Deaths due to internal obstructions of the airway (choking) are preventable injuries that are often associated with underlying risk factors including neurologic impairment by disease, intoxication, or very young or old age. We reviewed 138 decedents with accidental internal obstruction of the airway. Records including autopsy, toxicology, and investigators' reports were reviewed for a five-year period. There were 138 choking deaths and the age ranged from one to 96 years (mean = 57). Neurologic disease (e.g., remote cerebral vascular events, dementia, developmental disorders) was the most common risk factor for fatal choking (51%), followed by acute alcohol intoxication (13%), psychiatric illness (8%), and young age (8%). In 8% of decedents, there was no identifiable risk factor following investigation, autopsy, and toxicological examinations. The choking episode most commonly occurred in residences (62%), followed by nursing home/long-term care facilities (20%), streets/parks (6%), restaurants/bars (4%), and schools (1%, including one culinary school). Meat was the most commonly identified food object (14%); non-food objects included drug packets. It is exceedingly rare for a neurologically intact adult to choke to death on a bolus of food without another underlying, identifiable risk factor. For death investigation, it is important to have a high index of suspicion for choking, and one must be careful not to confuse terminal aspiration of gastric contents with a fatal blockage of the airway by a swallowed bolus of food. A risk factor should be sought in each choking death, as it usually is the underlying cause of death.


Dreamweaver can not only design static webpage but also provide strong DB accessing function.Using DB access technology,records can be inserted、updated、deleted and queried by using form.In Dynamic webpage,DB accessing is a difficult and key point.It needs to install and configure web server,establish database and website to access to DB.Incorporating window operation with SQL code can develop a dynamic website that can query、insert、update、delete teacher information without writing program code.


Abstract. An analysis of existing methods and a new combined process of bimetallic fabrication are presented, according to which a special regular macro relief is made on the surface of its functional component by laser or mechanical treatment. The bimetallic component thus prepared is placed in sand form, the dimensions of the cavity of which correspond to its dimensions. A melt of the structural component of bimetal is fed to the surface of the functional component through a hole in the form of a special device with a defined flow rate. The process of manufacturing bimetal, the functional component of which was a nickel alloy, and structural – carbon steel St.3Mathematical modelling and computing determine the patterns of temperature distribution over the height of the projections of the macro relief when they are heated by the melt of the structural component of bimetal, depending on their geometrical parameters, thermophysical characteristics of the material, schemes and conditions of pouring. Metallographic studies have established the conditions under which metallurgical bonds are formed between bimetal components and their bond strength is ensured. It is proved that to insure high bond strength of bimetallic components and uniform distribution over the joint plane, it is necessary that the height of the macro relief and the step between them have the optimum value. In this case, the transverse dimensions of the projections (1x1) mm, the optimal dimensions of the projection height are 0.5 mm, the steps between them - 1.5 mm. The high efficiency of the new, innovative combined technology of bimetal manufacturing has been demonstrated.


This paper provides a tutorial in the use of artificial neural networks (ANNs) in accounting and finance in the form of a well-documented exploratory application of an ANN with automatic learning to the analysis and interpretation of the noisy data contained in the financial statements of a sample of small businesses. The application uses the learning algorithm of the Boltzmann machine (BM), which employs the technique of stochastic optimization called simulated annealing. Various experiments are run using balanced training sets and (un)balanced test sets. Since most assessment errors are boundary errors and the ratios of successful classifications for the test sets are clearly above chance for the balanced training/test sets, the BM with two- and three-class output separation appears to have practical value. As expected, the BM demonstrates better accuracy as the size of the training sample increases in a balanced fashion, and less accuracy as the test set is augmented in an unbalanced manner.


Disaster resilience is important for a smart city. Analyzing disaster cases within a scenario-based analytical framework provides an effective way to acquire specific experience in disaster prevention and emergency management. This study proposes a dynamic scenario model, which consists of developing scenario representation and developing scenario sequence. Developing scenario representation provides a normalized representation framework for disaster scenarios. Meanwhile, how to make the representation contributes to severity evaluation is discussed. Developing scenario sequence establishes dependencies among disaster scenarios to show the whole disaster evolution of disaster cases. A disaster case of a crude oil tank is taken as an example to give a better understanding of the dynamic scenario model. The result shows that the dynamic scenario model can establish a more structurally and normalized representation for disaster scenarios. Furthermore, the model also provides an intuitive way for evaluation of disaster consequence severity, which helps in improving the situation awareness of the disaster.


Scattering of radiation through crop canopies has been found to be linearly related over the entire to the foliage characteristics such as the foliage density and inclination index of foliage in the PAR range and by second degree regression in the NIR range. The scattering function presented higher cumulative values in the near infrared (NIR) as compared to the visible (PAR) range. The scattering was highly dependent on the crop geometry with higher amount of scattering in vertical inclined leaves and progressively decreased in crops with relatively horizontal 'nature of leaves.


From rapidly-increasing populations to diminishing natural resources, the Gulf of Mexico faces a complex array of threats that require a new, collaborative approach toward resource management. This paper describes a project that will create a preliminary Ecological and Developmental Assessment Model at the regional, national, and international scale for the Gulf and its bordering states. This model ultimately is intended to provide a broad group of decision makers and stakeholders accurate, timely and relevant information about the present and future states of the Gulf. This paper describes the project`s development, objectives, expected results, and benefits with special reference to the petroleum industry.


Using statistical comparisons and accounting for the variances between players of different eras and levels of competition, this work provides the answer to the question of the greatest home run hitter of all time.


One of the main technologies of cloud computing is virtualization. Virtualization allows Virtual Machines (VMs) to share physical resources simultaneously resulting in higher utilization of hardware resources and lower infrastructure costs. With the proliferation of VMs, the importance of virtual switches (vSwitches) comes to the forefront. The concept of network virtualization is connecting VMs using virtual switches. The virtual switches are responsible for the packet switching between VMs. A virtual switch can be designed and implemented by software or hardware. In this paper, the virtual environment we implement is a Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM) and we connect the VMs with Open vSwitch. The purpose with factorial design is effective to discern the impact and the extent of system workload on the performance of applications running on the VMs. We also measure and analyze the performance and overhead of different virtual switch deployment topologies.


Heterogeneity of organic matter (OM), including size, type, and organic pores within OM, is being recognized along with increasing study using SEM images. Especially, the contribution of organic pores to the entire pore system should be better understood to aid in the evaluation of shale reservoirs. This research observed and quantitatively analyzed over 500 SEM images of 19 core samples from Longmaxi-Wufeng Shale in the eastern Sichuan Basin to summarize the features of OM particles and OM-hosted pores and their evolution during burial. The features of organic pores as well as the embedded minerals within OM particles enables to recognize four different type of OM particles. The organic pore features of each type of OM particles were quantitatively described using parameters such as pore size distribution (PSD), pore geometry, and organic porosity. The PSD of weakly or undeformed porous pyrobitumen indicates that the large organic pores (usually 200 nm to 1 um) is less common than small pores but the major contributor to organic porosity. The organic porosity of OM particles covers a large range of 1–35%, indicating a high heterogeneity among OM particles. Based on analysis of 81 OM particles, the average of organic porosity of the five samples were calculated and ranges from 3% to 12%. In addition, samples from well JY1 have higher organic porosity than JY8. These results helped to reveal how significant the organic pores are for shale gas reservoirs. In addition to presenting many examples of OM particles, this research should significantly improve the understanding of type and evolution of OM particles and contribution of OM-hosted pores to the entire pore system of high to over mature shale.


The invention provides a mobile terminal based human-computer interaction method applicable to the field of communications. The mobile terminal based human-computer interaction method includes controlling a camera of a mobile terminal and acquiring a user's face image through the camera in real time; detecting positions of the two eyes according to the acquired a user's face image; extracting search windows according to the detected positions of the two eyes and initializing the search windows; determining positions of eyeballs of the two eyes from the search windows, and judging opening and closing states of the two eyes by detecting height of dark-pixel connected domain of eyeball areas; sending corresponding control instructions to the mobile terminal to perform corresponding operations according to the opening and closing states of the two eyes. The invention further provides a mobile terminal based human-computer interaction system which can control operations of the mobile terminal by blinking eyes, so that user experience is further improved.


A comparative study determined the ability to predict line-of-sight aircraft infrared radiance measurements using multispectral radiances derived from the AVHRR.


The utility model discloses a control system for a movable type engineering machine and the support legs thereof. The control system comprises a controller, a horizontal detecting device and a plurality of hydraulic control devices; the horizontal detecting device is used for obtaining the inclination angle of the movable type engineering machine; a plurality of support leg cylinders are respectively connected with a main hydraulic power source through the hydraulic control devices; and the controller controls the hydraulic control devices according to the inclination angle of the movable type engineering machine. The controller can decide the state of the movable type engineering machine, and can enable all the support leg cylinders to be synchronously stretched, or enable part of the support leg cylinders to be extended or retracted, to perform leveling operation. By adopting the control system, the dependence on the personal experience and the field observation and judgment ability of operators can be got rid of, and the status switching of the movable type engineering machine is accomplished while the safety of the movable type engineering machine is guaranteed, so that the efficiency of control operation can be greatly improved.


In this work, the response surface methodology (RSM) was used to investigate the influence of processing variables on two responses of electrical discharge machining (EDM) characteristics of AISI D2 steel. The response functions considered are material removal rate (MRR) and surface roughness (Ra), while machining variables are pulse current, pulse on time, duty cycle and gap voltage. The effects of the machining parameters were studied by adopting central composite design (CCD). The response variables were fitted to predictive quadratic polynomial models using multiple regressions, which reveal that pulse current is the most significant machining parameter on the response functions followed by pulse on time and gap voltage for MRR. However, the pulse current is most significant factor governing Ra. Applying the composite desirability function method, the optimal-setting of the parameters was obtained for MRR and Ra with reduced number of experiments that needed to provide sufficient information for statistically acceptable results.


The purpose of this study is to know the effectiveness of intervention program for chid with stuttering. Single male subject participated in this study. Subject is 6 year 3 month old child having severe stuttering and shows blocking and part-word repetition as his major type of stuttering. This program was included in combined verbal prompt and token economic and activity reinforcement and task analysis and multiple probe technique taken from applied behavior analysis and parent counseling. All sessions were thirty. As a result of this program, the subject showed 1.64 stuttering word per minute which is a mild level of stuttering.


lymph node enlargement. Biopsy of right inguinal lymph node and stomach biopsy returned positive for metastatic melanoma. The patient is currently being treated with immunotherapy. Conclusions The cutaneous melanoma dissemination to the gynecological tract is rare. The prognosis depends on the initial state and in advanced stages the prognosis declines, mainly due to the high rate of metastases, which are mostly lymphatic. Our case report demonstrates a diagnosis of ovarian malignant melanoma which simulated primary ovarian cancer. The differential diagnoses are sex cord-stromal tumors and germ cell tumors.


Perityle vigilans is described from the Sierra Madre Occidental of southwestern Chihuahua. It differs from other Perityle by the combination of its white ligules, sparsely setose- hispid achenes, finely grayish-villosulous tomentum, and absence of pappus bristles. The new species is believed to be most closely related to P. rosei and P. trichodonta, which occur about 800 km to the south. A key is presented that distinguishes the 12 known taxa of Perityle occurring in the northern Sierra Madre Occidental, an area of high diversity in the genus.


CASE A 43-years-old man was admitted to our Neuro-rehabilitation Unit with a severe aphasia and a moderate to severe right hemiparesis mainly involving the upper limb. CT scan showed a deep lesion in the left frontotemporal region. Complete hematological examination and cardiac ultrasounds were negative. A carotid Doppler scan showed an occlusion of left internal carotid artery (ICA), immediately after its origin. Cerebral catheter angiography showed an "irregular profile of ICA in the extracranial tract with fibroplastic phenomena and severe stenosis of its intracisternal tract and of the proximal tract of left MCA" (Figure). Diagnosis of "major stroke due to mean cerebral artery dissection in patient with fibromuscular dysplasia" was supposed and the patient continued oral anticoagulation treatment for six months. At one year-followup the patient did not present any ischemic recurrences with a slow but significant improvement of his neurological condition.


This paper describes a study whereby groups of users are tasked with learning Irish Sign Language (ISL) gestures in distinct environments and performing a comparison of outcomes to determine the general effectiveness of each method. One groups of users are tasked with learning via traditional tuition methods, and the second groups is placed in a virtual reality environment with a custom training module for teaching ISL gestures. This paper discusses such a study and details the processes, motivations and potential future work.


The present invention includes a first substrate and a second substrate facing each other; A liquid crystal layer formed between the first substrate and the second substrate; And comprises, including a first polarization layer formed on the first substrate, wherein the first polarizing layer is a plurality of carbon nanotubes aligned in a first direction in order to perform the anti-static function, with polarization Sikkim the incident light as to a liquid crystal display device and a method of manufacturing the same, characterized in that formed it comprise, According to the invention, a separate, without the need for a static electricity prevention layer, did not require the drawing process as in the prior art without causing the problem that the first polarizing layer is contracted, the getting the production and management of the first polarization layer easy, as the thin there is an advantage that can be produced.


The University of Tasmania is the state of Tasmania's only university and therefore plays a
significant role in state and community development. Decisions about the university's
transport facilities and operations impact on organizational and individual costs, social
accessibility, and environmental impact, and can have far reaching effects on the
community into the future. The University of Tasmania is one of Tasmania's largest
employers and as a growing institution it is a significant trip generator in the state. Here,
we share the journey, lessons and outcomes of the University of Tasmania's first holistic
sustainable strategy, the Sustainable Transport Strategy (UTAS STS). We particularly
discuss the process of the UTAS STS development, its business case, and the added
value the strategy has brought in terms of university and community sustainability. Finally
we discuss the community spillover benefits of the UTAS STS, what the development and
roll out of the strategy has meant for transport facilities and initiatives that extend beyond
our campuses, as well as how we are delivering significant education for sustainability and
operational sustainability objectives for the University.


Initial Gross Domestic Product (GDP) announcements are important economic signals that convey information on the state of the economy but contain substantial estimation error. We investigate how GDP estimation errors affect firms' real decisions and profitability. Consistent with theoretical predictions from the literature on macroeconomic signal errors, we find that GDP estimation errors are positively associated with one-quarter-ahead changes in firms' capital investments, production, inventory, and profitability. Stronger profitability responses to GDP signal errors are observed for firms that are more sensitive to macroeconomic fluctuations. We also observe a reversal in future quarters' corporate profits, consistent with initial over (under) production being met with declines (increases) in future profitability.


Oleaginous yeasts may provide an alternative platform for the sustainable
 production of microbial lipids-derived biodiesel and other health promoting bioactive
 metabolites such as natural pigments. In this regard, traditional fermented foods are
 unique and untapped habitats for the isolation and characterization of oleaginous yeasts
 with beneficial properties. In this study, we analysed the yeast diversity from selected
 traditional fermented foods of Manipur and Mizoram, India and studied their oleaginous
 attributes for biodiesel production. 14 potential oleaginous yeasts were isolated using
 culture-dependent techniques. The isolates were identified by 5.8S internal transcribed
 spacer (ITS) rRNA gene sequencing. Intracellular triacylglycerides (TAG) accumulation by
 yeast cells were confirmed by Nile red fluorescence microscopy. Fatty acid methyl esters
 (FAME) profile of the yeast strains were analysed by GC-MS. The identified yeast
 isolates belonged to seven different genera viz. Rhodotorula, Pichia, Candida,
 Saturnispora, Wickerhamomyces, Zygoascus and Saccharomyces. Rhodotorula mucilaginosa R2
 exhibited the maximum lipid content (% lipid/g dry cell weight) of (21.63 %) after 96 h
 of growth in nitrogen-limited medium. R. mucilaginosa R2 single cell oil (RMSCO) was
 transesterified into biodiesel with a conversion efficiency of 96.6 % using a
 heterogeneous potassium hydroxide catalyst (K-RAC) supported on R. mucilaginosa R2
 deoiled cake activated carbon. The physico-chemical properties of the biodiesel derived
 from R. mucilaginosa R2 single cell oil were within the limits of ASTM and EN standards.
 FAME analysis of the transesterified lipid extract suggested the potential use of yeast
 derived oil as an alternative to vegetable oil for biodiesel production. Furthermore,
 carotenoids obtained from the pink yeast R. mucilaginosa R2 was composed of
 torularhodin, torulene and β-carotene and exhibited strong antioxidant activity.
 Keywords: Oleaginous yeast, Triacylglycerides, Fermented food, Rhodotorula
 mucilaginosa


INOC 2019 The 9th International Network Optimization Conference was held on June 12–14, 2019, in Avignon, France. The papers submitted and accepted for inclusion for this special issue are organized as follows. Anapolska et al. [1] study the minimum color-degree perfect b-matching problem. They show the problem is NP-hard on bipartite graphs and also provide some inapproximability results. Then they propose several polynomial-time dynamic programming algorithms for special cases. Cambier et al. [2] consider optimization of the network expansion plan of a mobile telecommunication company, including the deployment and/or reinforcement of several technologies. The dynamics of subscribers' adoption of a technology are included in the model and can be influenced by subsidies from the operator. The authors propose a mathematical model and a heuristic strategy to solve it, and they then present a case study for 3G and 4G technologies. Marciano et al. [5] study the edge reversal strategy for scheduling, in which the objective is to minimize or maximize the concurrency of a distributed system. The complexity of the problem is studied as well as several approximation algorithms. A case study on assembling musical phrases is also presented. The conference version of this paper was awarded the Best Student Paper Award at INOC 2019. Tomaszewski et al. [7] propose a solution approach for semi-stable routing in Software-Defined Networks, where reconfigurations cannot be too frequent. The paper focuses on the issue of deciding when and how to reconfigure the network as traffic evolves. We would like to thank the authors for having submitted top-quality papers and the referees for their excellent reviews. Bernard Fortz and Luis Gouveia, Guest Editors


OZET Civciv rasyonlarinda en fazla kullanilan tahillarin (Bugday, misir, yulaf, arpa, akdan) proteinlerinin biyolojik degerlerini saptamak amaciyla civcivlere uc haftalik iki deneme duzenlenmis tir. . Biyolojik deger tayininde olcu olarak protein yarayisliltk orani (Protein Efficiency Ratio = P.E.R.) ve net proteinden yararlanma derecesi (Net Protein Utilizdtion = N.P.U.) degerleri kullanilmistir. Ayrica vucut suyu ve vucut nitrojeni arasindaki iliskiler ile P.E.R. ve N.P.U. degerleri arasindaki iliskiler de arastirilmistir. 1. En yuksek P.E.R. degerleri soya kontrol grubundan elde ed~lmis ve onu sirasiyla ,bugday, akdari, misir, arpa ve yulaf diyetleri izlemistir. Yulaf diyetinin P.E.R. degeri diger tahil diyeilerinin P.E.R. degerlerinden istatistik olarak onemli derecede dusuk (P L0.05) cikmistir. 2. N.P.U. degerlerinde de bu siralama, buyukluk sirasi· na gore, soya kontrol, akdari, misir, bugday yulaf ve arpa di· yeileri seklinde olmustur. Arpa ve yulaf diyetleri ise diger tahil. diyetlerinden onemli derecede dusuk bulunmustur. 3. v,ucut suyu ile vucut nitrojeni arasinda y = 9.80 + 42.10 X seklinde ifade edilebilen bir regresyon ile r = 0.942 i olan bir korelasyon hesaplanmistir. 4. P.E.R. ve N.P.U. degerleri arasinda da y = 0.85889 + 0.03021 X seklinde linear bir regresyon bulunmustur. Korelasyon -katsayisi ise r = 0.783 olmustur. THE BIOLOGICAL EVALUATION OF WHEAT, CORN BARLET; OAT AND MILLET PROTEINS IN CHICKS SUMMARY Two experiment were conducted to investigate the b.ilogical value of the protein of some cereals (Wheat, com; barley, oat, millet) whkh areextensively used in the rations of chicks. The exiperI! mehts were of three weeks dutation. . Cdteria used to mea:sure responses and evailuate the results were protein efficiency ratio (1'. E.R.) and net protein utilization (N.P.U.). In addition, the mterrelationship between the nitra· gen and water eantent of the body, and the intterrelationship betwe(;m N.p.U. and P.E.R. were alsa investigated. i. As far. as the P.E.R. is i concerned .the best result was obtained from the group fed on soybean meaL. According to their superiority, the cereals were in the following order: Wheat, millet, com, barleyand aat. There were significant differeIices betWeen aat and the other cereal prote~ ns relative to the p.:g.R. values. 2. N".P.U. values were in the fol1owing order: Soybean, control, millet, com, wheat, oot and barley. Oat and barley diets showed the lowest N.P.U. values amoung all the experiinental diets: 3 The regressiol1 equaiion obtained from the relationship between the water and nitrogen conf-ent of the body·· was y = -9,80 + 42,LUX and the correlatiion ·coefficient was r :;;: 0,942. 4. The regression equation and icorrelationcoefficientobtained from the relationship between the N.P.U. and P.E.R. values were respectivly y = 0,85889 + 0,03021 X and r = 0,783.


Pancreaticopleural fistula is a diagnostic challenge to physicians. The diagnosis should be suspected if a patient presents with pleural effusion in a setting of chronic pancreatitis. The significantly raised amylase in the pleural fluid offers an important clue to the diagnosis. Computed Tomography (CT), Endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography (ERCP) and Magnetic resonance cholangiopancreatography (MRCP) can reveal the fistulous tract between the pancreas and the pleural space. The therapeutic options include medical, endoscopic, as well as surgical interventions. Here we report a case of pancreaticopleural fistula in a chronic alcoholic that was treated successfully by medical management.


Purpose: This study was designed to identify the effect of auriculotherapy on low abdominal pain and dys- menorrhea in school-aged girls. Methods:This design was a pre and post-test with nonequivalent groups. The subjectswere 71 girlswho weremiddleschool students withdysmenorrheal (35 students for the treatment group and 36 students for the comparison group). The subjects of the treatment group received auriculotherapy once aweek for 10weeks. The comparison group received instruction on auriculotherapyandwas requestedwaiting for the order. Results:The treatment group reported significantly less low abdominal pain than the comparison group. However, therewere not statistical differencesin reported dysmenorrhea. In future analysis, 60.0%of the treatmentgroupreportedmorephysical comfort, and45.7%reportedmoreemotionalcooldown. Conclusion:The findingindicatethatauriculotherapycouldbeeffectiveindecreasinglow abdominal painduringmenstrual periods. Therefore, auriculotherapy could be an effective nursing intervention for low abdominal pain occurring during mensuration. However, further studies need to be done to support auriculotherapy as effective.


Holstein dairy cows (n=21) entering second or greater parity were enrolled in blocks of 3 during the dry period (28 days before expected calving date) and randomly assigned to 1 of 2 treatments or a control group: the BCCA group (n=7) received 384 g per day of RPBCAA (BALCH EMTM) mixed with 200g of dry molasses top dressed in feed from calving to 35 days-in-milk (DIM); the BCAA plus PG (BCCAPG) group (n=7) received 384 g per day of RPBCAA mixed with 200g of dry molasses top dressed in their feed from calving to 35 DIM plus 300 ml of PG from calving until 7 DIM; the control group (n=7) received 200g of dry molasses top dressed from calving to 35 DIM. Cows were kept in tie stalls to measure daily intake and refusals. Postpartum, cows were milked 3 times a day and milk weights were recorded at each milking. Milk samples were collected from 3 consecutive milkings once a week and analyzed for fat and true protein. Blood was sampled 3 times per week 21 days before excepted calving until 21 DIM. Betahydroxybutyric acid (BHBA) was measured cow side using a TaiDoc ketone meter (Pharmadoc, Liidersdorf, Germany). Repeated measures ANOVA was conducted for the outcomes of BHBA, true protein as a percentage of total solids in milk, and total milk production until 35 DIM. Results


iii CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION 1 1.1 Prologue: My Story 1 1.2 Diabetes in context 3 CHAPTER TWO: THE PATIENT-PROVIDER RELATIONSHIP AND T2DM ....... 11 2.


Mobile devices have become a popular form of interacting with others, even those in a shared setting. When copresent, communication mediums like SMS and IM also provide channels to engage in discussions that parallel larger, more central discussions, such as lectures and presentations. In the interest of exploring this phenomenon, we present Backchannel, a mobile application for communicating with those around you discreetly. We have two goals with this project. First, by sampling other mobile communication mediums, we seek to develop a novel locationsensitive method of interacting with others. Secondly, we wish to observe its use among actual mobile device owners and capture any emergent behavior that arises. ACM Classification: H5.2 [Information interfaces and presentation]: User Interfaces. Graphical user interfaces. General terms: Design, Experimentation, Human Factors


We present a field-based approach to the analysis of cosmic shear data to infer jointly cosmological parameters and the dark matter distribution. This forward modelling approach samples the cosmological parameters and the initial matter fluctuations, using a physical gravity model to link the primordial fluctuations to the non-linear matter distribution. Cosmological parameters are sampled and updated consistently through the forward model, varying (1) the initial matter power spectrum, (2) the geometry through the distance-redshift relationship, and (3) the growth of structure and light-cone effects. Our approach extracts more information from the data than methods based on two-point statistics. We find that this field-based approach lifts the strong degeneracy between the cosmological matter density, (cid:2) m , and the fluctuation amplitude, σ 8 , providing tight constraints on these parameters from weak lensing data alone. In the simulated four-bin tomographic experiment we consider, the field-based likelihood yields marginal uncertainties on σ 8 and (cid:2) m that are, respectively, a factor of 3 and 5 smaller than those from a two-point power spectrum analysis applied to the same underlying data.


A 40-year-old patient with no cardiovascular risk factors nor medical history was referred for chest pain with EKG atypical anterior leads repolarization changes. Transthoracic echocardiography showed normal left ventricular function and a large vessel behind the left atrium. The computed tomography scan showed a large coronary arteriovenous fistula between the right coronary artery and the coronary sinus ( Panel s A, …


Character recognition is intricate work because of the various writing styles of different individuals. Most of the published work on handwritten character recognition problems deals with statistical features, and a few works deal with structural features, in general, and Gurmukhi script, in particular. In the present work, we propose a methodology for offline handwritten Gurmukhi character recognition by using a modified division points (MDP) feature extraction technique. We also compare this technique with other recently used feature extraction techniques, namely zoning features, diagonal features, directional features, intersection and open end points features, and transition features. To select a representative set of features is the most significant task for a character recognition system. After feature extraction, the classification stage makes use of the features extracted in the previous stage to recognize the character. In this work, we used linear-support vector machines (linear-SVM), k-nearest neighbor (k-NN), and multilayer perceptron (MLP) classifiers for recognition. For experimental analysis, we used 10,500 samples of the isolated, offline, handwritten, basic 35 akhars of Gurmukhi script. The proposed system achieved a maximum recognition accuracy of 84.57%, 85.85% and 89.20% with linear-SVM, MLP and k-NN classifiers, respectively, with a five-fold cross validation technique.


It has been ten years since Russia started to open is commodity prices and transit to market economy.How to comment on the 10 year economic transition of Russia?Concluding the contradictions and results of the economic transition in Russia in the 1990s,the paper analyzes the current economic situation in Russia,the tendency and prospects of economic reform and economic development in the future,and its affecting factors. The paper tries to look for some enlightenment to the economic reform in China.


Abstract This article presents a historical overview of traditional music studies in Chile, pointing out some of the main achievements and problems. It describes the origins of traditional music studies through the establishment of the Chilean Folk Society in 1909 and then offers a periodisation of studies during the twentieth century, followed by a critical review of the preference for facts over processes. Finally, it explores the renaissance of traditional music studies during the last 30 years (1990–2020), analysing 123 dissertations about traditional music and the concepts of "tradition" they employ. It concludes that Chilean folk studies have changed from a scientific to a humanistic approach, using the idea of tradition as a comprehensive concept and the idea of folklore as behaviour or performance.


22S I appreciate the opportunity to discuss this article1 that deals with "barriers to optimal pain management" and offers solutions for the problem. It provides a valuable addition to the Pain Management Supplement to Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery. Pain management is a primary factor in the postoperative care of plastic surgical patients. They are largely treated in ambulatory surgery centers, and failure to control pain in that setting has negative effects. It increases the time in the surgery center, delays recovery, and can lead to unanticipated readmissions to the facility or to a hospital. Hospital inpatients also require careful pain management. Because of the prevalence of opioid tolerance, a broad approach to pain control is necessary. There are an increasing number of patients who routinely use or abuse opioids. Opioids are associated with postoperative deaths. Keyes et al2 reported 23 deaths in 1,414,418 cases. Three of the deaths were from abuse of postoperative analgesics. Two patients were wearing fentanyl transdermal patches and using quantities of hydrocodone (Vicodin), and the third patient was using large quantities of opioids. For many reasons, opioids should be minimized in the postoperative period and they commonly contribute to postoperative nausea.3 Appropriate medications for nausea control are required. A multimodal plan set up preoperatively for both pain and nausea can decrease the need for opioids. Pain control is key perioperatively and must be taken into account by the physician from the initial consultation and discussed in detail with the patient. It is important to involve the patient's family or caregivers. With preoperative assessment and planning, it is possible to achieve effective pain management. Postoperative pain assessment is an important responsibility of the facilities' staff. There are many variables, and a reliable and valid pain assessment tool must be used.3 Pain is multifactorial so its successful treatment depends on an approach using multiple modalities. Dr. Viscusi emphasizes nonopioid multimodal medications, an excellent approach to the broad problem of postoperative pain control. One of the drugs in his program is ketorolac (Toradol). He states that nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs have been avoided in plastic surgery due to bleeding concerns but maintains that the literature does not corroborate this belief. This is a controversial statement because there are articles that show the increased risk of bleeding when ketorolac is used. When plastic surgeons are polled on the use of ketorolac, there is no uniform opinion on the risks versus the benefits if it is used as part of a multimodal approach. Other nonopioid medications recommended include celecoxib (Celebrex), a COX-2 inhibitor not associated with a significant increased risk of postoperative bleeding, and the antineuropathic medications, such as gabapentin (Neurontin) and pregabalin (Lyrica), which are not associated with bleeding problems. Effective perioperative pain control decreases the risk of chronic or persistent postsurgical pain (CPSP). The incidence of CPSP rises in patients who have poor pain management in the early postoperative period. This article emphasizes pain control issues associated with breast surgery and reports the incidence of chronic pain for mastectomy with reconstruction patients at 49%. It is therefore vital to avoid early postoperative uncontrolled pain. The barriers to effective pain management are discussed in Table 3 presented by Baratta et al.1 The table is divided into 2 categories: those physician/nursing-related and those patient-related. These are well thought out and important hurdles for the physician to consider to manage postoperative pain. The takeaway message from this approach is that the consequences of inadequate postoperative analgesia are profound and increase the risk


Tile effects of addition of eggshell to sawdust substrate for the growth of F. velutipes were investigated. Eggshell used in this study contained 20.7% C, 0.81% N, 2530 ppm and 44.37% Ca. The addition of eggshell resulted in the increase in bulk density and decrease of moisture content of the substrate. The addition of eggshell significantly increased the yield of the mushroom fruitbody. The addition rate of 15% (v/v), by 25% and at the rates of 5% and 10%, about 20%. Although the addition of eggshell to substrate did not improve the quality of mushroom, it increased the number of effective stipes as compared to control plot; approximately 13% more than in the control plot.


With Hexi Corridor as the study case, this study established an evaluation index system for the development of the industrial parks and industrial clusters, and used the coupling coordination model and exploratory spatial data analysis method (ESDA) to explore the evolution and spatial correlation of the coupling coordination between the industrial park and industrial clusters in Hexi Corridor from 2005 to 2017. It is found that from 2005 to 2017, the industrial parks and industrial clusters has shown closer correlations; despite the high level of coordination, the degree of coupling remains low; the Hexi Corridor has not yet developed a growth engine for the coordinated development of the industrial parks and the clusters, and there is no county-level industrial entities that have strong stimulating power. Given the requirements of the current industrial agglomeration model for regional innovation capabilities, this study proposes suggestions for coordinated development of industrial parks and industrial clusters in Hexi Corridor.


Abstract Uroleucon is one of only two genera of Aphidinae to have undergone significant speciation in South America, with a group of about 14 endemic, morphologically similar species feeding on native Compositae, especially Baccharis. Multivariate morphometrics (canonical variates analysis, CVA) was used to discriminate between these species and compare them with the North American subgenus Lambersius , in which most of them have hitherto been placed. It is concluded that they probably form a separate monophyletic group. Four new species are described in this group — brevisiphon , essigi , petrohuense and pseudomuermosum — and five names are placed in synonymy. Of the other species of Uroleucon in South America, U. lizerianum is widespread and feeds on many species of native and introduced Compositae; it is morphometrically inseparable from the North American species U. ambrosiae and is probably an introduced form of that species, but has consistently fewer secondary rhinaria. A key is provided to the 19 available species of Uroleucon recorded from South America.


The application of Common Size Statement is an analysis method to find out the percentage of investment in each asset to the total assets, and to find out the capital structure and the cost composition which has occurred and it is related to the amount of sales. This research is meant to find out how the application of Common Size Statement is in order to assess the financial performance of PT Ricky Putra Globalindo,Tbk in Indonesia Stock Exchange 2009-2013 periods. It has been found from the result of the research that the company is in good financial condition. The proportion of post investment of current assets of PT Ricky Putra Globalindo,Tbk shows an upward trend and non-current assets shows a downward trend, so it can be stated that the short term financial condition is in the liquid condition. Moreover, the proportion of capital structure on the short term liability post shows a downward trend, the long term liability shows an upward trend and the equity post shows a downward trend. The tendencies toward these trends show the ideal proportion of capital structure. Furthermore, on the profit and loss statement of PT Ricky Putra Globalindo, Tbk in 2009-2013 periods the sales of the company increases every year. The HPP post shows a tendency of a downward trend, the business burden post shows a tendency of an upward trend and the net profit post shows a tendency of an upward trend. It can be concluded that the company can reduce their costs and the net profit increases every year. Keywords : Application Common Size Statement, Trend, Financial performance, Balance Sheet, Loss-Profit Statement.


One of the most significant challenges humanity will face is food production. In order to preserve the output, mineral fertilizers are essential. However, it's not a suitable option in the long term. Magnesium is a crucial macronutrient, but it is the most limiting element in agriculture. Nanotechnology, with the implementation of nanofertilizers, is an excellent alternative since it provides nutrients, supports growth, and improves production; this in low amounts is more sustainable than conventional fertilizers. Although there is a piece of limited information regarding the proper foliar application of this macronutrient, the study helped to validate the effect of the foliar application of Magnesium nano fertilizer on the physiological, biochemical responses and yield of bean plants. Bean plants ejotero cv. 'Strike' and magnesium nanoparticles were applied at doses of 0, 50, 100, and 200 ppm. The biomass accumulation, yield, activity of the enzyme nitrate reductase, and photosynthetic pigments were evaluated. The foliar application of Mg nanoparticles at 50 ppm generated the highest amount of biomass and photosynthetic pigments. The 100 ppm dose improved pods yield and allowed the increased activity of the Nitrate Reductase enzyme. The results obtained suggest that, when increasing the dose of magnesium in plants, the amount of carotenes decreases.


Abstract The distribution of bacterial and ciliate abundance, ciliate community composition and other parameters were studied during summer along a transect from the mouth of the Słupia River to offshore waters (southern Baltic Sea). Bacteria were examined under an epifluorescence microscope and ciliates were observed under an inverted microscope. Two water masses were identified along the transect. Less saline waters in the river mouth and in the surface layer in the port of Ustka were characterized by high bacterial abundance (5.51–6.16 × 106 ml−1) and low ciliate abundance (0.34–0.90 cells ml−1). More saline waters in the near-bottom zone in the port of Ustka and in the surface layer outside the port contained smaller numbers of bacteria (0.99–2.14 × 106 ml−1) and larger numbers of ciliates (2.65–5.40 cells ml−1). The differences were statistically significant. The separation of the two water masses indicated that the Słupia River exerted a minor impact on the marine waters. The ciliate community composition changed along the transect studied. The main statistically significant difference observed was the low contribution of oligotrichs and choreotrichs to ciliate biomass (3–4%) in less saline waters and their dominance (45–80% of ciliate biomass) in more saline waters.


A 63-year-old woman was admitted to our gastroenterology unit to undergo a screening colonoscopy, scheduled for faecal occult blood test positivity. During the procedure, a flat, rectal granular lesion was found. With the use of magnification and narrow band image (NBI) technology, the lesion was diagnosed as a laterally spreading tumour (LST), granular mixed type, 30 mm in maximum diameter (figure 1). The pit pattern was unclassifiable and vascular pattern was similar to the type IV of the classification proposed by Inoue regarding the microvasculature pattern of the oesophagus for diagnosis and evaluation of the squamous cell carcinoma. The …


The question is almost as old as Western philosophy itself: What is the relation of morality to the will of the gods? Plato's Socrates famously asks: "Is what is holy holy because the gods approve it, or do they approve it because it is holy?"I Within monotheistic religious traditions there is ample historical precedent for disagreeing with Plato and taking morality to be dependent on the will of God. Though theological voluntarism has not been popular among contemporary moral philosophers, there has been a revival of interest in it during the past two decades among analytic philosophers of religion. This revival has been sensitive to the fact that the extreme view according to which divine volitions are wholly arbitrary is just one among many forms of voluntarism and may well not be the most plausible version of the position. I begin this paper by taking stock of what has so far been accomplished in the course of that revival. But my aim is not merely to summarize what has already been done; I also mean to make a contribution to the project of breathing new life into theological voluntarism. So I go on to make a proposal about what should be done next on behalf of this neglected tradition of moral thought, and I then act on my proposal by discussing two promising strategies of argument in support of the view that morality depends on the divine will. One should, of course, be appropriately modest in one's hopes and expectations for success in a project that many philosophers are bound to regard as quixotic. It is most likely not to be expected that philosophers whose deepest loyalties bind them to the predominantly secular assumptions of contemporary academic moral philosophy will be persuaded that theological voluntarism deserves to be taken seriously. It is, however, reasonable to hope that such philosophers can be brought to acknowledge that there are intellectually vital and respectable traditions of moral


In this study, analysis of extending the linear modulation range of a zero common-mode voltage (CMV) operated n-level inverter by allowing reduced CMV switching is presented. A new hybrid seven-level inverter topology with a single DC supply is also presented in this study and inverter operation for zero and reduced CMV is analysed. Each phase of the inverter is realised by cascading two three-level flying capacitor inverters with a half-bridge module in between. Proposed inverter topology is operated with zero CMV for modulation index <86% and is operated with a CMV magnitude of V-dc/18 to extend the modulation range up to 96%. Experimental results are presented for zero CMV operation and for reduced common voltage operation to extend the linear modulation range. A capacitor voltage balancing algorithm is designed utilising the pole voltage redundancies of the inverter, which works for every sampling instant to correct the capacitor voltage irrespective of load power factor and modulation index. The capacitor voltage balancing algorithm is tested for different modulation indices and for various transient conditions, to validate the proposed topology.


The advantages of the instrument here shown over other similar instruments are as follows: The blades or teeth are so constructed that they grasp a considerable portion of the tonsil, but do not tend either to crush off or tear out the grasped portion; consequently, having once engaged the tonsil they remain in place from the beginning to the end of the operation, even in case of a very friable tonsil. The extreme lightness of the instrument, its small size, and the bend of the handles insure its remaining in position throughout the operation without either dragging unduly on the tonsil by its weight, or interfering with the manipulations of the operator. Scissors, knives or dissecting instruments of any kind may be used around it with the greatest ease. It interferes in no way with the patient's comfort. A tonsillotome or the loop of a wire snare, no matter how


Over the last year, the Georgia Tech group has experimentally studied vertical turbulent sheets of water issuing downwards into atmospheric pressure air at Reynolds numbers Re = U{sub 0}{delta}/{nu} = 53,000 and 120,000 and Weber numbers We = {rho}U{sub o} {sup 2}{delta}/{sigma} = 2,900 and 18,000, respectively. Here, U{sub o} is the average jet speed, {delta} is the jet thickness (short dimension) at the nozzle exit ({delta} = 1 cm), and {nu}, {rho} and {sigma} are the kinematic viscosity and density of water and the surface tension at the air-water interface, respectively. These Re and We values are about 50% and 20% of the prototypical values for HYLIFE-II, respectively. In this report, the flow coordinate system is defined so that the origin is at the center of the nozzle exit, with the x-axis along the flow direction, the y-axis along the long dimension of the nozzle, and the z-axis along the short dimension of the nozzle (cf. Fig. 1). During the final year of this project, we have made three contributions in the area of thermal-hydraulics of thick liquid protection, namely: (1) Experimentally demonstrated that removing as little as 1% of the total mass flux using boundary-layer (BL) cutting can more » reduce the number density of the drops due to turbulent breakup of the liquid sheet below the maximum background density levels recommended for HYLIFE-II of 5 x 10{sup -19} m{sup 3}; (2) Shown that a well-designed flow conditioning section upstream of the nozzle can greatly reduce surface ripple, and that boundary-layer cutting can be used in conjunction with well-designed flow conditioning to further reduce surface ripple below the 0.07{delta} beam-to-jet standoff proposed for HYLIFE-II; and (3) Quantified how different flow conditioner designs affect the rms fluctuations of the streamwise (x) and transverse (z) velocity components in the nozzle itself (i.e., upstream of the nozzle exit) and affect surface ripple in the near-field of the flow, or x {le} 25{delta}. The rest of this section details these conclusions. In all cases, further details of this work can be found in the doctoral dissertation by Durbin. « less


Background The aim of this research is to analyze the efficacy of neostigmine in the treatment of postoperative urinary retention (POUR). Methods In this research, we screened multiple databases including PubMed, EMBASE, Web of Science, and Chinese National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI). After a systematic search process, data extraction was conducted. Review Manager 5.2 was adopted for meta-analysis, sensitivity analysis, and bias analysis. Results After searching for articles, 20 eligible trials including 1,850 patients after surgery were extracted. Our results suggested that the neostigmine group had a higher effective rate for urinary retention than the Chinese traditional and physical therapy group (OR =7.47, 95% CI: 4.10–13.59, overall effect P<0.001). Further subgroup analysis showed that neostigmine acupoint injection was better than neostigmine intramuscular injection. Time to first voiding in the neostigmine acupoint injection group was shorter than that in the neostigmine intramuscular injection group (MD =–81.92, 95% CI: –130.13 to –33.70, overall P<0.001, I2=99% with random effects model). Furthermore, neostigmine acupoint injection improved urine excretion (MD =243.40, 95% CI: 201.62–285.18, overall P<0.0001) and reduced the residual urine volume (MD =–41.31, 95% CI: –58.05 to –24.58, overall P<0.001, I2=75% with random effects model). The results of the sensitivity analysis and publication bias showed that this research was robust and had little publication bias. Discussion Our meta-analysis results suggest that neostigmine can effectively improve the symptoms of POUR and neostigmine acupoint injection may achieve a better therapeutic effect.


Context: Some patients diagnosed with small renal solid masses or complex cystic lesions may benefit from active surveillance (AS) instead of immediate treatment. Aims: Report our series of patients undergoing AS for small renal solid and complex cystic lesions, and compare growth rates and outcomes between both types of lesions. Materials and Methods: A retrospective review AS database for renal lesions was conducted. From 1995 to 2017, a total of 82 patients with 89 renal lesions were included. We describe our AS protocol, patient and tumor characteristics, comparisons between solid and cystic lesions, and final outcome of patients who underwent delayed intervention (DI). Statistical Analysis Used: Categorical and continuous data were analyzed by the Chi-square and the Student's t-test, respectively. The Wilcoxon/Kruskal–Wallis test was used for growth rate comparisons of solid and complex cystic lesions. Results: Median age of patients at the beginning of AS was 77-year-old, median size for solid and cystic lesions was 2.3 cm (0.08–3.8) and 2.6 cm (1.2–4.0), respectively. No differences in annual growth rate between solid and complex cystic lesions (0.04 cm [0.00–1.5] and 0.05 cm [0.01–1.7]) were observed at a similar median follow-up of 61 months for both groups (range: 15–182, and 14–254). Five patients with solid lesions underwent DI, 3 for rapid growth (>0.5 cm/year), 1 demanded treatment, and 1 due to hematuria. Adherence to AS protocol was high (94%). No cancer-related deaths or metastatic progression was observed, six patients died of another medical condition, being cardiovascular disease the most frequent cause. Conclusions: AS is a reasonable and safe option for the management of small renal masses. No difference was observed in the growth rate between solid and complex cystic lesions during AS. Centers offering AS should present a standardized protocol and give exhaustive information to patients regarding benefits and risks.


1. Introduction. A considerable amount of attention has been paid to the problem of determining the conditions which decide whether a liquid heated from below is stable or unstable. The motion consequent upon the disturbance of an unstable ideal gas does not, however, seem to have been treated so far, and this problem forms the subject of the present paper. Heat conduction and viscosity are at first neglected, and we are therefore dealing with the small motions of a gas slightly disturbed from a position of equilibrium under the influence of gravity. The condition for the stability of such a gas is well known, namely, the temperature gradient must be less than the adiabatic gradient. Furthermore, it is known that there is a sharp distinction between slow large-scale (meteorological) and rapidly varying small-scale (acoustical) phenomena. The present paper confirms these points and derives the time scale of meteorological phenomena. Heat conduction and viscosity are then shown to set a lower limit to the dimensions of such disturbances, while the effect of the earth's rotation is shown to be negligible.


The precise disturbance determination in fire and burglary protection systems by linear detectors, independently of its type, is a main problem of modern fire and burglary control equipment. This work presents experimental results realized on five different types of coaxial cables: RG U/6, RG 178 B/U, RG 122/U, RG 213/U and RG 214/U, every 200 m long by impulse reflectometer TX6000 in possible burglary protection systems where the coaxial cable should be used as detector. This work is just a small part of a large investigation applied for realization of PhD thesis "Fire and burglary protection using non-typical electric lines", which was approved by University of Niš, evidence number 8/20-01-003/11-019.


Marketing is carried out in order to introduce products and services to potential consumers. MSMEs as supporting the country's economy also need marketing media to increase interest in potential buyers. This community service program is carried out on MSMEs in Madiun Regency, namely the Bengkel Truk Hartono and Warung Mbak Tut. The activity was carried out for 2 weeks from January 3 to 17, 2022. Finally the Bengkel Truk Hartono was assisted to create and use a membership program as a promotional step and Warung Mbak Tut used google my business as a marketing medium


In the present study a sonification of running data was evaluated. The aim of the sonification was to both convey information about the data and convey a specific emotion. The sonification was evaluated in three parts, firstly as an auditory graph, secondly together with additional text information, and thirdly together with an animated visualization, with a total of 150 responses. The results suggest that the sonification could convey an emotion similar to that intended, but at the cost of less good representation of the data. The addition of visual information supported understanding of the sonification, and the auditory representation of data. The results thus suggest that it is possible to design sonification that is perceived as both interesting and fun, and convey an emotional impression, but that there may be a trade off between musical experience and clarity in sonification.


We have developed a thin, modular, and stackable diode package to produce a flat diode pump aperture of high brightness. We have incorporated microchannel cooling technology into the package to also permit high average power operation. The packages are 2 cm wide and mount 1.8 cm of diode bar. The packages can be stacked with a pitch of 5.5 packages per centimeter. We are using these packages to achieve high average power diode pumped solid-state laser operation. A face pumped slab geometry has been chosen to take advantage of the large face area available for simple diode pumping. The slab is 90 mm long with a laser aperture of 4 mm by 18 mm. The front end of the slab is antireflection coated, while the back face is coated for high reflection. A folded zigzag optical path is used to hold the wavefront distortion low under average power loading. The zigzag laser cavity is formed by two external mirrors and the high reflector on the back face of the YAG slab. In our initial studies, the external mirrors are each 20 cm from the transmitting crystal face. The folded zigzag optical path traces a three diamond shaped pattern in the slab. All of the external mirrors used have a radius of curvature of 75 cm. The slab's two pump faces are pumped by a diode stack of 40 packages each. Average Nd: YAG laser power output of 275 w has been achieved at 2.5-kHz repetition rates.


Abstract This article was drawn from a qualitative study of pre-service teachers', public school teachers', and public school administrators' perceptions of the importance of specific kinds of content and methodology in an undergraduate curriculum course for pre-service teachers. The authors explained the initiatives put into action regarding standards and high-stakes testing in Florida and the subsequent effects. One of the major effects was that all three groups (pre-service teachers, teachers, and administrators) prioritized content that related to standards and high-stakes testing. More specifically, teachers' and administrators' top concern was how to prepare pre-service teachers to correlated instruction to standards. The authors speculate that these effects will most likely change the content and methodology of courses at the university level. ********** Educational Significance Recently in one of my undergraduate Curriculum and Instruction courses I asked my students who are pre-service teachers, "What do you think is the most difficult part of being a teacher?" I waited expecting to hear classroom discipline or the parents or planning. I was surprised by the number of students who voiced concerns about how to teach to standards and how to best prepare their students for performing well on high-stakes tests. Some were also concerned about receiving a poor evaluation if their students did not perform well on state tests. Others echoed this concern about the effects of standards and high-stakes testing in a study done at the University of South Florida. The study originated within the department of Leadership Development when two faculty, Ann Lee and I were given the charge of laying the groundwork for updating and revising an undergraduate curriculum course. There are currently several widespread trends in teacher education programs in the United States and specifically in the state of Florida. These trends include standards-based designs, accountability, performance assessment, and multiple measures of student performance (Diez, 1998; Moss, 1999; Blum & Arter, 1996; Marzano & Kendall, 1996; McConney & Ayres, 1998; Campbell, 2000.). The National Council for the Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE) has recently developed new standards that encompass the trends mentioned above. The new standards have moved away from a course-based approach in which guidelines describe what should be covered in courses, toward a description of what teacher candidates ought to know and be able to do (NCATE, 99). The new standards require that evidence used for the decisions about a program come from assessments and evaluations of candidate proficiencies in relation to those standards. Moreover, the program faculty is responsible for documenting not only that candidates are meeting the standards, but also how well they are meeting them (NCATE, 99). The issue of standards seems to be the primary position of interest in education across the United States. Although there is a current emphasis on standards in teacher education programs, the standards initiative began in K-12 schools in the 1990's. In the state of Florida, there have been several initiatives put into action regarding standards and high-stakes testing. In 1991, the Florida Legislature approved the Florida System of School Improvement and Accountability. The system has six components: state education goals, school improvement process, student performance standards and assessments, local flexibility, performance indicators and reporting, and accountability for results. Part of this system was further defined in 1996 when the Florida State Board of Education approved the expectations for student achievement. These expectations were named the "Sunshine State Standards." Initially Sunshine State Standards were written for seven subject areas and four grade clusters (PreK-2, 3-5, 6-8, and 9-12. …


A laboratory experiment on utilization of seaweed-containing solid wastes as media for growing mushrooms was conducted by researchers from the Institute for Environmental Technology. The solid wastes were obtained from PT. Agarindo Bogatama, a food industry which produces jelly powder processed from seaweed of Gracilaria. The company generates 60 tones of solid wastes of seaweed per-day that contained 70% of water content. The solid media was used to grow Auricularia polytricha, Pleurotus astreatus, and Ganoderma lucidum. Some mixed media were prepared with the percentage ratio of sawdust to solid waste as 0, 25, 50, 75, and 100. After sterilization the media were planted with mushrooms and then were kept in incubator. After 28-day the basidiomas of G. lucidum was developed while P. astreatus appeared after 36-day of incubation. Both were grown on 100% seaweed media (using 100% sawdust media as a control). This very early results indicated that solid waste of seaweeds have an additional value which can be used as media for mushrooms plantation. Implementation waste to product as a part of cleaner production approach should be disseminated to the industries, especially SMEs like PT. Agarindo Bogatama, who are concern to the environment.


While the body of literature on arbitrage opportunity identification is well established in the financial, energy, and real-estate markets, research on arbitrage in the retail marketplace is relatively limited. As arbitrage opportunities in this context differ inherently from other markets, we propose a data analytics framework to identify such an arbitrage by leveraging a machine learning model to predict the optimal purchasing point from the price movement. Our predictive approach is enhanced by incorporating user-generated content which demonstrates its informative power. Overall, the enhanced model attains the precision rate of more than 90 percent while the recall rate is higher than 80 percent in a cross-validation test using the data collected from Amazon Marketplace. In addition, we conduct a field experiment to verify the external validity of the model in a real-life setting. The result shows that our model is capable of generating as much as a 113.31% profit margin.


INTRODUCTION. Taxanes represent the most active first-line treatment for metastatic hormone refractory prostate cancer. However, most patients progress while receiving taxanes-based treatment and require a second-line approach. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the activity and the safety of the combination of bevacizumab and taxanes in patients with metastatic, hormone refractory prostate cancer with evidence of disease progression after a previous docetaxel-based chemotherapy. METHODS. Twenty patients were enrolled into the study protocol. Treatment consisted of bevacizumab (10 mg/kg) plus docetaxel (60 mg/m2) administered every three weeks. Biochemical and objective responses, progression-free survival, overall survival, and toxicity were eval-


Ockman has taken an unexpected, but for me inspired decision, to introduce a last chapter devoted to the works of Cindy Sherman and Kiki Smith that can be seen as parodying and thus subverting Ingres-like constructions of women's bodies and which, more importantly, offer ways of resisting the negative meanings construed for them. Two chapters of the book have already appeared as articles in learned journals. Each chapter could be enjoyed separately. Yet there is a concern in the book with broad overarching issues of sexuality that have been differently addressed in the discourse surrounding Ingres's work. These are the object of Ockman's researches and consideration and they give the book coherence. Her sense of anger, frustration, and determination to write a 'corrective' work come through powerfully at the end of chapter five as she seeks to shed the disturbing compulsions and fears of twentieth-century 'masculine' writing that make the association between women's bodies and the deformed or bestial seem unproblematic. Her opposition to binary thought may be occasionally pushed a step too far, as in the identification of the young Ingres in his early Self-Portrait with the figure ofBriseis in Achilles receiving the Ambassadors of Agamemnon; but I am grateful for the anger and the frustration. They have impelled the author to problematise the whole question of reception and of changing perceptions of Ingres's work and to invite the reader not only the feminist reader to look, with a different understanding of pleasure and distaste, at Ingres's eroticized bodies. This learned, stimulating book is also immensely enjoyable, lucidly written, beautifully produced and illustrated, and offers a new feminist challenge to received ideas on Ingres and essentialist notions of sexual differ-


The paper examines contextual and emphatic fronting in academic prose, fiction narrative and fiction dialogue in order to ascertain whether the types of fronting can serve as a style marker. The differences in the distribution and their effect on style are assumed to be connected with the respective FSP structures: in emphatic fronting the fronted element is the rheme, whereas in contextual fronting it is the diatheme. Hence emphatic fronting displays a prominent deviation from the basic distribution of communicative dynamism, whereas contextual fronting achieves agreement with it. As compared with the unmarked postverbal ordering, emphatic fronting intensifies the emphatic/emotional character of the content being expressed, which is a feature of speech, while contextual fronting serves as a direct link with what precedes, hence contributes to textual cohesion, which is a characteristic of academic prose, with fiction narrative presumably occupying an intermediate position. The results of the study show more types of fronting with diversified structures and less clear-cut relations between the types of frontings and the examined text sorts.


Along with the restructuring of the power sector and the dissemination of the system automation and the information and communication technology, the power utilities have been encouraged to deliver more and more information to their consumers, grid operators and regulation agencies concerning the performance of the power system. This paper presents the application of protective digital relays to assist the power quality evaluation of a power system. Recommended power quality indices are used to measure the severity of short-duration voltage variation. The indices are calculated based on the registers of digital relays of different characteristics and compared to the indices calculated from a disturbance analyzer. Although the sample rate of the relays is smaller than that of the disturbance analyzer, the numeric relays can be used to assess the power quality of electric power systems.


Measurements of the pressure dependence of electron concentration and mobility have been analyzed for heavily doped, bulk GaAs:(Si,Sn,S,Te). It is demonstrated that the samples with ng2\ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{}${10}^{18}$ ${\mathrm{cm}}^{\mathrm{\ensuremath{-}}3}$ exhibit the effect of carrier freeze-out for pressures below 20 kbar. GaAs:Te represents the exception to this behavior (n versus pressure is constant up to 25 kbar). Two models of the localized state of the donor are considered. Neutral, ${\mathrm{DX}}^{0}$, or negatively charged, ${\mathrm{DX}}^{\mathrm{\ensuremath{-}}}$, states might appear after trapping one or two electrons, respectively, by the positively charged donor center. The results obtained show that the energetic level related to the DX center, ${E}_{\mathrm{DX}}$, is located much higher in the conduction band than could be deduced from results extrapolated from ${\mathrm{Al}}_{1\mathrm{\ensuremath{-}}\mathrm{x}}$${\mathrm{Ga}}_{\mathrm{x}}$As (${E}_{\mathrm{DX}}$ situated about 170 meV above the bottom of the \ensuremath{\Gamma} conduction band, versus ${E}_{\mathrm{DX}}$g250 meV obtained in this work). The results show that the localized and metastable DX center is not related to any single conduction-band minimum; its energy position and pressure coefficient exhibit significant temperature dependence. For a Si donor in GaAs, weakening of the electron-lattice coupling strength as a result of applying pressure is anticipated. Increase of electron mobility with decreasing carrier concentration has been observed here. Though it is suggestive to use this result for eliminating the concept of the ${\mathrm{DX}}^{\mathrm{\ensuremath{-}}}$ center, some objections to this conclusion, due to possible correlations in dopant distribution, are presented in the paper.


Objective To assess the clinical utility of mitral annulus movement velocity during diastole measured by Doppler tissue imaging (DTI) in evaluation of left ventricular (LV) diastolic function in coronary artery disease (CAD).Methods 199 angina patients were divided into the CAD (n=106) or non-CAD (n=93) groups. The peak velocities of E wave (Ea) and A wave (Aa) of the mitral annulus at the points of interventricular septum and ventricular lateral wall were measured and the Ea/Aa ratio was calculated.Results There were no differences between the CAD and non-CAD groups as regard to the mean values of left ventricular ejection fraction and the echocardiographic indexes commonly used for evaluating LV diastolic function. The mitral flow E/A ratio of the two groups was barely different (P=0.05). However, CAD group had a lower Ea/Aa ratio at both the mitral annular points than non-CAD group (0.68±0.24 vs 0.62±0.17,P0.05; 0.85±0.36 vs 0.76±0.25, P0.05).Conclusions Mitral annular movement velocity parameters during diastole measured by DTI can be used to detect LV diastolic dysfunction in patients with CAD and seems to be more sensitive than the conventional echocardiographic diastolic indexes.


Unsaturated soil condition which give rise to negative pore pressure is important in evaluating the stability of geotechnical structures such as slopes, retaining walls, excavations and footings, Its importance is more so in tropical countries, where rainfall and intense chemical weathering have resulted in the formation of such soils. In this study, the shear strength characteristics of granite residual soil were investigated using consolidated drained triaxial tests with special emphasis on the effects of the negative pore pressure, i.e. the matric suction. These tests involved sheafing under either a constant net confining pressure and varying matric suctions or under a constant matric suction and varying net confining pressure. The influence of confining pressure and matric suction on shear strength was analyzed and a linear relationship was found to relate matric suction and shear strength.


This article discusses the improvement of the structure of memory system.In order to raise the speed of memory system,the method is to choose relevant parameter rationally and improve dispatcher algorithm properly. And the text especially explains the composition and operation principle which is about the level of buffers and stores at a high speed,the arranging address and the working course of crossing and overlaying which is about the level of fictitious stores,multi-body parallel memory stores,the establishment of buffer stack,and it also proves the method of improving percentage of hits and accelerating rate.


Citation: H-Net Reviews. Hyde on GonzÖ¡lez, 'This Small City Will Be a Mexican Paradise: Exploring the Origins of Mexican Culture in Los Angeles, 1821-1846'. H-Urban. 04-11-2014. https://networks.h-net.org/node/22277/reviews/22836/hyde-gonz%C3%B6%C3%A2%C2%A1lez-small-city-will-be-mexican-paradise-expl oring-origins Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.


Mercury is a sequential satisficing planner that favorably competed in the International Planning Competition (IPC) 2014. Mercury planner is based mainly on the red-black planning heuristic. Red-black planning is a systematic approach to partial delete relaxation, taking into account some of the delete effects: Red variables take the relaxed (valueaccumulating) semantics, while black variables take the regular semantics. Mercury planner exploits a powerful tractable fragment requiring the black causal graph – the projection of the causal graph onto the black variables – to be a DAG. Further, it applies techniques aimed at making red-black plans executable, short-cutting the search. As in 2014, Mercury planner is entered into sequential satisficing and agile tracks of the competition.


Solar cell cracking is a potential reliability concern that may affect the long-term performance of modules that experience mechanical stress in the field. We present a methodology that utilizes EL images to predict power loss due to cell cracking. We explored pixel intensity histogram normalization methods to generalize this approach to a wide range of measurement conditions. The final optimized EL metric exhibits a strong correlation with power loss for a range of module technologies where a 1% increase in the dark area due to cracks results in a 3% loss in performance. This approach enables field EL mapping to translate to module P $_{max}$ mapping across a system.


The teaching styles of academics embody the extraordinary teaching arts and the unification of uniqueness and regularity.The cultivation of academics' teaching styles is very important improve teaching quality,realize teaching objectives and the professional development.


The Watch Tower movement was a millennial social movement which was popular in Nyasaland, Southern and Northern Rhodesia, and the Belgian Congo, and in parts of the countries bordering these territories, between the two world wars. It derived its doctrine initially from the writings of Charles Russell, the founder of one of the largest sects of the twentieth century, the Jehovah's Witnesses. The African Watch Tower however was largely independent of the Jehovah's Witnesses, although this body attempted to establish its control in central Africa, and its ideology and organisation changed and developed in accordance with local conditions. While some similarities in the conditions of rapid urbanisation which surrounded the origins of the Jehovah's Witnesses in America, and the Watch Tower in Africa, may be discerned, its political and historical role was a very different one. Spread by labour migrants moving between employment centres and from the village to the urban compound, the Watch Tower contributed to the new forms of association which enabled workers to protest against their conditions of employment, and assisted in spreading a pan-Africanist consciousness which was a significant current in the development of anti-colonial nationalism. It was not only an urban movement, but also selectively influenced the countryside, where external factors and the nature of local social organisations were favourable. It spread rapidly, in a wide variety of forms, and with little formality regarding who was or was not a member, but retained a central core of ideas and an organisational structure, which allows the movement to be treated as a unity. Continued in thesis ... .


Abstract Repeated observations and recovery experiments using serum samples as controls for the alkaline phosphatase activity test indicate that the original enzyme activity is retained for a long period of time if properly frozen. The use of the calibrated frozen serum is proposed as a better control for serum alkaline phosphatase determinations.


Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) produces large amounts of ammonia. Based on higher readings obtained with an ammonia‐sensitive electrode when compared to a specific enzymatic assay, it has been claimed that H. pylori also produces potentially toxic volatile amines.


This paper shows the results obtained from a laboratory test on the mechanical behavior of asphalt mixtures that were subjected to the Peruvian altitude climate for the application of pavement construction. A case study was performed at Juliaca Airport, Puno, which is located at an altitude of 3,800 meters and presents behavior peculiarities in the pavement structure because of the combination of climatic demands and the high level of the water table and soils in the subgrade. The results are presented that concern the resilient modulus and rutting of asphalt mixtures with conventional Peruvian asphalt, which is normally employed at worksites in the region studied. A comparison is also made with the results obtained with the same asphalt modified by 4% of styrene butadiene styrene (SBS) polymer.


In this paper we examine whether an incentive scheme for improving research can have adverse effect on research itself. This work is mainly motivated by the Research Assessment Exercise (RAE) and the Research Excellence Framework (REF) in UK. In a game theoretic framework we show that a scheme like RAE/REF can actually result in deterioration of the over-all research in a country though it may create a few isolated centres of excellence. The central assumption behind this result is that high ability researchers produce positive externalities to their colleagues. We assume these externalities have declining marginal benefit as the number of high ability researchers in a department increases. Because of this declining marginal benefit an incentive scheme like the RAE or REF may lead to over concentration of the high ability researchers in a few departments.


This study examines if Facebook, one of the most popular social network sites among college students in the U.S., is related to attitudes and behaviors that enhance individuals' social capital. Using data from a random web survey of college students across Texas (n = 2, 603 ), we find positive relationships between intensity of Facebook use and students' life satisfaction, social trust, civic engagement


The objective of this study was to evaluate the effects of jabuticaba ( Plinia cauliflora ) peel extract on the diets of female blue Betta splendens concerning the level of digestive enzymes, liver metabolism, and antioxidant activity. The sample constituted 150 individuals subdivided into five groups in tripli -cate, totaling 10 fish per 20-liter experimental unit. Commercial diets (40.88% crude protein (CP) and 4374.8 Kcal•kg -1 v) were added to hydroalcoholic jabuticaba peel extract (EHJ) at concentrations of 0 (control), 0.5, 1.0, 1.5, and 2.0 g•kg -1 . The diets were provided twice a day, until apparent satiety, for 21 days. Fish mortality was not observed during the study. Growth indices did not show any significant differences, apart from feed conversion. The use of the extract promoted an increase in the luminosity of the fish; however, there was no statistical difference in chromaticity a* and b*. A decrease in the activity of SOD on the skin of fish fed with diets of 1.5 and 2 g kg -1 EHJ was observed in comparison to the other diets. There was no change in catalase (CAT) activity among the experimental treatments. It is concluded that the use of 2 g•kg -1 EHJ has an antioxidant effect that reflects the greater luminosity of blue female Betta splendens .


An attempt to compare Russian Tsar Alexander I was the head of the Grand Duchy of Finland, which the Russian army captured in 1809 as a result of the Russo-Swedish war. The final act of the Congress of Vienna of June 1815 decided to establish the Kingdom of Poland. Beside the title of Grand Duke of Finland tsar, Alexander I was awarded the title of the King of Poland. From that moment on, for over one hundred years, the fate of the Grand Duchy of Finland and the Kingdom of Poland was intertwined during the rule of five Russian tsars.
The aim of this paper is to answer the question whether two different ways on the road to independence – romantic Polish way with national uprisings, and pragmatic Finnish, relative loyal to the Russian tsars – had an impact on their policy towards both nations. The Kingdom of Poland and the Duchy of Finland were autonomous, were in a personal union with Russian tsars, had their own constitutions, parliaments, armies, monetary systems and educational structures, and official activities were held in Polish (Polish Kingdom) and Swedish (in the Grand Duchy of Finland). Both countries also had their own universities.
The first national uprising in the Kingdom of Poland, which broke out in November 1830, resulted in a wave of repression. The Constitution was replaced by the so-called The Organic Statute, the Sejm (the Parliament) and the independent army were liquidated. The Kingdom was occupied by the mighty Russian army, and in 1833 martial law was introduced. The second national uprising of January 1863 led to another wave of repression and intensive Russification of Polish territories. In 1867, the autonomy of the Kingdom of Poland, its name and budget were abolished. From 1872 the Polish language was only an optional choice. After 1863, the policy of the Russian authorities changed towards the Grand Duchy.
A session of the Finnish parliament (Eduskunta) was convened for the first time since 1809, the new parliamentary law allowed the dissemination of the Finnish language. After the deadly assault on Alexander II in 1881, his son Alexander III made attempts to limit also Finland's autonomy. The years 1899–1904 were called the first period of Russification in Finland ("the first period of oppression"). The Manifesto of June 1900 introduced obligatory Russian language in correspondence of officials with Russia. In 1901, the national Finnish army was liquidated. In Russia this was the beginning of the process of the empire's unification into one cultural, political and economic system. After a short thaw as a result of the 1905 revolution in Russia, the Grand Duchy of Finland, the so-called "second period of oppression" and anti-Finnish politics took place. During the great war of 1914–1918, the Grand Duchy was on the side of Russia. The territories of the former Kingdom of Poland were under German rule since 1915. After the outbreak of the revolution in Russia, the Eduskunta (on 6 December 1917) passed a Declaration of Independence. After a short period of regency, on 19 July 1919, the Finns adopted the republican system with a parliamentary form of government.
On 11 November 1918 Germany surrendered on the Western Front. On that day, the Regency Council in Warsaw handed over military authority to the Polish Legion commander Jozef Pilsudski. Although Poland still had to fight for the final shape of the state, the 11th of November 1918 is considered the first day of recovered Polish independence.


This study synthesized refractory metal-oxide-doped titanate nanotubes (TNTs) using a hydrothermal process and investigated their photocatalytic activity under ultraviolet and visible light irradiation. Refractory metal doping ions such as Mo6+ and W6+ can be supplied from molybdenum oxide and tungsten oxide sources. The refractory metal-doped TNT may act as an electron trap or enhance the adsorption capacity, which increases the number of active sites and promotes separation efficiency.


Objective. To evaluate the results and effectiveness of simultaneous operations for echinococcosis of the liver. Methods. Surgical diseases requiring surgical treatment (cholelithiasis: calculus cholecystitis, choledocholithiasis, nodular goiter, ventral postoperative hernia) were detected in 38 patients with echinococcosis of the liver. 23 patients underwent organ-preserving operations for echinococcosis, and 15 patients underwent radical operations, all operations were perfomed in combined with cholecystectomy, choledocholitotomy, thyroidectomy, and herniotomy (coating of a polypropylenemesh for hernia gate).Immediate and remote results were studied. Patients were reexamined 6 months after surgery within a 3-year period. The examination included the checkup, general blood test, liver and kidney tests, an ultrasound examination of the abdominal organs, and a chest x-ray once a year. Results. During theimmediate postoperative period 4 patients out of 38 (10.5%) had complications. After simultaneous operations using organ-preserving methods of echinococcectomy, 2 patients out of 23 (8.7%) had complications (pleuritis, wound suppuration), and 2 - out of 15 had radical operations (bile leakage, pleuritis). All complications had been cured by the time of discharge. The remote results were studied over a period of 6 months to 3 years. 34 patients were examined up to 1 year, 31 - from 1 to 2 years, 26 - from 2 to 3 years. Within the examination and follow-up periods no recurrence of echinoccosis was observed. Conclusion. During simultaneous operations and the echinococcectomy of the liver it is necessary to observe accurately the rules of aparasiticity and antiparasiticity.Simultaneous operations for the liver echinococcosis should be performed according to strict indications and by a highlyexperiencedandqualified surgeon. Patients who have undergone simultaneous operations was asked toundergoa medicalcontrol examination at least once a year. What this paper adds The possibility of performing simultaneous operations for echinococcosis of the liver has been defined. The sequence of operations for echinococcosis in combination with other pathologies requiring surgical treatment has been justified.


The success of petroleum exploration business depends on appropriate design and implementation of seismic exploration programs. Volume of seismic data instances (deduced for structural interpretation) is used for modeling multidimensional data structures in a warehouse environment. Several business rules (constraints) are applied to the design and development of a data warehouse. Seismic-time horizons, well-data, reservoir properties and petroleum production as data dimensions or classes and their associated attributes, have been used for integrating and modeling their data instances with numerous hierarchies. Ontology addresses issues of semantics and contexts (naming conventions) involved during design of business rules and building relationships among several hierarchies. Business rules inform the data integration and data mining process, especially when heterogeneous data structures are denormalized for fine-grained data structuring and facilitate the association rule mining process. Several data views have been presented for analyzing the effectiveness and deliverability of warehouse-modeled information. Design of business rules combined with fine-grained ontology structuring appears to have a definitive impact on data mining of seismic data instances, enhancing seismic data knowledge and improving geological interpretation. Petroleum ontology proves to be an effective knowledge mapping tool, which can revolutionize the petroleum exploration industries.


There is an inviolable rule in the European Union: only citizens of the titular nation can become presidents, prime ministers and chancellors. Unfortunately, Ukraine has taken a different path in recent years. He found that deviation from this rule causes irreparable damage to the economy and politics of our state. The latest research shows that only nationalists are able to build a new Ukraine. If we analyze the oligarchs who are plundering Ukraine, it becomes clear that the majority, including former prime ministers and presidents, are representatives of other nationalities.


Multiple description image coding Arithmetic based on scalar quantization(MDSQ) can effectively improve the data receival quality.The paper completes the MDSQ Arithmetic using Matlab due to its advantage in matrix processing,and proves its feasibility by analyzing the experiment results.


Globalizing Information:1 Accountability and Disciplinarity As in most discussions about literary and cultural studies, "globalization" in German studies has most often been discussed in terms of theory or new contents, as challenges to traditional scholarship that reveal its Western, capitalist, and often nationalist or even imperialist biases. Yet as early as 1992, an additional dimension to discussions of globalization in literary studies was identified by political scientist Aijaz Ahmad, who argued that the political-critical intent behind new theoretical impulses since post-structuralism has been blunted by the retreat of critics behind the walls of the academy. In Ahmad's account, theory in the academic world has been mobilized to domesticate, in institutionalized ways, the very forms of political dissent which those movements had sought to foreground, to displace an activist culture with a textual culture, to combat the more uncompromising critiques of existing cultures of the literary profession with a new mystique of leftish professionalism, and to reformulate in a postmodernist direction questions which had previously been associated with a broadly Marxist politics...(1). That reformulation also "has had the effect, in the more recent years, of greatly extending the centrality of reading as the appropriate form of politics" (3). Over a decade later, it is now critical, I believe, to explore the implications of this shift for such critics-turned- scholars within the academy-the disciplinary politics of current scholarship. Over the last decade, scholars have indeed offered readings of cultural phenomena, raising consciousness about the political and social implications of practices naturalized in literary and cultural studies. In a real sense, those scholars have become fer formers of readings, as they enact new and often politicized master narratives of interpretation. At the same time, however, the ethics or accountability of such scholarly performances has remained largely unquestioned within the scholarly community while being highly contested in public. One result has been that, to the general public at least, the scholars' role seems identical with that of critics and public intellectuals debating nationalism, canonicity, and hegemonic pressures on cultural processes. To be sure, current consciousness about globalization's political and cultural effects has led most scholar-critics to problematize their roles within cultural institutions like the university as a social force bridging "town and gown," as it were. Nonetheless, such politically aware scholars have rarely interrogated their own praxis and responsibilities within that newly globalized community of scholars whose very existence is aimed at producing specialized knowledge. That is, these scholars have accepted broad responsibilities as members of society, but not necessarily within their community of peers. The scholar-not the critic as public intellectual-is, after all, determined by her position within the academy, and thus by disciplinary processes as much as cultural processes. Thus the kind of reading (in Ahmad's sense) that a scholar produces is by definition not itself public unless specifically placed as such, because it originates in acts customarily performed within disciplinary (and most often academic) frameworks. Such performed readings can all too easily attain a kind of hegemonic status derived from the scholar's position as expert. The scholarly community which acts as guarantor for that expertise can choose to affirm or refute that individual within its own space. Scholarly affirmation, however, does not necessarily guarantee that the expertise involved need have any great significance within the public sphere. By definition, the space of scholarship can be radically divergent from public venues, and to overlook that difference is to assume, for example, that "cutting edge scholarship" immediately makes good public policy. …


Recent findings on the outer-planet satellites are presented, with special consideration given to data on the rheologic properties of ice on icy satellites, the satellite surfaces and exogenic processes, cratering on dead cratered satellites, volcanism, and the interiors of outer-planet satellites. Particular attention is given to the state of Titan's surface and the properties of Triton, Pluto, and Charon. 210 refs.


Multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) caused by mycobacterium tuberculosis becomes a global life threatening issue in many developing countries incl uding India. Treatment of MDR-TB with second line a nti tubercular drugs is associated with lot of side eff ects which includes hepatitis, depression and hallu cinations. Siddha system of medicine has wide choice of therap eutic formulations which offers ailment against dre adful infectious like TB.As an objective of exploring alt ernate therapy for the clinical management of MDR-T B with less or no side effects the present investigation aimed at evaluating the anti-mycobacterial activity of th e siddha drug Singi Chenduram (SC) using Luciferase Reporter Phag e assay. In-vitro anti-mycobacterial activity evalu tion of SC carried out at the concentration of 100 and 500μg/m l against standard strains of M. tuberculosis H37Rv , clinical isolates of M. tuberculosis strains resistant to fi rst line anti-TB drugs (Streptomycin (S), Isoniazid (H), Rifampicin (R) and Ethambutol (E)) in comparison with marketed standard Rifampicin 2μg/ml. The result obtained fr om the study clearly reveals that the drug SC at both the concentration of 100 and 500μg/ml shows significant percentage reduction in relative light units (RLU) which is a marker indication of its efficacy against. Hence fo rm the study it was concluded that the drugs like SC from the siddh a system of Indian traditional medicine will provid es clinically significant results in treating MDR-TB and further has to be ascertained by proper clinical evaluation n the infected subjects.


The "Tutor's File" is a textbook designed to help tutors of and students taking a programme of study leading to an advanced vocational certificate of education in information and communications technology.