A method is described for routine determination of residues in soil of 5,6-dichloro-2-trifluoromethylbenzimidazole, the major product formed in soil from the acaricide fenazaflor. The residue is extracted from moistened soil with acidified aqueous methanol. After clean-up by partition the residue is determined by g.l.c. with electron capture detection.

Details are presented of the investigations which led to the adoption of this procedure in preference to other variations.


Cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) are known as the greater cause of death in the world. As a way to prevent the development of CVDs in consequence of the increase of postprandial lipemia (PPL), aerobic exercise has been shown as an important protective intervention, once it can reduce postprandial concentrations of triglycerides (TG) and accelerate TG clearance rate. The aim of this study was to verify the effect of two different intensities of prior exercise on PPL after the consumption of a high fat meal. Eleven male subjects, physically actives (BMI 23,43 ± 2,43 kg/m2) with an average of 23 ± 3 years old performed three randomized protocols: Low-intensity (LI) exercise at the ventilatory threshold 1; Moderateintensity (MI) exercise at 10% under the ventilatory threshold 2; or a control protocol (Rest). The sessions of prior exercises were isoenergetic (15% of basal metabolic rate). MI exercise seems to attenuate for longer than the LI the curve of TG comparing to Rest. MI was more effective to reduce the area under curve (AUC) of triglycerides (7,9%) than BI in relation to Rep. In conclusion, MI aerobic exercise performed prior to the consumption of a high fat meal shows a greater attenuation of triglycerides than LI aerobic exercise.


Robotic arm-assisted total knee arthroplasty (RA-TKA) has been increasingly adopted in the adult reconstruction prac-tices in the United States. A multitude of studies have evaluated clinical outcomes after RA-TKA. 1 – 4 Notwithstand-ing, the evidence on this subject is constantly evolving. Through the current investigation


Ultrasonic and Brillouin scattering measurements have been used to establish the relaxation properties of zinc chloride, zinc nitrate, and calcium nitrate hydrate melts in the frequency range 5 MHz to 12 GHz. A distribution of relaxation times is observed for these melts which is generally much broader than for a single relaxation. The width of this distribution decreases with increasing temperature and water content. Deuteration of the hydrate melts produces a significant increment in the low frequency absorption and also an increment in the mean relaxation time. The experimental data have been compared with the Isakovich–Chaban and Montrose–Litovitz theories of viscoelastic relaxation. The mean relaxation times predicted by the I–C theory are generally longer than the experimental values, and the shape of the predicted distribution is different. The data can be closely fitted to the M–L treatment with proper choice of the two adjustable parameters in the theory. A multiple state chemical model is propos...


Through analyzing the breeding situation of grain food crops in Guangxi in recent ten years,the existing problems of the crops breeding were discussed and the goals and measures on breeding new grain food crop varieties and the extension strategies of the new varieties were put forward according to the aims and demands on developing the production of grain food crops.The aims on breeding new grain crop varieties were to breed new varieties with special use and function through improving the grain quality and resistance of rice with high and stable yield.The measures were to strengthen the introduction and innovation of breeding germplasm resources,and the breeding of new varieties with special use and function,high and stable yield,good grain quality,etc.Moreover,it is put forward that the extension idea should be innovated,the management of agricultural industrialization should be actively promoted,and the extension service system in rural areas should be set up and improved.


The development and preliminary investigations of the validity of the Halifax Mental Status Scale (HMSS) are described. The HMSS was constructed to find a balance between ease of administration and broad sampling of behavior


Bacterioses are considered one of the most important diseases of vegetables field crops and ornamental plants. Bacteria mostly overwinter and spread by seed. During last few decades, the role of seed as the major source of primary inoculum was increased, due to unlimited possibility of transportation. In our country bacterioses cause the most important yield lost of vegetables, especially of pepper, bean, potato and brassicaceae. Use of pathogen-free seed and other propagative material is considered as basic control measure for bacterioses. In order to obtain proper health condition this plant material should be visually field inspected during vegetation and checked in special laboratories according to standardized bacteriological methods.


These studies show that either central pharmacological blockade or genetic ablation of α1B‐adrenoceptors markedly attenuates the behavioral activation caused by modafinil, implicating these receptors in the drug's action. Synapse 46:269–270, 2002. © 2002 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.


In this paper a simplified hardware implementation of a dot product arithmetic operation with constant coefficients is presented. The proposed methodology exploits a combination of distributed arithmetic and common subexpression sharing techniques. An algorithm is introduced for identifying the common sub partial sums systematically. Subsequently, a hardware architecture is proposed and the obtained circuits are synthesized in a 90-nm 1.0 V CMOS standard-cell library using Synopsys Design Compiler. Comparisons reveal significant reduction of 52% and 23% in area and power respectively for 1.5 ns delay over a regular dot product constant multiplier.


Abstract Anti-N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor (anti-NMDAR) encephalitis is an autoimmune encephalopathy characterized by neuropsychiatric symptoms, autonomic instability, and abnormal movements. Most children who undergo tumor removal and receive appropriate immunosuppressants have substantial neurological improvement. We report a 14-year-old girl with relapsing anti-NMDAR encephalitis who presented with paroxysmal tingling and weakness of the right lower limb. Despite long-term prophylaxis with immunotherapy (azathioprine), tumefactive demyelinating lesion and multifocal subcortical white matter lesions were identified on magnetic resonance imaging, which improved after high doses of steroid therapy. There may be overlap between the clinical manifestations of anti-NMDAR encephalitis and acquired demyelination syndromes in children.


Changes to family law legislation have prioritised the safety of the child. This article explores decisions handed down following the reforms and identifies several themes that have emerged in post-reform family law decision-making.


In multi-category response models, categories are often ordered. In the case of ordinal response models, the usual likelihood approach becomes unstable with ill-conditioned predictor space or when the number of parameters to be estimated is large relative to the sample size. The likelihood estimates do not exist when the number of observations is less than the number of parameters. The same problem arises if constraint on the order of intercept values is not met during the iterative procedure. Proportional odds models (POMs) are most commonly used for ordinal responses. In this paper, penalized likelihood with quadratic penalty is used to address these issues with a special focus on POMs. To avoid large differences between two parameter values corresponding to the consecutive categories of an ordinal predictor, the differences between the parameters of two adjacent categories should be penalized. The considered penalized-likelihood function penalizes the parameter estimates or differences between the parameter estimates according to the type of predictors. Mean-squared error for parameter estimates, deviance of fitted probabilities and prediction error for ridge regression are compared with usual likelihood estimates in a simulation study and an application.


In this paper, the Hölder regularity of weak solutions for singular parabolic systems of p-Laplacian type is investigated. By the Poincare inequality, we show that its weak solutions within Hölder space.


This study presents an Input-Output (I-O) approach to measure the potential economic loss to a regional economy of a governmental policy. I-O models provide a relatively straight forward way to estimate the impact of public spending on a regional economy.1 A number of ready-made models exist that provide the multipliers necessary for the analysis. 2 The legal framework for this problem was a court case involving the constitutionality of procurement preferences rules. These rules give preference to bidders for state contracts based on local content and local vendor criteria. These rules consider an in-state bidder the low bidder when the bid is no higher than a specified percentage over the non-resident bidder. The economic rationale for such preferences is that by purchasing within the state, the policy results in creating more jobs than would have occurred otherwise. Further, the policy potentially produces more tax revenues for the local government. The legality of procurement preference laws has been challenged on a number of constitutional issues. In a recent case in South Carolina, the judge ruled that the preference scheme would withstand an equal protection challenge so long as the challenge drawn is rationally related to a legitimate state interest. It was argued that current state policy is to promote jobs and that this policy is a legitimate state interest. Using an I-O approach, the number of jobs that would be lost had the contract been awarded to a non-resident was determined. The earnings impact multiplier was used to determine the lost earnings and associated lost income taxes that would have resulted from an out-of-state award. These losses were compared to the added cost to the state due to the higher price paid as a result of applying the procurement percentage. *Research Economist, College of Business, Division of Research, Umverslty of South Carolina, Columbia, SC I For a comprehensive treatment of I-O models see Mfiler, Ronald and Peter Blair, (1985) Input-Output Analysts' Foundations and ExtensLons, Englewood Chffs: Prentice-Hall 2 In this case, RIMS II, a model developed by the Bureau of Economic Analysis of the U.S Department of Commerce, was used.


In addition to reduce oil consumption and pollution emissions, electric vehicles (EVs) show great potential for the power system as flexible load. For this reason, it provokes our interest to investigate the extent to which EVs could contribute to the power system management from the power system operator's perspective. To achieve this goal, a unit commitment (UC) model for the power system operation that considers EVs charging is used. A case study in Guangdong province is carried out to quantify the impact of EVs in terms of generation mix by fuel type, demand profiles with EVs, variable generation cost of the system, and power purchase cost for grid companies. Result shows that in an economic dispatch context, controlled charging could reduce the variable generation cost, and the purchase cost for grid companies. At the meantime, the high coal consumption due to controlled charging can be observed, which conflicts with the low-carbon electricity transition policy in China. In addition, the controlled charging reduces the peak load by 5.77% compared with uncontrolled charging, when there is 2 Million EVs. While the impact of control charging on reducing peak load is uncertain yet, the grid companies probably face peak load challenges in both controlled and uncontrolled charging when there is high penetration level of EVs.


Single species non-neutral plasmas have very robust confinement properties because the conservation of canonical angular momentum in a system with azimuthal symmetry provides a powerful constraint on the allowed radial positions of the particles. If no external torques act on the plasma, the plasma cannot expand radially to the wall. However, collisions with a background neutral gas will exert a torque on the rotating plasma thus allowing the mean-square radius to increase. In the electron diffusion gauge experiment, a pure electron plasma is confined in a Malmberg–Penning trap and the radial density profile is measured as a function of time. The base pressure is 5×10−10 Torr and purified helium is injected to pressures ⩾5×10−9 Torr. The magnetic field is varied between 100 and 600 G. The experimentally measured radial density profile shape is found to match closely the theoretically predicted (expanding) equilibrium profile, where a single free parameter proportional to the electron temperature T is vari...


Tours fo r m any tastes Tours and activities have been created for many tastes. W hether you opt to head for Western North Carolina's breathtaking Blue Ridge Mountains, or remain in the Q ueen City, we promise you exciting touring opportunities. (Final details regarding prices and times will appear in the ACRL conference program and on the Web site.) • Low e's M otor Speedw ay (http:// www.lowesmotorspeedway.com/). Board an air-conditioned motor coach for a 30-minute drive to Lowe's Motor Speedway in Concord, North Carolina. Constructed in I960, Lowe's Motor Speedway is the leading promoter, mar keter, and sponsor o f m otor sports in the United States and is considered the hub of NASCAR in the Southeast. Get a behind-thescenes look at the Speedway grounds— includ ing Pit Row, garages, infield hospital, touring tower, dirt track, W inners Circle, and more. You will participate in an impressive tour of the track, a lap around the Speedway, and a buffet lunch in the popular Speedway Club, which overlooks the track. Many race shops are located in the track vicinity. Features in clude round-trip transportation via deluxe mo tor coach , guided tour o f the Speedw ay grounds, buffet lunch at the Speedway Club, and a lap around the Speedway Track. • B iltm ore Estate, Gardens, and W in ery (http://www.biltmore.com/). Travel to George Vanderbilt's legendary 8,000-acre Blue Ridge Mountain estate in Asheville, North Caro lina. Billed as the largest and most exquisite private home in America, the Biltmore Estate w as built in 1895 and features a 250-room mansion with 34 master bedroom s, 43 bath rooms, 65 fireplaces, 3 kitchens, and an indoor swimming pool. The mansion is filled with ar tistic treasures, including w orks by Renoir, Chippendale, and Wedgewood. Your tour will include the mansion, the estate winery, and the gardens. A self-guided tour through the winery's production facility will conclude with a wine tasting. The gardens are one o f the most no table achievements of America's foremost land scap e architect, Frederick Law Olmstead. Travel time is 130 minutes each way. Features include round-trip transportation via deluxe


Nghe An is a province in Vietnam, with 10 mountainous districts and 1 mountainous town, accounting for 83.31% of the province's natural area. The mountainous area of Nghe An is a place with complicated and dangerous terrain and poor infrastructure; the lowest human development index (HDI) in the province; economic situation is extremely difficult, but it is a place with an important strategic position in terms of socio-economic development and protection of national border security. Therefore, building a contingent of ethnic minority cadres has a very important position and role in the development of the mountainous area of Nghe An. However, the work of building a contingent of ethnic minority cadres in mountainous districts of Nghe An currently has many shortcomings and limitations that need to be overcome, and possible solutions are needed so that the construction building a contingent of ethnic minority cadres in mountainous areas to achieve good results in the coming time.  Article visualizations:


Sir, Erythromycin, clarithromycin and azithromycin are similar in terms of their in-vitro spectra of activity against Gram-positive bacteria. Since they became available, the newer macrolide and azalide compounds have been used more commonly for the treatment of out-patients with respiratory tract infections, especially those who are allergic to penicillins. At the same time, studies have documented the increasing prevalence of penicillinresistant pneumococci, a situation that underscores the need for alternative therapeutic agents. The objective of this investigation was to evaluate the susceptibilities of clinical isolates of Streptococcus pneumoniae and Strepto coccus pyogenes to erythromycin, clarithromycin and azithromycin. During the winter of 1993–1994, consecutive, nonreplicate, respiratory tract isolates from patients attending out-patient clinics in 12 different medical centres throughout continental USA were collected at this institute. This exercise yielded 333 strains of S. pyogenes, 197 from children of 12 years of age and 136 from adults, and 260 of S. pneumoniae, 100 from children and 160 from adults. The susceptibilities of the isolates to erythromycin, clarithromycin and azithromycin were determined by a broth microdilution method according to a protocol of the National Committee for Clinical Laboratory Standards (NCCLS); susceptibility to benzylpenicillin was determined concurrently. All four drugs were serially diluted in cation-adjusted Mueller–Hinton broth containing 2–3% lysed horse blood. The microdilution trays were inoculated with approximately 5 10 cfu/L and then incubated at 35°C in an atmosphere without additional CO2. After 20–24 h, the MICs were recorded as the lowest concentration permitting no visible growth; the interpretative breakpoints were those defined by the NCCLS i.e. for erythromycin and clarithromycin, susceptible 0.25 mg/L and resistant 1.0 mg/L, and for azithromycin, susceptible 0.5 mg/L and resistant 2 mg/L. All of the S. pyogenes strains were shown to be highly susceptible to penicillin (MIC 0.06 mg/L). Of the pneumococci, on the other hand, only 62% of isolates from children and 82% of those from adults were susceptible to this antibiotic; 8% exhibited high-level penicillin resistance (MIC 2.0 mg/L), while the remaining strains (27% and 11% of those from children and adults respectively) were of intermediate susceptibility (MIC 0.12– 1.0 mg/L). These prevalence figures are consistent with those recently reported by Doern et al. for the USA. The susceptibilities of the respiratory tract pathogens to erythromycin, clarithromycin and azithromycin are shown in the Table. Of the S. pyogenes isolates, only 2% or fewer were resistant to all three macrolides. Similar prevalence figures have been reported from Spain. Of the penicillin-susceptible strains of S. pneumoniae, between 1% and 3% were resistant to each macrolide, compared with approximately 16% that exhibited intermediate susceptibility and approximately 57% that were penicillin-resistant. Soriano & Fernandez-Roblas have made similar observations in respect of isolates from Spain. The increasing prevalence of penicillin-resistant pneumococci is causing serious therapeutic problems in


Demand responsive transit (DRT) services in suburban regions serve residents as the complements of the public transportation. Since suburban DRT service usually faces demand fluctuation in some special situations, such as terrible weather, DRT operators have recourse to temporal rental vehicles to satisfy all requests. There are two types of rental contracts. In the first case, the costs of rental vehicles are similar to the costs of owned vehicles, and the multi-trip vehicle routing problem is studied. In the second case, the costs of outbound trips are not covered by DRT companies, and the open vehicle routes are introduced. In this paper, a mixed integer linear programming formulation is proposed to model the route optimization problem of the suburban DRT service, in which the number of rental vehicles and two classes of routes should be decided simultaneously. To solve the proposed model, a branch-and-price algorithm is designed, which has two pricing subproblems to generate two classes of routes, respectively. From the results of experiments, it can be found that the service sequence is introduced, when open routes are involved. Renting vehicles can help DRT companies save operational costs even in daily operations.


We investigate a subgraph mining framework, that can connect similar entities according to their structure and attribute similarities. We take one mapping between two related points chosen from the query and target graph as one vertex in the correspondence graph and decide the weight of the edge based on the similarity score. In this way, we transform the problem to a dense subgraph discovery problem. To adapt this method to large scale, we choose the candidate group by some effective pruning methods. We also add some techniques to make our method more flexible to fit uncertain user sketched input. We investigate how changes to certain parameters in the algorithm can influence the results. By integrating all these adjustments into the framework, we can provide a method that exhibits both accuracy and flexibility in many situations with a degree of generality. Experiments on both certain and uncertain query graphs can give satisfactory and informative results.


A process for alkylating an aromatic compound with a cyclic group characterized by the following points: a) the catalyst used is a zeolite of faujasite structure having pore openings of greater than 6.7 A, the silica / alumina of this zeolite being greater than 2.5 and its residual level of ion (s) alkali (s) being less than 3%; b) the reaction is effected in the liquid / solid heterogeneous phase at a temperature between 20 degree (s) C. to 250 degree (s) C, under a pressure at most equal to 30 bars. aromatic compounds obtained by this method.


MgAl2O4-TiC/W composite has been successfully insitu synthesized in a high dense form using combustion synthesis under-load technology. The process was applied to a blend of titanium dioxide, carbon magnesium oxide, aluminum metal and tungsten carbide powders. The different parameters affecting the synthesis of the target composite were investigated. This included the effect of aluminium particle size (37, 18.2, 5.6 μm), carbon stoichiometry (0.7–0.9), WC wt% (10–30 wt%). The obtained results showed that, 18.2 μm Al, 0.8 carbon stoichiometry and 234 MPa load were necessary to obtain high dense composite 2.4 vol% porosity and hardness of 1535 HV with homogeneous microstructure. Addition of 20 wt% WC highly improved the microstructure and the sample hardness was increased to 1754 HV with a sample porosity of ∼3.0 vol%. Thermodynamic study of the different reactions involved in the combustion process was also conducted.


The structures of 2-(pyrimidin-2-yl)(1c), 2-methoxycarbonylisatogen (1d), and 2-(1-ethyl-benzimidazol-2-yl)isatogen (1e) have been determined by X-ray crystallography. The dihedral angle between the isatogen ring and the plane of the 2-substituent varies as 43°(1c), 15°(1d), and 48°(1e). The transoid arrangement of the isatogen O(1) atom and the pyridine-type nitrogen atom N (1 5), previously reported in (1b), is preserved in (1e) despite the increased steric effects arising from the ethyl group in this molecule. There are surprising variations in the lengths of the O(1)–N(1)–C(2)–C(3)–O(3) bonds in the isatogen moiety and the C(2)–C(10) bond, this last having very little double bond character. MNDO calculations using the experimental geometries show, as before, that the C(2) atom carries a negative charge and indicate that there is a strong stereoelectronic effect arising from the centres of highest electron density in the isatogen ring O(1) and the nitrogen atoms, N(11) and N(18) in (1c) and (1e), which are remote from each other. The energies of the LUMO and HOMO orbitals indicate that the reaction between these isatogens and dipolarophiles shows the same regioselectivity reported in an earlier paper. Natural abundance 15N NMR spectra of isatogens are reported for the first time. The chemical shifts of the N(1) atom in the isatogens (1a-e) correlate negatively (r=–0.96) with 13C shifts of the C(3) atom, providing further evidence of the highly polarizable nature of the five-membered ring in the isatogen system.


The effect of salinity on chlorophyll a, chlorophyll b, total chlorophyll, carotenoid and proline content of hydroponically grown seedlings of Avicennia alba was studied to observe its tolerance to changing salinity. The selected seedlings were exposed to five different salinity levels (2, 5, 10, 15 and 20 psu) for a period of 30 days and observations were done at a regular interval of 7, 14, 21 and 30 days respectively. The concentrations of chlorophyll exhibited significant positive correlations with salinity (p < 0.01). The chlorophyll a:b ratio in the plant varied between 3.04 to 3.56 through out the period of inves- tigation. The salinity fluctuation did not affect the carotenoid level and proline content in the leaves of the species as evidenced from the insignificant r values. The results show that Avicennia alba of Indian Sundarbans region can tolerate and adapt to high saline condition as witnessed in the central sector of the deltaic complex around the Matla River.


The present invention relates to a method for a transmission end transmitting a feedback by using a codebook in a wireless communication system, which supports a multiple antennas, comprising the steps of: determining a first codeword for a first horizontal antenna group from a first codebook, which comprises at least one precoding matrix and is selected for a plurality of horizontal antenna groups from a predetermined codebook; determining a second codeword for a second horizontal antenna group; determining a third codeword for each of the antenna groups other than the first and second horizontal antenna groups, from the plurality of horizontal antenna groups; and providing a feedback of at least one of first, second, and third codewords to a receiving end, wherein the third codeword is determined according to a phase increase value, which is determined in accordance with the first and second codewords.


After fifteen years of war in Afghanistan and Iraq, many now see "small-footprint" security force assistance (SFA)–training, advising, and equipping allied militaries–as an alternative to large U.S. ground-force commitments to stabilize weak states. SFA, however, confronts challenges of interest misalignment between the United States and its typical partners. The resulting agency losses often limit SFA's real ability to improve partners' military effectiveness. For SFA, small footprints usually mean small payoffs.


An energy policy analysis tool for the personal computer has been developed, called the Sectoral Energy Analysis and Data System (SEADS-PC). The software package requires that the policy under investigation be translated into: changes in components of Gross National Product; a change in industry final demand; or a change in energy intensity in specific industries. SEADS-PC then converts these policy implications into changes in energy use in the US economy. These changes are analyzed through an input-output representation of the US economy that includes over 100 industries. An application of SEADS-PC to the energy consequences of balancing the federal budget suggests that the energy effects would be slight, but that petroleum use would increase relatively more than other fuels. A second application shows that as a result of petroleum intensity declines over the period 1972-1981, the economy used 4.6 quad (51.4%) less oil in 1981.


This paper considers the problem of fair allocation of multiple types of resources in heterogeneous servers, along with a resource type external to those servers. Our work is motivated by the need for fair multi-resource allocation in mobile edge computing (MEC), where the users must upload their tasks over a single dedicated wireless communication link that exists outside the computing servers. We propose a fair multi-resource allocation mechanism for this environment, termed Task Share Fairness with External Resource (TSF-ER), which finds the Kalai-Smorodinsky bargaining solution satisfying important fairness properties. We show that TSF-ER is envy-free, Pareto optimal, and strategy-proof, and it satisfies the property of sharing incentive. Large-scale simulation driven by Google and Alibaba cluster trace further shows that TSF-ER significantly outperforms the existing utilitarian, Nash social welfare maximizer, and egalitarian solutions, leading to fairer resource allocation while maintaining a high level of resource utilization.


[Objective] To explore the expression of HIF-1α and the relationship between its expression and bcl-2 in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma.[Methods] Expression of HIF-1α and bcl-2 were assessed by immunohistochemistry staining in 60 cases of esophageal squamous cell carcinoma and 10 cases normal esophageal tissues.[Results] HIF-1α was hardly expressed in all normal mucosa epithelium,while its expression rate was 61.7% in 60 cases of esophageal squamous cell carcinoma.The positive expression rate of HIF-1α increased as the size increasing and the degree of differentiation decreased of the primary tumors(P 0.05),and its positive rate in the group with lymph node metastasis(78.3%)was much higher than that in the group without lymph node metastasis(51.4%,P 0.05).That the relationship between HIF-1α and bcl-2 was negative(P 0.01).[Conclusions] The over expression of HIF-1α may promote the proliferation and poorly differentiation of esophageal squamous cell carcinoma,and may take part in the metastasis of lymph node.


A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T Article history: Received: 29 June, 2020 Accepted: 11 August, 2020 Online: 08 September, 2020 This paper studies a trade-off between security (intercept probability (IP)) and reliability (outage probability (OP)) for a multi-hop decode-and-forward (DF) relaying protocol in an underlay cognitive radio network, in presence of a multi-antenna eavesdropper. In the considered protocol, all primary and secondary terminals are equipped with multiple antennas, and they employ transmit antenna selection (TAS) (at transmitter sides) and selection combining (SC) (at receiver sides) techniques to enhance the system performance. Relying on channel state information (CSI) of the primary-to-secondary interference links known or unknown, two efficient TAS/SC techniques are proposed for the secondary networks. Moreover, operating on the underlay spectrum sharing mode, the secondary transmitters including source and relays must adapt their transmit power so that OP of the primary network is not higher than a pre-determined threshold. Under impact of Rayleigh fading and co-channel interference, the end-to-end (e2e) OP and IP are expressed by exact closed-form expressions that are verified by Monte-Carlo simulations. Then, both simulation and theoretical results are presented to show the OP-IP trade-off.


Two groups of 26 male and 26 female rats at the initial age 30 ± 2 days were fed during 31 weeks on diets containing 20 percent of yellow lupin seeds having low (LG) or high (HG) gramine content. The animals were mated twice within nutritional groups, 1 male: 1 female, and their main reproductive parameters were recorded. In both reproductive cycles body weight of females at mating, after parturition and after 21‐days lactation was lower in HG than in LG group. Fertility rate and body weight of neonates were not affected by the diet while number of neonates per litter tended to be lower by 0.7 and 0.8 pups in HG than in LG group. Body weight of weaners was also substantially smaller in dams fed on HG than LG diet. Relative weight of spleen but not of liver, kidney and heart was significantly greater in HG females. Four weeks old males and females issued from the first litters born to LG and HG animals (ten males and ten females per treatment) were fed individually on respective diets during 3 weeks. Feed intake and growth rate did not differ between the treatments. In males relative weight of liver and testicles was greater, while hematocrit and red blood count were lower in HG than in LG group. In females organ weights did not differ. Activity of liver enzymes determined in males was not affected by the diet. It may be concluded that high‐gramine lupin affects negatively lactational performance, probably via lower feed intake, but it does not induce apparent teratogenic effects in the progeny.


Digital Subscriber Lines (DSL) transmit over twisted-pair telephone loops, and knowledge of the loop make-up is vital for determining what types of DSLs may be deployed and what bit rates they may transmit. Single-ended automatic loop identification (LID) is essential for achieving low-cost deployment of DSL, since it allows loops to be qualified in bulk and does not involve any human intervention at the customer's location. This paper describes strategies to enhance previous algorithms for loop make-up identification via single-ended measurements based on Time Domain Reflectometry. In particular, we show that clustering techniques can be effectively used to partition the set of possible loop topologies so as to reduce overall identification time. Furthermore, statistical data is used to improve overall LID accuracy by accounting for the likelihoods of different cable gauges at different distances from a central office (CO).


DEA method is an important method for evaluating the efficiency of units.At the same time,a right and efficient system of DEA software is a basic condition and important basis to which DEA methods are applied.At first,the problem of solving DEA model by software of linear programming and the necessity of developing DEA software are analyzed.Then,an algorithm and software for judging DEA-efficient units are provided.Finally,an algorithm for judging the efficency of decision making units is given.


The studies and implementations of a radio/acoustic communication buoy used for underwater multi-rate data communication in shallow-water acoustic channels are investigated.The underwater communication and wireless communication schemes as well as the engineering implementation of the buoy are introduced in detail.The underwater communication,wireless communication,and DSP signal processing techniques are integrated in this buoy.The buoy can also play the role of a radio/acoustic communication(racom) gateway node of an underwater acoustic communication/sensing network with software upgrade.A sea experiment is conducted successfully and the results verify the feasibility of the racom buoy's design.In this experiment,the buoy's wireless communication distance reached 15.2 km with BER of less than 10-6,underwater communication maximum distance was 9.6 km with BER of about 1% and the capability of communicating between buoy and undersea moving platform is also verified.


Azimuth pattern analysis of a side-mounted antenna is made keeping reflections separate from the main radiated signal. Each reflection is characterized by a reflection coefficient and path difference in wavelengths at a distant receiving summing point. At each azimuth, the reflections are expressed as echoes accompanying a modulated VSB data pulse. The corresponding receiver equalizer tap weights are determined from which the DTV receiver threshold impact is calculated. Measurements of a side-mounted antenna using an azimuth fly-around technique are compared to the calculated results for specific azimuth directions. It is concluded that the DTV performance degradation caused by close-in reflections from adjacent tower members may be predicted by calculation and that the degradation is small.


In data acquisition system of USB host based on DSP, aiming at theproblem of less spaces of ROM and RAM in DSP,this paper brings up a method of applying LZW data compression coding to compress data, and then transmitted the compresseddata to the exterior memory through USB bus. It was proved that this method can greatly improve the exterior memory use andthe efficiency of the USB bus.


The synthesis and fluorescence behavior of a series of bis(trisilylalkyl)anthracene molecules is described. The photodegradation of these molecules under UV light has been monitored and compared to a commercially available fluorescent optical brightener. There is a relationship between the structure and the rate of photo decay. The materials with more bulky substituents exhibit the greater stability towards UV. For bis(triphenylsilyl)anthracene the photostability appears to be comparable with a commercially available optical brightener, but the molecule may be susceptible to thermal decay.


A locally made biscuit cabinet dryer to be operated in homes was designed and developed to prepare biscuits in Nigeria homes. A thorough study of the imported dryer for home use was done. Design drawings and calculations were established and the machine was fabricated with well selected materials and components all sourced locally. The 714mm x 574mm x 984mm box shaped cabinet was constructed using mild steel and fiber glass was used as insulator to control heat loss by conduction The performance of the fabricated cabinet tray dryer was finally evaluated against an imported cabinet tray dryer in using a t-test analysis at 95% confidence level, and the result showed that there is no significant difference between the locally fabricated and the imported dryers.


OBJECTIVE
To evaluate the clinical significance of systemic amyloidosis in the differential diagnosis of pleural effusion.

METHOD
Retrospective analysis of the incidence and the characteristics of pleural effusion in systemic amyloidosis.

RESULTS
Seven (47%) of 15 cases of systemic amyloidosis were complicated with pleural effusion, of them 4 cases were confirmed by positive Congo red stain of percutaneous pleural biopsies specimens.

CONCLUSIONS
Systemic amyloidosis involving pleura was not rare. Pleural amyloidosis should be suspected in pleural effusion complicated by multiorgan disease. Percutaneous pleural biopsy with Congo red stain can confirm the diagnosis.


Subclavian artery occlusion causes vertebral-basilar artery insufficiency and affected limb ischemia.Currently percutaneous transluminal angioplasty and stenting(PTAS)is a major therapy for patients with subclavian artery occlusion.Surgical procedures were performed only in cases of failed or unfeasible endovascular treatment or total occlusion of the proximal vertebral artery or subclavian artery.In this study,PTAS was successfully performed using two-way angiography and double guide wire crossing in a patient with subclavian artery occlusion.


Abstract : Water repellent and trasparent antistatic coatings of chromium phosphinates as tricaesyl phosphates (TCP) plasticized compositions were evaluated. They dissipated a positive charge of 5000 volts to zero in 7.5 and 45.0 seconds. Volume resistivity measurements of CHC13 stock solutions of these materials showed they are the most conductive of the phosphinates tested. Rigidity and tensile strength of one zinc phosphinate coating were barely improved by the use of benzoyl peroxide or by the peroxide with a chromium phosphinate. Through cross-linking of chromium phosphinate polymers by phosphinic acids, tensile strengths or in some cases, elongation were increased considerably. (Author, modified-PL).


A novel algorithm is proposed and designed to route and process the optical signals of a crossover network.Firstly,based on the link rule and function principle of the crossover network,the corresponding processing matrixes are achieved to denote and illustrate the relative signal operating and control and to establish the relation between input and output signals.According to the performing matrixes and the orders of input/output signal arrays,the node controlling and signal routing are determined.Finally,the signals are routed and controlled.It is shown that the proposed algorithm can not only be used in the routing control for a 8×8 crossover optical interconnection network,but also can be used in those for 16×16,32×32 and 64×64 networks.Furthermore,it also has excellent transplant ability and compatibility for perfect shaffle networks and Banyan networks.These results indicate that the routing algorithm is useful for optical switching applications,optical computing,and optical information processing in the future.


Absence of N-Methyl-D-Aspartate Receptor IgG Autoantibodies in Schizophrenia: The Importance of Cross-Validation Studies Patients with anti–N-methyl-D-aspartate receptor (NMDAR) encephalitis usually develop characteristic neurologic and psychiatric symptoms. Some patients have isolated psychiatric symptoms, mimicking a schizophrenia-like psychotic episode.1,2 Therefore, it has been hypothesized that a subgroup of patients diagnosed as having schizophrenia actually has anti-NMDAR encephalitis,2 which would have important clinical implications. Anti-NMDAR encephalitis is caused by IgG-type autoantibodies to the GluN1 subunit of the NMDAR. Conflicting reports have been published regarding the seroprevalence of anti-NMDAR autoantibodies in schizophrenia, ranging from 0% to 8%.2,3 Some studies that reported high seroprevalences included patients with schizophrenia with atypical features, such as seizures and movement disorders. We hypothesized that the use of a single antibody detection assay, without any further validation of the findings, may have contributed to the inconsistent findings.3 Here, we investigated the presence of anti-GluN1 IgG autoantibodies in 475 patients with a schizophrenia spectrum disorder and included the cross-validation of positive samples.


For more than 20 years Galois coverings have been one of the most efficient techniques in contemporary representation theory of algebras over a field and matrix problems and have been used successfully in solutions of various classification and theoretical problems. They were Ž originally invented for studying representation-finite algebras see 1, 15, . 17, 20 . Later, the Galois covering techniques were adopted for the Ž . representation-infinite case see 10 12 ; also 3, 4, 6 and were effectively applied in 16, 19, 28, 30, 31 . In the meantime, they also became a useful tool for studying matrix problems 9, 14, 23 25 . The Galois covering method, also in the infinite-representation case, often allows us to reduce the description of the module category of an algebra A, in particular, the classification of indecomposables or at least determining the representation type of A, to the analogous problems for ̃ its cover category A, which are usually simpler. Therefore especially important, because of these applications, are results which are a specializaŽ . tion of the conjecture under some extra assumptions saying that, for a ̃ given Galois covering F: A A with a group G, A is representation-tame ̃ Ž provided that so is A. It is shown in 11 that if A is representation-tame ̃. then so is A. This conjecture has been stimulating research in this topic area for many years. Its positive solution was announced by Drozd and


Poly (sodium acrylate) with high-molecular weight was synthesized with a redox initiator at 30~60 ℃ by inverse emulsion polymerization. The effects of reaction temperature, initiator concentration, molar ratio of oxidant to reductant, emulsifier concentration and weight ratio of compounding emulsifiers as well as acrylic acid neutralization on M w of poly(sodium acrylate) were studied. The results indicate the emulsification and stability of the reaction system are greatly influenced by the weight ratio of compounding emulsifiers and acrylic acid neutralization. The proper reaction temperature is 40~50 ℃. The proper reaction conditions are : initiator concentration , 4×10 -3 mol/L in water phase; molar ratio of oxidant to reductant, 2/1; emulsifier concentration, 5% by weight in total oil phase; hydrophile-lipophile balance(HLB) of compounding emulsifiers, less than 5.65 ; and acrylic acid neutralization, 70%.The M v of the obtained powdery poly (sodium acrylate) ranges from a few million to over ten millions, and the highest M v is up to 30 70 million.


Purpose
This paper aims to evaluate the influence of the parameters of the Fused Filament Fabrication (FFF) process on the mechanical properties and on the mass of parts printed in Polylactic Acid (PLA). In addition, the authors developed predictive models for the analysed responses.

Design/methodology/approach
A full Factorial type of experimental planning method was used to define the conditions for manufacturing parts according to the variation of the construction parameters, extrusion temperature and print speed. Samples were printed for tensile, flexion and compression tests. Their mass was measured. Multiple regression methods, based on power equations, were used to build the forecasting models.

Findings
It was found that the extrusion temperature was the parameter of greatest influence in the variation of the analysed responses, mainly because it generates behaviour patterns and indirectly demonstrates thermal/rheological characteristics of the material used. Print speed affects responses, however, with variations dependent on part geometry and printer hardware/software. It was possible to establish prediction models with low error rates in relation to the experimental values.

Originality/value
The study demonstrates a good relation between the use of a structured experimental planning method as the basis for the development of predictive models based on mathematical equations, the same structure of which can be used to describe different responses.


The factor structures of the Views of Life questionnaire for four data sets collected in northern Mexico were compared with the original structure reported by Diaz-Guerrero (1979). None of the factor structures for these data sets replicated the original. The subscale means and variances were also compared. While statistically significant differences in subscale scores were obtained, little variance was explained by these comparisons (w2 usually < .10). Only one pair of variances was reliably different. Several explanations for the failure to replicate and suggestions for appropriate uses of the instrument are presented.


Professions in computer science are constantly changing and developing. Nevertheless, some fundamental working processes remain despite of this process of change. These working processes include competencies and skills a computer specialist has to deal with. For further development of the profession and enhancement of its curriculum, these working processes have to be identified. After that, all competencies and skills included in these processes have to be named to develop a comprehensive normative competence description. To reach that goal, several studies have been conducted to identify basic working processes; afterwards, all information given in these studies has been used to develop a competence description for the profession of computer specialist. We identified seven basic working processes and three cross-sectional support processes to describe professional competency in computer science. Additionally we found statements about social and personal competencies to complete the competence description. In this paper, we present the resulting competence structure description. Furthermore, we discuss which implications will be given for the further improvement of the profession and the curriculum of computer specialists.


Analogue designers and modellers have learnt to be extremely creative using the restricted simulator primitive set available in standard SPICE. This paper explores the modelling, simulation limits and restrictions imposed on designers using SPICE-based tools, and contrasts the Analogue Hardware Description Language (AHDL) approach. Of particular interest are the improvements in performance and accuracy that may be achieved by using an AHDL, and the scope for more complex device modelling. >


Making use of the transformer leakage inductance, a self-excited continuous conduction mode ZVS flyback converter that performs self-excitation operation with a continuous conduction mode and zero voltage switching is proposed. In this converter, by turning off of one switch element, another switch element is turned on. By setting a delay time, ZVS operations are realized alternately. A new control scheme is used for independent control of each on-time of two switching elements. By means of the extended state-space averaging method, the static and dynamic characteristics are derived analytically. Then, the design equation, ZVS operating condition, and frequency characteristic of the transfer function are derived. Based on the analysis, a converter is designed and is tested experimentally for confirmation of the validity of the approach. In the experiment, efficiencies of 94.1% and 90.0% are attained, respectively, with outputs of 24 V/6 A and 24 V/15 A for an input of 141 VDC. In comparison with the converter operated in the critical current mode, the output is about 1.8 times as large and is 360 W. © 2005 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Electron Comm Jpn Pt 1, 88(107rpar;: 18–27, 2005; Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI 10.1002/ecja.20222


Entrepreneurial activities are increasing well in various countries including Indonesia. Business activities can play a role in increasing income, but also in various business structures in society. Entrepreneurship can also be the development of an interest in creativity and the courage to take risks for the work done in order to achieve the best results. Activities can be carried out properly by changing the pattern of exposure, namely by doing a more in-depth explanation. This community service activity is aimed at high school students and female students. It is hoped that by holding this activity it will be able to increase the interest of students in applying the entrepreneurship knowledge they got at school. The activity is carried out through online media zoom but still does not reduce the quality of the presentation where the presentation of introductory material about entrepreneurship in the tourism sector is made as active as possible by starting with an explanation about entrepreneurship and then continuing by giving several examples of entrepreneurial activities in the tourism sector to make it easier for students to get material. Based on the calculation of the average results of the feedback given as many as 40 students in the Educative category of 77% (Good) from this category it is hoped that the educativeness of the students can increase, and in terms of Objective it is 78% (Good) where is in accordance with what is expected, in terms of Accountability by 78% (Good), Transparent by 76% (Good).


Natural inherent of Acinetobacter baumanni to survive in hard conditions in surfaces and its ability to resist against commonly used antibiotics in hospitals caused it to be one of the most prevalent cause of hospital infections. The present study was carried out to research the prevalence, antibiotic resistance pattern and distribution of virulence genes in the A. baumannii strains of various infections of immunosuppressive patients. One-hundred and fifty samples were collected and cultured. Their positive results were subjected to disk diffusion and PCR. Of all 150 samples studied, 20 samples (13.33%) were infected with A. baumannii. Wound infections had the highest prevalence of A. baumannii (16%). Csga (70%) and cnf1 (50%) were the most commonly detected virulence genes. A. baumannii strains showed the highest levels of resistance against ampicillin (100%), tetracycline (95%), gentamycin (75%) and cephalexin (60%), while lowest against imipenem (5%) and ceftriaxone (35%). Statistically significant difference was seen between the type of samples and prevalence of A. baumannii, prevalence of antibiotic resistance and also distribution of virulence genes (P < 0.05). Quick determination of infections caused by A. baumanni and its treatment with imipenem can decrease the risk of A. baumanni's infections.


Some years ago Samir Khalil Samir presented a Christian Arab apologetic text contained in the codex sinaiticus arabicus 154 during the Third Congress of Christian Arabic Studies held at Louvain-la-Neuve.1 The text of this Melkite Arabic apology was not totally unknown to scholars since it was edited by Margaret Dunlop Gibson in the last year of the nineteenth century.2 This ancient parchment, cataloged by the expedition to Mount Sinai,3 was dated to the end of the eighth century or the beginning of the ninth century


Compared with traditional 2D Synthetic Aperture Radar(SAR), 3D SAR can obtain 3D resolution and 3D scatter information of the observed target. But the image formation of SAR is time-consuming because of its data volume and complicated processing procedure, which is more obvious in 3D SAR image formation. Some scholars design real-time SAR processor with DSP(Digital Signal Processor) and FPGA(Field Programmable Gate Array). This kind of system is complex in hardware implementation and takes long time to develop imaging algorithm[1]. With its floating-point processing ability enhancement, GPU(Graphics Processing Unit) is used by more and more scholars to accelerate SAR image formation to meet the realtime qualification. Scholars used NVIDIA Tesla C1060 GPU to accelerate SAR/ISAR image formation based on back projection algorithm. They got 30X performance improvement compared with using Intel Core i7-920 processor @2.67GHZ[2]. With 4 NVIDIA GeforceFX 5900 GPU-accelerated nodes, for a 4096×4096pixel image, 109X speedup ration was obtained compared with a single-node CPU[3]. GPU owns more hardware processing cores and higher bandwidth, which makes GPU more suitable for parallel processing. NVIDIA Corporation's GPU owns NVIDIA CUDA (Compute Unified Device Architecture) programming environment which helps engineers to design parallel program much more conveniently.


The shock to detonation transition in heterogeneous high energy density solids starts with the spatial localization of mechanical energy into so-called hotspots that form due to the interaction between the leading wave and microstructural features and defects. We used large-scale molecular dynamics to characterize the hotspots resulting from the shock-induced collapse of cylindrical voids and elongated cracks focusing on the effect of shock strength, defect shape, and size. The temperature fields resulting from the collapse of cracks elongated along the shock direction show significantly higher sensitivity to both shock strength and size than cylindrical voids. Cracks 80 nm in length result in temperatures almost three times higher than voids 80 nm in diameter, reaching values corresponding to the ideal case of isentropic recompression of a gas. The molecular dynamics trajectories reveal the atomic origin of this contrasting behavior. While circular voids undergo a transition from viscoelastic pore collapse to a hydrodynamic regime with increasing shock strength, shock focusing in elongated cracks results in jetting and vaporization which, upon recompression, leads to increased heating.


With increasing salinity in irrigation areas, the option of tree planting in areas with shallow groundwater is seen as an 'environmentally friendly' alternative for controlling salinity. This study uses simulation modelling to investigate the long-term effects of planting Eucalyptus grandis in irrigated areas with shallow and saline watertables in the Riverine Plains where concerns exist about salinity effects on irrigated agriculture. APSIM, a 1-dimensional model of the soil-water-plant system, was modified to describe the interaction between the watertable within the plantation with the, normally shallower, watertable in the surrounding irrigated pasture. The model was tested against measured data and then used to simulate a range of different environmental conditions (depth and salinity of the groundwater, soil) and management options (irrigation with different amounts and salinity). The results of a total of 702 simulation runs helped to identify conditions in which irrigated plantations may be viable and how the irrigation of these plantations may be managed to decrease the impact of salinity on tree growth. The results indicated that if irrigation is to improve productivity, it must be in large amounts (1000 mm or more) and of good quality to have a significant effect on tree production. Irrigation with low salinity water (EC <2 dS/m) can only be used to reliably increase production in conditions where there are deeper watertables (4 m or deeper) on fast-draining soils. In these cases, flexible irrigation practices (scheduled irrigation) need to be employed in order to manage the salt levels within the tree root-zones. The viability of plantations is likely to decrease with increasing irrigation water salinity as salt accumulation in the profile reduces the ability of the trees to act as natural sinks. Depending on the irrigation and groundwater salinity, trees might be effective only up to a few years (as little as 9 years). Optimum response of trees to irrigation is only predicted with fresh water and scheduled irrigation (up to 1700 mm/year). However, if ample fresh water was available, other higher value cropping options are likely to be sought by land managers. Furthermore, the large amounts of water added to the plantation will have negative effects (water and salt export from the plantation) on the surrounding land, which will need further intervention to be sustainable.


Two types of food poisoning from Bacillus cereus, the emetic type caused by emetic toxins and the diarrhea type caused by enterotoxins, have been reported . Most cases in Japan are the emetic type, therefore, the cereulide needs to be proven when B. cereusfood poisoning is suggested. The original detection method for cereulide is performed by microscopic assessment of vacuole formation in HEp-2 cells, but it involves some judgement problems that require adept skills as well as reproducibility of the result. Furthermore, it also requires considerable labor to obtain and maintain the cells. Recently, an analysis method using liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (LC-MS), which shows excellent accuracy, quantification, specificity and reproducibility is often used to detect cereulide. In this paper, we compared Nutrient broth containing manganese and glucose (NB+Mn) medium as previously recommended and 10% skim milk medium for the production of cereulide, and further investingated the influence of heat-treatment process of culture fluid on the recovery of cereulide measured by LC-MS.


Palladium was used in organic synthesis for long time only as a heterogeneous catalyst for hydrogenating unsaturated compounds. But in recent years palladium compounds have found broad application as homogeneous catalysts. In the last decade, homogeneous catalysis relying on transition metal complexes has led to innovations in organic synthesis. Complexes of various transition metals are now used for organic synthesis, and each metal has its own characteristic features. Palladium complexes are the most versatile and used extensively in organic synthesis, particularly for carbon–carbon bond formation. Palladium-catalyzed reactions can be classified into several groups based on their substrates: organic halides, allylic compounds, conjugated dienes, alkenes, and alkynes. Propargylic compounds undergo a variety of palladium-catalyzed transformations and make up one important class of these reactions. It is well known that copper and silver salts promote or catalyze several reactions of propargylic compounds. However, palladium compounds, particularly Pd0 complexes, show catalytic activities entirely different from those of silver and copper salts. Advances in the research on the palladium-catalyzed reactions of propargylic compounds in the last decade have made the scope of the reactions clear. The ready availability of numerous propargylic alcohols and their esters by the reaction of terminal alkynes with carbonyl compounds clearly enhances the synthetic utility of their reactions. Palladium complexes, in particular palladium phosphane complexes, are soluble in organic solvents and behave as active catalysts under homogeneous conditions.


Two monoclonal antibodies conjugated to fluorescein isothiocyanate (FITC) were successfully used in a direct immunofluorescence test (DIFT) to demonstrate listeria in seven samples of soft cheese where Listeria monocytogenes had been cultured by conventional techniques. Using DIFT, listeria was not detected in 20 cheese samples from which L. monocytogenes had not been isolated, or was present in low numbers (< 102/g). The DIFT was also used to presumptively identify > 90% of strains of L. monocytogenes isolated from food and cultured on Modified McBride agar or Blood agar. Less than 10% of strains of other species of listeria would be misidentified when grown on these media. All tests were carried out within 2 h.


1. FLYERS IMPROVED, CONVERTIBLE CARNET, WHICH IS DEFINED BY consist of a rectangular sheet or the like CARDBOARD IN THE REASONS CONTAINED PUBLICITY AND ATTACHED which carries another sheet, ALSO RECTANGULAR, smaller in size, easily removable .


South Florida has several major ports of entry and one of the busiest airports in the country allowing for a great influx of international trade and tourism. Along with imported commodities and people, insects are frequent hitchhikers, with an average of one new insect species becoming established a month in south Florida. Many of these become either economic or aesthetic pests. The most concerning of these new insects includes: the lobate lac scale (Paratachardina lobata lobata Chamberlin), pink hibiscus mealybug (Maconellicoccus hirsutus Green), Sri Lanka weevil (Myllocerus undatus Marshall), and tabebuia thrips (Holopothrips cf. inquilinus Bournier). All, except for the tabebuia thrips, have a wide host plant range, which includes many commonly grown ornamentals, and pose a significant threat to agricultural crops. In addition, little is known about their biology. Recent findings including possible biological control agents will be discussed.


The human population is expected to reach 9 billion by 2050 and thus high yield crop varieties need to be developed. Remote sensing can estimate crop parameters non-destructively and quickly. The aim of this study was to compare and evaluate the use of a commercial RGB camera with an expensive canopy sensor in the crop development of two legumes. The RGB camera based vegetation index (NGRDI) was compared with the canopy sensor derived vegetation indices (NDVI and NDRE) for estimating legume crop growth parameters. The results indicated that the use of a simple digital camera RGB can in some cases replace spectral canopy sensors.


INTRODUCTION: To determine the rate of prenatal invasive diagnostic procedures performed over time in the era of noninvasive cell free fetal DNA prenatal testing. METHODS: This is a retrospective review of the number of invasive prenatal diagnostic procedures (chorionic villus sampling and amniocentesis) performed between January 2010 and June 2013 among women referred to our prenatal diagnosis center for a high aneuploidy risk. Starting February 2012, the option of noninvasive prenatal testing became available at our center. This study was done at a single, large urban academic tertiary care medical center. Best fit and goodness-of-fit analyses with significance set at P⩽.05 were performed as indicated. RESULTS: The number of invasive diagnostic procedures performed at our center is represented statistically in 6-month intervals between January 2010 and June 2013 in Figure 1. There was a significant (P=.04) decline in the number of chorionic villus sampling procedures conducted (n=4,069; best fit −2.768±2.7, goodness of fit, r2=0.6197). Similarly, amniocentesis procedures followed this declining trend (P=.001) over time (n=492; best fit −1.131±0.17, goodness of fit, r2=0.892). Starting in February 2012, 400 noninvasive tests were performed at our center. Trends in invasive diagnostic testing. CONCLUSION: The number of invasive procedures has declined over time in the setting of the availability of noninvasive prenatal testing. Noninvasive prenatal testing is a relatively new screening test and its long-term effect on prenatal diagnosis is not yet known. The appropriate counseling of patients and selection of which screening or diagnostic test to use is important at this time. Further studies are needed.


Aim: The aims of the present study were to explore the relations between the gingival phenotype (GP) and the periodontal health status and find the prevalence of a specific gingival phenotype in a small Bulgarian population.
 Materials and methods: We recruited 50 patients attending our dental practice with different periodontal diagnoses. A detailed periodontal status was taken to assess the diagnosis of each participant. Several clinical methods for evaluation of the gingival thickness and keratinized tissue width, including the TRAN method, transgingival probing, and direct measurement, were used. The data were summarized and analyzed statistically.
 Results: We found a significant prevalence of the thick gingival phenotype, in particular the thick flat type. The patients with periodontitis had a higher distribution of the thick gingival phenotype, while in those with gingivitis, the thin scalloped gingival phenotype was noted. In regards to the gingival thickness (GT), 36 participants were found to have GT >1 mm, and the remaining 14 had GT ≤1 mm. Statistically significant differences were found in the keratinized tissue width and the width of attached gingiva in the different gingival phenotypes. No significant differences were found in the age and sex of participants.
 Conclusions: We found a significant prevalence of the thick (with a mild prevalence of thick flat to thick scalloped) versus thin gingival phenotype in the studied sample. The highest relative proportion of patients with periodontitis was among the subsample of individuals with thick flat gingival phenotype. Regarding gingivitis, the highest proportion was in the thin scalloped phenotype subsample – 42.9%. The highest prevalence of periodontal health was among the individuals with thick scalloped GP (50%), followed by the thin scalloped GP (35.7%).


mobbing ( mobbing ), zachowanie nieetyczne ( unethical behavior ), elastyczne formy zatrudnienia ( flexible forms of employment ), spółdzielnie socjalne ( social cooperatives ) The article presents the results of empirical studies covering 2,118 respondents employed using various flexible forms of work: specified period of time employment, part–time employment, commission contracts, self–employed contractors, remo-te workers (telecommuters), substitutes, temporary workers, and seasonal workers. Additionally, people employed in social cooperatives were also encompassed by the study. Three forms of unethical behavior as experienced by respondents from their coworkers were analyzed. The results confirm that people employed in nontraditional forms of work do experience various forms of the mobbing phenomenon from their coworkers and superiors. These results carry significant practical implications and point to future research directions.


In this chapter things get slightly out of hand. You may regret this, but you will soon notice that it is a good idea to give chance a chance in the further creation of new brands of vehicles. This will make available a source of intelligence that is much more powerful than any engineering mind. Out of the collection of vehicles that we have produced for the purposes of our experimentation, we will choose some of the more complicated specimens and put them onto a large table. Of course there will also be some sources of light, sound, smell, and so forth on the table, some of them fixed and some of them moving. And there will be various shapes or landmarks, including the cliff that signals the end of the table top. Now you and I will gather a plentiful supply of materials (tin, plastic, threshold devices, wheels, motors, sensors, wires, screws and bolts) and proceed to build vehicles, taking as our models vehicles that we pick from the ones circulating on the table. Each time we copy a vehicle, we will put both the model and its copy back on the table, pick up another vehicle, copy it, and so on. Of course we will not pick up vehicles that have fallen on the floor because they have proved their own inability to cope with the environment. We will be careful to produce vehicles at a pace that roughly matches the rate at which vehicles fall off the table, to prevent the race from dying out, on one hand, and to prevent the table from becoming unduly crowded, on the other. Note that while we are playing this game, we won't have time to test the behavior or to study the wiring, let alone to understand the logic of the vehicles that we pick up as models for copying. Nor should we. All we are asked to do is to slavishly connect the parts according to the pattern in the model. Note also that when we do this in a hurry, we are bound to make occasional mistakes. It may be our fault when our copy of a perfectly well-tested vehicle falls off the table as soon as we put it down. But it is also possible that we will unwittingly introduce a particularly shrewd variation into the pattern of connections, so that our copy will survive forever while the original may turn out to be unfit for survival after all. It does seem surprising that errors arising in the sloppy execution of a task should act as germs for improvement. What is less astonishing is the creative power of a special sort of error consisting of new combinations of partial mechanisms, each of which is not disrupted in its own well-tested structure. This can easily happen when we pick up one vehicle as a model for one part of the brain and then by mistake pick up another vehicle as a model for another part of the brain. Such errors have a much greater chance of transcending the intelligence of the original plan. This is an important point. If the lucky accidents live on forever, they will also have a multitude of descendants, for they will stay on the table all the time while the less lucky ones come and go. Therefore, they have a much greater chance of being picked up by the copyists as models for the next generation. Thus very good ideas unwittingly


The article is devoted to the consideration of the multiple variables concept. The author emphasizes that mathematics is one of the most important disciplines for human functioning and mathematical principles are permeated through all spheres of life and activity, making the importance of understanding these principles even greater. For proper conclusion and solution of life's problems, mathematics is more than necessary. The author comes to the conclusion that by learning mathematics, it is actually possible to train your reasoning and logic so that you can respond properly to key life problems.


We present neutron scattering measurements on powder samples of the spinel FeSc2S4 that reveal a previously unobserved magnetic ordering transition occurring at 11.8(2)~K. Magnetic ordering occurs subsequent to a subtle cubic-to-tetragonal structural transition which distorts Fe coordinating sulfur tetrahedra lifting the orbital degeneracy. The application of 1~GPa hydrostatic pressure appears to destabilize this N\'eel state, reducing the transition temperature to 8.6(8)~K and redistributing magnetic spectral weight to higher energies. The relative magnitudes of ordered $\langle m \rangle^2\!=\!3.1(2)$ and fluctuating moments $\langle \delta m \rangle^2\!=\!13(1)$ show that the magnetically ordered ground state of FeSc2S4 is drastically renormalized and in proximity to criticality.


In this study, fundamental properties of concrete mixed with fiber has been analysed. Compressive strength, tensile strength and plastic shrinkage has been tested to conduct the optimum addition ratio of fiber. Effect to control press concrete's cracking has been tested. The following results could be made as the conclusion. For the flowability, slump decreased about 41-79% when all types of fiber used in the concrete. When the addition ratio of fiber is 1.2%, the slump of concrete decreased about 45%. For the strength properties. all the specimens with different addition ratio of fiber shown higher compressive strength comparing with Plain. Comparing with Plain, cracking decreased when the fiber added. Especially, when NY fiber used in the concrete, the plastic shrinkage did not occurred. In addition, Latex modified concrete(LMC) has improved superior physical and chemical properties. The properties of latex, combined with the low water-cement ratio, produce a concrete that has improved flexural, tensile, and bond strength, lower modulus of elasticity, increased freeze-thaw resistance, and reduced permeability compared to conventional concrete of similar mix design.


Restrictions on foreign trade all too often harm the very people they aim to protect: American consumers and producers. Trade restrictions limit the choices of what Americans can buy; they also drive up the prices of everything from clothing and groceries to the materials manufacturers use to make everyday products. Moreover, lower-income Americans generally bear a disproportionate share of these costs. Trade treaties increase freedom to trade and do not result in loss of sovereignty; they are part and parcel of wider international relations and they are not new.


Hacking became one of the world's most famous information technology problem. It's the work of whom doesn't has a work, a work to gain more money, a work to harm others, and a work for many other purposes. Almost every week, if it is not every day, we hear about hacking attacks that hits many significant sites in the country, such as: Ministries, Banks, Uniform sites and many other important persons accounts on the social network sites. Fortunately, not all the hackers are professional in hacking, but they trained them self on one or more of such programs for one of the previous purposes. On the other side, the secret of success in such hacking attacks is that the intended attacked targets did not take the proper precautionary measures to protect themselves from such attacks. In this research, I am focusing on "BackTrack System" and highlight more on its security and protection capabilities that can be used to rise security precautions levels and analyze system network in order to determine weakness points and identify points that attack our system. My research subject is very important, especially in these days, where we heard in almost every week, about an e-attack that hits major sites in my country; Saudi Arabia, while the majority of people frightened , doesn't know how to stop such attack.


The wind simulation method proposed by Paul S. Veers from Sandia National Laboratories has been checked for the measured wind velocities at 40m and 80m height at FINO1 platform. The Sandia method applied as it is, gives relatively higher standard deviation (turbulence) than the actual but works better when random phases are used. A code for the generation of wind field based on Sandia method has been developed from a time series of wind speed at hub center. Various wind fields based on difference in wind shear and turbulence intensity have been projected on to the reference wind turbine to find root bending moments of the blade. The bending moments are calculated based on 2D Beam Element Momentum theory. The mean bending moment values are affected by wind shear while the maximum bending moments by turbulent intensity. An increase in turbulence in the wind field will increase the maximum and standard deviation of flap-wise bending moment drastically.


The aim of this study was to focus on fetuses diagnosed with severe hydronephrosis and correlate prenatal sonographic characteristics with postnatal outcome.


Background Hepatitis B virus (HBV) remains endemic in Africa and an important co-morbidity in the HIV epidemic. The HIV treatment guidelines of the World Health Organisation (WHO) recommend tenofovir−lamivudine (or emtricitabine) as first-line therapy for HIV−HBV co-infection management in children ≥10 years old. However, many children in sub-Saharan Africa are not screened for HBV and may remain on lamivudine monotherapy for many years. This study aimed to characterise HBV infection in HIV-infected children in Namibia. Methods The study included HIV-infected/HBsAg-positive children, exposed to lamivudine monotherapy, attending the Katutura paediatric HIV clinic in Windhoek, Namibia. Dried blood spots and serum samples were collected from participants. Serological investigations were performed using Murex assays. HBV DNA viral load was determined using the automated AmpliPrep/COBAS TaqMan HBV test V2.0. Genotyping and mutation analysis were performed through the NCBI HBV Genotyping tool (www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/ projects/genotyping/formpage.cgi) and Geno2Pheno (http:// hbv.geno2pheno.org/index.php). Results To date, 14 children have been enrolled; of whom 14 DBS and 11 serum samples were analysed. HBsAg was detected in 10 children (90%; 10/11); 7 were HBeAg-positive/HBeAb-negative and 3 HBeAg-negative. Among HBeAg-negatives, 1 was HBeAb-negative and 2 were HBeAb-positive. One child was non-reactive for all markers. Of the 14 children, 7(50%) tested HBV DNA-positive. Lamivudine drug-associated resistance variants, together with immune escape mutants in the overlapping surface gene, were identified in these children. Resistance mutation patterns included: rtV173L+rtL180M+rt-M204V (4/7; 57%), rtL80I+rtV173L+rtL180M+rtM204I (1/7; 14%) and rtL180M+rtM204V (2/7; 29%); with the overlapping sE164D and/or sI195M variants. HBV strains belonged to genotype E (6/7, 86%) and genotype D3 (1/7, 14%). Conclusions Half of the children included in this study had detectable HBV DNA and showed lamivudine resistance. Uncontrolled HBV infection is associated with an increased risk of severe liver damage and hepatocellular carcinoma. HBsAg screening of HIV-infected children, using cost-effective point-of-care methods, and treatment with tenofovir should be made more widely available in resource-limited settings.


This paper makes a study of both Sports and Physical Education with document materials and logical analysis methods. It expounds that the essence of Sports is an entertainment culture, one mainly including body movement and watching contests to satisfy people's spiritual needs. Furthermore, it also indicates that Sports and Physical Education respectively refer to two different kinds of things in essence, which are not subordinate to each other .


We synthesized bulk polycrystalline samples of metastable phases of Sb2Te3 and Bi2Te3 topological insun final form 28 April 2015 vailable online 11 May 2015 lators by rapid quenching after a high-pressure–high-temperature treatment at P = 3.7–7.7 GPa; T = 873 K and found superconducting transitions with TC = 2 K and 6 K, respectively. A low critical current value of about 2 mA in the metastable Sb2Te3 phase and an absence of the detectable heat capacity effect at the superconducting transition indicated a low-dimensional character of superconductivity. A zero-field magnetic susceptibility cusp and linear positive magnetoresistance indicate a topological insulator state. © 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.


We have surgically treated 36 patients with cerebral arteriovenous malformations (AVMs) since 1991, when intraoperative digital subtraction angiography (DSA) was introduced. The patients ranged in age from 6 to 67 years (mean-33.8) and had a mean grade of 3.4. Preoperative embolization was employed in 18 patients to occlude surgically inaccessible feeders and to reduce arterial blood supply to large AVMs by 50%. The embolic material was silk thread and polyvinyl alcohol particles in 9 patients, and liquid coils in 9. Intraoperative DSA using portable equipment was used in all 36 patients. Frameless stereotactic microsurgery with the Mehrkoordinaten Manipulator (MKM) system was performed in 4 patients; 2 patients had trigone AVM, one motor cortex AVM, and the other sylvian AVM. Endovascular embolization resulted in transient hemianopsia in 1 patient but no permanent deficits nor death. Three patients underwent partial resection, after which the residual nidus involving the motor cortex, the thalamus, and the basal ganglion was stereotactically irradiated. One patient died of postoperative bleeding complication, and mild neurological deficits appeared in 2 patients. Surgical mortality and morbidity were 2.8% and 5.6%. In conclusion, endovascular feeder occlusion is safe and useful as a preoperative adjuvant therapy. Intraoperative DSA is essential for the surgery of cerebral AVMs, and image-guided microsurgery allows stereotactic access to deep-seated lesions while sparing the brain.


The phenomenological formulas for the critical-current spread of the bicrystal grain-boundary Josephson junctions are proposed. By considering the intrinsically shunted-junction model and the gamma distribution, the fluctuation of effective-barrier thickness from 0.01to0.1nm corresponds to the 1−σ critical-current spread from 14% to 106%. With a fixed scale parameter, the critical-current spread is inversely proportional to the square root of the bridge width. When the bridge width is fixed, the spread is inversely proportional to the square root of the mean critical-current density. These predictions are qualitatively in agreement with the experimental results reported to date.


At the time when Jane Austen lived and worked, being a female novelist was not appreciated, therefore she never gained acknowledgment during her lifet


The lifetime of optical components submitted to high laser fluences is degraded under organic contaminant environment. The molecular background of the Ligne d'Integration Laser (LIL), prototype of the future Laser Megajoule, might reduce the laser damage threshold of exposed fused silica surfaces. This paper reports the interaction effects between pure model contaminant deposits and a pulsed 1064 nm laser radiation on the coming out of mirror damage. The experimental setup allowed us to condense nanolayers of model contaminants on optics, the deposit impacts were then investigated by Laser Induced Damage Threshold (LIDT) tests in Rasterscan mode. In order to highlight physical processes emphasizing the emergence of optics damage, we characterized the irradiated deposit using interferometric microscopy analysis and spectrophotometric analysis. The challenge was to determine physical and phenomenological processes occurring during the irradiation of a pure contaminant deposit with a 1064 nm pulsed laser and to study the impact of this model contaminant on the LIDT of dielectric SiO2/HfO2 mirrors.


Oxidation and gel-forming ability of chicken white (breast) and red (leg) muscle myofibrillar proteins during storage at 0°C were examined. Breast myofibril gels exhibited greater shear moduli than leg myofibril gels throughout 8 days storage. Shear moduli of both breast and leg gels in the intermediate temperature zone (45–55°C) decreased during storage, but at >55°C, they either increased or remained unchanged. Lipid oxidation was inhibited by washing myofibrils with antioxidants propyl gal-late, ascorbate, and tripolyphosphate. However, these antioxidants did not affect the content of protein carbonyls, and only slightly decreased the amine content during storage. Storage affected the kinetic process of myofibril gelation independently of antioxidant treatments.


LARYNGEAL obstruction, whether due to foreign body, to inflammation, or to J allergic reactions, alarms the patient and the laryngologist. It is a problem of serious import, necessitating constant vigil and prompt remedial action. Treatment may be medical or surgical, or at times both. It is the purpose of this paper to deal with laryngeal obstruction due to penicillin. The newer antibiotics are not discussed here because they have been in use only a short time and few cases of sensitization have developed. Peck and Siegal 1 at Mount Sinai Hospital, New York, have studied allergic reactions to penicillin and have divided them into four groups: Group 1: Reactions similar to those seen in other cases of drug sensitization and often characteristic of serum sickness. Closely allied to this group are the various toxic erythemas and the severe local reactions after the administrations of penicillin in beeswax and peanut oil.


Heart failure (HF) with left ventricular systolic dysfunction (LVSD) is associated with a shift in substrate utilization and a compromised energetic state. Whether these changes are connected with mitochondrial dysfunction is not known. We hypothesized that the cardiac phenotype in LVSD could be caused by reduced mitochondrial oxidative phosphorylation (OXPHOS) capacity and reduced mitochondrial creatine kinase (miCK) capacity. The study aim was to test mitochondrial OXPHOS capacity in LVSD myocardium compared with OXPHOS capacity in a comparable patient group without LVSD.


Grace Louise McCann Morley (1900-1985) was a museologist of global influence. She was the founder of San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and its Director for 23 years starting in 1934. During these years, she was active in the US art world. She was Second Vice President of the American Federation of Arts, 1939; Counselor for Arts at the Bureau of Inter-American Affairs, 1941; a Member of the Committee of the Fine Arts Buildings of the International Exposition in San Francisco and Director of Pacific House 1940 as well as a member of the Committee of Experts on the Arts, State Department from 1940 to1945. From 1946 to 1949, she took leave from San Francisco Museum of Art to become Consultant for Museums at UNESCO Preparatory Commission, and then as the Head of its Museums Division.


The concept and system of democracy were originally produced by the West, from the pastoral age extending all the way through industrialization and the age of information. In the West democracy for a while came packaged with the ancient practice of slavery, and for a time merged with modern colonialism; its negative side effects are generally dispersed outside of the democratic world, among the powerless classes (such as slaves) and weak nations (such as colonized peoples). Many people only gaze toward the dream they see in cinema, newspapers, and textbooks, and are quite isolated from concrete praxis. People thus misunderstanding democracy are the most likely to see democracy as a lyric poem rather than a construction blueprint. They lack the practical attitude of the builder, who researches carefully, measures precisely, and constantly learns from experience. Keywords: autocracy; China; lyric poem; modern colonialism; West democracy


Activating mutations of the FLT3-receptor tyrosine kinase such as the short internal tandem duplication (ITD) represent the single most common genetic aberration in patients with acute myeloid leukemia (AML). FLT3-ITD mutations are present in about 25% of AML patients and are associated with high blast counts and a higher rate of relapse after conventional chemotherapy. In search for a valid model system for FLT3-ITD AML we greatly improved retroviral gene transfer of the mutated FLT3 receptor into human G-CSF mobilized CD34+ peripheral blood progenitor cells (PBPCs). In the past, retroviral vector production for FLT3 had been hampered by low virus titers related to transgene toxicity in the virus producing cells. Virus vector production in the presence of the FLT3 inhibitor GTP14562 strongly increased the virus vector titer. Subsequent ultracentrifugation and resuspension of the concentrated virus vector in fresh medium enabled us to consistently transduce CD34+ PBSCs to levels of greater than 50%. For individually tested CD34+ PBPC from 5 donors, co-cultivation of FLT3-ITD overexpressing PBPC on the irradiated mouse stromal cell line M210-B4 resulted in a 6 fold increased formation of early cobble stones and a dramatic proliferation advantage for suspended cells compared to naive, GFP-transduced or FLT3-wildtype transduced PBPCs. The enhanced proliferation of the FLT3-ITD transduced cells was associated with decreased CD34 expression compared to control-transduced cells. Addition of the CXCR4 chemokine inhibitor AMD3100 to the co-culture decreased the cobble stone formation and growth advantage of FLT3-ITD transduced PBPCs. In contrast, cultivating the same FLT3-ITD overexpressing PBPCs in liquid culture (X-VIVO10, 1%HSA, TPO, SCF, FLT3 and IL-3) resulted in a moderate or no growth advantage or in an even reduced cell viability (dependent on the donor PBPCs used), which indirectly highlights the influence of stromal cells on FLT3-ITD overexpressing PBPCs. And in contrast to previously published data from murine cells, addition of the CXCR4 ligand stromal cell derived factor-1 (SDF-1) to liquid cultures did not confer an additional growth advantage for FLT3-ITD positive cells. Using an improved transduction protocol we demonstrate that the robust FLT3-ITD mediated growth advantage for human PBPCs is dependent on co-cultivation on a stromal cell layer and we show that the enhanced proliferation can be partly inhibited by the CXCR4 inhibitor AMD3100. Studies to delineate factors that confer FLT3-ITD specific cell growth on stromal cells are under way.


The world contains abundant energy resources. The challenge is extracting and utilizing these resources affordably, in an environmentally responsible way, and in a dense enough form to be useful to humans. The link between energy, the environment, and the economy is unavoidable and involves the geosciences at its core. Carbon-based fuels such as wood, hay, and coal powered human society for millennia. Then, in the early twentieth century, petroleum in various refi ned forms came into use for lighting, heating, and early combustion engines. Today, fossil fuels—coal, petroleum products, and natural gas—represent an important 85% of the global energy mix, but they are not without challenges. Coal's greatest challenges are environmental: the impact of surface mining; water contamination; discharge of airborne pollutants including sulfur, nitrogen, and mercury; and the emission of CO 2 . The emerging technologies of carbon capture and sequestration may offer the prospect of solving one of coal's problems; large, stationary sources of CO 2 (such as coal-fi red power plants) are the most effi cient targets for carbon capture. However, capturing CO 2 is expensive. Oil and, to a much lesser degree, natural gas also produce CO 2 and other emissions when combusted. Oil and natural gas require drilling, entailing the associated environmental impacts of oil-fi eld operations; yet there remain considerable global oil and natural gas resources. The current frontiers for conventional oil and natural gas production include ultra-deep water, the Arctic, sediments deposited beneath major salt formations, and other extreme operational environments. As existing and new conventional oil and natural gas reserves decline, unconventional reservoirs—shale gas, coal bed natural gas, tight gas, shale oil, oil shale, oil sands, and perhaps eventually natural gas hydrates—will represent a growing part of the fossil-fuel mix.


Passive optical access network are becoming denser thus monitoring and fault localization are becoming more crucial. This paper presents optical network monitoring and fault localization using the L-band amplified spontaneous emission (ASE) in Time Division Multiplexing (TDM) Ethernet Passive Optical Network (EPON). A fiber Bragg grating with a distinct center wavelength is placed at each drop fiber before the optical network unit (ONU) in the tree-structured network. The distinct reflected signal from the fiber Bragg grating (FBG) acts as the branch identifier. An optical power meter is used as the receiver to monitor the reflected signal. The system will automatically switch to Optical Time Domain Reflectometer (OTDR) if it detects any breakdown of the drop fiber. This system is capable to monitor up to 64 ONUs with minimum bit error rate (BER) of 10-9.


Collybistin, a brain-specific GEF, is required for gephyrin clustering at the postsynaptic membrane. This is important for the correct arrangement of GABAA and glycine receptors. Binding of collybistin to a membrane is initiated by a C-terminal PH-domain. In general, this domain is known to specifically bind to phosphoinositides (PIPs) in the membrane.
The aim of this study was to design an in vitro assay that enables detailed studies of binding of collybistin binding to phosphoinositides. With this assay we analyzed the impact of different collybistin 2 domains on binding to a membrane. Solid-supported lipid bilayers (SLB) with different phosphoinositides mimicking the cellular postsynaptic membrane. This approach allowed to investigate specific binding of the protein isoforms using reflective interference spectroscopy (RIfS). We found out that the PH domain (CB2PH) from collybistin prefers binding to monophosphorylated PIPs with moderate binding affinity. The PH/DH-tandem domain (CB2SH3-) reveals a weaker binding affinity to different PIPs except for PI(3,5)P2. In addition the collybistin isoform containing an additional SH3 domain (CB2SH3+) showed no significant binding to PIPs. This suggested a closed/inactive protein conformation. Activation of CB2SH3+ is initiated in vivo by the postsynaptic cell adhesion protein Neuroligin-2. For our in vitro studies this was successfully mimicked by two point mutations in the protein isoform CB2SH3+/W24A-E262A. In contrast to CB2SH3+, the partly-activated mutant CB2SH3+/W24A-E262A binds to phosphoinositides in SLBs with decreasing binding affinity to PI(3)P, PI(4)P and PI(3,5)P2.
This study provides new insights into the binding of collybistin to phosphoinositides in membranes. In order to draw a comprehensive picture of this protein to membrane binding process, the impact of each protein domain was investigated.


BACKGROUND
Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) infections diagnosed at hospital admission are often referred to as community-acquired. This designation may include MRSA strains previously acquired in a healthcare setting (healthcare-associated) as well as those that have emerged from community-based S. aureus strains.

METHODS
To understand further the epidemiology of MRSA from the community, a case-control study was performed. During 1997-2002, 254 patients with and without MRSA bacteraemia at hospital admission were studied.

RESULTS
All patients with MRSA bacteraemia in the first 24 h of hospital admission had a recent exposure to a healthcare setting: true community-acquired MRSA was not detected. Independent risk factors for healthcare-associated MRSA bacteraemia, defined as MRSA bacteraemia in the first 24 h of hospital admission among patients with a recent exposure to a healthcare setting or intervention, included previous MRSA infection or colonization (OR = 17, P < 0.001), cellulitis (OR = 4, P = 0.006), presence of a central venous catheter (OR = 3, P < 0.001) and skin ulcers (OR = 3, P = 0.007).

CONCLUSIONS
In this study, MRSA bacteraemia diagnosed in the first 24 h of hospital admission represented healthcare-associated MRSA strains and not true community-acquired strains. The clinical characteristics associated with healthcare-associated MRSA bacteraemia can assist clinicians in targeting measures to prevent cross-transmission and may help to streamline empirical vancomycin therapy.


This article contains a description of the developed installation for salting and heat treatment of raw meat, which allows accelerate the salting process due to electrophysical effects. To provide the population with quality products from small-sized meat raw materials with reduced energy consumption, it is necessary to create rational conditions for their processing, ensuring the intensification of production processes based on the use of non-traditional types of energy carriers, and in particular electromagnetic waves of ultrahigh frequency. When raw materials are introduced into the resonator chamber in the developed installation, a traveling component appears in the standing wave, which transfers energy from the source to the raw material, which ensures its heating.


The aim was to find the best preventing method of Maryland tobacco brown spot to adopt Wufeng County,Hubei Province.[Method]Control technology of Maryland tobacco brown spot in Wufeng was studied in four aspects,such as altitude,varieties,transplanting,and pesticide application technology.[Result]The incidence of tobacco brown spot disease was lower in low altitude height tobacco area.The three Maryland tobacco cultivars like Wufeng1,Md872 and Md609 were middle-resistance to tobacco brown spot. The tobacco brown spot indexes of transplanting young seedlings under film and well-cellar transplanting method were decreased by 8. 81 and 8. 98 compared with control.Medical effect of the field experiments showed that 600 × thiodiazole-copper and 750 × thiophanate-methyl had the best controlling effect on tobacco brown spot,with control efficacies of 98. 41% and 98. 58% respectively. The better ways were 200 × nongyonglianmeisu and 600 × dimetachlone,with control efficacies of 96. 48% and 97. 32% respectively.[Conclusion]The results provide reference for comprehensive control of Maryland tobacco brown spot.


In computer communication networks, routing is often accomplished by maintaining copies of the network topology and dynamic performance characteristics in various network nodes. The present paper describes an algorithm that allows complete flexibility in the placement of the topology information. In particular, we assume that an arbitrary subset of network nodes are capable of maintaining the topology. In this environment, protocols are defined to allow automatic updates to flow between these more capable nodes. In addition, protocols are defined to allow less capable nodes to report their topology data to the major nodes, and acquire route information from them.