In general, we have heard and read innumerable papers in many journals covering the basis of de sign of the Bridgeport System and it is now time to discuss and present some realistic actual oper ating data. Tables 1 and 2 presented in the paper have been published previously and are not new. It would be of benefit to all individuals involved in any Resource Recovery Operation if figures were made available on the basis of realistic and actual operating and analytical data dealing with the MSW received at the Bridgeport Plant as well as the RDF (Eco FuelTM II) produced. Similarly, the sections on Ma terials Balance and Utilization and Energy Recov ery seem to discuss theoretical and design data and do not provide information relative to actual oper ating experience. In the same vein, information would be of benefit and interest if test results regarding air pollution and/or power generation of the burning of oil are compared with Eco-FueITM II and the burning of oil by itself. The energy available from the process is very good on a relative basis and the use of the Eco Fuel represents an excellent approach to the utilization of energy which heretofore has been wasted, especi ally since it can be used in conjunction with another fuel in an existing operating furnace. In the overall review of the paper, which is well prepared, several questions presented themselves which I think are of interest in the total evaluation of·the project. 1. Are the.Electrostatic Precipitators newly in stalled since the plant started burning RDF or were they in use when the plant was burning heavy oil, which superceded the original coal burning opera tion. If they were existing units, were they modified and to what extent? 2. Eco-FuelTM is an interesting approach to the disposal of MSW, but to what extent and degree does the embrittling agent modify the composition of the RDF? Also to what degree is the fly ash dis charge changed or modified by its presence? 3. Can the Eco-FueITM be used in a furnace which was specifically designed for the burning of oil since there are no grates or provision for the removal of ash? Eco-FuelTM II has some 15 percent contami nants and ash which either drop to the furnace bottom or go out the stack to be picked up by the E.S.P.


T he death of Dr. Denton A. Cooley generated a wealth of gratitude from his patients and an outpouring of admiration from his colleagues around the world. One tribute, in particular, caught the attention of our staff—from a man in Mexico, born in 1958 with total anomalous venous return. When he was 14 months old, his defect was surgically corrected by Dr. Cooley at Texas Children's Hospital in Houston. A review of Dr. Cooley's personal handwritten log of operations yielded the patient's name and the date of the procedure—"3-3-60" (Fig. 1). Amazingly, it was already the 13th such repair so early in Dr. Cooley's career.


The utility model relates to a pony mixer that spurts the helping hand stirring rake has, including the bottom support, bottom support upper end fixedly connected with tank body, the nearly left end in tank body upper end are provided with the inlet pipe, and the nearly right-hand member in tank body upper end is provided with the water injection pipe, and inlet pipe and water injection pipe bottom penetrate tank body upper wall and tank body fixed connection, and the tank body upper end is located fixedly connected with workstation between inlet pipe and the water injection pipe. The utility model discloses a pony mixer that spurts the helping hand stirring rake has is by single motor simultaneously drive turbine fan and (mixing) shaft, feeds through mutually by air outlet with the turbofan and jet orifice on the stirring rake, and the high-pressure gas who produces by the turbofan comes supplementary (mixing) shaft rotation to resistance when the reduction motor just changes reduces the consumption, makes the mixer more energy-conserving.


Automatic summarization is emerging as a feasible instrument to help biomedical researchers to access online literature and face information overload. The Natural Language Processing community is actively working toward the development of effective summarization applications; however, automatic summaries are sometimes less informative than the user needs. In this work, our aim is to improve a summarization graph-based process combining genetic clustering with graph connectivity information. In this way, while genetic clustering allows us to identify the different topics that are dealt with in a document, connectivity information (in particular, degree centrality) allows us to asses and exploit the relevance of the different topics. Our automatic summaries are compared with others produced by commercial and research applications, to demonstrate the appropriateness of using this combination of techniques for automatic summarization.


The motion of a real object model is reconstructed through measurements of the position, direction, and angle of moving objects in 3D space in a process called "motion capture." With the development of inertial sensing technology, motion capture systems that are based on inertial sensing have become a research hot spot. However, the solution of motion attitude remains a challenge that restricts the rapid development of motion capture systems. In this study, a human motion capture system based on inertial sensors is developed, and the real-time movement of a human model controlled by real people's movement is achieved. According to the features of the system of human motion capture and reappearance, a hierarchical modeling approach based on a 3D human body model is proposed. The method collects articular movement data on the basis of rigid body dynamics through a miniature sensor network, controls the human skeleton model, and reproduces human posture according to the features of human articular movement. Finally, the feasibility of the system is validated by testing of system properties via capture of continuous dynamic movement. Experiment results show that the scheme utilizes a real-time sensor network-driven human skeleton model to achieve the accurate reproduction of human motion state. The system also has good application value.


High-efficiency colloidal quantum dot photovoltaic devices (CQDPVs) are achieved by improving the interfacial charge extraction via chemical modification of PbS-CQD/ZnO heterojunctions. Simple treatment of the heterojunctions using a chemical modifier, 1,2-ethanedithiol, effectively reduces the interband trap sites of the ZnO nanoparticles (ZnO-np) by passivation of the notorious intrinsic oxygen-deficient defects. As a result, the interfacial bimolecular recombinations between (i) trapped electrons in the ZnO-np layers and the holes in the CQD layers and (ii) accumulated electrons in the CQD layers and the holes in the CQD layers are suppressed. Consequently, the power conversion efficiency of the chemically modified CQDPVs reached a certified power conversion efficiency of 10.14% with decent air stability. Notably, the entire device fabrication process, including chemical modification, could be performed at room temperature under ambient atmosphere.


The structure-function relationship of organic photovoltaic (OPV) cells based on the chloroaluminum phthalocyanine (ClAlPc)/fullerene (C-60 planar heterojunction are explored. Optimization is achieved with the use of a molybdenum oxide (MoOx) and an underlying 3,4,9,10-perylene tetracarboxylic acid (PTCDA) interlayer at the hole extracting electrode, the latter acting as a structural template for the subsequent growth of the CIA]Pc donor layer. OPV cells demonstrate power conversion efficiencies of 3.0% Under Simulated AM1.5G (air mass 1.5 global) illumination, with the short-circuit current (J(sc) showing an similar to 25% improvement relative to a device Without a templating layer. Results from X-ray diffraction and electronic absorption spectroscopy suggest an improved packing and crystallinity in the ClAlPc layer when deposited on the PTCDA template, which suggests an enhancement in charge transport through the film. External quantum efficiency measurements confirm an overall improvement in J(sc) in the ClAlPc spectral region upon templating. The effect of the MoOx interlayer is to minimize losses in the open-circuit voltage and fill factor caused by significant band bending and pinning of the adjacent organic layer highest occupied molecular orbital levels to nonstoichiometric defect states in the near Fermi level region of MoOx. The results present an improved strategy for the development of higher-performance OPV cells based oil small molecule heterojunctions.


Objective — to analysis and systematization of literature data about pathogenesis of the inflammatory reaction and the clinical course of coronavirus infection caused by SARS-CoV-2.
Materials and methods. Access to various full-text and abstract databases was used for the search query «coronavirus», «COVID-19», «SARS-CoV-2» and their systematic evaluation was carried out. The most complete database of available literature sources (about 70) was obtainedon the molecular pathophysiology of COVID-19.
Results and discussion. The results of the analysis of the molecular pathophysiology of COVID-19 showed that the biomedical terms associated with COVID-19/SARS-CoV-2 form several clusters: cluster 1 is inflammation and the formation of a cytokine storm; cluster 2 — pathophysiological justification of the treatment of coronavirus infection, cluster 3 — comorbid conditions. Analytics of cluster 1 showed one of the most interesting working hypotheses today is model of bradykinin storm. This hypothesis can explain the multisymptomatic nature of COVID-19, including some of its strangest manifestations. The essence of the theory of bradykinin is that, when the virus begins to affect the regulation of renin-angiotensin-aldosterone system (RAAS) through the activation of angiotensin-converting enzyme type II, it causes the mechanisms that regulate bradykinin levels to fail. Bradykinin's receptors repeatedly are sensitized and the body also ceases to efficiently break down bradykinin. ACE break down bradykinin, but when the virus suppresses its activity, it cannot work with the same efficiency. The end result of such an imbalance is the release of excessive amounts of bradykinin, due to its mass unrestrained accumulation with the formation of a phenomenon — bradykinin storm. According to the bradykinin hypothesis, this particular variant of the storm is ultimately responsible for the polymorbidity of the clinical picture and the fatal effects cause d by COVID-19.
Conclusions. The bradykinin hypothesis of the development of a systemic inflammatory response in SARS-CoV-2 virus is a model that contributes to a better understanding of the pathogenesis and course of COVID-19 and adds novelty to data that are already known. It predicts almost all known symptoms today and offers quality treatments for the disease. Analysis of the processed data from the literature of cluster 2, devoted to the pathophysiological rationale treatment of coronavirus infection led to the role of vitamin D — as a nutrient involved in regulatory processes with participation of RAAS.


Geomancy is a special culture phenomenon in ancient China and has an important influence on the theory of ancient novel techniques.Novel critics quoted the concept of Long Mai to describe the narrative features of text clue and the organic correlation in novels,and also invoked many terms from geomancy to indicate other novel techniques.Therefore,the theory of ancient novel techniques presents its vividness,appropriateness and preciseness.The influence of geomancy on the theory of ancient novel techniques is closely connnected with the prosperity of geomancy during Ming and Qing dynasties.


Purpose – While having "more" in life seems to have a positive impact on consumers' well-being, the role of how satisfied consumers need to be with this "more" before it is able to enhance their well-being is not clear. This study aims to examine an integrated model of the mediating effect of satisfaction on the relationship between objective life circumstances and subjective well-being. Design/methodology/approach – The new model proposed is tested by using data obtained from British Household Panel Survey. A fixed-effects econometric model is estimated using Stata 10 to identify the mediating effect of satisfaction with life circumstances on the relationship between life circumstances and well-being. Findings – The results show that objective circumstances affect well-being primarily through the mediating effect of satisfaction with corresponding life domains irrespective of the level of objective circumstances. However, this mediating effect varies by life domain and cannot be generalized. Practical im...


ABSTRACT This article addresses a relative vacuum of the historiography of early-seventeenth-century navies. The central question is how European states established and sustained their navies. The article presents the main historiographical issues, especially the concepts of the 'military revolution afloat' and the 'fiscal-naval state', and demonstrates the technological, administrative and social concerns of early modern navies. It also exposes the main contemporaneous threats and alternatives to early modern state navies. It presents the changes that states made to navies and vice versa just before the so-called military revolution afloat in the mid-seventeenth century. This contested concept is put into context and exposed as a historical construct. The author, along with some other scholars, argues that it was far from a revolution, but more of a gradual evolution. The process of state-building in relation to state navies therefore needs to be reassessed: the navy was one of the tools of state-building, not just a tool of the already built and consolidated state.


The need to reduce injuries and fatalities on the roads, coupled with the increasing number of telematics and communications systems in the vehicle competing for the driver's attention are currently accelerating the development of Advanced Driver Assistance Systems. A fundamental issue of concern is the role of intervention or automation and the extent to which control of the driving task should remain with the driver. Though intended to increase driving safety, there are also concerns about potential negative behavioural effects such as risk homeostasis, overdependence, issues of trust in technology and emergent behaviours as well as long term effects such as behavioural adaptation. This paper describes some of the human factors research activities within Motorola Labs. which are driving the development of the Driver Advocate TM system. Far from automating the driving task, the philosophy is for the driver to remain a central component of this system. For the covering abstract see ITRD E122427.


In this paper, a system is proposed wherein a network of robots, each termed a 'BeachBot,' would be used to collect waste and litter that is found on beaches, coastal locations, and out into the oceans. The system takes the path of remote human-robot interaction, where each BeachBot would be teleoperated by a human operator through a virtual reality interface. That user would be crowdsourced online, with registered individuals being able to log-in and be assigned a robot. The proposed system is first tested through an online virtual reality game that simulates the implementation of such a system.


Exhaustive extraction of semantic information from text is one of the formidable goals of state-of-the-art NLP systems. In this paper, we take a step closer to this objective. We combine the semantic information provided by different resources and extract new semantic knowledge to improve the performance of a recognizing textual entailment system.


On the basis of reviewing the experience of art education at Suzhou University in the past ten years,this paper elaborates,considering the current situation,on the necessity for institutions of higher learning to deepen understanding,put in more funds,conduct educational research and combine activities both in and outside classrooms so as to make further reforms and improve art education.


The application of the finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) technique to problems in ionospheric radio wave propagation is complicated by the dispersive nature of the ionospheric plasma. In the time domain, the electric displacement is the convolution of the dielectric tensor with the electric field, and thus requires information from the entire signal history. It is shown that this difficulty can be avoided by returning to the dynamical equations from which the dielectric tensor is derived. By integrating these differential equations simultaneously with the Maxwell equations, temporal dispersion is fully incorporated. An FDTD approach utilizing the vector wave equation is also presented. The accuracy of the method is shown by comparison for a special case for which an analytic solution is available. The method is demonstrated with examples of pulse propagation in one and two dimensions. The computational limitations of present-generation computers are discussed. The application of this approach to the study of wave propagation in randomly structured ionization is addressed.<<ETX>>


The sequences of three peptides isolated from C. symbiosum (C.S.) GDH are shown each containing an essential lysine residue (marked by an asterisk) and homologous sequences N. crussa (N.C.) and E. coli (E.C.) GDH. spacing and Tocation suggests that they may be involved in substrate binding, the carboxyl groups of the substrate forming ionic interactions with the &-amino groups of the three lysine residues, thus orientating the carbonyl/amino group of 2-oxoglutarate and glutamate, respectively, to be in close facilitating hydride transfer during catalysis. in beef liver (B.L.) GDH, the NADP'-dependent GDH from proximity to the nicotinamide of the coenzyme, thus


PURPOSE: A low-temperature penetration type liquid coffee extract machine with a large capacity is provided to wet coffee powder by providing cool water to the inside of an extractor from an upper sprayer and a lateral sprayer and then to spray cool water to the inside of the extractor from the upper sprayer so that the cool water penetrates through the coffee powder for coffee liquid to be extracted. CONSTITUTION: A low-temperature penetration type liquid coffee extract machine with a large capacity includes an extractor (10) and a sprayer. Coffee powder is stored in the extractor. Coffee liquid is extracted while cool water is penetrating through the extractor. The sprayer provides cool water to the inside of the extractor. The sprayer includes an upper sprayer (210) and a lateral sprayer (220). The upper sprayer provides cool water to the inside of the extractor from the upper part of the extractor. The lateral sprayer provides cool water to the inside of the extractor from the side of the extractor. The coffee powder stored in a large capacity extractor can be extracted into coffee liquid while cool water is evenly penetrating the extractor.


This research aimed to determine the phytochemicals content of Terminalia catappa leaves extract (TCL) and its effects on the survival and blood profiles of ornamental fish ( Betta sp) Ninety fish were randomly assigned into six triplicates groups and reared in various concentration of TCL: 0 (control), 125, 250, 375, 500, 625 ppm for 30 days. Temperature, Dissolve oxygen (DO), and pH were monitored during the trial. After 30 days, survival, Red Blood Cells (RBC), White Blood Cells (WBC), haemoglobin (Hb), lymphocyte, and total protein serum (TPS) were analyzed. Based on the phytochemicals test, saponin, triterpenoid, quinon, phenolic, tannin, and flavonoid were detected on the TCL. Temperature and DO were not affected by any concentration of TCL. The lowest pH (5.05) was found in fish medium immersed with 625 ppm of TCL. Adding TCL above 375 ppm resulted in significantly higher survival, RBC, and Hb. The highest WBC was found in fish immersed with 625 ppm whereas the lowest lymphocyte was found in fish immersed with 375 of TCL. However, immersing any various concentration of TCL did not affect on the TPS. In summary, immersing TCL above 375 ppm is beneficial to enhance survival, RBC, WBC, and Hb of Betta sp. How to Cite Nugroho, R. A., Manurung, H., Saraswati, D., Ladyescha, D. & Nur, F. M. (2016). The Effects of Terminalia catappa L. Leaves Extract on the Water Quality Properties, Survival and Blood Profile of Ornamental fish ( Betta sp) Cultured. Biosaintifika: Journal of Biology & Biology Education , 8(2), 240-247.


Lead germanium telluride (Pb1-xGexTe), a pseudo-binary alloy of IV-VI narrow gap semiconductors PbTe and GeTe, is considered a potential mechanically robust high-index coating material. Pb1-xGexTe thin films were evaporated on silicon substrates from the ingots of single crystals using electron beam and resistance heating, respectively. The surface topographies and compositions of thin-films were characterized by using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and energy dispersive X-ray analysis (EDX); the transmission spectra in a spectral range of 2.5~12 μm were also examined. Thin films demonstrated columnar microstructure; moreover, those evaporated using e-beam heating have much larger granular dimensions, in comparison with those using resistance heating. The measurement of transmittance reveals the advantage of perfect stoichiometry in e-beam evaporated thin films fails to improve optical properties. It can be deduced the scattering from the larger grains may impair the optical transparency. It can be concluded that electron beam evaporation is an optimum deposition choice.


The effective mass of particles in a non-equilibrium quantum condensate can significantly change the behaviour of wave formation. We analyse the velocity dependence of the effective mass of polaritons in a variety of semiclassical mean-field models showing the deviation from the parabolic approximation for the condensate dispersion relation. We find that the velocity dependence implies significant modification of theoretical predictions with the primary driver of the dynamics being the transfer of energy into high wavenumber components in the condensate. We present explicit solutions for plane waves and linear excitations determining the deviation of the general form from the parabolic model. Finally we point out that the direct experimental observation of the effective mass switch in polariton condensates would require more subtle experiments than so far pursued.


Most classification algorithms deal with datasets which have a set of input features, the variables to be used as predictors, and only one output class, the variable to be predicted. However, in late years many scenarios in which the classifier has to work with several outputs have come to life. Automatic labeling of text documents, image annotation or protein classification are among them. Multilabel datasets are the product of these new needs, and they have many specific traits. The mldr package allows the user to load datasets of this kind, obtain their characteristics, produce specialized plots, and manipulate them. The goal is to provide the exploratory tools needed to analyze multilabel datasets, as well as the transformation and manipulation functions that will make possible to apply binary and multiclass classification models to this data or the development of new multilabel classifiers. Thanks to its integrated user interface, the exploratory functions will be available even to non-specialized R users. The mldr package aims to provide the user with the functions needed to perform exploratory analysis of MLDs, determining their main traits both statistically and visually. Moreover, it also brings the proper tools to manipulate this kind of datasets, including the application of the most common transformation methods, BR (Binary Relevance) and LP (Label Powerset), that will be described in the following section. These would be the foundation for processing MLDs with traditional classifiers, as well as for developing new multilabel algorithms. The mldr package does not depend on the RWeka package, and it is not linked to MULAN nor MEKA. It has been designed to allow reading both MULAN and MEKA MLDs, but without any external dependencies. In fact, it would be possible to load MLDs stored in other file formats, as well as creating them from scratch. When loaded, MLDs are wrapped in an S3 type object with class "mldr", which allows for the use of methods. The object will contain the data in the MLD and also a large set of measures obtained from it. The functions provided by the package ease the access to


ABSTRACT The digitisation of work poses global challenges but also offers new employment opportunities. This article explores the experiences of refugees and migrants who study at coding schools in Berlin to pursue digital careers. Attracted by the promise of coding as a fast lane to decent work, these newcomers hope to circumvent barriers of the local labour market, such as the need for local language skills and accredited qualifications. But many coding students realise that the fast lane they have entered is not so fast after all, and that it is scattered with obstacles and uncertainties. The ostensibly inclusive tech sector emerges as highly competitive and demands total commitment, passion, and a 'culture fit': alongside learning to code, they must learn to decode the behavioural and cultural specifics of an international tech sector. Coding thereby becomes a digital extension of the demands and expectations of national integration. As migrants and refugees hope that digital skills will lead to decent work, respectability, and middle-class status, they experience a contradiction between aspirations that are said to be universal, because anyone can in theory succeed as a coder, and recurring experiences of discrimination and precarity.


This title is an inquiry into the personal decision-making process of some of today's most powerful and dynamic business people. At the heart of this process is that fusion of knowledge and experience which we call intuition. The book explores and defines intuition by letting highly successful individuals tell their own stories of perceiving and acting on hunches. Here is John Sculley telling how he decided to go with the famous "lemmings" ad that ran during the 1984 Super Bowl when almost everyone else in Apple's top management was against it. Here is Robert Pittman defying conventional wisdom by making the decisions that launched MTV. Here is Eugene Krantz, head of Apollo mission control, revealing the thought processes that saved the moon landing for Apollo 9, and saved the lives of the crew of Apollo 13. Based on more than 60 interviews, and developed with a psychological analysis of patterns of thought, this book is a look at the mind, and how to actualize its secrets in business and in life. Ron Schultz is the author of "Cashing Out".


The rapid growth of Internet Technology (IT) in Indonesia proposes many new improvement opportunities for small and medium enterprises (SMEs) particularly in business process automation. Observing the cost of acquisitioning IT has become more affordable now compared to ten years ago, more and more SMEs are implementing it. Various studies in the field of SMEs have been done, but not much focusing on how SMEs adopting Integrated Information Systems. Specifically, in Surabaya greater area, most of SMEs are trying to automate their business processes, however not many realize that in terms of IT adoption context, SMEs are not just merely a simple scaled-down model of large firms, hence many project implementations in SMEs were failing. This study focuses on examining four important antecedents of technology adoption using Technology Acceptance Model framework. The perceived efficiency benefit and perceived service benefit were proposed as the antecedents of Perceived Usefulness. Familiarity and Owner's ICT Knowledge were proposed as antecedents of Perceived Ease of Use. The collected data of 264 SME owners or managers were tabulated and analyzed using path analysis to measure the causal effects. Result findings from final model confirmed the significance of Perceived Ease of Use as the largest predictor of Intention to Use IT for business process automation. Despite solid theoretical contribution of the findings, this study offers practical means of increasing the success rate of IT adoption by SMEs.


Magnesium alloys have wide prospects in the automotive industry,electronic industry and civilian industry products.The progress of die casting technology of magnesium alloys,such as semi-solid die casting,vacuum die casting etc.,is introduced.The key techniques of die-casting including choosethe machine of die-casting,design of the processing parameters and pouring system are analyzed.It is proposed that the good combination of melting and die-casting techniques should be improved in order to expand its application of die-casting for magnesium alloys.


Destructive feeding by insects delayed early spring development of native shortgrass range nearly 2 months. Although the perennial grasses and most forbs recovered, growth of several plant species was prevented completely for one growing season. Evidence indicated spotted cutworm [Ame all boundaries were abrupt and sharply defined. The few western wheatgrass clones were the only obvious living plants in a matrix of dormant, carry-over buffalograss [Buchloe dactyloides (Nutt.) Engelm.] and blue grama [Bouteloua gracilis (H.B.K.) Lag. ex Steud.] from the previous year, but tiller numbers and heights were markedly reduced compared with similar western wheatgrass clones in unaffected vegetation. Scattered representatives of other plants hidden by old residue showed various degrees of damage ranging from none to complete. Ball cacti [Mamillaria vivipara (Nutt.) Haw. and Neobesseya missouriensis (Sweet) B. & R.] and scarlet globemallow [Sphaeralcea coccinea (Pursh) Rydb.] apparently were undamaged. Otherwise, Japanese brome, little barley [Hordeurn pusillum Nutt.], western ragweed [Ambrosia psilostachyu DC.], and Louisiana sagewort [Artemisia ludoviciuna Nutt.] were absent; slimflower scurfpea [Psoralea tenuzjlora Pursh] and purple poppymallow [Callirhoe involucrata (T. & G.) Gray] were stunted, apparently from growing point removal. Common pricklypear [Opuntia humzjksa Raf.] also appeared damaged to the extent no newly developing pads were found on plants in affected sites compared with normally developing ones on plants in the unaffected area. Warm-season perennial grasses, buffalograss, blue grama, and red and purple threeawn . [Aristidu longiseta Steud. and A. purpurea Nutt.] had no visible


A 68-year-old man had right facial weakness with a droop, slurred speech, and eyelid ptosis that progressed over 5 years from right temple numbness and did not respond to gabapentin or steroids. What is your diagnosis?


Purpose
The purpose of this study is to look at the structure of the interactions between the board of directors' chairman qualities such as chairman independence, tenure, ethnicity, age- and impression management (IM).

Design/methodology/approach
The research population consists of non-financial Malaysian companies listed on Bursa Malaysia's Main Market, using data gathered via annual reports and DataStream. The study relies on the ordinary least square regression to test the direct relationships between the directors' chairman characteristics and IM. Moreover, robustness and sensitivity tests were used to examine the effectiveness of chairman characteristics with IM. Furthermore, the results rely on the FGLS regression as an additional test. The study found that chairman independence, chairman ethnicity and chairman age have a significant impact on IM.

Findings
The results reveal that chairman independence has a negative association with qualitative IM (IMSC1). Moreover, chairman ethnicity has a positively significant relationship with qualitative IM (IMSC1) and quantitative IM (IMSC2). Also, the effectiveness of chairman characteristics has a negative and significant association with IMSC1.

Originality/value
The primary goal of this paper is to fill a gap in the literature and to open up opportunities for more in-depth research on the subject. So far, there has been no research into the impact of the board chairman's (BC) personality on IM. This study serves as a warning to policymakers, businesses and their stakeholders, as well as researchers, about the importance of BC characteristics, which may impede the effectiveness of corporate governance mechanisms. The paper provides a framework for investigating these characteristics in the context of IM.


Bacterial meningitis disease is a burden in the African meningitis belt. Before 2010, Neisseria meningitidis serogroup A (Neisseria meningitidis A) was the predominant pathogen causing about 90 percent of meningitis epidemics in Africa. The meningococcal A conjugate vaccine (MACV) protecting against Neisseria meningitidis A was introduced since 2010. The purpose of this quantitative study was to determine the magnitude and fatality of meningitis bacterial disease in Africa following the introduction of MACV from 2010 and 2017. An interrupted time series design and nonprobability sampling were used. Secondary data issued of meningitis enhanced surveillance were retrieved from World Health Organization database. The binomial negative regression and Pearson's Chi-Square tests were used. The study found that after the MACV introduction there was a 39% decline of incidence rate of meningitis suspected cases (IRR 0.61, 95% CI 0.48 – 0.79, p 10%) after the MACV immunization (RR 0.547, 95% CI 0.40 – 0.74). There was a 49% decline of fatal meningitis (IRR 0.51, 95% CI 0.41 – 0.68, p < .001). After 2010, Neisseria meningitidis A declined and S. Pneumoniae, Neisseria meningitidis W135, Neisseria meningitidis C, Neisseria meningitidis X, and Hib became predominant. Between 2010 and 2017 Neisseria meningitidis all serogroups concerned remained higher the other pathogens 15,885 (62.06%) Vs 25,596. The study showed that following the MACV introduction despite the dramatic reduction of Neisseria meningitidis A, meningococcal meningitis bacterial disease remains a major public health problem.


The structure of multi-wall carbon nanotubes has been attributed previously to disordered stacking of the graphene planes. Evidence is presented that the nanotubes analyzed in this paper occur with stacked graphene layers in the sequence of AA′, where alternate graphene planes are translated by half the hexagon width. We further present proof that the crystalline materials comprise graphene helices (∼5 nm in width), rather than in the form of a perfect tube. We also show that the structural model proposed here may be a common structure for multi-wall carbon nanotubes.


Disulfide bonds play fundamental roles in proteins. This work is devoted to highly rare motifs containing disulfide bonds. A search for four cysteines, forming a 16‐atom membered ring (4CR) embodying two disulfide bonds, was carried out against all entries in the Protein Data Bank. Searching the crystallographic subset, only few protein molecules, all dimeric, were found to embody this peculiar structural feature, which establishes a covalent link between two different polypeptide chains. In contrast, in a peptide studied in solution by NMR, the four cysteines moiety includes only residues from one chain. A comparative analysis provided evidence for similarity and difference. It emerged that 4CR motif is highly rare and may serve to gain a specialized function. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Biopolymers 91: 1048–1055, 2009.


ABSTRACT A list of 50 war events was developed and presented to a sample of 442 Kuwaiti undergraduate male and female students. Participants were asked to rate each event on an 11-point scale according to the degree of distress which they felt toward it. Analysis of responses showed that events related to loss of persons and psychological pain occupied the highest ranks, events related to patriotic feeling and loss of materials occupied the middle position, while events related to humane sensitivity and everyday necessities came at the bottom of the scale. Results of multiple regression analysis indicated that perception of certain groups of events was significantly influenced by sex, experience of loss of persons, father's education, family income and experience of loss of materials. Residence during invasion, either inside Kuwait or outside of Kuwait did not show any significant effect on the regression findings. The relative importance of each predictive variable was assessed.


This article is devoted ascent depreciation in an earth orbit of space crafts for different functions that allow to solve many problems connected with space activity, in particular, maintenance of wider use of space resources and more effective clearing of a near space from space debris. The last is particularly true for bulky space objects of a technogenic origin which can be deorbit from earth orbits by using the special means for deorbiting injection into the target orbit by launch vehicles. As the ascent of such means for deorbiting by orbital launch vehicle demands significant financial expenses, for their decreased application of easy autophagy launch vehicles with burned fuel tanks is offered. The basic making unit of such launch vehicles is an autophagy engine. The design of autophage engine design and the principle of its operation of the version with compulsory fuel supply to the combustion chamber are presented and the expediency of use of such an engine for small spaceships in case of the impossibility of application of rather heavy usual systems of storage and fuel supply is shown. However, now the weight of the accepted systems of compulsory fuel supply autophagy engines for spaceships remains significant for launch vehicles. As one of the alternative ways of a feed the engine of autophagy launch vehicle, the capability of submission by using the inertia of the most fuel charge is considered. The unit of the autophagy engine contains an evaporator and works in a pulse mode, supplying fuel supply between momentums at the moment of low pressure in the engine. The effect of retardation (easings), representing pressure decrease and engine thrusts in flight time is established. This effect is called by the forces of inertia acting on the sliding engine, and has экспоненциальную an easing picture. Considering the effect of retardation, a system of the equations for calculating kinematic and design data of the launch vehicle with the autophagy engine is offered. The received results of the research have scientific and practical value and can find wide applications in the design of schemes and deorbiting means.


The paper characterises a new locality of Melampyrum cristatum identified in Debno upon Warta (Wielkopolska region, Poland). Its ecological conditions are presented, along with the size of the popula- tion, phytosociological affiliation, as well as a characteristics of the species focusing on new traits of seed sculpture.


The revolution of road traffic in the past few decades has predominantly increased. In general, the roads in India are mainly bitumen based roads. Moisture damage is one of the major failure and strength, durability and resistance to fatigues are other failure modes of the asphalt pavement. As an alternative source for pavement Zycotherm additive with Nano based technology was used. Warm Mix Asphalt (WMA) is modified Hot Mix Asphalt (HMA), which reduces process than convectional mix. The objective of this study is to investigate the effect of Zycotherm and glass powder on Asphalt mix. The case study of Bituminous concrete (BC-I) mix, Glass powder as filler material and Zycotherm additive with


The aim of this paper is to analyze how globalization has influenced the spread of different social movements, with a peculiar focus on gender issues, the Islamist expansion and the Gandhian nonviolence repertoire and self-immolation. These particular social movements were chosen due to their heterogeneity as they entail different contents (central claims being made) and repertoires (forms of manifestation). If the Islamist movement, the Gandhian repertoire of nonviolence and self-immolation have reached a global level due to conscious actions undertaken by leaders and networks of followers spreading from the less developed to the more developed regions of the globalized world, the plight of gender equality seems to follow a different pattern. Many of the positive outcomes connected with the feminist movement (such as a better economic situation for women, better job market penetration, more equal wages) stem not necessarily from conscious and coordinated actions (although these were often organized and contributed) but can largely be seen as secondary outcomes (spill-overs) of FDI penetration and trade openness. In brief, once western companies relocated to new eastern/southern locations they required female labor force and were more inclined to offer more equal payment than local capitalist/companies. As such, the higher level of gender equality brought by globalization in the 'poor South' was largely an unintended effect or a positive externality of FDI penetration and the more gender inclusive labor practices of western companies.


Carcinoma Ovary ranks third in gynaecological cancerrelated mortality among women worldwide (GLOBACON 2018). Tumour stage is considered the most important prognostic factor in ovarian cancers. Most of the ovarian cancers are diagnosed in stages III or IV. Other major prognostic factors are residual tumour volume present after cytoreductive surgery, histologic subtype, histologic grade, age and performance status. About 90% of ovarian cancers are epithelial in origin.


A code, referred to as FBCSIM, is being developed to predict large-scale atmospheric fluidized-bed combustor (AFBC) performance with fundamental fuel data from bench-scale test units as input. This work is carried out as a part of AFBC fuels characterization program sponsored by the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI). The code accounts for the physics of fluidization, which is unit specific, and the chemistry of combustion, which is fuel specific. The code includes a 3-D model and modules on bed hydrodynamics, chemical kinetics, solid distribution, and transport phenomena. The model for in-bed combustion incorporates a two-region particle mixing formulation. The code for in-bed combustion has been validated for different AFBC unit sizes (0.1, 2, and 20 MW) and different coals (two bituminous and a lignite). Sensitivity analyses have been carried out to identify the controlling variables and guide experimental work. Computer simulations have also been performed to delineate system response to operational parameters.


Pb/Si interfaces prepared by deposition of Pb onto the clean Si(111)7×7 and Si(001)2×1 surfaces, as well as oxygen-contaminated Pb/Si interfaces prepared by deposition of Pb onto the oxygen-contaminated Si(111)7×7 and Si(001)2×1 surfaces, have been studied with electron-energy-loss spectroscopy in conjunction with low-energy electron diffraction and Auger electron spectroscopy. The results show that, in contrast with its generally accepted properties, Pb intermixes strongly with Si at the Pb/Si(111) and Pb/Si(001) interfaces, forming a unique intermixed interfacial phase. However, at the oxygen-contaminated interfaces no evidence of such intermixing could be found


Rotating sliding wear experiments on TiB 2 -B 4 C have been conducted at room temperature (25 °C) in dry conditions according to the ASTMG99-95a standard. SiC balls were used as static counterpart. The disk specimens were surface finished by polishing. The tests were performed using different rotating sliding speeds from 0.1 up to 1.5 m/s with a mean Hertzian contact pressure of 1.2 GPa. Balls and disk specimens were analyzed by 2-D and 3-D surface topography, SEM and optical microscopy. The experimental results demonstrated that the sliding velocity influences both friction coefficient and wear rate values of TiB 2 -B 4 C ceramics. It was shown, that the wear rate varied between 3.64E-7 to 8.43E-7 mm 3 /Nm. Wear mechanisms such as polishing, abrasion and wear debris formation have been identified by means of SEM and EDX technique.


This article examines the story on Qur'an which is one of the greatest elements in the Qur'an. It shows that a story has become an easy intermediary for delivering messages and lessons. Muhammad Ahmad Khalafullah is a contemporary Islamic intellectual Faculty of Art and Literatures, Cairo University, in 1939, offered his thoughts in his dissertation about reading Qur'anic story. It aimed to make the Qur'an reader and researchers are able to take full existence from stories in Qur'an. Through its comprehension of story style in Qur'an One of his seemingly contradictory thoughts is the existence of an element of mythology in the story of the Qur'an. The methodology in this discussion is the method of analysis of the thoughts of Muhammad Ahmad Khalafullah along with the criticisms with the foundations of the arguments and arguments of scientist Qur'an. it is understood that the story in the Qur'an Muhammad Khalafullah is an opinion that makes misunderstanding over the Qur'an itself.


We report on the incorporation of the Visual DNA concept in a genotyping assay as a simple and straightforward detection tool. The principle of trapping streptavidin‐coated superparamagnetic beads of micrometer size for visualization of genetic variances is used for PrASE‐based detection of a panel of mutations in the severe and common genetic disorder of cystic fibrosis. The method allows a final investigation of genotypes by the naked eye and the output is easily documented using a regular hand‐held device with an integrated digital camera. A number of samples were run through the assay, showing rapid and accurate detection using superparamagnetic beads and an off‐the‐shelf neodymium magnet. The assay emphasizes the power of Visual DNA and demonstrates the potential value of the method in future point‐of‐care tests.


Many geophysicists swear by analytic velocity functions and wouldn't consider any other way of depth conversion. (Is there any other way?, we hear you say.) Analytic functions are conceptually easy to understand. The variation of some measured velocity is defined with respect to depth or seismic reflection time, leading to a mathematical manipulation (which might not be quite so easy) that defines the depth in terms of reflection time. Both constants associated with the function and the depth conversion can be easily revised as new data become available but, like all methods, analytic functions have limitations.


BACKGROUND
High blood pressure (BP) may impair renal function following percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). However, the predictability of renal progression based on admission and discharge BP and BP threshold values remains unclear.

METHODS
A total of 8,176 adult patients who underwent PCI at Seoul National University Hospital from 2006 to 2016 were retrospectively analyzed. Renal progression was defined as a doubling of serum creatinine levels, ≥ 50% decrease of the estimated glomerular filtration rate, or development of end-stage renal disease. The risk of renal progression according to admission BP (any time) and discharge BP (8:00-10:00 AM) was evaluated by multivariable Cox and additive generalized models with penalized splines.

RESULTS
During a median follow-up of 7 years (maximum: 13 years), 9.3% of patients (n = 758) reached renal progression. BP between admission and discharge showed a low correlation, and all BP parameters showed a non-linear relationship with renal progression. Systolic BP at discharge (SBPd) was selected as the best predictor of renal progression because the delta for the Akaike information criterion from the baseline model to the model with BP parameters was the lowest. The risk of renal progression started to increase at SBPd ≥ 125 mmHg. This increasing risk of renal progression with SBPd ≥ 125 mmHg remained significant, despite adjusting for the competing risk of all-cause death.

CONCLUSIONS
High SBPd is associated with renal progression following PCI, particularly when it is ≥ 125 mmHg. This can be used as a risk classification and potential target of renoprotective therapies.


Effects of acupuncture at Taekjung and Ungyo() bloodletting on serum glutamic oxaloacetic transaminase (GOT) activity, glutamic pyruvic transaminase activity(GPT), total Protein, Albumin, Alkalin Phosphatase(ALP), -GT, lactic dehydrogenase (LDH), total cholesterol and triglyceride were determined. 1) In the Ungyo bloodletting group, GOT, GPT, ALP, -GT and LDH activity showed a tendency to decrease compared to those of only group and Taekjung acupuncture group. 2) Serum albumin content showed a tendency decrease by treatment of and to increase by treatment of Ungyo bloodletting. 3) The values of serum total protein, total cholesterol and triglyceride showed no significant difference among all the treatment groups. 4) All the biological values showed no significant difference between the only group and Taekjung acupuncture group except the values of albumin. Results from this study indicate that the Ungyo bloodletting showed the possibility of liver function recovery in liver-harmed rats by .


There is a wave of hopelessness that is enveloping the Philippines. A 2006 poll found that one of every three Filipinos wanted to leave the country because "they see no hope". Poverty continues to be a central development issue in the country. According to the 2006 NSCB estimates, 27.6 million Filipinos or 4.8 million families are living below poverty line, and poverty has worsened between 2003 and 2006.2 Rather than exporting manufactured goods, the Philippines is an aggressive exporter of Filipino workers. From the 1990s, a feminization of OFWs (Overseas Filipino Workers) has increased. These women have university degrees, such as teachers, nurses, and doctors (turned nurses) leaving the country to become nurses, housemaids, entertainers, and caregivers in rich countries. But signs of a worrying social cost are already showing. Recently, policymakers and government officials were alarmed by a 'crisis' in the country's health sector where some 200 public hospitals had to close down and another 800 hospitals were partially closed because nurses and doctors had left the country for a better future in foreign lands. More than 6 million Filipinos work abroad and in 2006 they sent US$11billion in remittances to their families, and this helped prop up a national economy


Fourteen water treatment plants using lime in Zhejiang Province were investigated.The mode,position and amount of adding lime,the influence on alum consumption and the existing problems were summed up and analyzed,and the suggestions on rational application of lime in production are put forward.


We investigate the baryon fraction in dark matter haloes formed in non-radiative gas-dynamical simulations of the Λ CDM cosmogony. By combining a realisation of the Millennium Simulation (Springel et al.) with a simulation of a smaller volume focussing on dwarf haloes, our study spans five decades in halo mass, from 10 10 h − 1 M ⊙ to 10 15 h − 1 M ⊙ . We find that the baryon fraction within the halo virial radius is typically 90% of the cosmic mean, with an rms scatter of 6% , independently of redshift and of halo mass down to the smallest resolved haloes. Our results show that, contrary to the proposal of Mo et al. (2005), pre-virialisation gravitational heating is unable to prevent the collapse of gas within galactic and proto-galactic haloes, and confirm the need for non-gravitational feedback in order to reduce the efficiency of gas cooling and star formation in dwarf galaxy haloes. Simulations including a simple photo-heating model (where a gas temperature floor of T floor = 2 × 10 4 K is imposed from z = 11 ) confirm earlier suggestions that photoheating can only prevent the collapse of baryons in systems with virial temperatures T 200 . 2 . 2 T floor ≈ 4


Dynamic firewalls with stateful inspection have added a lot of security features over the stateless traditional static filters. Dynamic firewalls need to be adaptive. In this paper, we have designed a framework for dynamic firewalls based on probabilistic ontology using Multi Entity Bayesian Networks (MEBN) logic. MEBN extends ordinary Bayesian networks to allow representation of graphical models with repeated substructures and can express a probability distribution over models of any consistent first order theory. The motivation of our proposed work is about preventing novel attacks (i.e. those attacks for which no signatures have been generated yet). The proposed framework is in two important parts: first part is the data flow architecture which extracts important connection based features with the prime goal of an explicit rule inclusion into the rule base of the firewall; second part is the knowledge flow architecture which uses semantic threat graph as well as reasoning under uncertainty to fulfill the required objective of providing futuristic threat prevention technique in dynamic firewalls.


Cognitive vulnerabilities have been posited as central to the development of anxiety disorders and have been given substantial research attention. Despite widespread empirical investigations into the relationships with symptoms of mental disorders, and use as markers of symptom severity among clinical adult populations, research is lacking information on the progression of cognitive vulnerabilities across adulthood. The investments associated with longitudinal research requires a priori evidence of age-related differences from cross-sectional data. The current research used 1477 community members (72% female, 18–64 years) to cross-sectionally assess trends in cognitive vulnerabilities and their dimensions throughout adulthood and between distinct age groups (i.e., 18–19, 20–29, 30–39, 40–49, and 50+). Results suggest small, albeit statistically significant, associations with age which provide important insight into construct stability across adulthood and potentiate an avenue towards the understanding of progression across adulthood. Vulnerabilities encompassing somatic symptoms (i.e., fear of physiological sensations, injury, and illness) and uncertainty over future events (i.e., prospective-IU) exhibited positive linear relationships with age. Vulnerabilities encompassing fears of evaluation (i.e., fear of negative evaluation and socially observable anxiety), behavioral inhibition (i.e., inhibitory-IU), and loss of cognitive control (i.e., fear of cognitive dyscontrol) exhibited quadratic relationships with age. Participants over 50 years of age tended to report elevated cognitive vulnerabilities. Comprehensive results and directions for future research are discussed.


A trust anchor represents an authoritative entity via a public key and
associated data. The public key is used to verify digital signatures
and the associated data is used to constrain the types of information
for which the trust anchor is authoritative. Relying parties use trust
anchors to determine if digitally signed objects are valid by
verifying digital signatures using the trust anchor's public key
and by enforcing the constraints expressed in the associated data.
This document describes some of the problems associated with the lack
of a standard trust anchor management mechanism as well as problems
that must be addressed by such a mechanism.


The focus of the study is to analyze the supernatural phenomena experienced by a family on Aran Island located on the west coast of Ireland. The person directly involved with the supernatural phenomena is Maurya, the protagonist of the drama, having lost all of her male family members. By the time this story begins, the second last son, is declared lost and finally found dead on the sea. After that her youngest son goes to the bazaar in the Mainland to sell horses but he never returns. These supernatural phenomena with various forms emerge from the span of these two events. There is a strong belief in supernaturalism among the people of Aran Island and this makes supernaturalism a significant aspect of the whole storyline. The research method used is Descriptive Qualitative with a focus on library research with the ground that descriptive qualitative is appropriately used to study the social phenomena where people make various senses of their life experiences. The result shows that the supernatural phenomena appear in varied forms: Mystery behind the death of Michael, Supernatural vision of Maurya, Foresightof Mauryaand Supernatural nuance in the title.  Keywords:  supernaturalism, mystery, vision.


A second-generation, semi-synthetic lipoglycopeptide antibiotic, with bactericidal activity against a variety of gram-positive bacteria. Upon administration, dalbavancin binds, at a site different from that of penicillins and cephalosporins, tightly to the D-alanyl-D-alanine portion of peptidoglycan chains, thereby preventing peptidoglycan elongation and interfering with bacterial cell wall synthesis. This leads to activation of bacterial autolysins and induces cell wall lysis.


During the last 20 years a new category of schools, schools for children with special needs, has settled to be a growing part of the Swedish school system. This is despite the political aim in Swed ...


We survey discrete and continuous model-theoretic notions which have important connections to general topology. We present a self-contained exposition of several interactions between continuous logic and $C_p$-theory which have applications to a classification problem involving Banach spaces not including $c_0$ or $l^p$, following recent results obtained by P. Casazza and J. Iovino for compact continuous logics. Using $C_p$-theoretic results involving Grothendieck spaces and double limit conditions, we extend their results to a broader family of logics, namely those with a first countable weakly Grothendieck space of types. We pose $C_p$-theoretic problems which have model-theoretic implications.


Abstract. These data comprise 1,231,024 routine tests carried out over a 5‐year period on voluntary blood donors. The percentage of positive results on the machines varies from 1 to 3% of the total number of samples tested. Antibodies identified either by manual or automated techniques make up 15–20% of the positive screening reactions. Rhesus, Lewis and P systems prevail, whilst Duffy, Kidd and Lutheran systems are absent.


The present invention optionally in combination with an MTP inhibitor, apoB-100 synthesis inhibitors or PCSK9 inhibitors; (R) -2- (4 - ((2- ethoxy-3- (methyl) phenoxy 4- (trifluoromethyl) propyl) thio) -2-methyl-phenoxy) -acetic acid or a salt thereof is homogeneous bonding family It discloses useful in the treatment of sex and cholesterol increases.


The present study entitled the figurative language used in "Twilight" movie is concerned with the analysis of the figurative language that this movie script contains and the meaning contained therein. The topic about figurative language is interesting because it gives people a new information when they are speaking, reading, writing, and also listening the source or something which contains figurative language. The aims of this study are to identify and analyze the types of figurative language used in "Twilight" movie script and the meaning conveyed. This study used two theories, The theory of figurative language is adopted the theory of Perrine and Richard E.Mezo. The second theory is adopted the theory of meaning by Lichao song to support the analysis. The researcher choose descriptive study as the kind of the research and presented the results in qualitative way. In collecting the data, the researcher used document analysis. The instruments were checklist, to help the researcher collecting the complete data of figurative language in analyzed the meaning of figurative language. The method consists of three steps, The first step was downloading the movie script from the internet. Then the movie script was read repeatedly and intensively. The last step was noting down the figurative language. The result of this study shows that there are eight types of figurative language found, they are simile, metaphor, personification, synecdoche, hyperbole, paradox, litotes, irony. The researcher use situational context to know the meaning of each figurative language which appear in Twilight movie.


A 30-year-old man presented to our clinic for evaluation of newly diagnosed hypertension. On examination, he had an apical systolic ejection click, a grade 2/6 systolic murmur, and weak femoral pulses. The difference in blood pressure between his arms and legs was 60 mm Hg. Echocardiography revealed coarctation of the aorta and a bicuspid aortic valve with mild stenosis. (See the Supplementary Appendix, available with the full text of this article at NEJM.org, for a chest radiograph showing the consequences of coarctation.) Catheterization through the right femoral artery was performed in preparation for stenting of the coarctation. Contrast material was injected . . .


In this paper we study Computer Aided Geometric Design (CAGD) and Manufacturing (CAM) of developable surfaces. We develop a direct representation of developable surfaces in terms of plane geometry. It uses control planes to determine a surface which is a Bezier or a B-spline interpolation of the control planes. In the Bezier case, a de Casteljau type construction method is presented for geometric design of developable Bezier surfaces. In the B-spline case, de Boor type construction for the geometric design of the developable surface and Boehm type knot insertion algorithm are presented. In the area of manufacturing or fabrication of developable surfaces, we present simple methods for both development of a surface into a plane and bending of a flat plane into a desired developable surface. The approach presented uses plane and line geometries and eliminates the need for solving differential equations of Riccatti type used in previous methods. The results are illustrated using an example generated by a CAD/CAM system implemented based on the theory presented.


This article focuses at different approaches concerning the financial system's role on the long term capital accumulation in the Brazilian economy. It reappraises what is here understood as interpretative biases established by the two main trends, such as: privatization defenders and state-ownership supporters, in an effort to contribute to the ongoing structuring of other referentials for the discussion over the perspectives offered by the financial system to reorganization of long term capital accumulation planning in the Brazilian economy.


ƒÀ-1 , 3-Endoglucanase highly purified from soybean cotyledon tissue possessed the activity to release soluble elicitors from insoluble cell walls of Phytophthora megasperma f. sp. glycinea. Antiserum raised against the purified enzyme appeared to be specific for soybean ƒÀ-1, 3-endoglucanase, since it formed a single precipitation band with soybean tissue homogenates in Ouchterlony double diffusion plates but did not react with homogenates of other plant species. The antiserum almost completely inhibited both ƒÀ-1, 3glucanase and elicitor-releasing activity by the purified enzyme as well as crude extracts from soybean tissues. Furthermore, these two activities shown by cut soybean cotyledon tissue were also inhibited by the antiserum. The antiserum, however, did not inhibit either ƒÀ-1 , 3-glucanase or elicitor-releasing activity shown by extracts from other plant species. Zymolyase 100T, a partially purified ƒÀ-1, 3-endoglucanase preparation of bacterial origin, also possessed elicitor-releasing activity. These results confirm the previous observation that elicitor-releasing activity is due to ƒÀ-1, 3-endoglucanase activity and that ƒÀ-1, 3-endoglucanase is the major elicitor-releasing factor present in soybean tissues. (Received February 16, 1990)


From the perspective of China's commercial banks and the interest rate market development, the risk of commercial banks is analyzed,and the risk of interest rate market is put forward.


The thermo-hydraulic investigations for triple concentric-tube heat exchanger with two-thermal communications have been experimentally carried out at steady state conditions. Water at different temperature was passed through the inner tube, the inner annulus and through the outer annulus. Experiments were performed at all possible flow arrangements for Reynolds number ranging from 2800 to 11,000 of hot water in inner annulus. Validations of experimental results have also been carried out with the established results. Experimental investigations have been carried out to measure the variations in temperature of fluid streams along the length of heat exchanger and variations of friction factor and of Nusselt number with Reynolds number.


John Dunn's autobiography forms part of a historiography that offers us a fascinating perspective of a witness to his times. His account is certainly not that of a bystander or spectator because he had a vested interest in the outcome of the events he writes about. It is entirely possible that on occasion, as a key player, he even had a hand in shaping some of these events. Therefore Dunn's treatise is best read together with the other evidence in our possession, made up of official documents; further witness reports; and the oral histories of the Zulu nation, in order to arrive closer to the historical "truth" via triangulation. When reading this autobiography one has to constantly keep in mind the self serving nature of the work, which is in reality Dunn's attempt to legitimise his status as a civilising force on, and intermediary with, the Zulu nation.


Amidst the current debate on the practice of statistical inference, more attention should be directed to the random-sampling assumption. We demonstrate the ubiquity of the assumption in sample surveys, controlled experiments and regression models, and argue that the assumption is crucial to inference. If it fails, as is often the case, not only the P value, but also the confidence interval may not be meaningful. An informal survey of papers that present include inferential data analysis found a low rate of a mention of the issue: 1 in 10 papers in two volumes of Journal of Statistics Education, and 2 in 8 papers in one volume of Statistical Education Research Journal. None of the three papers discuss implications of the failure on the conclusions. We make several recommendations to help the statistics education community improve the practice of inferential data analysis.


The use of vulture parts by traditional healers in the public market in Maseru was investigated. Only Cape Griffon Gyps coprotheres parts were noticed in the market, and all parts of the birds seemed to be used. Observed results were extrapolated to indicate the extent of trade and potential impact of this on Cape Griffon populations in Lesotho. Although interviews with traditional healers indicated that each healer uses one vulture per year, determining actual numbers of Cape Griffons used per year was not possible. Using an estimate based on results obtained, a mathematical extrapolation was done, and indicated an alarming threat to Cape Griffon populations in Lesotho. Vulture News Vol. 53 2005: 15-19


In this paper we present data distribution methods for parallel processing environment. The primary objective is to process partial match retrieval type queries for parallel devices.
The main contribution of this paper is the development of a new approach called FX (Fieldwise eXclusive) distribution for maximizing data access concurrency. An algebraic property of exclusive-or operation, and field transformation techniques are fundamental to this data distribution techniques. We have shown through theorems and corollaries that this FX distribution approach performs better than other methods proposed earlier. We have also shown, by computing probability of optimal distribution and query response time, that FX distribution gives better performance than others over a large class of partial match queries. This approach presents a new basis in which optimal data distribution for more general type of queries can be formulated.


Quantum bit error rate is an important operating parameter in quantum key distribution.As to the satellite-to-ground quantum key distribution,the highly attenuated laser pulses with Poisson distribution are used as single-photon sources.The theoretical model of the quantum bit error rate caused by the background light is established and the expressions of the quantum bit error rate are given.The quantum bit error rate is analyzed in the numerical simulation for the laser links between a ground station and a 300km altitude satellite in a low earth orbit.The study shows that the background light is one of the main factors that limit the link distance for free-space quantum key distribution,and that it is feasible to implement quantum key distribution between a ground station and a satellite in a low earth orbit.In daylight,the quantum bit error rate is on the order of 10-3~10-2,at night,10-4 during a full moon and 10-6~10-5 during a new moon.


ABSTRACT Online business is currently experiencing rapid growth. In 2013, there were about 4,3 million people who got used to shopping online, and in 2016 it was estimated to have reached 8,4 million buyers. This is certainly a great opportunity for online shopping companies to give the best service for consumers. Lazada is one of he well-known online shopping sites. Based on the data from the Ministry of Communications and Informatics, Lazada ranked third in the most frequently used sites in online transactions in 2015, however according to the Popularity Index in 2015 and 2016, Lazada ranked first. Although Lazada is very popular in online buyers community, Lazada has received a lot of complaints about the quality of their services. Based on this phenomenon, a research has been conducted to find out about the quality service of Lazada. The research applies the SERVQUAL method and specifically for online services that is known as e-SERVQUAL. This method can be used to find out if there is a significant gap between consumer expectation and perceptions. There are six main dimensions as the focus in the research, namely reliability, responsiveness, ease of use, security/privacy, aesthetics, and information. Furthermore, the research will be formulated by using Importance Performance Analysis to figure out which dimensions need evaluation and improvement. This research applies questionnaires involving 140 respondents as sample. Sampling method used in this research is purposive sampling. The average value of expectation is 4,32 and the average value of perception is 3,98. The value of e-SERVQUAL is -0,34. Keywords: service quality, e-SERVQUAL, Importance Performance Analysis, Lazada


The widespread distribution of different services on demand and business applications requires a designing and implementation the highly-productivity networking solutions. Traditional multiservice network solutions often not allow to provide services with guaranty QoS characteristics. First of all, such situation connected with a high overloading of network environment – the data forwarding equipment today provide a lot of addition management and monitoring functions that influent to the efficient of service provision greatly. The implementation of Software-Defined Networking (SDN) paradigm and different virtualization technology, i.e. cloud computing is became very popular today. The main principles of SDN paradigm and cloud computing are provide the availability of different type of services which are allocated at different parts of the distributed multiservice network to users who wants to access those resources from their work place in the form as a service through an optimized and reliable service provider maintaining convenience and ubiquity [1]. The services implementation through cloud computing has many advantages: increasing network scalability, performance, reliability, fault tolerant and decreasing cost of implementation and utilization. The multiservice networks based on SDN solutions has a lot of benefits. The productivity, control of transport quality, transparent services provision, network function virtualization (no overhead of encapsulation), and flexible traffic management are the most significant benefits of SDN implementation. However, the complication of SDN paradigm is not finishing process. The traffic engineering mechanisms and service provision scenarios are not completed. The challenges in services provision in SDN-based networks connected with low interoperability between hosts, lake of resource control and nodes migration control. The prediction of load intensity and effective load distribution between different computation nodes is still actual question [2]. In this way the finding load balancing solution for clouds is not easy process. The analysis of main policies and characteristics like round trip time, throughput that archived by using of different load balancing algorithms and resources utilization give ability to choose and implement better traffic engineering solutions for SDN-based networks.


alkali-nity of the blood was the one recently devised and described by Dr. A. E. Wright.2 This process is an extremely ingenious and reliable one, and possesses the great advantage of not requiring more than two or three drops of blood in order to make an accurate determination of its alkalinity. I first estimated the percentages of alkalinity of specimens of blood drawn from twenty-five healthy male adults, which I found to vary from o.i6i to 0.185 per cent. of anhydrous sodium carbonate, the average being o. 167. This average I have taken as representing the normal alkalinity of the blood. In the following table (Table I) are shown the results of the determinations that I made of the alkalinity of the blood of a patient suffering from subacute gout; the estimationis were made throughout the duration of the attack, mostly on alternate days. The normal alkalinity of healthy blood is shown for comparison at the foot o'#the table:


Executing a card-based cryptographic protocol is an attractive way to perform secure multiparty computation (MPC) with a deck of physical cards. Crèpeau and Kilian at CRYPTO 1993 proposed card-based AND and XOR protocols that can deal with a logical conjunction and exclusive-or of variables. Their protocols use a familiar shuffling action called a random cut that can be easily implemented by humans, while the numbers of required cards and shuffles are not small enough to be efficient and the protocols are Las Vegas algorithms, i.e., they are not finite-runtime. Several researchers have improved upon the protocols for a quarter of a century. Eventually, there are many AND protocols in the literature, some of which are quite efficient and practical to execute. By contrast, there are only three XOR protocols including the Crèpeau--Kilian protocol mentioned above. In this paper, we design an efficient XOR protocol using only random cuts; the numbers of required cards and shuffles are six and two (which is fixed), respectively. Our proposed XOR protocol is the first construction of a finite-runtime XOR protocol if we restrict ourselves to use only random cuts.


What you need 11⁄4 cups all-purpose flour 2 teaspoons baking powder 1⁄2 teaspoon baking soda 1⁄2 teaspoon salt 1 teaspoon cinnamon 1 cup uncooked oatmeal 1 cup skim milk 1⁄3 cup brown sugar, packed 1 egg 1⁄4 cup vegetable oil 1⁄3 cup applesauce 11⁄4 cup raisins, unpacked How to make it 1. Wash your hands; make sure your cooking area is clean. 2. Place the raisins in a bowl of hot water for 15 minutes to soften them. 3. Drain the raisins. 4. Stir together the carrots, raisins, salad dressing, salt and pepper. 5. Chill it about 15 minutes before serving.


Polyclonal antibodies and antigens of host and pathogen were used for early diagnosis of rhizome rot disease of ginger. Pythium aphanidermatum, a causal organism was detected in ginger rhizome after eight weeks of inoculation by agar gel double diffusion and immuoelectrophoretic tests, but only one week after inoculation by indirect ELISA (enzyme linked immunosorbent assay). Systemic protection against P. aphanidermatum was induced in ginger (Cv. Suprabha) by soaking rhizome seeds separately in selected synthetic chemicals or specific herbal extracts for 1 h prior to sowing. Among 12 plant defence activators tested, jasmonic acid (JA, 5 mM) and 10% leaf extract of Acalypha indica (ALE) reduced disease significantly, with concomitant increase of defence-related proteins (DRPs). Analysis of protein profiles of leaves of JA-treated and inoculated plants by SDS-PAGE and Image Master VDS-ID Gel Analysis Version 3.0 revealed 18 protein bands, including four DRPs having molecular masses 32, 24, 18 and 14 kDa respectively. At least four DRPs were detected in leaves of ALE-treated inoculated plants. Growth response of pathogen to both JA and ALE was evaluated in vitro. ALE stimulated growth, while JA inhibited growth at high concentration (0.5 mM) and slightly stimulated growth at low dose (0.005 mM). Results suggest their host-mediated role in induced systemic protection against disease.


Abstract A dominator coloring (resp. total dominator coloring) of a graph G is a proper coloring of the vertices of G in which each closed neighborhood (resp. open neighborhood) of every vertex of G contains a color class. The dominator chromatic number (resp. total dominator chromatic number) of G is the minimum number of colors required for a dominator coloring (resp. total dominator coloring) of G. In this paper, we determine the dominator chromatic number and total dominator chromatic number of the circulant graph Cn (1, 2).


We have fabricated light-emitting diodes (LEDs) with Schottky contacts on a single ultrathin amorphous silicon (Si) layer containing Si nanocrystals formed by simple techniques as used for standard Si devices. Orange electroluminescence (EL) from these LEDs could be seen with the naked eye at room temperature when a reverse bias voltage was applied. The EL spectrum has a major peak with a photon energy of 1.9 eV and a minor peak with a photon energy of 2.2 eV. The operation voltage is reduced to 4.0−4.5 V, which is low enough to be applied to a standard Si transistor.


The different resistance levels of different cotton varieties to Apolygus lucorum Meyer-Dur and the relationship between contents of GAA and tannin in cotton leaf and resistance to Apolygus lucorum Meyer-Dur were studied in the net room and laboratory.The results showed that the contents of GAA and tannin differed among different cotton varieties and among different growing periods.The contents of leaf GAA and tannin at the bolling stage indicated a strong positive correlation with the resistance to Apolygus lucorum.


In this study, factors affecting the extraction conditions like particle size of fruit (X1: 0.30 – 3.67 mm), water – fruit ratio (X2: 2.3 5.7), extraction temperature (X3: 1575 °C) and extraction time (X4: 44 196 min) were investigated to obtain soluble solid extract in a high yield and quality from carob bean fruit whose dry matter (90%) contains substantially sugar and fiber, using response surface methodology (RSM). Effects of these factors were investigated with respect to the water holding capacity of testing carob pod and pH, extraction efficiency, clearness and the soluble solids (SS%) of fruit. It was observed that the calculated determination coefficients for all dependent variables except pH were varied between 0.77 and 0.97 values. In the study it was determined that while the interaction between the time-temperature exhibited the most significant effect on SS% (P<0.05), the individual effects of water fruit ratio (P<0.001) and the temperature (P<0.01) on the SS% was also found significant. The results indicated that high SS% value required the low water with the high temperatures for short time or a long time for low temperatures.


Basing on the present situation of the pasturce resources in Xiahe county of Gansu provine, the sustainable approaches were to construct domestic animal seed engineering, to drove animal production and structure adjustment, to decide the quantities of domestic animal accoding to the quantities of forge production, to intensify animal husbandry serving system and industrialization for reasonable utilization of pasture resources, in order to realize sustainable development of animal husbandry.


A programme of trial work with soybeans conducted in Northland between 1974 and 1980 is described. Small plot experiments were conducted on cultivars, sowing dates, weed control, seeding rates and row spacing. Grain yields ranged from I to 6 t/ha, although a conservative yield expectation with current techniques was considered to be 2.5 t/ha.


Colonial legacies are embedded like massive conglomerates in and on the land. Brown's essay, like a virtual field trip, focuses on her childhood memories of growing up in rural Jamaica. Yvonne Brown demonstrates the historical shifts between a colonial centre in the former colonized periphery. (A concept once elaborated by Ann Norton who taught us). Sandra Dixon's poem, complements Brown's essay, by imagining the life of an enslaved person. Moving to the present, DePass' essay highlights some important experiences of participating in the Jamaica Geographical Society (JGS) and the Geography Department's Conference held in summer 2016, to celebrate the Department's Golden Anniversary. Extracts from one of the first UWI Geography publications, submitted by Faye Lumsden, illustrate the key issues in teaching and learning Geography, in the 1960s and 1970s. Finally, Part 2 concludes with Colin Hewitt's Photo Journal. Hewitt's vivid, visual field trip, documents some of the cultural history underpinning the campus' Geography. It offers a transition to Part 3, in which our Geography field trips moved off campus.


This study aimed to identify and analyze scientific publications related to training that address professional development. It was based on the selection of articles from the CAPES Journal Portal database, in which 12 references were analyzed. Among the main authors that supported this work, choose: (Garcia, 1999), (André, 2017), (Alarcão, 2014), (Gatti & Barreto, 2009) who have a great contribution in research on teacher professional development. The methodology used, according to (Morosini & Fernandes, 2014), stands out as a review of the literature, of the state of knowledge type. The results show that it is necessary for the teacher to develop professionally, always renewing his knowledge, overcoming the difficulties present in the school context, introducing new instruments and mechanisms so that the classes have more meanings and senses and consequently a solidification in relation to the students' learning, thus contributing to the existence of comprehensive training.


A checklist of Cyanobacteria (Blue-green algae) has been made by reviewing available literature in order to contribute to the knowledge of biodiversity of algae in the Punjab state of India. The list records 317 taxa of the phylum Cyanobacteria distributed among 74 genera, 32 families, and six orders. The order Oscillatoriales has 115 taxa, followed by Nostocales (84), Synechococcales (60), Chroococcales (49), Spirulinales (8), and Pleurocapsales (1). The family Nostocaceae has the maximum number of genera followed by Microcoleaceae, Chroococcaceae, Oscillatoriaceae and other reported families. The genera with the highest number of species were Phormidium (39 species), Lyngbya (15 species), Oscillatoria (14 species), and Leptolyngbya & Scytonema (13 species each). The checklist revealed a high degree of species richness within phylum Cyanobacteria found in Punjab. This checklist can provide a baseline for future floristic studies with taxonomically updated/accepted name of genera/species of cyanobacteria.


Numerical analysis of acoustic wave propagating in YZ lithium niobate covered by ideal periodic metal strips is presented. Mathematica package has been found convenient for the analysis. Graphical results are presented for surface acoustic wave velocity and for the generating efficiency of strips for wide range of metallization ratio and frequency.


The article deals with the issue of the possibility of classifying some cases of euthanasia as the so-called abnormal motivational situation of the perpetrator. Therefore, with the literature on the function of motivation under criminal law as a basis, the article attempts to discuss the essence of an abnormal motivational situation using the concepts of motivational background and motivational conflict, and to translate these factors into the features of a prohibited act under Art. 150(1) of the Criminal Code. Moreover, using the interpretation of Art. 150(2) of the Criminal Code and views of criminal law scholars, the article analyses the function of Art. 150(2) of the Criminal Code and tries to demonstrate the legitimacy of a further reduction of criminal liability due to the abnormal motivational situation of the euthanasia's perpetrator.


Clean energy processes are a panacea to mitigating the adverse effect of greenhouse gas emissions from the combustion of fossil fuel. Attaining the target of net-zero carbon emission in 2050 is largely dependent on the availability and affordability of clean energy processes which are renewable. Since the clean energy processes to a large extent depend heavily on several variables, such as the weather, the technology being utilized, and the materials being employed, modeling and optimization could help to minimize this inherent sophistication thereby enhancing the availability and affordability. Due to the strategic importance of clean energy processes in actualizing net-zero emissions by 2050, this subject set was designed to explore expert contributions on breakthroughs, improvements, and advances in the modeling and optimization of clean energy processes. The modeling of bio-hydrogen recovery from agro-industrial wastewater was reported by Hossain et al. The authors employed data-driven machine learning algorithms to model biohydrogen production from dairy, chicken processing, and palm oil mills. The production of biohydrogen from different wastewaters may be adjusted in real-time with the aid of machine learning algorithms, increasing process effectiveness and effective usage of resources like energy and materials. The historical data from the processes may be used to optimize intended products and constantly enhance process performance. Natural gas as a clean energy source has been anticipated to play a vital role in transitioning to net-zero emissions by 2050. With increasingly rigorous environmental regulations, liquified natural gas (LNG) is seen as a possible alternative fuel for the maritime sector, although the safety issues brought on by LNG leakage incidents need to be taken into consideration and studied. Wang et al. employed computational fluid dynamics to simulate cryogenic safety analysis in an LNG-powered ship during leakage. When LNG leaked, the range of the cryogenic area in the fuel gas preparation room was correlated with the direction of the flow field. Traditional energy sources not only have finite supplies but also release harmful byproducts into the environment. One of the most stimulating eco-friendly energy sources is the photovoltaic (PV) Solar System. Srivastava et al. evaluated a grid-connected solar-powered microgrid in northern India using PV*Syst software. Rooftop solar panels are a technologically and OPEN ACCESS


A plate strap is die-cast integrally with an upstanding conducting member, which may be either a terminal post or a riser to form part of an intercell connector, by means of a mold having a cavity affording an elongated plate strap position which is closed at the top and has slots in the floor through which the plate lugs project, and a chimney position upstanding from the plate strap position to form the upstanding conducting member. The part of the floor between the plate lugs is formed by cylindrical dowels each having a diameter substantially equal to the spacing between adjacent lugs. The dowels are retracted to permit removal of the mold from the plate strap or straps. A single mold may form a row of plate straps associated with a number of intercell connectors and a pair of terminal posts.


Significance Dietary folate deficiency is associated with fetal neural tube defects, psychological disorders, and age-associated dementia. However, it remains unclear how folate deficiency could be a causative factor in such a diverse range of disorders. Through analysis of the FRAXA locus, which contains an extensive CGG repeat sequence, we show that folate deprivation triggers extensive mitotic missegregation of the locus. Moreover, the entire chromosome X becomes unstable during a period of long-term folate deprivation. Considering that the human genome contains several loci associated with extensive CGG repeat regions, these findings suggest a mechanism by which folate deficiency contributes to the onset of a wide range of human diseases. The instability of chromosome fragile sites is implicated as a causative factor in several human diseases, including cancer [for common fragile sites (CFSs)] and neurological disorders [for rare fragile sites (RFSs)]. Previous studies have indicated that problems arising during DNA replication are the underlying source of this instability. Although the role of replication stress in promoting instability at CFSs is well documented, much less is known about how the fragility of RFSs arises. Many RFSs, as exemplified by expansion of a CGG trinucleotide repeat sequence in the fragile X syndrome-associated FRAXA locus, exhibit fragility in response to folate deficiency or other forms of "folate stress." We hypothesized that such folate stress, through disturbing the replication program within the pathologically expanded repeats within FRAXA, would lead to mitotic abnormalities that exacerbate locus instability. Here, we show that folate stress leads to a dramatic increase in missegregation of FRAXA coupled with the formation of single-stranded DNA bridges in anaphase and micronuclei that contain the FRAXA locus. Moreover, chromosome X aneuploidy is seen when these cells are exposed to folate deficiency for an extended period. We propose that problematic FRAXA replication during interphase leads to a failure to disjoin the sister chromatids during anaphase. This generates further instability not only at FRAXA itself but also of chromosome X. These data have wider implications for the effects of folate deficiency on chromosome instability in human cells.


Aim: To examine: 1) the association between socio‐economic status and adolescent physical activity; 2) to assess links between mothers' and fathers' social support and adolescents' physical activity. Methods: Participants were 326 urban adolescents and their parents. Physical activity was measured using a 7‐d physical activity recall. Socio‐economic status and parents' social support was assessed using questionnaires. Results: Boys were significantly more active than girls, and fathers' explicit modelling towards boys was higher compared to girls. In contrast, fathers' and mothers' logistic support was significantly higher towards their daughters. Social class and fathers' and mothers' social support were significantly related to adolescent self‐reported physical activity. Fathers' explicit modelling was the strongest predictor of adolescent physical activity, predicting 13.5% of the total variance. Social class, fathers' logistic support and mothers' explicit modelling were also significant predictors, accounting for additional 14% of the variance in adolescents' weekly physical activity.


The spin dynamics in the block magnetic phase of the iron-based ladder compound \bfs\ has been studied by means of single crystal inelastic neutron scattering. Using linear spin wave theory and Monte-Carlo simulations, our analysis points to a magnetic Heisenberg model with effective frustrated antiferromagnetic couplings only, able to describe both the exotic block order and its dynamics. This new and purely antiferromagnetic picture offers a fruitful perspective to describe multiferroic properties but also understand the origin of the stripe-like magnetic instability observed under pressure as well as in other parent compounds with similar crystalline structure.


Objective To observe Mongolian gerbil's reproducing performance and growth indexes of biology for guidance of development and use of laboratory animal. Methods\ 80 gerbils in breaking away from lactation were selected(females and males were 40 each),and one male and one female cohabited for a long period of time.Results\ Every embryo gave mostly birth to 3-7 young gerbils,accounting for 77 percent of all the embryos and averaging 5.02±2.11 baby gerbils. There were mostly 5-9 embryos in a year, accounting for 91.7 percent of all the embryos and averaging 7.494±2.11 embryos in a year. The earlist birth was 13-week-age and the longest was 52-week-age,mostly(80 percent) in 13-20 and 25-28 weeks age. The body weight of baby gerbils avaraged 3.5 g,and adult female gerbils were 55.6 g and adult male gerbils were 67.2g.Conclusion It can provide the indexes in reproducing performance of Mongolian gerbils for theory guidance.


1. When leukocytes from two normal, unrelated subjects are mixed together and cultured, some of them transform into large basophilic cells that can synthesize DNA and undergo mitosis.

2. The stimulus for this change is the presence of two sets of leukocytes. Foreign erythrocytes, plasma or platelets have no effect.

3. Studies with mixtures of leukocytes from pairs of identical and nonidentical twins indicate that the reaction may be related to genetic differences between the two subjects.

4. It is suggested that the reaction in leukocyte mixtures may be related to homograft immunity.


Until 1960 the Bigelow series wasthe only set of monthly interest rates available for the antebellum American economy. Because the origin of Bigelow's series is obscure, historians have understandable reservations about both its precision and to what market it is applicable. Nevertheless, in lieu of better information, Bigelow's widely reproduced estimates have been a mainstay for economic and business historians. Given' the prior paucity and uncertainty of the data, the publication of Professor Davis' independent monthly interest rate series for the Boston area was most welcome. One of Davis' contributions was to provide a benchmark by which to evaluate the Bigelow series. Chart I taken from Davis' article depicts the two series. Davis concluded that his new series was in "general agreement" with Bigelow's except that "they conflict in their description of money market conditions during much of 1848." The discrepancy is by no means minor: whereas the Bigelow series depicts 1848 as a year of extreme credit stringency with the interest rate averaging 15 percent, Davis' "textile series . . . suggests that normal rates [i.e. 5.8 to 6.8 percent] prevailed for ten of the twelve months of 1848 " In only two months


Through field investigations,distribution features of aboveground biomass of Lathyrus quinqueneruius and Viciaam cracca,and their relationships with soil factors were studied in Songnen grassland. The maximum aboveground biomass of L. quinqueneruius was 286. 25 g / m2,and the minimum was 51. 73 g/m2,while the values for V. cracca were 494. 77 and 61. 19 g / m2respectively. Population aggregation levels of the two legumes were primarily 100-200 g / m2 and 100-300 g / m2respectively. There were significant positive correlations between aboveground biomass of the two legumes with community height,community aboveground biomass,species richness index,diversity index,evenness index,and significant negative correlation relationships with community density. There were significant positive correlation relationships between aboveground biomass of the two legumes with soil organic carbon content,total nitrogen content, and significant negative correlation relationships with soil pH and electrical conductivity,but no significant correlation relationship with soil total phosphorus content. Under low legume aboveground biomass,the change of community characteristics and soil factors with an increase of legume biomass was large but it became weaker with an increase of legume biomass. Compared with V. cracca,the change rates of community characteristics and soil factors with an increase of L. quinqueneruius aboveground biomass were larger( 51. 73 and 61. 19 g / m2respectively) and were the minimum aboveground biomass in unit area to maintain population existence for L. quinqueneruius and V. cracca,respectively. The ecological traits of the two legumes may have facilitation effects on community structure and function,and the effects from unit mass of L. quinqueneruius rather than V. cracca may be greater. Degree of soil salinization alone did not limit the distribution of the two legumes. Soil phosphorus may be a limited factor for distribution of these two legumes. This study provides important references for protection and development of these two legumes in this region.


The trial was to study the gastrointestinal parameter of 24~54 weeks old Hy-line Brown laying hens. The pH of craw,glandular and muscular stomach,activities of pepsin in chyme of glandular and muscular stomach and activities of trypsin,chymase,amylase,lipase and bile acid content in the chyme of jejunum were measured continuously. The results showed that the chyme pH in craw and stomach was raised with the age increasement while the jejunum pH was stable and ranged in 6.32~6.38. The moisture content of chyme in craw,stomach and jejunum had no significant change with age while that of jejunum is apparently higher than that of craw and stomach. Pepsin activity was relatively stable and high in 24 to 34 weeks of age and decreased significantly after 44 weeks of age. The activity of amylase, trypsin,chymotrypsin,lipase and bile acid content decreased gradually with age and rapidly after 44 weeks of age.