An in silico approach was adopted to identify potential cyclooxygenase inhibitors through molecular docking studies. Four potentially active molecules were generated by fusion of dopamine with ibuprofen or ketorolac derivatives. The binding mode of the considered ligands to cyclooxygenase-1 and cyclooxygenase-2 isoforms was described using Autodock Vina. Preliminary docking to full cyclooxygenase isoforms structures was used to determine possible binding sites for the described dopamine-derived ligands. The following more accurate docking iteration to the described binding sites was used to achieve better conformational sampling. Among the studied molecules, IBU-GABA-DA showed preferable binding to cyclooxygenase active site of cyclooxygenase-1, while IBU-DA bound to peroxidase site of cyclooxygenase-1, making these ibuprofen-comprising ligands a base for further research and design of selective cyclooxygenase1 inhibitors. Keterolac-derived ligands KET-DA and KET-GABA-DA demonstrated binding to both cyclooxygenase isoforms at a side pocket, which does not relate to any known functional site of cyclooxygenases and needs to be further investigated.


Christiansen uniformity (CU) and Distribution uniformity (DU) are the most commonly used irrigation quality evaluation indicators, focusing on overall uniformity and local water deficit, respectively. Clarifying the quantitative relationship between the CU and DU has important production value for determining the water distribution characteristics of whole and localized areas in the evaluation of sprinkler irrigation water uniformity and improving the quality of sprinkler irrigation. This paper analyses the relationship between the calculation formulas of CU and DU based on mathematical analysis. The results reveal a prominent linear relationship between CU and DU, and the sum of the slope coefficient and the constant term of the linear relationship equation is 1. The value of the slope coefficient of the CU–DU linear relationship characterizes the differentiated form of the sprinkler water distribution. The slope coefficient is determined by the nozzle type, operating parameters and working scenarios. Notably, the specific form of the linear relationship obtained by fitting the experimental results in the literature is not universal. The mapping relationship between the value of the slope coefficient and the distribution form of sprinkler irrigation water quantity was established, and the influence of the value range of the slope coefficient on the DU of the overall and local sprinkler irrigation water quantity was demonstrated. The results show that the deviation rates of CU and DU decrease with increasing slope coefficient. When the slope coefficient is less than 1, CU is greater than DU; and the slope coefficient ranges from 0.46 to 1.36. When the slope coefficient is 0.625, the possibility of uniform irrigation is the highest. This research helps to overcome the limitations of CU and DU for irrigation uniformity evaluation and provides a reference for carrying out sprinkler irrigation uniformity evaluation with comprehensive characterization capabilities.


The present invention discloses a battery remaining capacity estimating apparatus, a method and a system for. The apparatus includes an interface and a processing module. An interface for receiving information parameter indicating the battery status. The processing module is coupled to the interface, the ratio between the calculated remaining capacity and the battery capacity ratio, the capacity ratio is calculated with reference to the remaining capacity for the battery capacity and the processing means for comparing the parameter with a reference value to produce a first comparison result and for comparing the reference ratio and the capacity ratio to generate a second comparison result, the processing module is further configured to set the amount of change in accordance with the first comparison result and second comparison result, and changes the remaining capacity calculated by the change amount. Apparatus for estimating the remaining capacity of the battery of the present invention, a method and system for improving the accuracy of estimating the remaining capacity of the battery, simplifying the process of estimating the remaining capacity of the battery, and save a lot of time.


A new ZVS cell is proposed based on the active clamping technique. With a small clamping diode in the cell the voltage ringing caused by the auxiliary inductor is eliminated, and the circulating loss is minimized. A new ZVS boost converter is presented and analyzed in detail to demonstrate the operation principle of the new ZVS cell. Utilizing this cell a new family of ZVS DC-DC converter can be constructed based on typical non-isolated DC-DC converters. A 500 W/200 kHz ZVS boost prototype is made to verify the analysis


Texture mapping is a very efficient technique to enrich the appearance of polygonal models with details. Textures do not only store color information, but also normals for bump mapping and various shading attributes to create appealing surface effects. However, texture mapping requires parameterizing a mesh, by associating a 2D texture coordinate with every mesh vertex. Distortions and seams are often introduced by this difficult process, especially on complex meshes.


Ilex paraguariensis St.Hil., popularly named erva-mate in Brazil, is an indigenous species of the Araucaria Forest with a large geographic distribution and a high social and economic importance. The seeds of this species exhibits physiologic and seed coat  impermeability dormancies and needs stratification on sand in order to break them. This work aimed to evaluate the influence of genotype -environment interaction on embryo development of erva-mate seeds formed under different environmental conditions. The fruits were collected in Cascavel, Toledo and Campo Mourao, State of Parana, and in Soledade, State of Rio Grande do Sul, in February 2003. The experiment was carried out on Forest Seed Laboratory of Embrapa Florestas, in a completely randomized design with four replications of 25 seeds each. It was concluded that the seeds from State of Parana provenances presented more developed embryos than those ones from the State of Rio Grande do Sul, probably as a response of the higher mean annual temperature and the amount of sunlight.


[Concerning the deaf], we ignore or suppress their unique and highly developed language and culture, isolating them from one another and, as children, from adults like them. And we treat their condition as a medical or psychological problem, spawning a vast and (to hearing people) very profitable "helping" industry, while depriving them of virtually all influence on that industry. The result. . . is that the deaf are now, in effect, a subjugated people in our midst— paternalistically denigrated by our "expert" pronouncements, effectively divided for the purposes of exploitation.


Stems from three clones of willow (Salix viminalis), known as high, medium and low accumulators of Cd, were collected from two Fields of short rotation forestry in Sweden. The clones showed the same differences in Cd accumulation properties as previously shown and the differences in accumulation between the clones did not depend on the Cd concentration in the soil (HN0 3 -fraction), pH or organic matter. The concentration of Cd in the stems of willow was, without exception, higher than that of the soil; thus, it is suggested that willow could be used in phytoremediation of soils with elevated Cd concentrations. Calculations based on the situation in Sweden showed that it will take 12 years for willow to remove the Cd accumulated in the soil during the last century.


Web service selection with the preference is a hot spot in the area of Web service.Preference eliciation is a complex task,especially elicitation involving non-expert users.Preferences acquired often encounter such problems that preferences are incomplete or inconsistent.It causes a lot of problems in the practical applications.In this paper,based on a graphical representation tool CP-net,we sum up the problem about uncertain in CP-net.We define the optimal relation and weak optimal relation on the outcome corresponding to CP-net.By analysis,we propose intersection and complement operator on CP-net.Bases on the above,we propose a method to solve the uncertain problem,and optimal this method.The final experiments demonstrate the effectiveness of our method.


Background: Neisseria gonorrhoeae (Ng) has developed resistance to most antimicrobial agents and the antibiotics recommended for therapy are restricted, for the most part, to third generation cephalosporins. In order to investigate new potential sources of antimicrobial agents, the antibacterial properties of 14 Canadian plants used in traditional First Nations' medicine were tested against Ng isolates having differing antimicrobial susceptibility profiles. Methods: Ethanolic extracts of 14 Canadian botanicals, analyzed by high-performance liquid chromatography, were tested for their antimicrobial activity (disc diffusion and/or agar dilution assays) against susceptible Ng reference strains and a panel of 28 Ng isolates with various antimicrobial resistance profiles. Results: Extracts of Arctostaphylos uva ursi (kinnikinnick or bearberry), Hydrastis canadensis (goldenseal), Prunus serotina (black cherry), and Rhodiola rosea (roseroot) inhibited the growth of all Ng isolates with minimum inhibitory concentrations of 32 &mgr;g/mL, 4 to 32 &mgr;g/mL, 16 to >32 &mgr;g/mL, and 32 to 64 &mgr;g/mL, respectively. Extracts of Acorus americanus (sweet flag), Berberis vulgaris (barberry), Cimicifuga racemosa (black cohosh), Equisetum arvense (field horsetail), Gaultheria procumbens (wintergreen), Ledum groenlandicum (Labrador tea), Ledum palustre (marsh Labrador tea), Oenothera biennis (common evening primrose), Sambucus nigra (elderberry), and Zanthoxylum americanum (prickly ash) had weak or no antimicrobial activity against the Ng isolates with minimum inhibitory concentrations ≥256 &mgr;g/mL. The phytochemical berberine from H. canadensis inhibited the growth of all Ng isolates. The phytochemicals, salidroside and rosavin, present in R. rosea, also showed inhibitory activity against Ng strains. Conclusion: Canadian botanicals represent a potential source of novel compounds which inhibit Ng, including isolates resistant to antibiotics.


This paper describes the first record of the intertidal, tropical
tetraclitoid barnacle Tetraclita sp. cf. T. stalactifera (Lamarck, 1818) from
the middle Neogene of the Canary Islands. The barnacles were recovered as
isolated plates from a bioclastic volcanic agglomerate. Associated fauna includes patellid and neritid gastropods, and an oyster bank, which confirm a
shallow-water litoral setting. Living Tetraclita stalactifera is recorded from
tropical waters of the America, South Africa and the Arabian Sea; it is first
recorded as fossil from Plio-Pleistocene of Curaçao (Caribbean Sea,
Venezuela).


The area of business models for the Internet of Things and how to approach modelling them is relatively unexplored. Therefore this study researches how others have previously approached the area th ...


One does not know what one writes. This truism of that form of thought which is writing holds all the more true perhaps when the one writing is not an individual but the aleatory product of a wayward conversation, the plural subject of a singular yet common encounter. It is under the sign of this truism that the present essay is born, as I return to the encounter that took place between Antonio Negri and me in a book titled In Praise of the Common: A Conversation on Philosophy and Politics, as I revisit here that encounter in the attempt to understand and, indeed, to know exactly what it is that one wrote there, so as, hopefully, to go beyond it. In particular, it is the titular object of praise that continues to linger and to preoccupy me as the eminently unfinished business of that book: the concept of the common was certainly praised yet not fully given, grasped, defined there. In the essay, "Surplus Common," that serves as a preface to that book, I sketched a possible genealogy of the concept of the common by interrelating what I took to constitute its earliest proto-modern intimations in Dante Alighieri's De vulgari eloquentia and De monarchia, and its latest postmodern reincarnations in Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri's Multitude: War and Democracy in the Age of Empire. (Hardt and Negri's subsequent collaborative undertaking, Commonwealth, had not yet been published.) Crucially, I sketched this genealogy by putting Alighieri's and Hardt and Negri's works in conversation with one another via the intermediary and nodal figures of Aristotle, Karl Marx, and Baruch Spinoza. The aim of such a genealogy, however, was to approach the concept of the common indirectly, transversally, secondarily. I analyzed, interwove, and deployed the various articulations of the common in these thinkers so as to produce another and primary—that is, logically anterior—concept, which I referred to as "surplus common" [pluscomune]. In doing so, I hoped in effect to re-elaborate a distinctly Marxian theoretical-methodological maneuver. Much like Marx shows in the Grundrisse that, paradoxically, "the creation of surplus value," namely, the immediate result of the process of capitalist circulation, "is the presupposition of capital" itself [326],1 much like Marx demonstrates, in other words, that surplus value is at


We report InP/InGaAs/InP Double Heterojunction Transistors (DHBTs) with high breakdown voltages in a substrate transfer process. A device with a 400 /spl Aring/ thick graded base, a 500 /spl Aring/ chirped superlattice base-collector grade and a 2500 /spl Aring/ thick InP collector exhibits f/sub /spl tau//=165 GHz and f/sub max/=300 GHz with breakdown voltage BV/sub CEO/=6 V at a current density, J/sub e/=1/spl middot/10/sup 5/ A/cm/sup 2/. A device with a 400 /spl Aring/ thick graded base, a 500 /spl Aring/ chirped superlattice base-collector grade and a 1500 /spl Aring/ thick InP collector exhibits f/sub /spl tau//=215 GHz and f/sub max/=210 GHz with breakdown voltage BV/sub CEO/=4 V at a current density, J/sub e/=1/spl middot/10/sup 5/ A/cm/sup 2/.


Apis mellefera jemenitica is the smallest race of A. mellifera both in its body and colony sizes. In the current study we assessed the natural nest volume, workers brood cell dimensions and bee space of the race through measuring their dimensions from naturally built combs in log hives. The optimum box hive volume and surface area requirement were assessed by keeping colonies at different volumes of frame hives with four replications each and monitored for a period of one year. The average occupied nest volume and comb surface area of the race in log hives were 12.28 ± 5.98 l and 8017.2 ± 3110.60 cm2 respectively which are significantly smaller than other A. mellifera races. The worker brood cells width and depth of the race were 4.07 ± 0.17 mm and 9.39 ± 0.42 mm respectively and the race builds an average of 262.5 more worker brood cells/dm2 than is built on embossed foundation sheets. The race maintains an average of 7.27 ± 1.35 mm bee space and naturally builds 30% more combs per unit length than other races. Based on the performances of colonies, box hives with seven standard frames were found to be the optimum for the race in the region. The study indicates the importance of designing box hives and accessories that match with the natural nest volumes, their body and colony sizes which may contribute to enhance the productivity of the race.


With the printing and distribution of this issue of Palliative & Supportive Care (PS&C Volume 2, Number 4), we complete and celebrate the second year of publication of this rather unique scientific journal. It may seem to be a small affair really, this scientific journal business, yet it is in fact larger than one initially appreciates. It requires the immense diligence and hard work of a rather large cadre of editors, publishers, reviewers, and of course the scientists and writers who so graciously present their work into our trust. But, what has been the most profound realization of the last year is the fact that scientists and clinicians around the world actually read and appreciate our "small" journal.


society. It is the first book dedicated entirely to the TV viewers in post-Soviet Russia and their perception of news that uses sophisticated methods of heuristics and is based on extensive field work. It would be interesting to probe Mickiewicz's ex post reflections on how much the TV public differs across the most remote regions of Russia in Siberia, Northern Caucasus and the Far East. What are the differences across numerous ethnic groups in Russia? These varieties of public must be significant, and field work might reveal great diversity among TV viewers, and probably would provide us with some more explanations of the main question on the Russian public. The same could be asked with regard to the TV audience in Belarus, Ukraine, Moldova, and other post-Soviet states, as most of them have access to the same TV channels. However, I admit that this is not a question that should or could have been asked or answered in the same book. Mickiewicz has written an excellent book on modern Russian TV viewers. This study makes a significant contribution to our knowledge about the relation between TV watchers, political leadership, and the peculiarities of television in Russia. It also contributes to studies of comparative politics, society, and applied heuristics.


Introduction: A major milestone of Cassini's extended tour of Saturn's icy moons has been the discovery of exospheres around Rhea and Dione [1-3], produced by magnetospheric radiolysis and sputtering of the surfaces, and held in place by the moon's gravity. The exospheres have similar density, and chemical composition; consisting of carbon dioxide and molecular oxygen, suggesting similar exospheric mechanisms at both bodies. Over multiple close flybys at different dates and over locations, Cassini CAPS and INMS measurements have led to a remarkably detailed new understanding [4] of these icy satellite exospheres; revealing that (1) the exospheres stick to the cold night side and polar surfaces, (2) the gas diffuses into the regolith, and (3) the exospheres are seasonal.


Introduction: Image fusion involves integrating elements from two or more characteristically different, multi-sensor, and/or multi-temporal images to create a new image that relays more information than the component images provide. In Earth-based remote sensing, image fusion is employed to enhance the spatial resolution of a multi-spectral (MS) image by integrating the MS spectral content with geometric (edge) details from a higher-resolution panchromatic (Pan) image. The derived high-resolution multispectral (HRMS) image can then be said to have both highspectral (from the original MS) and high-spatial (from the Pan) resolutions. Although widely utilized in Earthbased remote sensing, image fusion as applied to planetary images is still relatively uncommon; a few known applications include its use in Viking Orbiter images of Mars [1,2] and Chandrayaan and SELENE images of the Moon [3]. In the current design of most remote sensing imaging systems, an inherent trade-off exists between a system's ability to highly resolve spatial and spectral information, due to the standing inverse relationship between the system's instantaneous field-of-view and spectral bandwidth sizes. Additionally, planetary mission payload mass restrictions, and data transmission and cost limitations make the integration of an on-board HRMS imaging system typically unfeasible. Thus, planetary missions which integrate both low-resolution MS and high-resolution Pan instruments stand to benefit from image fusion as a suitable post processing solution for sharpness enhancement of MS images. Several standard image fusion methods have been developed which establish various means of extracting geometric details from the Pan and injecting it into the MS. While many of these methods are successful at enhancing the spatial resolution of the MS, results may contain significant color distortion. In a previous work, the following six well-known image fusion methods were applied to Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera (LROC) Narrow Angle Camera (NAC) and Wide Angle Camera (WAC) images: Intensity-HueSaturation, Brovey Transform, Principal Component Analysis, the University of New Brunswick method, High Pass Filter and Additive Wavelet [4]. In both qualitative (via visual inspection) and quantitative (metric-based) assessments in which spectral content preservation was emphasized over sharpness enhancement, the wavelet-based image fusion method yielded the best spectral performance. In this study we apply different wavelet-based image fusion methods to lunar images from the LROC WAC and NAC system based on wavelet family and level of decomposition, and assess results for overall spatial and spectral quality.


Left turn traffic affects the control delay and the chosen number of phases. Permitted and protected left turn traffic are usually decided as a function in left turn traffic volume and traffic volume of the opposite direction. This research studies the effect of two variables on the relation between left turn traffic and the control delay. These variables are the average lane volume and the percentage of difference in traffic volume between opposite directions. More than 160 model runs are done on Synchro software to record the relationships between these three variables. Three sets of curves are extracted from this analysis. The first set explains the effect of the value of the average lane volume on the relationship between control delay and the left turn traffic. This set is repeated for different values of difference between opposite traffic volume. The second set of curves explains the effect of the percentage of difference between opposite direction on the relationship between the control delay and the left turn traffic. This set is repeated for different values of traffic volume. The third set of curves summaries all variables that affect the relationship between left turn traffic and the control delay. The research concluded that the value of average lane traffic volume affects the relationship between the control delay and the percentage of left turn traffic. The same conclusion is acquired for the effect of percentage of difference between opposite traffic volume on the relationship between the control delay and the percentage of left turn. The research introduces guides for protecting and permitting left turn traffic.


E nergy consumption is a growing concern in many areas of computer architecture. Not only for the handheld embedded market, but also for desktop machines and high-end server facilities, there is a demand for ever increasing processing power while maintaining or even decreasing energy consumption. For processors embedded in battery-powered devices, consumers both demand an increasing number of features and an increase of battery lifetime. For commodity desktop and high-end server systems, the demand to reduce energy consumption is mostly fueled by cost, environmental issues, and the wish to have systems without noisy cooling systems. This dissertation studies several techniques that aim at reducing energy consumption in processors. Part of the techniques presented in this dissertation focusses at reducing energy consumption by decreasing the amount of data transferred between a processor and external memory. Since memory is one of the known bottlenecks in computer systems, manufacturers had to employ increasingly aggressive techniques in the past decades to increase performance. The techniques proposed in this dissertation target at improving or at least maintaining performance, while reducing the amount of energy dissipated in the memory subsystem. Another part of this dissertation focusses on reducing energy by lowering the speed of nodes in multiprocessor systems in combination with turning off some of these nodes. Multiprocessor systems have gained significant interest in the past years, mostly because power constraints have prevented further increasing clock frequencies and because instruction level parallelism has suffered from diminishing returns. Due to the way how energy is dissipated in semiconductor fabric, using multiple cores on a reduced frequency is an effective way to reduce energy consumption. Due to decreasing sizes of the components from which processors are built, it is expected that this energy model will change significantly in future years. Some of the techniques presented in this dissertation aim at reducing energy consumption in such contemporary and near-future multiprocessor systems.


This paper presents a methodology for im- proving breast ultrasound (BUS) classification by using intensity-invariant texture features based on log-Gabor filtering and ranklet transform. The Fisher's linear dis- criminant analysis (FLDA) classifies 641 BUS images in benign and malignant lesions. The results point out that the FLDA performance improves significantly, in terms of area under ROC curve index, from 0.89 to 0.93 with the proposed scheme.


Descriptive Experience Sampling (DES) rightly encourages concrete, experience-near description of specific psychological states. But it needs to be further connected and opened up, both to the search for converging methods and objective corroborating evidence for the reports of subjective experience, and to more temporally- extended sequences in experience. I criticize DES for deliberately eradicating the dynamics of conscious experience by providing only a flash snapshot of 'the last undisturbed moment before the beep'. This restriction rules out certain significant experiential phenomena, and renders the kind of 'personal truth' revealed strangely thin, by neglecting the fact that we are creatures whose present experience is often animated in many distinctive ways by our past. I query the dis- tinction between recalling and reconstructing, and re-examine parts of two reports discussed by Hurlburt and Schwitzgebel. These exam- ples reveal rich cross-temporal interactions that should encourage us to explore, in ways DES officially rules out, how kinaesthetic memory and autobiographical memory respectively animate present experi- ence. A slightly extended experience-sampling practice could take a central place among other methods for investigating experience.


According to the single-ended forward inverter shortage.This paper proposed a new control scheme for single-ended forward inverter,which is control DC voltage quality by using push-pull circuit before it.So it decreases the output wave of DC voltage.Using soft-switch control and output all kinds of frequency of loads voltage.It can decrease the output device by using the pspice simulation soft ware in output frequency 50 kHz,experiment shows by using DSP 2812 that the control approach can carry our purpose expected,and the control welding system runs stably and reliably.


To the Editor: I read with special interest the reports of safe short-term use of gabapentin in three patients with hepatic porphyria published in Neurology in March1 and June.2 Indeed, most anticonvulsants eventually induce high levels of deltaaminolevulinic acid (δ-ALA) synthase via cytochrome P450-related hepatic metabolism.3,4 δ-ALA synthase, the rate-limiting enzyme for the heme-porphyrin pathway, is under control by feedback inhibition of high heme levels, but increased translation from RNA is inducible under conditions of increased heme synthesis when the …


The performance of cooling extruders widely used in thermoplastic foam extrusion was analyzed, by numerically solving the equations of motion and heat transfer. Analysis of cooling extruders does not require a consideration of the melting behavior of polymers, thus simplifying the system equations considerably. The flow geometry analyzed was an unwound screw channel of a single-screw extruder, i.e., a rectangular channel of uniform height followed by diverging and converging sections. Due to the cooling of both the extruder barrel and the screw, the heat transfer equation considered includes the terms describing the convective heat transfer in the down-channel direction and the conductive heat transfer in the cross-channel direction, in addition to the terms describing the viscous shear heating. For the analysis, a power-law model was used as the constitutive rheologlcal equation, describing the viscosities of a mixture of a fluorocarbon blowing agent and a low-density polyethylene melt (or polystyrene melt). The parameters in the Theological model were determined using the data of Han and Ma (13). In obtaining numerical solutions of the equations of motion, an integration method was employed to overcome the problem of numerical instabilities. The present analysis predicts the profiles of developing temperature and velocity in the down-channel direction, and the profiles of temperature, velocity, shear rate, and viscosity in the cross-channel direction. In presenting the results of computer simulation, emphasis is placed on the effects of cooling the extruder barrel and screw on the performance of cooling extruders, in terms of the pressure drops along the extruder axis and the mechanical power consumption. This study provides a rational basis for the design of cooling extruders widely used in thermoplastic foam extrusion and for the selection of optimum extrusion conditions in producing thermoplastic foams.


Circulation. 2020;141:694–695. DOI: 10.1161/CIRCULATIONAHA.120.045853 694 Race may negatively influence whether black male patients with advanced heart failure are recommended for transplantation, according to a recent study presented at the American Heart Association (AHA) Scientific Sessions. The study surveyed more than 400 members of a national heart failure organization who were blinded to the purpose of the study and randomized to review clinical vignettes about black and white male patients with advanced heart failure. In surveys, the physicians were asked whether they would allocate a particular patient to transplantation or ventricular assist device implantation, and no significant bias was detected. But when a subset of 44 physicians were asked to think aloud through treatment choices, the investigators found that race impacted every step in the process and that black men were slightly less likely to be offered transplantation. Specifically, physicians suspected that the black patients had less social support, were less likely to be adherent, and were less trustworthy, explained lead author Khadijah Breathett, MD, MS, Assistant Professor of Medicine and advanced heart failure/transplant cardiologist at the University of Arizona's Sarver Heart Center in Tucson. "It shows that there is definitely opportunity to improve the process, because it's fraught with bias," Breathett said. The study is the latest in a growing body of evidence that suggests that physicians implicitly favor white patients, with studies showing mixed results on whether those biases impact clinical decision making and patient care. Other studies presented at the meeting showed that black patients were less likely to be diagnosed with hypertension and were less likely to be prescribed statins. The lead author and presenter of the statins study, Michael Dorsch, PharmD, MS, Assistant Professor of Clinical Pharmacy at the University of Michigan College of Pharmacy, noted that a range of factors, including unconscious bias, patient education, and other potential barriers to care, may factor into such health inequities. "The most important thing is to recognize that implicit bias is real, and it's pervasive, and that clinicians really need to look within and really think about whether or not they have implicit biases and how those might be influencing their decisions," said Kiarri N. Kershaw, PhD, MPH, Associate Professor of Preventive Medicine at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and a member of the American Heart Association's Quality of Care and Outcomes Research and Social Determinants of Health Committee, in a press statement.


The present invention relates to a technique used in the competition on the part of the television channel spectrum. In some instances, the back-off value, when the channel free competition, is used to determine the number of competitors competing to be transmitted, back-off value is determined based on the number of competitors. In some embodiments, the competitor is a case of monitoring a contention channel, and the higher priority contender detects a competition is being withdrawn from the contention channel is in competition.


Abstract Retention volume of proteins increased or decreased with increasing phosphate buffer or neutral electrolyte concentrations in the mobile phase. This variation suppressed or accelerated by changing pH values in the mobile phase. The behavior of proteins can be interpreted by knowing isoelectric points (pI) of proteins and pKa value of the residual silanol groups on the surface of diol-bonded porous glasses. Positively charged surface of proteins below pH 8.0 (cytochrome c, lysozyme) retarded the elution by the ion-adsorption effects and negatively charged proteins around pH 7.0 (egg albumin, bovin serum albumin) eluted earlier than expected by the ion-exclusion effects. These effects suppressed by increasing phosphate buffer and neutral electrolyte concentrations in the mobile phase. Size-exclusion separation was attained in the mobile phase over 0.1 M phosphates and 0.1 M NaCl concentrations at pH 7.0. Mcllvaine buffer and Gomori buffer showed opposite action to proteins for retention comparing w...


Objective To investigate the value of ultrasound in diagnosis of BI-RADS 4 level breast lesions.Methods Three hundred thirty-eight patients with 405 breast lesions underwent ultrasound examination,and the lesions were diagnosed as BI-RADS 4 level.The results were compared with surgery and pathological findings.Results The diagnostic specificity of "spiculation","posterior echo attenuation" and "RI≥0.7" to BI-RADS 4 level breast cancer was 98.36%(299/304),90.12%(274/304) and 86.24%(262/304),respectively.Conclusion The findings of "spiculaiton","posterior echo attenuation" and "RI≥0.7" are the most specific ultrasonic signs of BI-RADS 4 level breast lesions that indicating the grading of BI-RADS 4 level to 4C.


Aim To investigate the characteristics of blood inflammatory markers in patients with vascular cognitive impairment no dementia.Methods 68 subjects were classified into two groups: vascular cognitive impairment-no dementia(44 cases) and normal cognitive(24 cases).For all the subjects,the levels of the index of CD64,C-reactive protein,interleukin-6,peripheral white blood cell count and the percent of neutrophil in the peripheral blood were measured by automatic flow cytometry,immunoturbidimetry and haematology analyzer respectively.Results The index of CD64,interleukin-6,C-reactive protein and the percentage of neutrophil in vascular cognitive impairment-no dementia group were significantly higher than those in the normal cognitive group(P0.05),while the peripheral white blood cell count was no statistical difference between the two groups(P0.05).At multiple regression analysis,the high level of IL-6 was an independent of risk factor of vascular cognitive impairment-no dementia.Conclusion The results suggested that inflammation may play a role in the pathological process of VCI-ND.The level of IL-6 was associated with the decline of cognitive function.IL-6 may be the candidate blood inflammatory marker in VCI-ND,but the relationship between the levels of the index of CD64 and cognitive impairment was not clear.


Neoliberalism is a set of political, economic, cultural and social force. Its theory emphasizes efficiency and believes that efficiency can be best achieved in the "free market" with minimal government regulations. Transnational higher education (TNHE) development is an important impact that neoliberalism has on higher education in China. This article discusses some issues and problems that currently exist in TNHE by analyzing the context that helped the emergence and development of TNHE in China. The author's thinking on how the TNHE in China should face the challenges in the process of globalization is also provided in the article.


Having proper budgets.
Budgets must be monitored every month.
Income statements must be completed by the very latest the 15th of the following month and clearly show how income is made up and what action has been taken against defaulters.
Managing Agents are there for one purpose only - to manage.


This chapter aims at providing data analysis experts with an overview of the most common strategies in knowledge discovery, highlighting those steps or blocks of steps that are most likely to appear in common problem solving in conventional and data-intensive contexts, as well as giving examples that can be replicated in a range of problems in different domains. The chapter provides the common substrate that data analysis experts must know in order to address systematically their knowledge discovery problems in a data-intensive context. Inexperienced data analysis experts find the chapter useful for understanding and systematizing knowledge discovery, problem-solving procedures beyond individual steps and components for conventional to data-intensive problems. More experienced data analysis experts find the chapter useful to develop their understanding of how the data-intensive context influences conventional data analysis strategies.


COVID-19 as a pandemic has impacted many lives with continued threat to our way of life. Decision-makers are grappling with the spread without insights into whether they are in a peak or a plateau of the spread. This severely limits resource management in regions severely affected by COVID- 19. Analysis of COVID-19 cases and deaths as time-series distributions can yield insights that can aid the efforts in such regions to help estimate the curve of the spread. In this chapter, we use time-series analysis to analyze COVID- 19 spread at various locations to study the overall patterns that emerge. We utilize methods including piecewise aggregate approximation (PAA), matrix profiles (MPs), and time-series discretization to identify time periods where the number of cases and deaths reported depicted any major anomalies and where the overall time series seems to be following a trend. Our analysis can prove beneficial to understand the distributions of COVID-19 cases and deaths to quantify the data into different trends to show when the number of cases spiked and when they remained fairly consistent, even when they are in a trend of high number of cases and deaths. This type of trend analysis is particularly useful to compare locations with similar metadata such as number of assisted living communities, population densities, etc., and study if the disease spread is similar or deviating. This can also provide insights into how the policies have had an impact on the spread at these locations. © 2021 River Publishers. All rights reserved.


Antenna of honey bees is geniculate and has been known to possess a wide variety of sensilla. The sensilla are sensitive to odor, temperature, humidity, air pressure and gustatory stimuli. In the present investigation, ultrastructural study on the antenna of the two open-nesting worker honey bees- Apis florea F. - the dwarf honey bee and A. dorsata F. - the giant honey showed considerable amount of variation in the types and distribution pattern of sensilla in the two species. The antennal form as well as the sensilla arrangement has been suggested to be adapted to the pheromone perception need of regarding a particular species.


Despite a proclivity toward openness, libraries have historically been involved with data and content under various levels of restrictions imposed by copyright and proprietary business arrangements. Libraries have also dealt with data primarily through self-contained applications, mostly managed within relational databases. While these modes of operation persist today in the mainstream production systems of interest to libraries, a strong movement is underway toward the principles of the Semantic Web and more open approaches to sharing data. I see libraries now at an interesting juncture between the realm of proprietary, restricted, and isolated data and a new era with possibilities for more openness in sharing data and putting it to work through Semantic Web technologies. The library community seems to be ready to push boundaries and more liberally share previously restricted data. To what extent can metadata related to collections be shared with other organizations or exposed freely for the entire world? When can the actual content of collections be shared? Copyright, licensing terms, and business contracts impose specific restrictions, but libraries have been working toward arrangements that allow more sharing. The open access movement, for example, has been underway for a decade or so, aiming to transform scholarly publishing. Yet, it seems that the progress achieved has yet to significantly relieve the financial burden that libraries face in gaining access to scholarly publications. Still, there is reason for optimism as increasing numbers of important academic institutions, such as Harvard University, become strategically committed to open access to the works created by their researchers. We see more aggressive movement toward liberal models of access in the metadata that describes library collections or bodies of published content. In this issue of Smart Libraries Newsletter, we explore developments toward more freedom in sharing metadata stores of interest to libraries, such as Dewey Decimal Classification, the Virtual International Authority File, the bibliographic records from libraries such as Harvard University, and ultimately OCLC's WorldCat database. International efforts such as Europeana have set a high standard for openness that other organizations will do well to follow. In addition to sharing data, the library community has also become increasingly involved in Semantic Web technologies that enable more powerful use of that data. One of the technologies associated with the Semantic Web is linked data, which exposes data elements with built-in interconnectivity. Rather than using proprietary formats, linked data makes use of W3C standards such as RDF (Resource Description Framework); exposes each element through a A LA TechSource alatechsource.org


This research-in-progress examines the roles of technology and human systems in supporting emergency response management through the dual perspectives of knowledge and psychology. Task critical knowledge is linked to organizational effectiveness in delivering business value and psychological factors characterize the unique challenges of an emergency context. This exploratory research is among the first to develop a theoretical model based on these two important yet understudied theoretical aspects. The article contributes to the research development in emergency response information systems and sheds light on the organizational response management practice.


[Objective] To observe the influence of GinkgoLeaf Extract and Dipyridamole injection on pulmonary arterial hypertension(PAH) and hemorheology of patients with chronic pulmonary heart disease in the acute aggravation stage.[Methods] The patients with chronic pulmonary heart disease in the acute aggravation stage were randomly divided into two groups.Both groups were treated with routine Western drugs and GinkgoLeaf Extract and Dipyridamole injections were added in control group.To compare clinical curative effect and the changes of PAH,arterial blood gas and hemorheology of two groups.[Results] The clinical curative effect of the therapeutic group was apparently superior to that of the control group(P0.05),the improvement of PAH,arterial blood gas and hemorheology indicators were significantly better than the control group.[Conclusion] GinkgoLeaf Extract and Dipyridamole injection can effectively reduce the chronic cor pulmonale pulmonary artery pressure,reduce hematic viscosity,and improve the clinical curative effect.


ABSTRACT Introduction "Altinha", a variant of beach soccer that is very popular on the beaches of Rio de Janeiro, is a recreational activity that adapts the basics of beach soccer to a game with a circular formation, with the participation of several players who mainly use the following parts of their bodies: feet, legs, head, knees and trunk. Since it is a Brazilian pursuit, the relationship between "altinha" and skin infections is poorly described. The authors report six cases of patients diagnosed with common warts, seeking to correlate the development of these lesions with participation in "altinha". Clinical Case Six patients, young adults from Rio de Janeiro who play "altinha" on Rio's beaches, with complaints of painless verrucous lesions, were assessed. Physical examination revealed cracked normochromic keratotic papules mainly affecting feet and legs of the dominant limb. In light of the medical history and physical examination, the diagnosis was of vulgar warts. The patients were treated with cryosurgery, obtaining satisfactory results. Discussion The sport and its outdoor environmental conditions favor transmission of the human papillomavirus due to exposure to factors such as humidity, sweating and trauma, besides direct contact with the infected skin of other players and with colonized surfaces. "Altinha" is played barefoot, and the equipment of choice is the soccer ball, which is constantly shared between players, leading to trauma caused not only by the ball, but also by the sand. Moreover, the activity demands physical exertion from participants, resulting in sweating and potential physical contact. Conclusion With the increasing popularity of "altinha" among beachgoers, dermatologists must be aware of the sun protection habits of these individuals. They must also be mindful of the need to examine their skin for related dermatosis and to warn them of the risk of infection by the human papillomavirus in this new sport. Level of Evidence IV; Case series.


Moderate‐to‐severe postoperative pain persists for longer than the duration of single‐shot peripheral nerve blocks and hence continues to be a problem even with the routine use of regional anaesthesia techniques. The administration of local anaesthetic adjuncts, defined as the concomitant intravenous or perineural injection of one or more pharmacological agents, is an attractive and technically simple strategy to potentially extend the benefits of peripheral nerve blockade beyond the conventional maximum of 8–14 hours. Historical local anaesthetic adjuncts include perineural adrenaline that has been demonstrated to increase the mean duration of analgesia by as little as just over 1 hour. Of the novel local anaesthetic adjuncts, dexmedetomidine and dexamethasone have best demonstrated the capacity to considerably improve the duration of blocks. Perineural dexmedetomidine and dexamethasone increase the mean duration of analgesia by up to 6 hour and 8 hour, respectively, when combined with long‐acting local anaesthetics. The evidence for the safety of these local anaesthetic adjuncts continues to accumulate, although the findings of a neurotoxic effect with perineural dexmedetomidine during in‐vitro studies are conflicting. Neither perineural dexmedetomidine nor dexamethasone fulfils all the criteria of the ideal local anaesthetic adjunct. Dexmedetomidine is limited by side‐effects such as bradycardia, hypotension and sedation, and dexamethasone slightly increases glycaemia. In view of the concerns related to localised nerve and muscle injury and the lack of consistent evidence for the superiority of the perineural vs. systemic route of administration, we recommend the off‐label use of systemic dexamethasone as a local anaesthetic adjunct in a dose of 0.1–0.2 mg.kg−1 for all patients undergoing surgery associated with significant postoperative pain.


The chemically recuperated gas turbine (CRGT) is a promising engine on ship because of its high thermal efficiency and low pollutant emission. This paper is aimed at determining an applicable configuration of the CRGT for marine applications. Diesel is the selected fuel, and the minimization of Gibbs free energy method (MGFE) is applied to model the diesel-steam reforming reaction. A chemical regenerator (CR) is designed based on the reforming reaction, and a steam generator (SG) is set on the foundation of thermodynamics. Some feasible configurations of the CRGT are proposed based on a marine gas turbine with two spool shaft and a free power turbine and the best one is determined by performance calculation. The best configuration has a 44.51% thermal efficiency at rated 25MW output power of the prototype, and good stability in operation. Additionally, the selected configuration has lower combustion temperature at the same output power with the other configurations, and it can yield less NOX emissions. These works form the foundation of the CRGT being applied in the marine propulsion and provide a research thought for the CRGT in other applications.


Adoption of AI-equipped systems and their societal benefits are heavily dependent on human understanding of the rationale behind the systems' outputs. Such systems' widespread inability to explain their outputs causes human mistrust and doubts regarding their regulatory compliance. Research in psychology points to the amenability of argumentation as a paradigm for human reasoning, advocating that humans developed reasoning in order to argue. We here overview a number of approaches using computational argumentation frameworks as the scaffolding for explanations for human consumption. Our argumentation frameworks are automatically mined from data and data-centric methods. We define explanations as graphs obtained from these argumentation frameworks, which are customisable by means of properties. We illustrate our methods with various consumer-oriented tasks in the media and entertainment industry, providing reasoning outputs that can be explained to consumers, and that consumers can directly interact with to give rise to improved recommendations.


Based on the demand of logistics information security of a large enterprise,the paper proposes a systematic method to partition the large logistics system and to determine the hierarchical protection of security domain,provides a strategy to establish a deep security protection architecture including technology and management and designs a network topology of the logistics system based on the architecture and logistics characters.


QUESTIONER: The concentration of trimethoprim in the sputum is about double that in plasma, and the concentration of sulphamethoxazole is less. Has Dr Hughes done any ~xperi:ments with trlmethoprim alone in treating respiratory Infections ? Is one treating the organisms In the sputum or trying to treat some condition in the lung Itself? I wonder wheth~r the penetration of the substances Into the lung is more Important than the penetration Into the sputum?


As my previous study indicates, majority of the EFL learners are reluctant to speak English in spoken class than practicing the target language through trial-and-error. They have negative attitude towards their oral errors. Thus, the purpose of this study was to assess factors contributed to the EFL learners' negative attitudes to their English language oral errors, and to identify the effects of the attitudes on the EFL learners speaking skills. To do so, 100 systematically sampled preparatory school students and 5 their English language teachers from three Preparatory Schools were selected. The study has come up with the following findings. Majority of the learners identified that they fear of their classmates' ridicule and negative evaluation. A large number of them are concerned with accuracy than fluency in speaking English. Furthermore, their English teachers' frequent corrections of their oral errors have negatively influenced them. Similarly, they think that their teachers' expectation of perfect accuracy on them during English language oral practice is the other one. To sum up, the points stated above are some of the factors that negatively influenced the learners on the English language oral production.


In dealing with graphics or images, the Bezier curve was widely used. Through adding control points to modify the Bizier curve without changing the primary curve shape, the common way of "adding a number of control points" is presented.This paper puts forward the idea that the Bezier curve is divided into two segments,then the control points are calculated again without "adding a number of control points",in addition to taking the three degree of the Bezier curve example. Practice shows that the method is feasible.


In this manuscript, we consider the extension of the Hilbert-Einstein action to ana- lyze several interesting features of the theory. More specifically, the Lagrangian f ( R ) is replaced by f ( R,L m ) in action, where R is the Ricci scalar, and L m is the matter Lagrangian. We derive the motion equations for a test particle in the Friedmann-Lemaˆıtre- Robertson-Walker (FLRW) flat and homogeneous spacetime. We also derive the energy conditions in this framework. Then, we use the cosmographic parameter such as Hubble, deceleration, jerk, and snap parameters to constraint the model parameters. As a result, we observe that with the constraint range of model parameters our model shows the current accelerated expansion of the universe.


The traditional methods of hearing aid dispensing have been altered dramatically within the past few years (4,5). Major changes that have been seen include factors concerning prosthetics technology, dispensing approaches, and dispenser qualifications. Other contributions to the changing hearing aid scene included: (1) philosophical and technological changes as reflected in the trends in types of units dispensed (45, 48); (2) effects of third party providers (3 1, 41); (3) alterations in manufacturer-dispenser relationships; (4) advances in hearing aid education (22); and (5) the manufacturer's perspective (45,48). This paper provides an historical review of the changing concepts that have emerged over the past 10 years and documents legislative activities that have contributed to this changing scene.


Synopsis. The epithelial cells involved in the movement of ions and water form a major subset of all epithelial cell types. Both the form and the functions ofcell junctions present in these cells are essentially the same as those found elsewhere. Gap junctions are believed to regulate intercellular communication; desmosomes and hemidesmosomes provide mechanical anchorage to other cells and the extracellular matrix; septate junctions play roles in providing cell to cell anchorage, and perhaps in sealing the lateral surfaces of adjacent cells together to prevent paracellular fluid and solute movement; tight junctions (of limited distribution in insects) are seals between adjacent cells. They form a barrier to the paracellular movement of solutes and water. Examination of the junctions in salivary glands and midgut provide insight into the roles of these junctions in the development and function of ion transport systems. In Manduca sexta (Johannsen) the cells ofthe salivary gland are joined by pleated septate and gap junctions. Individual salivary cells have numerous folds and canaliculi. The walls of the canaliculi consist of extensively folded plasma membrane in intimate association with mitochondria. Gap junctions connect adjacent parts of the same cell across membrane folds, effectively shortening diffusion distances in the cells. Hemidesmosomes are present in the walls of developing canaliculi. They are attached to pore filaments that occupy the lumen of the developing canaliculi. The hemidesmosomes and pore filaments may have a morphogenetic role as they disappear after the canaliculi are formed. In Manduca sexta the midgut cells are joined by gap and septate junctions. These junc? tions differ in morphology from their counterparts in the salivary gland; physiological studies show the goblet cells are not coupled to neighboring tail columnar cells. We have shown the gap junctions joining them are typical of non-coupling junctions. Preliminary studies suggest that the gap junctions change form when the cells are coupled.


Weed populations and their control aspects of plant physiology herbicide metabolism in plants genetic resistance to herbicides improved resistance through genetic engineering mycoherbicides allelochemicals as herbicides. Appendix: herbicide usage.


The paper outlines the strategy employed in a town in Cornwall, England to maximise the benefits obtained from the construction of a bypass. Whenever a bypass is proposed, claims are made to justify its construction. The bypass will shorten journey times for through traffic, it will assist industry and commerce allowing the town to breathe and regenerate. It will reduce pollution, lessen accidents and enhance the environment. In the vast majority of cases, most of these claims can be justified, but will it be true to say that we will have done our best for the town if all we have done is to build a bypass? In this paper it is proposed that bypasses are only part of the answer. In order to maximise the benefit of that investment, a comprehensive package of proposals addressing traffic management, land use and environmental issues is needed. (A) For the covering abstract see IRRD 862726.


The international community continues to struggle to address the proliferation of transnational terrorism. Ideologically driven, non‐state affiliated terrorist organizations, the most well‐known being Al‐Qaeda, have successfully exploited chasms within international law and therefore are met with a fractured and inconsistent global response to their violent actions. In particular, states are unclear and divided as to the due process requirements to be used when a transnational terrorist is captured. Questions concerning confinement, trials, and punishment abound and remain unanswered. This article attempts to answer these questions by offering a proposal for a comprehensive international criminal justice system that specifies how to handle a transnational terror suspect from the point of capture, through prosecution, and into post-trial confinement.


The main purpose of higher vocational education is to train talents for the enterprises to the demand,the productive practice is the school by making full use of their own advantages,and enterprise jointly,in the process of production,the training of the students' practical skills,improve the students' comprehensive ability and improve the students' zero distance of the employment of a kind of practical teaching mode.


The application of plant engineering was inhibited by transgene silence. Update displayed that transgene silence was caused by maily mechanisms such as DNA methylation, paramutation, senior structure of chromosome, karyotypes, RNA degradation and so on. Transcriptionaland post-transcriptional silencing of transgene might occur. The problem will be solved followedby deep researchl on the mechanisms and the application of new transgene methods.


The present invention, by that, implementing the device for so as to form a single substrate solution component analyzing the mixing channel, reaction channel and a measurement channel in a continuous fine groove on the element, and a method of manufacture for the solution of component analysis, it can be downsized and, there is an effect that can be moved quickly by analyzing the sample. Further, by forming a transparent silicon oxide film between the measuring channels of the device for the solution of component analysis of the present invention and the optical fiber, it becomes easy to insert the optical fiber there is an effect that it is possible to simplify the optical system configuration for sample analysis. Microanalysis devices, mixers, reactors, microchannel


In future 6G mobile networks, the Internet-of-Everything (IoE) is expected to provide extremely massive connectivity for small battery-powered devices. Indeed, massive devices with limited energy storage capacity impose persistent energy demand hindering the lifetime of communication networks. As a remedy, wireless energy transfer (WET) is a key technology to address these critical energy supply issues. On the other hand, cell-free (CF) massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) systems offer an efficient network architecture to realize the rollout of IoE. In this article, we first propose the paradigm of reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS)-aided CF massive MIMO systems for WET, including its potential application scenarios and system architecture. The four-stage transmission procedure is discussed and analyzed to illustrate the practicality of the architecture. Then we put forward and analyze the hardware design of RIS. In particular, we discuss the three corresponding operating modes and the amalgamation of WET technology and RIS-aided CF massive MIMO. Representative simulation results are given to confirm the superior performance achieved by our proposed schemes. Also, we investigate the optimal location of deploying multiple RISs to achieve the best system performance. Finally, several important research directions of RIS-aided CF massive MIMO systems with WET are presented to inspire further potential investigation.


Consider a set of waveforms whose Fourier spectra are band-limited within a certain frequency band. We assume that the weighted Lp integrals (1<p< +∞) of the Fourier spectra are bounded with respect to a given weight function. We present a method which optimally approximates the original waveform contained in the above set with respect to an appropriate measure of error. We use a series of sample values of the outputs obtained when the waveform passes through a given finite number of linear time-invariant filters.

Here, we establish a theorem which shows that there exists a waveform among all those waveforms whose sample values at the sample points are all zero, whose error is a maximum at some arbitrary fixed time t. Further, under the condition that p = 2 and the sample values, which are in general not all zero, are given, we prove that the upper limit of approximation error is proportional to the maximum of absolute value of the approximation error described above. As a result, it is shown that as long as the set of waveforms and the measure of approximation error mentioned above are adopted, the proposed linear approximation method is superior to all other approximation methods even including, for example, non-linear signal processing using the same sample values. Further, at the end of this paper, we show that our argument can be applied to more general sets of waveforms.


Background: Extra-articular distal tibial fractures are one of the most complicated ones to treat, specially comminuted fractures. Its subcutaneous nature and lack of adequate musculature makes it more prone for soft tissue damage and bone loss. The key to handle these troubling fractures is to skilfully preserve and reconstruct the soft tissues, early mobilisation and functional use of the extremity with the maintenance of satisfactory length and alignment of the fracture.Methods: This prospective longitudinal study involved 30 patients with extraarticular distal tibia fracture, who are admitted in Vydehi Institute of Medical Sciences and Research Centre between January 2017 to 2019. All were treated with closed reduction and internal fixation using pre-contoured anatomical distal tibia locking plate using minimally invasive percutaneous plate osteosynthesis (MIPPO) technique. Functional and radiological outcome along with associated complications are evaluated in serial follow up.Results: 30 patients with minimal follow up criteria of 6 months was evaluated with AOFAS score for functional outcome. At the end of 1 year, 21 cases (70%) of the cases had excellent results, 5 cases (16.7%) had good results, 3 cases had fair results and only 1 case had poor result.Conclusions: With the use of pre-contoured anatomical locking plates used, MIPPO technique is effective in extra articular distal tibia fractures where it not only helps in decreasing operating time but also in achieving excellent functional outcome with radiological union the fractures by preserving osseous vascularity and minimal soft tissue insult due to surgery.


In 1930 I succeeded in obtaining the first laminagraphs. I was followed in rapid succession by Ziedses des Plantes (1931), Bartelink (1932), and by Grossmann and Chaoul (1935). Since then, the method has been generally adopted under the names of planigraphy, stratigraphy, laminagraphy, and tomography. Preparatory experimental work tending toward cross-sectional study of the body was made by Kieffer in 1938, and by Amisano in 1944 and 1946. Early in 1947 more fruitful experiments on cross-sectional laminagraphy were conducted by myself and by Frain and Lacroix. Later in 1947 I was able to obtain sat isfactory crosssectional studies of the living patient. Since then, with the help of my coworkers, I have been able to perfect this new method of examination. This method we have called axial transverse laminagraphy. The geometrical factors involved are shown in Figure 1. The roentgen beam is directed with considerable obliquity to the center of the desired cross section and reach es a film which is carried on ...


It is caused that combustion performance of engine is increasing effects according to the controling back pressure. Therefor, Exhaust variable valve is installed around the automation silencer. After the exhaust variable has analysed with the reckoning stress distribution to affect in valve, the design factor was analysed with influence. Therefor, It has to translate between the conditions an variables. After results, the distribution of pressure has been indicated when it have condition on the convex face. The distribution was indicated the most alike as pressure and stress that diameter about 42mm and depth to height 5mm in model between the stress and strain. If this interpretation of using it. That's possible to reduce the time and cost about a valuation.


As the amount of information to be processed by computers has recently been increased, there has been cluster computing systems developed by connecting PCs and workstations using high-speed networks. hs a result, the studies on a cluster-based DBMS have been done with a wide range and it is necessary to develop a cluster manager for monitoring and managing cluster-based DBMSs. But, a cluster manager for efficiently managing cluster-based DBMSs has been studied in a first step. In this paper, we design and implement a high-availability cluster manager for a cluster-based DBMS. It monitors the status of nodes in cluster systems as well as the status of DBMS instances in a node, by using a graphic user interface (GUI). Our cluster manager supports the high-availability for a cluster-based DBMS by perceiving errors and recovering them, based on the monitored information on the status of a server.


Transient magnetic circular polarisation and optically detected magnetic resonance are reported for the 520 nm luminescence in additively coloured MgO. The results are shown not to be consistent with the F++F- centre recombination model for this luminescence of P. Edel et al. (1979, 1980). An alternative model is proposed in which a metastable state F Dagger is populated during relaxation from the excited state reached optically in the 250 nm band. In this state one of the electrons may tunnel from F Dagger to a neighbouring F+, being captured there in the F* state and de-exciting with the emission of a 520 nm photon. As a consequence of spin selection rules during the electron tunnelling, polarisation of both the F+ centre ground state and the F Dagger excited state is transferred to the F* state. Thus both magnetic circular polarisation and optically detected magnetic resonance are detected on the long-lived components of the 520 nm band.


Due to their enhanced stability and contaminant transport potential, environmental nanoparticles derived from soil and biosolid materials may pose a considerable risk to groundwater quality. Very little information exists on the stability and transportability of environmental or natural nanocolloids in the presence of As, Se, Pb and Cu contaminants, all of which are considered to represent substantial threats to human and animal populations through groundwater contamination. This study involved stability settling experiments of nanocolloids (NCs) ( mixed > kaolinitic > biosolid. Among the nano-fractions, the smectitic and kaolinitic colloids demonstrated lower stability than the MCs, but higher than those of the mixed and biosolid fractions. Physicochemical characterizations indicated that extensive organic carbon surface coatings and higher Al/Fe:Si ratios may have induced higher stability in the NC fractions, but their overall stability may also have been hindered in some cases by nano-aggregation phenomena.


In civil construction any and all services must be performed objectively and safely, especially the services at the height of the painter, where the employee is more exposed to the risk of falls and impacts of the user's own objects on lower limbs. Both the employee and the employer are responsible for everything that happens at the construction site, the employer providing safety devices and plans to minimize the rich of accidents while performing the services and the employee must obey any and all safety orders and plans aimed at not only your physical integrity but that of your colleagues doing services around you. Therefore this work will address the NR-6 regulations dealing with single use equipment, NR-18 which work conditions and environment in the construction industry and NR-35 work at height, which regulate service at height with the main focus.


A bipolymer gelling fluid for medium low temperature,ca 65℃,was developed on the basis of a high temperature HPAN/water soluble phenolic resin gelling fluid successfully used in Shengli,through introducing HPAM to improve suspension stability of water insoluble substances in HPAN and NH4Cl additionally to regulate,to shorten,gelling time of the fluid.An optimized composition was found as 0.2%~0.3% HPAM+3%~4%HPAN+0.8%~1.0%water soluble phenolic resin +0.4%~0.5%NH4Cl.The gelling time of the optimized fluid at 65℃ was in range 3~5 days and its plugging rate in sand packs was higher than 95%.At an area of Northern Gudao West,Shengli,being water flooded again after polymer flood finished and reached 95% water cut,indepth modification jobs by using this gelling fluid were made in two injection wells and positive responses were observed in 7 of 9 connected production wells in 3~9 month,or ca 6 months in average;more than 2000 tones additional oil output;water cut drop of 1.1%~3.4% from initial value of 95%.


Poor nitrogen (N) management is among the leading causes of winter wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) yield gaps in Kansas, and sowing date—which is impacted by crop rotation—is among the most important variables determining winter wheat's attainable yields in the U.S. central Great Plains. This research aimed to investigate the relationship between N management strategies and various cropping systems in Kansas. The treatments consisted of nine combinations of three N management practices (standard, progressive, and green N) and five crop sequences (WtWt = continuous winter wheat; SyWt = winter wheat after soybean; TrSyWt = triticale (hay) – soybean – winter wheat rotation; CpWt = winter wheat after cowpea; TpDPwt = dual-purpose winter wheat after tepary bean; MoDPwt = dual-purpose winter wheat after moth bean). Standard N-management consisted of one single broadcast N application at 80 lb/a as UAN at spring greenup. Progressive N-management consisted of a split-N application at 40 and 27 lb/a each at greenup and jointing, using streamer bar nozzles and N-inhibitors added to the fertilizer. Green N management consisted of no fertilizer application except for the carryover N from the previous terminated legume crop. Crop sequences that allowed winter wheat to be sown at the optimum sowing date had the greatest yields. Green N management decreased dual-purpose winter wheat grain yield and shoot biomass. Both standard and progressive N management practices had similar results within crop sequences. Overall, our results suggested that intensive N management produced the same yields as the standard, but at lower N rates. Dual-purpose winter wheat combined with green N (i.e., relying exclusively on carryover N) was detrimental to winter wheat yield.


…one cannot desire anything without simultaneously desiring an increased ability to attain it (even if what the person desires is to desire nothing). E.A Singer, Jr.


The morphology of graphite is a decisive factor that affects the performance of nodular cast iron. In this paper, the basic types of graphite morphology in nodular cast iron are introduced. The morphological features used in the recognition are defined. During the establishment of a fuzzy recognition system, we apply the evolution strategy to computing the weight coefficient of every feature. The results of the experiment show that the method can effectively recognize the graphite with types of morphology in nodular cast iron.


Objective To evaluate the efficacy and adverse reactions of temozolomide plus concomitant radiotherapy in the patients with brain metastases.Methods 95 patients with brain metastases were divided into the treatment group and the control group randomly.47 patients were treated by temozolomide plus concomitant radiotherapy in the treatment group.And 48 patients were treated by radiotherapy alone.The efficacy and the adverse reactions in the two groups were compared.Results The overall remission rates were 100% in the treatment group,89.5% in the control group,significant difference between these two groups(P0.05).The median recurrent period and the median survival period in the treatment group were longer than the control group with significant difference(P0.05).The adverse reactions between these two groups have no significant difference(P0.05).All the patients can tolerate the treatment.Conclusion For brain metastases,temozolomide plus concomitant radiotherapy is safe and efficient,and can increase the metastasis control rate and prolong the median survival time.


Abstract A method of growing single crystals of PbZr x Ti1-x O3 from apure PbO flux is described. The method is based on a knowledge of the PbO-TiO2 and PbO-ZrO2 phase diagrams and can be used to grow small crystals of predictable composition. Dielectric, optical and X-ray measurements are used to characterize the crystals.


Missing data is the key challenge facing life cycle inventory (LCI) modeling. The collection of missing data can be cost‐prohibitive and infeasible in many circumstances. Major strategies to address this issue include proxy selection (i.e., selecting a surrogate dataset to represent the missing data) and data creation (e.g., through empirical equations or mechanistic models). Within these two strategies, we identified three approaches that are widely used for LCI modeling: Data‐driven, mechanistic, and future (e.g., 2050) inventory modeling. We critically reviewed the 12 common methods of these three approaches by focusing on their features, scope of application, underlying assumptions, and limitations. These methods were characterized based on the following criteria: "domain knowledge requirement" (both as a method developer and a user), "post‐treatment requirement," "challenge in assessing data quality uncertainty," "challenge in generalizability," and "challenge in automation." These criteria can be used by LCA practitioners to select the suitable method(s) to bridge the data gap in LCI modeling, based on the goal and scope of the intended study. We also identified several aspects for future improvement for these reviewed methods.


. A modelling study of radical chemistry in the coastal Antarctic boundary layer, based upon observations performed in the course of the CHABLIS (Chemistry of the Antarctic Boundary Layer and the Interface with Snow) campaign at Halley Research Station in coastal Antarctica during the austral summer 2004/2005, is described: a detailed zero-dimensional photochemical box model was used, employing inorganic and organic reaction schemes drawn from the Master Chemical Mechanism, with additional halogen (iodine and bromine) reactions added. The model was constrained to observations of long-lived chemical species, measured photolysis frequencies and meteorological parameters, and the simulated levels of HO x , NO x and XO compared with those observed. The model was able to replicate the mean levels and diurnal variation in the halogen oxides IO and BrO, and to reproduce NO x levels and speciation very well. The NO x source term implemented compared well with that directly measured in the course of the CHABLIS experiments.


In this article, a collection of conditions to achieve asymptotic stability of switched nonlinear systems with guaranteed safety via a state-dependent switching law are provided, where the asymptotic stability of individual subsystem is not assumed. Multiple barrier functions and multiple Lyapunov functions (MLFs) are merged as a tool for analyzing the asymptotic stability with guaranteed safety control problem of switched nonlinear systems. Meanwhile, the state-dependent switching law is designed to refrain zeno phenomenon. Moreover, bilinear sum of squares methodologies are employed to construct corresponding MLFs for switched nonlinear systems. Finally, three simulation examples are introduced to prove the effectiveness of the provided method.


Anti‐muscarinic type 3 receptor autoantibodies (M3R) and anti‐SSA antibodies are both related to salivary secretion. The presence of M3R antibodies in Sjögren's syndrome is previously demonstrated; nevertheless, the relationship between the anti‐SSA antibodies and M3R fragment antibodies, namely the N terminal, first, second, and third extracellular loops, remains to be elucidated. In this study, we analyzed the antibodies against the M3R epitopes in healthy controls and anti‐SSA antibody‐positive connective tissue disease patients through ELISA method. Antibodies against the first, second, and third extracellular loop (M3R211–230) were not increased in anti‐SSA positive patients compared to healthy controls. Indeed, antibodies against the N terminal (M3R1–33) were found to be high in healthy controls. High levels of M3R1–33 in healthy controls are a novel original finding; further research is needed for the clinical significance. There is no significant difference between SSA‐positive patients and healthy controls in terms of autoantibodies against the remainder of the linear M3R fragments.


Harmonious education is one of the key problems in building a harmonious society.At present,there is a great gap in quality between teachers at grass-root areas and those in towns,especially in the mid-west part of China.The weakness of teaching staff has become the "bottlenecks" that restrict the development of education in rural areas,so it is the foremost focus to solve the rural-urban education gap.This paper will analyze the employment and tendency of graduates of normal university at basic schools,and provide the basis for promoting graduates to work at grass-root schools in the future.


A notional 440 kW auxiliary power unit has been developed for 300 passenger commercial transport aircraft in 2015AD. A hybrid engine using solid-oxide fuel cell stacks and a gas turbine bottoming cycle has been considered. Steady-state performance analysis during cruise operation has been presented. Trades between performance efficiency and system mass were conducted with system specific energy as the discriminator. Fuel cell performance was examined with an area specific resistance. The ratio of fuel cell versus turbine power was explored through variable fuel utilization. Area specific resistance, fuel utilization, and mission length had interacting effects upon system specific energy. During cruise operation, the simple cycle fuel cell/gas turbine hybrid was not able to outperform current turbine-driven generators for system specific energy, despite a significant improvement in system efficiency. This was due in part to the increased mass of the hybrid engine, and the increased water flow required for onboard fuel reformation. Two planar, anode-supported cell design concepts were considered. Designs that seek to minimize the metallic interconnect layer mass were seen to have a large effect upon the system mass estimates.Copyright © 2005 by ASME


To assess the potential application of terahertz waves in security examination, the transmission characteristics of terahertz waves in packaging materials should be studied. This paper simulates the propagation of terahertz waves in cloth and paper, studies the changes of shape and position of crest of terahertz waves before and after these materials, and gets the law of these changes, which has potential applications in thickness measurement for the thin insulated materials; gives reflected and transmitted wave of terahertz waves, and computes reflected and transmitted coefficient, indicates the good transmission properties of these materials for terahertz waves, which provides the theoretical basis for the realization of contactless security examination of packaged post, package and people pass the important passageway (such as airport and station).


The double-slit electron diffraction experiment is an ideal experiment for explaining the waveparticle duality. It serves as the.experiment basis for the wave-particle duality of material particles and the statistical explanation of a wave function. Bat how do the electrons pass through the double-slit and form the interference patterns? In this paper the answer is exploded by experiment combined with wave-particle duality and uncertainty principle.


Current approaches for autonomous crack detection are mainly based on supervised learning, which relies on a large number of annotated examples for training. However, it requires a time-consuming and labor-intensive image acquisition process. This paper proposes a transductive approach based on the improved Prototypical Network (ProtoNet) for few-shot crack detection to solve this issue. Its architecture consists of a cross-domain feature encoder and a linear classifier. The feature embedding is achieved through pre-trained DNN backbones from ImageNet, and the transductive inference is based on Euclidean distance after embedding normalization. The approach is validated on a public dataset for automatic bridge crack detection, which can achieve over 94% mean accuracy for 2-way 5-shot crack identification in the test set through pre-trained GoogleNet backbone after fine-tuning. The approach is also tested using real bridge inspection images, demonstrating its capability of fast implementation for crack detection with weakly supervised information under practical scenarios.


An efficient, telescopic, and scalable process for an antihypertensive drug substance, valsartan with an overall yield of 58%, and ∼99.9% purity is described. A simple, and safe process is developed for the recovery of tributyltin chloride from the tributyltin hydroxide, byproduct formed in the tetrazole ring construction, and reused in the synthesis of valsartan.


The invention provides high-flash-point alcohol ether diesel oil which is prepared from the following raw materials in percentage by mass: 5%-15% of mixed alcohol, 10%-18% of polymethoxy dimethyl ether (DMM), 0.03%-1% of glycol ethylene ether, 0.05%-0.3% of an additive and the balance of diesel oil. According to the alcohol ether diesel oil, other main physical and chemical indexes can all meet or exceed the requirements of GB252-2011 standards of national standard diesel while the high flash point of more than 55 DEG C is ensured, the shortcomings of unsafe storage, transportation and use and no practicality of conventional alcohol ether diesel oil or fuel due to an excessively low flash point are overcome, the discharge is low, few PM particles are generated, the environment is improved, and the atmospheric haze is controlled, so that the high-flash-point alcohol ether diesel oil is clean fuel oil with practical application values at present.


Abstract As a Korean endemic plant, Salix koriyanagi Kimura ex Goerz belongs to the genus Salix L. which is the largest genus of Salicaceae. In this study, we presented a complete chloroplast genome of S. koriyanagi which is 155,707 bp and has four sub-regions: 84,484 bp of large single copy (LSC) and 16,125 bp of small single copy (SSC) regions are separated by 27,549 bp of inverted repeat (IR) regions including 130 genes (83 coding regions, 8 rRNAs, and 38 tRNAs). The overall GC contents of the chloroplast genome were 36.7% and in the LSC, SSC, and IR regions were 34.4%, 31.00%, and 41.8%, respectively. A phylogenetic analysis showed that S. koriyanagi is distinct from Salix purpurea, which is incongruent to relationship based on their phenotypes.


During the last two decades, the scene in education is rapidly changing by the deployment of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT). Smart classes, virtual classrooms, online collaborative educational experiences and emerging WEB 2.0 applications are increasingly used, either as stand alone or blended with conventional education. Additionally, as emphasis is shifting from 'teaching' to 'learning', technologies that promote active, participative learning, such as computer based audience response systems, are employed in order to enhance students' participation and explore their degree of understanding. This paper presents our approach in combining online active learning and active learning in class in the case of medical education.


SUMMARY Exploration of the presence of risk for compassion fatigue among residential childcare workers (RCW) at residential treatment facilities and the relationship between self-care practices and compassion fatigue were explored. Using the Professional Quality of Life Survey (ProQOL-R III) to assess compassion fatigue, burnout, and compassion satisfaction among RCWs workers at two residential facilities for emotionally disturbed children, this study identified demographic and self-care practices that correlate with risk for compassion fatigue. Findings are interpreted and recommendations for RCWs and administrators of residential treatment programs for emotionally disturbed children are presented.


Christopher Marlowe's body was barely cold before the English began to tell ghost stories about him. Derided by his enemies as a filthy playmaker, he was apotheosized as a translunary poet by George Peele, George Chapman, Thomas Nashe, Michael Drayton, and others who ushered him into the celestial company of antique authors shortly after his death in 1593. By 1600, Marlowe was for Thomas Thorpe purely a figment of print, to whom he referred as a "ghost or genius" in his dedicatory epistle to Lucan's First Book, one who could be seen to "walk the Churchyard in (at the least) three or four sheets."1 He becomes a textual specter, wrapped in manuscript, resurrected through the medium of print. Perhaps the churchyard Thorpe had in mind was Paul's-where Walter Burre vended this translation of the Pharsalia at the Sign of the Flower de Luce. By the turn of the century, Marlowe is imagined as a disembodied ghostwriter, his literary afterlife quite separate from his unquiet corporeal term. But this reading is too neat by half. As a playwright, he continued to throw his shade across the stages of London, particularly at the new Fortune Theater, where his plays were undergoing another revival at the beginning of the seventeenth century, his various theatrical creations re-embodied by his shadow, Edward Alleyn.This essay is a story about the way dead plays and playwrights haunted the Fortune in the late autumn of 1600, spun from the theatrical records that survive for the Admiral's company at this time. It is, therefore, like all ghost stories, not true, although the peculiar quality of such stories is that they scarcely rely or presume on credibility yet are committed to their own brand of seriousness. As trivial as tall tales, ghost stories provide a form of popular eschatology and are therefore "good to think with." They manage memory, organize anxiety about mortality into a narrative form, and enable the quick and the present to negotiate with the past and the dead. They combine nostalgia with the uncanny, but one argument here is that the Elizabethan word for "nostalgia" was "ghost."My argument is that one thing the Admiral's company was up to upon their move into the Fortune was the telling of ghost stories, lilis argument would seem to contravene a central critical practice-maybe even a responsibility-to demystify the practices of the theatrical past. Yet I contend that the company were themselves (unwittingly) fabricating a mythical history, uncanny and nostalgic, by reviving the plays of Marlowe and other dead playwrights. This latter trend has not escaped scholars such as Andrew Gurr, who characterizes the Admiral's repertory as "traditional" or even "outdated," part of a general plump for the Fortune as a "citizens' playhouse" to distinguish it from the presumably more outre offerings of the Blackfriars or Globe.2 I do not entirely disagree, but such commentators arguably respond to the Admiral's aggressive marketing campaign to construct just such a narrative for itself, to write itself into theater history, forging (in both senses) a corporate history that privileged continuity over change, nostalgia over novelty, and revivalism over innovation. This dynamic relied upon the resurrection and simultaneous creation of "classic" plays of the recent past, an effort that threw living playwrights into collaboration with their dead predecessors, a model of writing that muddies any attempt to characterize the period's writing culture as purely "singular" or "plural." My tack here will be to analyze the effects of repertoriai nostalgia on our notions of emergent paradigms of authorship. The Admiral's servants, circa 1600, were not laying the ghosts of the theatrical past but rather stirring them, developing a repertoriai ethos anchored by several charismatic members of the dead poet's society, with Marlowe at its center.This story shadows a more immediately available novelty narrative about the opening of the Fortune. …


Online teaching is a virtual teaching mode developed with the help of modern information technology, which is widely used in colleges and universities. Online teaching has the advantage of learning across time and space, but it also brings problems such as ineffective classroom management and poor learning effect. To improve the existing problems in the current situation, we need to do a good job in teaching preparation, strict management of teaching and learning process, timely feedback and improvement of the existing problems. Students, teachers, and organizations need to join efforts to improve the quality of teaching.


BACKGROUND
Treatment of advanced thyroid cancer (TC) with antiangiogenic drugs, including lenvatinib (LEN), associates with several adverse events. Hypocalcemia has been reported in registration studies, but scanty data are available from real-life cohorts. Aim of our study was to report the prevalence and to describe the characteristics and the management of hypocalcemia in patients on LEN treatment.

METHODS
We enrolled consecutive patients, followed-up at our single tertiary center, who received LEN for at least six months for advanced TC. Phosphocalcic metabolism and bone mineral density were evaluated during treatment.

RESULTS
We included 25 patients treated for a mean of 29 ± 19 months (range 6-68 months). Hypocalcemia occurred in 6/25 patients (24%), being of grade ≥3 in 2/25 patients (8%), and recurrent in 4/6 patients. Median time to onset of hypocalcemia was 3 months (range 0.5-13 months) from LEN start. No differences were found between who developed and who did not develop hypocalcemia regarding either starting and mean dose of LEN or several clinico-pathological characteristics. Patients who developed hypocalcemia had more frequently, albeit not significantly, osteoporosis (75% vs 33.3%) and gastrointestinal side effects (diarrhea, vomit/nausea, weight loss). During the hypocalcemic crisis, the 2 patients with grade ≥3 hypocalcemia had low magnesium and low or inappropriately normal parathormone (PTH) levels, while 2/3 patients with grade 2 hypocalcemia had a secondary hyperparathyroidism. Hypocalcemia was managed with calcium oral supplementation or intravenous treatment and with transient LEN withdrawal, when necessary.

CONCLUSIONS
Hypocalcemia is frequent during LEN treatment, with a prevalence higher than that reported in the registration SELECT trial (24 vs 6.9%). Both PTH-dependent and PTH-independent mechanisms have been shown to lead to hypocalcemia in the present cohort. Moreover, osteoporosis and gastrointestinal side effects could be considered as predisposing conditions, though further studies are needed to get more insights into other possible risk factors to monitor. Since hypocalcemia can be a life-threatening condition, monitoring of calcium levels is required, in particular during the first year of treatment. Oral calcium supplementation can correct hypocalcemia if promptly diagnosed; however, up to 10% of patients may require intravenous treatment and LEN transient discontinuation.


A significant proportion ofaccounts of eventspublished in typographical workshops from Granada between the end of the 16th century and the first third of the 17th involving the city in a events constructed from a reality that marks the evolution of international relations: the war between Christians and Ottomans.  All of them, it emanates from a particular story about the 'Turkish', bringing us the collective imagination, official strategies of interaction-constraintor certaindefinitions identity, among other  multiple aspects. A stage convulsed on which these old journalism pieces offer a particular representation, appealing to the collective emotions, and that more important than the facts itself, is its legitimation.


In this paper, a microwave photonic dual band radar based on a photonic-assisted de-chirp processing receiver is proposed. The dual band operation is realized independently and simultaneously with a single set of hardware. At a transmitter end, two linear frequency-modulated signals separately located in C-band and Ku-band are transmitted, echoes are collected and sent to a receiver to implement photonic-assisted de-chirp processing. At the receiver end, a main modulator with a special structure, which consists of four parallel sub-modulators, is employed. The echoes and reference signals of C-band and Ku-band are applied to two pairs of sub-modulators of the main modulator, which are biased at the peak points for C-band and biased at the null points for Ku-band. In this case, the intermediate frequency signals of C-band and Ku-band produced by de-chirp processing locate at two different frequencies. Thus operation in different bands based on a unified system is achieved. An experiment operating in C-band and Ku-band with a bandwidth of 700 MHz and 3600 MHz is conducted. The results verify the concept of the dual band radar and show the potential of photonic technology to improve the performance of modern radar system.


AIM: To investigate the effects of nitric oxide(NO) on peripheral blood dendritic cells(DCs) in patients with bladder cancer.METHODS: DCs were obtained from peripheral blood mononuclear cells(PBMC) in patients with bladder cancer.The DCs were cultured in the presence of granulocyte/macrophage colony stimulating factor(1×10~6 U/L),interleukin-4(5×10~5 U/L),tumor necrosis factor-α(10~5 U/L) and tumor-associated antigen(TAA) extracted from human bladder cancer cell line T-24.The phenotypes(CD1a,CD80,CD86 and HLA-DR) were determined by flow cytometry.The proliferation of lymphocytes induced by DCs and the cytotoxicity of cytotoxic T lymphocytes(CTL) were assayed in the presence of NO.Bladder cancer cell line T-24 was cultured as target cells and the cytotoxicity of CTL was determined by MTT assay.RESULTS: The proliferation of lymphocytes induced by DCs was inhibited by NO in a dose-dependent manner(P0.01).The NO resulted in an inhibition of the cytotoxicity of CTL against bladder cancer cell line T-24(P0.01).The DC in vitro induced by TAA effectively resulted in the proliferation of lymphocytes [proliferation rate:(74±6)%] and the killing effect was significant on the bladder cancer cell line T-24 by CTL [killing rate:(54±3)%].CONCLUSION: NO can inhibit the proliferation and the activation of lymphocytes induced by DCs and down-regulate the antitumor cytotoxicity of CTL in patients with bladder cancer.


Quantitative OCT measurements of optical parameters such as the attenuation coefficient could allow for better differentiation between healthy and diseased tissues. To investigate relationship between the attenuation coefficient and OCT signal we developed a Monte Carlo (MC) simulation method for OCT measurements that takes into account the confocal function. To validate the MC model simulations were compared to OCT measurements on phantoms. Both the A-lines, and attenuation coefficients extracted from the A-lines based on a singly scattered model, matched well between the simulated and experimentally measured data.


A 67-year-old man with a year history of palpitations and dyspnoea presented to the physician's office. His blood pressure was 140/80 mm Hg and pulse was 80 beats/min. Heart auscultation revealed a loud systolic click followed by a holosystolic murmur. The ECG showed sinus rhythm, P wave +/− in V1 and P wave duration 140 ms in DII. The Holter monitoring showed atrial extrasystoles and an episode of atrial tachycardia (figure 1A).

Figure 1
( A ) The Holter monitoring showed atrial extrasystoles and an episode of atrial tachycardia. ( B ) M-mode …