Purely financial players without any physical assets can participate in day-ahead electricity markets as virtual bidders. They can arbitrage the price difference between day-ahead (DA) and real-time (RT) markets to maximize profits. Virtual bidders encounter various monetary risks and uncertainties in their decision-making due to the high volatility of the price difference. Therefore, this paper proposes a max-min two-level optimization model to derive the optimal bidding strategy of virtual bidders. In this model, the risks of uncertainties associated with the rivals' strategies and RT market prices are managed by robust optimization. The proposed max-min two-level model is turned into a single-level mixed integer linear programming model through duality theory (DT), strong duality theory (SDT), and Karush-Kuhn-Tucker (KKT) conditions. An illustrative case is designed to demonstrate the advantages of the proposed model over the deterministic model. Moreover, case studies on the IEEE 24-bus test system validate the applicability of the proposed model.


Aiming at the safe problems which occurred at later mining stage and the situation that mining in the later period can not supersede normally in the stope of Wushan Copper Mine.The linear charge chamber blasting method which was popular in recent years was put into use to reach the purpose of reducing the hidden accident quickly and effectively in mining stope and insuring the copper production smoothly.


The circuit installation practice which is a basic practice teaching curriculum,occupies an important position in the training of students' comprehensive quality,practice ability,engineering consciousness and innovation ability.This paper presented some thoughts about the teaching reformation of the circuit installation practice.The reformation of practical teaching system,teaching method,experiment instrument and environment is discussed.The influncence of reformation and some tentative idea for further reformation of circuit installation practice are presented.


This study reports the isolation and screening of actinomycetes from the rhizosphere of oil palm (Elaeis guineensis Jacq.) for antagonism against Ganoderma boninense, the causal agent of basal stem rot disease of oil palm. A total of 600 isolates of spore producing and fast growing actinomycetes with different morphology were tested for their inhibitory effects on G. boninense mycelial growth on dual culture plates. About 13.5% of the isolates showed Percentage Inhibition of Radial Growth (PIRG) of more than 80% with 21 isolates exhibited observable abnormal growth of G. boninense. These 21 isolates were further tested using their culture filtrates in the form of liquid or powder (freeze-dried) for their effect towards G. boninense growth. Four isolates: AGA 043, AGA 048, AGA 347 and AGA 506 were highlighted for their ability to inhibit and exhibit potential metabolites against G. boninense. This study identified actinomycete strains with the ability to affect and inhibit the growth of G. boninense. Keyword: Ganoderma boninense, actinomycetes, antagonistic, biological control, Streptomyces. Date received: 9 July 2014; Sent for revision: 16 July 2014; Received in final form: 11 November 2014; Accepted: 5 January 2015. isOLATiOn OF ACTinOMYCETEs FROM RHiZOsPHERE OF OiL PALM (Elaeis guineensis Jacq.) FOR AnTAGOnisM AGAinsT


The American workforce and the role of employee benefits have changed dramatically since the 1980s when economists seriously considered dual labour market models to describe pay and employment patterns. Then, dual labour market models described men's labour markets, but not women's and the tests applied to wages and salaries, not total compensation including employee benefits. Applying a switching regression technique using the 2000 Current Population Survey and including women workers and employee benefits, we find that the dual labour market hypothesis is consistent with both female and male labour market structures, especially when total compensation is considered.


This paper analyzed the core content of Taiji Health Project by the methods of literature review and expert interview. We looked up the material about Taiji and public service system. Conclusions: We should make full use of unique body-building cultural resource of Taiji,build a Chinese Taiji health cultural brand,and create Taiji health social image,which are good for nationwide fitness program. Building cultural brand is the start point of Taiji Health Project,improving service consciousness is the force origin of Taiji Health Project,and constructing information platform is the key point of Taiji Health Project. The implementation of Taiji Health Project is to transform Taiji from technique teaching to cultural spreading and health service.


. We prove an existence and uniqueness result for solutions ϕ to a weighted pendulum equation in (cid:82) where the weight is non-smooth and coercive. We also establish (in)stability results for ϕ according to the monotonicity of the weight. These results are applied in a reduced model for thin ferromagnetic nanowires with notches to obtain existence, uniqueness and stability of domain walls connecting two opposite directions of the


Alternating-time temporal logic (atl) is one of the most influential logics for reasoning about agents' abilities. Constructive Strategic Logic (csl) is a variant of atl for imperfect information games that allows to express strategic and epistemic properties of coalitions under uncertainty. In this paper, we propose a logic that extends csl with a notion of plausibility that can be used for reasoning about the outcome of rational behavior (in the game-theoretical sense). Moreover, we show how a particular notion of beliefs can be defined on top of plausibility. The resulting logic, cslp, turns out to be very expressive.

We show that beliefs satisfy axioms KD45 in the logic. We also demonstrate how solution concepts for imperfect information games can be characterized and used in cslp and that the model checking complexity increases only slightly when plausibility and rational beliefs are added.


For decades, successful manufacturers have continually improved the quality of the goods they make. Using statistical process control and related process disciplines, they continually reduce process variation, thereby minimizing waste and reliably create consistent products conforming to precise specifications. In contrast, the produce industry does not have a tradition of strong process controls. This has created a major opportunity to substantially improve the consistency of produce quality and shelf life by adopting modern process disciplines and quality management techniques.


Research that examines beachhead choice and speed of expansion in the context of a regional entry strategy is absent in international business literature. To address this gap, we developed a three-part model of country-by-country expansion and applied it to a uniquely compiled dataset of foreign firms that entered various Latin American countries between 1990 and 2005. We found that a firm's regional speed and performance in Latin America were sensitive to its beachhead choice and its sequential expansion path. The implication is that managers should weigh the regional knowledge a country provides when selecting a beachhead for regional expansion.


Conjugated polymers are known to provide the advantage of a collective optical response. [1–4] They can function as light harvesting materials and exhibit enhanced quenching efficiency by electron transfer [1] or optical amplification via Förster resonance energy transfer (FRET). [2] Because of these exceptional properties, conjugated polymers are useful in the detection of biological and chemical target molecules with high sensitivity. [


Summary The paper reviews the extensive literature on fatigue of concrete and summarizes the most important conclusions. Fatigue hardening of the compressive zone and fatigue softening of the tension zone are examined in detail, and the authors' tests to verify these effects are described. The effects are illustrated by suggested transformations in equivalent section properties in members subjected to fatigue. The increase or decrease of fatigued strength is plotted against maximum stress in the fatigue stress range. It is finally concluded that, with a load factor of 2 specified in the Code of Practice for prestressed concrete, fatigue is never likely to be a design criterion for strength.


To reveal the action mechanism of vibration frequency in alfalfa opening compression, a self-developed vibration compression test system was used to evaluate the variation of compression force during alfalfa open compression. A faster vibration frequency yielded a smaller compression force required for compressing alfalfa into blocks. Compared with free vibration compression, vibration compression was beneficial to release the internal stress of alfalfa block, reduce the forming pressure, and stabilize the high density. In the range of test vibration frequency, when the frequency was 15 Hz, the residual internal stress release ratio of alfalfa block was the highest, and the stable density of alfalfa block was the largest. Considering the pressure and alfalfa block density comprehensively, the optimized vibration frequency was approximately 15 Hz.


The N. Sakhalin Basin has high potential for large hydrocarbon reserves, with prospectivity focused primarliy on the thin sands that derive from the Amur Delta. However seismic challenges require that leading technologies are used for data acquisition an


Abstract We investigated a newly introduced pathogen in a wild population of smallmouth bass Micropterus dolomieu in the St. Lawrence River to illuminate unknown temporal and demographic prevalence patterns. We used real-time quantitative reverse-transcription polymerase chain reaction to assess viral hemorrhagic septicemia virus (VHSV) genotype IVb (VHSV-IVb) viral N-gene levels. Our objectives were to characterize the distribution and abundance of this newly introduced pathogen within a naive population of economically valuable sport fish through an annual cycle. We also sought to describe VHSV-IVb levels across demographic groups (males and females; adults and subadults). Strong temporal variation in prevalence of VHSV-IVb was evident through the annual cycle; peaks in prevalence corresponded to the smallmouth bass spawning period and a temperature range of 10–14°C. No difference in VHSV-IVb prevalence between male and female smallmouth bass was detected. However, a markedly higher prevalence was obser...


Hypothesis / aims of study Residual defects of the anal sphincter after primary repair of obstetric anal sphincter injury (OASIS) may not be uncommon, with a reported incidence of 16 to 90% (1,2). Women with anal sphincter defects seem more likely to suffer from defecatory symptoms postpartum (2). The aim of this study was to evaluate the incidence of residual defects of the external anal sphincter (EAS) after primary OASIS repair using translabial ultrasound and to correlate sonographic appearances with defecatory symptoms.


Abstract : Combat operations are suffering from unnecessarily high fuel demand which degrades capability, exposes support operations to greater risk than necessary, and increases operations and support costs. This thesis describes the current suite of hybrid drivetrain technologies, evaluates their effectiveness in a tactical environment, and suggests an architecture that reduces fuel consumption while maintaining performance against mobility, transportability, survivability, and safety requirements. This thesis includes a comprehensive analysis of nine power sources and three general hybrid architectures against ten performance attributes using multiple criterion decision theory with considerations for selection criteria dependencies and vehicle duty cycles. The rating of selection criteria is not always a direct comparison of component performance parameters. In some cases, capabilities are dependent on the general hybrid architecture and on the form of energy storage in others. In a fully burden cost of fuel context, the capability of hybrid drivetrains to improve fuel economy of vehicles by up to 20% translates to $0.39-$83.54 billion in annual savings across the Army's tactical wheeled vehicle fleet depending on the fuel delivery method. The recommended hybrid drivetrain architecture is a series hybrid with a diesel engine primary power source, flywheel secondary power source, and permanent magnet traction motors.


We present some recent experiments performed at INRIM, which were addressed to test local hidden variable models specifically built for not‐being excluded by present experiments on Bell inequalities.


The problems of current financing of innovations determine the relevance of the research allowing for quantifying and evaluating the performance of regional innovation systems in terms of the structure of innovation financing. The paper presents an approach to analyzing and evaluating the efficiency of innovation activity in Russian regions using the Data Envelopment Analysis. To estimate the efficiency of regional innovation systems, we use the ratio of a set of input parameters of sources and structure of R&D financing to a set of output parameters of the innovative goods volume in the context of 80 Russian regions. We rank the regions according to the technical efficiency index, determine the degree of their homogeneity and differentiation, reveal leading and outsider regions by the degree of efficiency of financial resources use in regional innovation systems. It is determined that the share of the leading regions makes 25% and the share of inefficient regions makes 53%. The conclusion is made on the need to spread the best practices of the leading regions and to apply a more efficient structure for financing innovative activities in outsider regions. Keywords—research and development (R&D), financing, innovative activity, Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA), technical efficiency


The paper discusses the feasibility of new alloy (ZHMn58-3.5-2-0.015) replacing tin-bronze (ZQSn6-6-3) as bearing material and the properties test of new alloy. Comparing with tin-bronze, the paper draws a conclusion that the new alloy can take the place of tin-bronze on mechanical property and chemical property except for physical property, which isn't ideal enough, and worth further researching.


Under the same cultivation condition, the experiment were conducted to study the effect of different cultivation density with 67 500, 75 000, 82 500, 90 000 and 97 500 plant/hm2 on potato yield in non-tillage rice field covered with rice straw. The results showed that there was no positive proportional relation between the planting density and the potato yield, the potato cultivar Zihuabai obtained the highest yield and the best economic benefit when the planting density was 90 000 plant/hm2.


ZnO layers have been deposited by electron beam (EB) evaporation and laser ablation molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) as buffer layers to grow GaN by metal organic vapor phase epitaxy (MOVPE). The photoluminescence spectrum of the ZnO layer deposited by an EB evaporator shows an emission peaks of 367 nm. GaN was grown on ZnO/Si, Si and sapphire substrates under the same growth condition employing low-temperature-grown AIN buffers to prevent the dissociation of ZnO during the high GaN growth. The GaN on ZnO/Si shows sharp photoluminescence spectra at room temperature and 10 K. These results indicate a potential use of ZnO/Si substrates for GaN based blue-UV optical devices such as vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers (VCSELs).


This working paper was prepared for the Conference "Think Tank Exchange" organized by the Think Tank Initiative in South Africa, June 18-20, 2012


In this paper we discuss the photometric and spectroscopic observations of newly discovered (symbiotic) systems in the dwarf spheroidal galaxy NGC 205. The Gemini Multi-Object Spectrograph on-off band [O III] 5007 A emission imaging highlighted several [O III] line emitters, for which optical spectra were then obtained (Gon\c{c}alves et al. 2014). The detailed study of the spectra of three objects allow us to identify them as true, likely and possible symbiotic systems (SySts), the first ones discovered in this galaxy. SySt-1 is unambiguously classified as a symbiotic star, because of the presence of unique emission lines which belong only to symbiotic spectra, the well known O VI Raman scattered lines. SySt-2 is only possibly a SySt because the Ne VII Raman scattered line at 4881 A, recently identified in a well studied Galactic symbiotic as another very conspicuous property of symbiotic, could as well be identified as N III or [Fe III]. Finally, SySt-3 is likely a symbiotic binary because in the red part of the spectrum it shows the continuum of a late giant, and forbidden lines of moderate- to high-ionization, like [Fe v] 4180 A. The main source for skepticism on the symbiotic nature of the latter systems is their location in the PN region in the [O III] 4363/H\gamma\ vs [O III] 5007/H\beta\ diagnostic diagram (Gutierrez-Moreno et al. 1995). It is worth mentioning that at least another two confirmed symbiotics, one of the Local Group dwarf spheroidal IC 10 and the other of the Galaxy, are also misplaced in this diagram.


Under the current social development in China, the application of evidence-based practice evaluation in psychological health of psychological platform is very important, especially in the context of today's Internet + technology, the evaluation and application of psychological platform mental health evidence-based practice evaluation are faced. new challenge. The development of today's Internet + background is driving the operation of big data and providing effective data support for evidence-based practice evaluation. Based on the current Internet + technology background, this paper looks forward to the combination of Internet + technology and psychological platform evidence-based practice evaluation, and proposes the practical application method combining Internet + technology and mental platform mental health evidence-based practice evaluation. The effect analysis of the combination of Internet + technology and mental health evidence-based practice evaluation, this paper applies to the daily work of China's major psychological platforms, provides theoretical support for the evidence-based practice evaluation of major psychological platforms, to promote mental health evidence-based The maturity of practical evaluation techniques.


ABSTRACT Consistent with the anniversary theme of this special issue of ATE, this article offers an overview of 40 years of advocacy for social justice- and equity-centered teacher preparation through three extended examples from the author's own work. Arranged chronologically and shaped by differing policy and political landscapes, the examples represent contrasting genres of scholarship emerging from the author's involvement in different aspects of the work of teacher education. Each example provides a snapshot of equity-related advocacy work in teacher preparation at a particular point in time and a particular social and political context. Taken together, the three examples also suggest that a number of key questions recur in advocacy (and controversy) related to justice- and equity-oriented teacher preparation, including: What is the meaning of equity in teacher preparation? What is the meaning of practice? What kinds of knowledge are needed to teach well? What does it mean to learn to teach? The article comments on the shifting policy contexts that have shaped efforts to advocate for justice- and equity-oriented teacher education. It concludes by connecting 40 years of advocacy to a major current controversy related to equity and teacher education.


An esterase (carboxylic acid hydrolase EC 3 1.1.1.) has been prepared from Saccharomyces cerevisiae. This esterase is active at pH 4.4 and, though it is unstable in solution, it can be maintained in an active form either by lyophilization or by coupling to an affinity gel. At pH 4.4, yeast esterase can hydrolyse between 20 and 40% of the esters commonly present in beer, and it is capable of synthesizing ethyl acetate from ethanol and acetic acid in a simple buffered solution without the provision of a co-factor. Different yeast strains yield different amounts of esterase, and there appears to be a positive correlation between the ability of the yeast to form esterase and the level of esters present in fermentations accomplished by that yeast.


M ore teenage drivers are involved in car crashes every year — and more are killed — than any other age group. And the number of deaths is rising, even though overall fatalities of teen drivers and passengers have decreased substantially in the last 25 years. Still, some 6,000 teens die in accidents annually — more than 15 a day. Teens are the least likely age group to use seat belts and the most likely to drink and drive. Moreover, the presence of teenage passengers strongly increases the risk that a teen driver will crash, as does driving at night or on weekends. Graduated driver licensing programs have helped bring down teen crash statistics in many states, but safety experts and advocates say more needs to be done, including imposing tougher limits on teen driving. Some say driver education programs are ineffective; others argue that state laws need to be better enforced. Almost all agree, however, that parents need to be more involved in training and monitoring teenagers behind the wheel. I N S I D E THE ISSUES............................3 BACKGROUND ....................10 CHRONOLOGY ....................11 CURRENT SITUATION ............16 AT ISSUE ............................17 OUTLOOK ..........................19 BIBLIOGRAPHY ....................21 THE NEXT STEP ..................22 THISREPORT More than 3,600 teen drivers were killed in fatal accidents in the United States in 2003. CQResearcher Published by CQ Press, a division of Congressional Quarterly Inc. thecqresearcher.com


The study on interfacial structure and tensile properties of MgLi matrix composites. The results showed that there was a clear interface between the MgLi matrix and SiC whiskers. Calculation of thermodynamics confirmed that the clear interface between the matrix and SiC whiskers may contribute to the low reactionary potential or the low reactionary dynamics. However, some SiC whiskers were attacked. As a result, SiC whiskers connected with matrix in {111} and formed 70.5° or 109.5° stages on the whiskers surface in {111} face. The reason was the lower interfacial energy of {111} face. Tensile test confirmed that the SiCw /MgLiAl composites showed higher tensile strength and higher modulus compared with MgLi matrix. Moreover, the specific strength and specific modulus were also increased obviously.


The Mesozoic strata are the key of hydrocarbon target in the northern Qaidam Basin.Combined the seismic data and geologic field materials,the residual distribution maps of Jurassic and Cretaceous strata and the fault system maps were generated. Meanwhile,the cross sections before and after erosion in Jurassic and Cretaceous times were revealed by cross section restoration.Based on the synthetic analyses of Jurassic and Cretaceous residual strata distribution,faults systems and cross-section evolution,we proposed that the northern Qaidam Basin experienced three phases of basinal evolution during the Mesozoic:A series of small faulted-basins developed in the Early Jurassic northern Qaidam in an extensional environment;Afterwards,these small faultbounded basins were covered by a larger depression basin in the Middle Jurassic to Early Cretaceous;During the Late Cretaceous,the northern Qaidam basin was reversed and wholly uplifted,resulting in formation of palaeo-uplifts.


Chang Ho Oh,* Chul Yun Rhim, Hyung Hoon Jung, and Seung Hyun JungDepartment of Chemistry, Hanyang University, Haengdang-17 Sungdong-Gu, Seoul 133-791, KoreaReceived March 3, 1999Hydropalladium carboxylates, formed from π-allylpalladium chloride dimer plus carboxylic acids, have beenshown to catalyze cyclization of structurally diverse enediynes to form the corresponding six- or five-mem-bered rings depending upon the reaction conditions. Some enediynes having an oxygen linker in an appropriateposition under the similar condition yielded the corresponding cyclopropanation products in highly stereose-lective manner. A study using deuterated formic acid has proven that the alkylpalladium intermediates formedin our conditions were reduced by the pendant formate ligand. The dienediyne 10 yielded only the tricyclicproduct 12 in 67% yield, although it was expected to form the cyclic product 11. All these cyclizations seemedto occur via the corresponding alkylpalladium intermediates I, which could proceed to the corresponding cyclicproducts depending on the reaction conditions and the substrates. The study using deuterated formic acid couldprovide an important information to understand the present cyclization mechanism. Overall the present studycould play an important role in developing new synthetic methodologies for constructing complex polycycliccompounds. IntroductionPalladium catalyzed reactions have long been widely stud-ied for invention of new organic reactions and also for syn-theses of complex natural products because palladiumcompounds offer more possibilities of carbon-carbon bondformation than any other metal compounds.


Byusing the literature material and questionnaire survey,this paper researchesthe internal and external factors of promoting. Research results show that the park volley project has a broad prospects for development; it is currently in infancy;Park volley project is having the internal and external factorsof promoting in China. At last,it puts forward the corresponding development strategies.


We establish the local uniqueness of steady transonic shock solutions with spherical symmetry for the three-dimensional full Euler equations. These transonic shock-fronts are important for understanding transonic shock phenomena in divergent nozzles. From mathematical point of view, we show the uniqueness of solutions of a free boundary problem for a multidimensional quasilinear system of mixed-composite elliptic--hyperbolic type. To this end, we develop a decomposition of the Euler system which works in a general Riemannian manifold, a method to study a Venttsel problem of nonclassical nonlocal elliptic operators, and an iteration mapping which possesses locally a unique fixed point. The approach reveals an intrinsic structure of the steady Euler system and subtle interactions of its elliptic and hyperbolic part.


Nature has a hierarchical structure, with time, length, and energy scales ranging from the submicroscopic to the supergalactic. Surprisingly, it is possible, and in many cases essential, to discuss these levels independently—quarks are irrelevant for understanding protein folding and atoms are a distraction when studying ocean currents. Nevertheless, it is a central lesson of science, very successful in the past three-hundred years, that there are no new fundamental laws, only new phenomena, as one goes up the hierarchy. Thus arrows of explanations between different levels always point from smaller to larger scales, although the origin of higher-level phenomena in the more fundamental lower-level laws is often very far from transparent. (In addition some of the dualities recently discovered in string theory suggest possible arrows from the highest to the lowest level, closing the loop.)


In order to be independent from light source and atmospheric conditions, radiance values extracted from a remote hyperspectral image have to be converted into reflectance values before data processing. Several methods have been proposed in the literature but they require that the lighting/and or atmospheric conditions to be estimated. In the framework of supervised classification, we propose an approach to deal with such lighting and atmospheric temporal fluctuations without reference measurement. Assuming that materials to the surface objects to be discriminated is Lambertian, we show that the difference in lighting conditions after a log-transformation of both reflectance and radiance signals can be expressed as an additive effect. This effect remains additive after the use of a linear dimension reduction method and can be efficiently estimated in a low dimensional feature space. In the feature space, this difference in ligthing can be estimated and thus corrected by finding the translation for which the class densities obtained for each image best overlaps (using cross correlation). This novel approach was applied on a remote sensing data set over the Quiberon peninsula France. For the tested images, classification results obtained with this approach were comparable to those obtained using a classical reflectance correction technique.


The W7-X stellarator being built at IPP-Greifswald will be equipped with a flexible ECRH system designed for 30 minutes operation with total power 10 MW generated by 10 gyrotrons [1]. The ECRH system will be the main heating source during the initial stage of W7-X operation. At low to moderate densities, heating is with the 2 nd harmonic of the extraordinary mode (X2 at 140GHz and B=2.5T) with low-field-side launch in a bean-shape plane. High-density and high-β regimes above the X2-cut-off density, i.e. from 1.2×10m to 2-2.4×10m, are accessible using the 2 harmonic of the ordinary mode (O2). In the present work the high performance O2-heating scenarios for W7-X are investigated by means of predictive simulations using a new 1-D transport code [2]. Neoclassical core confinement with empirical anomalous transport at the plasma edge is assumed [3]. The anomalous diffusivity scales inversely with plasma density in the region of high density gradient and exponentially decays towards the plasma axis. The radial electric field, electron and ion temperatures are advanced self-consistently with a calculation of the power deposition profiles by the ray-tracing code TRAVIS [4]. The shape of the density profile with a gradient region of about 10cm is fixed. The modeling is performed for the standard magnetic configuration, which is optimized for maximum confinement. Configuration of the ECRH heating system used in simulations is shown in Fig. 1.


The aim of the study is to identify the wood utilized in the traditional houses built in Uva province of Sri Lanka, constructed using traditional construction technologies. The timber samples were taken out from roof elements such as rafters, wall plates and reapers from three different timber structures located at three different locations constructed during 1960 – 1970 using vernacular timber preservation technics and preservatives. Samples were extracted and adequately prepared for a microscopic investigation to observe the characteristic microscopic anatomical features. Sledge microtome was used for wood sectioning and photomicrographs were obtained by polarized light microscope. The authentic samples and reference microscopic identification keys were employed in order to conclude on the wood species involved. The relative density of the samples was also measured using the maximum moisture content method to verify the identification. Timber samples were identified using vessels, fibers, rays, parenchyma, and other microscopic features. Based on the macro and micro examination of the external and microanatomical features the timber used for rafters, reapers, wall plates were identified as Mango wood which is scientifically known as Mangifera indica. The relative density values were in the range of 0.52 – 0.7.


Polyphenols in banana buds were found to consist of flavanan tannin (condensed tannin) as the major component; catechin, its oligomers, dopamine and dopa as minor components. Total phenol and vanillin-positive phenol were higher in the buds of cultivars Bungulan, Lacatan and Latundan and lower in the buds of cv. Saba. Polyphenol oxidase (PPO) in cv. Saba was localized in the male flower; 3 times less in the peduncle and bract; and about 30 and 300 times less in the peel and pulp of the fruit respectively. PPO activity in the male flower, peduncle and bract was inhibited by 0.13M NaCl about 20 to 30%, while that in the peel and pulp was inhibited about 40 to 50%. Buds of the other cultivars had similar levels of PPO which were inhibited about 20% by 0.13M NaCl. The Ki value for NaCl of PPO in the peel was estimated to be 0.28M. The astringency, bitterness and color of banana buds were monitored before and after heating, NaCl treatment and squeezing. These are discussed with reference to the polyphenols and PPO focussing on food quality.


The sphere of tourism business is one of the most powerful and promising sectors of the national economy of the world. Today the modern alternative destination is gaining popularity - gastronomic tourism, which is a specialized type of tourism and includes acquaintance with the national culinary traditions of the world, as well as tasting of food and beverages, which is a synthesis of ecology, culture and production. The subject of research in the scientific article is the current international trends in the development of the gastronomic tourism market of the European region. The aim of the article is to assess the international trends in the development of the gastronomic tourism market and identify key trends for improving the gastronomic tourism market in the current conditions of COVID-19. In this scientific work the following research methods are used: descriptive, historical-geographical, comparative, statistical, systematization and generalization, terminological analysis, analytical, cartographic. The results of research on this topic can be used in the field of restaurant and hotel business and tourism as ideas for the development and increase of competitive advantages in business, as well as presented for discussion at seminars and conferences in this field. Conclusions: the study of current international trends and innovative trends in the market of gastronomic tourism in the European region allowed to identify key areas and key trends in the functioning, improvement and further promotion of gastronomy as an alternative direction of tourism in the current environment.


This study presents the methodology to achieve a plantation of wild rose, using fourvarieties of Rosa Canina from wild flora of Transylvania. Also has been considered: how to harvestthe plant material, market demand for vegetable raw material costs to establish, maintain the cultureand life of a culture. Vegetative material consists of four varieties of Rosa Canina, seen as valuable fortheir high content in vitamin C, fruit size and productivity. These varieties were selected based onmacroscopic, biophysical and biochemical studies. The results obtained can be achieved in a breedingground to be studied, characteristics of the four biotypes considered valuable. These characteristics canbe improved by scientific methods of selection and be homologated the plants which provide the bestefficiency. Planting material created and certified must then be extended by a specific technology to alarger culture.


This article addresses the ubiquitous nature of uncertainty in industrial hygiene-related risk assessment and defines two basic types of uncertainty: natural variability and a basic lack of knowledge. A relatively simple physical-chemical modeling example is provided as an illustration in which uncertainty and sensitivity are described using two methods, a conventional technique and a readily available and user-friendly computer simulation software. The need for and value of monitoring data for validation and as a "reality check" is emphasized.


Quality insurance is not simply an option, but rather a duty for organisations, being a must in the relationship with the clients, the main beneficiaries of the offer, as well as in the relationship with all those having direct or indirect interests connected to its existence and functioning. The extension of the focus from the client-centred quality to the quality for all those interested is an essential component of the philosophy of total quality management (TQM) and the starting point in the implementation of continuous improvement strategies. For the educational services this approach becomes more important if we take into account the role of education in the development of modern society. In this context, the analysis of the preoccupations of higher education institutions for a better understanding of the stakeholders' requirements regarding the quality of the performed activity and of the degree of satisfaction generated by the performance and the offer to the society becomes a fairly significant action.


That light can be deflected by gravity is one of the most fundamental phenomena in nature. Gravitational lensing, as it is called, is one of the celebrated outcomes of relativity that readers almos...


Community pharmacists often need to communicate with private information during the medication counseling process with patients. This study aimed to...


This paper examines the idiosyncratic information-content of corporate conference calls. It studies the determinants, and the consequences, of idiosyncratic information production. To facilitate this study, I develop a novel measure of information-content which analyzes every (idiosyncratic) word choice made by management during both sessions of the call. In a sample of S&P 1500 firms from 2001 to 2012, this new measure of information-content explains cumulative abnormal returns. It shows how CEOs produce (suppress) information during the conference call. It shows how analyst participation in the call improves information production. It shows that a differential value is placed on information conditioned on the market segment of the firm. I contrast the effectiveness of this new measure to that of the conventional methodologies of tone and word-counting. I provide evidence that this new information-content measure is better suited to conference calls than are the other two.


1. Farr's 63 healthy districts are, as a whole, representative of the stationary districts of England and Wales, i.e. those districts in which growth or decline of industry has, on the whole, been absent and in which mortality rates are consequently free from the influence of industrialisation, though not necessarily unaffected by urbanisation. 2. These healthy districts maintained, until 1901–10, the advantage they held over England and Wales as regards their relative death rates in 1851–60. 3. From 1851–60 to 1901–10 the death rate of the healthy districts remained roughly constant at 76 per cent, of the death rate of England and Wales. Both improved their total death rate to the extent of 30 per cent, of what it was in 1851–60, the rates for this decennium being—England and Wales 21·17, healthy districts 16·13 per 1000. 4. The population of the healthy districts has been unfavourably constituted for a low death rate throughout the period. 5. That the periods during which the most improvement was made in lowering the death rate—not only in the healthy districts, but in England and Wales as a whole—were 1881—90 and 1901–25. 6. By 1921–5 the position of the healthy districts had become a little less favourable, their death rate having risen from 76 to 86 per cent, of that of England and Wales. It is quite possible, however, that this is due, not so much to a falling-off in the rate of improvement in the healthy districts, as to an exceptional increased improvement in backward, very unhealthy districts. 7. For the following diseases, the healthy districts show improvement at faster rates, of varying degrees, than England and Wales as a whole, during the period 1851–1925. Measles, scarlet fever, whooping cough, diphtheria, pulmonary tuberculosis, and respiratory diseases. On the other hand, the data relating to diarrhoea seems to indicate less improvement, though inherent deficiencies in the data make this a matter open to doubt. The death rate from cancer, which has increased considerably in the whole country during the last forty years, appears to have increased at a slightly faster rate in the healthy districts. But, as discussed in the report, the untrustworthiness of the data, relating to comparisons of individual disease death rates over long periods of time, make it essential to regard the points enumerated in conclusion 7 rather in the manner of interesting possibilities than as proven facts. 8. When the 141 administrative areas, which in 1920–5 corresponded to Dr Farr's original healthy districts, were classified as to whether the majority of their occupied persons worked in other districts or in their own district, the standardised death rates found were as follows: I. Districts in which 50 per cent, of occupied persons work in other districts. Death rate = 10·55 per 1000. II. Districts in which more than 50 per cent, of occupied persons work within the district. Death rate = 9·90 per 1000. When the second of these classes is sub-divided according to whether 50–75 per cent, or over 75 per cent, of occupied persons work within the district, the death rates are: (a) 50–75 per cent, of occupied persons working within the district. Death rate = 9·69 per 1000. (b) 75–100 per cent, of occupied persons working within the district. Death rate = 10·14 per 1000. When the same class is sub-divided according to whether the majority of workers are engaged in non-agricultural or agricultural pursuits, the death rates in each sub-class are: (a) Mainly non-agricultural. Death rate = 9·85 per 1000. (b) Mainly agricultural. Death rate = 9·98 per 1000.


During the preparation of calcium bilirubinate (CaBR) single crystals, brown crystals were grown in a gel solution of CaCl2/Sodium bilirubinate. X-ray diffraction analysis proved that the crystal was calcite. FTIR investigations support this result. However, the subtracted spectra revealed that the CaBR dispersed in the crystals and interacted with calcite on the molecular level, since the maximum band shift of the CaBR in calcite from the correspond bands of CaBR was ca. 20 cm-1. It was confirmed that microstructure also by x- ray diffraction and photoacoustic Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy.


The relevance of effective and efficient veterinary diagnostic services cannot be over emphasized in animal welfare and public health, as well as in food safety. Some of the major functions served by accurate and prompt diagnosis of animal diseases include the prevention of exotic livestock diseases from spreading into the country; control and/or eradication of endemic diseases; the assurance of standard pre-import/export testing which conforms to World Trade Organization (WTO) requirements; and the promotion of public health and food safety. This review examines the current state of veterinary diagnostics in Nigeria, including existing capabilities, constraints, opportunities and future potentials. A vision for the improvement of Nigerian veterinary services over the next twenty-five years is also briefly outlined, as well as recommendations aimed atshifting the current status quo towards global best practices.


Whilst there is evidence of a range of effective treatments available for people with severe mental health problems (SMHP), people frequently disengage from mental health services (MHS). This thesis investigates experiences of disengagement of people with SMHP and comprises two studies: 1) semi-structured interviews to elicit the experiences of people with SMHP and a history of disengagement from MHS; and 2) building on those findings, focus groups with staff from assertive outreach teams (specialising in providing care for people with SMHP and a history of disengagement).

The participants were those perceived as the most disengaged from MHS yet they were willing to engage with the research. Interpretative phenomenological analysis was used to develop themes for individual participants and then across the participants. Disengagement from MHS was part of a wider experience of a limited connection to social structures, including an ambivalent and complex relationship with MHS. There was a sense of sadness in all aspects of the participants' experience but they had developed strategies to reinforce personal resilience and to reassert personal identity.

The findings of this thesis can be employed to better understand the context of disengagement from MHS and consequently better inform future engagement with this client group.


The value of a distributed resource is often enhanced by its remaining distributed and under the control of the party responsible for its creation and maintenance. Metadata expressed as XML provides a mechanism to publish the existence of this resource and to support multiple access of the resource from its source location. In this way, uncertainty is minimized about whether the resource is current or from where the resource originates. A challenge then is to characterize the resource in a flexible way which allows the characterization ontology to capture new information in a time frame consistent with the evolution of knowledge in the domain itself. Softclassing has been developed as a means to support such a responsive system.


Sour cherry (Prunus cerasus L.), sweet cherry (P. avium L.), peach [P. persica (L.) Batsch], nectarine [P. persica (L.) Batsch var. nucipersica (Suckow) C.K. Schneid], apricot (P. armeniaca L.) and plum (P. domestica L.) trees either known to be infected, or shown to be so during a survey of different stone fruit growing regions of Turkey, were tested for the occurrence of Prunus necrotic ringspot virus (PNRSV) using double antibody sandwich (DAS)-enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR). DAS-ELISA detected virus in only 31 of 486 samples; an additional 20 samples (total infection 51) were found to be infected by PNRSV when RT-PCR was used. The highest virus incidence occurred in nectarine followed by that in peach. In order to identify specific virus strains, the PCR products amplified from the capsid protein (CP) gene of the 20 isolates selected from different provinces were subjected to restriction fragment length polymorphic (RFLP) analysis. The PCR products were digested by eight different restriction endonucleases. Most of the PNRSV isolates were identified as members of group PV96, but a single isolate was a member of group PV32; none of the isolates belonged to group PE5. Phylogenetic analysis divided the virus isolates into three additional major and three minor groups. No relation was found between the geographic distribution and the grouping of the PNRSV isolates based on RFLP.


The main goal of this article is to investigate the relationship between agent's utility function of wealth and the proportion of investment of the agent in investment models based on a multiplicative stochastic process. Multiplicative stochastic processes are of special interest because of its property to generate power laws distributions which resemble real wealth distributions. We discuss a power utility function that can be used by agents to describe their proportion of investment in terms of relative risk. Finally, we show the different relationships between the relative risk premium and the proportion of investment for different risk-propensity types (risk-averse, risk-neutral and risk-seeking). This characterization of the risk-propensity of an agent in terms of proportion of investment can be used to ease the task of modelling agent's attitude towards risk together with an utility function of wealth.


The effect of therapeutic doses of indomethacin versus a placebo on cerebral hemodynamics was studied in nine preterm infants using Doppler ultrasound. Three doses of indomethacin (0.2 mg/kg) induced a significant decrease in the mean frequency compared to the placebo. Heart rate, blood pressure, transcutaneous carbon dioxide tension, and transcutaneous oxygen tension remained stable throughout the study. The changes in mean frequency occurred rapidly and were sustained at significantly diminished levels for at least 1 hour. All infants were mechanically ventilated, and the increase of mean frequency secondary to suctioning was significantly attenuated after each dose of indomethacin as compared to the placebo. The results confirmed that infusion of indomethacin caused a reduction in cerebral blood flow, probably by vasoconstriction of cerebral vessels. Indomethacin also seemed to attenuate the cerebrovascular response to hypercapnia induced by endotracheal suctioning. Even so, and because of the alteration of resting cerebral hemodynamics, we do not support the recommendation that indomethacin should be used prophylactically to prevent patent ductus arterious or periventricular intraventricular hemorrhage.


Fly ash, a waste by-product is generated abundantly by combustion of coal in thermal power plant. The percentage variation of fly ash plays an important role in the enhancement of mechanical properties of glass fiber reinforced epoxy composite. The present study deals with the effect of percentage variation filler contents on composites. As per ASTM D 3039 the CAD model is designed and three different specimens of various filler contents (10%, 30%, and 40%) and one pure composite specimen were numerically analyzed on ANSYS 16.0. It was found that the pure composite material enhanced the more strength.


The eff ectiveness of the use of a therapeutic complex based on the combined eff ects of intragastric low-intensity and transcutaneous infrared laser therapy in the antiulcer drug therapy of 60 patients with gastric ulcer and duodenal ulcer was studied. In all
30 patients of the main group, after a course of combined laser exposure, the regression of the morphological picture of the activity of the infl ammatory process with epithelialization of the ulcer defect and positive dynamics of the clinical manifestations of the disease within 10 days of treatment was noted. Meanwhile, in the patients of the control group (n = 30), the positive dynamics of similar parameters in the same period was achieved in 70 % of patients against the background of basic drug therapy.


Jonas' conception of the principle of responsibility is criticized, because the contemporary techno-sciences are changing societies, not only the biophysical nature. As a good example of techno-science, the new technologies of information and communication (TIC) are briefly considered. The Jonasian principle is viewed as an axiological principle, whose imperative formulation is problematical. By distinguishing different subsystems of outstanding values for the techno-sciences, we conclude that there are different notions of responsibility, related to these plurality of types of values.


The pressure drop across cascade micro flow holes can be divided into two parts,one is caused by capillary holes,and the other part is extra pressure loss caused by sudden dimension change.It is too complicated to establish the math model of cascade capillary holes,so ANSYS is used to analyze its characteristic,and the pressure field and velocity field are attained.According to the analysis results,the coefficient of extra pressure loss and its relationship with holes number are calculated.


With several years of enrollment expansion of colleges and Universities,the undergraduate teaching of law has been facing difficulties.It must carry out the corresponding reform.There are some ways to develop high-quality legal professionals,such as improving the practical ability of the law,cultivating students' inquiry learning with a variety of methods,and combining of teaching and judicial examination.


Objective To investigate the impact of 8F intra-urethral catheter on uroflow rate in pressureflow studies in patients with benign prostatic hyperplasia.Methods one hundred and three men with lower urinary tract symptoms underwent free uroflometry and pressure-flow study respectively.With an 8F urethral catheter,we recorded the standard pressure-flow variables such as umflometry,detrusor pressure at maximum uroflow and so on.We analyze,free uroflow rate and catheter's uroflow rate with paired t-test.Results The maximum voided volume in free uroflometry and in pressure-flow study were (177.68±70.55)ml and (180.90±68.34)ml respectively.The maximum free uroflow rate and the maximum catheter's uroflow rate were (10.2±3.1)ml/s and (7.8±3.9 )ml/s in BPH with detrusor normal-activity group ( P<0.05 ),(9.1±4.1)ml/s and (5.8±3.2)ml/s in BPH with detrusor under-activity group(P<0.05 ).The differences of uroflometry between two voids in tow groups were (2.9±2.8)ml/s and (3.4±2.9)ml/s( P<0.05 ).Paired t-test showed that there was significant difference between the maximum free uroflow rate and maximum catheter's uroflow rate.Conclusions 8F urethral catheter appeared to have a significant impact on maximum umflow rate in benign prostatic hyperplasia and there was more significant impact in BPH with detrusor under-activity group.It must be considered when analyzing pressure flow parameters to make a accurate diagnosis.

Key words:
Urodynamics; Pressure-flow study transurethral; Catheterization; Uroflometry


Purpose: To help predict the severity of ocular complications in orbital blunt trauma by analyzing clinical features of ocular complications and orbital wall fracture. Methods: A retrospective survey consisting of 169 eyes of 168 patients with orbital blunt trauma who visited Kosin University Gospel Hospital was performed. The patients' age, gender, height, weight, cause of accident, and ocular complications were investigated. The patients were imaged using computer tomography and divided into two groups according to whether they had orbital wall fracture: the orbital contusion group and the orbital wall fracture group. Variables of orbital wall fracture, including the location, length, width, and area were measured using computer tomography in the orbital wall fracture group. Results: The incidence of ocular complication was 27 of 67 eyes (40.2%) in the orbital wall fracture group and 75 of 102 eyes (73.5%) in the orbital contusion group; ocular complications were found significantly more often in the orbital contusion group than in the orbital wall fracture group (p < 0.001). Among causes of the accident, 'flying object' showed the highest incidence of ocular complication at 40 of 48 eyes (85.1%). In the orbital wall fracture group, there was no significant difference in orbital fracture location, length, width or area between the ocular complication group and the non-ocular complication group. Conclusions: Ocular complications were found significantly more often in the orbital contusion group than in the orbital wall fracture group, and 'flying object' showed the highest incidence of ocular complication among causes of the accident. J Korean Ophthalmol Soc 2016;57(8):1282-1286


A 2D-Matlab model was developed to predict the UV absorbance spectra and thus concentration of oligodeoxynucleotide samples. This model will be valuable for researchers designing experiments involving oligodeoxynucleotides. Initial data was acquired from UV absorbance spectra of oligodeoxynucleotides 23, 24 and 34 bases long. The model, which would predict the concentration of DNA from the R260 value, is shown to predict absorbance spectra and the extinction coefficient of DNA as shown when compared across a range of concentrations.


Objective: Obesity is a metabolic disorder that occurs due to excessive body fat accumulation and can lead to physical and emotional problems. Preventing and treating obesity in childhood and adolescence is crucial. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of obesity awareness education provided to fourth-grade elementary school students.
Methods: An experimental study with pretest-posttest control group design was conducted. The study sample consisted of a total of 663 students, 344 students in the experimental group and 319 students in the control group, who attended the fourth grade of two elementary schools in Istanbul and met the inclusion criteria.
Results: The sample included 326 girls (49.2%) and 337 boys (50.8%). The mean (SD) BMI was 18.45 (3.49) in the experimental group and 18.04 (3.00) in the control group. 73% (n = 251) of the students in the experimental group and 77.7% (n = 248) of the students in the control group stated that obesity only made walking/running difficult. There was no difference in obesity awareness scores between the experimental and control groups before the education (p=0.92). However, at 1 week and 1 month after the education, the experimental group had significantly higher scores compared to the control group (p


"After all, we never succeed in education until our aims have become the child's aims, until our purposes have become his purposes," says William Henry Pile, in his Psychology of Learning. This applies to an experiment I made in outside, or home, reading during the past year with a class in ninth-grade English. In spite of several years' experience in teaching English in which home reading was required, I never felt that I managed that part of the work successfully, even satisfactorily. It persisted in feeling like a thing apartan alien in an otherwise pleasant community. I had no way of checking up on it except through written reports-a device not only stilted, formal, and unnatural, but also unproductive of good in that grade. I speak only for myself on that point, however. One day near the opening of school I picked up in the corridor outside my door a folded piece of printed matter. Its soiled, worn appearance gave evidence of its having been carried much in a pocket. So before dropping it into the wastebasket I unfolded it, and found it to be a page from some book catalog. That was nothing unusual, of course; but the number of books checked off was. There must have been nearly fifty marked off in stubby pencil. I examined the list, and found that all the books, so far as I could tell, were juveniles and belonged to that pariah class which, after we grow up and put on much learning, we style as "cheap." They were altogether unknown to me; I do not recall that there was listed even one that I knew by name. The titles vied with each other in proclaiming adventure, in speaking loudly of romance, and in hinting of love. With no more evidence than that the piece of paper was folded carefully and was worn and soiled and pressed with much carrying in a pocket, I came to the conclusion that it belonged to a boy and that it had served as his summer's reading list. That list of poor fiction represented one of my problems, so I kept it. This was near the beginning of the term, and I had not yet introduced the subject of home reading. Although I had not yet talked with my new pupils about books, I knew from past experience that that list represented somewhat the kind of reading many of them were engaged in. Of course there were always the exceptions-some


ABSTRACT In two striking books released in 2019, Ariella Aïsha Azoulay and Georges Didi-Huberman explicitly draw a connection between their respective theoretical approaches to images and their family histories. In Potential History: Unlearning Imperialism, Azoulay recounts the suppression of the existence of her Algerian-Jewish grandmother Aïsha by her father, who wanted to hide his Arabic-Algerian origins. Azoulay consequently develops a critical view on the history of photography and its role in the imperialist destruction of entire lifeworlds. In Pour Commencer Encore, Didi-Huberman recounts the story of his mother, who had to hide her Jewishness to survive the Nazi occupation of France, and of his father, who migrated to France as a Jewish Tunisian. In both cases, their relatives' cultural identity had to remain invisible for various reasons in the countries in which their children grew up. Azoulay and Didi-Huberman present their approaches to images as influenced by the injustices experienced by these relatives and their commitment to them even goes as far as both them of changing their author names: Azoulay added "Aïsha" to her name and Didi-Huberman adopted his paternal ("Didi") and maternal ("Huberman") family name. However, this commitment led them to develop vastly different approaches to images and photographs. Whereas Azoulay emphasizes the role of photography in the imperialist destruction of worlds, remaining cautious of even reproducing certain photographs in her book, Didi-Huberman argues that worlds are never completely lost and that traces of these worlds always reappear by means of images. Azoulay aligns photography with imperialism and colonialism, while Didi-Huberman associates photography with migration. In their desire to do justice to the sufferings of their relatives, both influential theorists of images develop strongly diverging views on the politics of photographs and how they can reveal traces of lost worlds.


Molecular methods are still relatively ineffectual for monitoring community dynamics during bioremediation, due primarily to the cost, technical difficulty and retrospective nature of the analyses. For nucleic acid analyses to meaningfully contribute to bioremediation efforts they must not only contribute to the fundamental understanding of microbial ecology, but also be formatted in such a manner that infield analysis can be achieved. The objective of this project is therefore to develop an integrated microbial and nucleic acid detection method and prototype system for the characterization and analysis of subsurface sediments, focusing on the molecular detection of metal and sulfate-reducing bacteria and activity in sediments obtained from the Oak Ridge Field Research Center. We are meeting this objective by combining environmental molecular microbiology with renewable surface techniques, microfluidic systems and microparticle analytical chemistry. The fluidic systems are used to evaluate hypotheses on the integrated biochemistry that is necessary to directly detect 16S rRNA from metal-reducing microbial communities on a suspension microarray, without using the polymerase chain reaction (PCR). These investigations include the use of peptide nucleic acid capture and detection probes and 'tunable surface' concepts to increase nucleic acid capture and detection efficiency and/or mitigate interferences due to co-extracted humic acids. Themore » unified microparticle sample preparation method and suspension array is then used to characterize the 16S rRNA metal- and sulfate-reducing microbial community in FRC sediments before and after biostimulation.« less


Xiang Xiu and Ji Kang interpreted Zhuang Zi differently. Xiang took a social approach, aiming to coordinate the intense contradictions between the individual and the society, and between nature and the Confucian ethical code, and seeking for a way of living for scholars who needed peace of mind out of the troubled world. Ji's interpretations were concerned with individual life, exploring the space of spiritual world and creating a life of freedom and a home of purity, and finally entering a world of complete freedom. Xiang's approach reflected the needs of the society while Ji's was the necessary result of individual consciousness being raised. Together they reflect the spirit of that particular historical period.


&NA; With the emergence of daily oral tenofovir disoproxil fumarate and emtricitabine‐based pre‐exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) use in Canada, questions have emerged concerning the impacts of this HIV prevention tool on gay men's social and sexual lives. We conducted small focus groups and individual qualitative interviews with 16 gay men in Toronto who were part of the 'first wave' of Canadian PrEP users. Participants were on PrEP for at least one year as part of a demonstration project (November 2014‐June 2016). These participants accessed PrEP before regulatory approval by Health Canada in February 2016. The mean age of participants was 37.6 years (SD 11.02); 94% completed secondary education, and 69% were white. Sex‐stigma emerged as a complex theme in men's accounts of PrEP use across three overlapping domains: (1) PrEP‐related stigma, including discussions of concealment and stigma from friends, family, and sexual partners, (2) PrEP as a perceived tool for combating HIV‐related stigma, where some men said that they no longer discussed HIV status with sexual partners, and (3) PrEP as illuminating structural stigma, where it was attributed to unmasking stigma related to sex and sexuality. For some participants, PrEP has allowed for liberating sex and a self‐described return to normalcy—normal, exciting, pleasurable sex that was no longer reliant on condom use. Paradoxically, some men said that PrEP use both led them to experience stigmatizing reactions within their social and sexual networks, while also helping to remove stigma, shame, and fear related to HIV, sexuality, and sex with gay men living with HIV.


Purpose : To compare differences in the biomechanical characteristics of posterior cruciate ligament (PCL) reconstructed by the inlay and transtibial techniques. Materials and Methods : PCL reconstruction was performed in 12 pairs of porcine hindlimbs using the inlay and transtibial techniques. Cyclic load testing was carried out in three steps. The first step was 750 cycles at 35-350 N, the second 10,000 cycles at 35-350 N, and the third 10,000 cycles at 45-450 N. Length changes of the reconstructed PCLs were measured and the sites of rupture observed. Results : Among the 10 pairs of limbs that completed the test procedure, the graft ruptured before step 3 in all specimens except one in the transtibial group, and seven specimens completed step 3 testing in the inlay group. Comparing the load elongation curves obtained in step 2 tests, more elongation of the graft was evident in the transtibial group (p


A novel broadband polarization twist reflector using a meander-grooved conducting plane is proposed in this study. A genetical swarm optimization (GSO) technique was utilized to achieve the broadband design of the meander-grooved polarization twist reflector for Ku-band applications. Measured reflection coefficients are shown to be in good agreement with the simulated results. The optimized design exhibits a 17 dB suppression bandwidth over 12.5% (15.48-17.55 GHz). The measured polarization twisting loss was less than 0.2 dB at 15.35-17.6 GHz.


Metasurfaces enable flexible and effective control over electromagnetic waves. To achieve low scattering of the antenna, this paper proposes a multifunctional metasurface with frequency-selective absorbing properties. The structure consists of a lossy layer and a lossless layer, where the lossy layer is composed of a metallic square ring with a lumped resistor, and the lossless layer is an improved Jerusalem cross gap structure. The proposed metasurface exhibits a 90% absorption rate within the frequency range of 9.76GHz-25.65GHz, with a relative bandwidth of 89.7% and an insertion loss of 1.02dB at 5.73GHz.


In this paper, we present a novel pilot-based Maximum Likelihood (ML) estimation scheme for the channel and carrier frequency offset (CFO) in amplify-and-forward (AF) two-way relay networks (TWRNs). We develop an estimator for two separate channel scenarios, reciprocal and non-reciprocal. We use simulations to plot the mean-squared error (MSE) performance of the proposed scheme and show that it converges to the corresponding Cramer-Rao bound (CRB) in both cases.


When new options are introduced into the transport market or existing options are modified it is found that travel demand responses are not instantaneous but evolve over time. Given the importance of behavioural change to transport policy it should be considered imperative to understand and predict the dynamics of travel behaviour responses. This paper uses a panel survey to seek greater understanding about the time-scale of behavioural responses to a new transport option and the factors that influence this. It first reviews existing work and finds a shortage of studies that have obtained appropriate data to investigate this. It is explained how a panel survey has been designed in order to monitor the responses made to a new bus service after its introduction. Analysis of the data shows that the rate of new users of the service has been modest but stable during the first four months of operation after which the number of new users appears to decline sharply. During the first six months of operation the awareness of the service, positive attitude towards it and overall usage has grown slowly. Of those residents that have used the service some are shown to become regular users while others are one-off users and others have increased their use over time. Taking into account change in frequency of use of the service by individuals over time is shown to improve estimation of overall demand for the service. An analysis of general bus use frequencies shows that 35 residents increased bus use and 13 decreased bus use in the period of the panel study. A complementary decrease in car driver trip frequencies was found to occur. The new service appears to have had a lasting impact on mode shares in the study area with the panel survey revealing the dynamic nature of the impact.


The modeling and simulation of nuclear power plant control system has been investigated. Some mathematical models for rapid and accurate simulation are derived, including core models, pressurizer model, steam generator model, etc. Several numerical methods such as Runge-Kuta Method and Treanor Method are adopted to solve the above system models. In order to model the control system conveniently, a block diagram-oriented visual modeling platform is designed. And the Discrete Similarity Method is used to calculate the control system models. A corresponding simulating software, NCS, is developed for researching on the control systems of commercial nuclear power plant. And some satisfactory results are obtained. The research works in the paper will be of referential and applying value to design and analysis of nuclear power plant control system.


LUNEX 5 (free electron Laser Using a New accelerator for the Exploitation of X-ray radiation of 5 th generation) aims at investigation the production of short intense and coherent pulses in the soft X-ray region with innovative schemes (such as echo and seeding with harmonics generated in gas) and compact design. The undulators of the FEL line are designed to provide high field short period devices: modulators are in-vacuum undulators with a period of 30 mm and 0.27 m long, radiators are in-vacuum undulators with a period of 15 mm and 3 m long with a cryogenic option, relying on SOLEIL development experience of NdFeB U20 hybrid in-vacuum undulators and 2 m long PrFeB U18 cryogenic undulator operated at 77 K installed on a long straight section of SOLEIL, and ESRF development experience of many in-vacuum undulator and 2 NdFeB U18 cryogenic undulators operating at 150 K. In addition, the line comports electromagnetic quadrupoles for the beam focusing, chicane dipoles for the beam compression and an electromagnetic bending magnet for the beam dump. A prototype of cryo-ready radiator is under design. Variable permanent magnet quadrupoles are under study for the transport of the Laser WakeField Accelerator towards the undulators.


The epistemology, theoretical constructs and production mechanism in optimality-theoretic approaches to phonology are examined and critiqued in terms of the phenomenology of speech sounds. An understanding has been arrived at that phonological optimality is construed too narrowly. A linguistic form is optimal in that it invokes in the hearer the meaning intended by the speaker. Its occurrences in different usage events form a cloud, in which phonological abstractions take place. Phonology is thus an inventory of both concrete and abstract exemplars, with the latter immanent in the former. Due to its emphasis on constructions, Cognitive Grammar provides the means for the flesh-out of a comprehensive model for optimality-theoretical approach to phonology.


In this paper, we show that an aspherical compact graph manifold is nonpositively curved if and only if its fundamental group virtually embeds into a right‐angled Artin group. As a consequence, nonpositively curved graph manifolds have linear fundamental groups.


INTRODUCTION Laser cladding (hardfacing) is a welding-related technique that restores worn surfaces of used implements by depositing a welded overlay, providing hardness, abrasion, erosion, galling, impact, corrosion or heat resistance to cover the original or the worn out surface so that it performs better in a harsh environment, for longer time and with less maintenance. When applied to new parts, it protects the substrate material with a layer of a complex alloy coating by enhancing its chemical, physical and mechanical properties. This technology can be applied for the repair of Industrial Wear Parts in Aerospace and Power Generation Industries, i.e., gas & steam turbine components, Mining, Transportation, Aggregate/Cement, Recycling, Agricultural, Chemical and Injection Mould Industries. Examples of wear parts suitable for laser cladding (hardfacing) are listed in Figure 2.


Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to describe a calibration method developed to improve the absolute accuracy of a novel three degrees‐of‐freedom planar parallel robot. The robot is designed for the precise alignment of semiconductor wafers and, even though its complete workspace is slightly larger, the accuracy improvements are performed within a target workspace, in which the positions are on a disc of 170 mm in diameter and the orientations are in the range ±17°.Design/methodology/approach – The calibration method makes use of a single optimization model, based on the direct kinematic calibration approach, while the experimental data are collected from two sources. The first source is a measurement arm from FARO Technologies, and the second is a Mitutoyo coordinate measurement machine (CMM). The two sets of calibration results are compared.Findings – Simulation confirmed that the model proposed is not sensitive to measurement noise. An experimental validation on the CMM shows that the absolute acc...


OBJECTIVE To discover the deficiency and weak link about technical work in obstetrical department and to improve the obstetrical service level and promote its quality.METHOD According to"Service Quality Inspection Standard of the Maternal and Child Health Technology(assisting delivery)",the hospitals' obstetrical quality were investigated with the layer random sampling method.RESULTS Except the spot survey item,the score about management of administration,appraise of technology,infection and nursing in one class hospital is lower than of other class hospitals obviously.The average rate of caesarean birth in the inspected hospitals were 43.74% and increased relatively with the rising of hospital's class.CONCLUSION The obstetrical hospitals have many problems such as the houses used for business tension,the personnel deploys deficiency,medical record writing non-standard,the rate of Caesarean higher,and so on.We suggest that developments of hospital and the normalize management shoul be strengthened,the employee's train should be enhanced,the regulation system and the operation regulations should be consummated.


Summary
The feasibility of obtaining clonal lines with replicating, multicopy geminivirus vectors by direct DNA trans-formation of cultured tobacco cells was studied. The replicating vectors pTGA32 and pST31 are based on the tomato golden mosaic virus (TGMV) A genome and encode the neomycin phosphotransferase type II (NPT-II) enzyme that confers kanamycin resistance to plant cells. Following introduction into plant cells, unit-length viral genomes were released from the tandem repeats and replicated. In protoplasts, replication of unit-length pTGA32 and pST31 was about as efficient as replication of unit-length DNA A from plasmid pTGA26, which contains 1.5 copies of wild-type DNA A. Tobacco suspension culture cells were bombarded with the recombinant DNA A constructs and selected for kanamycin resistance. The number of kanamycin-resistant clones per bombardment was about the same when the TGMV DNA A vectors or a non-replicating plasmid (pLC14) which also encodes NPT-II was used. Replicating, unit-length DNA A in up to approximately 1000 copies per cell was found in about 10% of the kanamycin-resistant clones selected following bombardment of cells with TGMV vectors. The results suggest that geminiviruses may serve as useful multicopy vectors in cultured cells.


. In a recently introduced parameterization for the soil water retention curve (SWRC) with a sigmoid wet branch and a logarithmic dry branch, the matric potential at the junction point of the sigmoid and the logarithmic branch (h j ) was a fitting parameter, while that at oven–dryness (h d ) was derived from the fitting parameters. The latter is undesirable, especially if reliable data in the dry range are limited. Therefore, an alternative is presented in which 10 shape parameter α instead of h d is a derived parameter, and h d can be fitted or fixed. The resulting relationship between α and h j is such that it prevents correct fits for h j . Fortunately, an expression for h j is found that allows it to be replaced by α as a fitting parameter. The corresponding parameter space is well–behaved and has fewer internal bounds defined by restraining relationships between parameters. The few available values of h j in the literature are in line with those according to the new expression. The reformulated SWRC is fitted to data of 21 soils by shuffled complex evolution. The paper gives the main features of an accompanying open–source fitting code. The fits are good, except for some clayey soils. A theoretical value of h d performs well for a wide range of soils. For some soils, α is very large. If this is the case, the new SWRC simplifies to an earlier junction model of the SWRC based on a well–known power–law SWRC.


A theoretical study is made of the "evolution" of a space-time of one Petrov type into another. The word "evolution" is used to mean that change of type which a point observer would consider his local space-time had experienced as a discontinuous front swept over him. The study is motivated by a desire to better understand the Petrov classification and thus improve its use as a tool to deal with solutions in general relativity. An algorithm is developed that may in principle be used to test the evolution of any closed-form solution known. A flow diagram is found which shows the routes that each Petrov type may use and the Petrov type of the discontinuity causing each change. During this development some results of the study of discontinuous hypersurfaces are found essentially equivalent to Trautman's information approach to waves, thus yielding further motivation for the use of the latter. The Weyl technique is understood as an important method for at least partially separating the coordinate and physical behaviors.


Let k be a field of characteristic 2 and let G be a finite group. Let A(G) be the modular representation algebra1 over the complex numbers C, formed from kG-modules2. If the Sylow 2-subgroup of G is isomorphic to Z2×Z2, we show that A(G) is semisimple. We make use of the theorems proved by Green [4] and the results of the author concerning A(4) [2], where 4 is the alternating group on 4 symbols.


Slow/controlled Release Fertilizers will become a new trend of fertilizers science in 21centary .It can make crop have a high yield and reduce the pollutions of environment .Meanwhile,it can increase the utilization ratio of fertilizers and save resource .This paper discussed the definition,classification and the evaluation of release characteristics of Slow/controlled Release Fertilizers(SRFs/CRFs).Furthermore,the aim and focal point of research and development of SRFs/CRFs in china were illustrated on the basis of summarizing the trends of new pattern fertilizer research and development at home and abroad.


Two-photon ionization of rubidium atoms in a magneto-optical trap and a Bose–Einstein condensate (BEC) is experimentally investigated. Using 100 ns laser pulses, we detect single ions photoionized from the condensate with a 35(10)% efficiency. The measurements are performed using a quartz cell with external electrodes, allowing large optical access for BECs and optical lattices.


In given article the problem of electromagnetic compatibility of radio-electronic means is examined. The review of modern systems of the automated designing and the engineering analysis allowing is presented to lead electromagnetic modeling and the electromagnetic analysis of radio-electronic means. Their basic possibilities, merits and demerits are reflected, and also some recommendations for choice software for carrying out of the electromagnetic analysis are presented


According to the operator experiences, the variable rate fertilization system based on the fuzzy self-tuning PID controller is researched in this paper, which is driven by electrically and hydraulic system. This system solves the problem that the parameters adjustment of the traditional PID is difficult. The system model is presented and is simulated by using MATLAB/ SIMULINK toolbox. The simulation results shows that the fuzzy self-tuning PID control could obtain better dynamic response and achieve the expected control effects. In order to verify this control system performance, many experiments are carried on in the lab. The experiments results show that the variable rate fertilization system based on fuzzy self-tuning PID control has high control accuracy and could meet the control requirements of the variable rate fertilization in precision agriculture.


In 2011, Rudolph Byrd and Henry Louis Gates, Jr., issued a new Norton Critical edition of Jean Toomer's 1923 novel, Cane, a work widely seen as one of the finest expressions of black culture in the twentieth century. Both men have written on Toomer, on race, and on literature. Byrd, recently deceased, was the author of the finely wrought Jean Toomer's Years With Gurdjieff (1990). Gates is a famous scholar of African American studies. In op-eds for the Chronicle of Higher Education, in the pages of the New York Times, and on the radio stream of NPR, the editors, drumming up attention, accused Toomer of "passing" for white, a provocation rooted, they felt, in the evidence, but also sure to guarantee book sales and critical attention. "He was running away from a cultural identity that he had inherited," Gates said to Felicia Lee in one of these paratextual interviews; "He never, ever wrote anything remotely approaching the originality and genius of Cane. I believe it's because he spent so much time running away from his identity." Gates then added, "I feel sorry for him." 1 This damning conclusion that Toomer engaged in racial subterfuge is somewhat off-putting because it runs counter to just about everything written about Toomer since the 1980s. It also pushes back against the foundational assumptions of the "bi-racial" and "mixed-race" movements—both of which prioritize self-identification and self-fashioning outside of official categories— and challenges recent histories of race and passing. Still, because of the unique editorial authority of this pair, the new edition of Cane will surely become a consumer triumph. "Jean Toomer may have been a bit of a cad and a man who had a fondness for the company of white women," wrote Sharon Toomer, the author's great granddaughter, in response to an interview with Gates in the New York Times, "but to say . . . that he decidedly passed for white is an explosive accusation that demands nothing short of evidence—not interpretation." She continued: "In countless documents, Toomer said he wanted to be identified as an American. That is different from deciding to pass for white."2 But how is it different? And what is that evidence? And what, finally, is that interpreta-


Predicate dispatch is an object-oriented (OO) language mechanism for determining the method implementation to be invoked upon a message send. With predicate dispatch, each method implementation includes a predicate guard specifying the conditions under which the method should be invoked, and logical implication of predicates determines the method overriding relation. Predicate dispatch naturally unifies and generalizes several common forms of dynamic dispatch, including traditional OO dispatch, multimethod dispatch, and functional-style pattern matching. Unfortunately, prior languages supporting predicate dispatch have had several deficiencies that limit its utility in practice. We introduce JPred, a backward-compatible extension to Java supporting predicate dispatch. While prior languages with predicate dispatch have been extensions to toy or non-mainstream languages, we show how predicate dispatch can be naturally added to a traditional OO language. While prior languages with predicate dispatch have required the whole program to be available for type-checking and compilation, JPred retains Java's modular typechecking and compilation strategies. While prior languages with predicate dispatch have included special-purpose algorithms for reasoning about predicates, JPred employs general-purpose, off-the-shelf decision procedures. As a result, JPred's type system is more flexible, allowing several useful programming idioms that are spuriously rejected by those other languages. After describing the JPred language and type system, we present a case study illustrating the utility of JPred in a real-world application, including its use in the detection of several errors.


Internal variability comprises all processes that occur within the climate system without any natural or anthropogenic forcing. Climate‐driving variables like the surface solar radiation (SSR) are shown to exhibit unforced trends (i.e., trends due to internal variability) of magnitudes comparable to the magnitude of the forced signal even on decadal timescales. We use annual mean data from 50 models participating in the preindustrial control experiment (piControl) of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project‐Phase 6 (CMIP6) to give quantitative grid‐box specific estimates of the magnitudes of unforced trends. To characterize a trend distribution, symmetrical around 0, we use the 75th percentile of all possible values, which corresponds to a positive trend with 25% chance of occurrence. For 30‐year periods and depending on geographical location, this trend has a magnitude between 0.15 and 2.1 W m−2/decade for all‐sky and between 0.04 and 0.38 W m−2/decade for clear‐sky SSR. The corresponding area‐weighted medians are 0.69 W m−2/decade for all‐sky trends and 0.17 W m−2/decade for clear‐sky trends. The influence of internal variability is on average six times smaller in clear‐sky, compared to all‐sky SSR. The relative uncertainties in the physical representation, derived from the CMIP6 inter‐model spread, are ±32% for all‐sky and ±43% for clear‐sky SSR trends. Reasons for differences between models like horizontal resolution, aerosol handling, and the representation of atmospheric and oceanic phenomena are investigated. The results can be used in the analysis of observational time series by attributing a probability for a trend to be caused by internal variability, given its magnitude, length, and location.


The acts of human beings are usually guided by our purposes. To meet our purposes, we deliberately take different strategies. It is the same case in verbal communication. In communication, vague language has been widely applied as a discursive strategy to achieve speaker's communicative purpose. We usually adopt different vague languages in order to achieve different communicative purposes. We call this discursive strategy pragmatic vagueness, which is different from the vagueness of language. The latter is an intrinsic feature of some languages themselves while the former is used as a strategy in communication and heavily influenced by our communicative purposes, therefore, to some degree, indicating the language using ability of the speaker. Thus it is necessary to explore the communicative functions of pragmatic vagueness for achieving communicative purpose. By examining the examples mainly in daily usage, this thesis intends to explore what communicative functions pragmatic vagueness has, how its functions are achieved and why people tend to do it in this way, and to analyze how speakers' goals are accomplished by making use of vague languages.


The impact of strategic procurement is driven by the contribution of the function to overall corporate performance and its interface relationships. The actual impact on corporate performance in the UK government sector has been neither empirically substantiated nor rigorously examined. This paper provides empirical evidence that much progress has been achieved in strategic procurement in government and suggests areas for continuous improvement.


This paper gives full details of how to feasible perfectly comprehend and apply the Model and Layout in AutoCAD2000 to draw various output Layouts, thus forming the living and all kinds of printing interfaces to meet the need of practical working,aiming at rapidly and efficiently realizing the output functions of integration in AutoCAD2000


This paper studies the effects of LTV limits, PTI limits and the mortgage interest deduction on mortgage debt exploiting a series of policy changes in the Netherlands. As intended, regulatory loan limits reduce mortgage leverage ratios and they also induce bunching at the loan limits. Loan limits and restrictions of the mortgage interest deduction trigger large declines in mortgage volumes. The leverage- and volume responses are larger for young, borrowing-constrained households. The repeal of the mortgage interest deduction for non-amortizing mortgages decimates the market for non-amortizing mortgages. The PTI tightening is also associated with a substantial rise in the fraction of mortgages that have very short periods during which the interest rate is fixed. This unintended risk-shifting pattern to quasi- adjustable-rate mortgages (ARM) may increase income risk. The reform of the mortgage interest deduction, which boosts amortization, is also associated with a significant decline in principal amounts at origination. Overall, this paper highlights the distributional effects as well as the unintended potential consequences of macroprudential and fiscal policies aiming to reduce mortgage debt.


Binary offset carrier (BOC) modulation which is used in new generation of global navigation satellite systems (GNSS) signals provides these signals with enhanced robustness against multipath and increases the precision of range measurement. However, since the BOC signal has a multi-peak auto-correlation function (ACF), it will bring ambiguity problem to signal acquisition and tracking if the traditional matching-correlator-based methods are used in receivers. Side-peaks cancellation techniques can be used to solve the ambiguity problem, the key of which is using some synthesized correlation functions instead of BOC ACF in acquisition and tracking. Several SC methods have been developed. However, the design of SC algorithms is still scarce of uniform theoretical frame and analytical method.


AIM:To evaluate the efficacy and safety of neurotropin in the treatment of neuropathic pain. METHODS:A systematic literature search was performed in biomedical database including MEDLINE, EMBASE,Coehrane Central Register of Controlled Trials,CBM and CNKI.All studies focused on the clinical controlled trials,especially randomized controlled trials(RCTs).The outcome measures included efficacy, life quality,cost of the treatment and adverse reactions.Quality assessments of clinical trials were evaluated with Jadad Score.Meta-analysis of included studies was performed with Revman software.RESULTS:Twenty-six clinical trials were included.Jadad Score of 24 trials was less than 3,which indicated the poor quality of the trials.None of the clinical trials evaluated the changes in life quality and cost related to neurotropin treatment. Meta analysis of 11 trials indicated neurotropin was more effective than placebo or blank,and the odds ratio of efficacy was 3.84[2.68,5.50].The combining effect of 6 RCTs showed that neurotropin decreased the pain scores measured by Visual Analog Scale significantly compared with placebo or blank,the weighted mean difference(WMD)was -1.76[-2.31,-1.21].The pooled effects of the trials comparing neurotropin with other pain relieving drugs such as earbamazepine or NSAIDs also showed positive effect favored neurotropin. Neurotropin had no more adverse reactions than placebo,carbamazepine or NSAIDs,and the pooled risk difference was -0.01[-0.04,0.02].CONCLUSION:According to present evidence,neurotropin may be effective and safe in the treatment of neuropathic pain.However,the poor quality of the studies decreases the persuasion of the results.Large-scale and well-designed RCTs with enough follow-ups should be carried out to provide further evidence for the use of neurotropin in neuropathic pain.


In our first model, individuals have opinions in [0, 1]d. Connections are broken at rate proportional to their length `, and a randomly chosen end point x connects to an individual chosen at random. If version (i) the new edge is always accepted. In version (ii) a new connection of length `′ is accepted with probability min{`/`′, 1}. Our second model is a dynamic version of preferential attachment. Edges are chosen at random for deletion, then one endpoint (again chosen at random) connects to vertex z with probability proportional to f(d(z)) where f(k) = θ(k + 1) + (1 − θ)(d + 1), and d is the average degree. In words, this is a mixture of degree-proportional and at random rewiring. The common feature of these models is that they have stationary distributions that satisfy the detailed balance condition and are given by explicit formulas. In addition, the first model is closely related to long range percolation, and the second to the configuration model of random graphs. As a result, we can obtain explicit results about the degree distribution, connectivity and diameter for both models.


Our society today is not the same as we use to have in the olden days because change which is the essence of life has characterized the world in which we leave today. As a result of this, there are a lot of problem facing the modern family which lead to different kinds of behavior in their children. This study is carried out to assess the impact of family structure on the involvement of adolescents in marital sex in Somolu local government area of Lagos state a well structured questionnaire was constructed by the researcher to elicit responses from the respondents . All data collected were subjected to chi-square analysis statistics. The findings has shown that 23.3% of the respondents that filled the questionnaire falls within the age group of 13 – 15 years, 51.3% within the age range of 15 – 17years and 25.3% falls within the age group of 17 - 19years . from the result of the hypothesis analysis, 10.6% of respondents from monogamous family are involved in pre-marital sex, 12% from polygamous family, 6.1% from single parents and 8.1% from the extended family. The research recommended that individual planning to go into marriage should maintain monogamy type of family structure so as to be able to have time in educating the children on the things they need to know before they reach puberty. Also the high rate of divorce which usually leads to single parenting should be regulated.


hoads and Ferrara are to be commended for their understanding of the increasing need for healthcare organizations operating in a competitive environment in the United States (US) to seize the opportunities offered by technological advances in access to data and advanced analytics. Their White Paper, "Transforming Health Care through Better Use of Data," postulates that in an increasingly competitive environment, hospitals and health systems in the US that will be able to leverage their data to improve patient care, drive innovation and improve organizational performance will generate an ongoing competitive advantage. This argument is not new and had already been put forward by Davenport for the private industry in 2006 (Davenport 2006). In addition, the authors propose that most organizations have the data they need but lack the foundational practices and capabilities to get the most out of these data assets. They propose that in order to leverage their data, organizations should assess their capacity to assess their organizational capacity in six areas: data governance; data acquisition; data sharing; data standardization; data integration; and analytics. Finally, they make the point that the next generation of data will be bigger, less structured and less easily integrated. The first question arising from this analysis relates to its relevance to Canada. Many would argue that the Canadian context is vastly different from that of the US and that competition does not play the same role in Canada as in the US. In reality, Canada offers a contrasted picture with intense competition in a few large urban areas for fundraising and government attention, and little or no competition in rural and remote parts of the country. Today, 60% of the 600 Canadian hospitals are small community hospitals with little to do with the situation described by Rhoads and Ferrara. However, the introduction of Activity-Based Funding mechanisms in Alberta, British Columbia, Ontario and other provinces will create a more competitive environment for healthcare providers. The level of