Dust particles are the building blocks from which planetary bodies are made. A major goal of studies of planet-forming disks is to constrain the properties of dust particles and aggregates in order to trace their origin, structure, and the associated growth and mixing processes in the disk. Observations of the scattering and/or emission of dust in a location of the disk often lead to degenerate information about the kinds of particles involved, such as the size, porosity, or fractal dimensions of aggregates. Progress can be made by deriving the full (polarizing) scattering phase function of such particles at multiple wavelengths. This has now become possible by careful extraction from scattered light images. Such an extraction requires knowledge about the shape of the scattering surface in the disk, and we discuss how to obtain such knowledge as well as the associated uncertainties. We use a sample of disk images from observations with the Very Large Telescope/SPHERE to, for the first time, extract the phase functions of a whole sample of disks with broad phase-angle coverage. We find that polarized phase functions come in two categories. Comparing the extracted functions with theoretical predictions from rigorous T-Matrix computations of aggregates, we show that one category can be linked back to fractal, porous aggregates, while the other is consistent with more compact, less porous aggregates. We speculate that the more compact particles become visible in disks where embedded planets trigger enhanced vertical mixing.


Asthma is a chronic inflammatory disease that involves the narrowing of the lung airways and excessive mucus production. Resveratrol (RES), a polyphenolic stilbene, is known to control asthmatic attacks via different molecular mechanisms. However, no studies have examined the effect of resveratrol on the microbiome in the ovalbumin (OVA)-induced asthma mouse model. In this study, we induced asthma in BALB/c mice by injecting OVA followed by 7 days treatment with RES. Plethysmography showed that the expiratory resistance in the lung tissue was significantly reduced in the RES treated group, while mean volume, peak expiratory flow, and frequency of respiration was increased. Histopathological examination of the lungs of the RES-treated group showed significant reduction in inflammatory cell infiltration and led to restoration of normal lung tissue architecture. In addition, there were significant increases in the expression of the genes encoding tight-junction molecules (claudin-1 and cadherin-18) in the RES-treated group. We performed 16S rRNA microbial analysis of cecal flushes and pulmonary tissues, which showed that RES treatment alters the gut microbiome by significantly increasing the level of Bacteroides acidifaciens spp. compared to disease controls. In addition, there was a significant increase in Akkermansia muciniphila (AM) species within the lungs after RES treatment. AM is a gram-negative, non-spore-forming bacterium known to induce mucus degradation. Since asthma is characterized by an increase in mucus in the lungs, we concluded that RES improves asthma in OVA-induced mouse model by significantly increasing AM and preventing mucus build-up in the lungs.


Construction projects are considered crucial in every developed and developing country from the perspective of economic and social development. Thus, it is mandatory to achieve successful completion of the project. Efficient production is one of the significant criteria in ensuring the success of projects. An efficient production, labour productivity is considered an important aspect. Labour productivity is affected by several factors which are essential to study for productivity improvements. Since in Pakistan, labour productivity is one of the least studied areas within the construction industry. Hence, this paper focused on determining the common factors which have influenced the labour productivity. A survey among the construction practitioners included 33 identified factors from literature. A total of 150 questionnaire forms were distributed, and only 54 completed data forms were received back. These forms were used to analyse statistically using frequency analysis with SPSS software and weighted average (WA) calculation with Microsoft Excel application. The results indicated 1 factor as very often occurring, and other 32 factors were reported as often occurring during construction works while WA value for significance revealed that there are seven factors which have extremely significant while other 26 factors lie in the category of very significant. Those seven dominating factors reported as extremely significant are the misuse of schedule, the increase of labourer age, weather changes, tool and equipment shortages, violation of safety precautions, working seven days per week without taking a holiday and lack of financial motivation system.


This essay discusses how writing serves to prevent academic progress among students of color on predominantly white campuses. In particular, the work identifies writing as a strategy to maintain as hegemonic Eurocentric truth and knowledge against knowledge and truth challenges as they come from communities of color. Garry Rolison Associate Professor, Sociology, California State University, San Marcos, CA Kathrine Rolison Doctoral Candidate, Department of History, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ This essay questions the common perception among many on predominantly white campuses that students of color reduce the quality of education that can be provided on the campus because of their limitations in writing. Instead, the essay argues that there is no such animal as "good writing" except as a construction often at the caprice of those in power across academe. The political challenge that students of color bring to this conception is one that threatens to deconstruct it. In short, awareness that communication may be best expressed through the spoken word and performance as opposed to the written word and precise lecture. Most importantly, however, as recipients of writing advice that differs from one expert to another. It is through this process that the student becomes aware that the act of correcting writing is a political one and represents one's familiarity with Anglo-Saxon culture as much as it does any rules of good writing. Which sentence do we consider correct here? The cat chased the ball. The ball was chased by the cat. It is the first sentence. Why, because the cat is the subject, the ball is the object, and it is the subject that acts and the object is acted upon or on. Oh wait, my grammar program tells me that I am being wordy here. Let's (Let us) try, because the cat is the subject, the ball is the object, and the subject acts and the object is acted upon or on. I am at a lost to tell you why the two sentences differ with respect to meaning. By the way, is it on or upon? I went to a ghetto school and I never heard of the rules that I invoked above to make my writing better. I do not think that I communicated better, but I do know that I used the rules of writing English that are appropriate. Oops, there we go being too wordy again. I do know that I used the appropriate rules of writing. Therefore, undergraduate school was catch-up in writing all the time. Therefore (consequently-same word twice), I bought a writing book for those for whom English is their second language. I learned the rules and went on. I do not know if I can end with that preposition at the end of a sentence like that. My grammar program did not pick it up, so maybe I can. The purpose is to show that writing is an arbitrary process that hides itself under putatively universal rules for English speakers. In other words, to show that writing exists through convention established by power. One who can employ these rules successfully is one who has been educated. Not one who has simply acquired the writing patterns of dominant class. It appears to us as universal because we have all given consent to it. After all, does not good writing mean effectively getting your ideas across to others? We argue only if the ones receiving your ideas understand good writing. In other words, are similarly educated otherwise it may inhibit communication among those for whom these rules are not common sense but exist in a sea of other common sense rules for writing. Say, a newspaper headline, an advertising slogan, labels and so on. What some may label as practical English. Why this discussion of practical and educated English matters and its connection to college students of color is direct? Those who determine the grades of domestic students of color apply the hegemonic rules of writing which asserts Anglo-Saxon superiority and the suppression of their respective culture. If this persists, they become disadvantaged students and do not graduate or graduate with a grade point average to low to allow them to attend graduate or professional school. The power to name a good or a bad writer is simultaneously the power to graduate or not graduate a student. In short, it helps maintain the inequalities in our educational system where students from good schools, often private, continue to attain academically while those from poor segregated schools fail to thrive academically. In the end, this prevents a professional and intellectual class to serve communities of color in a voice understood by that community. Presenters Garry Rolison is an Associate Professor of Sociology at the California State University, San Marcos. He has published on women and crime, race and ethnicity, Black student alienation and class structure. He is presently researching the nexus of race and sexuality in the United States. Kathrine Rolison is a Ph.D. Candidate in the Department of History at the Arizona State University. She is an enrolled member of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma and is completing her dissertation on the impact that Federal Allotment Policy had on Cherokee people in the 20th Century. She has also presented on various issues affecting Cherokee people. During her graduate studies, she also has served as a graduate academic advisor.


Abstract Background The Florida Keys Mosquito Control District has used dry ice-baited light traps to monitor mosquito populations on Vaca Key since 1998. The first site sampled was monitored continuously for almost 20 years until all vegetation was removed. New information This paper describes a dataset compiled over almost 20 years of continuous trapping along Manor Lane on Vaca Key, Florida.


Wangqingtuo area in Tianjin is one of the most affected cities by Land Subsidence in China,and also the largest Land Subsidence region in North China.Land Subsidence and its secondary disasters have effected the economic and social development and ecological environmental protection of the city.Wangqingtuo area is the most seriousely influenced area in Tianjin by land subsidence.It is located at the junction of the Wuqing District,Xiqing District,Beichen District,so,it's not convenience in the administrative divisions of the inconvenience of unified management.Over the years,it is difficult to find the settlement causes and take strong measures.This paper is based on the special survey in the area,collecting data including years of groundwater(well) information.This paper analyzes the evolution trend of regional subsidence,well distribution of groundwater and the corresponding settlement crater,initially gave the region the ground settlement reasons of evolution in recent years.In order to understand and take charge of the land subsidence disaster laid the foundation.


The Kantorovich-Rubinshtein metric is an $L^1$-like metric on spaces of probability distributions that enjoys several serendipitous properties. It is complete separable if the underlying metric space of points is complete separable, and in that case it metrizes the weak topology. We introduce a variant of that construction in the realm of quasi-metric spaces, and prove that it is algebraic Yoneda-complete as soon as the underlying quasi-metric space of points is algebraic Yoneda-complete, and that the associated topology is the weak topology. We do this not only for probability distributions, represented as normalized continuous valuations, but also for subprobability distributions, for various hyperspaces, and in general for different brands of functionals. Those functionals model probabilistic choice, angelic and demonic non-deterministic choice, and their combinations. The mathematics needed for those results are more demanding than in the simpler case of metric spaces. To obtain our results, we prove a few other results that have independent interest, notably: continuous Yoneda-complete spaces are consonant; on a continuous Yoneda-complete space, the Scott topology on the space of $\overline{\mathbb{R}}_+$-valued lower semicontinuous maps coincides with the compact-open and Isbell topologies, and the subspace topology on spaces of $\alpha$-Lipschitz continuous maps also coincides with the topology of pointwise convergence, and is stably compact; we introduce and study the so-called Lipschitz-regular quasi-metric spaces, and we show that the formal ball functor induces a Kock-Z\"oberlein monad, of which all algebras are Lipschitz-regular; and we prove a minimax theorem where one of the spaces is not compact Hausdorff, but merely compact.


A simple proof is presented for the known result about the strong regularity of Cayley graph of a bent function.


Determination of in situ lateral stress remains a difficult task despite two decades of significant innovation in field and laboratory measurement techniques. This paper summarizes and discusses the advantages and shortcomings of the various laboratory and field methods available from which direct or indirect measurements of lateral stress in soft clays can be obtained. These include the following tests: 1) Indirect estimates of the lateral stress ratio at rest (K(sub O)); biased on a) other soil properties and b) on situ penetration tests; 2) Active or passive laboratory measurements of lateral stress; 3) Intrusive field or non-intrusive field methods to measure lateral stress. Two case histories at soft clay research sites in the northern United States are used to illustrate the fairly wide scatter in the interpreted test data from the various tests and methods. The results suggest that the self-boring pressuremeter still remains the tool of reference and generally provides a lower bound value of in situ horizontal stress. However, other intrusive type methods are promising and can give relatively good estimates of the field lateral stress state. (A) For the covering abstract see IRRD 859983.


We investigate whether permanent price impact measures describing intra-day price movements are helpful in characterizing information asymmetry about the fundamentals of firms. We conduct an event study of the Russell 1000 index reconstitution and find that the permanent price impact measures change around the event despite the fact that Russell 1000 membership is based on market capitalization and therefore the event is not associated with any change in private information about the firms. We also examine a large cross-sectional sample and find that the permanent price impact measures do not consistently reflect uncertainty about future earnings or relate to price informativeness about future earnings in a manner that is compatible with their use as proxies for information asymmetry about firms' fundamentals.


Molecular phylogenies of extant species are considered effective tools to infer mechanisms of speciation. Here, we benefit from this utility to investigate the evolutionary history of an organismal group linked to different aquatic ecosystems, the microgastropod genus Pseudamnicola (family Hydrobiidae). Previous studies have found around 45 species of the nominal subgenus P. (Pseudamnicola), most of them in coastal stream localities of several Mediterranean islands and mainland territories, whereas only 12 species of the other subgenus, P. (Corrosella), have been collected from springs and headwaters of mountainous regions of the Iberian Peninsula and south of France. As springs often act as isolated habitats affecting dispersion and constraining gene flow, we supposed that the temporal history and mode of diversification of species from both subgenera should differ and therefore be reflected in their phylogenetic patterns. To assess this hypothesis, we performed a molecular phylogeny based on mitochondrial and nuclear DNA sequences and later conducted an independent analysis to examine the potential effect of certain geographic and ecological variables in the genetic divergences of the subgenera. Additionally, we estimated the ancestral area of diversification of both groups. Published anatomical revisions and our molecular analyses suggest that the genus Pseudamnicola should be divided into three genera: the two previous subgenera plus a new one described here. As postulated, the evolution of the spring organisms was strongly related to habitat fragmentation and isolation, whereas dispersal followed by divergence seem to have been the most common speciation processes for euryhaline species inhabiting coastal streams and low river stages in which waters remain connected. On the contrary, rather than habitat fragmentation or dispersion, environmental conditions have played a larger role during the deep divergent split leading to the three genera.


are found to be moderate with regard to gender. There is no signicant difference between male and female B.Ed students in their personal values and critical thinking. It also reveals that there is signicant relationship between personal values and critical thinking of B.Ed students.


Topic:Topic: 16. Myeloproliferative neoplasms - Clinical Background: Background: Most of myelofibrosis (MF) cases harbor somatic mutations in the driver genes JAK2, CALR, or MPL. Other somatic nondriver mutations have been increasingly detected with the use of high-throughput sequencing. The role of TP53 in prognosis of MF has long been unclear, but recent first studies suggested worse survival for patients harboring this mutation. Aims: Aims: While allogeneic stem cell transplantation still remains the only curative treatment option, outcome of patients with TP53 has not been evaluated yet. Methods: Methods: Here, we analysed in 417 patients with PMF or post ET/PV MF incidence and impact on otcome of TP53. We detected 46 patients with detectable TP53 mutation using next-generation sequencing, and compared characteristics and outcome after allograft with 371 non-TP53 patients with primary or secondary MF. Samples were collected at time of transplantation. Primary end points were overall survival (OS) and nonrelapse mortality. Secondary objectives were relapse, relapse-free survival, and graft-versus-host disease (GVHD). Results: Results: Median follow-up from transplantation was 6.1 years for the TP53 group and 7.0 years for the non-TP53 group, respectively (P=0.50). Baseline characteristics were generally balanced, whereas more patients in the TP53 group had Karnofsky performance score <90 (57% versus 40%; P=0.04).


The purpose of this research was to mobilize the educational community of a disadvantaged Montreal high school so as to implement practices more adapted to its environmental reality by developing an approach to support the building of collaborative bridges connecting school, family, and community. During the discussion, the perceptions of high school parents (n = 109), primary school parents (n = 381) and neighborhood families (n = 14) concerning the participating school will be presented. Subsequently, the school staff (n = 79) tries to identify the elements that, according to them, contribute to a good home-school cooperation. Finally, we analyze the findings to highlight some of the key elements of the relationship family-school-community and stress the need to work together in order to promote high school students' retention and academic success.


According to the goal of training advanced surveying and mapping person with innovation spirit and practice ability, based on the characteristic of the experimental teaching of surveying and mapping engineering, the impersonal and science experimental teaching evaluation system are established in this paper, which included to the content, way and criterion of evaluation. Teachers and students are guided and inspirited to innovational teaching and studying in order to supervise the experimental teaching.


This paper presents a method for automatically generating a 2D obstacle map of an environment using a robot or team of robots. The algorithm is adaptable to a variety of robotic platforms and presents an iterative solution for determining the map. Its primary contributions to the field of autonomous mapping include the abstraction of specific robot hardware from the mapping algorithm and the integration of obstacle avoidance, path finding, and destination selection. The map is sampled multiple times by each robot to filter anomalous data and to correct for inaccuracies in the operation of the robots. This paper details the algorithm in its purest form and additionally presents variant design and implementation details


Author(s): Negley, Benjamin | Advisor(s): Beal, Amy C | Abstract: In 1966, the Ford Foundation began an ambitious ten-year program to support North American symphony orchestras. Through a total investment of $80.2 million to sixty-one orchestras in the United States and Puerto Rico, the Ford Foundation sought to improve the economic conditions of orchestral musicians and assure the financial stability of individual orchestral institutions. Toward this goal, the Ford Foundation issued both expendable funds, distributed during the first five years of the program, and endowment funds, which were released at the end of the program and contingent on the orchestras matching the foundation's contributions. Building on heightened public interest in symphonic music, the Ford Foundation's Program for Symphony Orchestras contributed to the growth and success of American orchestras in the 1960s and 1970s. In not only enhancing the level of standing associated with orchestral musicians and orchestral institutions, but also encouraging orchestras to develop and improve fundraising mechanisms, the Ford Foundation made an unprecedented bet on the success of orchestral music in North America. This dissertation investigates the Ford Foundation's support of orchestras in the 1960s and 1970s within postwar American culture, and examines how the Ford Foundation's Program for Symphony Orchestras intertwined with local factors to transform individual orchestras. I focus on two divergent grantees: the Oakland Symphony Orchestra, which eventually declared bankruptcy in the late 1980s, and the Minnesota Orchestra, which raised more endowment matching funds than any other grantee orchestra. Based on interviews and archival research, these case studies show how the efficacy of the Program for Symphony Orchestras depended greatly on local factors. Furthermore, I consider the longer-term effects of the program, and the prospects for a similar program today.


This paper describes the relationship of disasters with institutional aspects, social networks and cultural communities. In various reports, Indonesia is often stated as one of the countries that experienced the most natural disasters and even in the last thirty years has experienced more than twenty major disasters with more than 10,000 lives outside the Aceh Tsunami which claimed more than 200,000 victims. However, this study shows that the disasters experienced are caused by human neglect. On the other side, the study of Toya Hideki (2014) criticizes that natural disasters have an impact on building social solidarity. The natural disasters that hit Indonesia to date show a response that is not always the same from the communities. Furthermore, it turns out that the amount caused by human discord also has a fairly high number. Some foreign scientists say that Indonesia has a Malay culture that tends to be lazy and easily rages (amok), has been denied by Syed Hussein Alatas (1988). However, Mochtar Lubis in his self-criticism (1977) and Adnan (2006) showed that Indonesia has a weak culture. Using literature studies as a basic of this research then accompanied by quantitative surveys via Google-form found the data that people tend to conduct undetail or sometimes careless. Then, those data had been strenghten supported by observations and documentation in the form of a photo shows that the Indonesian people have some uniqueness in behavior: in designing activities, in understanding what is meant completely, what is meant by perfection, and what kind in holding principles. These things become interesting when juxtaposed with concern for disaster.


Context: Oral Lichen planus (OLP) is a chronic, debilitating, immune-mediated disease whose management is considered a challenge in medical science. Aims: To quantitatively evaluate the effect of administration of enteral hydroxychloroquine (HCQS) as a monotherapy for six months on the extent and severity of erosive OLP using reticular score, erythema score and ulcerative score (REU score), and to subjectively evaluate the success of HCQS as a therapeutic drug for OLP-e using Tel Aviv-San Francisco Scale, visual analogue scale (VAS) and severity of burning sensation (BURN score). Settings and Design: Prospective clinical trial. Methods and Material: A total of 45 subjects received 200 mg of HCQS bid for six months. REU, VAS, BURN scores and Tel Aviv-San Francisco Scale readings were taken at the beginning of the study (baseline) and three- and six-month intervals post administration of enteral HCQS. Subjects were examined for any adverse drug outcomes for one year after the cessation of enteric HCQS therapy. Data were analysed with SPSS version 25. Results: There was a stark reduction in REU, VAS and BURN scores during the study period, with a statistically significant reduction (P < 0.05) seen at three- and six-month time intervals as compared to baseline. Further, the mean of change in R, E and U scores showed a statistically significant difference, with the highest reduction seen at baseline to six-month time interval. The Tel Aviv-San Francisco Scale showed 70%–100% remission in disease in more than 70% of subjects. Conclusions: Enteral HCQS can be considered a viable treatment option for the enigma that is erosive OLP.


This is the result of a project of the European Centre for Modern Languages within its "Learning through languages" programme 2012-2015. The ECML is a Council of Europe institution promoting excellence in language education in its member state.


The lattice Boltzmann method is an appropriate mesoscopic-scale tool for investigating the diffusion processes. However, since the state-of-the-art multi-component diffusion lattice Boltzmann (LB) models are based on the kinetic theory and start from the lattice Bhatnagar–Gross–Krook model, some defects cannot be avoided: they are only suitable for steady flow and there are limitations for setting the velocity and viscosity in lattice units. We devise a new incompressible LB model for ideal gases in solid oxide fuel cells (SOFCs), which is based on the advection–diffusion equation and coupled with the Maxwell–Stefan (M–S) equation by relaxation time. The coupled M–S equation is used for correction, considering the driving force in a multi-component diffusion system. Our LB model is implemented to predict the concentration overpotentials of a porous anode in a SOFC. The overpotentials are calculated from an H2–H2O–Ar ternary mass transport simulation and compared to the corresponding experimental results and several published continuum-scale and LB computations, demonstrating that our model offers a better consistency with the experimental measurement. Moreover, a Stefan tube is simulated for benchmarking against the local parameters; this is compared with the related experimental data and demonstrates the accuracy of our LB model.


Relationship functioning and psychopathology are strongly associated with one another. In this article we provide a selective review of the literature on relationship discord and the presence, incidence and individual-based treatment of psychiatric disorders. We then present a model for conceptualizing couple-based interventions with couples in which one partner has a psychiatric disorder, distinguishing between partner-assisted interventions, disorder-specific interventions and couple therapy interventions. Finally, we provide examples of how to employ these interventions with several psychiatric disorders (obsessive-compulsive disorder, anorexia nervosa and depression) and selectively review the efficacy of couple-based interventions in the treatment of psychopathology.


We surveyed amphibians at 4 montane and 2 plains lentic sites in northern Col- orado using 3 techniques: standardized call surveys, automated recording devices (frog-log- gers), and intensive surveys including capture-recapture techniques. Amphibians were ob- served at 5 sites. Species richness varied from 0 to 4 species at each site. Richness scores, the sums of species richness among sites, were similar among methods: 8 for call surveys, 10 for frog-loggers, and 11 for intensive surveys (9 if the non-vocal salamander Ambystoma tigrinum is excluded). The frog-logger at 1 site recorded Spea bombifrons which was not active during the times when call and intensive surveys were conducted. Relative abundance scores from call surveys failed to reflect a relatively large population of Bufo woodhousii at 1 site and only weakly differentiated among different-sized populations of Pseudacris maculata at 3 other sites. For ex- tensive applications, call surveys have the lowest costs and fewest requirements for highly trained personnel. However, for a variety of reasons, call surveys cannot be used with equal effectiveness in all parts of North America.


Organic admixtures are an indispensable component of modern concrete. Thus, their purposeful application is not only technically and economically viable but in addition an inevitable tool to make concrete more environmentally friendly. In this context, the use of polysaccharides has increasingly gained interest in the built environment as sustainable resource for performance enhancement. However, due to its origin, biopolymers possess a vast variety of molecular structures which can result in incompatibilities with other polymers present in concrete, such as superplasticizers. The present study highlights effects of the joint application of different types of starches and polycarboxylates with respect to their influence on cement hydration and structural build-up of cement pastes.


Existing assembly programming simulator tools used for educational instruction are stand-alone programs with aged user-interfaces. These tools are antiquated for modern programmers who are accustomed to powerful IDE environments. VSCode has emerged as the go-to in an academic and industry setting. Dashmips is a MIPS Interpreter and Debugger which adds MIPS assembly programming support to VSCode. The interpreter, developed in Python, has a functional design that is easily customizable and extensible for academic instruction specific to a course. Inline Python documentation automatically generates program usage and help documentation for student support. Additionally, the MIPS interpreter is stand-alone from the debugger and can be utilized on the command-line and programmatically via scripting or a Python program allowing integration into auto-grading frameworks. This demo will provide a brief introduction to the features of Dashmips as an educational tool, including simple setup, one-click debugging, clear visualization of register and memory data, and framework for instructor customizations. A step-by-step tutorial for creating a new program and interacting with the debugging environment will illustrate the accessibility of the environment for modern programmers. Information about Dashmips and the Dashmips Debugger can be found at https://github.com/nbbeeken/dashmips and https://github.com/nbbeeken/dashmips-debugger, respectively.


Since deep buried depth of target in deep natural gas exploration in northern part of Dongying area, the data with large angle (far-offsets) cannot be acquired, leading to be unable to use conventional method to pick up the lithologic parameters from three elastic impedance data volumes with wide, mid and small angle. For that reason, the method studying on using two elastic impedance data volumes with mid and small angle to pick up petrophysical parameters has been carried out by introducing approximate formula and numeric test has been also implemented. The results showed that the parameter pickup method discussed in the paper is able to pick up such lithologic parameters as P- and S-wave impedances accurately from model data, and using the method to carry out the lithologic parameter pickup in the studied area, and further to develop the reservoir prediction, achieving good results.


: With the transformation of geological prospecting units in China to multiple business areas, the types and contradictions of identification and evaluation of technological achievements have also increased substantially. Taking 288 project achievements completed by a Bureau in the six years from 2016 to 2021 as an example, this paper quantitatively extracts and sets up a variety of award scoring parameters, and divides the outstanding project achievement awards into: Geological exploration, engineering construction, mining development, ecological civilization construction, surveying and mapping geographic information, scientific research and prediction, and technical advisory services. The selection scope covers all industrial categories in the transition period of geological prospecting units. The evaluation results reflect the role of opening up the grade and encouraging the advanced. The revision and formulation of the management method has improved a lot in terms of fairness, impartial and rationality, but the leading role in scientific and technological innovation is still insufficient and needs to be further improved. By statistical analysis, the distribution model of the quantitative score of the award is established, and it is considered that the better award results should conform to the normal distribution or T distribution with initial right deviation. With the evaluation system from the emphasis on output value to the emphasis on innovation-oriented, the mathematical statistics distribution law of the evaluation result score should show the change of à distribution characteristic form under the condition of á = 4.


The acclaimed "Dictionary of African Historical Biography," the only single-volume biographical work on Sub-Saharan African history, has been expanded and updated to include entries on over eight hundred people important in Sub-Saharan African history up to 1980.


Low-density parity-check (LPDC) decoders assume the channel estate information (CSI) is known and they have the true a posteriori probability (APP) for each transmitted bit. But in most cases of interest, the CSI needs to be estimated with the help of a short training sequence and the LDPC decoder has to decode the received word using faulty APP estimates. In this paper, we study the uncertainty in the CSI estimate and how it affects the bit error rate (BER) output by the LDPC decoder. To improve these APP estimates, we propose a Bayesian equalizer that takes into consideration not only the uncertainty due to the noise in the channel, but also the uncertainty in the CSI estimate, reducing the BER after the LDPC decoder.


In the narrative configuration of the Third Series of the National Episodes the inclusion of letter is striking. Galdos includes here an epistolary novel as well as two partially epistoray novels and he intercalates several letters in the remaining works. The present work deals, then, with the Galdosian handling of the epistolary technique in this set of novels that reveals, also, the versatility and the literary genius of the Canarian author.


The vast majority of small businesses in Australia kick off as solo efforts, as one person takes their great inspiration or idea, adds a bucket load of courage, sprinkled with a dose of luck and plenty of advice from trusted sources and sets sail into the business world.


Arsenic profiles were obtained from full-scale conventional treatment (coagulation, Fe-Mn oxidation, or softening) plants, facilitating testing of theories regarding arsenic removal. Soluble As(V) removal efficiency was controlled primarily by pH during coagulation, be Fe{sup +2} oxidation and Fe(OH){sub 3} precipitation during Fe-Mn oxidation, and by Mg(OH){sub 2} formation during softening. Insignificant soluble As(V) removal occurred during calcite precipitation at softening plants or during Mn{sup +2} oxidation-precipitation at Fe-Mn oxidation plants. The extent of soluble As(V) removal during coagulation and softening treatments was lower than expected. Somewhat surprisingly, during coagulation As(V) removal efficiencies were limited by particulate aluminum formation and removal, because much of the added coagulant was not removed by 0.45-{mu}m-pore-size filters. At one utility, reducing the coagulation pH from 7.4 to 6.8 (at constant alum dose) improved removal of particulate aluminum, thereby enhancing soluble As(V) removal during treatment.


The translation titled "The Overrated Reason" is based on the German text "Die Überschätzte Vernunft," by Friedrich Hayek—a lecture that Hayek gave at a symposium at Castle Kleβheim in early 1982.


IgG4-related sclerosing disease is a disease entity that has recently attracted attention, manifesting as a multiorgan disease characterized by high serum IgG4 levels, extensive IgG4-positive plasma cells and lymphocyte infiltration of the affected organs, with the pancreas (autoimmune pancreatitis) and kidney as representative targets. In cases of renal involvement, parenchymal lesions are predominant, such as renal cortical lesions or diffuse renal enlargement. However, mass-like lesions involving the renal pelvis are very rare, and mass forming or pelvic involvement types should be distinguished from lymphomas, metastatic cancers and other genitourinary malignancies to avoid unnecessary surgery. Herein, we report a case of IgG4-related sclerosing disease involving the kidney as an unusual involvement pattern presenting as a mass-like lesion with pelvic and perirenal involvement. (Korean J Med 2014;87:710-715)


This paper will look at contingency planning and how it can help an organization survive an incident or disaster. Contingency planning has four basic aspects: business impact analysis, incident response plan, disaster recovery plan, and business continuity plan. While there may be multiple ways to address each plan, and multiple ways to implement each, each component should be developed fully for maximum effectiveness. Creating a fully-fleshed out contingency plan is difficult and time consuming, and, once created, must be polished to maintain a state of readiness for any situation at any time. A well-made contingency plan can save an organization from going out-of-business should an incident or disaster occur.


Historically, the public sector in Commonwealth countries has been the main provider of essential service delivery and infrastructure. However, growing fiscal deficits have limited the capacity of governments to meet infrastructural needs and now represent a major constraint to member countries' efforts to improve their investment climate. To augment limited public resources for infrastructure, private sector participation should be encouraged through an enabling environment. Most Commonwealth governments have been turning to the private sector as a means of financing infrastructural development through public–private partnerships. It is widely recognised that PPP best practices and processes are still evolving. This chapter, however, attempts to answer some of the questions frequently asked by government officials considering adopting and applying a PPP approach of their own.


With the rapid development of information technology, estimation and prediction by big data have been used widely. However, problems exist in the procedure. Due to the flaws of row data, there is still a gap to the truth. Inaccuracy of risk assessment is caused by objective reasons and subjective ones. The advanced assessments of events lead to discrimination. Moreover, regular competition has been replaced by malicious monopoly. In the situation, the harm to data owner is inevitable. In the article, we tend to list risks in big data processing. Not only the risks do harm to fair market, but also there will be detriments on the national economy as a whole in a long run. Our goal is to design a sound regulatory strategy by analyzing the risks and come up with several regulatory advice.


Abstract : Aerial photographic work in the deserts of East Central Asia, in comparison with the deserts in West Central Asia, does not differ basically. The methods of Soviet scientists to utilize aerial photography in the geographic studies on the desert territories of the Soviet Union could successfully be used also in East Central Asia. It is necessary to disseminate widely these methods and achievements in order to introduce these into geographic studies of the tremendous desert territories of the Chinese Peoples Republic.


Having an acute coronary syndrome (ACS) is obviously stressful, and some patients develop post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Postulating that the medical environment could contribute to PTSD, these authors assessed whether patients admitted from the emergency department …


Contrary to tea' s material culture heritage, its non-material culture heritage is generally neglected by mass. However, tea's non-material heritage densely represents the wisdom and civilization of Chinese people and it contains high historical, aesthetic, social and economy developmental value. Additionally, because it is characterized by its spread through speaking, collectivity, inheritance, variance and adhering to environment, it cannot be protected forcibly. Native legal system far lags to satisfy the needs of the protection of non-material culture heritage. In order to protect non-material culture heritage belonging to Chinese traditional culture heritage effectively, it is necessary to analyze and demonstrate concerned law system and establish sound law protection model, as well as better non-material culture heritage protection system and appoint strict law responsibility.


Superhydrophobic materials are significant for engineering applications in the anti-icing field because of their non-wetting property. The interface physical mechanisms of non-wetting properties are important to promote real applications of superhydrophobic surfaces, especially under low-temperature conditions. Here, we found that low temperature could induce the wetting state transition from a Cassie–Baxter state to a Wenzel state. This transition occurred at 14 °C (and 2 °C) on superhydrophobic surfaces with pillar heights of 250 μm (and 300 μm). As a consequence, the driving-force of the Cassie-Wenzel (C-W) wetting transition was induced by the contraction of air pockets on cooling, and the pressure of air pockets supporting the droplet decreased with the contraction degree. Decreasing the pressure of air pockets broke the mechanical equilibrium at the solid–liquid contact interface, and the continuous contraction overcame the resistance in the C-W wetting transition. Based on the analysis of work against resistance in the C-W wetting transition, lower C-W wetting transition temperature was mainly attributed to a higher pillar, which produced more work against resistance to require more energy. This energy was directly reflected by the energy required for continuous contraction of air pockets. Superhydrophobic surfaces with higher pillar structure remain stable non-wetting property at low-temperature conditions. This work provides theoretical support for the application of superhydrophobic materials in low-temperature environments.


Abstract : In order for Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF) to be in a position for independent operations by 2014, the United States needs to decouple general purpose forces (GPF) from partnering now and focus strictly on advising under independent conditions. When US Special Operations Forces (SOF) turned the security force assistance (SFA) mission in Afghanistan over to US GPF in 2003, a shortfall in advisor teams as well as GPF personnel with advising experience led to an over reliance on partnering as the predominant form of SFA. The over reliance on partnering operations resulted in ANSF dependent on US operational forces to meet Afghanistan's internal and external Taliban threat. A gap now exists in capability between the current state of ANSF and the goal of an independently operating ANSF by 2014. In order to close the capability gap, NATO needs to decouple GPF now and allow the ANSF to conduct independent operations with the support of advisors. This will allow embedded advisor teams to refine all internal ANSF operations and processes while also retaining a NATO GPF backstop to stem operational failure and reinforce success prior to the 2014 deadline.


EPO resistance and iron deficiency in CKD-related anemia are associated with an increase in inflammatory cytokines associated with the innate immune response, such as IL-6, IL-1 and TNF-α. Recently (Bandach et al. Sci Reports 2021) we reported that kidney fibrosis and anemia of CKD can be worsened or relieved when IL1 effects are enhanced or inhibited respectively.
 The Water lily (Nuphar lutea) plant has been widely used as a traditional remedy for the treatment of rheumatism, scars, pain and more. Gopas, Golan-Goldhirsh et al. (Cancer Biology Therapy 2009) extracted an active ingredient from the family of nupharidines: 6,6′-Dihydroxythiobinupharidine (DTBN), which showed anti-inflammatory properties, mainly through the inhibition of NF-κB. The purpose of this study was to test the effects of DTBN in a mouse model of CKD-associated anemia.

 8 weeks old male C57BL/6 mice were divided into three groups: control, CKD (induced by adenine diet) and CKD-DTBN. CKD groups were injected with saline-DMSO or 30 µg DTBN, every 2 days and sacrificed after 3 weeks from dietary intervention.

 Serum urea and kidney TGFβ mRNA were significantly decreased in CKD- DTBN versus CKD. Kidney histology in CKD mice showed macrophage infiltration and renal fibrosis, which was ameliorated in CKD-DTBN.
 A significant improvement in inflammation indices (blood lymphocytes, kidney and liver IL-6 and p-STAT3, liver CRP), as well as kidney immunoreactive NF-κB and F4\80, which were increased in CKD, were decreased in CKD-DTBN. CKD anemia indices (hemoglobin, hematocrit and red blood cell (RBC) count) significantly improved in CKD-DTBN. Kidney HIF-2α and EPO mRNA were significantly decreased in both uremic groups, but was unchanged in CKD- DTBN versus CKD. However, serum iron and transferrin saturation significantly increased in CKD-DTBN versus CKD.

 Uremic mice treated with DTBN show improvement in kidney fibrosis, inflammation and anemia indices. Thus, DTBN may be a novel therapeutic alternative for CKD and its complications.


We present intermediary results using conventional differential SAR interfero metry (DInSAR) in a lignite open pit mining area in Germany. All available ENVISAT and ERS-2 scenes since 2002 were used. Due to the area of interest's rural character and vegetation zone, temporal decorrelation is a limiting factor for C-band based interferometric analyses. Additionally a network of twelve Corner Reflectors has been installed to investigate possible advantages for the analysis. Another limiting factor is caused by radar signal delay variation s in the earth's atmosphere which can produce an additional phase contribution to the differential phase. This contribution is often highly variable in the spatial domain by ranges up to tens of kilometres, but can also show linear trends. A simple approach for the elimination of these phase contributions is shown.


(57) a solution containing sodium waterglass silicates and at least 8% by weight of an organic polyhydric compound (e.g., glycerol) having a Abstract] 3 smaller modulus, the production of the intermediate layer used in fire resistant glass laminates it is beneficial. The solution was dried on a flat surface such as glass and to produce clear foamable intermediate layer having improved impact resistance. The dried intermediate layer is also used as an intermediate layer of a refractory plate glass is removed from the surface in the form of a resilient material.


Sociologists can employ statistical tools to understand the uses of law. While often debated when applied to the sociology of deviance or criminality, these tools are rarely discussed in the sociology of law. Drawing from examples in labor law, we analyze both the recourse to quantitative data at the intersection of legal sociology and other sociological approaches, as well as the methods of inquiry employed in empirical research.


Objective To study the effect of early nurse intervention on the the equilibrium function and the level of neurologic impairment in patients with cerebral infraction. Methods Totally 60 patients with cerebral infarction for the first time were selected from the First People's Hospitail of Zhaoqing between January 2002 and January 2005.They were randomized divided into two groups, rehabilitation group (30 cases) and control group (30 cases). Both of groups of CI all reciveved the routime treatment. The routin group accepted the common nursing, the early rehabilitative interven- tion and psychology treatment were added in rehabilitative group. But contrast group only accepted the common nursing . The level of neurologic impairment and equilibrium function were assessed before and6 weeks after rehabilitation treatment with the score of clinical neurologic impairment and Fugl-Meyer method.Results There was no significant difference in equilibrium function scores and neurologic impairment scores between the two groups. The equilibrium function scores and neurologic impairment scores were greatly improved in both groups of patients after 6-week and therapy compared with admission time,and there was significant difference (P0.05)The improvement in rehabilitation group was greater than that in control group (P 0.05) Conclusion The early nurse intervention can decrease the neurologic impairment scores and improve equilibrium function evidently in patients with cerebral infarction.


The Consultation and Liaison Psychiatry in the General Hospital should benefit from the new forms of management that are being introduced in recent times in the public health system. Through the realization of a systematic bibliographical review and the application of the profesional experience accumulated throughout last fifteen years in the development of these activities in the University Hospital of A Coruna, the authors present an approach to what could be considered the basis for developing a manual of procedures that sets out the information recording systems, protocols, guidelines and clinical pathways, standardized indicators and other basic instruments, that must develop inside the area of the clinical management for a constant improvement of quality


With regard to marine renewable energies, significant electrical power can be extracted from marine tidal current. However, the power harnessed by a marine current turbine varies due to the periodicity of the tidal phenomenon and could be highly fluctuant caused by swell effect. To improve the power quality and make the marine current generation system more reliable, energy storage systems will play a crucial role. In this paper, the power fluctuation phenomenon is described and the state of art of energy storage technologies is presented. Characteristics of various energy storage technologies are analyzed and compared for marine application. The comparison shows that high-energy batteries like sodium-sulphur battery and flow battery are favorable for smoothing the long-period power fluctuation due to the tide phenomenon while supercapacitors and flywheels are suitable for eliminating short-period power disturbances due to swell or turbulence phenomena. It means that hybrid storage technologies are needed for achieving optimal performance in marine current energy systems.


In addition to his stellar scientific career, Prof. Yuval Ne'eman devoted many years to public service. At the beginning of the 1980s, Ne'eman joined the political arena, through which he sought to actualize his ideological beliefs, such as by helping to establish dozens of Jewish settlements in Juda and Samaria. This article explores his contribution to the advancement of archeological research in Judea and Samaria, which stemmed from his desire to strengthen Israel's ties to this patrimony. Recentlyreleased archival files reveal his substantial behind-the-scenes activity in this field. He established and headed the Israel Ministry of Science and Development, which carried out surveys and excavations in peripheral areas, particularly in Judea and Samaria. His decisive contribution resulted in an unprecedented research drive in this region. Governmental backing, public support, and prevailing calm in terms of security, encouraged senior Israeli archeologists to participate in archeological research over the Green Line, although they could have done so for the preceding 15 years. The result was a golden age of archeology in Judea and Samaria, which has not recurred up to the present day (2021).


Chung, Daeho. 2015. On the syntax of multi-focused fragment answers in Korean: An oblique merge analysis. Linguistic Research 32(3), 573-606. As observed in the literature (Park 2005, 2013, Park and Shin 2014, Ku and Cho 2014, among others), focus elements in a multi-focused fragment answer in Korean behave asymmetrically depending on their positions: Focus elements in a non-final position retain their dependent markers, while those in the final position optionally delete them. This paper first shows that the restriction is merely a subcase of a superordinate constraint, which states that a focus element in a non-final position pied-pipes the minimal node that dominates it and c-commands the following focus element(s), whereas a focus element in the final position optionally pied-pipes its dominating node(s). It is argued then that the pied-piping for non-final focus elements is caused by an economy-driven oblique merge operation that clusters elements with a focus feature before the complex focus element formed in this way moves to the focus licensing functional phrase. Focus clustering due to the same oblique merge operation is attested in other constructions containing multiple focus elements. (Hanyang University)


The electric power industry is undergoing rapid and significant change with the advent of deregulation. In a networked environment, it is desirable that the agent be mobile. In the envisaged market scenario, the customer's agent (load) attempts to get the best value for money and minimize costs and the seller's (generator) agent attempts to maximize profit and minimize costs. The success of the agent technology depends heavily on inter-agent communication, agent architectures and agreed standards. In this paper, the authors focus more on how these latter issues are addressed theoretically and practically and less on complex agent trading behaviours.


Semiempirical method has been developed at University of California for prediction of forces induced by waves in moderately deep water; for single horizontal cylinders drag coefficients during acceleration agreed with uniform motion values, but deviations occurred during deceleration; acceleration modulus did not correlate resistance coefficients near boundary layer transition.


Despite the many statements in the literature regarding the importance of fat in the diet, there are few actual records of the fat metabolism of adolescent girls. Maignon and Chahine 1 stated their belief that fat in the diet has a definite function in protein metabolism, while Orgler 2 stated that lack of fat in the diet predisposes to edema and increases susceptibility to infection. Holt and Fales, 3 in their excellent article on the food requirements of children, reported the fat intake of one hundred and six children between the ages of 1 and 18 years, but only four were girls between the ages of 12 and 15 years. This was merely a dietary study with no analysis of excreta. These authors and others 4 have reported a number of investigations relating to fat metabo (Footnote continued on next page) lism, but their studies included only infants and children


This paper seeks to investigate how good answers and prompt answers can be obtained from community question answering sites (CQAs) on the basis of (1) where questions are asked, and (2) how questions are asked. To address the question of "Where to ask?", six popular CQAs were investigated. They include three English sites, namely, Yahoo! Answers, WikiAnswers, and Answerbag, as well as three Chinese sites, namely, Baidu Knows, Tencent Soso Wenwen, and Sina iAsk. On the other hand, to address the question of "How to ask?", five types of questions commonly posted in CQAs were identified, namely, factoid, list, definition, complex interactive, and target. The results are as follows: (1) In terms of "Where to ask?", Yahoo! Answers, Answerbag, and Tencent Soso Wenwen were found likely to attract good quality answers promptly. (2) In terms of "How to ask?", definition, and complex interactive question types were found likely to receive good quality answers promptly. The implications of the findings are discussed.


A general finite element displacement formulation is presented to determine the natural frequencies of spatial thin-walled curved girders including the warping contribution. Also included are the rotatory inertia effects with respect to flexure and torsion, and the effects of antisymmetry of cross section (found to be significant). The stiffness and inertia properties of the finite element are obtained using the solutions of homogeneous differential equations governing the static problem as deformation modes. The obtained element relationships were programmed for use in digital computers, and a few example problems were analyzed. Some charts are given to expedite the determination of natural frequencies of horizontally curved girders.


Core accretion and disk instability have traditionally been regarded as the two competing possible paths of planet formation. In recent years, evidence has accumulated in favor of core accretion as the dominant mode, at least for close-in planets. However, it might be hypothesized that a significant population of wide planets formed by disk instabilities could exist at large separations, forming an invisible majority. In previous work, we addressed this issue through a direct imaging survey of B2–A0-type stars and concluded that <30% of such stars form and retain planets and brown dwarfs through disk instability, leaving core accretion as the likely dominant mechanism. In this paper, we extend this analysis to FGKM-type stars by applying a similar analysis to the Gemini Deep Planet Survey sample. The results strengthen the conclusion that substellar companions formed and retained around their parent stars by disk instabilities are rare. Specifically, we find that the frequency of such companions is <8% for FGKM-type stars under our most conservative assumptions, for an outer disk radius of 300 AU, at 99% confidence. Furthermore, we find that the frequency is always <10% at 99% confidence independently of outer disk radius, for any radius from 5 to 500 AU. We also simulate migration at a wide range of rates and find that the conclusions hold even if the companions move substantially after formation. Hence, core accretion remains the likely dominant formation mechanism for the total planet population, for every type of star from M-type through B-type.


Twenty years of AI research in knowledge representation has produced frame knowledge representation systems (FRSs) that incorporate a number of important advances. However, FRSs lack two important capabilities that prevent them from scaling up to realistic applications: they cannot provide high-speed access to large knowledge bases (KBs), and they do not support shared, concurrent KB access by multiple users. Our research investigates the hypothesis that one can employ an existing database management system (DBMS) as a storage subsystem for an FRS, to provide high-speed access to large, shared KBs. We describe the design and implementation of a general storage system that incrementally loads referenced frames from a DBMS, and saves modified frames back to the DBMS, for two different FRSs: LOOM and THEO. We also present experimental results showing that the performance of our prototype storage subsystem exceeds that of flat files for simulated applications that reference or update up to one third of the frames from a large LOOM KB.


Forty-four aortas dissected from human subjects were sliced into 30-50 se rial sections and studied morphologically for the presence of thrombi. A total of 569 thrombi were found histologically in 1,400 sections. The frequency of thrombosis was 7% for subjects under 30 years-old. However, with increasing age, the frequency rose to 8% in the third decade, 9% in the fourth decade, 13.5% in the fifth decade, 10.5% in sixth decade, 25.5% in the seventh decade and 33.5% for subjects over 80 years-old. Thrombi were morphologically classified into three types: (1) microthrombi (2) membranous thrombi, and (3) large massive thrombi. The latter were rarely found on the intima, and no sclerotic lesions were observed. The frequency of thrombosis on non-pathologic areas was 11 %, and almost all of them were microthrombi. The thrombi on the areas of cloudy thickening was 47% with 6% of them being classified as membranous thrombi or large massive thrombi. The thrombi on atherosclerotic lesions was 42%, unusually high compared with the other categories and 32 % of them were membranous or large massive thrombi. In each region of thoracic and abdominal aorta, thrombi were apt to be more on abdominal aorta than that on thoracic aorta.


The molecular mobility in polyimides containing long sequences of dimethylsiloxane units (from 9 to 99 units) in the main chain was studied using the proton magnetic relaxation technique. Dynamic nonuniformity of the dimethylsiloxane sequence was revealed, which was also manifested in crosslinked and filled systems. It was assumed that this phenomenon is due to segregation processes and the corresponding formation of associated structures with a lower mobility of methyl groups, wherein the proportion of dimethylsiloxane units involved in the formation of these structures decreases with increasing temperature.


Task conflict is an issue that many teams struggle with, and recent research on conflict suggests that task conflict can have positive or negative effects on team outcomes depending on the team's c...


The empirical growth literature has focused on capital accumulation but largely ignored productivity growth. To address this imbalance, we propose a methodology for analyzing productivity convergence based on frontier production functions. We examine whether departures from the frontier are cointegrated, determine the extent and speed of catch-up, and assess the importance of efficiency changes for economic growth. Using a sample of 26 OECD countries from 1965-90, we find convergence and catch-up is fairly strong among EU countries but not among the G-7. Overall, the ability to absorb new technology is an important source of economic growth.


During the 1950s and early 1960s, a large number of specialists from the German Democratic Republic (GDR) were sent by their government to China to assist in the latter's socialist construction, in which the GDR government had significant room to manoeuvre. These experts helped improve the GDR's economic relations with China yet during their tenure in China, they enjoyed preferential treatment from the Chinese government, and their living conditions were much better than those of the average Chinese people around them, which triggered resentment and violence from ordinary Chinese people. Meanwhile, East Germans were deeply concerned about Chinese technological catch-up via imitation and reproduction. The hierarchical system of socialist economic and technological cooperation and the legacy of technology transfer between Germany and China since the late nineteenth century were two main reasons for this predicament in bilateral relations, which undermined their cooperation even before the bilateral split became widely known.


Web usage mining has become very critical for effective Web site management, business and support services, personalization, and network traffic flow analysis and so on. Web usage mining has become very critical for effective Web site management, creating adaptive Web sites, business and support services, personalization, and network traffic flow analysis and so on. Previous study on Web usage mining using a concurrent Clustering has shown that the usage trend analysis very much depends on the performance of the clustering of the number of requests. In this paper, a novel approach FCM Algorithm is introduced kind of Clustering Technique, in the process of Web Usage Mining to detect user's patterns. The process details the transformations necessaries to modify the data storage in the Web Servers Log files to an input of FCM Algorithm. The Experiment show that the efficiency of FCM Algorithm is better than k-mean algorithm for web log data.


The power generated by a wind farm is fluctuating in nature due to the variation of wind speed. This leads to voltage and frequency variation along with some power quality issues which may render to inject large amount of renewable power into the existing AC grid. The stated problem may be addressed by an E-STATCOM which absorbs power fluctuations, such that the grid is seeing the wind farms as a constant power source. The E-STATCOM is formed with supercapacitors where supercapacitors are integrated at the sub modules of Modular Multilevel Converter (MMC) through DC-DC converters. The proposed configuration has all features of a STATCOM and is capable to support active power for a definite time span. The integration of supercapacitor into an MMC and associated control are discussed in this paper. The proposed configuration is suitable for high power level due to modular structure and better efficiency. The complete system is simulated in PSCADIEMTDC to check the performance.


Within the study area, samples for strain determination were collected along six section lines, which extended from the Little North Mountain thrust in the east to the Alleghenian structural front in the west. Along each section line, 20-25 oriented samples of well-sorted, quartz-rich, framework-supported sandstones were collected from seven levels between the basal Silurian and basal Mississippian. The use of seven levels enabled sampling in both cover anticlines and synclines and allowed assessment of strain variation with stratigraphic level. Strain determination was performed on oriented sample thin sections using the normalized Fry and Rf/phi methods. These strain data are presented on the six new cross sections that were constructed from new field data and existing geologic maps. These strain data were used to determine whether microscale deformation (1) made little contribution to cover deformation, (2) occurred as a layer-parallel shortening preceding the emplacement of underlying horses, (3) occurred as only local strains in response to flexural flow during folding, or (4) occurred as flattening during emplacement of underlying horses.


Abstract : This report addresses the determinants of military nutritional requirements-that is, the relevant variables that determine the types and quantities of foods necessary to support ADF training and operations-and the current state of knowledge about nutritional requirements. It also includes recommendations on nutritional standards for ADF rationing systems, and suggests areas of research that will help fill the gaps in our knowledge. Nutritional standards are recommended for fresh (i.e. in-barracks or garrison) feeding and for combat ration packs. These standards are based largely on the Nutrient Reference Values recommended by the National Health and Medical Research Council for Australia and New Zealand, but include specific Military Nutrient Reference Values for certain key nutrients.


The MC21 Monte Carlo code is required to permit an individual geometric component or groups of components to be tagged as 'movable' within some permissible range. Typical examples of such movable components would be control devices such as translating rods or rotating drums. Given this geometric information, a target multiplication factor (keff), and a convergence criterion, MC21 will iterate on movable component positions and return a final position that reflects a keff close to the target value. An initial version of this capability is demonstrated through modifications to MC21 that sets the geometry data structures for the movable components, calls the main Fortran-95 solver to compute keff, and converges on the final position. This approach uses an adaptive batching algorithm that continually increases the accuracy of each successive MC21 keff result as the movable geometry approaches the converged position.


Sieber 15 Introduction Increasingly nonprofits are following the lead of public agencies and private industry by implementing a GIS. They are drawn to a GIS because it can combine large amounts of data from disparate sources and on different media, order them into layers or themes, and analyze or display various relationships. The greater promise of the technology, to nonprofits such as grassroots organizations (GROs) and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), is that it may assist in influencing public policy, through the sophistication of analysis and presentation of powerful images. With increasing visibility that successful GIS adoption is possible (e.g., see the growing presence of GROs/NGOs in the annual map books produced by Environmental Sciences Resource Institute [ESRI]), GIS skills in the grassroots are being viewed as useful and even indispensable (Aberley 1993). The potential of geographic information systems to empower the GROs has led to the emergence of supportive institutional structures, such as vendor foundations and technological assistance programs (Sawicki and Craig 1996, Barndt 1998, Leitner et al. 1998). At the same time that studies explore the process of GIS diffusion to GROs by external organizations (Leitner et al. 1998, Sawicki and Peterman 1998), a growing debate questions the appropriateness of geographic information systems in the grassroots: whether it empowers or marginalizes GRO impact (Pickles 1995, see also http://www.nciga.ucsb.edu/varenius/ppgis/ papers/index.html). However, these studies and arguments ignore the process of GIS implementation within the GRO itself. GIS Implementation in the Grassroots


A compact, low-cost, multi-wavelength NDIR sensor was designed to measure G-type CW agents at ppm-levels. This 4-color sensor can distinguish between the different agents (sarin, soman, tabun) and is more sensitive than a single wavelength sensor. The design of the sensor and test results with simulants R-12 (dichlorodifluoromethane) and sulfur hexafluoride is presented. These test results support a lower detection limit of 3 ppmv for a 1 sec integration time. Modifications of the sensor design which will enable us to achieve <1 ppmv sensitivity are discussed.


The utility model discloses a radiation PCB board, comprising a base body and an insulation layer. The PCB board takes the shape of a regular polygon and a group of subtense is provided with semi-circular limit holes as well as bipolar holes and a group of holes used for fixing LED chip. When in use, the LED chip is positioned at the fixing holes. The utility model can form various types according to demand, and compared with the prior art, the utility model has the advantages of solving radiation problem of LED lamp, improving light conversion rate and intensity of the LED chip, being easy to be assembled to luminous body of various sizes, higher brightness for the assembly of groups of LED than that of a signal LED, being able to illuminate or decorate and energy saving.


This paper presents a new solution to the motion control problem for a rotary wing vehicle powered by four rotors. The proposed control structure is a parallel scheme consisting of a partial state saturated feedback to control the vehicle altitude and a partial feedback linearizing feedback to control the planar vehicle's position. It is shown that the resulting closed-loop dynamics has a local asymptotic stability property. Numerical simulations show the performance of the proposed controller.


The study's aim was to analyze the effects of different levels of halloysite (H) and zeolite (Z) in feed and pellets on the growth and meat quality in chickens; 500 Ross 308 broilers were assigned to five groups (1 g, control; 2-5 g, experimental). In Groups 2-5, different proportions of Z and H in feed (25:75 ratio; 0.5% to 2%) and pellet in kg/m2 (2, 0.650H; 3, 0.325H and 0.325Z; 4, 0.650Z; 5, 0.160H and 0.490Z) were used. Body weight was higher than 1 in all experimental groups, and carcass weight was higher, except for Group 2. The feed consumption was lower in Groups 3 and 5 than in Group 4. The breast muscle weight was higher in Group 3 than in the control group. In Groups 2, 3, and 5, the water holding capacity in the breast muscles was better than in Group 4 and in the leg muscles in Groups 3 and 4 than in Groups 1 and 5. Most of the tested characteristics indicate a beneficial effect of aluminosilicates in feed and litter on the growth and quality of meat.


The general objective of the research is to strengthen the techniques available for the definition and evaluation of Not Constructing a Transportation Facility (NCTF) alternatives. Three aspects of NCTF are emphasized. The first approach recommends utilizing a realistic NCTF alternative as a point of comparison by which to evaluate larger build alternatives. Such an NCTF alternative should identify the probable transportation and land use outcomes that can be expected if a decision is made not to construct a proposed facility. The second approach focuses on the use and misuse of the methodologies for the prediction of NCTF impacts. For each impact catagory, the adequacy or inadequacy of available methodologies and techniques are evaluated from both theoretical and practical viewpoints. The last approach, utilizaiton of an NCTF alternative, broadens the scope of plan evaluation to include the option of not constructing the proposed project. In addition it provides a clear means of expressing the positive and negative impacts of any proposed project action when compared to making no investment in construction.


Differences in petiole K+ concentration of ungrafted grapevine rootstocks grown under field conditions at Merbein, Victoria, were compared with the rootstock effects on grape juice pH of the scion varieties Chardonnay and Ruby Cabernet. Significant positive correlations were obtained between grape juice pH of the scion varieties on various rootstocks and K+ accumulation in the petioles of ungrafted rootstock vines. Rootstock varieties that contributed to high pH in the grape juice of the scion (e.g. Freedom, Dog Ridge, Rupestris du Lot) showed high K+ concentrations in their petioles, while those rootstocks that contributed to low pH in the grape juice of the scion (e.g. 140 Ruggeri, 1202 Couderc, 110 Richter), had low K+ concentrations in their petioles. In 2 water culture experiments in the glasshouse, K+ uptake and distribution in ungrafted rootstock vines was examined at different K+ levels. In the first experiment the rootstocks 140 Ruggeri and Freedom had similar K+ concentrations in the various plant parts when grown in nutrient solution with 0.1 mmol K+/L. With K+ concentrations of 1, 2, and 10 mmol/L in the nutrient solution Freedom had significantly higher K+ contents in leaves and petioles than 140 Ruggeri. When K+ supply was increased from 1 to 2 mmol/L, K+ concentrations in the various plant parts were not significantly increased. However, when the supply was increased to 10 mmol/L, K t concentrations were significantly different. In the second experiment with K+ levels of 1 and 10 mmol/L, higher K+ contents were obtained in the basal and apical leaves of Dog Ridge and Ramsey compared with 140 Ruggeri, Schwarzmann, 1103 Paulsen and Sultana, while in roots, 140 Ruggeri, 110 Richter and Sultana had the highest K+ contents. Dog Ridge and Rarnsey are both known to increase scion grape juice K+ concentration and pH of the scion variety, while 140 Ruggeri and 1103 Paulsen contribute to low grape juice K+ concentration and pH. The results demonstrate that differences between rootstocks in the extent of K+ accumulation in the shoot are a major determinant of the rootstock effects on grape juice pH. The extent of K+ accumulation can best be measured in basal leaves or petioles. This provides a screening method for the evaluation of rootstocks which restrict K+ accumulation and contribute to lower grape juice pH.


We study the semi-classical behavior of a quantum Hamiltonian whose Weyl symbol has some symmetries coming from a compact group G. The quantum reduction is done by restricting the operator to subspaces of L 2 (R n ) The quantum reduction is done by restricting the operator to subspaces of L 2 (R n ) called symmetry subspaces, coming from the Peter Weyl decomposition. The restrictions are called the reduced quantum Hamiltonians. For a finite group, we give a Gutzwiller formula for the reduced Hamiltonian, involving the symmetry of periodic orbits of the energy shell. We interpret this formula in the classical reduced space when G acts freely. For a compact Lie group, we give a Weyl asymptotic formula of the eigenvalue counting function of the reduced Hamiltonian, for which we calculate the first term. Oscillations of the spectral density are also described by a Gutzwiller formula involving periodic orbits of the reduced space, corresponding to quasi-periodic orbits of R 2n.


We show that the fluidity, made dimensionless by the square root of the granular temperature, measured in numerical simulations of granular shearing flows of frictionless spheres, may be predicted over a wide range of volume fractions using existing kinetic theories. We also show that the departure of these predictions from the measurements in the limit of random close packing is due to the reduction of the dissipation because of velocity correlations and the contribution of the anisotropy of the second moment of the velocity fluctuations to the shear stress. The former causes the granular temperature to increase without bound, the latter ensures that the pressure and shear stress behave in the same way with temperature. This combination of mechanisms may also be relevant to the shearing of emulsions, dense colloids, and non-Brownian suspensions.


An interstitial-cell tumor of the testis with estrogen activity is reported. Evidence for estrogen secretion was based on clinical grounds as well as on a study of steroid excretion. The function of both the tubular and the endocrine apparatus of the testis was apparently suppressed as a result of the production of estrogen by the tumor. There was a return to normal function after removal of the tumor. The literature on the subject is reviewed and discussed.


Artificial Neural Network (ANN) is used in heat supply network real-time prediction. The problem of structure design for BP network predictive model is discussed. Back Propagation Network (BPN) is adopted to establish heat supply network real-time predictive model. This model is trained and tested with part of the data from a boiler plant in Xihailin district, Mudanjiang, from Nov. 2000 to Apr. 2001. The result shows that the model has preferable ability of dynamic tracking and predicting.


The objective of this study was to assess genetic diversity within old and modern common spring wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) varieties cultivated in Siberia and to find out whether old Siberian varieties could be a potential source for genetic diversity in modern wheat breeding in Siberia. A set of 54 varieties was analysed using 22 wheat microsatellite markers (WMS), determining 23 loci located on 19 different chromosomes. In total, 151 alleles were detected with an average of 6.6, ranging from three to 11 alleles per locus. The average genetic diversity value (polymorphic information content) was 0.70. WMS located in the B genome produced more alleles per locus (7.6) compared with WMS located in the A (6.0) and D (6.0) genomes. Genetic similarity values between varieties ranged from 0.19 to 0.96 and were used to produce a dendrogram. With a few exceptions the varieties studied were clustered in two nearly equal groups consisting of predominantly old (released before 1960) and modern (released in 1960-90s) varieties, respectively. Genetic diversity values within these two groups were similar with 0.60 and 0.58, respectively. The numbers of group-specific alleles were 34 and 29, respectively. A significant variation in frequencies of 79 shared alleles was observed. The results obtained by using genomic microsatellite sequences demonstrated that breeding has not resulted in a decrease in the genetic diversity in Siberian spring wheat. However, significant quantitative and qualitative changes in allelic frequencies of different loci were detected. It may be suggested, that old Siberian common spring wheat varieties are a potential basis for genetic diversity in modern wheat breeding in Siberia.


Objective To study the expressions of HSP60, HSP70 and its significance in gastric cancer. Methods Immunohistochemical method of avidin-biotin complex was used in paraffin-embedded sections of gastric cancer tissues. Results The positive rates of HSP60, HSP70 were significantly lower in the cases of well-differentiation and without metastasis of lymph nodes than that in the ones of undifferentiation and with metastasis of lymph nodes. Conclusion The expressions of HSP60, HSP70 may be related to the clinicopathological characterization, biological behaviors and prognosis of gastric cancer. HSP60 and HSP70 may be important markers in reflecting the biological behavior and prognosis of gastric cancer.


Pressure-related structural properties of CaCrO4 with zircon-type structure (I41/amd) at ambient pressure were investigated using synchrotron radiation x-ray diffraction in energy-dispersive mode in a diamond anvil cell (DAC) up to 29.1 GPa at room temperature. A sluggish first-order structural phase transition to a scheelite-type phase (I41/a) was observed at 5.7 GPa. The lattice parameters of both phases at different pressures were calculated. The isothermal Birch–Murnaghan equation of state (EOS) was used to fit the data of pressure versus unit cell volume, and the bulk moduli were simulated to be 103.7 ± 0.3 and 125.1 ± 6.2 GPa for the zircon and scheelite phase, respectively.


The use of technology, and more specifically the Internet, has been an important advance for distance education. In the authors' case, they produced an electronic course book (ECB), accessible by Java-enabled web-browsers. The ECB is complementary to the written material and-at the same time-provides a means for course management. This work-in-progress describes the way in which the ECB is used, the appreciation of the ECB by students and the authors' experience with the development of single concept modules. The early results are based upon an ECB-based course that was given last year.


The development of organisms shows an end-state-directedness at various levels of organization. The concept of "self-organization", arising from the study of physicochemical processes, has been used for the understanding of the nature and causality of this specific characteristic of organismic development. Based on that concept it is currently attempted to develop computational models of complex bio-molecular systems. We believe, however, that essential differences exist between physicochemical and biological systems, which must be taken into account for future theoretical work. We discuss, e.g., the relationship between static and dynamic quantities, which limits the feasibility of mathematical modeling of the dynamics of organismic development. To grasp the logic of the organismic causality we outline a postphysicalistic concept of organisms based on the idea of an intrinsic nature, which is not static, but rather the process of the production of information.


The Leprosy Mission Community Hospital Shahdara, India is one of the tertiary care hospital and a referral centre for treatment of leprosy. The Leprosy Mission Hospital, is involved in the training of medical officers, nurses, physiotherapists and other medical and paramedical workers who are involved directly or indirectly under NLEP (National leprosy eradication programme). This report is on the 1 month training programme which is specifically designed for physiotherapists and undergraduate physiotherapy students. This report is based on the data which is collected from the training programme for undergraduate students of physiotherapy during January 2010 to December 2013. The main focus of the training programme was to give an overview of clinical and surgical leprosy. The name of this course was 'One month training course for physiotherapists in clinical and surgical leprosy'.


The main objective of this investigation was to evaluate the behavior before cyclic lateral
loads of non-reinforced adobe walls and walls reinforced with recycled polyethylene
terephthalate (PET) ropes.
The rope of recycled polyethylene terephthalate was subjected to a tensile test, obtaining
an average maximum effort of 1318.32 Kg / cm2, greater than 1200 Kg / cm2, minimum
value for reinforcing cords indicated by the E.080 standard. Design and Construction with
Reinforced Earth. The soil, the adobe units and the adobe masonry (piles and walls) were
also characterized.
The diagonal compression test was carried out to evaluate the shear strength in nonreinforced
adobe walls (M-SR) and walls reinforced with recycled polyethylene
terephthalate ropes (MR-30 and MR-20). From the results it was observed that the walls
reinforced with PET ropes recycled at 30 cm and 20 cm (MR-30 and MR-20) showed
greater resistance to the cut, reaching both the average value of 0.76 Kg / cm2, showing
an increase of 57% with respect to the walls without reinforcement (M-SR) that reached
the value of 0.49 Kg / cm2. In addition, the type of failure in the reinforced walls was
ductile compared to the unreinforced walls that failed frailly.
Finally, a quasi-static cyclic lateral loading test was carried out on non-reinforced adobe
walls (M-SR) and adobe walls reinforced with recycled PET ropes placed at a spacing of
30 cm (MR-30) and at a spacing of 20 cm (MR-20). From the cyclic lateral load test
hysteretic loops were obtained, which allowed to determine: energy dissipation, rigidity
degradation, maximum resistance, displacement ductility and tenacity. From this test it
was concluded that the walls reinforced with polyethylene terephthalate ropes recycled at
a spacing of 20cm (MR-20) have better behavior against cyclic lateral load than the
reinforced walls at a spacing of 30cm (MR-30) and these better behavior at lateral loads
in its plane than walls without reinforcement (M-SR). The improvement in behavior is
evidenced by a notable increase in the evaluated properties. In addition, it was observed
that the presence of reinforcement allows maintaining the structural integrity of the walls
and increases the capacity to dissipate energy by friction. This proposal represents an
ecological alternative that allows to take advantage of an abundant residual material in
Peru and around the world to reinforce adobe houses in an economical and sustainable
way.


A concentration series of Y3Al5O12:Ce solid solutions were prepared, and the composition demonstrating the highest X-ray luminescence intensity of cerium was identified. Based on the best composition, a series of luminescent diamond–Y3Al5O12:Ce composite films were synthesized using microwave plasma-assisted chemical vapor deposition (CVD) in methane–hydrogen gas mixtures. Variations in the amounts of the embedded Y3Al5O12:Ce powders allowed for the fine-tuning of the luminescence intensity of the composite films.


The terminations of high-temperature superconducting (HTS) power cables help supply current between the cryogenic HTS power cable and the room temperature power system while maintaining electrical insulation. This involves a cryogenic section with circulating liquid nitrogen (LN2) for cooling the HTS power cable and temperature gradient section with level interface formed by thermal equilibrium and an ambient section with current leads and insulation gases such as nitrogen and sulfur hexafluoride (SF6). The level of LN2 varies depending on the structure of the termination and the operation conditions, and this may further affect the temperature of the ambient section that is installed at the upper end of the cryogenic section. As the level of LN2 increases, the temperature of the insulation gas decreases and condenses, resulting in a significant decrease in the dielectric strength. Therefore, it is crucial to estimate the level of LN2 while designing the termination for HTS power cable. In this study, the LN2 level of the termination was estimated according to heat load and the operating conditions to avoid dielectric breakdown of insulation gas are proposed using a commercial thermo-fluid network analysis tool, SINDA/FLUINT.


This paper aims to provide a global synthesis of Holocene dust mass accumulation rates (DMAR) and particle size distributions (PSD) from various archives. Additionally the compiled data is compared to a global model of the dust cycle using the Community Earth System Model (CESM). S. Albani et al. present a transparent process which they use to select DMAR time series from various archives ranging from marine over lacustrine and terrestial sediments to ice cores. Considering the great uncertainties associated with the individual archives and methods and the differences between the archives this compilation is an ambitious undertaking. It demands a careful review of each type of archive and each individual record which is the major part of the presented work. The manuscript fits well into the focus of "Climate of the Past" and is in general suitable for publication. However some minor clarifications and changes are needed before final publication.


Let R be a finite commutative chain ring, D2n be the dihedral group of size 2n and R[D2n] be the dihedral group ring. In this paper, we completely characterize left ideals of R[D2n] (called left D2n-codes) when gcd(char(R), n) = 1. In this way, we explore the structure of some skewcyclic codes of length 2 over R and also over R × S, where S is an isomorphic copy of R. As a particular result, we give the structure of cyclic codes of length 2 over R. In the case where R = Fpm is a Galois field, we give a classification for left D2N -codes over Fpm , for any positive integer N . In both cases we determine dual codes and identify self-dual ones.


Ornamental peppers (Capsicum annuum L.) belong to the plant family Solanaceae, which includes ornamentals such as the Brugmansia (Angel's trumpet), Brunfelsia, Browallia (Bush violet), Datura, Nicotiana, Petunia, and Salpiglossis. Solanum pseudocapsicum (Jerusalem Cherry) and Solanum capsicastrum (False Jerusalem Cherry) are often confused with ornamental pepper. The genus Capsicum is native to the tropics of Central and South America. Pepper cultivation is ancient in the Americas where they were valued for their culinary and medicinal properties (Pickersgill, 1969a, 1969b). Peppers were introduced to Europe by Columbus, and subsequently to Africa and Asia by the extensive trading routes of the Spanish and Portuguese. When introduced to Europe in the 15th century, peppers were held in higher esteem as an ornamental plant than as a food source. Ornamental peppers as potted or bedding plants and a florist crop are still popular today (Stommel and Bosland, 2005). Ornamental peppers have been known as ''Christmas peppers'' for many years in the floriculture industry (Harthun, 1991). Pepper plants with vibrant green foliage and bright red fruits have traditionally been sold during the winter holiday season. Ornamental peppers with their bright contrasting colors and edible fruits were the most popular Christmas gift plant until the 1960s when the poinsettia industry began to introduce and promote improved poinsettia cultivars. Modern ornamental peppers exhibit considerable diversity in plant habit and morphology. Plants range in size and shape from short, compact plants with small fruit, such as 'Holiday Cheer', to plants as tall as three to four feet, with full-sized fruits, such as 'NuMex Mirasol'. This diversity, together with assorted ripe fruit color and varying hues of green to purple to black foliar pigmentation, affords a myriad of opportunities to develop unique ornamental cultivars suitable for use as potted types, bedding and garden plants, and cut stems. Ornamental peppers grown as potted plants are widely marketed for retail sale in the fall and winter months. Availability of compact plants with colorful fruit, ease of propagation from seed, relatively short cropping time, heat and drought tolerance, and excellent keeping quality are valuable attributes of ornamental peppers for commercial propagators. As bedding and garden plants, heat and drought tolerance and vibrant colors, have made ornamental peppers popular as border or specimen plants, or in mass plantings. The Agricultural Research Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced the release of the ornamental pepper (C. annuum) Christmas Lights cultivar series. The Christmas Lights series comprises four cultivars named Christmas Lights Blue/Red, Christmas Lights Blue/Orange, Christmas Lights Yellow/Red, and Christmas Lights Yellow/Orange. Color designations denote immature/mature fruit color for the respective cultivars. These cultivars are intended for ornamental applications. With their compact growth habit, prolific fruit set, and distinctively shaped fruit with vibrant contrasting colors, the Christmas Lights cultivars are well-suited for bedding plant production and container plant production, during the summer and fall garden and holiday season.


ARTICLE INFO Titanium alloy Ti-6Al-4V (Grade 5) is most popular material for Aerospace, Biomedical and Automobile field due to its inherent properties like high corrosion resistance, high strength to weight ratio is minimum, dimensional stability at elevated temperature. Titanium alloy metallurgy influences the machining process due to low modulus of elasticity, strain hardening, poor thermal conductivity and highly chemical reactivity. This article focuses on main difficulties impairing the machinability of Ti6Al-4V. Machinability performance considered on following criteria: tool wear, chip morphology, lubrication techniques & their attributes on surface integrity. Finally described best techniques and proposed study on basis of present state of research in field of Titanium alloy machining. Keywords— Chip morphology, Lubrication techniques, Surface integrity, Tool wear. Article History Received :18 th November 2015 Received in revised form :


The safety and efficacy of coronary stents, utilized for treatment of ischemic heart disease, have been evaluated extensively. In comparison with bare-metal stents, first-generation drug-eluting stents more than halved the need for target lesion revascularization, but long-term safety has been questioned, as the first-generation drug-eluting stents seem to be associated with a small, but increased, risk of (very) late stent thrombosis. The latter may be related to an inflammatory reaction caused by the polymer used for drug-release control. The second-generation zotarolimus-eluting stent, Endeavor™, was believed to represent a safer alternative. We present an overview of the currently available data comparing Endeavor with the first-generation sirolimus-eluting stent, Cypher™. We also present the limited results with the next-generation of zotarolimus- and sirolimus-eluting stents.


Different methods used for synthesis of Cu2O micro-/nano-crystals are introduced.Cu2O with sphere,cubic,cuboctahedral,and hierarchical structures have been prepared by wet chemical,electrochemical,and solvothermal synthesis methods.The ability to prepare Cu2O micro-/nano-crystals with well morphologies should facilitate the examination of their catalytic,electrical,and other properties.The characteristics and applications of Cu2O with different morphologies are summarized.Hierarchical structures of Cu2O micro-/nano-crystals have special performances and broad application prospects.Therefore,it will become the focus of future research.


. The caroteroid compound, crocetin, has been shown to lower plasma lipid levels in previous animal studies. In this investigation the total cholesterol, HDL cholesterol and total triglyceride levels were monitored in rats fed two different hyperlipemic diets for either 22 or 168 d depending on the diet. Injections of crocetin via subcutaneous and intraperitoneal routes were compared. No significant hypolipemic action was observed for any of the groups receiving crocetin injections in this study. The results clearly show that subcutaneous injections of crocetin in rats do not lower plasma lipid levels. Since crocetin has been shown to lower plasma lipid levels in rats given intraperitoneal injections of crocetin, hepatic activation or higher blood concentrations of the drug is apparently required in rats. The results also suggest that the mechanism responsible for crocetin's physiological activity is different in rats and rabbits.