We recently reported that low-intensity conditioning combined with facilitating cell (FC)-enriched hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (FCRx) can safely achieve high levels of durable chimerism in unrelated and related mismatched kidney transplant (KTx) recipients. This is associated with stable renal function, complete absence of GHVD, and successful withdrawal of immunosuppression (IS). We herein present interim follow-up of now 19 subjects and present data to demonstrate that donor specific hypoactivity does not correlate with tolerance to the renal allograft if chimerism is not present.

HLA-mismatched related (n = 12) and unrelated (n = 8) living donor KTx recipients were conditioned with fludarabine (days -5,-4,-3), cyclophosphamide (50 mg/kg day -3, +3), 200 cGy TBI, (day -1), KTx (day 0), followed by infusion of cryopreserved G-CSF mobilized FCRx (day +1). Multilineage chimerism was assessed prospectively by STR analysis. Mixed lymphocyte reaction (MLR) and cell mediated lympholysis (CML) assays were performed to assess donor-specific hyporeactivity.

Subjects ranged in age from 18-65 years. 18 of 19 patients demonstrated peripheral blood macrochimerism at 1 month post-transplant (6% - 100%). The one patient who failed to engraft was highly sensitized (Class I PRA > 40%). No subjects developed acute or chronic GVHD or "engraftment syndrome." Chimerism was transient in 4 subjects, each of which received either a suboptimal cell dose or had PRA > 20%. Durable whole blood and T cell chimerism was achieved in 14 subjects. All patients demonstrated in vitro donor-specific hyporesponsiveness (DSH) by MLR +/- CML post-transplant regardless of chimerism status. However, DSH in patients who lost chimerism was not predictive of successful IS weaning, as 3 of 4 transiently chimeric patients with DSH had subclinical Banff 1A rejection on protocol biopsy and while on tacrolimus monotherapy. Recurrence of underlying autoimmune disease has only occurred in subjects who were transiently chimeric. Protocol biopsies in chimeric subjects have exhibited normal histology for up to 3 years. Nine chimeric subjects are completely off IS from 1-34 months. The remainder are in the process of weaning.

The presence of durable, high level whole blood and T cell chimerism in combined kidney + FCRx recipients is a robust biomarker of tolerance. DSH alone without donor chimerism in the first post-transplant year does not predict successful IS withdrawal or tolerance.

Disclosures: Tollerud: Regenerex, LLC: Equity Ownership. Ildstad: Regenerex, LLC: Equity Ownership.


White Bison has been effective in training 388 peer recovery support persons, known as Firestarters, to implement standardized, Native-focused, peer recovery programs based on the traditional knowledge of tribal elders. Following the elders' Four Laws of Change, White Bison has demonstrated the program capacity to build indigenous support communities of Wellbriety, which are facilitated by these healthy and sober spiritual leaders. Using the Native paradigm of evidence-based model programs, effectiveness has been measured and validated through success at generating this human capital of civic leadership. In turn, using a clan model of Wellbriety, community coalitions have begun to emerge to sustain the work of the Firestarters through local Healing Forests that correct for multigenerational family problems that have grown up in the wake of high rates of addiction.


We show that the invariant method (Pinski and Narin, 1976), recently axiomatised by Palacios-Huerta and Volij (2004), and used to quality-rank academic journals is subject to manipulation: a journal can boost its performance by making additional citations to other journals.


Abstract This paper focuses on the pattern of care in two Adelaide lunatic asylums between 1858 and 1884. Prior to 1867, Robert Moore, the Colonial Surgeon, introduced a curative orientation to care. But with the appointment of Alexander Paterson as Colonial Surgeon in 1867, a custodial model developed which was consistent with Paterson's ideas on the nature of mental illness. This paper suggests that the curative model was not in the interests of attendants and nurses: (1) curative practices were more time-consuming, (2) with the increasing number of criminal and dangerous patients being admitted, the keepers became more and more intimidated, and so resorted to custodial measures. In taking advantage of shifts in medical thinking, the asylum keepers, accordingly, had an influential role in effecting the change from curative to custodial care.


Korean folk medicine 'Ma Ga Mog' has been used as a remedy for rheumatis, cough and bronchitis in Korea. The botanical origin of the crude drug has been no pharmacognostical confirmation on it. To clarify the botanical origin of 'Ma Ga Mog', the anatomical characteristics of the bark of Sorbus amure...


Different from gradient-based neural networks, a special kind of recurrent neural network (RNN) has recently been proposed by Zhang for online matrix inversion. Such an RNN is designed based on a matrix-valued error function instead of a scalar-valued error function. In addition, it was depicted in an implicit dynamics instead of an explicit dynamics. In this paper, we develop and investigate a discrete-time model of Zhang neural network (termed as such and abbreviated as ZNN for presentation convenience), which is depicted by a system of difference equations. Comparing with Newton iteration for matrix inversion, we find that the discrete-time ZNN model incorporates Newton iteration as its special case. Noticing this relation, we perform numerical comparisons on different situations of using ZNN and Newton iteration for matrix inversion. Different kinds of activation functions and different step-size values are examined for superior convergence and better stability of ZNN. Numerical examples demonstrate the efficacy of both ZNN and Newton iteration for online matrix inversion.


Anoplophora glabripennis (Motschulsky) (Coleoptera: Cerambycidae), a longhorned beetle species native to Asia, has been introduced into several North American and European cities. Currently, eradication and preventive measures are limited to identifying and destroying infested trees and protecting uninfested trees with trunk or soil-injections of the systemic insecticides imidacloprid.


Abstract Graphene aerogel‐supported manganese ferrite (MnxFe3−xO4/GAs) and reduced‐graphene oxide/manganese ferrite composite (MnFe2O4/rGO) were synthesized and studied as cathode catalysts for oxygen reduction reactions in urea/O2 fuel cells. MnFe2O4/GAs exhibited a 3D framework with a continuous macroporous structure. Among the investigated Fe/Mn ratios, the more positive oxygen reduction onset potential was observed with Fe/Mn=2/1. The half‐wave potential of MnFe2O4/GAs was considerably more positive than that of MnFe2O4/rGO and comparable with that of Pt/C, while the stability of MnFe2O4/GAs significantly higher than that of Pt/C. The best urea/O2 fuel cell performance was also observed with the MnFe2O4/GAs. The MnFe2O4/GAs exhibited an OCV of 0.713 V and a maximum power density of 1.7 mW cm−2 at 60 °C. Thus, this work shows that 3D structured graphene aerogel‐supported MnFe2O4 catalysts can be used as an efficient cathode material for alkaline fuel cells.


In work results of 14 years probes of a resource of a serial diesel engine of diesel locomotive ЧМЭ-3 and in particular a resource of the details limiting life cycle of a diesel engine sleeves of cylinders, the top flutes of piston rings and a cylindrical part of buckets are resulted. During operation from November, 1989 till 13.10.2008 the diesel engine has turned out 137718 motor-hours and 3 times replacement of цилиндро-piston groups was made. The first replacement has taken place after an operating time 36232 motor-hours, the second after 54974 motor-hours, the third after 46512 motor-hours. It is established, that the resource of цилиндро-piston group of a serial diesel engine of diesel locomotive ЧМЭ-3 is within the limits of 36-55 thousand motor-hours. Work is executed with the purpose of an estimation of a resource of the shunting diesel locomotives maintained in Ukraine now.


This article elaborates on the functions of the second-pass pressure compensating valves in the load sensing system of boring machines,which provides a reliable theoretical basis for the use,maintenance,and trouble-shooting of the equipment.


Abstract The relationship between the distribution of Panonychus ulmi (Koch) and cluster size was examined. As the population intensity increased, P. ulmi numbers and distribution tended to be more closely related to the number of leaves in a cluster.


We describe here the modeling of highly heterogeneous plates, when three different lenght scales are present: the area of the middle surface, the plate thickness, and the heterogeneity scale. We derive a two-dimensional PDE model for such problem, which turns out to have rough coefficients. We employ asymptotic techniques to estimate the modeling error with respect to the thickness. To tame the numerical troubles of the resulting model we use finite elements methods of multiscale type.


An outline description is given of the University of British Columbia (U.B.C.) watershed and flow models, which are a set of computer programs for the calculation of hydrologic behaviour of watershed and river systems. The U.B.C. watershed model calculates snowmelt and rain runoff from meteorological data for mountainous watersheds. The model can be operated continuously for any number of years without reinitialization. The watershed model can be interfaced with the U.B.C. flow model which routes and combines the flows from a complex network of watersheds through downstream channels, lakes, or reservoirs.A revised temperature index for the calculation of snowmelt is presented and illustrated. In addition to using the mean daily air temperature, use is made of the diurnal temperature range to describe additional radiant energy input and the minimum temperature is used to approximate dewpoint and vapour exchange.The enhanced watershed response resulting from high intensity rainfall is examined and it is sho...


Long-term tracking is an expanding field with applications in logistics, ecology and wearable computing. The main challenge for longevity of tracking applications is the high energy consumption of GPS, which has been addressed by using low power sensors to trigger GPS activation upon detecting events of interest. While triggering can reduce power consumption, static thresholds can underperform in the longterm as context changes. This paper presents an auto-covariance based triggering algorithm that adapts trigger thresholds based on the incoming data and is effective with limited prior knowledge. We test the algorithm on empirical data from flying foxes and show that it outperforms static thresholding and existing adaptive algorithms from the literature.


The possible transmission of high power laser beams over long distances and their conversion to thrust, electricity, or other useful forms of energy is considered. Specific topics discussed include: laser induced chemistry; developments in photovoltaics, including modification of the Schottky barrier devices and generation of high voltage emf'sby laser radiation of piezoelectric ceramics; the thermo electronic laser energy converter and the laser plasmadynamics converters; harmonic conversion of infrared laser radiation in molecular gases; and photon engines.


Even in a special "drama and the novel" issue, the reader will no doubt find it strange to encounter what she encounters here: in a publication devoted to modem theatre , a piece that discusses a nineteenth-century novel — neither drama, nor modern, certainly not theatre — a mere essay surfacing among scholarly articles.


Ethnopharmacological relevance: Cistanche deserticola (CD) known as "ginseng of the desert" is used in Chinese traditional medicine. Currently most Cistanche deserticola is gathered in Kazakhstan and exported to China and South Korea. Cistanche is considered to be stronger than ginseng. Few studies have investigated the chemical composition and biological properties of this plant. The present study was designed to explore biological activity, medicinal properties of Cistanche deserticola for potential production of herbal remedies, teas and energy drinks.


Activation of bovine chymotrypsinogen is catalyzed with increasing velocity by human, rabbit, boar, bull and ram acrosin. Antiboar-acrosin rabbit gamma-globulins cause a significant reduction in the proenzyme activation rate induced by boar and bull acrosin, but only a weak reduction or none if ram or rabbit acrosin is the activating agent. The antiboar-acrosin gamma-globulins from sheep strongly inhibit chymotrypsinogen activation by ram, bull and boar acrosin, and significantly inhibit the human acrosin-catalyzed reaction.


In this paper, we develop a framework to maximize the network energy efficiency (EE) by optimizing joint user-base station (BS) association, subchannel assignment, and power control considering an in-band full-duplex (IBFD)-enabled small-cell network. We maximize EE (ratio of network aggregate throughput and power consumption) while guaranteeing a minimum data rate requirement in both the uplink and downlink. The considered problem belongs to the category of mixed-integer non-linear programming problem (MINLP), and thus is NP-hard. To cope up with this complexity and to derive a trade-off between system throughput and energy utilization, we first restate the considered problem as a multi-objective optimization problem (MOOP) aiming at maximizing system's throughput and minimizing system's energy consumption, simultaneously. This MOOP is then tackled by using $\epsilon $ -constraint method. To do so, we first transform the binary subchannel and BS assignment variables into continuous ones without altering the feasible region of the problem and then approximate the non-convex rate functions through majorization-minimization (MM) approach. Simulation results are presented to demonstrate the effectiveness of our proposed algorithm in improving network's EE compared to the existing literature. Furthermore, simulation results unveil that by employing the IBFD capability in OFDMA networks, our proposed resource allocation algorithm achieves a 69% improvement in the EE as compared to the half-duplex system for practical values of residual self-interference.


To better understand the thermodynamic behaviour of chlorine in blast furnaces, CaO‐SiO2‐Al2O3 slags were brought into equilibrium with Ar + H2 + HCl + H2O gas mixtures at temperatures between 1673 K and 1798 K. The dissolution of chlorine into molten slags could be well interpreted through a reaction: (1/2) {CaO}slag + (HCl) = {Ca1/2Cl}slag + (1/2) (H2O). Conforming to this formula, a linear relation was observed between log (%CI) and log (PHCL2/PH2O) with an anticipated slope of 1/2.


The Tec family tyrosine kinase, Itk, regulates signaling downstream of the TCR. The absence of Itk in CD4 + T cells results in impaired Th2 responses along with defects in maturation, cytokine production, and survival of i NKT cells. Paradoxically, Itk 2 / 2 mice have spontaneously elevated serum IgE levels, resulting from an expansion of the V g 1.1 + V d 6.3 + subset of gd T cells, known as gd NKT cells. Comparisons between gd NKT cells and ab i NKT cells showed convergence in the pattern of cell surface marker expression, cytokine profiles, and gene expression, suggesting that these two subsets of NKT cells undergo similar differentiation programs. Hepatic gd NKT cells have an invariant TCR and are derived predominantly from fetal progenitors that expand in the thymus during the first weeks of life. The adult thymus contains these invariant gd NKT cells plus a heterogeneous population of V g 1.1 + V d 6.3 + T cells with diverse CDR3 sequences. This latter population, normally excluded from the liver, escapes the thymus and homes to the liver when Itk is absent. In addition, Itk 2 / 2 gd NKT cells persistently express high levels of Zbtb16 (PLZF) and Il4 , genes that are normally downregulated in the most mature subsets of NKT cells. These data indicate that Itk signaling is required to prevent the expansion of gd NKT cells in the adult thymus, to block their emigration, and to promote terminal NKT cell maturation. The Journal of Immunology , 2013, 190: 000–000. he Tec family tyrosine kinase, Itk, regulates signal trans-duction in T cells via the TCR. In the absence of Itk, T cells have defects in phospholipase C- g 1 activation, calcium mobilization, MAPK


Under the background of the current development of science and technology, new technologies have been applied in the development of various industries in the neighboring cities, and they are widely used in the process of government public administration. The scientific and effective application of big data technology can provide convenience for management decision-making and ensure the stable development of society. The government must conduct effective public administration, and all kinds of information and data play an extremely important role in the management process. The government's public administration is the foundation to ensure the stable development of society, and the specific management needs the support of relevant data information, and the application of big data technology can play a positive role. Through big data technology, we can improve the government's ability of public administration and decision-making, break the shackles of traditional ideas, and constantly pay attention to the reform and innovation of ideas. At the same time, we should improve the system, analyze the influence of big data on government's public administration and decision-making, and seize the opportunity to pay attention to all aspects of reform based on big challenges, so as to provide reference for readers, and then achieve the purpose of improving government's ability of public administration and decision-making. This paper analyzes the characteristics of big data, its attributes and significance in government public administration, and then expounds the application strategies of big data in government public administration, and studies the relationship between big data and government public administration decision-making, hoping to help improve government public administration decision-making.


■ Abstract Processes operating beneath glaciers can have a greater influence on flow dynamics than those operating within them. The variety and complexity of these processes, which involve interactions among ice, water, and geological solids, resist efforts to establish simple truths and can lead to surprising outcomes. Thermal conditions at the ice-bed interface (melting or nonmelting) and the mechanical properties of the glacier substrate (soft or hard) determine which processes can be activated. The warm-soft case supports the greatest variety of processes and is the most important for fast-flow dynamics and for the mobilization of subglacial sediment. Process interactions can lead to oscillations and spatio-temporal switching behavior in glaciers and ice sheets as well as to the generation of subglacial landforms.


In this thesis a thorough literature review is taken of infrared type-II superlattice (T2SL) detectors, specifically in the long wave and very long wave bands of the infrared spectrum. Then a mid-wave infrared T2SL detector grown by MBE is fabricated and characterised. A dark current of 1x10-4A/cm2 at 77K is achieved without any surface treatment or passivation. A responsivity of 0.45A/W and detectivity of 1.3x1010cmHz1/2/W is measured at a peak wavelength of 3.7µm and a cut-off wavelength of 4.5µm, at 77K. Following this the device is then modelled using the Schrodinger-Poisson solver Nextnano 3 (Nn3), this is used to confirm the band-gap of the device. A band-gap of 0.353eV equivalent to a 3.5µm cut-off wavelength is simulated. Then the X-ray diffraction (XRD) graph is simulated and compared to experimental data to see the difference between the theoretical structure and that grown by molecular beam epitaxy (MBE). The XRD shows good agreement with the intended structure, with only a 1.5% discrepancy in lattice period. Then the XRD software is used to simulate a Very long-wave infrared (VLWIR) T2SL device grown on an InAs substrate, to lay the foundations for further research into a VLWIR avalanche photodiode (APD). Several strain balanced structures with various interface layers are reviewed.


Take the journey with an attorney who has given up the practice of law in favor of a more civilized form of conflict resolution. What caused him to make the switch? What new skills did he need? What old skills did he continue to use?


The utility model discloses a heavy current and constant current discharging device of a parallel type storage battery, which is characterized in that the device comprises one or more constant current discharging modules mutually connected in parallel; the discharging modules are connected with one another through communication lines; and each discharging module is connected with the storage battery. The discharging module achieves coarse adjustment or fine adjustment of discharged currents by controlling the filing number of fling-cut switches and regulating current set values sent to a direct current converter. The device has the advantages that the precision of current discharging control and regulation is high, the structure is simple, the parallel connection of the discharging modules of different capacities can be realized, and different current distribution modes, such as automatic modes, manual modes and the like, can be realized during parallel connection.


The aim of this paper is to provide a contribution to the analysis of the 3D, high Reynolds number, turbulent, separated and reattached flow around a fixed sharp-edged rectangular cylinder with a chord-to-depth ratio equal to 5. The present computational study is developed in the frame of the Benchmark on the Aerodynamics of a Rectangular Cylinder (BARC). First, the adopted flow modelling and computational approach are described. Second, some of the 2D mechanisms that are responsible for the variation of the fluctuating pressure on the side surface are scrutinised: the computational approach post-processing facilities are employed to point out the flow structures which mainly affect the vortex formation and shedding past the separation point and to look for significant relationships between them and the pressure field on the cylinder side surface


Poverty is damaging the health of children in the UK and must be urgently tackled by the next government, paediatricians have warned.

The Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health and the Child Poverty Action Group, in a joint report based on an online survey of 266 paediatricians working at 90 NHS trusts in the UK,1 asked doctors for their views on how poverty is affecting the physical and mental health of the children they see and whether things are getting better or worse. …


Photograph of Stan Kenton at the Pennsylvania Lounge, observing a jewelry box. He is surrounded by other men who are watching him.


Shogaol and gingerol, compounds in ginger, can act as antiemetic. Ginger extract was formulatedby patch transdermal to increase the effectiveness of therapy and to minimize the side effects. Inthis study, maceration with ethanol 96% was used as extraction method and phytochemical screeningwas carried out to the extract to identfy the exctracted compounds. The formulation of transdermalpatch used matrix method with ginger extract concentrations of 0,5 gr (F1), 1 gr (F2), and 1,5 gr (F3).Evaluation of patch was carried out by organoleptic test, patch weight, thickness, tensile strength,elongation at break, modulus young, moisturizer test, and folding endurance. Effectiveness test usedwistar mice by observed the pica response and a decreasing in kaolin consumption. The yield of theextract obtained was 6,46% and it contained essential oils, flavonoids, steroids, and polyphenols. Thebest patch characteristics of the concentration was F3 with a patch weight of 0,39 gr, thickness 0,23mm, tensile strength 1,32 N/mm2, elongation at break 129,52%, young's modulus 0,96 mPa, humidity1,32%, and folding endurance >200 times. F3 was also the most effective formulation with 6%response of pica and 93,11% of decreasing in kaolin consumption observed in day 9. In conclusion, F3can reduce nausea and vomiting.


From September to December 1989 Ipswich TAFE (an adult education facility near Brisbane, Queensland) hosted a Communication Course for five adults who each have a profound intellectual disability and physical disability (in the UK this is the equivalent of profound and multiple learning difficulties). None of the five students possess skills of intentional communication. The course is believed to be the first one of its kind in Australia and was of an experimental nature. The course content is described. The main aim of this presentation is to share information and to invite collaboration from others in similar areas of work.


New partial results are obtained related to the following old problem of Erd\"os: for any infinite set $X$ of real numbers to show that there is always a measurable (or, equivalently, closed) subset of reals of positive Lebesgue measure which contains no subset geometrically similar to $X$.


This paper addresses analytical aspects of deterministic, continuous-time dynamical systems defined on networks. The goal is to model and analyze certain phenomena which must be framed beyond the context of networked dynamical systems, understood as a set of interdependent dynamical systems defined on the nodes of a (possibly evolving) graph. In order to advocate for a more flexible approach to the study of network dynamics, we tackle some qualitative problems which do not fall in this working scenario. First, we address a stability problem on a network of heterogeneous agents, some of which are of dynamic nature while others just impose restrictions on the system behavior. Our second context assumes that the network is clustered, and we address a two-level stability problem involving the dynamics of both individual agents and groups. The aforementioned problems exhibit lines of non-isolated equilibria, and the analysis implicitly assumes a positiveness condition on the edge weights; the removal of this restriction complicates matters, and our third problem concerns a graph-theoretic characterization of the equilibrium set in the dynamics of certain networks with positive and negative weights, the results applying in particular to signed graphs. Our approach combines graph theory and dynamical systems theory, but also uses specific tools coming from linear algebra, including e.g. Gersgorin discs or Maxwell-type determinantal expansions. The results are of application in social, economic, and flow networks, among others, and are also aimed at motivating further research.


We present large sample evidence on the performance of domestic and U.S. (foreign) bidder firms acquiring Canadian targets. Domestic bidders earn significantly positive average announcement period abnormal returns, while U.S. bidder returns are indistinguishable from zero. Measures of pre- and post-acquisition abnormal accounting performance are also consistent with a superior domestic bidder performance. Domestic bidder announcement returns are, on average, greatest for offers involving stock payment and for the bidders with the smallest equity size relative to the target. Neither direct foreign investment controls, horizontal product market relationships, nor acquisition propensities explain why domestic bidders outperform their U.S. competitors.


I had been sterilized at the age of eleven, at the IHS [Indian Health Service I hospital here in the early 1950s. I got married in the 1960s and I went to the doctor and he told me that I had a partial hysterectomy. [When I was a child] they were giving us vaccinations and mine got infected and a nurse came and gave me some kind of shot so I wouldn't hurt. When I woke up my stomach was hurting and I was bleeding (Woman speaking on radio show, "Native America Calling," 2002). NEITHER THIS WOMAN NOR HER PARENTS HAD CONSENTED TO THE STERILIZATION procedure. Many Native women have such stories about being sterilized, either without their consent or through coercive means. Although voluntary sterilization is a popular, safe, and reliable form of birth control for many women, the unauthorized use of sterilization procedures on marginalized women constitutes abuse. Furthermore, numerous women in countries outside the United States have faced sterilization abuse. Various ideologies have contributed to the involuntary sterilization of women, especially women of color. Imperialism, capitalism, patriarchy, and Malthusianism have shaped social and socioeconomic standards by which many women and their fertility are valued. As capitalism and industrialization have expanded, so too has international interest in fertility control of "lower-class" people. The United States filters monies through agencies such as U.S. Agency for International Development, the Rockefeller Foundation, and the Ford Foundation for population control programs. These agencies were responsible for the sterilization of men and women in regions such as Puerto Rico, Brazil, Guatemala, Africa, and Panama (Mass, 1976). Some abuses continue today. "More than 20 years since testimony against the practice at the United Nations, Indigenous women in Mexico and other Latin American nations are still routinely sterilized without their consent" (Giago, 2000: A5). Likewise, colonialism intersected with patriarchy to directly threaten American Indian women through sterilization abuse. Scholars, such as Lisa Poupart and Andrea Smith, have examined the ramifications of colonialism and oppression on Indigenous women's bodies, reproductive health, and lives. Poupart (2002) discusses the devastating impact of Western European and American historical domination and oppression on American Indians, which has created and perpetuated injustices throughout Indian Country. The continued political, social, and economic oppression has left American Indian people, especially women, vulnerable to systematic abuse--in this case Indian Health Services (IHS). Paternalistic policies toward American Indians allow the federal government to make decisions on their behalf without their full consent or participation. "Just as a father makes decisions for his children, then, the oppressive structures within patriarchy--particularly those of state bureaucracies and multinational corporations--and those individuals acting as vehicles of authority make decisions for those groups deemed in need of guidance" (Poupart, 1996: 5). Furthermore, Smith (2003) points out that Native women threaten colonial structures through their ability to reproduce the next generation of colonial resistance. The state and mainstream U.S. society justify themselves in the encroachment upon the private lives of Native women by assuming control over their right to make their own decisions concerning their lives and their bodies. This encroachment has a double-edged blade. One side carries a sharpened edge that has cut away at women's right and ability to bear children, our next generation. It has inflicted invisible abuse and violence upon America Indian women and their cultures and communities because we cannot look at each other and know who has been sterilized. The other edge of the blade is silence. Sterilization abuse has silenced Indian women's voices through fear and shame. …


[Abstract] The geometry-variable hypersonic intake plays an important role in the next generation air-breathing propulsion system operating across a wide Mach spectrum. Among them, the turbine based combined cycle (TBCC) engine which operates in Mach regime ranging from zero to five, typically require a geometry-variable hypersonic intake capable of sucking high quality air with adaptive mass flow rate under different flight conditions. A trivariable adjustable rectangle hypersonic intake concept was derived in this paper from integrated multi-level performance analysis of TBCC propulsion system. The design process of the intake firstly worked out its configuration in design-point based on integration of intake with turbofan/ramjet hybrid engine by means of one-dimensional shock wave theory. Whereafter, the intake's geometry-viable scheme and its control laws in off-design points were acquired using a multi-object optimization algorithm based on intake and TBCC engine iterative interaction. Result of simulation demonstrated that the geometry-variable intake matched well with the turbofan/ramjet hybrid engine in the given Mach regime.


Ananas comosus (L.) Merr. (Bromiliaceae), commonly known as Pineapple, is native to Central and South America and grown in several tropical and subtropical countries including the Indian subcontinent. The present study assessed the chloroform and methanol extracts of A. comosus leaf for their acute anti-inflammatory potential by carrageenan induced paw oedema in Wistar albino rats. All of the test extracts exhibited significant anti-inflammatory activity. The methanol extract was found to be the most potent followed by the chloroform extract. The present preliminary study demonstrated marked acute anti-inflammatory activity of A. comosus leaf in Wistar rats.


This study of the effects of three years of piano instruction is based on a sample of 117 fourth-grade children attending public schools in Montreal. The children had never participated in formal music instruction, did not have a piano at home, and their annual family income was below $40,000 Can. Children in the experimental group (n= 63) received individual piano lessons weekly for three years and were given an acoustic piano at no cost to their families. Children in the control group (n= 54) did not participate in formal music instruction. Participants were administered tests of self-esteem, academic achievement, cognitive abilities, musical abilities, and motor proficiency at the beginning of the project and throughout the three years of piano instruction. The results indicated that piano instruction had a positive effect on children's self-esteem and school music marks but did not affect their academic achievement in math and language as measured by standardized tests and school report cards.


This paper present the low complexity PAPR reduction in the multi-carrier modulation scheme using partial transmit sequence. OFDM Suffers as the no of Subcarriers operating in the large dynamic range operates in the non-linear region of amplifier due to OFDM suffers the PAPR problem. Peak to Average Power Ratio (PAPR) is one of the serious problems in any wireless communication system using multi carrier modulation technique like OFDM, which reduces the efficiency of the transmit high power amplifier. In order to reduce PAPR, the sequence of input data is rearranged by the PTS for the reduction of PAPR. The results are performed using partial transmit sequence (PTS) technique for different route number which is most efficient technique for PAPR reduction when the number of subcarrier is large. Simulation also performed with different number of subcarrier for N=256 and 512. Comparative analysis is also presented for the different number of sub blocks with N=256 and N=512.


This evidence-based, practical overview of parental smoking and its effect on infants describes the role health visitors can play in educating pregnant women and parents/carers of young children on effective ways to stop smoking tobacco. A range of examples are offered of effective communication strategies which can engage pregnant women and other adults who smoke in reducing their children's risk of exposure to tobacco smoke. If parents and carers are contented smokers and not ready to change their habit, techniques to raise the issue of protecting children from exposure to second-hand smoke are explained. The article provides an overview of treatment for nicotine dependence, including nicotine replacement therapy, NHS Stop Smoking Services and harm-reduction approaches to smoking.


Mpilo Central Hospital is located in Bulawayo and deliveries 9000 deliveries per year. Bulawayo is the second largest city in Zimbabwe after the capital city Harare, with a population of 653, 337 as of the 2012 census.1The unit receives referrals from urban and rural centres. It is located in Matabeleland, 439 km southwest of Harare, on the way to Victoria Falls. In low-resource settings, women with breech presentations have limited choices regarding elective caesarean delivery and vaginal breech delivery due to lack of resources. Some present unbooked and in advanced labour.


The role of actuarial savings in determining the optimal solution to the consumer's problem is thoroughly analyzed taking into account the effect of transaction costs. Equilibrium conditions are obtained and compared with the classical ones. A numerical example is worked out. In the companion to this paper mathematical foundations were established. A proper treatment of transactions costs was shown to be essential in modeling the decisions relating to the determination of an optimal savings mix. Two types of actuarial savings were shown to be mutually exclusive.


The execution of new curriculum calls for the transformation of students'learning methods. Students must seek high quality in autonomous learning, must pursue real development in cooperative learning, must make innovations in research learning.


Beekeeping is one of the most important agricultural activities in Brazil. It is widespread in all regions of Brazil, obtaining honey in the Amazon, Atlantic Rainforest, Pantanal, Caatinga, Pampa Gaucho and Cerrado, becoming an instrument of economic inclusion and alternative employment and income. The Northern region has a recognized potential for the development of beekeeping. The present work aims to make a temporal analysis regarding the production of honey in the main producing states, highlighting the years from 1997 to 2016. Data on honey productivity in the North region were obtained from the website of the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE) through the SIDRA platform (Data Bank). Data were collected from all the states of the North region for the years 1997 to 2016. For the better homogeneity of data, the states that did not present production in one or more years were discarded. After this discrimination only 5 states were selected. Each state was analyzed individually in order to obtain the production oscillation separately. According to data from the Municipal Livestock Research IBGE (2016) obtained through the SIDRA platform, honey production in the North region is concentrated in the states of Rondônia, Amazonas, Roraima, Pará and Tocantins, where these stand out as the largest producers. In view of the above, it is concluded that beekeeping in the North region is still in great expansion, occupying the 5th position of largest honey producer in the country, highlighting the state of Pará as the largest producer. This practice is important because it places man in the field, also contributes to the maintenance of the local flora of each state, also increases production in agriculture through pollination, and is of great importance for the country's economy.


Xinjiang's oasis agriculture has made enormous strides over past decades. Structural adjustment of oasis agriculture sector has promoted production diversification. Xinjiang's oasis agriculture sector is entering a new era. The era means more adjustments in oasis agricultural and rural economic structure so as to realize the sustainable development of agriculture. By summering and analyzing the main problems in Xinjinag's oasis agricultural structure, such as raising farmer's income, industry structure within agriculture, rural urbanization, pressure coming from market, agricultural environment degradation, puts forward the ideas, directions and countermeasures to adjust oasis agricultural structure.


We can move an entrance pupil from on-axis to off-axis by decentering lens groups of a zoom lens. This decentering zoom lens can contribute to miniaturization of objective lenses of a stereomicroscope.


Under the environment of transmission and distribution separated electricity market, in order to realize the intelligent operation of micro-grid, this paper designs a two-level energy market, including the contract market and the real-time balancing market. The paper analyzes the operation model in detail that real-time balancing market compensates for the real-time gap between supply and demand of the micro-grid. The work realizes optimal configuration among power supply, energy storage device, load and distribution network, taking the efficiency profit maximization as the goal. The calculation results show that the real-time market response including the energy storage system and the demand side response can balance micro-grid supply and demand real-timely. And the teal-time balancing market can rapidly respond to the distribution network needed exchange capacity, and can enhance electricity efficiency of the terminal and reduce or postpone investments for units.


Gravimeters are devices that can be used in a wide range of applications, such as mining, seismology, geodesy, archeology, geophysics and many others. These devices have great sensibility, which makes them susceptible to external vibrations like electromagnetic waves. There are several technologies regarding gravimeters that are of use in industrial metrology. Optical fiber is immune to electromagnetic interference, and together with long period gratings can form high sensibility sensors of small size, offering advantages over other systems with different technologies. This paper shows the development of an optical fiber gravimeter doped with Erbium that was characterized optically for loads going from 1 to 10 kg in a bandwidth between 1590nm to 1960nm, displaying a weight linear response against power. Later on this paper, the experimental results show that the previous described behavior can be modeled as characteristic function of the sensor.


Figure 1. Schematic of imaging under real-frequency and synthesised complex frequency excitation in a superlens. The same object, when imaged through a superlens under different real-frequency illumination, results in images with varying degrees of blurriness, and none of the real-frequency images can discern the true appearance of the object. By combining the field amplitudes and phases of multiple single-frequency images, a clear image can finally be obtained. Image credit: HKU


The study presents the current status of contamination with metals (Cu, Cr, Cd, Pb, Ni, Zn and As) and their anthropogenic or natural origin in the sediments of the Aries River Basin, Romania, affected by mining activities. The results indicated an enrichment of metals in the sediments. Different con- tamination levels of the Aries River and its tributaries were identified. Accord- ing to sediment quality guidelines and contamination indices, the sediments from the Aries River were found to be highly contaminated with Cd, Cu and As, considerably with Zn and moderately with Pb and Ni. The right-bank tributaries were found to be more contaminated than the left-bank effluents, where only contamination with As of geogenic origin was identified. Principal Component Analysis enabled the identification of five latent factors (86 % total variability), reflecting the anthropogenic and natural origins of the metals. Arsenic, Cd and partially Pb were found to have a common anthropogenic origin, different from that of Cu. The statistical approach indicated also the geogenic origin of Pb due to its association with Ca, K, Na and Sr. Chromium and Ni were attributed to natural sources through their association with Mn, Fe, Al and Mg.


The spectrum of the extragalactic X-ray and gamma-ray backgrounds, originating in a redshift of about 3.0, provides a measurement of the integrated X- and gamma-ray evolution of known sources such as clusters of galaxies, active galaxies, and quasars. It also limits possible new classes of sources, such as accreting black holes and a hot intergalactic medium. Attention is given to the contribution to the X- and gamma-ray backgrounds of known evolved and unevolved sources, as well as the character of small scale and large scale fluctuations in the X-ray background. Speculations as to the origin of the X- and gamma-ray background include such possibilities as the inverse Compton scattering of microwave background photons by intergalactic cosmic-ray electrons, accretion of the intergalactic medium onto pregalactic black holes, and matter-antimatter annihilation in a baryon-symmetric universe.


One of the big performance problems of software model checking is the state-explosion problem. Various tools exist to tackle this problem. One of such tools is Java Pathfinder (JPF) an explicit-state model checker for Java code that has been used to verify efficiently a number of real applications.
We present jpf-bdd, a JPF extension that allows users to annotate Boolean variables in the system under test to be managed using Binary Decision Diagrams (BDDs). Our tool partitions the program states of the system being verified and manages one part using BDDs. It maintains a formula for the values of these state partitions at every point during the verification. This allows us to merge states that would be kept distinct otherwise, thereby reducing the effect of the state-explosion problem.
We demonstrate the performance improvement of our extension by means of three example programs including an implementation of the well-known dining- philosophers problem.


Photodissociation is the primary destructive process for interstellar molecules outside of dense clouds. A quantitive discussion of the photochemistry of two diatomic and eight po1yatomic molecules is given. Six are known to occur in the interstellar medium and the others are suspected or otherwise of interest. For an interstellar molecule the lifetime against photodecomposition depends upon three factors: the absorption cross section, the quantum yei1d or probability of dissociation following photon absorption, and the interstellar radiation field. The first two factors plus the mode of photodecomposition or photochemical primary processes constitute the photochemistry of the molecule. For some of these molecules the pathways for decomposition or the quantum yield is uncertain and each may depend upon wavelength. In the case of CO, the only spin allowed process energetically possible with interstellar photons (A > 912 R) is formation of carbon and oxygen atoms in their 3p ground states. No laboratory studies of CO photolysis have been reported for wavelengths below the decomposition threshold at 1115 R. If long-lived excited states are involved below 1115 R as has been shown to be at longer wavelengths, the dissociation probability could be significantly less than unity. The third factor influencing the lifetime of an interstellar molecule is the interstellar radiation field. For the unobserved regions we adopt the results of Habing who obtains a constant energy density of 4x1017 ergs -2 0-1 cm A • The radiation field in obscuring clouds is estimated by combining the adopted constant flux with the observed interstellar extinction curve covering the visible and ultraviolet regions. Lifetimes against photodecomposition in the unobscured regions and as a function of increasing optical thickness in obscuring clouds are calculated for the ten species. The results show that, except for CO, all the molecules considered here have comparable lifetimes of less than one hundred years in unobscured regions. Thus these molecules can exist only in dense clouds and can never have been exposed to the unobscured radiation. This implies that polyatomic molecules were formed or released in the gas phase in the clouds where they now occur. The calculation further show that the lifetimes in clouds of moderate opacity (a few magnitudes extinction in the visual) are of the order 6 of 10 years. The lifetime for CO in unobscured regions will be between one hundred and one thousand years if the dissociation probability is between unity and one-tenth. The smaller dissociation probability leads to a lifetime comparable to that for other diatomics. This means that CO molecules require considerably less protection than formaldehyde and the other polyatomics and readily explains the observation that the size of a CO cloud is at least an order of magnitude larger than that of a typical formaldehyde cloud.


Purpose
Untimely delivery of goods and services, especially in a post-COVID landscape, is a critical harbinger of end-to-end fulfillment. Existing literature in supplier delivery modeling is focused on penalizing suppliers for late deliveries built into a contractual transaction, which eventually erodes trust. As such, a holistic modeling technique focused on long-term relationship building is missing. This study aims to design a supplier evaluation model that analytically equates supplier delivery performance to cost realization while replicating a core attribute of successful supply chains – alignment, leading to long-term supplier relationships.

Design/methodology/approach
The supplier evaluation model designed in this paper uses delivery deviation as a unit of measure as opposed to delivery duration to enhance consistency with enterprise resource planning protocols. A one-sided modified Taguchi-type quality loss function (QLF) models delivery lateness to construct a multinomial probability penalty cost function for untimely delivery. Prescriptive analytics using simulation and optimization of the proposed mathematical model supports buyer–supplier alignment.

Findings
The supplier evaluation model designed herein not only optimizes likelihood parameters for early and late deliveries for competing suppliers to enhance total landed cost comparisons for on-shore, near-shore and off-shore suppliers but also allows for the creation of an efficient frontier toward supply base optimization.

Research limitations/implications
At a time of systemic disruptions such as the COVID pandemic, global supply chains are at risk of business continuity. Supplier evaluation models need to focus on long-term relationship modeling as opposed to short-term contractual penalty-based modeling to enhance business continuity. The model offered in this paper is grounded in alignment – a cornerstone of successful supply chain integration, and offers an interesting departure from traditional modeling techniques in this genre.

Practical implications
The results from this analytical approach offer flexibility to a supply manager toward building redundancies in the supply chain using an efficient frontier within the supply landscape, which also helps to manage disruption and maintain end-to-end fulfillment.

Originality/value
The model offered in this paper is grounded in alignment – a cornerstone of successful supply chain integration, and offers an interesting departure from traditional modeling techniques in this genre. The authors offer a rational solution by creating an evaluation model that uses penalty cost modeling as an internal quality measure to rate suppliers and uses the outcome as a yardstick for negotiations instead of imposing penalties within contracts.


Background: Colorectal carcinoma (CRC) is a common cause of cancer-related death worldwide. 5-fluorouracil (5-FU), a first-line chemotherapeutic drug in CRC, has several side effects limiting its therapeutic outcomes. Quercetin (QU) is a dietary bioflavonoid with antioxidant and cytotoxic prooxidant properties. Here, we hypothesize that combination treatment with QU and 5-FU can modulate 1,2-dimethylhydrazine (DMH) induced histological and biochemical changes in the colon of Wistar rats. Methods: A Wistar rats CRC model was established and the animals were randomly divided into five groups. Rats in group A received a suspending vehicle. Group B rats received DMH twice a week subcutaneously for 4 weeks. Animals in the other groups (C, D and E) received the same treatment of DMH, along with QU or 5-FU (individually) or combined QU+5-FU treatment. Results: The DMH-treated rats developed adverse histological alterations (aberrant crypt foci, ACF) and biochemical changes (elevated serum CA19-9; reduced tissue levels of enzymatic antioxidants; elevated CDH12 protein expression and decreased SOX7 mRNA levels). Treatment of DMH-treated animals with QU+5-FU (but not with QU or 5-FU, individually) significantly reversed these changes (i.e., suppressed the formation of ACF; decreased the CA19-9 levels; reduced CDH12 protein expression and increased SOX7 mRNA expression). Conclusions: Conclusively, to the best of our knowledge, our study was the first to evaluate the effects of QU+5-FU treatment on the histological and molecular changes following DMH administration in a rat colon model. Our data suggest that combination therapy with QU+5-FU has therapeutic benefits in colon cancer induced by DMH, with potential for translation to spontaneous disease.


The state of French archaeological theory has been recently covered by two French-authored papers in English (Audouze & Leroi-Gourhan 1981; Cleuziou et al. 1991). These articles emphasize the weight of national tradition and demonstrate the unique position of France between two great currents of European, indeed world, archaeology: Germanic (concerned with cultural and chronological classification) and English-speaking (more interested in general interpretative models). These two articles also ponder another phenomenon: the relative absence of French archaeology in theoretical — notably post-processual — debate.


A new technology of control and optimization of the power chain structure is presented in this work. This technology consists of driving electric cars by a three-transistor converter only in order to push the disadvantages of the converter to two levels of voltages such as the floating potential. Moreover, this structure offers the advantage of an undoubted reduction in the cost of the power chain since it comprises only three transistors. This structure also offers the advantage of simplifying the control algorithm of the power chain. Indeed, it's implemented under the simulation environment Matlab-Sumilink for performance analysis of studied structure.


Alternative management practices are evaluated by stochastic dominance for a representative dairy farm in Wisconsin. Analysis of harvesting schedules, integrated pest management, and harvesting technology indicates that a mid-bud cutting schedule using silage technology achieves maximum income at a minimum risk. An additional benefit is reduced pesticide applications.


We discuss the broadly tunable terahertz (THz) radiation in solid state terahertz (THz) emitters based on high-temperature superconducting Bi2Sr2CaCu2O8+δ (Bi-2212). We experimentally measure the current-voltage characteristics (IVC) of mesas of different geometries, such as triangular-, pentagonal-, hexagonal-, and elliptical- cavities, and compare the IVC of the radiating and no-radiating cavities. The THz emission spectra in radiating THz cavities was measured using the Fourier transform infrared spectrometer in order to elucidate the radiation mechanism of the emitters. Moreover, we experimentally and theoretically study the angular dependence of the emission intensity obtained in mesas' plane at various frequencies and detection angles, by rotating the sample holder relative to the detector, to identify the excited EM cavity modes within the cavities that participate in the emitter output power enhancement. Reference: [1] DP Cerkoney et al., J. Phys. Condens. Matter 29, 015601 (2016), [2] K. Delfanazari et al, J. Infrared Millim. Terahertz Waves 35, 131-146 (2014), [3] K. Delfanazari et al., IEEE Trans. Terahertz Sci. Technol. 5, 505-511 (2015), [4] K. Delfanazari et al., Opt. Express 21, 2171-2184 (2013),


The Oblique Columns are not conventionally parallel or at right angles to a specified line means they're inclined or slanted or Rotated at an angle. Oblique columns are stiffer as RC frames and so the initial stiffness of the RC frames largely depends upon the stiffness of oblique column. For oblique column of below 90, there'll be a decrease in plan dimensions and for above 90, there'll be increase in plan dimensions as we reach upper floors. It affects the lateral stiffness of the buildings. Compared to standard columns, oblique columns of below 90 have lesser storey shear values. Oblique columns of above 90 have higher storey shear values. Stiffness of RC frames significantly depends on the distribution of oblique column within the frame. The lateral loads are resisted by structure with Oblique columns, the highest storey displacement is incredibly much less in Oblique structure as compared to the easy RC Frame building. Analyzing the behavior of oblique columns is that the main purpose of this study. Analysis has been meted out by considering columns of 80, 82, 84, 86, 88 and 90 degrees. Static and Dynamics analysis should be finished these Columns. Ground motion performance of oblique columns are analyzed by Response spectrum method. The analysis of the buildings will be done by using ETAB software and the performance will be analyzed by same building with oblique columns replaced with normal vertical columns. Analysis has been meted out by considering columns of 80, 82, 84, 86, 88 and 90 degrees.


The germinal center (GC) is composed of distinct regions with proliferation and affinity maturation of GC B cells (GCB) occurring in the dark zone (DZ) and antigen-mediated selection and commitment of the long-lived plasma cell (LL-PCs) precursors occurring in the light zone (LZ). Despite the key role for GCs in establishing enduring humoral immunity, we know little about the dynamics of the GCB cell response. We showed that the transcription factor T-bet is expressed by GCB cells and that B cell intrinsic T-bet is required for the LL-PC response following influenza (flu) infection. To test whether the loss of LL-PCs in these mice was due to a role for T-bet in regulating the GCB response, we infected 50:50 Tbx21−/−: pepboy chimeric mice with flu and enumerated GCB cells. We found that Tbx21−/− B cells were overrepresented in the GC relative to the pepboy cells and that Tbx21−/− GCB cells were enriched in the LZ. Partitioning of GCB cells in the LZ/DZ is regulated by chemokines and we showed that T-bet controls transcription of two chemokine receptors, CXCR3 and CCR6, which are expressed by GCB cells. Using 50:50 Tbx21−/−: pepboy chimeras, we tested whether T-bet regulates GCB cell positioning by inducing CXCR3 and repressing CCR6. We observed that the CCR6+ GCB cell subset, which is known to localize in the LZ, was very enriched in Tbx21−/− GCB cells. By contrast, the CXCR3+ GCB subset, which was dominated by WT cells, was enriched in the DZ. To determine the role for CXCR3 in GCB cell localization, we infected 50:50 Cxcr3−/− :pepboy chimeras and found that the Cxcr3−/− GCB cells are enriched in the LZ. Therefore, T-bet regulates GCB cell localization and potentially the dynamics of the GC response by controlling CXCR3 and CCR6 expression.


Structural chemistry is an important basic course for chemistry related majors. In order to cultivate students' modern chemical scientific literacy, we have deeply explored the ideological and political elements in the course of structural chemistry, and redesigned some teaching contents. By integrating the scientific literacy of modern chemistry with ideological and political teaching, we can cultivate students' correct scientific attitude and sense of social responsibility, and promote students to deeply realize that chemistry has made great contributions to the creation of material and spiritual wealth. Through the teaching enlightenment and teaching practice of ideological and political elements in structural chemistry, this paper focuses on three aspects: situational teaching as an important ideological and political teaching method, the achievements of Chinese scientists in structural chemistry as ideological and political materials, and the scientific research achievements of structural chemistry in recent years as the core of ideological and political, so as to help students form the key competencies and essential qualities needed for future chemical development.


Cuttings of dormant Lonicera tartarica, collected in March, were treated with a factorial series of indolylacetic acid and nutrient solutions. Indolylacetic acid was used at dosages of 0, 10, 50, and 100 p.p.m. in conjunction with 0, 1, and 10 concentrations of a modified Hoagland's nutrient solution. Indolylacetic acid treatment significantly increased the percentage of rooting, and the number and total length of roots, the fresh root weight and the green weight of leaf per group of cuttings treated, the higher concentrations having the greater effect. The use of nutrient also significantly affected each of the foregoing characters. The results suggest that some dormant cuttings may be deficient in minerals essential for rooting, and that there is an optimum nutrient concentration somewhere below the highest used in this experiment.


The utility model discloses a clamp claw of an elastic film gear pitch circle positioning clamp. A through hole is arranged at the upper part of the clamp claw, the clamp claw is fixed on the positioning clamp through a fixing element arranged in the through hole, the lower part of the clamp claw is made into a circular arc-shaped positioning part, the bottom end of the circular arc-shaped positioning part is a circular arc positioning surface, and the circular arc positioning surface is in a circular arc structure matched with the outer circle outline of a gear to be processed, wherein a stop device used for clamping the gear to be processed is arranged on the circular arc positioning surface. The clamp claw has the advantages that the gear to be processed can be firmly clamped in the processing process and cannot be easily disengaged to fly out, in addition, the roundness of the processed gear is good, and the qualification rate is high, so the clamp claw can be widely applied to the gear processing.


In a 9‐year‐old boy referred because of growth retardation, chromosome analysis showed the presence of a minute marker chromosome in 75% of the metaphases examined. The application of microdissection in combination with fluorescence in situ hybridization demonstrated that the marker was derived from the centromere region of chromosome 8, the karyotype being: mos 47,XY,+mar.ish der(8)(D8Z1+)[75]/46,XY[25]. The clinical and cytogenetical findings are compared with cases previously reported in the literature. © 2003 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.


In this paper, the authors have concentrated on the practical application of optimization problems related to the minimization of the energy consumption of WSN. Here a noble algorithm called Self-adaptive Multi-Objective Weighted Approach-Genetic Algorithm (SMOWA-GA) is proposed to resolve the optimization problem. A multi-objective optimization problem was chosen as the subject of this research. The main objective of the paper is to propose and apply different WSN node deployment strategies to design an efficient Wireless Sensor Network to minimize the energy consumption of the whole WSN. The statistical analysis also has been carried out on the obtained data of the optimization techniques. To analyze the obtained result a statistical tool, Wilcoxon rank-sum test has been used. The Wilcoxon rank-sum test assists in determining whether the population chosen for the experiment (SMOWA-GA) is accurate. The statistical analysis also will help the reader to gather a detailed analysis of obtained data from the Multi-objective energy-efficient optimization problem.


Pityriasis rubra pilaris Devergie is a very rare papulosquamosus disease which has chronic course and still unclear etiology. Already, we know that this dermatosis occurs as often in male as in female, can be present in each age and has genethics background. Diagnostic and especially therapy of those skin diseases is very difficult and can make a lot of problems not only dermatologist. This paper presents the case of a 48-year-old man with diagnosed and histological confirmed Pityriasis rubra pilaris Devergie. Advantages of retinoids therapy were also discussed.


rp-u^n from leave, Major C. R. O'Brien, m.b., enan?p iVl1 burgeon, is Posted to Dacca, vice Lieut8ra,ited iel M' Mackelvie> m.b., f.r.c.S.E., i.m.s., Major J. D. Sandes, m.d., E.r.c.p.i., i.m.s., officiating Professor of Medicine, Medical College, Calcutta, and First Physician, College Hospital, is appointed to act as Principal of the said institution, with effect from the 16th April 1926, vice Lieutenant-Colonel F. A. F. Barnardo, c.i.E., c.b.e., m.d., f.r.c.s.E., i.m.s., granted leave.


Shoots, about 1 cm long, of chrysanthemum (Dendranthema grandiflora) 'Cayman' were cultured on modified MS medium supplemented with 0.5-1.5 mg L-1 paclobutrazol (PBZ) singly or in combinations with 1-2 mg L-1 N6-benzyladenine (BA). All explants were cultured for two-culture cycles with a 5-week interval. For treatments comprising of the combinations of PBZ and BA; BA was omitted in the second culture cycle. Length of shoots (1.02-1.45 cm) and number of nodes (4.1-7.9) were reduced when higher concentrations of PBZ or BA were applied, compared to the control set without PBZ and BA (9.82 cm long, 10.6 nodes and 1.0 shoot). Higher numbers of shoots (11.3-15.7) were found from BA while only one shoot was obtained from PBZ. Medium containing 1.5 mg L-1 PBZ in combinations with 1.0 or 2.0 mg L-1 BA provided the best results with 0.50-0.78 cm long, 7.6-8.0 nodes and 4.0-4.5 shoots at the first culture cycle and 4.8-5.52 cm long, 7.4-7.6 nodes and 2.1-2.8 shoots at the second culture cycle.


Using finite difference, pseudofinite element and pseudospectral spatial approximations and various (known and new) symmetric discretizations in time twoand three-level schemes are constructed for solving the nonlinear Schr dinger equation. The theorems showing convergence of solutions of all the considered linear and nonlinear schemes to a sufficiently smooth solution to the original differential problem are proved in the L2 and C mesh norms. For nonlinear schemes solved by iterative methods we prove simultaneously the existence and uniqueness of their solutions and the convergence of the iterative procedures used. The convergence theorems are proved for arbitrary nonlinear terms from the wide class of locally Lipschitz-continuous functions in case of one evolution and one, two and three spatial variables. The convergence of all the schemes considered is established under unimprovable constraints imposed on the spatial and time steps: τ and hl ~h2 ~/i3 are sufficiently small quantities, i.e. no constraints are imposed on the relation between the spatial and time steps.


The application of coded design variables instead of real variables is the combination possibility with other optimization methods, the plurality of the number of evaluations, the independency of this method from the problem design space and using some searching points at the same time are the unique characteristics of this method. One of the limitations of this method is exact identification of the optimized point in answer space. In this paper, to increase the ability of genetic algorithm method, Hook-Jeeves method as one of the direct searching methods of Hillclimber is used. To combine with genetics algorithm and the results of this combination regarding the optimization of operation of an assumed water distribution system, it was compared with pure genetic algorithm and the accuracy of the answers was evaluated. In all the cases, combinational genetics presented acceptable results and the results of pure genetics algorithm were improved to more than 2.8%. [Banafsheh Norouzi. The comparation of the results of GA to combinational GA in the optimization problems. J Am Sci 2013;9(7s):117-122]. (ISSN: 1545-1003). http://www.jofamericanscience.org. 17


Chapter five moves from ethnography at the village level to examine the demographics of declining fertility and rural depopulation plaguing many affluent nations. A failure of generational renewal threatens the well-being of individuals, communities and societies. With the story of a child who is the last child in his remote Italian village, the author illustrates the critical importance of children to each other and to their communities. After introducing demographic concepts such as birth rate and replacement rate, total fertility rate and replacement rate fertility, the book discusses the low birth rate crisis in Italy where the population is declining at an unsustainable rate. It examines factors affecting birth rates, including adolescent fertility rate, mother's marital status, percentage of women in the workforce, and gendered division of domestic labour. In comparison with Italy, US birth rates have been relatively robust; however, after the Great Recession US birth rates declined steadily and are now well below replacement rate. The chapter closes with discussion of the interplay between politics and demographics, including rules on birth right citizenship, the role of immigration in rejuvenating populations, and the misuse of demographic data to fuel anti-immigrant, sectarian, and racial conflict.


We introduce the networks of Mealy multiset automata, and study their computational power. The networks of Mealy multiset automata are computationally complete. 1 Learning from Molecular Biology Systems biology represents a new cross-disciplinary approach in biology which has only recently been made possible by advances in computer science and technology. As it is mentioned in [10], it involves the application of experimental, theoretical, and modelling techniques to the study of biological organisms at all levels. Adding new abstractions, discrete models and methods able to help our understanding of the biological phenomena, systems biology may provide predictive power, useful classifications, new paradigms in computing and new perspectives on the dynamics of various biological systems. Recent promising work [1] employs automata theory as an efficient tool of describing and controlling gene expression (a small automaton is encoded by DNA strands and then it is used in logical control of gene expression). In [2], we present a way of interaction between gene machine and protein machine, namely the process of making proteins, in abstract terms of Mealy automata, transformation semigroups and abstract operations. The Mealy automaton proposed as a formal model of the genetic message translation is a minimal one that accepts the mRNA messages and terminates the translation process (according to [9], there is no appropriate formalism for the process of translation). However molecular biology "deals" not only with sequences, but also with multisets. The biological cells are "smart" enough to put together at work sequences and multisets of atoms and molecules, so if we try to get models from their functioning, we should not restrict ourselves to dealing only with sequential machines (like classical automata). To deal with multisets, the main approach is given by membrane systems [11]. There is also introduced and studied an automaton-like machine to work with multisets [7], i.e. multiset automaton. At a first glance, it seems that they are nothing else but weighted automata with weights in the semiring of positive integers. In [8] it is proven that such automata (weighted automata with Proceedings of the International Workshop, Automata for Cellular and Molecular Computing, MTA SZTAKI, Budapest, pages 52 63, 2007.


write an alternative form of history, a history of mentalities: specifically, the mentality of European aristocracy from the early sixteenth to the early nineteenth century" (1:42). Since Godwin's last three novels—Mandeville (1817), Cloudesley (1830), and Debraine (1833)—have never been reprinted before, this set will clearly provide a general overview of the fiction for the first time, which is in itself a notable achievement. But since all the novels, with the exception of Caleb Williams, are only readable in facsimile or scarce reprint, a uniform edition, according to the strictest of modem editorial procedures, should at once call attention to the importance of Godwin's fiction and supply a standard text for citation. Aside from the excellent general introduction, each volume has a brief preface that contextualizes the novel, plus running annotations (at times overestimating the general reader's ignorance), and a continuing but unobtrusive referencing to the pagination of the copy-text edition. The only anomaly in this splendid set, aside from pricing whose cost (it might be anticipated) largely puts it beyond the means of individual scholars, is a thirteen-page section in volume 1 reprinting Godwin's fatherly letters to Shelley from 1812, which have never before been wholly available. Why, one wonders, print letters only from the one year, and why only letters to Shelley, since Godwin acted as mentor to a succession of young ambitious intellectuals? Indeed, what this section suggests to this reader is what might be constituted if Godwin's correspondence from the Abinger papers were available in whole or large part, an intellectual record of the age commensurate with that of Coleridge's letters, which have been long accessible in six fat volumes. Not that one would suggest another industrial installation for scholarly research and development, but, as we already have so many of Godwin's principal interlocutors in print, the welcome effort to re-establish the centrality of his voice in the cultural affairs of his time might extend to his private as well as public writings.


The invention discloses a light utilization regulating device, which is connected with a supporting base through a connecting device, wherein a photoreactor body is connected with the supporting base through a mechanical shaft structure, and the photoreactor body is of a cubic closed type structure with a light receiving face. The light utilization regulating device is characterized in that a light-orientation regulating device specifically comprises a photoreactor angle control device, one or a plurality of sensor devices, a temperature and gas content setting device, and a composite expansion and contraction device, wherein the sensor device(s) is/are used for sensing the reaction temperature or the gas content in the photoreactor body and sending information to a monitoring device; and the composite expansion and contraction device is used for regulating an expansion angle between the photoreactor and the supporting base. The invention further discloses application of the light utilization regulating device to culture of light-energy live beings, and the light utilization regulating device disclosed by the invention can be used for realizing culture condition optimization during light-energy live being culture.


In Acta Rad. in 1928 LUNDQUIST gave a very good account of the planning and outfit of darkrooms in roentgen departments. Since then however further technical possibilities have been added and new experiences gained wherefore the question of darkrooms, so important for the planning and equipment of roentgen departments may again justify being taken up for discussion. In the darkroom of a roentgen department various kinds of work have to be carried out, such as reloading of casettes, development, fixing, rinsing and drying films. Further there are special photographic tasks to be seen to in the darkroom, such as reduction and enlargement of radiograms, copying and making lantern slides. Finally in the darkroom the radiologist will have to inspect radiograms just taken and on the strength of these decide about the further examination of the patient. The radiologist should also be able to demonstrate the radiograms just taken and give a preliminary report to the doctor in charge of the patient on the result of the examination. These various tasks justify dividing the darkroom into two units. In one of them all so-called darkroom work should be carried out, such as reloading of casettes, developing and fixing films. In the other unit the films should be rinsed and inspected. Thus the first unit should only have ordinary darkroom lighting while inspection of the films requires a strong light. Both units should be in communication with each other to enable the staff to move readily from one to the other. For that purpose either a passage can be made, 1 metre long and 0.80 metre wide, with closefitting doors at each end, opening from the passage, or else a passage about 2 metres in length with screens put across in a way to permit a zig-zag


Otolaryngology online Head and neck squamous cell carcinoma is among the common malignancies, particularly in developing countries. Carcinogens in the tobacco are considered as the most common etiology for this disease, with synergistic action of alcohol in some cases. Over the past two decades, there is an increase in incidence of oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinoma in Europe and America, while the incidence of oral, laryngeal and hypopharyngeal cancer is showing a downward trend1. This rise is commonly seen in otherwise healthy young individuals who are nonsmokers. Epidemiological and molecular studies have confirmed that human papilloma virus (HPV) is the cause of such cancers. Gillison described the causal association of HPV with oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinoma2.


Is it reasonable for officials to decide that a public, municipally sponsored monument no longer deserves to be permanent municipal property? Frederick MacMonnies's Civic Virtue offers insight into this question. The 1922 monument invoked a higher common life, but its statue portion was widely interpreted as misogynous. That reputation has continued to this day, and the work is now in disrepair. This article, a biography of Civic Virtue from its conception in the 1890s to its tumultuous afterlife beginning in 1922, reveals how sex and the city were the heart of the problem and argues that the work should be stabilized as a unique historical embodiment of those controversies.


Web content is, by nature, ephemeral: sites are updated regularly and disappear, which involves the loss of unique value information. The importance of this media grows continuously in our society and institutions are developing websites with a variety of content creating a large media-centric Web sphere. Like any media, it is essential to preserve it as a key part of our heritage.


With the continuous popularization of sustainable development concept, tailings have received more attention from the government and mining enterprises as a kind of recyclable resource. The paper introduced main approaches of domestic comprehensive utilization of tailings at present, and indicated some existing problems. It also proposed specific strategies and recommendations for development of comprehensive utilization of tailings in China.


Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to supplement the scant previous investigations on the corrosion behaviour of 2205 and 2507 duplex stainless steels in selected organic acids containing chloride additions.Design/methodology/approach – Microstructural examination of the alloys was first carried out, after which the corrosion behaviour of the alloys in citric, oxalic, formic and acetic acids containing chloride additions at varying temperatures was studied using electrochemical techniques.Findings – The alloy 2507 material had a larger grain size than did the alloy 2205 sample. The corrosion resistances of the alloys generally are highest in acetic acids and lowest in citric acid. The addition of chloride had a pronounced effect on their corrosion resistance. Alloy 2507 generally exhibited higher corrosion resistance in all of the acids than alloy 2205, with the exception of acetic acid at room temperature. The 50:50 ratio of ferrite to austenite composition, as revealed by phase compositional analysi...


The railway overpass at Lot was built for the crossing of the high-speed railway line from Brussels to Paris over domestic tracks. The superstructure is an assembled mixed structure, consisting of two main composite girders equipped with an intermediate reinforced concrete deck plate with transverse stiffening ribs. Steel truss elements were subsequently bolted to the upper flanges of the composite girders. The completed girders were transported from workshops to the building site by train. For fixing the truss elements to the precast girders, geometric compatibility between both components had to be achieved. The deformation of the composite girders could be predicted within certain limits. Due to the use of high performance concrete, the time factor appeared almost insignificant.


Abstract The aim of this study was to investigate the expression of miRNA-222 in intervertebral disc degeneration (IDD), and explore its regulatory mechanism. Totally 30 patients with IDD and 36 normal control subjects were included. Quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR), Western blot analysis, and enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) were preformed to detect the mRNA and protein expression levels of MMP1, and the miRNA-222 expression levels, in the nucleus pulposus (NP) tissues and blood samples. Bioinformatics analysis was performed, and dual-luciferase reporter assay was conducted for confirmation. HNPC cells were cultured in vitro, and the effects of agomiRNA-222 transfection were analyzed. The results showed that MMP1 expression was significantly up-regulated in the NP tissues and blood samples of patients with IDD, and the miRNA-222 expression was significantly down-regulated in both specimens. Bioinformatics analysis showed that MMP1 was the direct target for miRNA-222, which was confirmed by the dual-luciferase reporter assay. Over-expression of miRNA-222 significantly decreased the expression levels of MMP1 in HNPC cells in vitro, and the expression levels of type II collagen were significantly up-regulated. These results suggest that MMP1 expression is up-regulated in the NP and blood of patients with IDD, which may be related to the down-regulation of miRNA-222. The miRNA-222 may regulate the expression of related proteins in intervertebral disc nucleus cells through MMP1, thus affecting the disease pathogenesis and development.


Traditional notice board, is widely used in many places, where there are abundant amount of people either working at the particular places or people who visit those public places like universities, institutions, bus stand, railway station, hospitals etc. Here, the existing ordinary notice board is enhanced into a multi-featured board as well as a smart notice board which alerts the people whenever a place catches fire i.e it acts as a fire alarming system and a special feature is that it transmits the audio message spontaneously, spoken by the user, more precisely an authorized user which requires an authentication to use the particular smart notice board i.e it requires the authentication in a form of password in text form. Here microcontroller and GSM models have been used for transferring the message to the audiences.


It is sad to realize that since the first volume of this important work was published its distinguished author has been taken from us. In his tribute to Surgeon-Commander Keevil, as a man of action and letters, and in this a man after his own heart, Sir Gordon Gordon-Taylor tells us much that we should know about the author to appreciate further the work which follows. This second volume bears the same mark of thoroughness and accuracy as the first, and as the Royal Navy reaches new phases of greatness in its pages, so the medical historian finds growing treasure in the reading of them. Pepys and Admiralty, ships, scurvy and sea fights, the beginnings of a medical conscience stirring where authority rested, all these things are framed in the everyday matters of the times, the slop-chit as it were, the key to the past. It is a book to live with and to take down again and again for its human interest as well as for reference. H.H.G.E.


Abstract Studies were carried out on structural and cytochemical aspects of the stigma and style of Vitis vinifera . The stigma is of the wet papillate type with a continuous cuticle and pellicle. During the development of the papillae, the cell walls increase in thickness and produce a secretion product constituted of lipids that pass through the wall forming the exudate. The style is solid with a central core of transmitting tissue which has conspicuous intercellular spaces that increase remarkably from the periphery to the centre where the cuticle is present. The intercellular spaces, where the pollen tubes grow, contain a matrix that includes polysaccharides, pectic substances and scattered areas of lipidic nature.


PURPOSE: An impurity doping method on a substrate, a solar cell manufacturing method thereof, and a manufactured solar cell using the same are provided to dope with a first dopant and second dopant without shunting a first area and second area adjacent to the substrate with a diffusion barrier pattern using a first mask and second mask, thereby reducing manufacturing cost and time and enabling to produce a high efficiency solar cell. CONSTITUTION: An impurity doping method on a substrate is comprised of following steps. A diffusion barrier pattern is formed between a first area and second area adjacent to the substrate. A first doping pattern(DP1) is formed by doping a first dopant in the first area using a first mask. A second doping pattern(DP2) is formed by doping a second dopant in the second area using a second mask.


THE INVENTION WITH RESPECT TO NEW COLORED PIGMENTS BASED RARE EARTH. PIGMENTS COLORES INVENTION CHARACTERISED BY THE FACT THAT THEY INCLUDE AT LEAST ONE RARE EARTH SULPHIDE RESPONDENT LNS THE FORM IN WHICH REPRESENTS LN AT LEAST ONE ELEMENT MADE IN THE GROUP IS BY AND lANTHANIDES YTTRIUM. THEY MAY BE USED IN PARTICULAR IN THE INDUSTRY OF PLASTICS AND IN THE FIELD OF PAINT AND LASURES.


The recent innovation in mechanical farming techniques has provided a rapid advancement in farming occupations and has increased both efficiency and productivity in the sector. This review work has investigated the current status of mechanized farming; farm machinery, the domestic factories of the farm implements and their importations, as well as the challenges confronting agricultural mechanization in Nigeria. The paper also discussed and provided the insightful information about the environmental considerations in agricultural mechanization practices.


Orientation: The effectiveness of social service delivery depends on the motivation of social workers to perform their work well. Motivation is directly related to social workers' job satisfaction.Research purpose: The study aimed to determine the factors of job dissatisfaction among social workers and identify ways to address them.Motivation for the study: The research tries to solve the existing problem of low job satisfaction among social workers, given the low wages in this area, the great complexity of the work (associated with emotional tension) and difficult working conditions.Research approach/design and method: The study relies on a qualitative approach – a subjective approach to the research from the social worker's point of view.Main findings: The research found that social workers, being a rather specific category of employees, consider the issue of job satisfaction in a rather complex symbiosis. Factors such as relatively low pay or paper records and documentation keeping are of little importance. Instead, the irrational fear of losing a job influences social workers' perceptions of work and their job satisfaction the most.Practical/managerial implications: Social workers value and are satisfied not with the job in the sense of their performance or the result obtained but with the actual availability of the job (the workplace).Contribution/value-add: Compared with other international studies, the study opens a new vector of scientific inquiry – the elimination of the fear factor from the model of job satisfaction assessment for social workers.


ABSTRACT Streaming media has contributed to a significant amount of today's Internet Traffic. Like traditional web objects, rich media objects can benefit from proxy caching, but caching streaming media is more of challenging than caching simple web objects, because the streaming media have features such as huge size and high bandwidth. And to support various bandwidth requirements for the heterogeneous ubiquitous devices, a transcoding proxy is usually necessary to provide not only adapting multimedia streams to the client by transcoding, but also caching them for later use. The traditional proxy considers only a single version of the objects, whether they are to be cached or not. However the transcoding proxy has to evaluate the aggregate effect from caching multiple versions of the same object to determine an optimal set of cache objects. And recent researches about multimedia caching frequently store initial parts of videos on the proxy to reduce playback latency and archive better performance. Also lots of researches manage the contents with segments for efficient storage management. In this paper, we define the 9-events of transcoding proxy using 4-atomic events. According to these events, the transcoding proxy can define the next actions. Then, we also propose the segment-based caching policy for the transcoding proxy system. The performance results show that the proposing policy have a low delayed start time, high byte-hit ratio and less transcoding data.Keyword:Transcoding, Proxy Caching, Multimedia Caching, Segment Based Caching


v CHAPTER 1 : INTRODUCTIO 1 . 1 Background 1 1.2 Stat ment of he problem 2 1.3 Objectives of he Study 7 1.4 Significance of the study 7 CHAPTER 2; LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Scope of Diversification 8 2 . 1.1 Definition and Conceptual Framework 8 2 . 1.2 Dimensions of Divers 'fication 9 2 . 1 . 3 Rationale for divers'fication 14 2 . 2 Research on Diversification 22 2 . 3 The Kenyan Insurance Indus ry 24 2 . 3 . 1 Role of Insurance in Ken a 24 2.3 . 2 The Structure of Ins ranee industry in Kenya 25 2 . 3.3 Government Regulation 28 2.3. Conceptualiza ion of Diversific ion in the


Some wireless network protocols do not consider channel assignment and signal interference issues while constructing the multicast distribution tree and hence do not use full capacity of the network. Some others consume all channels for multicast traffic leaving no free channel for other traffic types. We propose a distributed scheme called Efficient Wireless Multicast (EWM) for constructing multicast tree in multichannel multi-interface wireless mesh networks (MIMC-WMN) which carefully selects relay nodes and assign orthogonal radio channels to them. EWM also tries to minimize path delay when selecting relay nodes. The resulted tree is efficient in terms of throughput and end-to-end delay. EWM also employs the broadcast nature of the wireless media to reduce the number of relay nodes. It makes use of only three orthogonal channels resulting in no interference and hence high throughput.


The increasing complexity of manufacturing systems in highly competitive environments motivates the need for refinement of the design of manufacturing systems. The application of systems engineering is still undeveloped in some industries, but the potential benefits are substantial. However, there exists a chasm between the theory and practice of systems engineering applied to the design of manufacturing systems and existing lack of information sharing among organizations to enable right first time practices. To close this gap, the authors suggest systems engineering methods for supporting and enabling more effective and efficient design of manufacturing systems. Keywords— Manufacturing system design, product quality, responsiveness, stakeholders, systems engineering


Abstract We analyze observations made in August and November 1995 during the Earth and Sun crossings of Saturn's ring plane, respectively. The August 1995 observations combine data taken with the Adonis adaptive optics system at the European Southern Observatory (ESO) and images from the Hubble Space Telescope (HST). The November 1995 data are based on HST images only. We report here the detections of four new objects (three in August, one in November) orbiting near, or within, the F ring of Saturn. Two of the objects observed at ESO in August 1995 are most probably S/1995 S5 and S/1995 S6, reported by P. D. Nicholson et al. (1996, Science 272, 509–515) from the HST observations on August 10, 1995. The third object, S/1995 S20 cannot be clearly linked with any other objects reported by other observers. An elongated object, or arc, is tracked in November 1995, and can be connected to one of the arcs also reported by Nicholson et al. Our combined measurements improve the determination of the orbital parameters of S/1995 S5 and the arc, indicating that these objects orbit, within the error bars (≲±140 km), in the F ring. We discuss the nature and origin of these F-ring features. We propose that they are clouds of regolith ejecta resulting from collisions between large particles, or "parent bodies," within the F ring. From the available constraints (brightness and lifetime of the objects), we show that the observations are consistent with the presence of several hundred 1-km-sized (and/or several thousand 100-m-sized) unseen parent bodies embedded in the F ring, each of which is covered by a regolith layer tens of centimeters to ∼1 m in thickness.


Pheochromocytoma is important to point out as a rare cause of systemic arterial hypertension, in view of its important relevance for medical practice, with a view mainly to public health, in order to spread this knowledge to members of the health area. Pheochromocytoma is considered a rare tumor, with an incidence of 2 to 8 per 1 million adults and correspond to 5% of all adrenal incidentalomas, reaching an incidence of 0.005 to 0.1% in the general population, curative treatment consists of in surgical removal of the tumor, videolaparoscopy being the method of choice, which presents faster recovery, with shorter hospital stay and less risk of complications. The timely diagnosis of pheochromocytoma is of a singular nature, the loss of diagnosis can cause devastating losses due to its potential lethal cardiovascular complications.


Price of product or after sales service is always one of the top considerations for customer to buy the product or service. IT OEM/ODM industry is a very competitive environment that the net profit is extremely marginal. It is, therefore, crucial for OEM/ODM to offer a competitive price, including bill of material (BOM) price and average warranty cost per product, when customer wants to buy warranty from OEM/ODM. Efficient cost management on not only BOM price, but also average warranty cost per product is a main task for OEM/ODM. There are four purposes of the paper as follows: 1) to realize common warranty policies between OEMs/ODMs of LCD monitor and their buyers, 2) to compare the common warranty policies with customers' interests whether they meet customers' needs or expectations, 3) to find out a trend of change regarding to warranty policy from buyers' perspective, 4) to build prediction models for warranty servicing costs per region, and their applications. Three prediction models are demonstrated for warranty service costs on LCD monitors based on analysis of warranty claim (repair) data over more than four years collected by an ODM company, said T-company. Polynomial regression on 54 months' cumulative percentages of warranty returns, three prediction models are generated. These models can be applied for volume prediction of warranty returns. Total warranty costs are highly correlative to volume of warranty returns. Time period of warranty return is counted by the difference of returning and manufacturing month of product due to time usage data of product is difficult to collect. Warranty claim data of LCD monitors are analyzed to find return patterns for Europe, Asia Pacific, and United States of America when return patterns are different per different customer account and consumer behaviors in each region. Warranty related problems that T-company encountered are described with resolutions in a case study.


Introduction: Injuries to the ligamentum teres are being recognised more often with developments in imaging, such as MR arthrography, and the increasing use of hip arthroscopy. But they are difficult to diagnose, and it is not clear how best to treat them. Little is known about the mechanism of injury, nor the potential impact on hip stability of such injuries. The relationship between capsular and ligamentous contributions to stability has not been investigated. Methods: We examined the movement of the ligamentum teres in intact, fully reduced, cadaveric hip specimens by trans osseus arthroscopy. The movement of the ligamentum teres was captured with video throughout the excursion of the hip joint. The influence of restraining capsular structures was determined by sequential transection and repeat excursion testing. Ligamentum teres injuries were generated by extreme movements, and compared with clinically observed injuries. Results: The action of the ligamentum teres was successfully recorded in by video. The ligament was found to be the principal restraint to external rotation in extension and abduction. Injuries generated by forced rotation in this position resembled those seen in clinical practice. Conclusion: Knowledge of the action of the ligamentum teres will improve our understanding of injury to this structure. It helps to identify described mechanisms which should raise suspicion of such an injury, and may help to design investigation and treatment protocols.