During his tenure as President of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, Dr. Frank Miller created a multidisciplinary Task Force to review and consider the current state of scientific knowledge about the mechanisms, timing, and etiologies of neonatal encephalopathy and cerebral palsy. The Task Force consisted of a number of individuals with expertise pertinent to the topic area. They also liberally used consultants across the many disciplines that deal with the topics of pregnancy, neonatal encephalopathy, and cerebral palsy. Jointly sponsored by both the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) and the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), in a series of 5 meetings spanning 3 years, a consensus document was developed and circulated to many other professional societies and governmental agencies for their critique, input, and endorsement. Ultimately, 4 criteria were identified, all of which were felt to be required to accurately define an acute intrapartum hypoxic event as sufficient to cause cerebral palsy (Table 1). Additionally, it was recognized that there are other criteria that suggest an intrapartum timing for the occurrence of the injury, but which by themselves are nonspecific (Table 2). It is hoped that all who deliver either obstetric or neonatal care will carefully evaluate this information for inclusion into their practice. The areas of neonatal encephalopathy and cerebral palsy should become high priorities for national/international research agendas and as knowledge continues to expand, the criteria will of course require periodic reevaluation and updating. The undoing of misinformation, or what might otherwise be known as medical mythology, is a daunting task. Within the period that many of us have practiced obstetrics and gynecology, many nonspecific markers have been used to represent intrapartum asphyxia or birth asphyxia. Included among these have been such markers as meconium-stained amniotic fluid, abnormalities of the electronic fetal monitor strip, or condition of the baby as described by Apgar scores or time to spontaneous respirations at birth. Given the lack of equivalence of any of these criteria, in addition to their lack of specificity, the potential for diagnostic misclassification has been enormous (1). As one illustration, in the very recent past the International Classification for Disease Manual used the Apgar score to define not only birth asphyxia, but the degree of birth asphyxia. Unfortunately, once this diagnosis was entered onto the newborn's chart, it tended to be perpetuated by care provider after care provider until it artificially achieved a status of reality. In contrast, epidemiologic studies have suggested that neonatal encephalopathy of a moderate to severe degree was the cause of isolated intrapartum hypoxia in only 6% to 10% of cases (2–6). Some studies suggested that hypoxia might be superimposed on other antepartum risk factors in as many as another 25% of cases of moderate to severe newborn encephalopathy. Ultimately, however, approximately 70% of moderate to severe newborn encephalopathy would appear to have no Address correspondence to: Gary D. V. Hankins, MD, University of Texas Medical Branch, 301 University Boulevard, Galveston, TX 77555. E-mail: firstname.lastname@example.com Volume 58, Number 7 OBSTETRICAL AND GYNECOLOGICAL SURVEY Copyright © 2003 by Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, Inc.


What are the cultural roots of radical-right voting? We propose that the structure of local social ties may make certain communities more susceptible to voting for radical-right parties. We adopt the concept of "parochialism", describing communities which are marked by higher within-group trust, but lower generalized trust. Individuals in parochial communities may feel more threatened by the prospective arrival of outsiders than those in cosmopolitan regions. As a consequence, they are more likely to support parties that seek to curtail the in ow of outsiders. To test these propositions, we introduce a new measure of parochialism. Based on 50,000 responses to a unique online survey in Germany, we use the strength of local dialects as a measure of parochialism. Using both aggregate and individual-level data, we demonstrate that dialect strength is a strong predictor of voting for the radical-right AfD party. Finally, we show that the e ect of parochialism becomes larger as the political salience of the recent refugee crisis increases. †Department of Government, Harvard University (USA); email@example.com. ∗Department of Government, Harvard University (USA); email@example.com. ‡Department of Political Science, University of Zurich (CH); firstname.lastname@example.com. Daniel thankfully acknowledges funding from the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNF Ambizione Grant, NO. 179938).


When the Second World War ended, Germany embarked on a period of heightened reconstruction. Along with the restoration of bombed buildings and the reestablishment of political systems, the postwar era was a time of rich cultural adaptation as German musicians reinvented themselves and their style. Initially, the evolution of music was impacted by the military occupation in Germany and by American and British musical influences, which inspired German musicians to change their sound. However, the Cold War, which divided Germany, influenced the evolution of music in both parts of postwar Germany. In the West, the increasingly democratized Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) embraced capitalism, which created a freer environment for musicians to express themselves. In contrast, the eastern German Democratic Republic (GDR) became a socialist state, which censored music. My paper surveys how musicians in East and West Germany negotiated the presence of the Iron Curtain through their music. Using case studies of two Eastern musical groups and one Western singer-songwriter, I analyze how musicians challenged the socialist system and the Iron Curtain through their music. Whereas Eastern musicians faced censorship and sometimes persecution as they composed and performed their music, Western musicians aided the fight for freedom in the East by composing political music. As my paper demonstrates, musicians provided a voice for the people of a divided Germany and may even have contributed to the fall of the Iron Curtain. Introduction The Cold War developed out of the competing postwar worldviews of the Soviet Union and the United States and its Western allies. The disagreements complicated efforts to rebuild war-torn Europe and led to the formation of the Iron Curtain, a solid line that divided Germany into a Soviet-controlled, socialist, East German state and a Western-influenced, democratic, West German state. In response to Cold War tensions, Page 41 Oshkosh Scholar many East and West Germans turned to music to establish political, social, and cultural messages to protest the Iron Curtain. A number of historians have examined the impact of music during the Cold War. Historian Uta Poiger discusses the role of American culture in Cold War Germany. She argues that the introduction of American culture in postwar Germany influenced progressive changes among German youth who began to challenge the contemporary cultural norms.1 Historian Alexei Yurchak explores the integration of Western music and mass culture into Eastern Soviet socialist society, arguing that while Western mass culture during the Cold War produced political messages, Eastern youth failed to recognize the divide between "bourgeois mass culture and the politics of anticommunism,"2 essentially claiming that artists had no hand in stirring up politics through their music. On the other hand, historian Yale Richmond argues that the transmission of Western rock music onto the Eastern side of the Iron Curtain encouraged progressive free speech among citizens in a socialist society.3 Ultimately, few historians have looked at both the East and the West and focused on the impact of specific artists, which is the goal of this paper. The role of musical ideology begins with the American occupation in postwar Germany. American GIs arrived in Germany as occupying military authorities with the goal of influencing Germany's perspective of democracy. Two similar concepts, Westernization and Americanization, are commonly associated with the introduction of democracy into postwar Germany. According to historian Konrad Jarausch, popular culture and mass consumerism were powerful tools of Americanization and were useful in the process of teaching West Germans the value of democracy.4 However, the reception of this new culture varied widely in the context of East German socialism. Moreover, Jarausch argues, "This democratic influence was by no means a sure-fire success."5 As this paper argues, Western influence inspired a united front against the postwar divide of the East and West, and popular music became a powerful political force in the years to come.6 The acceptance of popular music varied at different generational levels in this era. Jarausch, in an examination of listeners, suggests the difference in reception between generations by stating, "Rock (in particular) appealed to the working-class youth, while it alarmed adults who saw suggestive gyrations."7 While the youth were able to identify with this new form of music, adults were fearful of cultural change. After rock music became popular, responses in East and West Germany took the form of actions to combat the new cultural ideology. These so-called actions took different forms on either side of the Iron Curtain. Uta Poiger suggests that "West German authorities, in spite of their commitment to a Western military and political alliance tried to find a fourth 'German' way," especially to separate from the "self-destructive, sexualizing, and emasculating power of American-style consumerism."8 After a decade and a half of occupation, dominant American culture became a roadblock to West German culture, nevertheless initiating inspiration into Germany's own creative process. West German musicians began to match the Western influences and had the freedom to produce German mainstream music without restrictions to their lyrical messages or public performances in the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG). The subsequent idea of "Germanness" began to spring forward, giving form to German music styles and creating a response to the Page 42 Oshkosh Scholar pressures of a globally distributed popular music.9 West German musicians, inspired by Western culture, flourished by introducing their own German styles and musical expressions. In the German Democratic Republic (GDR), maintaining a socialist ideology supported the government's oppressive nature. The GDR's vision for a socialist society strictly focused on youth groups and celebrating the working class. In the eyes of East German officials, rock 'n' roll was to blame for social unrest in the GDR, an issue they attributed to Western music culture.10 After witnessing so many rock 'n' roll riots, the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED) responded with a statement, criticizing the nature of the West. SED leaders wrote, "In West Germany, they depend on these ways of life to poison young people psychologically and to prepare them ideologically for their criminal war plans with all possible means of brutalization and of stimulation of the basest instincts."11 The SED believed that the West was poisonous because rock 'n' roll "was one of the first forms of Anglo-American music to 'conquer' Germany and reinforce a 'quasi-colonial relationship' between West Germany and the United States."12 Accordingly, Eastern leaders saw the looming threat from cultural change in the FRG as the result of the West's willingness to adapt to Western culture. Soviet leaders were determined to persuade the East Germans of the superiority of Soviet culture and socialism.13 In this effort they failed. Pedro Ramet, author of "Disaffection and Dissent in East Germany," observed, "As resocialization fails, the population becomes susceptible to alternative cultures."14 East Germans refused to conform to socialism, not because the SED failed to convert its residents, but because its residents were already immersed in the Western culture that permeated through the Iron Curtain. As a response, the Soviet Union and East German authorities "began a campaign against the United States and United States presence."15 The Communist Party was determined to "portray America as an oppressor and aggressor,"16 and eventually cracked down and banned Western artistic influences and the artists themselves. In the East, the ultimate goal for socialist music was to inspire artists to return to their German roots. In 1958, the SED worried that the Germanness, which had "brought forth Bach and Beethoven," would be distorted, and "young people were being transformed into raging beasts with the help of [rock] music."17 Furthermore, "the SED had feared that rock music . . . [reinforced] tendencies toward individualism,"18 and began making clear that these immoral and individualistic attitudes were unacceptable. Additional restrictions on East German citizens followed. But how did East German musicians use their music to combat these cultural restrictions? Pedro Ramet has suggested that disaffection and dissent are accurate representations of society in this case. "Disaffection," according to Ramet, "is discontent with the system without invoking one's ability to change the system," whereas "dissent is discontent charged by one's ability to effect change."19 Although East German musicians were primary targets of cultural censorship, disaffection arose among Eastern and Western activist musicians alike. This led to dissent against the GDR's unnecessary cultural restrictions and the Iron Curtain itself. Author Jolanta Pekacz argues, "The question as to whether rock music is able to play a role in a process of political change evokes skepticism, rather than endorsement."20 My research compares Eastern rock musicians the Klaus Renft Combo and Wolf Biermann with the Western singer-songwriter Udo Lindenberg, and explores the Page 43 Oshkosh Scholar disaffection shared through their music. While one cannot argue that they brought down the Wall, their music and lyrical messages contributed to an undercurrent of rebellion against the Cold War, evoking a political attitude and backlash against the Eastern cultural censorship. The German Democratic Republic and Censorship: "The Bad Boys of East German Rock" Cultural oppression in the socialist landscape of the GDR took a toll on musicians' lyrics. Regulation of creative freedom burdened a musician's creative process. For example, lyrics were required to portray an appreciation of the socialist state and


Turbidity currents are the most important mechanism for the dispersal and deposition of sand in the deep-sea setting and thus the main phenomenon leading to the formation of oil and gas reservoirs in deep water deposits. The flow characteristics of turbidity currents are difficult to observe and study from the modern environment and their experimental approximations in the laboratory are typically limited by scaling issues, unrealistic flume geometries and short durations. Computational fluid dynamic (CFD) analysis, realised as numerical simulations, has been developed to fill the gap between the small and large scale, integrating data from theory, nature and experiments. CFD can also shed light on flow parameters which are so far impossible to deduce from experimental and field studies, such as detailed density and turbulent kinematic energy distributions. The deterministic process modelling CFD software MassFLOW-3D™ has been developed and used successfully to construct a three-dimensional model for the simulation of turbidity currents. All principal hydraulic properties of the flow (e.g. velocity, density, sediment concentration, apparent viscosity, turbulence intensity and bottom shear stress) and its responses to topography can be monitored continuously in three dimensions over the whole duration of the turbidity current. In this paper, comparisons made between the numerical output of MassFLOW-3DTM and the physical experiments are presented. In addition, the code is used to model the spatial characteristics, velocity structure and deposits of high-density turbidity currents and the flow dynamics of low-density turbidity currents in a sinuous channel. The numerical simulations show close fit to experimental sandy turbidity current dynamics for flows with sediment concentrations up to 27%. However, despite this initial success, on-going customisation and validation of these models, together with implementation of improved subroutines aimed at sediment transport and deposition, is essential in improving the computational code and our understanding of the natural phenomena.


Earlier experiments have shown that ionizing radiations produce marked functional changes in cells and tissues. Zirkle (1932), working with Pteris longifolia spores, and Henshaw (1938), using Arbacia eggs, found that nuclei were affected to a larger degree than the cytoplasm, while Duryee (1939) observed the opposite effect in frog eggs. Cytological observations on irradiated cells and tissues have indicated inhibition of formation and possible depolymerization of desoxyribonucleic acid (Mitchell, 1942, 1943; Stowell, 1945; Koller, 1947; Hevesy, 1948; and Harrington and Koza, 1951). Irradiation of thymonucleic acid in vivo or in vitro produced a marked decrease in the viscosity of the isolated nucleic acid solutions, indicating degradation of the nucleic acid molecule (Sparrow and Rosenfeld, 1946; Errera, 1947; Taylor, Greenstein, and Hollaender, 1947a, b; Limperos, 1951; and Rozendaal, Bellamy, and Baldwin, 1951). In this laboratory Tahmisian (1949) found that X-irradiation produced functional enucleation of the cells of grasshopper eggs and altered enzymatic activity, but the effects were not discernible until 4 days after treatment.


Abstract The absorption spectrum of a coherently driven four-level atom in the N-configuration and coupled to a broadband squeezed vacuum is examined. The squeezed vacuum is coupled only to the intermediate levels of the atom. The absorption spectrum has a threshold separating the spectrum into two regions with different behaviour and characteristics. The appropriate conditions for transparency are studied.


Multi-agent coordination involves both the individual reward and team reward, where the former guides the agent to learn basic skills and the latter measures how well such a team cooperatively completes final tasks. However, in many complex scenarios, these two aspects can be contradictory, due to that one agent excessively pursuing its own profits may suppress the performance of other teammates and lead to the reduction of overall profits. Besides, such dual rewards are generally entangled which make the learning swing between optimizing either the former or latter, which further leads to the sub-optimal and unstable solutions. Moreover, the sparse reward problem commonly encountered in the multi-agent system would further exacerbate this contradiction. In the present work, we address these challenges by proposing CEMARL, a novel framework combining cross-entropy method (CEM) and off-policy multi-agent reinforcement learning (MARL). CEM is gradient-free and learns from the whole episode, whereas MARL is gradient-based and learns from the experiences of agents. The core idea behind CEMARL is that it explicitly decomposes the individual reward and team reward, and deals with them through gradient-based learning and gradient-free evolution, respectively. By means of this, it can simultaneously maximize the individual and team reward, and reconciles the contradiction between individual and team as well as the sparse reward problem. CEMARL shows both conciseness in framework and stability in training, and achieves significantly better performances than state-of-the-art baselines on a range of complex tasks.


pH‐induced chemical shift perturbations (CSPs) can be used to study pH‐dependent conformational transitions in proteins. Recently, an elegant principal component analysis (PCA) algorithm was developed and used to study the pH‐dependent structural transitions in bovine β‐lactoglobulin (βLG) by analyzing its NMR pH‐titration spectra. Here, we augment this analysis method by filtering out changes in the NMR chemical shift that stem from effects that are electrostatic in nature. Specifically, we examine how many CSPs can be explained by purely electrostatic effects arising from titrational events in βLG. The results show that around 20% of the amide nuclei CSPs in βLG originate exclusively from "through‐space" electric field effects. A PCA of NMR data where electric field artefacts have been removed gives a different picture of the pH‐dependent structural transitions in βLG. The method implemented here is well suited to be applied on a whole range of proteins, which experience at least one pH‐dependent conformational change. Proteins 2010. © 2009 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.


Competition. Some say it's what made America great. Cooperation. It creates team players who make the world a better place. Which is best? Which should be emphasized in physical education classes? The Competition-Cooperation Link puts this debate to rest by explaining that neither competition nor cooperation is inherently good or bad; it's how you teach them that matters. Daniel Midura and Donald Glover, who together have authored two highly popular team building books, reveal how you can teach your students to be good competitors and good teammates. Believing that competitive activities should only be part of the physical education curriculum, they explain how to put respect and cooperation into competition and clearly explain the role that team building plays in the physical education curriculum.First, Midura and Glover introduce you to competition-cooperation theory, which supports the idea that competitive and cooperative activities are equally important within a child's physical activity experiences. Next, they provide concrete ways for integrating cooperative activities into your physical education classes. You'll learn how to- create your own program using the cooperation-competition model;- encourage positive, cooperative behavior in your students;- make cooperative activities fun and challenging;- determine which aspects of cooperation to focus on with different age groups; - make teamwork and sportsmanship an everyday part of your program; and- reinforce healthy attitudes and make your expectations clear.The heart of the book is the activity section, which features detailed instructions for 30 games and activities that link cooperation and competition. This section features 6 activities designed to last 5 to 10 minutes, 12 activities expected to take 15 to 20 minutes, and 12 activities that require at least a full class period. All activities are fully explained and illustrated to show you how to set them up and carry them out effectively.Prepare your students to successfully and responsibly face situations that require cooperation and competition. By doing this, you'll not only teach them to enjoy physical activity for the rest of their lives; you'll also prepare them to be successful in the workplace, enjoy personal relationships, and become good parents, coaches, and leaders later in life.


Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is a continuum of liver diseases that ranges from non-alcoholic fatty liver (NAFL) to non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH). Accumulation of hepatic steatosis can be driven by insulin resistance and other components of the metabolic syndrome [1]. NASH is the potentially progressive form of NAFLD and is projected to become the most common indication for orthotropic liver transplantation in the United States [1]. The distinction between NASH and non-NASH NAFLD has important prognostic implications [1–4]. In this context, it is estimated that 10–15% of NASH patients will develop advanced liver disease with significant morbidity and mortality from cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma [1,2]. At first glance, it may appear that this is a small number of NAFLD patients that will progress to cirrhosis. On the other hand, given the enormous number of individuals affected by NAFLD, the clinical burden of NAFLD and NASH is projected to be tremendous. In fact, on average, one in four people have NAFLD globally, though there are regional variations in prevalence [1–4]. The incidence of NASH in the general population has been estimated to range from 1.5% to 6.5% [3]. Furthermore, recent forecasting studies have found that the burden of NAFLD will continue to increase substantially such that a recent model projected a 178% increase in NASHrelated liver deaths by the year 2030 [2,4].


Through the physics teaching, let the training students know the scientific knowledge and the scientific method to research and its influence to society and personal deeply,and increase the scientific accomplishment of the students.


Objctive: Little information exists regarding thrombotic thrombocytopenic purpura(TTP) and hemolytic uremic syndrome(HUS) during pregnancy. We report 4 cases of TTP and HUS complicating pregnancy, with emphasis on diagnosis and management of these rare disorder. Methods: From Sep. 1988 to May. 2006, case history of four cases with either TTP(n=2) or HUS(n=2) were analyzed. Clinical and laboratory findings and maternal and fetal conditions were recorded from the medical records. Results: Of 4 cases,3 were nulliparous, one multipara. All women were in good health before pregnancy. Three in the third trimester (34w to37w), had eclampsia, 2 of whom complicated abruptio placenta. The diagnosis was made at admission as HELLP syndrome with eclampsia in 3 cases and one sespected as TTP. The laboratory analyses showed that all 4 cases were anemic(range 29.0 t0 66.0g/L) and 3 had abnormal fragmented red cells on peripheral blood smear. The platelet count ranged from 25 to 40 ×10 9 /L The mean peak serum LDH value was 2616.75U/L(range 914 to >4000U/L),7-to 11 fold the peak serum AST and ALT values. The mental status abnormalities was in 3 cases. All cases had oliguric,2 of whom had acute onset of anuria after delivery. The mean peak serum BUN and creatinine values were 26.14±12.96mmol/L(13.1 to 37.56 mmol/L) and 647.85±347.4μmol/L(184.4 to 1027μmol/L), respectively. The renal biopsy performed on day 8 in one case with anuria, revealed findings consistent with HUS with glomerular crescents. vWF-cleaving protease was measured after plasmapheresis in case of TTP, in whom the report was normal. Treatment included fresh-frozen plasma in 3 cases except one who died before treatment. Of the 3 surviving cases, one received CRRT and plasma exchange and 2 received CRRT and hemodialysis. Of 4 cases,2 delivered vaginally, one ceasarean section, one spontaneous abortion. The course of illness was prolonged, but uneventful 24 to 25 days after treatment and discharge. All fetal death occurred before delivery. During the follow up 3 months to 16 years after discharge, one of 3 cases had another pregnancy complicating preeclamsia at 36 weeks without any other complication and the other two were all normal in renal function and BP. Conclusion: TTP and HUS complicating pregnancy is associated with high maternal mortality and morbility. The endothelial dysfunction appears to be an important factor in TTP-HUS. With the intense concern about the distinction of preeclampsia/eclampsia/HELLP syndrome from TTP/HUS, the physician must remain alert for the possibility. Improved survival after this disorder had been attributed to treatment with plasma transfusion or plasmapheresis.


Blockchain Technology has been increasing in popularity in recent times due to its decentralized nature, immutability, transparency, high security and transparency. Several private and public organisations have been using it to develop new and innovative projects like cryptocurrency, NFTs, Metaverse, etc., and also to upgrade and improve old technologies like supply chains in agriculture and government voting systems. Land Registration is one such sector that can be upgraded using blockchain because in the current system there are a lot of middlemen involved and data is centralized and not secure, these things make the current system vulnerable to frauds and corruption. In this paper we have proposed a new implementation for the existing land registration system in the country that uses Non-Fungible tokens in the blockchain to represent a property and a sidechain like IPFS for storing its data in a decentralized manner. With our implementation we can overcome the flaws in the old system and make land registration secure, transparent and trustless. Here by "trustless" we mean that users do not have to trust any centralized authority or intermediary to verify transactions or maintain the integrity of the system. Instead, trust is placed in the system's consensus mechanism and cryptographic protocols.


In order to study the vehicle motion response under the condition of high speed puncture when turning, Based on the Chery QQ car, made a turn driving road test, Using the multivariate regression principle and with the aid of SPSS software, the regression equation is established that among the most sensitive and second sensitive driving stability parameters with tire pressure and speed on the basis of the statistical analysis of data, and the feasibility of the model is verified based on this model predict the vehicle motion response under the condition of high speed flat tire, It turned out that when the speed of 120km/h, lateral acceleration of the most sensitive parameter can reach to 7.868 (m·s) at the inside wheel puncture, but maximum roll angle of the most sensitive parameters can reach to -3.590(°), The inside wheel flat tire makes trend of steering yaw heavily, which can bring drift and slip. The outside wheel puncture is benefit to driving straight but there will be rollover. Moreover, according to our research, we know that the inside of front wheel flat tire is the most dangerous


Relativistic quantum key distribution (QKD) protocol is a kind of modified BB84 QKD protocol based on the principles of not only quantum mechanics but also special relativity. Its advantage compared with BB84 protocol is that all of the qubits could be used for key generation, and Alice and Bob are able to select any measuring bases. We prove its unconditional security against coherent attack via the method based on CSS codes: begin with a modified EPR based protocol which can be proved unconditionally secure, then reduce the protocol to a CSS codes based protocol. Finally, the CSS codes based protocol is demonstrated equivalent to the relativistic QKD protocol, and we arrived at the conclusion of the unconditional security of the final key.


Purpose: The purpose of the study was to assess the influence of reverse logistics on performance of food and beverage manufacturing firms in Kenya with an aim of making recommendations on proper use of reverse logistics management practices in manufacturing companies. Methodology: This research study adopted a descriptive research design approach. This study used probability sampling since the population and location of food and beverage manufacturing firms is known. Specifically, the study used stratified random sampling in order to account for the uneven distribution of firms in various towns. Based on distribution of firms in the 10 towns the study used proportions calculated in the population distribution to come up with a representative sample distribution. The proportions calculated give the number of firms to be included in the sample for each segment. Thereafter simple random sampling was used to select the names of food and beverage manufacturing firms in which data is to be collected. The study combined two methods in its data collection that is, questionnaires and key informant interviews. After data collection, quantitative data was coded using Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) version 20. Data was analysed through descriptive statistical methods such as means, standard deviation, frequencies and percentage. Inferential analyses were used in relation to correlation analysis and regression analysis to test the relationship between the four explanatory variables and the explained variable Results and conclusion: The response rate of the study was 92%. R square value of 0.647 means that 64.7% of the corresponding variation in performance of food and beverage manufacturing firms in Kenya can be explained or predicted by (product returns management, recycling management, disposal management and product repackaging) which indicated that the model fitted the study data. The results of regression analysis revealed that there was a significant positive relationship between dependent variable and independent variable at (β = 0.647, p=0.000 <0.05). The findings of the study concluded that product returns management, recycling management, disposal management and product repackaging have a positive relationship with performance of food and beverage manufacturing firms in Kenya. International Journal of Supply Chain and Logistics ISSSN 2520-3983 (Online) Vol. 4, Issue No.2, pp 129 151, 2020 www.carijournals.org 130 Unique contribution to theory, practice and policy: the study recommended that food and beverage manufacturing firms should embrace reverse logistics so as to improve performance and further researches should to be carried out in other sectors to find out if the same results can be obtained.


Land use change is one of the main reasons for changes of greenhouse gases concentration in the atmosphere. However, the impacts of land use change process, such as conversion process from forestland to cropland, on soil N2O emission is still lack of a systematic study. In this study, forestland was converted into cropland in the hilly area of the Central Sichuan Basin in mid July 2016, and then planted as winter wheat-summer maize rotation from October 26, 2016 to September 15, 第 2期 任 晓等: 林地转变为耕地对紫色土 N2O排放的影响 215 http://www.ecoagri.ac.cn 2017. Static chamber-gas chromatographic technique were used to compare the characteristics of N2O emission from croplands, converted from forest land with tillage without fertilizer (CL-T) and with tillage and fertilizer (CL-TF), and forestland (CK). The results showed that during the experimental period, the soil N2O emission fluxes of CL-T and CL-TF both significantly increased compared to CK (P < 0.01), and there was an obvious emission peak at the beginning of land use conversion from forestland to cropland. The mean N2O emission fluxes in the wheat season and maize season were 2.52 μg(N)·m·h and 4.60 μg(N)·m·h under CK, 3.55 μg(N)·m·h and 11.63 μg(N)·m·h under CL-T, 6.26 μg(N)·m·h and 22.16 μg(N)·m·h under CL-TF, respectively. N2O emission peak flux was significantly higher in maize season than in wheat season. The annual accumulative soil N2O emissions were 0.271 kg(N)·hm, 0.515 kg(N)·hm and 0.957 kg(N)·hm under CK, CL-T and CL-TF, respectively. Compared to CK, CL-T and CL-TF increased the annual accumulative soil N2O emissions by 89.8% and 253.0%, respectively. This indicated that land use conversion from forestland to cropland significantly induced the increase of N2O emission in purplish soil. Tillage changed soil structure and significantly increased soil inorganic nitrogen content (P < 0.05), then fertilizer application increased soil inorganic nitrogen content sharply by a large quantity, which resulted in pulsive N2O emission. While soil temperature (5 cm) and soil moisture (WFPS) were not changed significantly (P > 0.05), and planting did not change N2O emission significantly in short time during the process of land use conversion. It was suggested that the fundamental mechanism of stimulating N2O emission caused by land use conversion from forestland to cropland might be derived from the increase of mineralization rate of soil organic nitrogen. However, the effect of land use conversion on soil nitrogen transformation and the mechanism of changing of soil N2O emission need to be further studied.


Simple Summary The objective of the present study is to establish a new in vivo patient-derived xenograft (PDX) model for uveal melanoma (UM) based on the chick chorioallantoic membrane (CAM) assay. Furthermore, various implantation techniques and monitoring tools, such as different ultrasound modalities, optical coherence tomography and angiography, fluorescein angiography, image analysis, as well as fluorescent immunohistochemistry, were investigated for the assessment of the growth, vascularity, and, therefore, the viability of the implanted grafts. The results suggested an increase in the size parameters of the UM specimens and comparable data for the applied monitoring instruments, resulting in the CAM-based PDX model becoming an alternative step in translational cancer research for novel diagnostic and therapeutic experimentation in the field of ocular melanoma. Abstract Background: Patient-derived tumor xenografts (PDXs) have emerged as valuable preclinical in vivo models in oncology as they largely retain the polygenomic architecture of the human tumors from which they originate. Although animal models are accompanied by cost and time constraints and a low engraftment rate, PDXs have primarily been established in immunodeficient rodent models for the in vivo assessment of tumor characteristics and of novel therapeutic cancer targets. The chick chorioallantoic membrane (CAM) assay represents an attractive alternative in vivo model that has long been used in the research of tumor biology and angiogenesis, and can overcome some of these limitations. Methods: In this study, we reviewed different technical approaches for the establishment and monitoring of a CAM-based uveal melanoma PDX model. Forty-six fresh tumor grafts were acquired after enucleation from six uveal melanoma patients and were implanted onto the CAM on ED7 with Matrigel and a ring (group 1), with Matrigel (group 2), or natively without Matrigel or a ring (group 3). Real-time imaging techniques, such as various ultrasound modalities, optical coherence tomography, infrared imaging, and imaging analyses with Image J for tumor growth and extension, as well as color doppler, optical coherence angiography, and fluorescein angiography for angiogenesis, were performed on ED18 as alternative monitoring instruments. The tumor samples were excised on ED18 for histological assessment. Results: There were no significant differences between the three tested experimental groups regarding the length and width of the grafts during the development period. A statistically significant increase in volume (p = 0.0007) and weight (p = 0.0216) between ED7 and ED18 was only documented for tumor specimens of group 2. A significant correlation of the results for the cross-sectional area, largest basal diameter, and volume was documented between the different imaging and measurement techniques and the excised grafts. The formation of a vascular star around the tumor and of a vascular ring on the base of the tumor was observed for the majority of the viable developing grafts as a sign of successful engraftment. Conclusion: The establishment of a CAM-PDX uveal melanoma model could elucidate the biological growth patterns and the efficacy of new therapeutic options in vivo. The methodological novelty of this study, investigating different implanting techniques and exploiting advances in real-time imaging with multiple modalities, allows precise, quantitative assessment in the field of tumor experimentation, underlying the feasibility of CAM as an in vivo PDX model.


On January 9, I joined the thousands of protestors marching through central London to protect the NHS bursary, and on the night of January 11, I sat in Westminster Hall listening to MPs debate the e-petition 'Keep the NHS Bursary'.


Although both the structures and the reactions of histidine and phenylalanine ammonia lyases (HAL and PAL) are very similar, the former shows a primary kinetic deuterium (D) isotope effect, while the latter does not. In the HAL reaction, the release of ammonia is partially rate‐determining and is slower than the release of the product (E)‐urocanate (4), whereas in the PAL reaction, the release of (E)‐cinnamate (2) is the rate‐limiting step. With (2S,3S)‐[3‐2H1]phenylalanine (1a), we determined the kinetic D isotope effects with the PAL mutants Q487A, Y350F, L137 H, and the double mutant L137 H/Q487E. The kH/kD values for the former two were of the same magnitude as with wild‐type PAL (1.20±0.07), while the exchange of L137 to H almost doubled the effect (kH/kD=2.32±0.01). We conclude that L137 is part of the hydrophobic pocket harboring the phenyl group of the substrate/product and is responsible for its strong binding. The stability of the HAL ammonia complex was demonstrated 40 years ago. Here, we show that, in contrast to the former assumption, ammonia in the complex is not covalently bound to the prosthetic electrophile, 3,5‐dihydro‐5‐methylidene‐4H‐imidazol‐4‐one (MIO; 5). We carried out experiments with a mutant enzyme lacking MIO and exhibiting ca. 103 times less activity. Nevertheless, the enzymeammonia complex was formed, and the mutant behaved upon addition of (E)‐[14C]urocanate (4a) like wild‐type HAL. We conclude, therefore, that ammonia is bound in the complex by Coulomb forces as ammonium ion and can be released only after (E)‐urocanate (4).


The purpose of the present study was to investigate the cow-level association between acute hoof lesions and the somatic milk cell count in dairy cattle. Cows from three loose-housed Swedish dairy herds were enrolled in the study if they had an acute hoof lesion treated by a veterinarian or professional hoof trimmer during the preceding year, according to farmer records. Studied lesions were sole ulcer, dermatitis, interdigital necrobacillosis and hoof abscess, in each case causing lameness. For each hoof-diseased cow, 0 to 3 healthy cows were included, matched with respect to herd, breed, parity and lactation stage. Cell counts were obtained from monthly test recordings from one month before to three months after the hoof-lesion diagnosis, and log-transformed. In total, 203 cell-count observations from 14 hoof-diseased and 32 healthy cows were analysed using mixed least-squares multivariable regression modelling. A random effect for cow identity was included. The principal explanatory variable was disease month, coded as -1 the month before diagnosis, as 0 for the same month as diagnosis, as 1 or 2 for the corresponding number of months after diagnosis, and as 3 for 3 months after diagnosis and all observations in healthy cows. Predictors representing herd identity, breed, parity, lactation stage, milk yield, type of hoof lesion and season were tested but excluded in the final analysis because they were judged not to improve the model. Cows with an acute hoof lesion had a 2.1 times higher cell count the month before the diagnosis (P=0.002) and a 2.3 times higher cell count the same month as the diagnosis (P=0.005) compared to 3 months after the diagnosis and healthy cows.


There has been a considerable amount of recent work on high-speed micro-aerial vehicle flight in unknown and unstructured environments. Generally these approaches either use active sensing or fly slowly enough to ensure a safe braking distance with the relatively short sensing range of passive sensors. The former generally requires carrying large and heavy LIDARs and the latter only allows flight far away from the dynamic limits of the vehicle. One of the significant challenges for high-speed flight is the computational demand of trajectory planning at sufficiently high rates and length scales required in outdoor environments. We tackle both problems in this work by leveraging semantic information derived from an RGB camera on-board the vehicle. We first describe how to use semantic information to increase the effective range of perception on certain environment classes. Second, we present a sparse representation of the environment that is sufficiently lightweight for long distance path planning. We show how our approach outperforms more traditional metric planners which seek the shortest path, demonstrate the semantic planner's capabilities in a set of simulated and excessive real-world autonomous quadrotor flights in an urban environment.


INTRODUCTION In recent years, nearly every European society, including Latvia, has been faced with the emergence and growth of a variety of new religious movements (NRMs). Some NRMs are centered around the "re-invention" of pre- or non-Christian belief systems, such as Wicca, Asatru, the Goddess Movement, or Neo-Druids in France or Great Britain; Roman Gentilitas in Italy; and the various autochthonic movements of Neopaganism in Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, and Ukraine. These NRMs oppose Christianity and reclaim a primordial European or national spirituality for themselves. The forms of such Neopagan belief systems and religious practices are mostly very heterogeneous across different groups and countries. Dievturība stands apart from the mainstream of the global contemporary Neopagan movements like Wicca, the Goddess Movement, or the broad milieu of Pagan-influenced New Age, or even such well-known transnational movements such as Druidry or Asatru. For instance, Dievturība is usually not characterized as pantheistic, polytheistic, shamanistic, or magical religion oriented toward spirituality of nature. Individuals in Dievturi groups are searching for an "individual path to God." Dievturība belongs to the branch of Neopaganism that, ignoring the long presence of Christianity in Latvia, strives to reconstruct the cultural legacy of those ancient Baltic peoples (including tribes such as Latgalians, Selonians, Zemgaļi, and Kursi) whose merger in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries formed the Latvian people, language, and common culture. The reconstruction of this legacy does not have a global outreach; it is meant only for Latvians.


The semi-analytic theory of tidal shocks proves to be a powerful tool to study tidal interactions of star clusters and satellite galaxies with their massive hosts. New models of the globular cluster evolution employ a combination of analytic estimates, solutions of the Fokker-Planck equation and direct N-body simulations. The models predict large destruction rates for the Galactic globular clusters. Those on the highly eccentric orbits around the Galactic center are much more likely to be disrupted than the ones on nearly circular orbits. The destruction rates are largely increased near the bulge. Disruption of the low-mass clusters changes the Luminosity Function of the Globular Cluster System, shifting the peak of the Luminosity Function to the brighter end.


Twelve steroidal sapogenins were isolated from sixteen Liliaceae plants : ruscogenin from Albuca nelsonii ; diosgenin and gentrogenin from Aletris foliata ; diosgenin from Aletris formosana ; gitogenin, smilagenin and tigogenin from Allium grayi ; sarsasapogenin from Asparagus cochinchinensis ; diosgenin and heloniogenin from Clintonia udensis ; ruscogenin from Ophiopogon jaburan ; diosgenin and ruscogenin from Ophiopogon planiscapus ; diosgenin from Paris japonica, Polygonatum officinale, Smilacina hondoensis, Tofieldia japonica and Trillium smallii ; hecogenin from Polygonatum falcatum ; rhodeasapogenin and isorhodeasapogenin from Rohdea japonica ; ruscogenin and neoruscogenin from Tofieldia japonica.


A papermaking fabric, comprising a system of CD yarns and a system of MD yarns, CD yarns of said system comprises a plurality of CD yarns. MD yarns of said system of MD yarns further comprises a first sub-system and a second sub-system of MD yarns, wherein said first sub-system and a second sub-systems overlap each other vertically. The first sub-system comprises MD yarns having substantially similar aspect ratio of at least two MD yarns of the shed. MD yarns in the second subsystem MD yarns of said MD yarns aspect ratio greater than said first sub-system of the aspect ratio of the MD yarns. The MD yarns all of the yarns the first and second sub-systems in the system of CD yarns interwoven with the CD yarns in the fabric weave in full. Finally, using only MD yarns of said first subsystem of MD yarns forming seaming loops.


In Internet era, the strong penetration of e-commerce has had a profound impact on the retail industry and played a pivotal role on their growth all over the world. At present, the new changes in the world economic situation make the environment of retail industry more and more complex and face significant changes. The online retails in China and the United States are listed in the forefront of the world, but their development paths and the environments are very different. The reason is that traditional Chinese retailers do not achieve large-scale development and reflect slowly to the e-commerce developments and changes. Thereby, the performance of these traditional retailers is far less than e-commerce ones in the online retail market. Therefore, it is of great significance to analyze the development path and the different performance of online retailing in China and the United States, and to analyze the internal causes of the development of China's retail industry in depth.


Time can be represented spatially in two prevalent metaphors; ego-moving has the self moving "forward" towards the future while time-moving has the future moving "forward" towards the self. Anger also is represented spatially by an approach-related motivation. Because time and anger share an approach-related spatial representation, we hypothesised a link between anger and the ego-moving time perspective. In Study 1, participants naturally adopting an ego-moving representation of time had higher trait anger than those adopting a time-moving representation. Study 2 showed that processing an angry event (vs. an emotionally neutral event) predicted more ego-moving spatial interpretations of time. In Study 3, a scheduling task priming ego-moving (vs. time-moving) time representation prompted higher state anger. Our results reveal a novel bi-directional link between the seemingly unrelated but similarly embodied abstract domains of anger and time.


In grain amaranthus (Amaranthus hypochondriacus L.) ten genotypes were evaluated for twelve characters under four plant density levels viz. very high (D ), high (D ), normal (D ) and low plant density (D ) 1 2 3 4 levels to study the influence of different plant density levels on growth and grain yield of grain amaranthus. The study was conducted at College Orchard, Department of Horticulture, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru College of Agriculture and Research Institute, TNAU, Karaikal during kharif 2007. Grain yield plant was reduced in very 1 high and low plant density levels mainly because of reduction in length of the primary inflorescence, fresh weight of the inflorescence, number of secondary branches per inflorescence and leaf area at 50% flowering when compared to high and normal plant densities. The high plant density produced the highest grain yield plot which was mainly due to the number of plants per unit area was higher under this density level than 1 normal and low plant density levels which could increase the grain yield plot . Based on the mean 1 performance, Annapurna was identified as ideal genotype performing superior under all the four plant density levels followed by the genotype E C 519554 for most of the yield and yield attributing characters.


This study aims to analyse how Palestinian-Israeli conflicts are reported by two different news media, in this case Fox News (American) and Detik.Com (Indonesian). The data in this study were words and sentences which represent how Palestinian-Israeli conflict is reported by the two media. The data were taken from 4 news articles of Fox News and Detik.com which were reported from May 15 to May 31, 2021. The data were collected by using participant non-observation method with note-taking techniques. Then, the data were analyzed based on Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) theory proposed by Fairclough (1995). The results of the research indicate that there are differences in the representation of Palestinian and Israeli conflicts in the two media. In Fox News articles, Palestine, especially Hamas, is represented as a terrorist and there is an element of the American government's alignment with Israel. Meanwhile, in Detik.com articles, Israel is represented as the perpetrator of the attack while Palestine is represented as the victim.


The Safety Research Laboratory was established in April 1, 1989 in response to the Higashi-Nakano accident in which a train collided with another train. This laboratory has developed many safety mechanisms, systems, rules, and the like for the purpose of higher railway safety. In this paper,the author will introduce some of the laboratory's safety development over the past 25 years.


Traditional fishermen in Indonesia were commonly positioned as the poorest people. Actually, the society had owned the strategy to face the social economic difficulties. Generally, poor people had more spirit of survival because they needed to survive their life. That kind of potency might be in the form of personal-social asset, adaptation strategy and problem solving (coping strategy) used locally based on their house condition. This research aimed to explore the way of poor fishermen to survive, conducted in Tanjung Tiram. Methodologically, this research used qualitative approach focusing on people strategic way to survive toward poverty. The data were collected and interpreted simultaneously. The result showed that various strategy combinations of poor fishermen in surviving were the point between social structure awareness and selfcorrection through reflexive monitoring of action responding to the situation faced. The structural aspect included unbalance economy access and patron-client relation which limited the fishermen's ability to increase their social economic status exploitatively. That condition created adaptive behavior such the optimality of coastal resource in their environment involving the whole members of family to earn livelihood. These three strategies became the common thing among them to survive toward social economic crisis.


The Yushugou HP granulite–peridotite complex is located at the east of the northern margin of the southern Tianshan, China, which mainly consists of granulite and peridotite units. Because of the rare association of granulite and peridotite, their origin has been debated for a long time. The main controversial points include whether these units represent a complete ophiolite suite [1], a tectonic mélange [2,3] or a continental crust–mantle transition zone [4]. In this study, we propose a hanging wall subduction model for the HP granulites based on petrological study and U-Pb zircon dating. The HP granulites can be further grouped into two types: type I is hypersthene-free and type II is hypersthenebearing granulite. The mineral assemblage is garnet (33%) – diopside (32%) – plagioclase (30%) for type I granulite; and garnet (22%) – diopside (10%) – hypersthene (14%) – plagioclase (45%) for type II granulite. Garnet in both types exhibits core–rim zoning with increasing grossular and decreasing pyrope. Petrographic observations and phase equilibrium modeling, coupled with pseudosections calculated in the NCFMASHTO system using THERMOCALC for two representative samples suggest that the granulites have experienced three stages of metamorphism. Stage I is characterized by the porphyroblastic garnet core, and the P–T conditions of this stage are 9.4–10.4 kbar and 860–900 C for type I, and 9.9–10.9 kbar and 875–890 C for type II granulite, respectively. Stage II (Pmax stage) is identified based on garnet zoning involving increasing grossular and decreasing pyrope; the P–T conditions of this stage, defined using the garnet rim compositions and the Ca content in plagioclase, are 12.1 kbar and 755 C for type I, and 13.8 kbar and 815 C for type II granulite, respectively. Stage III, the amphibolite facies, was characterized by an overprint of hornblendic amphibole in the granulites. Consequently, the Yushugou HP granulite has recorded an anticlockwise P–T path characterized by cooling related to subduction, with the temperature decreasing and pressure increasing simultaneously. Based on studies of zircon morphology, Th/U ratios and REE patterns, ages of c. 430 Ma are interpreted as dating the protolith of the HP granulites, reflecting Silurian magmatism. Metamorphic rims of zircon yield three groups of ages at c. 390 Ma, c. 340 Ma and c. 320 Ma, interpreted as corresponding to the stage I, II and III metamorphic events, respectively. We conclude that the mafic HP granulites from the Yushugou granulite–peridotite complex were formed by subduction-related cooling of lower crustal rocks in the hanging wall of the central Tianshan plate during the northward closing of the paleo-Asian ocean.


This paper analyzes the application feature of modern technique,which represented by digital cartography,multibeam sounding technique,satellite navigation and positioning technology,in chart designing,producing and application process.Upon the effects that these techniques' development made to chart producing,product form and usage way,this paper analyzes the new effect of these and the way to eliminate the adverse effect and improve chart quality.


Forty-two freshly defecated fecal samples from captive Asiatic Black Bear (Ursus thibetanus) were collected between May 2017 and April 2018 from Bangladesh National Zoo, Dhaka, Shaheed A.H.M. Central Park and Zoo, Rajshahi and Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Safari Park, Gazipur. The collected samples were processed by Formol-ether concentration technique. Altogether nine different gastrointestinal (GI) parasites were observed and identified, which include one protozoan, Coccidia spp. (42.86%); four cestodes, Hymenolepis spp. (42.86%), Diphyllobothrium spp. (28.57%), Spirometra spp. (14.29%) and Taenia spp. (21.43%); and four nematodes Ascaris spp. (57.14%), Toxocara spp. (21.43%), Trichuris spp. (21.43%) and hookworms (35.71%). No trematode parasite was found during the study period. Dominance of helminth parasites (71.43%) over protozoan parasites was observed. The male bears were found more susceptible to parasitic infection than the females. The intensity of infection was found erratic in young and adult bears. The species diversity, animals feeding behavior and hygiene maintenance may be responsible for the high prevalence rate of gastrointestinal parasites in the present study.


www.jogh.org • doi: 10.7189/jogh.10.020391 1 December 2020 • Vol. 10 No. 2 • 020391 The COVID19 pandemic has laid bare stark inadequacies and disparities in health systems all over the world, particularly so in low/middle income countries [1]. Recent events highlight that strong political will and prior preparedness for health-related emergencies are critical to being able to think and act at the same time. A necessary requirement is rapid access to, and synthesis of, the right information. In a time of crisis, the question we are all asking ourselves is, how do we come together, leverage our strengths and resources to combat this enormous challenge? The other question we need to be asking ourselves is, how can our systems be set up to do the same? A digital health system that is smart, agile, performs early warning functions and is programmed to detect and inform on inequities in health care, can be a life-saving tool, especially in low resource settings.


The bulk to boundary mapping for massive scalar fields is constructed, providing a de Sitter analog of the LSZ reduction formula. The set of boundary correlators thus obtained defines a potentially new class of conformal field theories based on principal series representations of the global conformal group. Conversely, we show bulk field operators in de Sitter may be reconstructed from boundary operators. While consistent at the level of the free field theory, the boundary CFT does not satisfy cluster decomposition. The resulting conformal field theory does not satisfy the basic axioms of Euclidean quantum field theory due to Osterwalder and Schrader, so is likely not well-defined once interactions are included.


A microearthquake study carried out in the vicinity of Mount Katmai, Alaska, revealed disappearence of shear waves along certain paths crossing the volcanic range. A close geographical correlation of these paths and active volcanoes strongly suggests that magma or zones of partial melting exist and are responsible for S-wave shadowing. Three shallow (< 10 km) and one deeper (about 20 to 30 km) magma chambers are proposed. Additional evidence for the magma chamber is provided by the high attenuation of high-frequency P waves. From this attenuation an estimate of viscosity in a magma chamber of 108 cgs units is made.


The preparation of a lead-selective electrode based on 5,11,17,23-tetra-tert-butyl-25,26,27,28-tetrakis-(diphenylphosphinoylmethoxy)calix[4]arene (1) as an ionophore is reported. The plasticized PVC membrane containing 30% PVC, 57% ortho-nitrophenyloctylether (NPOE), 4% sodium tetraphenylborate (NaTPB) and 9% ionophore 1 was directly coated on a graphite electrode. It exhibits a nearly Nernstian slope of 28.0 ± 0.2 mV decade^-1 over a concentration range of 1 × 10^-5 - 1 × 10^-2 mol dm^-3 with a detection limit of 1.4 × 10^-6 mol dm^-3. The response time of the electrode was found to be ca. 17 s. The potential of the sensor was independent of the pH variation in the range 3.5–5.0. The selectivity of the electrode performance towards lead ions over Th^4*, La^3+, Sm^3+, Dy^3+, Y^3+, Ca^2+, Sr^2+, Cd^2+, Mn^2+, Zn^2+, Ni^2+, Co^2+, NH_4+ Ag+, Li+, Na+ and K+ ions was investigated. The prepared electrode was used successfully as an indicator electrode for a potentiometric titration of a lead solution using a standard solution of EDTA. The applicability of the sensor for Pb^2+ measurements in various synthetic water samples spiked with lead nitrate was also checked.


Deep learning (DL) models have demonstrated great potential in cuffless blood pressure (BP) estimation under static conditions, while the performance under dynamic conditions was still not fully validated. This study developed a DL model using population data for training and followed by individualized fine-tuning to directly learn features from multisensory signals including electrocardiogram (ECG), photoplethysmogram (PPG) and PPG derivatives for beat-to-beat BP estimation under water drinking. 25 healthy subjects were recruited, and the leave-one-subject-out approach was used to evaluate the model performance. The results showed that individualized fine-tuning using a small amount of individual baseline data did not change the tracking capability of the model, while can largely reduce the individual bias in dynamic BP estimation, with the mean absolute errors decreased from 13.43 to 9.49 mmHg and 8.48 to 5.54 mmHg for systolic BP and diastolic BP, respectively. It was also found that the model presented better results around the baseline BP levels than that at larger deviations from the baseline, indicating that future work should incorporate individual dynamic data in the fine-tuning to improve dynamic BP estimation further.


This research study addresses how the arrangement and morphology of the Graphene nanoplatelet (GNP) impacts the properties of epoxy nanocomposites using polycrystalline theory and micromechanics. The effective properties of the macroscopic epoxy network were used as inputs with GNP properties in the micromechanical model. Generalized Method of Cells (GMC) was applied to evaluate mechanical properties of the nanocomposites. The obtained results showed that the morphology and the arrangements of inclusions in epoxy have significant impact on the mechanical behavior of GNP/epoxy nanocomposites. The results of the simulations provide an understanding of the link between the morphology, the arrangement of the reinforcements, and the composite performance. The methodology can be used to optimize the GNP/epoxy performance for different engineering applications in automotive and aerospace industries.


Background: The novel gene HA117 is a multidrug resistance (MDR) gene expressed by all-trans retinoic acid-resistant HL-60 cells. In the present study, we compared the multidrug resistance of the HA117 with that of the classical multidrug resistance gene 1 (MDR1) in breast cancer cell line 4T1. Methods: Transduction of the breast cancer cell line 4T1 with adenoviral vectors encoding the HA117 gene and the green fluorescence protein gene (GFP) (Ad-GFP-HA117), the MDR1 and GFP (Ad-GFP-MDR1) or GFP (Ad-GFP) was respectively carried out. The transduction efficiency and the multiplicity of infection (MOI) were detected by fluorescence microscope and flow cytometry. The transcription of HA117 gene and MDR1 gene were detected by reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR). Western blotting analysis was used to detect the expression of P-glycoprotein (P-gp) but the expression of HA117 could not be analyzed as it is a novel gene and its antibody has not yet been synthesized. The drug-excretion activity of HA117 and MDR1 were determined by daunorubicin (DNR) efflux assay. The drug sensitivities of 4T1/HA117 and 4T1/MDR1 to chemotherapeutic agents were detected by MethylThiazolyl-Tetrazolium (MTT) assay. Results: The transducted efficiency of Ad-GFP-HA117 and Ad-GFP-MDR1 were 75%-80% when MOI was equal to 50. The transduction of Ad-GFP-HA117 and Ad-GFP-MDR1 could increase the expression of HA117 and MDR1. The drug resistance index to Adriamycin (ADM), vincristine (VCR), paclitaxel (Taxol) and bleomycin (BLM) increased to19.8050, 9.0663, 9.7245, 3.5650 respectively for 4T1/HA117 and 24.2236, 11.0480, 11.3741, 0.9630 respectively for 4T1/MDR1 as compared to the control cells. There were no significant differences in drug sensitivity between 4T1/HA117 and 4T1/ MDR1 for the P-gp substrates (ADM, VCR and Taxol) (P < 0.05), while the difference between them for P-gp nonsubstrate (BLM) was statistically significant (P < 0.05). DNR efflux assay confirmed that the multidrug resistance mechanism of HA117 might not be similar to that of MDR1. Conclusions: These results confirm that HA117 is a strong MDR gene in both HL-60 and 4T1 cells. Furthermore, our results indicate that the MDR mechanism of the HA117 gene may not be similar to that of MDR


This project aims to summarize the events present in clips coming from sports or news sequence as an augmented image. The summarization will be adapted to the capabilities of the multimedia mobile devices and networks. The user shall be provided with capabilities to view the information as a current video clip but he also will be able to retrieve semantically related visual information. To reach the proposed objectives, this project shall start from a clip acquired with a fixed camera. The project is divided into three main tasks, which are : a) Clustering and identification of trajectories generated from the different moving regions within the scene, b) representation of the clip with a panoramic image including information from the dynamic regions and from the camera movements (pan, tilt, zoom) enabling the reconstruction of the video clip at the user side and c), take advantage of the representation obtained in b in order to classify and structure a sports video sequence by events of interest (goals, etc.). Finally, the project will add user interacting capabilities using the representations mentioned above.


Sebuyau is a coastal fishing village located about 100km away from the main city of Kuching, Sarawak. Local communities depend on fishing activities, agriculture, small businesses, and cottage industry products as their economic resources. Sebuyau can be highlighted as one of the potential tourist attractions in Samarahan District through boat rentals to tourists for fishing and river cruise activities. Boat rental for fishing and river cruise activities is a community-based tourism (CBT) product that provides opportunities for boat operators or fishermen to engage in social entrepreneurship by using their existing boats. It is an approach to diversifying their sources of income with a lower impact on natural resources. However, to ensure a sustainable transformation, the local community needs to be given exposure, knowledge, and guidance to shift the activities of ordinary fishermen or individual boat owners to boat operators who are able to generate income from boat rental activities. Therefore, higher education institutions need to take proactive roles to assist local communities in ensuring this transformation is achievable. This article discusses the role of the higher education institution in developing entrepreneurial skills among boat operators in Sebuyau. In addition, this article also discusses the achievements of the local communities who have successfully managed their boat rental activities as a result of an approach involving the roles of higher education institutions.


Dear Editor, Chrysiasis has been reported many times in long-standing rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients undergoing chrysotherapy. We herein report an unusual case of laser-induced chrysiasis previously treated by microneedle therapy system (MTS) using gold. A 40-year-old female patient presented with hyperpigmentation on the face. The lesion was uniformly deep blue to gray in color with a metallic tint and included macular patches of various size and shape, especially on both cheeks (Fig. 1b). She had undergone laser toning with a 1064-nm neodymium:yttrium–aluminum–garnet (Nd:YAG) a week prior for melasma, which was present over the face (Fig. 1a), and after one pass during the first course, immediate edema developed and facial hyperpigmentation was noted. She had been treated with MTS 2 years prior, with the aim of improved skin condition by creating microscopic channels by mechanical puncture using thin golden needles. Histologically, dark brown to black colored granules inside dermal macrophages were observed; the particles in the upper dermis were elongated, ranging from scattered to a large collection in close proximity to dermal capillaries (Fig. 1c). Under cross-polarized light they showed a faint pink birefringence of pigmentation, more profound in the larger deposit (Fig. 1d). Chrysiasis is clinically defined as cutaneous pigmentation in patients on long-term chrysotherapy as a result of skin deposition of gold pigment. The gold standard for chrysiasis diagnosis was scanning electron microscopy (SEM) with microanalysis, but Al-Talib et al. have suggested to diagnose by finding a striking orange-red birefringence under cross-polarized light, as the past method is time-consuming, expensive, and requires specialist operators and devices. We have sought to utilize SEM, but had difficulties due to lack of equipment, and instead used cross-polarized microscopy. The specimen showed faint pink and we cannot confirm that this deposit was clearly gold; thus, the diagnosis of this case is suspicious. As the number of reported cases is low, one could argue the possibility that orange-red is not the only color, and that others may exist according to chemical formation. Our patient had a history of MTS with golden needle, and we believe this was when gold was introduced into skin.


Cannabis in Indonesia belongs to the type of narcotics class 1 means substances or drugs derived from plants that can cause decrease or change of consciousness, loss of pain and can cause dependence that cannot be used for the benefit of health services. In writing this thesis the author uses the method of legal juridical normative approach with the collection of literature study materials. In the discussion of this thesis the authors raised the problem about punishment of drugs abuse class 1 type of Cannabis according to Law No.35 of 2009 on Narcotics is related to the use of medical purposes with case studies Fidelis Ari. Based on the problems presented, it is concluded that the abuse of Narcotics class 1 type of Cannabis used for treatment is not justified for any reason and Law No.35 of 2009 on Narcotics has not developed in accordance with the progress of science and technology that change dynamically and particularly in the classification of marijuana as Narcotics class 1. The expectation of a revision of the Law or the rules governing the classification of marijuana as a class 1 drug to be used for medical use after research and clinical trials conducted on Government and community initiatives.


Observations of aerosol‐particle (AP) composition obtained via volatility measurements during the 'Rain In Cumulus over the Ocean' (RICO) experiment are presented. The measurements show that sub‐cloud APs with a radius rp ≤ 0.2 µm are composed mainly of ammonium sulphate, while APs with a radius rp ≥ 0.2 µm are composed mainly of sea salt. The AP distribution also contains an indeterminate non‐volatile component (rp ≤ 0.4 µm), which could be either elemental carbon or mineral dust. Copyright © 2008 Royal Meteorological Society


This study aims at evaluating the impact of wild-grown fruits (elderberry, sea-buckthorn, rowan, and hawthorn) on the nutritional properties of wheat-flour breads. The following parameters were measured: the content of the total starch (TS), slowly digestible starch (SDS), rapidly digestible starch (RDS), resistant starch (RS), the starch digestion index (SDI), the chemical composition (dry matter, protein, fat, dietary fiber, and ash). The breads enriched with wild-grown fruits had higher nutritional value due to significantly higher contents of fat and dietary fiber as well as ash in comparison with the control bread. Bread with sea-buckthorn had the lowest value of total starch (TS). All enriched breads had significantly lower content of rapidly digestible starch (RDS), except the hawthorn bread. Only the sea-buckthorn bread had significantly higher amount of slowly digestible starch (SDS), while the elderberry bread had significantly higher content of resistant starch (RS). Elderberry and sea-buckthorn breads had the lowest starch digestion index (SDI). The bread with elderberry fruits had the highest content of total polyphenols. All enriched breads had much greater antioxidant capacities than the control bread. The breads with elderberry exerted the strongest antioxidant capacity.


In recent years, 2D layered materials, including graphene, topological insulators, transition metal dichalcogenides, black phosphorus, MXenes, graphitic carbon nitride, and metal‐organic frameworks, have attracted considerable interest due to their potential applications in the fields of physics, chemistry, biology, and energy. Their rise in the field of nonlinear photonics began around 2009 and has become an important research direction. Here, the synthesis techniques, nonlinear optical properties, integration strategies, and device applications of layered materials are reviewed. In terms of nonlinear optical properties, the focus is on saturable absorption and Kerr nonlinearity. On this basis, their applications in various pulsed lasers, including fiber lasers, solid‐state lasers, waveguide lasers, and related nonlinear optical phenomenon, are summarized. In addition, novel optical devices using layered materials, such as optical modulators, optical polarizers, optical switchers, and even all‐optical device, are also involved. It is believed that the development of 2D layered materials in the field of photonics will continue to deepen, thus laying a good foundation for its practical application.


Objectives To develop a model of heart failure patients' attitudes, beliefs, expectations, and experiences based on published qualitative research that could influence the development of self-management strategies. Methods A synthesis of 19 qualitative research studies using the method of meta-ethnography. Results This synthesis offers a conceptual model of the attitudes, beliefs, and expectations of patients with heart failure. Patients experienced a sense of disruption before developing a mental model of heart failure. Patients' reactions included becoming a strategic avoider, a selective denier, a well-intentioned manager, or an advanced self-manager. Patients responded by forming self-management strategies and finally assimilated the strategies into everyday life seeking to feel safe. Discussion This conceptual model suggests that there are a range of interplaying factors that facilitate the process of developing self-management strategies. Interventions should take into account patients' concepts of heart failure and their subsequent reactions.


On the History of the Growth Optimal Portfolio (M M Christensen) Empirical Log-Optimal Portfolio Selections: A Survey (L Gyorfi et al.) Log-Optimal Portfolio Selection with Proportional Transaction Costs (L Gyorfi & H Walk) Log-Optimal Portfolio with Short Selling and Leverage (M Horvath & A Urban) Nonparametric Sequential Prediction of Stationary Time Series (L Gyorfi & G Ottuscak) Empirical Pricing American Put Options (L Gyorfi & A Telcs).


This invention provides an ophthalmologic apparatus that requires no fixation line control instruction by an operator to a patient even when executing an inspection set including a plurality of scanning conditions. In an ophthalmologic apparatus including a scanning unit configured to scan measuring light on an eye to be inspected and execute measurement of the eye to be inspected, and a fixation unit configured to fixate the eye to be inspected to a desired measurement position, a determination unit configured to determine whether to cause the scanning unit to continue the measurement of the eye to be inspected in accordance with an inspection set, and a fixation target control unit configured to change the on state of the fixation unit when the determination unit has determined to continue the measurement are arranged.


In its endocrine relationships, the kidney plays a tripartite role: It serves as a target organ for a number of hormones; it influences the metabolism of various others, including insulin and parathyroid hormone; finally it acts directly as an endocrine organ, secreting regulatory hormones. These renal-endocrine relationships and their effects, both physiologic and pathologic, on renal function are considered in detail.


The goal of this paper is to understand the impact of externally and internally directed launch activities on market launch success.


Abstract The stellarator plasma device has been widely studied as one of the candidate solutions paralleling the ITER project, and its coupling with a fission blanket can bring benefits promoting the development of fusion technology with stable energy production simultaneously. However, the neutronics optimization design for the stellarator-type Fusion-Fission Hybrid Reactor (FFHR) is extremely complex since the helical structure with a large amount of spline curved surfaces cannot be exactly described in most of the Monte Carlo simulation processes, and the preliminary design stage has also been a time-consuming and error-prone task with the requirements frequently changing. In this context, the mesh-oriented optimized method has been considered for the parametric modeling analysis in order to get the ideal structure without redundant topologic information, and the corresponding conversion process from computer-aided design (CAD) to Monte Carlo simulation has been fulfilled by the CAD-PSFO code. Moreover, the liquid type of thorium-uranium fuels has been selected as the solutes dissolve in the molten salt blanket with its multilayer structure, where the burnup feature and neutronics properties have been analyzed and explained with the help of the OMCB code. The stellarator-type FFHR has been designed as a compact multifunctional device that can incinerate plutonium and transmute the minor actinide isotopes with tritium self-sufficiency and the high-energy multiplication factor.


Corresponding Author: firstname.lastname@example.com Tel.: +234 806 277 2420 The socio-economic and management practices of acute and chronic symptoms of lymphatic filariasis were determined among twenty five randomly selected persons with such symptoms for a year in three endemic villages in Kano State, Nigeria. The instrument used was a questionnaire designed and validated by a medical sociologist. Out of the sixteen respondents with Adenolymphangitis (ADL), 4 (25%) sought traditional medicine, 6(37.5%) modern medicine while 6(37.5%) sought both traditional and modern medications. The treatment costs of the 16 respondents for traditional medicine to cure ADL only 2(12.5%) have spent between N1:00 to N500:00 during the last one year. Treatment costs for modern medicine for 7(28%) ranged from N1:00 to N500:00 while for 1(9.1%) it was about N1000:00. Eleven of the respondents with ADL claimed that it prevented or curtailed them from performing their daily activities within the last one year. The management practices among fourteen of the respondents with chronic symptoms revealed that 8(57.1%) sought traditional medicine, 3(21.4%) modern medicine and 3(21.4%) both traditional and modern medicine. The treatment costs for each of the two persons with hydrocoele that underwent surgery was about N5200:00. Only three persons with chronic symptoms claimed that prevented them from performing activities. The most common treatment seeking behaviour among the respondents was traditional medicine but a sizeable percentage also sought modern medicine. The socioeconomic burden was mainly associated with ADL may because those with chronic symptoms have developed coping mechanisms. Since Nigeria has launched its lymphatic filariasis control project, it is recommended that the management practices which varies from one endemic community to another be taking into consideration in order to succeed in morbidity control which is a key component of the programme.


Identity-based cryptography has been introduced by Shamir at Crypto'84 to avoid the use of expensive certificates in certified public key cryptography. In such system, the identity becomes the public key and each user needs to interact with a designated authority to obtain the related private key. It however suffers the key escrow problem since the authority knows the private keys of all users. To deal with this problem, Riyami and Paterson have introduced, at Asiacrypt'03, the notion of certificateless public key cryptography. In this case, there is no need to use the certificate to certify the public key, and neither the user nor the authority can derive the full private key by himself. There have been several efforts to propose a certificateless signature (CLS) scheme in the standard model, but all of them either make use of the Waters' technique or of the generic conversion technique (proposed by Yum and Lee at ACISP'04) which both lead to inefficient CLS schemes. Besides making use of the Waters' technique and the generic conversion technique (proposed also by Yum and Lee at ICCSA'04), there exists direct approaches to construct certificateless public key encryption (CLE) scheme in the standard model. ∗Address for correspondence: Faculty of Information Technologies and Communication, University of Hong Duc, Thanh Hoa, Viet Nam. Received April 2017; revised May 2018. 220 V.C. Trinh and S. Canard / Certificateless Public Key Cryptography in the Standard Model In this paper, we introduce a new and direct approach to construct a CLS scheme in the standard model with constant-size of all parameters and having efficient computing time. We also show that the Boneh et al.'s identity-based encryption scheme secured in the standard model at EC'04 can be extended to the certificateless setting. Interestingly, the resulting scheme can be comparable with the existing CLE schemes in term of both efficiency and security.


Homocysteine is a reactive sulfur-containing amino acid formed as an intermediary in the catabolism of the essential amino acid methionine. It has long been known that patients with certain genetic errors in homocysteine metabolism have very high total homocysteine levels (100 450 pinol/L), and that these patients suffer from premature arterio sclerosis and consequent cardiovascular events (1). The role of mild to moderate homocysteine elevation (-15-100 pmol/L) in the pathogenesis of cardiovascular disease in those without such genetic defects remains to be defined. Several large, prospective observational cohort studies have demonstrated that patients with moderately elevated homocysteine levels have an increased risk of cardiovascular disease compared to controls (2,3). This association has been shown, with some exceptions, to be independent of known cardiovascular risk factors and therefore it has been suggested that elevated homocysteine may be a novel risk factor for cardiovascular disease. Indeed, at the cellular level homocysteine has been implicated in endothelial injury, platelet activation, smooth muscle proliferation, oxidative modification of low-density lipoproteins, and in endothelial-leukocyte interactions (4). Large-scale clinical trials are now underway to assess the effect of homocysteine lowering on the primary and secondary prevention of cardiovascular events (5). However, their enrollment has begun in a period where widespread folic acid fortification of cereal grains has been undertaken by the governments of the U.S. and Canada with the intention of preventing neural tube defects in the newborn (6,7). This will almost certainly reduce the statistical power of these studies (10) by diminishing the prevalence of mild hyperhomocysteinemia (>13 ~tmol/L) in the study population by 50% according to one population-based analysis (8). Comparing folate supplementation against a background of population-wide dietary supplementation will make achieving significant homocysteine reductions more difficult as well as make less probable a significant difference in outcomes among treatment arms. Patients with chronic renal insufficiency, end-stage renal disease, and who are recipients of renal transplants compose a population exposed to dietary folic-acid fortification that retain an excess prevalence of hyperhomocysteinemia (9,11). This is a population that is also disproportionately stricken by cardiovascular. disease (11). This "high-risk" group clearly has an excess burden of traditional cardiovascular risk factors (i.e. diabetes, hypertension, dyslipidemia), but this only partially explains their excess prevalence of events (12). Elucidation of the roles of renal-specific cardiovascular risk factors including anemia, proteinuria, elevated thrombogenic factors and homocysteine is an area of active investigation. Confounding the research into a causal role for homocysteine and cardiovascular events in chronic renal failure is that serum total homocysteine levels are inversely proportional to glomerular filtration rate (13), perhaps reflecting renal metabolism rather than excretion (13). Elevated homocysteine in this population m ight be conceived of as a benign epiphenomenon reflecting merely the degree of renal dysfunction rather than an independent risk factor. A large-scale randomized placebo controlled homocysteine lowering trial whose primary endpoint would be cardiovascular events would help resolve this question. Endothelial dysfunction is the primary process in atherogenesis and both in vitro and in vivo studies have suggested that this may be the mechanism of homocysteine-induced vascular injury (4). Hyperhomocysteinernia has been associated with impaired endothelial-dependent vasodilation (14), which is a prevalent finding in chronic renal insufficiency (12), and a recent study of patients with known CAD randomized to homocysteine lowering therapy for 12 weeks had improvement in this parameter (15).


Case 1. Married, 26 years old. Gave birth once. Complaint - bleeding that began a week after urgent menstruation and continued for 26 days. Until this time, menstruation was correct. For five weeks, a growing tumor is seen in the left lower abdomen. Partly with a pipette, partly with a sharp spoon, part of the contents was removed from the uterine cavity, showing the presence of loheocytes and decidual cells. The suspicion of an ectopic pregnancy was confirmed by gastrointestinal surgery, and the entire sac (funnel, fallopian tube, omentum, ovarian wall) was removed. Recovery.


are locally diffeomorphisms. In particular dx = dY-=d. Then &εΙ(Χ,Υ,<€') maps ^a.compOO into L> tloc(X) if β ^ a — μ. This was shown by H rmander s a consequence of the calculus in [7]. By composing 3F with a fractional integral operator it is easy to see that ^G/*(jr,r,<jf') maps La,comp into I£Ioc, 2 ^ < 7 < o o , if β £ αμd/2 + d/q. More general if dx ^ dy and dnL has maximal rank 2dx then the same mapping properties hold for Fourier integral operators in the class ̂ 6/ + ~(T, 7,«")·


Ecotheology is a discipline that discusses the relationship of God, man, with nature. In berekoteology the need for a proper and biblical paradigm as the basis for maintaining the environment. The problem formulation in this study is: What is the right and biblical paradigm in philoteology? What is the attitude of believers towards the nature of creation? The purpose of this writing is to describe the right and biblical paradigm in theology and explain the attitude of believers towards the nature of creation. This research uses qualitative method with descriptive approach. The result of the discussion is that believers should have a theocentric paradigm. In addition, believers play a role as stewardship, build solidarity with nature and be directly involved in the recovery of environmental crises.


How should the pricing principles prescribed by welfare economic theory be translated into operational pricing policy for different transport services?
This question is considered for scheduled tra ...


The "3414"design was used in the test of fertilizer efficiency in maize planted in yellow soil to establish the application models for its high-yield in Xixiu district,Anshun city.The optimum yield was up to 480.96 kg/667m2 under the application amount of N 12.25 kg/667m2,P2O5 6.84 kg/667m2 and K2O 10.98 kg/667m2 calculated by the ternary quadratic regression equation.Because the recommended application amount calculated by the monomial quadratic regression equation was higher,the application amount calculated by the ternary quadratic regression equation should be referenced in maize production in Xixiu district,Anshun city.


The term 'identity' is used in a variety of discourses about Aboriginal people, their self-perceptions, their cultures, their lands, and their relationships with each other and with non-Indigenous society. Its overbroad deployment risks diffusing its meaning. Nevertheless, it has served, and no doubt continues to serve, a useful purpose as a gateway to reflection upon the complex, multi-dimensional and dynamic character of Australian Aboriginality.


have set up referral trauma center to centralize expertise to improve trauma management. There is scant and controversial evidence regarding the impact of provider's volume on the outcomes of trauma management. The aim of our study was to evaluate the impact of hospital volume on the outcomes of renal trauma management in a European healthcare system. METHODS: A retrospective multicenter study was conducted, including all patients admitted for renal trauma in 17 hospitals between 2005 and 2015. To evaluate the impact of HV we divided patients into four quartiles according to the caseload per year: low volume ( 8/year), moderate volume (9-13/year), high volume (14-25/year), and very high volume ( 26/year). The primary endpoint was failure of non-operative management defined as any interventional radiology (IR) or surgical procedure needed within the first 30 days after admission. RESULTS: Of 1771 patients with renal trauma, 1704 were included. There were significantly more non-operative managements in the very high and low volume centers (84.6% vs. 76.9% vs. 78.5% vs. 81.6%; p [ 0.02). Early follow-up imaging was used more commonly in lower volume centers (86.1% vs. 83.9% vs. 73.8% vs. 81%; p [ 0.0007). In univariate logistic regression analysis, very high hospital volume was significantly associated with a lower risk of non-operative management failure when compared to low (OR [ 0.54; p [ 0.05) and moderate hospital volume (OR [ 0.48; p [ 0.02). There were significantly less nephrectomies in the high and very high volume groups (0.9% and 0.5% vs. 1.9% and 3.5%; p [ 0.003). In multivariate analysis very high volume remained significantly associated with a lower risk of non-operative management failure compared to low (OR [ 0.48; p [ 0.04) and moderate volume (OR [ 0.42; p [ 0.01). CONCLUSIONS: In this multicenter study, the management of renal trauma varied significantly according to hospital volume. There were lower rates of nephrectomy and failure of non-operative management in very high volume centers. These results raise the question of centralizing the management of renal trauma patients which is currently not the case in our healthcare system.


Recognition of psychosocial factors associated with physical activity (PA) levels will facilitate development of targeted behavioural interventions to promote PA. The aims of this feasibility study were to screen individuals at risk of diabetes mellitus (DM), to quantify their physical activity (PA) levels and to investigate the associations between PA levels, exercise self-efficacy (ESE), psychological flexibility (PF) and health-related quality of life (HRQoL). Twenty-six adults at risk of developing DM were recruited. Participants' demographics, anthropometrics, ESE, PF and HRQoL, step counts using pedometers and self-reported PA levels (New Zealand physical activity questionnaire) over a 7-day period were collected. Participants' mean (SD) age, weight and BMI were 41.4 (13.2) years, 71.4 (17.5) kgs, and 26.39 (8.41) kg/m, respectively. Based on daily step counts, 32% of participants were classified as "low active". Mean (SD) scores of ESE, PF, HRQOL: physical (PCS) and mental component scores (MCS) were 3.4 (0.9) and, 47.8 (6), 51.4 and 49.2, respectively. ESE and MCS scores were positively associated with vigorous PA minutes/week (R= 0.17; p=0.04) and moderate PA minutes/week (R=0.20; p=0.03), respectively. This feasibility study highlights the potential association of positive psychosocial attributes in determining PA levels in a cohort of individuals at risk of developing DM. Shields C, Baxter D, Mani R (2016) Psychosocial correlates of physical activity levels in individuals at risk of developing diabetes mellitus a feasibility study. New Zealand Journal of Physiotherapy 44(3): 157-165. doi: 10.15619/NZJP/44.3.05


Purpose We aimed to compare the potential value of 68Ga-FAPI-04 and 18F-FDG PET/CT in primary cervical cancer and lymph node metastases. Methods Patients with cervical cancer underwent both 68Ga-FAPI-04 and 18F-FDG PET/CT. Histopathology and follow-up CT or MRI results (at least 3 months of follow-up) were used as reference criteria. Paired-sample t test was used to compare the SUVmax of 18F-FDG and 68Ga-FAPI-04 PET/CT for cervical cancer primary lesions and metastatic lymph nodes. Results A total of 35 patients with a mean age of 53 ± 11 years (range, 30–76 years) were included. The detection rate of both tracers for primary tumors was 100%. There was no significant correlation between 18F-FDG and 68Ga-FAPI-04 for SUVmax (14.5 ± 5.7 vs 15.1 ± 6.2; P = 0.645). In addition, the detection rates of 68Ga-FAPI-04 and 18F-FDG for lymph node metastasis were 100% and 98%, respectively. No significant difference was found in SUVmax between 18F-FDG and 68Ga-FAPI-04 groups (7.6 ± 4.0 vs 7.0 ± 3.5; P = 0.572). Twelve false-positive lymph nodes were detected in 8 patients with 18F-FDG PET/CT, none of which were developed on 68Ga-FAPI-04 PET/CT. Conclusion 68Ga-FAPI-04 PET/CT has a high tracer rate for the diagnosis of primary cervical cancer and lymph node metastases. Moreover, 68Ga-FAPI-04 PET/CT also showed good results in distinguishing metastatic lymph nodes from reactive lymph nodes of cervical cancer.


Microstructure and hardness of metallic powder of Cu was studied after high pressure torsion (HPT) with 10 torsions and high pressure of 6 GPa. The size Cu grain decreases drastically after HPT and reaches the nano size range. During HPT, Cu powder increases hardness and Hall-Petch hardening, due to...


By using the methods of documentary,testing and mathematical statistics,the current condition of students constitution in art colleges is monitored and evaluated so as to provide the reference for the students' health.The results show that the height of student's body fast grow and the weight grow not in the same as height.The physical fitness trend declines,and some indexes of constitution are lower than the average of all colleges students in 2000.Based on this result,the author analyzed the reason why the stuedent's physical fintness reduced,and put forward some countermeasures to promote the physical fitness health development.


The article is devoted to the analysis of constitutional guarantees and problems of the realization of passive electoral right of a citizen of the Russian Federation. Under the conditions of applying the proportional electoral system the realization of passive electoral right has its special features. The author has proposed the lawful mechanisms, which will make it possible to consider the special features in the electoral legislation.


Due to lagging in waste removal at the open pits, further economical mining has been questioned. Unfavorable trend of copper prices at the world market for past several years only worsen the situation. Aiming to provide continuity of extraction at existing ore deposits, currently mined by open pits, we started the considerations of possibilities for transition to underground mining of those deposits. Block caving mining methods were the primary choice for consideration. Paper gives some world experiences of those methods' application. The experiences had significant influence in designing the development and mining method for those deposits.