Theory informs us that decentralisation, a process through which powers, responsibilities and resources are devolved by the central state to lower territorial entities and regionally/locally elected bodies, increases efficiency, participation, equity, and environmental sustainability. Many types and forms of decentralisation have been implemented in Africa since the colonial period, with varying degrees of success. This paper explores the process of forest management decentralisation conducted in Cameroon since the mid-1990s, highlighting its foundations and characterising its initial assets. Through the transfer of powers to peripheral actors for the management of forestry fees, Council Forests and Community [or Village] Forests, this policy innovation could be empowering and productive. However, careful observation and analysis of relationships between the central state and regional/local-level decentralised bodies, on the one hand, and of the circulation of powers, on the other, show – after a decade of implementation – that the experiment is increasingly governed by strong tendencies towards 're-centralisation', dictated by the practices of bureaucrats and state representatives. The paper also confirms recent empirical studies of 'the capture of decentralised actors'. It finally shows how bureaucrats and state authorities are haunted by the Frankenstein's monster syndrome, concerning state–local relationships in decentralised forest management.


The general objective of this study was to determine the factors which influence residential sector consumption of commercial energy in Kenya. The specific objectives were to first, identify the main determinants and their corresponding elasticities, and to use these to generate policy measures. These objectives have achieved by first identifying the major determinants of consumption of kerosene, Liquified petroleum Gas (LPG) and electricity individually, and secondly by calculating their corresponding elasticities. Using both nominal and constant value time-series data for the period 1970-1990, on a loglinear model, it has been found out that the latter give a better fit at 95 level of confidence. This is an indication that Kenyan households make their commercial energy consumption decisions on the basis of nominal prices and income. Using the nominal value data therefore, it has been found out that the major determinants of Kerosene consumption are wage employment level, population levels, price of LPG, and GDP. The main determinants of LPG on the other hand have been found to be:population levels, lagged consumption and GDP while for electricity, the main determinants have been found to be wage employment levels and lagged consumption. For Kerosene and LPG it has also been found that there exist other significant determinants which have not been captured by this work hence need further research. The elasticity results indicate elastic coefficients for wage employment levels, Gross Domestic Product (GDP), and population levels in the case of Kerosene and GDP in the case of LPG. The cross price elasticity between kerosene and LPG is found to have an inelastic coefficient and so are population levels and lagged consumption in the case of LPG and wage employment levels and lagged consumption in the case of electricity.


Many existing steganographic methods hide more secret data into edged areas than smooth areas in the host image, which does not differentiate textures from edges and causes serious degradation in actual edge areas. To avoid abrupt changes in image edge areas, as well as to achieve better quality of the stego-image, a novel image data hiding technique by adaptive Least Significant Bits (LSBs) substitution is proposed in this paper. The scheme exploits the brightness, edges, and texture masking of the host image to estimate the number k of LSBs for data hiding. Pixels in the noise non-sensitive regions are em- bedded by a k-bit LSB substitution with a lager value of k than that of the pixels in noise sensitive regions. Moreover, an optimal pixel adjustment process is used to enhance stego-image visual quality obtained by simple LSB substi- tution method. To ensure that the adaptive number k of LSBs remains unchanged after pixel modification, the LSBs number is computed by the high-order bits rather than all the bits of the image pixel value. The theoretical analyses and experiment results show that the proposed method achieves higher embedding capacity and better stego- image quality compared with some existing LSB methods.


During recent years heightened standards for board audit committee membership has been imposed by the SEC, NYSE and others. Sarbanes-Oxley requires that the Audit Committee will be comprised solely of independent directors, and that the company must disclose whether at least one of the members of the Audit Committee is a "financial expert" and if not, why not. An "audit committee financial expert" is defined as a person who has the following attributes: (i) an understanding of generally accepted accounting principles and financial statements; (ii) the ability to assess the general application of such principles in connection with the accounting for estimates, accruals and reserves; (iii) experience preparing, auditing, analyzing or evaluating financial statements that present a breadth and level of complexity of accounting issues that are generally comparable to the breadth and complexity of issues that can reasonably be expected to be raised by the registrant's financial statements, or experience actively supervising one or more persons engaged in such activities; (iv) an understanding of internal controls and procedures for financial reporting; and (v) an understanding of audit committee functions. Many seasoned audit committee chairmen hold the view that Audit Committee Financial Experts should be experienced in performing financial accounting functions themselves -- rather than simply having supervisory experience over the function. Indicative of this view is that if accounting is the language of business, an Audit Committee Financial Expert needs to fluently "speak GAAP and GAAS" to understand the nuances of sophisticated and complex accounting, auditing, internal controls and SEC regulations. Who then qualifies as a financial expert? This is a fact-dependent practical question that must be answered by every board, governance and nominating committee, and audit committee member. My goal here is to examine the technical requirements imposed by law and regulation and to present thoughts as to best practice.


The rationale for this special section of Conflict and Society lies in anthropology's relatively recent and steadily growing application to the study of political violence in its various manifestations, from everyday instances of subtle structural violence to more overt cases of war and mass atrocities. In the late 1990s, Carolyn Nordstrom's (1997) work among soldiers and ordinary civilians whose lives had been intimately aff ected by Mozambique's civil war and Antonius Robben's (1996) work among survivors and perpetrators of Argentina's Dirty War enabled an important shift among ethnographers. Whereas in the past ethnographers typically focused on violence and warfare in substate and prestate societies, Nordstrom and Robben emphasized the foundations of political violence in complex state societies. Their work led to the emergence of a small cohort of ethnographers—among them Philippe Bourgois (2003), Nancy Scheper-Hughes (1997, 2002), and Neil Whitehead (2002, 2004)—specialized in what was soon termed "the ethnography of political violence".


Roland Barthes suggests that from his past it is his childhood which 'fascinates' him most; '…it is not the irreversible I discover in my childhood, it is the irreducible: everything which is still in me, by fits and starts; in the child, I read quite openly the dark underside of myself – boredom, vulnerability, disposition to despairs (in plural, fortunately), inward excitement, cut off (unfortunately) from all expression.' (Barthes, 1977).

The child as Other is an adult construct - a fantasy, but also a reality in that she/he is a psychological reflection of the adult world – summoned up from memory, history, revisited and revised – a reflection of loss, of difference. Or, as Jacqueline Rose suggests: '…childhood is something in which we continue to be implicated and which is never simply left behind. Childhood persists…' (Rose, 1992).

Cinema has a long history of re –presenting the image of the child/childhood as Other on the screen – multiple, contradictory, mythical images, often difficult to negotiate – contentious depictions of the innocent (tabula rasa), of the monstrous (the bodies or sexuality of the prepubescent female child becoming the site of Kristeva's/Creed's notions of the abject) - recurrent motifs, themes, patterns which filmmakers appear to recycle from film to film.

This paper aims to explore the ways in which some cinema has attempted to engage the child/childhood as Other in a more equal discourse. Jane Campion, Victor Erice, and Abbas Kiarostami have all produced cinematic images which seem to draw the Otherness of the child out from the margins. Through their negotiations with form and content these filmmakers appear to meet the Other in a manner similar to the way in which some writers engage with l'ecriture feminine.


Limitations of modern artificial intelligence are most evident in comparison with the human ability to selfregulate cognitive and learning processes. Is it possible to model the human self-regulation ability in artifacts? And vice versa, can a computer model of this sort help students to develop self-regulation skills? This work describes a blueprint of an innovative intelligent tutoring system called Cognitive Constructor, to be used as a self-regulatedlearning assistant to students in mathematical problem solving paradigms. Cognitive Constructor will enable parallel acquisition of domain-specific mathematical skills and general self-regulated problem solving skills. At the core of Cognitive Constructor is our recently developed cognitive architecture GMU BICA that provides a suitable basis for modeling self-regulated problem solving.


Stevia rebaudiana (Bertoni), a perennial shrub, is the sweetest plant belonging to the Asteraceae family. Stevia leaves are an excellent source of diterpene glycosides stevioside, rebaudioside A-F, dulcoside, and steviolbioside, which are responsible for sweetness and have been utilized commercially for sugar substitution in foods, beverages, and medicines. To the best of our knowledge, a large number of studies have been carried out on composition, health implications, and safety of steviol glycosides. However, commercial production of stevia-incorporated food products needs further research in order to meet the huge global demand. Stevia-incorporated products possess better sweetening potency and maximum consumer acceptability, when compared with other sugar substitutes. Hence, the current research attempts to review the health promoting effects of stevia with special emphasis on its application in the food system. The paper majorly features 1) the anti-hyperglycemic, anti-hypertensive, anti-caries, anti-inflammatory, and anti-cancer benefits of stevia, 2) value-added stevia-incorporated products, e.g. bakery, dairy, and beverages, 3) the effect of incorporation of stevia on physicochemical, rheological, and nutritional food properties, 4) the current status and regulatory perspective of utilizing stevia at national and international level. Due to legislative actions and growing consumer awareness, public interest in natural sweeteners has significantly increased. Since the use of artificial sweetener has recently been questioned, the data the present article provides will be useful for consumers and manufacturers that seek an alternative.


The first issue to address when considering light therapy is to identify those patients most likely to benefit from this particular modality. Whereas many patients with mood disorders will report some worsening of symptoms in fall and winter, a clear onset in that period with complete remission in the spring and summer months is the SAD phenotype that is most likely to respond to light. Patients with more chronic forms of depression or incomplete summer remission are less likely to have a robust response, although they may benefit to some extent (Lam et al, J Affect Disord 2001;63:123-32). For patients with true SAD, atypical symptoms such as carbohydrate craving and hypersomnia predict a robust response, whereas melancholic symptoms such as insomnia and weight loss are generally less responsive to light (Terman et al, Am J Psychiatry 1996; 153:1423-9).

It is then important to choose an appropriate light therapy unit and to implement a standardized regimen that has been well tested. Patients should use commercially available units specifically designed to treat SAD, because homemade units may not have the appropriate brightness and/or ultraviolet filtration to ensure safety. The dose of light that has proved to be the most beneficial is 5000 lux hours per day, which could take the form of, for example, 10 000 lux for one half-hour each morning. Most studies indicate that early morning treatment (before 8 am) is optimal.

It is now well established that the therapeutic effect of light is mediated through the eye, although patients should not stare at the units directly. The typical treatment regimen involves sitting comfortably in a quiet setting about 16 inches (41 cm) from the unit, which is usually set on a table at an angle. Patients can read or have breakfast as they use the light. It is important that light therapy be used consistently on a day-to-day basis including weekends.

Light therapy differs from standard antidepressant medication in having a more rapid therapeutic effect, usually within the first several days of treatment. Given this fact, and some variability in the timing of the onset of symptoms from year to year, light therapy is usually implemented as symptoms begin to emerge, rather than as a preventive treatment. Treatment is typically continued through the fall and winter period and discontinued at the time of natural remission in the spring and summer.

Light therapy should not be used in patients taking photosensitizing medications or with significant retinal pathology. For other ophthalmologic conditions, consultation with an ophthalmologist may be needed.

Light therapy is generally well tolerated, with headache, nausea and agitation being the most common side effects. Some patients will not be able to tolerate light therapy because of agitation. In these cases, temporarily decreasing the duration of therapy and/or increasing the distance from the light may be considered. As with other effective antidepressants, hypomania can be induced on occasion in individuals with a bipolar diathesis. There have been case reports of possible ocular damage with bright light treatment, although longer term follow-up studies have not shown ocular damage with light (Gallin et al, Am J Ophthalmol 1995; 119: 202-10). Notwithstanding, ophthalmologic assessment every 2–3 years may be helpful in this regard, particularly in individuals at greater risk for ocular disease.


Using micro-level tax data on attorney incomes in 2004 (when the law was changed to make it confidential), we analyze the industrial organization of the Japanese bar. These data suggest two sources of high income: an idiosyncratic return to talent in Tokyo and a compensating differential for the lack of amenities in the provinces. The most able would-be lawyers (those with the highest opportunity costs) pass the bar-exam equivalent on one of their first tries or abandon the effort and pursue careers outside of law. If they pass, they opt for careers in Tokyo that involve complex litigation and business transactions. This work places a premium on their talent, and from it they earn appropriately high incomes. The less talented face lower opportunity costs and opt to spend many years studying for the exam. If they do eventually pass, they apparently choose between a relatively low-income career in Tokyo and a provincial career paying a compensating differential.


This paper addresses the design of broadband finite impulse response (FIR) beamformers with a power complementarity property. The power complementarity requirement is needed to preserve the whiteness of the channel noise at the beamformer output, which allows the application of optimum trellis-based equalizers to the output signal. The power complementarity property imposes non-negative definite quadratic constraints on the beamforming filters so that the beamformer design is expressed as a constrained quadratic optimization problem. Two approaches are proposed to solve this problem. The first method is a Lagrangian relaxation technique, which exploits the fact that the dual mathematical problem reduces to the unconstrained minimization of a convex function over a convex domain. A second approach employs a cascaded lattice representation of the power complementary filterbank and performs the beamformer design incrementally, one lattice stage at a time.


This paper will describe how a course was turned around through the construction of an innovative curriculum. Using a novel blend of techniques, this renewed curriculum went from concept presentation, to deep understanding, to simulated application all embedded in a narrative course structure. This narrative course structure provided the scaffold that allowed students to master skills in a step-by-step manner and through stories that grew more interactive as time went on. Within this overarching narrative structure, other learning techniques were introduced. These included mini-activities in each lecture, paired reading strategies for understanding business cases quickly, and a form of cognitive scaffolding that guided students' ability to think analytically. While the mini-activities within each session kept students engaged, motivated and learning, a variety of reading techniques that were introduced to help students read and understand a 25-page Harvard Business case within one hour, gave them the confidence to master difficult material. The thinking framework that was developed guided students to the central issue that they needed to locate in each case which broke down their habit of jumping to the end of the case to try and answer the assignment questions immediately without understanding. The combination of these innovations led to success as students felt that they had mastered materials that they had initially found intimidating. It developed their confidence as they volunteered for more case competitions and aspired to better jobs. This innovation has applicability to any course which uses case-based or problem-based learning.


Industry transforms its production and business models according to Industry 4.0 concept, a current trend of automation and data exchange in manufacturing technologies that includes cyber-physical systems, the Internet of things/services, cloud and cognitive computing. Digital maturity is the ultimate precondition for transition. Intralogistics, an ubiquitous activity inside every company, consequently follows this trend and expands the concept of industry 4.0 in the field of logistics. In doing so, traditional companies have to lead their development along the evolutionary path, on which they are faced with a lack of examples of good practice that might be followed. They can use maturity models, but the use of these often requires the involvement of consulting firms. Maturity models are supportive tools to assess the AS-IS state, derive and prioritize improvement measures and control the progress. With the awareness of the inadequacy of merely the use of maturity models for the transition in industry 4.0, we began to evolve complementary tools.
The paper examines the applicability of the maturity model, more specifically The Digital Maturity Model 4.0, in combination with Business Process Modelling and the AS-IS state analysis in the light of the technological upgrading according to Industry 4.0 guidelines on specific case study in Tooling manufacturer. The paper concludes that the maturity model is useful for general diagnostics, but for more detailed planning of further development steps analytics at the process level is needed.


Students of democracy increasingly emphasize the fact that democracy implies government by the people, not mere "electoral democracy" in which elites hold elections but the citizens have little real influence on their actions. Genuinely "effective democracy" does not simply result from elite cost-benefit calculations. It emerges when ordinary people acquire resources and values that enable them to put effective pressures on elites\-\- a process that we term "human empowerment." "Self-expression values" reflect a syndrome of interpersonal trust, tolerance and political activism that plays a crucial role in the emergence and survival of democracy. When people have relatively ample economic and cognitive resources, and move from emphasizing survival values toward emphasizing self-expression values, they become most effective in the struggle to obtain democratic institutions.


One of the vitamins that the human body significantly need is ascorbic acid, commonly known by its biologically active form, as Vitamin C. The study sought to obtain the percentage content analysis of Vitamin C supplements available in the market today. This includes the range of synthetic and herbal Vitamin C supplements. In so doing,the researchers proposed to broaden the knowledge on informed use of Vitamin C supplements. The researchers employed the alkaline cupric tartrate test to collect the Vitamin C and the iodimetric titration to further determine the percentage content of ascorbic acid (Vitamin C) based on the United States of Pharmacopeia/National Formulary (USP/NF) method. Essentially, the percentage content analyses obtained from the sampled synthetic and herbal Vitamin C supplements do not conform with the USP standards. Most of the obtained results for percentage content of Vitamin C supplement both for synthetic (Class X)and herbal (Class Y) fall below the USP reference standard for Vitamin C (99-100.5). Necessary recommendations were then formulated after the findings of this study.


Lithuania underwent radical changes in economic and social systems at the end of the 20th and beginning of the 21st century. The country has a declining and ageing population. The dependency ratio will increase to 44.9%, public pension expenditure in Lithuania will reach 8.6% of GDP in 2050, and both values are lower than the corresponding values for the EU-25 average. To address such challenges, the country introduced policy measures and in 2018 a new social model came into force. The chapter discusses pension system reforms, pension policy, employment and health policy and provides a selective review of existing research on these topics. Research on extended working life is developing in Lithuania. It provides evidencebased arguments for influencing social policy for older workers. However, the gender and health implications of extendingworking life in Lithuania are not very favourable and do not fully support peoples' rights for sustainable wellbeing in late work and after retirement.


Investigating variability of scores between different observers, between animals and over time aids the design of valid sampling methodologies for measuring animal welfare. Locomotion scores (0 to 5 scale) were collected: i) from 154 sows in one herd, using three to five observers each time, and scoring sows on up to ten occasions over a 19-month period; and ii) for 123 of these sows, locomotion scoring also took place prior to farrowing and at weaning. The distribution of scores was highly skewed towards low scores (0: 84.8%, 1: 9.5%, 2: 4.0%, 3+: 1.7%). Sows showed moderate consistency in their scores over time and later parity sows had higher scores, but there was no effect of stage in the reproductive cycle (days pregnant, pre-farrowing, post-weaning). This suggests that infrequent visits to a farm (eg annual) might provide an accurate estimate of the extent of lameness if a representative range of parities was sampled, although a larger study of more farms would be required to investigate this. The three different types of agreement between observers (absolute differences, matching and association) were assessed as follows: i) analysis of absolute differences between observers showed that the farm manager scored lower than researchers/technicians; ii) exact matching approaches suggested fair or good agreement — agreement was poorest for mild gait abnormalities (score 1 'stiff'), and agreement improved if scores were combined into 'sound' (0–1) and 'lame' (2–5) categories; and iii) measures of association suggested moderate agreement. Inter-observer reliability improved over time until the 5th scoring event. To improve inter-observer agreement, observer training/practice and the use of fewer categories are recommended, and inter-observer agreement should be checked regularly.


OBJECTIVE. The relationship between sensory processing factors and the sleep habits and patterns of typically developing children ages 8–12 yr was investigated. METHOD. Forty‐five typically developing children and their parents or caregivers took part. Parents completed the Sensory Processing Measure‐Home Form, Children's Sleep Hygiene Scale, and Children's Sleep Habits Questionnaire, and the children completed the Children's Report of Sleep Patterns. Spearman &rgr; correlation and linear regression analyses were completed with the children's sleep habits and patterns as the dependent variables and the sensory processing factors as the independent variables. RESULTS. Sensory processing factors were significantly associated with the children's sleep habits and patterns, as reported by parents and children. Predictive relationships were established between the children's sensory processing factors and sleep habits and patterns. CONCLUSION. Occupational therapy practitioners should consider sensory processing factors when working with children who present with suspected sleep problems.


White Prescriptions? The Dangerous Social Potential for Rilalin and Other Psychotropic Drugs to Harm Black Males, by Terence D. Fitzgerald. Boulder, CO: Paradigm Publishers, 2009, 210 pp., $31.95, paperback. White Prescriptions?: The Dangerous Social Potential for Ritalin and Other Psychotropic Drugs to Harm Black Males discusses racial trends in the "age of Ritalin" and illustrates how psychotropic medications are covertly used to control African American boys. The book stems from Terence Fitzgerald's professional experiences as a school social worker and a camp site director. He and his staff were regularly responsible for administering prescription drugs to such a substantial number of children that the staff began jokingly, yet privately, referring to themselves as "pill pushers." Based on these incidents, Fitzgerald sees the prescribing and administering of medication to African American pre- and adolescent males as a crucial social problem, and nothing more but an extension of the racial and gender dynamics in the larger society. Fitzgerald's overall thesis is that Black male students are being over-medicated in order to exert control and power over them, particularly in educational settings. This in turn reinforces a "White racial frame," which is "an organized set of racialized ideas, stereotypes, emotions, and inclinations to discriminate" (p. x). Fitzgerald supports his argument with conflict theory and explains the education system as an institution that ". . . remains a primary location for the reproduction of racism, control, and oppression" (p. 32). This theoretical lens allows Fitzgerald to show how and why African American boys are being disproportionally "diagnosed" by teachers resulting in the administering of Ritalin and other behavior altering drugs. In the first few chapters, Fitzgerald provides a historical backdrop and informs readers that Ritalin emerged as a pharmaceutical stimulant in the mid- 19th century. Not surprisingly, African American youth were sampled as initial test markets; children who were undergoing psychotherapy were given Ritalin to test the effects of the drug on treatment. Fitzgerald notes that prescribing behavioral stimulants was historically seen as "appropriate treatment to bad parenting" (p. 62) and "were promoted to control the behavior of unruly children" (p. 63). Currently, Ritalin and other drugs such as Adderall and Sfrattera are used to "control" behaviors attributed to attention deficit disorder, attention deficit hyperactive disorder, and several other similar conditions; for example, ODD (oppositional defiant disorder), CD (conduct disorder), and ED (emotionally disturbed). Fitzgerald takes three issues with medicating African American boys. The first issue is the lack of prescription oversight. Studies have indicated that "many children are prescribed stimulants without any official diagnoses from a psychiatrist" (p. 58). The second issue is the culture of medicalization in our society. The willingness and societal acceptance of drug use is so pervasive that is widely acceptable to intervene pharmaceutically when and if a child is deemed "uncontrollable." The third and probably the most significant issue that Fitzgerald presents is: Who is saying the child is "uncontrollable"? …


We live in a world of becoming. The future is not given, but forms continuously in dynamic processes where path dependence plays a major role. There are many different possible futures. What we actually end up with is determined in part by chance and in part by the decisions we make. To make sound decisions we require models that are flexible enough to identify opportunities and to help us choose options that lead to advantageous alternatives. This way of thinking differs from traditional cost-benefit analysis that employs net present value calculations to choose on purely economic grounds, without regard to future consequences.Time and dynamic behaviour introduce a separate perspective. There is a focus on change, and decisions acquire windows of opportunity: the right decision at the right time may lead to substantial change, while it will have little effect if too early or too late. Modelling needs to reflect this dynamic behaviour. It is the perspective of time and dynamics that leads to a focus on sustainability, and thereby the role hydrogen might play in a future energy system. The present work develops a particular understanding relevant to energy infrastructures.Central elements of this understanding are:- Competition- Market preference and choice beyond costs- Bounded rationality- Uncertainty and risk- Irreversibility- Increasing returns- Path dependence- Feedback- Delay- Nonlinear behaviourChange towards a "hydrogen economy" will involve far-reaching change away from our existing energy infrastructure. This infrastructure is viewed as a dynamic set of interacting technologies (value sequences) that provide services to end-users and uphold the required supply of energy for this, all the way from primary energy sources. The individual technologies also develop with time.Building on this understanding and analysis, an analytical tool has emerged: the Energy Infrastructure Competition (EICOMP) model. In the model each technology is characterised by a capacity, an ordered-, and an actually delivered volume of energy services. It is further characterised through physical description with parameters like efficiency, time required for extending capacity and improvement by learning. Finally, each technology has an attractiveness, composed of costs, quality and availability, that determines the outcome of competition.Change away from our present energy infrastructure into a sustainable one based on renewable energy sources, will entail substantial change in most aspects of technology, organisation and ownership. Central results from the overall work are:- Change is dynamic and deeply influenced through situations with reinforcing feedback and path dependence. Due to this, there is a need for long-term perspectives in today's decision making: decisions have windows of opportunity and need to be made at the proper time.- Strategies aimed at achieving change should team up with reinforcing feedback and avoid overwhelming balancing feedback that counteracts change.- The EICOMP model is now available as a tool for furthe analysis of our existing energy infrastructure and its dynamic development into possible, alternative energy futures. As the model is intended for practical guidance in decisions, a central practical aim has been to allow it to be used close to where decisions are actually made; i.e. decentralised and locally in firms and in public institutions. In this respect much effort has been made in an attempt to make it transparent and easy to communicate.- The EICOMP model may be used to analyse situations of reinforcing feedback throughout the alternative energy infrastructures that we may come to have in the future.


This paper describes the mathematical modelling of a part of the blood coagulation mechanism. The model includes the activation of factor X by a puri ed enzyme from Russel's Viper Venom (RVV), factor V and prothrombin, and also comprises the inactivation of the products formed. In this study we assume that in principle the mechanism of the process is known. However, the exact structure of the mechanism is unknown, and the process still can be described by di erent mathematical models. These models are put to test by measuring their capacity to explain the course of thrombin generation as observed in plasma after recalci cation in presence of RVV. The mechanism studied is mathematically modelled as a system of di erential-algebraic equations (DAEs). Each candidate model contains some freedom, which is expressed in the model equations by the presence of unknown parameters. For example, reaction constants or initial concentrations are unknown. The goal of parameter estimation is to determine these unknown parameters in such a way that the theoretical (i.e., computed) results t the experimental data within measurement accuracy and to judge which modi cations of the chemical reaction scheme allow the best t. We present results on model discrimination and estimation of reaction constants, which are hard to obtain in another way. 1991 Mathematics Subject Classi cation: 65C20, 65K10, 90C31, 92C40, 65L05.


ABSTRACTWhen the parabolic differential equation is integrated backward in time, it can create unwanted shortwaves with large amplitude. Hence, instead of solving it as a differential equation, the diffusion equation is converted to the equations of volume-integrated-concentration, and mixing/diffusion is treated as subgrid-turbulent-fluxes across the cell boundaries. Those equations become a set of linear algebra equations and can be solved in both forward- and backward-in time. The proposed method has been validated by the numerical simulations of an idealized case, which consists of 5 different sizes of concentric cylinders with different species. The time evolution of compositions shows that the concentrations in each cylinder can change drastically with time. For the data collected at downwind region, the proposed reverse-in-time integration can be used to assess the concentrations at the source regions, which can be quite different from those derived from the conventional backward-trajectory method without mixing. It also shows that the traditional forward-trajectory or backward-trajectory method without mixing (i.e., Lagrangian method) widely used in meteorology and air pollution can misinterpret the property of fluid parcel at both upwind and downwind regions significantly.


Abstract The mineralogical, geochemical and micromorphological features of an isalteritic clay facies, which originated from weathering of an anorthosite, were compared to those of clay facies derived from the degradation of a bauxite developed from the same rock. The isalteritic clay was formed by the hydrolytic alteration of plagioclase, whereas the degraded clays were formed by decomposition of gibbsite and neoformation of kaolinite. This resilification process resulted from the reintroduction of silica via the oscillation of the phreatic level and/or the decomposition of organic matter on the surface. The degradation process was gradual and yielded two different facies: (a) degraded clays with almost total decomposition of gibbsite, and (b) degraded clays with gibbsite nodules. Morphologically, the isalteritic clays differ from the degraded clays because they contain larger hexagonal and pseudo-hexagonal crystals. The degraded clays have more irregular crystal shapes, ranging from laths to anhedral shapes.


In 1997, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) established the ''Heat Island Reduction Initiative'' to quantify the potential benefits of Heat-Island Reduction (HIR) strategies (i.e., shade trees, reflective roofs, reflective pavements and urban vegetation) to reduce cooling-energy use in buildings, lower the ambient air temperature and improve urban air quality in cities, and reduce CO2 emissions from power plants. Under this initiative, the Urban Heat Island Pilot Project (UHIPP) was created with the objective of investigating the potential of HIR strategies in residential and commercial buildings in three initial UHIPP cities: Baton Rouge, LA; Sacramento, CA; and Salt Lake City, UT. Later two other cities, Chicago, IL and Houston, TX were added to the UHIPP. In an earlier report we summarized our efforts to calculate the annual energy savings, peak power avoidance, and annual CO2 reduction obtainable from the introduction of HIR strategies in the initial three cities. This report summarizes the results of our study for Chicago and Houston. In this analysis, we focused on three building types that offer the highest potential savings: single-family residence, office and retail store. Each building type was characterized in detail by vintage and system type (i.e., old and new building constructions, and gas and electric heat). We used the prototypical building characteristics developed earlier for each building type and simulated the impact of HIR strategies on building cooling- and heating-energy use and peak power demand using the DOE-2.1E model. Our simulations included the impact of (1) strategically-placed shade trees near buildings [direct effect], (2) use of high-albedo roofing material on the building [direct effect], (3) urban reforestation with high-albedo pavements and building surfaces [indirect effect] and (4) combined strategies 1, 2, and 3 [direct and indirect effects]. We then estimated the total roof area of air-conditioned buildings in each city using readily obtainable data to calculate the metropolitan-wide impact of HIR strategies. The results show that in Chicago, potential annual energy savings of $30M could be realized by ratepayers from the combined direct and indirect effects of HIR strategies. Additionally, peak power avoidance is estimated at 400 MW and the reduction in annual carbon emissions at 58 ktC. In Houston, the potential annual energy savings are estimated at $82M, with an avoidance of 730 MW in peak power and a reduction in annual carbon emissions of 170 ktC.


This paper presents a control strategy for a doubly fed induction generator (DFIG) using an indirect matrix converter, which consists of an input side matrix converter and an output side voltage source converter (VSC). The capability of the input converter to generate different "virtual dc link" voltage levels is exploited. The commutation of the VSI with reduced voltage is illustrated for operating points where the output voltage demand is low without any deterioration of the current control performance. The proposed method leads to a reduction in the commutation losses in the output converter and reduced common-mode voltage. For the input converter, soft switching commutation is obtained by synchronizing the input and output converter pulsewidth-modulation patterns. This modulation strategy is particularly applicable in DFIG applications because the required rotor voltage decreases when the DFIG speed is close to the synchronous speed. The complete control strategy is experimentally validated using a 2-kW rig.


In this study, the researcher started by viewing INSET (the in-service training for teachers) as a basic need for all teachers, especially for those who are un- or under-qualified. The aim of INSET is to help teachers already in the profession to keep in touch with developments in education and update their teaching strategies, skills, techniques, approaches, and methods. The researcher argues further that opportunities to attend INSET abound in South Africa. However, INSET can be seen as problematic because many INSET courses are initiated, organized, designed and conducted by facilitators who have either lost touch with schools or have never been at schools. Often INSET courses are conducted without any input from the teachers. This research surveyed a group of teachers to find out their experiences with and opinions about such INSET programs and to gather their input about what kind and how INSET should be organized to be more successful. The results showed that the INSET in which teachers want to participate is one in which they are participants and not passengers only. They would like to be heard so that they may make a difference and own the courses too. They further indicated that their attendance in future INSETS will depend on whether planning, organization and management of the courses meet certain criteria


First-year writing students are a very large, diverse, and ubiquitous information user group, as writing courses are typically required of all undergraduate students, regardless of major. While in their institution's writing program, students frequently must utilize research (information) in their writing assignments. While this formal, task-related information behavior is important for stakeholders in the fields of information science and the humanities to understand, little research has been done on this significant group of students. This study arrived at key exploratory findings by collecting data and context from first-year writing students through semi-structured interviews. The researchers found that students continue to be Google-dependent and fearful of using Wikipedia, though they use it anyway. Students appear to operate in comfort and convenience zones, and distinctly prefer secondary sources which they fail to read completely. People comprise a major part of students' information seeking behavior, but students tend only to consult friends and family members. This study offers practical implications of these behaviors which may be used to help students and inform further research.


This paper proposes a two-part contribution to the human factor issues raised by the prospect of the deployment of swarms of autonomous robots under the supervision of a human operator. First, we propose a generic framework for system description that allows us to analyze and guide the design of automated systems. Second, we analyze the way some highly adaptive systems such as swarms can be perceived by operators, and especially the way representational gaps between man and machine can impact global performances.


This study is concerned with the identity of the Church and its social and political mission in South Africa. Here the argument is that the religious identity of the Church is fulfilled in the realization of the Kingdom of God through the historical event of incarnation which liberates human identity from oppression and alienation. This doctrine in turn, it is contended, depends for its relevance upon the significance of the concepts of prolepsis and commitment for the mission of the Church, Prolepsis signifies that the Church exists to bear witness to that which has come and is coming in Jesus Christ, In this way the thesis attempts to situate the proclamation of the Kingdom of God in relation to a particular problem of oppression and exploitation in South Africa, Hence commitment should be understood as the fulfilment of Black identity and thus as a liberation which brings about the transformation of the South African identity as a whole. In this thesis the hermeneutic circle as a theory of interpretation is applied in the theological and historical analysis of the South African social formation. Part One of the thesis lays the theoretical foundations of the study by developing the hypothesis and discussing identity theories and methodology. Part Two contains an analysis of South African social reality in which the variable of class is identified as that which underpins the South African social structure. Consequently, Apartheid is explained with reference to the economy rather than race. It is an economic rather than a racial factor. Part Three consists of a theological and sociological analysis of South Africa; it employs the Marxist social theory of alienation and applies the conception of identity advocated by the Liberation Movements of Southern Africa, particularly the African National Congress. It is concluded that the religious identity is a crucial factor in the emergence of a full humanity.


In this study, the effects of bee pollen on the development of digestive organs were evaluated in broiler chickens. A total of 144 1-day-old AA broiler chickens were randomly and equally divided into two groups, assigned as the control group and the pollen group, respectively. The control group was fed with a basic diet, while the pollen group was fed with a basic diet supplemented with 1.5% bee pollen over a period of 6 weeks. At the end of each week, the digestive organs were obtained for comparison from 12 broilers randomly selected from each group. The results demonstrated that compared to the control group, the small intestine villi from the duodenum, jejunum, and ileum were longer and thicker in the pollen group. This difference was more significant during early development, especially through the first 2 weeks. Bee pollen increased the length of the villi by 37.1% and 29.4% in the duodenum, 28.1% and 33.7% in the jejunum, and 18.6% and 16.2% in the ileum in week 1 and 2, respectively. Furthermore, the small intestinal glands were developed at a higher density in the pollen group, and the depth of the glands was significantly increased by bee pollen in the first 2 weeks. These findings suggest that bee pollen could promote the early development of the digestive system and therefore is a potentially beneficial food supplement for certain conditions, such as short bowel syndrome.


How long does it take to catalogue a book? This latest entry in the PLA "Results" series should help you to answer that question and others you have related to the output and performance of your staff. By analyzing, in a systematic way, how long work activities take and then assigning steps to each unit of work, you will have a quantifiable measure of the output of your staff. "Staffing for Results" equips you to not only gauge performance and output but also build on what you learn to maximize and even increase productivity. Using common public library tasks as the context, the authors walk you through the process of measuring work, identifying best practices, assigning costs to each activity, analyzing resource allocation, and communicating results. With more than 20 figures and workforms that you can customize for your setting, six easy-to-follow chapters provide step-by-step guidance on how to ensure that your library is optimizing it resources.


We study a mini-batch diversification scheme for stochastic gradient descent (SGD). While classical SGD relies on uniformly sampling data points to form a mini-batch, we propose a non-uniform sampling scheme based on the Determinantal Point Process (DPP). The DPP relies on a similarity measure between data points and gives low probabilities to mini-batches which contain redundant data, and higher probabilities to mini-batches with more diverse data. This simultaneously balances the data and leads to stochastic gradients with lower variance. We term this approach Diversified Mini-Batch SGD (DM-SGD). We show that regular SGD and a biased version of stratified sampling emerge as special cases. Furthermore, DM-SGD generalizes stratified sampling to cases where no discrete features exist to bin the data into groups. We show experimentally that our method results more interpretable and diverse features in unsupervised setups, and in better classification accuracies in supervised setups.


The purpose of this research was to explore experts' memory capacity and the strategies experts use to achieve that capacity. Expert air traffic controllers were asked to recall traffic information during two radar and two nonradar scenarios. During radar scenarios, air traffic information was communicated aurally and displayed visually. During nonradar scenarios, air traffic information was communicated aurally only. Qualitative recall data assessment revealed an average capacity of five to eight aircraft in radar scenarios and three to six in nonradar scenarios, with two to three details recalled for most recalled aircraft. Recalled details and order of detail recall were highly consistent across experts, which suggest that aircraft details were organized and stored within larger conceptual knowledge structures. Recall patterns were additionally suggestive of frames containing slots designated for holding specific data types, structures described by Klein's Data/Frame Model of Sensemaking. The extent of information recalled and its organization are additionally consistent with the use of long term working memory to extend working memory capacity; however, they do not rule out the use of working memory alone. Differences between radar and nonradar conditions were observed. Greater overall recall and greater and earlier recall of certain data-tag elements were observed in radar scenarios. In nonradar scenarios, greater and earlier recall of assigned actions were observed. Evaluation of experts' descriptions of their recall processes suggested primarily visuospatial information encoding in both conditions and a lack of support for differences in the use of visuospatial or verbal encoding.


A bstrAct — Apatite fission-track (AFT) data collected along an elevation traverse at Molas Pass in the Needle Mountains of southwestern Colorado record Early to Middle Miocene cooling of this region. A younger thermal pulse that is likely related to Late Miocene magmatism in this region is superposed on the simple cooling trend. High elevation samples from Pennsylvanian to Permian sedimentary rocks, west of Molas Lake, have AFT ages that range from 19.3±3.6 Ma to 13.6±2.8 Ma; the ages decrease systematically with decreasing elevation. In contrast, AFT ages from Proterozoic rocks at lower elevation to the east of Molas Pass do not correlate with elevation and appear to have been affected by a localized, fault-related Late Miocene hydrothermal event. Thermal history modeling of the age and track-length data reveals that the fission-track system in all samples was totally reset prior to 20 Ma as a result of heating during stock emplacement at 26.6 Ma along the southern margin of the Silverton caldera located just a few kilometers to the north. Burial of the area by volcanic and volcaniclastic rocks during formation of the San Juan volcanic field also contributed to thermal resetting. The lag in time between caldera formation at 26.6 Ma and cooling of the higher elevation samples at 19 to 14 Ma and the track length distributions (mean lengths of 13.1±2.8 to 13.9±2.3 µm) suggest that the section was cooling as a result of exhumation as opposed to relaxation of isotherms following volcanism.


Conventional spatial distributions, such as the negative binomial and Neyman-Scott, have been proposed as models for the clustered distribution of ore deposits. B. B. Mandelbrot has proposed that ore deposits are clustered at many different scales and that fractal distributions are appropriate. The apparent fractal characteristics of geologic controls on the locations of hydrothermal deposits (self-similar systems of fractures, circulation cells, and magmatic intrusions) support his proposal. Examination of the spatial distribution of 4775 hydrothermal precious-metal deposits in the Basin and Range, western United States, reveals fractal distributions acting within two scale ranges, together covering the entire range from 1 to 1000 km.This result gives additional credibility to concepts of regional controls on mineralization, such as metallogenic provinces and tectonostratigraphic terranes. The distribution of these ore deposits about a known occurrence follows a regular radial-density law. Within a range of radii ( r ) of 1 to 15 km, the probability-density function of these deposits is given by d = 0.46 r -1.17 , and within a range of radii of 15 to 1000 km, by d = 0.08 r -0.83 where d is deposits per square kilometre.


Different morphologies of anatase TiO2 from nanoparticles, nanofibers, and hierarchical spheres to ellipsoid spheres are successfully fabricated via solvothermal reactions of titanium n-butoxide and acetic acid. The variations of morphology, size and crystal phase of TiO2 micro-/nanostructures are investigated in detail by XRD, FTIR, SEM and TEM. Effects of different TiO2 morphologies on the photovoltaic performance of dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) are also discussed based on I–V, IPCE, IMPS, IMVS and UV-vis absorption and diffuse spectra. The DSSC based on the hierarchical anatase TiO2 sphere photoelectrode shows an overall light-to-electricity conversion efficiency of 9.35% accompanying a short-circuit current density of 17.94 mA cm−2, an open-circuit voltage of 803 mV and fill factor of 0.65, which is much higher than that of nanoparticles (7.37%), nanofibers (8.15%) and ellipsoid TiO2 spheres (7.93%). The significant enhancement of short-circuit current density and power conversion efficiency for the hierarchical sphere-based DSSC compared to other nanostructures is mainly attributed to the larger dye loading, superior light scattering ability, and/or faster electron transport and longer electron lifetime.


The author's intention is to contribute to the general discussion on timber multi-level commercial buildings. Interest in this topic is expected due to the environmental advantages of timber construction when compared to concrete and steel. This paper looks into three timber based systems for resisting lateral loads for buildings to six storeys, that will ensure relatively 'open' floor spaces. In this paper, three proposed lateral load resisting systems are termed 'frame', 'circular core', and 'shear walls'. Only low stresses occur in the three systems and they can be made with timber below 'structural grade' which is more economical. The concept of reinforced concrete 'socket' foundations, for returning columns to their original locations, is briefly explained. The paper considers the lateral load resisting systems from the viewpoints of structure, architecture and economics. Architecturally, the most flexible arrangement would be a 'frame' system on each external wall. It would leave the floor areas free except for internal columns; and windows can be placed within the frame construction allowing light to enter the building. Assumptions have been made, such as the deflections due to joint slippages and these will, at some stage, need to be studied and their accuracy checked.


In the field of vascular gene therapy, targeting systems are promising advancements to improve site-specificity of gene delivery. Here, we studied whether incorporation of magnetic nanoparticles (MNP) with different magnetic properties into ultrasound sensitive microbubbles may represent an efficient way to enable gene targeting in the vascular system after systemic application. Thus, we associated novel silicon oxide-coated magnetic nanoparticle containing microbubbles (SO-Mag MMB) with lentiviral particles carrying therapeutic genes and determined their physico-chemical as well as biological properties compared to MMB coated with polyethylenimine-coated magnetic nanoparticles (PEI-Mag MMB). While there were no differences between both MMB types concerning size and lentivirus binding, SO-Mag MMB exhibited superior characteristics regarding magnetic moment, magnetizability as well as transduction efficiency under static and flow conditions in vitro. Focal disruption of lentiviral SO-Mag MMB by ultrasound within isolated vessels exposed to an external magnetic field decisively improved localized VEGF expression in aortic endothelium ex vivo and enhanced the angiogenic response. Using the same system in vivo, we achieved a highly effective, site-specific lentiviral transgene expression in microvessels of the mouse dorsal skin after arterial injection. Thus, we established a novel lentiviral MMB technique, which has great potential towards site-directed vascular gene therapy.


Liquid/gas diffusion layers (LGDLs), which are located between the catalyst layer (CL) and bipolar plate (BP), play an important role in enhancing the performance of water splitting in proton exchange membrane electrolyzer cells (PEMECs). They are expected to transport electrons, heat, and reactants/products simultaneously with minimum voltage, current, thermal, interfacial, and fluidic losses. In this study, the thin titanium-based LGDLs with straight-through pores and well-defined pore morphologies are comprehensively investigated for the first time. The novel LGDL with a 400 μm pore size and 0.7 porosity achieved a best-ever performance of 1.66 V at 2 A cm−2 and 80 °C, as compared to the published literature. The thin/well-tunable titanium based LGDLs remarkably reduce ohmic and activation losses, and it was found that porosity has a more significant impact on performance than pore size. In addition, an appropriate equivalent electrical circuit model has been established to quantify the effects of pore morphologies. The rapid electrochemical reaction phenomena at the center of the PEMEC are observed by coupling with high-speed and micro-scale visualization systems. The observed reactions contribute reasonable and pioneering data that elucidate the effects of porosity and pore size on the PEMEC performance. This study can be a new guide for future research and development towards high-efficiency and low-cost hydrogen energy.


Biogenic silica profiles in varved sediments from northern Lake Malawi (Nyasa), East Africa, span the past 700 yr and reflect past primary productivity in the overlying waters. On a centennial scale this has been influenced by lake level and a consequent shift in the location of high diatom productivity within the lake basin. Primary production was higher during the Little Ice Age, an arid period from about A.D. 1570 to 1850, when lake level was about 120 m lower than during the previous three centuries or the past 150 yr.


With a decade to go until the deadline for the Millennium Development Goals, it is clear that key targets on health agreed by heads of state in 2000 will be missed--not for want of knowledge and technical tools but lack of political will and resources. Using a baseline of 1990, the targets state that by 2015: the number of people suffering from malnutrition and extreme poverty should be halved; infant and child mortality reduced by two-thirds; maternal mortality be slashed by three-quarters; and the spread of communicable diseases such as HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria reversed. Other targets include gender equality; universal access to primary education; and more widespread sanitation and drinking-water. In his annual report to the General Assembly on implementation of the Millennium Declaration, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said a "major breakthrough" would be needed in order to achieve the targets. Much of Asia and North Africa was on track to halve extreme poverty, he said. Countries in Latin America, the Caribbean and West Asia were making good progress towards goals such as education but were less successful in combating poverty. Sub-Saharan African and some least developed countries in other regions were "far from making adequate progress on most goals," Annan's report said. "The record of the last 12 months for the poorest is hardly encouraging," he said. "The number of HIV/AIDS infections was higher in the last calendar year than ever before, raising serious concerns about the development prospects for whole regions of the world in which hundreds of millions of people live." The document, released at the end of August, drew heavily on the findings of the draft interim reports from the individual task forces of the Millennium Project, chaired by Professor Jeffrey Sachs of Columbia University, and on country reports. While the interim reports did not provide significant new insights into novel forms of treatment or prevention, they helped draw attention to the lack of resources, according to Dr Andrew Cassels, Director of Health and Development Policy at WHO. "The knowledge is already out there and being applied," Cassels told the Bulletin. "What's new is the recommendations on how the MDGs can be used to focus attention on the resources needed for their achievement." Jan Vandemoortele, Director for Poverty Reduction at the UN Development Programme (UNDP), said the interim reports helped put poverty and ill-health "on a front-burner". But their practical impact would depend on the ability of developing countries to tailor the accumulated knowledge to specific national and local needs, and whether donor governments are willing to finance that effort, he said. The task force reports made it clear there were no quick fixes to lack of basic infrastructure and crumbling health systems, or the chronic shortage of health workers which was singled out as one of the biggest obstacles to tackling HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis. They also reflected hurdles caused by political sensitivities over issues like reproductive health, which was not initially included in the targets, and access to essential medicines, which split the task force to such an extent that its two pharmaceutical industry members issued a dissenting statement. Infant and maternal mortality Task Force Four said the overall picture was "worrisome indeed," with 10.8 million children under the age of five dying each year and mortality rates in some parts of sub-Saharan Africa increasing. It said deaths from diarrhoeal diseases and vaccine-preventable conditions had fallen since the 1970s, but there was little progress on acute respiratory infection. Only 16% of countries were on track to meet the child mortality targets, none of them in sub-Saharan Africa, it said. The report cited studies published last year in the Lancet of 23 high-impact interventions. …


We use numerical climate simulations, paleoclimate data, and modern observations to study the effect of growing ice melt from Antarctica and Greenland. Meltwater tends to stabilize the ocean column, inducing amplifying feedbacks that increase subsurface ocean warming and ice shelf melting. Cold meltwater and induced dynamical effects cause ocean surface cooling in the Southern Ocean and North Atlantic, thus increasing Earth's energy imbalance and heat flux into most of the global ocean's surface. Southern Ocean surface cooling, while lower latitudes are warming, increases precipitation on the Southern Ocean, increasing ocean stratification, slowing deepwater formation, and increasing ice sheet mass loss. These feedbacks make ice sheets in contact with the ocean vulnerable to accelerating disintegration. We hypothesize that ice mass loss from the most vulnerable ice, sufficient to raise sea level several meters, is better approximated as exponential than by a more linear response. Doubling times of 10, 20 or 40 years yield multi-meter sea level rise in about 50, 100 or 200 years. Recent ice melt doubling times are near the lower end of the 10-40 year range, but the record is too short to confirm the nature of the response. The feedbacks, including subsurface ocean warming, help explain paleoclimate data and point to a dominant Southern Ocean role in controlling atmospheric CO2, which in turn exercised tight control on global temperature and sea level. The millennial (5002000 year) time scale of deep ocean ventilation affects the time scale for natural CO2 change and thus the time scale for paleo global climate, ice sheet, and sea level changes, but this paleo millennial time scale should not be misinterpreted as the time scale for ice sheet response to a rapid large human-made climate forcing. These climate feedbacks aid interpretation of events late in the prior interglacial, when sea level rose to +6-9 meters with evidence of extreme storms while Earth was less than 1°C warmer than today. Ice melt cooling of the North Atlantic and Southern Oceans, increases atmospheric temperature gradients, eddy kinetic energy and baroclinicity, thus driving more powerful storms. The modeling, paleoclimate evidence, and ongoing observations together imply that 2°C global warming above the preindustrial level would be dangerous. Continued high fossil fuel emissions this century are predicted to yield: (1) cooling of the Southern Ocean, especially in the Western Hemisphere, (2) slowing of the Southern Ocean overturning circulation, warming of the ice shelves, and growing ice sheet mass loss, (3) slowdown and eventual shutdown of the Atlantic overturning circulation with cooling of the North Atlantic region, (4) increasingly powerful storms, and (5) nonlinearly growing sea 1 Climate Science, Awareness and Solutions, Columbia University Earth Institute, New York, NY 10115, USA 2 Department of Environmental Studies, University of North Carolina at Wilmington, North Carolina 28403, USA 3 Trinnovium LLC, New York, NY 10025, USA 4 NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, 2880 Broadway, New York, NY 10025, USA 5 Institut Pierre Simon Laplace, Laboratoire des Sciences du Climat et de l'Environnement (CEA-CNRS-UVSQ), Gif-sur-Yvette, France 6 Key Lab of Aerosol Chemistry & Physics, Institute of Earth Environment, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Xi'an 710075, China 7 Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California, 91109, USA 8 Department of Earth System Science, University of California, Irvine, California, 92697, USA 9 Program for the Study of Developed Shorelines, Western Carolina University, Cullowhee, NC 28723, USA 10 Department of Geological Sciences, East Carolina University, Greenville, NC 27858, USA 11 GEOMAR, Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research, Wischhofstrasse 1-3, Kiel 24148, Germany 12 Mediterranean Institut of Oceanography, University of Toulon, La Garde, France 13 Department of Applied Physics and Applied Mathematics, Columbia University, New York, NY, 10027, USA 2 level rise, reaching several meters over a time scale of 50-150 years. These predictions, especially the cooling in the Southern Ocean and North Atlantic with markedly reduced warming or even cooling in Europe, differ fundamentally from existing climate change assessments. We discuss observations and modeling studies needed to refute or clarify these assertions.


Malignant melanoma of the skin is one of the most aggressive human cancers with increasing incidence, despite efforts to improve primary prevention. In particular, the prognosis of patients at late stages of the disease has not significantly improved in the last three decades, because systemic therapies have proven disappointing. Thus, metastatic melanoma continues to be a daunting clinical problem. The increasingly high rates of lethal outcome associated with advanced melanoma rely on the acquisition of invasiveness, early metastatic dissemination of tumor cells from their primary sites, and generation of chemoresistance as a consequence of alteration of key molecules involved in the regulation of cell survival. Thus far, extensive studies have been conducted to understand the molecular mechanisms that drive tumor progression, but the specific requirements underlying the aggressive behavior are still widely unknown. Understanding the determinants of this process is key to unveiling its dynamics, especially those that promote invasiveness, and may open new routes for the development of therapeutic strategies that control metastatic spread, and eventually the prevention of life-threatening metastases. Here, we review recent advances on molecular aspects, particularly of E2F1 transcription factor function, in the context of patient data, and discuss the implications for targeting melanoma cells when they begin to invade and metastasize.


Propolis is a resinous hive product collected by worker bees from various parts of the plants. It is widely used in Indian folk medicine for the treatment of stomach ulcers. The preventive and curative effects of Indian propolis for ulcers were evaluated using models of acute gastric lesions induced by ethanol and indomethacin in rats. Moreover, the effects of ethanolic extract of propolis on gastric content volume, total acidity and pH, using the pylorus ligated model were also evaluated. Animals pretreated with propolis extract showed a significant reduction in lesion index in both ethanol and indomethacin induced ulcer models in a dose dependent manner when compared to the control group. Similarly, post-treatment with propolis (300 mg/kg body weight) for a period of 15 days revealed a statistically significant improvement in the ulcer healing process p <0.05. In the pylorus ligated model, it was observed that the Indian propolis extract displayed an antisecretory activity, which led to a significant reduction in the gastric juice volume, total acidity and pH. These findings indicate that Indian propolis displays both ulcer preventive and ulcer curative properties and provides a scientific rationale for the use of propolis in the traditional medicinal system.


Conductive polythiophene-based brushes grafted from an indium tin oxide substrate were fabricated as promising materials with directional conductivity for potential optoelectronic applications. The obtained brushes, thanks to their ordered structure and large conjugation length, exhibited high conductivity after chemical doping. Surface-initiated photoiniferter mediated polymerization of a 3-methylthienyl methacrylate monomer was used in the first step of grafting enabling formation of dense brushes. In the second step a self-templating approach that utilized oxidative polymerization of the pendant thiophene groups in the grafted multimonomer chains was used for the formation of ladder-like conjugated brushes. The polymerization conditions were optimized towards the largest possible effective conjugation lengths of the macromolecules. The rate of the undesirable spontaneous iodine dedoping process was followed for the first time using conductive atomic force microscopy. UV-VIS and grazing angle IR spectroscopy were applied to find correlations between various synthetic procedures and the conjugation lengths of the brushes.


MOTIVATION
It is commonplace for authors to propose a new classification rule, either the operator construction part or feature selection, and demonstrate its performance on real data sets, which often come from high-dimensional studies, such as from gene-expression microarrays, with small samples. Owing to the variability in feature selection and error estimation, individual reported performances are highly imprecise. Hence, if only the best test results are reported, then these will be biased relative to the overall performance of the proposed procedure.

RESULTS
This article characterizes reporting bias with several statistics and computes these statistics in a large simulation study using both modeled and real data. The results appear as curves giving the different reporting biases as functions of the number of samples tested when reporting only the best or second best performance. It does this for two classification rules, linear discriminant analysis (LDA) and 3-nearest-neighbor (3NN), and for filter and wrapper feature selection, t-test and sequential forward search. These were chosen on account of their well-studied properties and because they were amenable to the extremely large amount of processing required for the simulations. The results across all the experiments are consistent: there is generally large bias overriding what would be considered a significant performance differential, when reporting the best or second best performing data set. We conclude that there needs to be a database of data sets and that, for those studies depending on real data, results should be reported for all data sets in the database.

AVAILABILITY
Companion web site at http://gsp.tamu.edu/Publications/supplementary/yousefi09a/


This essay grows out of the experience of teaching a Women's Studies service-learning seminar entitled "Single Motherhood in the Contemporary U.S.: Myths and Realities." It identifies the challenges that arose as the professor and her students sought to support the mission of the Family Development Research Program, a grant-funded program designed to provide a variety of mentoring services to teenaged mothers. The article identifies obstacles activist teachers and students are likely to encounter as they partner with social service workers to create ambitious, sustainable programs for young and low-income women. Among the topics discussed are the challenges of bridging class divides, addressing space and funding needs, and dealing with transportation and liability issues. The students designed and implemented a broad range of programs that were useful not only to the teen mothers, but also to several other groups of low-income single mothers, such as those residing at a local homeless shelter and those participating in a PA Department of Welfare-sponsored program. The essay concludes by noting how valuable partnerships between a college and multiple social service agencies can be when one is attempting to build and sustain programs that depend on grant funding. The closing words are given to two teenaged single moms, who speak of the important role these collaboratively designed support programs have played in their personal and academic development.


In children, the ratio of forced expiratory volume in 1 s (FEV1) to forced vital capacity (FVC) is reportedly constant or falls linearly with age, whereas the ratio of residual volume (RV) to total lung capacity (TLC) remains constant. This seems counter-intuitive given the changes in airway properties, body proportions, thoracic shape and respiratory muscle function that occur during growth. The age dependence of lung volumes, FEV1/FVC and RV/TLC were studied in children worldwide. Spirometric data were available for 22,412 healthy youths (51.4% male) aged 4–20 yrs from 15 centres, and RV and TLC data for 2,253 youths (56.7% male) from four centres; three sets included sitting height (SH). Data were fitted as a function of age, height and SH. In childhood, FVC outgrows TLC and FEV1, leading to falls in FEV1/FVC and RV/TLC; these trends are reversed in adolescence. Taking into account SH materially reduces differences in pulmonary function within and between ethnic groups. The highest FEV1/FVC ratios occur in those shortest for their age. When interpreting lung function test results, the changing pattern in FEV1/FVC and RV/TLC should be considered. Prediction equations for children and adolescents should take into account sex, height, age, ethnic group, and, ideally, also SH.


Aim and Objective: Quality of methodological and statistical parameters published in various Indian Medical Journals are usually debated in terms of appropriateness. Aim of this manuscript is to analyze and validate efficacy studies on antidepressant drugs published in Indian Medical Journals regarding quality of various methodological and statistical parameters used. Materials and Methods: An in-depth review of Efficacy studies on Antidepressant published in Indian Medical Journals was conducted. Articles were retrieved from all possible sources like Published Journals, downloaded through Pubmed, MedInd, Opengate, Medknow, and Cochrane. These studies were analyzed and validated for various methodological and statistical parameters. Descriptive statistics for various parameters with confidence interval (CI) is also reported herewith. Results: Of 32 articles reviewed, primary and secondary endpoints and sample size calculation was reported in only one article (3.1%; 95% CI, 0.5 to 15.7%). Power and CI was not reported in any of the reviewed articles. Inclusion and exclusion criteria were reported in 9 (28.3%; 95% CI, 15.5 to 45.3%) articles. Information regarding randomization was mentioned in 12 (37.5%; 95% CI, 22.9 to 54.7%) articles, whereas reporting of blinding or open label status of the study was mentioned in 21 (65.6%; 95% CI, 48.3 to 79.5%) articles. Assumptions of statistical tests were not reported in any of the reviewed articles. Statistical tests were used in only 14 (43.7%; 95% CI, 28.1 to 60.6%) articles of which 70% of were inappropriate. All studies were underpowered for small and medium effect size. Conclusion: Quality of reporting of methodological and statistical aspects of antidepressant efficacy studies published in Indian medical journals are poor and hence makes difficult to conclude on issues related to validity of these studies.


Southeast Asian women, including Cambodians and Thais, experience higher rates of breast and cervical cancer incidence than any other racial/ethnic group in the U.S. Incidence of cervical cancer among Cambodian and Thai women is among the highest in the U.S. and incidence rate of breast cancer for these two groups is rapidly increasing, while rates are decreasing for other racial/ethnic groups. Cambodians and Thai women also experience higher rates of late-stage breast cancer than non-Hispanic White women, resulting in increased morbidity and mortality from the disease. Despite these staggering statistics, little is known about barriers and facilitators of screening for Cambodian and Thai women, particularly women in Southern California, which is home to the largest population of both groups. This dissertation sought to better understand breast and cervical cancer screening behavior among Cambodian and Thai women in California. Using a mixed methods approach, this study has the following aims: 1) identify individual and environmental level predictors of breast and cervical cancer screening among Cambodian and Thai women in Northern and Southern California, 2) examine the association between behavioral intention and mammogram adherence among Cambodian and Thai women in Southern California, 3) explore ethnic-specific, culturally-based norms and systems-related factors that influence the decision-making process for Cambodian and Thai women in Southern California, and 4) examine the role of community health navigators in assisting Cambodian and Thai women to overcome individual and environmental barriers to mammogram screening in Southern California. Results from this study contribute to breast and cervical cancer literature and expands the existing literature on Cambodian and Thai women. By stratifying data analysis, the quantitative portion of this study identified community-specific individual, social, and environmental level predictors of breast and cervical cancer screening. Additionally, the qualitative portion of this study found that while self-efficacy and health-care seeking behavior differ between Cambodian and Thai women in Southern California, these two groups are influenced by similar factors in the decision-making process. Lastly, using a mixed methods approach, this study found that Cambodian and Thai women are not able to act on their intentions to get screened without assistance from a Community Health Navigator. This finding supports previous research that found behavioral intention to be a poor indicator of actual behavior in more disadvantaged communities. The overall findings of this dissertation research have significant implications for how health disparities are conceptualized and addressed in diverse communities. This research recognizes that health behavior is a function of individual, social, and environmental factors and as such, a mixed methods approach is need to better contextualize and interpret breast and cervical cancer screening practices for Cambodian and Thai women in Southern California. This dissertation research underscores the need to move beyond the traditional research paradigm of using quantitative methods alone and reinforces the value of using mixed paradigms and methods to better understand health behavior in order to design more effective interventions to eliminate health disparities.


The practical Byzantine fault-tolerant algorithm does not add nodes dynamically. It is limited in practical application. In order to add nodes dynamically, Dynamic Practical Byzantine Fault Tolerance Algorithm (DPBFT) was proposed. Firstly, a new node sends request information to other nodes in the network. The nodes in the network decide their identities and requests. Then the nodes in the network reverse connect to the new node and send block information of the current network, the new node updates information. Finally, the new node participates in the next round of consensus, changes the view and selects the master node. This paper abstracts the decision of nodes into the undirected connected graph. The final consistency of the graph is used to prove that the proposed algorithm can adapt to the network dynamically. Compared with the PBFT algorithm, DPBFT has better fault tolerance and lower network bandwidth.


Title of research "System and Structure of Regency / City Economic Growth of East Java". This type of research uses quantitative descriptive method. The data used in this research is secondary data obtained from the Central Statistics Agency of East Java, the East Java regional GDP data year 2000-2007. Data analysis techniques used in this study is the analysis of economic growth and Typology Analysis Klassen.
From the results of research can take the conclusion that Mojokerto town has average of the highest economic growth in the amount of 6.15% while the regency is experiencing the lowest economic growth is Pacitan Regency from 2000 to 2007 experienced an average economic growth only by 3.23%. Based on the results of research using Klassen typology analysis can be classified patterns and the structure of economic growth of each Regency are: a Regency that
falls into this category and quickly developed a fast growing city of Mojokerto. Categoriesdeveloped regions but stressed this are Gresik, Malang, Sidoarjo, Surabaya, Kediri, East Java.
Categories of rapidly developing region are Bojonegoro, Lumajang, Banyuwangi, Magetan, Tulungagung, Ponorogo, Blitar, Probolinggo, Madiun, Blitar, Kota Batu. Later that fall into that category is relatively remote area Pacitan Regency, Trenggalek, Kediri Regency, Bondowoso Regency, Situbondo, Pasuruan Regency, Jombang Regency, Nganjuk Regency, Madiun Regency, Ngawi Regency, Tuban, Lamongan Regency, Bangkalan Regency, Sampang Regency, Pamekasan Regency, Jember Regency, Malang regency, Mojokerto regency, Sumenep, Pasuruan, Probolinggo Regency.


Continuous technological innovations are forcing businesses to bring automation into its core activities. Eprocurement is one of such technological advancement, receives much attention these days as it is a key to optimise supply chain performance, through cost reduction and improved process efficiency. The purpose of this paper is to compare substantial impact of e-procurement and traditional procurement process for MRO (maintenance, repair and overhaul) in an aviation industry through a qualitative case study approach where stages before and after implementation of e-procurement have been analysed to assess the impact on supply chain performance. The study shows that the eprocurement has advantages over the traditional procurement through bringing simplification and transparency throughout the process, reducing turnaround time and also long term relationship with the suppliers along with subsequent cost reduction across the value chain.


The Industrial Revolution accompanied a dramatic change in energy systems, away from locally gathered, traditional fuels such as biomass to commercially traded fossil fuels. For nearly 2 billion people in the world today, this commercial energy transition is yet to occur. We review the literature on the causes and consequences of this transition and the effectiveness of policy instruments aimed at accelerating or directing the transition. Income is the main driving force, but other factors—such as population density and the availability of rival fuels—affect energy choices. Although correlations between the energy transition and economic growth are high, cause and effect relationships have proved difficult to establish.


Clostridium difficile, a non-aerobic spore former, is currently one of the most serious causes of nosocomial infections and antibiotic associated diarrhea (AAD). Due to the resilient nature of spores, its propagation can be difficult to control. Preventing infections through efficient and durable disinfection of hospitals' facilities would result in diminished contaminations. This project was based on testing the efficacy of a new substance called Goldshield® Antimicrobial (a patented nano-molecular-assembly technology developed at Emory University) against Clostridium difficile. The tests were also done with the aerobic spore forming Bacillus anthracis Sterne. Goldshield's active reagents were tested against the isolated spores of C. difficile and B. anthracis Sterne, by the method of environmental sampling. Its durability on a surface (fabric and plastic), was tested through different stressors, such as heat and washes. The spores were applied to surfaces treated with varying amounts of Goldshield. Results indicate that G.S. 48 inhibited the growth of both organisms under normal conditions and heat. When the surface was washed and the spores reapplied, growth was present in all tested application amounts. Applications of G.S. 48 below 50μl were proportional to the inhibition of growth. Goldshield proved to be an efficient product in single applications against both organisms, in all tested conditions. Although, its usefulness as a coating system was not satisfactory, given it was easily removed from the surfaces, indicating poor durability. Goldshield could be considered a disinfectant alternative in healthcare settings given its non-toxic and water based composition, but its use as a coating layer is not recommended since it would not bring sustainable results. Degree Type Open Access Senior Honors Thesis Department Health Sciences This open access senior honors thesis is available at DigitalCommons@EMU: http://commons.emich.edu/honors/215 The Effects of Goldshield® Antimicrobial on Bacillus anthracis Sterne and Clostridium difficile Victor Petreca and Lynne M. Shetron-Rama PhD,MT(ASCP)


Objective. DIP joint OA is common but has few cost-effective, evidence-based interventions. Pain and deformity [radial or ulnar deviation of the joint or loss of full extension (extension lag)] frequently lead to functional and cosmetic issues. We investigated whether splinting the DIP joint would improve pain, function and deformity. Methods. A prospective, radiologist-blinded, non-randomized, internally controlled trial of custom splinting of the DIP joint was carried out. Twenty-six subjects with painful, deforming DIP joint hand OA gave written, informed consent. One intervention joint and one control joint were nominated. A custom gutter splint was worn nightly for 3 months on the intervention joint, with clinical and radiological assessment at baseline, 3 and 6 months. Differences in the change were compared by the Wilcoxon signed rank test. Results. The median average pain at baseline was similar in the intervention (6/10) and control joints (5/10). Average pain (primary outcome measure) and worst pain in the intervention joint were significantly lower at 3 months compared with baseline (P = 0.002, P = 0.02). Differences between intervention and control joint average pain reached significance at 6 months (P = 0.049). Extension lag deformity was significantly improved in intervention joints at 3 months and in splinted joints compared with matched contralateral joints (P = 0.016). Conclusion. Short-term night-time DIP joint splinting is a safe, simple treatment modality that reduces DIP joint pain and improves extension of the digit, and does not appear to give rise to non-compliance, increased stiffness or joint restriction. Trial registration: clinical trials.gov, http://clinicaltrials.gov, NCT01249391.


Abstract—The commercial nuclear power reactor in South Korea, Kori Unit 1, which was a 587 MWe pressurized water reactor that started operation since 1978, was permanently shut down in June 2017 without an additional operating license extension. The Kori 1 Unit is scheduled to become the nuclear power unit to enter the decommissioning phase. In this study, the preliminary evaluation of the decommissioning wastes for the Kori Unit 1 was performed based on the following series of process: firstly, the plant inventory is investigated based on various documents (i.e., equipment/ component list, construction records, general arrangement drawings). Secondly, the radiological conditions of systems, structures and components (SSCs) are established to estimate the amount of radioactive waste by waste classification. Third, the waste management strategies for Kori Unit 1 including waste packaging are established. Forth, selection of the proper decontamination and dismantling (D&D) technologies is made considering the various factors. Finally, the amount of decommissioning waste by classification for Kori 1 is estimated using the DeCAT program, which was developed by KEPCO-E&C for a decommissioning cost estimation. The preliminary evaluation results have shown that the expected amounts of decommissioning wastes were less than about 2% and 8% of the total wastes generated (i.e., sum of clean wastes and radwastes) before/after waste processing, respectively, and it was found that the majority of contaminated material was carbon or alloy steel and stainless steel. In addition, within the range of availability of information, the results of the evaluation were compared with the results from the various decommissioning experiences data or international/national decommissioning study. The comparison results have shown that the radioactive waste amount from Kori Unit 1 decommissioning were much less than those from the plants decommissioned in U.S. and were comparable to those from the plants in Europe. This result comes from the difference of disposal cost and clearance criteria (i.e., free release level) between U.S. and non-U.S. The preliminary evaluation performed using the methodology established in this study will be useful as a important information in establishing the decommissioning planning for the decommissioning schedule and waste management strategy establishment including the transportation, packaging, handling, and disposal of radioactive wastes.


OBJECTIVE To examine the effects of baseline and incident diabetes on change in cognitive function over 12 years. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS A sample of 1,290 individuals aged ≥40 years at baseline, participating in the Maastricht Aging Study, were cognitively tested at baseline, after 6 years, and after 12 years. Of these, 68 participants had type 2 diabetes at baseline, and 54 and 57 had incident diabetes at the 6- and 12-year follow-up, respectively. Changes in performance on tests of information-processing speed, executive function, and verbal memory from baseline to 6- and 12-year follow-up were compared between groups using linear mixed models. Effects of diabetes on cognitive decline were adjusted for demographic variables, history of smoking, alcohol intake, and comorbid conditions, including hypertension, cardiovascular disease, BMI, and depression. RESULTS Participants with baseline diabetes showed larger decline in information-processing speed (estimate −7.64; P < 0.01), executive function (21.82; P < 0.01), and delayed word recall (−1.35; P < 0.05) over the 12-year follow-up compared with control subjects. No significant difference in decline was observed for immediate word recall. Compared with control subjects, participants with incident diabetes showed subtle early decline in information-processing speed only. Interestingly, they did not show larger decline in any other cognitive domain. CONCLUSIONS Individuals with baseline type 2 diabetes show accelerated cognitive decline, particularly in information-processing speed and executive function, compared with individuals without diabetes. In incident diabetes, decline in speed becomes detectable first, and cognitive decline seems to increase with increasing exposure time.


Abstract Intentional destruction of cultural heritage is a well-known phenomenon which has been particularly exacerbated in recent times. Its common denominator is represented by the intent to persecute the communities for which that heritage represents an essential element of their cultural identity and distinctiveness. In legal terms, it produces different implications, to the point that – depending on the circumstances in which it is perpetrated – it may be qualified as a war crime, crime against humanity, violation of internationally recognised human rights, or evidence of the existence of the intent to commit genocide. Since the whole international community is seriously affected by the destruction of cultural heritage, it is indispensable that the doctrine of responsibility to protect (R2P) be put into practice seriously and effectively with the purpose of protecting humanity against the irreplaceable loss of its heritage.


Flowering plants exhibit striking interspecific and intraspecific variation in flower number, which strongly influences the reproductive success of animal‐pollinated plants. However, the reproductive consequences of producing a single flower are poorly understood. Here, we test if plants producing a single flower have a reproductive disadvantage compared with plants producing multiple flowers by combining field investigation of five deceptive orchids and a survey of published literature. Pollen limitation was estimated by comparing fruit production between hand pollination and open pollination. Flowering frequency was monitored over years to assess the potential advantage of producing a single flower. Both single‐ and multiple‐flowered species suffered strong pollen limitation. However, single‐flowered species had significantly lower fruit set and produced fewer seeds per individual, although they had a significantly higher pollen removal than species with multiple flowers. A phylogenetically independent contrast of 28 species representing four of the five subfamilies of Orchidaceae revealed that fruit set was significantly positively associated with flower number. Both pollen removal and fruit set had a positive relationship with flower number within the multiple‐flowered species. Synthesis. Current data and phylogenetically independent contrast support the hypothesis that producing a single flower has reproductive disadvantages. Single‐flowered species may compensate for low female success through high flowering frequency over years. This study provides insight into costs and benefits of producing a single flower in deceptive orchids.


Poly(2,6-dimethyl-1,4-phenylene oxide)/polyamide 6 (PPO/PA6 30/70) blends were impact modified by addition of three kinds of maleated polystyrene-based copolymers, i.e., maleated styrene-ethylene-butylene-styrene copolymer (SEBS-g-MA), maleated methyl methacrylate-butadiene-styrene copolymer (MBS-g-MA), and maleated acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene copolymer (ABS-g-MA). The mechanical properties, morphology and rheological behavior of the impact modified PPO/PA6 blends were investigated. The selective location of the maleated copolymers in one phase or at interface accounted for the different toughening effects of the maleated copolymer, which is closely related to their molecular structure and composition. SEBS-g-MA was uniformly dispersed in PPO phase and greatly toughened PPO/PA6 blends even at low temperature. MBS-g-MA particles were mainly dispersed in the PA6 phase and around the PPO phase, resulting in a significant enhancement of the notched Izod impact strength of PPO/PA6 blends from 45 J/m to 281 J/m at the MBS-g-MA content of 20 phr. In comparison, the ABS-g-MA was mainly dispersed in PA6 phase without much influencing the original mechanical properties of the PPO/PA6 blend. The different molecule structure and selective location of the maleated copolymers in the blends were reflected by the change of rheological behavior as well.


Poaching of rhino and elephant has increased significantly over the last decade. We develop a model that views poaching and protection of a migratory species as a repeated, spatial game between strategic opponents. A poacher and an anti-poaching patrol make locational decisions each season on where to poach and where to patrol. We simulate different locational strategies to determine their affect on species abundance. Random locational strategies that account for the spatial distribution of the species are superior to non-random strategies for both the poacher and the antipoaching patrol. This mixed-locational strategy is shown to be a unique Nash equilibrium. If elephants avoid kill sites from the previous year, they may contribute to their own protection by reducing the number sites where they would be found.


Mainstream core grammar theory, still to some extent relying on the idealized speaker in a homogeneous speech community, is ill equipped to handle different kinds of periphery data, like code-switching data and other types of language mixing data. In this paper, we defend a model of grammar that we argue is able to handle different types of both core and periphery data. Empirically, we focus on single-word code-switching data obtained from a small corpus of the Chinese production of a bilingual Mandarin Chinese – Norwegian child. We develop the beginnings of a generative frame model of grammar exploiting insights both from late insertion neo-constructional models and from code-switching theories assuming a matrix – embedded language asymmetry. We will be paying special attention to the lexicon – syntax interface.