Neglect of residual stresses created during welding processes can lead to stress corrosion cracking, distortion, fatigue cracking, premature failures in components, and instances of over design. Automated residual stress mapping and truly portable equipment have now made the characterization of residual stresses using x-ray difiaction (XRD) practical. The nondestructive nature of the x-ray diffraction technique has made the residual stress characterization of welds a useful tool for process optimization and failure analysis, particularly since components can be fieasfired hrire aqd afier I . I J ~ ! ~ ~ ~ ~ nnct yuV' tlrolrlinn .. w.Yn .b nrnrmxoc "vw".3-w. This paper illustrates the importance of residual stress characterization in welds and presents examples where x-ray diffraction techniques were applied in the characterization of various kinds of welds including arc welds, TIG welds, resistance welds, laser welds and electron beam welds. Numerous techniques are available to help manage potentially harmful residual stresses created during the welding process thus, the effects of a few example post weld processes such as grinding, heat treating and shot peening are also addressed. INTRODUCTION The advantages of XRD and three areas of concern regarding residual stress and weld quality, stress corrosion cracking, fatigue, and stress concentrations, will be briefly discussed. F a t i ~ u e and Stress Concentrations Tensile residual stress fields created during the welding process often contribute to decreases in the fatigue life of welded components, especially when they exist in the HAZ. The residual stress state existing in certain weld toes and undercuts can also ba critical when stress concentration geometries exist which can magnify the effects of applied loads. fatigue cracking are considered, potentially When issues of harmfbl tensile residual stresses alone or in combination with stress concentrations can lead to fatigue crack initiation and propagation. This means that accurate residual stress characterization must be performed in key areas such as the toe and the I= of welds to understand fatigue failures, help in the experimental verification of stress concentration factors predicted by finite element models and to reduce instances of over-design and unneeded increases in weight. Environmentally Assisted Weld Cracking Also known as Stress Corrosion Cracking or SCC, environmentally assisted cracking is A rrajor source of potential failures in the process industries, in pulp mills, in storage vessels, and even in aircraft. Most often, SCC occurs in the heat affected zone (HAZ) immediately adjacent to a weld simply because the I N is left in a state of very high residual tensile stress as a result of the shrinkage and differential cooling occurring in most welds. Tensile stresses (residual or applied) are the main component of the stress corrosion cracking triangle: the other two are a susceptible metal and an environment that often needs to be only slightly corrosive to that metal. For instance, grade 316 stainless steel is essentially inert to the corrosive effect of common salt urtless tensile stresses are present, when it becomes very sensitive to chloride induced SCC. There are a number of possible solutions. The obvious one is to change the environment, but that is rarely possible. The next is to change the tnetal, but usually that is expensive and if the equipment is already built, impractical. Thermal stress relieving is a partial solution at best because, to relieve all the tensile stresses in the HAZ, it is necessary for the heating to reach the annealing temperature and the material properties will be lost. Corrosion engineers have long recognized that an effective solution for the retardation or even prevention of SCC is the introduction of compressive stresses in the I M . This can be done using controlled shot peening. Surface residual tensile stresses in the IIAZ may approach or even exceed the yield strength of the material but if the surface is shot peened, the dimpling action of the shot bombardtnent can reduce the tensile stresses and even replace them with residual stresses that are in compression if properly done. IIence, there is a clear need for accurate nondestructive residual stress characterization of welds to verify the residual stress state of weld HAZs in components that may be susceptible to SCC. This type of weld characterization can be performed t~ondestructively on components that are already in service and ideally, on welded components before they go into service. Advances in XRD Technology Accurate characterization of residual stresses in welds has been difficult and oflen impractical since most residual stress measurement techniques are destructive and lack the resolution to accurately characterize the steep stress gradients that exist in weld H M s . Recently, the measurement of residual stresses using x-ray diffraction techniques has becotne both practical and eflicient. In addition, the introduction of stress mapping techniques has allowed the quick and precise characterization of entire welds, including areas of interest such as steep stress gradients and their associated tensile residual stress maxima. 1%:: skess mzp dfsp!r;j! has given engineers i; cciiii;!zk and accurate visual analysis of the magnitude and distribution of residual stresses in their welded components. Since surface stress measurements using x-ray diffraction techniques are non-contact and nondestructive, meas~iren~ents can be performed at the same point before and after a process such as post weld heat treating or shot peening, so that residual stresses can be characterized at all steps of the manufacturing process. This can help in the optimization of these manufacturing processes and the management of their associated residual stresses. MEASUREMENT APPARATUS The residual stress measurements were performed at the Proto Mfg. Ltd. x-ray diffraction laboratory and in the field using a dual solid state detector diffractometer with automated stress mapping hardware and software. BASICS OF THE X-RAY DIFFRACTION STRESS MEASUREMENT TECHNIQUE The x-ray method does not measure stress directly but measures strain ffom which stress values are calculated. The x-ray method rather elegantly takes advantage of the crystalline structure of the material itself, by using the atomic lattice spacing as a strain gage. As a result, thousands of "built in strain gages" within the crystals which compose the material are available for strain measuretnent by the x-ray diffraction method. 'To phrase it more exactly, the surface strain present can be determined by the tneasurement of the elastic atomic lattice spacing or "d-spacing" as it is commonly called. Illis lattice spacing, the distance between the planes of atom;, is dependent upon the material and the stresses present in the material. The x-ray diffraction angle 0 for a given x-ray wavelength h can be used to determine the material "d" spacing by means of Bragg's law: nh=2dsin 0 ( 1 ) For x-ray diffraction to occur, i.e, constructive wave interference, the path difherence traveled by the diffracted beam through the mateh l , as compared to a non-difl'racted beam, must be equal to nL (Noyan and Cohen, 1987). The presence of residual stresses in the material produces a shif? in the x-ray diffraction peak angular position (Cullity, 1978) which is directly measured by the detector. Once the lattice d-spacings are measured for the unstressed (do) and stressed (d,) material conditions, the atomic lattice strain can then be calculated by the following relationship (Hilley et. al., 1971): strain = (di-do)/do.. (2) For isotropic materials, strains can be converted to stress ... ....... ..&-, d l . , . :,I . , . . , l.,l,.., " U I U L J U 3 l l l t j L11L LCl"u:IuII SLIUWII U b I U W . d -do E 1 stress ( c ~ ) = ( ~ ) ~ do s ~ n v (3) is the x-ray elastic col~stant, y is the angle where: (j+v) subtended by the bisector of the incident and diffracted beam and the surface normal, dv is the lattice spacing at a given yr tilt and do is the unstressed lattice spacing. Residual stresses are measured using either of two techniques. The first is the single exposure technique (SET), whereby a stress measurement is performed using only one tilt angle. This technique gives the user a very quick and eflicient method to perfom a stress measurement and is particularly suited to cases where many measurements are needed quickly. The second is the multiple exposure technique (MET), whereby multiple beta tilts are used in the analysis. The MET method is more revealing for material conditions for which the d vs. sin2\y relationship is not linear, as assumed in equation (3), but takes much longer than the SET (Klug and Alexander, 1974). Techniques are also available that deal with phase changes that may exist through the weld, the HAZ and the parent material (Noyan and Cohen, 1987).


Conditional sampling measurements based on the 4-quadrant classification method were made to reveal the turbulence structure of a round water jet and a round gas-liquid two-phase jet moving in the vertical direction using a two-dimensional LDV. In the central part of the jets, the rms values of the vertical and radial turbulence components and the Reynolds shear stress of the two-phase jet are much greater than those of the water jet. This difference is attributable to the wake of bubbles rising upward. The difference becomes very small at the outer edge of the jets. Turbulent motions were classified into four distinct categories : ejection, sweep, outward interaction, and inward inter-action. The contribution of each motion to the Reynolds shear stress and turbulence kinetic energy were determined. Turbulence production was much greater in the two-phase jet than in the water jet. Ejection and sweep were found to be mainly responsible for turbulence production in both kinds of jets.


Purpose of this evaluation was to determine whether the failure of any non-Class I (seismic) equipment could result in a condition, such as flooding, that might adversely affect the performance of the safety-related equipment required for the safe shutdown of the facility, or to mitigate the consequences of an accident. Criteria developed by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission were used to evaluate the acceptability of the existing protection system as well as measures taken by Consolidated Edison Company of New York (CECNY) to minimize the danger of flooding and to protect safety-related equipment. Based on the information supplied by the licensee, it is concluded that the licensee, CECNY, has demonstrated in its analysis that the Indian Point 2 Power Station has the capacity and capability to manage and mitigate any single incident, such as flooding, from a non-Class I system component or pipe, so that this flooding will not prevent the safe shutdown of the facility.


Summary The determination of citric acid with pyridine and acetic anhydride has been investigated at reaction temperatures from 17 to 60° C. The optimum proportions of pyridine, acetic anhydride, water, and acetic acid for maximum color intensity and stability are given for each temperature. The procedure has been modified to eliminate the violent nature of the reaction, even when the analysis is done at a reaction temperature of 60° C. Details of a method for the determination of 25–200 μ g. of citric acid, at a reaction temperature of 32° C., are presented. In comparison with previously published methods based on the reaction, the recommended technique results in improved sensitivity, stability, and reproducibility without requiring careful timing. The method has been successfully applied to the routine analysis of milk and milk products. Milk and serum can be analyzed directly, after suitable dilution. Corrections for the interference caused by fat in homogenized milk, and by trichloroacetic acid in T.C.A. serum, can be made easily. Results of direct analysis of milk were from 5 to 15% higher than those for the corresponding sera and are believed to represent the true values for the citric acid content of milk.


This article investigates how expectations influence the determination of the Brazilian benchmark interest rate. It rescues Keynes' views on the relationship between expectations and monetary policy to form the article's theoretical framework. Then, as empirical methodology, we use Autoregressive Distributed Lag Models and Bounds Testing Approach to Cointegration, to study, in the short and long-run, the connection between expectations and central bank interest rate. For the period from 2001Q3 to 2017Q4, results show that in the long-run business and consumer confidence, as well as expectations related to market interest rates, GDP, inflation and exchange rate play an important role on monetary policy actions. In the short-run, business and consumer confidence lose importance, while the other mentioned expectations are still statistically significant. Therefore, the way agents perceive future expectations of important variables, in the short and long-run, is important for monetary policy decisions in Brazil.


Following the economic crisis of 1997 in Thailand, rubber-based small holding farms were forced to take various steps to remain economically viable. These steps were taken with the objective of increasing the farmûs productivity and farm income of the six main types of rubber-based farming systems. The four systems of rubber-based farms: rubber-pineapple farm (R2), rubber-durian-mangosteen farm (R43), rubber-durianmangosteen-rambutan farm (R44), and rubber-durian-fishery farm (R61) achieved greater in economic performance respectively, net farm income and gross margin, than any other farm types. And also, four significant explanatory variables: accessibility to sources of information (AIN), smallholdersû participation through group activity (PTG), Agricultural knowledge and skill in management (KUA), and Using fertilizer and feed (FUF) have influence on farm household income with the coefficient of multiple adjust (R2) of 0.460 explained at least 46%. However, smallholders face many constraints in trying to maintain a profitable farming operation, including fluctuating prices, low capital for investment, disease and pests, insufficient water and poor water management systems. To encourage and help farmers to change farm modernization implementation strategies are suggested including providing improved credit systems, modern tapping methods, provision of soil and leaf analysis, provision of infrastructure and financial incentives, provision of information on highyield varieties, and new water resources infrastructure development. To help increase farm income directly, it is suggested to implement government programs which focus on the needs of smallholders, encourage agents of technology transfer to be more supportive of smallholders, improve rubber-processing technology, encourage the establishment of value-added businesses in local communities and optimize land use. Key word : rubber, farming system, smallholding rubber-based farm, farmûs evolution 1 Department of Agricultural Development, Faculty of Natural Resources, Prince of Songkla University, Hat Yai, Songkhla 90112, Thailand. 2 Department of Agricultural Economics, Faculty of Natural Resources, Prince of Songkla University, Hat Yai, Songkhla 90112, Thailand. Kasetsart J. (Soc. Sci) 21 : 158 177 (2000) «. ‡°...μ√»" μ√å ( —ߧ¡) aï∑'Ë 21 : 158 177 (2543)


Objective: The present paper aims to study the effect of fineness of quarry dust on the compressive strength of M30 concrete containing quarry dust as fine aggregates is studied. Method: The compressive strength and workability of quarry dust concret


Brown, Roger, & Gilman, Albert (1960). The pronouns of power and solidarity. In Thomas Sebeok (ed.), Style in language, 253-76. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Fishman, Joshua A. (1972). Domains and relationships between microand macro-sociolinguistics. In John J. Gumperz & Dell H. Hymes (eds.), Directions in sociolinguistics, 435-53. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston. Poplack, Shana (1980). Sometimes I'll start a sentence in English Y TERMINO EN ESPANOL: Toward a typology of code-switching. Linguistics 18:581-618. Smitherman, Geneva (1981), ed. Black English and the education of Black children and youth. Detroit: Wayne State University, Center for Black Studies.


In order to reduce short channel effects for devices with channel lengths less than 0.25 /spl mu/m, the buried oxide (BOX) thickness will need to be less than 200 nm. To this end, an experimental low dose (0.7/spl times/10/sup 18//cm/sup 2/) oxygen implantation process for thin-BOX SIMOX has been explored. The extended defects in this material are predominantly dislocation pairs that run from the superficial Si/BOX interface to oxide precipitates. As in all electronic materials, the dislocation density in the device region must also be minimized. A reduction in the superficial Si layer dislocation density from /spl sim/10/sup 7//cm/sup 2/ to an estimated value of less than 100/cm/sup 2/ was achieved by subjecting this material to a prolonged (16 hour) anneal at 1325/spl deg/C in an atmosphere of 0.5% O/sub 2/ in Ar. The anneal effectively reduced the device silicon layer from 270 nm to 200 nm as measured by cross-sectional transmission electron microscopy (TEM). The BOX layer thickness was unchanged by the anneal and remained at 130 nm.


Body-worn inertial measurement units (IMUs) have been widely used in postural stability and balance studies because of their low cost and high level of convenience. In most studies, single IMU sensors are put on the lower back attached to a belt, placing the sensor near the body's center of mass (COM). For some populations, such as pregnant women, wearing the sensor on a belt over the lower back presents challenges in terms of fit and comfort. Thus, it may be necessary to identify a better location for the sensor and a more comfortable means for attaching the sensor to the body. This study aims to implement and test a novel pendant IMU sensor hanging from the subject's neck and placed over the sternum. Three standing tasks (double-leg, tandem, and single-leg standing) were performed under open- and closed-eye conditions for preliminary assessments of the ability of the new sensor to discriminate between balance conditions. Standard deviations were analyzed in different conditions, along with ROC curves and ANOVA analysis. The results showed that the pendant sensor can detect the signals as good as the sensor on the waist.


The aim o f this study established formulas for r elay intercropping and cr op sequence evaluations based o n biological and e conomical parameters from crop intensification perspective. At the same time as prediction f ormulas to predict the succ ess of in tensive crop sequences from farmers view perspective. Four intensive successions and five conventional sequences were conducted in 2005/06 and 2006/07 years in D akahlia go vernorate. The res ults supported the superiority of sequence 1 including wheat with co tton i n rel ay inte rcropping. This intensive sequenc e regi stered the hi ghest mean net returns due to hi gher production of both cr ops coupled wi th bet ter market price.The formulas were e stablished for estimating the Economic Yield Advantage Ratio (EYAR) whether intensive or conventional sequences 1 systems. EYAR equation values showed t hat the relay intercropping of cotton with wheat was superior 2 in al l successions b y va lues ranging be tween 17.08 to 181.02 %. EYAR equation val ues were demonstrated that the i ntensive sequenc e 2 was superior t o the t raditional sequence 6 by 26.46%. On t he 2 other hand , the differences between EYAR values and n et return ratio v alues due to t he variations of area time land occupied of both sequences. So, it can be said that the net return values given were not 2 true enough to eva luate t he comparisons between the crop sequences. EYAR equation va lues showed that the both of intensive sequence 3 a nd tr aditional sequence 5 w ere failed by -4.59 a nd - 5.53 %,respectively, compared with conventional sequence 7. This means that the increasing in net return of sequence 3 was n ot e nough for th e compensate the increasing in the sequence duration. T he economic evaluation of water requirements of each sequence d isplayed that the co tton / wheat in rel ay intercropping recorded the highest net return for m of water re quirements. 3


In this paper, a computational method is presented to solve potential-type Fredholm integral equations of the first kind, equations in which the unknown functions are singular at the endpoints of the integration domain, in addition to the weakly singular logarithmic kernels. This method provides a numerical solution based on the Newton interpolation technique via the Vandermonde matrix, which can accommodate an approximation of the unknown function, in such a manner that its singularity is easily removed, as well as the removal of kernel singularity. In addition, the Gauss–Legendre formula is adapted and applied for the computations of the obtained convergent integrals. Thus, the obtained numerical solution is equivalent to the solution of an algebraic equation in matrix form without applying the collocation method. The numerical solutions of the illustrated example are strongly converging to the exact solution for all values of 1 x  including the end-points 1  whereas the exact solution fails to find the functional values at these end-points; which ensures the powerful and high accuracy of the presented computational technique. Keywords—Electro-optics, electromagnetism, Fredholm integral equations, well-posed, singular, logarithmic kernel.


We propose a learned lossless image compression method for high bit-depth medical imaging (up to 16 bit-depths). Instead of compressing a high bit-depth medical image as a whole, we split it into two low bit-depth subimages, i.e., the most significant bytes (MSB) subimage and the least significant bytes (LSB) subimage, respectively. The MSB subimage depicts piece-wise smooth structure information that is relatively easy to compress. We thus use traditional lossless codecs for low complexity. The LSB subimage depicts the complementary texture information that is more challenging to compress. We design an autoregressive entropy model conditioned on the MSB subimage that models the probability distribution of the LSB subimage and effectively reduces the redundancy between the MSB and LSB subimages. We then encode the LSB subimage to bitstreams based on the learned entropy model. The compressed high bit-depth medical image is finally stored including the bitstreams of the MSB and LSB subimages. Experimental results demonstrate the state-of-the-art compression performance of the proposed method on high bit-depth medical images, compared with both existing traditional and learned lossless image codecs.


The fusion Z-pinch experiment device produces a 0.3 cm radius by 50 cm-long Z pinch between the end of the inner electrode of a coaxial plasma gun and an end wall 50 cm away. The plasma column is stabilized for thousands of instability growth times by an embedded radially sheared axial plasma flow. To investigate the effect of end wall design on Z-pinch plasma behavior, the solid end wall with a central exhaust port is replaced with a spoked end wall with a solid hub. While the Z-pinch plasma behavior was largely unaffected, the plasma exhausted from the Z-pinch provides an experimental platform to study magnetic confinement and detachment. Current and density signals are compared between two cases: a low energy and a high energy case. Plasma is found to be frozen-in flux in the Z-pinch assembly region. The exhaust of plasma from the flux conserving region is found to be dependent on the ratio of plasma ram and thermal pressures to the local magnetic pressure, calculated from an equilibrium model at the end wall. Plasma exhaust is observed to increase with the spoked end wall only for the high energy conditions as its ratio of ram and thermal pressures to the magnetic pressure increases.


Acknowledgements Note on spelling Introduction: the politics of tears 1. Three sentimental writers 2. Towards a model of the sentimental text 3. Love and money: social hierarchy in the sentimental text 4. Sentimentalism in the rhetoric of the Revolution 5. Sentimentalism and ideologie 6. Beyond sentimentalism? Madame de Stael Conclusion Notes Bibliography Index.


Plant growth models are used to explain the mathematical relation among plant physiology, and the climate and soil conditions, and to predict the plant physiology from these conditions. In this study, basic assumptions used in plant growth models are overviewed and the CERES-Maize model is evaluated. This maize growth model is a version of CERES, which has a worldwide use since it considers for a variety of plants and is updated continually.


Significance The paradoxical coexistence of excessive autoantibodies and inadequate affinity-matured pathogen-specific antibodies in lupus is poorly understood. Here, we found that excessive CD11c+T-bet+ age-associated B cells (ABCs)—a recently described autoimmunity-relevant B cell subset [K. Rubtsova et al., J. Clin. Invest. 127, 1392–1404 (2017)]—not only contribute to the production of autoantibodies but also promote aberrant follicular T-helper (TFH) cell differentiation and consequently compromise affinity-based germinal center (GC) B-cell selection and antibody-affinity maturation in lupus mouse models. Importantly, ablating B cell-intrinsic Toll-like receptor (TLR) signaling adaptor MyD88 in lupus mice inhibited CD11c+T-bet+ ABC differentiation, normalized TFH differentiation, and rescued GC selection, as well as prevented autoantibody production, suggesting that CD11c+T-bet+ ABCs and TLR signaling are potential targets for lupus treatment. Excessive self-reactive and inadequate affinity-matured antigen-specific antibody responses have been reported to coexist in lupus, with elusive cellular and molecular mechanisms. Here, we report that the antigen-specific germinal center (GC) response―a process critical for antibody affinity maturation―is compromised in murine lupus models. Importantly, this defect can be triggered by excessive autoimmunity-relevant CD11c+Tbet+ age-associated B cells (ABCs). In B cell-intrinsic Ship-deficient (ShipΔB) lupus mice, excessive CD11c+Tbet+ ABCs induce deregulated follicular T-helper (TFH) cell differentiation through their potent antigen-presenting function and consequently compromise affinity-based GC selection. Excessive CD11c+Tbet+ ABCs and deregulated TFH cell are also present in other lupus models and patients. Further, over-activated Toll-like receptor signaling in Ship-deficient B cells is critical for CD11c+Tbet+ ABC differentiation, and blocking CD11c+Tbet+ ABC differentiation in ShipΔB mice by ablating MyD88 normalizes TFH cell differentiation and rescues antigen-specific GC responses, as well as prevents autoantibody production. Our study suggests that excessive CD11c+Tbet+ ABCs not only contribute significantly to autoantibody production but also compromise antigen-specific GC B-cell responses and antibody-affinity maturation, providing a cellular link between the coexisting autoantibodies and inadequate affinity-matured antigen-specific antibodies in lupus models and a potential target for treating lupus.


This study explored how different intensities and types of physical activity are related to academic-related outcomes in children. It found that type and not intensity of physical activity was associated with better academic-related outcomes. Specifically, sport and short bouts of physical activity done in the classroom were associated with better focus in the classroom, which may lead to better academic achievement.


There is existing tension within many Aboriginal communities between economic development and preservation of traditional lands for the continued practice of traditional activities. The "duty to consult" doctrine has has become an important mechanism by which these concerns were identified and addressed (when possible) prior to development. This is a legal requirement that is rooted in the Constitution Act (1982) and subsequent legal case law that has further defined and outlined requirements under this obligation. This article describes the process that was carried out to advance the proposed Kabinakagami River Hydro Project Class Environmental Assessment in Northern Ontario, Canada with an emphasis on the approach to Aboriginal consultation. This project is unique because the co-proponent of the project is an Aboriginal community, with several neighbouring Aboriginal communities potentially affected by the project. This project raises questions about the approach to carrying out the duty to consult in an effective way. An evaluative framework was developed to examine timeline, information, means, and flexibility and transparency of the process to highlight shortcomings in the process and make recommendations for improvement.


South African society and workplaces are riddled with challenges related to race, gender, age and political differences, which subsequently created opportunities for the development of numerous related, but mostly unsubstantiated organisational myths. Such myths may cause or contribute to undesirable organisational behaviour forms and outcomes. The primary objective of this paper was therefore to investigate the extent to which a number of demographic variables moderate primary employment relationship satisfaction (PERS) levels of a sample of employees from two South African cities. 545 respondents participated in a voluntarily questionnaire survey. Descriptive and inferential statistics were applied to investigate the statistical significance of differences in PERS levels of different groupings within the sample group. A number of differences between PERS levels of different sample groups were investigated. Eight myths were dispelled and two realities were identified.


We investigate the gravitational collapse of both a massive (Schwarzschild–AdS) and a massive-charged (Reissner–Nordström–AdS) 4-dimensional domain wall in AdS space. Here, we consider both the classical and quantum collapse, in the absence of quasi-particle production and backreaction. For the massive case, we show that, as far as the asymptotic observer is concerned, the collapse takes an infinite amount of time to occur in both the classical and quantum cases. Hence, quantizing the domain wall does not lead to the formation of the black hole in a finite amount of time. For the infalling observer, we find that the domain wall collapses to both the event horizon and the classical singularity in a finite amount of proper time. In the region of the classical singularity, however, the wave function exhibits both nonlocal and nonsingular effects. For the massive-charged case, we show that, as far as the asymptotic observer is concerned, the details of the collapse depend on the amount of charge present; that is, the extremal, nonextremal and overcharged cases. In the overcharged case, the collapse never fully occurs since the solution is an oscillatory solution which prevents the formation of a naked singularity. For the extremal and nonextremal cases, it takes an infinite amount of time for the outer horizon to form. For the infalling observer in the nonextremal case, we find that the domain wall collapses to both the event horizon and the classical singularity in a finite amount of proper time. In the region of the classical singularity, the wave function also exhibits both nonlocal and nonsingular effects. Furthermore, in the large energy density limit, the wave function vanishes as the domain wall approaches classical singularity implying that the quantization does not rid the black hole of its singular nature.


&dquo;inputs&dquo; by the U.S. and its alliese.g., Korea, Vietnam, embargoes, and especially U.S.-British involvement in the Outer Island rebellion and the possibility that the reaction of individual &dquo;triangle&dquo; components may have been independent and rational, while at the same time naturally contributive to relations among them. The evolution of such an independent and &dquo;rational&dquo; reaction is apparent, for instance, if one performs on Soekarno's speeches the kind of content analysis Professor Simon confined only to CPR media. These remarks barely touch upon the analytic and factual deficiencies of this volume. One wishes the author had at least perused the substantial excellent literature concerning Indonesia of the 1950's, Guided Democracy, the PKI, and Indonesia's foreign policy (e.g., books by Feith, Hindley, Lev, Bunnell ; articles by Mozingo, Bunnell). Perceptual analysis surely is welcome, but it must rest on more, not less, substantive knowledge.


Aim TCRP1 is a novel gene which was cloned from a multi-drug resistant cell line Tca8113/PYM in previous research.The preliminary functional investigation in vitro indicated that TCRP1 was a new chemo-resistance related gene,which mediated specifically resistance to cisplatin in Oral Squamous Cell Carcinoma(OSCC) cells.This study aims to futher explore the effect of TCRP1 in OSCC in vivo.Methods The effect of TCRP1on sensitivity to cisplatin and 5-Fu was observed through establishing the ectopic tumor animal model of over/silence expression of TCRP1,and then the initiatory mechanism was imvestigated.Results The outcome of tumor growth curves and tumor weight displayed that TCRP1 significantly increased the resistance to cisplatin in OSCC ectopic tumor,but not to 5-Fu.And the TUNEL assay indicated there were fewer number of apoptosis cells in up-regulated TCRP1 tumor tissue.Conclusion TCRP1 is a novel chemo-resistance related gene,and its functional mechanism is correlated with reducing the cells apoptosis induced by cisplatin.


Only 4% of 600 particles slid on or adhered to buccopharyngeal surfaces of Oreochromis esculentus. Only a minute quantity of mucus was visible during feeding (0.6% of 68 224 video frames; 30 frames s -1 ), and very few particles were retained in this mucus. Filtration by mucus entrapment on the branchial arches is rejected as a mechanism of particle retention in this species. Since particles contacted the branchial arches infrequently, and the inter-raker spaces are too large to retain particles less than approximately 50 μm, sieving by gill rakers as a particle retention mechanism is rejected also. Unlike the suspension-feeding congener O. niloticus, O. esculentus does not use branchial arches to retain food particles by sieving or by mucus entrapment.


The utility model relates to a environment protective expansion perlite plate steel fire resisting door, which comprises a hinge back plate, a fire resisting rubber strip, a door core plate, a stiffening plate, a lock, a door panel, a hinge and a door frame, and is characterized in that the inner periphery of the door core plate is welded with a groove-shaped framework, a expansion perlite plate is adhered on the door core plate through the fire resisting rubber strip, and fixed between the door panel and the door core plate to form a door leaf, the hinge back plate is arranged on one side of the door leaf, the stiffening plate is arranged on the other side of the door leaf, and the fire resisting rubber strip is adhered on the door frame. The environment protective expansion perlite plate steel fire resisting door has the advantages of high intensity, good fire resisting performance, smoke proof, sound insulation, damping, dust prevention and fire resisting performances, has smooth and clean outer surface without welding spots, is artistic and practical, and applied to the high residential building and the fire fighting access.


McCaulley makes an important point: in many practices, even those based in and near areas endemic for Lyme disease, that diagnosis is often missed and may not even be considered. This concept, which has been dealt with in a previous article, 1 was one of the major points made at the National Clinical Conference on Lyme Disease 2 and, in fact, is one of the goals of the extant, broad, clinical literature on Lyme disease. However, in clinical practice in endemic and near-to-endemic areas, a larger problem is overdiagnosis and overtreatment. 3-5 It is critical that the diagnosis of Lyme disease be considered when appropriate, a point made in the article under discussion 3 and in previous discussions of overdiagnosis. 1 Lyme disease should be included within the differential diagnosis when prudent clinical practice suggests that it is a plausible explanation of the patient's problems. However, the diagnosis should not


Democracy has both a direct and an indirect relationship with sustainable development. Democracy is related to the movement toward long-term economic development directly, and indirectly, democracy can provide the means to create the institutional structures needed to create links between the political systems, the culture of participation, and the social values of a society. Since economic development is a multidimensional concept and one of its primary requirements is to achieve a high level of income and appropriate economic growth, knowing the relationship between democracy and economic growth is especially important for policymakers. Many important questions are raised about the relationship between democracy and economic performance. What is the relationship between democracy and economic growth? Is this relationship different in developed countries and developing countries? Considering the effects of democracy and economic growth on the welfare of communities, the main purpose of this study was to investigate the causal relationship between democracy and economic growth from 1990–2020 for the OECD and selected developing countries. The results showed that the conflict and skeptical hypotheses had been established in OECD and developing countries, respectively. It was concluded that the pattern of economic growth and development in OECD countries differed from that in developing countries. For OECD countries, real per capita GDP growth was mainly affected by previous per capita GDP growth, and the effect of democracy on per capita economic growth was negative. Moreover, the results indicated that in developing countries, democracy alone had not triggered economic growth and that real per capita GDP growth depended on other important structural variables such as social and physical infrastructure.


This study aims to examine ICT competencies, research competencies, and teacher professionalism. The research method used is a mixed method.This study was conducted on urban and rural residents. The instruments used are teacher competency questionnaires, research competency questionnaires, questionnaires that measure teacher professionalism and interview instruments. Based on the results of data analysis, it is known that there is a relationship between teacher professionalism, ICT competence and research competence. This finding is that there is a relationship between ICT competence and research competence simultaneously on teacher professionalism.

Keywords: Profesional Teacher , ICT, Research Competencies, Urban, Rural


Recent advances in spatial transcriptomics have enabled measurements of gene expression at cell/spot resolution meanwhile retaining both the spatial information and the histopathological images of the tissues. Deciphering the spatial domains of spots in the tissues is a vital step for various downstream tasks in spatial transcriptomics analysis. Existing methods have been developed for this purpose by combining gene expression and histopathological images to conquer noises in gene expression. However, current methods only use the histopathological images to construct spot relations without updating in the training stage, or simply concatenate the information from gene expression and images into one feature vector. Here, we propose a novel method ConGI to accurately decipher spatial domains by integrating gene expression and histopathological images, where the gene expression is adapted to image information through contrastive learning. We introduce three contrastive loss functions within and between modalities to learn the common semantic representations across all modalities while avoiding their meaningless modality-private noise information. The learned representations are then used for deciphering spatial domains through a clustering method. By comprehensive tests on tumor and normal spatial transcriptomics datasets, ConGI was shown to outperform existing methods in terms of spatial domain identification. More importantly, the learned representations from our model have also been used efficiently for various downstream tasks, including trajectory inference, clustering, and visualization.


Approximately 8 years ago, two groups independently reported enrichment of Fusobacterium nucleatum (Fn) in human colorectal cancer (CRC) tissues compared with adjacent normal tissues.1 2 Since this discovery, intense research interests have been drawn to the bacterium in the context of CRC. The association between Fn and CRC has been confirmed in numerous studies, and several Fn-driven pro-oncogenic mechanisms have been proposed based on observations from preclinical models.3 Notably, much of our knowledge regarding the involvement of Fn is at the primary CRC development stage. How Fn might impact CRC metastasis—the late stage of carcinogenesis that really determines poor prognosis in patients—is relatively unexplored, despite detection of the bacterium in CRC metastases to the liver and lymph nodes.1 2 4

The first evidence that Fn is important for CRC metastasis emerged in 2017, when it was shown that Fn presence correlated with successful establishment of CRC patients-derived xenografts in mice.4 Yet, the molecular process underlying Fn-dependent metastatic tumour formation was undefined. Earlier this year, three research groups, using a similar in vitro experimental design, reported that Fn infection enhanced migration of human CRC-derived HCT116 cells, although each group proposes distinct mechanisms.5–7 These include induction of interleukin-8 (IL-8) and C-X-C Motif Chemokine Ligand 1 (CXCL1),5 upregulation of caspase …


Omega rings (Ω-rings) (and other related structures) are lattice-valued structures (with Ω being the codomain lattice) defined on crisp algebras of the same type, with lattice-valued equality replacing the classical one. In this paper, Ω-ideals are introduced, and natural connections with Ω-congruences and homomorphisms are established. As an application, a framework of approximate solutions of systems of linear equations over Ω-fields is developed.


The utilization of industrial waste produced by industrial process has been the focus of waste reduction research for economical, environmental and technical reasons. Sugarcane bagasse ash (SCBA) is a fibrous waste product of the sugar mill industry. Sugarcane bagasse ash (SCBA) mainly contains silica, ion, calcium and aluminium. In this paper, bagasse ash has been chemically and physically characterized, and partially replaced in the ratio of 0 %, 5 %, 10 %, 15 % and 20 % ash by weight of weight in Clay brick. The samples were fired at temperatures between 800 oC and 1100 oC. X-ray fluorescence, thermal analysis (differential thermal analysis, thermo gravimetric analysis), and test for texture (particle size analysis), compressive strength, porosity, water absorption and shrinkage were carried out to characterize the samples. The results showed that the amount of ash to be incorporated will depend on mainly the composition of clay but also ash, and indicated that the clay used in this work can incorporate up to 15% weight of ash to produce solid bricks. The results also showed an improvement in clay/ash properties at sintering temperature 1000 oC.


The problem of fault detection was dealt with for a class of networked control systems with quantization and data packet random dropout.An observer-based FDF was introduced as a residual generator,the FDF design problem could be transformed as an H∞ model-matching problem.At the same time,the error introduced by quantization was considered as model uncertainty.The mean square stable condition of observed error system and the H∞ disturbance level of relative residual were derived by using Layapunov-Krasovskii approach and associated solution of the problem could be obtained by solving corresponding linear matrix inequality(LMI).A simulation example was given to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method.


Characterizations of the class of Banach spaces isomorphing to the space $c_0$, as well as to the class of Banach spaces not containing $l_\infty^n$'s uniformly, are obtained in terms of almost surely unconditional convergence of weakly sub-Gaussian random series. Under almost surely unconditional convergence of random series, convergence of all permutations on the same set of full probability is understood. The questions of almost surely unconditional and weak absolute convergence in the spaces isomorphing to $c_0$ are investigated as well.


Intestinal absorption of glucose and activities of amylases of intestinal and pancreatic origin were measured in animals vitamin A deficient, diabetic and combined state of vitamin A deficiency with diabetes. The vitamin A deficient diet caused a significant reduction in intestinal digestive and absorptive functions. On the other hand the digestive and absorptive functions were increased in the diabetic state. The combination of diabetes with vitamin A deficient diet caused a decrease in the digestive and absorptive functions along with blood glucose level in comparison to diabetic state alone. These findings suggest that the inhibition of digestive and absorptive functions observed in the combined state of vitamin A deficiency and diabetes may be due to the presence of vitamin A deficient diet.


Cardiovascular (CV) disease continues to be a major threat to the health of older patients. Despite marked advances in the detection and treatment of most CV diseases, heart failure (HF) continues to produce a heavy burden of CV morbidity and mortality, especially in the elderly population. In 2006 in the United States, HF accounted for nearly 750,000 emergency department visits, 1 million hospital admissions, and an estimated cost of nearly $30 billion, with much of this being attributed to the elderly population. Cardiopulmonary fitness (CF) and exercise are known to predict prognosis and functional capacity in patients with a variety of CV disorders, including HF. We have recently reviewed the marked benefits of CF and exercise training (ET), especially with formal cardiac rehabilitation and ET (CRET) programs in patients with a variety of CV disorders. Although many of these benefits have been noted in younger patients with CV disease, the benefits of ET have been noted in elderly patients, including in cohorts well over the age of 70 (Table 1). Although in most of these studies, the benefits of ET were assessed according to estimated exercise capacity (in metabolic equivalents (METs)), substantial improvements in precisely measured exercise capacity (peak oxygen consumption (peak VO2)), including in 57 adults with a mean age of 78 (Table 2) who had a 13% improvement in peak VO2, were also demonstrated. In another large study of 260 older adults with a mean age of 75, although a less impressive, but significant, 7% improvement in peak VO2 after CRET (Po.001) was noted, this was associated with marked improvements in CV risk factors, as well as reductions in the prevalence of depression ( 67%; Po.001), hostility ( 50%; Po.05), and anxiety ( 31%; Po.01), which may affect prognosis. The benefits of ET in patients with advanced HF continues to be controversial and has recently been reviewed. A review of 81 studies with 2,383 patients of ET in HF found an average increase in peak VO2 of nearly 17%. 13 This meta-analysis demonstrated a trend toward lower mortality with ET ( 29%; P 5.06). In Exercise Training Meta-Analysis of Trials in Patients with Chronic Heart Failure, which assessed 801 patients from nine studies, ET was associated with 35% lower mortality (P 5.02) and 28% fewer hospital admissions (P 5.01). A major randomized control trial (RCT) of ET in HF, A Randomized Control Trial Investigating Outcomes of Exercise Training (HF-ACTION), is a landmark trial that randomly assigned 2,331 patients with HF to 3 months of supervised ET (3 supervised sessions weekly for 36 ET sessions at 60–70% of the heart rate reserve; patients were instructed to exercise 5 times weekly) followed by unsupervised ET versus usual care. Although the primary endpoint was not significantly affected, after preplanned adjustment for confounding factors (baseline peak VO2, ejection fraction, Beck Depression Inventory, and history of atrial fibrillation or flutter), there was a significant 11% reduction in all-cause mortality and a 15% reduction in CV mortality or hospitalizations. Unfortunately, peak VO2 increased significantly, although by less than 5% (Po.001), possibly because the ET group did not perform the volume of exercise that was initially anticipated, thus resulting in much smaller increases in peak VO2 than the greater than 15% improvement anticipated and reported in the metaanalyses. Nevertheless, this study confirmed the safety and efficacy of ET in advanced HF in patients receiving vigorous contemporary HF management. If patients had been more adherent to their exercise prescription (e.g., ET for closer to 150 h/wk as opposed to only half this amount), it is likely that greater improvements in peak VO2 would have been noted, along with greater reductions in major CV events and mortality. In the study by Brubaker et al. in this issue of the journal, the data were ''revived'' nearly a decade after the study was completed. Presumably, presentation and publication of HF-ACTION has stimulated renewed interest in the study of ET in HF. As the authors point out, the mean age of their population was aged 70 and older, compared with only 59 in HF-ACTION, although their study included only 23 patients with baseline and post-ET data, and they included only three weekly supervised ET sessions, with no comment on other nonsupervised ET performed by their cohort. Unfortunately, there was no improvement in mean peak VO2 in their patients after ET, although the authors noted that, in six of 23 (26%), peak VO2 increased by 10% or more, and in nine of 23 (39%), there was 0% to 9.9% improvement. Therefore, the median change in peak VO2 would be much more meaningful and is clearly in the 0% to 9.9% range in this cohort. It was recently demonstrated that only small improvements in peak VO2 (0–10%) are required to produce improvements in depression and depression-related mortality in a large cohort with coronary heart disease, and greater improvements in peak VO2 ( 10%) produced no additional improvements in prognosis. Because it has been reported that depression has considerable effect on morbidity and mortality in patients with advanced HF, it is possible that even these small DOI: 10.1111/j.1532-5415.2009.02520.x


The intraconnection net computer and Internet non-authorized connection monitoring system includes internal net server which is isolated from Internet and is placed in the intraconnection net for supporting TCP/IP protocol; object computer used for sending trojan detection network data into intraconnection net; external net server connected on the Internet for receiving respose of object computerto detection network data, and judging that the monitored object computer is connected into Internet or not or is separated from Internet according to the respose. Said invention can find out and detect all the non-authorized external-connected computers and their IP addresses on the monitored net segment.


In the 21st century learning the ability of Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS) is very necessary especially in Environmental Learning. The problem is the unavailability of students' HOTS profiles. The purpose of this study was to describe the HOTS profile of elementary and junior high school students based on gender using Higher Order Thinking Skills Assessment based on Environmental Problems (HOTS-AEP). The study was conducted in July 2019. The sample used was 130 students, consisting of 14 male students and 18 female students at the elementary level. Then, 29 male students and 69 female students for junior high school. The results showed that the overall HOTS score of students were in very low category with the average score of junior high school for male students (17.70) and female (21.10) while elementary school students for male (20.70) and female (23.60). There were differences in scores between elementary and junior high school based on gender. This showed that the ability of HOTS students in environmental learning still needs to be improved. The conclusion was HOTS of female students still higher than male students at the elementary and junior high school. Besides that overall students HOTS are still very low and need to be improved.


This essay uses concepts of 'playful identification' and 'critical distancing' to explore television viewers' behaviour. In the resulting account, a distinction is made between identification of (a character or narrative), and identification with (an individual). The ludic involvement of consciousness effected by the latter, it is proposed, passes through three phases or 'moments': participation, prescription, and persuasion. Here, the emphasis is on the participatory phase, on the selectively creative processes of an audience's narrative building. The article considers Chinese-Australian (and Malaysian) viewers watching Western television, in particular an SBS drama the central character of which is an Asian immigrant. A focus group discussion is used to provide access to some conflicting interpretations of the program. The audience readings which emerge are structured by gendered oppositions between the participants. Assigned meanings bear witness to the social dynamics of the group. More generally, in the wake of cinematic psychoanalysis, the essay seeks to return televisual 'identification' to the attention of audience and academic alike.


Even with older aircraft, it is possible to lower your carbon footprint--as well as save buckets of money on fuel costs.


In this paper, after reviewing results in the emerging plasma photonics field, we report on a strong plasma emission in the Deep-UV (DUV) range using gas mixture for development of a tunable and miniaturized UV radiation source using microwave-driven plasma-core photonic crystal fiber. Several spectral lines in DUV were produced by Ar-N2-O2 plasmas and tailored by simply varying the gas ratio of this gas mixture. In addition, a planar technology was used to develop a special ring excitator for compact solution to sustain efficiently such plasmas with microwave power as low as the Watt-level.


Calcitonin gene related peptide(CGRP)superfamily includes several polypeptides with structural similarities.Calcitonin is mainly involved in calcium metabolism.Besides its close association with diabetes,amylin also has effects on cardiovascular system to some extent.CGRP can potently dilate blood vassels,lower blood pressure,excite heart and inhibit vascular smooth muscle cell proliferation,so it is closely tied with cardiovascular diseases,and hypertension in particular.CGRP does not only help to develop diseases,but also acts as an antihypertensive substance,thus it has potential clinical applications.Actually many effects of adrenomedullin are similar to CGRP,whose relation with hypertension attracts and activates more and more studies in this aspect.


A monumental frieze of 1902, by Secessionist painter Gustave Klimt, done in honor of a celebrated statue of Beethoven by Max Klinger which is in the Leipzig Museum, was saved by cutting it into eight pieces privately held until the government bought them for the Vienna UNO city in 1975. An intensive restoration was required. The special problems posed byKlimt's painting technique are discussed -- AATA


Natural disasters (earthquake, tsunami, and liquefaction) that were hit Palu City in 2018 had massively damaged the structure of Palu City. One of the affected areas is the tourism area. The tourism area is one of the sources of regional income for Palu City so that the destruction of the area automatically reduces the source of regional income. To rebuild the tourism area after the natural disaster, the Palu City Government needs to update the spatial planning plan for the tourism area. The problems raised in this paper include, firstly, the steps of the Palu City Government in preparing a spatial planning plan for the tourism area after three years of the earthquake and secondly, the obstacles experienced by the Palu City Government in the process of compiling the spatial arrangement. Based on the research conducted, we know that preparing the spatial plan for the tourism area in Palu City has been running for three years but has not yet received the final draft to hampers the process of restoring tourism Palu City. Secondly, the obstacles experienced by the Palu City Government during the spatial planning preparation include the lack of coordination between the bureaucracy in Palu City and central government, lack of budget support, and lack of human resources. This research is included in doctrinal legal research that uses a sociological juridical approach (applied law research). The sociological juridical approach uses case studies in the form of normative-empirical law that focuses on looking at legal behavior and the implementation of legal provisions that apply to a problem in society. There are two kinds of discussions, firstly a discussion on the law of the spatial arrangement of the tourism areas after the disaster in Palu City. Secondly, there is a discussion on the law implementation in the spatial arrangement of the tourist areas and the obstacles. The obstacles experienced in revising the spatial planning document in the tourism sector are lacking budget support, lacking qualified human resources, and lacking coordination between agencies in the regions.


A method is disclosed which allows a liner 10 with one or more external casing packers 14, (16) to be run into a wellbore on coiled tubing 26 in a single trip. Preferably the liner 10 is supported by a running tool 30 at a position near its lower end and adjacent to the lowermost external casing packer 14. A packer setting tool 28 may be positioned on the coiled tubing in close proximity to the running tool 30 so that the combined overall length of running tool 30 and inflation tool 28 is short enough to fit into a standard lubricator 36. The liner 10 is then run to a desired depth within the wellbore and the setting tool 28 sets the lowermost packer 14. This packer 14 is then able to support the liner 10 within the wellbore thus allowing the running tool 30 to disconnect from the liner 10 and the setting tool 28 to move to and inflate any remaining packers (16).


Absence of Credit is a serious problem in Chinese economic area. No redemption is the expression of personal credit absence. Since, it becomes more and more dangerous to the society, criminal law should be used to deal with the behavior. After researching of the connotation of encrochment crime, no redemption is encrochment crime can be proved, although criminal law hasn't specified that no redemption is criminal.


Introduction and aims: Minimal trauma fractures may be the first indication of osteoporosis [OP]. Available data suggests that the continuum of care [EDorthopaedic service-GP] is breaking down with respect to identification and treatment of osteoporosis. Our aim was to determine the extent of this breakdown in the Australasian context. Methods: Observational retrospective cohort study of patients aged 50 years or over who were treated and discharged with wrist fracture due to minimal trauma. Data collected included demographics, fracture details, cause of injury, bone density testing and osteoporosis-related medication change. Outcomes of interest were the proportion of patients who underwent bone density testing and treatment in the follow-up period. Results: 131 patients were studied; 83% were female with median age of 71 years. No patient was referred by ED or fracture clinic for bone density testing [0%, 95% CI 0–3.5%]. Telephone follow-up was obtained from 91 patients, of whom 28 [31%] reported having bone density testing after their fracture. 50% [14, 95% CI 32–67%] of these were found to have osteoporosis. Seven patients [8%] commenced treatment with a bisphosphonate and one [1%] commenced a selective oestrogen receptor modulator. Conclusion: Follow-up of 'at risk' patients suffering minimal trauma wrist fractures treated in the ED is poor. Systems to improve identification and treatment of osteoporosis in this group are needed if future osteoporotic fractures and their consequences are to be avoided. Possible models will be put forward.


There is now a highly automated electronic tool (called ICHOR) that facilitates the construction and validation of actively learnt machine learning models (Gaussian process regression) for molecules and molecular clusters.


In order to explore the migration of sulfate electron acceptors injected into aqueous media, and study the specific attenuation of BTEX with sulfate injecting. In this study, the laboratory sand tank was used for the injecting and natural attenuation monitoring experiments. The combination of MODFLOW and RT3D was used to simulate the attenuation process of sulfate and natural degradation of BTEX. The results showed that the concentration of sulfate in the source area was significantly lower than that of the surrounding area at the 600th day after injected on the 416th day and BTEX concentration also gradually tends to zero. The injection experiments were conducted for a total of 46 days with the injected sulfate quality of 1488.24 g, and the calculated sulfate output of 1320.52 g. It can be seen that the input was significantly higher than the output and the sulfate loss could be judged as acting on Redox reactions .Sulfate promoted the degradation of BTEX. The numerical simulation was carried out for the water flow model and water quality model calibration, the normalized RMS of water flow model and water quality model are 9.8% and 8% respectively, which are less than 10% of the conventional limit. The model can accurately simulate the migration of sulfate and BTEX attenuation and predict the further pollution of BTEX. And can be applied to the actual site contaminated by BTEX that has important practical significance.


Fluorescence tomography of tracers enhances accuracy when MRI Gadolinium-contrast difference is used as implicit prior data. This approach improves over using simpler post-contrast images, yet preserves the elegance of non-segmentation based priors.


With a focus to optimising the life cycle performance of Australian Railway bridges, new
bridge classification and environmental classification systems are proposed. The new bridge classification
system is mainly to facilitate the implementation of novel Bridge Management System (BMS) which optimise
the life cycle cost both at project level and network level while environment classification is mainly to improve
accuracy of Remaining Service Potential (RSP) module of the proposed BMS. In fact, limited capacity
of the existing BMS to trigger the maintenance intervention point is an indirect result of inadequacies of the
existing bridge and environmental classification systems. The proposed bridge classification system permits
to identify the intervention points based on percentage deterioration of individual elements and maintenance
cost, while allowing performance based rating technique to implement for maintenance optimisation and prioritisation.
Simultaneously, the proposed environment classification system will enhance the accuracy of prediction
of deterioration of steel components.


The Coconut black-headed caterpillar, Opisina arenosella Walker is a notorious pest of coconut in Kerala. Most damage is recorded from India and Srilanka. Caterpillars of this oecophorid prefer to live in a gallery of frassy material and they feed on leaf chlorophyll matter. O. arenosella causes significant yield losses in coconut crops, but there is a lack of scientific information whether this pest can be controlled effectively using biocontrol agents. This paper describes the effects of the parasitoid, Bracon brevicornis (Hymenoptera: Braconidae) on larvae of O. arenosella. The adult B. brevicornis gave excellent control of larvae of O. arenosella. These findings suggest that, repeated release of B. brevicornis was very effective. By controlling O. arenosella, using B. brevicornis is 78% of recovery was finally attained.


As a by-product of the uranium enrichment process,uranium tailings(UT) has lower radioactivity than purified natural uranium and similar chemical toxicity to enriched or chemically purified natural uranium.When inhaled or ingested in sufficient doses,UT causes a distinct health hazard.However,few studies were reported on the hazard extent of plants under the treatment of UT.B.juncea,B.napus and B.rapa seedlings were cultivated in the mixture of uranium tailings and river sands at the proportions of 0(CK),25%(T1),50%(T2),75%(T3),100%(T4),respectively.The emergence rate and the biomass of seedlings,the contents of chlorophyll,malonyldialdehyde(MDA) and reductive glutathione(GSH),the activities of superoxide dismutase(SOD),catalase(CAT),peroxide enzyme(POD),ascorbate peroxidase(APX),and glutathione reductase(GR) were determined in B.juncea,B.napus and B.rapa seedlings.The results indicated that the emergence rate of seedlings was promoted by UT,but there was no significant difference among the treatments of UT.The biomass of seedlings was the highest under T2 for B.napus and B.rapa,while the biomass of seedlings was the highest under T3 in B.juncea.The MDA content was the lowest under T2 in B.napus and B.rapa,while that was the lowest under T3 in B.juncea.There was significantly negative correlation between MDA and Chlorophyll content.The activities of SOD,CAT,POD,APX,GR and the content of GSH were increased with increase of applied UT in the three Brassica species.The study showed that low proportion UT could promote the growth and the antioxidase system of Brassica plants.The three Brassica species have strong tolerance to UT and can grow in UT as the pioneer plants.


We calculate the decay widths of both the second and the third radial excitations of {eta} and {eta}{sup '} within the framework of the {sup 3}P{sub 0} model. After comparing the theoretical decay widths and decay patterns with the available experimental data of {eta}(1760), X(1835), X(2120), and X(2370), we find that the interpretation of {eta}(1760) and X(1835) as the second radial excitation of {eta} and {eta}{sup '} crucially depends on the measured mass and width of {eta}(1760), which is still controversial experimentally. We suggest that there may be sizable pp content in X(1835). X(2120) and X(2370) cannot be understood as the third radial excitations of {eta} and {eta}{sup '}. X(2370) is probably a mixture of {eta}{sup '}(4{sup 1}S{sub 0}) and glueball.


(57) Abstract: The present invention provides a spray nozzle (22) having both desirable aesthetic and functional characteristics. Spray nozzles, central opening (31) and a plurality of occlusion recess arranged concentrically around the central opening (25), as well as cyclic and communicates with all the occlusion recess groove ( 23) and a. The closed recess and the annular groove, while providing each individually desirable aesthetic properties, a combination, each of them reduces the likelihood of product residue deposition to each other. Occlusion recess are intermittently smooth walls of the annular groove, before the liquid product can be dried, thereby flow out the liquid product from the annular groove.


The current main problem of medical data is low accuracy. Although existing data quality evaluation and audit can meet the needs, network security problem will be more serious in the future. As a result, the data quality evaluation model must include data credibility. This paper proposes the medical big data quality evaluation model based on credibility analysis and Analytic Hierarchy Process(AHP). Firstly, analyze the data credibility. After eliminating the unreliable data, calculate the data quality dimensions respectively. Then obtain the data quality evaluation result by integrating all dimensions with AHP. Through simulation, the data quality evaluation model can effectively identify the data that affects the credibility. The data quality evaluation results are improved after removing the untrusted data, besides the amount of data is reduced, which is applicable to the big data scenario.


Objective To investigate the effect of misoprostol combined with oxytocin for preventing postpartum hemorrhage.Methods 68 cases pregnant women with the risk of postpartum hemorrhage were divided into treatment group(36 cases) and control group(32 cases).Control group were treated by oxytocin,treatment group were treated by misoprostol combined with oxytocin.Compared the incidence of postpartum hemorrhage and 2,24h the amount of bleeding of two groups.Results Postpartum hemorrhage rate of treatment group(0) was lower than that of control group(15.6%)(P0.05);And postpartum 2,24h bleeding volume of treatment group were less than those of control group(P0.05).Conclusion Misoprostol combined with oxytocin for preventing postpartum hemorrhage has significantly effectual,and is worth for generalization.


This manuscript develops a framework for software maintenance. The development is based on an approach called 'grounded theory', which is an iterative process of theory formation and empirical assessment. The framework's purpose is to unite past theoretical concepts and scientifically observed facts. The result is a four-component model consisting of programmers, source code, maintenance requirement, and organizational influences. The interaction of these four components provides 16 distinct areas of software maintenance inquiry. The manuscript concludes by providing sample uses and implications for the use of the framework.


Due to China's ever-expanding opening-up, sustained rapid economic growth, and its rising international status, the sharp rise in demand of national consciousness has outstripped the original operation model. Chinese renaissance can not only be understood as a catalyst for globalization, but it does also enlarge the global village by opening new economic, political, diplomatic, intellectual, and artistic horizons. Our government pays more attention to publicize and preserve traditional culture. Therefore, it becomes an urgent task about how to do research and mining, preserve fine traditional Chinese culture, and enhance the international cultural communication. Rhymed opera proverb as an important part of Chinese opera culture mirrors the ideology and culture in China. The opera proverb is responsible for both inheriting the tradition and developing the ancient art. The biggest challenge is translation which is carrier of culture. Through good translation, we will gain a better understanding of the quintessence of our tradition and of the living embodiment of China and Chinese culture. This paper is intended to study opera proverb translation from the viewpoint of "intertextuality". The author believes that translation is a type of transforming activity intertextualized with language, text, and culture. Intertextuality theory is applied to investigate the process of translation. Intertextuality will be of great help to the translation of opera proverbs, which means not only to explore and transfer the literal meaning of the source text, but also to interpret and expound the cultural meaning. Only if a translation is reliable and makes sense of traditional culture can our culture be known and appreciated by the world.


An approach was proposed to determine the solubility of pure zinc lactate at a high heating rate(20 K·h-1),which significantly improves the efficiency of solubility measurement.The results showed a good agreement with the solubility data obtained through isothermal processes.This approach was extended to measure the solubility of zinc lactate in the presence of small amount of impurity.The influences of impurities,including malic acid,succinic acid and sodium oxalate,on the primary nucleation kinetics of zinc lactate in cooling crystallization were investigated,and a method was presented to estimate the primary nucleation kinetics based on Nvlt theory by measuring the metastable zone width of zinc lactate at specific cooling rate in the solution.The results showed that the rate of primary nucleation of zinc lactate decreased in the presence of malic acid or succinic acid.However,when sodium oxalate was introduced in the solution,the nucleation of zinc lactate was accelerated at low supersaturation but suppressed at high supersaturation.


ORGANIZATIONS known as stu dent councils have long been a part of school programs. Student councils can be traced back to the ancient academies of Plato and Aristotle. Traditionally, the rationale for stu dent councils is based upon the informal learning that accompanies their activities. Lately, educators have begun to realize that this organization should work toward build ing a "climate for learning" within the school. One source declares, "If the student council does not contribute directly to the main function of the school as an educational in stitution, it should not exist at all." * Wood further defined this emergent philosophy when he wrote, "The student council . . . helps to create an environment in which students and faculty work together cooperatively for the betterment of the school and the well-being of each student." Thus, problems turned over to the council should be real problems, not imitation government. Its goals should be student commitment to a total effort to upgrade the school program. However, too often the success of a stu dent council is limited. To a large extent, effectiveness is contingent upon whether or not leadership training is provided for the newly elected student leaders. As a result, leadership programs have been developed to meet this need. One of the new techniques


There's a palpable longing to go back, but does it make sense? Of the nearly 7 billion people on Earth today, four out of five were not alive when the first lunar landing took place. Without a doubt, a great many of them would love to see people back on the Moon again. But does it make sense to spend the US $50 billion it might cost to get them there? Do we need a base on the Moon to get to Mars? And if not, should we bother going to the Moon at all?


OBJECTIVE
Brain-computer interface technology has been applied to stroke patients to improve their motor function. Event-related desynchronization during motor imagery, which is used as a brain-computer interface trigger, is sometimes difficult to detect in stroke patients. Anodal transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) is known to increase event-related desynchronization. This study investigated the adjunctive effect of anodal tDCS for brain-computer interface training in patients with severe hemiparesis.

SUBJECTS
Eighteen patients with chronic stroke.

DESIGN
A non-randomized controlled study.

METHODS
Subjects were divided between a brain-computer interface group and a tDCS- brain-computer interface group and participated in a 10-day brain-computer interface training. Event-related desynchronization was detected in the affected hemisphere during motor imagery of the affected fingers. The tDCS-brain-computer interface group received anodal tDCS before brain-computer interface training. Event-related desynchronization was evaluated before and after the intervention. The Fugl-Meyer Assessment upper extremity motor score (FM-U) was assessed before, immediately after, and 3 months after, the intervention.

RESULTS
Event-related desynchronization was significantly increased in the tDCS- brain-computer interface group. The FM-U was significantly increased in both groups. The FM-U improvement was maintained at 3 months in the tDCS-brain-computer interface group.

CONCLUSION
Anodal tDCS can be a conditioning tool for brain-computer interface training in patients with severe hemiparetic stroke.


The fine and hyperfine structure intervals of 2 3 P and 2 1 P states of 3 He are calculated by use of 165-term Hylleraas type wavefunctions. For 2 3 P the levels denoted by | J F > are found to be |2, 5/2>, |1, 3/2>, |1, 1/2>, |2, 3/2> |0, |1/2> in the ascending order of energy and the corresponding intervals are 1781.0, 4512.2, 668.2 and 27413.5 MHz. 3 P 1 and 3 P 2 are hybridized strongly into |1, 3/2> and |2, 3/2>. In 1 P 1 |1, 1/2> is above |1, 3/2> by 20.3 MHz. The accuracy of the calculation is checked and it is found that the maximum error may interfere the digit of 1 MHz.


"Copeptin: A Novel, Independent Prognostic Marker in Patients with Ischemic Stroke," Katan et al., the following figures (1 and 2) and tables are the correct versions: Also, the following text changes should be noted: Page 799, first sentence of Results section in Abstract: Patients with an unfavorable outcomes and nonsurvivors had significantly increased copeptin levels on admission (p 0.0001). Page 799, left hand column, six lines from bottom: A prompt identification of patients at increased risk for adverse outcome would facilitate interventions targeted to those most likely to benefit. Page 799, right hand column, four lines from bottom: Copeptin is released in an equimolar ratio to AVP, and is more stable in the circulation and easy to measure. 9,19 Page 800, left hand column, eight lines in Clinical Variables section: . . . (ie, age, sex, smoking history, hypercholesterolemia, history of hypertension, diabetes mel-


es from 1.7% to 4.9%.3 The only primary prevention trial until recently was the West of Scotland trial, which studied men from 45 to 65 years of age with a mean cholesterol concentration of 272 mg/dL.4 In 1998, a second primary prevention trial with statin therapy (lovastatin) was published, the Airforce-Texas Coronary Atherosclerosis Prevention Study (AFCAPS).5~6 This study included 6,605 men and women without evidence of coronary artery disease, the men being 45 to 73 years of age, the women being postmenopausal and 55 to 73 years of age; the mean total cholesterol level was 221 mg/dL; mean low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-c) level, 150 mg/dL; the


This study examines whether people who have similar cognitive ability, vocational interests, and personality characteristics choose similar jobs. Subjects were 139 job applicants at a private employment agency: 49 individuals applied for general laborer positions, 48 for bookkeeping positions, and 42 for secretarial positions. As expected, people who had similar cognitive ability and vocational interests chose similar jobs. Contrary to expectations, however, persons who shared similar personality characteristics did not choose similar jobs. The results suggest implications for personnel selection, attraction-selection theory, and applications of human resource management technologies.


The unbalance of health workforce distribution is a world wide problem.The paper tries to analyze this phenomenon from the economics dimension.The urban preference in physicians getting a job and quality preference in patients going to a doctor are both related to the unbalance of health workforce distribution,and the interaction of the two side makes the unbalance further.Recognizing the objective law of this problem clearly can help to promote policy intervention better.


The authors analyzed the opportunities and challenges faced by nurses in the time of elderly care with medical support using SWOT analysis, for the purpose of suggestions for the development of nurses to cope with such new scenario. Advantages of the nurses in such a time are as follows: professional nursing care, holistic care ability, and standardized assessment skill. Their disadvantages include: poor team leadership, insufficient business and management skills, and poor motivation for personal development. Their opportunities include: guidance of the national strategy, innovation of " Internet plus" , and flexible working hours. Their challenges include: room of improvements for both quantity and quality of nursing personnel, better efficiency for integration and allocation of resources, and better capability to leverage " Smart elderly care" . Four suggestions are raised in this regard, i. e., to strengthen the ability for elderly care with medical support, to improve multidisciplinary coordination, to cultivate their entrepreneurship, and to improving the ability of information application.

Key words:
Elderlies; Elderly care with medical support; Nursing; SWOT analysis


A new tridentate Ni(Ⅱ) complex {Ni(H2O)3[Ph2(o-Ph-N-C7H7N)]PO}Cl2 was synthesized by the reaction of a new ligand Ph2(o-Ph-N-C7H7N)]PO with NiCl2 in C H3CH2OH. The complex was characterized by X-ray single crystal diffraction. The crystal structure of the complex belongs to monoclinic space group P21/n, a=1.25 9 28(9) nm, b=1.201 24(8) nm, c=2.039 03(14) nm, V=3.016 8(4) nm-3, Z=4, and R1= 0.047 1, wR2=0.120 5. And a molecular CH2Cl2 is filled in the crystal structure. CCDC: 241832.


The system of disregard of corporate personality, which has been established in western countries, is a legal measure to regulate the behaviors of abusing the system of corporate personality and to perfect the system of corporate entity. It reflects a function of law to regulate the interests behind specific behaviors and embodies a sort of efficiency as well as a kind of social justice.


STEP ONE: GET SUPPORT First, ensure administrative commitment and responsibility: leaders and resources must be assigned for a written exposure control plan. The OSHA Standard requires that the employer develop a comprehensive exposure control plan, update it annually, and indicate who's responsible for coordinating and implementing it. The plan should involve diverse groups of managers and workers. More information on the remaining nine steps will be included in fsture Health and Safety columns and can be found on the ANA's Web site, uz.vu>. need Iestick . o rg


The historical importance of the Eastern Region of Saudi Arabia can never be denied; Al-Hasa may have the fame as an oasis, but Katif as part of it is of no less importance. The territory of Katif is divided from Al-Hasa province by an intervening range of hills, the most famous of which is know as Jabal Mushahhar. This hill, seven hundred feet high, falls about ten miles to the south of Katif.


Precipitation-strengthened alloys have found uses in several structural applications and for us to better their performance and reliability, it is essential to have a thorough understanding of the microstructure and its effect on properties. Most of our understanding of these alloys date back to the mid-20th century and majorly rely on analyses carried out using transmission electron microscopes (TEMs), which are generally associated with shortcomings such as laborious destructive sample preparation, twodimensional field of view and limited penetrability in case of metallic specimens. High temperature evolution studies in electron microscopes are also enormously influenced by surface diffusion and projected view of the specimen. We have been able to use Full-field Transmission X-Ray Microscopy (TXM) [1, 2] to overcome almost all of these shortcomings and have been successful in providing novel insights into nanoscale evolution occurring in the bulk of these alloys. Using miniaturized mechanical testing to complement this technique has enabled us to better predict the alloy's mechanical behavior. By coupling this with segmentation using Machine learning, it has also been possible to analyze ultralarge volumes of material at a very high spatial resolution.


In this report, we have developed efficient methods for total RNA
extraction from hepatocarcinoma tissues and cell lines, reverse
transcription, cDNA cloning and quantitive real-time PCR (q-RT-PCR). We
compared the effect of two reverse transcriptase (M-MLV, SuperScriptII)
on the efficiency of total RNA reverse transcription and four DNA
polymerase (Taq polymerase, Pfu polymerase, LA taq polymerase, Prime
Star polymerase) in cloning large fragment of cDNA. The impact of
different RNA integrity on q-RT-PCR and large fragment of cDNA cloning
had also been investigated in this study. The newly developed RNA
extraction method greatly improved the integrity of total RNA. We found
that the integrity of total RNA is vital to large fragment cDNA
cloning. RNA degraded at some extent is only suitable for q-RT-PCR
analysis but not for cDNA cloning.


Cogeneration systems (CGS) have been widely accepted in the market, and various modified systems are in operation. Among them, a gas turbine repowering system is very interesting, in which a gas turbine generator (GT) is added to an existing combined power system of a boiler and a steam turbine (ST). In this system, the exhaust heat of GT is directed to ST, is used as an additional combined cycle, and the overall heat efficiency is improved.The characteristics of this repowering are : energy saving by 10-30 percent by step-by-step (cascade) energy use, less emission of carbon dioxide and nitrogen oxides, additional power generation by GT and total energy saving in a mill.


It is well known that the magnitude of band offset (BO) at any semiconductor heterojunction is directly derivable from the distribution of charge at that interface and that the latter is decided by a minimization of total energy. However, the fact that BO formation is governed by energy minimization has not been explicitly used in theoretical BO models, likely because the equilibrium charge densities at heterojunction interfaces appear difficult to predict, except via explicit calculation. In this paper, electron densities at a large number of (100), (110), and (111) oriented heterojunctions between lattice-matched, isovalent semiconductors with the zinc blende (ZB) structure have been calculated by first-principles methods and analyzed in detail for possible common characteristics among energy-minimized densities. Remarkably, the heterojunction electron density was found to largely depend only on the immediate, local atomic arrangement. In fact, it is so much so that a juxtaposition of local electron-densities generated in oligo-cells (LEGOs) accurately reproduced the charge densities that minimize the energy for the heterojunctions. Furthermore, the charge distribution for each bulk semiconductor was found to display a striking separability of its electrostatic effect into two neutral parts, associated with the cation and the anion, which are approximately transferrable among semiconductors. These discoveries form the basis of a neutral polyhedra theory (NPT) that approximately predicts the equilibrium charge density and BO of relaxed heterojunctions from the energy minimization requirement. Well-known experimentally observed characteristics of heterojunctions, such as the insensitivity of BO to heterojunction orientation and the identity of interface bonds, the transitivity rule, etc., are all in good agreement with the NPT. Therefore, energy minimization, which essentially decides the electronic properties of all other solid and molecular systems, also governs the formation of the charge density at these heterojunction interfaces. In particular, the approach presented here eliminates the need to invoke mechanisms that are specific to semiconductor interfaces.


This paper considers the legal status of a surveyor appointed under section 10 of the Party Wall etc. Act 1996. By reference to that Act as well as to the Arbitration Act 1996, the European Convention and to rules of natural justice it argues that the section 10 procedure is a statutory arbitration. It therefore argues that the appointed surveyor is an arbitrator who must be independent, act impartially, and be immune from suit. It also suggests that surveyors' awards can be adopted as judgments by the courts and that they can only be appealed against provided the strict appeals criteria of the Arbitration Act are met.


Patient medication compliance was estimated at a consultancy hospital and rural health centre in a developing country. Results indicate that only 20‐6% and 18.4% of patients at the hospital and health centre, respectively, took their medicines in the prescribed manner. Suggestions are made for improving these figures.


Acid-soluble collagen (ASC) and pepsin-solubilized collagen (PSC) were prepared from the waste freshwater carp fish scales. The results of SDS-PAGE showed that purified collagens were composed of at least two different chains which were in accordance with the type I collagen with α chain composition of (α1)2α2. Compared with the carp fish ordinary muscle type I collagen , porcine dermis type I collagen and other seawater fish collagens, freshwater carp fish scales collagen contained relative high half-cystine (Cys-s), but lower denaturation temperature(Td) than the porcine dermis type I collagen. These collagens had evident absorption at 230 nm by UV-Vis spectra. The spectrum X-ray diffraction showed that the collagen remained single-helix and tri-helix configuration with the minimum values of the repeat spacings (d) of about 4.48 A and 11.87 A. Therefore, to make more effective use of limited-resources, carp fish scales can be a potential resource for the extraction of type I collagen or gelatin.


The study aimed to identify the extent of the application of electronic entrepreneurship in Jordanian universities from the point of view of graduate students. Results The application of electronic entrepreneurship in Jordanian universities from the point of view of graduate students came to a high degree, and the researcher attributes this to the academic orientation in educational institutions, especially universities, towards keeping pace with the requirements of the modern era, especially the orientation towards electronic entrepreneurship. It recommends increasing the interest of university officials in the subject of electronic entrepreneurship, as it has become an important requirement of the modern era.
Keywords: entrepreneurship, electronic entrepreneurship, graduate students


FOSTER CARE INDEPENDENCE ACT ∑ Ms. SNOWE. Mr. President, I rise today to support the Foster Care Independence Act. I am a cosponsor of the foster care bill that was originally introduced in the Senate by our colleague, the late Senator John Chafee. Mr. President, this bill is an enormously important piece of legislation. It provides the means for States to support some of our most vulnerable children—teens who are facing the tenuous position of being dropped from foster care support for the simple reason that they are turning 18. For many young people, the transition to adulthood is an exciting time of newfound independence. These young people navigate this challenging time with the help and support of their parents and family, secure in the knowledge that a ''safety net'' awaits them at home. This momentous transition can be much more daunting, however, for the 20,000 foster children who make the difficult shift from foster care to independence and adulthood. Research has shown that these children—who average four homes in the final 7 years of their foster care—face many challenges when their benefits end and they are left on their own at the age of 18. Today, there are more than 500,000 children in foster care throughout the United States—young people wrenched from the security of their homes by death, abuse, or other tragedy. For these children, foster parents offer the only support they know, and the abrupt end of care can make transition to adulthood all the more important. We are asking these teens to move out of their foster care and immediately become productive members of society— yet we forget that older foster kids face the same growing pains faced by teens in more stable homes. They are struggling with growing up, struggling with establishing their independence, and struggling to mature and develop their personal identity. But this struggle is made exponentially more difficult when the teens must also face the struggle of housing, poverty, and unemployment. In 1986, Congress created the Independent Living Program to address the transitional needs of foster children as they reach the age when they are asked to live independently. Studies of teens who are forced to abruptly leave foster care have found that they have a significantly higher-than-normal rate of school dropouts, out-of-wedlock births, homelessness, health and mental health problems, poverty, and unemployment. One 1998 study of former foster care youth by researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison found that more than 40 percent of interviewed youth had been homeless, incarcerated, or had received public assistance since leaving State care. This same study found that during the 12to 18-month period after leaving care, 44 percent of former care youths had difficulty obtaining medical care due to a lack of medical insurance and the high cost of care. These foster children deserve a safe, stable, and nurturing environment in order for them to become productive, self-sufficient members of society. The Foster Care Independence Act will expand Independent Living Program services to provide this support for foster children who are 18 to 21 years old and are still learning valuable life skills. This bill will enable teens between the ages of 18 and 21 to successfully shift from foster families into independent adulthood. This bill will help teens during this important transition by doubling Independent Living Program funding and expanding access to Medicaid health care and mental health services through their 21st birthday. Foster children frequently lack a sense of permanency and the skills that are essential to becoming self-reliant and productive adults. Through State-administered Independent Living Programs, foster children will be able to obtain mentoring and personal support. The expanded program will assist older foster care adolescents in obtaining a high school diploma and/or secondary education; career exploration; and preventative health services. They may also use this program to develop vital daily living skills such as budgeting, locating and maintaining housing, and financial planning. We expect much of our youth because they are the future of our Nation. In turn, we must be willing to give them the support they need to learn, grow, and transition to productive and stable adult lives. The Foster Care Independence Act provides these crucial services for America's older foster children. As Congress works to conclude the first session of the 106th Congress, it is essential that the Senate echo the broad, bipartisan support given to this bill by the U.S. House of Representatives— which recently passed a companion bill by a vote of 380–67—and give these older foster children the stability they deserve. Mr. President, we have all heard the old adage ''an ounce of prevention is worth a pound a cure.'' Surely this rings true for helping our older foster children in their transition to adulthood. I can think of no better tribute to Senator Chafee, in tribute to his memory and to his life's work as an advocate of America's children, to name this bill in honor of him. And for this reason I rise today in support of the bill and I ask my colleagues to vote for this tremendously important piece of legislation.∑


Svilaja is a 30 km-long mountain range in the Outer Dinarides in the hinterland of northern Dalmatia, between the rivers Cetina and Čikola. It has never been the target of systematic butterfly surveys and its fauna remained completely unknown. During our surveys from 2019 to 2022, we recorded 112 butterfly species at 37 sites. The butterfly richness of the Svilaja Mountain is higher than that of the Mosor and Kozjak Mountains nearer to the coast, but similar to that of the Biokovo Mountains and lower than that of the nearby, much larger Dinara Mountains. However, the biogeographical composition of the mountains compared is similar, with dominant Euro-Siberian and Euro-Oriental faunal elements, but an obvious decrease in the number of montane species in all other mountains compared to the Dinara Mountains. New records are discussed for some species for which there is little information for Croatia or Dalmatia, such as Carcharodus orientalis, Pyrgus carthami, Tarucus balkanicus, Aricia artaxerxes, Polyommatus ripartii, Melitaea ornata, Melitaea athalia, Coenonympha rhodopensis and Hyponephele lupina. Although most of Svilaja Mountain is part of the Natura 2000 network, many of the sites with high conservation value are located outside the area. Overall, the abandonment and overgrowth of grasslands present the most imminent threat to butterfly diversity in the region.


C60γaminopropylsilylbonded silica was synthesized by chemical attachment of γaminopropylsilyl to silica, followed by the reaction of C60 with alkylamine. Using elemental analysis and the method for measuring the amounts of alkylamine described by Esko et al., the content of bonded C60 was determined to be 119×10-5 mol and 109×10-5 mol in per gram silica, respectively.