The results are presented of a study that examined the flexural and shear behavior of concrete beams reinforced with three-dimensional continuous carbon fiber fabric. The fabric studied was made from polyacrylonitrile-type continuous fibers. Details of the flexural tests and the shear tests are discussed. It was found that 3-D carbon fiber fabric reinforcement made by weaving together many closely-spaced small elements, provided excellent bond and anchorage to concrete. Study results relating to the post-cracking stage, the apparent modulus of elasticity of the fabric, elastic behavior and failure, and shear reinforcement are discussed.


The Electrodynamic Vibration Exciter (shakers) has been one of the most employed excitation sources in modal tests. The shaker is an electromechanical device that provides a mechanical motion due to the input signal sent to its coil. Despite being widely used, it is well known that the shaker interacts with the structure under test. In particular, when the structure passes through a given resonance, the force delivered by the shaker abruptly decreases, causing the so called drop off phenomenon. This paper aims to study this force drop off phenomenon in the single shaker modal testing. Analytical models are developed to help in understanding the physical principles involved in the interaction between the shaker and the structure under test. Experimental analyses are performed using different shakers as well as excitation signals, in order to evaluate the effects of the input signal, as well as the power amplifier operational modes, on the structure dynamics. Preliminary tests revealed that significant distortions might occur during vibration tests using shakers and these distortions significantly affect the determination of the structure response.


BACKGROUND: The quality of RBC components is influenced by collection, processing and storage conditions. Regulations require that whole blood (WB) units be refrigerated within 8 hours and processed into RBCs within 24 hours of collection. Overnight room temperature hold of WB has logistical advantages, but the effect on RBC quality has not been fully investigated. RBC additive solutions were compared for their ability to provide improved quality of RBCs prepared from WB held at room temperature for 24 hours.


Brown top millet [Brachiaria ramosa (L.) Stapf; Panicum ramosum L.] is an introduced annual grass that originated in South-East Asia. It is grown in Africa, Arabia, China and Australia, Clayton et al., (2006). It was introduced to the United States from India in 1915 (Oelke et al., 1990). In the US, it is mainly grown in the South-East for hay, pasture and game bird feed. The browntop millet, called korale in Kannada, is specially grown in rainfed tracts of Tumakuru, Chitradurga and Chikkaballapura districts of Karnataka state. The crop is popular in this region in terms of cultivation and consumption. This millet seed is grown in a variety of soils and climates. Like other millets, it is a hardy crop and well suited for dry land (Bhat et al., 2018). Brown top millet is an annual warm-season species that grows 1 to 3 ft tall. The smooth stems have pubescent nodes and may stand erect or Experiment was conducted during Kharif season 2018 at New Upland Research Station cum Instructional Farm, Lamker under SG college of Agriculture and Research Station, Jagdalpur, Bastar (CG). The experiment was laid out in split plot design with three replications. Main plot was three levels of fertilizer i.e. F1 (75% RDF), F2 (100% RDF) and F3 (125% RDF), and sub plot was four different spacing viz. S1 (22.5 x 10 cm), S2 (30 x 10 cm), S3 (45 x 10 cm) and S4 (60 x 10 cm). Grain yield, fodder yield per plot and per ha was recorded significantly highest in F3 among fertility levels. In case of different planting geometry, S4 recorded significantly higher grain yield but it was at par with S3 and S2. Fodder yield recorded significantly maximum in treatment S1 which was on par with S2 and S3. NPK content in grain and straw recorded significantly higher in treatment F3 (125% RDF) but it was on par with F2 (100% RDF) in N and P content in grain. In case of different planting geometry, S4 (60 x 10 cm) recorded statistically higher P content in straw which was at par with treatment S3.Treatment F3 recorded significantly higher NPK uptake in grain, straw and total uptake among fertility treatments but in case of different geometry, S4 recorded higher NK uptake in grain which was on par with S3 and S2. K e y w o r d s


This study examines the effect of exchange rate fluctuations on the performance of manufacturing firms in Ghana for the period 1990 to 2018. The study uses the bounds test approach to cointegration within the framework of autoregressive distributed lags model as the estimation strategy. The results reveal that exchange rate and monetary policy rate has a negative and significant relationship with manufacturing firm performance. It was also found that inflation, trade openness, and investment have significant positive relation with manufacturing firm performance in Ghana. Based on the negative and significant relationship with exchange rate and manufacturing firm performance, it is recommended that government and private partnership should ensure effective management of the exchange rate fluctuation and also encourage manufacturing firms to patronize locally made capital goods for their production in the face of a depreciating exchange rate. Further, the study recommends that monetary authorities should reduce interest rate to increase investment by firms. This will enhance manufacturing firms' performance.


Summary: Surgical damage to the cervix in patients undergoing termination of pregnancy may be responsible for serious complications in subsequent pregnancies.


A number of aphid species comprise multiple taxa (biotypes, races, subspecies etc.) with distinct but often overlapping plant ranges. These species complexes are of considerable evolutionary interest, with a long-standing debate as to whether they may have evolved sympatrically through disruptive selection arising from trade offs in the capacity to utilise different plants (e.g., Futuyma & Mayer, 1980; Diehl & Bush, 1989; Via, 1991; Bush, 1994). However, little is known about the behavioural or physiological processes that may underpin the negative correlations between the capacity of closely-related aphids to utilise different plant species [but see Wilkinson & Douglas (1998) and Caillaud (1999)]. This study concerns the black-bean aphid Aphis fabae Scop., a heterecious aphid with ca. 80 summer (secondary) hosts and 1–3 winter (primary) hosts. The differential capacity of the four recognised subspecies (A. f. cirsicanthoides, A. f. fabae, A. f. mordwilkoi and A. f. solani) to utilise secondary hosts may have selected for assortative mating of the sexual generation on the primary hosts (Mackenzie & Guldemond, 1994), and a negative correlation has been demonstrated in aphid utilization of Vicia faba and Tropaeolum majus, specific host plants of A. f. fabae and A. f. mordwilkoi respectively (Mackenzie, 1996). However, this trade off is not symmetrical (Douglas, 1997): A. f. fabae perform more poorly on T. majus than A. f. mordwilkoi on V. faba, and it was suggested that T. majus may be unsuitable for feeding by A. f. fabae. The purpose of this study was to use the electrical monitoring technique (EPG) of Tjallingii (1988) to test the prediction that the capacity of aphids to penetrate to the sieve elements and exhibit sustained feeding on phloem sap is reduced for A. f. fabae on T. majus, but not for A. f. mordwilkoi on V. faba.


Prefabrication and just-in-time delivery are important in lean supply system. Past research focuses on how much lead time is reduced and how much costs are saved, but few have studied on the environmental impacts. While most studies on the environmental impacts have focused on select life-cycle phases or specific building materials and components, the impacts of different construction methods or supply strategies from the construction phase are ignored or simply approximated. This paper presents results of a case study where the environmental impacts of prefabrication and just-in-time delivery strategy of rebar supply on a high-rise condominium project in Seal, Korea.


The asymmetric reduction of ethyl acetoacetate was carried out in organic solvent by using calcium alginate entrapped baker's yeast(Saccharamyces cerevisiae) and the performance of the immobilized cell was investigated.The effect of some key factors on the optical purity of the product,ethyl(s) 3 hydroxybutyrate were exammied.


OBJECTIVE
To investigate whether botulinum neurotoxin type A (BoNT-A) injections produce the same structural changes in juvenile and adult muscle.

METHODS
The present study was carried out in the Department of Anatomy, Faculty of Medicine, King Abdulaziz University, Jeddah, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia from October 2010 to May 2011. A total of 32 adult and 32 juvenile rats were used. Electron microscopy and immuno-histochemical techniques were used to conduct the morphological study. Neurofilament immunohistochemistry method was used.

RESULTS
The results indicate that the use of BoNT-A injections induced morphological changes in the form of muscle fiber atrophy, disorganization of the muscle fiber structure, extension of nerve terminal sprouts, and formation of new neuromuscular junctions. The same set of structural changes took place in both groups. However, the time scale of these changes occurred earlier in juvenile rats than adult muscle.

CONCLUSION
The injection of BoNT-A leads to morphological changes in juvenile and adult rat muscle. These changes were the same in both groups.


Secure applications like banking and e-commerce allow users to access applications from multiple devices. Growing popularity of biometrics for such applications results in users providing biometrics data from multiple devices of different make and manufacture (smartphones or tablets). The performance of biometric systems degrade generally when the enrollment data and probe data originate from different devices such as different make of smartphones due to different image characteristics, varying capture conditions with respect to illumination and user interaction. In this work, we investigate the performance of cross-smartphone periocular verification and propose a new technique to improve the verification performance for images originating from different smartphones. The proposed scheme is based on employing spatial and frequency components obtained after the Laplacian decomposition of the image coupled with dynamic scale selection. The proposed technique is evaluated on the publicly available visible spectrum iris (periocular) database - MICHE I dataset. Equal Error Rate (EER) is reduced by an average of 14% and 12% for iPhone and Samsung data respectively as compared to previously published results. The improved performance indicates the contribution of scale selection for such cross-smartphone and cross-scenario periocular verification.


The plastic deformation of sapphire ([alpha]-Al[sub 2]O[sub 3]) has been studied under hydrostatic confining pressure at temperatures below the ambient pressure brittle-to-ductile transition temperature. Samples oriented for prism plane slip (Type 1 samples) were deformed via dislocation slip at temperatures as low as 200 C. Samples oriented for basal slip (Type 2 samples) could be plastically deformed at temperatures as low as 400 C but showed more complicated deformation behavior, inasmuch as the sample orientation also allowed for the activation of basal twinning and two of the three rhombohedral twin systems. The temperature dependence of the critical resolved shear stress for basal slip was significantly greater than that for prism plane slip, causing the latter system to be the easy slip system below [approximately] 600 C. Type 2 samples deformed primarily by basal twinning in preference to both rhombohedral twinning and basal slip. The different temperature dependence of shear stress for basal and prism plane slip is attributed to details of the dislocation core structure; prism plane dislocations, having a large Burgers vector can dissociate into three collinear partials separated by relatively low-energy stacking faults, whereas the comparable dissociation of basal dislocations produces two noncollinear partials separated by a relativelymore » high energy stacking fault. Thus, dissociation of basal dislocations is most likely restricted to the dislocation core, which is manifested in a higher Peierls stress at low temperatures for basal slip compared to prism plane slip.« less


The recent critical attention devoted to travel literature enacts a logical transition from the ongoing focus on autobiography, subjectivity, and multiculturalism. Travel extends the inward direction of autobiography to consider the journey outward. Whatever be the journey's motive, it changes both the country visited and the self that travels. The last three decades of the nineteenth century and the first few of the twentieth witnessed an explosion of travel writing from Eastern India, particularly from Bengal. That Calcutta was the capital of British India till 1911 was, of course, one of its reasons. Situated almost seven thousand miles away from England, Bengal was the seat of British rule in the Indian subcontinent and curiosity about England, the land of India's imperial rulers, was an all-time high in the late nineteenth century, especially after Queen Victoria's Proclamation to her Indian subjects (1887) on assuming the title of 'Empress of India' and celebrating her Jubilee in a grand fashion. The spread of English education for the middle class during this time also played a significant role in developing such narratives. It is through learning English that the enlightened Bengali on the new age learnt to see modern Europe. The dissemination of Anglophone education, augmented by Macaulay's minutes of 1835 enhanced the interaction with the west. Many young men during this period travelled to England for secular reasons, particularly for professional advancement and employment. Also for many of the colonial tourists of the time, journeying into England was nothing new. England was not an alien place because they already knew about it through literature and from people who already visited the place but never wrote official travelogues. 1 After the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869, sea voyages to Europe and to England in particular, (often referred to by a general term 'Vilayet' in most of the writings) gained greater impetus and were recorded in a variety of literary forms ranging from diaries, religious tracts, personal memoirs, plain literary texts and even poetry. Though travel has been primarily a masculine enterprise, women were not excluded. They also travelled, migrated, moved, often for the same reasons as men – their husbands or fathers or sons. The kind of experiences they related to and the metaphysical roads they travelled were quite different. Their writing was not seen as a metaphor for quest or as an act of empowerment, instead their writings were seen as narratives of their journeys and representation of their personal experiences. Different critics have different reasons to offer for such a situation. In his introduction to Routes, James Clifford asks:


SUMMARY

Comparisons of embryo length, ISTA (International Seed Testing Association), cold (10 oC), controlled-deterioration, and slope tests for estimating seedling size variability and percentage seedling emergence were made using eighteen stocks of carrot seeds.

The coefficient of variation (C.V.) of seedling weight was closely correlated with the C.V. of embryo length (r = 0–87 D.F., 16) and also with the C.V. of root length from the slope test (r = 0–63 D.F., 16).

Poorer estimates of percentage seedling emergence were obtained from the cold test in all three sowings (correlation coefficients were between 0–65 and 0–70 D.F., 16) compared with the ISTA, controlled deterioration, and slope tests. For these three tests the correlation coefficients varied between 0–80 and 0–87 (D.F., 16) for all sowings.

The embryo test is a rapid (1 man hour per seed lot) and accurate method of assessing potential variability between seed lots. The slope test could provide a less labour demanding method of assessing potential variability than the embryo length test though the results would not be available immediately. However, the slope test could also provide as good an estimate of seedling emergence in the field as the ISTA or controlled-deterioration tests.


As a relatively new discipline, psychiatry always strived to live up to the latest medical standards. In doing so, it had to let itself be judged above all by its institutions. However, with each step forward taken in the field of medicine, these buildings were regarded as out of date as quickly as they were built.
 In this respect, therefore, district hospitals in Bavaria represent a special case. In a few decades and in line with the development of medicinal treatment and new concepts in hospitals, therapy and care, they became specialist hospitals. However, constant calls for modernisation have raised questions about how their old architecture can be integrated and continued to be used. In 2019, the 'Bezirksheimatpflege Mittelfranken', the association responsible for the cultivation of regional values and traditions in Middle Franconia, organised a conference in this regard called 'District Hospitals and the Preservation of Buildings of Special Architectural Interest'. The lectures from the conference are compiled in this book and are supplemented by other contributions. Eight essays underline the tremendous importance of such district hospitals and provide insights into the problems posed by their maintenance, use and further development.


Odontomas are asymptomatic, benign odontogenic tumours comprised of dental tissue. Most of the cases usually get detected on routine radiographic evaluation. Odontoma can be classified according to morphology in two different variants, compound odontoma showing anatomic similarity or miniature version of the tooth and complex odontoma having irregular masses with different type of dental tissues. Early detection of such type of silent lesion is mandatory to rule out certain silent but aggressive pathologies. Here, we present a case of erupting compound odontoma of maxillary area in 15-year-old male patient. Development of tooth is a result of complicated interaction between ectodermal and ecto mesenchymal tissue. Sometimes the remnants of such tissues are left behind in the jaw after development and eruption of tooth, which can become a source of development of odontogenic lesions later on.1 As revealed by World Health Organization (WHO), Odontogenic tumours can be classified in three different categories according to their histopathological form.2 1. Odontogenic tumours which develop from odontogenic epithelium without involvement of odontogenic ectomesenchyme, 2. Odontogenic tumours which develop from odontogenic epithelium with involvement of odontogenic ectomesenchyme, with or without formation of dental hard tissue and 3. Odontogenic tumours which develop from odontogenic ectomesenchyme with or without involvement of odontogenic epithelium.2 For such lesions "Odontoma" word was initially given by Paul Broca in 1866, who revealed the term as tumour occurred by the overgrowth of entire dental tissue. The growth of absolutely differentiated epithelial cells as functional ameloblast and mesenchymal cells as functional odontoblast can give rise to a different developmental anomaly coined as Odontomas.3 According to their behaviour and composition, odontomas can be considered as malformations or hamartomas rather than a true neoplasm. 4,5,6 In 2005, World Health Organization (WHO) classified two variants of odontomas, 1. Compound odontomas, which typically appears as unilocular lesions containing multiple radiopaque, tiny tooth like structures commonly known as denticles; and 2. Complex odontomas, which is comprised of an irregular mass of soft and hard dental tissues.


Inverter always uses instantaneous voltage and current feedback loop control strategy to acquire good performance. Current feed back point can be inductor, capacitor. Acording to the different current checking point, the authors present two instantaneous current feedback strategies,i.e. inductive current feed-back control and capacitive current feed-back control. Characteristics of these two instantaneous current feedback strategies for HPWM inverter including system stability, dynamic response for DC input disturbance and load disturbance, as well as non-linear loard capability are analyzed. Simulation and experiment testified the theoretical analysis.


Photochemical regulation of in‐plane alignment of a nematic liquid crystal is presented. A quartz plate surface was modified with 4‐hexyl‐4'‐hexyloxyazobenzene substituted with triethoxysilyl group through a spacer at the 2' position to introduce the side‐on type azobenzene unit of the surface. A liquid crystal hybrid cell fabricated with the azo‐modified plate was irradiated with linearly polarized visible light for the n‐π* transition. This resulted in the in‐plane reorientation of the liquid crystal molecules to afford homogeneous alignment. Discussion is made on the mechanism of the in‐plane alignment regulation, and the concept of a molecular rotor is proposed.


Transomental openings are usually congenital. Transomental hernia is a rare cause of intestinal obstruction. A 36-year-old female was found to have a transomental hernia at autopsy. We report the case of the strangulated intestinal obstruction with no past history.


The control of airborne molecular contamination (AMC) plays an increasing role in semiconductor manufacturing processes. A method to reduce AMC is purging of wafer boxes with inert gas. In this study, data on the practicability and optimization of purging a front opening unified pod (FOUP), a wafer box for 300-mm wafers, are presented. Different parameters for the purge process are evaluated experimentally. Key values for the assessment of efficiency are the time-dependent content of oxygen and humidity in the FOUP. The increase in the key values after the purge was measured and the construction of the FOUP was modified in order to obtain sufficient tightness. Spatially resolved measurements reveal the homogeneity of the purge. Experimental data are compared to data obtained by a simulation using a computational fluid dynamics program. Values for oxygen are in agreement with the calculated curves. In contrast to this, an additional, long-lasting contribution that was not taken into account in the simulations makes depletion of humidity slower than expected. This contribution is explained with the desorption and permeation of humidity through the plastic walls of the FOUP. The presence of both effects, desorption and permeation, is proved and quantified. Materials properties turn out to heavily affect purge effectiveness and the postpurge ingress of certain contaminants in a wafer box.


Abstract We studied how patient beliefs regarding the need for antibiotics, as measured by expectation scores, and antibiotic prescribing outcome affect patient satisfaction using data from 2,710 urgent-care visits. Satisfaction was affected by antibiotic prescribing among patients with medium–high expectation scores but not among patients with low expectation scores.


0. Introduction Numerous studies examining the regularity of occurrence of types of codeswitches in bilingual production data reveal that there is a systematic favoritism for switches that involve certain grammatical categories over others during codeswitched speech (see, for example, DiSciullo, Muysken & Singh 1986, Halmari 1997, Klavans 1985, Lance 1975, Lipski 1985, Myers-Scotton 1993, Park, Troike & Park 1993, Poplack 1980, Sankoff & Poplack 1981, Treffers-Daller 1995). In this respect, the available literature indicates that whereas functional elements tend to appear in one language, their complements appear in the other language (Muysken 1997). This phenomenon has come to be known in the literature as 'the functional element effect.' Several studies looking at Spanish-English codeswitching data, for example, have shown that when switches involve nominal phrases with a Determiner (Det) and a Noun (N), instances in which both Det and N appear in the same language occur less frequently than cases in which Det appears in one language and N in the other. This asymmetry has been attested in Sankoff & Poplack (1981), who note that the relative propensity of switches occurring between a determiner and a noun was 13% in their data, compared to the 2.3% figure representing codeswitched sentences containing the determiner and the noun in the same language. Another example is provided in a recent study by Milian (1996, cited in Myers-Scotton & Jake 1997), who reports that 81% of the switches involving determiners and their


The relative contributions of leaky, surface, and space waves are studied for an open-ended dielectric-loaded waveguide structure using Wiener-Hopf technique with the key step in factorizing the kernel being carried out numerically. The relative field contributions are evaluated by both ordinary saddle-point and modified saddle-point integration methods, and the accuracy of each method in different spatial regions is examined.


The demand for higher performance is driving package transmission lines to operate at higher frequencies with lower package insertion loss budgets. A typical solution to create adhesion between the copper and dielectric is by roughening the copper surface to provide anchors on which the laminated dielectric adheres. However, the requirements for next generation of high-speed input/output (HSIO) drives the need for lower roughness copper surface. A non-roughened solution, therefore, using chemical adhesive layer to enable a smoother copper-dielectric interface without compromising this metal-organic interfacial adhesion is required. In this work, we develop a series of characterization methods to understand the structure-property relationship of an organic adhesive film as example, which give significant insights to guide the materials/chemical screening processes to facilitate the development cycle. It is also demonstrated that the corrosion protection offered by the adhesive films plays a key role on improving interfacial integrity and reliability of next generation interconnects.


Abstract Objectives: An observational, prospective, cohort study was performed to compare efficacy and safety of a switch from ritonavir-boosted protease inhibitor (PI/r) to nevirapine or raltegravir with that of rosuvastatin addition to current antiretroviral therapy in HIV-infected patients with hyperlipidaemia. Methods: All HIV-infected patients receiving a stable PI/r-based antiretroviral regimen, with persistently suppressed viremia, naïve to non-nucleoside analogues and to integrase strand transfer inhibitors, with mixed hyperlipidaemia, and who underwent a switch from PI/r to nevirapine (Group A) or raltegravir (Group B) or who started rosuvastatin at 10 mg daily (group C) with unchanged antiretroviral regimen were enrolled into the study. Results: Overall, 136 patients were enrolled: 43 patients were included in the group A, 46 in the group B, and 47 in the group C. The mean age was 46.6 years, and 108 (79.4%) were males. After 48 weeks of follow-up, a significantly greater reduction in the mean low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol level was reported in group C (-28.2%) than in group A (−10.2%; p < .001) and B (−12.4%; p = .021), while a significantly greater reduction in the mean concentration of triglycerides was observed in group A (−31.2%) and B (−35.5%) than in group C (−11.9%; p = .034 and p = .004, respectively). The incidence of adverse events was <10% and comparable across the three groups. Conclusion: In HIV-positive subjects receiving a PI/r, the initiation of rosuvastatin treatment after 48 weeks yielded a greater decline in LDL cholesterol, while the switch from PI/r to nevirapine or raltegravir led to a greater decline in triglycerides.


Monique Chemillier-gendreau, The Right to Wage War or to Have Peace ? ; War and law are not dissociable even if one appears as the failure of the other. The right to make war, attribute of the state, has been accompanied by doctrinal debates over the just war and its methods from which have emerged international rules governing armed conflicts. The Charter of the United Nations has upset these rules by prohibiting the recourse to force in favor of mechanisms of collective security. However, the failure of these mechanisms leads to a focus upon regulating war. In this context, the question of guerilla war is difficult to deal with.


The stability of deep "three-soft" coal seam roof has always been a key issue in coal mining. There are a lot of factors affecting the stability of deep three-soft coal seam outburst roof. However, there is currently no definite method able to draw an accurate assessment conclusion on roof stability. In order to accurately determine the main influencing factors of the stability of deep three-soft coal seam outburst roof and reduce the loss of coal production, this paper performed three-soft coal seam risk identification on Lugou Mine based on the introduction of the fuzzy analytic hierarchy process theory. 23 main risk factors were identified. Then, it established a hierarchical structure model of coal seam roof stability in accordance with experts' opinions. The analytic hierarchy process was used to calculate the weights of indicators at all levels. Next, the paper used the fuzzy comprehensive evaluation method and expert scoring to evaluate various risk factors in the indicator system, as well as the overall safety level. The results showed that the deep three-soft coal seam stability of Lugou Mine ranks the third hazard level. The main risk and harmful factors include safety awareness, safety monitoring system, roof weakness, ventilation system, fire-fighting system, and rock bolt quality. In response to the evaluation results, this paper formulated corresponding control measure in terms of ventilation risk, safety monitoring risks, construction personnel risks, and fire protection risk to reduce losses in the mining process, providing a new evaluation method for the stability assessment of deep outburst coal seam roof.


Let E(x) be the third order differential equation 3F2 satisfied by a generalized hypergeometric function 3F2 (a0, a1, a2; b1, b2; x). Under some assumptions which guarantee that E(x) is irreducible and has no logarithmic solutions, we determine all the algebraic transformations E(x) = θ(x)E′(φ(x)), where E′(z) is a Fuchsian differential equation on P1, φ(x) a rational function, and θ(x) a finite product of complex powers of rational functions. We find E′(z) also turns out to be a 3E2.


Projective vector fields are the infinitesimal transformations whose local flow preserves geodesics up to reparametrisation. In 1882 Sophus Lie posed the problem of describing 2-dimensional metrics admitting a non-trivial algebra of such vector fields, which was solved in recent years. The analogous problem can be formulated in higher dimension. In the present paper we solve Lie's Problem for Levi-Civita metrics of arbitrary signature in dimension 3, extending the results found by A. Solodovnikov in 1956 who investigated Riemannian Levi-Civita metrics of the most basic type.


Introduction: The usage of back support belt for manual handling activities particularly lifting/lowering of loads in occupational setting has been a sore point of conflicting agreement between industrial practitioners and academician on its effectiveness in prevention of back injuries. As such, this pre-test and post-test experimental study was designed to investigate the effectiveness of back support belt in reducing localized musculoskeletal discomfort among male agricultural workers. Methods: A total of 38 subjects were randomly assigned into control and intervention groups (19 subjects in each group). The subjects were required to carry out a series of lifting and lowering of incremental weight load similar to the protocol as described in Progressive Isoinertial Lifting Evaluation (PILE) techniques. After completing each lift, subjects were required to rate the discomfort felt in the back region using the Localized Musculoskeletal Discomfort questionnaire. Results: Results showed that only several pairs showing statistically significant differences with no discernible trend. Within the control group, the median calculated from group data showed an overall increased discomfort rating as the weight load increases except for 19.4kg but an overall decreased discomfort within intervention group. Comparison between control and intervention group for post-test results showed significant difference between 5.9kg and middle back although the trend of LMD ratings across body part investigated may suggest interesting relationship. Conclusion: Despite positive subjective perception amongst the wearer as conveyed by industrial practitioners, the epidemiological data, clinical trials, and various other experimental studies in the past few decades including in this study has not shown sufficient evidence of effectiveness.


Presented is the first attempt of attributing an important part of A.N. Maikov's artistic legacy, which are his reviews of the Imperial Academy of Arts annual exhibitions published in Otechestvennye Zapiski and Sovremennik in the period from 1847 to 1853. In Article One, the attribution of the seven exhibition reviews posted in Otechestvennye Zapiski in 1847 and 1849-53 to Maikov was proved. However, as Maikov himself stated in the autobiography, the number of the articles posted was ''up to eight'', and, besides Otechestvennye Zapiski, they were also published in Sovremennik. This fact brings us to attribute another article by Maikov published in this journal. The article mentioned proves Maikov's authorship of the Academy of Arts exhibition review published in Issue 11 of Sovremennik of 1847. The evidence is logical principles of text building, statement of essential theoretical problems which are first realized in here and will be developed in later articles, general approach to analysis of some of the works presented in the exhibition (prime interest in the ''poetic thought'' lying in the basis of paintings, original interpreting of the plot as opposed to formal characteristics), and broad historical-cultural context, as well as characteristic peculiarities of the poet's style. Maikov's turn to the activity of an art critic in the period from 1847 to 1853 resulted from his own intensive creative pursuits, rising from the young poet's sensing the new missions laid upon the art, and his realizing the urgent problems of the art culture of those days. Another impulse to A.N. Maikov's public speaking was Val.N. Maikov's consent to edit Finsky Vestnik (The Finnish Herald) and, later, Otechestvennye Zapiski, and his own strategy of the journal development. The cease of his activity as an art critic was caused by the process of evaluation and a kind of creative and ideological crisis the poet underwent in the mid-1850s, which crucially changed his artistic interests. He probably turned to this work time and again in the 1860-70s (if not as an author then as a participant of discussions), especially, in connection with Dostoevsky's publishing projects. However, the archives do not allow us to surely confirm his authorship of any other articles about the condition of Russian painting art. Perhaps, the reason was the young writers specializing on art criticism (V.V. Strakhov, etc), but more probably it was that the poet's artistic inclinations prevailed over his aesthetic reflection.


Volume 1 Medical, Biological, and Social Issues H. Dele Davies, Volume Editor Series Foreword Foreword by Kimberlydawn Wisdom Foreword:Special Commentary on Childhood Obesity by Sheila Gahagan Preface PART I:OVERVIEW OF OBESITY Epidemiology of Childhood Obesity by Ihuoma Eneli and H. Dele Davies Causes of Childhood Obesity George A. Bray PART II: CONTEXTUAL INFLUENCES Social Inequalities in Childhood Obesity by Sharon Z. Simonton Built Environments: Planning Cities to Encourage Physical Activity in Children and Adolescents by Igor Vojnovic, Shannon Marie Smith, Zeenat Kotval, and Jieun Lee The Simple Act of Walking to School: A Historical Overview of Contemporary Issues Affecting Childhood Obesity, School Placement, and Active Transport by Joanne M. Westphal and Sheetal Patil PART III: THE MEDIA AND PUBLIC PERCEPTION You Are What You Consume: The Role of Media in Obesity by Teresa Mastin, Shelly Campo, and Natoshia M. Askelson Public Opinion and Obesity: A Different Look at a Modern-Day Epidemi by Toby A. Ten Eyck PART IV: NUTRITION AND OUTCOMES Nutrition and Obesity by Sharon L. Hoerr, Megumi Murashima, and Debra R. Keast Medical and Psychological Complications of Obesity by Monica Martin Goble PART V: UNDERSTANDING OBESITY THROUGH IMAGING The Neuroimaging of Obesity by Laura L. Symonds and Nakia S. Gordon Volume 2 Understanding Development and Prevention Series Foreword Foreword by Kimberlydawn Wisdom Foreword: Special Commentary on Childhood Obesity by Sheila Gahagani Preface PART I: SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL DEVELOPMENT Risk Factors for Obesity in Early Human Development by John Worobey The Role of Physical Activity in Obesity Prevention by James M. Pivarnik Childhood Overweight and Academic Achievement by Sara Gable, Jennifer L. Krull, and Arathi Srikanta Adiposity and Internalizing Problems: Infancy to Middle Childhood by Robert H. Bradley, Renate Houts, Phillip R. Nader,Marion O'Brien, Jay Belsky, and Robert Crosnoe Food Marketing Goes Online: A Content Analysis of Web Sites for Children by Elizabeth S. Moore Families and Obesity: A Family Process Approach to Obesity in Adolescents by Matthew P.Thorpe and Randal D. Day PART II: INDIVIDUAL DIFFERENCES AND ETHNIC VARIATION Responding to the Epidemic of American Indian and Alaska Native Childhood Obesity by Paul Spicer and Kelly Moore Obesity in African Americans and Latino Americans by Helen D. Pratt, Manmohan Kamboj, and Robin Joseph PART III: PREVENTION AND INTERVENTION Managing the Overweight Child by Ihuoma Eneli and Karah Daniels Mantinan Parents as the Primary Target for Healthy Eating among Young Children by Mildred A. Horodynski, Kami J. Silk, and Michelle Henry Surgical Treatment of Obesity by Jeff M. Gauvin Ethical Considerations Related to Obesity Intervention by Leonard M. Fleck and Karen A. Petersmarck


Abstract : Three major themes were selected for the technical program of the Seventh Symposium: (a) unsteady propeller forces, a concentrated presentation of the latest theoretical and experimental research results dealing with time-dependent forces generated by marine propellers, (b) fundamental hydrodynamics, a sampling of advanced analytical results emphasizing numerical techniques for solving a variety of basic hydrodynamic problems, and (c) unconventional propulsion, a wide-ranging discussion of a number of different propulsion schemes and devices other than conventional marine propellers. (Author)


Sinalliaria is described here as a new genus of the family Brassicaceae from eastern China, based on the morphological characters and molecular sequences. Sinalliaria differs from the related genus Orychophragmus in having basal leaves petiolate, simple or rarely with 1‒3 lateral lobes (not pinnatisect); cauline leaves petiolate, cordate at base (not sessile, auriculate or amplexicaul at base); petals obovate to narrowly obovate, claw inconspicuous (not broadly obovate, with a claw as along as sepal); siliques truncate (not long-beaked) at apex. The microscopic characters of seed testa also show significant differences between Sinalliaria and Orychophragmus . Phylogenetic evidence from DNA sequences of nuclear ribosomal ITS and plastid region trn L -trn F indicates that Sinalliaria is a distinct group related to Orychophragmus and Raphanus , but these three genera do not form a clade. The new genus Sinalliaria is endemic to eastern China and has only one species and one variety. The new combinations, S. limprichtiana (Pax) X. F. Jin, Y. Y. Zhou & H. W. Zhang and S. limprichtiana var. grandifolia (Z. X. An) X. F. Jin, Y. Y. Zhou & H. W. Zhang are proposed here.


This study explores not only students" and parents" perceptions of the cyber home learning programs developed by the Ministry of Education, but also students' utilization of those programs. Two groups of 210 students and 190 parents from an elementary school located in Incheon participated in the research. Questionnaires were respectively developed to get the information about general issues in using cyber programs and the English subject from the two groups of participants. According to the findings, the cyber home learning programs were not satisfactorily and appropriately introduced both to the elementary school students and their parents. Also, many of the students did not use the programs for the study of English. Results from the research provided some implications in relation to the necessities for more promotions and guidances to get more attentions from the students and parents. Based on the results and implications from the research, a few suggestions were made for more effective operations and utilizations of the English cyber home learning programs.


The paper describes the operational principles, the modeling foundations and some laboratory results of the gas-liquid separation process taking place within a cyclonic gas-oil separator. The centrifugal and the gravity forces, acting on the flow of the gas-liquid mixture, are the main driving mechanism to separate the phases. A research program, conducted by PETROBRAS and UNICAMP, was aimed to the hydrodynamic processes occurring within the equipment. Laboratory data were obtained from down size scale models operating with mixture of air and liquid with different viscosities. The basis for the modeling is launched and a discussion regarding the limitations and constraints of the operation is presented in light of the experimental results. Prospective field applications, based on the extension of the laboratory results to actual fluids and full dimension prototypes, are also presented.


SYNOPTIC ABSTRACT Langsrud and Naes (1998) proposed forward-selection and backward-elimination strategies for the analysis of nearly saturated designs using composite variance estimators. Their variance estimators combine an estimator that is a function of the smaller sums of squares of the effect estimators (assuming effect sparsity) with an independent variance estimator based on the available error degrees of freedom. However, exact control of error rates for their stepwise methods remains an open problem. We investigate procedures that likewise use composite variance estimates but also provide exact control of error rates.


With regard to the importance and position of food industries in generating higher employment rate (in comparison to other industries in Iran), and also it's vital role in the economy of Iran, the present study aims to examine the factors affecting labor productivity in food industries of Iran over the 1995 till 2009. The results of the study show that specialization of the employees has the most effect on labor productivity. The parameter of specialization is 0.66 followed by ratio of skilled workers to unskilled workers. The factors like education, skill, specialization, and capital per worker have effects on productivity differences in Iranian food industries. The trend of technical changes has a fluctuation during the time period. Further, the study shows that the progress of technology has not any effects on labor productivity in food industries of Iran.


The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) has set Vision 2030 to reduce the total dependency of the country oil sectors, diversifying the economy and achieving sustainable food security. This necessitated conducting this study which aimed at estimating and analyzing the association and impact of selected agricultural subsectors (dates, honey, fish, chicken, and cattle) on Agricultural Growth Domestic Product (AGDP) of KSA, and identifying the leading subsector in the economy that might substantially affect AGDP and other subsectors. Unit root test, Johansen co-integration, vector error correction model (VECM), multiple regression techniques, and impulse test were used in analyzing the secondary data that covered the period from 1985 to 2017. Results revealed the presence of long-run co-integration between designated variables. Only the coefficient of adjustment parameter for dates (as dependent variable) is negative (−5.42) and significant (critical t value = −2.52 with p = .02), meaning that the model was able to correct its past-time disequilibrium. Furthermore, short-run causality was noticed between few variables. The regression analysis results indicated the existence of positive and significant relationships between the dependent (AGDP) and each of the independent variables: cattle (0.83; p = .00), honey (50.05; p = .06), and chicken (0.07; p = .00). On the contrary, results of the impulse tests showed that the cattle subsector is leading in the economy. Accordingly, cattle, honey, and chicken subsectors should be given high priority in the government investment policy.


Sequential feeding is a 48h-cycle feeding programme of two feeds, one protein-rich-energy-poor (P+E-) and the other energy-rich-protein-poor (P-E+). The intake of each sequential feed is an essential key to reach an overall nutritional balance with sequential feeding. Therefore, for the present study, it was of interest to investigate the effect of sequential feeding on feed intake and consequences on growth performances of chickens (Exp. 1-2), and shortand long-term feed intake (Exp. 3). A control group (C) was fed with a standard diet, whereas for the sequential group (S) four cycles of 48h were used for sequential feeding of the two different diets E+Pand E-P+. Experiments 1 and 2 showed a significant decrease in growth with S (-6% for live weight at d28-30), due to low intake of feed and especially for E-P+. This effect was greater when the cycle started with E+P-. For experiment 3, feed intake kinetics indicated lasting under-consumption of E-P+: -9% after 1h of distribution, -1% the rest of the day, -2% at 24, 48 and 72h. In this situation, sequential feeding seemed to exacerbate how animals reacted by decreasing feed intake, which penalizes growth performance.


To efficiently generate safe trajectories for an autonomous vehicle in dynamic environments, a layered motion planning method with decoupled path and speed planning is widely used. This paper studies speed planning, which mainly deals with dynamic obstacle avoidance given a planned path. The main challenges lie in the optimization in a non-convex space and the trade-off between safety, comfort, and efficiency. First, this work proposes to conduct a search in second-order derivative space for generating a comfort-optimal reference trajectory. Second, by combining abstraction and refinement, an algorithm is proposed to construct a convex feasible space for optimization. Finally, a piecewise Bézier polynomial optimization approach with trapezoidal corridors is presented, which theoretically guarantees safety and significantly enlarges the solution space compared with the existing rectangular corridors-based approach. We validate the efficiency and effectiveness of the proposed approach in simulations.


A completely randomized experimental design was carried out to evaluate the crude protein reduction of diets and essential amino acids supplementation effects on performance and body composition of male broiler chickens from one to 21 days of age. A total of seven hundred and twenty broiler chickens were used. Birds were alloted in four treatments and six replicates of thirty birds each. The diets crude protein (CP) levels were 230, 210, 190 and 170 g/kg. There was decreasing linear effect of the CP levels on feed:gain ratio, weight gain, the final weight and feed intake. Carcass fat and carcass dry matter increased linearly with protein reduction.


We introduce a numerical algorithm to stochastically sample the dual fermion perturbation series around the dynamical mean field theory, generating all topologies of two-particle interaction vertices. We show results in the weak and strong coupling regime of the half-filled Hubbard model in two dimensions, illustrating that the method converges quickly where dynamical mean field theory is a good approximation, and show that corrections are large in the strong correlation regime at intermediate interaction. The fast convergence of dual corrections to dynamical mean field results illustrates the power of the approach and opens a practical avenue towards the systematic inclusion of nonlocal correlations in correlated materials simulations. An analysis of the frequency scale shows that only low-frequency propagators contribute substantially to the diagrams, putting the inclusion of higher order vertices within reach.


Background: Early emergency readmissions is a common and important problem in the elderly patient. Identification of the risk factors for early emergency readmissions is needed to prevent this occurring. Objective: The aim of this study was to study the risk factors for early emergency readmission in the elderly medical patient. Methods: A case-control study (sex- and age-matched) was conducted from March to December 1996. 380 elderly (age 65 years or over) medical patients with emergency hospital readmission (within 28 days) and 380 matched controls were recruited from an acute university general hospital in Hong Kong. Potential risk factors which included demographic, socio-economic, principal medical diseases, comorbid diseases, dysphagia, physical functional status and mental status were studied. Results: In bivariate analyses for the risk factors of early emergency readmission, institutional carer, previous visiting nurse service, adverse drug reaction, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, end-stage renal failure, mobility being chair- or bed-bound, dysphagia, use of a nasogastric tube feeding, urinary incontinence and bowel incontinence were significant. Readmission cases had higher mean number of comorbid diseases, lower mean Barthel Index, higher mean number of impairments in Activities of Daily Living (ADL) tasks and lower mean Abbreviated Mental Test score than controls. In multivariate logistic regression model, the number of ADL impairments (OR = 1.13, 95% CI = 1.08–1.19), no income (OR = 2.28, 95% CI = 1.19–4.37), adverse drug reaction (OR = 4.19, 95% CI = 1.56–11.2), advanced malignancy (OR = 2.45, 95% CI = 1.37–4.37), congestive heart failure (OR = 1.63, 95% CI = 1.05–2.53), chronic obstructive airways disease (OR = 2.1, 95% CI = 1.47–3.02), end-stage renal failure (OR = 5.48, 95% CI = 1.69–17.75), dysphagia (OR = 3.9, 95% CI = 1.5–10.11) and the number of comorbid diseases (OR = 1.3, 95% CI = 1.13–1.49) were significant risk factors for early emergency readmissions. Living in a private old aged home was associated with a lower risk of readmissions (OR = 0.53, 95% CI = 0.36–0.93). Conclusions: Definite medical, functional and socio-economic factors were found to be risk factors for early emergency readmissions in the elderly medical patient. A multiple risk factors intervention approach should be considered in designing future prevention strategies.


The granulocyte‐macrophage colony‐stimulating factor (GM‐CSF) is a hematopoietic cytokine able to regulate a variety of cell functions including differentiation of macrophages and granulocytes, dendritic cell development and the maintenance of homeostasis. It binds specifically to its receptor, which is composed of a cytokine‐specific α‐chain (GM‐CSF receptor α‐chain, GMRα) and a β‐chain shared with the receptors for interleukin‐3 and interleukin‐5. In this report, we present a comprehensive study of GMRα in the mouse. We have found that the mouse GMRα is polymorphic and alternatively spliced. In the absence of specific antibodies, we generated a novel chimeric protein containing the Fc fragment of human IgG1 coupled to mouse GM‐CSF, which was able to specifically bind to GMRα and induce proliferation of GMRα‐transduced Ba/F3 cells. We used this reagent to perform the first detailed FACS study of the surface expression of mouse GMRα by leucocytes. Highest expression was found on monocytes and granulocytes, and variable expression on tissue macrophages. The GM‐CSF receptor in mice is specifically expressed by myeloid cells and is useful for the detection of novel uncharacterised myeloid populations. The ability to detect GM‐CSF receptor expression in experimental studies should greatly facilitate the analysis of its role in immune pathologies.


Monolayer chromium-trihalides, the archetypal two-dimensional (2D) magnetic materials, are readily suggested as a promising platform for high-frequency magnonics. Here we detail the spin-wave properties of monolayer CrBr3 and CrI3, using spin-dynamics simulations parametrized from the first principles. We reveal that spin-wave dispersion can be tuned in a broad range of frequencies by strain, paving the way towards flexo-magnonic applications. We further show that ever-present halide vacancies in these monolayers host sufficiently strong Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction to scatter spin-waves, which promotes design of spin-wave guides by defect engineering. Finally we discuss the spectra of spin-waves propagating across a moiré-periodic modulation of magnetic parameters in a van der Waals heterobilayer, and show that the nanoscale moiré periodicities in such samples are ideal for realization of a magnonic crystal in the terahertz frequency range. Recalling the additional tunability of magnetic 2D materials by electronic gating, our results situate these systems among the front-runners for prospective high-frequency magnonic applications.


Various constructions are built to control shoreline erosion, while insufficient consideration is paid to the side effects of them. Groins, jetties, and offshore breakwaters can cause retreat on adjacent shoreline downstream. Seawalls, revetments can steepen the shoreface in front of them. It's dificult to find the proper sand for beach replenishment. A good coastal engineering project is not only easy to carry out by engineers, but also avoids side effects to adjacent environment. Several suggestions are given to coastal engineers.


Technological innovation and evolution of knowledge have always conditioned surgery both in technique and in the indications: it has resulted in a general greater well-being for patients. What will be the role of surgery in the future is currently under discussion. Here we show that SNPs genotyping leads the path towards personalized medical therapies. In the future it is therefore conceivable that genomics may lead the full personalized treatment plan. So, the need for surgery will depend upon the relationship between the individual genotype and a constellation of factors, able to influence the effectiveness of surgery. Finally, we introduce a new "omics" able to characterize the future of surgery: "Surgeromics", a neologism binding surgery to its individual determinants. *Corresponding author: Michele Rubbini, Int'al Fellow ASCRS, Associated Professor of Surgery, Dept. of Surgery, Director Programma of Coloproctological Surgery, AUSL di Ferrara, Via Cassoli ,3044121 – Ferrara, Italy, Tel: +390532235669/ Fax.+390532235776; E-mail: email@example.com Received Date: December 18, 2015 Accepted Date: March 14, 2016 Published Date: March 18, 2016 Citation: Rubbini, M., et al. There Will Be a "Surgeromics" In Our Future? Where the Relationship between Technological Innovation and Knowledge and Surgery is Leading Us. (2016) J Gastro Dis Liver Func 2(2): 6872. J Gastrointest Disord Liver Func | volume 2: issue 2 Introduction Technological innovation and evolution of knowledge have always conditioned Surgery both in technique and in the indications. The Surgery of 1800 and of the first half of the 1900 was affected by problems mainly due to the spread of infections, pain control and the effectiveness of anesthetic techniques: problems solved with the findings on antibiotics, analgesics, use of anesthetic gases. At the end of the Second World War, both the European and Americans Schools of Surgery were still marked on the assumption that the Oncological Surgery, had to be based on the greater removal of diseased tissue as possible as represented the main therapeutic tool against the majority of solid tumors, Over the years, due to the continuous thrust of technological innovation we moved to a new vision of the role of Surgery : a part of an integrated therapeutical plan where the synergies between clinical and laboratory activities are the conceptual basis of a new personalized therapy. Indeed new techniques and procedures tend to reduce as much as possible the demolitive surgical phase, side effects, or the consequent physical mutilation, and held in more and more attention to the characteristics of the individuals, their expectations and overall well-being, so ensuring the best possible therapeutic efficacy (Table 1) Copyrights: © 2016 Rubbini, M. This is an Open access article distributed under the terms of Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. 68 Department of Surgery, Director Programma of Coloproctological Surgery, University of Ferrara, Italy Perspective Open Access There Will Be a "Surgeromics" In Our Future? Where the Relationship between Technological Innovation and Knowledge and Surgery is Leading Us Rubbini, M., et al. DOI: 10.15436/ 2471-0601.16.724 Table 1: Relationship between innovation and effect on surgery in the second half of last century FROM INNOVATION FIELD OF APPLICATION EFFECT ON SURGERY 1960-70 TECHNOLOGY EQUIPMENT AND MATERIALS Interventional Endoscopy Reduction in open surgery indications, Biliary Tract, Urinary Tract, Prostate 1970-80 TECHNOLOGY EQUIPMENT AND MATERIALS Staplers Reduction in invasiveness Abdominal and Thoracic Surgery PARTICLE PHYSICS Nuclear Medicine, Radioisotopes Reduction in invasiveness Brest Surgery PHARMACEUTICAL CHEMISTRY Anti-ulcer Drugs Reducrion indications in Gastro-duodenal Surgery 1980-90 TECHNOLOGY EQUIPMENT AND MATERIALS Laparoscopic Surgery Reduction in invasiveness in General Surgery 1990-00 TECHNOLOGY EQUIPMENT AND MATERIALS ELECTRONICS Robotics Prosthetics Materials Reduction in invasiveness and Infectious complications 2000-10 TECHNOLOGY EQUIPMENT AND MATERIALS Nanotechnologies Molecular Medicine Genetics and "Omics" Reductions in indications and invasiveness in General Surgery Nanosurgery FUTURE ALL PREVIOUS AND MORE IN GENETICS Personalized Genomics Medicine and Surgery Decision Making Process Surgeomics ? The use of surgery will depend on the individual genetic characteristics and the complex of therapeutic possibilities Periods expressed in Decades in which startred the clinical practice induced by related innovation and consequential effect on Surgery. Innovations of each decade added to the previous realize an overall reduction in number of surgical procedures intended as indications to open surgery, degree of invasiveness measurable as reduction in length of hospytal stay, after surgery complications and side effects or socially disabling mutilations. This has resulted in better overall health outcomes due to shorter hospital stays, less pain, less scarring, faster recovery times, fewer complications and an increase in demand of minimally invasive techniques and has also greatly contributed to the reorganization of health facilities, and to reset the processes of patient managing and of therapeutic decision making. Furthermore, they have helped to overcome the believe that the greater the demolition the greater therapeutic efficacy could be introducing the concept that surgery is part of a more general treatment plan. In the last decade, the technological evolution of nanotechnology, molecular medicine and genetics has greatly contributed to a further development of the diagnosis and treatment of cancer, opening the way for intervention increasingly targeted to the characteristics of the patient. (Table 2). The result of these technological innovations, has increased our diagnostic and therapeutic options, and the combination of various Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms and/or presence of some Signalling Pathways, have been linked both to the risk of cancer and the efficacy of chemotherapy so giving a strong impulse to setting of personalized therapies. Thus, just as today the SNPs genotyping leads the path towards personalized medical therapies[1], in the near future it is conceivable that genomics may lead the full personalized treatment plan[2] of which Surgery , is an important part. Therefore as innovation has always produced a substantial improvement in the therapeutic efficacy of surgical procedures and a repositioning of their role, combining them with technical progress and a significant decrease in negative side effects, what can be expect from the relationship between innovation and Surgery in the coming years in terms of further benefit to the patient, thecnical improvement and about its conceptual role? The hypothesis that is developed here regards these aspects and how the possible future relationship between genomics and the role of surgery. In doing this, the need for surgery will depend upon the complex of relationships which will be elapsing between the individual genotype and a constellation of factors, able to influence the timing, the indication, the amplitude, the technical procedures and the effectiveness of surgery , so introducing the term "surgeromics", a neologism which lexically binds surgery to its individual determinants. Table 2: Relationship between innovation , correlation to cancer diagnosis, treatment or prognosis and clinical outcome in the last decade. Author Innovation Correlation to Clical Outcome Hong et al[8] Genotyping Diagnosis ,Therapy and prognosis Personalized medicine Ginsburg et al[9] Genomic Medicine Identify individual risk Guide clinical maangement Health care decision making Simons et al[12] Genotyping Risk of CRC Possible modification of therapy response Billeter et al[10] MicroRNA More aggressive tumor biology Invasiveness Formation of Metastasis Local recurrence Possible suppression of tumor progression Li et al[11] MicroRNA 215 Relapse of operated CRC Potential predictive marker of relapse after radical suergery for CRC Chae et al.[23] MicroRNA 367 Prognosis of CRC Potential marker for prognosis after surgery for curative CRC Blanco et al[3] Nanotechnology Chemotherapy Improved antitumoral efficacy Weldon et al[4] Nanomedicine Surgical procedures Potential to affect the field Allhoff F[5] Nanomedicine Surgical treatment Philosophycal aspect Conditioning surgical procedures and thecniques The role of surgery in the treatment plan has to be considered in the context of the personal characteristics of the patient opening the way for a real future personalized treatment. www.ommegaonline.org Surgeromics J Gastrointest Disord Liver Func | volume 2: issue 2 69 The "OMICS" The further revolution of the new century in surgery relates to the use of nanotechnology[3-5], molecular medicine and new knowledge about genomics: possibility to use molecules that bind selectively to tumor cells at the same time conveying the therapeutic agents (Theranostics)[6], greater diagnostic efficacy especially at the level of molecular biomarkers, identification of genotypic characteristics, the role of "omics" and polymorphisms associated with disease development or predictive of therapeutic efficacy, are now the elements that form the basis of modern medicine and surgery accordingly. The suffix "omics" has no precise or unique meaning: in biology adding the suffix makes the meaning of the word dynamic, since it indicates not only the characteristics of the discipline but also the techniques, the set of functions, the relationships between them and with other internal and external environments and the changes that as a result of these interactions can be generated. Especially in the last ten years, to the amount of information derived from studies of Nutrigenomics[7], (the study of how specific genetic polymorphisms interact with the bioactive food components in conditioning the level of cancer risk related


In an earlier paper, an aberration-balancing merit function, ΦD, was described in which the modulation transfer function squared, with suitable weightings, served directly as the image criterion. Further details concerning the optimization procedure are now presented: the coefficients of the normal equations are computed from the intermediate data generated in the numerical evaluation of the optical transfer function of the system. These coefficients are effectively the weighted values of the intermediate data in question, the weightings being design-parameter dependent.


The growth of the lactic acid probiotic strain Lactobacillus plantarum NCIMB 8826 isolated from the human gut on rice-based media has been investigated. Fermentation broths were obtained from the whole grain brown rice and rice bran of two Thai rice cultivars, RD6 (glutinous) and RD17 (nonglutinous). The rice used was not germinated and fermentations were carried out in a single step without growth supplementation. L. plantarum grew well in all tested broths, and a final biomass value of approx. 10.4 log CFU/mL was obtained. In addition, biomass production and substrate depletion were satisfactorily modelled using an unstructured mathematical model. There were no statistical differences observed among the four rice media. The results confirm that brown rice and rice bran are suitable substrates for the culture of the probiotic L. plantarum NCIMB 8826. Rice bran, currently a by-product of


The article discusses the penetration of WiFi and PDAs in education and library process on a large scale. The authors try to outline on one hand the benefits of the digitalization process in the social sphere, and on the other hand the necessity to solve the discrepancies of access to devices and lack of Internet connectivity.


In this article, we summarize social media in the academic context and contrast the differences between social media usage patterns in China and the United States. We describe our research methods and present the final results of our investigation. Our specific contribution is to clearly delineate the unique social media ecosystem as found in mainland China and how it is used in academic settings. Social media is helpful for supporting auxiliary academic activities such as knowledge dissemination and maintaining existing work and social relationships but is not a suitable way for people to obtain information that are necessary to foster research collaboration due to trust and privacy concerns. The expectation that social media might support academic relationship building has generally failed. Participants also reported being overwhelmed by the lack of work and life balance due to the fact that social media platforms have been adopted by their academic institutions as the official communication channel for work. We suggest ways to leverage social media to promote academic activities while avoiding the pitfalls identified in this paper.


Factory emissions and frequent dust storms are known to affect the human health of residents in arid countries. This study was undertaken to better characterize dust deposition rates and trace metals of fine particulate matter (i.e., PM1.0) at industrial and residential areas in Kuwait. Investigations on the PM1.0 fugitive dust revealed a significant relationship between low wind velocity and high rate of dust deposition (RD) in the summer and winter. RD and trace metal levels in PM1.0 were highest at the industrial areas and lowest at the residential areas. Trace metals were observed in the sequence of Al > Fe > Ni > Zn > Pb > Cd irrespective of the industrial areas or seasons. A high RD and trace metal levels in PM1.0 was correlated with several factors including: vast open area, wind velocity, rapid industrialization, and anthropogenic sources. These findings are relevant for establishing preventative measures to fine particulates in an arid environment.


Universal and specific features of verbal behavior strategy of extroverts and introverts are discussed. Individual and collective associative fields are characterized by presence or absence of equilibrium and symmetry in associative process mechanisms.


Australia's brutal live cattle export trade is discussed with special focus on Indonesia. The author opines that the trade moves beyond the ill-treatment of cattle to the destruction of forests, the decimation of orangutan populations, and the suffering of local Indonesian farmers.


The inhibitory activity of cymoxanil, mancozeb and their mixtures on Phytophthora infestans tested at different stage, in vitro , showed that cymoxanil was stronger in inhibiting the mycelium growth of the pathogen than mancozeb, but it was less effective in inhibiting the germination of sporangia and zoospores. Meanwhile these two fungicides were less effective in inhibiting mobility of zoospores. The mixtures of cymoxanil with mancozeb at the ratio of 1∶7 and 1∶8 were synergistic in inhibiting the germination of zoospores and mycelium growth, and synergistic ratio(SR) of the mixtures of the two compounds at the ratio of 1∶1~1∶10 was 1.55~5.39, and SR of the mixture of 1∶5 was as high as 5.39.


Paediatric homecare is an advancing field of healthcare, bringing care direct to patients in their own homes. Risk management is an integral component of homecare services, including incident and risk assessment management. The objective of the study was to investigate risk management in homecare focusing on two aspects: incident reporting and risk assessments. A Grounded Theory approach was used to gather key functions of these aspects; these were then mapped using the Functional Resonance Analysis method (FRAM). Nineteen nurses working in paediatric homecare services were interviewed for the study. The interviews were semi-structured and focused on risk, quality, complaints, audit, care, and management. The interview data were transcribed and coded using Nvivo; the data were then converted into functions for utilization in the FRAM tool. The FRAM detailed the process of incident reporting and risk assessment management of the actual work carried out as viewed by the participants of the study. The information was then analysed and contrasted with the organizational policy to gain an understanding of the systems of incident reporting and risk assessments, which then led to the development of a refined process that could have less variability in function. Consequently, changes to policy and training in risk management were recommended to enhance the systems.


Minerals are an essential component of many parts of today's fast-growing clean energy technologies – from wind turbines and power grids to electric vehicles. Demand for these minerals will grow rapidly as the clean energy transition accelerates. The paper examines some prospects for the transformation of the complex relationships between minerals and the energy sector in the green transition, focused mainly on electric vehicles expansion and related mineral resources demand increase.


A very simple event frequency approximation algorithm that is sensitive to event timeliness is suggested. The algorithm iteratively updates categorical click-distribution, producing (path of) a random walk on a standard $n$-dimensional simplex. Under certain conditions, this random walk is self-similar and corresponds to a biased Bernoulli convolution. Algorithm evaluation naturally leads to estimation of moments of biased (finite and infinite) Bernoulli convolutions.


The similarities and differences in the crystal and band electronic structures of four {kappa}-phase tetrathiafulvalene-based organic conducting salts {kappa}-(BEDT-TTF){sub 2}X (X{sup {minus}} = Cu(NCS){sub 2}{sup {minus}}, I{sub 3}{sup {minus}}), {kappa}-(MDT-TTF){sub 2}AuI{sub 2}, and {kappa}-(BMDT-TTF){sub 2}AU(CN){sub 2} have been examined. Donor dimers have a bond-over-ring arrangement in the superconducting salts {kappa}-(BEDT-TTF){sub 2}X (X{sup {minus}} = Cu(NCS){sub 2}{sup {minus}}, I{sub 3}{sup {minus}}) and {kappa}-(MDT-TTF){sub 2}AuI{sub 2} but a bond-over-bond arrangement in the nonsuperconducting salt {kappa}-(BEDT-TTF){sub 2}Au(CN){sub 2}, so that the intradimer spacing is considerably larger in the nonsuperconducting than in the superconducting {kappa}-phases. The terminal ethylene groups of BEDT-TTF have a staggered arrangement in the high-T{sub c} salts {kappa}-(BEDT-TTF){sub 2}Cu(NCS){sub 2} (T{sub c} = 10.4 K) and {beta}*-(BEDT-TTF){sub 2}I{sub 3} (T{sub c} = {approximately} 8 K) but are eclipsed in the low-T{sub c} salts {kappa}(BEDT-TTF){sub 2}I{sub 3} (T{sub c} = 3.6 K), {beta}-(BEDT-TTF){sub 2}AuI{sub 2} (T{sub c} = 5.0 K), and {beta}-(BEDT-TTF){sub 2}IBr{sub 2} (T{sub c} = 2.8 K). All the Fermi surfaces of the {kappa}-phase can be described in terms of overlapping distorted circles and hence are essentially two-dimensional in nature. However, the Fermi surface of the nonsuperconducting {kappa}-phase, {kappa}-(BMDT-TTF){sub 2}Au(CN){sub 2} exhibits a partial nesting in contrast to the casemore » of the superconducting {kappa}-phases, which is probably responsible for the metal-insulator transition at {approximately} 60 K. 26 refs., 8 figs., 2 tabs.« less


Experiments with (3R)- and (3S)-[3-3H; U-14C]-O-phospho-L-homoserine, (1a) and (1b), show that the conversion into L-threonine (2) effected by yeast enzyme proceeds with loss of the 3-pro-S and retention of the 3-pro-R hydrogen atoms.


X-ray diffraction is a material-specific technique, the results of which can be used as a material fingerprint to identify unknowns. In this paper we present an adaptation to a novel hybrid angular- and energy-dispersive X-ray diffraction technique, which, until now, has been limited in utility by sample thickness. Computed tomography techniques have been applied to spatially resolve the origin of the scattering signals and to reconstruct the diffraction pattern in each pixel. 2D cross-correlation has been used to compare the reconstructed data to a library of standards as a means of identifying the material present.


A second gear having a first plurality of teeth to which a first gear and a second plurality of teeth, and one of the first and second tooth is a non-linear tooth out of the linear according to the parabolic function, the first teeth are in theory contact line (line of contact) and which in common between the modified non-linear contact line is engaged in contact with the second tooth, the theoretical contact line represents a first gear and the theoretical point of contact between the second gear having a linear sawtooth, the modified non-linear contact line is a gear system, characterized in that indicating the point of contact between the first and the second gear having a non-linear first and second tooth Parabolic function, envelope, pitch, pinions, gears, bevel gears


Osteocalcin (OC) is a bone-specific protein that can be quantitated in serum by radioitnmunoassay. Serum OC is a sensitive measure of bone formation, but its response to calcitropic hormones in vivo is still poorly understood. We observed the effects on serum OC of a 5 min i.v. infusion (mean 5.0 U/kg) of PTH in 7 XLH patients (3 males, 4 females; ages 8-35 yr) who had been treated with 1,25(OH)2D3 and phosphate (Pi). Pre-infuslon renal Pi reabsorption (TRPi) was determined as a mean of three values from sequential 30 min collection periods (0900 to 1030 hr). Post-infusion clearances in 3 subsequent periods (1030 to 1200 hr) were examined separately. The large variation (5-116 ng/ml) in pre-infusion serum OC among individuals was related to age differences and treatment status. Urinary cAMP response to PTH was maximal in the first post-infusion period (mean increase: 7.6-fold); the phosphaturic response (blunted in XLH) was greatest in the second (ΔTRPi=-14%). Serum OC decreased in all 7 patients. At 15 and 45 min, OC concentrations were 63 ± 57. and 69 ± 7%, respectively, of pre-infusion ones (x ± SE, p<.01); but by 75 min, mean OC values were no longer significantly different from pre-infusion (87 ± 14%). We suggest that serum OC responds rapidly to PTH and may therefore be useful in the study of skeletal sensitivity to the hormone.


A wide variety of radiation-induced changes in electrical conductivity was observed in a series of irradiation experiments conducted on copper alloys in FFTF/MOTA. The behavior of each alloy was found to depend on the alloy composition, starting state, irradiation temperature, and the sometimes complex interaction of three radiation-driven processes. These processes are transmutation, void swelling, and solute redistribution. The objective of this effort is to identify those copper alloys that offer promise as high heat flux materials for fusion application. 13 refs., 4 figs., 2 tabs.


INTRODUCTION With the rapid growth in the modern day enterprise comes explosion of information, diversity in formats and the sources where they are located. Present day Enterprise Information Management (EIM) Systems manage this disparity through what is known as Syntactic Integration. This is done through techniques like Enterprise Application Integration (EAI) and Enterprise Information Integration (EII). While this is a fundamental building block towards the "Single Version of truth" paradigm, it still fails to achieve the so called "Semantic Integration." Semantic Integration can be realized when every single Information Asset has "one meaning" or "one context" to it. To achieve this state, the Enterprise Information Management Systems and the underlying architectures need to be enhanced. This paper attempts at outlining the enhancements and discusses the technology options available. CURRENT STATE OF ENTERPRISE INFORMATION ARCHITECTURE As organizations grow, new systems and applications are added and processes are refined, modified or improved. Enterprise Information Architecture (EIA) is constantly challenged by organizational expansion and changes due to:


Administrative Reorganization in Vermont. The Vermont legislature of 1923 embodied in two acts a fairly comprehensive plan of state administrative reorganization, thus placing Vermont in line with the numerous other states which have adopted or proposed similar schemes during the past ten or twelve years. In Vermont, as quite commonly elsewhere, the existence of a group of constitutional, elective officers stood in the way of a complete overhauling of the civil administration. This group includes, besides the governor, the secretary of state, auditor of accounts and state treasurer; the attorney general is an elective but not a constitutional officer. These constitutional offices could not be abolished or made appointive; but a scheme of reorganization could be built around them, so far as necessary, without the embarrassment of constitutional limitations. The offices of secretary of state and state auditor are not materially affected by the new acts. Certain duties are imposed upon the treasurer in addition to those already prescribed by law. They relate to forms of accounting, which must be approved by the governor and commissioner of finance; and to the requirement of a monthly statement to the auditor of all moneys withdrawn from the treasury upon warrants issued by the auditor, of sums appropriated by the legislature and the purposes of such appropriations, of amounts withdrawn from the treasury in pursuance of each specific appropriation, and of such other matters as may be required,—all under the direction of the governor. The treasurer seems to stand practically outside the newly created department of finance, being given no definite part in the preparation of the state budget. The office of attorney general is also unaffected by the reorganization. The acts created seven administrative departments, namely: Finance, public welfare, public health, highways, agriculture, education and public service. These departments are not uniformly organized, owing in part to pre-existing boards and offices which for one reason or another it did not seem advisable to merge for the sake of uniformity. The


Some terrestrial orchid species, including Epipactis palustris (L.) Crantz, are considered extremely difficult to germinate and cultivate in vitro. Observations of orchids germinating in nature are very few, and the timing and requirements for seedling establishment are unknown for most species. Seeds of E. palustris were incubated in vitro with an appropriate fungus, but germination was poor unless several other conditions were also met: scarification of the testa in Ca(OCL)2, an initial incubation for several weeks at 27°C, and a subsequent cold stratification for 8–12 weeks at 4–8°C, With these pretreatments, germnation responses exceeded 50% after incubation for 4 weeks at 20°C. Healthy protocorms with normal organ development were only produced by symbiotic culture following this lengthy seed preparation. The findings suggest that under natural conditions the seeds need some after-ripening, and the testa needs to be partially decomposed before germination. The requirement for chilling suggests that germination of seeds in situ occurs in spring.


Municipal sewage contains a lot of low quality thermal energy,the development of heat pump technology has facilitated the use of it in the past years.In order to improve the efficiency of existing heating system,collect data for application of secondary effluent in heat pump system and apply this technology widely in the future,the heating system of Jizhuangzi Reclaimed Wastewater Treatment Plant in Tianjin was reconstructed.In this project,the original heating boiler is replaced by high-temperature heat pump unit,and some terminal devices and air-handling units are changed.The heating efficiency is improved significantly compared with boiler heating.Meanwhile,the temperature of the secondary effluent was monitored for a whole year,which provides foundational data for the application of heat pump system in municipal sewage field.


Both 2-chloroethylphosphonic acid (Ethrel) and succinamic acid 2,2-dimethyl hydrazide (Alar) aided machine harvesting and improved quality of mechanically harvested sour cherries, Prunus cerasus L., cv. 'Montmorency' in a two year experiment. Alar applied two weeks after bloom at 2000 ppm reduced fruit acid levels, reduced the force required for fruit removal, and advanced red color development, but when used alone did not reduce fruit removal force enough to make shake and catch harvesting economic. Ethrel at 500 ppm applied one week prior to harvest on trees previously treated with Alar (2000 ppm) proved to be the best treatment each season on trees tested in both years. This combination resulted in adequate fruit removal coupled with better fruit quality than was attainable with Ethrel alone. Ethrel at 250 or 500 ppm specifically and effectively enhanced fruit removal but was phytotoxic at 1000 ppm as evidenced by gumming and leaf removal.


As part of the ongoing debate about the role of aesthetic design of interfaces, this paper presents an aesthetic evaluation tool which quantifies the layout characteristics of a web page according to fourteen different metrics. By using the rich medium of web pages as our input, we have significantly extended the prior work done in this area which has typically focussed on simple interfaces. We report the results of an experiment to determine whether users' judgements of 'aesthetic appeal' and 'perceived usability' match the numeric metric results. We found that aesthetic appeal (but not perceived usability) was captured by a metric that considered the placement of all objects on the screen, and that the placement of images is a strong predictor of both aesthetic appeal and perceived usability. We suggest practical implications of this work for web page designers.


Responsibility of the corporate sector is a well spread concept nowadays. Though the concept is not new, recently it has attracted the attention of almost every corporate house as well as the Government. However, the root is hidden somewhere at the individual level, which may be called individual social responsibility (which will be cited as ISR afterwards). A person who is engaged in any job or employed can set aside a few hours from the whole day and can utilise one hour in sharing his knowledge and expertise to those who need it. In society, people not only need money or its worth, money is required only for a few resources, which needs to be developed. It is not everything and at the same time may be many things. One can easily earn money by utilising his other resources and then he/she can earn other resources by using the previously earned money/wealth. Unlike corporate responsibility (ISR) is much more important and effective. However, we have only a few thousand corporates who are earning profit or can think about CSR, but we are having crores of capable individuals who can make an individual contribution.


In the article, based on the results of field measurements and calculations, recommendations are given for determining the roughness coefficient of the channel of the spillway. Based on the analysis of the literature and field research data, it was recommended to take the roughness coefficient of the channel of the spillway (canal) equal to n = 0.02 - for areas with steep slopes and without sediment deposits, and in areas with the worst condition of concrete surfaces and sediment deposits, take n = 0.0225. According to the results of field surveys of the canal, it was found that the hydraulic regime at the turning section No. 2 in the plan is characterized by an uneven distribution of depths in its cross-sections. This is due to the curvilinearity of the turning section of the channel, which has an unacceptably small radius of curvature in the plan causing centrifugal forces and rising levels along the concave wall, which led to an overflow of water over the top of the channel walls. As a result of the conducted experimental - laboratory studies of the turning section of the outflow tract (channel), recommendations are given for reducing the water incursion on the banks, the height of the walls.


Ganglia arising in the proximal tibiofibular joint have been known to cause sensory and motor deficits by direct compression or involvement of the peroneal nerve' 75. We report the case of a patient in whom such a ganglion caused anterior compartment syndrome. In order to determine why the peroneal muscles in our patient had been spared and to investigate the relationship of the fascia to the proximal tibiofibulan joint. we carried out anatomical studies of five lower extremities. These investigations confirmed that the fascia of the anterior compartment extends proximally anterior to the tibiofibular joint. so that there is a predisposition for extension of a ganglion from the proximal tibiofibulan joint to the anterior compartment, but the lateral compartment is protected from such extension.


Analyzing studies on motivation carried out by foreign scholars in 2017–2019 one can identify the following trends in search of motivational factors of achievements at school level and family miсrocommunity: the desire to stand out and assimilate, attractiveness and popularity, family tradition of education, relationships with parents, self-image, resilience. These studies distinctly show the value of motivational climate and suspended individual supporting strategies focused on life goals, including emotional involvement. Deep involvement in school life and the authority of the teacher can be regarded as predictors of high achievement motivation of junior adolescents. The review analyzes the reasons of reduction in learning motivation of high schoolers. The article discusses the models that demonstrate the role of belief in self-efficacy and role of mother and father in the formation of school achievement motivation. The authors show that scientists gradually shift the emphasis in the direction of non-invasive ways of shaping the «induced» learning motivation and targeted motivation for learning of particular top-requested disciplines.


We investigate the nuclear structure of Ru using the modified three parameters rotational (TPR) model. In this model we used the origin equation of the nuclei energy without the additional part that used in the old model. This modified model can be applied on the all range of the nuclei mass numbers. To mention few, and as a limitation, we applied this model on the medium mass nuclei. Energy levels of low lying states have been calculated for ground state bands. The results were compared with experimental data and acceptable agreement are obtained. The nuclear moments of inertia were calculated and compared with available experimental data. From the results of calculation it is found that model is suitable for description of nuclear structure of these nuclei, specially the collectivity properties. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Date of Submission: 03-10-2017 Date of acceptance: 12-10-2017 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


This presentation surveys imaging systems, their limitations and expectations for target and organ‐at‐risk position determination, delineation and respiratory motion estimation. Discussion will focus on systems that are in current clinical use. Imaging techniques at simulation usually attempt to use the same patient breathing conditions as at treatment, among them, breath hold, free breathing, coached breathing, or abdominal compression. CT remains the dominant standard for anatomical imaging of external beam radiotherapy simulation. CT acquisition techniques for motion estimation include breath hold at different inspiration levels, or more recently, respiration‐correlated CT (RCCT), involving retrospective sorting of axial images by means of a respiration signal. A limitation of RCCT is that images at a given position along the patient are confined to a single respiratory cycle, and assumes that the breathing pattern is repeatable, which is known to be violated to some extent depending on the patient. Further, images are acquired over several cycles and resorted into a single one; thus cycle‐to‐cycle changes in breathing pattern lead to artifacts. Coached breathing attempts to achieve more repeatable breathing and has shown varying degrees of improvement in some patients. Breath‐hold CT fidelity is similarly dependent on breath‐hold repeatability. Ideally imaging over several breath cycles is desirable, but imagingdose imposes limitations with RCCT, while patient fatigue limits breath‐hold CT. A possible future direction of development is to complement CT with modalities that can image over several cycles with little or no additional dose. For example, repeat MRI in the sagittal plane provides not only a self‐consistent image in terms of respiratory motion but also an estimate of cycle‐to‐cycle variation in motion extent, which is valuable for evaluating the sensitivity of a treatment plan to such variation. Education Objectives: 1. Understand the current technological advances in radiotherapyimaging at simulation to provide spatial information and respiratory motion estimation; 2. Understand the limitations, current expectations, and possible further improvements of these imaging systems.


wt, 20,000) which is associated with prealbumin; PA (mol wt, 55,000) as a proteinprotein complex. Plasma RBPlevel is kept constant by synthesis and secretion from the liver, and by degradation in the kidney (one of rapid turnover proteins with a biological half-life of 13hr). Vitamin A is assumed to be taken up through a specific receptor for RBPwhich is located on the surface of target cells (i.e., the retina, reproductive organ, taste buds etc.). Abnormally high threshold of taste acuity, measured with a use of electrogastometer (Lyon Co., Tokyo), was decreased and restored toward normal immediately after PTC-drainage in patients with cholestasis, with a concomitant restoration of daily food intakes. An inverse correlation between threshold of taste acuity and plasma RBP was observed (r=-0.86, P<0.001), strongly sug-


Abstract The present work is concerned with tungsten oxide (WO3) thin films, which feature strongly in electrochromic applications. The films were deposited on glass substrates and fluorine doped tin oxide (FTO) coated glass substrates by the electron beam evaporation technique using a WO3 target. The elemental analysis of the films was performed by particle induced X-ray emission (PIXE) spectroscopy, and the surface morphology of the films was studied using atomic force microscopy (AFM). To the best of our knowledge, this is the first time that PIXE has been used for the analysis of elements present in electron beam evaporated WO3 films. In this study, PIXE was applied to confirm the presence of constituent element in the films. Atomic force microscopic studies revealed that the deposited WO3 films are homogeneous, crack-free surfaces with uniform spherical nanograins. These characterisation studies were carried out for the films prepared on different substrates, and at different deposition temperatures and annealing temperatures. The increase in cluster size with increasing substrate temperature can be explained by the increased diffusion kinetics of the neighbouring particles and/or clusters in the film, causing them to coalesce to form a dense surface coating. This would provide a better understanding of the electrochemical behaviour of the films.


SIDEBARS: ON THE RECORD: WILLIAM MCDONALD, CONTRACT ADMINISTRATOR CHIEF OF STAFF, FEDEX PILOTS ASSOC. -- PILOT PERSPECTIVE: GREGORY VAN DYKE, DC-10 SECOND OFFICER.


In this paper we propose a novel optical flow estimation method accompanied by confidence measures. Our main goal is fast and highly accurate motion estimation in regions where information is available and a confidence measure which identifies these regions. Therefore we extend the structure tensor method to robust recursive total least squares (RRTLS) and run it on a GPU for real-time processing. Based on a coarse-to-fine framework we propagate not only the motion estimates to finer scales but also the covariance matrices, which may be used as confidence measures. Experiments on synthetic data show the benefits of our approach. We applied the RRTLS framework to a real-time super-resolution method for deforming objects which incorporates the confidence measures and demonstrates that propagating the covariances through the pyramid improves super-resolution results.


All-Solid-State-Lithium-Sulfur-Batteries(ASSLSBs) are the most promising candidate for next generation secondary battery because of its high theoretical specific capacity of Lithium metal (3860 mAhg-1) and elemental sulphur (1672 mAhg-1). However, the shuttle effect of Li-S battery is the major obstacles of commercialization. And there are still remaining safety issues due to dendrite formation during lithium deposition. Adopting solid state electrolyte can be a solution to these issues. Recent studies of all-solid-state-batteries have achieved high capacity and good stability. But there are still hindrances of interface problems between solid electrolyte and active materials. The interfacial issues of solid electrolytes can be solved by applying lithium metal powder. In this study, we fabricate composite electrode which have large specific contact area as well as intimate contact of electrode component by using solid electrolyte and lithium metal powder. Surface of lithium metal powder is modified by an ion conductive polymer material to prevent side reaction of solid electrolyte and lithium metal powder. This study can provide a new way of producing the surface modified lithium powder as an anode material for All-Solid-State-Lithium-Sulfur-Batteries.


In this study, two novel time sample cross correlation based power attacks using novel voting mechanism and novel multi reference bit mechanism are introduced. These two attack methods are applied on a Montgomery Ladder (ML) implementation of RSA algorithm. In the target ML implementation, use of operands from different locations according to the existence of toggling on the exponent bits is the source of vulnerability. To retrieve the bit type (toggling or not toggling of consecutive bit values) of the secret key, cross correlation values between power traces of a fixed reference bit and power trace of remaining bits of the secret key are calculated. For proposed first method, for each key bit, if this cross correlation value is greater than a threshold, this bit is labeled as the same type, otherwise labeled as the opposite type with respect to the reference bit and corresponding scores are increased. This procedure is repeated for each RSA run. As the number of used power traces are increased, to decide to the final type of each key bit, a voting mechanism is applied on the scores gathered from each RSA run. By application of this method, type of 970 bits of the 1024 bit RSA key could be retrieved correctly. However locations of wrongly estimated 54 bit positions can be found by examining the corresponding scores of those bits. For the second method, instead of scores, sum of correlation values are used to decide to the type of each bit. By this method type of all the 1024 key bits could be estimated correctly. It is also shown that this second attack method can be improved by using multi reference bits together. This property makes the method more flexible. Both of the attack methods are not affected by message blinding or modulus blinding type countermeasures. For a successful attack of these types, positions of square and multiply operations related with each key bit must be known. However, exponent blinding can be used as a countermeasure.