Many scholars of the arts of Africa and the African diaspora have noted the close connection of dance and music. African and diasporic musicians play music as movement, and dancers feel movement as music. In some cases, the mutuality of dance and music is tightly choreographed; in others, it is improvised yet still somehow achieved. However, there has been little published that analyzes how such mutuality is accomplished. The following article analyzes dancer-drummer interaction in bele, a performance art from Martinique in the French West Indies. It examines both interactive practices that are made explicit by performers and some underlying conditions of those practices that remain tacit. It may be considered a study in interactive and improvisational competence. American writers, both black and white, have often looked to the dance-music link to validate African-American expression. Among scholars, attention to the dance-music link began at least as early as Herskovits' provocative, although brief, remarks on the "cultural imponderables" of musical style and "motor habits" (Herskovits 1966, 59; Herskovits 1990, 265). Herskovits' attention to these "subliminal," "tenacious" (1966, 13), "resilient" (23), and "resistant" (60) elements of culture led diasporic studies away from the narrow focus on static "retentions" of strictly delimited Africanisms, as demanded by more conservative scholars such as M. G. Smith (1957), and toward a broader appreciation of the "syncretisms" and "reinterpretations" underlying even apparently "acculturated" phenomena (Herskovits 1966, 57, 60). Increasingly, diasporic studies has emphasized the transformational resilience of black identity and culture. Current writers recognize the stereotyping, romanticization, commercialization, and exploitation of black culture and yet celebrate it as a "changing same" (Gilroy 1991). A number of works have continued the project of validating black expression by insisting on the moral, symbolic, and spiritual importance of African dance (e.g., Asante 1990; Nketia 1974; Thompson 1966; Thompson 1974; Wilson 1985), by using African-American aesthetics to criticize orthodox musicological assumptions about musical meaning (Keil 1966), or by recognizing the tremendous role that dance and the body have played in the construction, stereotyping, repression, and resilience of black identity (e.g., Hazzard-Gordon 1983; McClary and Walser 1994). However, all of these writings treat the dance-music link more or less as a given and describe it only in general terms. An initial attempt to define the dance-music connection in greater detail may be found in Waterman's concept of a "metronome sense": the kinesthetic perception of regular beats by both dancers and musicians, "whether or not a given beat is actually expressed" in movement or sound (Waterman 1952, 211). Waterman introduced four aesthetic concepts (dominance of percussion, polymeter, off-beat phrasing of melodic accents, and overlapping call-and-response patterns) that have proved remarkably durable, being cited or paraphrased by numerous other authors. Waterman's ideas have appeal because they describe processes of music making rather than the static retention of specific instruments, texts, rhythms, dance steps, and so forth. Thus, they help not only to describe black music but to explain its transformations and resilience. But Waterman's concept of a metronome sense remains much less widely used than his four aesthetic principles. How does one demonstrate that such a thing exists or investigate its workings? If a metronome sense exists, it would be an underlying competence, a mostly automatic and tacit aspect of perception. It would help explain the perceptual foundation of polyrhythm; it would enable performers and listeners to make sense of varied, complex, asymmetrical patterns of notes and movements by relating them to one another via the perception of an underlying layer of regularity to which they also relate. …


In the 1830s, much of the world was still unexplored territory to European and American travelers, and the forbidding Antarctic region represented perhaps the ultimate mystery. Was there, in fact, a new polar continent where James Cook during his voyages of the 1770s had encountered only "Firm Field and Vast Mountains of Ice?" The prospect of discovering a lucrative whaling ground made this as yet uncharted and unexploited region especially enticing. Three expeditions to the pole were launched simultaneously by the United States, France, and Britain, each nation vying to be the first to forge a path through the pack ice and venture farther south than any vessel had ever sailed before. The leaders of these expeditions paved the way for the explorers, traders, and whalers of what was to become known as the "Heroic Age" of Antarctic exploration. The Race to the White Continent is a colorful and captivating account of their travels and adventures.


With the aim of exploring the properties of the class of FR 0 radio galaxies, we selected a sample of 108 compact radio sources, called FR0CAT, by combining observations from the NVSS, FIRST, and SDSS surveys. We included in the catalog sources with redshift ≤ 0.05, with a radio size . 5 kpc, and with an optical spectrum characteristic of low-excitation galaxies. Their radio luminosities at 1.4 GHz are in the range 10 . νL1.4 . 10 40 erg s. The FR0CAT hosts are mostly (86%) luminous (−21 & Mr & −23) red early-type galaxies with black hole masses 10 . MBH . 10 9 M⊙. These properties are similar to those seen for the hosts of FR I radio galaxies, but they are on average a factor ∼1.6 less massive. The number density of FR0CAT sources is ∼5 times higher than that of FR Is, and thus they represent the dominant population of radio sources in the local Universe. Different scenarios are considered to account for the smaller sizes and larger abundance of FR 0s with respect to FR Is. An age-size scenario that considers FR 0s as young radio galaxies that will all eventually evolve into extended radio sources cannot be reconciled with the large space density of FR 0s. However, the radio activity recurrence, with the duration of the active phase covering a wide range of values and with short active periods strongly favored with respect to longer ones, might account for their large density number. Alternatively, the jet properties of FR 0s might be intrinsically different from those of the FR Is, the former class having lower bulk Lorentz factors, possibly due to lower black hole spins. Our study indicates that FR 0s and FR I/IIs can be interpreted as two extremes of a continuous population of radio sources that is characterized by a broad distribution of sizes and luminosities of their extended radio emission, but shares a single class of host


The problem of recognition of objects in images is investigated from the simultaneous viewpoints of image bandwidth compression and automatic target recognition. A scenario is suggested in which recognition is implemented on features in the block cosine transform domain which is useful for data compression as well. While most image frames would be processed by the automatic recognition algorithms in the compressed domain without need for image reconstruction, this still allows for visual image classification of targets with poor recognition rates (by human viewing at the receiving terminal). It has been found that the Mandala sorting of the block cosine domain results in a more effective domain for selecting target identification parameters. Useful features from this Mandala/cosine domain are developed based upon correlation parameters and homogeneity measures which appear to successfully discriminate between natural and man-made objects. The Bhattacharyya feature discriminator is used to provide a 10:1 compression of the feature space for implementation of simple statistical decision surfaces (Gaussian and minimum distance classification). Imagery sensed in the visible spectra with a resolution of approximately 5-10 ft is used to illustrate the success of the technique on targets such as ships to be separated from clouds. A data set of 38 images is used for experimental verification with typical classification results ranging from the high 80's to low 90 percentile regions depending on the options choosen.


The spectrum crunch currently experienced by mobile cellular carriers makes the underutilized millimeter-wave frequency spectrum a sensible choice for next-generation cellular communications, particularly when considering the recent advances in low cost sub-terahertz/millimeter-wave complementary metal–oxide semiconductor circuitry. To date, however, little is known on how to design or deploy practical millimeter-wave cellular systems. In this paper, measurements for outdoor cellular channels at 38 GHz were made in an urban environment with a broadband (800-MHz RF passband bandwidth) sliding correlator channel sounder. Extensive angle of arrival, path loss, and multipath time delay spread measurements were conducted for steerable beam antennas of differing gains and beamwidths for a wide variety of transmitter and receiver locations. Coverage outages and the likelihood of outage with steerable antennas were also measured to determine how random receiver locations with differing antenna gains and link budgets could perform in future cellular systems. This paper provides measurements and models that may be used to design future fifth-generation millimeter-wave cellular networks and gives insight into antenna beam steering algorithms for these systems.


The police play an important role in implementing risk management strategies to prevent intimate partner violence (IPV). The focus of this study was to investigate the use of a restraining order (RO) as a risk management strategy and its crime preventive effect. Two hundred and fourteen male spousal assaulters assessed with the B-SAFER in a Swedish police county between 2005 and 2007 were followed up in 2009. Thirty-one per cent received a RO of which 44% relapsed into new IPV. There were no differences in recidivism between those who received a RO and those who did not. However, those assessed as low or medium risk for IPV were less likely to recidivate if they had a RO issued upon them than those assessed as high risk. These results indicate that the RO may be a useful crime preventive strategy for IPV in those specific cases, but not in general, and not for those assessed to present a high risk of future violence.


From 2005 to 2007, Memorial University of Newfoundland (MUN) and the College of the North Atlantic (CNA) participated, with the other Atlantic Provinces, in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development's (OECD's) 12-country, 14-region study on the contribution of higher education institutions (HEIs) to regional development. That study attempted to strengthen the contributions of HEIs to regional/local development by improving interplay and mutual capacity building between HEIs and regional/provincial/local stakeholders and to raise awareness that the role of HEIs extends beyond the core competencies of knowledge generation (research) and knowledge transfer (teaching) to a third function, knowledge mobilization (regional/local engagement).

This OECD exercise yielded vast amounts of useful information, which may be intimidating and may not be as accessible to those who can make good use of this research. To facilitate its use in the Newfoundland and Labrador (NL) context, this report has reviewed, evaluated and synthesized the relevant information to determine what lessons NL can take from the OECD exercise.

By applying these lessons locally, both the Atlantic Region and the province can enhance the role of our universities and community colleges as agents of economic and social growth. While NL's HEIs have performed well both in absolute terms and relative to HEIs in the other jurisdictions studied, it is important to recognize that the effectiveness of our universities and community colleges in facilitating regional/local engagement can be enhanced by implementing the positive initiatives and avoiding the negative lessons that fall out of the OECD study.

This report evaluates how NL, MUN and the CNA are doing in terms of regional engagement and it offers illustrations of successful regional engagement initiatives found in NL. In addition, this report profiles regional engagement practices found in the OECD countries studied.

There is a growing awareness around the world of the importance of local HEIs engaging local stakeholders and applying some of the institutions' intellectual capital to issues and problems that are important locally. Sometimes this awareness simply translates into lip service and does not become a tangible approach to promote institutional engagement. Consequently, rather than expressing the right sentiments, bolstered by the latest buzzwords, it is important to implement meaningful and specific changes within the HEIs.


Understanding emerging behaviors of reinforcement learning (RL) agents may be difficult since such agents are often trained in complex environments using highly complex decision making procedures. This has given rise to a variety of approaches to explainability in RL that aim to reconcile discrepancies that may arise between the behavior of an agent and the behavior that is anticipated by an observer. Most recent approaches have relied either on domain knowledge that may not always be available, on an analysis of the agent's policy, or on an analysis of specific elements of the underlying environment, typically modeled as a Markov Decision Process (MDP). Our key claim is that even if the underlying model is not fully known (e.g., the transition probabilities have not been accurately learned) or is not maintained by the agent (i.e., when using model-free methods), the model can nevertheless be exploited to automatically generate explanations. For this purpose, we suggest using formal MDP abstractions and transforms, previously used in the literature for expediting the search for optimal policies, to automatically produce explanations. Since such transforms are typically based on a symbolic representation of the environment, they can provide meaningful explanations for gaps between the anticipated and actual agent behavior. We formally define the explainability problem, suggest a class of transforms that can be used for explaining emergent behaviors, and suggest methods that enable efficient search for an explanation. We demonstrate the approach on a set of standard benchmarks.


Abstract Geotourism is becoming a well established form of tourism based on the geological environment. It offers a new form of sustainable tourism which is more holistic then previous niche forms of tourism. However, with more people than ever visiting natural areas worldwide, the cumulative impacts of visitors on geological sites is increasing. This paper surveys visitor impacts and site management at geological sites which are geotourism destinations. We describe geotourism which is the engine driving the core activities of conservation, education and sustainable development in geoparks. We then outline some lessons learned from management in dealing with visitor impacts at a heavily visited geopark in Taiwan, a volcano in Indonesia, and a coastal World Heritage site in England. The importance of education is emphasized for geo-climbing in Spain and all-terrain vehicles in Poland. A number of site management approaches are noted, including the importance of guiding as a management strategy as well as the value of a positive involvement by the local community. Finally, some examples are given of the risks associated with tourism activities in volcanic areas as well as related appropriate management activities.


How do race and nature work as terrains of power? From eighteenth-century claims that climate determined character to twentieth-century medical debates about the racial dimensions of genetic disease, concepts of race and nature are integrally connected, woven into notions of body, landscape, and nation. Yet rarely are these complex entanglements explored in relation to the contemporary cultural politics of difference. This volume takes up that challenge. Distinguished contributors chart the traffic between race and nature across sites including rainforests, colonies, and courtrooms.

Synthesizing a number of fields—anthropology, cultural studies, and critical race, feminist, and postcolonial theory—this collection analyzes diverse historical, cultural, and spatial locations. Contributors draw on thinkers such as Fanon, Foucault, and Gramsci to investigate themes ranging from exclusionary notions of whiteness and wilderness in North America to linguistic purity in Germany. Some essayists focus on the racialized violence of imperial rule and evolutionary science and the biopolitics of race and class in the Guatemalan civil war. Others examine how race and nature are fused in biogenetic discourse—in the emergence of "racial diseases" such as sickle cell anemia, in a case of mistaken in vitro fertilization in which a white couple gave birth to a black child, and even in the world of North American dog breeding. Several essays tackle the politics of representation surrounding environmental justice movements, transnational sex tourism, and indigenous struggles for land and resource rights in Indonesia and Brazil.

Contributors. Bruce Braun, Giovanna Di Chiro, Paul Gilroy, Steven Gregory, Donna Haraway, Jake Kosek, Tania Murray Li, Uli Linke, Zine Magubane, Donald S. Moore, Diane Nelson, Anand Pandian, Alcida Rita Ramos, Keith Wailoo, Robyn Wiegman


Childhood obesity has become a central concern in many countries and a range of policies have been implemented or proposed to address it. This co-authored book is the first to focus on the ethical and policy questions raised by childhood obesity and its prevention. Throughout the book, authors Kristin Voigt, Stuart G. Nicholls, and Garrath Williams emphasize that childhood obesity is a multi-faceted phenomenon, and just one of many issues that parents, schools and societies face. They argue that it is important to acknowledge the resulting complexities and not to think in terms "single-issue" policies. After first reviewing some of the factual uncertainties about childhood obesity, the authors explore central ethical questions. What priority should be given to preventing obesity? To what extent are parents responsible? How should we think about questions of stigma and inequality? In the second part of the book, the authors consider key policy issues, including the concept of the 'obesogenic environment,' debates about taxation and marketing, and the role that schools can play in obesity prevention. The authors argue that political debate is needed to decide the importance given to childhood obesity and how to divide responsibilities for action. These debates have no simple answers. Nonetheless, the authors argue that there are reasons for hope. There are a wide range of opportunities for action. Many of these options also promise wider social benefits.


This chapter briefly explains the distributed project management of four joint departments for first-grade joint project-based learning (PBL). That is, conventional studies and purpose, capital, competence and ability of four kinds of distributed project management were presented, and relations among them are shown after describing background (included prehistory of PBL in Osaka Institute of Technology (O.I.T.)). Then, consideration and analysis about communication, interaction, cooperation, merit, week-point, effect and inference were discussed. Some case studies were described about open innovation and competences in stakeholder management. They were distinctive and superior in first-grade PBL of O.I.T. Finally, some future themes were presented.


The Taklimakan Desert is the world's second-largest shifting sand desert, located in the rain shadow of the Tibetan Plateau. The initiation of desert formation in the Asian interior is one of the most prominent climate changes in the Northern Hemisphere during the Cenozoic Era. Dating the earliest formation of this desert is important for understanding the climatic effects of the uplifted Tibetan Plateau. Here we report 1071-m-thick Neogene deposits with inter calated eolian dune sands from the only outcrop in the central Taklimakan Desert. Based on paleo- magnetic measurements, biostratigraphic age control, and previous electron spin resonance dating results, the oldest in situ eolian dune sands were confi rmed to be ca. 7 Ma, much older than the previous reported wind-blown siltstone from the southern edge of the Taklimakan Desert. This new result indicates that desert conditions initiated ca. 7 Ma in the center of the Tarim Basin. We attribute this event to the late Cenozoic climatic deterioration and/or to the rain-shadow effect caused by late Miocene uplift of the northern Tibetan margin.


The common carp (Cyprinus carpio L.) is the most important fish species in Hungary, it is more than 70% of the total Hungarian fish production. The common carp production is important not only just in Hungary but in Middle-East Europe, as well as Southeast Asia. Majority of the production comes from fishpond culture. If the production sector wants to meet the increasing customer demands, there is need to intensify research on the intensive fish production opportunities for example all-female common carp technologies. The all-female technology is one of a genom-manipulation technology. Its production showed better growth rate than mixed-sex population in pond culture. Our experiment combined the recirculation aquaculture system (RAS) and the all-female common carp stocks intensification technologies. The reason for the experiment, is that there are no result about the growth of all-female common carp growth in RAS.
The experiment used the "Tatai grey scale type" common carp stocks. We propagated two all-female stocks (T2 and T3) and a control group (TK). Due to technological characteristics of RAS, the water quality parameters were the same for all treatments and corresponded to the technological tolerance of common carp.
The experimental period was from July 10, 2019 – November 20, 2019. Result of growth performance showed that the growth of mixed-sex stock was significantly higher than all-female stocks; (Control=3692.0±590.5g, T2=3438.8±415.4g, T3=3294.1±659.1g). Feed conversation ratio (Control=1.3±0.1 T2=1.5±0.2 T3=1.6±0.5) and SGR% (Control=0.8±0.0 T2=0.7±0.1 T3=0.7±0.1) were similar.
By the results it can be said the all-female common carp technology has neither advantages nor disadvantages compared to the mixed-sex stock. The all-female technology can be beneficial if the consumers need female common carps. It is worth continuing the experiment and examine how the stocks will perform above 3kg body weight.


Hobbes argues that liberal orders protect individual freedom and enable subjects to live
in different ways, but he is clear that only certain differences are tolerable: those who
challenge the legitimacy and solidity of the order are not just different but radically
different, they must be classed as 'enemies' and treated violently. Since Hobbes,
however, liberal thinkers have emphasised diversity, not violence. Whilst they rarely
advocate a fully inclusive order in which even liberalism's enemies can live freely, they
do claim that liberalism enables differences to flourish. This thesis aims to demonstrate
the illusory nature of this claim. It shows that post-Hobbesian thinkers offering liberal
visions of flourishing diversity conceal the number of subjects who will be classed as
radically different and are likely to experience exclusion, assimilation and normalisation
as a consequence.
It explains first that Locke, Mill and Rawls privilege rational, deliberative individuals in
their ideals but ignore the subtle violence experienced by those who diverge from this
model of subjectivity. However, the thesis focuses on three more radical theorists:
William Connolly, Bonnie Honig and Chantal Mouffe. They admit that liberalism
cannot escape radical difference and violence, but they attempt to limit this violence by
theorising a liberal order invigorated by institutions for 'agonistic contest,' into which
those who differ can channel their resistance and through which they can create spaces
for difference. However, it is shown that, despite their aims, these theorists, in different
ways, also conceal the number of subjects who will be treated violently in their visions
because they diverge from liberal subjectivity. The thesis thus reveals that even radicalliberals claiming to acknowledge and confront liberalism's violence conceal the number
of subjects treated violently behind an illusion of difference. It concludes by exploring
the potentially devastating implications of this analysis for liberal political theory and
practice.


Background Nosocomial infection remains the most common complication of hospitalisation. Despite infection control efforts, nosocomial methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) transmission continues to rise. Various isolation practices are used to minimise MRSA transmission in acute care. However, the effectiveness of these practices has seldom been evaluated. Objectives This review sought to evaluate the efficacy of isolation practices in minimising MRSA transmission in the acute hospital setting and explore staff, visitor and patient compliance with isolation practices. This review updates a review published in 2002. Search strategy A systematic search for relevant published or unpublished English language literature was undertaken using electronic databases, the reference lists of retrieved papers and the Internet. This extended the search published in the original review. Databases searched included: Medline, CINAHL, EMBASE, Cochrane Library and Joanna Briggs Institute Evidence Library. Selection criteria All English language research reports published between 1990 and August 2005 that focused on the role of isolation practices on the nosocomial transmission of MRSA in adult, paediatric or neonatal acute care settings were eligible for inclusion in the review. Studies that evaluated multiple infection control strategies or control of MRSA outbreaks were excluded. The main outcome of interest was the incidence of new cases of MRSA. The secondary outcome was staff, visitor and patient compliance with the isolation practices. Data collection and analysis Two reviewers assessed each paper against the inclusion criteria and a validated quality scale. Data extraction was undertaken using a tool designed specifically for this review. Statistical comparisons of findings were not possible, so findings are presented in a narrative form. Results Seven studies met the inclusion criteria. Given the small number of included studies and variable methodological quality, care must be taken when interpreting the review findings. There is some evidence that cessation of single room isolation and cohorting of MRSA patients does not increase nosocomial MRSA transmission when hand‐washing compliance and standard precautions are maintained. Indeed, there is some evidence that reduced MRSA transmission can be achieved by improving compliance with contact precautions alone. The low level of hand hygiene compliance reported in the literature suggests that staff compliance with isolation practices is a significant factor in evaluating any infection‐controlled intervention in the clinical setting. While staff compliance data are conflicting, regular audit and feedback of performance may improve compliance. Implications for clinical practice The heterogeneous nature of the topic and methodological weaknesses of included studies impairs the ability to aggregate data and develop specific practice recommendations. While this review presents evidence to suggest that ceasing single room or cohort isolation does not lead to increased MRSA transmission, these studies maintained high levels of hand hygiene or standard precautions. Additionally, the role of extraneous factors, such as environmental reservoirs, specific MRSA strains and patient mix, is unclear. None of the included studies measured financial, social or psychological factors associated with isolation practices. There is an urgent need for well‐designed research with significant sample sizes to develop an evidence base upon which to underpin future clinical practice.


Background Evidence suggests that the angiotensinogen (AGT) gene is involved in depression. The aim of this paper is to examine the association between the AGT M235T polymorphism and symptoms of depression in two independent populations; a population-based study, and a family-based study. Methods Symptoms of depression were scored using the Centre of Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale (CES-D) and compared between the MM, MT, and TT genotype groups. The extent to which AGT M235T explains the heritability of the scores was examined using a variance components analysis. Results A significant relationship between the AGT M235T polymorphism and CES-D scores was found in men in both populations. The heritability estimate was 32%. The AGT genotype contributed to 1% of the total variance of the CES-D scores. Conclusion Our findings suggest that the AGT gene is involved in the aetiology of symptoms of depression in men.


In the context of energy security and climate protection, biomass is given high importance. Nevertheless, land-use conflicts resulting from the cultivation of biomass and their economy-wide effects are yet to be fully understood. To shed light on this issue we link three distinctive models; a global, multi-regional general equilibrium model (DART), a regionalised agricultural sector model for Germany (RAUMIS) and a location model for biogas plants. The DART model allows capturing international and national feedback effects of an increased use of bioenergy such as increased agricultural prices. The interaction of DART and RAUMIS links global markets and connects them to the detailed specification of agricultural land use in Germany. Finally, we link this system to the newly developed location model ReSI-M that accounts for the location choices of biogas plants in Germany and the resulting regional markets for energy crop demand. As a first application of the modelling system we analyse the effects of the German Renewable Energy Source Act on German biogas production and of the EU 10%-biofuel target on German agriculture and world agricultural prices. A main result of the simulations is that accounting for existing land-use restrictions and land-use competition has a significant effect on model results.


Background and purpose: According to the world health organization (WHO), cataract is the most general cause of returnable blindness, accounting for 47.8% of total blindness in the world. Compared to Greek medicine, a major progress of Islamic medicine was in ophthalmology. Rhazes wrote, the first complete and comprehensive description about cataract and the first Persian book on eye diseases and treatments was written by Abu RuhJourjani. Materials and methods: A nonsystematic review study was done using library research and a review of the literature by a focus on Iranian Traditional Medicine books. Current research was performed in six phases (choosing the keywords, searching the sources, providing a single list, classifying, and comparing). Then, cataract was searched in Canon of Medicine written by Avicenna and the Nur-aluyun written by Jourjani. Results: Definition, etiology and treatment strategies were classified into three 3 main categories: nutrition, life style, and medications and surgery. The major difference between modern medicine books and these books was preventive measures for cataract that were suggested by the two scientists. Conclusion: Both physicians believed that changes in life style and avoiding certain foods can prevent this disease. According to Avicenna and Jourjani if the disease is detected at early stages, the progress could be hindered by appropriate treatments. But surgical treatment is needed if the cataract is


High–performance aircraft configurations, characterized by a small span and swept wings, have rolling moments of inertia that are significantly smaller than the pitching or yawing moments of inertia. As a result, nonlinear coupling during high–roll–rate manoeuvres produces significant yawing and pitching moments. For certain critical flight conditions, inertial coupling causes jump phenomena called roll–coupling instabilities. These jump phenomena typically occur as a result of turning–point bifurcations of the aircraft steady states. Analysis of the moment balances along the steady solution branches provides physical insight into the causes of these instabilities and potential means of eliminating them. Analysis performed by using the full eight–degree–of–freedom equations of motion shows that the critical control–surface deflections are essentially the same as for the fifth– and sixth–order equations of motion. Solving the full eight–degree–of–freedom equations allows one to determine the orientation of the aircraft before and after the instability. For the aircraft model studied here, roll–coupling instabilities result in a change in sign of the angle of attack of the aircraft. The equilibrium state of the aircraft changes from a spiral dive, with the bottom of the aircraft closest to the axis of the spiral, to a spiral dive where the top of the aircraft is nearest the axis of the spiral, or vice versa depending on the trim angle of attack from which the manoeuvre was initiated. Pitching moment balance is shown to be central to the instability.


Background Oppositional defiant disorder (ODD) is frequently co-occurring with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in children and adolescents. Because ODD is a precursor of later conduct disorder (CD) and affective disorders, early diagnostic identification is warranted. Furthermore, the predictability of three recently confirmed ODD dimensions (ODD-irritable, ODD-headstrong and ODD-hurtful) may assist clinical decision making. Method Receiver-operating characteristic (ROC) analysis was used in order to test the diagnostic accuracy of the Conners' Parent Rating Scale revised (CPRS-R) and the parent version of the Strength and Difficulties Questionnaire (PSDQ) in the prediction of ODD in a transnational sample of 1093 subjects aged 5–17 years from the International Multicentre ADHD Genetics study. In a second step, the prediction of three ODD dimensions by the same parent rating scales was assessed by backward linear regression analyses. Results ROC analyses showed adequate diagnostic accuracy of the CPRS-R and the PSDQ in predicting ODD in this ADHD sample. Furthermore, the three-dimensional structure of ODD was confirmed by confirmatory factor analysis and the CPRS-R emotional lability scale significantly predicted the ODD irritable dimension. Conclusions The PSDQ and the CPRS-R are both suitable screening instruments in the identification of ODD. The emotional lability scale of the CPRS-R is an adequate predictor of irritability in youth referred for ADHD.


In Mekong Delta, viral infection, including white spot syndrome virus (WSSV), monodon baculovirus (MBV), heptopancreatic parvovirus (HPV), infectious hypodermal and hematopoietic necrosis virus (IHHNV) and gill-associated nidovirus (GAV) frequently infect cultured shrimp starting at the postlarvae stage. These viral infections cause high mortality of shrimp and affect the farmer's income. Previous studies mainly focused on the detection, transmission and genetic variation of the pathogens, but few studied the correlation between disease occurrence and other factors, including pond conditions, culture technique and management. Three studies analysed the association of culture factors with the WSSV disease incidence determining risk and potential protective factors in freshwater rice-shrimp systems, and brackish water polyculture and monoculture of black tiger shrimp (Penaeus monodon). Studies on the risk and protective factors in the odd of viral diseases in rice-shrimp rotation were lacking, while in 2011 the Early Mortality Syndrome (EMS)/Acute Hepatopancreatic Necrosis Syndrome (AHPNS) caused the great losses of cultured shrimp in Mekong Delta. This study was carried out to describe the culture status of shrimp in Mekong Delta and to identify the risk and/or protective factors that related to disease incidences in black tiger shrimp cultured in 2011. Through interviews, 58 variables collected from 191 farmers (64: rice-shrimp rotation and 127: intensive system) in Soc Trang and Bac Lieu Provinces, Viet Nam. The data were analysed in two steps of variable reduction to increase model stability and binary logistic regression to identify the risk and/or protective factors. The results showed that the risk factors were pond size (entire dataset, rice-shrimp rotation and intensive culture), settling pond (entire dataset), period of pond dry (entire dataset), stocking density first (rice-shrimp rotation), and stocking density second (rice-shrimp rotation). The potential protective factors were the mode of water intake (entire dataset), water level (entire dataset and rice-shrimp rotation), water quality parameters before stocking (entire dataset), and fry test (rice-shrimp rotation).


Interactive volume rendering in its standard formulation has become an increasingly important tool in many application domains. In recent years several advanced volumetric illumination techniques to be used in interactive scenarios have been proposed. These techniques claim to have perceptual benefits as well as being capable of producing more realistic volume rendered images. Naturally, they cover a wide spectrum of illumination effects, including varying shading and scattering effects. In this survey, we review and classify the existing techniques for advanced volumetric illumination. The classification will be conducted based on their technical realization, their performance behaviour as well as their perceptual capabilities. Based on the limitations revealed in this review, we will define future challenges in the area of interactive advanced volumetric illumination.


Wheat is a major component of the UK diet, and provides approximately 20% of global caloric intake. Wheat is grown on more land area than any other crop, and the continued supply of wheat is essential for global food security. Biotechnology is likely to play an important role in the sustainable increase of wheat yields, and the genetic manipulation of chloroplasts for photosynthetic improvement has many potential advantages over transformation of the nuclear genome. The genetic modification of the chloroplast genome via transformation was first demonstrated in the late 1980's, and since then, chloroplast transformation of many Dicotyledonous (dicot) plant species such as Nicotiana tabaccum has been routinely performed. In comparison, the transformation of chloroplasts in Monocotyledons (monocot) plant species, which includes all cereal crops, has made far less progress. To date, there has been no reproducible homoplasmic plastid transformation event in the monocots. This study identifies a number of bottlenecks responsible for the prevention of chloroplast transformation in wheat. One such bottleneck is the lack of a suitable explant for plastid transformation, as traditional nuclear transformation targets are absent of metabolically active plastids. This study has developed a robust regeneration protocol for a previously undescribed tissue, termed the primary inflorescence leaf sheath (piLS), which is rich in active chloroplasts. Functional wheat specific chloroplast transformation vectors have been generated, and bombardment studies have been conducted with these on piLS and a second tissue, the immature embryosderived callus. Immature embryo callus (IEC) does not contain active plastids, however contains pro-plastids and is highly embryogenic. To uncover novel ways of increasing photosynthesis in C3 plants, a number of transplastomic tobacco lines expressing the Synechococcus elongatus PCC 7942 ictB gene were generated. Previous studies suggest that ictB may be an inorganic carbon transporter. In a number of transplastomic lines produced in this study, the intercellular carbon concentration (Ci) is significantly increased. This increased Ci did not result in an increased photosynthetic rate, however did cause a number of phenotypic differences, such as smaller plants, wider leaves, and earlier seed pod formation. The results, with regards to chloroplast transformation, and its implications in improving photosynthesis within C3 plants, are discussed in this thesis.


Multi0threshold CMOS is commonly used for suppressing leakage currents in idle integrated circuits. Power and ground distribution network noise produced during SLEEP to ACTIVE mode transitions and data presevartion during sleep mode are important reliability concerns in MTCMOS circuits. Sleep signal slew rate modulation techniques for suppressing mode0 ransition noise along with data retention technology is introduced in this paper. A triple0phase sleep signal slew rate modulation technique with a novel digital sleep signal generator with data retention mechanism utilising the same sleep signal is proposed. Reactivation time, mode0transition energy consumption, leakage power consumption, and layout area of different MTCMOS circuits are characterized under an equal0noise constraint. The proposed triple0phase sleep signal slew rate modulation technique enhances the tolerance to process parameter fluctuations by up to 183.1× as compared to various alternative MTCMOS noise suppression techniques in a UMC 800nm CMOS technology.


This qualitative study examines the issues 20 North Queensland secondary teachers face when students with disabilities are included in the school. Current educational policy in Australia has placed a strong emphasis on including students with disabilities in their neighbourhood schools. What began with primary schooling has now flowed on to secondary. Consequently all teachers now play a role in helping students with and without disabilities to develop and learn. This change makes it especially critical to investigate the viewpoints of teachers working with students with disabilities in secondary schools.

Three questions helped guide the inquiry. The first relates to the attitudes and professional beliefs of the teachers. The second focuses on the challenges faced by these teachers when including students with disabilities. The third explores whether the perceived challenges when
working with students with disabilities add to perceived stress levels.

During the study the researcher was both a secondary school special education teacher and the mother of a son with disabilities. This made her an insider researcher. To assist authentic inquiry while working as an insider researcher, the researcher kept a journal for systematic
reflection on identities, roles and relationships. The 20 mainstream and special education teachers in the study worked in one of two urban or two rural schools. Data collection began with a short written questionnaire to obtain personal biographical information. Semi-structured
interviews were then conducted in order to gather information on the teachers' experiences when including students with disabilities. The themes, which emerged from the analysis of the questionnaire and semi-structured interviews, were correlated with the reflective journal and the personal experience of the researcher.

The results of the study revealed that the majority of teachers interviewed were supportive of the philosophical ideals of an inclusive approach. However, they had mixed feelings about including students with disabilities in secondary school classrooms. It was obvious that the
teachers were strongly influenced by the nature of the disabilities, the educational problems they would encounter and their teaching area. In spite of their unease, there was recognition of the potential for social, academic and professional benefits for students with and without
disabilities as well as for staff.

The concerns expressed by the teachers focused on structural, curricular, instructional, professional efficiency and expectancy factors. The culture of the secondary school often meant there was a clash of expectations between the mainstream teachers and the special
education teachers, which centered on the nature of teaching and learning within the classroom. There was a dissonance between a collectivist focus on standards and individualist focus on needs. Increasing workloads, the multiplicity of work roles and the restrictions of the
school timetable were especially identified as hindering teacher collaboration. Access to ongoing professional development contributed to the challenge as a number of the teachers in the study had limited pre-service knowledge of the impact of different disabilities on learning.

The teachers in the study believed that inclusion in the secondary school environment continues to be complex and challenging; highlighting what appeared to be a large gap
between rhetoric and reality. There were conflicting views about whether the challenges involved in the inclusion of students with disabilities added to existing stress levels. However the words 'frustrated', 'discouraged', 'overwhelmed', 'anxious', 'tired' and 'exhausted' were
repeated often in the interviews. Analysis of transcripts revealed that the changes attributed to the inclusion process, the socially unacceptable behaviour of specific students with disabilities and the lack of support, particularly in rural areas, had caused a considerable impact on the teachers in the study personally and on their teaching practices.

While it is not possible to generalise from the qualitative results of interviews of this small sample of teachers, a range of cautious observations can be made about the teacher's role in the inclusion of students with disabilities in the secondary schools. Responsibility for students with disabilities remains a complicated professional issue with mainstream and special education teachers. The difficulties with collaboration and support meant that when students with disabilities were included in the classroom, many teachers in this study expressed serious
concern at the ever-increasing demands of their work.

The study concludes with a number of recommendations for practice and future research with regards to successfully including students with disabilities in secondary schools and for the preparation of secondary school teachers for inclusive schooling.


We are interested in understanding how well Transformer language models (TLMs) can perform reasoning tasks when trained on knowledge encoded in the form of natural language. We investigate their systematic generalization abilities on a logical reasoning task in natural language, which involves reasoning over relationships between entities grounded in first-order logical proofs. Specifically, we perform soft theorem-proving by leveraging TLMs to generate natural language proofs. We test the generated proofs for logical consistency, along with the accuracy of the final inference. We observe length-generalization issues when evaluated on longer-than-trained sequences. However, we observe TLMs improve their generalization performance after being exposed to longer, exhaustive proofs. In addition, we discover that TLMs are able to generalize better using backward-chaining proofs compared to their forward-chaining counterparts, while they find it easier to generate forward chaining proofs. We observe that models that are not trained to generate proofs are better at generalizing to problems based on longer proofs. This suggests that Transformers have efficient internal reasoning strategies that are harder to interpret. These results highlight the systematic generalization behavior of TLMs in the context of logical reasoning, and we believe this work motivates deeper inspection of their underlying reasoning strategies.


An all-fiber passively Q-switched Yb-doped fiber laser with fiber saturable absorber (SA) based on a piece of Sm-doped fiber is presented. For the first time, we observe the fast stimulated Brillouin scattering Q-switched process in an Yb/Sm all-fiber laser and obtain 41 ns pulses and 1.7 kW maximum peak power. Compared with the reported traditional SA Q-switched process, the pulse energy and peak power are both improved an order of magnitude. Furthermore, a traditional SA Q-switched process with 450 ns pulsewidth and 7.5 W peak power is also obtained in the same structure by increasing the feedback of cavity's output end.


AIM
Legislation relating to advance health care planning was introduced into Queensland in 1998. All states and territories apart from Western Australia, New South Wales and Tasmania now have legislation relating to this issue. The aim of this pilot study was to: determine current usage of advance health directives (AHDs) in an individual general practice; and encourage appropriate use of AHDs in general practice.

METHOD
One hundred clinical records were audited for evidence of advance health care planning and 100 adult patients were surveyed regarding advance care preferences.

RESULTS
One percent of clinical records showed evidence of advance health care discussion and 5% of those surveyed stated they had a current AHD. Only 10% of those surveyed were aware of AHDs; 70% wanted to know more about them; 83% wished family members to be substitute decision makers regarding health matters if the individual was too ill to be involved; 54% nominated doctors to be among their preferred decision makers.

CONCLUSIONS
Lack of familiarity with advance health care planning options was very common, however most patients wished to be involved in their own advance health care planning or wished to involve a family member. Legislation now exists in the majority of states and territories for this to occur. General practitioners could assist by having suitable information available in waiting rooms and including discussion in consultations where appropriate.


In this paper, we propose a comparative summary generation method and conduct key technologies research. We collect prior knowledge from the Internet via a light knowledge structure, extract core information from original literature, divide subtopics of two major topics with AGNES clustering to get the common and independent subtopics, and get comparative information with subtopics alignment and property alignment. We test the performance of each module to prove the validity of the proposed methods. Finally, we design and develop a comparative summary generation system, and the application in the nursing field shows that it can present users with useful information to facilitate the scientific research process.


Even though project management discipline is gearing towards the improvement of project effectiveness, traditional project management is responding slowly due to either false preconceptions or ineffective communication among project parties. A research study is needed to contribute to knowledge and practice on the effectiveness of Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) contracting strategy and consequently increase the chance of achieving product success at the site level. The objective of the research presented herein is to assess the effectiveness of EPC contracting strategy in meeting product objectives, from the end-user's perspective. Required data are collected using an online survey questionnaire targeting end-users working in six major oil and gas projects in Abu Dhabi. The questionnaire data are analysed using the structural equation modeling (SEM) statistical technique. Research findings reveal statistical significant correlations between the "effectiveness" concept and its respective factors. Being the first known research evaluating the influence of both "end-user's engagement" and "alignment of objectives" criteria on project effectiveness, it provides several contributions to literature and practice. These contributions are particularly illustrated as 1) the development of a conceptual measurement model for the "effectiveness" phenomenal concept, which could be applicable to researchers interested in examining such concept, 2) the identification of possible factors shaping the conceptual domain of "end-user's engagement" and "alignment of objectives" criteria in the oil and gas industry, 3) the operationalization of the conceptual measurement model based on measurement instruments verified by both literature and industry experts, and 4) the assessment of the strengths of influence of the causal factors on the effectiveness of EPC as well as the statistical significance viii of these relationships. The present research raises the awareness of oil and gas industry practitioners towards the influencing factors of "effectiveness", "engagement" and "alignment" concepts. The generated SEM model thus serves as a motivation tool for acknowledging the end-user's participation in various project phases and maintaining a proper alignment between project objectives and product objectives for the purpose of improving the project effectiveness.


This essay explores how an awareness of trauma theory can transform the experience of reading into an opportunity to bear witness to the cultural contexts and individual traumas that can underlie a narrative, especially a narrative of development that involves deterioration instead of growth and self-actualization. By approaching Edna O'Brien's The Country Girls Trilogy in this way, this article uncovers the forces that limit Caithleen, the trilogy's main character: childhood trauma in her family, the difficulties presented by the rural Irish cultural context, the fantasy of heterosexual romance as a salve and supplement for childhood wounds, and the relative dearth of options and social support. These factors—not a personal failure to overcome what are in fact almost insurmountable obstacles—explain Caithleen's deterioration and collapse of self. Rather than being cause for frustration with her disempowerment, her fate is a call for greater concern over the conditions that caused—and continue to cause—lifelong suffering for women in particular.


This research seeks to introduce architecture of new approach of exchanging XML data files between different Services. The importance of this study is to set new protocol standards of interchanging XML data files between different nodes and types of businesses. The main objective and goal of this study is to transmit XML data file in a secured manner coupled with reliability, quality of communication, independent, scalable and flexibility. Therefore, this architecture designed to minimize the risk of any alteration, data loss, data abuse, data misuse of an XML critical business data information been exchanged. As cloud computing, using existing cloud network infrastructure to get advantage of the scalability, operational efficiency, and control of data flow are big consideration in this architecture. A test has been made to measure the performance of RIDX, one by using TCP protocol, and one by UDP protocol. As a result, starting from 4 nodes up to 8 nodes in the cloud, RIDX architecture performance of UDP showed better performance than TCP, but using TCP assures the reliability and lossless of data transmission to all nodes, in addition, RIDX is reliable multicast transmission.


We sought to evaluate the reproducibility of a liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS)-based approach to measure the stable-isotope enrichment of in vivo-labeled muscle ATP synthase β subunit (β-F1-ATPase), a protein most directly involved in ATP production, and whose abundance is reduced under a variety of circumstances. Muscle was obtained from a rat infused with stable-isotope-labeled leucine. The muscle was homogenized, β-F1-ATPase immunoprecipitated, and the protein was resolved using 1D-SDS PAGE. Following trypsin digestion of the isolated protein, the resultant peptide mixtures were subjected to analysis by HPLC-ESI-MS/MS, which resulted in the detection of multiple β-F1-ATPase peptides. There were three β-F1-ATPase unique peptides with a leucine residue in the amino acid sequence, and which were detected with high intensity relative to other peptides and assigned with >95% probability to β-F1-ATPase. These peptides were specifically targeted for fragmentation to access their stable-isotope enrichment based on MS/MS peak areas calculated from extracted ion chromatographs for selected labeled and unlabeled fragment ions. Results showed best linearity (R2 = 0.99) in the detection of MS/MS peak areas for both labeled and unlabeled fragment ions, over a wide range of amounts of injected protein, specifically for the β-F1-ATPase134-143 peptide. Measured stable-isotope enrichment was highly reproducible for the β-F1-ATPase134-143 peptide (CV = 2.9%). Further, using mixtures of synthetic labeled and unlabeled peptides we determined that there is an excellent linear relationship (R2 = 0.99) between measured and predicted enrichment for percent enrichments ranging between 0.009% and 8.185% for the β-F1-ATPase134-143 peptide. The described approach provides a reliable approach to measure the stable-isotope enrichment of in-vivo-labeled muscle β-F1-ATPase based on the determination of the enrichment of the β-F1-ATPase134-143 peptide.


The potential physiological relevance of liquid-liquid phase separation in lipid membranes to the formation and stability of "lipid rafts" in cellular plasma membranes has prompted extensive investigation of the physical chemistry underlying these phenomena. Furthermore, the concept of lipid rafts – 10-200 nm regions of cellular membrane enriched in specific lipids and proteins to enable complex processes – has led naturally to questions concerning the sorting of both lipids and proteins between membranes of different organelles within the cell, each with distinct lipid and protein composition. The shapes and, more specifically, the curvatures of membrane transport intermediates have been invoked to play a role in both lipid and protein sorting. In addition, lipid and protein composition may directly affect the membrane curvature. In this contribution, the line tension and dipole density differences between demixed fluid phases of monolayers comprised of dimyristoylphosphatidylcholine and dihydrocholesterol were investigated by measuring the two-dimensional thermal fluctuations of domain boundaries. These parameters are essential determinants of domain stability, and their quantification will yield an increased understanding of the physical processes responsible for aspects of lateral phase separation. Furthermore, phase-separated giant unilamellar vesicles from which are pulled thin cylindrical tubes are employed to understand domain nucleation in curvature gradients, complemented by measurements of the biophysical force required to pull such tubes. These results indicate that strong lipid-lipid interactions can lead to lipid sorting by curvature, as well as present diffusion barriers to enable selective sorting of lipids and proteins. Finally, the curvature generation of Drosophila amphiphysin N-BAR domain is quantitatively assessed through the tube-pulling assay as before but performed using homogenous lipid membranes. Fluorescently-labeled protein preferentially sorted into the high (positive) curvature of the tubes from the essentially flat vesicle. Furthermore, the measured tube force decreased to lower equilibrium values in a protein concentration-dependent manner. Future measurements on other BAR domains will improve upon previous qualitative comparisons of curvature generation ability. Collectively, the results provide quantitative assessment of several biophysical parameters underlying the lateral sorting of lipids and proteins. Degree Type Dissertation Degree Name Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) Graduate Group Chemistry First Advisor Tobias Baumgart


Intertidal migration by the shore crab Carcinus maenas (L.) was studied on a seasonal and tidal basis from May to December 1992 on Ynys Faelog, Menai Strait, North Wales, UK. Work was carned out using a specially designed, remotely operated, unbaited directional trap, in conjunction with other conventional methods. Highly oriented migration was detected, with significantly more crabs taken in traps facing upand downshore tidal flow than when facing against or 90" to flow. Facing-flow crab catches from falling tides were greater than those from rising tides. No significant differences were found in the numbers of daytime and nighttime migrants. Green (early intermoult) crabs were more attracted to bait than were red (late intermoult) crabs, food searching activity being extensive dunng times of flood bde, and rare dunng ebb hdes. Most crabs caught in the unbaited trap were green male early intermoults, and they were retneved more abundantly from the top half of the shore; female crabs were virtually absent from the lower shore. Upper-shore migrants were smaller than lower-shore migrants, which contained a higher proportion of late intermoult red crabs Crabs remaining on the shore at low tide were smaller than high-tide migrants, nearly all were green and they were located most abundantly around the midshore Numbers of both resident and migrant crabs declined between summer and winter.


The integrated circuit (IC) packaging and testing industry is an important link in the semiconductor industrial chain that may decide the success or failure of the foundry industry. The purpose of this study was to compare the competitiveness of the packaging and testing industry in the rear section of the foundry process in Taiwan. Starting from the financial data of six listed companies and using Grey theory, this study summarizes their five factors of competition: scale, growth, profit, efficiency and risks. The study confirmed that the model is able to effectively compare the competitiveness of corporations in the same industry.


One of the objectives of IIASA's Project on the Processes of International Negotiation PIN) is to examine how fair and mutually beneficial agreements on transboundary environmental problems can be reached, especially between parties who each wish to satisfy their own interests and their own criteria of fairness and equity which may not coincide. Scientifically reasoned solutions to transboundary problems -- the type that IIASA models often generate -- may represent ideal answers, but are practical only if they satisfy the disputants' principles of justice and fairness.

Thus, a critically important dimension of negotiation analysis must be to identify these basic principles and assess the opportunities for convergence in fairness beliefs among disputants. If this can be accomplished, the scientific tools used to explore alternate scenarios and strategies can be more sharply honed to reflect the realities of national interests and acceptability by framing the problem and reasonable solutions in a practical light.

This paper reviews the literature and develops a framework for conceptualizing the role played by fairness in international negotiation. It is planned that applications of this framework will be performed concerning transboundary environmental conflicts. A prime candidate for application will be the case of long-range transboundary air pollution in Europe, where PIN Project staff can collaborate with analysts working on IIASA's Regional Acidification Information and Simulation (RAINS) model.


We consider the task of semantic robotic grasping, in which a robot picks up an object of a user-specified class using only monocular images. Inspired by the two-stream hypothesis of visual reasoning, we present a semantic grasping framework that learns object detection, classification, and grasp planning in an end-to-end fashion. A "ventral stream" recognizes object class while a "dorsal stream" simultaneously interprets the geometric relationships necessary to execute successful grasps. We leverage the autonomous data collection capabilities of robots to obtain a large self-supervised dataset for training the dorsal stream, and use semi-supervised label propagation to train the ventral stream with only a modest amount of human supervision. We experimentally show that our approach improves upon grasping systems whose components are not learned end-to-end, including a baseline method that uses bounding box detection. Furthermore, we show that jointly training our model with auxiliary data consisting of non-semantic grasping data, as well as semantically labeled images without grasp actions, has the potential to substantially improve semantic grasping performance.


In contemporary Western society, people are more often called upon to justify the choice not to have children than they are to supply reasons for having them. In this book, Christine Overall maintains that the burden of proof should be reversed: that the choice to have children calls for more careful justification and reasoning than the choice not to. Arguing that the choice to have children is not just a prudential or pragmatic decision but one with ethical repercussions, Overall offers a wide-ranging exploration of how we might think systematically and deeply about this fundamental aspect of human life. Writing from a feminist perspective, she also acknowledges the inevitably gendered nature of the decision; the choice has different meanings, implications, and risks for women than it has for men. After considering a series of ethical approaches to procreation, and finding them inadequate or incomplete, Overall offers instead a novel argument. Exploring the nature of the biological parent-child relationship -- which is not only genetic but also psychological, physical, intellectual, and moral -- she argues that the formation of that relationship is the best possible reason for choosing to have a child.


Current knowledge of the mechanisms underlying the production and comprehension of codeswitches derives largely from studies with bilingual speakers who do not codeswitch or who report codeswitching (CS), but do not belong to stable bilingual communities. Although these data have a place in CS research, the foundational knowledge must characterize bilinguals in communities where CS is linked to community norms. We examine this issue by comparing a group of Spanish-English bilinguals from Harlem, home to a well-defined community with regular CS, and a group of Spanish-English bilinguals who resemble participants of past lab studies. We recorded eye movements while participants read frequent and infrequent switches found in Spanish-English corpora. Despite differences between both groups, the findings revealed strikingly similar eye-movement patterns.


The introduction of Tagamet in the United States in 1977 represented both a revolution in ulcer therapy and the beginning of an important new industry. Today there are four prescription H2- antagonist drugs: Tagamet, Zantac, Pepcid and Axid, and they comprise a multi-billion dollar market for the treatment of ulcers and other gastric acid conditions. In this paper, we examine the determinants of sales in this market, using a carefully constructed data set made possible by IMS America. We concentrate particularly on the marketing of these drugs to physicians through detailing and medical journal advertising, and we make an innovative attempt to distinguish between 'industry-expanding' and 'rivalrous' marketing efforts. We find that the impact of total marketing on the expansion of overall industry sales declines as the number of products on the market increases. In addition, we find that the stock of industry-expanding marketing depreciates at a near-zero rate, while the stock of marketing oriented towards rivalrous market share competition depreciates at a 40% annual rate. We also find that the products' sales are affected significantly by price, quality attributes (such as number of FDA- approved indications and number of adverse drug interactions), and order of entry into the market.


OBJECTIVE
To determine the effects of clomipramine hydrochloride on heart rate and rhythm in dogs.

ANIMALS
17 healthy Beagles.

PROCEDURES
In experiment 1, 8 dogs received placebo or clomipramine (20 mg/kg of body weight, q 24 h, PO) for 7 days in a 2-way crossover design. In experiment 2, 9 dogs were evaluated for 48 hours before and 24 hours after oral administration of clomipramine (4 or 12 mg/kg) in a 2-way crossover design. Electrocardiogram and heart rate were monitored continuously by use of telemetry.

RESULTS
A significant diurnal rhythm in heart rate was detected; minimum values were recorded at night. Administration of 20 mg of clomipramine/kg induced a significant reduction in heart rate, with peak effect achieved approximately 12 hours after dosing. Administration of 4 or 12 mg of clomipramine/kg did not result in significant changes in heart rate. Sinoatrial and second-degree atrioventricular block and ventricular escape beats were observed during periods of slow heart rate in more dogs that received clomipramine (3 to 4 of 8 dogs), compared with dogs that received placebo (1 to 2 of 8 dogs), but this difference was not significant.

CONCLUSIONS AND CLINICAL RELEVANCE
Short-term administration of clomipramine induced benign cardiovascular effects in dogs rather than the potentially dangerous arrhythmias or tachycardia reported following administration of tricyclic antidepressants to humans. Precautions regarding cardiovascular effects may not be needed for the use of clomipramine in healthy dogs.


A man of as many names as motives, Edward Bancroft is a singular figure in the history of Revolutionary America. Born in Massachusetts in 1745, Bancroft moved to England as a young man in the 1760s and began building a respectable resume as both a scientist and a man of letters. In recognition of his works in natural history, Bancroft was unanimously elected to the Royal Society, and while working to secure French aid for the American Revolution, he became a close associate of such luminaries as Benjamin Franklin, Silas Deane, and John Adams. Though lauded in his time as a staunch American patriot, when the British diplomatic archives were opened in the late nineteenth century, it was revealed that Bancroft led a secret life as a British agent acting against French and American interests. In this book, the first complete biography of Bancroft, historian Thomas J. Schaeper reveals the full extent of the agent's deception during the crucial years of the American Revolution. Operating under aliases, working in ciphers, and leaving coded messages in the trees of Paris's Tuileries Gardens, Bancroft filtered information from unsuspecting figures including Franklin and Deane back to his contacts in Britain, navigating a complicated web of political allegiances. Through Schaeper's keen analysis of Bancroft's correspondence and diplomatic records, this biography reveals whether Bancroft should ultimately be considered a traitor to America or a patriot to Britain.


The chronicle of Robert Fabyan, one of the best known historical works of the 16th century, appeared in four posthumous editions, 1516, 1533, 1542, and 1559. John Kyngston, a prolific London printer, produced two versions: the 1559 edition and also revised and extended it for the years 1542-1559. Today Kyngston's work is the most widely cited 16th century edition of Fabyan's Chronicle.This essay examines the two versions of the chronicle, the new narrative, as well as editorial emendations to the 1542 text. Kyngston acknowledged the assistance of only two persons, Robert Recorde, the Tudor mathematician and sage, whose work he had previously printed and the Geman scholar, Johann Funck. Internal evidence, however, indicates that Kyngston's narrative drew on the work of another contemporary printer and chronicler, John Mychell of Canterbury. Historians have generally neglected the role of printers as chroniclers. In addition to Kyngston and Mychell, other 16th century printers including Richard Grafton and Robert Crowley contributed to chronicle scholarship. A study of Kyngston's work reveals his importance as a chronicler and his role in the formation of the national history.


* Corresponding Author: Mohammad Tahan, MSc. Address: Young Researchers and Elite Club, Birjand Branch, Islamic Azad University, Birjand, Iran. Tel: +98 (912) 0252104 E-mail: firstname.lastname@example.com Psychotherapy endows a sense of control in patients gripped with emotional conflicts; it allows them to handle their reflexes and regain composure through conscious and behavioral alterations. These transformational changes can be brought about by improving their listening skills, observational capacities, creating awareness, and making them more attentive and intervening. Conventional psychotherapy calls for one-to-one sessions during treatment. Considering the increased access to Information Technology (IT) in our daily living, the idea of replacement of human interaction by IT tools appeared. The specialized tools and techniques are employed through the course of therapy, which not only alters but also accentuates their cognitive and practical understanding. The idea of amalgamating these two broad ambits, the complexities of psychology and dynamism of Artificial Intelligence (AI), has gained momentum in recent years. The reluctance of a few psychologists in the past regarding inculcating expert systems into routine practice, because of employment-related insecurities or being swapped by a computer, led to the underutilization of the latent competence of using IT. Primarily, human behavior itself cannot be copied in totality by technology, and AI has a great deal to cover in this regards, but researchers are doing their best to deliver on these premises. Apart from this patient, resistance to this encroachment of technology should be critically investigated for gaining acceptance. This review focuses on how machine intelligence can enhance self-awareness through computer-implemented psychotherapeutic tools. A B S T R A C T


We describe a set of benchmark exercises that are designed to test if computer codes that simulate dynamic earthquake rupture are working as intended. These types of computer codes are often used to understand how earthquakes operate, and they produce simulation results that include earthquake size, amounts of fault slip, and the patterns of ground shaking and crustal deformation. The benchmark exercises examine a range of features that scientists incorporate in their dynamic earthquake rupture simulations. These include implementations of simple or complex fault geometry, off‐fault rock response to an earthquake, stress conditions, and a variety of formulations for fault friction. Many of the benchmarks were designed to investigate scientific problems at the forefronts of earthquake physics and strong ground motions research. The exercises are freely available on our website for use by the scientific community.


Pearson Education Limited. Paperback. Book Condition: new. BRAND NEW, Choices Intermediate Students' Book, Michael Harris, Anna Sikorzynska, *12 thematic modules for Pre-Intermediate and 10 thematic modules for Elementary and Upper Intermediate, each divided into sections: Topic Talk (opening page) networks that provide guided choice by marrying functional language with lexical items Grammar Skills Writing Workshop Speaking Workshop *Text Builder in units for process writing *Grammar Practice Grammatical structures compared and contrasted. Students trained in choosing forms that best express given meanings and intentions *Language Review/Self Assessment every second module. Revision exercises where students check their answers and use a feedback guide to choose what they need to practise more *Listening with two levels of difficulty (slow speed and authentic speed) catering for different levels of students. Also gives the option of listening to the more difficult version after students have listened to the easier level *Culture Choice 6 x lessons at back of Students' Book every two units which include cultural input, literature, songs and projects * At the back of the Students' Book: Skills Builder while doing listening, reading, writing and communicative activities, learners are given suport with strategies and...


We investigate the electromechanical properties of bucky-gel electrochemical actuators incorporating various amounts of single-walled carbon nanotubes and an ionic liquid electrolyte, 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium tetrafluoroborate, that are able to convert electrochemical energy into mechanical energy. The interplay between mechanical and electrochemical effects is studied. The electromechanical responses are investigated by means of electrochemical impedance spectroscopy and bending displacement measurements. We develop a theoretical model that allows us to rationalize the electromechanical properties of the bucky-gel actuators. This model takes into account electrochemical stress due to the intercalation (de-intercalation) process, which generates the strain and bending of the actuators. We then analyze the relationship between the strain and the real part of the complex capacitance by introducing a strain-capacitance coefficient. This coefficient is related to the electrochemical stress and the amount of the ionic adsorption (desorption) at the double-layer. From a practical point of view, the determination of the strain-capacitance coefficient is helpful for characterizing and optimizing the performance of electrochemical actuators.


Introduction: Health literacy is one of the crucial factors that has a considerable influence on health. However, the previous studies indicated that leukemia decrease the level of health. Therefore, the aim of current study is to investigate the relationship between health literacy and general health among patients with leukemia before bone marrow transplant. Method: This research is a descriptive and correlational research. The sample of current research included 100 patients with leukemia hospitalized into Shariati Hospital in Tehran that were selected through convenience simple in 2015. They responded to two research instruments such as; Health Literacy for Iranian Adults (HELIA) and Goldberg's General Health Questionnaire. Data was analyzed by utilizing the Pearson correlation and regression step by step. Results: The findings of Pierson test indicated that there was a significant positive relationship between health literacy and general health (sig= 0.01). In addition, based the results of regression, health literacy could be predicted the general health in patients with leukemia (sig=0.001). Conclusion: The results emphasize on the relationship between health literacy and general health among patients with leukemia. Thus, it is suggested that this result can be considered in prevention programs (primary and secondary) in order to increase the patient health.


What role does and should religion play in the legal sphere of a modern liberal democracy? Does religion threaten to create divisions that would undermine the stability of the constitutional order? Or is religious disagreement itself a force that works to create consensus on some of the core commitments of constitutionalism - liberty of conscience, toleration, limited government, and the rule of law? This essay explores these questions from the perspectives of contemporary political philosophy and constitutional theory. The thesis of the essay is that pluralism - the diversity of religious and secular conceptions of the good - can and should work as a force for constitutional consensus and that such a consensus is best realized through commitment to an ideal of public legal reason instantiated by the practice of legal formalism. The case for these claims is made in six parts. After the introduction, Part II, The Fact of Pluralism in the Context of Contemporary Religious Division, explores the idea of religious division in light of an important notion in political philosophy - the idea that John Rawls calls the fact of reasonable pluralism. Part III, Public Legal Reason, argues that the fact of pluralism has important normative consequences for the foundations of normative legal theory and argues for an ideal of public legal reason. Part IV, Legal Formalism, contends that this idea is best realized in constitutional practice through a formalist approach to constitutional interpretation - one that deliberately eschews direct reliance on religious and secular comprehensive conceptions of the good. Part V, Feasibility and Positive Theory, discusses the question whether this ideal of public legal reason and corresponding conception of constitutional formalism are realistic, given the constraints imposed by democratic politics under contemporary conditions. Finally, Part VI, Religious Division Revisited: From Pluralism to Formalism, brings the discussion to a close. (A previous version of the PDF file was corrupted. This version should open. If you experience a problem, please email the author.)


The work reported here focuses on two problems, that of synthesizing systems from formal specifications, and that of formalizing REST—a popular web applications' development pattern.
For the synthesis problem, we distinguish between the synchronous and the asynchronous case. For the former, we solve a problem concerning a fundamental flaw in specification construction in previous work. We continue with exploring effective synthesis of asynchronous systems (programs on multi-threaded systems). Two alternative models of asynchrony are presented, and shown to be equally expressive for the purpose of synthesis.
REST is a software architectural style used for the design of highly scalable web applications. Interest in REST has grown rapidly over the past decade. However, there is also considerable confusion surrounding REST: many examples of supposedly RESTful APIs violate key REST constraints. We show that the constraints of REST and of RESTful HTTP can be precisely formulated within temporal logic. This leads to methods for model checking and run-time verification of RESTful behavior. We formulate several relevant verification questions and analyze their complexity.


Summary Data from 50 sonobuoys were recorded over the Capel and Faust Basins, 800 km to the east of mainland Australia in water depths 1500-2000 m, during a 2006 seismic survey for Geoscience Australia. These data were interpreted and forward modelled by ray-tracing to provide an estimate of P-wave velocities in the upper sedimentary section, and hence constrain estimates of sediment thickness. Also recorded were gravity and magnetic anomaly data which, in conjunction with the very high quality seismic reflection data, provided additional constraints upon the velocity models. Typical ranges in four model layers below water were: 1.9, 2.3-3.0, 3.6-4.7, 5-5.3 km/s. Gravity models based on these results were compared to features identified on depth converted seismic reflection lines and indicate that sediment thickness at densities approximating 2.3 t/m3 may reach 5 km in several localities.


Amid the corruption and power struggles of the collapse of the Roman Republic, Cicero (106-43BC) produced some of the most stirring and eloquent speeches in history. A statesman and lawyer, he was one of the only outsiders to penetrate the aristocratic circles that controlled the Roman state, and became renowned for his speaking to the Assembly, Senate and courtrooms. Whether fighting corruption, quashing the Catiline conspiracy, defending the poet Archias or railing against Mark Antony in the Philippics - the magnificent arguments in defence of liberty which led to his banishment and death - Cicero's speeches are oratory masterpieces, vividly evocative of the cut and thrust of Roman political life.


The ecological tax reform that Germany implemented between 1999 and 2003 increased energy tax rates—especially on gasoline and diesel. Today, the ecological tax hikes yield an annual revenue of around 20 billion euros or 0.6 percent of GDP. The money is used to finance a higher federal grant to the public pension scheme. Calculations based on a pension simulation model show that the contribution rate to the statutory pension fund is currently 1.2 percentage points lower and pensions 1.5 percent higher than they would be without the currently higher federal subsidies. A microsimulation analysis found that overall, the ecological tax reform is neutral with regard to revenue and burden. For various income groups and social groups, there are certain levels of burden and relief. For example, the reform relieves middle-income households of employees and retired persons who benefit from the public pension scheme. Households with low incomes are actually burdened, as are commuters with long commutes. These distribution effects should be taken into account in a further development of ecological taxes.


Born in Hong Kong, Richard Giblett is a visual artist living and working in Melbourne. He has exhibited nationally and internationally, as well as having undertaken residencies in Seoul and New York. He has worked on art projects from Dubai to Venice and is currently part of the Liminal exhibition at the Carnegie Gallery, Hobart. His work focuses on architectural intrusions, modeling and installation, as well as large works on paper. For his Forum talk he will discuss his practice from 1990 to the present.


The viscosity of a series of Na2O-FeO-Fe2O3-Al2O3-SiO2 melts has been measured by micropenetration methods. The viscosity of the Fe-bearing melts follows the same compositional trend as the Fe-free Na2O-Al2O3-SiO2 melts as a function of Na/Al at constant SiO2 content: viscosity increases with decreasing peralkalinity and remains almost constant for all investigated compositions in the peraluminous field. The addition of 1 mol% Fe2O3 to the Fe-free peraluminous compositions causes ~1 log10 Pa s decrease in viscosity, while ~3 mol% Fe2O3 needs to be added to the peralkaline compositions to produce a similar decrease in viscosity. The need for more charge-balancing cations in the peraluminous melt structure appears to control the Fe2+/Fetotal, with the peraluminous compositions having a large Fe2+/Fetotal (0.6) compared with that for the peralkaline compositions (0.3). Although triclusters probably exist in peraluminous composition melts, the configurational entropy term at a viscosity of 1012 Pa s [Be/Sconf(Tg)] calculated for these melts suggests that the flow process is not initiated at a tri-cluster site. Thus the peralkaline and peraluminous melts have not only different structures but also slightly different flow processes. These differences are reflected in the viscosity, activation energy for viscous flow and calculated Be/Sconf(Tg) term.


Most spam filters are configured for use at a very low falsepositive rate. Typically, the filters are trained with techniques that optimize accuracy or entropy, rather than performance in this configuration. We describe two different techniques for optimizing for the low false-positive region. One method weights good data more than spam. The other method uses a two-stage technique of first finding data in the low false-positive region, and then learning using this subset. We show that with two different learning algorithms, logistic regression and Naive Bayes, we achieve substantial improvements, reducing missed spam by as much as 20% relative for logistic regression and 40% for Naive Bayes at the same low false-positive rate.


There is an urgent need for better drugs for a more successful fight against leishmaniasis, one of the most important neglected diseases caused by the parasite Leishmania. We have recently synthesized several symmetrical pyridinium compounds belonging to two dif‐ ferent series: bis-pyridinium and bis-quinolinium acyclic structures and bis-pyridinium diazacyclophanes derivatives. The first series of bis-pyridinium derivatives have been found to display activity against promastigotes and intracellular amastigotes of Leishma‐ nia donovani and Leishmania major, with EC50 values lower than 1 μM. The majority of compounds show a similar behavior in both Leishmania species, being slightly more active against intracellular amastigotes of L. major. The series of bis-pyridinium diazacyclo‐ phanes can be considered as rigid analogues of the previous bis-cationic ones. The activi‐ ty of these compounds has also been evaluated against promastigotes and intracellular amastigotes of L. donovani and L. major. All the diazacyclophanes are more active against L. major, with EC50 values of between 1 and 17 μM in intracellular amastigotes, and in some cases they present a higher selectivity index than the reference anti-leishmanial drugs such as amphotericin B and miltefosine. In conclusion, these bis-quaternary com‐ pounds represent promising candidates as potential therapeutic agents against leishma‐ niasis.


The kinetics and mechanism of hydrolysis of a series of substituted benzylidene benzoylhydrazones (X — BBH) have been studied at five different temperatures in the range 25 — 45°c by U. V. -visible spectrophotometry. The hydrolysis reactions were found to follow first - order kinetics. A mechanism has been postulated in which the attack of water on the protonated substrate is subject to general base catalysis. This mechanism has been supported by the effect of anion concentration of buffer, at constant pH, on the observed rate constant. The Bronsted ?-value for the hydrolysis reaction is 0.73. Hammett correlations, Arrhenius and thermodynamic parameters have been evaluated and discussed. The pKa values for the conjugate acids for benzylidene benzoylhydrazones derivatives (X - BBH) have been determined.


We include gaseous continuum and line emission into our galev models for the spectral and photometric evolution of Simple Stellar Populations (SSPs) for various metallicities in the range 0:02 Z=Z 2:5. This allows to extend them to significantly younger ages than before. They now cover the age range from 4 Myr all through 14 Gyr. We point out the very important contributions of gaseous emission to broad band fluxes and their strong metallicity dependence during very early evolutionary stages of star clusters, galaxies or subgalactic fragments with vigorous ongoing star formation. Emission- line contributions are commonly seen in these actively star-forming regions. Models without gaseous emission cannot explain their observed colors at all, or lead to wrong age estimates. We use up-to-date Lyman continuum (=Lyc) emission rates and decided to use recent empirical determinations of emission line ratios relative to H for subsolar metallicities. We justify this approach for all situations where no or not enough spectral information is available to determine all the parameters required by photoionization models. The eects of gaseous line and continuum emission on broad band fluxes are shown for dierent metallicities and as a function of age. In addition to the many filter systems already included in our earlier models, we here also include the HST NICMOS and Advanced Camera for Surveys (=ACS) filter systems.


Nowadays, we use embedded electronic devices in almost every aspect of our daily lives. They represent our electronic identity; they store private information; they monitor health status; they do confidential communications, and so on. All these applications rely on cryptography and, therefore, present us a research objective: how to implement cryptography on embedded systems in a trustworthy and efficient manner. Implementing embedded cryptography faces two challenges constrained resources and physical attacks. Due to low cost constraints and power budget constraints, embedded devices are not able to use high-end processors. They cannot run at extremely high frequencies either. Since most embedded devices are portable and deployed in the field, attackers are able to get physical access and to mount attacks as they want. For example, the power dissipation, electromagnetic radiation, and execution time of embedded cryptography enable Side-Channel Attacks (SCAs), which can break cryptographic implementations in a very short time with a quite low cost. In this dissertation, we propose solutions to efficient implementation of SCA-resistant and high-performance cryptographic software on embedded systems. These solutions make use of two state-of-the-art architectures of embedded processors: instruction set extensions and multi-core architectures. We show that, with proper processor microarchitecture design and suitable software programming, we are able to deliver SCAresistant software which performs well in security, performance, and cost. In comparison, related solutions have either high hardware cost or poor performance or low attack resistance. Therefore, our solutions are more practical and see a promising future in commercial products. Another contribution of our research is the proper partitioning of the Montgomery multiplication over multi-core processors. Our solution is scalable over multiple cores, achieving almost linear speedup with a high tolerance to inter-core communication delays. We expect our contributions to serve as solid building blocks that support secure and high-performance embedded systems.


Throughout the Ptolemaic era, the Greek rulers of Egypt had to tackle complex issues pertaining to the nature of their dominion over peoples who were in many ways culturally, socially, and politically distinct. This paper examines how, despite these differences, Ptolemy II Philadelphus found a way to connect with both the Greek and Egyptian segments of his population by identifying himself with the god Dionysus. Although a Greek deity, Dionysus possessed specific associations that would have resonated with elements of Egyptian religion and culture. These connotations would have promoted the perception of Philadelphus as a legitimate and benevolent ruler capable of transcending cultural boundaries. The grand procession in the Ptolemaia festival has been characterized by Dorothy J. Thompson as a form of propaganda for the ruling family. Similarly, the various forms of evidence presented in this paper suggest that Dionysus would have been a convenient political vehicle in this syncretic environment. Such an approach on the part of Philadelphus was highly innovative and effective, and influenced the political identity assumed by later Ptolemaic rulers. DOI:10.2458/azu_jaei_v02i1_goyette


Food production is not keeping pace with food demand. Growth in food production is consistently falling behind population growth making food shortages a recurrent problem. On the other hand, global financial crisis necessitates that world countries reach certain level of self-sufficiency in producing basic commodities. In Malaysia, the production of fresh beef is not enough to answer the people's need, either as food security reasons or to increase self-sufficiency level for the country. The major problem is that the beef sub sector of Malaysia has remained uncommercialized due to low productivity and the private sector has been silent on the beef sub sector development. The objectives of this study is to develop a Model for beef policy analysis in order to investigate the future trend of beef self sufficiency level in Malaysia via biological and mathematical simulation beef model, to develop a beef production system modeling for policy analysis, to predict the beef supply trend in future plans, and to analyze the benefit/cost of implementing alternative policy in increasing beef production in Malaysia.
Vintage approach simulation matrix model (VASIMM) was used to analyze the objectives of the study. The VASIMM method uses aggregate data on bringing the new breeding stock into the model, reproduction of existing breeding stocks, and culling rate, to derive a theoretical slaughter system based on different rates of calving, replacement, mortality, and slaughter in the past, as reduction rates to system simulation, and simulate the final results of female breeding stocks, male breeding stocks, female calves, male calves, slaughter, and production of beef cattle, dairy cattle, and buffalo. The ex-post simulation analysis was applied for 1960-2006 period, and the model was validated using RMSE, RMSPE, and U-Theil inequality coefficient, as the base model of ex-ante simulation model. The ex-ante simulation analysis was developed by examining different policy variables, such as mortality, slaughter, and calving rate, importation of female breeding stocks, and importation of animal for slaughter, in 9 different Scenarios. Scenario 1 depicts the current situation of fresh beef production in Malaysia without any breeding stock importation. Scenario 2 assumes that all management variables (mortality rate, slaughter rate, etc) are the same as in Scenario 1, but there are 10,000 heads of female breeding stock importation. In Scenario 3, apart from the importation of female breeding stock, the management is also improved. Scenario 4 investigates the poor management system of the industry while Scenario 5 analyzes the effects of importing 10,000 heads of beef cattle and buffalo for slaughter under the current situation. Scenarios 6, 7, and 8 are similar to Scenarios 2, 3, and 4 respectively, but the importation of beef cattle and buffalo for slaughter is added to each of them. Lastly, Scenario 9 investigates what changes in the current situation of fresh beef production would be if 50,000 heads of female breeding stock are imported in 2010, 2011, and 2012.
Amongst these 9 Scenarios, only Scenario 3 is economically applicable in long run, and can fulfill the targeted level of self-sufficiency (40%) by 2020. The results of positive Net Present Worth (NPW) and 45% level of self sufficiency under the following conditions of 3-4% mortality rate, 5-10% slaughter rate, 75-78% calving rate, importation of 10,000 heads Beef cattle, 500 heads Dairy cattle, and 500 heads Buffalo female breeding stock/year by 2010, respectively, indicate that under Scenario 3, in long run Malaysia can be independent on fresh beef importation. While, the negative value of NPW and low level of self sufficiency in Scenario 1, 2 , 4, 5, and 8 makes these Scenarios inapplicable. In Scenarios 6, 7 and 9, although the level of self sufficiency in beef production will be reached to the target and even exceed the target, the negative value of NPW depicts that Scenario 6, 7 and 9 are not economically feasible.
The simulated results indicate that Malaysia can boost its fresh beef production by increasing importation of female breeding stock, and improving the management system by reducing the rate of mortality and slaughter, and increasing the rate of calving, so that Malaysia would be independent on beef production in the near future.