Following our result that for the final state of continued spherical gravitational collapse, the gravitational mass of the fluid, M f → 0, we show that for a physical fluid the eventual value of 2 GM f /R f → 1 rather than 2 GM f /R f < 1, indi-cating approach to a zero-mass black hole. We also indicate that as the final state would be approached, the curvature components tend to blow up, and the proper radial distance l and the proper time τ → ∞ . This indicates that actually the singularity is never attained for the collapse of an isolated body. We also identify that, the final state may correspond to the local 3-speed v → c , eventhough the circumference speed U → 0. However, at a finite observation epoch, such Eternally Collapsing Objects (ECOs) may have a modest local speed of collapse v ≪ c , and the lab frame speed of collapse should practically be zero because of their extremely high surface gravitational red-shifts.


Antibody monoclonal carcinoembryonic antigen can be labeled with rhenium-188, this compound could be used for tumor imaging (Radioimmunosintigraphy) and theraphy (Radioimmunotheraphy)


In this paper a finite impulse response (FIR) filter for online adaptive modeling of satellite attitude control systems is proposed, and a recursive least squares (RLS) algorithm is used to adjust the adaptive FIR filter coefficients for minimizing the output error between the monitored system and the FIR filter. The fault information can be obtained through the analysis of the adaptive FIR filter coefficients. This fault detection technique is applied to the satellite attitude control system, and evaluate the performance with failures. Simulation results demonstrate that the method is effective in the fault detection and simple to implement.


This paper examines the issue of sustainability in Writing Across the Curriculum (WAC) programmes, focusing on the role of 'bottom up' initiatives in their development and spread. It argues that, although this element is essential for the start up of WAC initiatives, sustainability can only be achieved through institutionalization, a process requiring 'top down' measures.  Since both bottom up and top down approaches are essential to successful implementation, it is critical to find the right balance between both approaches. The experience of WAC implementation at the Mona Campus of the University of the West Indies, Jamaica is used as a context within which to examine these issues. This example demonstrates a mix of bottom up and top down implementation approaches, but with insufficient top down commitment to guarantee sustainability.  It concludes by looking at lessons learned and areas of continued activism which have borne some fruit. It is suggested that the issue of sustainability in the case of grassroots advocates is perhaps better conceptualized as sustained efforts to establish programmes, rather than programme sustainability per se .


Knowledge, however defined, is perceived as firms "key" source of competitive advantage and a central determinant of productivity and wealth creation. The value of knowledge as a competitive asset is not intrinsic, but depends instead on its application, i.e. innovation or the transformation of knowledge into new technologies, products and, or services. Therefore, the extent of innovation within an economy depends crucially on the rapid diffusion of new technology and best practice, which it is argued depends in turn on building strong regional networks. So, knowledge, its distribution and diffusion - particularly through the supply chain - form the central focus of this paper. For some economies (e.g. Finland, Israel) with high levels of domestic R&D spending much of the ''new'' knowledge driving local business competitiveness is created domestically. For Ireland, both North and South, however, historically low levels of domestic R&D spending mean that inward technology transfer - primarily associated with inward investment - has been crucial to recent economic development. This suggests two main questions. First, how does the knowledge transferred to Ireland, North and South, through international inward investment compare to international best practice? And, second, to what extent does this knowledge then diffuse to other manufacturing businesses located in Ireland? A third, and related, question concerns the contrasting experiences of Ireland, North and South, particularly given the very different history of inward investment in the two areas. The analysis in the paper is based on data collected through face-to-face interviews with 94 Multi-national enterprise (MNE) plants in the South and North of Ireland. The relatively high response rates achieved and the fact that the final sample coverage resembles relatively closely that of the underlying population suggests that the sample is likely to provide results which are representative of the whole population of large MNE plants in both the South and North of Ireland. The research findings demonstrate that the potential to transfer knowledge from MNE plants to local firms through the supply chain is higher in the South of Ireland than in the North. Yet, Northern suppliers' adoption of a range of best practice techniques lags further behind their MNE plants than in the South. Therefore, larger average knowledge gaps suggest a greater potential benefit from knowledge transfers in the North of Ireland. Yet, while general contact as part of normal trading relations between MNE plants and their suppliers is more common in the North, contact in the South of Ireland is characterised by developmental interactions such as collaboration on product developments and quality assurance systems. Furthermore, southern MNE plants report having had a significantly greater impact on both the performance and the competitiveness of local suppliers than their Northern counterparts.


Flunitrazepam (FZ) is an example of a sedative-hypnotic benzodiazepine whose pharmacokinetic properties include a rapid onset of action and an intermediate duration of action. It has a high affinit ...


The invention relates to the technical field of unmanned aerial vehicles, in particular to an unmanned aerial vehicle express system. The unmanned aerial vehicle express system comprises an unmanned aerial vehicle and express cabinets distributed on different networks. A battery pack of the unmanned aerial vehicle is horizontally and slidably arranged at the tail of the unmanned aerial vehicle, and a vertical lifting type express box is arranged below the unmanned aerial vehicle. A fixing device for fixing an undercarriage of the unmanned aerial vehicle is arranged at the top of each express cabinet. Limiting devices for fixing an unmanned aerial vehicle body are arranged on the front side and the rear side of each fixing device. A battery replacement device for replacing the battery pack is arranged on the rear side of each fixing device. An opening corresponding to the express box is formed in the position, located in the middle of the corresponding fixing device, of each express cabinet. A sorting device is arranged in each express cabinet. By the adoption of the unmanned aerial vehicle express system, delivery can be conducted quickly and effectively, the problems that the express delivery efficiency is low, and the coverage range is narrow are solved, and accurate delivery is achieved; and batteries of the unmanned aerial vehicle can be replaced automatically, the defects that the voyage is short and the load is low are overcome, meanwhile express receiving and delivery are integrated, and stable delivery of objects is guaranteed.


. Given a composition of Bely˘ı maps β ◦ γ : X → Z , paths between edges of β are extended to form loops, then lifted by γ . These liftings are then studied to understand how loops in Z act on edges of β ◦ γ , demonstrating the group operation in Mon β ◦ γ (cid:69) Mon γ (cid:111) Mon β . Abstracting away the specific Bely˘ı map γ and finding the image of π 1 ( Z ) in π 1 ( Y ) (cid:111) Mon β instead allows subsequently determining Mon β ◦ γ , for any γ , using only the monodromy representation of γ .


Results of an investigation about the use of media by young people aged 12-15 years. Conclusions could help to educational action of teachers, librarians and family, and stimulate critical use of the media.


Abstract In traditional parity space approaches, a parity vector with a low order means a simple online realization but a bad performance, while that with a high order leads to a good performance but an unacceptable calculation amount. In this paper, by introducing a simple scalar IIR (Infinite Impulse Response) filter, a new kind of parity relation based residual generator and the corresponding optimization approach are proposed. With the new approach, a residual generator can deliver a very good performance index but with a parity vector of low order. Simulation results are given.


Background. Nowadays, the measure of the fractional concentration of exhaled nitric oxide (FeNO) enables to assess airway inflammation during an office visit and there is international consensus on this testing methodology. The aim of this study was to evaluate whether FeNO measurement is predictable for bronchial hyperreactivity (BHR) in children with allergic rhinitis, asthma, or both. Methods. Two hundred and eighty children with allergic rhinitis, allergic asthma, or both were evaluated. Bronchial function (FEV1 and FEF25–75), BHR (assessed by methacholine challenge), FeNO, and sensitizations were assessed. Results. Bronchial function, BHR, and FeNO were significantly different in the three groups (p < .001). A strong inverse correlation between FeNO and BHR was found in patients with asthma and with asthma and rhinitis (r = −0.63 and r = −0.61, respectively). A cutoff of 32 ppb of FeNO was a predictive factor for BHR. Conclusions. This study highlights the relevance of FeNO as possible marker for BHR in allergic children and underlines the close link between upper and lower airways.


The objective of the present investigation was to design a path to avitourism through the elaboration of a diagnosis in which the primary and secondary information were collected; the same ones that resulted in the identification of three ecosystems that are: evergreen mountain forest, evergreen forest, evergreen high mountain forest. It was determined that the study area is suitable to house different types of species, which have different altitudinal scales ranging from 2,200 to 3,700 m.s.n.m. In each of the identified ecosystems, the registration of bird species was done by counting points, linear transects and intensive search, which were recorded by photographs that were used for their subsequent identification, which was carried out through the review of the bird book of Ecuador, and consult ornithological groups. The inventory within the three identified zones resulted in a total of: 44 species, 11 orders, 23 families; the communities are divided into 3 established zones, where the predominant order is the passeriform that has 11 families and 23 species that represent 52.27% of the total wealth, for the calculation of the diversity the Margalef index is applied, with which it was determined that in area one there is a high diversity (Dmg = 4.6), zone two (Dmg = 1.5) and zone three (Dmg = 2.1) are moderately diverse. On the other hand, with the Sorensen index it was determined that zones two and three are the ones with the highest similarity index for habitats and micro-habitats that are similar to the results of the QS = 94.7% similarity between these two study areas. With the results obtained, a avitouristic route was established, which was designed in the ARC GIS software, which has a distance of 7 km., Where three priority zones were established for the design of the route, short technical stations, temporary observatories, adequate signage and hiking for the realization of bird tourism. Finally, it was possible to confirm the avifaunal richness that the Hacienda La Virgen possesses. That is why it is recommended that the design of the avituristic route be complemented with a bird guide and thus facilitate the registration of the species.


Group B streptococci (GBS) were used to be known to cause mastitis only in cows up to 1930's. After Lancefield and Hare isolated GBS strains in vaginal cultures from postpartum women in 1935, Fry was first reported that three cases of fatal puerperal sepsis caused by GBS. After 1960's increasing number of newborn and maternal infections caused by this microorganisms were reported (1). Majority of the newborn infections occurred by vertical transmission and were also acquired from community. It is now well known that there is a high correlation between the maternal anorectal and urogenital carriage and the newborn infections. Colonization rate of GBS changes according to age, race, parity and sexual activity. GBS have been isolated from vaginal cultures of pregnant women at rates ranging from 5 to 35 % The Serotype Distrubition of Group B Streptococci Isolated from Pregnant Women


In previous work, we reported no deleterious effect in feeding broiler chickens with up to 14.30% of Full Fat Palm Fruit Meal (FFPFM) with no enzymes. This particular study was aimed at evaluating the effect of feeding graded levels of FFPFM diets with fibre degrading multienzymes on the growth performance and economics of broiler chickens. A total of one hundred and forty four one-day-old broiler chicks of Arbor Acre breeds were assigned to 4 experimental diets and randomly allocated to 16 units in a completely randomized design. The birds were fed graded levels (0, 5.0, 7.50 and 10.20% at starter and 0, 7.0, 9.50 and 14.30% at the finisher) of FFPFM with one level of fibre degrading multienzymes, maxigrain (each gram containing cellulase, 10000IU; beta-glucanase, 200IU; xylanase, 10000IU and phytase, 2500FTU) at 100g/tone of feed across T2, T3 and T4. Data were recorded on feed intake and weekly weight changes. On day 56 of the experiment, eight birds per treatment were randomly selected from each of the replicates, starved overnight and slaughtered to evaluate growth performance and economics. There was no significant difference (p>0.05) at starter and finisher phases in total weight gain, daily body weight gain, feed conversion ration and feed efficiency across treatments. However, highest values were recorded for birds in T3 group on final body weight per bird at starter and finisher phases. Although there were no effects in the economic parameters across treatments, T3 group recorded the highest values for gross margin and revenue per bird. Additionally, no effect of enzymes supplementation was recorded. Thus, up to 14.30% of FFPFM with or without enzymes could be used in broiler diets without any deleterious effects on growth performance and economics. Keywords: full fat palm fruit meal, enzymes supplementation, broiler chickens, cellulose digestion, economics


The following remarks are written by a political theorist who makes no claim to expert knowledge in the field of socialist jurisprudence or legal philosophy. They are prompted, however, by the attempt of a Professor of Socialist Law to answer certain questions of political and ideological history?and indeed, indirectly, of political theory?by reference to a comparative historical study of socialist legal systems. For Professor Codevilla poses the question of the origin of the "Soviet conception of freedom", proposing to contribute to an answer by an analysis made "from a legal point of view". But, more ambitiously still, he then argues that having dealt with this question "we shall be in a position to answer a related question, that of whether or not there is a possibility of a radical change in the Marxist-Leninist conception of human rights within the Soviet Union, with a consequent shift towards democratization". It is, in my opinion, extremely doubtful whether such a question could even in principle be answered on the basis of the kind of conceptual history undertaken by the author. Be that as it may, he does in any case explicitly take up, in his paper, problems which fall within the scope of activity of a political theorist, and it is on this basis and for this reason that I venture to offer some comments on the theoretical presuppositions which underlie his essay.


Air pollution remains a problem from ancient times since today. Air pollution has many aspects, in-creases in time and depends on the environmental conditions of each region. In the earlier times the air pollu-tion was a sign of a region's progress. Hippocrates was the first who correlated health problems with air pol-lution. Over the time some chronic diseases, were associated with air pollution resulting even to death. Now-adays more precautionary measures are followed in order to protect the environment from air pollutants and finally public health.
Air pollution refers to the presence of pollutants in the atmosphere. These pollutants are associated with increased concentration of various substances, noise, radiation or other forms of energy. The effects of the duration and the concentration of the pollutants can cause bad health conditions on living organisms and disrupt the ecological balance, in large or small geographic scale. Under certain conditions air pollution is likely to reach levels that can generate adverse living conditions, leading to bad health conditions, environ-mental, social and economical problems. Patras is a residential area where air pollutants come mainly from human activities that significantly affect the quality of life in the city.
The purpose of this study is to determine the degree of air pollution in the city of Patras, the temporal variation of air pollutants in the area and the effects of air pollution on public health. The above results are processed from the measurements given by the two air pollution monitoring stations (APMS) in the city of Patras one, in George Square (George APMS) and the second in Drosopoulou Square (APMS Drosopoulou) for the years 2013, 2014 and 2015.
The results of this study show that no high levels of CO, NO2 and SO2 were observed and the results were within the normal levels according to the Greek legislation. In contrast increased levels of O3 and PM10 were obtained. Concerning the ozone levels, there was a decrease in the years 2014 and 2015. PM10 levels were higher than the reference values provided from the Greek legislation in the years 2013-2015. This ob-servation highlights the need of preventive measures in order to ensure the Public Health.


Propylene carbonate in a concentration range from 10-4to 10-3mol has been analysed by two methods, alkalimetry and iodometry, base on its chemical properties that it is rapidly decomposed to propylene glycol and carbonate ion by excess of alkali. The limit of error of the alkalimetry was rather large, that is, (-) 6.0 to (+) 4.2%. After decomposition of propylene carbonate with alkali, the solution was treated with periodic acid in sulfuric acid solution, and then iodometry were performed by using sodium hyposulfite in acidic solution or by using arsenious acid in bicarbonate solutions; the limit of error of the former process was from (-) 2.2 to (+) 2.2%, and that of the later was from (-) 1.9 to (+) 0.4%.


The case of the Orthodox and Eastern Churches in Spain is key for understanding the impact of migratory movements and transnational diasporas on the national particularities of the current patriarchates. In the public sphere, these are interrelated to a greater or lesser degree to a marked context of religious pluralism, non-denominationalism of the State and religious freedom enshrined as a fundamental right. The general objective of the article is, on the basis of a convulsive international panorama generated by conflicts such as that between Russia and the Ukraine, to offer an analysis of the current interaction of these churches and their main dynamics in the light of transnational migratory flows. This includes the increase in the numbers of faithful and of places of worship and the changes in the ecclesiastical structures of public representation and dialogue. For this purpose, the methodological approach of the work will focus on different cases represented by national churches, such as the Romanian and Russian churches; the "autochthonous" cases of the Spanish Orthodox Church and the Hispanic Orthodox Church; and pan-orthodox cases, such as that of Greece. Also included will be a group of "newcomer" churches that, for the moment, have a smaller volume and degree of implantation.


Tina M. Campt, Durham, NC,, Duke University Press, 2012, 241 pp., ISBN 9780822350743 (pbk), (£16.99) It has been noted that a defining characteristic of many of the key works on photography and the...


Face recognition from visual images is difficult task due to illumination problem and in thermal imaging the main problem is of glasses. The solution of both these problem is data fusion of thermal and visual images. This paper presents the implementation of Human face recognition system using data fusion of visual and thermal images. Gabor filtering technique which extracts facial features is used in the proposed face recognition. . To our knowledge, this is the first visual and thermal data fusion recognition system which utilizes Gabor filter. Paper also discusses the performance improvement of face recognition along with issues of memory requirements.


This paper reports the main findings obtained from a U.S. consumer choice experiment regarding perceptions of food safety and meat attributes, and to the extent to which these attitudes translate into willingness-to-pay (WTP) for labeled ribeye steaks. The results indicate that USDA food safety inspection labels, labels indicating that the steak is tender, or the ability to trace back the animal to the farm are more important to consumers than country of origin labeling.


A micrometeorological technique was used to calculate the net transfer of NH₃ between a corn crop and the atmosphere. On the 10 days of measurement, there was continual interchange of NH₃ between crop and atmosphere with a strong indication of a diurnal cycle. Ammonia absorption by the plant-soil system (downward transfer of NH₃) predominated when the soil surface was dry, but sustained losses of NH₃ (upward transfer) occurred when it was moist. Net absorption rates of 6.6 g N ha⁻¹ hour⁻¹ were calculated in the former period, and net losses of as much as 27.6 g N ha⁻¹ hour⁻¹ in the latter.


Objective: To investigate the effect of retinoic acid on the differentiation and development of B lymphocytes, and explore the mechanism of vitaminA in increasing the production of antibodies. Method: In vitro cultured cells from children's normal mesentery lymph nodes, before and after administration of retinoic acid or retinoic acid antagonist, the changes of cell surface markers were analyzed by flowcytometry to observe the differentiation and maturation of B cells. Results: During culture in vitro, the percent of mature CD19+IgM+ B cells increased and relatively immature CD19+IgM- B cells decreased gradually, and the changes were especially obvious at 48 h. The administration of retinoic acid further increased the percent of CD19+IgM+ B cells, and the enhancement was markedly at 24 and 48 h (P0.05). However, when the retinoic acid antagonist was added to the culture, the promotion effect of retinoic acid was completely counteracted. Conclusion: Retinoic acid promoted the differentiation and development of B cells, from lymph node when cultured in vitro. The effect was mediated by retinoic acid receptors.


The aim of the present study was to investigate histochemically the localization of thyroid‐stimulating hormone (TSH) cells and the number of TSH cells in adenohypophysis of ovariectomized adult females, intact females at estrous and diestrous phase of sexual cycles and castrated and non‐castrated adult male rats. TSH cells, distributed throughout the pars distalis in all groups, were observed more frequent in areas near to the pars intermedia than other regions. The cells were round, ovoid, stellar‐shaped and had contacts with sinusoids. Their nuclei were large and round‐shaped. The cells were found mostly single or occasionally in groups of double and triple. The number of TSH cells was higher in estrous than diestrous phase in intact rats. In adenohypophysis of ovariectomized rats, their numbers were less than that of intacts in estrous, but higher than that of found in diestrous phases. Furthermore, the numbers of TSH cells in intact females during estrous phase was higher than those found in intact and castrated male rats. On the other hand, castration reduced the number of TSH cells while ovariectomy had no effect in this respect.


BS>Isotopic relations were obthiaed between the cross sections of transformation of a pi -meson amd a gamma quantum into three pi -mesons during collisions between the pi -meson or gamma -quantum and nucleons or deuterons. It is shown that near the threshold of the reaction and also for the formation of pi -mesons wth identical momenta some auxiliary relations hold. (tr-auth)


We describe a case of severe visual loss as a result of West Nile virus (WNV) infection. Associated headache and fever led to the proper diagnosis and management, but the findings of optic neuritis, retinitis, and uveitis were a surprising and prominent component of the patient's meningitis syndrome. Physicians diagnosing and treating patients with WNV infection should be alerted to the possibility of ocular and optic nerve involvement, which may leave permanent neuropathic residua.


System testing through the Graphical User Interface (GUI) is a valuable form of Verification & Validation for modern applications, especially in graphically-intensive domains like web and mobile applications. However, the practice is often overlooked by developers mostly because of its costly nature and the absence of immediate feedback about the quality of test sequence. This paper describes a proposal for the Gamification of exploratory GUI testing. We define - in a tool and domain- agnostic way - the basic concepts, a set of metrics, a scoring scheme and visual feedbacks to enable a gamified approach to the practice; we finally discuss the potential implications and envision a roadmap for the evaluation of the approach.


This article highlights the essence of organization of production, the creation of conditions that ensure the proper conduct of the technological process. Also studied that in each enterprise there are specifics of checking the availability of production units that make up its production infrastructure. In this regard, the relevance of this topic is that today the catering industry is growing. This requires more serious focus and responsibility in working with catering in large production companies.


It analyses the foundation characters of mountain area,specifically represents the management steps of the foundation of mountain area.And according to the project practice it puts forward the specific advices to solve the non-uniform of the foundation of mountain area and erase the foundation incipient fault of building,and accumulate the successful experience to manage the hard and soft non-uniform foundation of the projects construction of mountain area.


Novelproton-conductingZrO2-WO3-SiO2 nanofilmsofvariouscompositionsandthicknesses(∼50to ∼300nm)havebeenprepared by anodizing of magnetron-sputtered Zr-W-Si alloys in 0.1 mol dm−3 phosphoric acid electrolyte at 20◦C. All the anodic oxide nanofilms examined reveal efficient proton conductivity after post-annealing at 250 ◦ C. Further increase in the post-annealing temperature results in the conductivity degradation for the anodic oxide nanofilms on the alloy containing only 5 at% silicon, while the high conductivity is maintained even after post-annealing at 300 ◦ C for those containing 15 at% or more silicon. The proton conductivity is dependent upon tungsten content; the conductivity of 5 × 10 −6 Sc m −1 for the ∼100 nm-thick films on the Zr31W55Si14 at 100 ◦ C is approximately 10 times that on the Zr48W37Si15. The anodic oxide nanofilms consist of two layers, comprising a thin outer ZrO2 layer and an inner ZrO2-WO3-SiO2 layer. Both layers show thickness-dependent conductivity and the proton conductivity of the two-layer anodic films is enhanced one order of magnitude by reducing the film thickness from ∼300 nm to ∼100 nm. Different mechanisms are proposed for the thickness dependence of the conductivity of the outer and inner layers.


. A method for calculation on the progressive collapse, in accordance with which the account of the fall of ceiling panels on the underlying floor when the loss of bearing capacity of vertical frame elements in the form of local impact determined by multiplying the weight plates on the dynamic coefficient determined by the drop height and static deflection. The calculation is carried out in several stages with the use of the LIRA SAPR software.


Bacillus subtilis strains containing defects in the sporulation gene spoIIF (kinA), spoIU (kinA), or spoIIN (ftsA) cannot transcribe the cE-dependent gene spoIID. Results presented here and by other workers demonstrate that the spoIIF, spoIIJ, and spoIIN gene products control spoIID transcription indirectly by coordinating the induction of the spoIIGAB, spoIIE, and spoIJAC operons, which are required for crE synthesis and processing. Sporulation competence and spoIIGAB, spoIIE, and spoILAC transcription were restored in spoIIF, spoIJJ, and spoIIN mutants by introduction of crsA47, a mutation in the major vegetative sigma factor CA. crsA mutations are known to restore sporulation in certain spoO mutants. crsA suppression ofkinA andftsA mutations was achieved through inhibition of the transcription of sin, a gene involved in the selection between several post-exponential-phase cell states. A deletion of sin restored sporulation competence in spoIIF, spolIJ,


Objective: To research the effects and the related mechanism of natural taurine on portal hypertension in rats. Methods: Portal hypertension (PHT) models were induced by compound factors. A total of 60 rats were randomly divided into three groups: normal control group, model group and natural taurine group, 20 rats in each group. Detection of each group before and after treatment of portal vein pressure (PVP), Portal venous flow (PVF), mean arterial pressure (MAP), heart rate (HR), liver function, SerumⅣ-C, PC Ⅲ, HA, LN content.Observed before and after treatment in each of the changes in liver histology.The levels of NO, activity of nitric oxide synthase (NOS) and cCMP were detected by nitric reductase, colorimetry and Radioimmunoassay Methods. Results: Compared with model group, in the natural taurine group the levels of PVP, PVF and HR was significantly decreased, the levels of MAP was increased, there was significant difference (P0.05). The levels of ALT was significantly decreased, and ALB was increased, compared with model group difference was significant (P0.01). The levels ofⅣ- C, PCⅢ, HA, LN was significantly decreased, compared with model group difference was significant (P0.01), but TBIL was not significant change, compared with model group, there was no significant difference (P0.05). The levels of NO, cCMP and activity of NOS were all decreased, compared with model group difference was significant (P0.05), and the organizational structure of the liver was improved. Conclusion: Natural taurine is highly effective in the treatment of portal hypertension in rats, portal hypertension of cirrhosis of the formation mechanism of the "two-way"regulation, and have good prospects for the development and application of clinical.


In this paper,the chromosome numbers and the karyotypes of Aster poliothamnus in the Eastern of Qinghai-Tibet Plateau were studied. The result showed that the chromosome numbers was 2n=32(diploid). The karyotype formulae was 2n=2x= 32=26sm+6st, karyotype belonged to stebbings 4A type. No satellites had been found.


Brand new Boutique Inn is located on Sukhumvit Soi 11 Road which is the heart of Bangkok's business and entertainment center. Only few steps away from BTS Sky Train Nana Station. The rooms are comprise Premier room, Executive room, Premier Suite and Grand..


Energy and the environment: from the European coal and steel community (ECSC) to today. Environmental issues: from the European economic community (EEC) to nowadays. The green paper and the climate package. Strategic energy technology plan. Italy's national energy strategy.


This paper discusses the definition and the specificity of concepts «the space of culture» and «the cultural space» as well as their interaction and mutual influence. It is considered a system «the culture the space of culture the cultural space». There is given an overview of the features of the cultural space formation. It shows the difference between the space of culture and the cultural space, as well as their position relative to each other. This paper analyzes the culture as a phenomenon in its relation with the space of culture and the cultural space.


Leishmaniasis is a neglected disease caused by protozoan parasites of the Leishmania genus spread around the world. Benzyl farnesyl amine mimetics are known class of compounds selectively designed to inhibit the squalene synthase (SQS) enzyme that catalyzes the first committed reaction on the sterol biosynthesis pathway. Herein, we studied seven new benzyl farnesyl amine mimetics (SBC 37 - 43) against Leishmania amazonensis. After the first initial screening of cell viability, two inhibitors (SBC 39 and SBC 40) were selected for further studies. Against intracellular amastigotes, SBC 39 and SBC 40 presented selectivity indexes of 117.7 and 180, respectively, indicating that they are highly selective. Analyses of free sterol showed that SBC 39 and SBC 40 inhibit two enzymes, sterol Δ8 → Δ7 isomerase and SQS, resulting in depletion of endogenous 24-methyl sterols. Physiological analysis and electron microscopy revealed three main alterations: 1) in the mitochondrion ultrastructure and function; 2) the presence of lipid bodies and autophagosomes; and 3) the appearance of projections in the plasma membrane and extracellular vesicles inside the flagellar pocket. In conclusion, our results support the notion that benzyl farnesyl amine mimics have a potent effect against Leishmania amazonensis and should be an interesting novel pharmaceutical lead for the development of new chemotherapeutic alternatives to treat leishmaniasis.


Few studies have evaluated short-term psychosocial treatments with physically abused school-aged children and their offending parents or families. This study compares the treatment outcomes of 55 cases that were randomly assigned to individual child and parent cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) or family therapy (FT) with those who received routine community services (RCS). Measures of child, parent, and family dysfunction and adjustment were collected from both participants and supplemented with official social service records to evaluate the efficacy of treatment through 1-year follow-up. Compared with RCS, CBT and FT were associated with improvements in child-to-parent violence and child externalizing behavior, parental distress and abuse risk, and family conflict and cohesion. All three conditions reported several improvements across time. One parent participant each in CBT and FT and three in RCS were found to have engaged in another incident of physical maltreatment after treatment had begun. No differences between CBT and FT were observed on consumer satisfaction or maltreatment risk ratings at termination. The findings of this evaluation provide additional support for the continued development and evaluation of individual and family treatments involving child victims of physical abuse.


Anthropogenic radionuclide pollution of the Black Sea originated primarily from the atmospheric nuclear weapon tests carried out during the late 1950s and early 1960s before the signing of the Test Ban Treaty in 1963, and after the Chernobyl nuclear power plant (NPP) accident in April 1986. Chernobyl atmospheric fallout deposited 1.7–2.4 PBq of 137Cs into the Black Sea surface, which temporarily increased the 137Cs inventory of the 0–50 m surface layer by a factor of 6–10 in comparison with its pre-Chernobyl value. The contribution of Chernobyl-origin 90Sr (0.1–0.3 PBq) from atmospheric fallout was lower in comparison with that of 137Cs. A subsequent 90Sr input from the Danube and the Dnieper Rivers (about 0.16 PBq) was an important contribution to the budget of this radionuclide in the Black Sea, while the riverine 137Cs input (0.02–0.03 PBq) was insignificant. The decrease of the 137Cs inventory in the surface layer after Chernobyl accident has been mainly controlled by vertical mixing, loss through the Bosporus Strait, and radioactive decay. The loss through the Bosporus accounted for 2–2.5% of the 137Cs inventory. In the case of 90Sr, these processes have been compensated by river inputs from the Dnieper and Danube up to 1994–1995 and partially after 2000. The vertical mixing of 137Cs and 90Sr was mainly effective within the 0–200 m layer. Sediment inventories of 137Cs in the Danube and Dnieper delta regions exceeded by one order of magnitude the values in the slope zone and two orders of magnitude those in the deep basin. Because of the self-cleaning processes, the current levels of anthropogenic radionuclides are relatively low in all the components of the Black Sea environment, and therefore do not pose any radiological problem. Doses to marine biota from 137Cs and 90Sr are several orders of magnitude lower than those from natural 210Po.

Keywords:

Black Sea;
radionuclides;
global fallout;
Chernobyl accident;
seawater;
bottom sediments;
marine biota


Designing gravity-type vertical seawalls involves repetitive design calculations in each block layer at different water levels under a variety of wave conditions. Incautious human errors that are fatal to the design may be introduced in calculations or in interpolations of design charts. In view of this, a computer-aided-design package is a real necessity. This paper presents the development of a user-friendly program in BASIC language tailored for use on microcomputers for the computer-aided design of such vertical seawalls. The program simulates the conventional manual design procedures, combining the relevant codes of practice and some heuristic rules of thumb from design experience. It automatically computes forces and moments due to surcharge and soil pressure behind the seawall together with wind-generated wave forces, and it checks for the adequacy of the seawall configuration under a variety of loading cases.


Purpose: The purpose of this study was to evaluate the differences between the level of satisfaction and concern regarding appearance according to gender, the importance of appearance in job interviews, and the influence appearance has on job-seeking stress and anxiety under the ever-increasing pressure on students to secure employment so that appropriate psychological interventions can be provided to undergraduates. Methods: The survey was conducted on 170 third and fourth year undergraduates in Gyeonggi province from August 31st to September 6th, 2012 to figure out the correlations and differences in variables of appearance satisfaction and concern, and the importance of appearance in job interviews and job-seeking stress and anxiety according to the differences in gender. Data were analyzed by descriptive statistics, independent t-test, two-way ANOVA, and Pearson's correlation analysis. Results: 1. There was difference between the genders for appearance satisfaction and concern. The level of satisfaction was higher in male students while concerns regarding appearance were higher in female students. There was no gender difference regarding the importance of appearance in job interviews, job-seeking stress, and job-seeking anxiety. 2. For the concerns in appearance, there was a significant difference between the genders in appearance management, and gender and the importance of appearance in job interviews showed significant interactive effects. Stress and anxiety from job-seeking did not show significant differences between the genders, but there were common significant interactive effects between gender and grades, gender and employment, and gender and the importance of appearance in job interviews. 3. Both male and female students showed higher job-seeking stress as their job-seeking anxiety was higher. Job-seeking anxiety was higher in male students who had higher concern in appearance, and in female students who placed more emphasis on the importance of appearance in job interviews. Conclusion: As female students perceived appearance in job interviews as important more than male students, their job-seeking anxiety was higher, while male students who showed higher concern in appearance also showed higher level of anxiety in job-seeking. As job-seeking anxiety was higher, job-seeking stress was also higher according to the entire participants, based on this result, methods to decrease job-seeking anxiety should be suggested.


Most frequently aVected codons were localised in exon 3 (33, 44, and 45). Therefore, we additionally analysed exon 3 by direct DNA sequencing using the same primers as for SSCP, the Thermosequenase labelled primer cycle sequencing kit (Amersham), and an automated DNA sequencer (LI-COR) without identifying any changes in the nucleotide sequence. As there were no diVerences detected in the coding region, â-catenin gene expression in patients' lymphocytes was examined using reverse transcription PCR. PCR amplification of cDNA was performed in two separate PCR reactions using PCR primer pairs 3.1/6.2 and 6.1/13.2, as listed in table 2. This showed that in all persons tested the expected â-catenin transcript was present and of expected size, suggesting that diVerential splicing did not occur. However, as our experiments regarding â-catenin expression were performed on lymphocytes, diVerential expression in colonic or other tissues aVected in FAP, which were not available for our study, cannot be excluded. Taken together, using a combination of several techniques for the mutational analysis, in our group of 14 FAP APC negative families, no hereditary alterations were identified in the â-catenin coding sequence or gene expression, suggesting that â-catenin germline mutations do not account for APC negative FAP cases. Even though these results need confirmation in a larger sample of APC negative FAP families, they indicate that â-catenin might play a diVerent role in the pathogenesis of hereditary colon carcinoma compared to sporadic colorectal cancer. We thank Dr Karl Heinimann for critical review of manuscript. This work was supported by a grant from the Swiss National Foundation 3200-049310.96. All experiments comply with the current laws of Switzerland.


Proceedings of the 2022 Workshop on Resource AWareness of Systems and Society (RAW), colocated with ICT4S 2022 in Plovdiv, Bulgaria on 13th of June 2022.


The article presents the results of research on the maintenance and repair of agricultural machinery, as well as strategies for maintaining it in working condition. The system of technical support and repair of machinery in agriculture is maximally focused on the strategy of performing repair and maintenance actions with periodic or continuous monitoring. (Research purpose) The research purpose is studying the possibility of using a new resource-saving tolerance system for machine parts in the existing maintenance and repair system. (Materials and methods) The assessment of the technical condition of individual units and (or) tractor systems with the use of built-in and portable devices and the determination of their residual life make it possible to predict a repair time and prepare the workplace, spare parts, replacement units, aggregates in a timely manner. The technical and economic condition of the agro-industrial complex is mainly determined by two factors: providing agricultural producers with a regulatory need for agricultural machinery, its reliable maintenance and repair using modern technologies, including the use of a system for assessing the operational properties of the main indicators of machine reliability. (Results and discussion) The article presents the issues of import substitution of repair and technological equipment during the repair and maintenance of agricultural machinery. Authors have developed promising directions for the strategy for the maintenance and repair of agricultural machinery. The repair technologies and reliability indicators of agricultural machines were described. (Conclusions) As a result of the conducted research, the article presents the methods of improving the system of technical service of agricultural machinery, recommendations for their improvement and modernization. We have developed a maintenance and repair strategy based on minimizing the residual life of machine parts.


Abstract In an experiment, children in three grade levels (second, fourth, and sixth) viewed four advertisements. The children were shown advertisements with either metaphors in both pictorial and verbal form or a literal equivalent. The sixth graders interpreted more metaphors correctly than the fourth and second graders. In terms of recall of advertised content, the sixth and fourth graders recalled brand names, products, and additional copy better than the second graders. Within each grade level, metaphors did not enhance children's recall of advertised content or perceptions of the understandability of the advertisements and liking of the advertised products. The authors speculate that metaphors are most likely to enhance recall under conditions in which the metaphor serves as a direct representation linking the metaphor to the advertised product. Their findings suggest that advertisers should be aware that young readers may have difficulty interpreting metaphors and that metaphors may not be more eff...


Vertical p-type gallium arsenide (GaAs) nanowires with pure zinc blende structure were grown on GaAs (111) B substrate by metal-organic chemical vapor deposition via a Au-catalyst vapor-liquid-solid mechanism. The p-type doping was investigated by additional diethyl zinc (DEZn). In the high II/III ratio range (II/III>9.1%), there exists a critical length beyond which kinking takes place. Two possible reasons are discussed. Zn occurrence in the nanowires was verified by energy dispersive X-ray (EDX) analysis. Corresponding to II/III D 0.2%, the doping concentration is about 8 10 18 cm 3 .


Abstract Endoscopic biopsy of esophageal lesions is sometimes impossible, for a variety of reasons. In such cases, a simple technique of transcatheter biopsy has proved to be reliable, simple, and readily tolerated by even the most debilitated patients.


Increasing populations of glyphosate-resistant weeds, such as Palmer amaranth, have prompted growers to pursue alternative means of weed control in cotton. In many cropping systems, this means the utilization of older chemistries and residual herbicides. The goal of this research was to evaluate and understand the agronomic and environmental factors that affect the inconsistent injury often associated with these herbicides as well as determine the impact of Palmer amaranth emergence date on seed production, biomass, and cotton yield. Experiments were conducted in three counties in Arkansas giving a distinct range of climate and soil texture. Injury, biomass, and number of plants per m of row, number of seed per female Palmer amaranth plant, and cotton yield were assessed in experiments under various conditions. Seed vigor levels, seed size, stressed conditions, and planting depth constituted the majority of factors evaluated. Low seed vigor increased the risk of injury from diuron, fomesafen, and fluometuron. Increasing planting depth from 0.64 to 2.5 cm resulted in greater cotton injury from fomesafen but proved inconsequential when applying diuron or fluometuron preemergence. Cotton injury from glufosinate was observed on two Widestrike® cultivars and to a lesser extent on a Liberty Link® cultivar. Injury from glufosinate was significantly increased when cotton was shaded prior to application. Palmer amaranth emerging for the 10week period after cotton emergence is capable of producing seed, which points to need for extended period of weed control in cotton. Acknowledgements I would like to take this opportunity to thank those equally responsible for the completion of this thesis. A thesis, much like any objective undertaken by man, has not one honorary contributor but a collection of individuals dedicated to helping one another succeed. This document is a testament to that principle. To Almighty God: all good things stem from you and I humbly thank you for your many blessings. To my family: the love, discipline, and morality that you instilled in me were ever crucial in the completion of this great task. To my many friends and colleagues at the University of Arkansas: I am eternally grateful. Without your guidance and support this process would have been in vain. To my committee members: Dr. Fred Bourland, Dr. Tom Barber, Dr. Andy Mauromoustakos and Dr. Rick Norman, you are due a special token of appreciation as my success would not have been possible without your patience, understanding, and unwavering support. And finally to my major advisor, Dr. Jason Norsworthy, thank you for all your instruction and sacrifice. Working with you has truly opened up opportunities for me. Table of


The development objective of the Meghalaya Community Led Landscape Management Project (MCLLMP) for India is to strengthen community-led natural resources management in selected landscapes in the state of Meghalaya. Some of the negative impacts and mitigation measures are includes : (i) conversion of pine trees area into open land; (ii) improve on afforestation in the village; (iii) commercial logging is practice mainly in private land for sale as timber, causing fragmentation of forest into smaller patches; (iv) creating awareness on the higher value of the forest when they are left standing, and its impact on climate change, soil conservation, flash flood among the community and private owner; (v) habitat loss and habitat fragmentation due to logging and clearing of forest area in private land; (vi) identification, preserving, and providing awareness to private owner and community as a whole about these sensitive zone and avoidance of encroachment into this area; (vii) open forest (pine trees land) available in the interior part of the village, and dense forest are found only in the community forest. Coal mining in privately owned land have contributed hugely to the degradation of forest area; (viii)CLLMP will work towards spring shed development and drainage land treatment, by prioritizing the most affected area; (ix) aquatic life in river has decrease and in some river they have disappeared for good; (x) plantation of indigenous flora and trees to help support the loss of biodiversity; (xi) dustiness is another problem due to huge number of vehicles travelling from that area; (xii) capacity building and awareness on coal mine effluent and its impact on health and environment; (xiii) CLLMP will help develop community development plan which will help in providing employment opportunity for the community as a whole; (xiv) to keep a check on the land use pattern, jhum cultivation is practice only on the community land; (xv) to prevent the loss of natural environment the community has set up a reserve forest to preserve the natural flora and fauna of the region which has grown naturally; (xvi) to address to climate change, the community member has practice plantation within their private land.


Background The definition of an open fracture where the fracture and the hematoma communicate with the external environment is well known. But the treating surgeon should also be aware that the skin defect may not lie directly under the fracture site and may communicate with the fracture under degloved skin. Hence any fracture with a wound in the same region should be considered an open injury until proven otherwise by exploration. Open injuries – often high-velocity injuriesare frequently associated with higher risk of complications including amputation [1,2,3,4]. The present challenge to the trauma surgeon is not simply to salvage the injured limb but also provide a good functional outcome. The principles of management of open injuries have evolved with time and today with advances in both orthopaedic and plastic surgery, the management is now in the 'Era of functional restoration'. Surgeons have now realised that success of open injury management is not merely salvage and one should not succumb to the 'triumph of technique over reason'. The paradigm has now shifted to restoring a good functional outcome to the injured patient and also focusing on developing safe protocols of bone and soft tissue reconstruction5. In this article, we discuss the important recommended practices which are determinant of a good outcome in open injury management.


Climate change is a topic that has been widely discussed and debated over recent decades. Scientists have reached a general agreement that the lower atmosphere and the Earth's surface are definitely getting warmer. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reported that a gradual but accelerating increase of atmospheric greenhouse gases has occurred since 1750 as result of human activities and among the anthropogenic greenhouse gases, CO2 is the most important. The global atmospheric concentration of CO2 has increased from a pre-industrial value of about 280 ppm to 379 ppm in 2005 (Alley et al., 2007). Temperature has risen by about 0.3-0.6oC since the late 19th century. If CO2 emissions were maintained at 1994 levels, its concentration would increase to about 550 ppm by the end of the 21st century (Chakraborty et al., 2000). Thailand is a member of the United Nation Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), which is negotiated by the nations of the world in June 1992 (Michaelowa and Rolfe, 2001). The targets of the UNFCCC is to reducing CO2 emissions from the rate reported for 1990 during the five-year period from 2008 2012. This agreement is called the Kyoto Protocol which Thailand has ratified since August 28, 2002. There are two alternatives to reduce CO2, these include decreasing fossil fuel consumption and increasing carbon sink through forestry activities. According to Article 3.3 of the agreed Kyoto Protocol, some CO2 sources and sinks of forests shall be used to meet the commitments (UNFCCC, 1997). The sources and sinks to be used were measured as verifiable changes in carbon stocks in each commitment period (Terakunpisut et al., 2007; Forest research, 2011). Forestry sectors are known as an important natural brake on climate change since they play an important role in the global both as a carbon sink and source because of their large biomass per unit area of land (Gibbs et al., 2007). The carbon in forests originates from the atmosphere and is accumulated in terms of the organic matter of soil and trees, and it continuously cycles between forests and the atmosphere through the decomposition of dead organic matter (Alexandrove, 2007). Thus, changing carbon stocks in forests can affect the amount of carbon in the atmosphere. If more carbon accumulates in forest through


An ethno-medical survey was conducted in the tribal pockets of Tamiya and Petalkot of Madhya Pradesh wherein "Bharia" and "Gond" tribes inhabit. This paper presents 22 medicinal plants belonging to 17 families, used as tonic medicine among them.


Porous copper fiber-sintered sheets (PCFSSs) with different porosities were fabricated through the solid-phase sintering method using cutting copper fibers. PCFSSs with the same porosity and different porosities were then joined via a fluxless soldering method. By analyzing the uniaxial tensile property of the PCFSSs, the formation mechanism of the soldered PCFSSs was investigated. The difference in the tensile properties between the soldered and original PCFSSs was examined. Experimental results indicated that, for the PCFSSs with homogeneous porosity, reducing the porosity increased the tensile strength and elongation at break significantly. The fluxless soldering method with the lead-free solder resulted in excellent joining of the PCFSSs with the same porosity and different porosities. Moreover, the final tensile strength of the soldered PCFSSs with the same porosity was nearly equal to that of their parent PCFSSs. The tensile strength of the soldered PCFSSs with different porosities depended on the higher-porosity section. After soldering the PCFSSs, Young's modulus increased and the elongation at break reduced.


A degradable disposable dinner (or beverage) container is made up of plant fibres (stalk, straw, rice husk, bagasse, core cob core, etc), adhesive (starch) and water-proofing agent (amino plastic powder) through die perss at 130-140 deg.C under 100 tons of pressure. Its advantages include no pollution, low cost, high resistance to high temp (100 deg.C), freeze and food corrosion, and degradable nature.


Digital libraries, e-journal platforms, portals, e-prints and other web-based information systems provide services supporting users to perform intense work tasks that require complex interaction activities. The main components of such services are the users, the offered content and the system on which they are performed. This paper presents a model, which analyses the attributes of the electronic information services' components that affect user interaction and correlates them in the usefulness and usability evaluation process. An experimental study traces the relations between usefulness and usability, indicating that these evaluation parameters are interconnected and users do not find discriminating differences between them. The analysis of the content and system attributes suggests that user interaction is affected equally by content and system characteristics. Finally, the study illustrates users' preference for the attributes that constitute a useful system in contrast to those that support usability.


A Series of questionnaire items designed to measure the psychological states of anxiety, depression, effort stress and fatigue were administered to 151 male and female subjects and then readministered, one month later, to the same subjects. Difference scores, some based on individual items and some on item parcels, were intercorrelated and factor analyzed. The factor analytic investigation was carried through a third order analysis. Results support the notion that change score patterns are of substantial dimensionality and that the hypothesized dimensions can be identified on the basis of the included marker variables. Implications and future directions for research on the validity of the trait-state distinction are briefly discussed.


A novel approach is proposed for generating multidirectional multi-scroll chaotic attractors from the fractional differential systems, including one-directional (1-D) n-scroll, two-directional (2-D) n times m-grid scroll, and three-directional (3-D) n times m times l-grid scroll chaotic attractors. It is the first time in the literature to report the multi-directional multi-scroll chaotic attractors from a fractional differential system. Furthermore, some underlying dynamical mechanics are briefly investigated for the fractional differential multi-scroll systems.


Students of social and military history can turn to a number of published reports on the conflict with China in the early 1840s, including those of diplomat and trade superintendent Charles Elliot, foreign secretary Lord Palmerston, military diarists Edward Cree and Duncan McPherson, and even the controversial missionary Charles Gutzlaff. Contemporary newspapers voiced opinion without restraint, including the pro-opium Canton Register, anti-opium Canton Courier, the venerable if not always certain or entirely accurate Times of London, and the interestingly informative Chinese Repository. Books related to the Opium War, variously historical, critical, and sometimes sentimental, by authors such as Jack Beeching, Christopher Munn, and Frank Welsh, continue to inform readers.


Maki asserts that the incidence of intravenous catheter complications is greatly reduced when highly experienced nurses insert catheters.1 The single reference provided to support this statement makes interesting reading.2 This randomised controlled trial compares complications in two main groups of patients: those who are cannulated by house doctors and followed up by …


Thresholds for particle entrainment and natural disturbance frequency vary across hydrogeomorphic settings, but urbanization increases the rate and extent of channel erosion and sediment transport in alluvial channels. The urban disturbance regime is a change in the frequency, magnitude, and duration of hydrologically induced disturbance on the stream channel and ecosystem that can lead to geomorphic and ecological degradation. To preserve stream stability and ecological function, stormwater management systems should be optimized to maintain the natural disturbance regime of streambed material within the context of societal and environmental goals. Our proposed framework, based on data from 195 sites across 2 continents, shows that the tools of river mechanics can be used to develop relatively simple, regionally appropriate, streambed-specific guidance for stormwater designers, so that engineers can calibrate stormwater facilities that address the urban stream disturbance regime. In the absence of detailed hydrogeomorphic data, practitioners can use our model to predict an order-of-magnitude approximation of the critical discharge for bed particle entrainment (Qc) based solely on bed material class (e.g., cobble vs sand) and the respective 2-y peak discharge (Q2). The estimate also can guide practitioners toward the types of stormwater management strategies that are likely to be most effective at protecting stream stability in a given setting. For example, duration controls for large events (≥Q2) may be very important for preserving stability in gravel/boulder streams where Qc is expected to be >∼0.1 to 1 × Q2, but could have relatively little effect on the overall stability of sand-dominated systems where Qc is likely to be <0.01 × Q2 and controls of much more frequent events (<<Q2) may have a greater influence.


The setting up of experimental techniques, the synergic use of ellipsometry systems and synchrotron light sources are pivotal in the characterization and optimization of thin films devoted to EUV–VUV applications. The present manuscript will go through the research methods and the results obtained at CNR–IFN laboratories, by explaining the approaches adopted on the study of novel materials for the development of high throughputs EUV–VUV transmission filters, reflective coatings and phase retarders.


This paper introduces the generalized Egghe-indices as a new family of scientific impact measures for ranking the output of scientific researchers. The definition of this family is strongly inspired by Egghe's well-known g-index. The main contribution of the paper is a family of axiomatic characterizations that characterize every generalized Egghe-index in terms of four axioms.


Background: Medical treatment of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) has evolved significantly, and treatment with immunomodulators is recommended. These medications may alter the patient's immune response and increase the risk of opportunistic infections. Our aim was to evaluate the prevalence and the incidence of acute or chronic HEV infection in IBD patients under immunomodulatory treatment. Patients and Methods: We conducted a retrospective, multicenter, observational study between 2017 and 2018. IBD outpatients hospitalized for the infusion of immunomodulators were included in 16 French centers. During their daily hospitalization, blood samples were drawn for HEV serology (IgM and IgG) and HEV RNA detection. Results: A total of 488 patients were included, of which 327 (67%) patients had Crohn's disease and 161 (33%) ulcerative colitis. HEV IgM was detected in 3 patients, but HEV RNA was undetectable in all patients. The HEV IgG seroprevalence rate was 14.2%. IgG-positive patients were older at sampling (p = 0.01) and IBD diagnosis (p = 0.03), had higher seafood consumption (p = 0.01) and higher doses of azathioprine (p = 0.03). Ileal and upper digestive tract involvement was more frequent in IgG-positive patients (p = 0.009), and ileocolic involvement was more frequent in IgG-negative patients (p = 0.01). Under multivariate analysis, age > 50 years [OR: 2.21 (1.26, to 3.85), p = 0.004] was associated with previous HEV infection. Conclusion: Systematic screening for HEV infection is not needed among IBD patients on immunomodulatory medications. However, in the event of abnormal liver test findings, HEV should be part of the classic diagnostic assessment.


The present study investigates how diotic and dichotic masked thresholds, in a notched-noise masking paradigm, are affected by activation of the Medial OlivoCochlear (MOC) reflex. Thresholds were obtained for a 500-Hz pure tone diotic or a dichotic signal, S (S0 or Sπ respectively), in the presence of a simultaneous or forward diotic masker (bandpass noise with no notch or a 400-Hz notch). A diotic precursor sound (bandpass noise with a 400- or 800-Hz notch) was presented prior to the signal and masker to activate the MOC reflex. For simultaneous- and forward-masking conditions, the decrease in masked thresholds as a notch was introduced in the masker was larger for the diotic than for the dichotic condition. This resulted in a reduced binaural masking level difference (BMLD) for the masker with a notch. The precursor augmented these two effects. The results indicate that the effect of the precursor, eliciting the MOC reflex, is less pronounced when binaural cues are processed.


The double‐base number system has been used in digital signal processing systems for over a decade because of its fast inner product operation and low hardware complexity. This letter proposes an innovative multiplier architecture using hybrid operands. The multiplier can easily be linked to flash analog‐to‐digital converters or digital systems through a double‐base number encoder (DBNE) for realtime signal processing. The design of the DBNE and the multiplier enable faster digital signal processing and require less hardware resources compared to the binary processing method.


Industrial radiographic film,as a kind of recording materials in radiography nondestructive testing,is widely used in pressure vessel,chemical machinery,air craft,shipbuilding,nuclear power plant construction and their research.During radiographic film′s application,people not only demand higher photographic properties and coating-layer performance,but also want more requirements in storage,radiography and processing,and higher resistance to high temperature and humidity and strong mechanical properties(resistance to scratch).Researchers found that introducing polymer is one of the most effective measures.This paper focuses on researching for polymeric coagulant effectively used in manufacturing industrial radiographic emulsions


The single-particle level densities for calculated in terms of Equidistant Space Model, ESM, and NON-ESM, of Fermi Gas Model. It is found that the single particle level density, g, has no longer a constant value and becomes an energy dependent on the contrary with NON-ESM. The finite depth of the nuclear well and pairing corrections are examined with behavior of the single level density for both models. The particle-hole state density has been calculated, by means of the energy dependence of excited particles and hole level densities, for one and two fermions systems and different exciton number in . The present results are compared between two models with and without the inclusion of the finite well depth correction. NON-ESM system has a major effect in the present calculations at high excitation energies.


Performance contract management of public health services package is a new model of public health services provided by the government,but there are also many difficult problems in the implementation.Some projects in the implementation of in the service pack are discussed as follows:the content,performance,implementation of the conditions of contract,contract completeness,operational efficiency and other issues.And some related countermeasures are put for ward to performance contract management of the package of rural public health services.


This study analyzes anti-inflammatory activity from extracts of Nigella sativa and Cosmos caudatus Kunth co-encapsulated through in silico molecular docking. The LC-MS results revealed that extracts of N. sativa mostly contained thymoquinone and alpha-hederin, whereas quercetin and kaempferol were the major compounds in C. caudatus K. Nevertheless, the bioactive compounds are usually susceptible to degradation by exposure to light, heat, oxygen, which may limit its biological activity. Therefore, encapsulation is one of the promising techniques to protect bioactive compounds. Ligands were encapsulated with chitosan and sodium tripolyphosphate as wall materials. Cyclooxygenase-1 (COX-1) and cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2) as the target enzymes were docked with a combination of these active compounds (non-encapsulated and encapsulated), using the HEX 8.0 program, and visualized using the Discovery studio visualizer software v220.127.116.1150. Interestingly, docking results of the combination of encapsulated ligands showed no interactions to COX-1 but interacted with COX-2. Therefore, co-encapsulation of extracts combinations has been suggested to act as anti-inflammatory agents targeted specifically to the COX-2 enzyme. The total energy of the encapsulated of combination of extract compounds to COX-2 were -1425.88 (mol/cal) for thymoquinone + quercetin; -1435.87 (mol/cal) for thymoquinone + kaempferol; 1175.97 (mol/cal) for quercetin + alpha hederin; -957.74 (mol/cal) for kaempferol + alpha hederin; and -283.3 (mol/cal) for diclofenac sodium, as a control NSAID drug. These suggest that encapsulated active compounds in N. sativa and C. caudatus K. have potency as a drug candidate for the selective NSAIDs category, which can be subjected to further in vitro and in vivo studies.


Under capitalism, the homeless are an oppressed and an exploited class. They are exploited sometimes as part of what Marx identifies as the lower reaches of the surplus labor force, but most usually through their commodification. They are subject to Althusser's repressive and ideological state apparatuses. The long-term and recurrent homeless are commodified by being a source of both money-making employment and power among the police, the legal system, and psychiatrists and social workers. JEL Classifications: B51, J68, O18


This article describes and analyses a zoomorphic siltstone palette housed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (MMA 10.176.84). The palette is first situated within the wider corpus of zoomorphic palettes from the Naqada II Period. Considerations of form and design accompanying the development of palettes during Naqada I/II, and comparisons with visually similar forms attested on knife handles and other palettes, suggest that MMA 10.176.84 may represent a fish–antelope composite figure, 'antelope' here being broadly defined as a non-domesticated, horned quadruped of the Bovidae family. It is the first example of a palette modelled as such. The social functions of palettes in Predynastic southern Egypt are then outlined in order to consider the significance of modelling a palette in this way, as well as to explore implications of the palette's form for understandings of cultural developments in the late Predynastic Period.


In the decade between years 2001 – 2011 Kenya experienced change of CEOs of listed firms through dismissal, resignation and retirement which created a need to establish whether CEO departure events had a significant influence on stock returns and profitability of the affected firms. In this research 9 CEO departure events 3 dismissal, 3 retirement and 3 resignation events were analyzed. Abnormal stock returns were computed by employing the market model and profitability of the affected listed firms was measured by employing return on assets (ROA). Paired samples t-test was employed to examine whether there was a significant difference in the abnormal returns and profitability (ROA) during pre and post CEO departure period. The findings indicated that there was no significant difference in abnormal stock returns and profitability in the pre and post CEO departure events. The findings implied that NSE investors were not excited by change of CEOs and that the NSE is semi strong form efficient.


Septal efferent fibers from, the neurons in the medial septal nucleus are destroyed by fimbria‐fornix aspirative lesion. In the present study we used quantitative morphometric techniques to evaluate the response of these axotomized septal neurons to a constant infusion of nerve growth factor (NGF). By 2 weeks following the lesion, approximately 75% of the cholinergic neurons had degenerated in the untreated rats. The remaining cholinergic neurons showed few signs of the effect of the lesion when stained for a polyclonal antibody to ChAT and examined in 40‐μm‐thick sections. In 1‐μm‐thick sections the remaining ChAT‐immunoreactive (IR) neurons also appeared no different from the intact ChAT neurons. However, non‐ChAT‐IR neurons had a shrunken nucleus, while all other morphometric parameters appeared normal. NGF infusion protected most of the ChAT‐IR neurons from degenerating. The saved neurons had the same parameters as the undamaged ChAT‐IR neurons when examined in either 40‐μm‐ or 1‐μm‐thick sections. In addition, the shrunken appearance of the non‐ChAT‐IR neurons' nuclei was avoided by the NGF infusions.


The oil pipeline network requires periodic monitoring to detect pipeline damages, which may cause oil leakage with severe environmental contamination. These damages can be generated by interference from third parties such as construction works, sabotage, vandalism, excavations,and illegal oil theft. Todetect the oil pipeline damages,it canbeusedaerodynamic aerial vehicles (UAVs) with infrared cameras and image processing systems. This paperpresents the aerodynamic analysis of a UAV with a hawk shape (wingspan of 2.20 m and length of 1.49 m) for potential application in the detection of oil pipeline failures. A 1:6.5 scale prototype of the UAV is fabricated using a 3D printer. The aerodynamic coefficients of UAV are determined using computational fluiddynamic (CFD) simulations and experimental testing with a subsonic wind tunnel. In addition, the lift and drag coefficients of UAVsare obtained as a function of Reynolds number and angle of attack. Also, the air velocity profile around UAV is estimated with the CFD model. The proposed UAV could decrease the inspection costs of pipeline networks in comparison with the use of helicopters or light aircraft.


In this study, we examined the natural recovery of mangroves in abandoned shrimp ponds located in the Wunbaik Mangrove Forest (WMF) in Myanmar using artificial neural network (ANN) classification and a change detection approach with Sentinel-2 satellite images. In 2020, we conducted various experiments related to mangrove classification by tuning input features and hyper-parameters. The selected ANN model was used with a transfer learning approach to predict the mangrove distribution in 2015. Changes were detected using classification results from 2015 and 2020. Naturally recovering mangroves were identified by extracting the change detection results of three abandoned shrimp ponds selected during field investigation. The proposed method yielded an overall accuracy of 95.98%, a kappa coefficient of 0.92, mangrove and non-mangrove precisions of 0.95 and 0.98, respectively, recalls of 0.96, and F1 scores of 0.96 for the 2020 classification. For the 2015 prediction, transfer learning improved model performance, resulting in an overall accuracy of 97.20%, a kappa coefficient of 0.94, mangrove and non-mangrove precisions of 0.98 and 0.96, respectively, recalls of 0.98 and 0.97, and F1 scores of 0.96. The change detection results showed that mangrove forests in the WMF slightly decreased between 2015 and 2020. Naturally recovering mangroves were detected at approximately 50% of each abandoned site within a short abandonment period. This study demonstrates that the ANN method using Sentinel-2 imagery and topographic and canopy height data can produce reliable results for mangrove classification. The natural recovery of mangroves presents a valuable opportunity for mangrove rehabilitation at human-disturbed sites in the WMF.


Abstract : It is shown that solutions of a class of boundary value problems in linear viscoelasticity are unique, if the relaxation moduli in shear and compression are steadily decreasing functions of time which are convex from below and tend to nonnegative constant asymptotic values. (Author)


For strategies of active skin protection against UV-light and reactive oxygen species (ROS), the topical application of antioxidants becomes more and more prominent (5,11). However, only some of the in vitro effective antioxidants, appear to be functional in vivo too (12). In our studies we compared physiological activities of diverse known antioxidants (e. g. Vit. E, C) versus the highly water soluble flavonoid alpha glucosylrutin (AGR). The studies were conducted in vivo on human skin and in vitro using primary cells from biopsies of human skin. In vitro results: 1) AGR can bolster and protect the intracellular thiol level and the mitochondrial membrane potential of primary keratinocytes and fibroblasts against depletion by oxidative stress. 2) AGR deminishes the oxidative stress-induced decline in the rate of DNA-synthesis, -protection and -repair. 3) AGR reduces the level of tyrosine phosphorylation and ERK1/2 activation in primary skin cells challenged by oxidative stressors (H 2 O 2 , UVA). 4) AGR protects primary human skin cells against both, UV-induced reduction in DNA- and hyaluronan- synthesis as well as against UV-induced intracellular hydroperoxide formation. In vivo results: 1) Our studies on normal human skin using UVA-induced ultraweak photon emission measurements (UPE) confirm the antioxidative potential of topical AGR in vivo. 2) After UVA-irradiation in vivo, the phosphorylation of intracellular tyrosine residues and the hydroperoxide levels are significantly enhanced in keratinocytes isolated from donors suffering from polymorphic light eruption (PLE) compared with keratinocytes from healthy donors, but can be reduced even in PLE-skin cells by topical pretreatment with AGR-preparations. 3) Comparative in vivo studies on equimolar ratios of AGR versus Parsol 1789 using reflexion spectrometry give evidence that topical AGR acts predominantly as an antioxidant and not as an UV-filter. 4) Several clinical trials and home in use tests on PLE prophylaxis and UVA-protection of healthy skin showed a significant improvement of the PLE and the UVA-erythema scores at skin sites pretreated with AGR compared with untreated or placebo treated skin sites.


Zhang Zhidong paid great attention to his being incorruptible and self-disciplined in his life.He valued virtue,meritorious service and fame by writing,which reflects that he was honest and clean as a high-rank official.He lived a simple life,was self-disciplined.During his 47 years of officialdom,he did not accumulate any private property and his family was pennyless when he died.He conditioned himself to loyalty and duty and gave personal attention to everything,big or small.He punished the corrupted officials and rewarded the honest and clean ones.He rectified the official system and got rid of malpractices,thus bringing some fresh air to the corrupted official circles.What he did can be an example for combating corruption and building a clean government today.


An initial-rectification adaptive iterative learning control scheme is proposed to solve the angle tracking problem of robot manipulators with input deadzone under nonzero initial errors. Lyapunov approach is utilized to design the controller. First, the initial-rectification auxiliary reference signal is constructed to overcome the obstacle caused by nonzero initial errors during ILC design. Second, adaptive ILC strategy and robust control strategy are adopted for dealing with deadzone nonlinearity. In addition, adaptive learning neural network is applied to approximate for uncertainties. The stability of closed-loop robotic system is rigorously proven by theoretical analysis. In the end, numerical simulation results are provided to verify the effectiveness of the proposed adaptive iterative learning control scheme.


In vitro evaluation of the test fungicides against C. gloeosporioides inciting anthracnose of cowpea revealed that propiconazole (0.1%), flusilazole (0.1%), tebuconazole (0.1%) and carboxin + thiram (0.4%) caused 100% inhibition of the mycelial growth of the pathogen. The in vivo evaluation showed that three rounds of foliar application of flusilazole (0.1%) at 30, 45 and 60 days after seed emergence recorded the lowest disease index (5.60) followed by tebuconazole at 0.1% (8.30). The field evaluation revealed that foliar application of flusilazole or tebuconazole at 0.1% recorded the lowest anthracnose (0.93) index followed by treatment with copper oxychloride (0.2%). The persistence and degradation of fungicide residues indicated that tebuconazole (0.1%) had the shortest waiting period (zero day), indicating its safety to the vegetable.


Generating ultra-wideband pulse is a key technique for subsurface ground penetrating radar. By sharpening the transition time of pulse, the high frequency component can be improved, which contributes to the increase of bandwidth. In this paper, a compact pulse generator based on avalanche transistor and step recovery diode (SRD) is studied. Load resistor in the Gaussian pulse circuit is optimized to increase the pulse amplitude. In addition, the performance of output pulse is studied for different stage of shaping circuit. Experiment results show that transition time of the pulse is reduced by increasing stage of shaping circuit properly. As a result, we demonstrate a pulse with transition time of 200ps, full width at half maximum of 500ps, and amplitude of 43V.


This Master's thesis aimed at investigating comparatively the devices of lexical cohesion in Czech and English sample texts of publicistic style by means of Hoey's methodology for the analysis of lexical patterns in texts. Cohesion, one of the seven standards of textuality, refers to the linkage among the individual elements of a text. One type of these surface-level linkage devices is lexical cohesion, established through the choice of lexicon. Hoey's method of analysis of lexical patterns is primarily aimed as a means for creating abridgements or non-narrative texts. The research used this method as the basis for a comparative analysis of the devices of lexical cohesion in Czech and English columns by Art Buchwald, translated into Czech by Jan Jirak.


The aim of this study was to study the correlation between the Ser447ter (C-G) polymorphisms of the LPL gene and rs9939609 of the FTO gene and obesity in children and adolescents of the Rostov region (Russia). A case-control study examined the relationship between the rs9939609 polymorphisms of the FTO gene and Ser447Ter (S447X) of the LPL gene with obesity in 520 children and adolescents of both sexes aged 3 to 18 years: the main group consisted of 370 obese children and adolescents, and the control group - 150 children and adolescents without obesity. Genotyping of polymorphisms T / A rs9939609 of the FTO gene and C / G Ser447Ter of the LPL gene was performed using PCR- allele-specific primers. Polymorphisms of the FTO rs9939609 and LPL Ser447Ter genes in donor DNA samples were typed by the electrophoretic method using commercial test systems from the Litekh research and production com-pany (Russia). The relationship between the rs9939609 polymorphism of the FTO gene and obesity was revealed, differences (P<0.05) were established between the main and control groups in the frequency of occurrence of the AA genotype (P = 0.0079) and allele A (P = 0.005; OR 0.67; 95% CI 0.51–0.88) of the rs9939609 polymorphism of the FTO gene. Combinations of genotypes with increased and decreased risk of obesity in the child and adolescent population of Rostov-on-Don were determined. Antagonistic rela-tionships between the rs9939609 polymorphisms of the FTO gene and Ser447Ter of the LPL gene are shown. Using the MDR method, combinations of genotypes with an increased and decreased risk of obe-sity in the child and adolescent population of Rostov-on-Don were established.


Precise testing methods have been applied to an experimental study of the effect of the intermediate principal stress σ2 on failure of a granite, a limestone, and a dolomite rock at room temperature. σ2 affects failure in two ways. Strength at failure increases with σ2 by an amount that is proportional to, although smaller than, the amount of the least compression σ3; this effect of σ2 is much more pronounced for brittle than for ductile material. The angle between faults and maximum compression direction is markedly reduced as σ2 is increased from the value σ3 to σ1; this effect is pronounced for both brittle and ductile material.


1. An experiment was carried out to study more precisely by nitrogen balance techniques the intake of digestible crude protein required for maintenance in the mature non-pregnant ewe. 2. Four isocaloric diets supplying adequate energy, approximately 90 kcal/kg W0.73 metabolizable energy daily, and differing in crude protein content were each given to eight individually penned ewes. The diets provided 2.4, 4.9, 7.7 and 9.5 g digestible N per ewe per day. 3. The average weight of the ewes was 57.4 kg. They were rationed according to metabolic body-weight (W0.73) at a rate of approximately 800 g dry matter per 50 kg ewe per day for a 4-week period before N balance studies were carried out over an 8-day collection period. 4. The mean apparent digestibilities of dry matter were 67.3±0.8, 68.1±0.7, 70.9±1.0 and 68.8±0.8 respectively. The apparent digestibilities of N, increasing with increasing N intake, were 30.6±2.1, 46.3±2.1, 58.2±0.6 and 61.5±1.3 respectively. 5. The intake of apparently digested N required for maintenance was calculated in three ways, from the regressions of apparently digested N on N retention or on urinary N and from the underlying relationship between N retention and urinary N. The estimates so obtained were respectively 0.185±0.037, 0.148±0.020 and 0.150±0.020 g N per kg W0.78 per day, corresponding to 1.16, 0.93 and 0.94 g apparently digestible crude protein per kg W0.73 per day. 6. Metabolic faecal N, determined by the extrapolation method, was 0.629±0.047 g/100 g dry matter consumed. 7. The results are discussed in relation to practical feeding standards and other research findings.


Phase diagram calculations are an important topic in material science. They are usually carried out with limited-distribution software packages. This technology report is an introduction to software based phase diagram calculations. Three spreadsheets calculators are presented. The first one plots the Gibbs free energy versus composition for Al–Zn, Li–Mg, and Pelton's fictional A–B alloy. The second one calculates equilibrium phase composition for A–B. The third one calculates the Li–Mg temperature–composition diagram. The coding is reduced to a minimum and calculations are directly accessible to the user. The programs aim to be practice tools to complement instructor's lectures.


Benzothiophene (BT), dibenzothiophene (DBT) and 4,6-dimethlydibenzothiophene (4,6-DMDBT) were extracted from an oil phase to ionic liquid phase, and then oxidized to the corresponding sulfone by the cheap catalyst, N-hydroxyphthalimide (NHPI), using molecular oxygen as the oxidant in one-pot. The system can be recycled 5 times without a significant decrease in desulfurization.


have not mastered phonics by the junior high years then usually another method must be employed. In this proposed method their limited knowledge of phonics will be used with emphasis placed on syllabication. At Sam Houston State University in Huntsville, Texas, Cleb Mattox informally shared a technique of syllabication thatwith some adjustments and clarificationhas permitted much success for secondary reading improvement students, for some regular classes, and for some adults. When I introduce the unit, I remind the students of the difference between


We present an efficient path planning algorithm for an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle surveying a cluttered urban landscape. A special emphasis is on maximizing area surveyed while adhering to constraints of the UAV and partially known and updating environment. A Voronoi bias is introduced in the probabilistic roadmap building phase to identify certain critical milestones for maximal surveillance of the search space. A kinematically feasible but coarse tour connecting these milestones is generated by the global path planner. A local path planner then generates smooth motion primitives between consecutive nodes of the global path based on UAV as a Dubins vehicle and taking into account any impending obstacles. A Markov Decision Process (MDP) models the control policy for the UAV and determines the optimal action to be undertaken for evading the obstacles in the vicinity with minimal deviation from current path. The efficacy of the proposed algorithm is evaluated in an updating simulation environment with dynamic and static obstacles.


AS A COMPLICATION of surgery, the retroperitoneal lymphocele is not an uncommon entity. The incidence following radical pelvic surgery for carcinoma of the cervix has varied between 16% and 49%. 1 This complication has also been found after renal transplantation, the incidence being between 2% and 15%. 2,3 We report a case of retroperitoneal lymphocele as a complication of cancer chemotherapy; to our knowledge, this is the first such report. Report of a Case A 73-year-old woman went to her physician with the chief symptom of malaise. She had generalized adenopathy. Biopsy of an axillary node showed lymphosarcoma, and the patient was referred to Vanderbilt University Medical Center in November 1973. After review of the slides, the diagnosis of follicular, center cell, clonal-type lymphoma (Lukes and Collins) was made. Complete evaluation showed the patient to have stage IV-B disease. The lymphangiogram (Fig 1) showed involvement of the inguinal, iliac, and


Talent cultivation problems are the fundamental problem of the higher education and the key to the education and teaching reform.Reflection on talent cultivation problems by mode thoughts,it woud generate the theory of the talent cultivation mode.Based on the investigation of mode thoughts and reference for the academic achievement,we have combed and analyzed the connotations,elements,essence,characteristics and function of the talent cultivation mode from multiple persperctives,in order to enrich the theory of university talent cultivation and to better guide the practice.


A key exploration risk in the Lower Paleozoic of North Africa is the local absence of source rock facies in the lower Silurian shale. Following the Late Ordovician glaciation, decaying ice sheets left a residual topography that included a series of "underfilled" glacial incisions, carved by ice and/or meltwater. Some models explain the patchy distribution of high TOC shales as deposition in anoxic pools within this topography during Silurian post-glacial transgression. In some parts of North Africa, however, a high TOC shale "blanket" occurs, whereas in other parts a clear connection with fault activity is observed. We present data from Al Kufrah Basin in southern Libya, which includes a continuous section straddling the Mamuniyat (Late Ordovician) and Tanezzuft (Late OrdovicianSilurian) formations respectively. The topmost Mamuniyat Formation comprises glaciogenic sandstones, which pass upward into mixed facies of the Tanezzuft Formation. At its base, the Tanezzuft Formation includes a basal carbonate facies association, comprising bioturbated peloidal micrites and wackestones, bearing fragmented crinoids, bryozoa and orthocones (interpreted as reworked coolwater carbonates deposited under oxygenating conditions). Above, the remainder of the Tanezzuft Formation comprises hummocky cross-bedded and graded sandstone intervals intercalated with shale and siltstone (interpreted as storm influx onto a muddy shelf). These latter deposits, however, are interrupted by several lonestone-bearing intervals (interpreted as ice-rafted debris), a striated pavement (interpreted as glacial in origin), manganese crusts and concretions. The putative glacial deposits occur at the same stratigraphic level as high TOC shales elsewhere in North Africa. Deposition of the manganese concretions is interpreted as the result of a drop in sea level, a result of glaciation, which was accompanied by a fresh water influx, flushing out the potential for anoxia to develop and hence high TOC shales to accumulate. Reference Luning, S., D.K. Lydell, O. Sutcliffe, A. Ait Salem, E. Zanella, J. Craig, and D.A.T. Harpel, 2000, Silurian-Lower Devonian black shales in Morocco: Which are the organically richest horizons?: Journal of Petroleum Geology, v. 23/3, p. 293-311. Lower Silurian Black Shales of North Af i Th R l f Gl i ti th r ca: e o e o ac a on on e Distribution of Source-Rock Quality Facies D.P. Le Heron1, G. Meinhold2,3, A. Page, A2, A. Whitham2, Elgadry M4 , 1Royal Holloway, University of London 2CASP Cambridge University UK , , 3Goettingen University, Germany 4Libyan Petroleum Institute, Libya North Africa and the Saharan basins Algiers 0 500 km l s c o Tunis a


Introduction. In modern systematic reviews, there is a point of view that CYP2C19 polymorphism affects the results of treatment of peptic ulcer, erosive esophagitis and eradication of Helicobacter pylori.Оbjective. To evaluate the effect of CYP2C19 polymorphism on the effectiveness of treatment with rabeprazole at a dose of 20 mg once a day in patients with GERD during 2 and 4 weeks of treatment.Materials and methods. In total, the study included 75 patients with GERD (36 men and 39 women, mean age 41.7 ± 1.5 years). A clinical examination with the completion of standard questionnaires took place during three visits: before the start of treatment, after 2 and after 4 weeks of therapy. Esophagogastroduodenoscopy was performed in all patients before treatment and in patients with esophagitis after 4 weeks of therapy. All patients received rabeprazole at a dose of 20 mg once a day. Genotyping of single nucleotide polymorphisms of CYP2C19 metabolizer genes was carried out by real-time polymerase chain reaction. Ultrarapid, rapid, normal, intermediate and poor CYP2C19 metabolizers have been isolated.Results. Of the 75 patients examined, 8.0% of patients were ultrarapid metabolizers, 30.7% of people were rapid, 49.3% of individuals were normal, 10.7% of persons were intermediate, and 1.3% of patients were poor CYP2C19 metabolizers. Response after 4 weeks of treatment with rabeprazole 20 mg once daily was 94.4% for NERD and 90.5% for erosive esophagitis. In ultrarapid and rapid metabolizers of CYP2C19, a complete response to rabeprazole therapy was registered in 81.3% of NERD patients and in 84.6% of patients with erosive esophagitis.Conclusion. Based on the results of the study, we obtained high efficacy of Razo® at a dose of 20 mg 1 time per day for the treatment of GERD in a group of patients with a predominance of rapid and normal metabolizers of CYP2C19.


In this paper we investigate the factors influencing collaboration in the industries using chemical substances. The collaboration drivers and the partner features essential for enhancing collaboration initiatives in chemical companies, as well as the possible disadvantages of collaboration arrangements, are investigated. A survey study was carried out to examine which drivers and features make the potential shipping partners complement each other. A suggested collaboration approach is set up. By using the approach, decision makers within chemical companies are able to formulate recommendations for how to initiate and further enhance cooperation understandings, on a horizontal as well as on a vertical level. Such collaborative understandings should lead to more sustainable chemical industrial clusters. Safety and security cooperation within and between corporations using chemicals is very important for the social dimension of true sustainable clusters. Strategic safety and security collaboration arrangements may be initiated and/or enhanced taking the findings of this paper into account. Keywords chemicals using industries, safety and security collaboration, survey, sustainable chemical industry Language: en


Background Infertility is one of the most difficult life experiences that a couple might encounter. Infertility as a bio-psycho-social phenomenon, could influence all aspects of life. While paying special attention to the psychological aspects of infertility in couples; many studies have investigated the non-clinical aspects of infertility, however, they rarely have evaluated the psychosocial development of infertile versus fertile men. We aimed to study the effects of infertility on psychosocial development in men. Methods In fact, we designed the study based on "Erikson's theory of psychosocial development". We focused on the relationship between psychosocial development and some self-conceived indices. For this purpose, we divided the participants volunteers into two groups of cases (80 infertile men) and controls (40 fertile men) and asked them to complete a 112 (questions questionnaire based on "self description"). The statistical analysis was performed by SPSS (version 13) using independent t-test, Pearson correlation coefficient and analysis of covariance. A p-value <0.05 was considered significant. Results Data analysis showed significant inter and intra group differences. Infertile and fertile groups showed significant differences in trust, autonomy, generativity and integrity stages (p < 0.05). Infertile intergroup analysis represents us to higher scores in positive than negative stages. Conclusion Infertility as a phenomenon had its own effects on the psychosocial development of infertile men. However, good coping skills are powerful tools to manage these myriad of feelings surrounding infertile men.