Background and objective: Sleep fragmentation (SF) is an important constituent of many sleep disorders. Sleep rebound following sleep disruption is regulated by homeostatic processes that also are influenced by stress and social isolation stress has not been studied in context of sleep disruption. We investigated interactions between social isolation and SF on sleep-wakefulness and delta EEG power during SWS in mice. Methods: C57/BLJ adult male mice were exposed to 6 h SF using a custom-designed apparatus that elicits minimal stress, along with telemetric polygraphic recordings for 24h. In paired or isolated mice, baseline recordings were followed by SF (every 2 min), for 6h. Results and conclusions: In contrast with other published methods that induce sleep disruption, SF procedures were void of increased serum corticosterone. SF in both paired and socially isolated mice elicited an increase in slow wave sleep (SWS) and REM, and a decrease in wake during the dark period. However, there was no change in total time (24 h) in wake or SWS in both the groups. SF also induced reduced sleep latencies following arousal. EEG delta power during SWS was significantly attenuated in isolated animals when compared to the paired group. Social interactions exert important effects on sleep structure and homeostasis, as evidenced by sleep latency and delta power of the EEG, the latter serving as a surrogate indicator of sleepiness. Social isolation may negatively affect the quality of sleep, even when total sleep time is unaffected, and experimental paradigms that induce sleep restriction should take into consideration the underlying effects of isolation on sleep.


The invention relates to a method wherein a preparation of steel powders, compressed into a blank, this blank is infiltrated with copper, thus obtaining a piece (1) characterized in that one chooses powders and the blank is infiltrated sintered so as to obtain for said part one of the following two compositions (in% by mass): C be 0.6 to 1.2 - No 0-5 - Mo 0 2 - 0 to 4 Cr - 0 to 0.6 V - Ni + Cr + Mo + V + metallic impurities 0.1 to 5 - Cu infiltrated 4-15 - essentially Fe balance, either C 0.2 2 - 0 to 10 Mo - Cr 2-5 - W 0 to 15 - V 0.5 to 6 - 0 to 10 Co - Mo + Cr + V + W + Co + metal impurities 5 to 50 - Cu infiltrated 10-30 - balance essentially Fe, said workpiece and having good resistance to wear and fatigue and making use little or no counterpart in repeated shocks or friction. The invention also relates to the use of the method for manufacturing a workpiece (1) for dispensing a heat engine, and the pieces obtained.


China's urban community building and development do not only depend on the government itself,but also on the participation of the residents.Community participation has shown a good development trend currently,but there are still many problems.For example,there are less organizational participation and external participation,but nonpolitical participation is prevalent.And participation efficiency is low and the subject of the participants is single etc.The main cause is the weakness of community awareness,the lack of mechanisms to express interests,low degree of community organization,serious community-based administration and so on.


The link between IL-13 and bronchial hyper-responsiveness has brought this cytokine as a potential therapeutic target for asthma and allergic diseases. At the present study, we address the role of B cell derived IL-13 in the IgE and other immunoglobulin development. Antisense oligo for human IL-13 mRNA was used to study IgE down regulation. Human B-lymphocytes were purified by positive selection using magnetic cell sorting and were cultured in the complete medium plus anti-CD40 monoclonal antibody and recombinant human IL-4. Immunoglobulin assay was performed by ELISA in the presence and absence of antisense oligonucleotide. We demonstrated that IL-13 antisense causes the decrease of IgE and increase of IgA significantly and no significant changes in IgM and IgG levels (p<0.01). We also demonstrated that both IL-13 inhibition and IL-4 removal cause the complete blocking of IgE and significant decrease of IgM and IgG levels. Our IL-13 antisense oligo can block Bcell IL-13 productions and consequently inhibits IgE production followed by IgA class switching in vitro. We suggest that in contrast to the IL-4, IL-13 is apparently more potent in the IgE switching and has no significant role in IgG and IgM levels. Iran. Biomed. J. 8 (4): 185-191, 2004


Thesis (M.A.)--American University of Beirut, Center for Arab and Middle Eastern Studies, 2006.;"Advisor: Dr. Hilal Khashan, Professor, Political Science and Public Administration--Member of Committee: Dr. Nabil Dajani, Professor, Social and Behavioral Sc


This volume contains the papers presented to a symposium organized by the Theological Faculty of the University of Groningen on the occasion of the seventieth birthday of Adam S. van der Woude, former Professor of Old Testament and Early Judaism and former head of the Qumran Institute at the same Faculty. The essays, eight in English and four in German, explore (through case studies) the developments over the last few years in the different areas of study of the Old Testament and of Early Judaism, observe the new perspectives opened in these areas and map the directions in which the research will be moving in the third millennium. The volume also includes a German version of the public lecture on the significance of the Dead Sea Scrolls for the Study of Old Testament and of Early Judaism delivered in Dutch by Van der Woude during the symposium.


In the middle of the 1970s, U.S. health officials identified what some called a "silent epidemic." They were referring to childhood lead poisoning, a problem that is easily overlooked and underappreciated. Of all of the metal-poisoning episodes to date, none has come close in sheer numbers. Toxicology textbooks mention cadmium poisoning in Japan in the 1950s and methyl mercury poisoning in both Japan in the 1950s and Iraq in 1972. Some hundreds of deaths were attributed to each of these events. But most textbooks fail to mention lead poisoning, in spite of the fact that since the 1920s millions of American children have been quietly poisoned by lead, and thousands of deaths are attributed to this over the long term.


During the last Vendée Globe sailing race, extreme conditions were encountered by the competitors. Some had to abandon the race, and the presumed death of the Canadian sailor Gerry Roofs cast a tragic shadow over the event. His last known position was recorded on 7 January 1997 at 55.01° S and 235.78° E (Fig. 1). Taking advantage of the different passes of various sensors over this area, we propose to analyse the wind and wave conditions as well as their evolution during this period.


In Apis mellifera and Apis cerana hygienic behavior involves recognition and removal of sick, damaged or dead brood from capped cells. We investigated whether bees react in the same way to grouped versus isolated damaged capped brood cells. Ten colonies of Apis mellifera honey bees and ten colonies of Apis cerana honey bees were used for this investigation. Capped worker brood cells aged 12 to 14 days old were perforated with the pin-killing method. After making holes in the brood cells, the combs were placed back into the hives; 24 h later the number of cleaned cells was recorded in areas with pin-killed and control brood cells. Four repetitions were made in each colony. Isolated cells were more frequently cleaned than grouped cells, though variance analysis showed no significant difference. Apis cerana bees also were somewhat, though not significantly more hygienic than Apis mellifera honey bees with mean removal of pin killed brood 97.46+/-1.37% and 83.83+/1.13% respectively. We conclude that honey bees can detect and remove both isolated and grouped dead brood. The tendency towards greater hygienic efficiency directed towards grouped Hygienic behaviour in honey bees was studied for first time with the aim of understanding mechanisms of pathogen resistance and colony health. It shows how honey bees confer colony level resistance and remove dead and diseased brood from the colony. This hygienic behavioural study can potentially increase the procedure of screening colonies for hygiene and breeding.


The embedded processors operating in safetyor mission-critical systems are not allowed to fail. Any failure in such applications could lead to unacceptable consequences as life risk or significant damage to property or environment. Concerning faults originated by the radiation-induced soft errors, the embedded systems operating in aerospace applications are particularly susceptible. However, the radiation effects can also be observed at ground level. Soft errors affect processors by modifying values stored in memory elements, such as registers and data memory. These faults may lead the processor to execute an application incorrectly, generating output errors or leading hangs and crashes in the system. The recent advances in embedded systems concern the integration of hard-core processors and FPGAs. Such devices, called All Programmable System-on-Chip (APSoC), are also susceptible to radiation effects. Aiming to address this fault tolerance problem this work presents a Dual-Core LockStep (DCLS) as a fault tolerance technique to mitigate radiation-induced faults affecting processors embedded into APSoCs. Lockstep is a method based on redundancy used to detect and correct soft errors. The proposed DCLS is implemented in a hard-core ARM Cortex-A9 embedded into a Zynq-7000 APSoC. The approach efficiency was validated not only on applications running in baremetal but also on top of FreeRTOS systems. Heavy ions experiments and fault injection emulation were performed to analyze the system susceptibility to bit-flips. The obtained results show that the approach is able to decrease the system cross section with a high rate of protection. The DCLS system successfully mitigated up to 78% of the injected faults. Software optimizations were also evaluated to understand the trade-offs between performance and reliability better. By the analysis of different software partitions, it was observed that the execution time of an application block must to be much longer than the verification time to achieve fewer performance penalties. The compiler optimizations assessment demonstrate that using O3 level increases the application vulnerability to soft errors. Because O3 handles more registers than other optimizations, the system is more susceptible to faults. On the other hand, results from radiation experiments show that O3 level provides a higher Mean Workload Between Failures (MWBF). As the application runs faster, more data are correctly computed before an error occurrence.


Prolonged and intense physical exercise can produce acute cardiovascular changes that may impact on the athletes' health and performance. Echocardiography has allowed the discovery and understanding of the morphological and functional response experienced by the trained heart, contributing to assess the possible cardiac injury triggered by high intensity exercise. The athlete heart is characterized by global chamber remodeling, with a preserved biventricular systolic function, or in the lower limit of normality, and normal, or even improved, relaxation. There is some debate about whether the athlete systolic function at rest is a reliable parameter of left ventricular (LV) contractile capacity. Some authors support that a low left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) in athletes is not equivalent to systolic dysfunction, as the myocardium preserves the ability to increase its contractility with the increased preload elicited by exercise in response to the Frank-Starling law. New myocardial strain imaging techniques with speckle tracking have allowed to study cardiac function, providing additional information beyond ejection fraction. Caselli et al. (1) defined the characteristics of LV myocardial mechanics with 2D speckle tracking in 200 Olympic Italian athletes. They showed normal global longitudinal strain (GLS) values, though slightly below that of controls (–18.1%±2,2% vs. –19.4%±2.3%, P <0.001). Systolic strain rate (SRS) and early diastolic strain rate (SRE) were not different between athletes and controls and late diastolic strain rate (SRA) was lower in athletes. However, this reduction was not clinically relevant and should not be misinterpreted as reduced function. Athletes participating in resistance disciplines presented higher LV chamber diameter, wall thickness and mass index, as well as higher left atrial size compared with other disciplines, which represents adaptation to high hemodynamic load. Conversely, the differences in strain and strain rate related with the type of sport practiced were only slight, suggesting that, although LV morphological remodeling is associated


Swiss chard was grown on soil amended with municipal sewage sludges from Baltimore and Washington, D.C. The harvested crops were fed at 20 or 28% of the diet to guinea pigs for 80 days. Samples of soil, sludges, plant, and animal tissues were analyzed for up to 43 elements. The elements Br, Ca, Co, Eu, Fe, Ni, and Sr were found at higher concentrations in tissues of animals fed the chard cultured on sludge-amended soil than in control animals. Composting sludge prior to amending the soil appeared to render certain elements such as Cd, Cu, Ni, and Zn less available to Swiss chard subsequently grown.


The cannulation of the coronary sinus (CS) in supraventricular tachyarrhythmias is sometimes simple and sometimes very difficult. Some authors believe this fact is caused by the large variability of the diameter of the ostium. Our purpose was to examine the anatomy of the CS and the eventual association with many forms of the supraventricular tachyarrhythmias. Methods and results: In 32 patients; 12 female, adults, without structural cardiomiopathy, with supraventricular tachyarrhythmias, angiography of the CS was performed. Dimensions, morphology, collaterals, diverticulum, ostium and angle of the origin and exit were measured. There was great variability in morphology. We did not find differences between significant the diameter of CS in AVJRT and accessory pathways. In two of thirds our population we found an angle of origin, called attack angle, encountered more frequently in accessory pathways than AVJRT. Conclusions: The morphology of the CS has a large variability. We did not find any differences in the diameter of the ostium of coronary sinus between AVJRT and accessory pathways. We believe that the attack angle is responsible for the difficulty in cannulating the sinus and not its diameter. DESCRIPTORS: coronary sinus, angiography, supraventricular tachycardia. Reblampa 78024-316


Several years have passed since the popularization of multimedia. Even as the first applications now start to mature, expectations for new ideas, new business, and strong growth continue to rise. Rapid improvements in the capabilities and functions of computers, communications, and audiovisual devices and systems, brought about by constant improvement in semiconductor technology and high-level software, paint a bright future for multimedia. New applications and human-oriented systems will benefit from these advances. Hitachi multimedia developments create new value and contribute to a bright and abundant information society for the 21st century. This report summarizes the profound societal change, effects, functions, and applications brought about by multimedia. Real-world examples will be described, and finally, future trends will be considered.


The results show that the total area of grassland desertification in Ruoergai Basin reaches(5 030)hm~2,and it expands at the rate of 670hm~2 per year.This paper mainly reports on many causes of grassland desertification in Ruoergai Basin,using the method of romote sensing and on spot servey.The grassland desertification develops as a result of the comprehensive effects of environment and human activity,which has become a serious eco-environment problem in Ruoergai Basin,the upper reaches of the Huanghe river.


African catfish Clarias gariepinus (Burchell, 1882) constitutes a bulk of farmed freshwater fish, particularly in Africa. Its optimal production relies on an optimal feeding regime as feed covers about 50% of operation cost. Studies on feeding regimes have mostly been on feeding frequency and the daily required rations. This study was therefore designed to evaluate the impact of varied proportions of normal daily rations on the performance of C. gariepinus juveniles. Clarias gariepinus Juveniles of 17.6 ± 3.7 g were stocked at a density of 15 juveniles per 50 L of water in 80 L plastic tanks and cultured indoors for 42 days. They were fed a standard specific feed at 5% total biomass three times daily (8:00, 13:00 and 18:00). Treatment 1 received 33.33% of its daily ration at each feeding period, while treatments 2 and 3 received (50%, 25% and 25%) and (25%, 25% and 50%) of the daily rations at 8:00, 13:00 and 18:00, respectively. Fish biomass and survival rate were determined weekly and individual fish weights and lengths were determined at the end of the experiment. Water was aerated continuously and half the volume was renewed daily; temperature and pH were monitored twice daily. The specific growth rate, weight and length gained were best in treatment 3 although not significantly different (p>0.05) among treatments. However, feed conversion ratio and condition factor in treatment 3 were significantly (p<0.05) better when compared to treatments 1 and 2 although temperature and pH in the different treatments were not significantly different (p>0.05). The estimated investment cost was 3891, 4136 and 3907 FCFA, with profit index of 0.95, 0.87 and 1.09 in treatments 1, 2 and 3, respectively. Therefore, administering about 50% of the daily ration in the evening as was the case in treatment 3 is more profitable in the culture of C. gariepinus juveniles.


These papers were prepared as background papers for the May 1994 meeting of hte NEACD in Tokyo. They neither represent a consensus of the participants nor a summary of any part of the discussions at any of the meetings. They are presented here in the hopes that other readers outside of the NEACD prcess will find them to be as useful and thought-provoling as did the hosts and participants. Copyright Information: All rights reserved unless otherwise indicated. Contact the author or original publisher for any necessary permissions. eScholarship is not the copyright owner for deposited works. Learn more at http://www.escholarship.org/help_copyright.html#reuse Northeast Asia Cooperation Dialogue II Conference Papers 16–17 May 1994, Tokyo, Japan with an introduction by Susan L. Shirk and Christopher P. Twomey IGCC Policy Paper #9 August 1994 IGCC is grateful to Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory's Center for Security and Technology Studies and the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Nonproliferation Policy for their support of the Northeast Asia Cooperation Dialogue Copyright © 1994 by the Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation


Members of the transforming growth factor-β (TGF-β) superfamily regulate cell proliferation, differentiation, and apoptosis, controlling the development and maintenance of most tissues. TGF-β signal is transmitted through the phosphorylation of Smad proteins by TGF-β receptor serine/threonine kinase. During early tooth development, TGF-β inhibits proliferation of enamel organ epithelial cells but the underlying molecular mechanisms are largely unknown. Here we tested the hypothesis that antagonistic effects between Smad2 and Smad7 regulate TGF-β signaling during tooth development. Attenuation of Smad2 gene expression resulted in significant advancement of embryonic tooth development with increased proliferation of enamel organ epithelial cells, while attenuation of Smad7 resulted in significant inhibition of embryonic tooth development with increased apoptotic activity within enamel organ epithelium. These findings suggest that different Smads may have differential activities in regulating TGF-β-mediated cell proliferation and death. Furthermore, functional haploinsufficiency of Smad2, but not Smad3, altered TGF-β-mediated tooth development. The results indicate that Smads are critical factors in orchestrating TGF-β-mediated gene regulation during embryonic tooth development. The effectiveness of TGF-β signaling is highly sensitive to the level of Smad gene expression.


In this paper, the static response of three-dimensional beams made of functionally graded materials is investigated through a family of hierarchical one-dimensional finite elements. A wide variety of elements is proposed differing by the kinematic formulation and the number of nodes per elements along the beam axis. Elements' stiffness matrix and load vector are derived in a unified nuclear form that does not depend upon the a priori expansion order over the cross-section nor the finite element approximation along the beam axis. Results are validated towards three-dimensional finite element models as well as equivalent Navier-type analytical solutions. The numerical investigations show that accurate and efficient solutions (when compared with full three-dimensional FEM solutions) can be obtained by the proposed family of hierarchical one-dimensional elements' family.


The invention belongs to the field of directional solidification, and particularly relates to a process control method for directional solidification of polycrystalline silicon, wherein temperatures of an upper portion heating device, a middle portion heating device and a lower portion heating device are separately adjusted after a silicon material is melted to carry out crystal growth and annealing cooling on the silicon body, and finally the ingot is taken. With the present invention, a furnace space can be maximally utilized, and an equipment investment cost can be saved; and the temperatures of the lower portion heating device and the middle portion heating device are controlled, and the water cooling manner is adopted to reduce the temperature of the bottom of the crucible so as to rapid cool, such that energy consumption per unit mass of the casting ingot is reduced.


The invention discloses a male socket. The male socket includes a socket main body, a pin, an electromagnet which assumes a long strip shape and a first lead. The socket main body is provided with a slot thereon. The pin is inserted to the slot. The slot has a first bottom wall. The electromagnet is arranged on the outside of the first bottom wall. The first lead wraps the electromagnet in a preset direction and then is in electrical connection to the pin. The electromagnet is parallel to the pin. The invention also provides a female socket, an electronic device and a socket connector. The cooperation between the male socket and the female plug enables the female plug to be automatically bounced off in an mechanical manner when short circuit happens to the electronic device, so that the circuit can be rapidly disconnected from the root, which prevents the electronic device and a user from being harmed due to short circuit of the circuit.


Estimation of binding free energies is one of the central aims of simulations of biomolecular complexes. We explore the accuracy and efficiency of setups based on non-equilibrium pulling simulations applied to estimation of binding affinities of DNA-binding proteins. Absolute binding free energies are calculated over a range of temperatures and compared to results obtained previously using an equilibrium method. We show that realistic binding affinities can be obtained with the presented non-equilibrium approach, which also entails lower computational requirements. Errors of the binding free energy estimates are investigated and are shown to be comparable to those observed previously. Bounds are provided on the convergence of the errors with respect to the number of pulling simulations performed and with respect to the applied pull rate.


Frequency modulation of surface plasmon polaritons propagating at the Au/LiNbO3 interface was analyzed in detail. The intensity of the modulated signal varied according to the LiNbO3 crystal orientation, slit structure, modulator length, and modulation voltage.


In this chapter, some specialized applications are described in which computers are essential for manipulating and enhancing images obtained by using a transmission electron microscope, particularly to understand the tertiary and quaternary structures of biological macromolecules and their complexes. The chapter must be read with some knowledge of the basic principles of transmission electron microscopy (TEM) of biological material. The computational techniques for analyzing and reconstructing macromolecular structures from TEM images are reviewed in monographs. Partial results of single-particle analyses of both frozen-hydrated and negatively stained preparations are illustrated in the chapter. S-layers, the proteinaceous surface arrays found on some gram-positive and gram-negative eubacteria and many archaea, are naturally occurring 2-D crystals that are amenable to image analysis by electron crystallography. TEM, particularly cryoTEM, has become a powerful tool for analyzing the tertiary and quaternary conformations of biological macromolecules and their complexes. Computational image analysis and reconstruction are integral tools in this process. The chapter has illustrated two approaches to manipulating and processing macromolecular TEM images that one would commonly find in the structural and molecular microbiological literature.