Experiments with the evolving GEOS-2 data assimilation system (DAS) delineate the impact of NASA scatterometer (NSCAT) data on ocean surface analysis and numerical weather prediction (NWP). Extensions and refinements of the DAS to account for the characteristics of NSCAT data produced better results than were obtained with the GEOS-1 DAS. The two key extensions are to increase the vertical influence of the surface wind data and to take proper account of the time difference between the observation and the analysis. The results of these experiments show that surface wind analyses are improved by NSCAT data. This is seen in subjective evaluation of synoptic cases and in forecast impacts. NSCAT data have a very significant positive impact on the GEOS-2 forecasts in the southern hemisphere (SH). In the northern hemisphere (NH) the overall statistics show a modest positive impact. However, on a case by case basis, in the NH, the impact is generally neutral or significantly positive. The GEOS-2 results are compared to results obtained using the GEOS-1 DAS and using the 1995 National Center for Environmental Prediction (NCEP95) DAS. The GEOS-2 control forecasts are more accurate than those of GEOS-1. All three impact experiments show a large positive impact in the SH. In the NH, both the GEOS-2 and the NCEP95 NSCAT impacts are positive while the GEOS-1 impact is neutral.


To the Editor:— The report on burn shock in a Peruvian study of the National Institutes of Health ( J. A. M. A. 161 :1465-1473 [Aug. 11] 1956) gave evidence of ample facilities used with admirable precision by the team of workers. One criticism pertains merely to the writing of the report. The final conclusion has a statement "that the oral administration of isotonic saline solution would be quite useful in case of mass catastrophes or in areas throughout the world where adequate medical care cannot be obtained or where plasma, blood, colloids, and other intravenous therapy may not be available." Elsewhere there is reference to recommendations of "salt solutions as adjuvant therapy to plasma, blood, and other colloids as essential in the adequate treatment of burn shock." The wording seems designed to spare the sensibilities of the many followers of the plasma or colloid theory of shock treatment, and it


Image Segmentation has been considered as challenging task in image processing field. In this paper we proposed a new method for image segmentation purpose. Our proposed method is based on combining Grasshopper Optimization Algorithm (GOA) and k-means clustering. Grasshopper Optimization Algorithm (GOA), inspired by nature, divides the search process into two parts of exploration and utilization. The proposed algorithm in terms of mathematics models the behavior of Grasshopper groups in nature for solving the problems of optimization. We evaluate the proposed algorithm function based on eight-image segmentation and compare the obtained results of the tests of PSNR scale and SSIM measurement with four moth-flame whale algorithms by harmony search and social spider. The results indicate that the proposed algorithm with a simple threshold gives us a more optimized response regarding other state of arts in terms of both objective and subjective criteria.


The ability of small-diameter catheters to uniformly distribute anesthetic within the subarachnoid space of the spinal column was studied, both experimentally and computationally. It was found that there is minimal anesthetic mixing associated with the smallest catheters, both in the free jet emanating from the catheter and the flow interacting with the boundaries of the subarachnoid space. These results may help explain recent occurrences of neurological injuries associated with the use of small-bore catheters for continuous spinal anesthesia.


In cross-country equestrian competitions, riders have three tries to urge their mounts over the obstacles before the fence judge can throw them off the course. In the "sport" of legislative development, you often get more than three tries. Sometimes, in fact, you can try forever. But every now and then, a bill makes it over all hurdles and becomes law. It is beginning to look like the second session of the 107th Congress may be that time for bankers who favor some degree of comprehensive federal deposit insurance reform. Hill watchers predict that legislation could be introduced in late February or early March. There seems to be growing sentiment that after years of talking about change, it is time to get it done. FDIC Chairman Don Powell, who in an interview in last month's ABABJ said he did not want insurance reform to get in the way of wartime legislation, has recently indicated he is ready to get under way. "I'm going to be passionate about this after Jan. 1," Powell told bankers at ABA's Government Relations Council in December. What's more, while the events of Sept. 11 delayed things in the public arena a bit, more has been going on behind the scenes. Staff representatives of the House and Senate financial services committees and FDIC representatives have been meeting privately for some time. Various members of Congress have stepped forward to take leadership positions on the issue. And ABA has been integrally involved in the behind-the-scenes debate. On the other hand, this is a situation where the banking industry is not coming to Congress for a must-have solution and thereby having to accept unpalatable tradeoffs to get it. A skeleton for reform Congress always has a trick or two up its sleeve, so ironclad predictions are out. What follows is a rundown of what ABA lobbyists expect the proposed legislation to look like. (Note that ABA does not support all the likely provisions. See the accompanying table for a summary of positions.) Details on many issues remain to be hammered out and ABA experts point out that there are accounting implications to some of the likely elements of the bills that must be considered. Already, ABA has a group of bankers looking at the rebate system described below. * Fund merger--A done deal. If there is to be a comprehensive bill passed, the Savings Association Insurance Fund and the Bank Insurance Fund will be combined. Though the center of a bitter fight a few years ago, it will not raise blood pressue on Capitol Hill these days. * Elimination of the "cliff"--This is considered another done deal, Under current law, if a deposit insurance fund can't be brought back to its required ratio of fund assets to insured deposits (1.25%) within one year, FDIC must impose a 23-basis-point-- or more--assessment. This all-or-nothing approach would be eased in some fashion. The "cliff" has been of greater academic concern in light of several factors. These include: 1. large brokerage firms' transferring nondeposit funds into insured deposit accounts that have been engineered to produce high insurance levels--a matter of billions of dollars; 2. the rise in deposit levels due to concerns over Sept. 11 and the stock market; and 3. a vague concern about the possibility of a surge in troubled banks as the economy turns down. A related issue is whether the 1.25% ratio itself should be changed or eliminated. FDIC Chairman Powell would like to see a statutory ratio requirement dropped, with FDIC empowered to set-and amend-its own required ratio. * Deposit insurance coverage-Bankers still holding out hope for a general $200,000 coverage ceiling will be disappointed. With the Federal Reserve, the FDIC, and Senate Banking Committee ranking member Phil Gramm dead-set against an increase, it's considered a nonstarter on the Hill. However, indexing of the deposit insurance ceiling, to prevent its value from eroding through inflation, has much wider support. …


The most common indication for total hip replacement (THR) is painful osteoarthritis (85%). Classically patients complain of groin pain, difficulty climbing stairs and problems putting on shoes and socks (a key symptom in differentiating between hip and knee pain). Referral to an orthopaedic surgeon should be made if patients' symptoms are not controlled conservatively. InnovAiT article: Hip and knee arthroplasty. DOI: 10.1177/ 1755738017739331. InnovAiT


The effect of affirmative action policies on the immigrant population in the United States is examined. The author contends that "bestowing benefits intended for black citizens upon newly arrived immigrants has led to confusion in area after area of public policy. It distorts the common understanding of the problems immigrants face; complicates our efforts to solve them; encourages immigrants who come with hopes of advancing themselves in a free society to see themselves as victims of deprivation and discrimination; and results in policies that are frequently inappropriate." (EXCERPT)


Reliability Analysis System for Protection Relays (RASPR) is developed by CRIEPI, has been introduced into all of 11 Japanese electric power utilities. RASPR is a powerful tool to study the improvement of maintenance procedure and to investigate the replacement of aged relays based upon the accumulated data. RASPR is mainly composed of the database and the analysis system; in the former part, the equipment data and the failure data can be accumulated. The latter has functions to totalize the various kinds of data, to analyze the reliability, and to analyze the failure rate by Weibull distribution. We have contributed to Japanese electric power utilities through studies on rationalization of maintenance procedure. Already in Japan the period of cyclic testing was extended such as to eight years from six years based on the reliability analysis. This paper describes as follows; 1) the reliability analysis results and Weibull distribution using the accumulated data of 13 years, 2) the estimation of the deterioration for the 1st generation (introduction from about 1985) and the 2nd generation (introduction from about 1994) numerical relays, and 3) the estimation of the replacement of aged numerical relays.


João Pires da Cruz, 2 Cátia Silva, Kanshukan Rajaratnam, Peter Beling, and George A. Overstreet Jr. Closer Consulting, Av. Eng. Duarte Pacheco Torre 1 15-1 1070-101 Lisbon, Portugal Center for Theoretical and Computational Physics, University of Lisbon, Campo Grande, Edif́ıcio C8 1749-016 Lisboa, Portugal Dep. of Finance & Tax and the African Collab. for Quant. Finance & Risk Research, University of Cape Town, Rondebosch 7700, South Africa Department of Systems and Information Engineering, University of Virginia, 151 Engineer's Way, Charlottesville, VA 22904, USA McIntire School of Commerce, University of Virginia, 125 Ruppel Drive, Charlottesville, VA 22903, USA (Dated: July 17, 2017)


Even in the present era of women empowerment and liberalization, a rapid increase in crimes against women is a matter of great social concern. Women are victims of iniquity not only outside but inside home too. In this study epidemiology of deaths among newly married females was explored. Most of the victims were young adults in their early married years. Most of them were housewives of joint Hindu families of middle socio-economic class, where husbands were addicted to one or the other inebriant. Educated and employed women were least affected.


Maintaining or enhancing value throughout the solid-wood supply chain, from the stump to the client facility, is essential to enable the forest industry to manufacture the highest-quality products. FERIC promotes the use of a concept known as RAID to achieve this objective: Reduce stem and log breakage; Allocate the right log to the right mill at the right time; Increase fiber and value recovery; and Decrease value losses during wood storage. This paper describes the results and applications of several FERIC research initiatives under each of these four axes of the RAID concept. Reducing breakage through best operating practices (full-tree equipment) and the use of swing-boom skidders are discussed. Allocating the best log resulting from appropriate bucking scenarios and product sorting is also described. Project results on maximizing value recovery by means of optimized bucking in both softwood and hardwood operations are also provided. The paper concludes with an overview of the benefits of wood storage under snow and the integration of wood storage parameters in the Opti-Stock model.


The availability of the complete genome sequence of Mycobacterium tuberculosis has revolutionised many areas of tuberculosis research and facilitated functional genomics studies. Most notably, transcriptomics and proteomics have become important tools in gaining increased understanding of the biology of M. tuberculosis and offer the promise of being able to deliver novel drug targets and vaccine candidates.


The Ti-based IrO2–Ta2O5–SnO2 coated anodes(molar ratio of Ir to Ta equals to 2:1) with different SnO2 contents(molar fractions of Sn are 7.7%, 14.3%, and 20.0%) were prepared by thermal decomposition method. The electrocatalytic activity of the coatings were analyzed by cyclic voltammetry, polarization curve measurement, and electrochemical AC impedance spectroscopy. The corrosion resistance of the anodes were examined by accelerated lifetime test. The results indicated that the catalytically active surface area of the Ti-based IrO2–Ta2O5 coating is increased after doping SnO2, while the oxygen evolution potential and total resistance are increased as well, and the corrosion resistance is decreased. The comprehensive electrocatalytic property is the optimal when the content of SnO2 is 7.7%.


Abstract The study examines the role played by English and Romance languages (L2s) when learning grammatical aspect in Italian as additional language (Ln). Swedish university students of Italian (n = 34), divided according to knowledge of a Romance L2 and English aspectual knowledge, completed an interpretation task of aspectual contrast in Italian. Eight native speakers served as a control group. The findings showed that knowledge of a Romance language as L2 and high English aspectual knowledge exerted a differential influence on learning aspect in Italian. This outcome is discussed in the light of a consistent form-meaning relationship between the L2s and Italian. Yet, with a mismatch between grammatical and lexical aspect, the learners' judgments differed from the native speakers' judgments. Thus, our findings also support the idea of the existence of differential learning paths sustained by the L2s when learning complex aspectual configurations.


The plurality of persons in a crime is not considered in the Russian science of criminal law as an independent criminal law institution. The need to consider the multiplicity of persons in a crime in this capacity is due to the close relationship between the various types of multiplicity, as a result of which their comprehensive study is required to identify the essential content of each type, determine the criteria for their distinction and improve the mechanism for the criminal legal assessment of joint criminal activity. The present study does not imply a detailed study of each of the types of plurality of persons in the crime and can be considered as a theoretical formulation of the problem for its further study. A one-level system for classifying the multiplicity of persons in a crime is proposed: complicity in a crime, participation in a criminal association, special role-playing complicity, bilateral crimes, careless co-initiation, attachment to a crime. The main criteria for differentiating various types of plurality of persons in a crime have been determined.


This article advances a public health model of ethics and compliance. It argues that corporate leaders should draw from the successful lessons of public health to promote ethical behavior more effectively in their companies. With its attention to data-driven risk mitigation and behaviorally cognizant processes, a public health model can move compliance from the faulty assumption on which it is based, i.e., that organizational wrongdoing can be deterred solely through appeals to the rational decision-making processes of employees, to a more accurate understanding of the situational and social influences that foster noncompliance. The article supports its thesis in three parts. It begins by explaining the evolution of compliance and its transition from overly legalistic to behaviorally aware. Next it draws on behavioral ethics and network research to make the connection between public health and compliance. Third, it explores how corporate leaders can meld the insights from these two disciplines, offering a new way of approaching ethics and compliance that is focused on behavioral ethics conduct risk and the practical application of behavioral science within the firm—the best way to improve the legal, ethical, and financial health of companies.


Recent work shows that the weather affects U.S. labor productivity and supply (e.g., Deryugina and Hsiang, 2016). Although agricultural economists have identified factors that affect farmers' allocation of labor between on- and off- farm work, they have not related labor supply to weather. We estimate the impact of temperature and precipitation on individual on-farm labor supply using 10 years of the Agricultural Resource Management Survey data. We find that temperature and farm operator labor supply have a parabolic relationship with a minimum at 61oF. We compute that one 1oF increase in annual temperature translates into 8.5 million hours of reduced country-wide farm operator labor valued at about $188 million. Precipitation has a significant but negligible marginal impact on the operator labor supply, consistent with the existing literature.


In order to make traditional point cloud slicing algorithm suitable for robotic spray path planning of complex surface, four improvements are put forward in this paper. Firstly, adaptively choose the dominant eigenvector direction of oriented bounding box of spray target as the normal vector direction of the slicing plane. Secondly, propose intersection-projection joint segmentation method to obtain points for constructing spraying path. Thirdly, use polynomial fitting and uniform interpolation method to construct smooth spray path. Finally, propose an iteration formula of interval between adjacent slicing planes to obtain equal distance spray path for variable curvature surfaces. Numerical examples show that the proposed algorithm can generate robotic spraying path directly from point cloud model, and suitable for complex, irregular shape spray target.


We present the case of a 26 year-old male with a personal history of proctosigmoiditis, who developed a severe relapse, triggered by broad-spectrum antibiotherapy received in another medical unit with a brief course of IV corticoids and azathioprine. The patient presented to our clinic in a severe condition, with more than ten bloody stools per day, incontinence for faeces, abdominal pain, pallor and weight loss. Biological tests showed severe hypochromic anemia, hypoalbuminemia and nonspecific inflammatory syndrome. Clostridium difficile toxin was negative and stool culture did not reveal any pathogen including enterohemorrhagic E. coli, Salmonella, Shigella and Yersinia species. Serology tests showed high levels of serum antiCMV (Cytomegalovirus) IgG and IgM antibodies. Sigmoidoscopy performed with care revealed severe colitis on the distal 30 cm of the colon, consistent with ulcerative colitis (UC), with large, irregular ulcers ("punched-out" and "geographic" ulcers) (Fig. 1). The H&E (x400) staining of the colorectal biopsy showed cytomegalic cells containing basophilic intranuclear inclusions ("owl's eye" appearance) (Fig. 2, arrow). Immunohistochemistry confirmed the presence of CMV antigens in the colonic mucosa. Despite efficient antiviral therapy, the infection added to morbidity of the underlying UC. Within months, the disease progressed from limited proctosigmoiditis to severe pancolitis, with "carpet like" pseudopolyps from rectum to cecum and deep ulcers (Fig. 3). The patient experienced multiple flare-ups resistant to medical therapy and ultimately required a total proctocolectomy. Cytomegalovirus is considered an ubiquitous infection and an opportunistic disease. CMV colitis was reported in 5% of the patients with UC [1], more frequent in severe flare-ups and steroid refractory UC (35%) [2], altering the outcome of the underlying disease [3-5]. Most studies did not find any significant endoscopic features to discriminate CMV colitis from UC [5]. CMV colitis may be suggested by "geographic ulcers" (>5 mm, irregular), punched-out IMAGE OF THE ISSUE


The zero-temperature properties of a dilute two-component Fermi gas in the Bardeen–Cooper–Schrieffer phase–Bose–Einstein condensate crossover are investigated. On the basis of a generalization of the variational Schwinger method, we construct approximate semi-analytical formulae for collective frequencies of the radial and the axial breathing modes of the Fermi gas under harmonic confinement in the framework of the hydrodynamic theory. It is shown that the method gives nearly exact solutions.


Simple Summary Positron emission tomography (PET), typically combined with computed tomography (CT), has become a critical advanced imaging technique in oncology. With PET-CT, a radioactive molecule (radiotracer) is injected in the bloodstream and localizes to sites of tumor because of specific cellular features of the tumor that accumulate the targeting radiotracer. The CT scan, performed at the same time, provides information to facilitate the characterization of radioactivity from deep or dense structures, and to provide detailed anatomic information. PET-CT has a variety of applications in oncology, including staging, therapeutic response assessment, restaging and surveillance. This series of six review articles provides an overview of the value, applications, and imaging interpretive strategies of PET-CT in the more common adult malignancies. The third report in this series provides a review of PET-CT imaging in gastrointestinal malignancies. Abstract PET-CT is an advanced imaging modality with many oncologic applications, including staging, assessment of response to therapy, restaging and longitudinal surveillance for recurrence. The goal of this series of six review articles is to provide practical information to providers and imaging professionals regarding the best use of PET-CT for specific oncologic indications, and the potential pitfalls and nuances that characterize these applications. In the third of these review articles, key tumor-specific clinical information and representative PET-CT images are provided to outline the role that PET-CT plays in the management of patients with gastrointestinal malignancies. The focus is on the use of 18F fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG), rather than on research radiopharmaceuticals under development. Many different types of gastrointestinal tumors exist, both pediatric and adult. A discussion of the role of FDG PET-CT for all of these is beyond the scope of this review. Rather, this article focuses on the most common adult gastrointestinal malignancies that may be encountered in clinical practice. The information provided here will provide information outlining the appropriate role of PET-CT in the clinical management of patients with gastrointestinal malignancies for healthcare professionals caring for adult cancer patients. It also addresses the nuances and provides interpretive guidance related to PET-CT for imaging providers, including radiologists, nuclear medicine physicians and their trainees.


A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T Article history: Received: 01 July, 2017 Accepted: 10 August, 2017 Online: 19, August, 2017 Cloud providers seek to maximize their market share. Traditionally, they deploy datacenters with sufficient capacity to accommodate their entire computing demand while maintaining geographical affinity to its customers. Achieving these goals by a single cloud provider is increasingly unrealistic from a cost of ownership perspective. Moreover, the carbon emissions from underutilized datacenters place an increasing demand on electricity and is a growing factor in the cost of cloud provider datacenters. Cloud-based systems may be classified into two categories: serving systems and analytical systems. We studied two primary workload types, on-demand video streaming as a serving system and MapReduce jobs as an analytical systems and suggested two unique energy mix usage for processing that workloads. The recognition that on-demand video streaming now constitutes the bulk portion of traffic to Internet consumers provides a path to mitigate rising energy demand. On-demand video is usually served through Content Delivery Networks (CDN), often scheduled in backend and edge datacenters. This publication describes a CDN deployment solution that utilizes green energy to supply on-demand streaming workload. A cross-cloud provider collaboration will allow cloud providers to both operate near their customers and reduce operational costs, primarily by lowering the datacenter deployments per provider ratio. Our approach optimizes cross-datacenters deployment. Specifically, we model an optimized CDN-edge instance allocation system that maximizes, under a set of realistic constraints, green energy utilization. The architecture of this cross-cloud coordinator service is based on Ubernetes, an open source container cluster manager that is a federation of Kubernetes clusters. It is shown how, under reasonable constraints, it can reduce the projected datacenter's carbon emissions growth by 22% from the currently reported consumption. We also suggest operating datacenters using energy mix sources as a VoltDB-based fast data system to process offline workloads such as MapReduce jobs. We show how cross-cloud coordinator service can reduce the projected datacenters carbon emissions growth by 21% from the currently expected trajectory when processing offline MapReduce jobs.


This study reports a new chemical sensor based on ion-imprinted polymer matrix using copper nanoparticles-polyaniline nanocomposite (IIP-Cu-NPs/PANI). This sensor was prepared by electropolymerization using aniline as a functional monomer and nitrate as template onto the copper nanoparticles-modified glassy carbon (GC) electrode surface. Both ion-imprinted (IIP) and nonimprinted (NIP) electrochemical sensor surfaces were evaluated using UV-Visible spectrometry and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The electrochemical analysis was made via cyclic voltammetry (CV), linear sweep voltammetry (LSV), and impedance spectroscopy (IS). Throughout this study various analytical parameters, such as scan rate, pH value, concentration of monomer and template, and electropolymerization cycles, were optimized. Under the optimum conditions, the peaks current of nitrate was linear to its concentration in the range of 1μM-0.1M with a detection limit of 31μM and 5μM by EIS and LSV. The developed imprinted nitrate sensor was successfully applied for nitrate determination in different real water samples with acceptable recovery rates.


A novel low-leakage robust SRAM design for sub-100nm technologies, Hybrid SRAM (HSRAM) cell, is presented in this paper. Leakage power, especially subthreshold leakage and gate leakage, and soft error are challenging the design of SRAM. While these important issues have been separately addressed in previous SRAM designs, there exists no design that simultaneously cuts down leakage power and enhances the resistance to soft error. In this work, we have built the first such SRAM cell, by hybrid of high-/spl kappa/ gate dielectric and dynamic threshold voltage which is realized in the form of jointly biased gate and substrate transistor. The HSRAM not only makes the gate leakage negligible, but lessens the severe increase of subthreshold leakage caused by Fringing/Field Induced Barrier Lowering (FIBL) effect accompanied with the introduction of high-/spl kappa/ gate dielectric, and in the same time reduces the susceptibility to soft error by increasing the node capacitance. Experiments were performed in both transistor level and circuit level for this novel HSRAM using ISE8.0 and HSPICE. They indicate that up to 93% reduction in total leakage is possible by using HSRAM cell, with an up to 23% increase in reliability degree and an up to 73% reduction in bitline delay, compared to standard 6T SRAM.


Thursday night I was unable to fall asleep, I lay awake watching in disbelief as my compatriots voted to leave the European Union. The next morning I woke to find thousand messages of WhatsApp…


During the covid-19 pandemic trainees may be asked to work in unfamiliar environments. Abi Rimmer asks experts how doctors can deal with the change


In many ways, technology in general (and the Internet in particular) has fueled a revolution in the information age. The printing press—the "agent of change" in the history of humankind—was itself a technological innovation [1]. While it allowed information to be printed and shared as never before, it had to adhere to the rules of a physical world: printed books, libraries, and publishing houses. The Internet pushed through these limits; from web pages to video sharing sites to podcasts, Internet-related technologies increased information speed, volume, diversity, audience, and many other facets. In particular, the significant increase of online and distributed classroom environments brings new technological challenges. The next decade will likely continue this shift from traditional university classrooms to online offerings. This change requires new technologies and learning systems to bring students together in new ways, improve collaboration in distributed settings, and support learning in new, improved ways. In this minitrack, we explore this changing landscape with research into learning technologies, their application, and their impact on all of us. Papers were solicited on learning theories, cognition, tools and their development, enabling platforms, communication media, distance learning, supporting infrastructures, user experiences, research methods, social impacts, and/or measurable outcomes as they relate to the area of technology and its support of improving teaching and learning. Nine papers were accepted to the minitrack. These papers can be grouped as follows:


Does the pooling of knowledge in export networks help firms to be more successful exporters? Do firms who become member in an export association exhibit higher export sales, ship more products or serve a greater number of markets in the future? Using Danish firm-level data from 1995 - 2006, we assess whether the major Danish export association fosters trade along these dimensions. Using an approach which combines matching techniques with difference-in-difference estimation, we find a positive causal effect of membership on export sales after entry into the association. Moreover, our estimates provide evidence for an immediate increase in the number of exported products. According to our estimates, there is no positive effect on the number of export destinations served.


Context Little is known about adolescent transition to self-management after heart transplant. This gap in knowledge is critically important because the consequences of poor self-management are costly and life-threatening, often resulting in nonadherence, rejection, repeated hospitalizations, and poor quality of life. Objective To explore how adolescents and parents perceive their roles in self-management, and how adolescents integrate self-management into their daily lives and navigate the transition from parent-dominated to self-management. Design Qualitative descriptive design, using online focus groups. Setting Online focus groups using itracks, an online qualitative software program. Participants A purposive sample of 4 adolescents, 13 to 21 years old, who were at least 6 months posttransplant, and of 6 parents of adolescent heart transplant recipients. Results Several parallel themes emerged from the parent and adolescent online focus groups. Managing medications was the predominant theme for both parents and adolescents. For the remaining themes, parents and adolescents expressed similar ideas that were categorized into parallel themes, which included staying on top of things/becoming independent, letting them be normal/being normal, and worries and stressors. Conclusions The transition to self-management after heart transplant was a clear goal for both parents and adolescents. The transition is a shared responsibility between parents and adolescents with a gradual shift from parent-directed to self-management. The process of transition was not linear or smooth, and in several instances, parents described efforts to transfer responsibility to the adolescent only to take it back when complications arose. Additional research with a larger sample is needed in order to fully understand adolescent heart transplant recipients' transition to self-management.


To complement the manual contact-tracing methods, a flood of coronavirus-related apps was launched in the first half of 2020. Despite the incredible promises made by the governments, contact-tracing apps did not live up to expectations. We provide a contextual perspective of the government commissioned contact-tracing apps from four countries to understand the non-functional requirements (NFRs) and socio-technical factors that hindered the success of these apps. We collected the user reviews from the app stores for iOS and Android versions and identified top news articles related to each app. Our analysis revealed that the dominant factors behind the negligible success of these apps are complex and entangled with the cultural and political dimensions rather than being just technical. The multilayer diversity of the target users also impacted the design and development of contact-tracing apps in an extremely challenging situation. This perspective paper brings into light important elements, such as politics and socio-cultural aspects that should be studied in the design of contact-tracing apps, and public apps in general.


The Marce Society, a multidisciplinary group set up in 1980 to advance the understanding, prevention and treatment of post-partum mental illness, met in York for its biennial meeting last September to celebrate its tenth birthday. In the middle of the 19th century, Louis Marce first drew attention to the special nature of psychiatric illness in the puerperium. Since then, as opening speaker, Dr Channi Kumar pointed out, although maternal morbidity has dropped dramati cally, in particular over the last 40 years with improve ments in obstetric care together with social, cultural and educational changes, psychiatric morbidity in the puerperium remains as prevalent as it was 100 years ago. Currently a prospective study of pregnant women with a past history of puerperal psychosis and so at high risk of a further episode is in progress at the Maudsley Hospital. Among this high risk group it seems that the mothers who relapsed with a neurotic disorder were twice as likely to have experienced an adverse life event in the preceding 12 months, while women who had only recently been discharged from in-patient psychiatric care were at increased risk of a psychotic relapse in the puerperium. Significant fac tors in the partners which predicted relapse in the women were poor social adjustment and low com munication. Biological factors in the mother may also be predictive: in the at risk group there was an enhanced apomorphine induced growth hormone response, which might suggest, for example, hypersensitivity of hypothalamic D2 receptors. Controversy continues over whether or not depression is more prevalent in post-partum women


Overview A critical distinction in methodological work is between (a) building (and applying) statistical models for the processes that generate the social science data and (b) tossing the data at available statistical methods. In my own work I strive for (a) and discourage others from settling for (b). Regrettably, expositions and applications of the popular causal modeling methods (under the various names path analysis, structural equation models, LISREL, etc.) contain much of (b) and little of (a). In fact, my favorite typographical error "casual models" (which I've suffered in print) is enjoyable in large part because of its accidental accuracy. And an argument can be made that the methodological proselytizing for and dominance of causal models has retarded the much more useful methodological work of (a). A similar theme is present throughout Freedman's paper, as in the last paragraph of his conclusion which begins "My opinion is that investigators need to think more about the underlying social processes... ". Earlier in the paper Freedman requires that the "as-if-by-experiment" conclusions "must depend on a theory of how the data came to be generated." The translation of substantive theory into methods for data collection and analysis is where I think the fertile interaction between statisticians and social scientists lies (rather than in arguing a "thumbs up" or "thumbs down" on path analysis).


This paper describes the U.S. data collection system for trade in services, discusses improvements that have been made in it over roughly the last 15 years, and identifies some of the improvement tasks that remain. The discussion covers both data on trade in the conventional sense of exchanges between residents and nonresidents and data on services delivered through locally established affiliates.


Objective:To explore the effect of electroencephalogram(ECG) biofeedback on attention deficit hyperactivity disorder in children(ADHD).Methods:38 ADHD children aged 7~15 years underwent EEG biofeedback treatment for 20 times.Assessment of clinlcal symptom and cognitive function test were carried out before and after treatment,then the results were compared with those of healthy children.Results:There was significantly difference in hyperactivity factor,hyperactivity index,short-term memory,Stroop color test,word interference test,the first and second part of number cancellation test and omission rate in CPT before and after treatment in ADHD children(t=2.755,t=2.189).There was no difference in short-term memory,the first and second part of number cancellation test and omission rate in CPT between healthy children and children after treatment(P0.05).Conclusion:Clinlcal symptom and cognitive function improve after EEG biofeedback treatment in ADHD children,some even as good as healthy children.


The rapid sintering of printable metal nanoparticle inks is vital for the industrial mass production of electronic devices. In this paper, we report a rapid laser annealing method for printed Ag nanoparticle-based inks. We also fabricate Ag circuits and organic thin-film transistors (OTFTs) on flexible plastic substrates through spontaneous patterning under deep ultraviolet (DUV) exposure. Compared to the conventional thermal annealing, laser annealing significantly reduces the processing time from 3600 to 10 s while preventing damage caused by excessive heat. The OTFT with laser-annealed Ag source/drain electrodes achieved good performance with saturated mobility of 1.68 cm $^{{2}}\cdot \text{V}^{-{1}}\cdot \text{s}^{-{1}}$ , high-reliability factor of 86.75%, and large saturated drain current resulting from the small channel resistance. This rapid laser annealing method is feasible for printing flexible electronics using metal nanoparticle-based inks in industrial mass production.


Cerebral aspergilloma of initial sinus origin developed in a patient with mixed cell leukemia. Computed tomography imaging showed signs of a cystic multitumoral syndrome with a crown-shaped filling image without peritumoral edema. Follow up of cerebral lesions during medical treatment was by repeated CT scans, with progressive regression of images over a period of 8 months. The patient died after recurrence. Aspergilloma is seen mainly in patients with alternating immunity defenses.


The residents in Foshan do not have a scientific attitude toward bodybuilding contents and ways. This paper discusses the state of adult bodybuilding in Foushan and its present problems , then provides a corresponding strategy based on our investigation, that is, a scientific adjustment of bodybuilding project choice, of the quantitation of exercise intensity and of exerscise time length.


of the past and that all three have foundered on the shoals of race, gender, and class politics. Drawing on feminist theory, she emphasizes that the impact of these and similar social movements will depend on the social location of the activists and which groups stand to benefit the most from their activism. Thus, the Wisconsin movement to protect government workers failed in part because these public sector jobs disproportionately employed and provided services to women and people of color; as Collins writes, ''racialized and gendered histories of public sector work shaped the perceived legitimacy of those who provided its services and those who used them'' (p. 135). In the face of the virulent racism and sexism of the conservative forces arrayed against them, this Keynesian-inspired movement to ''revalue'' these workers and the services they provided did not stand a chance. Scott Walker was reelected by a wide margin. But for Collins, the importance of these three ''revaluation projects'' does not lie in their size or persistence or even their influence, but rather in what they reveal about ''antipolitics.'' This concept refers to institutionalized efforts by conservative think tanks and legislatures to reify economic inequality, create the impression that social injustice is inevitable, and squelch the emergence of any alternative discourse. Antipolitics works by designating an issue as the rightful purview of technical experts, not concerned citizens. These three movements are significant precisely because they were able to open up public discussions on the question of value. Although their efforts have so far been fleeting and limited, all three movements insisted that regular people should play a role in determining the definition of a healthy economy. That these mild-mannered critiques of capitalism were crushed by opponents tells us how neoliberal hegemony operates and exactly what is at stake in its overthrow. Family Values: Between Neoliberalism and the New Social Conservatism, by Melinda Cooper. New York: Zone Books, 2017. 416 pp. $29.95 cloth. ISBN: 9781935408840.


The effect of wear-friction properties of Al-Sn bearing alloys contenting 3%~30% Sn was studied The results shown that the friction coefficient and bearing capacity of alloys reduces with the increasing of Sn. The microstructure of the alloys is the soft Sn particales distributing on the hard matrix of Al-Sn solid solution. The aluminum alloys containing 9% Sn has the best wear-friction properties at room temperature.


Sir, In an article recently published in the European Journal of Clinical Investigation , Halminenet al.analysed the effects of known insulin gene polymorphisms on the risk of insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus (IDDM) in Finnish families [1]. The authors also evaluated the parental transmission of insulin gene haplotypes to the diabetic offspring because earlier studies, including our own [2], reported a distortion in the parental transmission of the insulin gene [-] haplotype [3–7]. This haplotype confers genetic protection from IDDM, but in our study of Caucasian North American families protection was mainly observed when the protective haplotype was paternally inherited [2]. It is of interest that Halminent al. did not observe a similar distortion in a Finnish population. However, there are several other studies reporting a parental effect [3–7]. Although it is clear that such a parental influence may not be seen in every population, Buiet al. meticulously analysed non-overlapping data sets in the literature and concluded that there is indeed very strong evidence for a parental genderrelated effect in American families, as well as in combined data sets from the US, the UK, and France [7]. The existence of such parental influences should not be overlooked as it may imply the existence of other phenomena, independent from inherited alleles, which may significantly contribute to the complexity of IDDM susceptibility. One potential explanation for the observed parental influence may be genomic imprinting, a regulatory mechanism allowing expression of only one parental copy of a gene while the other allele is not expressed [8]. Thus, the lack of protection we observed for maternal haplotypes may be explained if imprinting prevents their phenotypic expression. Imprinting may take place in the thymus, where we [9,10] and others [11] have recently demonstrated monoallelic expression of the insulin gene mRNA. We are presently testing the hypothesis that insulin gene polymorphisms and/or imprinting may influence insulin expression in the thymus and in turn the process by which insulin-specific autoreactive T cells are eliminated during the maturation of the immune system [10, 11]. As insulin is one of the major target autoantigens in diabetes, such influences may play a key role in the development of insulin-dependent diabetes. Alberto Pugliese, M.D. Assistant Professor of Medicine Diabetes Research Institute University of Miami School of Medicine


What is most surprising about the latest economic downturn is its impact on European lenders and particularly French banks, writes Siqalane Taho.


MoO3 donor doped Ba(Ti0.91Zr0.09)O3 ceramic was prepared by a solid phase reaction, its dielectric properties were determined by Agilent 4284A testing analyzer, ZT—I polarization hysteresis loops and d33 testing instrument. The effects of MoO3 content on dielectric properties of Ba(Ti0.91Zr0.09)O3 ceramic were investigated .The results show that MoO3 additives can lower the sintering temperature, with increasing MoO3 donor doped amount, when the x(MoO3) is 0.05, ρv is the best 5.682 g·cm–3 and tanδ is the smallest 0.015 7, er reaches 2 510, the Curie temperature of the samples is shifted high temperature. A typical dielectric relaxation behavior is not observed, though all studied compositions exhibit the broad diffused phase transitions.


The sovereignty dispute over the islands have become increasingly intense,the protection and development of China's uninhabited island has become an focused issue in research field.By analyzing related research on uninhabited island from 2003 to 2011,we can find out that researches of our country's uninhabited island protection and utilization mainly concentrate on the resources and characteristics,problems,sustainable development,the significance of protection and utilization,relationship to be addressed,the feasibility assessment,relevant laws issues and models of the development and utilization.In addition,concentration of these researches has changed over time,bearing a prominent practical significance.With rich contents,it has gradually become a theoretical system.The researches mainly take the macro-perspective,so there is a lack of deep and thorough case analysis.And most of the researches are qualitative-based,quantitative analysis are needed urgently.To enrich and improve the theoretical system of uninhabited islands protection,development and utilization,we should explore research perspective,research depth and research methods in the future.


In December 1890, while on patrol down the west coast of northern Cape York Peninsula (NCYP), accompanied by Senior-Constable Conroy and a few native troopers of the Thursday Island Water Police, Sub-Inspector Charles Savage visited 'the Seven Rivers'.1 From this place, the party went south to the mouth of the Batavia (now Wenlock) River. There they met the chief or mamoose of the Seven Rivers tribe,2 a man identified as Tongambulo (variations Tong-ham-blow,3 Tongamblow4 and Tong-am-bulo5) and also known as Charlie in one account.6 At the time of this meeting, Sub-Inspector Savage was seeking another candidate for induction into government policies intended 'to civilize the Natives of Cape York Peninsula'.7 The first NCYP Aboriginal person to have had this experience was Harry, also known as King Yarra-ham-quee, and described as the 'mamoose of the Jardine River'.8 This man had been taken to Thursday Island earlier in the year:


The article defines the stages of the use of intellectual assets by individual entrepreneurs in order to increase economic security. The author shows that the unprotected and inappropriate use of intellectual assets in the course of conducting economic activity at various stages of the activity of individual entrepreneurs (creation-growth-stability-decline) can form certain threats to the economic security of individual entrepreneurs using intellectual assets. The author's model of the development of entrepreneurial activity of individual entrepreneurs based on the protected use of intellectual assets is proposed


A genetic characterization of 18 different isolates of Staphylococcus aureus using random amplified polymorphic DNAs (RAPDs) was carried out. Out of one hundred primers tested, ten showed polymorphism. The amplification reactions with the 10 primers generated 88 bands, 51 of which is polymorphic with band size ranging between 200 and 3,000 bp. Variation and relatedness between different isolates were determined by converting RAPD data into a Jaccard similarity matrix and analysed by UPGMA (unweighted pair-group method, arithmetic average) to produce completely twelve different groups at 100% Jaccard similarity and at 50% coefficient of similarity. The isolates were classified into two major groups, the first comprises of mildly and weakly virulence, while the other group are the highly virulence Staphylococci . The results demonstrated that the RAPD technique may be of great use in the classification of Staphylococcus aureus . African Journal of Biotechnology Vol. 4 (7), pp. 611-614, 2005


Objective: To follow up the hepatitis B recurrence post liver transplantation using the combination of lamivudine and high-dose intravenous/ intramuscular hepatitis B immunoglobulin. Methods: Fifty-two consecutive patients who underwent liver transplantation were included in this analysis. All patients were administered lamivudine combined with hepatitis B immunoglobulin intravenous(V group) or intramuscular(M group) injection prophylaxis. Dosages of hepatitis B immunoglobu- lin were 4 000 U during anhepatic phase, 2 000 U/d during the first six days after operation, 2 000 U/week at 2-4 weeks after operation and 2 000 U/month at 2-6 months after operation. The dosages of hepatitis B immunoglobulin were decided by blood concentrations at 6 months after transplantation in both groups (HBsAb titer≥200 U/L during the 6-12 months after operation; 100-200 U/L one year after operation). The negative-conversion rates of serum HBsAg, serum HBsAb levels and hepatitis B recurrence rate at the 6th month, 1 year after transplantation and at the end of this study were investigated.Results: The daily average negative-conversion rate of serum HBsAg was significantly faster in V group than that of M group within the first 4 postoperative days (P 0.05). The 100% of serum HBsAg negative-conversion rate was obtained in two groups after one week of operation. No recurrence was found in two groups. And the case of death was independent on HBV recurrent during the follow-up. Conclusion: Lamivudine combined with hepatitis B immunoglobulin intravenous/ intramuscular injection prophylaxis was effective protocol for the hepatitis B recurrence after the liver transplantation.


Background  The aim of this study was to test the feasibility of using the tail of Macaca mulatta for neurophysiological testing of the peripheral nervous system.


Electronic parameters of amid and ester in some compounds modelling substrates of proteolytic enzymes,and electronic properties of corresponding tetrahedral compounds,which are intermediates of the hydrolytic reaction,are calculated by the CNDO/2 method.The nature of substituents and the formation of the hydrogen bond by the carbonyl oxygen atom are shown to have no sufficient influence on the charge and bond orders of the amide group.The dramatic dependence of the amide electronic state from the distort degree of its planar structure is found.The resonance stabilization is shown to be absent in the bicyclic β-lactams.The pKa values of the amide nitrogen atom are calculated at various hybridization states in amides.


In this paper, we study the volume growth property of a non-compact complete Riemannian manifold X . We improve the volume growth theorem of Calabi (1975) and Yau (1976), Cheeger, Gromov and Taylor (1982). Then we use our new result to study gradient Ricci solitons. We also show that on X , for any q ∈ (0,∞), every non-negative L subharmonic function is constant under a natural decay condition on the Ricci curvature.


In recent years there have been several experimental demonstrations of
 the application of polarization spectroscopy (PS) as a combustion
 diagnostic technique.1-3 However, there have been very few theoretical
 investigations of the technique since the work of Teets et al.4 in
 1977. Teets et al.4 investigated the low-laser-power limit where
 saturation effects are small. In this paper we present the initial
 results of a theoretical investigation of polarization spectroscopy
 using the method of direct numerical integration (DNI) of the
 time-dependent density matrix equations to analyze the process. The
 application of this numerical method allows us to include saturation
 effects, Doppler effects, non-steady-state effects associated with the
 finite pulse length of the pump and probe lasers, and will enable us
 to investigate in great detail the effects of different kinds of
 collisions.


*† ‡ In this paper a multi -objective evolutionary algorithm is introduced. This algorithm is especially adapted to handle discrete and continuous design variables simultaneously making it suitable for configurat ion optimization problems, which are often characterized by a mix of discrete and continuous variables. Furthermore response surface approximation functionalities have been integrated to increase efficiency and performance. The response surface approximati ons are built over continuous subspaces using the current population design points. A clustering technique is applied for dividing the population in groups in order to built more accurate response surfaces. Subsequently an optimization is performed on thes e response surface models and the resulting optima are fed back in the population. The capabilities of the algorithm have been demonstrated on a number of real world problems two of which are presented in this paper. First the buckling load of a stringer stiffened plate is optimized and second the configuration optimization of the satellite encompassing the general structural layout, arrangement of equipment and mechanical dimensioning § }.


In the adult turtle (Johnston, '15 b) the large ridge projecting into the ventriclt: from the lateral wall of the hemisphere has strong fiber connections with tht! cerebral peduncle and has obvious close relations with the cortical layers of the pallium in the caudal pole. Indeed, in its caudal part this ridge appears to bc a fold of the whole thickness of the brain wall and is marked extcrnally by the 'amygdaloid fissure.' Here the cell layers of the general palliurn turn in to become continuous with the cell masses of the ridge. It is evident from these facts that the relations of the dorsal ventricular ridge are chiefly with the general pallium. Its position lateral and dorsal to both the caudate and lentiforrn nuclei shows that it does not belong to the corpus striatum. Its independence from other cell masses in its rostra1 part gives one the impression (from the study of adult material alone), that the ridge has been formed by infolding from the caudal region ('15 b, p. 417). The origin of this ridge in the embryo should throw light not only on its relalions in the turtle but also on its significance in the evolution of the mammalian brain. I am able to give the main outlines of the development on the basis of a series of early embryos of Chelydra serpentina, for which I am indebted to Dr. C. E. Johnson of this University; and of sections of 17, 20, and 28 mm. embryos of Chrysemys, belonging to the Anatomical Laboratory of Washing ton University for the loan of which I am indebted to Dr. Edwin A. Raumgartner.


Lithiation of benzo[b]phenanthro[9,10-d]furan (1) in THF at -78°C leads to the formation of the corresponding intermediates (2) which by reaction with appropriate electrophiles afford a series of 10-substitutedbenzo[b] phenanthro[9, 10-d]furans (3a-d). The structure of these compounds was elucidated by spectroscopic methods. A study concerning the reactivity of BPF was performed by ab-initio calculations and the structure of compounds 3a-d confirmed.


In Reply. —In his essay, Bayer states, "The looming crisis in health care for those with HIV disease set the stage for congressional action that could scarcely have been imagined a short time earlier." Although initial budget cuts may have dampened Bayer's hopes for change, perhaps he should have been more optimistic about the choices the American public was ready to make. President Clinton was elected in no small part because of his views on reform of health care organization and financing, and he has recently promised additional funding for the Ryan White Act. We believe that the nation is turning the corner on health care not only for those infected with HIV, but for all persons.


Formulation residue, observer viewing distance, light intensity, viewing angle, observer viewing position, and observer-to-observer variability affect the ability to confirm the cleanliness of manufacturing equipment.


The spatial distributions of three readily identifiable chromosomes in somatic cells of monoploid barley (Hordeum vulgare, n = x = 7), as determined by the measurements of distances between them, w...


Describes an energy approach to the acupuncture phenomenon based on the bioenergetics of the cells in the body surface receptor "acupoints" following the signal transduction postulate in a biomolecular model. Using the gamma camera scintillation technique "Acupuncture Scintigraphy" with technetium pertechnetate, various minimal dose injection (25-200 micro Ci) intra-acupoints were gamma visualised with different connections instead of the well known blood, lymphatic or nerve pathways. Over 3 years in human volunteers and animal laboratory research, acupoints scintigraphy has been applied to basic scientific investigation: biophysics and biomolecular studies have been used to profile the meridians system.


In this paper, we present design principles for business domain-specific e-collaboration (BDSpeC) - a concept that focuses on integrating e-collaboration into the core processes of particular business domains and the corresponding transactional enterprise systems (ESs) supporting these core processes. These principles are based on our research results regarding collaboration support in product costing as pilot domain. In this domain, we discovered a specific lack of integrated e-collaboration to enable communication, coordination, and information exchange in direct connection to the core processes with their daily work routines and data sources. In a design science research project, we created artefacts for the product costing domain and derived design principles for a broader scope of contexts. The design principles for BDSpeC illustrate how such an integration can be achieved in various business domains with similarities to product costing. By focusing on design principles, we have abstracted and codified design knowledge that is useful for both, research and practice. In design practice, the design knowledge can be used to develop other instances as solutions to a class of problems sharing similarities with product costing. In design research, it is intended to encourage exaptation by supporting the transfer of our solution into other domains.


Key words: leaf area; radiation interception; QUEFTS model; fertilizer recovery fractions; nutrient mass fractions; crop growth; calibration; validation; radiation use efficiency; sensitivity analysis East Africa Highland banana yields on smallholder farms in the Great Lakes region are small (11−26 Mg ha−1 cycle−1 in Uganda, 21−43 Mg ha−1 cycle−1 in Burundi and 25−53 Mg ha−1 cycle−1 in Rwanda). The major causes of poor yields are declining soil fertility and soil moisture stress. In order to improve production, knowledge on highland banana physiology, growth patterns and response to fertilization is important, to establish the potential yield of the crop, to quantify the yield gaps between potential and actual yield, and to explore options for closing the yield gaps. Measurements of plant morphological characteristics, radiation interception and biomass (by destructive harvesting) were taken in experimental fields in central and southwest Uganda. Results showed that total leaf area can be estimated by using height and girth (used to estimate middle leaf area) and number of functional leaves. The light extinction coefficient, k determined from photosynthetically active radiation (PAR) measurements over the entire day was 0.7. Banana plants partitioned more dry matter (DM) to the leaves during first phase of vegetative growth, with the pseudostem becoming the dominant sink later with 58% of total DM at flowering, and the bunch at harvest with 53% of the total DM. Changes in dry matter partitioning influenced the allometric relationships between above-ground biomass (AGB in kg DM) and girth (cm), the relationship following a power function during the vegetative phase (AGB = 0.0001 (girth)2.35), and exponential functions at flowering (AGB = 0.325 e0.036 (girth)) and at harvest (AGB = 0.069 e0.068 (girth)). This thesis shows that allometric relationships can be derived and used to estimate biomass and bunch weights. In fertilizer trials, yield increases above the control (13.0 Mg ha−1 yr−1) ranged from 2.2−11.2 Mg ha−1 yr−1 at Kawanda, to more than double at Ntungamo, 7.0−29.5 Mg ha−1 yr−1 (control 7.9 Mg ha−1 yr−1). The limiting nutrients at both sites were in the order K>P>N. Differences in soil moisture availability and texture resulted in higher yields and total nutrient uptakes (K>N>P) at Ntungamo, compared with Kawanda. Per unit dry matter yield, highland bananas take up a similar amount of N (49.2 kg finger DM kg−1 N), half the amount of P (587 kg finger DM kg−1 P), and five times the amount of K (10.8 kg finger DM kg−1 K), when compared with cereal grain. Calibration results of the static nutrient response model QUEFTS using data from Ntungamo were fair (R2 = 0.57, RMSE = 648 kg ha−1). The calibrated QUEFTS model predicted yields well using data from Mbarara southwest Uganda (R2 = 0.68, RMSE = 562 kg ha−1). A new dynamic radiation and temperature-driven growth model, LINTUL BANANA 1 was developed to the compute potential yields of East Africa highland banana. The model considers (i) the physiology of the highland banana crop; (ii) the plant dynamics (i.e. three plant generations, Plant 1, 2 and 3 at different stages of growth constituting a mat); and (iii) three canopy levels formed by the leaves of the three plants. Average computed potential bunch dry and fresh matter were slightly higher at Ntungamo (20 Mg ha−1 DW; 111 Mg ha−1 FW), compared with Kawanda (18.25 Mg ha−1 DW; 100 Mg ha−1 FW), and values compared well with banana yields under optimal situations at comparable leaf area index values (20.3 Mg ha−1 DW; 113 Mg ha−1 FW). Sensitivity analysis was done to assess the effects of changes in parameters (light use efficiency, LUE; the light extinction coefficient, k; specific leaf area, SLA; the relative death rate of leaves, rd; relative growth rate of leaf area, RGRL; and the initial dry matter values) on bunch dry matter, leaf dry matter and leaf area index (L) at flowering. Sensitivity results for Kawanda and Ntungamo showed that changes in LUE1 resulted in more than proportional increase in bunch DM (1.30 and 1.36), a higher leaf DM (0.60 and 0.67) and L at flowering (0.60 and 0.67). Changes in rd1 values reduced bunch dry matter, leaf dry matter and L at flowering. Changes in SLA1 reduced only leaf DM, whereas both leaf DM and L at flowering were reduced by changes in k1 at both sites. Initial dry matter values had a small effect (sensitivity < 0.0263) for bunch DM, leaf DM and L at flowering. Based on the model results, it is clear that the potential yield of East Africa highland bananas is more than 18 Mg ha−1 DW. Management options that increase LUE and reduce the relative death rate of leaves, and improvements in parameters related to light interception (SLA and k) are important to increase yield.


Abstract Background Diarrhea remains an important cause of morbidity and mortality in neonatal foals, and correct identification of etiologic agents is essential for effective disease management. Objective To examine the association between diarrhea and detection of Enterococcus durans or other enteropathogens in neonatal foals on 1 breeding farm in Kentucky, USA. Animals Fifty‐nine Thoroughbred foals and their broodmares. Methods Prospective observational study. Study foals and broodmares were sampled and tested for E. durans and other enteropathogens during the first 10 days after foaling. The frequency of foals in which E. durans or other enteropathogens was compared between foals with or without diarrhea. Results Seven of 59 foals developed diarrhea. The frequency of foals with E. durans infection was higher in foals with diarrhea 5/7 (71%), compared to foals without diarrhea 0/51 (0%; P < .01). Detection of E. durans in foals was associated with detection of E. durans in broodmares; in 2/7 (29%) foals with diarrhea, the 2 broodmares tested positive for E. durans, and, in 51/51 (100%) foals without diarrhea, all broodmares tested negative to E. durans (P = .01). Based on the spatial and temporal distribution of foals with diarrhea, 5 of 6 additional cases of diarrhea were attributed to lateral transmission of E. durans infection. Conclusions and Clinical Importance Detection of E. durans was associated with diarrhea in foals. Implementation of enhanced biosecurity measures might mitigate disease transmission associated with E. durans infection in foals.


Abstract The aim of the study was to estimate the current epidemiological situation concerning swine influenza (SI) in Poland. The study was based on an annual passive survey of 11,770 fatteners' sera from 584 herds, taken at slaughterhouses within the last 30 months (from January 2010 till June 2012), as well as, an active monitoring conducted in 2011 and 2012, in 25 farms, using 388 sera taken from life pigs of different age/technological groups. The analysis of simultaneous circulation of different swine influenza virus (SIV) subtypes was taken into a deep consideration. The wide spread of SIV in Poland, including the occurrence of multiple SIV infections was demonstrated. In 2010 and 2011, the domination of H1N1 subtype and the most frequently co-circulation of H1N1 and H1N2 viruses was evidenced, while in the first 6 months of 2012, the co-circulation of H1N1 and H3N2 viruses was detected more often. Based on the obtained results, it can be stated that the epidemiological situation concerning SI in Poland is dynamic and similar to that observed in other European regions with high pigs' density; however, the prevalence of antibodies and the occurrence of mixed SIV infections is lower than in Western Europe.


Water soluble amphoteric graft copolymers of polysaccharide were synthesized via grafting of cationic monomer onto the sodium carboxymethylcellulose )CMC( and then used as a shale stabilizer in the water-based drilling fluids. Accordingly, five types of CMC-graft copolymers with different ratios of acrylamide )AM( and diallyldimethylammonium chloride )DADMAC( were synthesized. Grafting of monomer)s( onto the CMC was verified by FT-IR spectroscopy. Results showed that grafting percentage is strongly affected by the monomer type as well as the weight ratio of monomers. Synthesized CMC-graft copolymers were used in the formulation of water-based drilling fluid. Drilling fluid was then subjected to the rheological, fluid loss and shale recovery tests. It was found that ability of CMC in the shale stability enhances by grafting of cationic monomer onto CMC. Fluid loss is also controlled in the acceptable region in the presence of CMC-graft copolymers. Among graft copolymers, CMC-grafted with pure cationic monomer exhibited higher efficiency in the fluid loss control and more important in the shale stability. )*( To whom correspondence should be addressed.s n E-mail: email@example.com Available in: http://jips.ippi.ac.ir Iranian Journal of Polymer Science and Technology Vol. 22, No.6, 483-493 February-March 2010


International environmental agreements are a primary mechanism of global environmental governance. Increasingly, international environmental agreements recognise the importance of public participation through education. Yet, despite the prominence of international environmental agreements on the international agenda, and the stated commitment to public participation through education, effective public involvement remains an elusive goal. The research informing this article suggests that the 'problem' of public participation through education is not simply an issue of procedural exclusion from the policy process. Instead, it argues that procedural exclusion is one outcome of deeply held assumptions and beliefs about knowledge, education and the public that operate within the discourse of international environmental agreements. It is the identification of such assumptions, and a critical analysis of the discourse they support, that forms the focus of this article.


As Himalayan glaciers melt, the natural dams formed beneath them become a dangerous threat to villages below. However, local yak farmers could soon have a simple solution.


Global Positioning System (GPS) is currently the common solution for land vehicle positioning. However, GPS signals may suffer from blockage in urban canyons and tunnels, and the positioning information provided is interrupted. One solution to have continuous vehicle positioning is to integrate GPS with an inertial measurement unit (IMU) and the navigation solution is achieved using an estimation technique which is traditionally based on Kalman filter (KF). In order to have a low cost navigation solution for land vehicles, MEMS-based inertial sensors are used. To achieve a better performance during GPS outages, the speed derived from the vehicle odometer is used as a measurement update. To improve the positioning accuracy of the MEMS-based INS/Odometer/GPS integration, particle filtering (PF) is used as a nonlinear filtering technique, which does not need to linearize the models as in Extended KF (EKF). Because of PF ability to deal with nonlinear models, it can accommodate arbitrary sensor characteristics and motion dynamics. An enhanced version of PF is used which is called Mixture PF. While the Sampling/Importance Resampling (SIR) PF samples from the prior importance density and the Likelihood PF samples from the observation likelihood, the Mixture PF samples from both densities, then appropriate weighting is achieved followed by resampling. This mixture of importance densities leads to a better performance. The performance of this method is examined by road test trajectories in a land vehicle and compared to KF.


Heavy metal pollution caused by anthropogenic activity is a great concern of the present days. Widespread use of substances containing metals inevitably lead to their deposition in soil affecting soil microbiota, which plays important role in maintaining soil functions. The aim of our study was to determine number of heavy metal resistant isolates acquired from the soil from heavy metal polluted area of dump near Hnúšťa. Soil samples were obtained from two collection sites (48° 36 ́ 4,47502 ́ ́ N, 19° 57 ́32,654 ́ ́ E and 48° 36 ́ 4,4634 ́ ́ N, 19° 57 ́ 32,67 ́ ́ E) and mixed together. The microorganisms used in this study were routinely cultivated and screened for resistance to different concentrations of four heavy metals – Zn (2–500 mg/l), Cu, Ni, Pb (all three metals tested at concentrations from 0,5 to 125 mg/l). Very high resistance against Cu, Ni and Pb even at the highest tested concentrations was found at majority of tested bacterial strains. Almost all 89 from 89 isolates show resistance against these metals at tested concentrations. Only in case of Zn we determined the MIC (minimal inhibitory concentration) – 125 mg/l. The results point out very high resistance pattern in soil bacteria.


Processes and industrial plants for plastic deformation of metals and their alloys are among the foundations for the global industry and economy. The role of plastic deformation of metals and alloys is constantly increasing. These processes change the shape and the dimensions of the slug for the end product and they are efficient methods for altering the properties of the metals. In this paper, the technological regime for obtaining a hexagonal rod of copper is discussed. The production cycle consists of extrusion and subsequent drawing. The drawing itself was conducted at three different drawing speeds – 30, 50 and 70 m/min. Mechanical tests of the end products were conducted to determine tensile strength and relative elongation as well as hardness and electrical conductivity tests. It was found out that the strength and plastic properties of the metal changed negligibly, remaining within the range indicated by the standard for the tested product. The electrical conductivity remained unchanged. From the results obtained, it follows that the currently operating process of extrusion and drawing of a hexagonal profile can be improved successfully by implementing the drawing process in one pass at a maximum drawing speed for the aggregate, namely 70 m/min. As a result of the described technology, a high-quality end-product with physical-mechanical properties, corresponding to the standard, is obtained


This paper evaluates the performance that can be achieved using candidate ground and onboard navigation approaches for operation of the James Webb Space Telescope, which will be in an orbit about the Sun-Earth L2 libration point. The ground navigation approach processes standard range and Doppler measurements from the Deep Space Network The onboard navigation approach processes celestial object measurements and/or ground-to- spacecraft Doppler measurements to autonomously estimate the spacecraft s position and velocity and Doppler reference frequency. Particular attention is given to assessing the absolute position and velocity accuracy that can be achieved in the presence of the frequent spacecraft reorientations and momentum unloads planned for this mission. The ground navigation approach provides stable navigation solutions using a tracking schedule of one 30-minute contact per day. The onboard navigation approach that uses only optical quality celestial object measurements provides stable autonomous navigation solutions. This study indicates that unmodeled changes in the solar radiation pressure cross-sectional area and modeled momentum unload velocity changes are the major error sources. These errors can be mitigated by modeling these changes, by estimating corrections to compensate for the changes, or by including acceleration measurements.


From the perspective of Resource-based Theory (RBT), organizational culture can be a source of sustained competitive advantage. And resources integration models, divided by property rights of resource, not firm boundary, as internal and external resources integration models, are presented as being specific in different cultural contexts. However, the literature review shows the absences of an integrated framework, which can help to highlight the different role that context-specific facets of culture play. This paper develops a conceptual framework based upon the culture literatures and evolutionary theory to define the relationship between four different cultural types, namely team-long-developmental culture (TLD), team-authority-communicative culture (TAC), long-risk-developmental culture (LRD) and risk-control-authoritative culture (RCA), and two different resource integration models. Our study undertook a survey of 168 effective samples from manufacturing industries and developed a model of Partial Least Squares (PLS). The empirical results confirm the reliability and validity of measurement scales. The theoretical hypotheses of cultural evolution mechanism for resource integration are also supported by the empirical evidence.


Undershot water wheel is appropriate technologies that raise the water level elevation of the river which was originally low for irrigation purposes with low cost. The water wheel is generally used in agricultural areas that do not get technical irrigation network. Water capacity capable be appointed the waterwheel is relatively low when compared with technical irrigation but the capacity could be increased if the factors affecting debits lifter of water can be optimized. These factors are the blades, the debit of flow, the position of box, the amount and type of box. The purpose of the research determines the dimensions of blade effective and debit of flow optimum which produces a maximum of debits lifter water. Research conducted in the laboratory to do the testing on the model undershot waterwheel. Model waterwheel was created in such a manner resembling a waterwheel in the field without scale models. Testing is done by varying the dimensions of the blade is the blade size of 6 cm × 4.5 cm, 6 cm × 6 cm and 6 cm × 7.5 cm, and then the flow rate is 3.07 l / sec, 3.8 l / sec and 5,99 l / sec and amount of box is 6, 12, 18, 24, 30 and 36 as well as the type of box that is type 1 (small size), type 2 (medium size) and type 3 (large size). The results showed the number of boxes 36 with a box type 3 in spoon size of 6 cm × 6 cm to debit of flow 5,99 l / sec produce maximum of debits lifter water that is equal to 38,17 ml /sec. It can be concluded dimention of spoon effective is the size of 6 cm × 6 cm and debit of flow that optimum is 5,99 l / sec.Keywords: undershot water wheel, dimension of blade, debit of flow


The design method of secondary cooling water automatic distributing modes by parameter control for the No.5 super-low slab continuous caster in the No 1 steel making plant of Jigang.Production practices show that the surface and inner quality of the slab are improved and the aims of increasing casting speed and stable production are reached by using and optimizing this model constantly.


The Cartan-Penrose (CP) equation is interpreted as a connection between a spinor at a point in spacetime, and a pair of holographic screens on which the information at that point may be projected. Local SUSY is thus given a physical interpretation in terms of the ambiguity of the choice of holographic screen implicit in the work of Bousso. The classical CP equation is conformally invariant, but quantization introduces metrical information via the


In addition to being realistic, a mobility model should be easy to understand and use. Unfortunately, most of the simple mobility models proposed thus far are not realistic and most of the realistic mobility models proposed thus far are not simple to use. In this work, we present SMOOTH, a new mobility model that is realistic and simple to use. SMOOTH imitates a recently published mobility model, SLAW, that is realistic but not simple to use. While SLAW was constructed by extracting statistical features of real human movement, it has input parameters that are very complex to set. SMOOTH, on the other hand, is realistic (as SMOOTH is based on the real GPS traces used by SLAW) and is simple to use (as SMOOTH avoids SLAW's complex input parameter.


International data found that the severity of the problem epidemiological, clinical comprehensive assessments recommend to patients abusers/addicts and use of psychotropic diagnostic tools, whose efficiency makes them useful elements in certain brain pathologies. We describe the neuroanatomy-physiology of the areas involved in the production of addictive disease as a centre of management and long-term rehabilitation. It indicates the role of frontal cortical structures in human behaviour which disables alteration to the individual to assess the potential reward associated with self-medication. Emphasis is placed in the imagenological participation in the diagnosis and management of these disorders, techniques that make it over him without invading and where the identification of underlying neuro-biochemical mechanisms is crucial. It highlights the resources for better long term psychotherapeutic rehabilitation that joins the utility-educational information to patients and their families. Synergy pharmacological, psychological counseling and vocational favors the highest rate of abstinence and relapse prevention in disorders such as addiction to nicotine, which along with psychosocial support reach the goal of early referral of consumption and maintenance of sustained abstinence. The involvement of health personnel in educating patients and families gives the professional work force and contributes to the dissemination of health recommendations made to that effect, as strengthening management of individual cases, whose quality and warmth contributes to the decline in social stigma due to ignorance and misunderstanding of these disorders.


Abstract : The purpose of the acquired instrumentation was to perform high spatial resolution and nanosecond time resolution plasma diagnostics in intense electron beam-driven high power microwave (HPM) sources to better understand the "pulse shortening" problem. We have thus performed the first laser interferometry measurement inside a high power backward wave oscillator (or any other intense beam-driven HPM source for that matter) during the course of microwave generation reported in the literature. Line-integrated electron densities between 9 x 10(exp 15) and 2 x 10(exp 16)/sq cm for microwave powers between 20 and 120 MW have been measured. The two main sources of the measured electron density are postulated to be: (1) plasma generated from the cutoff neck due to beam scrape off and, (2) material removed and ionized from the slow wave structure walls during microwave generation. A catastrophic microwave discharge results in termination of subsequent microwave generation. Novel modifications to the inlet of the slow wave structure in intense beam-driven backward wave oscillators are suggested as a result of this research.


The invention discloses a high-strength environment-friendly composite board which is characterized by being prepared from the following raw materials in parts by weight: 5-10 parts of debregeasia orientalis powder, 5-10 parts of corncobs, 20-30 parts of bamboo powder, 5-10 parts of wollastonite powder, 5-10 parts of brucite fibers, 0.5-1 part of sodium lignosulfonate, 0.5-1 part of polyethylene wax micropowder, 0.1-0.2 part of sodium benzoate, 0.5-1 part of a titanate coupling agent TMC-201 and 10-20 parts of a bonding aid. The composite board has high strength, high toughness and excellent impact resistance, and is strong in water-proof and corrosion-proof performances, good in durability, stable in property, uniform in texture, good in use performance, wide in raw material source, low in price, simple in process, environment-friendly, nontoxic, harmless, economic and practical.


T here is a need for a concise, easy to read, well referenced book on immunisation practices that can be used by medical and nursing staff as a source of ready reference. The "green book" issued annually by the Joint Committee on Immunisation and Vaccination in Britain, while a useful initial reference, often leaves users frustrated through lack ofexplanations for its advice and very limited references. Alistair Dudgeon and William Cutting's book combines historical information, immunisation theory, schedules, and administration techniques with details about currently used vaccines. It is easy to read as a whole or to use as a reference source. The chapters are clearly structured with abundant references, and there is an excellent index. New techniques of vaccine production in theory now make it possible to produce a vaccine for virtually any infectious agent, limited only by factors such as rapidly changing genotypes, cost, and difficulties with administration and distribution. These points are discussed in sections on new bacterial and viral vaccines, as is vaccination in immunocompromised people, an important subject of current interest. Practitioners will find the section giving details on individual vaccines very helpful. Inevitably some observations are already out of date. For example, an active vaccine against hepatitis A virus is about to be released, and cholera vaccination is now being discouraged by the World Health Organisation, both for individual protection and as a means of controlling outbreaks. Finding details about vaccines against "hepatitis" all in one section may for some cause confusion between the very different viruses concerned. The short section on immunising travellers is unlikely to be detailed enough to act as a reference source for individual itineraries. For example, yellow fever is said to be present in both Central and South America but manycountries in these areas are infection free. Plague and anthrax are given substantial coverage but Japanese B encephalitis vaccine is given only a fleeting mention at a time when it is being prescribed more liberally for those travelling to Far Eastern countries. Mention could have been made of regularly updated sources of information such as the NHS viewdata system (TRAVAX) and sources of telephone advice that are available to practitioners. Alistair Dudgeon, the senior editor and author, died shortly before the book's publication. His foresight in seeing a need for a concise practical text on immunisation should be rewarded with its wide use by specialists in infection, communicable diseases, and public health medicine as well as by doctors and nurses woring in primary care. -ERIC WALKER, consultant physician/epidemiologist, Communicable Diseases (Scotland) Unit, Glasgow


We defined the ambulatory arterial stiffness index (AASI) as unity minus the regression slope of diastolic on systolic blood pressure, as measured at the brachial artery by ambulatory monitoring.1,2 AASI reflects the dynamic relation between diastolic and systolic blood pressure during the day. Conceptually consistent with a hypothesis put forward in 1914,3 the stiffer the arterial tree, the closer the regression slope and AASI are to 0 and unity, respectively. We concede that AASI is an indirect measure of arterial stiffness and must be influenced by other hemodynamic factors, such as wave reflections originating from peripheral sites, stroke volume, and …


A number of genes involved in zygotic genome activation (ZGA) have been identified, but the RNA‐binding maternal factors that are directly related to ZGA in mice remain unclear. The present study shows that maternal deletion of Igf  2bp2 (also commonly known as Imp2) in mouse embryos causes early embryonic developmental arrest in vitro at the 2‐cell‐stage. Transcriptomics and proteomics analyses of 2‐cell‐stage embryos in mice reveal that deletion of IMP2 downregulates the expression of Ccar1 and Rps14, both of which are required for early embryonic developmental competence. IGF2, a target of IMP2, when added in culture media, increases the proportion of wild‐type embryos that develop successfully to the blastocyst stage: from 29% in untreated controls to 65% (50 × 10−9 m IGF2). Furthermore, in an experiment related to embryo transfer, foster mothers receiving IGF2‐treated embryos deliver more pups per female than females who receive untreated control embryos. In clinically derived human oocytes, the addition of IGF2 to the culture media significantly enhances the proportion of embryos that develop successfully. Collectively, the findings demonstrate that IMP2 is essential for the regulation and activation of genes known to be involved in ZGA and reveal the potential embryonic development‐related utility of IGF2 for animal biotechnology and for assisted reproduction in humans.


Abstract This paper describes a study that investigated interactivity in distance education lessons delivered by audiographics technologies. Videotaped observations of language lessons delivered to upper primary school students in remote schools were used to investigate the forms of interactivity supported by the technology, to determine the extent to which teachers were employing these interactions, and to establish the impact of the interactivity in enhancing the quality and form of the instructional programs. Results indicated that while audiographics can support interactions of many forms, the teachers tended to use a limited range of interactions and to use them largely for classroom management and content delivery.


Africa is facing challenges with the opening of its economy to the world and the internationalisation of financial markets. Among these challenges is embedded in the process of convergence and harmonisation in international accounting, under the leadership of the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB), which has been seeking ways to normalize the activity of accounting due to the adoption of international standards known as International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS), and that is to bring in transparency, accountability and efficiency in the financial markets and in each and every country in the world. According to the IASB, the standards meet the public interest by promoting trust, growth and long-term financial stability in the global economy in order to protect economic partners and facilitate the functioning of the capital market in the financial world. In this World process of international convergence African countries did not seem indifferent, so some African countries adopted the international standards issued by the IASB. But among these African countries, we have former colonies of European countries that have long remained isolated and unknown abroad, as well as their accounting practices in the case of African countries in the franc zone. This fact raises the following question: How has the evolution of accounting developed in these countries and what are the historical, economic reflexes faced by French-speaking African countries to adopt the international IFRS standards of the IASB? The main objective of this study is to analyze the evolution of accounting in the countries of the franc zone in Africa until their process of convergence to IFRS. To achieve this, a method of bibliographic and documentary research was used in which it was divided into three periods of time: pre-Independence, post-independence and current moment of international IFRS standards. The study shows that the convergence of the franc zone countries was a complex path in which there was a need for collaboration and negotiation with the colonizer, but they chose to follow the opposite path and thus adopted international norms. The comparison between IFRS and SYSCOHADA international standards shows that SYCOHADA in Frenchspeaking African countries follows international standards, but there are some points of divergence.


In the VB program design course teaching, how resolve the program design lifeless and difficult understand this problem, find out a more novel teaching method, have been large calculator teacher rather interested in topic.The article combines the teaching fulfillment and the theories thinkings, inquiry into from the teaching means and the method angles, and emphasize to experiment the link, the reasonable improvement investigates the method, paying attention to the student exaltation of the plait distance ability and actual applied ability, to attain the purpose of raise the course teaching quantity, elaborate the VB program design reform in education of what time viewpoint.


Longstanding research in political behavior tells us that citizens pay very little attention to politics and, in turn, are not civically engaged. Recent studies on heuristics argue that citizens can make good decisions based on limited information; however, the quality of those decisions is questionable. Notably, and for the purposes of this paper, Lau and Redlawsk (1997; 2006) examine "voting correctly" and find convincing evidence on voters' ability to match their political preferences to presidential candidates. Nonetheless, questions concerning voter ability remain—such as the possible existence of demographic group variation and whether voting incorrectly is more likely to occur in sub-presidential elections. Based on data from the 1990 and 1992 Senate elections, this study finds that individual characteristics of a political nature, such as political knowledge and ideological extremism, do a far better job of predicting a correct vote than an individual's demographics. INTRODUCTION Two weeks following the 2010 election, the PEW Research Center administered a nationwide poll examining public familiarity with current events. After the Republicans' historic victories in November, less than half of those surveyed knew that the GOP had taken over the House. 2 This same survey showed that Americans did not know the unemployment rate and few knew who would be the new Speaker of the House. Results such as these are not unusual in American politics. Since the advent of modern polling, political scientists have frequently addressed Americans' poor understanding of how government works and lack of familiarity with who represents them (Delli Carpini & Keeter, 1996). In addition to low levels of knowledge, evidence also exists that the public is less interested in politics than citizens of earlier generations (Neuman 1986). A number of concerns arise from the public's poor knowledge of and interest in politics. At the most basic level, a lack of political knowledge affects the quality of representation because voters may not be able to link their political preferences to candidates who would best represent those preferences (Nicholson, Pantoja, & Segura, 2006). Adding another layer of complication, the public's poor level of political knowledge is not equally distributed across all groups in society. In fact, research indicates that some groups in American society are consistently less knowledgeable, interested, and engaged (Delli Carpini & Keeter, 1996; Galston, 2001). 3 Given this, some individuals and groups may be better able to link their preferences to candidates and, subsequently, better represented in government (Verba, Burns, & Schlozman, 1997). The ability to link political preferences to candidates is a tall order for any voter. Given the likely absence of complete information, how are voters able to make good decisions at the ballot box? In the 1990s, researchers began to advance the notion that people use information shortcuts, or heuristics, in place of full information to make voting choices (Popkin, 1991; Sniderman, Brody, & Tetlock, 1991; Tetlock, 1991). This means that voters can operate within a complex political world by using simple cues, such as party identification, to develop an opinion or cast a politically representative vote (Lau & Redlawsk, 2001; Schaffner & Streb, 2002). This paper examines the link between voters' political values and beliefs and their selection of U.S. Senate candidates. In particular, I ask whether voters in a Senate election can


Objective To study effects of laser combined with Cyclophosphamide on tumor growth and angiogenesis of hepatocellular carcinoma in mice.Methods Tumor loaded mice models were established,then 40 cases of tumor loaded mouse were divided randomly into NS group,low energy laser irradiation group(JG group),Cyclophosphamide group(CTX group) and low energy laser irradiation combined with Cyclophosphamide group(JG+CTX group) with 10 mouse in each group.The drugs or laser irradiation were given every day in each group for 10 days.Tumor growth sit uation,tumor weight and spleen weight were measured,tumor inhibitory rate and spleen index were calculated.Ex pression of VEGF mRNA was detected by in situ hybridization,the expression of MVD and PCNA were detected by immune histochemistry.Results ① The weight in NS group 7,10 days after the drug administration [(23.24 ±0.60),(26.79±0.59) g] were lower than those in JG group [(26.74 ±1.23),(26.79±0.59) g],CTX group [(25.55±0.71),(25.69± 0.35) g] and JG+CTX group [(26.09±0.68),(26.41±0.67) g],the differences were statistically significant(P 0.01);tumor inhibition rate in JG group,CTX group and JG+CTX group were(50.82 ±0.33)%,(65.57±0.24)%,(53.69±0.33)%;tumor weight in JG group [(1.20±0.43) g] and JG+CTX group [(1.13±0.43) g] were all lower than those in NS group [(2.44±0.23) g],spleen index in JG group [(14.30 ±0.20)‰] and JG+CTX group [(14.51±0.16)‰] were all higher than those in NS group [(9.96±0.18)‰],the differences were statistically significant(P 0.01 or P 0.05).②Average grey degree of VEGF mRNA in JG group(62.28±2.36),CTX group(68.12±2.60) and JG+CTX group(69.95±4.38) were all lower than those in NS group(49.87±3.76),the differences were statistically significant(P 0.01);average grey degree of VEGF mRNA in JG group was lower than that in JG+CTX group,the difference was statistically significant(P 0.01);the difference of average grey degree of VEGF mRNA in JG+CTX group and CTX group was not statistically significant(P = 0.234).MVD value in NS group(14.57± 0.58) were higher than those in JG group(13.52±0.33),CTX group(12.30±0.29) and JG+CTX group(11.49±0.44),the differences were statistically significant(P 0.01);MVD value in JG+CTX group were lower than those in JG group and CTX group,the differences were statistically significant(P 0.01).③PCNA Positive cell number in NS group [(80.6±2.01) numbers] were higher than those in JG group [(73.8±2.57) numbers],CTX group [(63.7±2.75) numbers],JG+CTX group [(66.1±3.38) numbers],the differences were statistically significant(P 0.01);the difference of PCNA Positive cell number in CTX group and JG+CTX group were not statistically significant(P 0.05).Conclusion Low energy laser irradiation combined with Cyclophosphamide can obviously inhibit the proliferation of tumor cells and angiogenesis,which show synergistic antitumor effect.