2 Introduction and Background 3 Literature Review 5 What is vaping? 5 Why is this important? 5 Methods 13 Participants 13 Design 14 Discussion 15 Findings 17 Recommendations 19 Conclusion 20 Reflection 20 Learning Outcomes 20 References 21 Appendix A 23 HOW VAPING IS IMPACTING ONE RURAL HIGH SCHOOL AND WHAT CAN BE DONE Richardson 2


The European Union faces a crisis which offers a great opportunity to rethink, redefine and set the new basis for further steps of the European development. This seems to lead to a definitive constitutionalization, or metaconstitutionalization, as some authors had already defined it. It is facing challenges such as the achievement of an European citizenship, or the definition of the Member States role in a future political union. Published online : 27 November 2014


Objective To report the method of treatment of severe facial trauma caused by animal bite in infants. Methods Antibiotics and skin flap repairing tissue defect were used after wound debridement. Results 9 case of severe facial trauma caused by animal bite were all cured. Conclusion The treatment of tissue defect caused by animal bite in infant should follow the principle of simplicity , the simpler the manipulation the better, at the same time antiallergy and antiinflammation medicines should be applied. To closing the wound, using direct suture as possible and avoiding island flap or local flap.


Let $X$ be a normal projective variety defined over an algebraically closed field $k$ of positive characteristic. Let $G$ be a connected reductive group defined over $k$. We prove that some Frobenius pull back of a principal $G$-bundle admits the canonical reduction $E_P$ such that its extension by $P\to P/R_u(P)$ is strongly semistable.
Then we show that there is only a small difference between semistability of a principal $G$-bundle and semistability of its Frobenius pull back. This and the boundedness of the family of semistable torsion free sheaves imply the boundedness of semistable principal $G$-bundles.


Sauna bathing and aerobic exercise have each been shown to affect cardiovascular function. However, direct comparisons between standalone sauna bathing and a combination of exercise and sauna on vascular indices remain limited. Therefore, we conducted a cross‐over study using matched durations to explore the hemodynamic changes of sauna exposure when compared to a combination of aerobic exercise and sauna exposure.


This article evaluates the reasons for career choice and job satisfaction among community college faculty who teach sociology, in relation to a social justice motivation for teaching. Using closed- and open-ended response data from a 2014 national survey of community college sociology faculty, this study finds that a preponderance of faculty do not see themselves as pushed into their careers through external factors but, rather, describe being pulled into community college instruction through a set of personally meaningful internal motivations. Those motivations include serving a diverse and underserved student body. Despite difficult working conditions, most faculty indicated that they likely will teach at a community college until retirement and would do so again if they could. Nearly half of sociology faculty discuss their motivations and satisfactions in community college careers in terms that are consistent with a social justice orientation.


Correlations between family-age and the mean value of slope of the spectral distribution, caused by the cumulative effect of cosmic irradiation, have been established for S-type dynamical families by many authors. We noticed that if there is a variety in the primordial surface composition, then the typical timescale that determines the speed of this evolution is bound to have a range of values. Consequently, as the mean value of the color distribution tends to steeper (redder) slopes, a progressive skewness in this distribution should develop. Using SDSS-MOC-4 colors and NEOWISE albedos, we cross-examined the S-type families members as defined by both Nesvorny et al. (2015) and Spotto et al (2015) and retained only members with albedos and colors in the characteristic range of the S-types. We corroborate the color evolution with age and we compare our results with previous estimations. Using only the "true S-type" family members, we also find a significative correlation between some particular skewness-estimation parameters and age. Our results offer additional evidence of the effects of cosmic-radiation on asteroidal surfaces and may provide possible new relations to determine the age of S-type dynamical families.

References

Nesvorny D.(2015). NASA Planetary Data System, id. EAR-A-VARGBDET-5-NESVORNYFAM-V3.0

Spoto, F.; Milani, A.; Knežević, Z. (2015). Asteroid family ages. Icarus, Volume 257, p. 275-289.


Novel ship concepts, increasing size and speed, and strong competition in the global maritime market require that a ship's hydrodynamic performance be studied at the highest level of sophistication. All hydrodynamic aspects need to be considered so as to optimize trade-offs between resistance, propulsion (and cavitation), seakeeping or manoeuvring. VIRTUE takes a holistic approach to hydrodynamic design and focuses on integrating advanced CFD tools in a software platform that can control and launch multi-objective hydrodynamic design projects. In this paper current practice, future requirements and a potential software integration platform are presented. The necessity of parametric modelling as a means of effectively generating and efficiently varying geometry, and the added-value of advanced visualization, is discussed. An illustrating example is given as a test case, a container carrier investigation, and the requirements and a proposed architecture for the platform are outlined.


The laminated metal structure (1) includes a radial outer component (3) and a radially inner component concentrically interconnected (2) with each other. The radially outer component (3) has a porosity of at least 80% and the radially inner component (2) is a radial reinforced impermeable element is a metal sheet. The metal structure can be used in continuous ambulatory treatment peritoneal dialysis catheter for holding (6) in a human body.


In order to create a cost-effective, suitable for large-scale application technology on forming a layer of a wide-band "window" for the thin-film photovoltaic converters based on cadmium sulfide and telluride we have carried out experimental studies of the dependence of optical properties and crystalline structure on temperature of the cadmium sulfide films deposition obtained by magnetron sputtering with direct current. By the two-channel optical spectroscopy method it has revealed that the cadmium sulfide film deposition at a temperature of 160 °C allows creating layers with band gap of 1.41 eV that is close to the value typical for single crystals, and the density of the photon flux passing through the cadmium sulfide layer in the cadmium telluride photosensitivity spectral range at a level 37.0 W nm cm -2 . These two parameters determine the amount of optical loss of film photovoltaic converters based on cadmium telluride sulfide with the back configuration in the wide-band "window" layer. Using X-ray diffraction methods it was demonstrated that by increasing the deposition temperature from 100 °C to 160 °C , the growth of the size of coherent scattering regions, and decrease in the macrodeformation level have a decisive impact on the reduction of the optical losses in the CdS films formed on glass substrates. According to the elemental analysis results with further increase of the deposition temperature to 230 °C the experimentally observed increase in optical losses of cadmium sulphide films occurs as a result of thermally activated depletion of these layers by a volatile sulphur component.


The invention relates to intelligent cooking equipment, which comprises a machine frame, a heating pan device, a re-cooking device, a main and auxiliary material feeding device and a seasoning feeding device, wherein the machine frame comprises a support frame and a support plate, the heating pan device is connected with the support frame, the re-cooking device is connected with the support frame, the main and auxiliary material feeding device is arranged on the support plate and is positioned above the heating pan device, the seasoning feeding device is connected with the support frame, is positioned at the outer side of the support frame and guides seasoning into the heating pan device through a conveying pipeline, the intelligent cooking equipment also comprises a control module and a wireless communication module, the wireless communication module is used for realizing wireless connection with a user, the control module is used for receiving vegetable cooking instructions of a user terminal, and the intelligent cooling equipment realizes automatic cooking. The intelligent cooking equipment has the advantages that the size is small, and the intelligent operation control can be realized.


Watching Arthur Miller and Dustin Hoffman talk with the movie director, the producer, and others about Hoffman's portrayal of Willie Loman in Death of a Salesman catches the interest of most senior-high-school students. If Dustin Hoffman is not Michael Jackson, he is still to contemporary students enough of a culture hero to capture their attention in this PBS documentary. Analysis of the documentary naturally leads to interest in the production itself and on to the text of the play and perhaps to another text, as well as the Frederic March film version. Questions abound at each step of the way: Why did Hoffman want to play the role of someone so much older? How did he take Miller's text and turn Willie Loman into a believable character? Is Willie a believable character? Why would anybody want to play Willie? How would you play Willie if you had to? Would you want to? How would your Willie feel about Linda, about Biff, about Happy? Does the suicide seem inevitable? What makes the relationship between Willie and his sons seem so bad? Would finding your father with another woman make you that upset? Would such a situation be dated? Students come back to the initial questions: Why did Dustin Hoffman want to play Willie Loman? What is there about Willie's tragedy that might have appealed to Hoffman? What is there about that tragedy that makes you feel as you do about the characters?


Learning algorithms for neural networks follow either a supervised or a unsupervised scheme. In the first case a teacher provides a target for each pattern in the learning set, while in the second one no target is provided and the learning process aims at fitting the network to the data distribution. In this paper we propose a learning algorithm which, somehow, lies in between these two schemes. The supervisor does not provide a specific target for each example but he specifies a set of relationships among pairs of input patterns. The neural network is trained to map the examples into points of the output space which meet the topological constraints related to the relationships provided by the supervisor. This algorithm is applied to realize an adaptive dimensionality reduction for the vector space representation of text documents. We present a set of experimental results showing that the algorithm is capable of exploiting the semantic relationships implicitly contained in the user's feedback .


A new kind of nondestructive test sensor and measuring system were developed based on the electromagnetic coupling numerical analysis technique,skin effect,and component magnetic flux.Through inspection by means of scanning on the surface of the object,defects and their sizes were found out by measuring the component of magnetic flux density.Some application examples in engineering were also introduced.


Liquid biopsy tests are an integral part of the molecular diagnostic workup of patients with multiple cancer types. We have extended validation studies of a new liquid biopsy test panel that uses an amplicon-based targeted next-generation sequencing (NGS) panel with a semiconductor-based system, the Ion GeneStudio S5 Prime. The workflow requires very low input (20 ng) of cell-free nucleic acids extracted from human plasma and has been demonstrated to yield results in less than 72 hours from sample receipt at the laboratory. This report details the analytic performance of the test panel for detecting copy number variations (CNVs), fusions and exon skipping variants in plasma. These data add to previously reported validation data for the detection of somatic nucleotide variants (SNV) and indels [97.7% - 100% concordant with orthogonal droplet digital PCR (ddPCR) tests]. The updated study sample sets included consented clinical and normal healthy, donor specimens, and reference cell lines to detect fusions and exon skipping [HCC78 (ROS1), CRL-5935 (EML4-ALK), KM12 (NTRK1) and HTB-178 (MET exon 14 skipping)], and CNVs [CRL-5928 (HER2 gain), SK-BR-3 (HER2, CDK6, EGFR and MYC gains), HCC-827 (EGFR gain) and CRL-5909 (MET gain)]. The limit of detection (LOD) for fusion/skipping was initially established at a molecular coverage of 42 copies and was then verified by detection of three additional fusion/skipping variants. The LOD for CNVs was initially established at 1.40 fold-change and was then verified with the detection of three additional CNVs. Verification was conducted with specimens near the initially established LOD. In the precision studies, all expected fusion/skipping variants were detected in all runs and all days of testing (n=18/18) generating a hit rate of 100%. An average CV of 20.5% (range 8.7% to 34.8%) for repeatability and 20.8% (range 15.7% to 30.5%) for reproducibility was established. Twenty eight of 29 CNVs were detected, generating a hit rate of 96.6%. An average CV of 1.85% (range 0% to 5.49%) for repeatability and 6.59% (range 1.65% to 9.22%) for reproducibility was established for detected CNVs. We conclude that the validated test panel meets the criteria for being rapid, highly sensitive and specific, and has utility for the reporting of clinically relevant variants of interest in multiple cancer types.
 Citation Format: Audrey Audetat, Cherie Tschida, Sarah Kreston, Leisa Jackson, Hestia Mellert, Adam Stephen, Gary A. Pestano. Analytic and clinical validation of a new pan-cancer NGS liquid biopsy test for the detection of copy number variations, fusions/exon skipping, somatic variants and indels [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2022; 2022 Apr 8-13. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2022;82(12_Suppl):Abstract nr 5323.


There is limited information about assessment of hearing in horses, although age, ototoxic drugs, disease and genetics all have the potential to affect hearing. Horses, like most animals, rely on hearing, although mild to moderate loss of hearing, particularly if unilateral, may not be detected by routine examination. Electrophysiological testing is therefore necessary to accurately detect and determine the extent of hearing loss in the horse. The Brainstem Auditory Evoked Response (BAER) uses a range of click stimuli to stimulate the auditory nerve, with this activity able to be measured via subdermal probes at three positions on the horse's head. In this study, we examined 4 horses, aged 6, 6, 18 and 22 years, respectively, for clinical health and BAER response. The older horses showed partial deafness as evidenced by their increased BAER thresholds and wave V latencies. It was concluded that older horses can suffer from partial deafness as shown on BAER assessment. As a result, older horses may not respond as well to auditory signals and may compensate for any hearing loss with other senses.


The EAM potential set up by Mishin et al. [Phys. Rev. B 63 224106 (2001)] is used to study some elementary processes in the homoepitaxy of Cu on Cus111d. After having checked its ability to reproduce surface physical quantities, this potential is applied to an investigation of the energetics, the vibrations and the surface diffusion of CuN close-packed adislands s1oNo7d. In each case we determine the most stable configurations, the corresponding activation barriers, the local vibrational spectra, and the Vineyard prefactors. In particular it is found that, at room temperature, dimers and trimers are still very mobile and move by concerted jumps much faster than tetramers while heptamers can be considered as immobile. The very good agreement of our results with scanning tunneling microscopy observations justifies the use of Mishin et al. potential for treating surface diffusion. This allowed us to study in details the influence of the lateral atomic environment of the adatoms along its diffusion path. An effective lateral pair interaction model is set up which is able to predict the existence of a saddle point along the path and to give a very good estimation of the activation barrier height. This model will be very useful in kinetic Monte Carlo simulations of homoepitaxial growth of Cus111d.


The second group argues that perhaps Icaza is accurate in his description of the Indian problem; but, they add, such miserable conditions, even when they truly pertain, do not justify their inclusion in "literature." In other words, Icaza should not have been so disgustingly forthright in his presentation of the problem. Such things are not pretty to read. Huasipungo has been translated into Russian, Chinese, and every other major language but the only English version was done in Moscow. In an interview with Icaza last year he told me that nineteen years ago a prominent United States house offered to publish an English editionbut only if he would change the ending to a happy one. He naturally refused and so the only American version of this fine novel is a fragmentary one that appeared in the New Masses. The story of the bloody suppression of the Indian was a "natural" for the Communist presses. Here are Icaza's own unhappy words about the effect of his most famous novel:


Broadband emission in zero dimensional metal (Sb3+, In3+, Cd2+, Bi3+) halide hybrids originates from self-trapping of excitons within the metal-halide units (intrinsic STEs). Regulation of intrinsic STE emission can be...


Abstract Objective We evaluated the knowledge of physicians, nurses, and paramedics in Poland about the procedures in a chemical contamination. Methods An anonymous survey was mailed to 600 randomly selected physicians, nurses, and paramedics. The survey included questions concerning the process of decontamination, knowledge of toxidromes, and the use of selected antidotes. Results Completed surveys were received from 510 respondents (85%). A very low level of knowledge was observed regarding decontamination techniques (from 8.3% to 34.2%), use of antidotes (from 13.7% to 61%), and knowledge of toxidromes (from 10.2% to 22.7%). Conclusions Our findings showed that for all aspects of chemical rescue procedures queried, the knowledge of medical personnel was not satisfactory. Both practical and theoretical training of medical personnel is urgently needed for life-saving procedures during a chemical contamination. (Disaster Med Public Health Preparedness. 2014:0:1–4)


4 Abstract: Longitudinal study design was devised for field trial of lumpy skin disease virus (LSDV) vaccine strains in two dairy farms of Bishoftu, Ethiopia from October 2012 to May 2013 to give an insight for the comparative serum neutralization test (SNT) antibody responses and dynamics in cattle population. Three LSD vaccines were administered to dairy cows of two farms and followed up to 63 days post vaccination. The vaccines were Capripox vaccine (n= 44), Neethling vaccine (n= 39) and Romanian vaccine (n= 40) strains. A total of 425 sera samples (including both before and after vaccinations) were tested for LSDV antibody. Among the study animals, only 13.3% had protective antibody at cut-off value of > log before vaccination. 5 2


When a supernova explosion occurs in neighbors around hundreds pc, current and future neutrino detectors are expected to observe neutrinos from the presupernova star before the explosion. We show a possibility for obtaining the evidence for burning processes in the central region of presupernova stars though the observations of neutrino signals by current and future neutrino detectors such as KamLAND, JUNO, and Hyper-Kamiokande. We also investigate supernova alarms using neutrinos from presupernova stars in neighbors. If a supernova explodes at ~ 200 pc, future 20 kton size liquid scintillation detectors are expected to observe hundreds neutrino events. We also propose a possibility of the detection of neutrino events by Gd-loaded Hyper-Kamiokande using delayed $\gamma$-ray signals. These detectors could observe detailed time variation of neutrino events. The neutrino emission rate increases by the core contraction in the final evolution stage. However, the O and Si shell burnings suppress the neutrino emission for a moment. The observed decrease in the neutrino event rate before hours to the explosion is possibly evidence for the shell burnings. The observations of detailed time evolution of presupernova neutrino events could reveal properties of burning processes in the central region of presupernova stars.


—In order to reveal the various factors that restrict the cooperative efficiency of all parties in emergency rescue, this paper constructs a tripartite evolutionary game model of government, private logistics organizations, and the affected people by considering the bounded rationality of each participant, and systematically analyzes the dynamic evolution process of the tripartite game. The numerical simulation results show that: the change of the initial intention of the three parties will affect the final choice of strategy; the cost of government supervision will affect the strategy choice of the three parties; the cost of private logistics organizations and the subsidies they receive will affect their enthusiasm for participating in transportation; the positive or negative feedback of the affected people also affects the decision-making of government and logistics organization to a certain extent. The discussion and analysis show that the feedback of the affected people should be taken into account, and a government-led cooperation system with extensive participation of private logistics organizations should be promoted to form a good mechanism for efficient rescue in emergencies.


In cross-border transactions, an amount may be taxable either in South Africa or in the foreign country, but not both.


The present invention relates to aqueous gel particles coated with a lipid and a preparation method, the lipid coated particles of hydrogel dispersed therein lipid dissolved in an organic solvent prepared by the hydrogel particles. Hydrogel core prior methods prepare different vesicles, the present invention can be effectively prepared by an emulsion method hydrogel particles coated with lipid, without involving a chemical treatment step of the surface of the gel with water or diluted, whereby conducive to mass production and lowering drugs to prevent encapsulation efficiency. The present method can be widely used to study the delivery vehicle or cell structures oil / water-soluble active substance reproduction, more specifically, the keratin-containing natural moisturizing factor of the present invention for forming cell binding mimetic can contain a large amount of water for a long time, and thus exhibit superior the ability to retain moisture and moisture, and to provide a cosmetic composition is a moisturizing composition.


Integrate product and process development attempts to consider all aspects of a product during the early stage of design. Feature-based manufacturing process planning is the bridge between design and manufacturing. This paper discusses the roles of feature based manufacturing process planning in product design and process development and the research on the development of a prototype feature-based automated process planning (FBAPP) system for integrated product and process development.<<ETX>>


AbstractThe estimation of user demands in water distribution systems is usually based on flow and pressure measurements in the system. Even when the number of measurements is larger than or equal t...


The mobile internetworking protocol or mobile IP, proposed in the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), does not consider the requirements of tactical military networks, which are predominantly radio based and "on the move" with minimal fixed infrastructure. We present a tactical mobile IP solution for the military architecture, specifically the radio access point (RAP) network, with a focus on providing mobility and fault tolerance. Our approach, in this work, is on improving survivability by moving mobility agents to higher, less mobile and more fault tolerant echelons in the hierarchy. As a baseline approach, we propose a tactical mobile IP solution based on the mobile IP protocol proposed in the IETF using Class C address assignment. It is observed that an architecture with multiple Class C address assignment supports basic mobile IP operation without any modification. We propose the use of classless inter-domain routing (CIDR) to accommodate a large number of Internet addresses. It is shown that other address assignment schemes can also be applied to the military architecture without any modification to the mobile IP. Three route optimization schemes are also described to improve the performance of datagram routing to mobile nodes.


The close relationship between nationalism and sport is an acknowledged fact. Numerous questions can be asked, however, about the precise nature of links between sportive nationalism and nationalist politics. The examples of Scotland, the Republic of Ireland, and Sweden suggest that these links are by no means straightforward. Indeed, these case studies describe very different types of relationships between sport and nationalism, depending on the role of nationalism itself in each context. In general, however, sportive nationalism, as opposed to political nationalism hiding behind sport, operates most successfully in societies where the issue of nationality is relatively uncontentious.


The invention relates to a method for influencing the movement of a vehicle, consisting of a longitudinal acceleration requested by the driver and a steering angle requested by the driver resulting frictional forces at the wheel to be distributed as a function of detected environment information. The resulting friction forces are distributed in such a way to influence the longitudinal acceleration and the lateral acceleration that a collision with at least one detected obstacle is avoided or the consequences of unavoidable collision are vermindeert.


PurposeThis study aims to augment the understanding of dynamic capabilities (DCs) by exploring the interrelations among the DC categories (sensing, seizing, reconfiguring) and the distinct impact of each DC on firm performance under low and high levels of competitive intensity.Design/methodology/approachThe analysis is based on a cross-sectional survey of 139 managers in Israel. The data were collected through Web-based questionnaires using the Qualtrics software. A two-stage data analysis was performed using structural equation modeling (SEM).FindingsThe findings indicate that DCs follow a sequence in which sensing drives seizing, which, in turn, enhances reconfiguring. The effects of sensing are mainly manifested through its direct impact on seizing, with no evidence for an impact of sensing on company performance. Moreover, under low competitive intensity, only seizing appears to impact performance, while under high competitive intensity, reconfiguring joins seizing in improving firm performance.Originality/valueThe study's findings advance the debate on the direct vs sequential nature of DCs by indicating an internal DC sequence. Our research also advocates for a crucial role of sensing in enhancing DCs, regardless of the level of competitive intensity. Furthermore, this research expands the understanding of the consequences of DCs and enables the prioritization of DC categories under low and high competitive intensity.


The present article analyzed the proposals of collective intellectuals of the Social Service in the counterreform process in health policy in the city of Campina Grande / PB and seized the contribution of such intellectuals in the perspective of consensus or resistance in the Paraibano Forum in Defense of SUS and Contra the Privatization of Campina Grande sectional health. This research was based on the bases of critical social theory, which is the result of an analysis through the bibliographical, documentary and field research, semi-structured interviews and the systematic observation performed in the period 2015/2016 in said health forum.


This paper studies practical design aspects of a high-power DC-DC converter which might be employed with renewable power sources like large offshore wind farms. The component selection and losses are studied for a 6.8kV/100kV, 5MW step-up DC/DC converter. It is concluded that inverter-grade thyristors offer overall advantages because of ability to operate at high switching frequencies. The converter operates at all zero current switchings and therefore an increase in the operating frequency has minimal effect on the efficiency. The detailed converter modelling at switch level indicates that the converter efficiency will be around 96-97%. Better efficiencies are possible with phase-control thyristors, but this would come at the expense of significant increase in the size and weight of the passive components. The dimensions and weight of the crucial passive components are calculated and the largest air-core inductor may weigh around 610kg. The converter responses are simulated for reference step changes and the detailed steady-stet curves are analysed. The converter is further tested for the worst case fault conditions. The simulations indicate that the converter will not propagate fault currents, if the converter components are adequately selected.


Prolonged glucocorticosteroid therapy is the most common cause of secondary osteoporosis, named glucocorticoid-induced osteoporosis. It is estimated that 30 to 50% of chronic glucocorticosteroid users experience vertebral or hip fractures. Prevention of osteoporosis is a very important public health concern. Dermatologists are among the leading prescribers of oral glucocorticosteroids; therefore, this topic is of utmost importance. Dermatological patients treated with glucocorticosteroids for longer than 3 months should receive prophylactic treatment to decrease the risk of bone loss. When glucocorticoids are used for a period shorter than 3 months, current literature does not suggest prophylaxis. All patients starting glucocorticosteroid treatment should be given instructions on general measures for prevention of bone loss. PRACE POGLĄDOWE


For the purpose of bioenergy production, biomass cropping on marginal land is an appropriate method. Less consideration has been given to estimating the marginal land in cities at a fine spatial resolution, especially in China. Marginal land within cities has great potential for bioenergy production. Therefore, in this research, the urban marginal land of 20 representative cities of China was estimated by using detailed land-cover and 3D building morphology information derived from Ziyuan-3 high-resolution remote sensing imagery, and ancillary geographical data, including land use, soil type, and digital elevation model data. We then classified the urban marginal land into "vacant land" and "land between buildings", and further revealed its landscape patterns. Our results showed that: (1) the suitable marginal land area ranged from 17.78 ± 1.66 km2 to 353.48 ± 54.19 km2 among the 20 cities; (2) it was estimated that bioethanol production on marginal land could amount to 0.005–0.13 mT, corresponding to bioenergy of 2.1 × 1013–4.0 × 1014 J for one city; (3) from the landscape viewpoint, the marginal landscape pattern tended to be more fragmented in more developed cities. Our results will help urban planners to reclaim unused urban land and develop distributed bioenergy projects at the city scale.


The operating organizations including Seoul Metropolitan Rapid Transit Corporation are constructing the reliability maintenance system and are lots of effort to get the system through maintenance politic for safety. It applied to SR001 system under developing and manufacturing by SMRT in the RAMS process and to the existing EMU in the RCM process base on 7 stages. This paper is to introduce the 7&8 line brake system applying SMRT"s RCM process. There are doing a lot of researches and studies in selecting incoming employees for the accomplishment of SMRT"s RCM process. We have done step by step the analysis of Reliability after establishing a standard of Reliability analysis stages. We make it code that presents the maintenance period and methods are connected with maintenance tasks to find failure modes. we have analyzed the failure pattern and the life of components through the analysis of operating data for eleven years. We are going to expand the analysis for primary system of EMU on the basis of a case study. It is required of active interests and participations of all those concerned in order that reliability analysis techniques are established by methodical data management and continuous RAMS activities.


The article is concerned with the analysis of changes in the structure of training of managers in present conditions, which represent the expansion of the professional sphere of action. The author has presented characteristics of the components of this structure, generalized the personal, ideological, professional and moral characteristics of the manager.


High‐frequency (f≥1 MHz) magnetic power devices are key elements for developing compact and low‐profile switching power supplies. Planar inductors with a flat coil are investigated,1–3 however, a problem arising from the use of a flat coil is not addressed. The problem is that normal components to the magnetic plate inevitably exist in the exciting fields from a flat coil and that those components induce severe in‐plane eddy currents. The problem is most typical in the case of a spiral coil. In this paper, a new flat coil is proposed (see Fig. 1) for planar inductors which greatly improves the problem because paths of eddy currents are chopped up corresponding to the mesh size of the coil. It is obvious that density of eddy currents becomes small when the mesh size becomes fine. Sandwich planar inductors with a proposed coil (mesh coil) and a meander one were prepared for preliminary tests using pairs of Metglas 2705M amorphous ribbons of 50×50 mm2 and 100‐μm copper wires, where the mesh size was 3 mm, eq...


This study aims to determine whether the retaliation variable can moderate the personal cost, professional commitment, and ethical environment variables in the interest of the Civil Service Inspectorate of Sidoarjo Regency in whistleblowing. This study uses primary data while samples are taken by random sampling by distributing questionnaires through google form to get 45 respondents. This study indicates that the variables of professional commitment and ethical environment have a significant effect on interest in whistleblowing. Still, personal costs are stated to have no effect. The retaliation variable can moderate the influence of the personal cost and ethical environment variables on interest in whistleblowing. So it can be concluded that there is quasi-moderation, which means that the variable that moderates the relationship between the independent variable and the dependent variable and at the same time becomes the independent variable. The results of this study are stated to be very useful for the Sidoarjo Regency Inspectorate; besides that, this research provides input so that the Sidoarjo Regency Inspectorate improves the whistleblowing system flow for internal employees themselves.


In this paper, computer-based methods for defining tumor region in the brain using MRI images is presented. Brain tumor detection is a most important area in medical image processing. Various methods are used to know whether a brain having tumor or not. Magnetic resonance (MR) imaging is currently an indispensable diagnostic imaging technique in the study of the human brain . It is a non-invasive technique that provides fairly good contrast resolution for different tissues and generates an extensive information pool about the condition of the brain. Classification of human brain in magnetic resonance (MR) images is possible via supervised techniques such as artificial neural networks and support vector machine (SVM) , and unsupervised classification techniques unsupervised such as self organization map (SOM) and fuzzy c-means combined with feature extraction techniques. Other supervised classification techniques, such as k-nearest neighbors (k-NN) also group pixels based on their similarities in each feature image can be used to classify the normal/pathological T2-wieghted MRI images.


Despite its ubiquitous employment by users of English to achieve authentic communicative goals, taboo language has received little attention in the education literature. Even less focus has been placed on such language in English language teaching - specifically, in teaching English as an Additional Language (EAL). Given the multiplicity of communicative struggles experienced by EAL learners surrounding the use of taboo language in authentic communication, meaningful consideration of this aspect can be seen as crucial in EAL instruction. Classroom learning could prepare learners for navigation and negotiation of taboo language use they will inevitably encounter in social interactions in target language communities of practice. However, EAL teachers' uncertainty or reluctance to introduce taboo language in classroom instruction is a key impediment in developing learners' sociocultural knowledge regarding such language use. We foreground one case of such uncertainty and reluctance surrounding the introduction of taboo language in EAL instruction derived as interview data from an experienced EAL teacher.


Today there is no socialism-oriented country in Africa: Socialist projects ended in the late 1980s. Two cases are examined: the so-called "traditional" version exemplified by the Tanzanian Ujamaa project; and the protracted liberation struggle in Mozambique and Guinea-Bissau. It is argued that the failure of these projects lay basically in the abandonment of the peasantry, a class whose numerical strength would have created material conditions for socialist transformation. Other elements are considered like: monopolization of power by the petty bourgeoisie, destabilization by the racist regimes of South Africa and Rhodesia, and "structural adjustment" imposed by the West.


In this paper, we have investigated the spatial patterns in heterogeneous biological system by using a simple Turing model. Periodic external forcing is considered as the inhomogeneity. The formation mechanism has been analyzed. A variety of complex patterns including superlattice patterns can be induced. It is found that the intensity and the period of the external forcing play an important role in the pattern- forming process.


This report presents the results of a literature survey of the effects of borated water leakage on carbon and low-alloy steel components (other than fasteners) in PWR applications. Boric acid corrosion field experience and laboratory test results are addressed. The report reviews and summarizes corrosion events that have occurred in PWRs and provides, for each event, plant identification, year of occurrence, component or part affected, materials, leak rates (where available), extent of corrosion and repair procedures. Laboratory test data are also discussed, including some recent unpublished data. The report recommends corrective actions that the utilities should take to prevent boric acid corrosion of pressure boundary components. 18 refs., 3 figs., 4 tabs.


Ch 1: The Non-linear Schrodinger Equation and Ordinary Solitons Ch 2: Dispersion-Managed Solitons Ch 3: Spontaneous Emission and Its Effects Ch 4: Soliton Interations Ch 5: Wavelength Division Multiplexing with Ordinary Solitons Ch 6: Wavelength Division Multiplexing with Dispersion-Managed Solitions Ch 7: Polarization and Its Effect Ch 8: Hardware and Measurement Techniques Appendix A: Sample Maple Program for the ODE Method Appendix B: History of the Soliton


Investigations were carried out during Summer 2003 and 2004 at Muthorai on sandy loam soils in RBD with six treatments (P1 : Seed tuber soaking in panchakavya (3%) + spraying panchakavya (3%) at 8 days interval, P2 : Seed tuber soaking in panchakavya (3%) + spraying panchakavya (3%) at 15 days interval, P3 : Only spraying panchakavya (3%) at 8 days interval, P4 : Only spraying panchakavya (3%) at 15 days interval, P5 : Normal cultivation with spraying panchakavya at 15 days interval and P6 : Control (normal cultural practices) and four replications, to study the effect of organic spray on potato seed production. Pooled data of two years suggest that panchakavya spray at 15 days interval could improve the yield of 30-60g sized tubers by 22 per cent over control and the increase was 6.7 per cent when it was sprayed on normal cultivated crop at 15 days interval. From multiple linear regression, it was shown that seed sized tuber number was affected significantly by total chlorophyll at 90 days, plant height at 60 days and dry matter at 60 days after planting. Seed sized tuber yield was influenced by total chlorophyll at 75 days, plant height at 60 and 90 days and dry matter at 60 days after planting. This is because the supply of nutrients and other growth promoting substances seemed to be at an optimal rate and interval when compared with other treatments. Hence, application of panchakavya @ 3% concentration at 15 days interval is useful in improving the seed sized tuber number as well as yield under Nilgiri conditions.


The integration of haptics into virtual environments has triggered a new era by allowing interaction with virtual objects through force feedback in a number of fields. Medicine has been the field w ...


In this paper, an advanced load balancing algorithm in nth order Hypercube distributed system has been proposed. The new algorithm uses centralized load-balancing to avoid blocking phenomenon and processor thrashing, and shows the results which makes loads to approach average value of loads. The new algorithm is compared with several other algorithm and it shows a merit in cost function value.


Generalized analysis of hydraulic jump in sloping or horizontal prismatic channels of any cross-sectional shape is presented, which leads to simple and practical method of computing essential dimensions of phenomenon. (25 refs.)


Much of the history of black urban government in pre-1990s South Africa consisted of white control, or of corrupt and morally bankrupt Africans directly or indirectly serving white government interests in the latter years of apartheid. Despite this focus, there were instances of black and white cooperation and periods when blacks held a measure of control over their own local affairs. In Alexandra township, located just outside the municipal boundaries of Johannesburg, Africans and 'Coloureds" held elected positions on a local authority on which they were a majority in the 1920s and early 1930s. Unlike other Rand townships, Alexandra, founded in 1912, was outside municipal control and exempt from the provisions of the 1913 Natives Land Act. As a result, Alexandra fell under the provisions of the Transvaal Local Govemment Ordinance of 1912 that allowed for settlements to progress by stages to municipal status. From 1916, the township was administered by a health committee with direct resident representation. Between 1917 and the end of 1932, standholders formed a majority on the committee. As segregationist ideology increasingly predominated in official discourse and policy, Alexandra was not allowed to progress beyond the health committee stage before the transfer of its administration to the Peri-Urban Areas Health Board in 1958. As a result, standholders were forced to cling to their democratic rights by asserting Alexandra's compatibility with segregation based on its racially exclusive residential regulations that stipulated that whites and Asians could not own land or settle there. Standholder participation on the Alexandra Health Committee (AHC) and the extension of the local franchise to men resident in Alexandra for three months or more, focused political energy on local issues. Thus Alexandra residents had access to formal political structures and local organisations could focus energy on local politics and development. In other townships, as Baruch Hirson argues, new


Since renewable power is intermittent and uncertain, modern grid systems need to be more elegant to provide a reliable, affordable, and sustainable power supply. This paper introduces a robust optimal planning strategy to find the location and the size of an energy storage system (ESS) and feeders. It aims to accommodate the wind power energy integration to serve the future demand growth under uncertainties. The methodology was tested in the IEEE RTS-96 system and the simulation results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed optimal sizing strategy. The findings validate the improvements in the power system reliability and flexibility.


Predicament causation of the valuation of ecosystem services was precisely analyzed as well as the existing predicaments of the valuation of ecosystem services, which offered favorable theoretical basis for the improving of the valuation of ecosystem services in future.


The present paper investigates the error committed by using an infinite time horizon Markov renewal program as an approximation of the (often more realistic) Markov renewal program with a finite time horizon t0. Under weak assumptions the error is shown to converge to zero exponentially fast when $t_0 \to \infty$. The convergence is based on explicit error bounds. Improved error bounds hold when the (transformed) transition law has a nontrivial stochastic lower bound. Some bounds use the discounted renewal function. For the latter, monotone upper and lower bounds are obtained by an iterative method combined with an extrapolation. Several examples demonstrate the applicability of the results.


New fluoride glasses in the PbF2-CdF2-AIF3-LiF have been synthesized. Stability against crystallization has been studied by thermal analysis of the glasses. The present glasses were found to be 85–90% transparent to IR radiation up to 7 μm. The absorption at 2.9 μm was due to HF2-species and not due to OH-species. A static dissolution test showed very low solubility for these glasses in water at room temperature. Results on refractive index and microhardness measurements have been discussed.


The design of orthogonal waveform was one of key technology to realize MIMO radar.Presently,some statistical optimization arithmetic,such as SA(Simulated Annealing) and GA(Genetic Algorithms),was often used to design orthogonal waveforms for MIMO radar.The common flaws of before-mentioned methods were low efficiency and the performance of waveform set should descend along with the increase of the waveform number.So a new method based on chaos frequency modulation signal was proposed to design orthogonal waveform set for MIMO radar.Because of the well statistic characteristic,the good orthogonal waveform set is gotten without using optimization arithmetic.Moreover,the waveform number would not affect the performance of waveform set.So the proposed method has advantage at arithmetic efficiency and waveform diversity.The simulations indicated the validity of the method.


Modern conditions impose special requirements to the assessment of economic entities. Efficiency is an important parameter of the activity of any business. The present research involved a critical analysis of standard methods for assessing the effectiveness of both domestic and foreign practices. The analysis revealed a need to apply new approaches to business efficiency assessment because the standard approach is not systematic and its indicators repeat themselves. The article offers a new conceptual methodological approach to understanding the term efficiency. The new methodological concept is hybrid in nature and includes classical economic, financial, and institutional methods. It also adopts some methods and approaches from management and natural sciences. The authors built a comprehensive model for assessing the effectiveness of an economic entity in modern conditions. It is based on the idea that the optimal methods are those that do not use relative indicators. This model includes three levels of indicators: standard, qualitative, and synergistic. The new approach is systemic and corresponds to modern economic environment, which resolves the issue of relative performance indicators.


As one of the important parts of the space system, the reliability of the SRAM storage circuit always affects the safety of the spacecraft. The harsh environment full of radiation and extreme temperature in space brings radiation effect and aging effect to the circuit, which causes accidental damage and life reduction of the device, and in serious cases, circuit error and system failure. In this paper, from the perspective of fault model and fault injection, the hybrid modeling method of device level and circuit level is adopted to establish the fault model. At the same time, the sensitive area and the randomness of the fault are considered, and the switching factor is introduced to comprehensively consider the fault injection to improve the accuracy of the model. A device-level Metal-Oxide-Semiconductor Field-Effect Transistor (MOSFET) simulation model is established in Technology Computer-Aided Design (TCAD), and the process calibration of the established MOSFET model is carried out through the process library file, to better approximate the actual model. Combined with the established MOSFET device model, the failure mechanism of single-particle effect in radiation effect and negative bias temperature instability effect in aging effect was studied. Based on the physical mechanism of the device level, the fault is mapped to the circuit level and the corresponding hybrid model is established. Combined with the advantages of the Veriloga language, the current source, and voltage source models are established, and the fault sensitive area and the randomness of fault occurrence are considered, and the switching factor is introduced into the fault model. Then, the established fault model is injected into the SRAM storage circuit in the form of fault devices for fault simulation, and the power current data is collected and compared with the fault model without a switching factor. Taking the measured data as a reference, the data errors of the two are compared. Experimental results show that the proposed fault model fits the actual data better and has higher accuracy.


The emergence of social networking web sites has created numerous interactive sharing platforms for users to upload, comment, and share multimedia content online within their social circles. It has led to the massive number of web multimedia documents, together with their rich meta-information, such as category information, user tagging and description, and user comments. Such interconnected but heterogeneous social media data has provided opportunities for understanding traditional multimedia data, such as images and text documents. More importantly, the different types of activities and interactions of social users could be utilized to understand and analyze user behaviors, and discover social trends in social networks. Clustering is an important approach to the analysis and mining of social media data. However, different from traditional multimedia data, the social media data are typically massive, diverse, heterogeneous and noisy. Those characteristics of social media data raise new challenges for existing clustering techniques, including the scalability to big data, the ability to automatically recognize the number of clusters in data sets, the strategies to effectively integrate data from heterogeneous resources for clustering, and the robustness to noisy features. Moreover, considering that different social users may have different preferences for categorizing the social media data, incorporating user preferences into the clustering framework to produce personalized data clusters is also a challenge. In order to address the above issues, in this thesis, we investigate and develop novel clustering algorithms for the fast and robust clustering of large-scale social media data by integrating their multiple but different types of features and user preferences, and explore their applications to the associative social media mining tasks. Towards this goal, we have completed four key tasks. First, we developed a twostep semi-supervised hierarchical clustering algorithm, termed Personalized Hierarchical


Teresa of Avila's desire for suffering cannot be interpreted as the mere passive assumption of a feminine sacrificial role. On the contrary, Teresa was able to transform her suffering into the incarnated performance of her relationship with God: By desiring suffering and by understanding it and her ability to confront it as proof of divine love, she was able to reinforce her self‐confidence and strength. This article discusses Teresa of Avila's experience and interpretation of suffering in the context of the female ascetic‐mystic Christian tradition. It criticizes Teresa's positive conceptualization of suffering but examines in depth the potential of her ability to actively manage and control it. Although Teresa was able to affirm her personality through ascetic practices such as self‐humiliation and mortification, the general applicability of such practices to the management of suffering is fraught since they leave the suffering individual in a vulnerable position. Although Teresa of Avila finds fulfillment and, paradoxically, self‐actualization through self‐denial and the surrender of her will, such practices entail the substantial risk of total self‐annihilation.


The article presents the results of the comprehensive assessment of food security of the Samara region. Factors affecting it are identified. An economic and mathematical modeling of the dependence of the consumption of various foods on the income level of the population has been carried out. The directions for strengthening the food security of the Samara region and Russia as a whole are proposed.


Abstract Many research studies conclude that satisfaction is strongly and positively related to repurchase intentions and loyalty behaviour. However, companies are often faced with the perplexing question of why some customers, who are satisfied, still switch suppliers given the right circumstances. To answer this question, an exploratory research study was conducted in the facilities-management industry with business-to-business service customers. The study was conducted in two stages: an exploratory stage that focused on the industry as a whole, and a confirmatory stage that focused on lost customers from one specific company. It was found that switching motives and actual reasons for switching are quite different. Customers, despite being satisfied, are more likely to switch suppliers for price reasons than they originally stated.


The resolution of LCD and the frequency of camera video signal are getting higher and higher while LCD is applied to multimedia display.When the system frequency exceeds 40 MHz,the traditional methods restraining EMI and ESD with filters will reach their technical limit.The technique presented in this paper can be used to control the EMI in LCD by compressing the displayed data and transferring the compressed data with differential transmission based on DC balance mode,which has been used to improve the performance of the transfer system of LCD.


Perforation of a retrosternal interposed ileocolon is rare. We present a case of perforation of the interposed colon on the ninth postoperative day, which subsequently herniated to the right pleural space. We suggest that the dilated haustral trapping and the associated "waterfall" effect may have resulted in incarceration of the colon. Careful dissection of the pleura in order to create a retrosternal tunnel, and the use of a suitable length of an esophageal substitute could prevent this complication.


Implementing CIPS is the basis and key of information for petroleum and chemical engineering. The method of establishing models, system structure,and the development status and tactics of key technologies for implementing CIPS in petroleum and chemical engineering of our country are studied.


1 SURVEY OF GLOBE SEISMICITY IN 2002 A total of 16 strong earthquakes with Ms≥7.0 occurred in the world in 2002 according to the determination of the Chinese Seismic Station Network (Table 1). The two strongest earthquakes were……


Objective To evaluate the clinical restdts of Bryan cervical disc prosthesis in treatment of cervical disc herniation. Methods There were 34 patients with cervical disc herniation.There were 13 females and 21 males at age range of 31-57 years(mean43 years).The herniated disc was located at C3-4 in 2 patients,at C4-5 in 4,at C5-6 in 22,at C6-7 in 1,at C4-5,5-6 in 2,C3.4.5-6 in 2 and C5-6,6-7 in 1.There were 14 patients with myelopathy and 20 with radiculopathy.A total of 39 sets of Bryan cervical disc prosthesis were implanted,with single level disc replaced in 29 patients and bi-level in 5.The Bryan cervical disc prosthesis contained a proprietary,low-friction,wear-resistant,unique polyurethane nucleus and a titanium plate(shells)that included convex porous ingrowth surfaces,to allow bony fixation to the adjacent vertebral endplates.The level of stableness and mobility at the implanting location were observed on dynamic radiograph postoperatively.The nerve function was evaluated by CSM40 score. Results The average follow-up was 14 months(3-42 months),which showed significant improvement in neurological symptoms in.all patients.Radicular pain for patients suffering from raduculopathy was relieved completely.The average CSM40 score was improved by 8.5 points.with efficiency rate of 100%.There was no prosthesis displacement or loosening in all patients,with mean range of motion(ROM)for 9.3 degrees at implant level on the flexion-extension radiographs. ConclusionImplantation of cervical disc prosthesis Can attain deftnite stabilization and satisfactory mobility,significantly improve neurological symptom and hence provides a new effective treatment for cervical disc herniation.

Key words:
Cervical vertebrae;  Cervical disc;  Replacement;  Cervical disc herniation


This paper describes the development of a new piezohydraulic actuator for integration into a microjet flow control device. The actuator utilizes a lead zirconate titanate (PZT) stack actuator and a hydraulic amplification design to achieve relatively large displacements required to control flow through a microjet. Displacement amplification of 81 times the stack actuator displacement was achieved using a dual-diaphragm design that seals the fluid within the device. The nonlinear field-coupled structural dynamics and fluid behavior of the actuator is predicted using a system dynamic model and compared with experimental results. It is shown that minor loop hysteresis of the piezoelectric stack actuator and nonlinear deformation of the diaphragm play an important role in the piezohydraulic displacement amplification.Copyright © 2008 by ASME


Abstract This review summarizes the data for over twelve hundred four - and five - coordinate copper(II) coordination compounds. The four-coordinate derivatives are mostly distorted square-planar. The five-coordinate derivatives are mostly square-pyramidal. The most common ligands are oxygen- and nitrogen- donors. There is a trend for the Cu-L distance to increase with covalent radius of the coordinated atom and also increasing coordination number. There are three types of isomerism - distortion, cis- and trans- and configuration. Several relationships are found and discussed.


In the actual traffic, there are not only cars, but also buses, trucks and other vehicles. These vehicles with different maximum speeds or security headway or both are interspersed irregularly to form a heterogeneous traffic flow. In addition, most of the maximum speed of modern cars is hardly affected by gradients due to the fact that the car engine and brakes are rarely operated at their max while the maximum speed of trucks is affected. Considering that the performance of various types of vehicles is multifarious and the vehicles sometimes drive on the road with slopes, a novel two-lane lattice hydrodynamic model on a gradient road considering heterogeneous traffic flow is proposed in this paper. In order to verify the rationality of the model, the linear stability analysis is carried out first, that is, the linear stability conditions are derived from the linear stability theory and the stability curve is drawn accordingly. The results of the above analysis prove that the three factors studied in this paper, namely, time lane change, slope and mixing of different types of vehicles, all have a significant influence on the stability of traffic flow. The modified Korteweg–de Vries (mKdV) equation is deduced by the nonlinear analysis method, which can describe the propagation characteristics of the traffic density waves near the critical point. Last but not least, the numerical simulation for new model is conducted and the numerical simulation results obtained are in good agreement with theoretical ones. In summary, increasing the lane changing rate or the slope on the uphill can improve the traffic flow stability. What is more, increasing the slope can lower the traffic flow stability on the downhill. Finally, in the heterogeneous traffic flow of different types of vehicles, the vehicles with larger security headway will make traffic flow difficult to stabilize, as do the vehicles with larger maximum speed.


A cell-free enzyme preparation from Halobacterium cutirubrum was shown to catalyze the biosynthesis of fatty acids from malonyl-CoA at zero sodium chloride concentration, with a specific activity about that of a similarly prepared fatty acid synthetase from E. coli. Both the H. cutirubrum synthetase and that from E. coli were strongly inhibited by high sodium chloride or potassium chloride concentrations (0.5–4 M). The malonyl-CoA: ACP transacylase, which catalyzes the first step in the fatty acid biosynthetic pathway, was shown to be strongly inhibited by salt in H. cutirubrum, but not in E. coli. It is concluded that H. cutirubrum contains a fatty acid synthetase system which normally operates at a very low level of activity as a result of inhibition by the high intracellular salt concentration present in this organism.


The theory of personality is the ideal and perfect crystallization that the thinkers of generations cared the life of human being,strived to the ideals and achieved the ideal personality.Mencius established the theory of ideal personality that takes the real man as the raising goal,takes the cultivation of benevolence and justice as its central content,and is based on the theory of goodness.In order to achieve their ideal personality,he advanced a series of effective ways such as the cultivation of goodness of inner nature,the everlasting of aspirations and moral force,tempering the ethical will,the fostering of self-examination and soul-searching.Knowing and grasping the ideal personality theory of Mencius' has the important value to the contemporary personal education and the personality construction.


In this article, we consider a degenerate parabolic system coupled with an equation and a boundary condition. We get the sufficient condition and necessary conditions of the solutions blowing up in finite time. For blow-up solutions, we establish the precise blow-up estimates.


More and more extrapancreatic actions of incretin-based therapies have been demonstrated and recently case reports have linked glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) receptor agouist therapy with the improvements in psoriasis.Psoriasis is a common skin disorder characterized by chronic inflammation.Epideminological studies have showed that patients with psoriasis exhibit increased rates of cardiovascular disease,obesity,and type 2 diabetes,owing probably to the enhanced local and (or) systemic inflammation.The observations of anti-inflammatory actions of GLP-1,which exerts direct and indirect actions on immune function,together with the improved psoriasis,offer new insights into the investigation of non-classical anti-inflammatory actions of incretin-based therapeutics and provide a new direction for the research of the novel clinical application of GLP-1.

Key words:
Glucagon-like peptide-1 ;  Psoriasis;  Inflammation;  Diabetes mellitus;  Obesity


By making use of thermo field dynamics(TFD),we construct the thermal Kerr states with finite temperature.We investigate the quantum statistical properties of these states and their dependence on temperature.We discuss the fluctuations of amplitude in these states and squeezing.We also introduce the definition of thermosqueezing for thermalized states and discuss the effect of temperature on thermosqueezing for thermal Kerr states.


The {ital CPT} theorem is reexamined in non-Abelian gauge theory where there is {ital spin} {ital from} {ital isospin}. Jost's proof can be adapted with the substitution of {ital k} spin in place of the usual {ital j} spin where the {ital total} angular momentum is now {bold K}={bold J}+{bold I}. Possible implications on the parity eigenvalues are discussed. If the parity is given by {ital P}{prime}=({minus}1){sup {ital l}}, where {ital l}({ital l}+1) is the eigenvalue of {bold L}{sup 2} with {bold L}={bold r}{times}{bold p}+{bold I}, rather than {ital P}=({minus}1){sup {ital l}{sub 0}}, where {ital l}{sub 0}(l{sub 0}+1) is the eigenvalue of {bold L}{sub 0}{sup 2} with {bold L}{sub 0}={bold r}{times}{bold p}, then a modified {ital CPT} theorem holds.


The reaction of (E)- or (Z)-5-ylidene-1,3-dioxan-4-one (1) and 2-bromothiophenol, followed by bromo-lithium exchange with nBuLi, provides a new access to optically active thiochroman-4-ones 4 and 5. Stereoselective conjugate addition occurs in the first step and the resulting 5-(1-phenylsulfanylalkyl)-1,3-dioxan-4-ones 2 and 3 undergo ring transformation to thiochroman-4-ones by attack of the lithiated phenyl ring at the dioxanone carbonyl carbon atom, cleaving off pivalaldehyde. If reactants with a (Z)-configuration are used, a retro-aldol reaction occurs in the ring transformation step, thus affording the 3-unsubstituted thiochroman-4-ones 5 rather than 3-(1-hydroxyethyl)-thiochroman-4-ones 4. This phenomenon can be rationalized by the steric congestion in the intermediate enolate 7.


T his paper describes experimental research investigating the genre classification utility of combining features extracted from lyrical, audio, symbolic and cultural sources of musical information. It was found that cultural features consisting of information extracted from both web searches and mined listener tags were particularly effective, with the result that classification accuracies were achieved that compare favorably with the current state of the art of musical genre classification. It was also found that features extracted from lyrics were less effective than the other feature types. Finally, it was found that, with some exceptions, combining feature types does improve classification performance. The new lyricFetcher and jLyrics software are also presented as tools that can be used as a framework for developing more effective classification methodologies based on lyrics in the future.


As procurement is to take an evermore important role in shaping strategy, the need to develop a strategic approach to procurement is vital.

Brought to you from leading researchers at Cranfield School of Management, Leading Procurement Strategy is a ground-breaking new title that will equip you with the skills, knowledge and tools needed to articulate an effective procurement strategy and embrace a transformational role to lead procurement teams. Ultimately, it will show you how procurement can become an influential function that delivers sustainable competitive advantage.

Leading Procurement Strategy is a must-read for all senior procurement executives wishing to further enhance their skill set, master the latest developments in procurement strategy, and really come into their own as procurement leaders. Through tackling the major issues that senior procurement practitioners encounter, this book equips readers with the skills to apply powerful and practical tools for managing procurement and supply.

Leading Procurement Strategy provides the latest thinking in procurement and supply management with the broad perspective of different industries. This book is supported by an extensive range of real-world case studies drawn from the author's experiences, including Tesco, IKEA, Toyota, Coca-cola, and Apple. It includes forewords by David Noble, Group CEO of CIPS, and Peter Kraljic, Director Emeritus, McKinsey and Company.

In this book Carlos Mena, Remko van Hoek and Martin Christopher cover the following strategic considerations: global sourcing; cost and value evaluations and cost management; supplier relationship management; information technologies and procurement; sustainable procurement and future developments.


Intelligent transport systems have received high attention from researchers as part of smart cities recently. Several advanced technologies have been used to enhance the smart behavior of vehicles over road networks. Machine learning and Artificial intelligence mechanisms have widely been used in this field of research. In order to allow the traveling vehicles to make the best decisions based on the real-time traffic distribution during their trips. Analyzing the real-time traffic characteristics and context over the road network has received extensive attention. In this work, we mainly aim to assist and investigate the available datasets used to analyze the context of traffic in terms of detecting emergency vehicles. The source, characteristics, and limitations of these datasets are investigated. Moreover, the effects of these datasets on the performance evaluation of the developed detection models in this field are discussed. From this study, we can mainly infer that the available datasets suffer several drawbacks and limitations that severely affect the accuracy and performance of the trained models in this field of research. Thus, we recommend preparing a more realistic and representative dataset.


Infection of many cultured cell types with Sindbis virus (SV), an alphavirus, triggers apoptosis through a commonly utilized caspase activation pathway. However, the upstream signals by which SV activates downstream apoptotic effectors, including caspases, remain unclear. Here we report that in AT-3 prostate carcinoma cells, SV infection decreases superoxide (O⨪2) levels within minutes of infection as monitored by an aconitase activity assay. This SV-induced decrease in O⨪2 levels appears to activate or modulate cell death, as a recombinant SV expressing the O⨪2 scavenging enzyme, copper/zinc superoxide dismutase (SOD), potentiates SV-induced apoptosis. A recombinant SV expressing a mutant form of SOD, which has reduced SOD activity, has no effect. The potentiation of SV-induced apoptosis by wild type SOD is because of its ability to scavenge intracellular O⨪2 rather than its ability to promote the generation of hydrogen peroxide. Pyruvate, a peroxide scavenger, does not affect the ability of wild type SOD to potentiate cell death; and increasing the intracellular catalase activity via a recombinant SV vector has no effect on SV-induced apoptosis. Moreover, increasing intracellular O⨪2 by treatment of 3T3 cells with paraquat protects them from SV-induced death. Altogether, our results suggest that SV may activate apoptosis by reducing intracellular superoxide levels and define a novel redox signaling pathway by which viruses can trigger cell death.


As to the role of "general," Chesterman and Franck correctly note that "the formal title of commander-in-chief of the world's peacekeepers rarely means actual command authority over national contingents, even when they wear blue helmets" (p. 233). It is, indeed, a central anomaly of the job's evolution that, as the secretary-general's political power grew, his administrative power— control over the budget and resource allocation— diminished. This change is due in part to the rise of the G-77 and the power of the small states in the General Assembly who control allocation of UN resources, in part to the growth and decentralization of UN tasks that affect the peace and security functions, and in part to the growth of regional organizations and NGOs.


Photoacoustic tomography (PAT) is a novel modality that can visualize blood vessels without contrast agents. It clearly shows blood vessels near the body surface. However, these vessels obstruct the observation of deep blood vessels. As the existence range of each vessel is determined by the distance from the body surface, they can be separated if the position of the skin is known. However, skin tissue, which does not contain hemoglobin, does not appear in PAT results, therefore, manual estimation is required. As this task is very labor-intensive, its automation is highly desirable. Therefore, we developed a method to estimate the body surface using the cloth-simulation technique, which is a commonly used method to create computer graphics (CG) animations; however, it has not yet been employed for medical image processing. In cloth simulations, the virtual cloth is represented by a two-dimensional array of mass nodes. The nodes are connected with each other by springs. Once the cloth is released from a position away from the body, each node begins to move downwards under the effect of gravity, spring, and other forces; some of the nodes hit the superficial vessels and stop. The cloth position in the stationary state represents the body surface. The body surface estimation, which required approximately 1 h with the manual method, is automated and it takes only approximately 10 s with the proposed method. The proposed method could facilitate the practical use of PAT.


Brucellosis is considered the most important zoonosis worldwide with high prevalence among livestock. A total of 780 cattle (n = 405) and buffalo (n = 375) serum samples were collected from abattoirQuetta, Balochistan and evaluated for the presence of antibrucella antibodies, using Rose Bengal plate test (RBPT) and indirect enzyme -linked immunosorbent assay (i-ELISA) respectively. The overall prevalence of 3 % and 3.20 % was recorded through RBPT and i -ELISA respectively.In samples collected from cattle (n=405) the higher seroprevalence of 3.95 % and 5.9 % was recorded than buffaloes (n= 375) with 2.1% and 0.265 using RBPT and i -ELISA respectively. Similarly a relatively higher seroprevalence offoundin female animals as 3.72 % and 3.88 % using RBPT and ELlSA respectively. While the prevalence in male was 0.6% using both the test. These results revealed that RBPT and ELISA can be used for large scale screening of brucella antibodes in animals. These fi ndings suggest an alarming situation of bovine brucellosis in animalsslaughtered at Quetta abattoir in Balochistan.


We demonstrate stable room-temperature electroluminescence (EL) at 1.54 μm from erbium-doped porous silicon devices under both forward- and reverse-bias conditions. Erbium was infiltrated in the pores (⩽1019 cm−3) by cathodic electrochemical migration of the ions followed by high-temperature annealing (950–1100 °C) in an oxygen and nitrogen environment. The devices exhibit an exponential EL dependence in both bias conditions as a function of input power. In reverse bias, the external quantum efficiency reaches 0.01%. The EL intensity decreases by a factor of 24 for reverse bias and 2.6 for forward bias when the temperature increases from 240 to 300 K. The different device characteristics in forward and reverse biases suggest that different excitation mechanisms are responsible for EL.


Herbs have been highly valued and used regularly for thousands of years by the peoples of the world as the medicine of the masses. Man has always searched for that herb that heals the body and soothes the mind and nature is a rich source of biological and chemical diversity and a number of plants in the world have been used in traditional medicine remedies for various diseases. This work constitutes a literature review on medicinal plants showing behavior modifying properties such as anxiety, depression, seizures, poor memory, dementia, insomnia even though these herbs may have many other therapeutic effects. The review has been


Hegel formed his concept of labor on the basis of studying classical economy;it is the foundation for him to discover the social reality.Hegel's idealistic formulation led social reality to double crisis.Marx's philosophy initiated a new road of essence orientation on the critique of Hegel's concept of labor.Only in this way can we see the contemporary significance of Marx's philosophy.


Precipitation of anionic surfactant by calcium has been studied in the presence of added nonionic surfactant and added NaCl. A model is developed that can predict the precipitation boundary as a function of surfactant composition and concentration of added NaCl. The model uses a solubility product relationship between anionic surfactant monomer and unbound calcium and a regular solution theory description of monomer-micelle equilibrium and considers counterion binding of divalent and monovalent counterions onto the micelles. The model works well at moderate NaCl concentrations but is less accurate at high NaCl concentrations. Calculatiom from the model confii that mixed micelle formation is responsible for increased hardness tolerance in anionic surfactant solutions when nonionic surfactant is added.


This paper introduces the basic principles and techniques of Ajax,and illustrates the application of Ajax technique with an example of accident analysis system of railway traffic safety.


During a survey of mango plantations in Sindh for investigating the association of fungi with mango malformation disease (MMD), six fungal species viz., Fusarium nivale (Fr.) Ces, F. oxysporium, F. moniliforme, F. semitectum, Alternari alternata and Aspergillus niger were isolated and identified on the basis of their colony characteristics and conidial morphology. F. nivale (Fr.) Ces., was predominantly isolated from malformed tissues of infected inflorescence; it produced white colonies and some discoloration of the agar medium was noticed around the growing mycelium. This is the first record of Fusarium nivale (Fr.) Ces., from Pakistan and also the first report of its association with mango malformation in Sindh, Pakistan.


The paper introduces data field theory into the field of image segmentation, and proposes novel methods of image segmentation. Simulating some physical fields, such as electromagnetic fields, the fields of gravity, the fields of nuclear force etc., each data point is considered as a material particle with radiate ability, and the interaction of all data points forms a data field. Each image pixel is considered as a data point, all pixels in an image form an image data field which is the basis of image segmentation. The basic steps of image segmentation approaches based on data field include: (1) generate image data field; (2) optimize and adjust influence factor; (3) implement image segmentation based on the optimal image data field. Two kinds of methods are proposed in this paper. One is the method of interactive image segmentation: directly give the isopotential threshold value of the interesting target object, and implement image segmentation and extract the special object; the other one is the method of automatic segmentation: automatically segment the whole image based on the given classification number. Some experiments and analysis confirm the validity of the proposed methods.


The perovskite nanopowders of lanthanum strontium cobalt ferrite (LSCF) have been synthesized using the alginate mediated ion-exchange process. This perovskite-based material is a promising cathode for intermediate-temperature solid oxide fuel cells (IT-SOFCs) due to its high electrical conductivity, low polarizability, high catalytic activity for oxygen reduction, enhanced chemical stability at an elevated temperature in high oxygen potential environment and high compatibility with the ceria based solid electrolytes. Phase pure LSCF 6428, LSCF 6455, and LSCF 6482 corresponding to La0.6Sr0.4Co0.2Fe0.8O3-δ, La0.6Sr0.4Co0.5Fe0.5O3-δ, and La0.6Sr0.4Co0.8Fe0.2O3-δ, respectively were successfully synthesized. The simultaneous thermal analysis (DSC-TGA) and XRD were used to determine the optimum calcination temperature for the dried ion-exchanged beads. Single phase nanopowders of LSCF (6428, 6455, and 6482) have been successfully prepared at a calcination temperature of 700 °C. The TGA analysis showed that every ton of LSCF-ALG dried beads can potentially yield 360 kg of LSCF nanopowders suggesting a potential for scaling-up of the process of manufacturing nanopowders of LSCF.


2004 Background: DPD deficiency is a pharmacogenetic syndrome associated with severe and life-threatening toxicity in cancer patients receiving 5-fluorouracil (5-FU). More than 30 mutations have been reported in the gene (DPYD) which codes for the DPD enzyme. Familial studies have demonstrated that this is an autosomal co-dominantly inherited disorder. While the frequency of DPD deficiency has been reported to be approximately 3–5% in populations composed primarily of Caucasian (CA) volunteers and cancer patients, the incidence in the African American (AA) population remains unknown. Objective: The aim of this study was to compare the range of DPD activity, frequency of DPD deficiency and genotype of AA and CA populations. Methods: DPD enzyme activity was assessed in 91 AA and 87 CA volunteers from the general population using both the 2-13C-uracil breath test (Clin Can Res 10: 2652, 2004; Proc. ASCO 2003, Abstract #494) and DPD radioassay (J Chrom B 696:183, 1998). Differences, reported here, between AAs...


The utility model relates to an online water quality detection system of a direct water dispenser. The direct water dispenser is provided with a purified water storage tank. The detection system comprises a control circuit, a user end data transceiving device and a data processing center, wherein the user end data transceiving device is used for transmitting water quality information of the direct water dispenser, the control circuit is composed of a maser control CPU (central processing unit) and a TDS (total dissolved solid) meter for detecting water quality, the TDS meter is disposed in the purified water storage tank, the master control CPU is respectively connected with the TDS meter and the user end data transceiving device, and the user end data transceiving device is communicated with the data processing center through a wireless network. The sensor-based internet of things is applied to monitoring and controlling direct water dispensers, safety hazards in use of purified water caused by overloaded operation of a filter membrane can be avoided, safety of users in using water is guaranteed, and maintenance cost is reduced.


The post‐injection olanzapine delirium/sedation syndrome (PDSS) was observed in a 60‐year‐old Caucasian, schizophrenic, non‐smoker and underweight [body mass index (BMI), 18.2 kg/m2] women after the fourth intramuscular injection of 405 mg olanzapine pamoate. Clinical symptoms of PDSS were similar to those of acute oral olanzapine intoxication. The patient received supportive treatment and recovered fully. High olanzapine concentrations in serum, with maximum level of 698 ng/mL, were confirmed by liquid chromatography with tandem mass spectrometry (LC‐MS/MS). The authors wonder whether a low BMI and advanced age may predispose patients to PDSS occurrence.


Azurin is a member of blue-copper proteins family which induces apoptosis in cancer cells. In the present work, azurin (Az) has been modified via replacement of copper at active site with cobalt and nickel. FTIR revealed that its secondary structure is practically indistinguishable from that of its derivatives. UV spectroscopy and DSC results revealed that native form of Az is more stable than Coand Ni forms. SRB was used to elucidate their possible anti-tumor effect on cancer cell lines from breast and colon cells (MCF-7 and HCT116, respectively). To our best knowledge, this is the first time metal replacement of Az has been used with cell line. It appears that this process is the predominant reason for the effectiveness of Az. Experimental results showed that the anti-tumor activity of Cuand Co Az (at concentration ≤ 25 μg/L) is higher for colon-relative to breast cells, while that for Ni-Az is higher for both cells (at low concentration, 5 μg/L). Hence, according to our findings it was revealed that Ni-Az form has the most extensive anti-antitumor effect on breast-and colon cancer cells. This highlights that Ni may be bona fide copper ion impersonator in vivo. Correspondence to: Maha Anwar Ali, Department of Biophysics, Faculty of Science, Cairo University, Giza, P. O. Box 12613, Egypt, E-mail: email@example.com. eg and email@example.com


In our philosophical exploration we shall originally analyze dialectical contradictions of predispositions and skills as a source of memory phenomenon development; the patterns leading to the human professional activity evolution, as well as the identification of obstacles and barriers. The area of human orientation in the world of changing opportunities under the influence of the information society formation, hyper-reality and Smart Society in the cognitive innovation perspective, which is defined in the twenty-first century in the novelties of the labor market, new professions, in the processes of technological development, digitization, and transition to the virtual world of communication networks and the Internet, is justified. Moreover, studies of the memory environment reveal a search for "a certain space of inclination," as well as "corresponding features of each block" of the memory environment, determining the patterns of individual professional selection and prospects of a figure, as the subject not only of professional activity in particular, but of life in general. The correlation of the activity approach developments within the development of the subject's life as well as the model of predisposition realization by M. Achtnich mentioned as holistic and optimal one, maintained by the specific-historical conditions of the figure, have mostly determined the key problem, which this article is devoted to. The purpose of this scientific exploration is the philosophical understanding of predisposition and skill dialectic in human professional activity (on the example of models by Martin Achtnich and Gregory Popov). The achievements of the theoretical model of Gregory Popov represent the significant results of the solution of the issue, to which P. Drucker reached himself in his formulation of "Smart Approach." It is the aforementioned concept that stands now decisive for the prospects of a "smart society" dispute in various activity spheres. Furthermore, the following disposition considers the praxeological perspective of knowledge of the patterns of the "inclination-skills" contradiction resolving application based on the models of G. Popov and P. Druker.


Analyzing powers for the /sup 4/He(p,2p)/sup 3/H reaction have been measured at 250 and 500 MeV for three pairs of quasifree angles, i.e., 55/sup 0/-25/sup 0/, 50/sup 0/-30/sup 0/, and 45/sup 0/-35/sup 0/. The range of recoil momenta covered is from zero to 150 MeV/c. The data have been compared with distorted-wave impulse approximation predictions. In general only reasonable agreement is obtained, pointing to deficiencies in the distorted wave impulse approximation even at low recoil momenta.


In this paper we study the distance between the sign function and a class of parametric activation functions. The distance is measured in Hausdorff sense, which is natural in a situation when a sign function is involved. Precise upper and lower bounds for the Hausdorff distance have been obtained.


The proliferation of smart objects and their connectivity have contributed to the realization of the Internet of Things (IoT) paradigm, offering a plethora of applications and services in many sectors of our lives. There are a number of communication architectures put forth to realize commercial IoT. Among other architectures, programmable networking solves most of the network management problems through Software Defined Networks (SDN). In SDN, the control plane is separated from the data plane and hence can be a perfect choice for IoT where things have to be managed from different perspectives such as communications, resource allocation, energy consumption, and so on. Addressing the problems of traditional networks through SDN indirectly advocates for its use in IoT environments. However, the "softwarization" of the network, i.e. SDN, poses new challenges to the network security. Among other security issues, lack of trust between the SDN controller and network management application (application that controls the network behavior) is one of the key security problems in SDN that may jeopardize IoT security. To fill the gaps, in this paper, we propose a trust establishment framework for SDN. The main idea is to establish direct trust between OpenFlow SDN controller and the applications. Our results show that by using the proposed trust management framework, financial losses could be considerably reduced for the networks.


The research project Centauro (Connected Environments for Negotiated Traffic Control and Urban Optimization) has been introduced with a technical paper in the 12th ITS European Congress in Strasbourg. The project deals with the evolution of traffic signal control in the era of Big Data and the Internet of Things. The current technical paper describes the most important developments and achievements of Centauro, as well as the next steps for the simulations and field tests. The goal and the research approach of the project are presented. Centauro covers four main tasks: Building the laboratory environment, analysing the potential of new data sources, developing prototypical algorithms and finally testing in the real world. The latest developments on these core tasks are being described in this paper.


D oes life make sense? Most often it doesn't, yet somehow each of us has to find a way to understand what this or that event, senseless as it seems to be, means. How do we make sense out of its message? Life happens is the saying that comes to mind when I think of how senseless life often seems. An accident or illness here, having to change jobs there, needing to move or break up with a spouse, partner, or friend: All of these things can be life-changing, and how hard it often is to make real sense out of these challenging experiences. By now I have a tendency to assume that such an event is another message from the inner world given in a strange language and having to be translated into what I understand. Often I go to the I Ching to toss the coins and get the help of Confucius in my efforts to understand the message. And often the oracle does indeed decipher the event that just bubbled up from the depths in that foreign language. Lately our weather has been unpredictable, and this fickleness has made more and more sense out of the reality of climate change. Ocean temperatures rise, sea levels rise, glaciers melt, rain withdraws to parts unknown in some regions while drowning others. I can make great sense out of that message. But what about people who deny that this cataclysmic global alteration is occurring at an ever-increasing rate and say it is a political lie being made up by the other party? So, I might make one kind of sense out of the event and another human being makes another. Are we both right or wrong or neither? Synchronicity plays a part in something making sense or not. Unlike coincidence, synchronicity is more likely to have deep meaning of one kind or another. I had to go to the ER recently and saw many doctors because it was a teaching hospital. While in bed, I watched the various doctors file through the room, asking questions and staying only a little while. But one young doctor


The article is based on the review and analysis of historical documents describing prewar and postwar period of the development of the Soviet nuclear science and the solution of the problem with raw materials at the initial stage that became the background of subsequent scientific and technical revolution in the sphere of nuclear weapon development in USSR.


Multicultural education is "a democratic approach to teaching and learning that seeks to foster cultural pluralism within culturally diverse societies and an interdependent world" (Bennett, Niggle, & Stage, 1990, p. 244). Multicultural teacher education is the effort to produce professional educators who are both committed to the ideals of multicultural education and competent in their practice of it. Hidalgo, Chavez-Chavez, and Ramage (1996) captured the complexity and the progression of evolving conceptions of multicultural education:


1. The omission of the tension in the air-water interface has introduced an erroneous factor into Haines' formulae; certain additional factors have also crept into his expressions for average stress. 2. With these corrections, the stress due to moisture varies comparatively little with changing water content, though falling slightly throughout the range. The energy needed to cause rupture rises continuously in a manner not unlike Haines' measurements, and should more probably be associated with them than should the tensile stress. 3. The geometrical approximation used by Haines gives a close geometrical representation of the figure, but a mechanical approximation which is less satisfactory. Since neither the formulae connected with the true curve, nor the tables needed to use them, are readily, accessible, sufficiently exact numerical data have been here put on record.


We develop a matching model to account for the fact that worker turnover in Europe is much less than in the United States, whereas job turnover is roughly the same. The model assumes that the quality of worker‐firm matches is both an inspection good and an experience good. Both parties have limited information at the time of meeting about the match's quality, which is completely revealed only by engaging in production. Hiring practices play a key allocational role in this economy. We show how labor policies distort hiring practices and assess the consequences for labor market dynamics and welfare.


On the basis of the general theoretical results developed previously (Sokolov et al 2011 J. Exp. Theor. Phys. 112 246) we calculate the light transmission coefficient of a disordered dense ensemble of motionless atomic scatterers. We analyze dependence of this coefficient on thickness of the ensemble as well as on frequency of the light. This analysis shows no manifestation of light localization effects, even in those parameter regimes where the Ioffe–Regel criterion of strong localization is satisfied. An analogous calculation made in the framework of scalar approximation when the vector character of light is neglected demonstrates strong localization under some conditions.


A purification of lactic acid from a fermentation broth was carried out by molecular distillation following the associated calcium precipitation and solvent extraction. Response surface methodology was adopted to investigate the independent experimental parameters. Under the optimal distilling temperature of 367.1 K and operation pressure of 24.5 Pa, lactic acid purity, and yield can reach 92.39% and 74.09%, respectively, with only a single-pass distillation. A multi-pass distillation procedure was further designed to obtain lactic acid with a higher purity about 95.6%. Given the small scale of the laboratory device, a simplified mathematical strategy for scale-up was introduced to serve a practical production.,


STUDY OBJECTIVES
Could HSAT using a type III portable monitor (PM) Nox-T3 detect OSA in pregnant women?

METHODS
92 pregnant women (34.5 ± 4.3 years old, gestational age 25.4 ± 8.9 weeks, BMI 29.9± 4.7 kg/m2) with suspected OSA underwent HSAT with the Nox-T3 PM followed by an overnight polysomnogram (PSG) and PM recording simultaneously in the laboratory within one week. PMs were scored automatically and manually using a 3% criteria, and compared to PSGs scored by following guidelines.

RESULTS
Apnea-hypopnea index (AHI) was 8.56 ± 10.42, 8.19 ± 13.79, 8.71 ± 14.19 on HSAT, in-laboratory PM recording and PSG (p= 0.955), respectively. Bland-Altman analysis of AHI on PSG versus HSAT showed a mean difference (95% confidence interval) of -0.15 (-1.83, 1.53); limits of agreement (= ± 2 standard deviations) was -16.26 to 16.56 events/h. Based on a threshold of AHI ≥ 5 events/h, HSAT had 91% sensitivity, 85% specificity, 84% positive predictive value, 92% negative predictive value compared to PSG. When comparing the simultaneous recordings, closer agreements were observed. Automated vs. manual analysis of PM were no different.

CONCLUSIONS
A type III PM had an acceptable failure rate and high diagnostic performance operating as a reasonable alternative for in-laboratory PSG in pregnant women.