Mental health has become a national health priority in the West; however, it is still an overlooked issue in most African countries. Sixty-four percent of African countries do not have any mental health legislations or fail to adequately promote the rights of people diagnosed with mental illnesses (Mental Health and Poverty Project a World Health Organization, n.d). As a direct consequence, individuals with mental illnesses in African nations often do not receive adequate treatment. This review evaluates the barriers of appropriate development and implementation of mental health laws in Ghana, Kenya, and Zambia. Legislative actions that have been taken in these three countries will be examined in an effort to improve mental health laws, via an analysis of strengths and areas of improvement. Through these analyses, the author hopes to raise awareness about legislations in Africa regarding mental health issues, build a stronger path towards comprehensive mental health laws, and work towards the effective provision of treatment for people with mental health issues in Ghana, Kenya, Zambia, and the rest of the African continent.


The international market requires milk products to meet specified minimum standards that define acceptable composition. This study used a deterministic simulation model to estimate milk products yields of individual cows for different export markets. Four milk product portfolios were analysed which included 100% of the milk to either whole-milk powder (WMP), skim-milk powder, cheese, or butter. Milk product potential was estimated for 4310 mixed-breed heifers from LIC Sire Proving Scheme herds based on total lactation production. Lactation lengths were 212, 214 and 213 days for Holstein Friesian (HF), Holstein Friesian-Jersey crossbreds (HFxJ), and Jerseys (J) respectively. Milk yields were significantly different between breeds averaging 3121 for HF, 2947 for HFxJ, and 2751 litres for J cows. Holstein Friesians had the lowest fat, protein and lactose concentrations, whereas J had the highest. Holstein Friesian had the greatest yields of WMP per 1000 litres of milk, whereas J had the least. For all scenarios, J milk was most valuable per litre. Crossbred cows provided greater total milk income for all scenarios except 100% butter. Positive heterosis effects were estimated for first-cross HFxJ animals for milk production and product yields. Crossbreeding produces cows with milk better suited to the processing requirements of the New Zealand dairy industry and returning greater value to the New Zealand dairy farmer.


As recent partisan gerrymandering cases have shown, three-judge district courts play a unique and important role in how the federal judiciary considers significant election law disputes. Yet two somewhat quirky procedural questions involving these courts remain unresolved: first, is a Supreme Court ruling to summarily affirm a three-judge district court's decision precedential on all future courts? That is, why should a one-line order from the Supreme Court, without explanation, formally bind all future courts on the issue, especially when it is unclear what aspect of the lower court's decision was correct? Second, must a three-judge district court follow, as mandatory authority, circuit precedent in the circuit in which it sits, even though an appeal from the ruling of a three-judge district court will skip the court of appeals and go directly to the U.S. Supreme Court?

This Article tackles these problems and provides clear-cut answers, which will ultimately improve judicial decision making for some of the most important cases that the federal judiciary hears given their effect on democracy. On the first question, we find that summary decisions of the U.S. Supreme Court are entitled to zero or very little precedential value, and therefore that the Justices need not feel obliged to hear these cases in full if they want the issue to percolate in the lower courts first. Yet there should be a presumption in favor of the Court providing legal guidance on the issue, meaning that most of the time it should set the case for oral argument and provide a full written opinion. On the second question, we conclude that circuit precedent is not formally binding on three-judge district courts, although of course in many cases it will be highly persuasive.

Procedural questions stemming from three-judge district courts impact their substantive rulings, which mostly involve redistricting and campaign finance. Resolving these two questions on the procedures involving three-judge district courts will help to ensure that these special courts operate as Congress intended, ultimately improving our electoral system.


MECH-510 Analysis and Design of Machines and Mechanical Assemblies 4 Credits Corequisites: MECH-330 Prerequisites: MECH-300 and MECH-310 and MECH-312 Terms Offered: Directed Study The main aim of this course is to integrate the concepts of kinematic & dynamic analyses to the design of machines and mechanical assemblies used in automotive, medical equipment and other applications. These include (but are not limited to) the analysis and design of reciprocating engine sub-systems such as, piston cylinder mechanism, steering linkages, window and door-lock mechanisms, over-head valve linkage system, flywheel, gears & gearboxes, universal couplings and automotive differential. Synthesis of mechanism systems used in medical equipment area will also be covered. Kinematic and dynamic characteristics such as displacement, velocity, acceleration and forces are analyzed by graphical and analytical methods. CAE tools will be used to perform kinematic, dynamic and stress analyses and fatigue design of these systems using CAE tools. Temperature effects will also be included wherever appropriate in the design. Several practical design projects will be assigned during the term of this course. Lecture: 4, Lab 0, Other 0


The elevated prevalence of non-insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus (NIDDM) in Native Americans of the Southwest has been explained by several authors in terms of a dietary change from preindustrial traditional foods to modern foods. Physiology adapted to traditional foods became deleterious during the process of modernization. Although several versions of this hypothesis exist, they all relate to the rise in modern NIDDM with change from prehistoric subsistence practices to modern dietary practices. This is especially true for the Southwestern desert tribes of Arizona and New Mexico. Coprolite analysts have been recovering the sort of data needed by diabetes researchers to explore the prehistoric dietary foundations for NIDDM. Diabetes researchers have missed these studies that are essential in understanding ancient diet. We are taking this opportunity to show how coprolite analysis of diet provides data relevant to understanding debates. Our case example comes from Antelope Cave, Mojave County, Arizona. There was a high reliance on fiber-rich plant foods with low glycemic indexes. However, these were not just famine foods as suggested by the original "thrifty gene" hypothesis. These were the foods eaten on a day-by-day basis during all seasons, in both feast and famine.


A pretest-posttest experimental design was utilized to determine the efficacy of the Yuba Method on inaccurate elementary singers. Testing of pitch accuracy was analyzed using the Sona-Speech Model 3600 software program. Inaccurate singers (N=168) from a population of 320 fourth, fifth, and sixth grade students, were divided into three subgroups and a random sample of subjects was selected to be in a treatment group (N=30) and a control group (N=30). The Yuba Method, which is meant to target training of the cricothyroid muscle utilizing a series of vocal exercises intended to facilitate maneuverability over the vocal register break, was administered to treatment subjects (N=30) in a single 45-minute session. The effect of treatment was highly significant at the p < .001 significance level. Significant differences were also found among singing ability subgroups (before training) at the p = .002 significance level. Among inaccurate singers, the least accurate subgroup benefited the most and the most accurate singers benefited the least. Based on the results, the treatment was highly successful in correcting inaccurate elementary school singers in this study.


What constitutes a healthy diet? Mainstream media and advertisers would like you to think that the answer to this question is complicated and controversial. But science, fortunately, tells us otherwise.

 A Conversation about Healthy Eating brings together all the relevant science about healthy eating in one place, and it's exactly that – a conversation; an informal discussion between a scientist and a friend about their eating habits, keeping the science firmly rooted in everyday life. The conversation moves from topics such as metabolism and digestion to gut bacteria, hormones, neuroscience and the immune system. All of these concepts are explained in accessible terms to help you understand the roles they play in maintaining a healthy diet.

The conversation leads to the conclusion that staying lean and healthy simply requires avoiding the overconsumption of processed foods. While this is, of course, easier said than done, science also provides clear recommendations for how you can adapt your environment and lifestyle to make it possible.

Rather than simply presenting you with the principles of healthy eating, this book will help you to develop a comprehensive understanding of the science behind the principles, including the evolutionary facts that affect the way we eat today. This understanding will allow you to ignore the noise in the media and to move forward with a healthy lifestyle that work for you.


ABSTRACT Pathogenic Escherichia coli or its associated virulence factors have been frequently detected in dairy cow manure, milk, and dairy farm environments. However, it is unclear what the long-term dynamics of E. coli virulence factors are and which farm compartments act as reservoirs. This study assessed the occurrence and dynamics of four E. coli virulence factors (eae, stx 1, stx 2, and the gamma allele of the tir gene [γ-tir]) on three U.S. dairy farms. Fecal, manure, water, feed, milk, and milk filter samples were collected from 2004 to 2012. Virulence factors were measured by postenrichment quantitative PCR (qPCR). All factors were detected in most compartments on all farms. Fecal and manure samples showed the highest prevalence, up to 53% for stx and 21% for γ-tir in fecal samples and up to 84% for stx and 44% for γ-tir in manure. Prevalence was low in milk (up to 1.9% for stx and 0.7% for γ-tir). However, 35% of milk filters were positive for stx and 20% were positive for γ-tir. All factors were detected in feed and water. Factor prevalence and levels, expressed as qPCR cycle threshold categories, fluctuated significantly over time, with no clear seasonal signal independent from year-to-year variability. Levels were correlated between fecal and manure samples, and in some cases autocorrelated, but not between manure and milk filters. Shiga toxins were nearly ubiquitous, and 10 to 18% of the lactating cows were potential shedders of E. coli O157 at least once during their time in the herds. E. coli virulence factors appear to persist in many areas of the farms and therefore contribute to transmission dynamics.


Accumulated evidence points to DNA repair capacity as an important factor in cancer and other diseases. DNA repair proteins are promising drug targets and are emerging as prognostic and therapeutic biomarkers. Thus, the knowledge of the overexpression or underexpression levels of DNA repair proteins in tissues will be of fundamental importance. In this work, mass spectrometric assays were developed for the measurement in tissues of the human DNA repair protein NEIL1 (hNEIL1), which is involved in base excision and nucleotide excision repair pathways of oxidatively induced DNA damage. Liquid chromatography/isotope-dilution tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS), in combination with a purified and fully characterized recombinant (15)N-labeled analogue of hNEIL1 ((15)N-hNEIL1) as an internal standard, was utilized to develop an accurate method for the quantification of hNEIL1. Both hNEIL1 and (15)N-hNEIL1 were hydrolyzed with trypsin, and 18 tryptic peptides from each protein were identified by LC-MS/MS on the basis of their full-scan mass spectra. These peptides matched the theoretical peptides expected from trypsin hydrolysis of hNEIL1 and provided a statistically significant protein score that would unequivocally identify hNEIL1. The product ion spectra of the tryptic peptides from both proteins were recorded, and the characteristic product ions were defined. Selected-reaction monitoring was used to analyze mixtures of hNEIL1 and (15)N-hNEIL1 on the basis of product ions. Additional confirmation of positive identification was demonstrated via separation of the proteins by sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis and in-gel tryptic digestion followed by LC-MS/MS analysis. These results suggest that the developed assays would be highly suitable for the in vivo positive identification and accurate quantification of hNEIL1 in tissues.


Previous research suggests that musical context affects the formation of similarity relations among motivic/thematic materials during listening, and that three contextual aspects, namely contrasts in surface features and the organization and development of the musical materials, shape the listening experience of complete works. We empirically investigate the effects of these three contextual aspects on the perceived similarity of motivic variations while listening to Boulez's Anthèmes. This piece exists in two versions: 1) solo violin, and 2) violin and electronics. They contain clear categories of motivic materials, whose recognition can be studied within the natural contexts of the two versions. In Experiment 1, participants freely classified motivic variations extracted from Anthèmes 1 representing different motivic categories. In Experiment 2, participants provided dissimilarity ratings for these variations. From these results, motivic models were selected for each category. In Experiment 3, musicians identified variations of the models while listening to either version of Anthèmes. The results indicate that musical contexts that are more contrasting on the surface, or more predictable in terms of motivic features and organization, facilitate the identification of motivic variations, whereas the overall formal development of the musical materials and their context over time disturbs the recognition of those variations.


When cellular prion protein (PrPc) misfolds into the scrapie form (PrPSc), it is responsible for transmissible spongiform encephalopathies; however, the physiological functions of PrPc remain unclear. Studies with mice in which the gene encoding PrP is disrupted revealed that PrPc may play a neuroprotective role, as well as contribute to spatial learning. Khosravani et al. found that neuronal excitability was increased in hippocampal slices from the PrP-null mice--with increased action potential firing in response to a single stimulus, decreased minimal stimulus required to evoke an action potential, and decreased stimulus intensity required to reach a maximum response. This increased neuronal excitability was blocked by bath application of an antagonist of N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA)-type glutamate receptors. Primary cultures of PrP-null hippocampal neurons had NMDA receptor-mediated currents with longer decay times and larger amplitudes, and transfection of PrP into the cells restored wild-type kinetics to the response to NMDA, suggesting that PrP acutely regulates NMDA receptor signaling and that loss of PrP was not causing a developmental defect. NMDA receptors may be composed of various subunits with different electrophysiological and pharmacological properties. A comparison of the response of the cultured hippocampal neurons to application of an NR2B-selective inhibitor suggested that the wild-type neurons had a larger proportion of NR2B-containing NMDA receptors. The electrophysiological properties of the NMDA-stimulated responses in the PrP-null neurons were similar to those obtained in studies with heterologously expressed NR2D-containing NMDA receptors. Although the distribution and abundance of NR2D subunits appeared unchanged in the hippocampus of the wild-type and PrP-null mice, knockdown of the NR2D subunit by siRNA techniques in the cultured PrP-null neurons accelerated the decay kinetics and reduced the amplitude of the response to application of NMDA. PrPc and NR2D subunits coimmunoprecipitated from wild-type mouse hippocampus, suggesting that PrPc may interact with the NR2D-containing receptors and inhibit their activity. Thus, in the absence of PrPc, these NR2D-containing receptors contribute more to the response to glutamate--leading to a hyperexcitable phenotype. Both in vivo (focal injection) and in culture (bath application), the absence of PrPc was associated with increased neuronal death under conditions in which NMDA is toxic. Thus, one function of PrPc appears to be to limit the contribution of NR2D-containing NMDA receptors to hippocampal responses to glutamate signals and thus limit hippocampal excitability. H. Khosravani, Y. Zhang, S. Tsutsui, S. Hameed, C. Altier, J. Hamid, L. Chen, M. Villemaire, Z. Ali, F. R. Jirik, G. W. Zamponi, Prion protein attenuates excitotoxicity by inhibiting NMDA receptors. J. Cell Biol. 181, 551-565 (2008). [Abstract] [Full Text]


This special issue opens up a conversation between three multidisciplinary fields: memory studies, diaspora studies and refugee studies. The introductory paper articulates an analytical framework addressing various forms of memories of displacement. It defines the concepts of exilic and diasporic memories with regard to the classical and post-modern conceptions of diasporas and shows, beyond their formal opposition, the extent to which these two notions interrelate. The article continues by highlighting four themes that cut across the collection of papers in this special issue: the relationship between individual and collective memories; the diversity of actors (re)producing memory narratives; the transmission, negotiation and contestation of memory across space and between generations; and the confrontational and syncretic dynamics which between different types of memories. To conclude, the paper addresses the political implications of the production and dissemination of memories of displacement.


To avoid the "meaning conflation deficiency" of word embeddings, a number of models have aimed to embed individual word senses. These methods at one time performed well on tasks such as word sense induction (WSI), but they have since been overtaken by task-specific techniques which exploit contextualized embeddings. However, sense embeddings and contextualization need not be mutually exclusive. We introduce PolyLM, a method which formulates the task of learning sense embeddings as a language modeling problem, allowing contextualization techniques to be applied. PolyLM is based on two underlying assumptions about word senses: firstly, that the probability of a word occurring in a given context is equal to the sum of the probabilities of its individual senses occurring; and secondly, that for a given occurrence of a word, one of its senses tends to be much more plausible in the context than the others. We evaluate PolyLM on WSI, showing that it performs considerably better than previous sense embedding techniques, and matches the current state-of-the-art specialized WSI method despite having six times fewer parameters. Code and pre-trained models are available at https://github.com/AlanAnsell/PolyLM.


The aim of this work is threefold: first we obtain analytical expressions for the wavefront train and the caustic associated with the refraction of a plane wavefront by an axicon lens, second we describe the structure of the ronchigram when the ronchiruling is placed at the flat surface of the axicon and the screen is placed at different relative positions to the caustic region, and third we describe in detail the structure of the null ronchigrating for this system; that is, we obtain the grating such that when it is placed at the flat surface of the axicon its associated pattern, at a given plane perpendicular to the optical axis, is a set of parallel fringes. We find that the caustic has only one branch, which is a segment of a line along the optical axis; the ronchigram exhibits self-intersecting fringes when the screen is placed at the caustic region, and the null ronchigrating exhibits closed loop rulings if we want to obtain its associated pattern at the caustic region.


We present herein the occurrence of multifocal adenocarcinomas with a minute signet ring cell carcinoma that arose within a gastric inverted hyperplastic polyp (IHP) in a 40-year-old woman. Endoscopic ultrasonography demonstrated a heterogeneous hypoechoic mass in the third layer of the gastric wall. The endoscopic submucosal dissection specimen measuring 3.5×3.2×1.8 cm was a well-circumscribed protruding lesion that had a slit-shaped cavity. Histologically, the lesion consisted mainly of endophytic proliferation of hyperplastic columnar cells resembling normal foveolar epithelium. In addition, six foci of adenocarcinomas and a minute focus of signet ring cell carcinoma were randomly distributed in the superficial and deep regions. The adenocarcinoma was gradually transitioning from dysplasia, while the signet ring cell carcinoma was surrounded by hyperplastic foveolar epithelium. This is the first report of a gastric IHP with multifocal intramucosal adenocarcinomas and a signet ring cell carcinoma, and endoscopic submucosal dissection is used to completely resect it.


In the metalworking industry, continuous monitoring and control of temperature is vital to enhance process efficiency, reduce wastage, and attain product reliability in high-value manufacturing processes. The capabilities of conventional techniques such as the use of thermocouples and infrared thermometry for measuring temperature in these processes are limited. For example, in forging processes, there may be a need for mechanical alteration of the die to accommodate thermocouples for die surface temperature measurements, and with infrared thermometry, knowledge of the emissivity of the surfaces of process components is required for accurate temperature measurements. Given that phosphor thermometry has not previously been used in manufacturing processes, here, we report its potential implementation using the phosphor Mg4FGeO6:Mn for measurements of die surface temperature in a forging press. First, with this phosphor, laboratory trials were conducted to describe the cyclic heating of a die by pre-heated billets, which is a process leading to thermal fatigue that requires monitoring in practical applications. Then, the phosphor thermometry technique was demonstrated for die temperature measurements on a 2100 tonne screw press at the Advanced Forming and Research Centre (AFRC). The results show that phosphor thermometry is a candidate technique that would potentially enable more accurate measurements not possible by other techniques in this manufacturing process.


While the use of complementary, alternative and integrative medicine (CAIM) is substantial, it continues to exist at the periphery of allopathic medicine. Understanding the attitudes of medical students toward CAIM will be useful in understanding future integration of CAIM and allopathic medicine. This study was conducted to develop and evaluate an instrument and assess medical students' attitudes toward CAIM. The Complementary, Alternative and Integrative Medicine Attitudes Questionnaire (CAIMAQ) was developed by a panel of experts in CAIM, allopathic medicine, medical education and survey development. A total of 1770 CAIMAQ surveys (51% of US medical schools participated) were obtained in a national sample of medical students in 2007. Factor analysis of the CAIMAQ revealed five distinct attitudinal domains: desirability of CAIM therapies, progressive patient/physician health care roles, mind-body-spirit connection, principles of allostasis and a holistic understanding of disease. The students held the most positive attitude for the "mind-body-spirit connection" and the least positive for the "desirability of CAIM therapies". This study provided initial support for the reliability of the CAIMAQ. The survey results indicated that in general students responded more positively to the principles of CAIM than to CAIM treatment. A higher quality of CAIM-related medical education and expanded research into CAIM therapies would facilitate appropriate integration of CAIM into medical curricula. The most significant limitation of this study is a low response rate, and further work is required to assess more representative populations in order to determine whether the relationships found in this study are generalizable.


This illuminating and thought-provoking book questions whether classical Islamic capitalism, which has served Muslims so well for centuries, can provide a viable alternative world economic system. In the current recession – the worst since 1929 – this is surely a provocative question. But if Islamic capitalism is to emerge as a viable alternative, its nature and systems must be well understood.


There is developing phenomenon of quasi-privatized environmental enforcement occurring on behalf and in the name of governments by entrepreneurial attorneys who substitute in place of the public enforcers and derive professional payment from a contingent fee withdrawn from the public's environmental damage award. This Article addresses the question of whether governments should permit private attorneys to handle these "substitute environmental special counsel" enforcement arrangements. In so doing, the Article weighs the arrangement's costs and benefits from the standpoint of whether it maximizes the deterrence and restorative compensation goals of environmental enforcement. Governments are often the only entities with standing to sue on behalf of the public for environmental injury to public resources. In instances where governments lack the resources or choose not to enforce, there exists an enforcement gap not currently filled by any structural mechanism. Citizen suits are an incomplete gap filler because of the Article III standing hurdle, initial up-front litigation funding requirement and the fact that citizen suit provisions only exist for certain types of enforcement claims. Substitute environmental special counselor enforcement provides standing derivative of the standing, permits quasi-privatized enforcement for claims not currently permitted under citizen suit statutes, and contemplates a fee premium to incentivize the privatized funding. Because the arrangement helps fill an unacceptable gap in the enforcement scheme, the costs of arrangement are outweighed by the benefits. Certain costs, however, are particularly acute when using substitute environmental special counselors, including the tendency to monetize the damage award when equitable restorative remedy might better serve the public's environmental interest, the difficult to implement monitoring of the substitute enforcer, and the lack of transparency. The Article suggests an attorney fee shifting approach on top of the damage award in place of a contingency fee drawn from the damage award compensation structure, an open and competitive bidding requirement, a preference for government-led enforcement where feasible, and adequate controls on the monitoring process, to temper some of the arrangement's costs.


Osteoporosis is a common senile condition with major public health impact in both genders of all races. Very little is known about the natural history and etiology of bone loss, and trabecular and cortical volumetric bone mineral density (vBMD) in men, especially in men of African heritage.This research project was to evaluate age-related patterns and potential correlates for the rate of decline in areal BMD (aBMD) at the proximal femur, and vBMD at the radius and tibia in a cohort of Afro-Caribbean men aged 40 and above from the Tobago Bone Health Study. We also investigated the genetic associations of variants in a gene involved in the bone mineralization process, ectonucleotide pyrophosphatase/ phosphodiesterase 1 (ENPP1), with bone loss, aBMD and vBMD. In longitudinal analyses, a significantly greater rate of bone loss was observed in men aged 40-45 than those aged 45-49 and 50-54. Thereafter, the rate of bone loss accelerated with advancing age. The rate of bone loss was also comparable with those observed in Caucasian men. Additionally, we identified low body mass index, weight loss, prostate cancer, and treatment for prostate cancer with androgen deprivation (ADT) as potential determinants for accelerated bone loss.In cross-sectional analyses of vBMD, we observed an early decline of trabecular vBMD before age 50 and with a slower decline thereafter into 7th decade. Cortical vMBD, however, appeared to decrease with advancing age in a linear fashion. Correlates of vBMD included weight, diabetes, prostate cancer, ADT, cigarette smoking and bone chewing.In genetic association study, several variants in the ENPP1 gene were strongly associated with bone loss, aBMD or vBMD. More associations were found with cortical vBMD than with the other phenotypes.Our findings have important public health relevance as they increase our understanding of vBMD and age-related bone loss in an under-studied population. We have also identified a novel association of ENPP1 gene variants with bone loss and BMD in this population of African heritage. Additional research is needed to better understand the factors related to BMD and bone loss in populations of African ancestry, especially the apparent early loss of bone mass.


Cirrhosis is a prevalent cause of morbidity and mortality, especially for those at an advanced decompensated stage. Cirrhosis development and progression involves several important interorgan communications, and recently, the gut microbiome has been implicated in pathophysiology of the disease. Dysbiosis, defined as a pathological change in the microbiome, has a variable effect on the compensated versus decompensated stage of cirrhosis. Adverse microbial changes, both in composition and function, can act at several levels within the gut (stool and mucosal) and have also been described in the blood and oral cavity. While dysbiosis in the oral cavity could be a source of systemic inflammation, current cirrhosis treatment modalities are targeted toward the gut-liver axis and do not address the oral microbiome. As interventions designed to modulate oral dysbiosis may delay progression of cirrhosis, a better understanding of this process is of the utmost importance. The concept of oral microbiota dysbiosis in cirrhosis is relatively new; therefore, this review will highlight the emerging role of the oral-gut-liver axis and introduce perspectives for future research.


This paper examines stressed vowel duration and word stress placement in Italian. It presents experimental data showing that absolute duration is slightly longer in paroxytones than in proparoxytones (as previously reported), but relative duration (computed as the ratio between stressed vowel duration and the duration of the immediately post-tonic vowel) remains constant. The data also suggest that proparoxytones have a word-final secondary stress.The paper also examines the status of weight-sensitivity in Italian, arguing (on the basis of stress placement in loanwords, acronyms and non-standard pronunciations) that it is no longer productive. The same data also show that even-syllabled words tend to receive penultimate stress, while odd-syllabled words tend to be antepenultimate. The paper argues that it is the result of a conflict between preference for penultimate stress and the need to parse all syllables. Keywords: vowel duration; word stress; Italian phonology


To provide a venue for a comprehensive multidisciplinary review of the current state of knowledge regarding the human immunodeficiency virus-associated peripheral neuropathies and to provide the institute with guidance in formulating future research initiatives, the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (Bethesda, Md) convened a workshop on September 18 through 19, 2000. The participants were chosen from various disciplines and included clinicians, pathologists, neurobiologists, neurophysiologists, virologists, and neuroimmunologists. The present article summarizes the highlights of the meeting and includes the recommendations developed by the participants for future research. As might be expected in a rapidly evolving scientific field, the meeting was characterized by a lively and far-ranging discussion of data interpretation, experimental approaches, and priorities for future research. However, the recommendations presented at the end of this article constitute a consensus judgment reached by all of the participants of the most important areas for future research.


3MT presented at the 2017 Defence and Security Doctoral Symposium.This PhD investigates the concept of jamming missile seekers which use a Doppler Beam Sharpening (DBS) mode for target detection and homing. DBS provides a computationally efficient way of improving the cross-range resolution by using the Doppler domain to resolve targets that could not otherwise be resolved with a typical real beamed pulsed radar system. The PhD explores how to use low cost jammers to accurately place false targets in a desired location in the DBS image and the problems which arise when there is a lack of knowledge about seeker trajectory, velocity, waveforms used, etc.


Abstract The Upper Dharmaram Formation (Lower Jurassic, Sinemurian) of India has yielded three sauropodomorph dinosaurs, two new taxa and an indeterminate one. Lamplughsaura dharmaramensis n. gen. and sp., represented by several partial skeletons, is a heavily built quadrupedal form (body length ∼10 m). Autapomorphies include teeth with strongly emarginated distal edge; caudal cervical neural spines bearing a vertically oriented ligamentous furrow on cranial and caudal surfaces and a transversely expanded spine table; caudal neural spines bearing a craniodorsally directed spur (proximal caudal vertebrae) or a large process (midcaudal vertebrae); caudal neural spines shorter than transverse processes so former lost first in passing along tail; and a plesiomorphy that is the nontrenchant form of manual ungual I. The Indian dinosaurs were coded for two recent datamatrices for basal sauropodomorphs. The results of this preliminary analysis indicate that Lamplughsaura is either a basal Sauropoda or, less likely, based on Templeton's test, a stem sauropodomorph. The second large form, represented by the proximal half of a femur, is a sauropodomorph that is more derived than Saturnalia (Brazil) and Thecodontosaurus (Great Britain) from the Upper Triassic. This is also true for the smaller (body length ∼4 m as adult) Pradhania gracilis n. gen. and sp. which lies outside of the Sauropoda + Plateosauria clade, so it is definitely a stem sauropodomorph. Pradhania is known from fragmentary material; an autapomorphy is the very prominent medial longitudinal ridge on the maxilla.


Catastrophic events generate cascading and synergistic infrastructure failures that will produce unanticipated response requirements. Infrastructure failures not only influence the demands for services and commodities but also the mobility and capability of response organisations. This project modelled a catastrophic earthquake (M7.7) in the New Madrid Seismic Zone (NMSZ). The US Geological Survey (USGS) has estimated the probability of a major NMSZ (M7.5 to M8.0) earthquake has a 7% to 10% probability of occurring in a 50-year period (US Geological Survey, 2006). The effects of such an event will cause tens of thousands of injuries and thousands of deaths. Over seven million people will experience disruptions in lifelines and two million will seek shelter. Direct impacts will be felt in the Central USA with ripple effects evident throughout the nation. Damage to critical infrastructure and lifelines will severely impair response and recovery efforts. The comprehensive modelling performed in this study provides not only direct damages to physical inventory, but also estimates the social impacts and response requirements. These inputs provide emergency managers the information required to plan and develop strategies to respond to such an event.


In an effort to harness the abundant offshore wind resource over deepwater, the development of numerical design tools for floating offshore wind turbines (FOWTs) has progressed steadily in recent years. However, at present, a validated model capable of completely coupling the full elastodynamic response between the mooring system, floating support structure, turbine tower and the wind turbine is not commercially available.The University of Maine has developed a new FOWT design, VolturnUS, which utilizes a concrete semi-submersible hull. For the VolturnUS design effort a number of numerical models were developed to analyze the system's global performance. This paper presents the results of a validation study conducted to quantify the accuracy and suitability of a subset of these models for use in the design of the VolturnUS FOWT. Validation was conducted via comparisons of numerical model results to test data obtained from a 1:50 scale model testing campaign conducted by the University of Maine at the Maritime Research Institute, Netherlands offshore basin.The validation study evaluated the performance and capabilities of the numerical models over a range of design conditions. Emphasis was placed on design load cases (DLCs), which were found to govern the design of the FOWT. The DLCs follow the American Bureau of Shipping's (ABS) Guide for Building and Classing Floating Offshore Wind Turbines.Through this method of model validation this work sought to quantify the numerical models' accuracy, highlight their limitations, justify design assumptions, and identify areas requiring further development in the field of FOWT numerical modeling.Copyright © 2015 by ASME


In-network data aggregation allows energy-efficient communication within a sensor network. However, such data aggregation introduces new security challenges. As sensor nodes are prone to node-compromise, a fraction of nodes might act maliciously and forge aggregated data. For arbitrary aggregation functions, the verification of authenticity of aggregated data, i.e., its correctness, integrity, and origin, is impossible. Thus, one can either aggregate data and save energy or verify authenticity, not both. We present "ESAWN", a protocol that probabilistically relaxes authenticity in the presence of a fraction of compromised nodes. This enables a trade-off between probabilistic authenticity and probabilistic, energy-saving data aggregation. Besides theoretical analysis, we present MICA2-based simulation results. They indicate that even for high probabilities of authenticity and fraction of compromised nodes, ESAWN is more energy-efficient compared to (100%-)secure but non-aggregating communication. For example, with a fraction of 20% compromised nodes and 90% authenticity, ESAWN saves up to 40% energy.


[Excerpt] A careful consideration of federal pay is an essential part of fiscal stewardship and is necessary to support the recruitment and retention of a talented, agile, and high-performing federal workforce. Highperforming organizations have found that the life-cycle of human capital management activities—including workforce planning, recruitment, on-boarding, compensation, engagement, succession planning, and retirement programs—need to be aligned for the cost-effective achievement of an organization's mission. However, despite some improvements, strategic human capital management—and more specifically, skills gaps in mission critical occupations—continues to be a GAO high-risk area. This testimony is based on a body of GAO work primarily issued between June 2012 and March 2017. It focuses on (1) lessons learned in creating a more market driven, results-oriented approach to federal pay, and (2) opportunities, in addition to pay and benefits, that OPM and agencies could use to be more competitive in the labor market and address skills gaps.


The century-old US War on Drugs based on supply control measures is endangering its War on Terror in Afghanistan. With opium poppy cultivation the most profitable crop available to Afghan farmers, the Taliban has been able to use the illegal profits from the trade to buy arms and recruit farmers by offering protection from US led aerial spraying of the crops. These supply control measures are not warranted by welfare economics, classical liberal social ethics, or the actual outcomes of the US War on Drugs. The best policy to deal with US drug addiction would be to legalize drugs, concentrating on enforced treatment of chronic drug users. A successful War on Terror requires an end to aerial spraying, the buying up of Afghan opium and its conversion into morphine, for which there is excess demand in the Third World.


0 9- 0 Abstract One of the methods to prevent unsuitable lubrication of moving components of devices and machinery is using bi-metal and three-metal bearings. Centrifugal casting process is one of the manufacturing methods that is used for such bearings. In this study, the purpose is microstructure evaluation of the bonding location and length determination of diffusion bond in structural steel-bronze. A mold made of structural steel with inner diameter of 240mm, length of 300mm and thickness of 10mm was coated by a 6mm film of bronze under centrifugal casting process. At first, a bronze ingot with dimension of 5mm×10mm×20mm is located inside of the hollow cylindrical mold and then the two ends of it will be sealed. During mold rotation with the rate of 800 rpm, two high power flames are used for heating the mold under Ar gas atmosphere to melt the bronze ingot at 1000˚C. After 15minutes, the system is cooled rapidly. Results showed that the diffusion bonding of bronze in structural steel to depth of 1.2µm from the bonding line was obtained. In this bonding, copper element was diffused to 50% of its initial concentration.


Recently, there has been a disturbing increase in the number of natural disasters: for example, in 1998, Hurricane Mitch caused 7,500 deaths in El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua, and flooding in China affected 180 million people, destroyed nearly seven million homes, and killed close to 4,000 people. In 1999, a cyclone in India affected 10–15 million people and killed 10,000; and in 2000, floods in Mozambique left 330,000 homeless, and killed 500 people. Natural disasters of medium size and stronger caused at least 25,000 deaths around the world in 2001, more than double the number of the previous year, and economic losses of US $36 billion. More recently, human-made and natural disasters in 2004 claimed more than 21,000 lives worldwide and economic losses of US $105 billion. The year 2005 further tested the international relief community with 'unparalleled frequency and scale of natural disaster'; Hurricane Katrina alone destroyed 300,000 homes, displaced 770,000 people, and cost US $200 billion. In the future, climate change is likely to mean higher maximum temperatures and more intense precipitation (with concomitant increased avalanches, floods, mudslides, etc.). Because disaster response professionals and emergency managers from all levels of government, the military, the private sector, and volunteer organizations are often the first people 'on the ground' during/following an extreme weather event, this paper will explore what climate change may mean for disaster managers, how climate change may affect the environments in which they work, and how best to reduce risks, and save lives.


In the present investigation, the applicability of various physicochemical parameters has been tested for the QSAR study on some β-carboline compounds extracted from Harmine, in order to predict new unprepared derivatives with the best activity as a potent anticancer agent. Quantitative Structure Activity Relationship (QSAR) has been derived for a set of β-carboline compounds to explore the relationship between the physicochemical properties (such as: heat of formation, partition coefficient, molar refractivity, ΔE HOMO-LUMO, Ionization Potential (IE), Electron Affinity (EA), Chemical Hardness (η), The Electronegativity (χ) and Global electrophilicity Index (ω) and activity expressed as logIC50. Multi-linear Regression Technique (MLR) has been employed and the model gave significant regression coefficients. The physicochemical properties of each compound were obtained utilized GUSSAIN software at the PM3 (Parametric Method 3) level after full geometry optimization. Three new β-carboline compounds have been predicting with an interested very high value of activity, where the value of Log IC50 was -18.932, -18.747and -23.66 for N1-βC, N2-βC and N3-βC respectively. The more active β-carbolines are all more lipophilic and larger than the less active compounds.


Systems neuroscience studies involving in-vivo models often require realtime data processing. In these studies, many events must be monitored and processed quickly, including behavior of the subject (e.g., movement of a limb) or features of neural data (e.g., a neuron transmitting an action potential). Unfortunately, most realtime platforms are proprietary, require specific architectures, or are limited to low-level programming languages. Here we present a hardware-independent, open-source realtime computation platform that supports high-level programming. The resulting platform, LiCoRICE, can process on order 10e10 bits/sec of network data at 1 ms ticks with 18.2 µs jitter. It connects to various inputs and outputs (e.g., DIO, Ethernet, database logging, and analog line in/out) and minimizes reliance on custom device drivers by leveraging peripheral support via the Linux kernel. Its modular architecture supports model-based design for rapid prototyping with C and Python/Cython and can perform numerical operations via BLAS/LAPACK-optimized NumPy that is statically compiled via Numba's pycc. LiCoRICE is not only suitable for systems neuroscience research, but also for applications requiring closed-loop realtime data processing from robotics and control systems to interactive applications and quantitative financial trading.


OBJECTIVES
Retrograde intrarenal surgery (RIRS) has become an important alternative for the treatment of kidney stones due to its increased safety and efficiency. The purpose of this study is to compare efficacy and safety features of RIRS against percutaneous nephrolithotomy (PCNL) for the treatment of 2 - 3.5 cm kidney stones.

METHODS
142 cases (106 RIRS and 36 PCNL) encompassing 2 - 3.5 cm kidney stones that have been treated in our center between December 2009 and December 2011 have been considered. Demographic variables, stone characteristics, surgical stay and surgical time have been evaluated. Additionally, the complication prerate and success rate after one and two procedures (retreatment) have also been assessed. Student's T, Mann-Whitney U y Chi² - V Cramer (p=0.05) tests were used for statistical analysis.

RESULTS
There are not statistically significant differences in demographic or stone variables. The calculated mean surgical time was lower for PCNL (85 min) than for RIRS (112 min). Mean hospital stay was statistically significantly shorter in RIRS (16 h vs. 98 h in RIRS, p=0.001). PCNL exhibited a higher global complication rate of 19.4% vs. 6.6% for RIRS (p=0.001). PCNL also showed a higher successful rate (80.6% vs. 73.6% for RIRS), although this difference was not statistically significant (p=0.40). When comparing the success rate after a second procedure, PCNL results in 94.3% vs. 93.5% for RIRS (p=0.88).

CONCLUSION
RIRS was found to be a safe and efficient procedure with a short hospital stay. Overall, RIRS can be considered as an alternative to PCNL for the treatment of renal stones smaller than 3.5 cm.


We confirm the eventual evasiveness of several classes of monotone graph properties under widely accepted number theoretic hypotheses. In particular we show that Chowla's conjecture on Dirichlet primes implies that (a) for any graph $H$, "forbidden subgraph $H$" is eventually evasive and (b) all nontrivial monotone properties of graphs with $\le n^{3/2-\epsilon}$ edges are eventually evasive. ($n$ is the number of vertices.)
While Chowla's conjecture is not known to follow from the Extended Riemann Hypothesis (ERH, the Riemann Hypothesis for Dirichlet's $L$ functions), we show (b) with the bound $O(n^{5/4-\epsilon})$ under ERH.
We also prove unconditional results: (a$'$) for any graph $H$, the query complexity of "forbidden subgraph $H$" is $\binom{n}{2} - O(1)$; (b$'$) for some constant $c>0$, all nontrivial monotone properties of graphs with $\le cn\log n+O(1)$ edges are eventually evasive.
Even these weaker, unconditional results rely on deep results from number theory such as Vinogradov's theorem on the Goldbach conjecture.
Our technical contribution consists in connecting the topological framework of Kahn, Saks, and Sturtevant (1984), as further developed by Chakrabarti, Khot, and Shi (2002), with a deeper analysis of the orbital structure of permutation groups and their connection to the distribution of prime numbers. Our unconditional results include stronger versions and generalizations of some result of Chakrabarti et al.


The first instances of deformation theory were given by Kodaira and Spencer for complex structures and by Gerstenhaber for associative algebras. Since then, deformation theory has been applied as a useful tool in the study of many other mathematical structures, and even today it plays an important role in many developments of modern mathematics.
This volume collects a few self-contained and peer-reviewed papers by experts which present up-to-date research topics in algebraic and motivic topology, quantum field theory, algebraic geometry, noncommutative geometry and the deformation theory of Poisson algebras. They originate from activities at the Max-Planck-Institute for Mathematics and the Hausdorff Center for Mathematics in Bonn.


In this study, we use an anaerobic-aerobic integrated denitrification (Fe/C-ZACID) device with an iron-carbon-activated carbon and zeolite composite filter to remove nitrogen from simulated low carbon-nitrogen ratio (C/N) sewage. The impacts of dissolved oxygen (DO) level, hydraulic retention time (HRT), C/N and nitrate recirculation ratio on denitrification performance were studied. The results show that when HRT was 6 h, DO was 3 ± 0.1 mg/L, influent C/N was 3, and nitrate recirculation ratio was 100%, and removal rates of 95% for ammonia and 85% for total nitrogen (TN) were achieved. A beaker comparison test demonstrated that this synergistic denitrification system included heterotrophic denitrification, physicochemical denitrification, iron autotrophic denitrification and hydrogen autotrophic denitrification, etc. The Fe/C-ZACID device has a high-efficiency nitrogen removal effect for low C/N ratio sewage and strong shock resistance, which provides technical support and a theoretical basis for advanced denitrification of rural domestic sewage.


We evaluate the impact of different information sequences on participants' hypothetical willingness to pay (WTP) for food produced using nanotechnology. In three treatment groups, information on the health, societal, or environmental impact linked to nanotechnology was revealed in different sequences: an imposed order, a chosen order, and a chosen order after a discussion among participants. Results show that information choice is important. While in the imposed order, the first information revealed has no effect on WTP, the information chosen first has a strong impact. Discussion has no further impact. Health information was a priority and significantly decreased WTP, while societal and environmental information did not significantly influence WTP.


The evolutionary importance of cryptic taxa is well documented, yet few studies have examined them with a view to conservation. In the present study, the significance of cryptic speciation in freshwater crabs is examined. Allozyme and 16S rRNA sequence data were used to explore the degree of population differentiation between mountain stream populations of two distinct freshwater crab species. Marked patterns of differentiation were evident among populations; those in close geographical proximity were characterized by the fixation of alternate alleles at certain loci, indicating that currently there is no gene flow among populations. Both allozyme and sequence data provide evidence for the recognition of at least five distinct evolutionary lineages with pronounced levels of genetic differentiation. Morphometric data failed to detect any distinct geographically intermediate population groupings. Our findings indicate the presence of five phylogeographical units, all worthy of conservation, three of which are evolutionarily significant. © 2003 The Linnean Society of London, Biological Journal of the Linnean Society , 2003, 78, 129–147.


In this paper, the basic functions of an electric vehicle charging service provider are described with a focus on the associated optimization problems. A novel method of planning the charging of electric drive vehicles including electricity grid constraints, both voltage and power, is shown. The method establishes an individual charging plan for each vehicle and avoids distribution grid congestion while satisfying the requirements of the individual vehicle owners. The concepts proposed in this paper are tested on a simulated electricity grid. It is shown that both power and voltage constraints due to electric vehicle charging can be avoided using the proposed method.


This article argues that John Dewey's philosophy of progressive education offers, from a variety of perspectives, a strong rationale for the use of prior learning assessments in higher education. His philosophy also offers a foundation for implementation policies that can make use of contemporary formulations in the social sciences, such as activity theory, and procedures already evident and accepted in academia. These policies can also enable administrators and faculty to better appreciate "learning from experience" as an integral component of knowledge acquisition that is fully appropriate in formal educational settings, as well as informal or more worldly situations. As Dewey sees individualized learning experience as essential in sustaining a democratic society, we can recognize, by analogy, that it is also an important stimulus for the continued growth and development of American higher education.


Georgia, a country characterized by an aging population with a high incidence of poverty and limited public financial resources, offers virtually complete non-contributory basic pension coverage. The basic pension has, to date, proved effective in dealing with poverty arising from political instability, military conflicts, economic deterioration, transition to a market economy, emigration of its younger population, and aging. But Georgia's fiscal constraints and aging population also highlight the importance of developing and improving the pension system, in order to ensure its sustainability. Since 2012 the Georgian government has put forth a systemic reform proposal – a compulsory pension insurance – including the implementation of contributory pension schemes to supplement the basic non-contributory pension. While the proposal is a promising start, it alone would not be enough to ensure that the government's fiscal burden remains reasonable, while maintaining the basic pension system's long-term adequacy and flexibility to adapt to the evolving demographic environment. This paper presents policy reform choices, which suggest that, in Georgia, pension reform might also include increasing statutory retirement ages and reducing the generosity of benefits through means testing. These policy reform options would involve difficult tradeoffs, which are also described in this paper. Although the paper focuses on the Georgian non-contributory basic pension, its poverty reduction effect and policy reform options, the case of the Georgian non-contributory basic pension might hold value for some low- and middle-income countries that are considering implementation or expanding coverage of non-contributory pensions.


Background and Objectives Early-life exposure to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) can result in developmental delay as well as childhood asthma and increased risk of cancer. The high cost of childhood asthma related to ETS exposure has been widely recognized; however, the economic impact of ETS-related developmental delay has been less well understood. Methods and Results The Columbia Center for Children's Environmental Health (CCCEH) has reported adverse effects of prenatal ETS exposure on child development in a cohort of minority women and children in New York City (odds ratio of developmental delay = 2.36; 95% confidence interval 1.22–4.58). Using the environmentally attributable fraction (EAF) approach, we estimated the annual cost of one aspect of ETS-related developmental delay: Early Intervention Services. The estimated cost of these services per year due to ETS exposure is > $50 million per year for New York City Medicaid births and $99 million per year for all New York City births. Conclusion The high annual cost of just one aspect of developmental delay due to prenatal exposure to ETS provides further impetus for increased prevention efforts such as educational programs to promote smoke-free homes, additional cigarette taxes, and subsidizing of smoking cessation programs.


This paper presents a synthetic review of impact evaluations examining effectiveness of water, sanitation, and hygiene interventions in reducing diarrhoea among children. The evaluations were conducted in 35 low- and middle-income countries during the past three decades. The paper challenges the existing consensus that water treatment at point-of-use and hygiene interventions are necessarily the most effective and sustainable interventions for promoting reduction of diarrhoea. The analysis suggests that sanitation 'hardware' interventions are highly effective in reducing diarrhoea morbidity. Moreover, while there is a wealth of trials documenting the effectiveness of water treatment interventions, studies conducted over longer periods tend to show smaller effectiveness and evidence suggests compliance rates and therefore impact may fall markedly over time.


Aim Serum free light chain measurements are used to follow-up and manage patients with monoclonal gammopathies, and abnormal ratios are associated with risk of progression in certain diseases. B cell dysfunction is well described in HIV and patients are at risk of developing B cell lymphomas. This study investigated whether HIV is associated with abnormal free light chain levels and the impact of antiretroviral treatment (ART) on these. Methods κ And λ free light chain concentrations and ratios, serum albumin and immunoglobulin G (IgG) were measured in 366 HIV positive subjects and correlated with CD4+ counts, viral loads, IgG, albumin and ART use. Results 66% were women and most were black Africans (66%), 26% were of mixed ethnicity and 8% were Caucasian or of unknown or other race. 89% were on ART. κ Free light chain values ranged from 5.59 to 357.0 mg/L (median 19.6 mg/L) and λ free light chain values ranged from 9.28 to 286 mg/L (median 22.3 mg/L). Both correlated positively with viral load and IgG and negatively with CD4+ counts and albumin concentrations. The ratio only correlated with IgG concentrations. Patients on ART had significantly lower free light chain concentrations, but the ratio was not significantly affected. Conclusions This study demonstrated that free light chain concentrations were significantly correlated with markers of HIV disease severity, suggesting ongoing B cell dysfunction despite ART use. Free light chain ratio was not significantly affected.


The comparative grammar of the Austronesian languages underwent an unprecedented change immediately after World War 2, owing to the use of lexicostatistics, the appeal to migration theory and the like, and also because of the idea of Formosa being the cradle of the language family. The present book is essentially an attempt at answering the following question: What would the comparative grammar of Austronesian look like in the absence of speculation on speaker migrations, and in the absence of the so-called "data" produced by lexicostatistics and glottochronology? Whereas typology is unable to offer the proof that a given language belongs to a group or subgroup of languages, grammaticalization theory can say whether a given state A may have preceded a state B or the reverse, and solid arguments are needed to propose a relative chronology between events that would be improbable, or even exceptional, in terms of the typology of linguistic change. This book revisits central issues of the comparative grammar of Austronesian languages from this angle, such as the history of person markers, particularly in the 2nd person, the genesis of the so-called "focus" verbal voice system and the typology of sentence structures. There is nothing in these domains that supports the supposition that Proto-Austronesian was very similar to the Formosan languages.


The effects on image quality due to polarization changes of the illuminating beam after scattering by an object are studied. These effects include a decrease in signal-to-noise ratio (decrease in fringe visibility) of the hologram and, for an extended object, a loss of information of those segments of the object that have large curvature (edges, discontinuities, etc.). The autocorrelation function of the transmittance of a nonlinearly recorded hologram of a diffuse object is obtained. It is shown that the change of polarization of the illuminating beam by the object not only reduces the signal-to-noise ratio but also fortifies the distortion of the images due to the nonlinearity of the recording medium. This new distorting effect, which appears as a multiplicative factor, is dependent on the irradiance distribution of the object's cross-polarized component. A simple way of decreasing the above-mentioned degradation effects is suggested.


Side-channel attacks (SCA) present a major threat to secure embedded systems. Effective software countermeasures against SCA are well known in theory, but in practice are difficult to implement properly due to issues such as unexpected compiler transformations and/or platform-specific leakage sources. Although several recent examples from industry and academia show that SCA is becoming increasingly simple and inexpensive to perform as an attacker, evaluating the security of a system against SCA can still be expensive and time-consuming. Furthermore, most evaluation techniques must be performed near the end of the development schedule which adds significant risk. In this paper, we present a new technique for testing software for SCA vulnerabilities in a fast, inexpensive, and automated manner. This testing could be applied to evaluate software-based SCA countermeasures even without access to source code, as may be the case with proprietary software libraries that are delivered pre-built, and without the use of side-channel collection equipment. Our implementation of the SLEAK tool demonstrates the efficacy of this technique by detecting vulnerabilities in an AES implementation that utilizes a masking countermeasure. We discuss the advantages and limitations of our technique and we conclude that it can be used to detect and understand the sources of many common SCA vulnerabilities early in the development schedule. Keywords—Cryptography, side-channel attacks, masking, differential power analysis


BACKGROUND
Paediatric flat feet are a common presentation in primary care; reported prevalence approximates 15%. A minority of flat feet can hurt and limit gait. There is no optimal strategy, nor consensus, for using foot orthoses (FOs) to treat paediatric flat feet.

OBJECTIVES
To assess the benefits and harms of foot orthoses for treating paediatric flat feet.

SEARCH METHODS
We searched CENTRAL, MEDLINE, and Embase to 01 September 2021, and two clinical trials registers on 07 August 2020.

SELECTION CRITERIA
We identified all randomised controlled trials (RCTs) of FOs as an intervention for paediatric flat feet. The outcomes included in this review were pain, function, quality of life, treatment success, and adverse events. Intended comparisons were: any FOs versus sham, any FOs versus shoes, customised FOs (CFOs) versus prefabricated FOs (PFOs).

DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS
We followed standard methods recommended by Cochrane.

MAIN RESULTS
We included 16 trials with 1058 children, aged 11 months to 19 years, with flexible flat feet. Distinct flat foot presentations included asymptomatic, juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA), symptomatic and developmental co-ordination disorder (DCD). The trial interventions were FOs, footwear, foot and rehabilitative exercises, and neuromuscular electrical stimulation (NMES). Due to heterogeneity, we did not pool the data. Most trials had potential for selection, performance, detection, and selective reporting bias. No trial blinded participants. We present the results separately for asymptomatic (healthy children) and symptomatic (children with JIA) flat feet. The certainty of evidence was very low to low, downgraded for bias, imprecision, and indirectness. Three comparisons were evaluated across trials: CFO versus shoes; PFO versus shoes; CFO versus PFO. Asymptomatic flat feet 1. CFOs versus shoes (1 trial, 106 participants): low-quality evidence showed that CFOs result in little or no difference in the proportion without pain (10-point visual analogue scale (VAS)) at one year (risk ratio (RR) 0.85, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.67 to 1.07); absolute decrease (11.8%, 95% CI 4.7% fewer to 15.8% more); or on withdrawals due to adverse events (RR 1.05, 95% CI 0.94 to 1.19); absolute effect (3.4% more, 95% CI 4.1% fewer to 13.1% more). 2. PFOs versus shoes (1 trial, 106 participants): low to very-low quality evidence showed that PFOs result in little or no difference in the proportion without pain (10-point VAS) at one year (RR 0.94, 95% CI 0.76 to 1.16); absolute effect (4.7% fewer, 95% CI 18.9% fewer to 12.6% more); or on withdrawals due to adverse events (RR 0.99, 95% CI 0.79 to 1.23). 3. CFOs versus PFOs (1 trial, 108 participants): low-quality evidence found no difference in the proportion without pain at one year (RR 0.93, 95% CI 0.73 to 1.18); absolute effect (7.4% fewer, 95% CI 22.2% fewer to 11.1% more); or on withdrawal due to adverse events (RR 1.00, 95% CI 0.90 to 1.12). Function and quality of life (QoL) were not assessed. Symptomatic (JIA) flat feet 1. CFOs versus shoes (1 trial, 28 participants, 3-month follow-up): very low-quality evidence showed little or no difference in pain (0 to 10 scale, 0 no pain) between groups (MD -1.5, 95% CI -2.78 to -0.22). Low-quality evidence showed improvements in function with CFOs (Foot Function Index - FFI disability, 0 to 100, 0 best function; MD -18.55, 95% CI -34.42 to -2.68), child-rated QoL (PedsQL, 0 to 100, 100 best quality; MD 12.1, 95% CI -1.6 to 25.8) and parent-rated QoL (PedsQL MD 9, 95% CI -4.1 to 22.1) and little or no difference between groups in treatment success (timed walking; MD -1.33 seconds, 95% CI -2.77 to 0.11), or withdrawals due to adverse events (RR 0.58, 95% CI 0.11 to 2.94); absolute difference (9.7% fewer, 20.5 % fewer to 44.8% more). 2. PFOs versus shoes (1 trial, 25 participants, 3-month follow-up): very low-quality evidence showed little or no difference in pain between groups (MD 0.02, 95% CI -1.94 to 1.98). Low-quality evidence showed no difference between groups in function (FFI-disability MD -4.17, 95% CI -24.4 to 16.06), child-rated QoL (PedsQL MD -3.84, 95% CI -19 to 11.33), or parent-rated QoL (PedsQL MD -0.64, 95% CI -13.22 to 11.94). 3. CFOs versus PFOs (2 trials, 87 participants): low-quality evidence showed little or no difference between groups in pain (0 to 10 scale, 0 no pain) at 3 months (MD -1.48, 95% CI -3.23 to 0.26), function (FFI-disability MD -7.28, 95% CI -15.47 to 0.92), child-rated QoL (PedsQL MD 8.6, 95% CI -3.9 to 21.2), or parent-rated QoL (PedsQL MD 2.9, 95% CI -11 to 16.8).

AUTHORS' CONCLUSIONS
Low to very low-certainty evidence shows that the effect of CFOs (high cost) or PFOs (low cost) versus shoes, and CFOs versus PFOs on pain, function and HRQoL is uncertain. This is pertinent for clinical practice, given the economic disparity between CFOs and PFOs. FOs may improve pain and function, versus shoes in children with JIA, with minimal delineation between costly CFOs and generic PFOs. This review updates that from 2010, confirming that in the absence of pain, the use of high-cost CFOs for healthy children with flexible flat feet has no supporting evidence, and draws very limited conclusions about FOs for treating paediatric flat feet. The availability of normative and prospective foot development data, dismisses most flat foot concerns, and negates continued attention to this topic. Attention should be re-directed to relevant paediatric foot conditions, which cause pain, limit function, or reduce quality of life. The agenda for researching asymptomatic flat feet in healthy children must be relegated to history, and replaced by a targeted research rationale, addressing children with indisputable foot pathology from discrete diagnoses, namely JIA, cerebral palsy, congenital talipes equino varus, trisomy 21 and Charcot Marie Tooth. Whether research resources should continue to be wasted on studying flat feet in healthy children that do not hurt, is questionable. Future updates of this review will address only relevant paediatric foot conditions.


Violence against Indigenous women in the United States is higher than for any other racial group. Indigenous women tend to rely on families for support and recovery, yet the risk factors related to Indigenous families affected by violence are unknown. Therefore, interviews from a critical ethnography were used to uncover the perspectives of Indigenous women who have experienced intimate partner violence, along with the professionals who serve them, to understand potential risk factors that create vulnerability to and impair recovery from violence. Several themes emerged from pragmatic horizon analysis of interviews with 49 Indigenous women and professionals who work with tribal members affected by violence, including family divisions and parental impairments (i.e., intergenerational patterns of absent parental figures, parental alcohol abuse, and impaired bonding). Future research should examine these potential risk factors related to families affected by violence and their connections with historical oppression.


Product counterfeiting crimes have detrimental effects on consumers, brand owners, public health, the economy, and even national security. Over time, as product counterfeiting crimes and the response to them have evolved, U.S. federal legislation has developed and state legislation has followed suit, but with considerable variation across the states. The purpose of this article is to place product counterfeiting in the context of intellectual property rights, provide a historical review of relevant federal legislation, and systematically examine the extent to which state laws differ in terms of characteristics, remedies, and penalties. Additionally, we calculate indices of civil and criminal protections that illustrate the overall strength of each state's legislative framework. Collectively, this assessment provides a solid foundation for understanding the development of product counterfeiting legislation and serves as a basis for advancing research, policy, and practice


7-Chloro-3-Methyl-3-4-Dihydro-2H-1,2,4 Benzothiadiazine S,S Dioxide (IDRA 21), which attenuates the rapid autodesensitization of DL-alpha-amino-2,3-dihydro-5-methyl-3-oxo-4-isoxazolepropanoic acid (AMPA)-selective glutamate receptors and increases excitatory synaptic strength, improves cognition (learning and memory), as revealed by its ability to improve performance in water maze and passive avoidance tests in rats. Normal rats trained to (15-20 sec) reach the exit platform rapidly in a water maze that included four incorrect choices were given oral IDRA 21 (4-120 mumol/kg) or vehicle and then exposed to a delayed retention trial in a maze that included seven incorrect choices. In this retention trial, the IDRA 21-treated rats performed considerably better than those that received the vehicle. Moreover, oral IDRA 21 (ED50 = 7.6 microM) attenuated the performance impairment induced by the AMPA receptor antagonist 2,3-dihydroxy-6-nitro-7-sulfamoylbenzo (F) quinoxaline in the water maze test. In this test and in a passive avoidance test, the performance impairment elicited by alprazolam, a full allosteric modulator at gamma-aminobutyric acid-A receptors, or by scopolamine, a competitive muscarinic receptor antagonist, was also reduced by oral administration of IDRA 21 (ED50 = 13 and 108 mumol/kg, against alprazolam and scopolamine, respectively); in all these tests, IDRA 21 was 20- to 30-fold more potent than aniracetam. Because IDRA 21 is a racemic molecule; the two stereoisomers were isolated and studied behaviorally. Only the (+) form was found to be behaviorally active. These results indicate that IDRA 21 given orally to rats presumably crosses the blood-brain barrier and acts stereoselectively on specific receptors that were operative during this behavioral procedure. Because the activity of IDRA 21 on rat cognition tests appears to be related to its ability to potentiate AMPA-activated currents, one can suggest that IDRA 21 improves cognition by acting on a stereoselective site of AMPA receptor that is operative in attenuating the rapid autodesensitization of these receptors.


The purpose of this study was to assess the effects of hip belt use and load placement in a backpack on perceived exertion and postural stability. Thirty participants were instructed to stand on a force plate and walk along a designated route under five conditions: unloaded, high-load placement, low-load placement, hip belt on and hip belt off. The average velocity and sway area from the force plate were measured. Participants also rated their perceived stability and exertion. Compared to the unloaded condition, all loaded conditions significantly increased average velocity, sway area, perceived stability and exertion. Hip belt use did not affect average velocity and sway area; however, participants reported higher levels of stability and lower levels of exertion with hip belt use. Load placement did not affect average velocity, sway area, perceived stability or exertion. This study showed that wearing a backpack loaded to 20% of body weight reduced postural stability, while manipulation of load placement in a backpack did not affect subjective and objective measures of postural stability. Also, hip belt use only improved subjective measures of postural stability. Practitioner Summary: Load manipulation in a backpack did not affect stability and exertion. While hip belt use did not affect objective measures of stability, it helped participants to feel more stable and report less exertion. The findings are important for ergonomics backpack design and determining a proper way of packing and wearing a backpack.


Introduction Antibiotic dosing in critically ill patients is challenging because their pharmacokinetics (PK) are altered and may change rapidly with disease progression. Standard dosing frequently leads to inadequate PK exposure. Therapeutic drug monitoring (TDM) offers a potential solution but requires sampling and PK knowledge, which delays decision support. It is our philosophy that antibiotic dosing support should be directly available at the bedside through deep integration into the electronic health record (EHR) system. Therefore we developed AutoKinetics, a clinical decision support system (CDSS) for real time, model informed precision antibiotic dosing. Objective To provide a detailed description of the design, development, validation, testing, and implementation of AutoKinetics. Methods We created a development framework and used workflow analysis to facilitate integration into popular EHR systems. We used a development cycle to iteratively adjust and expand AutoKinetics functionalities. Furthermore, we performed a literature review to select and integrate pharmacokinetic models for five frequently prescribed antibiotics for sepsis. Finally, we tackled regulatory challenges, in particular those related to the Medical Device Regulation under the European regulatory framework. Results We developed a SQL-based relational database as the backend of AutoKinetics. We developed a data loader to retrieve data in real time. We designed a clinical dosing algorithm to find a dose regimen to maintain antibiotic pharmacokinetic exposure within clinically relevant safety constraints. If needed, a loading dose is calculated to minimize the time until steady state is achieved. Finally, adaptive dosing using Bayesian estimation is applied if plasma levels are available. We implemented support for five extensively used antibiotics following model development, calibration, and validation. We integrated AutoKinetics into two popular EHRs (Metavision, Epic) and developed a user interface that provides textual and visual feedback to the physician. Conclusion We successfully developed a CDSS for real time model informed precision antibiotic dosing at the bedside of the critically ill. This holds great promise for improving sepsis outcome. Therefore, we recently started the Right Dose Right Now multi-center randomized control trial to validate this concept in 420 patients with severe sepsis and septic shock.


This book, originally published in 1900, was the major work of the classical historian J. B. Bury. It became a standard textbook on the topic of ancient Greek history to the death of Alexander the Great for almost a century, and in its updated form is still studied today. Bury had studied philosophy as well as classics at Trinity College, Dublin, and had travelled widely in Greece, but until the publication of this work was better known for his two-volume History of the Later Roman Empire (also reissued in this series), and many of his other works also deal with the Byzantine period. He describes in the preface his decision to limit the extent of his history: 'compression into a single volume often produces a more useful book'. This magisterial and very readable synthesis of political and military history encompasses nearly three millennia and the whole of the Mediterranean and Near East.


This paper proposes an optimisation-based framework to tackle long-term centralised planning problems of integrated energy systems with bi-directional electricity-gas carriers coupling under various policy constraints. The framework is leveraged to gain insight into possible configurations of the future Belgian energy system, and identify the cost-optimal energy mix as well as short and long-term storage requirements to satisfy CO2 emissions reductions and energy security targets. Results shed light on the economics of a transition to a low-carbon energy system and reveal the potential of power-to-gas and storage in gas form to help achieve ambitious emissions reduction goals.


The process of image formation in optical system with partially coherent illumination is represented as a superposition of completely coherent modal images. Two modal representations of a partially coherent imaging system are given. The basic concepts are illustrated by en example of calculating the image intensity distribution.


Managing People addresses the perspective of the individual manager whose role includes the management of people, as well as issues concerning the organization as a whole. The theme of the book is about responding to organizational and environmental change and the people skills that will be required for this in the twenty-first century. A system model of how the different parts of HR fit together is included, with the acknowledgment that different contexts require different approaches, and the role of the individual manager is considered within them. The stakeholder perspective is examined as it affects the management of people, and links human resource management policy and practice to financial results. This new edition also reflects the modern move towards performance management as an organizational business strategy. The role of leadership at all levels of the organization is also emphasized. There is a new chapter on managing challenging situations, such as the management of diversity, power, stress, and conflict, as well as the handling of grievances and discipline. Another new chapter pulls together the increasingly important aspects of the legal regulation of behaviour at work, and stresses the move from collective relationships to individual rights in the workplace. This text is suitable for use on the Chartered Management Institute Diploma level modules on recruitment and selection, managing performance, and developing teams and individuals. It is also to be used for NVQ courses in HRM at levels 4 and 5 and is valuable for HR Professionals and line managers.


The growing resource shortage and environmental concerns have forced mankind to develop and utilize renewable energy sources. The penetration of solar photovoltaic (PV) power in the electricity market has been increasing over the past few decades due to its low construction costs, zero pollution nature, and enormous support from governments. However, the intermittency and randomness of PV power also cause huge grid fluctuations which limit its integration in the system. An accurate forecasting of solar PV power generation and optimization of operation and maintenance (O&M) management are essential for further development of the solar PV farms.
 A great number of related researches have been done in recent years. A review of PV power generation forecasting techniques together with their brief applications on the optimization of O&M management is presented in this paper. Machine learning methods are thought to be the most suitable at the present stage because of their ease of implementation and their capability in processing non-linear, complex data sets. Typical forecasting accuracy measures are summarized and further applications of PV power forecasting on the O&M management are also presented.


Protection against viruses is provided by the host innate, adaptive and cellular intrinsic immunities. Cellular intrinsic immunity, or intrinsic defence, against herpesviruses is in part enacted by components that constitute nuclear substructures known as ND10. ND10 (also called PML nuclear bodies after its major organising component) are dynamic nuclear domains that contain various cellular proteins, including PML itself, Sp100, hDaxx and ATRX. In the early stages of infection, herpesvirus genomes and sites of immediate early transcription become associated with ND10 and their components. Representative herpesviruses such as an alphaherpesvirus HSV-1 and a betaherpesvirus HCMV encode for strong transcriptional activators, namely the Immediate Early protein ICP0 and the tegument protein pp71, respectively. These proteins are known to counteract cellular intrinsic defence mechanisms.

In the context of HSV-1 and HCMV infections, the major ND10 component PML has been identified as an important constituent of cellular intrinsic defence. In addition, a number of research studies have demonstrated that Sp100 and hDaxx contribute to these processes during infection with HSV-1 and HCMV, respectively. The general hypothesis of the present study implies that cellular chromatin-associated factors within ND10 may act to repress viral gene expression. The two representative ND10 components present a particular interest for the current investigation based on the facts that: (i) hDaxx is a transcriptional co-repressor; (ii) ATRX is a chromatin-remodelling enzyme; and (iii) ATRX and hDaxx interact with each other to form a chromatin-remodelling complex with repressive properties. The purpose of the present study was therefore to investigate the roles of these two proteins in HSV-1 and HCMV infection. By using virus mutants incapable of efficient stimulation of Immediate Early gene expression (ICP0-null HSV-1 and pp71-null HCMV) it was possible to analyse the contribution of ATRX and hDaxx to the repression mechanism that occurs in the absence of these viral transactivators. An RNA interference approach was utilised for generating cell lines depleted of ATRX or hDaxx in order to assess their roles in viral infectivity. In addition, cell lines reconstituted with wt hDaxx, and ATRX-interaction or SUMO-interaction deficient hDaxx mutants were constructed in order to study the contribution of these functional elements to the role of hDaxx in the repression of ICP0-null mutant HSV-1.

The key findings presented in the current study can be summarised as follows:
(1) ATRX contributes to the intrinsic resistance against HCMV infection, and this mechanism is strongly counteracted by viral pp71;
(2) A chromatin-remodelling complex formed between ATRX and hDaxx contributes to the efficient repression of ICP0-null HSV-1 genomes, thereby constituting a part of anti-HSV-1 intrinsic cellular defence. ICP0 counteracts this process, and the possible mechanisms of ICP0 action are proposed.

These data provide the first evidence for the role of ATRX in viral infection and in addition demonstrate a role for hDaxx in the regulation of HSV-1 infection. The strong indication that ATRX and hDaxx act as a complex opens a possibility of chromatin-dependent repression of ICP0-null HSV-1 genomes. Whether ATRX and hDaxx contribute to the repression of pp71-null HCMV genomes as a complex is yet to be established. In summary, the conclusion of the studies presented in this thesis suggests regulatory roles of ND10-localised chromatin remodelling proteins ATRX and hDaxx in cellular anti-herpesvirus intrinsic resistance mechanisms.


South Africa is emerging from a protracted period of relative isolation in terms of being a competitive player on international markets. Because many of South Africa's competitors have evolved corporate governance systems that reflect sound practices with regard to employee participation, while South Africa has not, it is important that South Africa's economic performance is therefore maximised by a change in its approach to corporate governance. This would result in an improvement in the productivity and efficiency levels attained by its corporations. There are three key issues: firstly, corporate governance systems and legislation in South Africa have become anachronistic, especially in regard to employee participation; secondly, in order to achieve higher levels of corporate performance and to become more competitive on the global market, South Africa needs, amongst other things, to update its corporate governance systems, structures and legislation; and thirdly, corporate governance models based on systems, which have proven successful elsewhere and can be adapted to South Africa's specific needs and cultural dimensions, will provide a strategic platform to facilitate substantial improvements in corporate performance and productivity. This article sets out to identify the problems associated with South Africa's current corporate governance systems and structures, especially with regards to the rights and interests of the non-shareholder constituents including the employees.


STUDY OBJECTIVE--The aim was to assess the extent to which routinely collected data on poisoning in adolescents reflected deliberate self poisoning and, in doing, so to assess the accuracy of the diagnostic information on poisoning in the routine hospital abstracts which form the joint data base of Hospital Activity Analysis and the Oxford Record Linkage Study (ORLS). DESIGN--A comparison was made (a) of all eligible ORLS records during the study period with an independent source of records; and (b) of a random sample of records from an independent source with ORLS. SETTING--Records of patients admitted to the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford were used. SUBJECTS--These were (a) patients aged 10-20 years between 1980 and 1985 with a diagnosis of poisoning by drugs and medicaments in ORLS; (b) a random sample of 500 patients selected from the self harm monitoring files at the hospital (12 patients were not eligible for inclusion in ORLS and were therefore excluded from the rest of the study). MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS--The recorded diagnosis was compared on the records selected from the two files. Of the 1123 events of poisoning identified in ORLS, 1081 (96.3%) were correctly coded as poisoning and 1065 (95%) of these were deliberate self poisoning. Of the 488 cases from the monitoring files, 467 (95.7%) of all cases had a correct diagnosis of injury or poisoning on the ORLS file. Of the 453 poisoning cases 436 (96.2%) were correctly recorded in ORLS. CONCLUSIONS--Deliberate self poisoning in adolescents can be identified through routinely collected hospital statistics. A very high percentage of the diagnostic information on poisoning in ORLS files is correctly recorded.


Early modern charlatan representations, and their origins on the medieval religious stage

With reference to numerous pre-modern texts and images, some identified by my own archival researches and not previously noted in this context, this (FRENCH language) paper interrogates medieval performance culture for information on trends and themes relevant to the rise of early modern representations of charlatans. Already found in medieval religious drama and iconography, the subject of the quack healer attracted the attention of some of the greatest early modern writers and artists, and established itself as a major theme in both drama and genre painting. Some represent apothecaries, barber-surgeons, or the itinerant spice merchants and performing quacks or charlatans known in Latin as the 'mercator', 'circumforaneous', 'empiricus' or 'unguentarius', selling their medical products and services, with or without the help of performative sales techniques. Others represent actors representing healers. I examine ways in which developments in early modern representations of charlatans, and the performative strategies of actual charlatans, drew on and reflected popular trends in religious performance culture.

Representations of the Holy Women at the Sepulchre of Christ are known in art from at least the fifth century, and on the religious stage from the tenth century onwards. Perhaps encouraged by its female patrons, who were often the highly-educated elite leaders of wealthy religious communities, this tradition's visual and theatrical representations moved ever closer to providing an emotional female counterpart, at the end of Christ's life, to the male-dominated visit of the three Kings, or 'wise men from the east', whose gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh heralded its beginning. Precedents for the representation of spice merchants and quacks come not from the bible, but from medieval performance culture. Healthcare professionals, whether spice merchants, apothecaries or charlatans, established themselves as the earliest and most significant non-Biblical secular characters on the medieval European religious stage. This significant dramatic development is reflected in a new iconographic tradition, in which the Holy Women purchase their unguents or spices from itinerant spice merchants or charlatans. Following their great twelfth-century iconographic flowering in Lombard, Provencal and Catalan narrative religious stone carvings, the theme of spice merchants, apothecaries and quacks reappeared in a secular context in medical manuscript illuminations. From the mid-fifteenth century onwards, they also feature in printed book illustrations and other prints offering an accessible repertoire of iconographic templates for artists. Here too, in the context of its connections with the religious stage, the quack theme carries strong religious and moralistic connotations. During the sixteenth century, the quack healer became established as a popular secular stage role, and a fit subject for great artists in Flanders, Germany and Italy, of the stature of Hieronymus Bosch, Pieter Bruegel the Elder, Lucas van Leyden or Giulio Romano. Throughout the early modern period, it continued its consolidation into what eventually became a significant category of seventeenth-century secular genre paintings.

Many centuries separated quacks' first tentative foot in the door of the European stage, as unaccompanied, non-speaking spice merchants, from their triumphant domination as the noisy itinerant mixed-gender troupes of the lengthy merchant scenes of some fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Passion plays. When charlatans were transplanted onto the secular stage, in the farces and plays of the commedia dell'arte and of dramatists such as Hans Sachs or Moliere, this long tradition left its mark; they did not shake off all their religious connotations. Similarly, the quack healer as a fully formed, self-contained secular subject for the visual arts drew on a long iconographic tradition. It first flourished as modest self-contained vignettes within larger religious or allegorical pictorial cycles or compositions. This examination of the origins of quack representations identifies their point of departure as the religious spice-purchasing scene, whose progression it traces on the religious stage from the tenth century, and in illuminated manuscripts from the eleventh century onwards.


This book provides a single-source reference on the use of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) as interconnect material for horizontal, on-chip and 3D interconnects. The authors demonstrate the uses of bundles of CNTs, as innovative conducting material to fabricate interconnect through-silicon vias (TSVs), in order to improve the performance, reliability and integration of 3D integrated circuits (ICs). This book will be first to provide a coherent overview of exploiting carbon nanotubes for 3D interconnects covering aspects from processing, modeling, simulation, characterization and applications. Coverage also includes a thorough presentation of the application of CNTs as horizontal on-chip interconnects which can potentially revolutionize the nanoelectronics industry. This book is a must-read for anyone interested in the state-of-the-art on exploiting carbon nanotubes for interconnects for both 2D and 3D integrated circuits.