Background: Latvia is considered as one of the countries with highest prevalence of hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection in Europe. The prevalence of anti-HCV and HCV-RNA in Latvia was found to be 2.4% and 1.7%, respectively. The prevalence of anti-HCV and HCV-RNA among healthcare professionals in Latvia has never been studied before. Aim: The main objective of the study was to detect HCV infection prevalence in healthcare professionals at Intensive Care Units in Latvia and compare results with population data. The second objective was to analyze healthcare's professional's behavior in case of accident at workplace with potential exposure to HCV infection. Methods: Healthcare professionals from 35 intensive care units of 26 Latvian hospitals participated in the study. Antibodies against HCV (antiHCV) were identified in the venous blood sample of the study participants. Data were collected from April 2014 to April 2015. Study participants with positive anti-HCV had provided repeated blood samples in order to identify the presence of HCV-RNA using real time PCR. Immunoblot antibody test was performed to verify the presence of HCV antibodies in study participants with positive anti-HCV and negative HCV-RNA results. Study participants completed a questionnaire including questions regarding accidents at work, post-exposure preventive actions, and previous HCV testing. The results were summarized and subjected to statistical analysis. Results: One thousand two hundred twenty two medical professionals are employed in the intensive care units in Latvia. All were invited to participate in the study. Of those, 777 healthcare professionals voluntarily participated in the cross-sectional study, with a response rate (RR) of 63.6%. Others – refused. Four hundred and sixty four of 777 (59.7%) study participants indicated accidents at work with potential exposure to HCV. To prevent HCV infection 313 of 464 (67.5%) participants applied local preventive techniques. Seventy six (16.4%) of those who indicated accidents at work with potential exposure to HCV performed such local preventive techniques as wound washing. One hundred and thirty nine injured employees and 98 patients (source of exposure) were screened for presence of HCV. Out of all study subjects 471 (60.6%) had previously been tested for anti-HCV, while 254 (32.7%) had not been tested never before and 52 (6.7%) did not provide answer regarding previous HCV testing. Main findings: From the 777 subjects tested, 18 were positive for anti-HCV and HCV-RNA test was positive in 9 subjects so prevalence of anti-HCV in healthcare professionals included in this study is 2.3% (95% CI 1.3 to 3.4) and HCV-RNA prevalence is 1.2% (95% CI 0.4 to 1.9). Conclusions: The anti-HCV prevalence among healthcare professionals at intensive care units in Latvia is high and is similar to that in the general population. The prevalence of HCV-RNA among healthcare workers is slightly lower than observed in the population. Post-exposure interventions are limited mainly with local preventive techniques for the majority of participants and only small portion carry out all necessary postexposure actions. Approximately one third of healthcare professionals included in study have never been tested for hepatitis C before, despite high risk for exposure at work.


The surface quality of lead halide perovskite crystals can extremely influence their optoelectronic properties and device performance. Here, we report a surface engineering crystallization technique in which we in situ grow a polycrystalline methylammonium lead tribromide (MAPbBr3) film on top of bulk mm-sized single crystals. Such MAPbBr3 crystals with a MAPbBr3 passivating film display intense green emission under UV light. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy demonstrates that these crystals with emissive surfaces are compositionally different from typical MAPbBr3 crystals that show no emission under UV light. Time-resolved photoluminescence and electrical measurements indicate that the MAPbBr3 film/MAPbBr3 crystals possess less surface defects compared to the bare MAPbBr3 crystals. Therefore, X-ray detectors fabricated using the surface-engineered MAPbBr3 crystals provide an almost 5 times improved sensitivity to X-rays and a more stable baseline drift with respect to the typical MAPbBr3 crystals.


This paper investigates energy savings in data centers with flexible-bandwidth power-aware source-synchronous optical interconnects. Network simulations show ≥ 5× energy savings. Link experiment shows error-free operation from 625 Mb/s to 10 Gb/s.


This paper extends current auditor negotiation research by considering the effects of two dimensions of auditors' identity that are relevant to auditors' negotiation - gender and audit firm identification. The theoretical model proposes that auditor-client negotiation context has features that trigger the salience of auditors' gender and firm identity. Once salient, these two dimensions of auditors' identity shape auditors' motivational orientation towards negotiations, which, in turn, affects the auditors' negotiation behavior. The study finds that auditors approach audit adjustment and note disclosure decisions with different motivational orientations. In particular, the degree of firm identification differentiates women's and men's proposed audit adjustment and the level of experience effects auditors' note disclosure decisions. However, the direction of the interaction and the relationship between experience and note disclosure were unexpected. Therefore, further research is needed to explore why these findings are in contradiction of findings in past general negotiation and auditor negotiation research.


Abstract The physicochemical procedures for prediction of stability at shelf temperatures by rate studies conducted at elevated temperatures have been applied to the vitamin components of liquid multivitamin' preparations. The procedures have been expanded to include statistical techniques to provide estimates of error in assays, the extent of confidence to be held in prediction, and recommendations of concentration adjustment to meet minimum assay specifications of the marketed preparations. The validity of the predictions and recommendations has been demonstrated by the agreement of classical stability studies on preparations stored at room temperature with the selected values.


Geo-features play a key role in object-oriented or feature-based geo-processing system. So the strategy for how-to-manage and how-to-model the geo-features builds the main architecture of the entire system and also supports the efficiency and functionality of the system. Unlike the conventional 2D geo-processing system, geo-features in 3D GIS have lots to be considered to model regarding the efficient manipulation, analysis and visualization. The authors built a set of 3D geo-features, and each geo-feature contains a set of aspatial data and 3D geo-primitives. The 3D geo-primitives contain the fundamental modeling data such as the height of building and the burial depth of gas pipeline. They separated the additional modeling data on the geometry and appearance of the model from the fundamental modeling data to make the table in database more concise and to allow the users more freedom to represent the geo-object. To get the users to build and exchange their own 3D GIS data, the authors devised a file format named VGFF 2.0(Virtual GIS File Format). It is to describe the three dimensional geo-information in XML (eXtensible Markup Language). They also developed the authoring tools for users to create their own 3D geo-features and geo-objects and to edit and save them in VGFF 2.0 format.


In the modern society, the indoor lighting environment has an uneven illuminance distribution due to artificial lighting having optical properties such as fixed illuminance, color temperature, and light influx from outside. Because fatigue of the eyes is accumulated in the uneven illumination environment and the brightness of background is changed according to the position of the occupant, discomfort glare occurs when light of high luminance against the brightness adapted to the eyes lights up the eyes. In order to construct a pleasant indoor lighting environment, it is necessary to develop an illumination system that can maintain lighting uniformity and reduce glare. In this paper, we propose a lighting control system considering discomfort glare while maintaining lighting uniformity of indoor space.


Groundnut is considered as a gift for small and marginal farmers, who grow groundnut under low input conditions for food, oil, cattle feed and confectionery purposes. However, the crop suffers from many diseases and pests that cause serious yield reduction. Wild relatives of groundnut have reported to be the potential sources of resistance for number of diseases such as rust, late leaf spot, early leaf spot, bud and stem necrosis besides their tolerance to insect pests such as thrips and aphids. But, utilization of wild Arachis for genetic improvement of Groundnut along with their tolerance to major biotic stresses forms a key factor for groundnut research considering that those are lacking in cultivated Arachis hypogaea Linn. The cross compatibility in the Arachis genus identified that species within a section will usually hybridize but hybrids under different sections of same genus are difficult to hybridize and are usually sterile. The section, Arachis has immediate potential as sources for the genetic improvement of groundnut though the differences in ploidy levels seem to be the major bottleneck in gene transfer from wild diploid to cultivated tetraploid. The information furnished in this article establishes the complexity in the genetic improvement of the Arachis species. Tapping the genetic variability in any crop species will help a plant breeder to achieve his desired goal of varietal evolution. In this regard, the breeders can tap the secondary gene pool or tertiary gene pool rather tapping primary gene pool.


In this paper, I explore the asset pricing implications of a general equilibrium model with production, in which investment projects need time-to-build. This investment friction allows me to explain the observed negative correlation of investment growth and stock returns at the aggregate level – an observation that has been interpreted as evidence for irrational markets since it cannot be reconciled with the Q theory of investment. When I further enhance the time-to-build model with adjustment costs, the model is able to explain three empirical facts of aggregate data: (i) the negative comovement of stock returns and investment growth, (ii) the prolonged positive correlation between stock returns and future investment growth, and (iii) the negative correlation between investment growth and future stock returns. Further, since timeto-build implies an investment commitment, firms are levered by the commitment, leading to a risk premium and thereby alleviating the equity premium and excess volatility puzzles. ∗Sauder School of Business at The University of British Columbia, Finance Division, 2053 Main Mall, Vancouver BC, Canada V6T 1Z2; firstname.lastname@example.com. I thank Paul Beaudry, Murray Carlson, Adlai Fisher, Henry Siu, Tan Wang, and seminar participants at the 2006 Northern Finance Association Meeting for valuable comments and discussions.


The experience under consideration in this study is rooted in the Covid-19 pandemic as crystalised in the events in England and Wales between late March 2020 and July 2020, when the Government imposed a national lockdown and when the Church of England imposed a national lock-up on its churches. The religious tradition under consideration is the Christian theological response to human disease and suffering. For considerable periods during the Covid-19 pandemic, England and Wales were in lockdown and churches were closed. Church services were live-streamed or pre-recorded for internet-savvy members to access online at home. For some clergy the pandemic may have been a challenge to faith, while for others the experience of the pandemic may have been an opportunity to re-kindle faith. A sample of 1,050 Anglican clergy serving in England completed an online survey including the newly developed Lewis Index of Spiritual Awakening (LISA) alongside a range of other measures. The Lewis Index of Spiritual Awakening (LISA) was found to have good psychometric properties. The data demonstrated that considerably more Anglican clergy experienced a sense of spiritual awakening during the pandemic than experienced a spiritual decline. The data also demonstrated that higher levels of spiritual awakening among Anglican clergy were associated with two factors, one psychological and one ecclesial. Clergy who report higher scores of spiritual awakening are more emotionally stable, associated with one of the two wings of the Anglican Church (Evangelical or Anglo-Catholic) rather than with the middle way of Broad Church, and influenced by the Charismatic Movement.


It has to be the vision of an international oil and gas exploration and production company to explore for and produce oil and gas in the most economically efficient, social responsible and environmentally acceptable way. Based on this aim and due to the fact that Austria is a country with a environmental awareness and a high tourism level, OMV as the leading domestic oil and gas company had to elaborate strategies for the benefit of the company, its employees and shareholders, but also for the benefit of local communities maintaining the image of a healthy, clean and relaxing environment. The paper describes the different ways of implementing environmentally relevant technique and strategies beginning with exploration process and ending with the monitoring of oilfield wastes. Case histories demonstrate the concept of converting onshore drilling projects into action in environmentally sensitive regions using the idea of "ecological compensation". Further a new technology of water treatment based on "microbiological clarification" is shown. With the new water treatment technology a valuable contribution to the protection of environment could be shared by OMV, because this method works without any application of biocides. Finally, innovative methods of calculating the risk potential of oilfield deposits using micro-geophysical surveys are illustrated. This measuring practice takes care of the electric resistivity contrast between oilfield deposits to its surrounding, so that any leakage can be observed immediately due to the change of electric resistivity profile. Generally the paper has the goal to illustrate acceptable ways to meet the environmental sensitivities of communities and authorities.Copyright © 2002 by ASME


Chapter 29 includes cases related to the rights of individuals subject to immigration proceedings, with particular focus on the right to be made aware of the potential immigration consequences of taking a guilty, competence to participate in the proceedings, and the related right to representation where competence is in question. While criminal case recommendations are beyond the purview of forensic practitioners, those involved in mental health diversion programs should be aware of the potential consequences of diversion participation for defendants at risk of deportation. In addition, forensic evaluators are called upon to opine about the impact of mental illness and/or cognitive disability on competence to participate in the immigration proceedings. The cases in this chapter include Padilla v. Kentucky and Matter of M-A-M.


MANY educators have felt that teacher evaluations of pupils in kindergarten are as good as. if not better than, standard ized test results in placement of children, or predicting their success in first grade. Re search in this area for the most part has been centered on identifying particular de velopmental and/or academic tasks which may be effective as predictors of first grade achievement. Studies by Ilg and Ames have indicated that school placement of children needs direct and continuing observation. Their Weston Study revealed that correspondence between teacher ratings and developmental examinations was high in the lower grades, but agreement decreased with older children and higher grade placement. Dolores Durkin, Marion Monroe, and others concerned with child development have appealed to educators to use every available means to evaluate readiness for academic tasks such as reading and writing,


Aim of the study was to assess the fracture resistance of bonded & non bonded amalgam filling. Amalgam is the material of choice for posterior restorations because of its strength, longevity as compared to other materials. In spite of all these advantages of being cost effective, ease of manipulation, its inability to bond to tooth structure is a major problem. This makes an amalgam restoration to undergo micro leakage and subsequently secondary caries, marginal ditching and failure of restoration occurs. Scientific research has concluded that marginal breakdown is the factor which leads ultimately to the fracture of entire restoration. To improve the mechanical retention and ultimately the marginal breakdown and fracture resistance a new bonding amalgam has been introduced. The bonded amalgam needs to be evaluated and compared with conventional amalgam in respect of marginal integrity. It was concluded that there was no difference in marginal break down of conventional and bonded amalgam fillings and it was suggested that their use in traditional amalgam cavity preparations should not be recommended until proven clinical benefits have been demonstrated.


Fly ash from thermal power plants is disposed, in huge quantities in ash ponds, which occupy large land areas otherwise useful for agriculture, housing, or other development. For effective rehabilitation of ash ponds, densification of the slurry deposit is essential to increase the bearing capacity and to improve its resistance to liquefication. Extensive field trials were carried out to evaluate the effectiveness of deep blasting for densification of deposited fly ash. Ninety explosions comprising 15 single blasts, with varying depths and quantities of charges, and 3 group blasts, each having 25 charges placed at various spacings, were carried out. The compaction achieved in terms of an increase in relative density was evaluated from surface settlement measurements. Extensive field monitoring was undertaken through pore-water pressure measurements, vibration measurements, penetration tests, and block vibration tests. For the average charge of 2–4 g of explosive per cubic meter of untreated deposit, the average relative density was found to improve from 50% to 56–58%. Analysis of the test results indicates that deep blasting may be an effective technique for modest compaction of loose fly ash deposits. The field testing program presented in this paper provides valuable information that can be used for planning blast densification of fly ash deposits.


We present evidence for the combined production of VZ (V=W or Z) events in final states containing charged leptons (electrons or muons) or neutrinos, and heavy flavor jets, using data collected by the DO detector at the Fermilab Tevatron Collider. The analyzed samples correspond to 7.5 to 8.4/fb of ppbar collisions at sqrt s = 1.96 TeV. Assuming the ratio of the production cross sections sigma(WZ) and sigma(ZZ) as predicted by the standard model, we measure the total VZ cross section to be sigma(VZ) = 5.0 +- 1.0 (stat) +1.3 -1.2 (syst) pb. This corresponds to a significance of 3.3 standard deviations above the background only hypothesis. Furthermore, we have separately measured the cross sections for the WZ and ZZ processes to be simga(WZ) = 5.9 +- 1.4 (stat) +- 0.7 (syst) pb and sigma(ZZ) = 0.45 +- 0.61 (stat) +- 1.2 (syst) pb, in agreement with the standard model prediction.


Background: Melanoma is a type of threatening pigmented skin lesion, and as of now is among the most hazardous existing diseases. Suitable automated diagnosis of skin lesions and melanoma classification can extraordinarily enhance early identification of melanomas. Methods: However, classification models based on deterministic skin lesion can influence multi-dimensional nonlinear problem which leads to inaccurate and inefficient classification. This paper presents a Deep Convolutional Neural Network (DCNN) classification approach for segmented skin lesions in dermoscopy images. As an initial step, the skin lesion is preprocessed by an automatic preprocessing algorithm together with a fusion hair detection and removal strategy. Also a new probability map based region growing and optimal thresholding algorithm is integrated in our system which yields tremendous accuracy. Results: For obtaining more prominent results a set of features containing ABCD features as well as geometric features are calculated in the feature extraction step to describe themalignancy of the lesion. Conclusions: The experimental result shows that the system is efficient and works well on dermoscopy images, achieving considerable accuracy.


This article reviews the first learning advisor education program graduation symposium which was held online on March 14, 2021. The purpose of the symposium was to celebrate the first cohort of graduates from the program and also celebrate participants who graduated as advisor educators. The event featured six speakers from five countries who are leaders in the field of advising. This review will begin with details about the learning advisor education program. Then, it will include a summary of the events of the symposium and the authors' takeaways from each speaker. Finally, it will end with the authors' final thoughts.


Ebstein's anomaly is a complex congenital defect of the tricuspid valve and right ventricle. Various surgical methods to repair the regurgitant tricuspid valve have been reported, and most of them depend on monocuspidalization with using the anterior leaflet. We report here on our first experience with Ebstein's anomaly in a 31-year-old female patient who underwent cone reconstruction of the tricuspid valve with using three leaflets.


Automated argumentation is believed to be a more powerful approach to interaction between agents than game-theoretic and heuristic-based approaches. However, during argumentation agents spend a lot of time to ensure their arguments are safe. The paper attempts to find the reasons that slow down the argument generation process by considering a simple multi agent game – Diplomacy. The research is mainly concerned with high level knowledge base organization methodologies.


Five systems of absorption bands of N2, whose upper states are a 1IIg, a′ 1Σu—, B′ 3Σu—, w 1Δu, and C 3IIu, were investigated in the 1070–1600‐A region. A 2‐m and a 3‐m vacuum spectrograph, both of normal‐incidence‐type, were used in this work. The observations were extended to high vibration levels for four of the systems, a(v=13), a′(v=15), B′(v=20), w(v=11), while in the C—X system only two bands were analyzed. The progression which was previously ascribed as belonging to the w—X system was studied in detail, and an alternate possibility of this progression being the v″=1 progression of the a—X system was definitely removed. However, a final designation of the upper electronic state must come from a rotational analysis, because the observed T00 of the state differed from that of the w state by approximately 40 cm—1.The potential energy curves of the low‐lying N2 states prepared by Mulliken are compared with those calculated by using the presently determined constants.


The offshore wind industry is growing at high pace and is already one of the major renewable energy sources in Europe. To support this growth, costs must be further decreased, amongst others by efficiently designing the support structure of the offshore wind turbines (OWT). This requires accurate prediction of environmental loading such as dynamic ice-structure interaction. From industry practice it is known, that current phenomenological models show results that are highly sensitive to the used input parameters. It is investigated if the methodology used in industry practice, can be improved by coupled phenomenological modeling of dynamic ice-structure interaction. The phenomenological model proposed by Hendrikse and Metrikine (2015) is implemented and extended with the creep and buckling failure modes. The input parameters of the model are derived from reference data that is obtained from full-scale measurements. A verification study is performed to demonstrate that the reference data is matched. Furthermore, a qualitative verification is performed on the failure modes and ice-induced vibration regimes. The phenomenological model is applied to a structural model of an OWT and investigated in two case studies. For the implementation of the structural model, firstly the phenomenological model for ice-structure interaction is adjusted for cylindrical structures. Aerodynamic damping and thrust are included to enable simulations of the ice-structure interaction during the production of electrical energy. The coupled model is applied in two cases. The first case considers an offshore wind turbine model with ice loading as the only subjected load to the structure. The second case considers the combination of ice and wind loading. A comparison is made between coupled and uncoupled models for ice-structure interaction. The uncoupled models use an external ice load series to represent the ice-structure interaction and are therefore based on methodology used in industry practice. In case of ice-only loading, it is concluded that the uncoupled model is not capable of capturing intermittent crushing and frequency lock-in behavior due to inconsistency between the load signal and the response. In case of combined ice and wind loading, it is concluded that the uncoupled model is incapable of capturing intermittent crushing behavior and ice-induced damping. The same inconsistency is used as an explanation.


A band-structure calculation, (ASW method) on CuCr/sub 2/S/sub 4/ in order to determine its electronic and magnetic properties is reported. Local magnetic moments are calculated and compared with experimental values. A magnetic moment of 5.04 mu /sub B/ is found on chromium. Density of states shows the p-like character of the conductivity and allows the suggestion of an ionic model for the compound with two valence states for chromium. >


Search terms were formulated and executed on Google to retrieve health insurance information. Search results were then examined to identify those web sites that were health plan web sites, "quote" web sites, "list" web sites (list of quote web sites or health plan web sites), or "other." 46 search sets yielded 19,578,694 hits. However, only the first 100 hits from each set were included in the final analysis (3,955 sites). Among those, 834 (21.1%) were health plan web sites, 275 (7.0%) were "quote" web sites, and 251 (6.4%) were "list" web sites, while 2,595 (65.6%) were "other" web sites.


''We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and Property.'' That is what the Declaration of Independence would have said, if Thomas Jefferson had gotten his way. It was Jefferson's colleagues on the committee drafting the Declaration who made him replace his proposed right to property with the more vague ''pursuit of happiness.'' Jefferson's fellow Virginian James Madison shared his view that ownership of property should be acknowledged as a right, and wanted this right to be guaranteed by the Constitution. The Citizen's Share: Putting Ownership Back into Democracy, by Joseph R. Blasi, Richard B. Freeman, and Douglas L. Kruse, begins with the writings of the Founders, and uses them to make the case that the distribution of property ownership should be returned to the central place it once occupied in American national policy. The Founders viewed the concentration of property ownership as a threat to the stability of democracy, and shared with Jefferson the view that ''legislators cannot invent too many devices for subdividing property'' (p. 16). During the first century of this nation's existence, this general aim of broadening the distribution of property was embodied in numerous pieces of legislation, from grants of land to Revolutionary War veterans as a reward for their service, through the Homestead Act of 1862. In contemporary economies, in which most people work for companies with many employees, the most practical way to broaden the ownership of property is no longer with individual homesteads, but is instead in the sharing of ownership and/or profits with a firm's employees. This book makes the case for wider use of employee ownership and profit sharing, both as a goal of national policy, and as ways to motivate employees of individual firms. It would be difficult to find three authors who are better qualified for this task. For more than three decades, sociologist Joseph Blasi has been the nation's leading authority on employee stock ownership. For most of this time, the economist Douglas Kruse has been Blasi's colleague and coauthor in a series of increasingly larger studies of employee shareholding in the United States. In 2012, Kruse was appointed to serve as a member of the President's Council of Economic Advisors. Economist Richard Freeman is a well-known authority on labor unions and compensation. In the introduction and Chapter One, the authors cover the period from the Revolutionary War to the Homestead Act. The authors found more quotable lines from the Founders than they could integrate into the essay, so Chapter One ends with an appendix containing ten pages of additional quotes from John Adams, Alexander Hamilton, Thomas Jefferson, and James Madison. This is more than any reader can digest at one sitting, but I share the authors' The Citizen's Share: Putting Ownership Back into Democracy, by Joseph R. Blasi, Richard B. Freeman, and Douglas L. Kruse. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2013. 293pp. $38.00 cloth. ISBN: 9780300192254. Review Essays 21


All numerical methods of seismic wave simulation have the aim to improve their computational accuracy and efficiency. Through converting the odd high-order temporal derivatives of velocity(or stress) to spatial derivatives of stress(or velocity), we use the high-order difference method which has any order of the temporal and spatial difference accuracy and the staggered-grid technique in calculations of the first-order elastic wave equations expressed with velocity and stress. The snapshots and the simulated results of a realistic model show that this method is more accurate and less dispersive than conventional FD methods. Mean-while bigger spatial grids and temporal steps can be used to raise computational efficiency.


Centralized Radio Access Network (C-RAN) comprises one of the main technologies for high capacity and low latency fronthauling in 5G networks. In this paper, we propose and evaluate an optical fronthaul 5G C-RAN architecture that targets to meet the bandwidth, latency and energy requirements of high traffic hot-spot areas. The proposed architecture employs Intermediate-Frequency-over-Fiber (IFoF) signal generation by Photonic Integrated Circuit (PIC) Wavelength Division Multiplexing (WDM) optical transmitters at the Base-Band Unit (BBU), while a novel design of Reconfigurable Optical Add-Drop Multiplexers (ROADMs) is used at the Remote Radio Head (RRH) site. An aggregate capacity up to 96 Gb/s has been reported by employing two WDM links with 4-band Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) 64-QAM 0.5 Gbaud signals, showing error vector magnitude performance within the acceptable 8% limit. The physical layer evaluation of the proposed fronthaul is also extended with the evaluation of the network throughput and mean packet delay latency, using a Medium Transparent-Medium Access Control (MT-MAC) protocol, which employs gated service indicating latencies below 10ms.


Saccharomonospora viridis (Schuurmans et al. 1956) Nonomurea and Ohara 1971 is the type species of the genus Saccharomonospora which belongs to the family Pseudonocardiaceae. S. viridis is of interest because it is a Gram-negative organism cla ssified amongst the usually Gram-positive actinomycetes. Members of the species are frequ ently found in hot compost and hay, and its spores can cause farmer's lung disease, bagassosi s, and humidifier fever. Strains of the species S. viridis have been found to metabolize the xenobiotic pentachlorophenol (PCP). The strain described in this study has been i solated from peat-bog in Ireland. Here we describe the features of this organism, togethe r wit the complete genome sequence, and annotation. This is the first complete genome sequence of th family Pseudonocardiaceae, and the 4,308,349 bp long single replicon genome with its 3906 protein-coding and 64 RNA genes is part of the G nomic Encyclopedia of Bacteria and Archaea project. Introduction Saccharomonospora viridis strain P101 T (DSM 43017 = ATCC 15386 = JCM 3036 = NCIMB 9602) is the type strain of the species, which represents the type species of the genus Saccharomonospora [1, 2], which presently contains nine species [3]. Although phylogenetically a member of the Gram-positive actinomycete s, already the initial report on S. viridis strain P101 T noticed the astonishing feature of the organism to be Gram-negative , despite showing the typical mycelium morphology of Saccharomonospora [2]. Like in other actinomycetes, spores of S. viridis are readily dispersed in air, and apparently the prolonged exposure to the antigens of spores can result in acute respirator y distress (farmer's lung disease) which may lead to irreversible lung damage [4, 5]. Here we present a summary classification and a set of featur es for S. viridis P101 (Table 1), together with the description of the complete genomic sequencing and annotation. Classification and features of organism Members of the species S. viridis have been isolated or molecularly identified on several occasions from hot composts in Europe and USA, [6-9], and also from soil in Japan [1]. One novel, yet unpublished, cultivated member of the species has been repor ted by Lu and Liu from Chinese soil (AF127525). Uncultured clone sequences with significant (99%) sequence similarity were observed from composting mass in China (AM930281 and A M930338). Screening of environmental genomic samples and surveys reported at the NCBI BLAST server indicated no closely related phylotypes that can be linked t o the species or genus, with the closest matches (about 90% sequence similarity) to stra in P101 16S rRNA identified in a marine metagenome from the Sargasso Sea [10]. Figure 1 shows the phylogenetic neighborhood of S. viridis strain P101 T in a 16S rRNA based tree. The sequences of all three copies of the 16S rRNA gene are identical and perfe ctly match the previously published 16S rRNA sequence generated from NCIMB 9602 (Z38007). Figure 1. Phylogenetic tree of S. viridis strain P101 and all type strains of the genus Saccharomonospora inferred from 1474 aligned characters [11, 12] of the 16S rRNA gene under the maximum likelihood criterion [13]. The tree was rooted with all type strains of the members of the genus Prauserella, another genus in the family Pseudonocardiaceae. The branches are scaled in terms of the expected number of substitutions per site. Numbers above branches are support values from 1000 bootstrap replicates if larger than 60%. Lineages with type strain genome sequencing projects registered in GOLD [14] a re shown in blue, published genomes in bold. The hyphae of the vegetative mycelium of strain P101 T are branched and sometimes show curved endings [6]. Single spores are observed only on the aerial my ce ium either directly on the hyphae or on short sporophores (Figure 2). The spores are oval, 0.9-1 .1μm × 1.2-1.4 μm in size. Only very occasionally two spores are observed. The aer ial mycelium is either greyish green in colour, or turns from white to greenish as on Czapek Agar. The optimal temperature for growth is 55°C, but 45°C for aerial mycelium formation and pigment pr oduction. At 37°C and 60°C the growth is very limited and without aerial mycelium. No g rowth occurs at 27°C and 70°C [6]. Strain P101 has been observed to be sensitive to a variety of phages [15]. Member s of S. viridis are apparently able to metabolize pentachlorophenol but not other chlorophenols [9]. It was suggested that S. viridis metabolizes PCP by conjugation to form a more polar transformation product, but unlike other PCP-degrading bacteria, is incapa ble of effecting total degradation of the xenobiotic [9]. Microorganisms such as S. viridis may therefore contribute to PCP removal by microbial communities in situ, despite being unable to completely mineralize chlorophenols in pure culture [9]. S. viridis produces a thermostable αamylase which forms 63% (w/w) maltose on hydrolysis of sta rch [16]. Maltotriose and maltotetraose are the only intermediate products observed during th s reaction, with maltotriose accumulating to 40% (w/w). Both unimolecular and multimolec ular mechanisms (transfers and condensation) have been shown to occur during the concentrat ion-dependent degradation of maltotriose and maltotetraose. Such reactions result in the almost exclusive formation of maltose from maltotriose at high initial concentra tion [16]. S. viridis produces thermoviridin, an antibiotic that is primarily active against the Gram-positive bacteria (growth inhibition) [15, 2]. At higher concentrations, also Gram-negative bacte ri were growthinhibited [2]. Figure 2. Scanning electron micrograph of S. viridis P101 Chemotaxonomy. The murein of P101 T is of cell wall type IV. It contains mesodiaminopimelic acid in the peptidoglycan and arabinose and galact ose in whole-cell hydrolysates (sugar type A). Mycolic acids and teichonic acids were not reported. Strain P101 contains menaquinones MK-9(H 4) (60%) and MK-8(H4) (20 to 30%). The combination of the tetrahydromultiprenyl menaquinones MK-9(H 4) and MK-8(H4) is characteristic for the genus Saccharomonospora [15]. The major cellular fatty acids are saturated, iso-branc hed acids with 16 and 18 carbon atoms, and 2-hydroxydodecanoic acids. Details are described in the Compendium of Actinobacteria [17]. Phosphatidylethanolamine, hydroxy-phosphatidylethanolamine, and lyso-phosphatidyl-ethanolamine were identified as the ma in phospholipids . Table 1. Classification and general features of S. viridis P101 in accordance with the MIGS recommendations [18] a) Evidence codes IDA: Inferred from Direct Assay (first tim e in publication); TAS: Traceable Author Statement (i.e., a direct report exists in t he li erature); NAS: Nontraceable Author Statement (i.e., not directly observed for the living , isolated sample, but based on a generally accepted property for the species, or anecdotal e videnc ). These evidence codes are from http://www.geneontology.org/GO.evidence.shtml of the Gene Ontology project [21]. If the evidence code is IDA, then the property sho uld have been directly observed, for the purpose of this specific publication, for a live isolate by one of the authors, or an expert or reputable institution mentioned in the acknowledgements. Genome sequencing and annotation information Genome project history This organism was selected for sequencing on the basis of each ph ylogenetic position, and is part of the Genomic Encyclopedia of Bacteria and Archaea project. The genome project is deposited in the Genome OnLine Database [14] and the complete genome sequ nce in GenBank NOT YET. Sequencing, finishing and annotation were performed by the DOE Joint Genome Institute (JGI). A summary of the project information is shown in Table 2. Table 2. Genome sequencing project information MIGS ID Property Term MIGS-31 Finishing quality Finished MIGS ID Property Term Evidence code Current classification Domain Bacteria Phylum Actinobacteria Class Actinobacteria TAS [19] Order  Actinomycetales TAS [19] Suborder Pseudonocardineae TAS [19] Family Pseudonocardiaceae TAS [19] Genus Saccharomonospora TAS [1] Species Saccharomonospora viridis TAS [2] Type strain P101 Gram stain negative TAS [2] Cell shape variable TAS [17] Motility nonmotile NAS Sporulation single spores on mainly aerial mycelium TAS [1] Temperature range thermophile, 37-60°C TAS [15] Optimum temperature 55°C for growth, 45°C for aerial mycelium formation TAS [1, 6, 15] Salinity 7% NaCl TAS [15] MIGS-22 Oxygen requirement aerobic; nor reported if essential TAS [15 ] Carbon source D-glucose, sucrose, dextrin TAS [15] Energy source carbobydrates TAS [15] MIGS-6 Habitat peat and compost (species occurrence) TAS [1, 4, 6, 8, 9] MIGS-15 Biotic relationship Free living MIGS-14 Pathogenicity Lung damage TAS [4] Biosafety level 1 TAS [20] Isolation peat-bog at 250 cm depth TAS [6] MIGS-4 Geographic location Irish peat MIGS-5 Sample collection time before 1963 TAS [6] MIGS-4.1 MIGS-4.2 Latitude – Longitude not reported MIGS-4.3 Depth not reported MIGS-4.4 Altitude not reported MIGS-28 Libraries used Two Sanger libraries 8 kb pMCL200 and fosmid pcc1Fos MIGS-29 Sequencing platforms ABI3730 MIGS-31.2 Sequencing coverage 12.9x Sanger MIGS-30 Assemblers phrap MIGS-32 Gene calling method Genemark 4.6b, tRNAScan-SE1.23, infernal 0.81 INSDC / Genbank ID not yet available Genbank Date of Release not yet available GOLD ID Gi02228 NCBI project ID 20835 Database: IMG-GEBA 2500901760 Project relevance Tree of Life, GEBA Growth conditions and DNA isolation S. viridis strain P101 , DSM 43017, was grown in DSMZ medium 83 (CZAPEC PEPTONE Medium) at 45°C. DNA was isolated from 1-1.5 g of cell paste usi ng Qiagen Genomic 500 DNA Kit (Qiagen, Hilden, Germany) with a modified protocol for ce ll lysis including overnight incubation with lysozyme, mutanolysine, lysostaphine, achromopepti dase, and proteinase K at 35°C. Genome sequenci


K e y w o r d s: clusters, internationalisation, small and medium sized enterprises. INTRODUCTION Dynamic changes which are taking place in the global economy determine the necessity for the enterprises to constantly adapt to the new market conditions. In effect, companies' effective adjustment to the changing economic environment has become the indicator of their survival in the increasingly more demanding business environment. The need to systematically raise one's competitiveness concerns both global companies and the subjects possessing smaller economic potential. sFor most internationalisation is one of the crucial development moments which has a significant influence on the growth of the market value. The issue of small and medium subjects' internationalisation is particularly interesting as it is this group of companies that faces the biggest ∗ Adres do korespondencji: Dominik Sadłakowski, Uniwersytet Mikołaja Kopernika w Toruniu, Wydział Nauk Ekonomicznych i Zarządzania, ul. Gagarina 13a, 87-100 Toruń, e-mail: dominik. firstname.lastname@example.com. Dominik SaDłakowSki 54 market barriers in the mentioned process. Many experts search the solution of these problems by joining the enterprises into bunches (clusters) thanks to which local companies can expand internationally. The purpose of this article is to discuss the clusters' influence on the raising of the competitiveness of the SME sector enterprises and to stimulate the internationalisation process by that type of agreements. The paper has overview character. Literature analysis methods and Polish Agency for Enterprise Development's secondary data analysis have been used in the article. 1.THE CORE OF CLUSTERS' FUNCTIONING AND THE PREMISES OF THEIR CREATION The determinant of the contemporary economy is the pursuit of exisiting in it subjects of systematic development and the constant raising of one's market potential. In effect, enterprises must head for the relentless increase of their competitiveness in order to oppose the economic pressure imposed by other market participants. Competitiveness phenomenon has complex character; therefore, there are many economic theories that describe it. Enterprise's competitive context according to the author is best expressed as: "the ability to design, make, and sell products (services) which prices, quality and other assets are more attractive than equivalent products (services) that are offered by domestic and foreign competitors" [Kisiel, 2005, p. 15]. In the age of dynamic economic changes and progressive globalisation, the forms of economic subjects' rivalry are taking more complex frames. It is directly caused by the fact that, currently, market pressure is not only applied by domestic subject but also largely by foreign competitors. This state is affecting mainly market participants, both the biggest ones and the second-class players. The natural effect of this class asymmetry is the necessity for the cooperation between the enterprises that have less potential and for the creation of groups that allow them to rival the market elite. In the literature dedicated to this issue, one can find, among others, the concept of the creation of inter-enterprise cooperation defined by the names of competitive logic and transactional logic which can comprise the base of creating cluster initiatives. • Competitive logic is based on building the position of cooperating enterprises by expanding the range of operations and using the effect of mutual experiences. This process is carried out by the accumulation of resources, know-how, and sells networks in the partners' ambits [Romanowska, 1997, p 65]. • Transactional logic is based on the pursuit to enhance competitiveness The role of clusters in the process of internationalisation of SME sector... 55 by specialisations and complementarity of exploiting the cooperators' resources. In other words, each side of the agreement brings specific resources that allow to improve the value chain of the interrelated enterprises [Romanowska, 1997, p 66]. Concepts above reflect the possibilities created by the cooperation of market subjects that are apparent and well-known in the economy. Unfortunately, enterprises' alliances often have short-term and inconsistent character. In response to this, the solutions to formalise cooperation and remould it to long-lasting relation have been searched. It gave the beginning to the idea of creating clusters, that is, bunches of enterprises. One of the leading researchers of this theory was M. Porter. In his works he described clusters as: "geographic concentration of mutually related companies, specialised suppliers, service providing units, companies operating in affined fields and the institutions related to them (for example universities, standardization units and trade associations) in particular areas, competing with each other but also cooperating with each other" [Porter, 2001, p. 248]. As far as the introduced form of the inter-enterprises cooperation seems simple in its nature, the achievement of this kind of collaboration is connected to a long and complex process. For cluster initiation to be turned into a permanent agreement, it must be embedded in favourable economic and social environment. There are many theoretical schools that define in which conditions clusters can be created. Aside from the idea promoted by M. Porter, schools that can be indicated as the main currents are: Californian school, Nordic school and that of industrial districts. Their characteristics are shown in table 1. Table 1. Selected theoretical concept of clusters' creation Theory's name Factors underlying the cluster's creation and development Industrial districts concept External economies + mutual trust and industrial character of operations lead to the gain of innovation. Californian school The disintegration of vertical organisation structure, the reduction of transactional costs, strong cluster's social aspect orientated on the local labour market, informal subjects' cooperation. Nordic school Innovation as a learning process learning as a local process resulting from uncodified knowledge. Porter's conception Basing on subjects' proximity, from which emerges: better access to production factors, competitiveness, and access to recipients. Source: [Observatory of European SMEs: Regional clusters in Europe No. 3, 2002] Dominik SaDłakowSki 56 As it can be seen, each of the presented definitions shows a different view on the concept of cluster's creation and functioning. However, there are connected by some common elements that may be defined as cluster's determinants, which are: "territorial subject concentration, universal character, connections corresponding to strategic correlations and social relations"[Góra, 2008, p. 314]. Factors underlying cluster's creation are causing enterprises in that structure to obtain many advantages that allow them to function in the economy more effectively. This issue does not just concern raising the companies' efficiency as a part of functioning on the global market, obtaining the competitive advantage on almost every plane meets its further implications in creating enterprise's position on the international market. Profits resulting from cluster functioning are shown in picture 1. Picture 1. Profits resulting from enterprises' cluster functioning. Source: [Mikołajczyk; Kurczewska, 2008] 2. CLUSTERS AMD THE PROCESS OF ENTERPRISES' INTERNATIONALISATIONS – THEORETICAL VIEW The process of enterprises' internationalisation is regarded as the crucial moment of its development. However, this stage is achieved by relatively small percentage of companies due to the big barriers that are restricting that process. These restrictions can be caused both by enterprises' internal imperfections and their external environment. In that moment, a question should be asked: if cluster functioning can effectively break internationalisation barriers of subject possessing smaller market potential? According to the study of M. Gorynia and B. Jankowska [2008] it can be said that mentioned reliance exists. The concept introduced by the researchers assumes a trilateral link between enterprises' cluster functioning, competitiveness, and internationalisation. The relation between cluster existence and raising the competitiveness The role of clusters in the process of internationalisation of SME sector... 57 of the companies that are a part of it, besides from the already discussed aspect of subjects cooperation, results also from its internal competition. The consequence of that situation is some kind of selection inside the very bunch of companies. This means that the only remaining subjects are those that use the chances given by partner cooperation most effectively. Elimination factor of the weakest is natural aspect raising the competitiveness of the entire structure. Cluster functioning has also contributed to the raising of the competitiveness on the international scale which can give rise to enterprises' economic expansion to the new markets. On the other hand, internationalisation process allows for the raising of enterprises' competitiveness by, for example, know-how transfer, expanding production scale, or improving the quality of the produced goods. Then, the bilateral character of competitiveness and internationalisation should be highlighted [Gorynia; Jankowska, 2008, p. 105]. Discussed relation is shown in picture 2. Picture 2. The relation between : cluster, competitiveness, and internationalisation. Source: [Gorynia; Jankowska, 2008, p.105]. Clusters in themselves are the element that enhances the advantages created in the competitiveness internationalisation relation and helps break barriers that those processes restrict. However, the important fact is that the majority of cluster-based enterprises are the companies from the SME sector to which classic internationalisation forms and theories simply do not apply. Those are usually created f


surrendered hath in consideration of law a continuance." (Co.Litt. 838b.) It is thought that this reasoning has no application in the case of the adverse possessor. The title of such a party is an independent possessory title, in no way derived from the person who has lost possession. It cannot therefore be said that a squatter, like an under-lessee, obtains an " interest in the term " which will afford a basis for a fictitious prolongation of the lease for his protection. (See Pearson L.J. at 578, where this is shown clearly.) (3) The third ground on which Willmer L.J. based his judgment was that after a surrender the freeholder obtains the rights of the lessee for the remainder of the term. If he claims possession during this period, he can only do so if the lessee could have done so had the lease continued. Thus the defendant in the St. Marylebone case placed great reliance on the maxim nemo dat quod non habet; the title of the lessee of No. 315 had been extinguished, and therefore it was argued that he was not in a position to convey any rights to the plaintiff freeholder by surrender. This reasoning was adopted by Channell J. in Walter v. Yalden, supra, but once again it is submitted that it cannot be supported. As Pearson L.J. pointed out at p. 577, when the freeholder claims possession after a surrender he does so by virtue of his ownership of the fee simple, and not on the basis of rights derived from the lessee.


Objectives: In order to apply a new kind of molecular marker,which is target region amplified polymorphism(TRAP),to grass carp genetic analysis.In this paper,the influencing factors of target region amplified polymorphism(TRAP) were analyzed.Methods: By using genomic DNA of grass carp(Ctenopharyngodon idella),adjusting the concentration of template DNA,Mg~(2+),dNTPs,primers and the parameters of cycles to select the best optimization.Results: The stable and reproducible optimum reaction system of TRAP-PCR amplification parameters were established for grass carp.The optimal system was in 25 μl reaction volume containing about 50 ng template DNA,1U Taq polymerase,1×PCR Buffer,2.0mmol/L MgCl_2,0.2mmol/L dNTPs and 15pmol of each primer.The amplification program was after 1 cycle initial denaturation at 94℃ for 3 min,each 5 cycles consisted of 94℃ denaturation for 1 min,38℃ annealing for 1 min,72℃ extension for 1 min,then each 35 cycles consisted of 94℃ denaturation for 45s,55℃ annealing for 45s,72℃ extension for 1 min and finally extension was at 72 ℃for 7 min.Conclusion: The TRAP-PCR amplification was stable and reproducible,this new kind of molecular was useful for grass carp genetic diversity analysis.


For an antenna system constituted by circular microstrip antennas,a resonance peak will occur at a lower frequency by loading the short pins in appropriate ways based on the miniaturized requirements.The simulated results show that the aperture size and loaded location of short pin can affect the resonant frequency of the antenna directly.A model of the antenna system was designed with HFSS software,and was derived to form a S2P format file after S parameter of the antenna system which meets the needs was found.The influence of the short pin position and size on the antenna system working in low frequency is analyzed.The transmission characteristic of the antenna system was verified with ADS software to introduce the pulse signal into it.


Rivers are open systems and achieve a steady state or grow allometrically, according to the general equation y = ax b . This equation yields a straight line on double logarithmic paper and reflects a lognormal or Yule stochastic process. Horton9s laws are shown to be statements of these processes, and successive stream orders are seen to be new logarithmic cycles to the base of the bifurcation ratio for a river system. A new absolute order is suggested, derived by raising the bifurcation ratio to successive integer powers equivalent to stream order minus one.


E-governing is the new developing trend of e-governmental affair,our country has made some effects in executing e-governmental affair.Under new historical condition,our country should take scientific developing concept as guidance,to realize the spanning from e-governmental affair to e-governing,explore out the road of e-governing which adapt to the situation of our country.


Objective To study the optimal condition and the genotyping results using random amplified polymor- phic DNA(RAPD)for Candida albicans,and to analyse the epidemiological trends.Methods Candida albicans was geno- typed using RAPD under the different conditions of primer,template,concentration of Mg~(2+)and dosage of Taq polymerase. Results Eight gene types could be found from 105 strains using modified RAPD.Conclusions As a rapid and repro- ducible method,the modified RAPD can be used for genotyping of Candida albicans in the epidemiological investigation.


Purpose – This paper aims to identify the factors that have allowed some counties to avoid the so‐called "resource curse"; to determine practical steps that can be taken by companies, governments, local communities and aid agencies in collaboration to enhance mining's contribution to poverty reduction.Design/methodology/approach – Research was conducted collaboratively with the UNCTAD and the World Bank Group, overseen by an independent advisory group, and tested through two multi‐stakeholder workshops. Industry involvement in the initiative took place through an ICMM working group comprising around 20 companies and chambers of mines.Findings – Success depended on three factors: reformed mineral legislation, improved macroeconomic management and some improvements in governance.Research limitations/implications – Although the robust nature of the processes employed can be demonstrated, the explicit aim of identifying factors that allow certain "successful" countries to avoid the resource curse has inherent...


CEDA's national president reflects on the options for Australia's car industry. Adapted from an interview by Terry Lane on Radio National's The National Interest, September 2005.


In this paper, a fault-tolerant control method is developed. This method makes possible the compensation of additive or multiplicative actuator and component faults. Its principle is based on the online estimation of a quantity which is equal to zero in the fault-free case and equal to the fault magnitude when a fault occurs on the system. Then, a new control law is added to the nominal one in order to compensate the fault effect on the system. The main advantage of this approach is that it is very easy to implement and it does not require a fault diagnosis module which reduce the computation time and avoid the problems caused by false alarms and delays in the fault detection and isolation. The performances of this method are tested in simulation on a pilot plant.


The contiguous geographic range of bigtooth maple (Acer grandidentatum Nutt.) covers Utah, Idaho, Wyoming, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas and suggests that this deciduous tree is a potential landscape plant for many regions. Using bigtooth maples selected from provenances in New Mexico (NM), Utah (UT) and Texas (TX), we evaluated physiological and growth traits of plants subjected to root zone salinity treatments at concentrations 0 (control), 2.5, 5.0 or 10.0 dS·m−1 (0, 1,600, 3,200, or 6,400 ppm). At harvest, foliar Kjeldahl nitrogen, potassium, magnesium, phosphorus, and calcium concentrations of salinity-treated plants were not different from control plants. Plants from the TX provenance had the highest leaf dry weight (DW) (15.7 g [0.55 oz]), larger stem diameter (11.4 mm [0.45 in]), less foliar injury, and less negative midday stem water potentials while accumulating three and two times more foliar sodium than plants from the UT and NM provenance plants, respectively. Total DW (95.9 g [3.4 oz]) of T...


The Localism Act 2011 has provided the right for community organizations to nominate local buildings to be listed as an Asset of Community Value. In England a number of inner urban neighbourhoods host elite Premier League football stadia, their physical presence often visible from afar. Two in particular stand out, both recently listed as an Asset of Community Value, the globally renown football clubs of Liverpool FC and their Anfield stadium and Manchester United and Old Trafford. Three aspects of this are noteworthy. First, the capability of a community group to organize and agitate in such a way as to ensure a local asset is listed. Second, the extent to which the legislation is providing substantive rights for community activists thereby challenging those who would suggest localism is more rhetoric than real. Third, by reviewing a single case of Anfield, we can see how the role of elite professional football club in a low-income neighbourhood can be challenged for the benefit of local residents as plans for social and economic development are shaped.


The conditioning between voltage sources with low amplitude and loads that requires high voltage levels, especially for power above 500 W, is showing as a challenge to be solved. In this context, this paper presents a new high-gain converter based on coupled inductors and boostquadratic structure. The proposed converter uses only one switch, coupled inductors and output capacitors with low capacitance. The topology allows the use of energy from the leakage inductors and enables the input current to operate in the continuous mode. The validation of the concepts was carried out on a prototype of 1 kW with an input voltage between 48 V and 96 V and an output voltage of 800 V. The experimental results were consistent with the theory, the converter allowed high voltage gain and high efficiency for wide range of power, in addition to the energy utilization of the leakage inductances.


Network-constrained economic dispatch (NCED) problem, which takes into account the random mobility of electric vehicles (EV) and additional variables corresponding to each EV's charge/discharge cycles, is large scale, complex and computationally expensive. To reduce the computational burden associated with this optimization problem, distributed optimization is introduced. Since EVs randomly move from one bus to another bus, this paper proposes a temporal, rather than a geographical, decomposition approach to divide a ramp-constrained NCED. Thousands of EVs are considered over the scheduling horizon in order to take advantage of parallel computing and achieve reduced solution time. A ramp-constrained NCED is formulated for each sub-horizon while the connections between subproblems are modeled as shared variables/constraints. In order to coordinate the subproblems and find the optimal solution for the entire operation horizon, distributed auxiliary problem principle (APP) is proposed. Further, an efficient initialization strategy is presented to enhance the convergence time of the solution algorithm. The proposed method is employed to solve a week-ahead NCED on a 6-bus and IEEE 118-bus test systems. The results are compared with those of a centralized approach and effectiveness of the proposed method in reducing the solution time is verified.


Offshore wind power plants are gaining importance in recent years, as there is adequate space available for its installation, high wind speed, no restriction on the size of turbine blades (no transportation and construction problem) and blades can be allowed to rotate at higher speed without any noise constraint, thereby increasing the rated power. However, the existing offshore wind farms face greater cost related challenges than those of onshore plants. The integration of offshore wind farm with onshore power grid is a complex issue. Feasible solutions for power transmission through cables from offshore wind farms to onshore are HVAC, line commutated HVDC  and  VSC-HVDC.  This paper analyses the various schemes for integration of offshore wind farm with onshore power grid and suggests that LFAC with submarine cable operating at 0.7 Hz is an optimal choice in obtaining better performances.


The utility model discloses a novel single bolt hydraulic rubber tube clip, wherein a tube clip seat and an upper tube clip are included, the tube clip seat is fixed through a bolt positioned at one side of the tube clip seat, one end of the upper tube clip is fixedly provided on the tube clip seat, and the other end is fixedly connected with the tube clip seat through a buckling and pressing structure. In the novel single bolt hydraulic rubber tube clip provided in the utility model, when the rubber tube is installed, the tube clip seat is already fixed, thereby compared to the traditional tube clip, the problems are solved that the torque play of the bolt at the bottom of the tube clip seat is inconvenient, and the fixation is infirm. Simultaneously, because one end of the upper tube clip employs an ear plate buckling and pressing mode, only one bolt is required to fix the upper tube clip, the mounting and dismounting trouble is avoided caused by fixation with a plurality of bolts, and the fast and convenient operation of the hydraulic rubber tube is realized.


Improving the input power and LED the luminous efficiency is the only way to realize general lighting.A lot of practice shows that the basic reasons why leds can't increase input power,is due in working process LED will release a lot of heat,which makes the temperature of tube core junctionts rise rapidly.The higher the power inputs,the heating's effect will be.Temperature increasing will lead to the performance of the devices change and attenuation,and even failure.This paper focus on the warming effect power components and its impact on the performance of the warming effect,which we can find how to reduce such effect.


The isometric pyrochlore structure, ${A}_{2}{B}_{2}{\mathrm{O}}_{7},$ is generally susceptible to radiation damage, but certain compositions are remarkably resistant to radiation damage. In the binary system ${\mathrm{Gd}}_{2}({\mathrm{Ti}}_{2\ensuremath{-}x}{\mathrm{Zr}}_{x}){\mathrm{O}}_{7},$ the radiation resistance increases dramatically with the substitution of Zr for Ti, until the pure end member ${\mathrm{Gd}}_{2}{\mathrm{Zr}}_{2}{\mathrm{O}}_{7}$ cannot be amorphized, even at doses as high as \ensuremath{\sim}100 dpa. Although zirconate pyrochlores are generally considered to be radiation resistant, we report results for the amorphization of a zirconate pyrochlore ${\mathrm{La}}_{2}{\mathrm{Zr}}_{2}{\mathrm{O}}_{7}$ by ion beam irradiation (\ensuremath{\sim}5.5 dpa at room temperature). The critical amorphization temperature ${T}_{c}$ is low, \ensuremath{\sim}310 K. The susceptibility to ion-beam-induced amorphization and structural disordering for zirconate pyrochlores is related to the structural deviation from the ideal fluorite structure, as reflected by the x parameter of the ${\mathrm{O}}_{48f}.$


I was immediately struck by discrepancies between the conclusions stated in the laboratory report and the results shown in the test strips and recorded in the analyst's notes. According to the laboratory report, a semen sample collected from the seat of the complainant's vehicle where the rape occurred (Sample #1) contains "[a] mixture of DNA types consistent with J. Sutton, P. Stewart (the complainant), and at least one other donor." However, based on the DNA test results shown in the test strips and recorded in the analyst's notes, Sutton and Stewart should both have been EXCLUDED as possible contributors to this sample. I was also struck by inconsistencies in the DNA profiles of the reference samples. According to the test strips and lab notes, reference samples from the complainant were typed three times and produced at least two and arguably three different DNA profiles (a problem not mentioned in the lab report or testimony). The DNA test results were presented to the jury in a misleading manner that greatly overstated their value. After testifying that every human being has a unique DNA pattern, the ana lyst stated that Josiah Sutton's DNA pattern was found in the sperm fraction of vaginal swabs, on debris from a combing the complainant's pubic hair, and on a semen stain on the complainant's jeans. No statistical estimates were offered to explain the meaning of this finding. Jurors could reasonably have concluded based on this


RELEVANCE OF THE ANTIBODY INDEX TO DIAGNOSE LYME NEUROBORRELIOSIS AMONG SEROPOSITIVE PATIENTS To the Editor: Blanc et al. note that in Europe an anti-Borrelia CSF-serum antibody index is used as an indicator of intrathecal synthesis for diagnosis of Lyme neuroborreliosis.1 However, they incorrectly indicate that this is not the case in the United States, citing surveillance criteria of the Centers for Disease Control (CDC).2 An accompanying editorial surprisingly concurs. CDC surveillance criteria state that they are "not intended to be used in clinical diagnosis" and that encephalomyelitis must be confirmed for surveillance purposes by demonstrating production of anti-B burgdorferi antibodies in CSF (i.e., intrathecal synthesis), as shown "by a higher titer of antibody in CSF than in serum."2 Several US research groups have published methods of determining intrathecal antibody synthesis based on indices of specific antibodies in CSF and serum. Also, CSF-serum antibody indices of intrathecal synthesis of anti-B burgdorferi antibodies are commercially available in the United States. Furthermore, practice parameters for diagnosis of Lyme neuroborreliosis supported by the American Academy of Neurology (AAN) state that proper assessment of intrathecal antibody production needs to correct "for immunoglobulin leakage into the CSF because of blood– brain barrier disruption.. When CNS involvement is suspected, demonstration of intrathecal antibody production is highly specific and quite sensitive, particularly in patients with acute disease; it may even rarely be diagnostic despite negative peripheral blood serologic tests.. Intrathecal antibody production may persist for years following successful treatment, so this does not provide a useful marker of disease activity."3 Even the brief summary statement by the AAN Quality Standards Subcommittee concluded that "CSF analysis for cells, protein, and intrathecal production of specific antibody is indicated if CNS infection is suspected."4 Blanc et al. used a 3 3 categorization of test results (positive, intermediate, negative) and disease states (definite neuroborreliosis, possible neuroborreliosis, other conditions). Because calculation of sensitivity and specificity requires a 2 2 categorization,5 they combined the intermediate and negative test results only for cases with definite neuroborreliosis or other conditions, while inappropriately dismissing possible neuroborreliosis cases.1 This produces biased results (spectrum bias) as can be seen by considering such cases as either diseased or not diseased.5 "Possible neuroborreliosis" cases are those that pose diagnostic challenges and in whom the utility of such a diagnostic test should be evaluated. Instead, the test was given the much easier task of discriminating between clinically definite neuroborreliosis cases and controls without much suspicion of neuroborreliosis (low pre-test probability), which inflates calculated test indices.


Results: Administration of rhGH led to significant changes in body composition [weighted mean difference (95% confidence interval)], including fat mass [ 0.9 kg ( 1.3 to 0.4)], percent body fat [ 1% ( 1.3 to 0.7)], lean body mass [1.8 kg (0.6–2.9)], visceral adipose area [ 22.8 cm ( 39.8 to 5.7)], and lipid profile, including total cholesterol [ 7 mg/dl ( 11 to 3)] and low-density lipoprotein-cholesterol [ 9 mg/dl ( 13 to 5)]. There were increases in fasting plasma glucose [3 mg/dl (1–6)] and insulin [1.9 U/ml (0.2–3.7)]. The latter finding was found only in shorter-term studies. Adverse effects included [odds ratio (95% confidence interval)] arthralgias [6 (1.9–18.6)], peripheral edema [5 (2.4–10.5)], and paresthesias [6.5 (1.5–27.3)].


The invention relates to a selective chemical sensor for selective detection of chemical entities even at the nanogram level. The invention further relates to methods of using the sensor. The sensor comprises: (a) a piezoelectric substrate capable of detecting mass changes resulting from adsorption of material thereon; and (b) a coating applied to the substrate, which selectively sorbs chemical entities of a size smaller than a preselected magnitude.


A piezoelectric material is basically a ceramic that outputs a voltage upon being mechanically strained. Sensors made of this material are sensitive enough to generate signals when subjected to low-amplitude mechanical waves such as sound waves traveling through solids. This makes them candidate materials for all kinds of exciting applications. For example, sensors mounted on a wing surface could detect ice formation on the wing using surface active waves. Since the velocity of sound in a given medium is a function of temperature, such sensors are also being used to actually measure temperature. It is important for students to be aware of this new generation of materials and to be familiar with the use of these materials for measuring fundamental quantities such as the velocity of sound. This experiment has been designed for use in an introductory mechanical or materials engineering instrumentation lab. Initial setup (after procuring all the materials) should take the lab instructor about 2 hours. A single measurement can be initiated and saved to disk in less than 3 minutes, allowing for all the students in a typical lab section to take their own data rather than share a single set of data for the entire class. This experiment is offered to a sophomore-level laboratory class in mechanical engineering that focuses on measurements, instrumentation and manufacturing and addresses the first two topics in that course. Introduction A piezoelectric material is basically a ceramic that outputs a voltage upon being mechanically strained. Sensors made of this material are sensitive enough to generate signals when subjected to low-amplitude mechanical waves such as sound waves traveling through solids. This makes them candidate materials for all kinds of exciting applications. For example, sensors mounted on a wing surface could detect ice formation on the wing using surface active waves. Since the velocity of sound in a given medium is a function of temperature, such sensors are also being used to actually measure temperature. It is important for students to be aware of this new generation of materials and to be familiar with the use of these materials for measuring fundamental quantities such as the velocity of sound. This experiment has been designed for use in an introductory mechanical or materials engineering instrumentation lab. Initial setup (after procuring all the materials) should take the lab instructor about 2 hours. A single measurement can be initiated and saved to disk in less than 3 minutes, allowing for all the students in a typical lab section to take their own data rather than share a single set of data for the entire class. P ge 8.182.1 Proceedings of the 2003 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright © 2003, American Society for Engineering Education Approach Our experiment utilizes long single strand wire of different materials coiled on a cylindrical spool with the coils widely spaced to avoid interference. A piezosensor is connected to each coil at the same polar location and the electric signal is fed through an amplifier to an oscilloscope. A sound wavetrain is generated by a pencil lead break at one end of the wire and progresses through the length of the wire. The time lag between the wavetrain's arrival at successive coils, and the reduction of the signal's amplitude are a measure of fundamental material properties such as the velocity of sound and the attenuation factor for that material. The experiment enables students to interface concepts of physics, materials science and materials engineering and encourage them to develop scenarios for the practical application of novel materials. Equipment and supplies General supplies and measuring equipment commonly found in most physics/instrumentation labs are listed in Table 1. Materials/supplies that will need to be purchased specially for this experiment are listed in Table 2.


Robot-assisted laparoscopic prostatectomy (RALP) is a potentially curative surgical intervention for men with clinically localized prostate cancer. Although RALP can provide excellent oncological outcomes, it is also associated with detrimental effects to functional outcomes, particularly urinary continence, which negatively impact post-operative quality of life. The purpose of this study is to identify the degree to which pre-operative patient factors, tumor characteristics, and surgical technique influenced the postoperative return of urinary continence in men undergoing RALP performed by a single surgeon for the treatment of clinically localized prostate cancer. We analyzed 182 consecutive patients with clinically localized prostate cancer who were treated with RALP between April 2013 and September 2020. A retrospective chart review was performed to evaluate pre-operative patient and tumor characteristics, as well as post-operative urinary continence. Achievement of urinary continence was defined as wearing no pads or an occasional security pad by patient-reported daily pad usage within 3 (early) and 12 months (late) after RALP. Postoperatively, 68 (37.3%) and 120 (78.9%) men achieved early and late recovery of continence, respectively. Multivariate logistic regression analyses revealed that Retzius sparing approach (OR 2.995; 95% CI 1.265 – 7.089; p = 0.013) and lower BMI (OR 0.823; 95% CI 0.823 – 0.988; p = 0.027) were associated with continence at 3 months post-operatively, while longer pre-operative membranous urethral length (OR 1.205; 95% CI 1.003 – 1.448; p = 0.047) and younger age (OR 0.907; 95% CI 0.824 – 0.998; p = 0.044) were associated with continence at 12 months post-operatively.


Article presents a synthesis system of active electric filters on the basis of its mathematical models provided by linear transfer functions. Each filter is implemented to operational amplifiers, resistors and capacitors. All filter elements are linear, concentrated and invariant over time.The initial data for the synthesis filters are the cut-off frequency response model of dynamic links and angles of inclination to the axis (dB / decade). Initial data for calculation of filters are the nominal values of capacitors stored in the corresponding file. The developed system has the ability to expand at the expense of updating files that contain the concepts of unit cells of active filters and nominal values of capacitors.


A model of evolution called the modified Wright–Fisher model (MWF) is introduced. It is shown to exhibit a second order phase transition, and a quantitative mapping is established between the mean field Ising model and itself. An equation of state and scaling function are derived for the MWF from the steady state solution of the governing quasispecies equations. The critical exponents are identical to those of the mean-field Ising model. Simulation data for the MWF on a two-dimensional square lattice show good evidence for a critical point. The susceptibility exponent is estimated and is found, within the uncertainty of the simulation data, to be equal to that of the two-dimensional Ising model, suggesting that the two models are in the same universality class.


COVID-19 caused a health crisis that prompted the acceleration of implementing the new "new normal" paradigm at work. Employees are forced to work from home without preparation and face-to-face supervision from superiors. In this regard, the Ministry of Finance is implementing a Flexible Working Space. This study aims to analyze studies related to crisis communication, internal communication, Flexible Working Space, and their application in the Ministry of Finance. The scope of this research focuses on literature references related to crisis communication, internal communication, and Flexible Working Space in the COVID-19 pandemic conditions, which can be applied to the government sector. This research uses secondary data through literature studies related to organizational communication, Flexible Working Space, and the latest data related to COVID-19. The results show that crisis communication in the Ministry of Finance has adopted the Crisis and Emergency Risk Communication (CERC) model, which consists of six principles: be first, be right, be credible, express empathy, promote action, and show respect. Flexible Working Space at the Ministry of Finance is one of the strategic initiatives whose implementation is accelerated due to the impact of COVID-19. Therefore, internal communication is needed regarding the application of Flexible Working Space. Besides, it is necessary to formulate policies, feasibility, availability, schedule arrangements, response speed, productivity measures, office equipment, technical support, employee layoffs, and a physical environment to support Flexible Working Space's successful implementation.


The garden greening as a subsystem of the urban ecosystems beautifies the urban environment;it plays an active role for maintaining urban ecological balance and sustainable development.On the basis of surveying the green plants in Anshun city proper,the capability of sluggishing dust and disinfection involving typical plants is studied,and results show that the plant species is few,structure is unitary,species evenness is low;in terms of the index of leaf area,the order is the arbors,climbing plants,flowers and herbs,and shrubs one by one.With the time increasing,the capability of sluggishing dust is increasing for different green plants.Among them,the strongest is Rhododendron simsii that the capability of sluggishing dust reaches 6.6298g/(m2·week) four weeks late,compared with 3.3376g/(m2·week) in the end of the first week,it increases nearly two-fold;the second place belongs to Pinus massoniana,it is up to 5.7413g/(m2·week) ;the last place belongs to climbing plants.For the open area,the bacterial number is significantly more than that for the plant areas,11 species of them including Cinnamomum camphora have strong bactericidal effects,their sterilization rates are above 40%.


OBJCTIVE: To serch a new way to improve the tite of adenoviruses without getting down itsaffection capacity, METHODS:The primary succus of adenoviruses was condensed by sublimation drying anddilution. Its affection was determined by examination of plaque-forming units and imunohistochemical assay.RESULTS:The tite of adenoviruses can reach as high as 4.4×1012pfu. CONCLUSION:Sublimation dryingand dilution is a new and efficient way to improve the tite of adenoviruses.[


Full scale heat transfer tests have been performed in a coiled once-through steam generating tube (d/sub tube/ = 0.0155 m, D/sub coil/ = 0.836 m), with subcooled water at inlet and superheated steam at outlet. Pressure (p) ranges from 80 to 170 bar, specific mass flowrate (G) from 1000 to 2500 kg/m/sup 2/s, surface heat flux (q'') from 10 to 30 x 10/sup 4/ W/m/sup 2/ q''/G ratios have been kept almost constant, close to a typical value for LMFBR's steam generators: q''/G approx. = 0.13 kJ/kg. It has been deduced that for q''/G < 0.13 kJ/kg no DNB occurs. Thus designers may consider a boiling length extended up to 100% quality. Along this length (an important one of steam generators) a mean boiling heat transfer coefficient is suggested: anti h/sub b/ = 11.226 q''/sup 0/ /sup 6/ e/sup 0/ /sup 0132 -//sub p/ (W/m/sup 20/C) within a +-30% error margin. Internal and external side heat transfer coefficients, in the superheated steam region of the coil, may differ up to 100% and more.


The Protein Data Bank (PDB) was established at Brookhaven National Laboratories in 1971 as an archive for biological macromolecular crystal structures. In early 2021, the database has more than 175,000 structures solved by X-ray crystallography, nuclear magnetic resonance, cryo-electron microscopy, and other methods. Many proteins have been studied under different conditions, including binding partners such as ligands, nucleic acids, or other proteins; mutations, and post-translational modifications, thus enabling extensive comparative structure-function studies. However, these studies are made more difficult because authors are allowed by the PDB to number the amino acids in each protein sequence in any manner they wish. This results in the same protein being numbered differently in the available PDB entries. For instance, some authors may include N-terminal signal peptides or the N-terminal methionine in the sequence numbering and others may not. In addition to the coordinates, there are many fields that contain information regarding specific residues in the sequence of each protein in the entry. Here we provide a webserver and Python3 application that fixes the PDB sequence numbering problem by replacing the author numbering with numbering derived from the corresponding UniProt sequences. We obtain this correspondence from the SIFTS database from PDBe. The server and program can take a list of PDB entries or a list of UniProt identifiers (e.g., "P04637" or "P53_HUMAN") and provide renumbered files in mmCIF format and the legacy PDB format for both asymmetric unit files and biological assembly files provided by PDBe. Availability Source code is freely available at https://github.com/Faezov/PDBrenum. The webserver is located at: http://dunbrack3.fccc.edu/PDBrenum. Contact email@example.com or email@example.com.


0. In [0-1] it was proved that for any bounded hyperconvex domain D in C2 the Bergman kernel function K(z, w) of D satisfies In case n ═ 1, this is due to a behavior of sublevel sets of the Green function. The general case then follows by the extendability of L2 holomorphic functions.


Game is one of the most fundamental aspects of life,and culture is out of the way that game.The cultural formation of the game has the nature of sports and competition,the urge to race more ancient than the culture.In Huizinga "people: players," a book provides a clue for us to think games and sports,so there must examine and detect the philosophy relations between games and sports.The game is no intention,no purpose;Sports is intentional,purposeful.Game is nature and instinct,sports is habit and experience.From Huizinga cultural perspective,we can search the philosophy links between games and sports.


The alteration rights of autonomous minority areas can be classfied into the rights on laws,administration regulations and rights on proposal,decision,order and command according to their varied altered objects.The regulations on subject in the alteration right of law and administration regulations are not resonable in every aspect.It is not concise or scientific in the approval,solving system and approving time limit.Therefore,this paper suggests that the alteration subject and the approval organs should be unified,and the alteration rights should be approved more specificly.


Through grey correlation analyses of the two factors(Salinity and depth of irrigation water) and the production of reed from experiment,the comprehensive correlation degrees of the two factors are 0.5160 and 0.6805,respectively.This result indicates that depth of irrigation water plays a more important role than salinity for the production of reed field,which is consistent with the results of visual analysis method.


Paraffin sections and more than 7,000 plastic cross‐sections of temporal arteries from 27 patients with a clinical diagnosis of polymyalgia rheumatica (PMR), 16 patients with a clinical diagnosis of temporal arteritis (TA) and 18 age‐ and sex‐matched postmortem controls were studied using light microscopy. A new method was developed to permit a morphometric comparison between biopsies and autopsy specimens. Two stages of inflammation were discerned in TA. In atrophic arterial segments there was a focal, foreign‐body, giant‐cell reaction to the calcified internal elastic membrane (IEM) with a spatially correlated, mononuclear cell infiltration. Isolated giant cells were also found to attack the IEM in these cases. The majority of the biopsies displayed a different picture with a diffuse macrophage attack on media and intima with numerous and apparently macrophage‐derived giant cells, which did not attack calcifications. The latter arteries were significantly widened (p < 0.02), which indicates that this phase is the later one. Non‐inflamed segments of PMR vessels displayed a significant, non‐reactive media atrophy compared with controls (p < 0.03) and their IEM calcifications were significantly larger (p < 0.02). The circumference was smaller in atrophic PMR arteries than in inflamed TA arteries (p < 0.006), which contradicts post‐inflammatory scarring.


We study an integrated airline scheduling problem for a regional carrier. It integrates three stages of the planning process (i.e., fleet assignment, aircraft routing, and crew pairing) that are typically solved in sequence. Aircraft maintenance is also taken into account. The objective function aims at minimizing a weighted sum of the number of aircraft routes, the number of crew pairings, and the waiting times of crews between consecutive flights. In addition, it aims at maximizing the robustness of the solution by also minimizing the number of times that crews need to change aircraft. We present two mixed integer linear programming models for the integrated problem. The first formulation, called the path-path model, can be considered as the "natural model" in which both the crew pairings and the aircraft routes are represented by path-based variables. The other formulation, called the arc-path model, is a novel model in which the aircraft routes are represented by arc-based variables and the crew pairi...


First impressions count. The toilet cubicle door is open to reveal a figure standing astride the toilet with their back to us in the stance of a man urinating, with the clothing and appearance associated with that of a woman. The photo on the front cover is bold, powerful and provocative: the author clearly wants to grab our attention in a way which, unfortunately, most analytic book covers do not even attempt. As one of the few clinicians specializing in analytic work with transgender in the UK, I was very keen to be able to read and review this book. The author, Patricia Gherovici, describes herself only as an ''analyst in private practice'' and, as someone who has trained in two differing analytic disciplines, I was curious to find out what sort of analyst Ms Gherovici was. A brief search on Google revealed that the author is a Lacanian analyst, but I was still intrigued as to why this was not stated in her own description of herself although it is evident from reading the book, due to the heavy reliance on Lacanian theory. The aforementioned cover photo of the book and the reference to transgender in the latter half of the title suggest that this is a book on transgender. Indeed this does seem to be the case for the most part. However, the middle section of the book appears to get sidetracked into the realm of hysteria and an extensive psychoanalytic discourse of this area which detracts from what I thought was the main focus of the book. This I found to be an unhelpful deviation in what is already a complex area. Gherovici provides a well considered and contemporaneous portrayal of sex, sexuality, gender and transgender, which will be helpful for most analysts (of any tradition) and which I found a welcome addition to the currently scarce literature in this area. Other than the now extremely outdated writings of Money, Stoller and Green of the 1970s, the only writers contributing to his very specialist niche of analytic work are Colette Chiland (Psychoanalytic), Gherovici (Lacanian) and myself (Group Analytic). Gherovici relies heavily on Freud as representative of psychoanalytic theory as well as Lacan, but she does not call upon more contemporary analytic writers to the same extent. This might have added more to her discussions. In my opinion, the most important writer in this field to date has been the social theorist Judith Butler, whose writings on gender were the start of the Queer Theory movement and whose description of ''Gender as Performative'' around the time of writing Gender trouble (1990) is essential reading for anyone with an interest in both gender and transgender. Gherovici does make reference to Professor Butler's works. However, she does not make explicitly clear that the differing ideas and hypotheses Sexual and Relationship Therapy Vol. 25, No. 4, November 2010, 465–469


Knowledge about the degree of association of yield with components and the interrelationships among them may prove useful in crop improvement. Correlation and path coefficient analyses were carried out for 13 characters of yield and its components. Character association indicated that fruit yield per plant and average fruit weight was positive and significantly correlated with number of fruits per plant at genotypic and phenotypic level. Path analysis indicated that number of fruits per plant had significantly positive, direct effect on fruit yield per plant at genotypic and phenotypic level. The remaining characters had negligible to low or moderate indirect effects through other component characters. The high direct effect of these traits appeared to be the main factors for their strong association with fruit yield. Therefore, maximum weight age should be given to these characters for improvement of yield in sponge gourd.


In this paper, the electrical and optical properties of organic light emitting diodes (OLEDs) are analyzed, deriving the devices limits at high applied electric fields. In particular, for different device thicknesses, it is possible to conclude that the optical breakdown can be attributed to a surface phenomenon, that the temperature of electrical failure is significantly different from the optical one, that the two phenomena of failure are markedly similar at different thicknesses and that there is a maximum field beyond which the thin cathode may be destroyed due to phenomena not agreeable to thermal events.


The paper reviews flndings from recent estimations using various techniques of parametric continuous time models for flnancial price data, and it highlights some of the identiflcation problems. There is a clear need to make use of the high frequency data in estimation in order to break the identiflcation problems. The evidence from nonparametric volatility and jump component estimation is used to conjecture the characteristics of a better fltting parametric model, though the estimation of that model, which would formidable, is deferred to the future. The paper also explores some recently proposed schemes to simulate


When Melville referred to Australia as " that great America on the other side of the sphere," he was expressing a notion wide spread in his day and ours, that Australia and the United States were pretty much alike, give or take a kangaroo there, a buffalo here. Though the notion has only limited validity, the two countries did—and do—have much in common. The resemblance is apparent, for example, in the pattern followed by white occupation. Begin ning in each case with a thin band of settlement along the east coast, the conquest progressed inland and westward, augmented later by penetrations from the southern and western coasts. On both continents the invasion proceeded without much regard for the rights of the native inhabitants.


The present study examines the problem of moral values arising aboard manned spacecrafts. The authors believe that this problem is due to the transition of modern society to the Information Age. Under the conditions of a space flight, when the vital functions of the crew and passengers of a spacecraft are provided and controlled by information and communication technology, the problem of moral values takes on special significance. Information technology, as well as their applications can be divided into three types. These are technologies that record (store), transmit (communicate) and organize information. The authors studied the features of the influence of each type of information and communication technology on moral values and artistic freedom in the microsocial group of a spacecraft. Solving the problem of moral values aboard a manned spacecraft is a sine qua non for artistic freedom during a space flight, the quality of the tasks associated with the colonization of the outer space and the development of material, energy and information resources of the universe.


.Iwould like to declare my opinion about it. For screening hemostasis disorders before invasive procedures or surgery, we usually test APTT, PT, INR, BT, and Platelet Count to detect rele-vant abnormalities. Although these tests may be sufficient for major hemostasis disorders, some hemostasis disorders such as factor XIII deficiency may be overlooked. The PT, APTT, and thrombin time are normal in factor XIII deficiency. In these patients, bleeding follow-ing trauma or surgery may be delayed for 12 to 36 hours, while in other patients immediate bleeding occurs


Metal ions poisoning can result from environmental factors, intentional action, or disruption of homeostasis. Although the origin of toxicity may be different, the treatment is similar. Chelation therapy aims to remove the excess of metal ions from tissues to stop further damage of cells. For almost every metal ion, molecules that are able to bind it and remove from the human body are known. Over the years some new chelating agents were discovered and introduced into


We propose a new way to conduct multiple hypothesis testing in economics research. Our framework allows for correlation among tests and incomplete data, both of which are prevalent in economic meta-analysis. Our simulations show that that our method is able to produce the correct p-value cutoff that controls the overall rate of false discoveries at a prespecified level of significance. The single hypothesis test, as used by most researchers, leads to too many false discoveries and should be avoided.


A computer aided system for intravenous anesthesia based on the theory of pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics was designed.By emulating TCI and simulating intravenous processes,this system implemented the anaesthesia project that was concerned with the target plasma or target effect compartment of intravenous sedation drugs and narcotic analgesic used usually in patients of different ages,sexes and different classes of surgery and this system raised the controllability and safety of anaesthesia.