ABSTRACT Deinstitutionalization and marketization of eldercare has been delayed by 20 years in the Czech Republic compared to Western Europe, and it takes place in a completely different context, characterized by the legacy of communism, a growing older population, and less generous public subsidies. This study is the first in the Czech Republic to examine how deinstitutionalization and marketization effect implementation of these principles on the availability and quality of eldercare services at regional and municipal levels. A mixed-method approach was used, combining several data sources (policy documents, administrative data, statistics, expert panel, and secondary use of qualitative data). The findings suggest that the support for and availability of home-based care has declined, despite the ever-increasing number of older adults and policy preference for deinstitutionalization. Furthermore, home-based services have failed to adjust to growing care needs of older adults (e.g., inflexible schedules, limited provision of time-demanding care, inadequate staff composition). This situation occasioned an unintended outcome: the emergence of nonregistered, semilegal, for-profit nursing homes offering low-quality care and poor working conditions, and subject to no quality control. The health and even lives of older adults are at risk if they choose such services. Research is needed to study older adult decision making and offer them tools to identify and avoid questionable services.


Tapping of signal from an optical backplane which includes amplification will also cause a loss of pump power at the tapping points. This pump loss can be a significant factor in limiting the number of ports that can be served through power budget considerations. A report is made on the fabrication of a dichroic tap capable of giving a pump rejection in excess of 10dB.


The increasing demand towards dental implant in society with intermediate until high socio-economic status has forced implant practitioners to be more professional to work. This study aimed to find the differences between dental implant placement location before and after the dental implant examination by using the panoramic radiography. This research was a "Quasi Experimental" design with "Pre-Post Test". This study was conducted in the RSGMP FKG UNHAS with the subject of treatment by the number of 30 samples, included both male and female, aged 20-50 years, losing 1-2 dental units, had no systemic diseases, no proximal caries , minimum jawbone was 5 mm in width and 9 mm in height. Data was analyzed with SPSS Program version 12 for Windows. The results showed that there were significant differences in the disposition of dental implant before and after panoramic radiography examination. As conclusion, before the installation of dental panoramic implants radiographycally, all samples had good criteria, after installation of the implants 56.7% had good criteria, 16.7% moderate and 26.7% bad criteria. Based on gender, male had higher percentage for good dental implants placement compared to female. Female had higher percentage of dental implant shifted to mesial and on the other hand, male had higher percentage of dental implant shifted to distal.


Objective:To examine the effect of carbamazepine and valproate monotherapy on bone blood serum metabolism index and hormone in adult.Method: In the present study, 30 adult patients aged 18~40 with epilepsy and treated with VPA alone for over 6 months were recruited.Subjects for comparison consisted of two groups:30 age-matched adults with epilepsy taking CBZ as monotherapy for more than 6 months; and 50 community-dwelling, sex-matched volunteers of the same age-range serving as controls. Serum concentrations of calcium(Ca 2+)、 phosphate (P 3+),alkaline phosphatase (ALP),intact parathyroid hormone(iPTH),Calcitonin(CT) and 25 hydroxy-vitamin D[25-(OH)D] were examined in all patients and controls.Results:Carbamazepine group and Valproate group were compared with the control group for concentration of Ca 2+,P 3+ ,ALP.Serum concentrations of Ca 2+,P 3+ and 25-(OH)D were significantly lower with CBZ than control group, serum concentrations of Ca 2+ and 25-(OH)D in patients with VPA were significantly higher than those with CBZ and control groups. Serum concentrations of ALP,iPTH and CT were higher with both CBZ and VPA than control, implying that higher turnover and increased bone resorption caused by either drug. Conclusion: CBZ and VPA have different mechanisms affecting bone metabolism.


To improve the conductivity of electrically conductive adhesives, three short-chain dicarboxylic acids, malonic acid (acid M), adipic acid (acid A) and terephthalic acid (acid T), were used in a typical ICA formulation. Such acids can partially remove or can completely replace the C-18 stearic acid, which are commonly used as the surfactant in Ag flakes manufacturing process. Malonic acid and adipic acid, which only have single-bond short chain hydrocarbon between the dicarboxylic groups, increase the conductivity of conductive adhesives greatly. Terephthalic acid, however, deteriorates the conductivity due to the rigid aromatic structure in the molecule. The stabilized contact resistance has also been achieved with the introduction of dicarboxylic acids. Most importantly, the significant improvement of electrical properties is achieved without adversely affecting the physical and mechanical properties of the ICAs.


In this study, we investigated the relationship between subgroup perceptions and types of team learning and explored the mediating role of task and relationship conflict. We hypothesized and found that perceptions of subgroups negatively influenced learning about the task and learning about work processes. Perceptions of subgroups did not affect learning about social relationships. The negative relationship between subgroup perceptions and task and process learning was mostly due to increased levels of relationship conflict and partly due to increased levels of task conflict.


Objective:To observe the effect of salvia miltiorrhiza and ligustrazine injection in combination with traditional Chinese medicine enema on chronic kidney disease(CKD),endothelin(ET),6-keto-prostaglandin F1α(6-keto-PGF1α) and thromboxane B2(TXB2).Method:Seventy patients with stage 3-4 CKD were randomly divided into observation group and control group(n=35 each).Control group was received western medicine therapy and rhubarb fluid enema.200 mL rhubarb fluid were given via retention enema for 1-2 h and inserted into the intestine 20cm daily.The patients in observation group,on the basis of control group,were received salvia miltiorrhiza and ligustrazine injection 15 mL,diluted with 100 mL saline,iv,for 10 days.After two days' rest,the patients were received another course.There were two courses.Serum creatine(SCr),blood urea nitrogen(BUN),ET,6-Keto-PGF1α and TXB2 were tested before and after treatment.Result:The total effective rate of observation group(71.43%) was higher than control group(45.71%) with a significant difference(P0.05).BUN and SCr in observation group were lower than control group(P0.05,P0.01);After treatment,ET and TXB2 were decreased,and 6-keto-PGF1α increased in two growps.ET and TXB2 in observation group were lower than those in control group,however,6-keto-PGF1α in observation group was higher than that in control group(P0.05).Conclusion:Salvia miltiorrhiza and ligustrazine injection can decrease BUN and SCr in patients with stage 3-4 CKD,improve clinical efficacy,ameliorate hypercoagulative state and protect vascular endothelial function.


What the authors wanted to determine is if "demarketing"—in this case, establishing a norm that might discourage consumption—is an effective way to reduce our carbon footprint. They set up an online study and a laboratory study, and, after presenting study participants with a report that argued that people consume too much, asked them to make consumption choices in a variety of contexts. The choices were correlated with the participants' degree of materialism, which the authors also measured.


The invention discloses a rotary limiting device for a vehicle. A limiting mechanism of the rotary limiting device is positioned above a work plate; a movable limiting plate and an inducting plate are sequentially arranged outside each fixed limiting plate; the inducting plate is movably connected with the corresponding movable limiting plate; more than two first oil cylinders are fixedly arranged on each fixed limiting plate; each first oil cylinder piston is respectively and fixedly connected with the movable limiting plate; a limiting switch and a spring are arranged on each movable limiting plate and are fixedly connected; one end of a rack of a driving mechanism is fixedly connected with a second oil cylinder piston; two sides at the other end of the rack of the driving mechanism are respectively meshed with one gear; a gear shaft penetrates through the work plate and is fixedly connected with one end of the fixed limiting plate; a first through hole is formed at the other end of the fixed limiting plate; two second through holes are respectively formed on two sides of the work plate; two air cylinders are arranged below the work plate; and each air cylinder piston is arranged in the corresponding second through hole. The rotary limiting device can be used for limiting the vehicle by rotating the limiting mechanism, can be suitable for vehicles in various types and is simple and convenient for operation.


This paper presents a reliability model of structural components under constant amplitude, which is based on the distribution of stress intensity factor (SIF). Considering the stochastic nature of the environmental influences and the geometrical and mechanical properties of structural materials, the fracture toughness and the instantaneous length of fatigue crack are random variables and assumed to follow logarithmic normal distribution approximately. Consequently, this paper deduces that the SIF of components under constant amplitude loading also follows logarithmic normal distribution and the distribution parameters can be obtained from the expectation and variance of fatigue crack length. We give the steps of parameter computation of the Paris-Erdogan's crack propagation equation, and based on that, present methods for calculating the expectation and variance of the crack length at a given time. Then, a SIF-based reliability model is set up and the experimental data of the center crack testpieces of 7075-T7351 aluminum alloy are employed to demonstrate it. The results show that this model is in a good agreement with the experimental results.


OBJECTIVE To investigate the intervention role of esomeprazole on recurrent cough. METHODS In order to coafirm recurrent cough as the main symptoms of the patients,according to the diagnostic criteria 37 cases of chronic bronchitis and chronic cough,symptoins were enrolled:13 males and 24 females, aged from 31 to 72 years old, with an average age of 41.3 years old, cough accompanied by a corresponding upper gastrointestinal symptoms and endoscopy-negative.In each case the first treatment, the incidence was observed in one year, a year after the onset of the addition to the use of conventional antibiotics due to cough, the plus with oral esomeprazole tablets 20mg, 2 times a day, or 40 mg, once a day. According to the method of treatment of gastroesophageal reflux disease, the drugs were taken for 4 weeks. In the course of treatment,the quantitative score of alleviating cough symptom to stopping cough,interval time of cougheasing and the side effects of esomeprazole were recorded. RESULTS Addition of esomeprazole treatment, cough symptoms disappeared a few days, the entire treatment course shorter duration of remission was significantly longer (P0.01). CONCLUSION Esomeprazole used as intervention.


Objective: To compare the periodontal status in pregnant women and aspects related to their health assistance, as well as to correlate periodontal status and oral hygiene with pregnancy trimester. Material and Methods: A total of 150 pregnant women were randomly selected from a public (SPU) and private hospital (SPI) located in the city of Imperatriz, Maranhao, Brazil. The pregnant women were informed about the objectives of the study and consented their participation by signing a consent form. Participants underwent clinical examination to measure their oral hygiene status (S-OHI) and periodontal condition (CPI). The results were analyzed by Mann-Whitney and Spearman's correlation test (a 0.05) between the periodontal status of pregnant women attending the public (SPU) and the private service (SPI). The pregnancy trimester did not show a significant correlation with oral hygiene and periodontal status in the pregnant women (p>0.05). Conclusion: Although a significant difference concerning oral hygiene of pregnant women was observed between SPU and SPI services, periodontal disease was found to be a prevalent, common factor to both groups regardless of the pregnancy trimester.


Change detection in image processing is the process of identifying differences by comparing images taken at different times. There are several digital change detection techniques; nevertheless, there is no universally optimal change detection methodology: the choice is dependent upon the application. Change detection methods based on multispectral space transformations like Principal Component Analysis (PCA) show good solutions for remote sensing applications. One advantage of PCA is in reducing data redundancy between bands and emphasizing different information in derived components. This work focus on the PCA exploitation for the SPOT multispectral image change detection. Thresholds are applied to the transformed image (PC2) to isolate the pixels that have changed. Thresholding methods require a decision as to where to place threshold boundaries in order to separate areas of change from those of no change. The accuracy of change detection maps that are derived with SPOT data is represented in terms of producer's accuracy, user's accuracy, and overall accuracy, which are calculated from an error matrix (or confusion matrix). The obtained results have demonstrated solving efficiently the change detection problem.


For connection to at least two building blocks, comprising a releasably connectable tendon material or connecting member ( "tendon material"), a toy construction system. The tendon material is a resiliently deformable, and, in at least two Cartesian axes, at least two blocks, providing the movement of the predetermined range with respect to each other. The tendon member has an engaging portion, each block has a corresponding receiving element. .The 18


Christina Wang and colleagues conducted a randomized trial in two centers (California, USA and China) with two treatment groups (non-Chinese and Chinese men, respectively, 40 subjects each group). The primary aim of the study was to compare the efficacy of the combination of the progestin levonorgestrel (LNG) with testosterone (T) implants to that by T implants alone on spermatogenesis suppression ("Levonorgestrel Implants Enhanced the Suppression of Spermatogenesis by Testosterone Implants: Comparison Between Chinese and Non-Chinese Men," Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism, February 2006;91(2):460-70).


Today we know of 66 moons in our very own Solar System, and many of these have atmospheres and oceans. In addition, the Hubble (optical) Space Telescope has helped us to discover a total of 100 extra-solar planets, i.e., planets going around other suns, including several solar systems. The Chandra (X-ray) Space Telescope has helped us to discover 33 Black Holes. There are some extremely fascinating things out there in our Universe to explore. In order to travel greater distances into our Universe, and to reach planetary bodies in our Solar System in much less time, new and innovative space propulsion systems must be developed. To this end NASA has created the Prometheus Program. When one considers space missions to the outer edges of our Solar System and far beyond, our Sun cannot be relied on to produce the required spacecraft (s/c) power. Solar energy diminishes as the square of the distance from the Sun. At Mars it is only 43% of that at Earth. At Jupiter, it falls off to only 3.6% of Earth's. By the time we get out to Pluto, solar energy is only .066% what it is on Earth. Therefore, beyond the orbit of Mars, it is not practical to depend on solar power for a s/c. However, the farther out we go the more power we need to heat the s/c and to transmit data back to Earth over the long distances. On Earth, knowledge is power. In the outer Solar System, power is knowledge. It is important that the public be made aware of the tremendous space benefits offered by Nuclear Electric Propulsion (NEP) and the minimal risk it poses to our environment. This paper presents an overview of the reasons for NEP systems, along with their basic components including the reactor, power conversion units (both static and dynamic), electric thrusters, and the launch safety of the NEP system.


The current paper is mainly concerned with the internal layers for a quasi–linear singularly perturbed differential equation with time delays. By using the method of boundary layer functions and the theory of contrast structures, the existence of a uniformly valid smooth solution is proved, and the asymptotic expansion is constructed. As an application, a concrete example is presented to demonstrate the effectiveness of our result.


The root rot/wilt causing pathogens are, Sclerotium rolfsii Rhizoctonia bataicola and Fusarium sp. In vitro screening of fungicides was undertaken to identify an effective compound against these pathogens. Mancozeb, Carbendazim, Thiophanate methyl, Hexaconazole, Propiconazole, Carbendazim + Mancozeb and Carboxin + Mancozeb were found to be effective in inhibiting mycelial growth of all the three pathogens.


Experiment teaching and learning is an essential link for universities and colleges of higher education to cultivate compound talents. This article gives a integrated introduction about the background of editing, structure, charactersitics and experts evaluation on "21st Century Electric Engineering and Automation Serial Textbook" which will be published and distributed soon.


Map shows counties, roads, and settlements in the Connecticut Western Reserve in present-day Ohio. Includes legend in lower margin: text detailing history of the Western Reserve - "Reference's, Court House's, Meeting House's, College's, Mill's, Light House's, Village's, County Lines, Roads, Falls." No scale given.


—Contact discovery is a crucial component of social applications, facilitating interactions between registered contacts. This work introduces Arke, a novel approach to contact discovery that addresses the limitations of existing solutions in terms of privacy, scalability, and reliance on trusted third parties. Arke ensures the unlinkability of user interactions, mitigates enumeration attacks, and operates without single points of failure or trust. Notably, Arke is the first contact discovery system whose performance is independent of the total number of users and the first that can operate in a Byzantine setting. It achieves its privacy goals through an unlinkable handshake mechanism built on top of an identity-based non-interactive key exchange. By leveraging a custom distributed architecture, Arke forgoes the expense of consensus to achieve scalability while maintaining consistency in a Byzantine fault tolerant environment. Performance evaluations demonstrate that Arke can support enough throughput to operate at a planetary scale while maintaining sub-second latencies in a large geo-distributed setting.


This report reviews existing systems engineering, software engineering and security engineering processes and procedures and proposes an iterative design and development approach to building trusted information systems using commercial off-the-shelf and previously evaluated security products. The paper begins with a survey of the systems engineering process. Software engineering is then examined in the context of the US military DOD-STD-2167A development environment. Various other systems development methodologies are discussed with the focus of attention being on the spiral development regime developed by Boehm. The spiral development approach is embodied in a TRW software development that uses a "two-pass" design philosophy. It is this two-pass design concept that is used as the cornerstone of an iterative design and development technique that is proposed in the final part of the paper. The report presents material identified in a survey of the security evaluation criteria and standards available internationally today. It reviews the US Government Rainbow Series, the European harmonised evaluation criteria (ITSEC) and the ACSI series of documents in use in Australia. The various approaches to the design and the development processes of trusted systems are the focus of the material presented. It is this security design and development material that is used to support the proposed design method. The final part of the report is concerned with the issues of security architecture development, system security policies and the synthesis of these with the material drawn from the earlier sections. The main achievement of the report is the presentation of a concise trusted systems design method that utilises the TRW two-pass approach while incorporating the documentation requirements of DOD-STD-2167A and the mandatory security engineering activities.


This practitioner-oriented article explains the causal mechanism by which product commoditization occurs and describes a way of thinking that enables more sustainable innovation.


An analysis of the propagation of space-charge and electromagnetic waves through combined helical wiggler and axial guide magnetic fields is presented. A convenient method using complex basis vectors is used to derive a dispersion relation for coupled electrostatic and electromagnetic waves. Numerical results for space-charge waves differ markedly from the conventional approximation. For example, the effective electron-density factor Φ is double valued, becomes complex in some parameter regimes and large in others, and does not become singular near the stability limit for group I orbits. A numerical study of right circularly polarized electromagnetic waves also shows interesting effects of the combined wiggler and guide fields on the dispersion.


Cooperative MIMO technique is considered as one of the new solutions to minimize the energy consumption in wireless sensor networks.Considering the circuit energy consumption,we propose a multi-hop cooperative V-BLAST transmission scheme coupled with cross-layer design.In our design,the transmission rate,the number of clusters,the number of cooperative nodes and the number of hops are jointly optimized.Simulation results show significant energy savings and lifetime maximization of the network with judicious choice of network parameters.


The Philippines power sector underwent a substantial and largely complete reform process. Following a severe shortage of supply in the late 1980s and the Asian Financial crisis of 1997, which made the dollar-denominated debt of the National Power Corporation extremely burdensome, the Electric Power Industry Reform Act was passed in 2001. This was intended to improve the quality of service and reduce power tariffs via the introduction of private participation and competition at the wholesale and retail levels. Although the implementation of the full reform program took longer than originally expected, the unwavering support given to the reform agenda by successive presidents of the country ensured that the planned steps had all been completed by 2013. At that time, retail competition and open access for consumers in Luzon and Visayas of more than one megawatt were introduced. The reform process was not impeded by complications that would have arisen if consumer subsidies had been endemic, but retail prices are even higher than might have been expected in the absence of subsidies, due to domestic taxation and the presence of some inefficiencies that have not yet been eliminated by the onset of competition.


Abstract In response to the criticism by A. Finkelstein (J. Biomol. Struct. Dyn. 20, 311–314, 2002) of our Communication (J. Biomol. Struct. Dyn. 20, 5–6, 2002) several issues are dealt with. Importance of the notion of elementary folding unit, its size and structure, and the necessity of further characterization of the units for the elucidation of the protein folding in vivo are discussed. The criticism (J. Biomol. Struct. Dyn. 20, 311–314, 2002) on the hierarchical protein folding is also briefly addressed.


We consider a family of nonlinear diffusion equations with nonlinear sources. We assume that all nonlinearities are polynomials with respect to a dependent variable. The traveling wave reduction of this family of equations is an equation of the Lienard-type. Applying recently obtained criteria for integrability of Lienard-type equations we find some new integrable families of traveling wave reductions of nonlinear diffusion equations as well as their general analytical solutions.


In the participatory sensing network, the sensor noise dominates the quality of sensing data as well as the processing efficiency. Previous works focus on evaluating sensing accuracy with expectations, and fails to quantify the sensor noise with variance estimations, which will inevitably suffer from the dynamics and the incompleteness of the sensing data. In this paper, we propose FSP (Feeling Sensors' Pulse) method, which quantifies the sensor noise using the confidence interval. Specifically, we first use EM (Expectation Maximization) based iterative estimation algorithm to compute the maximum likelihood estimation (MLE) of sensor noise. Second, on the basis of these estimations, we leverage the asymptotic normality of MLE and the Fisher information to compute the confidence interval. The extensive simulations show that, FSP can achieve 90% success rate where the true values of sensor noise fall into the 95% confidence interval, at the cost of the polynomial time complexity only.


6 Questions That Could Save Your Life (or the life of someone you love):
What Women Need to Know about Colon Cancer Screening

March is National Colorectal Cancer Awareness Month and the American Society for Gastrointestinal Endoscopy (ASGE) encourages everyone over 50, or those under 50 with a family history or


Differential cross sections for elastic scattering of protons at 9.6 and 11.7 Mev from nickel-64 and zinc-64 are measured and compared. The observed shift in the positions of the maxima and minima of the differential cross sections is shown to be consistent with the presence of a symmetry energy term STAC(N-Z)/A! in the real nuclear potential of the optical model. It is found that C approximately 40 Mev, in reasonable agreement with the results of other observations. Comparison of the back angle data yields an estimate of about 16 mb for the compound elastic scattering cross section of Zn at 9.60 Mev. The 11.7- Mev data show no contribution from compound elastic scattering. 40 references. (auth)


The paper presents a spatiotemporal mechanism and model of the oscillatory nature of synthesis reactions of nanodispersed doped calcium carbonate phosphates as a biomaterial highly active during osteogenesis. The system is oscillating in nature and representable by a Brusselator of the simplest implementation of cubic nonlinearity. The developed biomaterial provides a high degree of resorption and transdermal capability for osteogenesis process activation in humans of any age, especially those with injuries. It can become a means for bone and dental tissue strengthening, as well as for restoration of joints.The paper presents a spatiotemporal mechanism and model of the oscillatory nature of synthesis reactions of nanodispersed doped calcium carbonate phosphates as a biomaterial highly active during osteogenesis. The system is oscillating in nature and representable by a Brusselator of the simplest implementation of cubic nonlinearity. The developed biomaterial provides a high degree of resorption and transdermal capability for osteogenesis process activation in humans of any age, especially those with injuries. It can become a means for bone and dental tissue strengthening, as well as for restoration of joints.


Objective:To establish a method for qualitative and quantitative analysis of the major active components in sepia.Methods: Melanin was identified by dissoving it in a basic solution to see whether there was segregation of a black substance.Glycine,asparagines,glutamic acid and alanine in sepia were determined by HPLC-AccQ-Tag method and iron was determined by atomic absorption spectrophotometer.Results: Melanin in sepia was dissolved in 2 mol/L NaOH solution and black substance was obtained in 2 mol/L HCl solution.The recoveries of the above 4 amino acids and iron were within the range of 95%-105% with RSD5%(n=6).The mean contents of glycine,asparagines,glutamic acid,alanine and iron in 3 batches of sepia samples were 7.37,11.23,12.05,7.32 and 0.206 mg·g~(-1),respectively.Conclusion: The method in this article is feasible for quantitative and qualitative analysis of bioactive contents in sepia;it has good repeatibility and may be used for the quality control of sepia.


In this paper, the methods of total RNA and mRNA extraction, cDNA synthesis and ditags preparation are discussed in constructing SAGE library of Monasccus Ruber. The optimal concentration of template and the number of PCR cycles are obtained by optimizing the PCR conditions.


Holomorphic extension of the Ackermann function is suggested. Algorithms of evaluation of tetration and pentation are discussed and illustrated with explicit plots and complex maps.


The study of expressions of filiation has already been the subject of several articles, which were limited to periods prior to the Third Intermediate Period. The aim of this article is to evaluate these expressions within the specific framework of the Books of the Dead from the 21st and 22nd Dynasties. These periods are marked by a significant increase in the variety of expressions employed, whereas the New Kingdom manuscripts expressed filiation according to a more uniform and rigid scheme. Similarly to what happens with titles and despite the diversity of expressions, one observes a progressive decrease in the mention of filiation which almost disappears from funerary papyri, while long genealogies on temple statues are developing. This contribution attempts to understand the motivations behind the use of these expressions and more generally to grasp their purpose in expressing the identity of the deceased.


The vehicle dynamic behavior of electric vehicles differs in many respects from that of internal combustion engine-powered vehicles. The fundamental difference is the torque-speed curve of the internal combustion engine and the electric motor. This fact is one of the important aspects for the consumption of an electric vehicle. The consumption of electric vehicles can be reduced by controlling the shift with artificial intelligence. In this article, we address this problem by detailing possible alternatives.


In this paper we derive the tree-level S-matrix of the effective theory of Goldstone bosons known as the non-linear sigma model (NLSM) from string theory. This novel connection relies on a recent realization of tree-level open-superstring S-matrix predictions as a double copy of super-Yang–Mills theory with Z -theory — the collection of putative scalar effective field theories encoding all the α ′ -dependence of the open superstring. Here we identify the color-ordered amplitudes of the NLSM as the low-energy limit of abelian Z -theory. This realization also provides natural higher-derivative corrections to the NLSM amplitudes aris-ing from higher powers of α ′ in the abelian Z -theory amplitudes, and through double copy also to Born–Infeld and Volkov–Akulov theories. The Kleiss–Kuijf and Bern–Carrasco– Johansson relations obeyed by Z -theory amplitudes thereby apply to all α ′ -corrections of the NLSM. As such we naturally obtain a cubic-graph parameterization for the abelian Z -theory predictions whose kinematic numerators obey the duality between color and kinematics to all orders in α ′ .


The experiment was conducted on two hybrids (Massouda and Chahin) sweet pepper (Capsicum annuum L.) in the field of the College of Agricultural Engineering Sciences, University of Duhok during growing season of 2018, to study the effects of three levels of artificial compost in soil (0:0, 1:1, 1:3 v/v) and four concentrations of seaweed extract spray (Tecamin algae) (0.0, 0.5, 0.75, 1 ml.l) on Massouda F1 and Chahin F1 hybrids. The results shows that Massouda hybrid significantly recorded higher fruit dry weight and vitamin C, whereas Chahin hybrid were overcome significantly from Massouda in chlorophyll a and b. The high level 1:1 compost significantly increased fruit dry weight, vitamin C and total carbohydrate, while the level 1:3 compost significantly recorded higher chlorophyll a and lower fruit respiration rate compared to untreated hybrids with compost. However, the influence of high concentration (1 ml.l) seaweed on the marketability pepper fruits was affected significantly and improved fruit dry weight, vitamin C, total carbohydrate, chlorophyll b and lower fruit respiration rate than untreated with seaweed except chlorophyll a which significantly increased in level (0.5 ml.l) seaweed. On the other hand, the triple interactions among the three factors significantly enhanced all detected traits compared to untreated plants.


IN THIS PAPER IT IS SUGGESTED THAT FROM A SAFETY POINT OF VIEW, MAN, ROAD AND THE VEHICLE, SHOULD BE CONSIDERED AS A SYSTEM IN WHICH MAN SHOULD BE REGARDED AS A MEMBER OF THE BIOLOGICAL SCALE AND NOT AS THE MASTER. THE ROLE OF THE ROAD IN THE DYNAMICS OF TRAFFIC, IS ANALYSED. IT IS POINTED OUT THAT THE CONCEPT OF A ROAD LAY-OUT BEING MERELY A FUNCTION OF VEHICLE DYNAMICS, IS LARGELY OUT-DATED, BASED ON THE FACT THAT MOUNTAIN ROADS HAVE A LOWER ACCIDENT RATE THAN EASY ROADS; THIS SEEMS TO INDICATE THAT, IN TERMS OF SAFETY A LOW MENTAL LOAD (ON THE DRIVER) IS LESS DESIRABLE THAN A MORE INTENSE ONE. THERE IS SOME BASIS FOR THE SUPPOSITION THAT A DRIVER'S ATTENTION TENDS TO RELAX IN DIRECT RATIO TO THE INCREASE IN THE EASINESS OF DRIVING CONDITIONS, IN PURSUIT OF WHICH THE LONG WIDE CURVES OF MODERN ROADS HAVE BEEN DEVELOPED.


Salmonella enterica serovar Typhimurium strain SL7207 is a genetically modified derivative of strain SL1344, which preferentially accumulates in tumors and can be used as a vehicle for tissue-specific gene delivery in vivo. Here, we report the draft genome sequence of SL7207, confirming a purported aroA deletion and four single-nucleotide polymorphisms compared to SL1344. Salmonella enterica serovar Typhimurium is most well known for causing acute gastroenteritis. If left untreated, S. Typhimurium infection can lead to systemic disease resulting in host septic shock and, in extreme cases, death. Despite these adverse effects, multiple Salmonella serovars have been demonstrated to preferentially colonize tumor tissue when administered intravenously and delay tumor growth. SL7207 is one of the most promising strains utilized for this purpose (1). SL7207 is reported to have a deletion in aroA, resulting in bacterial auxotrophy for two compounds: -aminobenzoic acid and 2,3-dihydroxybenzoate (2). These compounds are not found in mammalian tissue, rendering the bacteria attenuated in the mammalian host and lending to its suitability as a therapeutic agent. The parent strain of SL7207, SL3261, was engineered as a vaccine strain, and it has been used in cancer therapy studies (1, 3, 4). However, many studies have identified the tumor-preferential localization of SL7207 when administered intravenously (5–7). Multiple studies have employed SL7207 for its tumor disruption and tumor-specific DNA vaccine delivery, as well as identified tumor-specific Salmonella promoters and immune components involved in Salmonella-tumor localization. Furthermore, bioluminescent SL7207 has been employed as an agent to identify the location of tumors and metastasis in vivo (8, 9). However, a detailed analysis of the genetic makeup of this strain is lacking. To gain a deeper understanding of the mechanisms underlying the antitumor properties of SL7207, its entire genome was sequenced. Genomic DNA of S. Typhimurium SL7207 was extracted from a freshly grown single colony using an Illumina Nextera XT DNA sample kit per the manufacturer's protocol (Illumina, USA). Sequencing was performed by Illumina MiSeq using a 2 250 paired-end protocol. Read quality analysis and trimming were conducted using Trimmomatic and then quality assessed using in-house scripts combined with SAMtools, BedTools, and BWA-MEM. De novo assembly was conducted with SPAdes version 3.5, resulting in a total of 68 contigs, with 30 larger than 1,000 bp. The draft genome of strain SL7207 contains 5,026,283 bp, with 52.16% G C content, and encodes 4,754 coding sequences (CDSs), nine rRNAs, and 84 tRNAs. S. Typhimurium SL1344, in comparison, encodes 4,605 CDSs, 22 rRNAs, and 85 tRNAs. The contigs of SL7207 were reordered against the complete genome of SL1344, and aligned using progressiveMauve (version 20150226, build 10) (10). A list of single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) was generated from Mauve and visually inspected using CLC Genomics Workbench version 7. Received 29 November 2016 Accepted 1 December 2016 Published 2 February 2017 Citation Johnson SA, Ormsby MJ, Wall DM. 2017. Draft genome sequence of the tumortargeting Salmonella enterica serovar Typhimurium strain SL7207. Genome Announc 5:e01591-16. https://doi.org/10.1128/ genomeA.01591-16. Copyright © 2017 Johnson et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Address correspondence to Daniel M. Wall, firstname.lastname@example.com. S.A.J. and M.J.O. contributed equally to this work. PROKARYOTES


We present the constrained portfolio selection problem as a learning problem requiring hyper-parameter specification. In practice, hyper-parameters are typically selected using a validation procedure, of which there are several widely-used alternatives. However, the performance of different validation procedures is problem dependent and has not been investigated for the portfolio selection problem. This study examines the behaviour of common validation procedures, including holdout, k-fold cross-validation, Monte Carlo cross-validation, and repeated k-fold cross-validation for estimating performance and selecting hyper-parameters for constrained portfolio selection. The results demonstrate that repeated k-fold cross-validation is the best performing procedure and recommend using 5 repetitions with 3 ≤ k ≤ 10 in practice.


Recorded copies of instruments from January 1903 to December 1914 convening powers of attorney, permitting one person to represent another in the handling of business and legal matters, showing date and place of execution, name of person represented, name of representative, statement of limits of power, signatures of parties, and notarization. Also includes recording certificate, showing date filed, date recorded, and signature of county clerk or deputy. Powers of attorney are numerically interspersed with deed record. Arranged chronologically by date recorded.


Objective To study human telomerase reverse transcriptase(hTERT) mRNA in cervical exfoliated cells from the specimens of normal and squamous carcinoma of the cervix(SCC) and its contribution to clinical diagnosis.Methods The real-time fluorescent quantitative reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction(Real-time RT-PCR)was employed to detect the hTERT mRNA positive expression and quantitative levels of cervical exfoliated cells in Hela cell strains(The cell group),31 cases of SCC(The case group),21 cases of normal or cervicitis(The control group).The case group and the control group were all also detected by Thinprep Cytology Test (TCT) system.Results The positive rate of hTERT mRNA in exfoliated cells from the case group and the control group were expressed as 80.6% and 9.5%,The quantitative levels of hTERT mRNA (NhTERT) in them were respectively expressed as 0.4646~13.7823 and 0.0093~0.0816,indicating statistical significance(P0.05).The sensitivity and specificity of detecting hTERT mRNA in cervical exfoliated cells for screening SCC were respectively 80.6% and 90.5%.Conclusion The positive rate and quantitative levels of cervical exfoliated cells from specimens of SCC were more higher than that of the normal cervix.The procedure can be help to early detection in clinic for diagnosing SCC.


This paper presents a method of imaging the coloration pattern in the fingernail and surrounding skin to infer fingertip force direction during planar contact. Nail images from 7 subjects were registered to reference images with RANSAC and then warped to an atlas with elastic registration. Recognition of fingertip force direction, based on linear discriminant analysis, shows that there are common color pattern features in the fingernail and surrounding skin for different subjects. Based on the common features, the overall recognition accuracy is 92%.


We thank Drs Suzuki, Fujita, Matsubara and Hirata for their insightful letter regarding our recent study on Parkinson's disease (PD) non-motor symptoms in different motor subtypes and their associations with quality of life [1]. The findings from the study by Suzuki et al. [2] together with our study on early PD patients [3] that used different sleep instruments reinforce the point that the postural instability/gait difficulty (PIGD) motor subtype is associated with more severe sleep impairment. In our study, the association between the PIGD subtype and sleep impairment was first identified using the Non-Motor Symptoms Scale (NMSS) and further validated by the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI). The sleep/fatigue domain of NMSS briefly assesses daytime sleepiness, fatigue, sleep latency and efficiency, and restless leg syndrome. Even though rapid eye movement sleep behaviour disorder, restless leg syndrome and excessive daytime sleepiness (EDS) are characteristics of PD sleep-related symptoms, sleep is a complex physiological process and these symptoms individually will not fully represent the overall sleep impairment. To better quantify the overall sleep impairment, the PSQI was selected to validate our finding as it holistically assesses various aspects of sleep, including duration, latency, sleep disturbances, daytime sleepiness, sleep efficiency and sedative use. We agree with Suzuki et al. that detailed evaluation of specific PD sleep-related symptoms in different motor subtypes will be helpful to broaden the understanding of the pathophysiology of PD motor and non-motor phenotypes. Brainstem pathologies contribute to both sleep impairment and gait/postural problems in PD. A pathological study has shown that sleep disturbance in PD is associated with a-synucleinopathy in locus coeruleus and raphe nuclei [4]. EDS has been reported to be associated with dysfunction in the locus coeruleus, rostral raphe and ventral tegmental area [5]. PD patients with mainly akinesia and rigidity showed higher neuronal loss in the locus coeruleus, medial and lateral substantia nigra [6]. One common feature of neurodegenerative diseases is that the neuropathological process propagates through functionally and structurally connected vulnerable neural networks. With our findings of more severe sleep impairment, fatigue and urinary symptoms in the PIGD subtype [3], and the findings from the study by Suzuki et al. regarding EDS and other PD sleeprelated symptoms in the PIGD subtype [2], it may be postulated that various brainstem structures are functionally and structurally connected in the neuropathological process that results in the PIGD phenotype and the associated non-motor symptoms. Functional magnetic resonance imaging will be useful to investigate the neuronal connectivity for PD motor and non-motor features in future studies.


The idea that multifunctional open spaces support sustainable urban
 development has been widely accepted in theory and intensively used in
 practice of urban planning and design. It is based on the assumption that
 multifunctional spaces bring a wider spectrum of environmental, social and
 economic benefits to urban areas. And yet, multifunctionality of space is
 still a vague and diffuse concept that needs further clarifications. Besides
 that, different academic disciplines understand and use this concept in
 different ways. This makes the application of the concept difficult to
 assess and manage in relation to different aspects of urban sustainability.
 Through the literature review, this paper analyses and compares how the
 concept of multifunctionality is used in various spatial disciplines (urban
 planning and design, landscape architecture) in order to better understand
 and relate its different dimensions, applications and expected benefits for
 sustainable development. Based on this, a new, relational and
 multidimensional conceptualisation of the multifunctionality of public open
 spaces is proposed for analysis and assessment of urban design solutions. It
 is further applied and discussed in relation to students projects from
 ?Ecological urban design studio? from the University of Belgrade Faculty of
 Architecture, as visions for development of multifunctional public open
 spaces in modernist mass housing area of ?Sava Blocks? in New Belgrade,
 Serbia.


Eyes are the most precious gift given to us by the God as they help us to enjoy the beautiful world around us. Loss of the eyes can be detrimental to the patient both physically as well as mentally. Therefore, prosthodontic rehabilitation of such patients should be done as soon as possible with the ocular prosthesis. An ocular prosthesis, artificial eye or glass eye is a type of craniofacial prosthesis that replaces an absent natural eye following an enucleation, evisceration, or orbital exenteration. This article describes the simplified and innovative technique of prosthetic rehabilitation of a patient by customizing the stock eyes available in the market.


Kinetics of oxidation of acetanilide and benzanilide by Cr(VI) in aqueous acetic acid-sulphuric acid mixture reveals that the kinetic orders are fractional in [substrate], first order in [oxidant] and first order in [H] till 0.5M leading to second order in higher concentrations for acetanilide. Benzanilide exhibits first order in [substrate] till 0.005M leading to independent of [substrate] at higher concentrations, first order in [oxidant] and second order in [H]. These results are rationalized by a mechanism involving complex formation with different Cr(VI) species. The complex in a series of fast reactions yields azobenzene as the product in both the cases.


A countable structure (with finite signature) is computable if its universe can be identified with ω in such a way as to make the relations and operations computable functions. In this thesis, I study which Boolean algebras and linear orders are computable.
Making use of Ketonen invariants, I study the Boolean algebras of low Ketonen depth, both classically and effectively. Classically, I give an explicit characterization of the depth zero Boolean algebras; provide continuum many examples of depth one, rank ω Boolean algebras with range ω + 1; and provide continuum many examples of depth ω, rank one Boolean algebras. Effectively, I show for sets S ⊆ ω + 1 with greatest element, the depth zero Boolean algebras BuS and BvS are computable if and only if S \{ω} is n 2n+3
0
in the Feiner Σ-hierarchy.
Making use of the existing notion of limitwise monotonic functions and the new notion of limit infimum functions, I characterize which shuffle sums of ordinals below ω + 1 have computable copies. Additionally, I show that the notions of limitwise monotonic functions relative to 0' and limit infimum functions coincide.


. Stunting is the high-priority problem of child malnutrition in Indonesia. The purpose of this study was to determine the relationship between maternal posture and exclusive breastfeeding and stunting. This research will be conducted with a quantitative approach. This study was designed with a cross-sectional study design. The population is parents of stunted children aged 3-5 years in Demak district, Central Java. The sampling technique used in this study was purposive sampling and the sample was 36 parents of stunted children aged 3-5 years in Demak district, Central Java. The research instrument was a questionnaire and test. Data analysis used the chi-square test to measure the association between maternal posture and exclusive breastfeeding and stunting. The results showed there was no relationship between stunting and maternal education (OR.0,7,95% CI, 0,132-4,022;P=1.000), level of income (OR.0,7;95% CI, 0,132-4,022;P=1.000), maternal posture (OR, 1.0;95% CI, 0,320-3,123;P=1.000), and exclusive breastfeeding (OR, 1,5;95%CI,0,469-4,797;P=0,660).


min B12 deficiency and the benefit of Blz replacement in these patients, who are mostly older people.' Therefore, we read with great interest the article by Bernard and colleagues: published recently in the ]ournal, regarding the effect of vitamin Blz deficiency on older veterans and its relationship to health. The authors concluded that there was no significant correlation between the broadly defined vitamin B12 deficiency (serum B,, level < 200 gp/mL or 200 < Blz level < 300 and methylmalonic acid (MMA) or homocysteine (HC) elevated by more than 2 standard deviations) and cognitive impairment and general health. Only those with strictly defined vitamin B12 deficiency (B12 level < 200) experienced more bodily pain and demonstrated a lower score on the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE).' The study has indeed examined a subject of great clinical importance in geriatric practice. We do, however, have some questions and comments. When comparing the differences between the Blzdeficient group and the normal Blz group on the score of the MMSE and the parameters of the RAND Health Survey, the author adjusted the effects of daily alcohol intake, daily intake of a vitamidmineral supplement, annual income, and level of education. We believe the factor of daily vitamin supplementation should not have been adjusted if the purpose was to see the effect of B12 deficiency. The reasons are as follows: In the same study, the authors found a significant difference in the proportion of subjects taking a vitamin supplement in the group with strictly defined B,, deficiency (15.8%) compared with the corresponding normal B12 group (41.1%, P = .04, Table 1). A similar difference was found between the broadly defined B12 deficiency (26.5%) and the corresponding normal Blz group (42.1%, P = .044, Table 2). These results suggest that taking a vitamin supplement raises the Blz level. Adjusting for this factor would likely narrow the difference between the B12-deficiency group and the normal Blz group. An analogous situation would be to adjust for smoking while analyzing the effect of higher nicotine level on the incidence of COPD or lung cancer. It would be interesting to compare the groups without controlling for vitamin supplementation. If there is a significant difference, then the factor of vitamin supplementation could be added to the model to further examine the role of vitamin supplements. Symptoms and signs of biochemical B12 deficiency are very subtle and nonspecific. Aging-related changes and other medical problems make the correlation of the clinical findings to BIZ deficiency even more difficult. The MMSE and the RAND Health Survey may not be sensitive enough to find the differences between the two groups, especially when the sample sizes are significantly unequal as seen in this study. A more sensitive approach would be to treat the patients with broadly defined B12 deficiency with Blz and then compare the preand post-treatment status.


This chapter illuminates the rights discourse of China through a case study of political participation. It questions whether political participation is a right or a duty from the view of theory of rights. Political participation is categorized into two types: virtue-based and interest-based. Virtue-based participation is duty-oriented. Interest-based participation is rights-oriented. The chapter addresses Chinese rights discourse from the concept of de (virtue) and examine the Confucian ideal of 'rule by virtue'. It then elaborates virtuous rights. To examine why virtuous rights could not be developed into effective rights for individuals, virtuous rights will be compared with 'natural rights' in two aspects: the concept of virtuous rights theoretically rejected the involvement of self-interest; because of the belief that the inherent virtue must be revealed by self-cultivation. Author argues that the Chinese translation of English term 'right' and its adoption indicated conceptual progress in the legitimization of self-interest and individual power.Keywords: Chinese rights; confucianism; interest-based participation; political participation; virtue-based participation


Educational games bear a close resemblance to Intelligent Tutoring Systems and narrative centered learning environments since they all use technology to enhance learning, and deliver instructional material to students by leveraging the attractive features of computers, software, and mobile devices. However many DGBL environments fail to balance the game (learning) challenges to the skill level of the student [1]. The difficulty in this adaptation is brought about by the wide variations in the " frustration or patience " level of students; some are frustrated easily and others need more challenges. The insufficient balance between challenges and skill levels exists because of the lack of player profiling from an instructional perspective and also because of the absence of semantic descriptions which give insight into the meaning and usage of the game assets in educational games. [2]. In educational games, players are often modelled from a gaming viewpoint where data is recorded about game events relevant to the players such as points collected, completed levels and rewards found. This information is valuable and makes the game experience more believable; however (educational game) players are for the most part students. Consequently, equal emphasis must be placed on modelling the students' knowledge, their instructional goals, and overall learning achievements. In addition, since all of the learning activities are featured in an educational game as one or more game assets, these activities not only have a pedagogical context but also a gaming context. Therefore, a proper understanding of what the game assets mean and how they fit into the game world along with a detailed student/player model enables the selection of learning activities that are appropriate for use in the game. By using an ontological approach for representing the gaming context in educational games, the relationships between the instructional and gaming roles of the game assets become clearly defined. Few examples of ontologies specifically designed for use in educational games have been described in the literature ([1], [3]). By selecting and combining some of the pure 'gaming' concepts and some of the pure 'instructional' concepts from these ontologies, the game ontology shown in Figure 1 below was developed. The ontology features concepts which describe the gaming environment and the player because in order to adapt the challenges of the game to the player's skill level, a record of the game state that concerns the player must be kept. When a player gives a response to …


The article concerns the concept of "humanism" as a general philosophical principle which acquires its concrete historical content depending on the nature of social relations and level of social development, and is one of the main characteristic of the civilized society


The procedure for the development of a measure of humour appreciation among a convenience sample of 53 primary school children attending a one-week summer program held in Hong Kong is described. Two sets of visual stimuli depicting pictures of local celebrities portrayed either veridically (congruously) or incongruously were established from a pool of 30 pictorial items. The pictures were ranked for their humour properties yielding a 16-item test battery. Analyses of children's responses clearly indicated that incongruous pictures were rated as significantly funnier than congruous pictures.


Introducti0n. Peripheral nerve injuries are one of the common traumas in various sport fields. Nowadays, thera are a growing tendency to Martial arts among young people. Insufficient knowlodage about the biomechanics and true skills in these sports can expose the athletes to many neuromusculoskeletal injuries including peripheral nerve injuries. The aim of this study was assessment of peripheral nerve injuries among Kick-boxers.
Methods. The research was done on 30 male kick-boxers Aged between 17-28 years. Ulnar, tibial and median nerves were studied for the presence of unlar nerve entrapment on elbow, trasal tunnel syndrom and carpal tunnel syndrom.
Results. Ulnar neuropathy was observed in 12 cases. Tibial entrapment was detected in 13 cases. No median nerve intrapment of CTS was detected. There was a significant correlation between the age of the participants and nerve entrapment.
Discussion. Peripheral nerve injuries should be considered in athletes and should be trained to apply preventive and thrapeutic procedures.


Monte Carlo Tree Search (MCTS) is a family of methods for planning in large domains. It focuses on finding a good action for a particular state, making its complexity independent of the size of the state space. However such methods are exponential with respect to the branching factor. Effective application of MCTS requires good heuristics to arbitrate action selection during learning. In this paper we present a policy-guided approach that utilizes action abstractions, derived from human input, with MCTS to facilitate efficient exploration. We draw from existing work in hierarchical reinforcement learning, interactive machine learning and show how multi-step actions, represented as stochastic policies, can serve as good action selection heuristics. We demonstrate the efficacy of our approach in the PacMan domain and highlight its advantages over traditional MCTS.


AbstractA case of rubella in a 46-year-old woman with paroxysmal nocturnal haemoglobinuria (PNH) is described. The patient developed haemorrhagic bullae and a severe confusional state. The features of PNH and the haematological complications of rubella are discussed.


In this study a practical investigation to the electrical and optical performance of the electronic ballasts and compact fluorescent lamps commercially available on the Egyptian market is conducted. The study includes 18 different cases of fluorescent lamps driven through magnetic and electronic ballasts. The outcome of this study was made to encompass all relevant circuit particulars. The conclusive remarks confirms the superior performance of the electronic ballasts but find it with the relatively high level of harmonic order present in the current waveform thus impairing the lamp efficacy, true power factor, THD and crest factor resulting in an a discomforting impact on the low-voltage networks. INTRODUCTION In most areas of domestic, residential, commercial and industrial application of lighting systems fluorescent tube fixtures are extensively made-use-of. This is due to the fact that they consume less active power and cause a more prolonged operating lifetime of the tube than their counterpart the incandescent lamp. The superior performance of the fluorescent tubes are sometimes outweighed by the mandatory presence of the magnetic ballast and its companion the starter as means to start the arc and maintain the lamp in a stable operating state. Since the early 1990's the recent developments in the technology of power electronic devices made it possible the manufacturing of the electronic ballast as a direct replacement to the combination of the magnetic ballast/starter on one hand and also to develop the compact fluorescent lamp as a direct replacement to the filament lamp on the other hand. Now, after two decades of operation with the electronically-based ballasts, and considering their ever-growing field of utilization, it is useful to re-evaluate their impact on the field of illumination and on other relevant fields, mainly the power quality of the low voltage networks. It is the purpose of this paper to carry out a practical investigation to the electrical and optical performances of selected sample of the electronic and CFL commercially available on the Egyptian market. To assess its ever growing effect on the low-voltage distribution network, their low power factor and the interference problem they may produce. TESTING SYSTEM SETUP The practical setup used to perform to this study is shown in fig.(1) and an illustration to this setup is given in fig.(2). A computer software program was developed to generate other relevant deductible results from the measured ones through the use of the fast Fourier transform technique (FFT) of the MATLAB software version 7.0. Eighteen cases of ballasts and compact lamps available on the local market are carefully selected so as to cover a broad area of ballasts types as shown in table 1. Fig.(1) Testing system set up Fig.(2) Illustration of the testing system in use Fluorescent Lamp circuit Auto Transformer


A longtime principal says the best, and perhaps only, aim is always to work toward the best possible environment, support, and standards for teaching and learning.


Summary and Implications Porcine cytomegalovirus (PCMV) is an ubiquitousinfectious agent in swine population throughout the world.Field and some experimental observations have suggestedthat PCMV plays an important role in causing or enhancingrespiratory and/or reproductive disease of swine. However,no actual measure of this has been documented. As the firststep in assessing the economic significance of PCMVinfection for swine herds in the United States, a field-basedcase-control study was conducted to evaluate the potentialrole of the virus in respiratory disease of young swine. Thedata in this study, thus far, suggest that there may be anassociation between PCMV infection and increased risk ofrespiratory disease development in nursery pig populationsand that, as was expected, PCMV infection is a commonfinding among nursery pigs. In an era in which multi-factorial respiratory disease and associated decrease inproduction efficiency is such a large concern, it may beprudent to consider PCMV when developing andimplementing strategies for production management and pigflow.


With the pervasiveness of the "Big Data" characteristic together with the expansion of geographically distributed datacenters in the Cloud computing context, processing large- scale data applications has become a crucial issue. Indeed, the task of finding the most efficient way of storing massive data across distributed locations is increasingly complex. Furthermore, the execution time of a given task that requires several datasets might be dominated by the cost of data migrations/exchanges, which depends on the initial placement of the input datasets over the set of datacenters in the Cloud and also on the dynamic data management strategy. In this paper, we propose a data placement strategy to improve the workflow execution time through the reduction of the cost associated to data movements between geographically distributed datacenters, considering their characteristics such as storage capacity and read/write speeds. We formalize the overall problem and then propose a data placement algorithm structured into two phases. First, we compute the estimated transfer time to move all involved datasets from their respective locations to the one where the corresponding tasks are executed. Second, we apply a greedy algorithm in order to assign each dataset to the optimal datacenter w.r.t the overall cost of data migrations. The heterogeneity of the datacenters together with their characteristics (storage and bandwidth) are both taken into account. Our experiments are conducted using Cloudsim simulator. The obtained results show that our proposed strategy produces an efficient placement and actually reduces the overheads of the data movement compared to both a random assignment and a selected placement algorithm from the literature.


. In the present paper, we define the new class of representation on n -Lie algebra that is called as generalized representation. We study the cohomology theory corresponding to generalized representations of n -Lie algebras and show its relation with the cohomology corresponding to the usual representations. Furthermore, we provide the computation for the low dimensional cocycles.


Atomic force microscopy studies have been performed on GaAs (001) homoepitaxy films grown by molecular beam epitaxy. Multilayered features are seen to evolve when the growth conditions favor island nucleation. As the epilayer thickness is increased these features grow in all dimensions but the angle of inclination remains approximately constant at 1°. The mounding does not occur on surfaces grown in step flow. We propose that the multilayered features are an unstable growth mode which relies on island nucleation and the presence of a step edge barrier.


Dipole sonic logs acquired in near‐vertical pilot wells and over the build section of nearby horizontal production wells are inverted to determine the five elastic constants characterizing a transversely isotropic formation, under the assumption of lateral homogeneity. Slowness values from a single depth in the vertical well are combined with data from the corresponding depth in the deviated well; these data are then inverted using nonlinear optimization to derive the five elastic constants. The technique is demonstrated on data from the Haynesville Shale in Texas. Estimates of the anisotropy are in line with a priori expectations; the Thomsen ε and γ parameters are well correlated and generally possess positive anellipticity, with Thomsen's ε greater than Thomsen's δ.


Paroxysmal nocturnal hemoglobinuria (PNH) is a very rare acquired disease which is characterized by increased sensitivity to complement proteins. The only curative treatment option for PNH has been still allogeneic stem cell transplantation from HLA-matched donor. Eculizumab, which is a monoclonal antibody, has been established as the effective approach not only for prevention of hemolysis, but also for prevention of potential organ damages such as thromboses and failure of target organs. But eculizumab does not have any impact on, or may increase, clone status and nature of the disease. We, hereby, report a case whose disease undergone spontaneous remission under treatment of eculizumab treatment.


Abstract: In drilling, a cylindrical hole is produced in workpiece, removing the material inside the workpiece. The cutting tool used in drilling operation is called 'Twist Drill'; it rotates and allows the material to be removed from the workpiece in the form of chips and thus drill the hole. Cutting fluids or coolants are used to perform this operation smoothly. The coating on the drill bits helps to reduce friction in the cut and the heat buildup in the drill bit. Coating also helps in protecting against corrosion. The present work focuses on the features of uncoated High Speed Steel (HSS) Twist Drill bit and Titanium Nitride (TiN) and Titanium Aluminium Nitride (TiAlN) coated on HSS Drills. The workpiece material was Mild Steel and the drilling operation was done using normal machining condition i.e. in presence of coolant. The cutting parameters used are cutting speed (35.5 m / min), spindle speed (1500 rpm), feed rate (0.2 mm / rev.), depth of cut (10 mm). These parameters were kept constant. Temperatures were measured with the help of thermal imaging camera and with the help of ANSYS software thermal analysis were done. Experimental results showed that the average rise in temperature of uncoated HSS tool was higher as compared to TiN coated and TiAlN coated HSS tools. TiAlN coated drills showed the least average rise in temperature. Keywords: High Speed Steel (HSS) Drill, TiN and TiAlN Coated HSS Twist Drill, Mild Steel (MS), Thermal Analysis, ANSYS Software.


The Quest for Numeracy: Data and Methods in American Political History Since World War II, some American historians have used quantitative evidence in their research with an enthusiasm and rigor that was unequaled in the historical discipline among the members of previous generations of scholars in this country. The tendency became apparent among economic and political historians during the mid-1950s. Within a decade, a different kind of social history had emerged as well. Inspired in large measure by the work of social scientists, the proponents of these "new" histories attempted both to expand the breadth of their approach and to deepen analysis of the economic, political, and social phenomena of the American past. Most American historians of the I930s and I940s acknowledged multicausality in explaining events in history and provided shopping lists of causal factors in their writing. Over the past three decades, historians have emerged who try to measure (albeit tentatively) the specific contribution of particular variables to outcomes under study, emphasizing the use of quantitative methods.1 The quantifiers of the post-World War II generation did, however, have forerunners who were active in the field of American history between I89o and 1940. Currently, most accept Jensen's view that the dominant influence in emphasizing the importance of analyzing quantitative data during those fifty years stemmed from the research, teaching, and students of Frederick Jackson Turner, whose fruitful career at the University of Wisconsin and Harvard University spanned the years I885-I924.2


Development of modern diagnostic procedures has greatly increased our knowledge of chronic pulmonary diseases. New and improved laboratory methods, bronchoscopy, biopsy technics, and serial roentgenographic observations have served not only as an aid to the earlier recognition of these conditions, but also to facilitate the identification of atypical disease manifestations. As a result of the additional knowledge gained through these sources, it has become necessary to revise certain fundamental concepts of chronic pulmonary diseases which, heretofore, have been regarded as almost axiomatic. This has been particularly true in regard to our understanding of the nature and localization of the initial lesion in progressive pulmonary tuberculosis of the reinfection or adult type. Formerly, it was believed that the first lesion in active tuberculosis almost always began in or near the apex of the lung. We now know, however—mainly because of the observations of Assmann (1)—that this lesion frequently occurs in ...


A two-step solvothermal method was employed to synthesize the Graphene/Fe3O4/BaTiO3 (GFT). X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), Raman spectra are used to observe the microstructure and magnetic properties of GFT, and the nanoparticles of Fe3O4 and BaTiO3 were uniformly deposited on the surface of the graphene nanosheets. Then GFT filler and the silicone rubber were mixed to manufacture the electromagnetic shielding materials. The vector network analyzer was employed to evaluate the electromagnetic shielding effectiveness of the modified electromagnetic shielding materials. The influence of the mole ratio of the GFT constituents, the mass content of the filler on the electromagnetic shielding effectiveness was studied between 1 GHz and 20 GHz. It is shown that the GFT/silicone rubber has the best electromagnetic shielding effectiveness for 24:1:1 of graphene: Fe3O4: BaTiO3 and 16 % GFT.


The present study was conducted in Pali district of Rajasthan with the objective to assess the training needs of goat keepers. The study revealed that 33.75, 23.33, 32.50 and 48.75% of respondents perceived training needs as 'most important' in goat care and management, feeding, breeding and health, respectively. Majority of the respondents preferred one week training during summer season in their own village. The study concluded that, goat keepers needed training on breeding and health care to a greater extent to improve the production of goats. Hence, extension agencies should disseminate information based on training needs at the field conditions for livelihood security of the farmers.


Thailand's real gross domestic product growth has fallen to a permanently lower trend, making it the worst performer in the Southeastern Asian region. The export sector, the country's long‐standing growth engine, has sputtered due to the declining competitiveness of the manufacturing sector. Chronic political instability during the last two decades has resulted in the adoption of short‐sighted policies, in particular, populist policies designed specifically to garner votes rather than improve the long‐term productivity of the business sector. The military coup was expected to restore political stability and end costly populist policies introduced by elected civil governments. Unfortunately, as the military government develops its long‐term political aspirations, it, too, seeks the assistance of populist policies to ensure its political success. Thailand has promulgated laws and regulations to ensure fiscal discipline, but it has yet to be seen whether the letter of the law can help prevent such populist policies in practice.


This study examines six manners in which rabbinic literature and Targum Psalms interact. 1. An earlier rabbinic tradition provides the backdrop against which the Targum's translation must be understood. 2. The Targum applies a tradition it uses to translate one part of a psalm towards translating another verse in that same psalm. 3. The Targum revises earlier rabbinic traditions to suit its own ideological and literary concerns. 4. The Targum adapts interpretations that were originally generated well beyond the confines of the psalm being translated and even the Psalter as a whole. 5. The Targum inserts itself into popular late antique exegetical discourses of particular psalms. 6. It rejects a widespread interpretive trend attested to in rabbinic literature. Overall, by moving beyond the mere notation of parallelism, we gain a clearer portrait of the translator's relationship with rabbinic literature, his working methods, and the ideologies that impelled his creative endeavours.


In physical recycling process, the quality of recycled plastics becomes usually poor in case various kinds of plastic materials are mixed. In order to solve the problem, we tried to separate flame and nonflame-retardant plastics used for toner cartridges as one example of mixed plastics by using magneto-Archimedes method. By using this method, we can control levitation and settlement of the particles in the medium by controlling the density and magnetic susceptibility of the medium and the magnetic field. In this study, we introduced the separation system of plastics by the combination of wet type specific gravity separation and magneto-Archimedes separation. In addition, we examined continuous and massive separation by introducing the system which can separate the plastics continuously in the flowing fluid.


The function of purpose and delivery management in a project construction is to ensure its successful completion within a stipulated time frame. The contractor's ability to get the required materials easily from the suppliers is vital. In contrast, difficulties to obtain the materials from the suppliers or failure to get the materials to the construction site accordingly would delay the work in progress. Of late, many contractors are having such a hard time in obtaining certain materials due to the lack of the materials and the increase cost of the materials. On top of that, various strict regulations imposed by suppliers also influenced the high cost of purchasing, operating and delivering the material which complicated the task of material management. This study therefore is undertaken to compare the methods of purchasing and delivering management, and also to identify the problems encountered. 20 contractors from G4 and G7 class in Kedah were selected to be the respondents for this study. The results from the questionnaire were analyzed by using the Microsoft Excel programme. The findings show a significant difference between the class of contractors in respect to the purchasing plan style such as meeting requirements, methods of determining the materials to be used and the personnel who was responsible for the task, in purchase management, all transactions made by the contractors were through credits but the credits purchasing factor and the method of ordering materials were different. A significant differences is also noticed between the high class and low class contractors in terms of delivery, acceptance, safekeeping and usage of document. The problems faced by the contractors differ depending on their class but the payment stage was still the same. The delay in receiving materials from the suppliers would slow down the project and at the same time caused the contractor to hold up their payment to the suppliers.


One of the essential aspects of distributed simulations is to order events according to a causal consistency model. However, traditional approaches are costly in terms of processing to ensure causality. A promising approach to order events is using a hybrid synchronization approach, where processes can alter dynamically between optimistic and conservative approaches. Unfortunately, synchronizing processes running a hybrid synchronization is a complex problem. In this work, we discuss a multi-objective scheduling of hybrid synchronization messages problem. Beyond that, we propose using a scheduling algorithm and describe how to integrate the algorithm in an existing distributed simulator. Finally, we propose a preliminary analysis of our algorithm regarding work done and the number of messages.


In the atomic Bose-Einstein condensate, the interactions that bring a binary atom system to an intermediate state molecule in the Feshbach resonance create a second condensate component of molecules. The atomic and molecular condensates coherently exchange pairs of atoms. We discuss a signature of the coherent intercondensate exchange: Josephson-like oscillations of the atomic and molecular populations in response to a sudden change of the energy detuning. The dependence of the many-body ground state energy on volume suggests that the on-resonant ground state is a dilute condensate with the liquidlike property of a self-determined density. {copyright} {ital 1999} {ital The American Physical Society}


Virtua Health is a multi-hospital system based in southern New Jersey. In 2004, the organization's mobile intensive care unit (MICU) attempted to address its declining productivity and increasing inefficiency through a Six Sigma approach. However, the ..


The College of Engineering and Computer Science at the University of Michigan-Dearborn decided in early 1990s to increase, retain and graduate more minority students than in years before. A study was conducted to determine specific areas in engineering programs that impacted students' success; it revealed that students' performance in the first two calculus courses and physics were key to their subsequent success in engineering programs. To address this, a summer bridge in mathematics was developed and implemented. This was followed by academic year activities in tutoring and collaborative learning in key freshman and sophomore year courses. Most of these activities were initially funded through a NSF-AMP coalition grant but are now institutionalized through other sources. This report highlights the positive impact of the 4-week summer bridge program and academic year activities on the retention and graduation of minority students in engineering and computer science at the University of Michigan-Dearborn.


The professor of perioperative medicine at University College London talks to Jacqui Wise about her search for positive deviance and how her specialty is changing


Based on sociocultural theory, this article examines two activities constituted by a parent and child as jointly constructed bi-literacy practices. Bi-literacy practices enable the parent and child to co-construct conceptual meanings and sense across two languages. Concept development in young children begins with meaning in one language and over time develops into multiple nuanced sense in two languages; a process that reflects a developing system of thinking that ultimately enables proficiency in two languages. Using a discourse analytic approach to intertextuality, we elaborate the definition of intertextuality at the level of interaction and the level of utterance and analyze two transcripts for language form and function. Social practices that engage parent and child in bilingual interactions can be mapped for bilingual intertextuality to highlight the facilitation of concept development, which begins, rather than ends, with the construction of word meaning.


The reaction of [Pd(κ2-Ar)(O,O-acac)] (κ2-Ar = κ2-C,O-C6(NO2)2-2,6-(OMe); 1) with 1 equiv of RNC gives [Pd(κ2-Ar)(O,O-acac)(CNR)] [R = Xy (2a), tBu (2b)] and with 4 equiv of XyNC, trans-[Pd(κ1-Ar)2(CNXy)2] (κ1-Ar = κ1-C-C6(NO2)2-2,6-(OMe); 3). This complex has also been obtained (1) by reacting Tl(acac) with 1 equiv of trans-[Pd(κ1-Ar)Cl(CNXy)2] (4), obtained in turn by reacting trans-(NMe4)2[Pd(κ1-Ar)Cl(µ-Cl)]2 (5) with 4 equiv of XyNC or (2) by reacting [Pd(κ1-Ar)(C-acac)(phen)] (6) with 4 equiv of XyNC. cis-[Pt(κ2-Ar)(κ1-Ar)(PPh3)] (7) reacts (1) with Hg(OAc)2 (1:1) to afford a mixture of [Hg(Ar)(OAc)], cis-[{Pt(κ1-Ar)(PPh3)}2(µ-OH)(µ-OAc)] (8), and trans-[{Pt(κ1-Ar)(PPh3)}2(µ-OH)2] (9) or (2) with HgCl2 (1:1) to give trans-[{Pt(κ1-Ar)(PPh3)}2(µ-Cl)2] (10), which reacts with an excess of Ag(OAc) to give 8. The reaction of 10 with excess of KOH, or with Tl(acac) (1:1) gives 9. Reaction of palladium complex 5 with 2 equiv of Hg(OAc)2 affords trans-[Pd(κ2-Ar)(µ-OAc)]2 (11). The crystal structures of 2a, 2...


The scope of judicial activism not a limited one. It is used to look in the matters and enforce what is beneficial for the society at large. The word "JUSTICE" has no end, this critically tells that justice is for all, 'rich or poor, strong or weak', even the king and queen were entrusted by karma to provide justice. The object behind the research paper is focused on the expansion of judicial activism in Indian democracy. The judicial activism in India had touched almost every aspect of life to provide positive justice. Many a times the right to judicial review and judicial activism act as a boon for the weaker section of society in protecting their rights by mere filling of a social interest litigation or a public interest litigation. Many a times judicial intervention into the matter of executive and legislature have provided society with the upper hand in getting justice. Judicial system is a means of providing 'JUSTICE 'to all, and also to take all relevant and possible steps to protect the interest of JUSTICE. Judicial activism legal framework in Indian constitution integration towards fundamental rights.


The early activation of the fly-ash is low,and the activation development is very slow.The early strength of the fly-ash concrete is low.Adopting the chemical activate method to the activation fly-ash composite activator which stirred the hydrate lime—the alkali activation and the sodium sulfate—the sulphate activation to the fly-ash concrete,the activator makes the development of the early strength of the fly-ash concrete sped up.Using in the experiment,it's found that the early strength of the activated fly-ash concrete develops fast,and its 7 d strength and 28 d strength and 90 d strength are more than the common cement concrete corresponding strength 80% and 97%and 103%.However,the 28 d grind resistance of the fly-ash concrete is lower than the common cement concrete grind resistance,and the activated fly-ash concrete 42 d grind resistance is more than the common cement concrete grind resistance 11%~18%.


The invention discloses a longitudinal bending sandwiched energy converter-typed round disc stator and an ultrasonic motor to which the stator is applied, which relates to the ultrasonic motor field. The invention solves the problems in the existing ultrasonic motor, of complex processing, difficult assembly, and lower mechanical output capacity and controllability of the ultrasonic motor. The longitudinal bending sandwiched converter of the stator is fixed between a round disc at the upper end and a round disc at the lower end, both the front end cover and the back end cover of the longitudinal bending sandwiched energy converter are a quadrangular with a rectangle cross section narrowing down gradually, the small end faces of the front end cover and the back end cover are fixedly connected with the upper round disc and the lower round disc; each piezoelectric ceramic piece is polarized along the thickness direction and four pairs of piezoelectric ceramic pieces are respectively fixed between the front end cover, the back end cover and the flange. Rotors in the ultrasonic motor take the shape of a round disc and are embedded respectively from the top and the bottom of the stator component, a wearable cushion is fixed at the end face, contacting the round disc, of the rotor and the stator is fixed to a base through the flange on the energy converter. The longitudinal bending sandwiched energy converter-typed round disc stator and the ultrasonic motor of the invention has the advantages of simple structure, flexible design, high electromechanical coupling efficiency, outputwith large torque, stable performance and easy control.


The invention relates to a soft start method for a physical detection transmitter, comprising the following steps: before the CUP of the physical detection transmitter sends a dominant waveform, soft start time is increased by 10-70 seconds; during the soft start, the transmitter sends an alternating signal with a gradually increasing duty ratio and a frequency of 100 Hz-500 Hz; the current control capability of IGBT is utilized to increase output power gradually. By utilizing the start method of the invention, destructive impact of the sudden and great power change on the working machinery generated by the switch between the two status of operation/standby of the physical detection transmitter can be weakened, the vibration during start can be eliminated, the service life of a generator can be prolonged and unfavorable effects on an electric network can be alleviated.


Broadband response is pursued in both infrared (IR) and terahertz (THz) detection technologies, which find their applications in both terrestrial and astronomical realms. Herein, we report an ultrabroadband and multiband IR/THz detector based on blocked-impurity-band detecting principle. The detectors are prepared by implanting phosphorus into germanium (Ge:P), where photoresponses with a P impurity band, a self-interstitial defect band, and a vacancy-P (V-P) pair defect band are realized simultaneously. The response spectra of the detectors show ultrabroad and dual response bands in a range of 3–28 μm (IR band) and 40–165 μm (THz band), respectively. Additionally, a tiny mid-IR (MIR) band within 3–4.2 μm is embedded in the IR band. The THz band arises from the P impurity band, whereas the IR and the MIR bands are ascribed to the two defect bands. At 150 mV and 4.5 K, the peak detectivities of the three bands are obtained as 2.9×1012 Jones (at 3.9 μm), 6.8×1012 Jones (at 16.3 μm), and 9.9×1012 Jones (at 116.5 μm), respectively. The impressive coverage and sensitivity of the detectors are promising for applications in IR and THz detection technologies.


Extrusion pressure is very important for UHMWPE extruded through single screw extruder,It was suggested that when p3maxpN,raw material can been normally extruded.Based on the analysis of the course of UHMWPE extruded in the special single screw extruder,we can see the total forming of pumping pressure is continuous.It has build up it′s mathematical equations,include in the section of feed and grooved barrel smoothness compressed barrel and homogenized,and then given corresponding pressure trend diagrams through whole screw.It has enriched and perfected the extruding molding theory in single screw extruder for high-viscosity material and advanced the theory for UHMWPE in design of a single screw extruder.


This article discusses how development NGOs form advocacy coalitions to influence policy-making. In particular, it looks at how two advocacy coalitions — Kalikasan People's Network for the Environment and Defend Patrimony! Alliance and the Alyansa Tigil Mina (ATM) — were formed and investigates their combined influence on mining policy. It traces the beginning of more than a decade of advocacy campaigning to repeal the Mining Act of 1995, looks at what has been achieved to date, and considers the prospects of the Act's repeal in the future. The author argues that though the Mining Act of 1995 has yet to be repealed, it can be said that these advocacy coalitions have influenced mining policy in terms of consolidating the advocacy campaign for a minerals management policy through the Dapitan Initiative, and providing an Alternative Mining Bill (AMB) or House Bill (HB) No. 6342 which was submitted to the 14th Congress in May 2009. The AMB was re-submitted to the 15th Congress as HB 206 in July 2010, and was filed in December 2010 as HB 3763, which is now known as the Minerals Management Bill (MMB). Moreover, these advocacy coalitions had a major role in influencing the Local Government Units (LGUs) to assert their autonomy in terms of resisting mining entry and operations in their jurisdictions. However, it remains to be seen if there will be support from the Senate for the MMB to be passed into law in the 15th Congress to reverse the trend of large-scale exploitative mining.


The research aimed at discovering the description of mathematics learning in MTs and obtaining PBMSK (Problem-based learning of Cooperative Setting) model which was valid, practical, and effective to improve mathematical power and social skills of class VIII students at MTs. Negeri (Public MTs) Model Makassar. The study was a research and development which referred to Plomp's (1997) model development. The data analysis was conducted quantitatively to answer whether the model developed had already met valid, practical and effective criteria. The products of the study consisted of: model book, teacher's book, student's book, lesson plan, student's worksheet, and learning result test with the validity level 3.66 (extremely valid) which had met valid criteria. The implementation of model 1.88 (implemented entirely) had met practicality criteria. The effectiveness of model consisted of: learning completeness 92.15%, learning management 3.84 (excellent), student's responses on PBMSK model: (1) expressed delight 96.25%, expressed interested 95.0%, and (3) student's worksheet and text book easy to read 92.5%, interesting 95%, simple language 92.5%, and the students' activities were fairly high and still at the ideal time interval tolerance which had been determined. The results indicated that it had met effective criteria. Therefore, the objective to obtain qualified PBMSK model which fulfilled valid, practical, and effective criteria had been achieved. Keywords :  Model development, PBMSK model, valid, practical, and effective


The article contains the results of studying the peculiarities of personality of convicts inclined to prone to self-injury. The authors discuss their revealed features and interconnection between accentuations of the character and suicidal risk factors.


Objective: To assess whether social, economic and demographic measures are associated with initiating and sustaining quit attempts in a national sample of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander smokers.


Animation films were used frequently during online didactic activities during the COVID-19 pandemic. We have not identified research that focuses on the problems that teachers face when using animated films to enable students' learning of Natural Sciences and on the training models that can be organized based on this resource. Therefore, we analysed the problems faced by teachers and, to solve them, we identified, analysed, and described several instruction models based on animation films: illustrative, expositive, interactive, flipped classroom, learning through discovery, and learning through simulation. We analysed the way to integrate them into the didactic activity and, finally, we realized some recommendations.


In this paper, statistical quality control of a production line has been presented using the classical method Shewhart, cumulative sum method (CUSUM) and Exponentially Weighted Moving Average (EWMA). The Shewhart technique can be utilized in controlling the process in which there are big changes in mean. The cumulative sum method is more efficient in detecting small changes in the mean. The EWMA includes the two techniques, as limited cases, since when lambda = 1 the exponential smooth model is equivalent to the Shewhart technique, and when lambda = 0 equivalent to the cumulative sum technique.


Malik. Activation of NF- k B induced by H 2 O 2 and TNF- a and its effects on ICAM-1 expression in endothelial cells. Am J Physiol Lung Cell Mol Physiol 279: L302–L311, 2000.— Reactive oxygen species have been proposed to signal the activation of the transcription factor nuclear factor (NF)- k B in response to tumor necrosis factor (TNF)- a challenge. In the present study, we investigated the effects of H 2 O 2 and TNF- a in mediating activation of NF- k B and transcription of the intercellular adhesion molecule (ICAM)-1 gene. Northern blot analysis showed that TNF- a exposure of human dermal microvascular endothelial cells (HMEC-1) induced marked increases in ICAM-1 mRNA and cell surface protein expression. In contrast, H 2 O 2 added at subcytolytic concentrations failed to activate ICAM-1 expression. Challenge with H 2 O 2 also failed to induce NF- k B-driven reporter gene expression in the transduced HMEC-1 cells, whereas TNF- a increased the NF- k B-driven gene expression ; 10-fold. Gel supershift assay revealed the presence of p65 (Rel A), p50, and c-Rel in both H 2 O 2 - and TNF- a -induced NF- k B complexes bound to the ICAM-1 promoter, with the binding of the p65 subunit being the most prominent. In vivo phosphorylation studies, however, showed that TNF- a exposure induced marked phosphorylation of NF- k B p65 in HMEC-1 cells, whereas H 2 O 2 had no effect. These results suggest that reactive oxygen species generation in endothelial cells mediates the binding of NF- k B to nuclear DNA, whereas TNF- a generates additional signals that induce phosphorylation of the bound NF- k B p65 and confer transcriptional competency to NF- k B. MCDB-131). HMEC-1 cells, an immortalized endothelial cell line trans-formed by the SV40 large T antigen, retain the endothelial cell phenotype and functional characteristics; they express and secrete von Willebrand factor, take up acetylated low- density lipoprotein, form tubes when grown in Matrigel, and express CD31, CD35, ICAM-1 (CD54), and CD44 (1). HMEC-1 cells were passaged in uncoated culture dishes until they reached confluence. The cells between passages 17 and 21 were used in these studies, and all cell studies were carried out under the same conditions. Confluent HMEC-1 cells were serum starved for 2–4 h, washed two times with serum- and phenol red-free Dulbecco's modified Eagle's me- dium, allowed to equilibrate for 30 min, and then incubated with the indicated concentrations of H 2 O 2 (Sigma) or recom- binant human TNF- a (specific activity 2.3 3 10 7 U/mg protein; Promega, Madison, WI) for all experiments unless oth- erwise specified. Cell


On September 26, 2002, the Payment Cards Center of the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia held a workshop that explored the use of mandatory arbitration clauses in credit card agreements between issuers and consumers. Leading the workshop was Alan S. Kaplinsky, chair of the Consumer Financial Services Group at Ballard Spahr Andrews & Ingersoll, LLP. A pioneer in the development of consumer arbitration clauses, Kaplinsky described the arbitration process as a conflict resolution mechanism in the payment cards industry. He also provided a contextual overview of the Federal Arbitration Act of 1925, subsequent legislative actions, and relevant court cases. This paper summarizes his presentation and the ensuing discussion with workshop participants.


Although the library of the Fashion Museum of Province of Antwerp is only five years old, it already boasts an exciting history. Evolved from the collection of the national Vrieselhof Textiles and Costume Museum, the Fashion Museum Library opened its doors in 2002, in the heart of Antwerp, the Fashion City. This article relates the history of this library, with a look at both today and the future, attempting to pinpoint the uniqueness of what it means to manage a collection on the phenomenon of 'contemporary fashion'.


Because of its high incidence,venous thromboembolism (VTE) after major orthopaedic surgery is one of the main causes of death of patients in the perioperative period, and also an important cause of unexpected hospital deaths. In patients undergoing major orthopaedic surgery, taking effective preventive measures can not only reduce the risk of occurrence of VTE and relieve the suffering of patients, but also has been confirmed by a large number of pharmaceutical economic studies to decrease the overall expense. In order to improve prevention of orthopaedic-related VTE and to standardize preventive methods, this 'Chinese Guideline for Prevention of Venous Thromboembolism after Major Orthopaedic Surgery' has been specially formulated. In this guideline, 'major orthopaedic surgery' refers specifically to total hip replacement (THR), total knee replacement (TKR), and hip fracture surgery (HFS). This guideline provides only academic guidance, and implementation of its recommendations in the hospital setting must be tailored to each patient's specific medical condition.