The research presented in this paper aims to accelerate the natural science research process by partially automating the execution of experiments using AI-assisted Concept-Change Detection (C-CD), e.g., for monitoring systems and studying biodiversity and ecosystem functions. The purpose of C-CD is to detect concept changes, also known as concept drift, that may be relevant to the study or ecosystem state. For example, in intertidal marine ecosystems, the event of sudden flooding can lead to dramatic changes in biodiversity. It could also be of scientific interest to take sensor samples more frequently in the period leading up to such events. The paper proposes an architecture for C-CD to customize AI-based analysis of sensor data streams. Furthermore, the paper implements portions of the architecture and is applied on sensor data from the Spiekeroog Coastal Observatory (SCO) as a feasibility study. The study demonstrates C-CD's ability to detect anomalies that are either of scientific or technical interest to the operation and exploration activities of SCO.


This work presents a new application for the Hierarchical Function Expansion Method for the solution of the Navier-Stokes equations for compressible fluids in two dimensions and in high velocity. This method is based on the finite elements method using the Petrov-Galerkin formulation, know as SUPG (Streamline Upwind Petrov-Galerkin), applied with the expansion of the variables into hierarchical functions. To test and validate the numerical method proposed as well as the computational program developed simulations are performed for some cases whose theoretical solutions are known. These cases are the following: continuity test, stability and convergence test, temperature step problem, and several oblique shocks. The objective of the last cases is basically to verify the capture of the shock wave by the method developed. The results obtained in the simulations with the proposed method were good both qualitatively and quantitatively when compared with the theoretical solutions. This allows concluding that the objectives of this work are reached.


PurposeThe purpose of this study is to explore how Swedish police officers describe occupational knowledge. By learning more about how officers describe occupational knowledge, the study gives more insight about the types of information that they may be more likely to adopt in their occupational tasks.Design/methodology/approachIn this study, the author conducted 27 semi-structured interviews with Swedish police officers. I asked officers several open-ended questions about their everyday work life and professional experience.FindingsSwedish officers divide knowledge into two categories, which are theoretical knowledge and practical knowledge. Theoretical knowledge is learned in the academy and is described as "black and white," meaning that it is considered static and not applicable to what happens out in patrol. Practical knowledge is learned in the field from colleagues.Research limitations/implicationsPolice officers around the world have a wide range of requirements and training to become police officers. However, empirical studies have found that officers tend to use different types of information when performing policing tasks. Depending on how information is perceived and is taught, officers may respond differently to different types of knowledge, due to their evaluation of the validity of the knowledge.Originality/valueThe findings in this study support previous empirical studies on the area of policing and knowledge in two ways; first, this study argues that there is a categorization of knowledge among police officers. Second, this study suggests that officers view one occupational knowledge type as more theoretical and one as more practical.


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Citrus stubborn disease is a serious economic problem in California, in Southwestern United States, and in other arid citrus areas of the world. Knowledge of the disease has rapidly increased since 1969 when a mycoplasma-like organism was found by electron microscopy in thin sections of diseased leaves. In 1970, a mycoplasma, now named Spiroplasma citri, was cultured from diseased citrus tissue. Further research has revealed that two leafhoppers (see California Agriculture, November 1973) can transmit the stubborn disease organism. Cultured spiroplasma have been fed or injected into these insects and they, in turn, have transmitted stubborn to healthy citrus seedlings. More recently (see California Agriculture, February 1975), one of the insects, Scaphytopius nitridus, fed on diseased citrus trees was shown to transmit a severe disease to healthy Vinca rosea L., periwinkle plants, in controlled greenhouse experiments. This information prompted our investigating the possibility of natural spread of stubborn into periwinkle plants.


The folding biology common to all three kingdoms of life (Archaea, Bacteria, and Eukarya) is proteostasis. The proteostasis network (PN) functions as a "cloud" to generate, protect, and degrade the proteome. Whereas microbes (Bacteria, Archaea) have a single compartment, Eukarya have numerous subcellular compartments.We examine evidence that Eukarya compartments use coat, tether, and fusion (CTF) membrane trafficking components to form an evolutionarily advanced arm of the PN that we refer to as the "trafficking PN" (TPN). We suggest that the TPN builds compartments by generating a mosaic of integrated cargo-specific trafficking signatures (TRaCKS). TRaCKS control the temporal and spatial features of protein-folding biology based on the Anfinsen principle that the local environment plays a critical role in managing protein structure. TPN-generated endomembrane compartments apply a "quinary" level of structural control to modify the secondary, tertiary, and quaternary structures defined by the primary polypeptide-chain sequence. The development of Anfinsen compartments provides a unifying foundation for understanding the purpose of endomembrane biology and its capacity to drive extant Eukarya function and diversity.


This thesis examines the impact of the democratic promises of Internet communication technologies, social, and participatory media on the practice of public archaeology. It is focused on work within archaeological organisations in the UK in commercial archaeology, higher education, local authority planning departments and community settings, as well the voluntary planning departments and community settings, as well the voluntary archaeology sector archaeology sector . This work has taken an innovative approach to the subject matter through its use of a Grounded Theory method for data collection and analysis, and the use of a combination of online surveys, case studies and email questionnaires in order to address the following issues: the provision of authoritative archaeological information online; barriers to participation; policy and organisational approaches to evaluating success and archiving; community formation and activism, and the impact of digital inequalities and literacies. This thesis is the first overarching study into the use of participatory media in archaeology. It is an important exploration of where and how the profession is creating and managing digital platforms, and the expanding opportunities for networking and sharing information within the discipline, against a backdrop of rapid advancement in the use of Internet technologies within society. This work has made significant contributions to debates on the practice and impact of public archaeology. It has shown that archaeologists do not yet fully understand the complexities of Internet use and issues of digital literacy, the impact of audience demographics or disposition towards participation in online projects. It has shown that whilst recognition of democratic participation is not, on the whole, undertaken through a process of actively acknowledging responses to archaeological information, there remains potential for participatory media to support and accommodate these ideals. This work documents a period of great change within the practice of archaeology in the UK, and concludes with the observation that it is vital that the discipline undertake research into online audiences for archaeological information if we are to create sustainable digital public archaeologies.


Human skin fibroblasts were incubated in the presence of 4-methylumbelliferyl-beta-D-xyloside (Xyl-MU). The culture medium was recovered and Xyl-MU derivatives which were initiated by the Xyl-MU acting as a primer were purified. As a result, a novel Xyl-MU derivative was isolated, in addition to previously reported Xyl-MU derivatives such as glycosaminoglycan-MU, Gal-Gal-Xyl-MU, Gal-Xyl-MU, SA-Gal-Xyl-MU, Xyl-Xyl-MU, GlcA-Xyl-MU, and sulfate-GlcA-Xyl-MU. This Xyl-MU derivative was subjected to carbohydrate composition analysis, enzyme digestion, ion-spray mass spectrometric analysis, and Smith degradation. The results indicated that it was sulfate- O -3-Xyl-MU. When Xyl-MU was incubated with [35S]PAPS using a homogenate prepared from the same cultured skin fibroblasts, [35S]sulfate- O -3-Xyl-MU was produced. Moreover, when Xyl-MU was incubated with UDP-[3H]Gal, [3H]galactose was transferred to Xyl-MU, but when sulfate- O -3-Xyl-MU was incubated with UDP-[3H]Gal, [3H]galactose was not transferred. These results indicate that chain elongation from Xyl-MU is inhibited by sulfation of Xyl-MU, and that Xyl-MU sulfation is involved in the control of Xyl-MU-initiated glycosaminoglycan biosynthesis.


Despite massive investments of management time and money, innovation remains a frustrating pursuit in many companies. Innovation initiatives frequently fail, and successful innovators have a hard time sustaining their performance—as Polaroid, Nokia, Sun Microsystems, Yahoo, Hewlett-Packard, and countless others have found. Why is it so hard to build and maintain the capacity to innovate? The reasons go much deeper than the commonly cited cause: a failure to execute. The problem with innovation improvement efforts is rooted in the lack of an innovation strategy.


Risk Recognition is an important part in shipyard project risk management. The purpose of this paper is to explain how to identify risks by means of AHP. Firstly, we analyzed briefly the superiority of AHP in shipyard project risk Recognition; secondly, expounded the basic steps of risk Recognition based on AHP in shipyard project investment; then we proposed the principle and tips of applying AHP in identifying project risks by demonstrating a case of shipbuilding base. To prove the validity of AHP, we have identified the risk factors of the Shipyard project that mentioned in the case above, and have also calculated the influence weights taxis of dominating risk factors to the general risk.
Key words: Shipyard Project Investment; AHP; Risk Recognition; Risk Factors


The design of a new three-state myoelectric control system is presented . This controller determines its operating state from the initial rate of increase of the myoelectric signal, and the concept is realized in great measure through digital logic techniques . Proportional control of both active states (same dynamic range) is a unique feature of the controller: A microcomputer was interfaced in a simple way with myoelectric potentials to simulate the three-state controller described and to simulate various other state-determined uontrol methods (some multifunctional) . This was found to be a valuable method of evaluating control schemes without building the actual devices.


Predictive coding is a model of visual processing which suggests that the brain is a generative model of input, with prediction error serving as a signal for both learning and attention. In this work, we show how the equivariant capsules learned by a Topographic Variational Autoen-coder can be extended to fit within the predictive coding framework by treating the slow rolling of capsule activations as the forward prediction operator. We demonstrate quantitatively that such an extension leads to improved sequence modeling compared with both topographic and non-topographic baselines, and that the resulting forward predictions are qualitatively more coherent with the provided partial input transformations.


The research focus in aerial robotics is shifting from contactless inspection toward interaction and manipulation, with the number of potential applications rapidly increasing [1]. Eventually, aerial manipulators, i.e., unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) equipped with manipulators, will likely take on hazardous maintenance tasks now performed by humans. For this to happen, aerial manipulators must be able to perform all the different operations required in these maintenance routines.


Overview: This article investigates the complex and controversial exclusion of real world law from virtual worlds. By including examples of several documented unethical acts that have occurred in virtual worlds, this article suggests that real world law should be carried into virtual spaces in order to protect users. Some forms of protection discussed within this essay include the transfer of property rights and consequences of legal prosecution in order to deter unethical behaviors. Finally, this article includes benefits of adopting these strategies, while also acknowledging the potential negatives. Imagine a world where you can be perfect; a world where you can be whoever you want, whenever you want. Imagine a space you can retreat to in order to escape the pressures of the real world, achieve a new identity, and interact with a whole new population. Virtual worlds provide all of these ideal opportunities to their users. In fact, over 300 million users had registered accounts for a virtual world, according to data reported in 2008 (Waterburn 2009, 2.) As we move even further into a technological era, one can assume that this number has most likely increased as well. With such a large user base, it would be ideal for virtual worlds to be safe, enjoyable places where users can enjoy and be immersed in their experience. However, users can have their experience spoiled by others. Much like the real world, virtual worlds serve as a place where many unethical practices occur. Some of the most well-known unethical occurrences demonstrated in virtual worlds are basic harassment, extramarital affairs, sexual harassment, and virtual theft. Although many doubt the seriousness of these practices because they are not committed in the real world, their impact is felt, and has a serious influence on other users. However, the topic of unethical events occurring within virtual worlds has generated some debate in terms of liability and punishment. Some believe that if these unethical practices are not occurring in the real world, then they are not a real world problem. Others argue that the users that witness and are sometimes victims of these practices are real people, and therefore the acts should receive real consequences.


For many, "searching" is considered a mostly solved problem. In fact, for text processing, this belief is factually based. The problem is that most "real world" search applications involve "complex documents", and such applications are far from solved. Complex documents, or less formally, "real world documents", comprise of a mixture of images, text, signatures, tables, etc, and are often available only in scanned hardcopy formats. Search systems for such document collections are currently unavailable. We describe our efforts at building a complex document information processing prototype. This prototype integrates "point solution" (mature) technologies, such as document readability enhancement, OCR capability, signature matching and handwritten word spotting techniques, search and mining approaches, among others, to yield a system capable of searching "real world documents". The described prototype demonstrates the adage that "the whole is greater than the sum of its parts". Our complex document benchmark development efforts are likewise presented. Having described the global approach, we describe some point solutions which we developed over the years. These include an image enhancer, an Arabic stemmer, and a natural language source integration fabric called the Intranet Mediator. Bio: Ophir Frieder holds the Robert L. McDevitt, K.S.G., K.C.H.S. and Catherine H. McDevitt L.C.H.S. Chair in Computer Science and Information Processing and is Chair of the Department of Computer Science at Georgetown University. He holds a courtesy membership in the Georgetown University Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center. He is a Fellow of the AAAS, ACM, and IEEE.


This volume covers all unintentional injuries. One section is devoted to motor vehicles. Here it is reported that between 1912 and 1998, motor-vehicle deaths per 10,000 registered vehicles were reduced 94%, from 33 to about 2. In 1912, there were 3,100 fatalities when the number of registered vehicles totaled only 950,000. In 1998, there were 41,200 fatalities, but registrations soared to more than 215 million. This section presents motor-vehicle unintentional injury statistics in the following categories: deaths due to motor-vehicle accidents, 1998; type of motor-vehicle accident; estimating motor-vehicle accident costs; state legislation; speed; alcohol; occupant protection; deaths and death rates by day and night; deaths and mileage death rates by month; motor-vehicle accidents by time of day and day of week; type of motor vehicle; school bus transportation, 1997; age of driver; sex of driver; improper driving; motor-vehicle deaths by state, United States, 1995-1998; pedestrians; pedalcycles; work zone deaths and injuries; emergency vehicles involved in accidents; fleet accident rates by type of vehicle; motor-vehicle deaths and rates, United States, 1913-1998; motor-vehicle deaths by type of accident, United States, 1913-1998; motor-vehicle deaths by age, United States, 1913-1998; and motor-vehicle death rates by age, United States, 1913-1998.


The paper presents results from a simulation model of the IrDA advanced infrared (AIr) MAC protocol for nondirected multiple access infrared wireless communication. The MAC protocol is CSMA/CA based with robust RTS/CTS medium reservation which deals with 'hidden nodes'. Throughput performance is analysed in relation to protocol parameter settings. In particular, the effect of the CAS (collision avoidance slot) window size parameter is examined in relation to the data burst size and network size. The effect of a proposed CAS window size dynamic adjustment algorithm is also examined. The results are validated by comparison with those from an analytical model.


Background: As of January 2013, CMS required hospitals to submit Stroke CORE Measure data on all discharged patients in order to be eligible for full reimbursement in Federal Fiscal Year (FFY) 2014. Failure to do so results in a payment reduction to hospitals. Furthermore, rapid-change-cycle and continuous quality improvement programs suggest that a rapid communication feedback approach can improve compliance with evidence-based practice. To meet impending data-reporting and fiscal challenges, the 5 campus hospital organization implemented strategies in Aug-Dec 2012 to: reduce labor costs related to stroke core measure reporting without increasing risk to full CMS reimbursement; and decrease the FY 2012 lag time between patient discharge, and communication of core measure compliance to clinicians. The purpose of this study was to determine if: (1) savings in labor dollars were achieved; (2) risk of CMS payment reduction did not increase; and (3) reduction in time from discharge to internal reporting was achieved. Methods: Minutes/case abstraction of CORE Measures were directly measured for all inpatient stroke cases discharged in October, 2012/60 minutes. Number of hours was multiplied by the cost of labor/hour to establish a labor cost/case baseline. Time/case was reassessed in April, 2013. Successful submission of data to CMS Jan-March, 2013 was determiner of risk. Retrospective review of May -July, 2012 was used to establish a comparative baseline (equal to 65 days). Days from discharge until data resulted to clinician were audited from January-March, 2013 using quality control tool. Goal was set at 21 days or less. Results: In the time period analyzed, the labor cost related to time spent abstracting each case was reduced by 20%. Risk of failure to follow CMS public reporting rules was not increased, and the first quarter (Jan-March 2013) results were submitted/accepted by CMS with no quality control issues. During the time period reviewed, the days from patient discharge to internal reporting of compliance results was reduced from 65 to 21 or less. Conclusion: The process improvement strategies achieved all goals and clinical improvements during the period reviewed. The sustainability of these results is the subject of on-going, quarterly reassessment.


The role of acidity in digestion depends on the H-ion concentration rather than on the itratable acidity. In experiments with normal breast-fed infants, Marriott and Davidson 1 came to the conclusion that optimum gastric acidity was reached one and one-half hours after feeding and was maintained for one hour. The range of H-ion concentration during the period of optimum gastric digestion was found to be from pH 3.5 to 5, the average being p H 3.75. With an increase in the age of infants there is a gradual increase in the H-ion concentration, while disease, malnutrition and infections generally lower the H-ion concentration attained in the stomach. Cow's milk has a relatively great buffer capacity over the range of H-ion concentration concerned in digestion, and therefore requires a relatively high gastric secretion as compared with that necessary when infants are breast fed. 1 Attempts have been made to modify cow's


Clerical religious authority in early nineteenth-century New England was transformed by the landmark events of the Unitarian schism of 1815 and the disestablishment of the Congregational Church in Connecticut in 1818. As I have argued elsewhere, both William Ellery Channing and Lyman Beecher strove during this period to promote a new discourse of sermonic authority. (1) As Channing asserted, "the mass of the people" in America at this time were "distinguished by possessing means of improvement, of self-culture, possessed nowhere else"; self-culture as a national phenomenon is both "the care which every man owes to himself, to the unfolding and perfecting of his nature" and the communicating of that process, inasmuch as "[a] man was not made to shut up his mind in itself; but to give it voice and to exchange it for other minds" (2:367). Self-culture thus is not meant ultimately to isolate the individual and his authority, but to connect with others; and the language of self-culture should be motivated toward that same communitarian goal, not just for the improvement of the soul but for the improvement of society. Yet Beecher, for his part, did not want his authority as spiritual leader decentered in the way that disestablishment sought to do. Under the design of "benevolent" reform societies, he looked to create a different spiritual community with himself (and others like him) as the leader. As early as his 1812 address on the "Reformation of Morals," Beecher was calling for a new public discourse of religious authority, a community rhetoric through volunteerism: "The friends of good morals and good government have it in their power to create a public opinion, which nothing can resist" (26). Both Channing and Beecher, in short, understood the battle for the souls and minds of Americans to be a rhetorical and literary one. Dialogic, literary discourse, Channing argued, is wrongly perceived as "impractical"; it is, in fact, potentially the most practical language for the education and improvement of self and society. Meanwhile, in the literary marketplace, historical romances coming across the Atlantic vis a vis Sir Walter Scott were being adapted to American settings. Such romances provided during this age of rapid national growth and development the paragon of a "simpler" past--a total, idealized society within the pages of a single text--giving readers the illusory notion that widespread social reformation was within reach. Although such romances enjoyed significant popularity during the 1810s and 1820s, the most widely distributed and potentially influential genre of the period was the religious tract. The American Tract Society, for example, printed 470,000 copies of 77 tracts in 1823 alone (Ninth Annual Report 13). Tracts, usually four or five and rarely more than twenty pages long, instructed through tales of self-improvement involving religious conversion. While David Reynolds has distinguished between "conventional" and "subversive" types of New England antebellum reform writing (57), I would like to complicate this division by arguing that "conventional" and "subversive" approaches to reform literature were integrated through the particular discursive choices made by orthodox evangelical or neo-Calvinist writers. Religious organizations employed unprecendented publishing technology to extend the power of the pulpit, but not without risk. The circulation of these texts was seen by tract societies as a way to manipulate what they perceived to be the passive mind of the reader. Yet in many instances mass circulation had exactly the opposite effect--it validated individual readings and interpretation. These effects were in some ways determined by the rhetoric involved. Tract societies, in their attempts to guide the self-culture of their readers, employed what Mikhail Bakhtin has termed "authoritative discourse" in an attempt to diminish the potential of subversive or "internally persuasive discourse. …


Major advances have been made in understanding the epidemiology and biology of the hepatitis B virus. Two particular developments--hepatitis B immune globulin and a new hepatitis B virus vaccine--are of special interest to obstetricians, gynecologists, and others who provide health care to women. The appropriate use of hepatitis B immune globulin and hepatitis vaccine can prevent hepatitis B virus infections.


Anthropometry is an objective tool serving to evaluate the shape of the face and reveal changes observed in the subject over time, or among different sub- jects, analyzing quantitative and qualitative differences. It also permits the study of normal and abnormal growth, diagnosis of genetic or acquired malformations, plan- ning and evaluation of surgical and/or orthodontic therapy, and verification of the treatment results by analyzing, measuring and comparing the face shape. Among 3D digitization technologies, photogrammetry shows great promise because it is a low cost, biocompatible, safe and non-invasive methodology, but it still suffers from a need for considerable human intervention. In previous research, the Authors illus- trated a new approach based on a 3-Cameras photogrammetric system. After several tests, conducted to verify the validity of this methodology, the present experimen- tal study was carried out using a re-engineered photogrammetric scanning system to obtain landmark-models of human faces, and comparing these results with those achieved with laser scanning, applied to a dummy face (in order to eliminate errors caused by breathing movements in a living subject). Two different, specifically de- signed experimental 3D photogrammetric setups have been developed and tested to enhance the performance. This research demonstrates the potential of low-cost pho- togrammetry for medical digitization; further research will be addressed to testing the use of the scanning system on humans to validate its clinical performance.


One of the dynamics of transformational change which the study sought to establish within the offender correctional environment was the notion of resistance to change, which forms part of the human dimension of transformational change. This paper presents empirical evidence gathered from the Correctional Centres of the South African Department of Correctional Services in the Province of KwaZulu-Natal on resistance-to-change behavior displayed by the employees of Correctional Services, namely Correctional Officials regarding the fundamental culture change from the punishment-oriented philosophy to the rehabilitation-driven philosophy in terms of the treatment of sentenced offenders (herein referred to as DCS change). Inadequate empirical evidence on the significant role that the human elements and dynamics play in the success or failure of transformational change efforts has motivated the authors to embark on an empirical study which sought to establish whether the paradigm shift from the punitive approach to the rehabilitative approach within the offender correctional environment in South Africa was characterised by the resistance-to-change behavior on the part of correctional officials. The study was significant, particularly if one considers the fact that organisational change scholars (though there are still few who have researched on the subject) have put forward an argument that the high failure rate in the implementation of transformational change interventions is attributed to the neglect of the human factor during the planning and implementation phases of the transformational change management process. Change and transformation strategists, change and transformation implementers, change and transformation agents, change and transformation recipients, organisation development practitioners, and managers in general in both the public and private sector globally and in South Africa in particular will benefit from the study, particular if one considers the fact that transformational change interventions are currently being implemented across the South African public service as part of the government's agenda of reconstructing and developing the South African society. An extensive literature study on resistance to change was undertaken as part of contextualising the resistance-to-change behavior within the Department of Correctional Services and South Africa in general. The literature study was followed by the empirical study which focused on gathering data from correctional officials through utilising a survey questionnaire. The empirical findings revealed that there were indeed elements of resistance-to-change behavior on the part of correctional officials insofar as the DCS change was concerned. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2014.v5n3p548


Although the interferon (IFN) signaling pathway is a key host mechanism to restrict infection of a diverse range of viral pathogens, its unrestrained activity either at baseline or in the context of an immune response can result in host cell damage and injury. Here, we used a genome-wide CRISPR-Cas9 screen and identified the DNA binding protein Barrier-to-autointegration factor 1 (Banf1) as a modulator of basal cell-intrinsic immunity. A loss of Banf1 expression resulted in higher level of cytosolic double-stranded DNA at baseline, which triggered IFN-stimulated gene expression via a cGAS-STING-IRF3 axis that did not require type I IFN or STAT1 signaling. Our experiments define a regulatory network in which Banf1 limits basal inflammation by preventing self DNA accumulation in the cytosol. ABSTRACT Although the pathogen recognition receptor pathways that activate cell-intrinsic antiviral responses are well delineated, less is known about how the host regulates this response to prevent sustained signaling and possible immune-mediated damage. Using a genome-wide CRISPR-Cas9 screening approach to identify host factors that modulate interferon-stimulated gene (ISG) expression, we identified the DNA binding protein Barrier-to-autointegration factor 1 (Banf1), a previously described inhibitor of retrovirus integration, as a modulator of basal cell-intrinsic immunity. Ablation of Banf1 by gene editing resulted in chromatin activation near host defense genes with associated increased expression of ISGs, including Oas2, Rsad2 (viperin), Ifit1, and ISG15. The phenotype in Banf1-deficient cells occurred through a cGAS-, STING-, and IRF3-dependent signaling axis, was associated with reduced infection of RNA and DNA viruses, and was reversed in Banf1 complemented cells. Confocal microscopy and biochemical studies revealed that a loss of Banf1 expression resulted in higher level of cytosolic double-stranded DNA at baseline. Our study identifies an undescribed role for Banf1 in regulating the levels of cytoplasmic DNA and cGAS-dependent ISG homeostasis and suggests possible therapeutic directions for promoting or inhibiting cell-intrinsic innate immune responses. IMPORTANCE Although the interferon (IFN) signaling pathway is a key host mechanism to restrict infection of a diverse range of viral pathogens, its unrestrained activity either at baseline or in the context of an immune response can result in host cell damage and injury. Here, we used a genome-wide CRISPR-Cas9 screen and identified the DNA binding protein Barrier-to-autointegration factor 1 (Banf1) as a modulator of basal cell-intrinsic immunity. A loss of Banf1 expression resulted in higher level of cytosolic double-stranded DNA at baseline, which triggered IFN-stimulated gene expression via a cGAS-STING-IRF3 axis that did not require type I IFN or STAT1 signaling. Our experiments define a regulatory network in which Banf1 limits basal inflammation by preventing self DNA accumulation in the cytosol.


Noncompetitive inhibition, a type of allosteric regulation, is a specific type of enzyme inhibition characterized by an inhibitor binding to an allosteric site resulting in decreased efficacy of the enzyme. An allosteric site is simply a site that differs from the active site- where the substrate binds. Noncompetitive inhibition differs from other types of inhibition, such as competitive, uncompetitive, and mixed-type inhibition. In noncompetitive inhibition, the inhibitor binds at the allosteric site independently of substrate binding; meaning the inhibitor shares the same affinity for both enzyme and enzyme-substrate complex. This activity differentiates noncompetitive inhibition from uncompetitive inhibition, in which an inhibitor binds only to the enzyme-substrate complex. Upon inhibitor binding to the enzyme or enzyme-substrate complex, the enzyme is prevented from forming its product. The resulting decrease in enzyme activity is independent of substrate concentration as the inhibitor does not compete with the substrate for active site binding. Noncompetitive inhibition reduces the maximal rate of an enzyme's catalyzed reaction while leaving the affinity of the enzyme for its substrate unchanged.


Rax (Rx) genes encode paired-type homeodomain-containing transcription factors pre-sent in virtually all metazoan groups. In vertebrates, studies in fish, amphibian, chick and mouse models have revealed that these genes play important roles in the development of structures lo-cated at the anterior portion of the central nervous system, in particular the eyes, the hypothala-mus and the pituitary gland. In addition, human patients with eye and brain defects carry muta-tions in the two human Rax paralogues, RAX and RAX2. Here, we review work done in the last years on Rax genes, focusing especially on the function that mouse Rax and its zebrafish homo-logue, rx3, play in hypothalamic and pituitary development. Work on both of these model organ-isms indicate that Rax genes are necessary for the patterning, growth and differentiation of the hypothalamus, in particular the dorso-anterior hypothalamus, where they effect their action by controlling expression of the secreted signalling protein, Sonic hedgehog (Shh). In addition, Rax/rx3 mutations disturb the development of the pituitary gland, mimicking phenotypes ob-served in human subjects carrying mutations in the RAX gene. Thus, along with their crucial role in eye morphogenesis, Rax genes play a conserved role in the development of the hypothalamus and adjacent structures in the vertebrate clade.


To prevent further incidences of human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1), pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) is effective at inhibiting infection in high-risk populations; however, PrEP efficacy is correlated with adherence. Currently, the only approved PrEP regimen requires taking daily pills. To improve adherence, rilpivirine (RPV), a non-nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitor approved for antiretroviral therapy, has been developed into an injectable long-acting nanoparticle formula (RPV LA). RPV LA provides a depot of drug for sustained release and monthly dosing instead of daily pills. A concern with using approved antiretroviral drugs for both therapy and PrEP is the selection of drug-resistant mutations that may confer cross-resistance to multiple drugs. This issue has public health relevance, as individuals with cross-resistant mutations will have limited therapy options and could transmit drug-resistant virus to others. To study HIV-1 resistance to RPV in the context of PrEP, we treated macaques and humanized mice with RPV LA and characterized selection of drug-resistant virus and the ability to prevent mucosal transmission of drug-resistant HIV-1, respectively. We found that RPV LA monotherapy in macaques selected for transient low-level RPV-resistant mutations. We also found that RPV LA prevented vaginal transmission of HIV-1 with low- but not high-level resistance in a concentration dependent manner. Similar to macaques, we found no evidence of consistent resistance selection in breakthrough infections in mice. Together, these animal models indicate the risk of resistance selection by RPV LA is low; however, the in vivo protective concentration of RPV LA should be better defined before Phase 3 clinical trials to measure efficacy. To counter HIV-1 drug resistance, new antiretroviral compounds must be developed. We studied three experimental RPV analogs and found that one compound selected for a novel combination of two mutations in reverse transcriptase. Together the mutations conferred cross-resistance to all approved NNRTIs; however, hypersusceptibility to several non-NNRTI drugs was observed. This indicates that the analog has a novel interaction with HIV-1 reverse transcriptase that could be exploited to design better antiretroviral compounds.


1 Question-Answering systems enable users to retrieve answers to factual questions from various kinds of knowledge sources, but do not address how to respond cooperatively. We present InK, an initial inquiry system for RDF knowledge graphs that aims to return relevant responses, even when an answer cannot be found. It assembles knowledge relevant to the entities mentioned in the question without translating the input question into a query language. A user study indicates responses are found to be intelligible and relevant. Evaluation of questions with known answers gives high recall of 0.70 averaged on three QA datasets.


ABSTRACT In this study, a Turkish lignite (the Konya-Ilgın lignite) was used to study its drying characteristics in a fixed-bed dryer. The drying experiments were conducted with coarse lignite particles for utilization in the heating sector. In this study, the effects of the drying-air temperature and velocity were investigated. The particle sizes inside the bed were kept constant in the experiments, which was different from the previous works cited in the literature. The results showed that the drying-air temperature and velocity significantly influence the drying process. The drying time was reduced by increasing the air temperature and velocity. Additionally, drying of Konya-Ilgın lignite did not show an explicit constant-drying-rate stage. It showed the falling-drying-rate stage only despite containing more than 50% moisture by weight. This situation is different from most of the studies in the coal-drying literature.


Abstract Over the past three decades, Transnational Production Regimes (TPRs) have become the main source of technical and regulatory knowledge for Southeast Asia corporations. Typically TPRs transfer knowledge from lead firms located in the industrial North to supplier firms located in Southeast Asia. Regulatory knowledge transferred through TPRs largely bypasses Southeast Asian laws and legal institutions to directly influence the behavior of supplier firms. Although socio-economic studies show that TPRs are responsible for generating much wealth creation in the region, they hardly register in the socio-legal literature. Drawing on ethnographic studies conducted in Vietnam, this paper will attempt to explain why different types of TPRs produce different regulatory responses in Vietnamese firms. Preliminary findings suggest differences in the way that regulatory knowledge transmitted through Northeast Asian and Euro-American TPRs is absorbed and integrated into the organisational fabric of Vietnamese firms. They also shed light on two well-documented phenomena in Vietnam. In conclusion the paper will argue that TPRs displace state commercial laws and are partially responsible for the slow progress of conventional law and development projects in changing regulatory practices. It will contend that the different kinds of TPRs generate regulatory pluralism and the uneven application of state law in different business sectors.


Nano-structured materials attract a growing attention due to their superior mechanical and physical properties. Such properties are inherently related to the unique structure which is controlled at the nano-scale. In the early stage of their development, the structural characterization of nano-materials was limited to the average grain/particle size. However, nano-grains/particles form stochastic populations with diverse size and shape. The recent experimental and theoretical results show that in addition to the average size, size diversity of grains/particles has a significant effect on the properties of nano-materials. This rationalizes more advanced description of the structures of nano-materials. Advanced microscopic methods are now available to image microstructure of nano-materials, e.g., HRSTEM and AFM. The ultra-high resolution images can be efficiently processed to obtain quantitative description of the nano-grains/particles. Examples are shown how such a description can be used for optimizing the microstructures of modern engineering nano-materials.


The use of nanostructured heterojunctions has been a promising option for hindering the charge recombination and thus enhancing the photocatalytic performance of catalysts. Here we present a simple strategy to hierarchically grow heterostructures using a hydrothermal treatment route. A buffer SnO2 film was produced by a sol–gel derived method, resulting in a film of approximately 100 nm composed of 5–10 nm nanoparticles. X-ray diffraction and scanning electron microscopy revealed preferential growth of the nanorod-like structures along the c-axis perpendicular to the SnO2 film, with an average nanorod diameter and length of approximately 160 nm and 1.5 μm, respectively. The photoluminescence spectra of ZnO–SnO2 revealed a reduction in UV emission compared to individual ZnO nanorods, indicating that the recombination of the photogenerated carriers was inhibited in the heterojunction. This behavior was confirmed by evaluating the photocatalytic performance of such films against methylene blue degradation, showing that the as-prepared ZnO–SnO2 heterojunction was superior to the individual semiconductors, ZnO and SnO2.


Ellis-van Creveld syndrome (EVCS) is a rare autosomal recessive disorder characterized by a variable spectrum of clinical findings. Classical EVC syndrome comprises a tetrad of clinical manifestations of chondrodystrophy, polydactyly, ectodermal dysplasia, and cardiac defects. A 8 years old female child presented with history of breathlessness on exertion has disproportionate short stature, polydactyly, hydratic ectodermal dysplasia suggestive of EVCS. Echocardiographic examination revealed common atrium with mild pulmonary hypertension.


Using Enterprise Survey data, this study describes the characteristics of current Venezuelan firms the survivors of one of the deepest economic contractions of modern historyacross different dimensions, such as access to infrastructure services, firms investment and financing, labor and skills, foreign trade, the legal environment, and firms innovation and performance. The study identifies the main challenges faced by the surviving firms (notably: macroeconomic and political instability, unreliability of basic services, lack of credit, and migration), while identifying some of the opportunities for these firms to exploit if a comprehensive recovery strategy for the country were to be implemented. In this sense, I find that the representative Venezuelan survivor firm has managed to internationalize through several channels (foreign ownership, exports, and international quality certifications), as well as to match skills with current business and market demands and keep innovating. The study also briefly analyzes some of the traditional determinants of (labor) productivity at the firm level, bringing the most interesting aspects to the fore so they can be explored further in more topic-focused research.


Inhibition by Zn(2+) of iron uptake by apoferritin at very low substrate concentrations is shown to be competitive. It is proposed that Zn(2+) competes with Fe(2+) for sites on the protein at which the oxidation of Fe(2+) is catalysed. Interpretation of titration data suggests there are two independent classes of binding site for Zn(2+) and several other cations. Sites in one such class are probably on the external surface of the apoferritin molecule. The catalytic binding sites are presumed to be internal and may involve histidine or possibly cysteine as ligands.


5 brands of washing powders and a brand of local soap made in Nigeria were tested for toxicity to cercariae of the Nigerian strain of S. mansoni. The tests revealed that all washing soaps were super-toxic to cercariae at high concentrations, with soap bars being comparatively less toxic. The detergents killed all cercariae instantly at 250-4000 ppm while soap bars achieved the same effect between 3000-4000 ppm. At lower concentration 25-100 ppm, the detergents required less than 60 min to kill 100% of the cercariae while soap bars required less than 12 h. The 12 hours LC 50 and LC 90 for Omo (detergent) and local soap were determined. Also the effects of sub-lethal concentrations 1.25-10 ppm on the infectivity of cercariae in mice were evaluated. These tests revealed that the treatment suppressed infectivity and that the degree of suppression increased with increase in the sub-lethal concentration, 85.4% at 10 ppm as compared to 42.8% at 1.25 ppm.


Kant's deduction of the categorical imperative is the answer to the following
question: "How is a categorical imperative possible?" The answer
is given in subsection 4 (Sec. 4) of chapter three of the Groundwork.
It is impossible to understand this answer, and hence impossible
to understand Kant's deduction of the moral law, without taking into
account the overall context of Groundwork III (GMS III). However,
here I can only sketch the overall structure of GMS III, and therefore
only present a sketch of what I call Kant's thesis of analyticity.1 This
thesis is developed in Sec. 1 of GMS III; however, it appears time and
again in GMS III, and it deserves special attention (part 1). Part 2,
then, offers a close reading and analysis of Kant's deduction.


Most peripheral artery emboli originate in the heart, and systemic neoplastic emboli are infrequently associated with bronchogenic carcinoma. To our knowledge, there have been no reports of pulmonary vein infiltration by small cell lung cancer.We describe a highly unusual case of multiple instances of peripheral embolism as the first overt sign of occult primary small cell lung cancer. Tumor emboli infiltrated the pulmonary veins of a 62-year-old man who presented first with a transient ischemic attack and then with other ischemic symptoms. The uncommonly wide distribution of tumor emboli over a short time resulted in death.Improvements in diagnostic imaging have led to the early identification of relatively isolated small cell lung cancers. This patient's case underscores the importance of transesophageal echocardiography in detecting cardiac emboli when the cause of cerebral ischemic attack is unknown or if there might be multiple instances of arterial embolism. Computed tomography also has a role in the investigation of possible sources of emboli and unrecognized, asymptomatic embolization.


Obesity accounts for medical costs and lost productivity totaling more than $100 billion per year. Two important economic factors have been forwarded to explain obesity trends. The first is that healthy, palatable foods are no longer affordable to lower-income consumers. Recent decades have seen a trend toward lower consumption of nutrient dense fruits and vegetables and increasing consumption of less expensive energy-dense foods such as added sugars, fats, and refined grains among lower socioeconomic status households. The second is that lower socioeconomic status is associated with less investment in future well-being through healthy behaviors such as good nutrition and regular exercise. Both the availability of inexpensive, convenient, high-calorie foods and the lack of a desire to eat a healthy diet may explain obesity trends. However, they imply different means of reversing these trends.Taxes and subsidies are economic policy instruments that can induce healthier diets. Advances in food production have reduced the calorie costs of sweeteners and fats well below the costs of fruits, vegetables and proteins. Aligning diets with USDA recommendations would require significant market intervention. In order to improve diet quality, policymakers need to focus on the aggregate supply of healthy and unhealthy foods. Investing in better nutrition information only shifts the supply of healthier foods toward higher-income, health conscious consumers. The most promising food consumption policy interventions focus on providing incentives to increase production of healthier foods, and modifying choice architecture to improve diet quality among myopic consumers who are less likely to select a healthy diet.


The ownership and/or control of financial resources has conferred (political) power to people, ever since the original development of money systems. However the nature and role of this power, relative to other power sources, has been difficult to determine. This paper attempts to construct a general theory of financial power, which indicates its function within capitalist mechanics and outlines money as the primary (but not exclusive) source of power that determines present outcomes and historical transition. Production power, for instance, is seen as a secondary source to financial power since the trajectory of production is determined by the vagaries of the capitalist economic order, whereas finance is not constrained in the same manner. The paper suggests, therefore, that the notion of finance capital is a false one since, although most of the time the interests of financial and productive powers converge, as a result of the wealth creation imperative, this is not always the case. In times of a conflict of interest financial power will gain supremacy when financial powers seek to retain relative proportions of power.


Abstract A siderotic cornea from a case of post-traumatic hyphaemia showed large numbers of siderosomes in the corneal fibroblasts and a few in the corneal epithelial and endothelial cells. Electron-probe x-ray analysis revealed iron, phosphorous and sulphur in the siderosomes.


In order to evaluate the importance of higher-order correlations in neural spike count codes, flexible statistical models of dependent multivariate spike counts are required. Copula families, parametric multivariate distributions that represent dependencies, can be applied to construct such models. We introduce the Frank mixture family as a new copula family that has separate parameters for all pairwise and higher-order correlations. In contrast to the Farlie-Gumbel-Morgenstern copula family that shares this property, the Frank mixture copula can model strong correlations. We apply spike count models based on the Frank mixture copula to data generated by a network of leaky integrate-and-fire neurons and compare the goodness of fit to distributions based on the Farlie-Gumbel-Morgenstern family. Finally, we evaluate the importance of using proper single neuron spike count distributions on the Shannon information. We find notable deviations in the entropy that increase with decreasing firing rates. Moreover, we find that the Frank mixture family increases the log likelihood of the fit significantly compared to the Farlie-Gumbel-Morgenstern family. This shows that the Frank mixture copula is a useful tool to assess the importance of higher-order correlations in spike count codes.


Xiaohong Xu Vinothkumar Rajamanickam Sheng Shu Zhoudi Liu Tao Yan Jinxin He Zhiguo Liu Guilong Guo Guang Liang Yi Wang 1 1Chemical Biology Research Center, School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Wenzhou Medical University, Wenzhou, Zhejiang 325035, People's Republic of China; 2Department of Surgical Oncology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Wenzhou Medical University, Wenzhou, Zhejiang 325000, People's Republic of China Background: Triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) is an aggressive subtype of breast cancer which is associated with poor patient outcome and lack of targeted therapy. Our laboratory has synthesized a series of indole-2-carboxamide derivatives. Among this series, compound LG25 showed a favorable pharmacological profile against sepsis and inflammatory diseases. In the present study, we investigated the chemotherapeutic potential of LG25 against TNBC utilizing in vitro and in vivo models. Methods: Changes in cell viability, cell cycle phases and apoptosis were analyzed using MTT, clonogenic assay, FACS and Western blotting assays. The anti-cancer effects of LG25 were further determined in a xenograft mouse model. Results: Our findings reveal that LG25 reduced TNBC viability in a dose-dependent manner. Flow cytometric and Western blot analyses showed that LG25 enhances G2/M cell cycle arrest and induced cell apoptosis. In addition, LG25 treatment significantly inhibited Akt/mTOR phosphorylation and nuclear translocation of nuclear factor-κB (NF-κB). These inhibitory activities of LG25 were confirmed in mice implanted MDA-MB-231 TNBC cells. Conclusion: Our studies provide experimental evidence that indole-2-carboxamide derivative LG25 effectively targeted TNBC in preclinical models by inducing cell cycle arrest and apoptosis, through suppressing Akt/mTOR/NF-κB signaling pathway.


Because I can. Obviously, not the whole story, but important nevertheless. Perhaps if I were a fabulous blues singer I wouldn't write. And it isn't enough simply to write. For me the very look of the piece must declare a refusal to accept the boundaries. Refusal. That's the key word. I write, at least at this stage of my life, I write because the images of myself, of the world of women, of what I am supposed to value, of my society, the accepted 'common-sense' of dominant segments of the Western project and of the place it has constructed for me, as well as the 'me' it has tried to construct are unacceptable. More important, these notions hinder, perhaps even prevent the development of 'whole' persons, and simple decency. This serial is available in Kunapipi: https://ro.uow.edu.au/kunapipi/vol16/iss1/72


We propose an integrated deep learning architecture for the stock movement prediction. Our architecture simultaneously leverages all available alpha sources. The sources include technical signals, financial news signals, and cross-sectional signals. Our architecture possesses three main properties. First, our architecture eludes overfitting issues. Although we consume a large number of technical signals but has better generalization properties than linear models. Second, our model effectively captures the interactions between signals from different categories. Third, our architecture has low computation cost. We design a graph-based component that extracts cross-sectional interactions which circumvents usage of SVD that's needed in standard models. Experimental results on the real-world stock market show that our approach outperforms the existing baselines. Meanwhile, the results from different trading simulators demonstrate that we can effectively monetize the signals.


Over the years, many suggestions have been made on how to reduce the importance of family background in political recruitment. In this study, we examine the effectiveness of one such proposal: the expansion of mass education. More precisely, we utilize a difference-in-difference strategy to analyze how a large school reform launched in Sweden in the 1950s, which lengthened compulsory schooling and postponed tracking, affected the likelihood of individuals with different family backgrounds to run for public office. The data comes from public registers and pertains to the entire Swedish population born between 1943 and 1955. Overall, the empirical analysis provides strong support for the view that improved educational opportunities for individuals from disadvantaged backgrounds can be an effective means to reduce the importance of family background in political recruitment. According to our estimates, the Swedish comprehensive school reform served to reduce the effect of family background on the likelihood of running for public office by up to 40 percent.


A broadly influenced theory of consciousness and selfhood is presented, followed by a discussion of crucial incompatibilities between human consciousness instantiated in a living biological system and the limitations of artificial intelligence research that might hope to replicate that form of consciousness. It will be argued that human phenomenal experience is firmly anchored in sensation borne of human flesh within a human cultural milieu, and thus enjoys a privileged status. Other pivotal challenges faced by those in pursuit of human-level artificial intelligence are also presented. Based on these considerations, viewed in aggregate, it is concluded that the achievement of human-level artificial intelligence is highly unlikely, even if the potential realization of some form of machine consciousness in the future cannot be excluded.


The United States Senate voted to ratify the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty with Russia in 2010 by 74-26, all 26 voting against being Republicans. The change in the voting outcome compared to the 95-0 result in the 2003 SORT vote was dramatic. Using inductive frame analysis, this article analyzes committee hearings in the Senate Foreign Relations and the Armed Services committees in order to identify competing narratives defining individual senators' positions on the ratification of the New START. Building on conceptual framework introduced by Walter Russel Mead (2002), it distinguishes four schools of thought: Jacksonian, Hamiltonian, Jeffersonian, and Wilsonian. The argumentation used in the hearings is deconstructed in order to understand the increase in opposition to the traditionally bipartisan nuclear arms control regime. The results reveal a factionalism in the Republican Party. The argumentationin opposition to ratification traces back to the Jacksonian school, whereas argumentation supporting the ratification traces back to Hamiltonian, Jeffersonian and Wilsonian traditions. According to opposition, the Obama administration was pursuing its idealistic goal of a world-without-nuclear-weapons and its misguided Russia reset policy by any means necessary – most importantly by compromising with Russia on U.S. European-based missile defense.


then see to it that your hands are especially clean. Do not be rough and boisterous and selfish, simply because you are out of doors. This docs not mean that you should not be happy and jolly. Picnics ought to bring out all the fun there is in you. Have a good time, but a good time docs not mean a rude time. Try to see that others are well served, especially mothers and fathers and grandfathers and other older people, and do not forget the little ones or any who) may not be strong and well. Help in setting "the table" and in clearing It awav. When the luncheon 15 over carefully gather together all the pieces of paper, paper boxes, hag". bottles, lin'cans and "craps of food, and if there is no receptacle provided for them, take them home with you to destroy. Tin cans, us


Background
fractures occur more commonly in the thoracic than in the lumbar spine. Physical activity complemented with pharmacological interventions has been advocated as a preventive measure for osteoporosis. However, walking has been shown to produce only a small improvement in spinal bone mineral density. The characteristics of vibration transmission during walking at the lumbar and thoracic spines may be different, and this may help explain the relative incidence of fractures in the two spine regions.

Objective
to determine how mechanical vibration is transmitted in the lumbar and thoracic spines in older adults with and without osteoporosis.

Methods
16 young healthy adults, 19 older adults without osteoporosis and 41 adults with osteoporosis were recruited. Inertial sensors were attached to the skin over the lumbar and thoracic spines for recording the vibration transmitted during level walking. Vibration characteristics were compared across lumbar and thoracic spines and across groups.

Results
the lumbar spine generally amplified the vibration transmitted during walking, whereas the thoracic spine exhibited a much smaller amplification effect, except at the lowest frequency. The magnitude of vibration was generally reduced in the older spines. Osteoporosis had minimal effects on vibration transmission.

Conclusions
the larger amplification of vibration in the lumbar spine may explain the lower incidence of vertebral fractures in this region when compared to the thoracic spine. Ageing alters the transmission of vibration in the spine while osteoporosis has minimal effects. Future research should determine the characteristics of vibration transmitted through the thoracic spine during other physical activities.


During the Renaissance, there existed in Western Europe a widespread tension between hope and doubt with regard to the viability of human society that manifested itself in an increasing interest in the book of Revelation and its visual interpretation. This article explores two portrayals of the scene of John at Patmos, one reflecting a closed, even forbidding perspective, the other offering a decidedly more optimistic view. These different styles reflect the political and religious context in which the artists were working and show a clear contrast between fears of a cosmic collapse and the hope generated by an Eden-like territory portrayed in images related to the discoveries in the New World.


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Scalable deep Super-Resolution (SR) models are increasingly in demand, whose memory can be customized and tuned to the computational recourse of the platform. The existing dynamic scalable SR methods are not memory-friendly enough because multi-scale models have to be saved with a fixed size for each model. Inspired by the success of Lottery Tickets Hypothesis (LTH) on image classification, we explore the existence of unstructured scalable SR deep models, that is, we find gradual shrinkage subnetworks of extreme sparsity named winning tickets. In this paper, we propose a Memory-friendly Scalable SR framework (MSSR). The advantage is that only a single scalable model covers multiple SR models with different sizes, instead of reloading SR models of different sizes. Concretely, MSSR consists of the forward and backward stages, the former for model compression and the latter for model expansion. In the forward stage, we take advantage of LTH with rewinding weights to progressively shrink the SR model and the pruning-out masks that form nested sets. Moreover, stochastic self-distillation (SSD) is conducted to boost the performance of sub-networks. By stochastically selecting multiple depths, the current model inputs the selected features into the corresponding parts in the larger model and improves the performance of the current model based on the feedback results of the larger model. In the backward stage, the smaller SR model could be expanded by recovering and fine-tuning the pruned parameters according to the pruning-out masks obtained in the forward. Extensive experiments show the effectiveness of MMSR. The smallest-scale sub-network could achieve the sparsity of 94% and outperforms the compared lightweight SR methods.


Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser and Tamie Fraser with Commonwealth Secretary-General Shridath ('Sonny') Ramphal and Mrs Ramphal at the 1981 Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Melbourne.
Comments: CHOGM brought together Prime Ministers, Presidents, senior Ministers and officials from 41 Commonwealth countries representing one quarter of the world's population.
Inscription: In an album labelled "Presented to the Right Honourable Malcolm Fraser, MP - Prime Minister of Australia - as a memento of your participation in the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Melbourne, Australia".
Previous Control Number: UMA/I/6086
Previous Control Number: PA/141


This article argues that the costs of credit monitoring should be recoverable in cybersecurity tort litigation. If a data subject's personal information has been seriously exposed to improper access by a data possessor's negligence, expenses incurred to detect the opening of unauthorized accounts should be compensable. This issue — which is far from definitively resolved — arises with great frequency in suits against banks, universities, retailers, and employers. Although early court decisions denied recovery of credit monitoring damages on a variety of grounds, recent developments have called that precedent into question. On the one hand, there is increasing recognition that data possessors have a duty to protect the personal information of data subjects from improper access and to reveal information about breaches in data security. On the other hand, businesses now routinely make voluntary offers of credit monitoring to cybersecurity victims; class action settlements often provide compensation for credit monitoring; and courts and administrative agencies impose sanctions which require provision of credit monitoring services or reimbursement for the same. Credit monitoring enables the persons placed at risk by a data security breach to promptly detect the opening of unauthorized accounts and to take remedial action. Thus, the costs of credit monitoring are a reasonable and necessary response to any serious breach of cybersecurity. Recovery of credit monitoring damages is consistent with basic tort rules (including the duty to mitigate damages) and the principles of public policy favoring deterrence of deficient data practices and efficient allocation of losses.


In this paper, we present a new feature subset selection method that intends to optimize or preserve the performances of a decisional system in case of nonstationary perturbations or loss of information. A two-step process is proposed. First, multiple classifiers are created based on random subspace method, and an initial decision is obtained by combining all the classifiers according to a weighted voting rule. Then, we classify anew all the observations with a subset of these classifiers, chosen in function of the quality of their related feature subspaces. To illustrate this approach, the two-class textured image segmentation problem is considered. Our attention is focused on trying to determine the optimum feature subsets in order to improve the classification accuracy at the borders between two textures. Experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed approach.


Simple ammonium and pyridinium perrhenate salts were evaluated as catalysts for the deoxydehydration (DODH) of diols into alkenes. Pyridinium perrhenates were found to be effective catalysts at much lower temperatures than those in previous reports, outperforming primary, secondary, and tertiary ammonium salts, while quaternary ammonium salts are effectively inactive. The mechanism of reaction was studied computationally using DFT calculations which indicate that proton shuttling between the ion pair is intrinsic to the mechanism and that the reduction of rhenium by the phosphine occurs before the diol condensation.


István Enyedi junior came from an eminent Transylvanian Calvinist family, his father was Professor at the Bethlen College of Nagyenyed (today Aiud in Romania). He studied medicine at the University of Halle where he produced a dissertation much praised by his examiners, also a verse greeting by an occasional French poet (A. Jombert) left out from most extant copies. Enyedi went on to study and botany and medicine at Leyden before crossing the Channel for England in 1720. Once in London, he wrote a letter in Latin to Sir Isaac Newton, the most admired scientist of the age.  Although Enyedi had hoped to meet Newton, the latter never contacted the Hungarian traveller. The reason for this was probably Newton's reluctance to make his Arian views widely known abroad - he wrongly associated Enyedi with "Eniedinus", (György Enyedi), an internationally known Transylvanian Unitarian theologian of the 16th century.


Objective: Prostate cancer (PCa) is an epithelial malignancy of the prostate that currently lacks effective treatment. Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) can play an anticancer role through regulating the immune system, anti-tumor angiogenesis, regulating tumor cell apoptosis, autophagy dysfunction, and other mechanisms. This study attempted to explore the active ingredients and potential mechanism of action of the Astragalus–Scorpion (A–S) drug pair in PCa, in order to provide new insights into the treatment of PCa. Methods: Network pharmacology was used to analyze the A–S drug pair and PCa targets. Bioinformatics analysis was used to analyze the LncRNAs with significant differences in PCa. The expression of LC3 protein was detected by immunofluorescence. CCK8 was used to detect cell proliferation. The expressions of GDPD4-2, AC144450.1, LINC01513, AC004009.2, AL096869.1, AP005210.1, and BX119924.1 were detected by RT-qPCR. The expression of the PI3K/AKT/mTOR pathway and autophagy-related proteins were detected by western blot. LC-MS/MS was used to identify the active components of Astragalus and Scorpion. Results: A–S drug pair and PCa have a total of 163 targets, which were mainly related to the prostate cancer and PI3K/AKT pathways. A–S drug pair inhibited the formation of PCa, promoted the expression of LC3Ⅱ and Beclin1 proteins, and inhibited the expression of P62 and PI3K–AKT pathway proteins in PCa mice. Astragaloside IV and polypeptide extract from scorpion venom (PESV) were identified as the main active components of the A–S drug pair. GDPD4-2 was involved in the treatment of PCa by Astragaloside IV-PESV. Silencing GDPD4-2 reversed the therapeutic effects of Astragaloside IV-PESV by regulating the PI3K/AKT/mTOR pathway. Conclusion: Astragaloside IV-PESV is the main active components of A–S drug pair treated PCa by regulating the GDPD4-2/PI3K–AKT/mTOR pathway and autophagy.


The upcoming Internet of Things (IoT) is foreseen to encompass massive numbers of connected devices, smart objects, and cyber–physical systems. Due to the large scale and massive deployment of devices, it is deemed infeasible to safeguard 100% of the devices with state-of-the-art security countermeasures. Hence, large-scale IoT has inevitable loopholes for network intrusion and malware infiltration. Even worse, exploiting the high density of devices and direct wireless connectivity, malware infection can stealthily propagate through susceptible (i.e., unsecured) devices and form an epidemic outbreak without being noticed to security administration. A malware outbreak enables adversaries to compromise a large population of devices, which can be exploited to launch versatile cyber and physical malicious attacks. In this context, we utilize spatial firewalls, to safeguard the IoT from malware outbreak. In particular, spatial firewalls are computationally capable devices equipped with state-of-the-art security and anti-malware programs that are spatially deployed across the network to filter the wireless traffic in order to detect and thwart malware propagation. Using tools from percolation theory, we prove that there exists a critical density of spatial firewalls beyond which malware outbreak is impossible. This, in turn, safeguards the IoT from malware epidemics regardless of the infection/treatment rates. To this end, a tractable upper bound for the critical density of spatial firewalls is obtained. Furthermore, we characterize the relative communications ranges of the spatial firewalls and IoT devices to ensure secure network connectivity. The percentage of devices secured by the firewalls is also characterized.


In this paper, a new fault diagnosis method using an adaptive neural network for automotive engines is developed. A redial basis function (RBF) network is used as a fault classifier with its widths and weights on-line adapted to cope with model uncertainty and time varying dynamics caused by mechanical wear of engine parts, environment change, etc. Five different sensors are investigated for an automotive engine including throttle angle, manifold pressure, manifold temperature, crankshaft speed and engine torque. The engine data is acquired from a one-litre Volkswagen petrol engine test bed under different operating states, and then simulated multiplicative faults are superimposed. The real data experiments confirm that sensor faults as small as 2% can be detected and isolated clearly. The developed scheme is capable of diagnosing faults in on-line mode and can be directly implemented in an on-board engine diagnosis system.


We study the BGG-categories O-q associated to quantum groups. We prove that many properties of the ordinary BGG-category O for a semisimple complex Lie algebra carry over to the quantum case. Of particular interest is the case when q is a complex root of unity. Here we prove a tensor decomposition for simple modules, projective modules, and indecomposable tilting modules. Using the known Kazhdan-Lusztig conjectures for O and for finite-dimensional U-q-modules we are able to determine all irreducible characters as well as the characters of all indecomposable tilting modules in O-q. As a consequence, we also recover the known result that the generic quantum case behaves like the classical category O.


As is well-known, Duns Scotus adopts a moderately realist stance on the being of the common natures of categorial entities—substances and accidents. He believes that such natures have extramental being, such that, though real, each nature—e.g. humanity, redness, and so on—in itself lacks numerical unity. Scotus holds, too, that the divine nature is not like this: it is numerically singular, really the same in each exemplification of it. Scotus thus accepts a version of a more extreme realism in the case of the divine nature. Here, I intend to show how Scotus distinguishes these two cases and, more generally, how he understands them. In addition, my investigation also has ramifications for Scotus's account of individuation. I shall first of all give an account of three crucial terms in Scotus's theory: predicability, divisibility, and communicability. While Scotus's use of this terminology is not always consistent, a reasonably clear overall theory will emerge. Secondly, I shall look more closely at Scotus's use of certain identity claims in the context of his theory of common natures, by way of showing that he has good reason to hold that the more extreme form of realism that he accepts in the case of the divine nature is not logically incoherent. In the third section, I shall show how Scotus argues for the existence of these different sorts of natures in the cases, respectively, of creatures and of God.


Tolerance develops to caffeine-induced stimulation of both locomotor activity and rotational behavior. The role of dopamine in tolerance to the locomotor stimulant effects of caffeine has been documented. However, the role of dopamine in caffeine-induced turning behavior remains to be elucidated. Therefore, the present sturdy determined the role of dopamine receptors in tolerance to caffeine-induced rotational behavior. Rats with a unilateral lesion of the nigrostriatal tract, induced by 6-hydroxydopamine (6-OHDA), were treated chronically with either caffeine (1.0 mg/ml) or with drug-free tap water, by a method of scheduled access. Agonists with and without selectivity for dopamine receptor sub-types were tested in both groups of rats (nonselective: apomorphine, d-amphetamine; D1 selective: SKF-38393, SKF-77434; D2 selective: R(−)-propylnor-apomorphine (NPA), quinpirole). All drugs produced dose-dependent increases in turning that, with the exception of quinpirole, were comparable in both groups. Quinpirole produced a smaller effect in rats treated with caffeine than in control rats. Thus, there was significant cross-tolerance only to the effects of quinpirole. The concurrent administration of SKF-38393 with NPA produced a synergistic interaction on rotational behavior in control rats, to which cross-tolerance did not develop in caffeine-treated rats. In contrast to what occurs with locomotor activity, in control rats the selective D1 dopamine receptor antagonist SCH 23390 completely blocked SKF-38393-induced turning behavior and the selective D2 dopamine receptor antagonist eticlopride partially attenuated this effect. NPA-induced turning behavior was blocked only by eticlopride; SCH 23390 was without effect. Both SCH 23390 and eticlopride blocked d-amphetamine-induced rotational behavior. The results of this study suggest that D1 dopamine receptors are not involved in tolerance to caffeine-induced rotational behavior. The role of D2 dopamine receptors in this effect is unresolved. Results obtained from rotational behavior studies generally do not parallel those obtained from locomotor activity studies, suggesting that different mechanisms underlie the effects of caffeine on these two behaviors.


Hematopoiesis is a complex dynamic process by which all the blood cells of the peripheral blood are formed. Different molecular techniques identified different molecules involved in a coordinated and time-dependent fashion for the development of different blood cells of specific lineages. These are identified with the cells in isolation that may obscure the dynamical nature of hematopoiesis. This has an importance in understanding of different hematological diseases. However, there is no generalized model available in the literature by which clinicians and patients can be benefited. We have developed a systems model based on difference delay equation. Our model shows that minor variation as well as incorporation of a minor stochastic component to that model equation at the morphological stage(s) may exhibit different pathophysiological state of hematopoietic system. Therefore, this mathematical model reinforces the necessity of expert domain knowledge in translating the parametric values so that individual patient could be benefited.


The disappearing surplus makes it unlikely that Congress will pass any significant tax cuts, especially tax cuts for businesses, before 2002. Surprisingly, the tax bill passed early in 2001 and "hyped" as being primarily for individual taxpayers, offers relief for many urologists and their practices.


The present investigations demonstrate that as far as the genesis of non-lymphatic leukemias is concerned environmental factors may be assumed as an aetiological factor to an increasing extent. Medicaments, particularly cytostatics, exogenous noxious occupational agents and infectious-inflammatory diseases might be significant for developing ANLL, whereas virus infection, immunizations, and acclimatization to specific conditions of climate may be rather attributed as risk factors for ALL. A tendency to deviations from the blood picture ( lymphomonocytosis , leukocytopenia, toxic granulation of neutrophilic granulocytes) can be increasingly observed in workers engaged in chemical industry, with these changes, being still reversible. A permanent effect of exogenous toxic agents, however, will produce a serious damage of the bone-marrow. Further investigations are provided for elucidating the function of different haemopoietic cell systems, particularly the immune status, in workers of those enterprises where an exposure to noxious substances can be found.


Purpose - This paper offers a conceptualization of the internationalization decision confronted by a firm in an environment of terrorism-induced risk. Design/methodology/approach - The approach taken is a conceptualization of the internationalization decision framed from theoretical reasoning and informed by the literature. Findings - The model presents the internationalization decision, a product/market/mode (PMM) combination, in the case of a terrorism-free context and in a with-terrorism context. Using indifference curve mapping of risk/return tradeoffs, an opportunities set of possible PMM combinations and the notion of efficiency, it traces the most attractive opportunities set to show that within this set, the frontier of attractive opportunities is constrained in the with-terrorism case. Propositions are framed to guide future research. While conditions of risk can be calculated, it is concluded that remaining uncalculable is the true uncertainty incited by the systemic effects of international terrorism that call for managerial judgment. Originality/value - The literature in this field reports little on the effects of international terrorism on the firm. With heightened awareness of international terrorism, and the changed environment for the firm operating internationally, it is timely that the effects of terrorism on decision-making in firms be investigated. Advancing beyond description to substantive conceptualization of this decision is an essential step for better understanding of this now pervasive phenomenon.


Background: The critical value can occur while performing panels of tests at laboratory by different chemistry or blood analysers with varieties of principles. The main objective of the study was to study the process of critical result reporting and to know the way of communication and documentation done for critical value in the laboratory, ICUs and the wards.Materials and Methods: This study was prospective and non-experimental was conducted at B&C Medical College and Teaching Hospital from 14.04.2018 to 14.05.2018. Total 60 critical values samples were included. The data was collected by means of observing the critical values of inpatient and the process of reporting from the laboratory to the respective wards and ICUs.Results: Out of 60 samples included in our study, there was 100% communication to concerned treating units. For the confirmation of critical value repeat test was done in 68% of cases. In 75% of cases clinicians did follow up. Recording of a critical report in lab was done in 96% of cases and almost all of the critical values 98% were immediately reported to the respective wards by technical staffs. There was no communication in 1.6% of cases to treating units by technical staff. Majority 78% of critical values were communicated by respective wards and ICUs nurses to concerned doctors.Conclusion: Critical value can occur while performing panels of tests at laboratory and reporting such values to treating clinicians or respective wards or ICUs could help heath care providers for effective treatment of the patients and their adequate care.


In view of the problems of large overshoot and large oscillation frequency in current furnace temperature control, based on the development of intelligent control theory, expert control, fuzzy control and neural network control in intelligent control theory are combined with PID control. The intelligent PID control algorithm is used to carry out numerical simulation and experimental research on these several control algorithms. The results show that the adjustment effect of the intelligent PID control algorithm is significantly better than the traditional PID control algorithm. Among them, the fuzzy self-tuning PID control algorithm and the fuzzy immune PID control algorithm are feasible in the application of furnace temperature control. The neural network PID control algorithm It also has good development and application potential.


OBJECTIVE
To elucidate factors influencing practitioner decisions to refer dogs with cancer to veterinary oncology specialists.

DESIGN
Cross-sectional study.

SAMPLE
2,724 Ontario primary care companion animal veterinarians.

PROCEDURES
Practitioners were invited to participate in a survey involving clinical scenarios of canine cancer patients, offered online and in paper format from October 2010 through January 2011. Analyses identified factors associated with the decision to refer patients to veterinary oncology specialists.

RESULTS
1,071 (39.3%) veterinarians responded, of which 603 (56.3%) recommended referral for dogs with multicentric lymphoma and appendicular osteosarcoma. Most (893/1,059 [84.3%]) practiced within < 2 hours' drive of a specialty referral center, and most (981/1,047 [93.7%]) were completely confident in the oncology service. Few (230/1,056 [21.8%] to 349/1,056 [33.0%]) were experienced with use of chemotherapeutics, whereas more (627/1,051 [59.7%]) were experienced with amputation. Referral was associated with practitioner perception of patient health status (OR, 1.54; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.15 to 2.07), the interaction between the client's bond with the dog and the client's financial status, practitioner experience with treating cancer (OR, 2.79; 95% CI, 1.63 to 4.77), how worthwhile practitioners considered treatment to be (OR, 1.66 to 3.09; 95% CI, 1.08 to 4.72), and confidence in the referral center (OR, 2.20; 95% CI, 1. 11 to 4.34).

CONCLUSIONS AND CLINICAL RELEVANCE
Several factors influenced practitioner decisions to refer dogs with lymphoma or osteosarcoma for specialty care. Understanding factors that influence these decisions may enable practitioners to appraise their referral decisions and ensure they act in the best interests of patients, clients, and the veterinary profession.


Long-term surveillance of aquatic environ- ments is a costly endeavor, thus a sound strategy is neces- sary to select the locations of monitoring stations to im- prove the quality of a monitoring system. This can be accomplished by optimizing the locations of a sensor net- work with respect to the hydraulic and fate and transport characteristics of the surface water system. It is expected that such an approach may improve the effectiveness of the monitoring system and also reduce the cost. To determine the optimal sensor placement pattern, the hydrodynamics of the target environment must be un- derstood first. Based on this information, the contaminant transport behavior can be simulated. Since the hydrody- namics and the contaminant pathways in the surface water environment are complex, it is not possible to optimize a surface water network using simple optimizing methods. To solve this problem in a simplified form, a 2- dimensional hydrodynamic simulation model is developed using a finite element method. The best sensor locations are selected to minimize detection time of the contaminant presence. Genetic algorithm is used for the solution of the optimization formulation in selection of the best sensor network due to the nonlinear nature of the model. Further, these computation processes require a significant amount of computational time, thus parallel computing is adopted to reduce computation time.


The purpose of this study was to analyze the influence of intellectual impairment (II) on game-related statistics which best contribute to success in basketball. Official game-related statistics were gathered from 6 male teams (n=63 players) during the 13 games played in the World II-Basketball Championships (Ankara 2013). Variables were normalized to 100 ball possessions and descriptive statistics were calculated. To identify which variables contributed best to success, a discriminant analysis was performed. The obtained structural coefficients (SC) in the discriminant function pointed out 2-pt successful │SC=-0.65│, assists │SC=-0.61│, steals │SC=-0.41│ and offensive rebounds │SC=-0.32│ as variables which best contributed to success. Results were compared with previous studies in able-bodied (AB) basketball. Assists and 2-point successful were discriminant variables of success in II and AB-competitions; however, defensive rebounds were discriminant in many AB but not in any II-competition. In addition, steals and offensive rebounds were only discriminant variables in II-basketball. Relevancy of assists reflected the importance of teamwork in both AB and II-basketball; however, the lower shooting efficiency presented in II-players seem to indicate limitations on decision making capacity and tactical offense to reach the best option to shoot. Consequently, second opportunities to score (offensive rebounds) and scoring under low defensive pressure (fast-break after a steal); seem to take relevance to increase 2-point successful in II-players. These findings confirm the negative influence of II on basketball game-related statistics and this is a first necessary step to develop basketball-specific eligibility systems required to include II-basketball in the Paralympic program.


ISSUE ADDRESSED
the school setting is an important context for the development of children's eating behaviours. As most Australian children (86%) bring their lunch from home, knowledge of what parents provide in home-prepared school lunches can inform efforts to improve their nutritional quality. This study investigated the content of children's home-prepared school lunches, considered variation across the school week, and explored gender and grade level differences.

METHODS
this observational analysis of children's home-prepared school lunches was conducted in children attending the first three years of school at one of five northern Melbourne metropolitan schools. One hundred and seventy parents (response rate 12%) gave consent for their child's lunch to be audited up to five times (minimum of three) across a one-month period. The food and beverage items of students' school lunches were audited using the School Food Checklist.

RESULTS
the average home-prepared school lunch contained a sandwich, a piece of fruit and one and a half servings of extras (low nutritional value and/or high in added fat, salt or sugar). Servings of bread declined (Wilks' Λ=0.82, p=0.01) from Monday to Friday and there were more servings of extras (Wilks' Λ=0.79, p<0.01) on Monday than Wednesday. Younger children's lunches contained fewer servings of fruit (F(2,71.93)=4.84, p=0.03), vegetables (F(2,78.97)=3.86, p<0.05) and bread (F(2,140)=4.36, p=0.02) than those of older children. Girls' lunches contained significantly more vegetables than boys' lunches, (t(154.51)=-2.21, p=0.03).

CONCLUSIONS
lunches were high in extras and low in servings of vegetables and other healthy snacks with minor variations in the quantity of bread and extras across the school week.


Since developing an effective treatment for Alzheimer's disease (AD) has been encountered as a challenging task, attempts to prevent cognitive decline by lifestyle modifications have become increasingly appealing. Physical exercise, healthy diet, and cognitive training are all modifiable, non-pharmacological lifestyle factors considered to influence cognitive health. Implementing lifestyle modifications on animal models of AD and cognitive impairment may reveal underlying mechanisms of action by which healthy lifestyle contribute to brain health. In mice, different types of lifestyle interventions have been shown to improve cognitive abilities, alleviate AD-related pathology and neuroinflammation, restore mitochondrial function, and have a positive impact on neurogenesis and cell survival. Different proteins and pathways have been identified to mediate some of the responses, amongst them BDNF, Akt-GSK3β, JNK, and ROCK pathway. Although some important pathways have been identified as mediating improvements in brain health, more research is needed to confirm these mechanisms of action and to improve the understanding of their interplay. Moreover, multidomain lifestyle interventions targeting multiple risk factors simultaneously may be a promising avenue in future dementia prevention strategies. Therefore, future work is needed to better understand the synergistic impact of combinatory lifestyle strategies on cellular mechanisms and brain health.


Many grasslands, and in particular the tallgrass prairies of North America, are generally thought to be maintained by periodic fire. Semantic disagreement among researchers, however, threatens to hamper discussion of fire as an ecological force in grassland ecosystems. Some authors em phasize that fires are disturbances (or perturbations) since these fires disrupt or alter ecosystem states, trends, and dynamics (e.g., accumulating nitro gen is volatilized, plant and animal communities change in composition). Other researchers point out that, because these fire-induced disruptions and alterations can maintain the status quo of the ecosystem (e. g., prevent it from becoming woodland), it is the lack of fire rather than fire itself that should be considered a disturbance. We argue that, since both points of view are useful, there is little to be gained by labeling loosely either fire or the lack thereof as a "disturbance" in grassland ecosystems.


Electrochemical micro-machining (EMM) has become one of the main machining methods for production of miniaturized parts and components. Utilizing a developed EMM set-up, sets of experiments have been carried out to investigate the influences of some of the predominant electrochemical process parameters such as pulse frequency, feed rate of tool, machining voltage and ultrasonic frequency on the machining accuracy of micro-holes. According to the present investigation, the most effective zone of pulse on time and ultrasonic frequency can be considered as 15-50μs and 26KHZ, respectively, which can gives a desirable machining accuracy for micro-holes. A machining voltage range of 6-10V can be commended to obtain high machining accuracy. From the micrographs of the machined micro-holes, it may be observed that a lower value of electrolyte concentration with moderate machining voltage and moderate value of pulse on time will produce more accurate shape of micro-holes.


Mental illnesses are frequent co-morbid conditions in chronic systemic diseases. High incidences of depression, anxiety and cognitive impairment complicate cardiovascular and metabolic disorders such as hypertension and diabetes mellitus. Lifestyle changes including regular exercise have been advocated to reduce blood pressure and improve glycaemic control. The purpose of this project was to evaluate the effect of physical training on the most prevalent corollary psychiatric problems in patients with chronic organic ailments. This longitudinal study assessed the mental health of hypertensive (age: 57 ± 8 years) and/or diabetic (age: 53 ± 8 years) patients using mini-mental state examination, Beck's depression inventory, Beck's anxiety inventory and self-reporting questionnaire-20 before and after a 3-month supervised resistance and aerobic exercise programme comprising structured physical activity three times a week. Clinically relevant improvement was observed in the Beck's depression inventory and Beck's anxiety inventory scores following the 12-week training (61%, p = 0.001, and 53%, p = 0.02, respectively). Even though statistically not significant (p = 0.398), the cognitive performance of this relatively young patient population also benefited from the programme. These results demonstrate positive effects of active lifestyle on non-psychotic mental disorders in patients with chronic systemic diseases, recommending exercise as an alternative treatment option.


In discussions about how to implement learning through/in/at play, there is still not a commonly agreed view. This qualitative study investigated Chinese teachers' and parents' perspectives on learning in play to attain a co-constructed picture of learning in play through real classroom practices and perceptions using the Mosaic approach. Fourteen teachers and six parents took part in this study. Among the participants, six kindergarten teachers were interviewed to obtain their perspectives on learning in play. They assisted the researchers in the selection of exemplary play episodes, which were filmed in their own classrooms. Four three-minute videos containing the largest amount of learning elements based on the teachers' views were selected for further in-depth focus group discussions. The selected multivocal video-cued interview clips were shown to eight other teachers and six parents in focus groups to elicit their perspectives on learning in play. The co-constructed picture of learning in play that emerged included discipline in the classroom, more difficult and complicated learning matters, more freedom to play, and teachers' intervention to facilitate children's learning in play. The findings revealed different social representations of learning in play in the Hong Kong context, the contributions of which are important and useful for professional education practices and curricular policy currently undergoing reform.