesical Bacillus Calmette-Guerin (BCG) for in-situ carcinoma of the bladder. The patient was treated with steroids and anti-tuberculin therapy with complete response. While there is no established standard of care for the treatment of interstitial pneumonitis, recent reports describe success with combination of corticosteroids and anti-tuberculin medications. We elected to follow this precedent and treated our patient with corticosteroids and antituberculin therapy with good outcome.


This paper describes the application of the notion of instantaneous frequency amplitude spectrum (IFAS) to discriminate voiced and unvoiced segment of speech signal. The classification procedures of speech signal into voiced and unvoiced is determined by using harmonicity measure acquired after evaluating instantaneous frequency amplitude spectrum. For accuracy improvement, we use secondary parameter during transition from voiced-to-unvoiced and unvoiced-to-unvoiced to confirm the voiced area estimated by IFAS. Entropy of magnitude spectrum and instantaneous power are considered in this investigation. The performance of the dual method is compared to single thresholding using IFAS and also ESPS, AMDF and TEMPO to demonstrate its effectiveness.


Petri nets are a mathematical modeling language for the description of distributed systems. They are particularly effective to provide a synthetic, multi-layer graphical representation of processes, unveiling aspects such as iterative structures and concurrency. This paper aims to apply Petri nets to the formalization of a typical lesson in classical ballet. After analyzing the basic principles and the commonly accepted rules to structure a ballet class, we will define a net model that can be conveniently modified by changing either its initial marking or the network topology in order to take into account factors such as lesson duration, the age and skill level of dancers, etc. Such a model can be adopted also to automatically produce a lesson structure with customized features, as demonstrated by the final case study.


Abstract To show the benefits of organic agriculture, safe and sustainable production, the present research was performed in an open field (new reclaimed area of desert) of Wadi El-Notron, Beheira Governorate, Egypt, for two successive years (2013 and 2014) aimed at a better understanding and to investigate the role of alternative source of chemical fertilisers represented by humic substances, natural nano-zeolite-loaded nitrogen and biofertilisers (HNB) on yield, morphological, leaf and seed anatomy, chemical compositions reflected in macro and micro nutrients, indigenous hormones, plant pigments, total carbohydrates, ascorbic acid, thiamine, total phenolics, total flavonoids, total fatty acids, oil yield and constituents of caraway (Carum carvi L.) plants. Our results revealed that plants receiving a combination treatment (HNB) recorded significant increases over control in both growing seasons. Moreover, economic evaluation reflects the profound influence of combination treatment (HNB) that realized the maximum gross income and minimum production cost. These findings emphasize the magnitude of the role of natural soil additions and organic fertilisers in mitigating environmental pollution while providing safe production and also minimizing total costs of chemical fertilisers.


DNA base sequence homology among AG-2 group isolates of Rhizoctonia solani was investigated on the basis of DNA-DNA reassociation kinetics, and the genetic relationship among pathological types was examined. DNA homology value among isolates within each single type was 100.3% with the winter crops type (II), 98.1% with the rush type (IIIB) and 100.1% with the root rot type (IV). Comparatively high values of DNA homology ranging from 68.6 to 71.5% were observed between rush type isolates and root rot type isolates, both belonging to AG-2-2. DNA homology values of winter crops type isolates of AG-2-1 with rush type isolates of AG-2-2 was 37.6 to 40.1%, and 43.5 to 49.4% with root rot type isolates of AG-2-2. These results suggested that each pathological type in AG-2 is genetically homogenous, and that between the rush type and the root rot type of AG-2-2 there is a small but significant partial heterogeneity. AG-2-1 and AG-2-2 may form genetically distinct groups.


This study in 2011 determined the prevalence of smoking and its associated factors among universities students in Semnan Province located in the North Eastern of Iran. 9000 students (1462 studying for a Associate degree, 6835 a bachelor degree,433 a Master degree and 270 a PhD degree)were selected randomly among 93000 students of Semnan universities , to complete a questionnaire Which was prepared based on the Global Youth Tobacco Survey. The prevalence of current smoking was 21%(80%male and20%female). The most important factors in the tendency to smoking were: friends smoking, stress, separation from family and fun . KEY WORD: Prevalence, smoking, students, Semnan


Organisations are changing their strategies in order to improve their operations. National Home Builders Registration Council (NHBRC) has grown over the years, and this has led to it continuously changing in order to meet organisational goals and objectives. The aim of the study was to assess the impact of change management on the implementation of NHBRC's organisational strategy. A quantitative research method was used for the study. Further, a survey instrument was used to collect data from the following three levels of employees: executives, senior management and general employees within NHBRC. The data was collected from 70 participants, using non-probability (quota) sampling.


The growth and form of crystalline micrometer-long BaSO4 fibers, synthesized by unstirred room temperature (18−22 °C) reaction of Ba(AOT)2 reverse micelles with NaAOT microemulsions containing sulfate anions at w = 10 and [Ba2+]:[SO42-] molar ratios between 5:1 and 1.4:1, was studied principally by transmission electron microscopy. The fibers consist of twisted bundles of BaSO4 nanofilaments, elongated along their [010] axis and held together by interdigitated surfactant bilayers. Similar experiments at 4, 30, and 40 °C produced short straight filament bundles, highly curved and cone-shaped structures, and spindle-shaped aggregates, respectively. The filamentous structures develop within transient aggregates consisting of 5-nm-size surfactant−nanoparticle clusters that precipitate from the reaction medium after several hours at room temperature. The first stage of transformation involves the nucleation of a single 5-nm-wide BaSO4 filament, followed by further filaments parallel to the primary thread. Coal...


Process innovations mainly benefit consumers by reducing prices of services and of new and old goods, which benefits aspiring ordinary citizens more than the privileged rich. The interchangeable parts of the American system of manufacturing (famously demonstrated at Britain's Crystal Palace in Victorian England) reduced the costs of many goods, bringing them within the reach of the working class. Process innovations are often financed by rich venturesome consumers who buy expensive early versions of new goods. Besides lowering costs, process innovations also increase the variety, convenience, and quality of goods. Important process innovations include Fritz Haber's inventing a way to create fertilizer from air; Henry Ford's adaptation of the assembly line to reduce the costs of manufacturing cars; Sam Walton's logistical, information technology and managerial innovations to reduce the costs of retailing; and Jeff Bezos's Internet process innovations to increase the variety, convenience, and speed of delivery of retail goods.


Abstract Students should learn speaking skill to communicate as one of four major skills in learning English language. However, language anxiety will be experienced by students in learning speaking. The research is aimed to know students' perception of language anxiety in speaking skill. The learners' perception of language anxiety deserve a special mention as it is one of the parties directly involved in learning process. This study explores learners' perceptions of language anxiety in speaking classes at one of the university in Cimahi. This study involved thirty five students from  Indonesian Language Department as sample. To collect the data the researchers used numerical likert scale in the questionnaire by Dornyeiand Taguchi (2010: 150) with thirteen questions. From the results, most of students felt the various anxieties when they speak; for example being laugh at by other students when they make mistakes, and most of students feel ashamed if they got bad grades in English. Keywords: Students Perception, Language Anxiety, Speaking.


In present study, A spark ignition and a compression ignition engine with unfold valve scavenging of the cylinder and a transfer valve in the piston crown have been described. A great disadvantage of two-stroke engines is ports which are made in the cylinder bearing surface. Under the heat which is realised during the combustion, the thermal extension of the range in proximity of the ports and other parts of the cylinder is different and so the distortion of the geometry of the cylinder liner surface force the designer to make the clearance between the piston and the cylinder liner bigger. This paper presents the critical review to study the effect of fuel injection timing and scavenging using diesel on the combustion and emission characteristics of a single cylinder, two stroke, air cooled direct injection diesel engine. It is well known that injection strategies including the injection timing and pressure play the most important role in determining engine performance, especially in scavenging emissions. However, the injection timing and pressure quantitatively affect the performance of the diesel engine.


Forty-two patients who had 42 osteoarthritic and eight traumatic arthritic knees underwent open wedge high tibial osteotomies. The osteotomy sites were filled up with either autogenous, allogeneous or a combination of spaced bone grafts that were secured with or Without internal fixations. An additional post-operative cast protection was employed for two to three weeks. The hospitalization of patients ranged from 8-26 days with an average of 1.8 days. Using Insall's criteria6,7,the knee score of our patients improved from 62 points pre-operatively to 88.8 points post-operatively. The preoperative mechanical axis alignment averaged 10 degrees varus deformity, while the final follow-up evaluation demonstrated an average of five degrees valgus. There is no non-union, and neither neurovascular injuries nor post-operative infections occurred. However, one of the patients experienced an intraoperative fracturing of the proximal fibular, thus ending up with recurrent varus deformity, and one has a screw loosening. In each case, the three month post-operative X-ray demonstrated good bony union. The overall good and excellent clinical result is 86.8%. It is not a demanding and complicated procedure. It shows exciting and encouraging promise in treating medial compartmental problems of the knee. It is a less painful procedure since no fibulectomy or fibular osteotomy is needed.


Neuroinflammatory and neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson's (PD) and multiple sclerosis (MS) often result in a severe impairment of the patient´s quality of life. Effective therapies for the treatment are currently not available, which results in a high socio-economic burden. Due to the heterogeneity of the disease subtypes, stratification is particularly difficult in the early phase of the disease and is mainly based on clinical parameters such as neurophysiological tests and central nervous imaging. Due to good accessibility and stability, blood and cerebrospinal fluid metabolite markers could serve as surrogates for neurodegenerative processes. This can lead to an improved mechanistic understanding of these diseases and further be used as "treatment response" biomarkers in preclinical and clinical development programs. Therefore, plasma and CSF metabolite profiles will be identified that allow differentiation of PD from healthy controls, association of PD with dementia (PDD) and differentiation of PD subtypes such as akinetic rigid and tremor dominant PD patients. In addition, plasma metabolites for the diagnosis of primary progressive MS (PPMS) should be investigated and tested for their specificity to relapsing-remitting MS (RRMS) and their development during PPMS progression.
By applying untargeted high-resolution metabolomics of PD patient samples and in using random forest and partial least square machine learning algorithms, this study identified 20 plasma metabolites and 14 CSF metabolite biomarkers. These differentiate against healthy individuals with an AUC of 0.8 and 0.9 in PD, respectively. We also identify ten PDD specific serum metabolites, which differentiate against healthy individuals and PD patients without dementia with an AUC of 1.0, respectively. Furthermore, 23 akinetic-rigid specific plasma markers were identified, which differentiate against tremor-dominant PD patients with an AUC of 0.94 and against healthy individuals with an AUC of 0.98. These findings also suggest more severe disease pathology in the akinetic-rigid PD than in tremor dominant PD. In the analysis of MS patient samples a partial least square analysis yielded predictive models for the classification of PPMS and resulted in 20 PPMS specific metabolites. In another MS study unknown changes in human metabolism were identified after administration of the multiple sclerosis drug dimethylfumarate, which is used for the treatment of RRMS. These results allow to describe and understand the hitherto completely unknown mechanism of action of this new drug and to use these findings for the further development of new drugs and targets against RRMS.
In conclusion, these results have the potential for improved diagnosis of these diseases and improvement of mechanistic understandings, as multiple deregulated pathways were identified. Moreover, novel Dimethylfumarate targets can be used to aid drug development and treatment efficiency. Overall, metabolite profiling in combination with machine learning identified as a promising approach for biomarker discovery and mode of action elucidation.


An attempt is made in this article to provide a readable summary of the bases for and problems encountered with the resistivity and induced polarization methods in gencrat application. The article commences with a discussion of aqueous electrolytic conduction in rocks including consideration of the effects of temperature, rock texture, rock type, geological processes, and of the presence of clay minerals. Doth electrode and membrane polarization in soils and rocks are described in simple terms. The elementary theory for the rcsistivity and induced polarization methods are next described in terms of formulas for electrodes on a homogeneous and layered half-space. The notion of apparent resistivity is introduced. Vertical electric sounding is described in relation to curve types, inversion, equivalence, anisotropy, and correlation. ProfXug with resistivity is briefiy described while combined sounding-profiling is treated in more detail for both the resistivity and induced polarization methods. The parameters used to describe the induced polarization phenomena are next introduced. A brief discourse follows on data acquisition and processing including design considerations for transmitters and receivers, electrodes, and wire logistics.


The frequency regulation is an essential part of ancillary services in power systems to mitigate the impacts of uncertainty of load and variable energy resources (VERs) on system frequency. The battery energy storage systems (BESSs), typically with fast response rates, are one of the promising technologies to provide the frequency regulation service. However, the BESS along is not capable to restore frequency due to its limited capacity. As such, a hybrid frequency regulation system consisting of BESS and generators is usually more preferred. In this study, we first propose an optimal allocation method for regulation tasks to minimize the overall regulation cost of the hybrid system. We then optimize the regulation capacity of BESS and generators based on the optimal allocation method. The application of the proposed methods is illustrated with real regulation data from PJM. Simulation results indicate that the hybrid regulation system can better reduce frequency deviations at a lower cost.


A hydrogenating process of poor catalytic cracking raw material includes such steps as sequential contacting of said raw material with hydroprotecter, demetalizing hydrocatalyst and hydrorefining catalyst, reacting at 330-420 deg.C, 5-10 MPa (hydrogen), 300-(1000:1) volume ratio jof hydrogen to oil and liquid space speed of 0.2-1.2/hr with hydrogen, cooling, and separating of liquid from hydrogen. The gas product containing hydrogen can be cyclically used. The liquid product comes into fraction system. After above hydrogenating, said raw material contains less content of S, N and metals.


In this study,a salt tolerant variety VAO-9was used to analyse leaf cDNA library of oat treated with 300mmol/L NaCl by Illumina sequencing and in silico expression profile.At the same time,relative conductivity,MDA,and proline content of leaves under 0(CK),100,200,250 and 300 mmol/L NaCl stressed were determined,probed the relationship between the differentially expressed of genes and physiological response to salt stress.The results showed that:(1)transcriptome sequencing get 65 801 Unigenes,and the gene expression in oat transcriptome showed high nonhomogeneity and redundancy.FDR value≤0.001 and log2 Ratio≥2as the selection criteria when identify and analyze differentially expressed genes(DEGs),compared with the control,there were 306 and 64genes up-and down-regulated expressed respectively coercion 0.5h;coercion 3h,there were 639 genes up-regulated,290 genes down-regulated;stressed24h,1488 genes up-regulated and 882 genes down-regulated.(2)The KEGG pathway analysis indicatedthere are 23 652 unigenes comparison to the 128 KEGG metabolic pathways,including abiotic stress-related pathways,such as plant hormone signaling pathways,ABC transporter protein pathway,inositol phosphate pathway,osmotic adjustment,and so on.The changing trends of the physiological indicators(relative conductivity,MDA,and proline contents in oat leaves)were the same as the differentially expressed genes under 300mmol/L NaCl stressed,which indicated that the amount of differentially expressed genes is closely related to the physiological responses.Thus,salt tolerance genes expression can be judged according to the physiological indicators of plant salt response.


This paper presents a novel universal balancing controller that successfully stabilizes a planar bipedal robot in dynamic, unstable environments like seesaw and bongoboards, and also in static environments like curved and flat floors. These different dynamic systems have state spaces with different dimensions, and hence instead of using full state feedback, the universal controller is derived as a single output feedback controller that stabilizes them. This paper analyzes the robustness of the derived universal controller to disturbances and parameter uncertainties, and demonstrates its universality and superiority to similarly derived LQR and H∞ controllers. This paper also presents nonlinear simulation results of the universal controller successfully stabilizing a family of bongoboard, curved floor, seesaw, tilting and rocking floor models.


Our contribution focuses on a bottom-up view of the inputs of national interest organisations into EU-level policymaking. We pay particular attention to two categories of strategy adopted by interest organisations: (1) the strategies they adopt in terms of their selection of the level of government and the choice of institution to lobby (the national executive, national parliament and the executive EU institutions - the European Commission and EU Council, as well as the European Parliament); and (2) the strategies they adopt in terms of lobbying methods and techniques. Based on data from the INTEREURO Multi-Level Governance Module (MLG) (www.intereuro.eu ), we tested the following determinants which we expected to shape the strategies of interest organisations: the type of interest organisation (whether economic or noneconomic); the policy field (the empirical data on the 20 most salient legislative proposals in the period from 2008 to 2010 cover three policy fields – (i) environment and energy, (ii) rights and (iii) finances); country variations (data on interest organisations' input into EU policymaking was gathered for five countries: Germany, the Netherlands, Slovenia, Sweden and the UK); and finally, the EU funding of interest organisations and their membership of EU umbrella organisations . Our preliminary study reveals that the greatest difference among IOs appears to be between the IOs from the old member states (Germany, the UK and the Netherlands), which exhibit above-average levels of activity, and those from the new EU member states (Sweden, Slovenia) which exhibit below-average levels of activity. We can observe national patterns in the strategies of IOs in the scope of their targeting national and EU-level institutions. The greatest difference in the provision of information to political institutions at both levels of government can be observed when comparing the IOs from the UK with those from Slovenia; the scale of this difference can be characterised as giants against dwarfs . The differences in activity levels between countries are greater than the differences between different policy fields. Interest organisations are more homogeneous within a country than within the same policy field. The other variables - namely financing from EU programmes, membership of European umbrella organisations, and the type of IO (whether economic or non-economic) - all prove to be insignificant factors on the selection of lobbying venues by IOs. Although, as a rule, IOs from all five countries employ a media and publishing strategy more often than they mobilise their members and supporters, we can observe national patterns in their selection of strategy and in the intensity of its instrumentalisation.


The increasing importance and frequent use of computer aided engineering (CAE) methods motivate universities for educational activities in the interdisciplinary field of Computational Engineering (CE). Current approaches in the education of CE focus mainly on the specific topics, which are driven from a domain-centric perspective. Didactic concepts focusing on the stand-alone application fields hinder a holistic understanding of CE. Industrial applications of CE are applied indeed in the product creation process, for which data and processes are to be defined and managed regarding the product lifecycle aspects. The department of Computer Integrated Design (DiK) of the Faculty of Mechanical and Process Engineering has been involved in the study program "Computational Engineering" from the very beginning. Within this frame a new course "Introduction to CAE-D" has been established in the fall semester 2006 with a scope on the interdisciplinary feature of CE. Understanding of CAE as a process within the product lifecycle plays a crucial role in the syllabus. This contribution presents key points of a new approach towards an educational concept for CE considering the lifecycle aspects. The course aims at describing CAE as a dominating link between the engineering design and analysis, which enables efficient and reliable product verification. Students from different departments are made familiar with the notion of data integrity of CAE within a process chain.


Samuel Thomas, Department of CME, Shepherd University, Shepherdstown, WV 25443, and Melvin Louis Bowers III, Department of CME, Shepherd University, Shepherdstown, WV 25443, and Weidong Liao (Faculty Advisor), Department of CME, Shepherd University, Shepherdstown, WV 25443. GPU Computing and its Applications in AI and Deep LearningIn this presentation, we first describe various aspects of GPU Computing including its recent advancements. We then provide a survey of the applications of GPU computing with focus in the area of artificial intelligence (AI) and deep learning.


The article is devoted to the conceptual and historical-culturological research of the idea of transcendent, which would introduce the idea presented in this paper as secular transcendism into the framework of secular scientific worldview. The history of the understanding of the idea of transcendent is presented within the framework of conceptual oppositions "transcendent immanent", "actual potential", "absolute relative", "sacred profane", "cognizable non-cognizable".


The anatomy was studied of the sugar-storing tissue of nine sugar-cane clones known to differ in their rates of sucrose uptake in vitro . Clones having a high rate of sucrose uptake tended to have smaller cells, thicker cell walls and more vascular bundles than clones having lower rates of sucrose uptake and these differences in anatomy resulted in the high uptake clones having storage tissue with a higher percentage of fibre than that of the low uptake clones. The findings are discussed in relation to known associations between sugars and fibre and between sugars and the ratio of leaf weight to weight of node plus internode.


The status of the energy supply system in the Kakogawa Works is introduced and the problems must be solved in the future if ''oil-less'' iron and steel manufacturing is to be achieved are described.


Results The median duration of surgery was 180 minutes, the median time for passage of flatus was 2 days after surgery, and the median length of hospital stay was 4 days. Overall, the morbidity rate was 21 %, and the wound infection rate was 5%. There were no deaths. Eight patients underwent open laparotomy. The rate of complications was significantly greater in the latter group of patients (75%) than in those who underwent laparoscopy (16%, p = 0.002). The comparison between the first 20 cases and the last 20 patients revealed a significantly shorter duration of surgery (median 225 min. vs. 150 min.; p < 0.0001) and decreased length of stay (6 days vs. 4 days, p < 0.0001). Apart from a nonsignificant increase in the length of surgery, there were no differences in other study parameters when comparisons were made between those patients who underwent LAR for complicated diverticular disease and those patients who underwent uncomplicated diverticular disease.


Abstract Bariosincosite is a new barium vanadium phosphate hydrate from the Spring Creek Mine, near Wilmington, South Australia. The new mineral occurs as irregular clusters of pale green, very thin platey crystals up to 250 μm across and 2 to 5 μm thick. The tetragonal crystals are tabular on {001} and the other form present is {100}. Associated with bariosincosite are quartz, cuprite, native copper, fluorapatite, whitlockite, baryte and springcreekite, BaV33+(PO4)2(OH,H2O)6. Bariosincosite appears to have formed under supergene or low-temperature late-stage hydrothermal conditions. Electron microprobe analysis yielded: BaO 23.20; SrO 4.19; CaO 0.36; VO2 31.55; Fe2O3 0.20; Al2O3 0.50; P2O5 28.15; H2O 13.93 (calculated). These data give an empirical formula of (Ba0.77Sr0.20Ca0.03)∑1.00[(V0.964+Al0.03Fe0.013+)∑1.00O(PO4)]2·4H2O, calculated on the basis of two P atoms. The simplified formula is Ba(V4+OPO4)2·4H2O. The mineral is transparent with a very pale green streak, a vitreous lustre and an estimated Mohs hardness of 3. The strongest lines in the X-ray powder pattern are [dobs (Iobs) (hkl)] 6.414 (20) (110, 002); 5.748 (70) (111); 4.552 (30) (112, 200); 3.198 (20) (220, 004); 3.100 (100) (203, 221); 2.847 (40) (222, 114); 2.786 (80) (311); 2.368 (30) (313, 115); and 2.017 (100) (420, 332, 116). These data were indexed on a tetragonal cell, with a = 9.031(6), c = 12.755(8) Å and V = 1040(1) Å3; the space group is probably P4/n or P4/nmm. For Z = 4 and using the empirical formula, the calculated density is 3.306 gm/cm3. Bariosincosite is uniaxial negative with ω = 1.721(2) and ε = 1.715(2) (white light); pleochroism is weak from colourless (E) to pale green (O), absorption O > E. The mineral is named for the relationship to sincosite, Ca(V4+OPO4)2‧4H2O.


Tens of spectrograms of HgMn, normal and Si stars have been obtaned at the 1m telescope with a resolution of about 3 Å in the region of 5200 Å. Maitzen depressions were calculated by integration in the g1, g2 and y bands. It has been revealed that the depression in HgMn stars almost the same as in normal stars and much less than in Si-stars. Chemically peculiar HgMn (CP3) stars (Schneider, 1981; Khokhlova, 1983) are the late B-type mainsequence stars in the temperature region 10000-14000 K. These stars exhibit the existance of Hg, Mn and other overabundances and not significant overabundances of rare earths and Si in comparison with other stars in the same region of temperatures. The observations were made at the 1m telescope provided with different equipment. At the beginning they were performed with a transparent grating spectrograph (Chountonov G.A., 2000) with a 20 Å resolution, two years later with a classical low resolution grating spectrograph and CCD530x580 (GAD-1) and later with the Universal spectrograph (UAGS) and CCD2Kx2K with a 3 Å spectral resolution . Fig. shows the spectra of the normal star HD 192684, HgMn star HD 22929 and Si-star HD 29925 with a depression of 0.048. One can see from this figure that these spectra give a good presentation of the richness of the spectral region with spectral lines. The depressions were calculated by integration of stellar spectra in three regions corresponding to Maitzen filters (Vogt et al., 1998) using formula: a = ((g1+y)/2-g2)/((g1+y)/2), where g1, g2 and y are the average intensities of spectra at 5010 Å 5250 Å and 5450 Å accordingly. The results: no significant depression was found in 19 HgMn stars in comparison with 6 normal stars. The mean difference is 0.003. Conclusion. It is very likely that the depression is caused by Si or rare earth elements. Acknowledgements. The author expresses his gratitude to V.V.Vlasyuk for supporting this work. References Chountonov G.A. in: 'Magnetic fields of chemically peculiar and related stars", Proc. of International Conference, eds. Yu.V. Moscow, 2000, 252 Hubrig S. and Castelli F., 2001, A&A, 375, 963 Khokhlova, V.L., 1983, Itogi nauki i tekhniki, Astronomiya, 24, Moscow. Schneider H., 1981, Astron. Astrophys. Suppl.Ser., 44, 137 Vogt N., Kerschbaum F., Maitzen H.M., and Faundez-Abans M., 1998, A&AS,130, 455 c © Special Astrophysical Observatory of the Russian AS, 2004 SEARCHING FOR THE DEPRESSION AT 5200 Å IN SOME HGMN STARS 211 Figure 1: Spectra of different type stars in the region of 5200 Å depression.


We present a numerical technique and software tool able to predict the continuous saturation field during the capillary imbibition of porous media, under lateral flow assumptions compatible with the most common laboratory setups and analytical devices in paper-based microfluidics. The wetting front generator solves the non-linear Richards equation via repeated numerical integration using a high-order implicit scheme, with support for arbitrary capillary pressure and permeability (capillarity) models. The generator allows for the study and validation of current and new capillarity models in an efficient manner, including the fitting of model parameters to experimental data. Furthermore, we show that the generated wetting fronts may be used to reconstruct a continuous velocity field for the infiltrating liquid. Results obtained using the new tool are compared with the usual Lucas-Washburn approach in a lateral flow case, in terms of flow and transport behaviors.


An energy charging apparatus includes an energy charging unit charging green energy in an energy saving apparatus, a measured amount information acquisition unit acquiring measured amount information that indicates a charged amount of green energy measured by the energy saving apparatus from the corresponding energy saving apparatus, and a certificate issuance unit issuing a certificate for certifying an amount of green energy charged in the energy saving apparatus when a charged amount of green energy charged by the energy charging unit coincides with the charged amount of green energy shown in the measured amount information, wherein the certificate is managed in association with the energy saving apparatus and is discarded if the amount of green energy that is certified by the corresponding certificate is output from the energy saving apparatus.


Analysis of wheat yields over the past 20 years shows that wheat yield are growing in all regions of Ukraine. This is a result of the growing investment attractiveness of the grain industry and the significant investments made in the industry. However, the upward trend is accompanied by significant fluctuations in wheat yields, which are mostly caused by weather and climatic factors. The most noticeable is the climatic factors influence for the steppe regions of Ukraine. The paper proposes a classification approach to forecasting wheat yield taking into account weather and climatic factors and the use of machine learning methods. A set of wheat yield data in four regions of the steppe zone of Ukraine for the period 2000-2021 and the corresponding values of 12 meteorological factors were used to build computer models. Cross-validation with division into 10 groups was used to build and test of models. Numerical values of wheat yield were converted into a binary variable, which acquires only two values: "0" (low yield) or "1" (high yield). If the value of wheat yield exceeding over the trend value is greater than the specified threshold value, the new value of binary variable is 1, otherwise the binary variable value is 0. Two models are constructed to classify the excess of yield over the trend value, which are based on the regression logit and regression probit. The obtained model values can be interpreted as the probability of a significant excess of yield over the trend value. Both models provide high quality classification with a slight advantage of the logit model. The aggregate classification quality of both models exceeds 88%, which is a good result for such a complex task as modeling the dependence of yield on meteorological factors in a small sample.


The applications of power grid real-time data integration in recent years are analyzed and summarized in five aspects:the formation of real-time data center,the scope of integration application,the standardization,the key techniques and the development trend.Information sharing among EMS sub-systems and information exchange between EMS and other systems are the beginning of real-time data integration application.The research and construction of dispatch platform which integrates data,models and graphs are gradually developed in Southern Grid,Zhejiang and Jiangxi.The concept of enterprise data platform appears gradually in Shandong and Shanghai electric power companies,which collects data from dispatch systems and other relevant systems,serves whole company,and shares all kinds of information within the enterprise.IEC61970 plays an important role in the standardization of real-time data centre to realize the data sharing among all application systems of local dispatch centre and among different dispatch automation systems.The key techniques include the framework design,the component selection,the design of data and grid models,the import and export of graphs and the data interface.The conclusion of survey is that,the power grid real-time data integration will follow IEC61970 standard and open further the interfaces to bring a bright future in the grid-wide information integration and the cooperation of dispatch and enterprise data centers.