We present the results of the long-term hard X-ray monitoring of the high-mass X-ray binary 2S 0114+65 with INTEGRAL/IBIS from 2003 to 2008. 2S 0114+65 is a variable hard X-ray source with X-ray luminosities of 10 35 ―4 × 10 36 erg s ―1 from 20 to 100 keV due to accretion rate changes in different orbital phases. In several observations when 2S 0114+65 was bright, we found a pulse period evolution of ∼2.67 h to 2.63 h from 2003 to 2008, with a spin-up rate of the neutron star ∼1.09 x 10 ―6 s s ―1 . Compared with the previous reported spin-up rate, the spin-up rate of the neutron star in 2S 0114+65 is accelerating. The spectral properties of 2S 0114+65 in the 18-100 keV band which changed with the orbital phases generally could be described with a power-law model with a high-energy exponential cut-off. The variation of the power-law photon index over orbital phase anticorrelates with hard X-ray flux, and the variation of E cut has a positive correlation with the hard X-ray flux, implying a harder spectrum at the maximum of the light curve. The variations of spectral properties over orbital phase suggested 2S 0114+65 as a highly obscured binary system. In some observational revolutions, hard X-ray tails above 70 keV are detected. We study the characteristics of the hard X-ray tails combining JEM-X and IBIS data in the energy range of 3-100 keV. The 3-100 keV spectra of 2S 0114+65 are generally fitted by an absorbed power-law model with high-energy cut-off. We discover that the hard X-ray tails are only detected when the column density is very low. Thus, a high column density leads to the disappearance of the hard X-ray tails in this wind-fed neutron star accretion binary. Our results would help to understand the origin, evolution and properties of this peculiar class of superslow pulsation neutron stars in high-mass X-ray binaries.


procalcitonin in differentiating "CAP" from "no-CAP." However, the threshold value of procalcitonin (0.159 ng/ml) used by the authors in their study is different and lower than the previously reported values (2), which would increase the falsepositive rates and hence reduce the specificity of a test (3). Further, in routine clinical practice, a clinician's dilemma for correctly diagnosing CAP arises only in the presence of an abnormal chest radiograph, along with incongruous clinical features of CAP; a normal chest radiograph makes the diagnosis of CAP unlikely (4, 5). Also, in severe CAP requiring admission to the intensive care unit, the likelihood of a normal chest radiograph is even bleaker. Thus, we believe that the true predictive power of this novel genomic marker to correctly identify severe CAP would have been more apt if the no-CAP group had included patients with abnormal chest radiograph resulting from other conditions such as pulmonary edema, atelectasis, lung contusions, diffuse alveolar hemorrhage, and others. Despite performing better than protein biomarkers, the negative and positive predictive values of the FAIM3:PLAC8 ratio were 80 and 77.2%, respectively, making it neither a good rule-in nor rule-out test in the diagnosis of severe CAP in the intensive care unit. n


In-situ Al3Ti/Al composites were synthesized by direct melt reaction method under low frequency electromagnetic field in Al-K2TiF6 system.The effects of low-frequency electromagnetic field on the reinforced particles in Al3Ti/Al composites with different parameters such as input current intensity and electromagnetic frequency were investigated by SEM.The mechanism in-situ synthesized Al3Ti/Al composites under low frequency electromagnetic field was investigated.The result shows that when the induction coil input current was 200A,electromagnetic frequency was less than 5Hz,magnetic field action time was 3-5min,Al3Ti/Al composite with small size and uniform distribution has been gained.Within a certain range,increasing the current or increasing the frequency,the time of the magnetic field is reduced accordingly.But the parameters can not be increased indefinitely,otherwise the particles will be removed.


Design as an NRE cost For any semiconductor product, design is part of the nonrecurring engineering (NRE) cost—the fixed cost of development and production. As the semiconductor industry approaches the 100-nm technology node, manufacturing NRE (mask set and probe card) costs are nearing $1 million for a large IC. With an average of just 500 wafers produced from each mask set, rapid growth of manufacturing NRE can throttle the initiation of new IC design projects. However, design NRE costs, which routinely reach tens of millions of dollars, dwarf manufacturing NRE costs. Indeed, according to the 2001 International Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors (http://public.itrs.net), "Cost of design is the greatest challenge to continuation of the semiconductor roadmap." Consider two factors that contribute to design cost. First, according to a model developed by Dataquest for the 2001 ITRS, the design cost per unit time per designer consists of $326,070 ($181,568 in 1990, increasing by 5% per year for the past 12 years) for the designer's annual salary and overhead, plus $157,159 ($99,301 in 1990, increasing by 3.9% per year) for annual tool costs per designer. This estimate ignores the costs of CAD integration and support, which are often several times the tool costs. Second, the number of designer months (number of designers times total time) in a design project is increasing rapidly. The wellknown design productivity gap between growth in designer productivity (number of transistors per designer month) and growth in number of available transistors on a given-size chip—originally estimated by Sematech in 1994 to be increasing at 37% per year—is still growing today. Assuming a team of 20 designers can reliably complete a multimillion-gate design in one year, the design NRE cost is still nearly $10 million.


Since a significant amount of disease transmission occurs through human-to-human or social contact, understanding who interacts with whom in time and space is essential for disease transmission modeling, prediction, and assessment of prevention strategies in different environments and special settings. Thus, measuring contact mixing patterns, often in the form of a contacts matrix, has been a key component of heterogeneous disease transmission modeling research. Several data collection techniques estimate or calculate a contacts matrix at different geographical scales and population mixes based on surveys and sensors. This paper presents a methodology for generating a contacts matrix by using high fidelity simulations which mimic actual workflow and movements of individuals in time and space. Results of this study show that such simulations can be a feasible, flexible, and reasonable alternative method for estimating social contacts and generating contacts mixing matrices for various settings under different conditions.


The flavonoids extracted from rice-bran have multiple biological effects,and they can be used as a pharmaceutical intermediate,dietary supplement,cosmetic ingredient and food antioxidant.A process for extracting the total flavonoids from rice-bran was studied.To improve the concentration of flavonoids compounds in the extract solution,optimal processing conditions were investigated by using the single factors and orthogonal design.The results show the order of factors to affect the flavonoids extraction was temperature ethanol concentration extraction times the ratio of solid and liquid.The optimum extraction processing conditions are temperature 80 ℃,extraction time 3.5 h,ethanol concentration 70%,solid/liquid ratio 1∶ 40,and the best extraction yield was 1.515%.


In order to solve the contradiction between detection range and range resolution of pulse radar,the LFM signal with large time-bandwidth product is chosen to be modulated on the transmitter pulse so that the radar is of larger width and higher range resolution.Wide LFM signal may lead to close range blind zone due to conversion of the transceiver switches.Time share launching of one long and one short signals is the traditional solution,but it will cause a lower data rate.A kind of dualLFM signal based on frequency division multiplexing technology is presented and the short pulse is used in short range to offset the lack of wide LFM signal.Through simulation,it is guaranteed that,by using this kind of signal,the radar has a higher reso lution regardless of the short-or long-distance target and can eliminate the short-range blind zone.


A method that wave front real-time transform by using phase only liquid crystal spatial light modulator(LCSLM) is proposed,which may change the interferential planar light wave front to an arbitrary expected wave front.The method employs an optimal phase recovering algorithm,the initial phase array of which is produced by pseudorandom phase encoding.The phase distribution of the LCSLM is obtained from expected diffraction patterns of far field.The incident monochromatic interferential planar wave on the LCSLM will produce the expected diffraction patterns in far field according to the phase only modulation characteristics of the LCSLM.The feasibility of the transform above is proved by experiments.


The tropical cyclone that lands or passes through Guangxi coast is a serious natural disaster, which brings about strong winds, heavy rains, storm surges and other disasters causing severe damage of property or casualties in the coastal region every year. By counting and analyzing the tropical cyclones affecting Guangxi coast from 1950 to 2012, we find that the annual number of tropical cyclones changes significantly, and the maximum value can be up to 9, whereas the minimum value is 0 in some year. The regularity of seasonal distribution of tropical cyclones is obvious, and the peak period is in July, August and September every year, followed by June and October. Most of tropical cyclones come from the east of Philippines. After entering the South China Sea and passing through Hainan province and Leizhou Peninsula, they landed on Guangxi coast once again and caused the mean of peak surge reaching 111.2 cm, which is 2.6 times of non-landing typhoon. The formation of storm surge disaster is directly related to the severe typhoon weather systems, diurnal spring tide and discharge of river flood. Severe typhoons generate huge waves and rainfall, which lead to the rise of water level at the estuary, and would result in significant increasing water when stacking up with the storm surge, and cause huge tidal disaster.


Abstract A mechanism of a new quantum paraelectric state (QPS) formation in incipient ferroelectrics of SrTiO3-type and its role in spectroscopic effects are considered. The proposed model is based on the assumption that the tunnelling off-center ions appear in the host lattice in the vicinity of strong elastic defects. The corresponding order-disorder type clusters are responsible for QPS. The local transition in such clusters leads to ferroelectric microdomain formation. The corresponding new modes have an order-disorder nature (cooperative tunnelling modes) as well as displace one (a new acoustic-like microdomain mode). But in both cases the mixing of different type of modes plays an important role. This model gives the possibility to explain the main experimental results.


We discuss recent progress and unsolved problems concerning extremal graph packing, emphasizing connections between Dirac-type and Ore-type problems. Extra attention is paid to coloring, and especially equitable coloring, of graphs.


Parts are securely held on sealed, printed circuit board that is both package and test fixture. Parts can be handled, stored, and tested in sealed package.


Mobile media brings about a great change to spatio-temporal. In the situation that LBS and GPS in Smartphone caused the change about our 'spatial perception', how did Smartphone cause 'temporal perception'? In mobile media, the timeline style that strengthens the approach to the past and 'now-ness' settled as a dominant interface type. However, since the interface that represents the unpredictable future does not have current form in mobile calendar, it could not help using traditional form until now. In the case of Smartphone, while it recovered the initiative for individual time management, it made people harder about synchronizing personalized and socializing time. So, mobile calendar needs an alternative that can increase socializing time. Thus, in this study, we will collect various occupied mobile calendars and derive the scheduling strategy, in order to seek the style that represents the future and how to manage the sociality of schedule.


l)entazocine in patients with myocardial infarction. Laneet 1:379 (1969). 2. Jewitt, P. E., Maurer, B. J., and Hubner, P. 3. B.: Increased pulmonary arterial pressure after pentazocine in myocardial infarction. Br. Med. J. 1:795 (1970). 3. Scott, M. E., and Orr, B.: Effects of diamorphine, methadone, morphine, and pentazocine in patients with suspected myocardial infarction. Lancet 1:1065 (1969). 4. Alderman, E. L., Barry, VT. H., Graham, A. F., and Harrison, D. C.: Hemodynamic effects of morphine and pentazocine differ in cardiac patients. N. Engl. J. Med. 287: 623 (1972). 5. Gould, L., Beddy, C. V. R., Kalanithi, P., Espina, L., and Gomprecht, B. F.: Use of phentolamine in acute myocardial infarction. Am. Heart J. 88:144 (1974). 6. Cohn, J. N.: Vasodilator therapy of myocardial infarction. N. Engl. J. Med. 290: 1433 (1974). 7. Shell, W. E., and Sobel, B. E.: Protection of jeopardized myocardium by reduction of ventricular afterload. N. Engi. J. Med. 291:481 (1974). 8. Franciosa, J. A., Guiha, N. H., Limas, C. J., Rodriguera E., and Cohn, 3. N.: Improved left ventricular function during nitroprusside infusion in acute myocardial imifarcion. Lancet 1:650 (1972). 9. Keats, A. 5, and Telford, J.: Studies of analgesic drugs. VIII. A narcotic antagonist without psychotomimetic effects. J. Pharm. Exp. Therap. 143:157 (1964). 10. Bellville, J. W., and Green, J.: The respiraory and subjective effects of pentazocine. Clin. P/maria. Therap. 6:2 (1965). 11. Jeanett, S., Barker, 3. G., and Forrest, J. B.: A double-blind controlled study of the effects on respiration of pentazocine, phenoperidine, and morphine in normal man. Br. J. Anaesth. 40:864 (1968). 12. Dyrberg, V., and Kolliker, K.: A comparison of the effects of accumulated doses of pentazocine and pethidine on ventilation at Pao2=45 mm Hg. Aeta Anaesth. Scand. 15:65 (1971). 13. Davie, I., Scott, P. B., and Stephen, G. W.: Respiratory effects of pentazocine and pethidine in patients anaesthetized with halothane and oxygen. Br. J. Anaesth. 42:113 (l970). 14. Engineer, S., and Jennett, S.: Respiratory depression following single and repeated doses of pentazocine and pethidine. Br. J. Anaesth. 44:795 (1974).


T he primary objective of this book is to help researchers understand and select appropriate designs for their investigations within the field, lab, or virtual environment. Lacking a proper conceptualization of a research design makes it difficult to apply an appropriate design based on the research question(s) or stated hypotheses. Implementing a flawed or inappropriate design will unequivocally lead to spurious, meaningless, or invalid results. Again, the concept of validity cannot be emphasized enough when conducting research. Validity maintains many facets (e.g., statistical validity or validity pertaining to psychometric properties of instrumentation), operates on a continuum, and deserves equal attention at each level of the research process. Aspects of validity are discussed later in this chapter. Nonetheless, the research question, hypothesis, objective, or aim is the primary step for the selection of a research design. The purpose of a research design is to provide a conceptual framework that will allow the researcher to answer specific research questions while using sound principles of scientific inquiry. The concept behind research designs is intuitively straightforward, but applying these designs in real-life


Spend your few moment to read a book even only few pages. Reading book is not obligation and force for everybody. When you don't want to read, you can get punishment from the publisher. Read a book becomes a choice of your different characteristics. Many people with reading habit will always be enjoyable to read, or on the contrary. For some reasons, this special effects in photography tends to be the representative book in this website.


The purpose of the project is to stimulate interest and competition among tract builders and developers to market energy conserving passive solar homes. The program includes seven builders and their Design Teams involved in the process of designing highly marketable passive solar single family residential buildings. The price range of houses being designed are from the low $50,000 to $130,000 range. The purpose of the program is to develop a portfolio of tract type passive solar homes and to make those designs available to builders and the public. This portfolio will be expanded in the next year to include low-priced first or retirement home type designs and low rise attached homes. The type of designs developed are simple, efficient and traditional. Great attention has been taken by the designer to facilitate the needs of the builder from the point of view of their marketing limitations, their construction techniques, their performance and their producibility.


© 2011 Liverpool University Press.Teaching and research in French cinema has developed rapidly in a relatively short time since the mid- to late 1970s. At that time, teaching was confined to the occasional course unit in a handful of universities, and research was only just starting to emerge from work aimed at cinephile rather than academic readerships. This chapter starts by considering the ways in which teaching has evolved over that time, and then gives an account of developments in research, with a strong focus on the UK, but also taking into account work done in France and the USA. Teaching We can make four key points about the teaching of French cinema in UK higher education institutions: There are about 60 staff teaching and researching French cinema, and these can be found both in departments of French and of film in UK universities. In both types of department, French cinema is frequently taught as part of broader film historical or thematic units, such as 'modern European film', 'film analysis', or 'gender in film'. Many units on French cinema are taught to non-French language specialists. Discrete units labelled as French cinema tend to be generic 'histories' of the French cinema or broad introductions, where the films studied can be very variable. Beyond that, the most frequent areas of study across all units, whether general cinema or specifically French cinema, and across the UK, USA and France, are the 1930s Poetic Realist films (with a particular emphasis on Renoir), and The New Wave (with a particular emphasis on Godard).


Deuterated polystyrene (d-PS), synthesised for the first time using RITP, and hydrogenous polystyrene (h-PS) were characterised using 1H nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) and size exclusion chromatography (SEC) to compare their polymerisation behaviour. Using h-PS as a macro-initiator, block copolymers of hydrogenous polystyrene-block-deuterated polystyrene (hPS-b-dPS) were prepared for the first time using RITP. These block copolymers were analysed using SEC and liquid chromatography at critical conditions (LCCC) of h-PS to determine possible residual first blocks. At the LCCC conditions for h-PS a separation based on the isotopic effect was observed, where the hPS-b-dPS block copolymers eluted in SEC mode. In order to improve the separation, conditions were established where one component eluted in SEC mode while the other component eluted in liquid adsorption chromatography (LAC) mode. A separation was achieved where the hPS-b-dPS block copolymer was separated from the h-PS precursor. The two-dimensional liquid chromatography (2D-LC) fractionation revealed a third component that was not observed in the one-dimensional fractionations.


State space models are derived for pulse-width-modulated power converters operating at constant switching frequency under current programmed control. One model neglects the sample and hold effect of the current loop and is therefore representative of the traditional approach taken to modeling current programmed converters. The order of the model is the same as that of the power stage. A second state space model which incorporates the sample and hold effect is derived. The order of this model is two higher than that of the power stage. A comparison of the two models clearly demonstrates the superiority of the second modeling approach. As the models are in state space form they may be quite readily used in a computer-aided-design package for general power converter analysis and design, to determine all transfer functions and associated pole/zero locations of interest.<<ETX>>


This paper proposes reliability-based system-optimal traffic assignment under supply uncertainty based on the concept of the total system travel time budget, and defines the price of anarchy (PoA) for the corresponding user equilibrium (UE) traffic assignment. An analytical formula for a set of the upper bounds of the PoA for the equilibrium assignment to the networks with polynomial link travel time functions is derived. These bounds are proved to be independent of the network topology and demands. The formula for the minimum upper bound is also derived and can be reduced to the upper bound formula for traditional UE traffic assignment as a special case. The PoA for the traditional UE network design problem (NDP) with polynomial link travel time functions is defined, and proved to be bounded by the upper bound of that for traditional UE traffic assignment of the same instance, before any link expansion. The PoA for the reliability-based UE (RUE) NDP with polynomial link travel time functions is also proved to be bounded by the set of upper bounds of that for RUE traffic assignment of the same instance, before any link expansion.


This study aims to knows the implementation of health and safety management systems of work implemented by PT Satria Perkasa Agung ,Distrik Siak Kecil , Kabupaten Bengkalis, based on legislation in force , the Government Regulation No. 50 in 2012 on Health and Safety Management System of Work. This research is took a number of respondents as many as 65 people . The data obtained through questionnaires and interviews with key informance then further processed to be tested based on Government Regulation No. 50 in 2012 . So I can see the implementation of the system , management is Health and Safety PT Satria Perkasa Agung , Distrik Siak Kecil , Kabupaten Bengkalis, in accordance with Regulation No. 50 in 2012 . The results showed that the company has implemented a Health and Safety Management Systems Work under PP . 50 In 2012 , amounted to 88 % or a total of 147 items that have been implemented. Keyword : Implementation, Management Systems Occupational Health and Safety, Analysis


Summary Wild emmer wheat (Triticum turgidum ssp. dicoccoides) is the progenitor of wheat. We performed chromosome‐based survey sequencing of the 14 chromosomes, examining repetitive sequences, protein‐coding genes, miRNA/target pairs and tRNA genes, as well as syntenic relationships with related grasses. We found considerable differences in the content and distribution of repetitive sequences between the A and B subgenomes. The gene contents of individual chromosomes varied widely, not necessarily correlating with chromosome size. We catalogued candidate agronomically important loci, along with new alleles and flanking sequences that can be used to design exome sequencing. Syntenic relationships and virtual gene orders revealed several small‐scale evolutionary rearrangements, in addition to providing evidence for the 4AL‐5AL‐7BS translocation in wild emmer wheat. Chromosome‐based sequence assemblies contained five novel miRNA families, among 59 families putatively encoded in the entire genome which provide insight into the domestication of wheat and an overview of the genome content and organization.


According to optimal distinctiveness theory (ODT; Brewer, 1991, 1993), individuals have both the desire for assimilation (inclusion within a group) and also the desire for differentiation (distinctiveness from others). In order to reconcile these two competing needs, optimal distinctiveness theory states that individuals will seek social identities that are at the equilibrium point between the two needs. In other words, individuals will identify with groups that allow for both assimilation and differentiation. Although the needs for assimilation and differentiation can lead to differences in the groups with which individuals identify, these needs may also have an effect on the process o f categorizing others as ingroup and outgroup members. According to ODT, the inclusiveness of a particular group membership is inversely related to the amount of differentiation the group provides and directly related to the amount o f assimilation provided by the group. Thus, one way in which individuals may attempt to satisfy their assimilation and differentiation needs is by being either more restrictive or more lenient in terms o f defining who belongs to the ingroup and outgroup. Three studies were conducted in order to explore the role o f assimilation and differentiation needs in the process o f social categorization. Recent research on the ingroup overexclusion effect—the tendency to be stringent in one's criteria for ingroup membership—and an older body o f literature on ethnic identification indicates that social categorization may be influenced by the goals and motivations that perceivers possess. Although research on the ingroup overexclusion effect and research on racial categorizations suggest that individuals have a general default towards stringency when categorizing others as ingroup members, a different set of predictions was derived from Brewer's (1991) optimal distinctiveness model. It was predicted in the studies presented here that activating the needs for assimilation and differentiation would result in a relaxation or tightening of group boundaries leading to greater inclusion or exclusion of group members. More specifically, when the need for assimilation was aroused, participants were expected to be more lenient in their criteria for group membership, and when the need for differentiation was aroused, participants were expected to be more stringent. In addition, perceptions o f ingroup and outgroup homogeneity were predicted to be affected by assimilation and differentiation needs sych that greater perceived homogeneity would occur when participants' need for differentiation was aroused. Contrary to predictions, both the arousal o f the need for assimilation and the arousal o f the need for differentiation led to greater stringency in defining group membership compared to control participants. In addition, perceptions of ingroup homogeneity increased when either the need for assimilation or differentiation was aroused. The results presented in this dissertation suggest that a bounded and homogeneous ingroup may be important for the satisfaction o f both assimilation and differentiation


Face masks have been widely used since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Facial detection and recognition technologies, such as the iPhone's Face ID, heavily rely on seeing the facial features that are now obscured due to wearing a face mask. Currently, the only way to utilize Face ID with a mask on is by having an Apple Watch as well. As such, this paper intends to find initial means of a reliable personal facial recognition system while the user is wearing a face mask without having the need for an Apple Watch. This may also be applicable to other security systems or measures. Through the use of Multi-Task Cascaded Convolutional Networks or MTCNN, a type of neural network which identifies faces and facial landmarks, and FaceNet, a deep neural network utilized for deriving features from a picture of a face, the masked face of the user could be identified and more importantly be recognized. Utilizing MTCNN, detecting the masked faces and automatically cropping them from the raw images are done. The learning phase then takes place wherein the exposed facial features are given emphasis while the masks themselves are excluded as a factor in recognition. Data in the form of images are acquired from taking multiple pictures of a certain individual's face as well as from repositories online for other people's faces. Images used are taken in various settings or modes such as different lighting levels, facial angles, head angles, colors and designs of face masks, and the presence or absence of glasses. The goal is to recognize whether it is the certain individual or not in the image. The training accuracy is 99.966% while the test accuracy is 99.921%.


Out of 380 birds sampled, 128 (35.7%) were galliformes, 100 (28.6%) anseriformes, while 100 (28.6%) were columbiformes and 25 (7.1%) struthioformes. Haemagglutination Inhibition (HI) test was used for detection and quantification of antibodies against Newcastle Disease (ND) virus. The HI titre of each bird was determined and expressed in log 2 and the mean for each species was calculated. Of the galliformes tested, 92% of the chickens tested were positive, as were only 12% of the quails tested. Among the columbiformes tested, 44% of domestic pigeons tested were positive, as were 24% of mourning doves tested. The only species tested among the struthioformes was the ostrich, of which 52% were positive to ND virus antibodies. The mean HI titre for local chickens was 7.3 log 2 , 0.4 log 2 for quails, 0.1 for Khaki Campbell, 0.4 log 2 for laughing dove and 1.9 log 2 for ostrich. Galliformes were more susceptible to ND virus than all the other families tested. Anseriformes seem to be less susceptible to ND virus, although a high percentage of Muscovy ducks were positive to ND virus antibodies. Domestic pigeons and turtle doves were more susceptible to ND virus than other members of the columbiformes tested. Although there is no report of a clinical outbreak of ND in anseriformes and columbiformes in Nigeria, they are nevertheless infected with ND virus and may therefore serve as reservoirs of ND virus for galliformes.


There remains little doubt that computer technology will increasingly pervade the lives of individuals, institutions and societies in the future. The last ten years has witnessed a dramatic and unprecedented proliferation of computer-based technology, arguably the most influential being the personal or micro-computer. Whether one considers PCs (personal computers), automated banking machines or related computer based technologies, it becomes clear that computer technology has left the relatively few hands of highly skilled technicians and hobbyists to become a common instrument of daily living for a vast proportion of our society. In as much as this expansive trend can be anticipated to continue, it becomes valuable to consider the impact and influence of computer technology on families. As one of society's primary socializing agents, families may provide a relatively unique perspective with which to gain valuable insights about potential future trends in the ways in which this increasingly pervasive technology is used and understood. This paper proposes to explore the ways in which computer technology influences and is influenced by families across the life course. Do computers bring families together or do they tend to separate members from one another? Are children increasingly separated from their parents' realm by virtue of their greater understanding of and involvement with computers? Or do computers more often provide an additional platform upon which family members can assist and interact with one another? Much like "computer widows", could there be "computer orphans", or children "lost to computers"? Or is a computer an adaptive advantage families can utilize in order to maximize their functioning within and outside of the family? These and other related questions need to be explored in the future in an effort to acquire a better understanding of the impact of computers on families. The meager existing literature on the impact of computer technology on the family most often assumes a narrow focus and treats the family as a relatively homogeneous unit of analysis. In contrast, this paper utilizes a structural perspective based on the family life course as put forward by family development scholars such as Hill and Rodgers (1964), Duvall (1977), Aldous (1996), Mattessich and Hill (1987) , White (1991) and Rodgers and White (1993). The rationale for adopting this approach stems from a understanding that families go through a developmental process which involves significant change and adaptation on the part of the family at each stage of development. In this paper, a typology of discrete family stages is employed in an effort to provide a more in-depth examination of the diverse effects and issues brought about by the introduction of a home computer into the family household. In addition, other sources of heterogeneity within and between families are discussed, such as generation, social class and gender. THEORY One of the most difficult problems facing researchers in this area is that there has been almost no attempt at theoretical formulation. One of the most basic functions of theory is to provide categories and concepts with which to organize data and issues. Data never speaks for itself but must be "contextualized" by an intellectual framework. Theories provide descriptive taxonomic categories for collecting data into what are theoretically relevant and meaningful clusters. Furthermore, theory provides concepts and relations; the rudimentary tools for understanding and explanation. The literature on the impact of computers on the family has thus far lacked such organization and as a result lacks coherence and focus. Family development theory (and its corresponding individual level life course approach) is the only extant theoretical framework in the area of the family that incorporates time as a significant dimension. As we will see from our review, many studies of computers and families assume that the "family" is some sort of homogenous and time invariant cluster. …


This paper presents a design of adaptive hysteresis band voltage controller based a dynamic voltage restorer (DVR) with minimum VA loading. The DVR is desirable to have mitigate the typical all voltage problems and improve stability of the system and its controller strategy is opted the adaptive hysteresis band voltage controller technique, to generate accurate injected voltages with optimum injected angle. Hence to mitigate the voltage problems under different considerations. The optimal angle at which series voltage has to be injected so minimum VA loading of DVR is evaluated by particle swarm optimization (PSO) and he results are verified with genetic algorithm (GA).The dynamic model of DVR has been adopted with adaptive hysteresis band voltage control by using MATLAB/Simulink. Experimental studies are carried out on single-phase FPGA based open loop dynamic voltage controller prototype to verify the proposed topology


Abstract : A standard method developed for quantifying Coriolis (motion) sickness susceptibility was evaluated in 250 normal and three labyrinthine- defective subjects. The procedure required the subject to execute standard head movements (plus or minus 90 degrees in the frontal and sagittal planes) while seated in a chair device that was rotated at one of several constant velocities. The proper test velocity was predicted in the majority of cases with the Motion Experience Questionnaire. Three of the normal and all of the labyrinthine- defective subjects were found to be unsusceptible to these test conditions. Coriolis Sickness Susceptibility Index, CSSI, was determined for each subject by multiplying the appropriate E factor, the average stress effect of each head movement for the rpm used in the test, by the number of head movements required to provoke severe malaise (M III). The resultant CSSI values for the 250 subjects ranged from 0.4 to 100, but the distribution was markedly rigt skewed. The procedure yielded a high test-retest reliability (p = .89) in terms of CSSI scores and pattern of symptomatology. In reaching the Malaise III level, the nausea syndrome was manifested in most cases, but a significant percentage (9.6%) of the subjects remained free of any epigastric disturbance or nausea. (Author)


The widely used wavelets in the context of the matching pursuit are mostly focused on the time–frequency attributes of seismic traces. We propose a new type of wavelet basis based on the classic Ricker wavelet, where the quality factor Q is introduced. We develop a new scheme for seismic trace decomposition by applying the multi‐channel orthogonal matching pursuit based on the proposed wavelet basis. Compared with the decomposition by the Ricker wavelets, the proposed method could use fewer wavelets to represent the seismic signal with fewer iterations. Besides, the quality factor of the subsurface media could be extracted from the decomposition results, and the seismic attenuation could be compensated expediently. We test the availability of the proposed methods on both synthetic seismic record and field post‐stack data.


Using data describing the magazine industries of 23 countries it is shown that specific ad valorem taxes on magazines reduce the number of magazines published in a country. This result is consistent with previously developed theories about the impact of ad valorem taxes on market structure. However, limitations on magazine ownership seem to have little impact on the number of magazines published, perhaps indicating that reduced limitations on cross-media ownership may not have the deleterious effects many predict.


Background and objective: Chemical solutions are used to disinfect the teeth. They are usually used in combination with mechanical methods. Studies indicated that chemical solutions have a major role in the removal of microorganisms and microbial plaques. However, they cause physical and mechanical changes in acrylic resins such as changes in color, hardness and roughness of surface. Increasing surface roughness over time will increase the microbial and food particles adhesion to the acrylic surface, resulting in irritation and inflammation of the oral mucosa. Adding 1% TiO2 to acrylic can improve its properties. The objective of this study was to evaluate the effect of two denture disinfectant agents on the surface roughness of conventional acrylic resin and TiO2-reinfirced acrylic resin. Methodology: This research was a In-vitro study. The samples of this research included 60 acrylic resin samples in 2 groups (each group included 30 samples) and each group included 3 sub-groups (10 samples in each subgroup). Resin samples were made with heat-cured acrylic reinforced with 1% TiO2. They were immersed in three solutions of water, solution prepared with NatureDent tablet, and1% sodium hypochlorite for three periods of 30, 60 and 90 days. The disinfectant solution was replaced each day and this process was repeated. Then, the samples were washed with distilled water and placed in a container filled with distilled water to ensure uniformity of storage conditions. Then, the surface roughness test was performed on each sample. The data were analyzed using descriptive statistical methods and two-way ANOVA, one-way ANOVA, T-test and Tukey HSD test and through SPSS.17 statistical software. In this study, p value less than 0.05 was considered significant. Results: a significant difference was seen in surface roughness on the days 1, 30, 60 and 90, and the statistical value of 0.00 was reported in all 4 periods. By changing the type of disinfectant, the statistical value of the test on the day 1 and 30 did not show significant difference(p>.05). However, this value was reported 0.00 on the days 60 and 90, indicating a significant change in surface roughness(p <.05). In examining the simultaneous effect of resin type and disinfectant type, the statistical value of the test on the day 1 ,30 and 60 did not show significant difference(p>.05). However, on the day 90, indicating a statistically significant difference(p <.05). Moreover, the results showed that the rate of increase in sodium hypochlorite solution was higher than that of NatureDent and the rate of change in roughness in 1% TiO2-reinforced acrylic resin was less than that of conventional acrylic resin. Conclusion: By adding 1% TiO2 to heat-cured acrylic, the denture resistance to the change in surface roughness versus two solutions of sodium hypochlorite and a NatureDent disinfectant tablet can be increased. In addition, with increasing of time, the effect of the type of disinfectant solution on the roughness increases. This effect is lower in TiO2-reinfirced acrylic resin that in conventional acrylic resin. mechanical methods (Paranhos et al., 2007). The conducted studies suggest that chemical solutions play a major role in the removal of microorganisms and microbial plaques, but they cause physical and mechanical changes of acrylic resins such as color changes and surface roughness. Increasing surface roughness increases the microbial adhesion and food particles adhesion to the acrylic surface over time, leading to irritation and inflammation of the oral mucosa (Ebadian, Poorsina and Saghaei, 2007). There are several reasons for causing surface roughness by acrylic resins. One of the reasons is disinfectants. Many studies have been conducted so far on the effects of disinfectants on surface changes in acrylic resins and the creation of surface roughness, but 2011). Heat-cured acrylic is the most widely used in denture base construction, but it has some disadvantages. Hence, various methods have been used to increase the strength of denture materials, including the use of polymethylmethacrylate / TiO2. The result of the study conducted by Shirkavand et al under the title of "evaluation of the effect of TiO2 Nanoparticles on the tensile strength of acrylic resins" showed that the tensile strength increases in acrylics with 1% ws TiO2 nanoparticles, as reinforcing materials, and increasing the TiO2 nanoparticles more than this level reduces the tensile strength (Shirkavand and Moslehifard, 2014). In a study conducted by Kado et al, they examined the cleaning effect of TiO2-reinforced acrylic resin. They concluded that reinforcing acrylic resin with titanium dioxide (TiO2) had a positive effect on the ease of cleaning the resin by preventing the accumulation of bolus as laboratory residue (Kado et al., 2005). In a study conducted by Pinto et al on the effect of repeated and prolonged use of sodium hypochlorite disinfection on the surface roughness and hardness of acrylic resins, it was concluded that surface roughness significantly increased and its hardness decreased after 180 times of immersion in a hypochlorite solution sodium (Pinto et al., 2014).One of the main concerns in the removale prosthesis made of acrylic resin is the physical and mechanical changes of acrylic resin denture base. results various in acrylics and TiO2- reinforced acrylics, investigate effect two chemical on the conventional and reinforced heat-cured acrylic resin denture base. A total of 40 acrylic resins were immersed in 3 cleaning solutions (1% sodium hypochlorite, FittyDent tablet and 100% vinegar) daily for 90 days, and the results showed that after 90 times of immersion in sodium hypochlorite solution, surface roughness increased significantly, which is consistent with the results of the recent study (Sharma, Garg and Kalra, 2017). effects of nano-ZrO2 flexural and of the denture base surface of Poly methyl methacrylate. three-point flexural ZrO2-ABW / PMMA flexural surface acrylic roughness resistance with adding TiO2. In a study by the effects of certain disinfectants on the stability of a Poly methyl methacrylate base denture, consisting of a new disinfection method using reactive oxygen species (ROS) investigate the disinfectant effect on the properties and roughness disinfection method increased sodium hypochlorite and surface roughness and decreased the flexural strength. These results indicate that using 5% hypochlorite solution increases the surface roughness of the resin denture base than the control group (Odagiri et al., 2012) . The present study also showed that disinfection of acrylic sodium hypochlorite increases its roughness. In a study by Badaro et al. In 2017, which investigated the effect of immersion of acrylic resin in Ricinus communis and sodium hypochlorite, it was concluded that immersion of acrylic resin in 0.5% sodium hypochlorite increased the amount of acrylic resin roughness (Badaró et al., 2017) which is consistent with the results of this study . These results indicate that using 5% hypochlorite solution increases the surface roughness of the resin denture base compared to the control group (Odagiri et al., 2012). The present study also showed that acrylic disinfection with sodium hypochlorite increased its roughness. In a study conducted by Badaro et al in 2017to examine the effect of immersion of acrylic resin in Ricinus communis and sodium hypochlorite, it was concluded that immersion of acrylic resin in 0.5% sodium hypochlorite increased the acrylic resin roughness (Badaró et al., 2017), which is consistent with the results of this study . roughness. In a study conducted by Li study in 2014 to examine the frictional and wear properties of SiO2 and TiO2 nanocomposites, results showed that adding TiO2 enhanced the resistance to increased roughness (Li, 2014). the that TiO2-reinforcd acrylic had higher resistance to roughness than conventional heat-cured acrylic. Aziz (2018) also examined the effects of Tio2 nanoparticles on some of the characteristics of high impact acrylic resins using various processing techniques. A total of 120 high impact acrylic resins were divided into 2 groups based on cure (microwave, water bath) methods and each group divided into two subgroups of control (without Tio2) and Tio2 nanoparticles group. The results showed that reinforcing the acrylic resin with 3% Tio2 caused significant increase in impact strength of acrylic resin (Aziz, 2018). This study showed that the presence of Tio2 as reinforcing phase in resin improved some of the acrylic resin properties. In addition, scanning electron microscopy images showed that the effect of Tio2 is good when its nanoparticles are disributed uniformly in acrylic resin.


The article analyzes the necessity and possibility of achieving a new quality of engineering training. In the light of the society trends, the article considers the guidelines for improving engineering education. The authors systematize the requirements to the educational process ensuring effective development of students' professional and universal competencies. One of the hindrances is an inadequate readiness of teachers, employers, students to perform new functions. It is concluded that in the face of the unsolved problems, it is advisable to implement a phased transition to a new engineering education. It is necessary to realize at each stage not only the possible at that moment changes in educational process, but also measures that can help to resolve contradictions and create the prerequisites for a successful transition to the next stage. The article describes the most effective measures of the first stage of improving engineering education: the creation of university education-al standards, the use of project-based learning, the contest of lecturers, the independent assessment of educational outcomes, the interaction with employers, the elaboration of a system of activities with schoolchildren and etc.


This article presents an analysis of annual reports of listed chinese pesticide companies, primarily summa- rizing some of the financial indices reflecting the industry average. We then discuss the overall business climate of these companies including current problems. These conclusions should assist chinese pesticide companies as a reference useful in manufacturing and in conducting general company operations.


Objective: To analyze the surgical outcome of traumatic lumbosacral spondylolisthesis treated using posterior lumbar interbody fusion, and help spine surgeons to determine the treatment strategy. Methods: We reviewed retrospectively five cases of traumatic lumbosacral spondylolisthesis treated in our hospital from May 2005 to May 2010. There were four male and one female patient, treated surgically using posterior lumbar interbody fusion. The patients' data including age, neurological status, operation time, blood loss, follow-up periods, X- radiographs and fusion status were collected. Results: All the cases were treated using posterior lumbar interbody fusion to realize decompression, reduction and fusion. Solid arthrodesis was found at the 12-month follow-up. No shift or breakage of the instrumentation was found, and all the patients were symptom-free at the last follow-up. Conclusion: Traumatic lumbosacral spondylolisthesis can be treated using posterior lumbar interbody fusion to realize the perfect reduction, decompression, fixation and fusion.


The rhizosphere deposited carbon plays a significant role in carbon cycle of field land.It is not only the important compositions to maintain consume of root respiration,but also accounts for sizable proportion in plant rhizosphere carbon consume.The rhizosphere deposited carbon come from decompositon of plant residue and release of rhizophere carbon during plant grow period.The rhizosphere deposited carbon is primary source of soil organic matter.The determine method of rhizosphere deposited carbon is mainly isotope tracer technique.


ABSTRACT This paper examines the impact of good governance in selected developing and emerging countries on reinvestment of retained earnings by United States multinationals. The manifestations of good governance employed in this study are the indicators of institutions developed by Kaufmann et al. (1999). The six indicators are voice and accountability, political stability and lack of violence, government effectiveness, regulatory quality, rule of law, and control of corruption. The data for these variables were obtained from the World Bank database. Cross-sectional, time-series data for 22 emerging and developing countries were analyzed using fixed-effects (LSDV) regression model. The study finds that good governance in host countries has a statistically significant impact on reinvestment of retained earnings by United States multinationals. Interestingly, the study also reveal that openness of local economies by host countries do not have statistically significant effects on reinvestment. (ProQuest: ... denotes formula omitted.) INTRODUCTION The last few decades witnessed a momentous increase in global foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows. A critical examination of global FDI inflows data published by UNCTAD (2008) reveals that FDI inflows increased steadily over the years. For example FDI inflows increased by more than 30% between 2005 and 2007. The increase notwithstanding, developing countries' share of FDI inflows declined from 33% in 2006 to 27.3% in 2007. Moreover, while the share global FDI inflows of some developing countries increased (e.g. Brazil, India and Malaysia) in recent past, the share of many others (e.g. Argentina, Venezuela, South Korea, South Africa, and so on) declined significantly. Seemingly, there is concordance in both theoretical and empirical international business (IB) literature suggesting that the uneven spatial distribution of FDI is attributable to differences in characteristics of potential host countries (Root and Ahmed, 1978; Nigh, 1985; FatehiSedeh and Safizadeh, 1988; Wheeler and Mody, 1992; Wei, 2000; Stein and Daude, 2002; Globerman and Shapiro, 2003; Benassy-Quere, et al., 2007; Daude and Stein, 2007). The central tenet of the literature is that economic characteristics of a host country coupled with the quality of its government regulations determine its relative attractiveness to foreign investors. . The apparent concordance in the extant literature notwithstanding, it is important to note that researchers have in the past focused their attention, primarily, on questions about the explanatory power of an array of independent variables rather than on questions about the nature of FDI (Quijano, 1990; OECD, 1999; Desai et al., 2005). It is therefore not surprising that FDI has been operationalized in prior literature as a monolithic variable rather than a multidimensional one. To make meaningful contributions to the development of a comprehensive theory in this area of research, it is crucial that the researchers are cognizant of the multi dimensionality of FDI. Brewer (1993) asserts that di saggregati on of FDI is vitally important since each component (new equity, reinvested earnings1 and inter-company debt flows) may respond differently to the same set of predictor variables. Likewise, Auerbach and Hassert (1993), postulate that FDI comprises a number of dissimilar components that can respond differently to a given explanatory variable. Hence, the sensitivity of FDI to a given set of stimuli is apt to be greatly influenced by the component which accounts for the largest proportion of total FDI. Although the proportion of reinvested earnings (reinvestment) to total United States FDI outflow has increased steadily over the years, it has largely been neglected in IB literature. This prompted Lundan (2006), to posit that "to date nothing has been written regarding the empirical importance of reinvested earnings, or what factors govern the decision of whether income earned at a foreign location is repatriated or reinvested at the foreign location". …


The geochemistry and microbiology of two ephemeral playa lakes in the Western United States, Surprise Valley Alkali Lake (SVAL) and Eldorado Playa (EP), were examined over one wetting cycle, revealing dramatic temporal changes in suspended mineralogy, aqueous chemistry, and bacterial populations. In SVAL the predominant suspended mineral changed from smectite to vermiculite and clinoptilolite, which led to a depletion of soluble Mg2+. Nitrate became depleted in both playas as a result of biological nitrogen demand imparted by unusually dense microbial communities reaching ∼1 × 108 cultivable heterotrophs per ml of water. One hundred eighty eight bacterial isolates were obtained, representing sixty phylotypes and four phyla: Actinobacteria, Bacteroidetes, Proteobacteria, and Firmicutes. Phylogenetic analyses suggested that the microbial communities reflected different phases of succession, with SVAL changing from a diverse community with abundant Yonghaparkia to a less diverse late summer community with abundant Bacteroidetes and Proteobacteria such as Loktanella, Rhodobaca, Saccharospirillum, Flexibacter, and phylogenetically novel members of the Flexibacteriaceae. In EP, a diverse assemblage of bacteria often associated with soils was replaced very quickly by a much less even community dominated by Yonghaparkia, Sandarakinorhabdus, and relatives of Belliella baltica. Strikingly, the early summer microbial community from SVAL was not significantly different from the EP community that developed within one week of flooding, even though these playas are almost 1000 km apart, whereas sympatric communities in different phases of succession were different. To our knowledge, this is one of the first geomicrobiological studies of a recharge playa, the dominant playa type worldwide.


In order to study the effect of nitrogen, vermicompost and nitroxin biofertilizer on quantity and quality yield of Sesame, a field experiment was carried out at Behbahan in summer of 2009. Treatments were arranged in a factorial experiment based on RCBD with three replications. Three rates of nitrogen fertilizer (50, 75 and 100% of region recommended nitrogen rate, equals to 25, 37.5 and 50 kg/ha nitrogen from urea, respectively) as a first factor, three rates of vermicompost (0, 5 and 10 t/ha) as a second factor and two levels of nitroxin biofertilizer application (seed inoculation and non inoculation) as a third factor, were used. Results showed that treatments had a significant effect on yield and yield components of sesame. Nitroxin application increased grain yield 8.5 percent. Interaction of nitrogen and vermicompost showed that the most grain yield (1352 kg/ha) was obtained with applying the 10 t/ha vermicompost with 37/5 kg/ha of nitrogen rate while the lowest grain yield (947 kg/ha) obtained from without vermicompost treatment with 25 kg/ha of nitrogen rate. The highest oil percent (45%) obtained with application of 37/5 kg/ha nitrogen with 10 t/ha vermicompost and the lowest of it (40 %) obtained in 50 kg/ha nitrogen with 10 t/ha Vermicompost. The oil percentage in 50 kg/ha nitrogen treatment, vermicompost application and Nitroxin inoculation decreased the significantly. By increasing nitrogen fertilizer, vermicompost and nitroxin, protein yield and percentage increased significantly.


The Supai Formation of the Grand Canyon region is raised in rank to Supai Group and divided into four formations. Widespread surfaces of erosion and thin conglomerate beds separate these formations which range in age from Early Pennsylvanian to Early Permian. From oldest to youngest, they are named the Watahomigi, Manakacha, and Wescogame Formations and the Esplanade Sandstone. The type sections of these formations are in Havasu Canyon in the vicinity of Supai village. INTRODUCTION: FIELD TERMINOLOGY AND NEW NOMENCLATURE Probably the first geologist to carefully consider subdivision of the Supai Formation into logical, readily recognizable units was F. E. Matthes of the U.S. Geological Survey. In making a topographic map of the Bright Angel quadrangle in 1902-3, he noticed that the red beds of this formation, together with the overlying Hermit Shale, characteristically eroded into three prominent cliffs, interspersed among four welldeveloped slopes. The discrimination of these topographic units was called to my attention by Matthes in the 1930's in connection with my studies of the Supai Formation. A "field classification" that proved useful in recording data at that time and in all subsequent work resulted. Subdivision of the Supai on the basis of topographic expression, used during the present field investigation, recognized the following units: Upper cliff unit, locally includes a receding ledge unit (Esplanade cliff) Upper slope unit (divided by conglomerate into two parts) Middle cliff unit Middle slope unit Lower cliff unit Lower slope unit These units can be traced throughout the Grand Canyon, and they differ remarkably little from one end to the other, although, in general,


An electron microscopic study of osteons in the cortical bone of the mid-femoral shaft of six adult and four immature mongrel dogs is reported. Embedding was done with a methacrylate for the preliminary study of Haversian canals and with a plastic resin (Epon 812) for the study of intracellular detail. The anatomical features and relationships of the vascular and neural components, the cells (undifferentiated mesenchymal cells, osteoblasts, and osteocytes), and matrix (unmineralized and mineralized) are described. The physiological significance of the morphological findings is discussed on the basis of available evidence.


There are several reports on improvement of blood flow following LLLT, and reports on actual vessel dilatation and blood flow enhancement has been observed in animal models. However there are no reports on changes in blood flow observed in human subjects using a non-invasive method for any duration of time. In this study, we used non-invasive Doppler color flow imaging to observe changes in the blood flow of the common carotid artery following laser irradiation to the lateral neck region. Laser output- and dose-dependent differences in the blood flow were observed, but there was also an increase in the diameter and cross-sectional area of vessels. Increased blood flow was noted in the common carotid artery of both the irradiated and unirradiated side, which lasted for over 1 hour after laser irradiation. The maximum increase in the cross-sectional area, vessel diameter and the blood flow on the irradiated side were 69%, 31% and 63% respectively. On the unirradiated side the maximum increase of the cross-sectional area, vessel diameter and blood flow were 52%, 21% and 71% respectively. There were no changes observed in the maximum, minimum or average blood flow velocity of either the irradiated or unirradiated side.


A minimum of four GPS range measurements or two Loran-C time differences are normally required for a position solution for en route navigation, area navigation, and nonprecision approaches. This paper describes a new technique that hybridizes GPS and Loran-C used in the pseudorange mode to process efficiently all available navigation information. Emphasis is placed on combined GPS and Loran-C timing, both for the ground/space facilities and the user. The hybrid system has the potential to solve the GPS and Loran-C integrity problems; more range measurements are available than are required for the navigation solution.


We consider a Dirichlet elliptic equation driven by a weighted <inline-formula><tex-math id="M2">\begin{document}$ (p,q) $\end{document}</tex-math></inline-formula>-Laplace differential operator. The weights are in general different. When the reaction is "superlinear", using the fountain theorem, we show the existence of a sequence of distinct smooth solutions with energies diverging to <inline-formula><tex-math id="M3">\begin{document}$ +\infty $\end{document}</tex-math></inline-formula>. When the reaction is "sublinear" (possibly resonant), we establish the existence of a sequence of nodal solutions converging to zero in <inline-formula><tex-math id="M4">\begin{document}$ C^1_0(\bar{\Omega}) $\end{document}</tex-math></inline-formula> (in particular, the energies converge to zero).


NASA and Robert Mondavi Winery researchers worked together to use airborne remote sensing technology to classify grapevines and produce better wine.


Narrowband internet of things (NB-IoT) is a low power wide area network technology with numerous benefits over conventional technologies. The main advantages of NB-IoT are low-power, low-cost, long battery life, wider deployment, and many more. Along with these advantages, knowledge of the location of the devices for both the indoor and outdoor environments will have an added benefit for NB-IoT applications. The current global navigation satellite systems (GNSS) chipsets will drain the limited available battery and will not be useful for localization in NB-IoT applications while the global positioning system (GPS) applications accuracy is not enough to support NB-IoT applications. For NB-IoT implementation, having low per-unit cost of the devices is an important aspect along with other features mentioned earlier, and hence there is a need to have limited hardware components like processor, battery, and memory. Therefore, the main challenge for enabling a positioning system lies in the proper radio management and balancing of power consumption against the performance of the system. In this chapter, different localization methods, techniques, and metrics are discussed. The choice of each one of these depends on the application requirement. The standardization of NB-IoT is in the process and its current status as per the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) specifications are also highlighted.


Background: Outpatient heart failure (HF) care involves intensive self-management (SM). Effective HF SM is associated with improved HF outcomes. Homelessness poses challenges to successful SM of ma...


In an effort to expand the chemical horizons of a first-year high school chemistry students, this writer assigns three projects which are to be done by each student outside of the classroom. The three projects-a current events booklet, an interview, and a report on a scientific article-have been used successfully for the past three years. From "Using 'Real World' Examples in the Teaching of Chemistry - A Symposium", 7th BCCE, Stillwater OK, 1982.


Background Enthesitis is characterized by inflammation at the insertion of ligaments, tendons, joint capsule, or fascia to bone, and represents a well-known characteristic feature of ankylosing spondylitis (AS) and related spondyloarthropathies. Objectives To identify the location of enthesitis in ankylosing spondylitis (AS) and psoriatic arthritis (PsA) patients and to determine their response to anti-TNF treatment. Methods BioTRAC is an ongoing, prospective registry of patients initiating treatment for rheumatoid arthritis, AS, or psoriatic arthritis (PsA) with infliximab (IFX) or golimumab (GLM). Eligible people for this analysis included AS and PsA patients treated with IFX who were enrolled since 2005 or with GLM enrolled since 2010 who had available information on enthesitis. The paired sampled t-test was used to compare the enthesitis count at baseline and 12 months. Results A total of 260 AS patients and 261 PsA patients were enrolled with a mean (SD) age at baseline of 46.1 (13.0) vs. 50.0 (12.0) years, respectively, and disease duration of 6.4 (9.8) vs. 5.2 (6.8) years. Among patients with AS, 28.1%, 21.7%, 22.4% had enthesitis at baseline, 6 months and 12 months, respectively. For PsA these numbers were 32.2%, 19.7%, and 22.6%, respectively. The presence of enthesitis by anatomical site and visit are described in Table 1 with higher proportions observed for the greater trochanter (GT) in AS patients and the lateral epicondyle humerus (LEH) in PsA patients.Table 1 : Presence of enthesitis by anatomical site AS PsA Baseline 6 Months 12 Months Baseline 6 Months 12 Months (N=260) (N=203) (N=134) (N=261) (N=189) (N=133) LEH, % 10.8 6.9 7.5 16.1 8.5 6.8 MEH, % 8.1 5.9 4.5 12.6 7.4 6.8 PA, % 10.8 5.4 3.0 13.0 6.4 6.8 GT, % 14.2 8.4 10.4 10.7 9.0 6.0 IPF, % 7.7 3.4 4.5 11.9 5.3 3.8 SI, % 11.5 8.9 7.5 10.7 8.0 8.3 QIP, % 6.9 3.9 1.5 9.6 5.9 6.0 PATT, % 6.9 4.4 1.5 13.8 5.9 8.3 LEH: Lateral epicondyle humerus; MEH: Medial epicondyle humerus; PA: Proximal achilles; GT: Greater trochanter; IPF: Insertion plantar fascia; SI: Suprapsinatus insertion; QIP: Quadriceps insertion patella; PATT: Inferior pole patella or tibial tubercle. Presence of enthesitis in all anatomical sites was significantly associated with higher HAQ among AS and PsA patients. The mean (SD) enthesitis count at baseline and 12 months was 4.4 (3.4) vs. 2.6 (2.3) (P=0.061) among AS patients and 5.0 (3.8) vs. 3.8 (3.0) (P=0.006) in PsA patients, respectively. Conclusions A considerable proportion of PsA and AS patients had enthesitis at anti-TNF initiation in this Canadian real-world cohort. Overall, presence of enthesitis was associated with significantly higher functional disability. Treatment with IFX or GLM for 12 months was associated with significant reduction in the mean enthesitis count. Disclosure of Interest J. Kelsall: None declared, D. Choquette: None declared, P. Rahman: None declared, R. Arendse: None declared, M. Teo: None declared, I. Fortin: None declared, J. A. Avina-Zubieta: None declared, E. Rampakakis: None declared, E. Psaradellis: None declared, K. Maslova Employee of: Janssen Inc., B. Osborne Employee of: Janssen Inc., C. Tkaczyk Employee of: Janssen Inc., F. Nantel Employee of: Janssen Inc., A. Lehman Employee of: Janssen Inc.


The realization of topological insulators induced by correlation effects is one of the main issues of modern condensed matter physics. An intriguing example of the correlated topological insulators is a magnetic Chern insulator induced by a noncoplanar multiple-Q magnetic order. Although the realization of the magnetic Chern insulator has been studied in the classical limit of the Kondo lattice model, research on the magnetic Chern insulator in the original Kondo lattice model is limited. Here, we investigate the possibility of the many-body Chern insulator with the noncoplanar triple-Q magnetic order in the Kondo lattice model on a triangular lattice. Using the many-variable variational Monte Carlo method, we reveal that the triple-Q magnetic order becomes a ground state at quarter filling in an intermediate Kondo coupling region. We also show that the many-body Chern number is quantized to one in the triple-Q magnetic ordered phase utilizing the polarization operators. Our results provide a pathway for the realization of the many-body Chern insulator in correlated electron systems.


The level and quality of living standards are deteriorating in almost all countries of the world, including Russia. The article analyzes one of the features of modern Russia – an abnormally large proportion of the poor population in a rich country. This population group does not have stable socio-economic characteristics, in this regard, it needs constant monitoring: studying the mode, level and quality of life, value system, behaviour strategy to improve the social policy effectiveness of the state. Issues on the level and quality of living standards have always been given some attention, but mainly scientific searches were conducted in the field of socio-economic, monetary and financial relations, comparative sociology and statistics. In the paradigm of the philosophy of law, the problems of poverty and misery were not studied. The object of the study is the low-income population of Russia. The subject of the study is the dynamics of the main indicators of the living standards, the causes of poverty and misery, their conditionality by the social legislation of the state. The purpose of the study is to identify the signs, scale, and depth of poverty in Russia. Based on sociological comparative studies, the analysis of poverty and misery in Russia in comparison with other countries, in particular, with the People's Republic of China, is carried out. The peculiarity of the article is that the analysis of the "population poverty" phenomenon is not limited to socio-economic, sociological and statistical methods, but is conducted in the paradigm of the philosophy of law.


This is a paper dealing mainly with the accumulation and biological cycle of calcium and magnesium elements of the artificial 20-years old Kandelia candel community in the Jiulongjiang River Estuary of Fujian Province, China. The result of measurements is that the quantities of the two elements in the standing crop are (kg·ha-1) 772.91 for Ca and 526.57 for Mg. In the biological cycle of the two elements, the annual uptakes are 174.86 for Ca and 89.30 for Mg (kg·ha-1); the amounts of Ca and Mg returned via litter fall are estimated to be (kg·ha-1·a-1) 103.28 for Ca and 40.42 for Mg; the annual retention are (kg·ha-1·a-1) 71.58 for Ca and 48.88 for Mg, respectively. The turnover periods of Ca and Mg are 8 and 13 years, respectively.


This paper considers the modelling of scalar fields exhibiting non-stationary noise in the context of Gaussian Process (GP) regression. We show how a Heteroscedastic GP produces more accurate predictions of the variance of a process of this type compared to the standard Homoscedastic model. We present a parametric model for the noise process and derive analytical solutions to the Log Marginal Likelihood of the data and its gradients with respect to Hyper Parameters of the kernel and the noise process. We compare our parametric model to one which estimates a full GP for the noise and show analogous predictive performance with a model which has greater computational efficiency and is less complex to implement. We also discuss active sample selection in this framework and show through the numerical simulation of an arrested bathymetric front in an estuary, the superiority of using Mutual Information to Fisher Information, Entropy or Random sampling in terms of errors in the first two moments of the predicted distributions.


The subject of the article is the analysis of the image of Kiev, presented in Mikhail Bulgakov's feuilleton Kiev, the City. This work has rarely been the subject of in-depth analysis, despite the fact that it is one of the few texts in which the writer presents the image of his hometown. A characteristic element of the description of Kiev's past and present is the irony. It is noticeable in the title of the feuilleton, as well as in the names of its parts. The ironic image of Soviet Kiev stands in stark contrast to the vision of the city captured in the novel The White Guard. The analysis of the techniques used by the writer in the text of Kiev, the City (e.g. the naive narrator's mask, a combination of pompous style and colloquial speech) is carried out in order to prove that the feuilleton, in its style and ideas expressed, also shows the author's rejection of post-revolutionary reality and his attempt to overcome the trauma of the past through laughter. The ironic image of the Soviet reality on the background of eternal spiritual values makes Kiev, the City a harbinger of the problems covered inMikhail Bulgakov's later works.


[1] Significant changes have taken place in the number and size of China's lakes over the past several decades. To create a comprehensive picture of these changes over all of China, Ma et al. combined data from a wide variety of sources, including satellite imagery and maps. They compared data from the 1960s to the 1980s, before China's rapid development and industrialization, with data from 2005 and 2006. The authors found that over that time period the total number of lakes with area greater than 1 square kilometer decreased from 2928 to 2693. The total surface area of Chinese lakes declined by 13% over that time period. In addition, 243 lakes vanished, mainly in the northern provinces and some southern provinces, while 60 new lakes appeared, mainly in the Tibetan Plateau region. (Geophysical Research Letters, doi:10.1029/2010GL045514, 2010)


Abstract Pressure (0–19 kbar) and temperature (4–300 K) dependent EPR study of Sodium-Electro-Sodalite (SES) is presented. SES, which consists of a bcc sub-lattice of F-centers supported by a zeolite-like framework, is known to be a Mott insulator at room temperature. On cooling, SES undergoes an AF transition at 48±2 K providing the first example of an s-electron antiferromagnet. We find that the width of the EPR resonance above T N is influenced not only by a strong exchange interaction, but also by a fast spin-lattice relaxation. Also, with increasing pressure, T N decreases linearly and extrapolates to 0 K at about 65 kbar. The reason for this seemingly unexpected behavior is briefly discussed.


For too many years the morbidly obese have been discriminated against in the work force. Many employers wrongfully make employment decisions based on weight and appearance, two meaningless factors, rather than on education, training, and ability. Federal laws, state laws, and court decisions have not afforded the morbidly obese adequate protection from such employment discrimination. Therefore, the Americans with Disabilities Act, which protects individuals with disabilities from employment discrimination, should include morbid obesity as a disability. Historically, morbidly obese people have been discriminated against in the work force. As a result, there is an ongoing legal debate on whether morbid obesity should be considered a disability recognized under the Americans with Dis abilities Act. "The ADA protects qualified individuals with disabilities from employment discrimination" [1]. Under other laws that ban employment dis crimination, it typically is not difficult to know whether a person is protected because of his/her race, color, sex, national origin, or age [1, p. 299]. But to know whether a person is protected by the employment provisions of the Americans with Disabilities Act can be more complex [1, p. 299]. It is essential to grasp the act's very precise definitions of "disability" [1, p. 299]. "Under the ADA, an individual with a disability is a person who has: (1) a physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one or more major life activities; (2) a record of such an impairment; or (3) is regarded as having such an


Aortic vascular smooth muscle from spontaneously hypertensive rats (SHR) is known to respond in vitro to nonphysiologic cations with greater contraction than vascular smooth muscle from certain normotensive control stocks. The pattern of inheritance of the response of aortic rings to cobalt (Co2+) in vitro was determined. The test characteristic utilized was the cobalt response ratio (CRR) defined as the contractile response to 0.6 μM Co2+ divided by the response given by maximal stimulation with 10 μM Co2+. The SHR were crossed with Dahl salt-resistant rats that had been inbred for 21 generations (R/JR strain) to produce F1, F2, and backcross populations. The CRR was 0.90 ± 0.011 in SHR, 0.74 ± 0.016 in F1, and 0.38 ± 0.031 in R/JR. The F1 value was significantly higher than the midparental value indicating partial SHR dominance. The F1 males from reciprocal crosses had similar CRR indicating no sex-linked effect. In the backcross to the R/JR, the CRR showed a bimodal distribution segregating one intermediate type: one R/JR type. In the backcross to the SHR the CRR showed a unimodal distribution. In F2 rats there was a bimodal distribution segregating three intermediate type: one R/JR type. In F2 rats there was a significant (p < 0.005) blood pressure difference of 9.7 mm Hg between phenotypes. It is concluded that there is an autosomal locus (named "Hyp-2" for hypertension locus number 2) controlling vascular smooth muscle response to Co2+, which exhibits partially dominant inheritance. Alleles at Hyp-2 segregate with an increment in blood pressure. (Hypertension 4:459–467, 1982)


Sustaining financial support for multibillion-dollar international projects such as the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) requires a fine sense of balance. A recent review of the project by a team of US physicists and engineers concluded that scientists have been overly optimistic about the chances of achieving a self-sustaining burn. As a result political discussions about continuing funding support are ongoing and considering the diminished expectations.


The ultra-wide optical coherence tomography angiography (OCTA) has become an important imaging modality in diabetic retinopathy (DR) diagnosis. However, there are few researches focusing on automatic DR analysis using ultra-wide OCTA. In this paper, we present novel and practical deep-learning solutions based on ultra-wide OCTA for the Diabetic Retinopathy Analysis Challenge (DRAC). In the segmentation of DR lesions task, we utilize UNet and UNet++ to segment three lesions with strong data augmentation and model ensemble. In the image quality assessment task, we create an ensemble of InceptionV3, SE-ResNeXt, and Vision Transformer models. Pre-training on the large dataset as well as the hybrid MixUp and CutMix strategy are both adopted to boost the generalization ability of our model. In the DR grading task, we build a Vision Transformer (ViT) and fnd that the ViT model pre-trained on color fundus images serves as a useful substrate for OCTA images. Our proposed methods ranked 4th, 3rd, and 5th on the three leaderboards of DRAC, respectively. The source code will be made available at https://github.com/FDU-VTS/DRAC.


The US Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) new enhanced monitoring rule greatly increases the emissions monitoring facilities will have to conduct. The rule requires continuous documentation of compliance status for certain major emissions units in a permitted facility. Virtually all industries are subject to the final rule, which took effect Sept. 30, 1994. Of the estimated 36,000 emissions sources affected, more than half are required to implement enhanced monitoring. Facilities should take advantage of the rule's flexibility and develop the most efficient, cost-effective enhanced monitoring method allowed.


This paper functionally designs an efficient electric vehicle telematics framework for smart transportation, aiming at providing an EV-related advertisement via digital multimedia broadcasting. The electric vehicle charge service develops a reservation protocol between drivers and stations, station-side scheduling, and path adaptation according to a new charge plan. Taking advantage of information technology and wireless communication, the telematics system can support electric vehicle tracking, vehicle sharing, charging station selection, and location data analysis. In addition, as a promising business model, electric vehicle sharing needs station placement and relocation schemes, to which a previous pick-up point analysis result can give a helpful guide. The telematics framework enriches the related applications with diverse basic service building blocks and thus accelerates the penetration of electric vehicles into our daily life. Keywords: Electric Vehicle Road Network, Smart Grid, Path Adoption, Malware


The Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, Japan has begun an Earth Simulator project from the fiscal year of 1997 for predicting various Earth phenomena through the simulation of virtual Earth placed in a supercomputer, called 'Earth Simulator (40 Tflops/peak)'. GeoFEM challenges for long-term prediction of the activities of the plate and mantle near the Japanese islands through the modeling and calculation of the solid earth analysis, including the dynamics and heat transfer inside the Earth.GeoFEM is composed of 'analysis modules' for structural / electromagnetic thermal fluid / wave propagation simulations and 'platform' for parallel I/O / equation solvers / visualization functions. System is designed to be pluggable such that each analysis module is replaceable and that communications among PEs are done implicitly in platform. Platform includes a 'coupler', supporting communications among analysis modules for multi-disciplinary computations. 'Utilities' i.e. mesh partitioners and pre/post viewer are also supplied. ICCG solver tuned for SMP parallel / vector hybrid system is expected to attain over 10 Tflops on the Earth Simulator. In collaboration with solid earth researchers, various modules are being developed in such fields as earthquake cycle, faulting and propagation, mantle/core dynamics, seismic wave propagation, GPS data assimilation etc. GeoFEM/Tiger, a multi-purpose engineering version, can be downloaded from its web site (http://geofem.tokyo.rist.or.jp). REPORT DATE May 11th, 2002. TOTAL NO. OF PAGES 10 ANY OTHER IDENTIFYING INFORMATION OF THIS REPORT Submitted to WCCM V Fifth World Congress on Computational Mechanics July 7-12, 2002, Vienna, Austria Eds.: H.A. Mang, F.G. Rammerstorfer, J. Eberhardsteiner Research Organization for Information Science & Technology (RIST) 2-2-54, Nakameguro, Meguro-ku Tokyo, 153-0061, Japan TEL: +81-3-3712-5321 FAX: +81-3-3712-5552 http://geofem.tokyo.rist.or.jp/ Copyright©2002 Research Organization for Information Science & Technology (RIST) Parallel Finite Element Solid Earth Simulator : GeoFEM Hiroshi Okuda* and Genki Yagawa Department of Quantum Engineering and Systems Science, University of Tokyo 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo, Tokyo 113-8656, Japan e-mail: {okuda, email@example.com Kengo Nakajima and Hisashi Nakamura Research Organization for Information Science & Technology (RIST) 2-2-54 Naka-Meguro, Meguro, Tokyo 153-0061, Japan e-mail: {nakajima, email@example.com


Health service facility is a device and / or place used to carry out health service efforts in promotive, preventive, curative, and rehabilitative that carried out by the Central Government, Regional Government and / or the community. Based on the regulation of Indonesia Republic Number: 47 of 2016 concerning Health Service Facilities in article 4 that the types of Health Service Facilities as referred to in article 3 (Health Service Facilities provide health services in the form of individual health services; and / or public health services) consist of independent practice sites health workers, public health centers, clinics, hospitals, pharmacies, blood transfusion units, health laboratories, optics, medical services for legal purposes and traditional health care facilities.Likewise, based on PP No.47 of 2016 which is about the implementation of independent practices of health workers and traditional health service facilities. In this case the government gives the widest possible permits to health workers as long as they fulfill the requirements, Government and Private health facilities in Bogor Regency in 2016. It shows that there will be potential pollution of health facilities waste, if it is reviewed according to Minister of Health Regulation 1204 in of 2015, evaluating the condition of B3-Medical waste management from health facilities and providing policy for service health for managers of B3-Medical Waste in Health Facilities. And the research method is a theoretical research method with the aim of knowing and running the management of B3-Medical waste FasYanKes in Bogor. The results achieved are the process of managing B3-Medical waste from in 4 regions 42 Subdistricts and government hospitals and private hospitals, clinics and others more to management in Bogor district basically has the same process that is from the reduction / sorting of medical and non-medical waste, sorting, transporting waste to polling stations, processing and burial / stockpiling are stored at TPS until full, then the final process of solid medical treatment is carried out through combustion using an incinerator and overall the process of Medical-B3 waste management in Fasyankeas in Bogor Regency is not yet in accordance with the provisions, namely Environment and Forestry Candy Number: P.56 / MenLHK-Setjen / 2015, namely following the procedures and technical requirements for the Management of Hazardous and Toxic Waste from Health Care Facilities 2004. The problem is how to manage B3-Medical Waste according to Minister of Environment Regulation No. 56


Interest in service oriented architecture (SOA) is rapidly increasing in the business world due to the many benefits it offers such as reliability, manageability, reusability, flexibility, efficiency, and interoperability. There are many security technologies and models being developed for SOA. They implement or encode specific aspects of authentication, authorization, encryption, trust, and access control respectively but none of them was entirely devoted to integrity. In this paper we propose service Clark-Wilson integrity model (SCWIM), a top down integrity model for SOA capable of describing sufficient conditions to protect data integrity in any SOA implementation. Based on the original Clark-Wilson integrity model, our model can form the basis for system security audits and assist SOA architects in developing systems that protect data integrity, as well as providing guidance for evaluating existing SOA systems.


Abstract This article describes and compares public home-help services and institutional care of the elderly in Sweden, regarding the care-recipients, the care they receive and their care-givers. Interviews were carried out on 364 elderly (65+) care receivers, living in the community or in different institutions. Proxy interviews were used when direct interviews were impossible because of mental impairment or poor health. The institutionalized elderly were older and more often functionally disabled, especially cognitively impaired. They received more care and in more different forms than the elderly living in the community. However, the picture was not unambiguous. The occurrence of health problems, and the daily use of medication was rather similar in the two types of care. Half the home-help recipients received a great deal of help frequently, and sometimes even around the clock. There were many similarities between the recipients of high-extent home help, and the residents in service houses, concerning...


Polymer corrugated pipelines are a very promising type of construction that has many advantages over concrete and reinforced concrete structures that are widely used today for collecting and diverting surface runoff from residential areas and enterprise sites. To collect and divert surface runoff from residential areas and enterprise sites, the hydraulic characteristics of the drainage system made of corrugated polymer culverts of ACO Qmax are studied by computational and experimental methods. The experiments were carried out in the laboratory of Hydraulics and hydro-mechanics at different flow rates and different slopes. The kinematic and dynamic characteristics of the water flow in the pipeline were determined: the velocity, the roughness coefficient, and the hydraulic resistance coefficient were measured at different values of the pipeline filling. It is found that the characteristics of the water flow obtained by the computational method using a computer program differ from the experimental values, the reason for which, apparently, in the shortcomings of the computational program and the lack of accuracy of experimental measurements. Experimental studies were conducted to adjust the calculation methods of such pipelines used in the design and verification of hydraulic calculation methods of corrugated pipelines based on the software product ACO Qmax.


2017 marked the 100 anniversary of the Russian Revolution – both the February Revolution, which meant the collapse of tsarist Russia, and the "Great October Revolution" as it was called in the Soviet Union. Back then, there was no doubt that the Bolshevik Revolution, or the overthrow of the Provisional Government on 7 November 2017, was truly "great." But in the 25 years that have passed since the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the meaning of the Revolution has become highly contested. The El′cin regime of the 1990s regarded it as a "catastrophic event" that inaugurated the failed Soviet project. In the first post-Soviet decade the Revolution was defended mainly by the leftist and nationalist opposition, first and foremost the new Communist Party of the Russian Federation and its leader Gennadij Zjuganov (Malinova 2015, 36–61). The memory of the Revolution became yet another issue that divided Russian society. Under Vladimir Putin the Soviet period has been reintegrated as an extremely significant phase in Russian history. However, the reevaluation of Soviet history has not led to a similar positive reevaluation of the Revolution, quite the contrary. As scholar and commentator Maksim Trudoljubov pointed out in November last year: "Modern Russia is a legal successor to the Soviet Union, and yet the nation shies away from its date of birth" (Trudolyubov 2017). This is, to be sure, a paradox, but it also means that, given the current regime's positive view of the Soviet period, the Revolution cannot be fully ignored either. In post-Soviet Russia, the celebration of the Revolution has been replaced by the celebration of the end of the early seventeenth-century Time of Troubles, which represents a victory over foreign interventions, not over rebellion from below. What makes a celebration of the Revolution particularly difficult in today's Russia is that the Kremlin fears revolutions more than anything else, suffice it to mention the "Colour Revolutions" in the "Near Abroad" or the Arab Spring of 2011. Regime change is a threat. Another reason for the Kremlin to be critical of the revolutionary legacy is the nationality policies of the early


National task forces, commissions, and other ad hoc advisory bodies-both public and pr ivate-have been a prominent feature of the American political landscape since the turn of the century. However, studies of their impact on public policy are relatively recent and have focused primarily on presidential commissions. Privately sponsored bodies have received considerably less attention. This essay reports on a study we conducted with the support of The Commonwealth Fund to learn more about the impact of foundation-funded commissions on national health policy decisions. The study had two main objectives: (1) to assess the policy impact of one of Commonwealth's own recent commissions (the Task Force on Academic Health Centers), and (2) to extrapolate from the specific experiences of the task force and a small comparison group of commissions some practical lessons about the composition, conduct, and impact of such bodies. Because the sponsorship and funding of commissions is but one way foundations seek to influence public policy, our study cannot settle broader arguments about the policy role of foundations. It can, however, provide useful information for foundations and other sponsors about the design and management of ad hoc advisory bodies. Study methods. We defined foundation-funded commission as (1) an ad hoc, task-oriented advisory body, (2) sponsored (that is, established) by a foundation or other private institution or organization, and (3) funded by one or more foundations to deliberate and formulate recommendations on an issue of public policy. We excluded from this definition all governmental commissions (for example, all ad hoc advisory bodies established by executive or legislative mandate or regulation), even


Wireless networks, while evolving to provide an unprecedented variety of services, often encounter heterogeneous nodes. In the mean time, ultra-wideband (UWB) link emerges as a promising physical layer candidate for a wide range of wireless networks. In addition to the potential of very high data rate, the ultra-wide bandwidth also provides enhanced flexibility for transceiver designs with variable complexity, which is particularly suitable for networks with heterogeneous nodes. However, to establish physical communication links between nodes with distinct complexity requirements, asymmetric UWB transceivers need to be designed. Towards this objective, we utilize their similarity with multi-input multi-output (MIMO) systems and deploy the geometric mean decomposition (GMD) approach to achieve optimally in terms of both channel throughput and bit error rate (BER). Analysis and simulations corroborate the effectiveness of our transceiver designs


AbstractWhen Cu2S is chlorinated with Cl2 gas, CuS, CuCl and CuCl2 are observed at various stages of the reaction. It is proposed that CuCl2 and CuS are the first products, which then react to produee CuCl and elemental sulphur. The elemental sulphur is then chlorinated to S2Cl2, which acts as a liquid bridge for the transport of dissolved sulphur away from the reaction interface. CuCl2 forms only when all of the sulphide has been eliminated, and the partial pressure of chlorine in the CuCl2 layer can exceed that for the stability of CuCl. The activation energy proposed for the diffusion of sulphuralong the gradient in a pore filled with S2Cl2 is 8.6 ± 0.5 kcal. Resume Quand Cu2S est chlorure par Cl2 gaz, on observe CuS, CuCl et CuCl2 a divers stades de la reaction. L'hypothese proposee est que le CuCl2 et le CuS sont les premiers produits formes qui reagiront ensuite pour produire CuCl et S. Le soufre elementaire est ensuite chlorure en S2Cl2, et agit alors comme un pont liquide pour eloigner le S dissou...