9 In this analysis, unlike comparing to patients on dialysis, which showed a significant survival advantage for PAK, the difference was not significant up to 10 years of follow‐up. Please note that these comparisons were to waitlisted patients, not all Type 1 diabetic recipients of renal transplants. This means that the waitlist mortality does not account for patients who were delisted prior to dying and therefore may be underestimated. There is also a lead time bias as PAK survival is measured from the time of pancreas transplantation, which was frequently years following the prior kidney transplant (median 657 days). This fraught comparison was, in fact, the major source of the ongoing controversy related to the prior publica‐ tions from Venstrom et al. 10 and Gruessner et al., 11,12 and one that we intended to address in our recent publication. 1 It was also this compar‐ ison that has essentially derailed PAK as a viable and acceptable alter‐ native for the diabetic uremic candidate with a suitable living donor and was the primary motivation for repeating this analysis in order to demonstrate the survival advantage PAK provides compared to re‐ maining on the waitlist and receiving neither a kidney nor a pancreas. close as described by the American Journal of Transplantation .


This work provided an algorithm HTGA(Hybrid Tags Generation Algorithm)to generate tags for Chinese documents,which extracts phrase chunks as candidate keywords,and considers other factors like TF.IDF,words span etc.Experiments show that this algorithm improves the accuracy of keyword extraction,and has a stable performance over various texts.Some samples were extracted and compared with the standard answers.There are more than 60%results that are as well as or better than the standard answers in reflection of document topics.


Radiation admittance for an annular ring microstrip antenna has been determined using the magnetic current model and the variational technique. The results obtained for self conductance of a ring source have been verified with those available in the literature. The expression obtained for mutual admittance can also be used to describe mutual coupling effects in an array of annular rings.


Field experiment on effect of different weed management practices in machine transplanted rice (Oryza sativa L.) was conducted at ARS, Gangavathi, University of Agricultural Sciences, Raichur, Karnataka during kharif, 2012 and 2013 under irrigated condition in clay soil. Pooled mean indicated that, application of butachlor 50 EC fb passing of power operated low land rice weeder twice at 20 and 30 DAT with hand weeding in intra row space recorded significantly lower grassy weed population and dry weight at 40, 60 DAT and at harvest (1.98, 2.47, 2.97/0.25 m2 and 1.00, 1.20, 1.47 g /0.25 m2, respectively), sedge weed population and dry weight (2.61, 3.21, 3.52 /0.25 m2 and 1.19, 1.48, 1.71 g /0.25 m2, respectively) and broad leaved weed population and dry weight (1.68, 2.10, 2.52 / 0.25 m2 and 0.91, 1.06, 1.28 g /0.25 m2, respectively). Significantly higher WCE (87.53%), lower weed index (3.11 %), grain and straw yield (5160 and 6482 kg ha-1, respectively), gross and net returns (Rs. 92,212 and 50,410 ha-1, respectively), and B:C of 2.22 over unweeded check. Hence, application of butachlor 50 EC fb passing of power operated low land rice weeder at 20 and 30 DAT with hand weeding in intra row space was found to be the best weed control method as it recorded higher B:C. Present conventional manual weeding is which is not advantageous as it is costlier, time consuming and labour may trample and damage rice seedlings. Mechanical weeder and sequential application can overcome the same.


Scientific journals are always a good source of references to be updated on all the new knowledge that is always being generated in our field of expertise. That is why most scientists always end up having a certain set of preferred journals and magazines, and this is explained by the fact that journals, even in our field, tend to position themselves in certain areas of knowledge, (in technological terms or in other terms)


The parable of the Samaritan is traditionally treated as a reply to the lawyer's question, "Who is my neighbor?" but actually the story does not admit of that interpretation at all. Instead of answering the question of the lawyer Jesus catalogues it as being irrelevant and tells a story which he concludes with another question that changes a request for a definition into a desire for an opportunity. A lawyer stood up and made trial of Jesus with the question, "What shall I do to inherit eternal life?" The lawyer was in all probability asking not for the sake of receiving instruction or enlightenment but rather with an evil intention. Jesus replied, "What is written in the law? how read you?" By referring to the law as the valid and acknowledged authority for the answer to the question Jesus eliminated all farther occasion for inquiries. It is to be noticed that Jesus asks in particular for the written law and not the oral comments on the law which were recited by the rabbis. Without any hesitation the lawyer gives as his reply the famous combination of the laws to love God and to love one's neighbor. The first command was thoroughly familiar to every Israelite, but the second command seems to be not so noticeable in the Old Testament since it comes out of the middle of a verse in Leviticus 19: 18. In Mark 12:28-34 this combination of laws is presented as an original contribution of Jesus. It has been suggested that this selection was already in use by the rabbis. It is true that the combination of the two laws is found in the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs", but there is no evidence to indicate that this synthesis was in use in Rabbinical Iiterature.s


In this paper, we consider the Fisher-Snedecor F composite fading channel model and derive exact closed-form expressions for the symbol error rate (SER) of M-ary pulse amplitude modulation (M-PAM) and M-ary quadrature amplitude modulation (M-QAM). We also derive asymptotic expressions for the SER of M-PAM and M-QAM to study the behavior of SER at high values of signal-to-noise ratio. Moreover, we derive an exact closed-form expression for the average capacity. The derived expressions are evaluated for different values of the fading parameters to show the effects of shadowing and small-scale fading on the performance of SER and capacity. Simulation results are also provided to show the accuracy of the derived expressions.


The present study was under taken to investigate the biochemical characterization of Phyllanthus acidus, Phyllanthus emblica and Citrus limon. The results suggest that among the three varieties the level of storage polysaccharides (Total Carbohydrate & Starch) and total protein seems to be higher in Phyllanthus emblica than phyllanthus acidus and citrus limon. The amount of cholesterol in Phyllanthus acidus showed better level than the rest of the two varieties. When compared to Phyllanthus acidus and Phyllanthus emblica, the ascorbic acid content was found to be higher in Citrus limon. Phyllanthus emblica contain high amount of calciu m than the other two varieties. The amount of phosphorous and iron in Citrus limon posses better level than phyllanthus acidus and emblica. Thereby to conclude the fruits selected Phyllanthus acidus, Phyllanthus emblica and Citrus limon varieties showed very impressive biochemical co mponents which is of therapeutic and economic importance.


The paper tries to outline the potential problems of the
Central European Countries in the sphere of structural politics
after joining the EU.


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. In recent years, as performance and capacity of main and external memory grow, performance of database management systems (DBMSes) on certain kinds of queries is more determined by raw CPU speed. Currently, PostgreSQL uses the interpreter to execute SQL queries. This yields an overhead caused by indirect calls to handler functions and runtime checks, which could be avoided if the query were compiled into native code "on-the-fly", i.e. just-in-time (JIT) compiled: at run time the specific table structure is known as well as data types and built-in functions used in the query as well as the query itself. This is especially important for complex queries, performance of is CPU-bound. We have developed a PostgreSQL extension that implements SQL query JIT compilation using LLVM compiler infrastructure. In this paper we show how to implement LLVM-analogues of the main operators of the PostgreSQL, how to replace Volcano iterator model abstraction (open(), next(), close()) by the abstraction that is more suitable to generate code for a particular query. Currently, with LLVM JIT we achieve up to 4.3x speedup on TPC-H Q1 query as compared to original PostgreSQL interpreter.


The use of precast concrete segments facilitates quality control and reduces construction cost and period. However, as a construction method it has limited applicability, for it demonstrates structurally disadvantageous behaviors due to stress concentration and large displacement in the joint of assembled segments. This paper proposes a precast segment joint with improved structural performance, and experimentally assesses the structural performance of the proposed joint in terms of crack and failure modes, deformation, maximum load and displacement ductility. In consideration of constructability and structural performance, this paper suggests different types of joint with shear key, post tension and steel rods as variables, and performs a static loading test on them. The test results show that the performance of SGSP specimens is around 84% that of a monolithic specimen in terms of the maximum load, while their ductility behaviors are better than the monolithic specimen. This result confirms the improved structural performance and applicability of the proposed joint.


Recent experiments using low power EM-radar like sensors (e.g, GEMs) have demonstrated a new method for measuring vocal fold activity and the onset times of voiced speech, as vocal fold contact begins to take place. Similarly the end time of a voiced speech segment can be measured. Secondly it appears that in most normal uses of American English speech, unvoiced-speech segments directly precede or directly follow voiced-speech segments. For many applications, it is useful to know typical duration times of these unvoiced speech segments. A corpus, assembled earlier of spoken ''Timit'' words, phrases, and sentences and recorded using simultaneously measured acoustic and EM-sensor glottal signals, from 16 male speakers, was used for this study. By inspecting the onset (or end) of unvoiced speech, using the acoustic signal, and the onset (or end) of voiced speech using the EM sensor signal, the average duration times for unvoiced segments preceding onset of vocalization were found to be 300ms, and for following segments, 500ms. An unvoiced speech period is then defined in time, first by using the onset of the EM-sensed glottal signal, as the onset-time marker for the voiced speech segment and end marker for the unvoiced segment. Then, by subtracting 300msmore » from the onset time mark of voicing, the unvoiced speech segment start time is found. Similarly, the times for a following unvoiced speech segment can be found. While data of this nature have proven to be useful for work in our laboratory, a great deal of additional work remains to validate such data for use with general populations of users. These procedures have been useful for applying optimal processing algorithms over time segments of unvoiced, voiced, and non-speech acoustic signals. For example, these data appear to be of use in speaker validation, in vocoding, and in denoising algorithms.« less


The method of phenanthroline-Fe 2+ reaction system was used to measure the scavenging activity of Sophora subprostrate polysaccharide (SSP1) on hydroxyl radical. The autoxidation reaction system of pyrogallol was performed to investigate the scavenging action of SSP1 on superoxide radical. The method of horseradish peroxidase-phenol red system was used to measure the scavenging activity of SSP1 on hydrogen peroxide. The results showed that the polysaccharide(50~400 mg/l) in vitro had scavenging actions on hydroxyl radical in a concentration-dependent manner as well as superoxide radical, and a significant scavenging action on hydrogen peroxide was also observed. It was demonstrated that SSP1 had significantly antioxidative actions.


The dynamics of electron beam ablation plumes have been characterized through the application of dye laser resonance absorption photography. The ablation of fused silica by a channelspark electron beam was studied by probing the near-ground state, 3p2 1D−4s 1P0 neutral Si transition at 288.158 nm. Necessary background gases (Ar or N2) were tested at pressures of 15 or 30 mTorr. A two-lobed, Si atom plume shape was discovered that is hydrodynamically more complex than laser ablation plumes. These plumes merge into a single-lobed plume at about 400 ns after the e-beam current pulse rise. Plume front expansion velocities of Si atoms were measured at nearly 1 cm/μs, and are comparable to the expansion of laser ablated metal atom plumes with laser fluences of a few J/cm2.


This paper introduces the design of the BCU circuit and the software design which realizes communication Protocol based on EIB system. The C51 programming and IAP technology were used so as to lay foundation for the advanced research of embedding operation system and exploiting various intelligent house appliances. The research is helpful for promoting the development of new generation house appliances.


We delineated 0.088 micrometers line and space patterns by using an etched-in phase-shifting mask. The etched area of the mask had good morphology and high transmittance for deep UV light. The phase-shifting angle of the etched area was well controlled within 180 +/- 5 degrees.


In this paper a novel fuzzy convergence system (SC) and its fundamentals are presented. The model was implemented on a monoobjetive PSO algorithm with three phases: 1) Stabilization, 2) generation and breadthfirst search, and 3) generation and depth-first. The system SC-PSO-3P was tested with several benchmark engineering problems and with several CEC2006 problems. The computing experience and comparison with previously reported results is presented. In some cases the results reported in the literature are improved.


Most dinoflagellate species and individuals taken from Eel Pond during this study were luminescent and these were sufficient in abundance to explain all the luminescence recorded. This is probably the case in many marine environments. Macroscopic organisms capable of luminescence were removed by filtration, and the only microplankton constituents capable of luminescence and present in sufficient numbers were dinoflagellates.Dinoflagellate luminescence is commonly a cause of light production in surface regions of the ocean (Harvey, 1952 ; Hastings, 1963) and more knowledge is needed of the luminescent behavior of individuals and cultures of the various species. The effects of temperature, depth and other environmental conditions are unknown. Spontaneous luminescence without stimulation was observed in the laboratory, but is very variable and its extent in the natural environment is not known. Much work is needed on the ecology of dinoflagellate luminescence.The rate of luminescent flashing of natural popul...


Copyright © 2014 Giovanni Martinotti et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Date of Acceptance: 09/11/2014


Several energy intensive industrial processes, such as cement production, require particulate material to be treated at high temperatures. Renewable energy could be used to remove the reliance upon fossil fuels in such processes, and of the available technologies concentrated solar energy is perfectly adapted to provide a high temperature energy source. With this objective, the present study focuses on a solar reactor continuously transferring concentrated solar radiation to a bed of
flowing particles. Rotary kilns are the chosen concept due to their technical maturity, easy control and simple design. The feasibility of a solar driven rotary kiln has already been proven at lab-scale, with the successful calcination of materials up to a scale of kg/h. The present work describes a large solar rotary kiln able to heat particles to over 1000 °C at flow rates of up to 20 kg/h. The thermal performance of the reactor was evaluated through an on-sun experimental campaign, performed in the high flux solar simulator at the DLR. During one test, 17 kg/h of particles were heated up to 990 °C, with a thermal efficiency of 45 %. An improvement of the efficiency can be obtained by optimizing the reactor. To do this, a numerical model was developed and its parameters fit to the measured data. Simulations were used to quantify the different heat loss
mechanisms, and to explore ways of reducing them. The promising experimental results, together with the mprovements suggested by the model, provide the basis for an upcoming chemical campaign, where the calcination of CaCO3 and the effect of endothermic reactions on the temperature distribution will be investigated.


Through the analysis on the operation of partial system in a power plant,some effective measures are adopted including the optimization design and operational control,etc,so the auxiliary power consumption rate greatly reduces and the economic benefit improves significantly.


Capillary lens technology may ultimately bring benefits to neutron and x-ray-based science like conventional lenses with visible light. Although the technology is not yet 10 years old, these lenses have already had a significant impact in engineering, science, and medicine. Capillary lenses are advantageous when it is desirable to increase the radiation flux at a location without regard to its angular divergence. PNNL has worked to improve the technology in several ways. A single, optimally tapered capillary was manufactured, which allows intensity gains of a factor of 270 for an initially parallel, incident x-ray beam. Feasibility of constructing neutron lenses using {sup 58}Ni (particularly effective at reflecting neutrons) has been explored. Three applications for capillary optics have been identified and studied: neutron telescope, Gandolphi x-ray diffractometry, and neutron radiotherapy. A brief guide is given for determining which potential applications are likely to be helped by capillary optics.


AbstractInitially unipolar, but subsequently bipolar, spore germination in Diphyscium foliosum produces two primary filaments tapering towards their tips. These narrow filaments, only 5-8 μm in diameter, with non-pigmented walls, oblique septa and containing discoidal chloroplasts, trace at first an undulating and then a spiral course through agar media. Side branch initials are either cylindrical or swollen. The former produce identical or even narrower (3-5 μm diameter) spirally-growing filaments: the latter develop, by tip growth, into massive upright branches. These are subsequently transformed, as a result of intercalary divisions, into solid, highly chlorophyllous, funnel-shaped appendages with a convex upper surface and undulate margins, recognised by previous authors as diagnostic of the genus. Filament tip cells may also produce massive branches and conversely secondary filaments' grow out from the bases of the massive branches and from the columns of the funnels. Gametophores develop from both t...


CAMPAIGN PUBLICIZING THE HAZARDS UNDER DEVELOPMENT BY AN IATA WORKING GROUP, AIMED AT PASSENGERS, TRAVEL AGENTS, TOUR OPERATORS, TICKET AGENTS


Background: Previous metabolic studies of the colonic mucosa have been done using isolated cells or small biopsy specimens. Methods: A new method for assessing the utilization of short-chain fatty acids in human colonic mucosal tissue strips considerably larger than routine samples was evaluated and compared with the method of isolated colonocytes. Human colonic mucosal strips and isolated human and rat colonocytes were incubated with acetate (C2), butyrate (C4), and hexanoate (C6), and oxidation rates obtained by quantifying the production of CO2. Results: The wet weight of strips was highly correlated with the production of CO2, and intersample coefficient of variance was <10%. The production of CO2 from the oxidation of C2, C4, and C6 was in the order of C2 > C4


The author uses collected health and medical data of three clinic cases during a time period from 3/3/2020 to 2/14/2021. At first, he supplied statistical correlation analysis to study the degree of relationships of weight versus FPG and FPG versus PPG. He then applies his developed two moduli, GH-f and GH-p from the linear elastic glucose theory (LEGT) to calculate and evaluate the separated contribution percentages of three contributors within each period. These three contributors are: (1) postprandial plasma glucose (PPG) baseline factor via fasting plasma glucose (FPG) and GH-f Modulus, (2) diet factor via carbs/sugar intake amount and GH-p Modulus, and (3) exercise factor via post-meal walking steps. His purpose is to identify the FPG variance and its contribution on PPG formation due to the hidden strength from the overall health state of pancreatic beta cells.


Diminishing Sensitivity for Other-Regarding Preferences. (April 2002) Sarah Anne Hill Department of Mathematics Texas A&M University Fellows Advisor: Dr. William S. Neilson Department of Economics Because of the pervasiveness of diminishing sensitivity in economics, and because diminishing sensitivity has played such a crucial role in examining behavior toward risk, diminishing sensitivity for other-regarding preferences is explored using several proposed models and the equal-division equivalent. By placing restrictions on the models suggested by Fehr and Schmidt and by Charness and Rabin, inequity aversion and diminishing sensitivity can be guaranteed when the player is ahead and behind opponents. There are no simple restrictions that will guarantee diminishing sensitivity in the models suggested by Neilson and Stowe and by Bolton and Ockenfels when the decision-maker is ahead of his opponents. Thus if diminishing sensitivity is a desirable property of a model of other-regarding preferences, the Neilson-Stowe and Bolton-Ockenfels models are not appropriate. For both the Fehr-Schmidt and CharnessRabin models, the restrictions for diminishing sensitivity imply a dislike of a Robin Hood scheme that redistributes wealth from a higher-payoff opponent to a lower-payoff opponent. While one interpretation of this result is that diminishing sensitivity is not desirable in the context of other-regarding preferences, the problem actually is with the models themselves. Because the models only consider inequity aversion between the decision-maker and each individual opponent rather than a type of inequity between opponents, these models yield a dislike of redistribution of wealth ffom high-payoff players to low-payoff players. Therefore these results suggest that perhaps other models should be constructed which allow for diminishing sensitivity and a preference for a redistribution of wealth.


For saving the moribund rural economy in early half of the 20th century,Guomin government implemented the supply-led institutional transition focusing on rural cooperation movement,leading to large quantities of co-operations emerging.But co-operations couldn't operate well because of restrictions of financial and banking system.This phenomenon was due to insufficient institutional supply of the government and the lack of harmonious institutional construction.In fact,all kinds of systems functioning simultaneously in rural areas constitute the social institutional system,and coupling relations between systems determine that only a combination of all systems can function well.In addition,institutional supply should combine with social mobilization sponsored by governments in order to generate resonance between government power and rural people.Otherwise,social and economic transformation would possibly get caught up in the dilemma of "perfect institution but low efficiency".


In this paper, two classes are defined of time-varying large-scale interconnected systems that can always be stabilized by time-varying decentralized local feedback. The results extend previous ones. In addition, some useful properties are obtained.


A topology composed of a hollow-shaft rotor on rolling element bearings coupled with internal-stator magnetic bearings mounted on independently supported flexible shafts is considered for the purposes of vibration reduction. Details of a bespoke test rig constructed to assess this topology are presented. The rig makes use of customdesigned internal-stator magnetic bearings fabricated from Soft Magnetic Composite material. Results from standard numerical analysis of the rig are given to demonstrate the expected behaviour of the system, with a particular focus on its potential to reduce synchronous vibration seen in the rotor while passing critical speeds. These behaviours are then confirmed via a series of experimental tests. These results show that the proposed topology can be used effectively to alter the system vibration behaviour.


The total wear of tracks for construction machinery is mainly determined by the wear between track bushings and teeth of the sprocket. To achieve comparable wear resistance of bushings and track links, laboratory and field tests were carried out with construction machinery replacing the conventional steel for bushings with ceramic material, in particular Si 3 N 4 and ZrO 2 . Compared to the various special steels, Si 3 N 4 offers an abrasion wear reduction potential up to a factor of 20 and ZrO 2 up to a factor of 30. The fracture loads of parts made of Si 3 N 4 and ZrO 2 apparently show sufficiently high values to withstand impulse loading. Both the measured radial fracture load values as well as the road test on one 21-metric ton Liebherr PR 732 B-L dozer with 234 kN tractive force confirmed the author's assumption that bushings made of Si 3 N 4 and ZrO 2 ceramics are principly suitable for application in tracks for construction machinery. From the wear reduction potential under abrasive conditions and with lubrication the opportunity arises for a new concept of a non-oil-containing and wear reduced track.


This study aims to find out whether or not there is a content of vitamin C in tomatoes, cucumbers, chayote, spinach, lime and bilimbi by reacting with betadine containing povidone iodine 10% w/v, which is equivalent to 1% iodine. If iodine reacts with vitamin C, then the color of iodine will disappear. Each extract of fruits and vegetables is added to a glass containing aqua that has been added 25 drops of betadine with a solution color that is reddish brown. Obtained discoloration from each addition of fruit and vegetable extract: a) Cucumbers change color to solid bright yellow, b) Tomatoes change color to clear bright yellow, c) Chayote change color to white, d) Spinach changes color to dark green, e) Lime changes color to brownish orange and f) Bilimbi changes color to orange. The discoloration that occurs indicates that tomatoes, cucumbers, chayote, spinach, lime and bilimbi contain vitamin C.


Cloud Computing is deemed the main trend of IT development for the coming decades, and it is to have a profound impact on the development of the human society and the world economy. In this chapter, the authors examine the history of cloud computing, the technical and business models, and the global implications of cloud computing's development in the near future. Finally, the market demands for cloud computing and the foreseeable developmental stages are explored. THE HISTORY OF CLOUD COMPUTING Cloud computing was not born overnight. The concept of the Cloud in reality had encompassed the entire history of business machines and the Internet. In as early as 1961, when the first manned space craft was launched into space, a computer scientist and Turing Award recipient, John McCarthy, predicted: "Like the public telephone networks, the future of computing will be organized in such a way that it will be offered much like public resources and utilities. This will bring about a whole new industry." In 1964, an American inventor, Douglas Engelbart, did research in the area of human-computer interactions, which brought the rise of computer mice, links and network machines. During the same period, the ARPANet inventor, J.C.R. Licklider, had foreseen grid computing in the form of global network delivery. In the 1990s, grid computing was very popular and extremely similar to cloud computing, in that access for computing power became as easy as plugging into the electricity grid. (Baidu Encyclopedia, 2013) Microsoft had been quite closely related to cloud computing. It could be said that the Cloud operating system was a Microsoft invention. The former President of Microsoft Platform and Services group, Jim Alchin, while working on Yushi Shen Microsoft Corporation, USA Yale Li Microsoft Corporation, USA Ling Wu EMC2 Corporation, USA Shaofeng Liu Microsoft Corporation, USA Qian Wen Endronic Corp, USA


If register allocation is performed after instruction scheduling, the efficiency of register allocation can be degraded due to constraints caused by such scheduling. The authors propose a new register allocation technique that is performed before instruction scheduling and, consequently, allows great freedom in the optimisation of register allocation. Experiments show that the efficiency of the proposed technique is on average 7.4%, greater than that of the conventional approach.


The monocracy should be the spirit of all legal phenoma ; Man' s comprehensive development should be the multi-directional and various coordinative one, i. e, the developing idea. Today the monocracy culture as man's choice and creation is the internal need of man' s comprehensive development, and man' s comprehensive development should be regarded as the value of monocracy culture. We should cultivate the monocracy culture along the rational value orientation to further the man' s comprehensive development.


We propose a unifying framework for the role of visible product design as a driver of inter-firm competition, covering aspects of both value creation and value capture. Drawing on various theoretical perspectives explaining the demand-side effects of design, we theorize how design choices (i) affect consumer preferences through different modes of differentiation, (ii) act as a moderator of psychological processes involved in comparative evaluations, and (iii) may collide with demand-side norms regarding imitation. We also introduce a formal model that allows us to analyze and illustrate the conditions under which similarity or dissimilarity to a competing product's design is likely to be most beneficial. In highlighting the competitive, hitherto largely neglected, role of design, we corroborate its much-vaunted strategic relevance and unveil additional levers for creating competitive advantage.


In the preface to this volume, the author states that "the key question dealt with here is: Has the experience of American business managers in Europe had any effect on the way they conduct labor relations in the United States?" He also argues that almost all the literature on multinational corporations has focused on the way they have influenced the culture of their host country. "This volume pays more attention to the inverse relationship." As we will see later, this key question recedes into the background. The book is divided into eight chapters. The first four provide general information on U.S. multinationals inEurope. Chapters 1 and 3 deal with the historical growth of American direct investment in the European community and with the often repeated criticisms voiced against U.S. multinational corporations doing business in Europe. Such complaints include "the precipitous closing of industrial plants and the frequent refusal of U.S. owned firms to recognize the right of local trade unions to represent company workers." Nevertheless, the author does not elaborate on the reasons for the behavior of U. S. multinationals. In my opinion, one of the main reasons is the failure of U.S. based subsidiaries in Western Europe to understand the nuances of the local environment. For example, a number of issues ubject to collective bargaining in the United States, such as fringe benefits and grievance systems, are governed by law in some European countries. Chapter 2 examines the attitudes of the American business and labor communities toward the concept of industrial democracy. The author suggests that managerial prerogatives and traditional values will prevail for some years to come, but he claims that the American perspective on industrial democracy is changing and that "an increasing number of workers are participating inthe management of their work," without, however, providing any solid evidence to substantiate his claim. Throughout he book, he relies heavily on secondary sources and opinion polls and engages in broad generalizations to support his point of view. This, in my view, is a major weakness of this book. Chapter 4 describes a number of successful experiments with worker participation in decision making in the United States. The author fails, however, to analyze the common features shared by a large number of these successful labor-management cooperative programs. One such characteristic is that the creation of these programs has been stimulated by the existence of some problem or crisis. Several of the major U.S. companies that undertook cooperative projects, such as General Motors, were faced with serious competitive pressures or industrial relations problems; and both unions and management felt that the traditional collective bargaining process was incapable of solving these problems. Another common feature, overlapping with the first in some cases, is the presence of some key individual at the strategic level in the organization who believes strongly in such programs and is in a position to take action and pursue his objectives with energy, conviction and imagination. Irving Bluestone, former vice-president of the UAW, is one such individual. Chapter 5 focuses on the Western European trade union movement and its responses to the U.S. multinationals. The great merit of this monograph lies in its description of the ways in which trade unions in Western European countries differ from one country to another and the structure and strategies by which transnational unions have sought to balance the power of multinational enterprises. The author rightly points out that "the trade-unionist commitment to the regulation of international business is real and . . . the national and European political power of trade unionists is formidable." For example, the International Metal Workers Federation (IMF), which represents 11 million workers in the auto, steel, electrical appliances, ship building, and engineering industries, is the largest and oldest transnational trade union. The European Metal Workers Federation and the United Auto Workers in the United States and Canada are affiliated with the IMF. Although it has not been able to achieve worldwide collective bargaining as yet, the IMF has been quite effective in its training and publications program. The Federation has also developed a computerized data bank from which local union leaders can obtain up-to-date information on contract concessions reached at other company units, as well as updates on the company's overall economic and financial conditions. DeVos's final chapter deals with the key question raised in the preface, namely, has the experience of U.S. business managers in Europe had any effect on the way they conduct labor relations in the United States? The author concludes, "There has been some impact from the experience of American expatriates, and the majority of them may only have had their preference for the American way of doing things reinforced." The American way of doing things,


The thermal flexibility of buildings in integrated energy systems (IES) has great potential to improve the operational economy and wind power consumption. To incentivize the thermal flexibility of buildings under uncertainties, we propose a robust nodal pricing (RNP) model for thermal loads based on the Stackelberg game approach. The RNP model adopts a bilevel framework in which the IES operator plays the leader at the upper level while the thermal load aggregators (TLA) play the followers at the lower level. The IES operator problem optimizes the heat prices and dispatch plan, which is modeled as a two-stage robust optimization problem to address the uncertainties in the renewables and the loads. The TLA problem optimizes the thermal loads of buildings to minimize the energy cost and thermal comfort loss, which is modeled as a distributionally robust chance-constrained optimization problem to address the uncertainty in outdoor temperature. Then, we convert the TLA model into deterministic quadratic programming and prove that Slater's condition holds under a mild assumption. Using it, the TLA model is equivalently converted into Karush-Kuhn-Tucker conditions, leading to a reformulation of a classical two-stage robust optimization model for the RNP model. Case studies compare different pricing methods and verify the superiority of the proposed method.


Scherrer Equation, L=Kλ/β.cosθ, was developed in 1918, to calculate the nano crystallite size (L) by XRD radiation of wavelength λ (nm) from measuring full width at half maximum of peaks (β) in radian located at any 2θ in the pattern. Shape factor of K can be 0.62 - 2.08 and is usually taken as about 0.89. But, if all of the peaks of a pattern are going to give a similar value of L, then β.cosθ must be identical. This means that for a typical 5nm crystallite size and λ Cukα1 = 0.15405 nm the peak at 2θ = 170° must be more than ten times wide with respect to the peak at 2θ = 10°, which is never observed. The purpose of modified Scherrer equation given in this paper is to provide a new approach to the kind of using Scherrer equation, so that a least squares technique can be applied to minimize the sources of errors. Modified Scherrer equation plots lnβ against ln(1/cosθ) and obtains the intercept of a least squares line regression, ln=Kλ/L, from which a single value of L is obtained through all of the available peaks. This novel technique is used for a natural Hydroxyapatite (HA) of bovine bone fired at 600°C, 700°C, 900°C and 1100°C from which nano crystallite sizes of 22.8, 35.5, 37.3 and 38.1 nm were respectively obtained and 900°C was selected for biomaterials purposes. These results show that modified Scherrer equation method is promising in nano materials applications and can distinguish between 37.3 and 38.1 nm by using the data from all of the available peaks.


In the age of social media, many students approach emailing similar to texting and other forms of digital communication, where the crucial conventions are brevity and informality. But most college teachers consider emails closer to letters than to text messages. This style of writing calls for more formality, more thoroughness and more faithful adherence (sometimes bordering on religious adherence) to the conventions of Edited Standard Written English [4] -that is, spelling, punctuation, capitalization and syntax.


Some non linear dynamic systems described in the domain of chaos theory are characterized by three states: stability, periodic oscillation, and chaos. This system dynamics can be described by the Feigenbaum diagram. The present study investigates the performance of persons controlling such a system changing from stable to chaotic states and vice versa. In the experiment 48 subjects had to regulate the temperature of a simulated power station in which the temperature followed the development described in the Feigenbaum diagram.


Rapid measurements of macronutrients in human milk by infrared spectroscopy, particularly widely used mid-infrared at bed side, is undergoing rapid development in recent years. A recent published systematic review showed that the accurate rate of infrared spectroscopy for protein and fat measurement was only between 60% and 70%, while for carbohydrate/lactose was inconclusive. As for domestic used digital ultrasound techniques, only few studies were published based on small sample size and thus it is difficult to evaluate the results. The storage, temperature and container for milk samples may also affect the results. As individual human milk contents vary during the whole lactation period resulting in the instability of all contents, one single or few samples might not be representative. The proposed individualized fortification based on rapid measurement of human milk has failed to ensure a better growth though it might be true that the analysis made less error in determining the volume of fortifier. We concluded that routine clinical use of bedside or rapid measurement of human milk contents still lack of evidence and should not be recommended.

Key words:
Milk, human; Proteins; Carbohydrates; Spectrophotometry


Part 1 Change in the international system: farming, ranching and accounting - perspectives on change in international relations underdevelopment and the "Gap" theory of international conflict change in the international system - interdependence, integration and fragmentation restructuring foreign policy - a neglected phenomenon in foreign policy theory politics in command - foreign trade as national security policy revolution in the revolution - world views and foreign policy change in the Soviet Union. Part 2 Change in the study of international politics: retreat from Utopia - international relations theory, 1945-1970 along the road to international theory the comparative analysis of foreign policy - some notes on the pitfalls and paths to theory the necrologists of international relations international theory - national or international? mirror, mirror, on the wall, which are the fairest theories of all?.


This paper examines phonetic properties of long vowels in Pohnpeian, a Micronesian language. A production experiment and a perception experiment were conducted. The results of the production experiment show that Pohnpeian speakers produced long vowels with the mean duration only about 1.5 times longer than that of short vowels. The perception experiment confirmed that the ratio was wide enough for Pohnpeian listeners to discriminate vowel lengths. This study demonstrates a piece of evidence that Pohnpeian speakers acquire the ability to recognize phonological vowel length, one of the phonological features of the language, from their acoustic environment.


The article provides information about mammals listed in the Red Book of the Republic of Kazakhstan, taken in camera traps on the territory of the State Research and Production Enterprise "Kolsai Kolderi". According to preliminary information and literature data, 51 species of mammals are represented. Of these, 7 species are the Ursus arctos isabellinus Horsfield, 1826), Lutra lutra seistanica Birula, 1912, Lynx lynx isabellinus Blyth, 1847, Uncia uncia Schreber, 1775, Ovis ammon ammon (Linnaeus, 1758), Martes foina Erxleben, 1777 and Otocolobus manul (Pallas, 1776) are listed in the Red Book of the Republic of Kazakhstan. The snow leopard (Uncia uncia) is registered in the International Red Book. From 2014 to 2022, only 4 species of rare animals listed in the Red Book of Kazakhstan were recorded in camera traps on the territory of the Kolsai Kolderi State Scientific and Industrial Enterprise. These are Uncia uncia, Ursus arctos isabellinus, Lynx lynx isabellinus and Martes foina. In the course of the research, both traditional methods of field theriological research were used, including visual observations, identification and registration of various traces of animal activity, as well as remote methods using automatic animal tracking cameras (camera traps).


Objective To improve the diagnostic ability of CT for equidensity subdural hematoma. Methods CT findings of 15 cases(14 males, 1 female) with equidensity subdural hematoma proved surgically were retrospectively analyzed.15 patients were examined with plain scan of GE9000 CT scanner first, and then with enhancement scanning after 60-100 seconds of injection of 60 percent of the meglumini diatrozoas 100ml intravenously. Scanning condition for the process was 1200KV,200MA,5S.Layer thickness and slice interval were both 1cm. Results In these 15 cases, equidensity subdural hematoma were all located between inner plate of skull and cerebral cortex, with uniformly density close to ectocinerea, unclear edge and crescent shape. The cerebral cortex and the grey-white matter interface shifted internally, cortical sulci disappeared, cistern in the vicinity of the hematoma occluded, homolateral cerebral ventricle narrowed or disappeared because of compression,and mean line shift toward the opposite side in varying degree. During enhancement scanning, the hematoma was not enhanced. So there was a clear boundar between the hematoma and the enhanced cerebral cortex surface. Conclusion A CT scan in head, the enhanced CT particularly plays an important role in the positioning and timing diagnosis of equidensity subdural hematoma.


Although the introduction of highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) in the mid-1990s has resulted in a decrease of the morbidity and mortality in the HIV-1 patient population that has access to treatment, therapy failure still occurs. The surrogate markers for therapy failure, which ultimately results into clinical progression, are CD4 cell count and viral load. As changes in viral load mostly precedes changes in CD4 count, the determination of the viral load is the most relevant laboratory procedure to monitor the short-term in vivo activity of a therapy given to an individual patient. Lack of adherence, lack of therapy potency, pharmacological reasons, drug–drug interactions, and preexisting drug resistance can be factors resulting into therapy failure and rising viral loads. The evolution of resistance against HIV-1 inhibitors within a patient depends on the generation of genetic variation, reflected by substitutions, insertions, deletions, and recombination events, and on the selection of drugresistant variants during antiretroviral therapy. The high HIV-1 genetic variability is caused by the error-prone nature of HIV-1 reverse transcriptase, by the absence of any enzymatic proofreading activity, and by the huge rate of HIV-1 replication in vivo. Some of the created genetic variants will result in alterations to the structure and function of the molecules targeted by the antiviral drugs (currently reverse transcriptase, protease, and glycoprotein gp41). These alterations could confer changes in susceptibility to one or more of these drugs. In the presence of therapy, the variants with some level of resistance will gradually overgrow the wild-type variants. Under the continuous selective pressure of inhibitors and with the presence of residual replication as a result of insufficient potency of the treatment, additional mutations will accumulate. Thus, the main goal of HAART is to reduce the viral load as much as possible to prevent further clinical progression. However, its immediate goal is to reduce the viral load to prevent the formation of variants that result in antiviral resistance to the current therapy and that, because of the phenomenon of cross-resistance within drug classes, ultimately might lead to a limitation or even lack of future treatment options. METHODOLOGY


The objective of this study is to determine the empirical evidence about the impact of macro economic caused by of the implementation of state budget fiscal year 2004. A budget is a plan of financial operation embodying an estimated of proposed expenditures for a given period of time and the proposed means of financing them. The figures of the Indonesian government budget fiscal year 2004 has been fairly optimistic with an economic growth 4,8 percent, inflation 6,5 percent, exchange rate 8.500 (Rp/US$), and oil price 22,0 (US$/barrel). Being overly optimistic, government's taxation target Rp 272 trillion or 109,7 percent of taxation for the 2003 fiscal budget of Rp 248 trillion in terms of local currency. In 2003 Indonesia exit from the International Monetary Fund program. The developments in the fiscal year 2003 resulted in of the Indonesian economic growth of 4 percent. The forecasts for the fiscal year 2004 is that the Indonesian economic growth will be about 4,8 percent with a few innovations to accelerate economic recovery and employment generation. The Indonesian tax ratio in 2003 is 13,8 percent, while the tax ratio in 2004 will be about 13,6 percent, that mean a decline of 0,2 percent.


We previously reported a method for shoot tip micropropagation of the Vitis hybrid 'Remaily Seedless' (1, 2). In preliminary trials, rooting of subcultured shoots was erratic and shoots deteriorated after 2 weeks in culture. Herein we report the effects of sucrose and naphthaleneacetic acid (NAA) concentrations on the physical condition of subcultured shoots and subsequent root production in an attempt to increase the efficiency of grape micropropagation.


about the evalu-ation of the results of percutaneous cholecys-tostomy tube (PCT) versus cholecystectomyfor acute cholecystitis (AC) comparing theiroutcomesovertime.Theyhaveconcludedthat"among patients with AC, PCTs were placedin older patients with increased comorbiditiescompared to cholecystectomy. Mortality ratesafter PCT decreased over time."We congratulate the authors for theirextensiveexperienceintheapplicationofbothmethods and for the good results, especiallywhen using PCT during the second time pe-riod (over the more recent decade). However,we wish to highlight certain issues regardingthe study design and interpretation of the re-sults. In the "Methods" section, authors spec-ified that "patients who underwent operativemanagement of AC immediately before andafter each patient who underwent PCT place-mentservedascontrols,andwerematched2:1with PCT cases (143 patients)." It is not clearwhy the authors compared the patients sub-jected to cholecystectomy versus PTC, basedon the timing of intervention [especially inthe retrospective study design in which theyhad a great series (1559 patients) treated op-eratively, who were candidates for the controlgroup]. In this way, they got 2 very hetero-genic groups of patients for whom the onlything in common was that they had AC (seetheir Table 1) with too many uncontrolledconfounders. It is clear that the PCT group(Table 1) had more severe patients with sev-eral comorbidities and so it is logical to ex-pect a higher number of complications anddeaths in this group, which again is not di-rectly related to the type of treatment but isa consequence of uncontrolled confoundersassociated with their bad general condition.


The structural and spectroscopic analysis of Temozolomide acid (TMZA) have been performed using computation technique. The DFT computation of TMZA was done using Gaussian '09 program package using B3LYP method with the 6-311G(D,P) basis set, which has been successfully applied in order to derive the optimized geometry and vibrational wavenumber of the normal modes. Vibrational spectroscopy is an efficient tool for the charecterization of bioactive materials. This work focuses on the spectral investigation using FT-Raman and IR spectra along with the density functional theory (DFT) calculations. The hydrogen bonding interaction is well demonstrated by the natural bond orbital (NBO) analysis. The Mulliken population analysis on atomic charges and the HOMO-LUMO energy were also calculated.


This study uses the Market Model to assess the risk of securities in a thinner stock market, the Brussels Stock Exchange (Belgium) and compares the results to similar findings in French and U.S. stock exchanges.


Dangqu River,one of the sources of the Yangtze River,is the core part of the protection area for the Source of Three Rivers( Yangtze River,Yellow River,and Lantsang River). It is still a blank area of scientific research because of high elevation,marshy tracts and complex watersheds for scientific observation and research.There are some doubts about its position in the Yangtze River source. In this paper,some main scientific survey results in the past few decades are analyzed and compared. According to the comprehensive results of scientific investigation by the Yangtze River Scientific Research Institute in 2014,the position of Dangqu river in the source region of Yangtze River and the characteristics of river basin,landscape and wetland are analyzed. Problems on the position of Dangqu River basin are clarified and some suggestions on the division between the upstream and downstream,as well as ecosystem protection measures are put forward.


Objective: To compare coblation and bipolar diathermy tonsillectomy in adults in terms of operative time, operative blood loss, post operative pain and post operative complications. Patients and Methods: Thirty patients (aged 18-40 years) scheduled for tonsillectomy were enrolled in this study, the patients were randomized using sealed envelopes to have one tonsil removed by coblation and the other tonsil removed with bipolar diathermy. Operative time and operative blood loss were recorded for each side separately and compared. The patients were given a pain diary to record the level of pain on each side using a visual analog score for 7 days. They were asked also to report any complications. Results: Operative time and operative blood loss were significantly less in the coblation sides ( p<0.001). The mean pain score on the coblation sides was significantly lower compared to the diathermy sides on the 1 st and 2nd post operative days. Conclusion: This study can be added to the studies recommending the use of coblation for tonsillectomy in adults based on the minimal post-operative pain and similar morbidity compared to bipolar diathermy.


Phytotoxicity trials were conducted on matured dendrobium orchid plants, grown under 30% polypropylene net shade in no. 3 crushed basalt rock. Four weekly applications of selected insecticides at 4 x the recommended use rate were applied on 6, 13, 20 and 27 Jun to runoff using a compressed air sprayer with a no. 8004 Teejet nozzle at 40 psi. On 18 Jul, raceme length, flower length and the number of flowers per spray were recorded. Racemes were excised from the cane and measured for total length. Flower length was measured from the base of the most matured flower to the base of the youngest flower. Flowers and leaves were observed weekly for phytotoxic symptoms. Each treatment consisted of 12 plants replicated twice.


The article introduces the mechanism to cause power loss of overhead ground wire and methods to lower such loss.It studies how grounding method of the ground wire affects electric parameters of the overhead transmission line.It addresses,through PSCAD/EMTDC simulation,the importance to distinguish different grounding methods of ground wire when calculating zero-sequence parameter of the line by classical theory for the purpose to get accurate parameters.Moreover,it discusses the influence on relay protection of the transmission line.


The invention relates to a method for preparing rare-earth modified polyethylene fiber polyimide composite materials in the technical field of composite materials. The method comprises the following steps: immersing polyethylene fibers in a rare-earth modifier, and drying the obtained polyethylene fibers; stirring the polyethylene fibers with polyimide powder, and putting the mixed powder into a vulcanizing press mould for forming; raising the furnace temperature to 270 DEG C and preserving the heat for 80 minutes; performing preplasticization on preformed blanks for forming molded materials; and reducing the temperature along with a furnace to below 180 DEG C, taking the composite materials after compression molding out along with the mould, and cooling to room temperature to prepare polyethylene fiber polyimide wear-resisting composite materials. The method has the advantages of simple process, low cost and no environmental pollution, and the prepared rare-earth modified polyethylene fiber polyimide composite materials have good mechanical property and tribological performance.


OBJECTIVE
To screen the antitumor extract from Stellera chamaejasmel L..

METHODS
The means of systematic solvent extraction was used to separate the 95% ethanol extract. The antitumor activities of the different extracts in vitro were analyzed with MTT assay.

RESULTS
The petroleum ether extract and the chloroform extract strongly inhibited cell proliferation of human cancer cell lines such as leukemia HL-60, stomach cancer SGC-7901 and hepatocarcinoma BEL-7402, and showed significant dose-dependent response while the n-butanol extract and the methanol extract exhibited low antitumor activities in vitro. The petroleum ether extract was most active.

CONCLUSION
The petroleum ether extract is the principal antitumor extract from Stellera chamaejasmel L..


Abstract This paper studies abstraction methods suitable to verify very large models of discrete-event systems to be nonconflicting. It compares the observer property to methods known from process algebra, namely to conflict equivalence and observation equivalence. The observer property is shown to be the property that corresponds to conflict equivalence in the case where natural projection is used for abstraction. In this case, the observer property turns out to be the least restrictive condition that can be imposed on natural projection to enable compositional reasoning about conflicts. The observer property is also shown to be closely related to observation equivalence. Several examples and propositions are presented to relate different aspects of these methods of abstraction.


This study aims to determine: (1) the effect of board age diversity on bank credit risk, (2) the effect of board education diversity on bank credit risk, (3) the effect of board gender diversity on bank credit risk, and (4) the effect of board nationality diversity on bank credit risk. The population in this study are banking sector companies listed on the Indonesia Stock Exchange (IDX) in the 2014-2018 period. The sampling technique in this study used census sampling with a total sample of 37 banks. Data is collected from the bank's annual report. Fixed effect period regression analysis was used to test the hypothesis of this study. The results of this study indicate that: (1) board age diversity has a significant negative effect on bank credit risk, (2) board education diversity has a significant negative effect on bank buying credit risk, (3) board gender diversity has no significant effect on risk bank credit, (4) board nationality diversity has no significant effect on bank credit risk.


All biological systems exist in a constant rage of redox reactions, which are a normal component of the metabolism. The oxidation- reduction status of a cell or tissue is maintained in a balanced state by various components in the cells. When this balance is tipped in favour of the oxidation reactions, a condition called oxidative stress ensues. Severe oxidative stress can result in several pathological conditions like diabetes, hypertension, cardiovascular disorders, neurological disorders and cancer. All aerobic organisms are equipped with an effective antioxidant defence system, which can efficiently counteract the oxidative stress.


The Great East Japan Earthquake has resulted in the generation of large amounts of rubble. As a result, many 'outdoor rubble storage areas' have been established in the disaster areas. However, since the summer of 2011, a great number of fires have occurred in these areas of Tohoku district. One of the causes of these fires is believed to be the proliferation of microorganisms and fermentation of the organic material present in the rubble piles. The heat generated during fermentation ultimately results in spontaneous ignition. We conducted field surveys of two rubble storage areas in Yuriage and Kozukahara, Natori City, Miyagi prefecture where fires took place. Rubble samples containing material conducive to fermentation were collected from the fire-affected areas, and the risk of spontaneous ignition that is triggered by the heat generated during fermentation was examined. The results revealed that the heat generated during the fermentation of rotten tatami mats and wood chips most likely triggers and causes fires under adiabatic conditions.


This article investigates the relationship among pyramidal layers, risk†taking and firm value using a sample of local state†owned enterprises (SOEs) in China. We find that state†pyramidal layers have a positive and significant impact on firm risk†taking and firm value, suggesting that the pyramidal structure formed by the state protects SOEs from political intervention. Risk†taking is conducive to enhancing firm value and is one of the important channels through which state†pyramidal layers increase firm value. By exploring the role of state†pyramidal organizational structures in improving SOEs' risk†taking, our results contribute to both corporate governance and corporate finance literature.


Mast cells have effector functions in innate and adaptative response. They can promote allergic inflammation, tissue remodelling and tissue injury, specially because long standing activation. However mast cells can also have anti-inflammatory and immunosuppressive functions. In fact mast cells can both enhance and later suppress certain features of an immune response. The mast cell response will be highly dependent on the individual biological setting.


The Application of Ultraviolet Light and High Pulsed Electric Field Method to reduce Staphylococcus aureus ATCC 25923 and Escherichia coli ATCC 25922 in Goat Milk Suheri, K. F., R. R. A. Maheswari, and B. Hariono Milk is one of the important foods in human nutrition susceptible to pathogenic microorganisms, such as Staphylococcus aureus and Escherichia coli. The objective of this research was to observe the influence of combination treatment of ultraviolet (UV)-light and high pulsed electric field (HPEF) as non-thermal technologies to inactivate the pathogenic microorganisms in goat milk and to find the physical and chemical characteristics alteration out caused by both the two treatments. This research was devided into preliminary and primary section. The preliminary section was to find out the best number of UV reactor (which the factor levels were 1, 2, and 3 UV reactors) and the best frequency of HPEF (which the factor levels were 10 Hz, 15 Hz, and 20 Hz). The dose specification used of UV was 2,27 kGy, while the HPEF had electrical field strength of 31,67 kV/cm, current of 11 mA, and 3 cm distance of both electrodes. The primary treatment was to combine the best number of UV reactors and HPEF frequency to inactivate both Staphylococcus aureus ATCC 25923 and Escherichia coli ATCC 25922. The result data of physical and chemical characteristics of goat milk evaluated using complete random design through analysis of variance, while the microbe quality evaluated descriptively. The result showed that the treatment did not significantly effect the physical and chemical characteristics (P>0,05). The best number of UV reactor was 3 reactors of UV, while the best frequency of HPEF was 15 Hz. The combination treatment of UV light and HPEF could reduce Staphylococcus aureus ATCC 25923 up to 36,58%, while Escherichia coli ATCC 25922 was just 7,41%.


Abstract Doliwka and Lassak proved that if n ≤ 5 then every convex n-gon has a relatively short side and a relatively long side. In this paper we prove that this is true for n ≤ 5 only. More precisely, for any n ≥ 6, there exist n-gons without any relatively short sides.


at the ages of 7 and 28 days, cylindrical specimens with 15 cm diameter and 30 cm height were used. Prismatic specimens with the dimensions of 15 cm×15 cm×75 cm were used to determine flexural strengths at the age of 28 days. Before bending test, ultrasonic pulse velocity and dynamic modulus of elasticity values were determined by using 28-day prismatic specimens.


AbstractWidespread power outages and related critical infrastructure disruptions after major storms can thwart household and community recovery by limiting access to critical facilities and service...


A systematic analysis on the influencing factors of shear strength of asphalt mixture was conducted to effectively control rutting.In light of practical engineering,the effects of temperature,molding method,types of asphalt binder and asphalt mixtures,and aggregate grading on shear strength of asphalt mixture were investigated through triaxial shear test.In the meanwhile,the coherence between rutting test and triaxial shear test were analyzed.The research results show that(1) the shear strength of asphalt mixture increases with the decreasing of temperature;(2) the shear strength of asphalt mixture can be enhanced and the rutting can be reduced effectively by adopting high viscosity modified asphalt,gyratory compacting molding,Superpave asphalt mixture design method,and improving the control of quality and grading of aggregates.The results of rutting test and triaxial shear test are consistent with each other.In the view of mechanics,triaxial shear test can reflect the properties of asphalt mixture resisting high temperature,which can be applied in structural design and control the shear stress.


A Power Factor Corrected (PFC) two stage, Bridgeless (BL) Cuk converter based switched mode power supply is proposed in this work for arc welding applications. The absence of input Diode Bridge Rectifier (DBR) reduces the conduction losses and improves the thermal utilization of the converter's switches. The front-end comprises of a BL-Cuk converter operating in Discontinuous Conduction Mode (DCM) to attain unity Power Factor (PF) at the AC mains while at the back end, a PWM isolated Full Bridge (FB) DC-DC converter is used to regulate the output DC voltage. The performance of the system is examined in terms of the input PF, Total Harmonic Distortion (THD) of the ac mains current, voltage regulation and robustness. The obtained dynamic characteristics of this proposed topology depicts a constant voltage mode in various ranges of welding currents and inherent parametrical short circuit protection. Simulation results are presented to confirm the effectiveness of the proposed Arc Welding Power Supply (AWPS) in terms of excellent Power Quality (PQ).


Implementing collective behaviour in cooperative multi-agent systems requires several practical constraints to be addressed. In some environments, communication bandwidth is a critical constraint which may compromise the intended cooperative behaviour. This paper introduces a bio-inspired model which invokes collective behaviour in a multi-agent system using passive sensing without any explicit inter-agent communication. An agent looks for the majority of its neighbours either in its left or its right half space using two sensors. For a source localization problem, we compare performance of the proposed model using passive sensing against the well known school-of-fish collective behaviour models using ideal explicit inter-agent communication. For different cue strengths and neighbourhood radii, our results show that the proposed strategy boosts higher levels of group cohesion to make up for the information loss and in certain conditions performs better than the other collective behaviour models.


We show that the performance of an M-Algorithm detector for linear partial response coded modulation depends critically on the phase and is characterized by the partial energy function of the encoder. The effect of non-minimum phase channels on reduced search decoding complexity is also examined.


A system designed to mitigate or heal crack damage in metallic materials has been developed where the protected material or component is coated with a low-melting temperature film. After a crack is formed, the material is heated, melting the film which then infiltrates the crack opening through capillary action. Upon solidification, the healing material inhibits further crack damage in two ways. While the crack healing material is intact, it acts like an adhesive that bonds or bridges the crack faces together. After fatigue loading damages, the healing material in the crack mouth inhibits further crack growth by creating artificially-high crack closure levels. Mechanical test data show that this method sucessfully arrests or retards crack growth in laboratory specimens.


Due to religious opposition the Indonesian Family Planning Program does not offer sterilization. There is evidence however that surgical contraception is gaining acceptance in the country. To assess the potential for introduction of male sterilization to the national family planning program interviews were conducted with 22 vasectomy acceptors at Bangil Hospital Pasuruan in July 1994. 82% of respondents had an educational level that did not exceed elementary school. Many men were motivated to seek vasectomy because of concerns about the side effects of female reversible methods especially the pill and IUD. Respondents were aware vasectomy is an effective free method; however most were uninformed about the procedure itself and its possible side effects. Some men reported they were pressured by village leaders to undergo vasectomy to promote "social development." Only three respondents (two family planning workers and one village leader) reported they were "very pleased" with the procedure. Overall these findings indicate that vasectomy is not yet sufficiently acceptable to merit introduction to Indonesias national family planning program. To increase public knowledge and acceptance of this procedure outreach by satisfied acceptors and mass media campaigns are recommended.


For a critical history of philosophy, the relationship between philosophy and politics has been foreclosed by a strategy apparent since Marx s̓ remark in the Theses on Feuerbach that philosophers have only interpreted the world: the interminable search for a ʻtranscendental signified' which would supply a response to all our questions. This is a hopeless task which has as its result the occlusion of contingent points in history when the otherwise becomes possible. Recent reflections draw further attention to the problematic links between philosophy and the political, evident since Plato s̓ advocacy of tyranny (to mention nothing of that of Heidegger). But they do so, perhaps, within the framework of too orthodox a history (and historiography).1 The merit of the erudite and provocative work of Barbara Cassin is to have problematized the relationship between philosophy and the political in an entirely new fashion. The following article offers an introductory analysis of what she calls a ʻsophist history of philosophy' in terms of her interest in thinking the political ʻas such .̓ It is through the deceptive simplicity of the idea of ʻthinking the political as such' that the problematic nature of philosophical discourse becomes evident. For Cassin, this requires that the political not be subordinated to any more determining instance, and it is this negative condition which draws attention to the limits of philosophical reflection. Of course, an investigation of the conditions and limits of philosophical discourse is not, in itself, anything new: Kant, Hegel, Kierkegaard, Marx, Nietzsche, to mention but a few, all found themselves faced with the problem. However, the originality of Cassin s̓ work is to suggest that thinking the political, and questioning the limits and conditions of philosophy, involve a return to those inimical but wholly necessary enemies of philosophy, the original non-philosophers: the sophists. Cassin s̓ ʻsophist history of philosophy' is a detailed philosophical and philological examination of the relationship between philosophy and sophistry, primarily based on the first and second sophistries, those of Ancient Greece and Imperial Rome, but extending to the present day, through a consideration of the resonances of sophistry with the work of certain contemporary writers.2 It suggests that the major obstacle to thinking the political is, in fact, philosophy; more specifically, ontology. For Cassin this implies the need to confront the Heideggerian interpretation of the Presocratics, on the assumption that it is the predominance of Heideggerian motifs in much continental – particularly French – philosophy which accounts for the absence of any serious consideration of sophistry. Whilst it is certainly the case, as Deleuze and Guattari suggest in What is Philosophy? that it is difficult to be Heideggerian these days, it is also the case that the German master s̓ philosophy forms, as Badiou has put it, a ʻcommonplace' of contemporary thought and a pervasive interpretation of philosophy s̓ distant past. A persistent emphasis on ʻauthenticity' and on poetry qua Dichtung as privileged vector of experience, for example, provides a convenient and easily mobilized framework for deterring attempts to think the history of philosophy otherwise. One cannot shift responsibility for a contemporary reluctance or inability to rethink the history of philosophy entirely onto Heidegger, and Cassin s̓ work gives us little reason so to do. But it remains the case that it is difficult to mention the word ʻontology' without recalling Heidegger s̓ strictures about the meaning of Being.3 An alternative reading of the Presocratics and of metaphysics testifies to the existence of what Cassin If ontology, then politics


Thirteen patients (M7,F 6;age 36±s 15 a) with partial seizure refractory to antiepileptic drugs were treated with Cerebrolysin (20 mL in 10% glucose solution 500 mL,iv gtt,qd,for 10-14d) as add-on therapy.Frequencies of seizures per month before and after the add-on were 17±33 and 3 ± 8,respectively.Single photon emission computed tomography intake ratio of epileptic foci showed a significant increase for 81±8 before to 95 ±8 after the add-on (P0.01) with total effective rate 77%. It is suggested to use Cerebrolysin as a supportive means in epilepsy refractory to antiepileptic drugs.(Now in Depertment of neurology,Affiltated Sir Run Run Shaw Hospital of Zhejiang Medical University,Hangzhou 310016)


Preliminary studies on tar sand bitumen given in this report have shown that the reassociation of tar sand bitumen to its original molecular configuration after thermal stressing is a first-order process requiring nearly a week to establish equilibrium. Studies were also conducted on the dissolution of tar sand bitumen in solvents of varying polarity. At a high-weight fraction of solute to solvent the apparent molecular weight of the bitumen molecules was greater than that of the original bitumen when dissolved in chloroform-d/sub 1/ and benzene-d/sub 6/. This increase in the apparent molecular weight may be due to micellar formation or a weak solute-solvent molecular complex. Upon further dilution with any of the solvents studied, the apparent molecular weight of the tar sand bitumen decreased because of reduced van der Waals forces of interaction and/or hydrogen bonding. To define the exact nature of the interactions, it will be necessary to have viscosity measurements of the solutions. 30 refs., 3 figs., 3 tabs.


The purpose of this paper is to understand the role & requirement of automation in the traffic management domain. With number of vehicles increasing daily & India being the nation with largest number of 2-wheelers, its Important to track vehicles at an increasing pace than the convention systems in place. We aim to use a system using CV (Computer Vision) & YOLOv5 object detection for classifying vehicles in different categories, considering the vast amount of travel modes used in the Indian Peninsula like Autos & 2-wheelers.


The complete excavation of a Neolithic non-megalithic burial chamber, a so-called 'Mauerkammergrab', near Remlingen in 1998 provides new data on the architecture of this special collective grave type. The features offer structural details of the former tent-shaped roof and the floor, both made of oak-planks. In the western part of the chamber the skeleton of a young dog was found together with a conical cup. Disarticulated human remains, together with pots and potsherds, were uncovered in the eastern part. Remains of cattle bones in the entrance area may be interpreted as a team of oxen. The pottery shows strong cultural affinities to the Bernburg culture of Central Germany (c. 3100 - 2800 BC).


Though the compare and analysis with "the Warring States scheme" to "Mencius", this paper explained the difference of excuse between Confucianists and Political Strategists. Fighting for mastery on morality and justice and political trickery of two are represented emphatically, and the warm and mellow and the beautiful and colorful debating are analyzed. Then it is made out that the causes the win and defeat of trial of strength of two families are resulted from their different political views.


Background: Diabetes is a real public health problem in children and adolescents because of its chronicity and the difficulty in the control of blood glucose levels at paediatric age. Objective: The aim of this study was to assess the link of socio-demographic and anthropometric characteristics with the management and glycemic control in children with type1 diabetes (T1D). Materials and Methods: The study included a sample of 184 children with T1D of 15 years old or less. A structured questionnaire was used to collect information on socio-demographic status, characteristics and complications of the disease, diabetes management, diet, physical activity and therapeutic education of participants. Weight and height were measured and body mass index calculated. Results: The mean age of the patients surveyed was 8.49 ± 4.1 years; the majority (68.5%) was of school age, female (53.2%) and was from low socioeconomic level (83.2%). Only 20.1% of the patients had a good glycemic control. The low socioeconomic status and overweight or obesity were significantly more prevalent in children with poor compared to those with good glycemic control (P ≤ 0.001). Multivariate analysis revealed an association of poor glycemic control with the family history of diabetes (adjusted OR = 38.70, 95% CI: 11.61, 128.98) and the absence of therapeutic education (adjusted OR = 3.29, 95% CI: 1.006, 10.801). Conclusions: This study shows that diabetes is associated with overweight and obesity in children and that the quality of glycemic control is


This unit contains detailed synthetic protocols for the preparation of 4′‐methoxy 2′‐deoxynucleoside phosphoramidite monomers for A, G, C, T, and U. First, 3′‐silyl‐protected 2′‐deoxynucleosides (dNs) are converted in two steps to 4′,5′‐enol acetates as the key starting compounds. Next, 4′‐methoxy dNs are prepared by a one‐pot procedure comprising N‐iodosuccinimide‐promoted methoxylation, hydrolysis, and reduction of the formed intermediates. Finally, 3′‐phosphoramidites of 4′‐methoxy dNs are obtained by a routine three‐step procedure. Title phosphoramidite monomers are suitable for the synthesis of oligonucleotides on solid phase according to conventional amidite chemistry. 4′‐Methoxy substitution represents a simple modification of the sugar part of dNs, where β‐D‐erythro epimers preferentially adopt N‐type (C3′‐endo, RNA‐like) conformation. Moreover, it imparts superior chemical stability, nuclease resistance, and excellent hybridization properties to modified 4′‐methoxyoligodeoxynucleotides. The strong tendency toward RNA‐selective hybridization suggests its potential utilization in antisense and/or RNAi technologies. © 2016 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.


Histopathologic advancements have identified several rare subtypes of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), but the clinical significance of these distinctions is incompletely understood. Our aim was to investigate pathologic and treatment differences between HCC variants.


Abstract : This report presents the results of the environmental and ballistics study of Vithane sealing materials subjected to various environmental and ballistic conditions. Work was also conducted in testing two adhesive systems. This evaluation resulted in recommendations to limit the use of these materials to certain environmental conditions.


We report an experimental investigation on the nonlinear dynamics of a 1550-nm vertical-cavity surface emitting laser subject to positive optoelectronic feedback. A bifurcation diagram of the extrema of output peak series versus the feedback strength is plotted. Various nonlinear dynamical behaviors including regular pulsing, quasiperiodic pulsing, chaotic pulsing, and mode locking (ML) have been experimentally observed. A mapping of dynamical states is presented in the parameter space of bias current and feedback strength, where different states are identified and shown.


Leukocytes labeled with technetium-99m using pretinning with stannous complexes of pyrophosphate, glucoheptonate, and gentisic acid were compared with respect to labeling efficiency, time required for labeling, in vitro cell viability, initial lung transit, and image quality following reinjection into normal volunteers. Gentisic acid pretinning was the best method, offering the shortest preparation time, moderate labeling efficiency, rapid lung clearance, and greatest in vivo stability.


Amyloid-β protein (Aβ) is known to increase free radical production in neuronal cells, leading to cell death by oxidative stress. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the protective effects of PineXol® on Aβ25-35 induced neuronal cell death. Rat pheochromocytoma (PC-12) cells were pre-treated with 100 μg/mL of PineXol® for 2 h. The cells were exposed to single dose of 30 μM Aβ25-35 for 24 h. Cell death was assessed by a cell count kit-8 (CCK-8) assay, lactate and dehydrogenase (LDH) release assay. An Apoptotic process was analyzed by a protein expression of the Bcl-2 family using western blotting. Cell viability increased in PC-12 cells treated with both Aβ25-35 and PineXol®, compared to the control group. PineXol® induced a decrease of the Bcl-2 protein expression (p<0.05), while Bax and Sod1 increased (p<0.05), indicating attenuation of Aβ25-35 induced apoptosis. These results suggest that PineXol® may be a good candidate for the prevention of Alzheimer's disease(AD).


In this study we analyse the association between children's Time Use and their Social Skills. Participants were 112 children, aged eight and nine (52 girls and 60 boys) living and studying in the Metropolitan Area of Porto. Children's time use was collected through a time-diary, adapted from the Child Development Supplement of Panel Study of Income Dynamics (University of Michigan). Social skills were measured using the Portuguese adaptation of the Social Skills Rating System (SSRS). Cluster analyses revealed the existence of three groups of children with different patterns of time use. Statistical analysis revealed an association between the pattern of time use and some dimensions of social skills. For instance, the pattern with more time devoted to unstructured outdoor activities, without adult supervision, and with less time with parents, is associated with lower levels of assertion, cooperation and self control. Results are discussed and some clues are presented to implement programs to promote social skills and prevent anti-social behaviour, based on Time Use.


In the middle of the Cameroon line, in Noun Plain (West province-Cameroon), a potential hazard exists in volcanic crater lakes which can release toxic gas (like Lake Monoun, 1984). They occur on two types of volcanoes: hydromagmatic volcanoes showing maar deposits and hydroholomagmatic volcanoes with tephra. These crater lakes are the result of recent fissural basaltic eruptions


Although recent events are testing its durability, the Good Friday Agreement of 1998 has been hailed as a triumph of Anglo-Irish diplomacy. But why did it take 30 years of intense conflict to reach an understanding of the problem before a solution could be implemented? In this analysis, centuries-old misperceptions between the two islands are scrutinized and recent seismic shifts are examined, including the changing nature of Irish nationalism and the role of Irish-America in both shaping and resolving conflict. The study seeks to demonstrate how even the most intractable conflicts can be made more malleable.


3D digital model is the core element of 3D printing, and its users obtain a 3D digital model through CAD software designing or 3D scanning. A 3D digital model can be protected by copyright as an art or graphic work if it meets the requirement of originality. Replication of 3D digital model can be manifested in two ways. One is copying the digital file and the other is duplicating a 3D digital model from two-dimensional to three-dimensional. "Printing" a 3D digital model belongs to replicating works of fine art while "printing" a 3D digital model of product design cannot be treated as a replication act. In the framework of the current copyright law, we can protect the reproduction right of 3D digital model by establishing copyright collective management organization, taking the copyright technology protection measures and limiting the scope of private copying.


Polishing, the most expensive machining processes, in terms time and labor costs depending on the required surface finish, optic size, and amount of surface roughness from preceding machining operations. A material could remain on the polishing system for hours to days. Thus, attempting to understand the underlying mechanisms and basic science associated with the polishing process is crucial to, in turn, develop methods and procedures to reduce cost, trim schedule, and bolster performance. With an increased need for low surface roughness optics, as in x-ray and enhanced ultra-violet applications, it is imperative to understand the impacts of changing system variables. This paper reviews mechanism of chemical-mechanical polishing (CMP),to provide some interlinking data that can be used to many fundamental aspects of the CMP mechanism ,in turn can predict process responses, e.g., material removal rate, non-uniformity across the wafer, dielectric erosion and metal dishing. This review will provide a new platform for further investigation in CMP mechanism of material removal.


This paper investigates the point correspondence problem of two sets using scaled transform invariants. We proposed a method based on the idea of scaled invariant vector. A unit vector representation of invariants and scaling constant is introduced for affine transform. The method in principle applies to any dimension and any transformation with an computable invariant. The proposed method is shown to compute useful correspondence even with large number of outliers in noiseless case. We have also demonstrated improved performance comparing to most existing approaches for solving point pattern matching problem. The method is efficient and robust to noise up to a certain level.


This volume contains the proceedings of the Fifth European Conference on the Engineering of Computer-Based Systems (ECBS 2017), organized by the University of Cyprus in cooperation with ACM SIGAPP, SIGOPS, and SIGSOFT.

ECBS 2017 is a continuation of the Eastern European Regional Conference on the Engineering of Computer Based Systems (ECBS-EERC). It was established in 2008 as an Eastern/Central European offspring of the Annual IEEE International Conference and Workshop on the Engineering of Computer Based Systems, which itself was discontinued in 2013. This realization of ECBS makes the conference step out organizationally from the Central European region to Cyprus as a convenient and attractive location for both European and many non-European authors.


The author details a digital image registration algorithm based on the cross correlation of triple invariant image descriptors. This algorithm is applied to ocular fundus images, and its accuracy and reliability are quantified using simulated transformations, simulated noise, and a series of actual fundus images. >


The present invention is a non-ionic and anionic surface active agent, water, oil, and the present invention relates to a composition of an industrial detergent, including alcohol component O / W, and the cleaning agent of a microemulsion type of environment-friendly made much of the composition with water, water-based cleaning agent. Surfactants constituting the cleaning agent is a low toxicity, biodegradability has excellent properties and the microemulsion produced by using this has a very low interfacial tension and thermodynamically stable properties. Thus, the present invention is an aqueous cleaning agent is excellent in detergency for contaminants such as electronic components and the oil that has accumulated on the surface of the precision components, fat, machine oil, coolant, grease, liquid contaminants, flux, there are no fire hazard environmental safety also excellent Do. In addition, the best feature is not sensitive to temperature detergency is excellent in a wide temperature range as well as low-temperature, and easy cleaning agent applied according to the effect of substantially no operating conditions for pH, hardness, electrolyte concentration, and it is possible also saves energy. The composition of such a cleaning agent may contain the following ingredients (a) ~ (f) of the. (a) an aliphatic hydrocarbon group (B) Non-ionic HLB of 4~20 surfactants and anionic surfactants 0.5% by volume to 40% by volume (C) an alcohol as the auxiliary agent 0.5 vol% to 30 vol.% (D) (c) / (b) 0.01~1.5 (E) water, 50% by volume of 80% vol% (E) other additives, 0.01 vol% to 10 vol%


The publication in May 1987 of the Chorley Report on Handling Geographic Information must be regarded as a milestone in the discussion of geographic information systems (GIS) in Britain. The basic arguments underlying the Report are reviewed in relation to the events leading up to the establishment of the Committee of Enquiry chaired by Lord Chorley and the Government's response to the Report's recommendations.


ABSTRACT
This study aims to find answers about the values of Islamic education in the performance of the Seraway tribe in Meranti Jaya Village, Ujanmas District, Kepahyang Regency, Bengkulu Province. This research method uses field research with a qualitative approach. Data collection techniques used in this study include observation, interviews and documentation. The results showed that the values of Islamic education contained in Ngagai Rupuk'An were moral education, sholawatan, marhaban, dzikir, religious lectures, social, reciting and reading Persanji books. The conclusion of this research is moral education, here the members of Ngagai Rupuk'an give an example to the community, namely by implementing morals or what we often call praiseworthy morals, for example, being willing to sacrifice, honest, polite, polite, fair, patient, and disciplined. Sholawatan, here the members of Ngagai Rupuk'An provide sholawatan education so that more and more of our prayer reading will be given intercession of the Prophet Muhammad at the end of the day.
Keywords: Islamic education values, Ngagai Rupuk'an.


Engineering practice and real-life cases show that the geological conditions of the Guilin overlying karst site are complex. In particular, the groundwater, which drives the accelerated formation of soil cavities, and the thickness of the overlying soil layer, which affects the speed of the groundwater subsidence process. Therefore, this paper is based on a physical model to evaluate the effects of groundwater level changes caused by different factors on the deformation of karst cover. The model tests are simulated for different cover thicknesses (6 cm, 9 cm, 12 cm, 15 cm, 18 cm) under rainfall and other recharge, cavity supply, and drainage conditions at the same density (1.40 g/cm3) and initial water content (30%), respectively. The results show that with the increase of rainfall and other recharge time, the basic change trend of different cover thicknesses is that the infiltration curve changes faster at the beginning and slows down at the end, but the thicker the cover, the slower the overall deformation; at a certain rate of cavity recharge and drainage, the thicker the cover, the smaller the deformation caused by the fluctuation of groundwater level. The cavity recharge makes the cover displacement obvious, in the order of 0.304 cm, 0.173 cm, 0.118 cm, 0.068 cm, and 0.056 cm. After the formation of the cavity, the rainfall, other recharge, and the cavity supply and drainage accelerate the destruction and deformation of the soil body and the upward development of the cavity. The research results provide theoretical support for the subsequent prevention and control of karst collapse in covered karst areas, and have certain practical engineering significance.


—Catfi sh are popular recreational fi sh in Alabama, and management interest has been rising. We hypothesized that tailwater habitat more closely resembling lotic conditions would provide more suitable conditions for catfi shes compared to impounded habitats. We examined and compared population characteristics, including abundance, age and size structure, growth, and survival of blue catfi sh Ictalurus furcatus, channel catfi sh I. punctatus, and fl athead catfi sh Pylodictis olivaris between tailwater and reservoir habitats in a section of the Coosa River in 2001–2002. Coosa River system tailwater habitats appear to generally provide higher quality environments for abundance and growth of catfi shes than reservoir habitat, although results were often not consistent among species. We found no differences for many comparisons of stock descriptors between tailwater and reservoir habitat. We found that blue catfi sh were larger (48 mm total length larger) and fl athead catfi sh electrofi shing catch rates were higher (13 fi sh/h greater) in tailwater areas. Catfi sh populations in the Coosa River were characterized by slow growth and high longevity, fi ndings in accord with other recent otolith-based age analyses from populations in the Southeast. All species had moderate to high annual survival (57–88%), likely indicating light exploitation levels. Catfi sh populations in this section of the Coosa River appear robust, and the tendency for these dam tailwaters to have higher quality catfi sh populations may warrant management actions to enhance/sustain these fi sheries. * Corresponding author: firstname.lastname@example.com 1 Present address: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Columbia River Fisheries Program Offi ce, 1211 SE Cardinal Court, Suite 100, Vancouver, Washington 98683, USA Introduction Catfi shes (Ictaluridae) are a commercially and recreationally important group of fi shes in Alabama (Michaletz and Dillard 1999; Boschung and Mayden 2004). Dam tailwater areas are often popular for catfi shing (Graham and DeiSanti 1999) and may have populations with increased abundance (Walburg et al. 1981; Jacobs and Swink 1982; Jacobs et al. 1987; Jackson and Dillard 1993) and condition (Jackson 1985, 1995) relative to impounded areas. Many of these observations are largely anecdotal and should be substantiated if we are to increase our ability to manage catfi sh fi sheries. Catfi shes may be attracted to abundant prey that is entrained through turbines (Walburg 1971; Sorenson et al. 1998), attracted to increased tailwater velocity (Jackson 1995; Graham and DeiSanti 1999), or attracted to prey that had arrested migration (Hoyt and Kruskamp 1982). Favorable tailwater areas may provide an excellent foraging area for catfi shes, thereby enhancing growth and condition. Differential abundance, growth, and condition of catfi shes among tailwater, reservoir, and riverine habitats may be related to potential differences in prey density. Our objective was to examine and compare characteristics of catfi sh populations (blue catfi sh Ictalurus furcatus, channel catfi sh I. punctatus, and fl athead catfi sh Pylodictis olivaris) between reservoir and tailwater habitats. Three tailwater areas on the Coosa River and three sites within Jordan Reservoir (a Coosa River impoundment) were selected for study. The objectives of this study were to describe characteristics (i.e., abundance, age and size structure, growth, and mortality) of catfi sh populations in a section of the Coosa River. We also compared and contrasted population characteristics between tailwater and reservoir habitats and examine seasonal differences. 156 JOLLEY AND IRWIN