The jus ad bellum is generally viewed as a static field of law. The standard account is that when the UN Charter was adopted in 1945, it enshrined a complete prohibition on the use of force in inter-state relations, except when action is being taken in self-defense against an armed attack or under authorization of the UN Security Council. Yet it seems likely that in the years to come, many states and non-state actors will increasingly insist upon a different vision of the jus ad bellum, one that conceives of it as more protean in nature. Protean jus ad bellum acknowledges that, as of 1945, the static view was correct, but that over time-as we approach the 70th anniversary of the United Nations-the jus ad bellum is changing, buffeted in particular by several significant developments: (1) the emergence of weapons of mass destruction of various types potentially controllable by states and non-state actors; (2) the rise of global terrorism as a mechanism for projecting violence against states by non-state actors; (3) the elevation of the person to a central place in the realm of international law, both in terms of being protected and in terms of being accountable for misconduct; (4) the inability of the Security Council to be accepted by all states as a disinterested arbiter willing and capable of acting to address all threats to international peace and security as they arise; and (5) the continuing erosion of the sanctity of the sovereign state, resulting from exposure to myriad effects of globalization, including intrusive transnational rule of law programs, election monitoring, incessant and extensive media coverage, powerful transnational corporations and non-governmental organization, and relatively unrestricted transborder movement of capital, goods, and persons across borders.This essay suggests that the failure to either formally accept or reject the idea of protean jus ad bellum is likely, over time, to diminish the jus ad bellum's effectiveness as a normative regime. Too often transnational uses of military force are occurring in circumstances that are inconsistent with the idea of a static jus ad bellum: states and non-state actors are, at least in some situations, tolerating certain types of force in response to the overarching developments noted above. As the International Criminal Court moves closer to including aggression within its mandate for indicting and prosecuting persons, government leaders may see greater value in clarifying what uses of force are permissible. Things could continue as they are. But in the long-term, if the jus ad bellum is not to break down, then a more formal way should be found either to reject the notion of protean jus ad bellum or to accept it, and if the latter, then to try to identify the contemporary rules in this area, either through formal amendment of the UN Charter, through authoritative interpretations by the principal organs of the United Nations or regional organizations, or through other means.


Driven by temperature gradients, kinetic snow metamorphism plays an import role in avalanche formation. When gradients based on temperatures measured 10 cm apart appear to be insufficient for kinetic metamorphism, faceting close to a crust can be observed. Recent studies that visualised small-scale (< 10 cm) thermal structures in a profile of snow layers with an infrared (IR) camera produced interesting results. The studies found melt-freeze crusts to be warmer or cooler than the surrounding snow depending on the large-scale gradient direction. However, an important assumption within these studies was that a thermal photo of a freshly exposed snow pit was similar enough to the internal temperature of the snow. In this study, we tested this assumption by recording thermal videos during the exposure of the snow pit wall. In the first minute, the results showed increasing gradients with time, both at melt-freeze crusts and artificial surface structures such as shovel scours. Cutting through a crust with a cutting blade or shovel produced small concavities (holes) even when the objective was to cut a planar surface. Our findings suggest there is a surface structure dependency of the thermal image, which was only observed at times during a strong cooling/warming of the exposed pit wall. We were able to reproduce the hot-crust/cold-crust phenomenon and relate it entirely to surface structure in a temperature-controlled cold laboratory. Concave areas cooled or warmed more slowly compared with convex areas (bumps) when applying temperature differences between snow and air. This can be explained by increased radiative and/or turbulent energy transfer at convex areas. Thermal videos suggest that such processes influence the snow temperature within seconds. Our findings show the limitations of using a thermal camera for measuring pit-wall temperatures, particularly during windy conditions, clear skies and large temperature differences between air and snow. At crusts or other heterogeneities, we were unable to create a sufficiently planar snow pit surface and non-internal gradients appeared at the exposed surface. The immediate adjustment of snow pit temperature as it reacts with the atmosphere complicates the capture of the internal thermal structure of a snowpack with thermal videos. Instead, the shown structural dependency of the IR signal may be used to detect structural changes of snow caused by kinetic metamorphism. The IR signal can also be used to measure near surface temperatures in a homogenous new snow layer.


Abstract
Poor adherence to antipsychotics, which affects outcome, is frequent in first episode psychosis (FEP). Most randomized studies demonstrate no superiority of long-acting injectable antipsychotics (LAI-AP) over oral antipsychotics (OAP). However, participants in these studies represent a minority of patients who may benefit from LAI-AP. Mirror and naturalistic studies generally demonstrate efficacy of LAI-AP on more representative samples, but studies on FEP are scarce.

Aim
To describe LAI-AP's utilization and impact on FEP outcome in a naturalistic setting.

Methods
A 3-year longitudinal prospective and retrospective descriptive study of all consecutive admissions from two Early Intervention Services for psychosis (EIS) in Montréal, Canada, compared the characteristics and evolution of patients who received LAI-AP for at least 12 months to those who received OAP only.

Results
From 375 FEP patients included, 26,7% received LAI-AP during their follow-up. They were more likely to have poor prognostic factors (male gender, lower premorbid functioning, homelessness, substance use disorder and schizophrenia spectrum diagnoses). Despite a more severe illness and lower functioning in the LAI-AP group, at admission and study endpoint, clinical and functional improvements were observed.

Conclusion
Early prescription of LAI-AP seems beneficial in FEP with poor prognostic factors.


Abstract. We infer CO2 surface fluxes using satellite observations of mid-tropospheric CO2 from the Tropospheric Emission Spectrometer (TES) and measurements of CO2 from surface flasks in a time-independent inversion analysis based on the GEOS-Chem model. Using TES CO2 observations over oceans, spanning 40° S–40° N, we find that the horizontal and vertical coverage of the TES and flask data are complementary. This complementarity is demonstrated by combining the datasets in a joint inversion, which provides better constraints than from either dataset alone, when a posteriori CO2 distributions are evaluated against independent ship and aircraft CO2 data. In particular, the joint inversion offers improved constraints in the tropics where surface measurements are sparse, such as the tropical forests of South America. Aggregating the annual surface-to-atmosphere fluxes from the joint inversion for the year 2006 yields −1.13±0.21 Pg C for the global ocean, −2.77±0.20 Pg C for the global land biosphere and −3.90±0.29 Pg C for the total global natural flux (defined as the sum of all biospheric, oceanic, and biomass burning contributions but excluding CO2 emissions from fossil fuel combustion). These global ocean and global land fluxes are shown to be near the median of the broad range of values from other inversion results for 2006. To achieve these results, a bias in TES CO2 in the Southern Hemisphere was assessed and corrected using aircraft flask data, and we demonstrate that our results have low sensitivity to variations in the bias correction approach. Overall, this analysis suggests that future carbon data assimilation systems can benefit by integrating in situ and satellite observations of CO2 and that the vertical information provided by satellite observations of mid-tropospheric CO2 combined with measurements of surface CO2, provides an important additional constraint for flux inversions.


The Barzaman Formation in the UAE comprises a series of matrix supported to locally clasts supported, polymict alluvial conglomerates. The Formation is widely exposed on the western edge of the Hajar Mountains that are a part of the large and well known Oman-UAE ophiolite.
The Formation was deposited as an ophiolite-derived conglomerate with a serpentinite and harzburgite matrix of sand, silt and clay grade constituents. It formed during a heavy, possibly seasonal rainfall that resulted in viscous, slurry-like, rapid mass movement, of diverse grain size that are called debris flows. The Formation is now typically strongly dolomite cemented and therefore stands proud as resistant outcrops of the alluvial fans that overlie a sequence of intensively altered ophiolite mantle rocks. There is a very distinctive lithological sequence below the contact, which comprises from the top downwards: silicified and carbonated serpentinite, carbonate-veined serpentinite and carbonate-veined partially serpentinised peridotite that passes downwards into the normal partially serpentinised peridotite. These units are the main source of the clasts for the Barzaman Formation. The most common lithology of the Barzaman Formation is poorly sorted, cobble to boulder conglomerate with clasts largely of harzburgite, serpentinite, silicified serpentinite, gabbro and a minor amount of metamorphic rocks, which are other components of the ophiolite thrust stack. They are cemented by dense, hard, weathering-resistant dolomite, which has precipitated from phreatic and locally vadose groundwater. A petrographical study using optical and scanning electron microscopy revealed that the cementation was preferential and it involved, firstly the complete replacement of the serpentinite and harzburgite sand and silt matrix and simultaneously or subsequently it strongly affected clasts. Both, physical erosion of clasts during transportation and exposure to various weathering conditions as well as extensive groundwater-rock interaction during diagenesis contributed to the presence of highly altered ophiolitic clasts. The mechanical erosion has created fractures and areas of enhanced weaknesses that were subsequently penetrated by groundwater leading to zonal and concentric dolomitization of clasts.
The partial dissolution of silicate minerals locally resulted in simultaneous precipitation of clay minerals and/or Fe oxides/hydroxides, leaving a ghost texture as evidence of the presence of former clasts. Clasts with diverse original composition show distinctively different alteration patterns. The susceptibility to dissolution and subsequent dolomitization of ultramafic and mafic clasts is suggested as follows: harzburgite and serpentinite are the most susceptible followed by gabbro with intermediate susceptibility, and silicified serpentinite as the least prone to alteration.


Abstract Objective: To examine socioeconomic differences in general practice consultation rates among patients aged 65 years and over. Design: Secondary analysis of data from the fourth national survey of morbidity in general practice. Setting: 60 general practices in England and Wales. Subjects: 71 984 people aged 65 years and over. Main outcome measures: Annual contact rates and home visiting rates with general practitioners and practice nurses. Results: Social class differences in contact rates were greatest in 65-74 year olds, with rates 23% higher in patients from social class V than in class I (4.82 v 3.93 per person). In 75-84 year olds there was no clear association between social class and contact rates, and in people aged ≥85 years contact rates were highest in patients from class I. Home visiting rates were twice as high in patients from class V as in patients from class I (1.38 v 0.66 per person). Contact rates were 17% higher in people living in communal establishments and 8% higher in those living alone than in those living with others but not in a communal establishment. 66% of contacts with patients in communal establishments and 26% of those with patients living alone were in patients' homes compared with 18% with those living in standard accommodation. These differences persisted after adjustment in a generalised linear model. Conclusions: Elderly people show socioeconomic differences in consultation rates. The extra workload generated by elderly people living alone and in communal establishments suggests additional payments to general practitioners are needed. Key messages Little is known about the effect of socioeconomic status on use of general practice services by elderly people In this national study contact rates were 14% higher and home visiting rates 109% higher in elderly patients from social class V than in patients from class I Contact rates were 17% higher in elderly people living in communal establishments and 8% higher in elderly people living alone than in those living in standard accommodation 66% of contacts with patients in communal establishments and 26% with those living alone were in patients' homes compared with 18% of contacts with those in standard accommodation


Whenever the government operates a facility in a way that negatively affects the property interests of nearby owners, the question arises whether it has effected a taking. This is especially the case in instances in which the government's land use constitutes a nuisance. This Article explores the issue of when a nuisance ripens into a taking. The Article argues that when it is alleged that the government has effected a taking through its own land use, courts should employ a form of review that is more exacting than that applied in regulatory takings cases but that falls short of the categorical rule applied in physical invasion cases. In doing so, the Article focuses on both the magnitude of the harm, as well as the degree of its distribution among property owners, that accompanies intensive governmental land uses. The Article seeks to show how takings law can promote a greater degree of fairness when the government chooses sites for facilities that create significant negative externalities. The analysis will help property owners who have borne a disproportionate share of those externalities, including owners in poor and minority communities whose unequal treatment in this regard has given rise to the environmental justice movement.


Abstract This paper reports upon the insights gained through working with teachers as writers at their own level. As part of a two-year research project into the development of children's voice and verve in writing, a group of fourteen teachers' reflective journeys as writers were documented. Two other groups of teachers and one group of student teachers also took part in writers' workshops across the same period. The data encompassed: questionnaires, observations and teacher commentaries on their own writing, as well as interviews. A number of issues emerged, including: the tension between public and private writing and the security of the writing environment; authenticity in modelling writing; the importance of re-reading writing at the point of composition; the significance of choice and autonomy in writing and the potency of drama as an ideational and reflective tool. The consequences for classroom practice are also considered. It is argued that in order to enhance the teaching of writing, teachers and student teachers need real opportunities to write at their own level and reflect upon the process.


The rapidly increasing price of crude oil has generated a lot of concern over the relationship between energy consumption and agricultural production. In Malaysia, the use of agricultural machinery in agricultural production is certain to continue regardless of the energy situation. The concern over the increasing energy input into the process due to mechanization is overwhelming. Thus, it is advantageous to analyze the energy use at the various stages of the production process. The results could the be used in formulating a strategy on energy conservation in the production process. This paper will focus on the energy use in paddy production in Malaysia. At present, the paddy production process in Malaysia is going through a modernization stage with the introduction of modern agricultural machinery. The form and intensity of the energy input for the various stages of paddy production namely land preparation, nursery operation, transplanting, crop upkeep and maintenance, and harvesting were analyzed and discussed. The various form of energy input will be converted to an equivalent uniform unit of energy for comparison purposes. An economic analysis of the energy inputs in the process with respects to the present energy situation in the country will be briefly discussed. This will include the projected future energy input cost of paddy production in accordance with the future predicted price of crude oil. Available alternative energy inputs in the process will be discussed along with its implication on the effect on Malaysian agriculture as a whole


Much recent work in reinforcement learning and stochastic optimal control has focused on algorithms that search directly through a space of policies rather than building approximate value functions. Policy search has numerous advantages: it does not rely on the Markov assumption, domain knowledge may be encoded in a policy, the policy may require less representational power than a value-function approximation, and stable and convergent algorithms are well-understood. In contrast with value-function methods, however, existing approaches to policy search have heretofore focused entirely on parametric approaches. This places fundamental limits on the kind of policies that can be represented. In this work, we show how policy search (with or without the additional guidance of value-functions) in a Reproducing Kernel Hilbert Space gives a simple and rigorous extension of the technique to non-parametric settings. In particular, we investigate a new class of algorithms which generalize REINFORCE-style likelihood ratio methods to yield both online and batch techniques that perform gradient search in a function space of policies. Further, we describe the computational tools that allow efficient implementation. Finally, we apply our new techniques towards interesting reinforcement learning problems.


Background: Pedicle screw instrumentation is widely used for spinal stabilization. However, the accuracy for free-hand screw placement ranges from 69% to 94%. This study assesses the value of the existing classification systems, and investigates their impact on the ability to assess the accuracy of free-hand screw placement. Methods: Data were collected retrospectively from the medical records of 34 patients who received 224 pedicle screws placed utilizing a free-hand technique. Screw placement was evaluated employing the 2-mm increment and Zdichavsky et al. classification systems. Kappa coefficient and Landis and Koch interpretations were employed for statistical analysis. Results: The 2-mm increment classification system resulted in a total of 18 (8.03%) misplaced screws. Lateral screw misplacement was observed in 13 (5.8%) instances, with medial pedicle wall penetration being noted in 5 (2.23%). Of the 18 misplaced screws, 4 (22.22%) were classified as minor (≤2 mm), 12 (66.67%) as moderate (2–4 mm), and 2 (11.11%) as severe (>4 mm) (K = 0.882). The Zdichavsky et al. grading system categorized 208 (92.84%) pedicle screws as Ia, 10 (4.46%) as Ib, 1 (0.45%) as IIa, 2 (0.90%) as IIb, 2 (0.90%) as IIIa, and 1 (0.45%) as IIIb grade; this resulted in a total of 16 (7.14%) misplaced screws (K = 0.980). One patient exhibited a new postoperative radiculopathy attributed to poor screw placement. There were no additional early or late postsurgical complications attributed to screw misplacement. Conclusion: The free-hand pedicle screw placement technique is both safe and effective. Postoperative computed tomography studies; however, are useful to confirm the accuracy of screw placement. Although, the available grading systems proved reliable, easy to use, and clearly reflected the individual surgeon's skills, they do not clearly document whether screws are safely placed.


Abstract This study examined the acceleration demands associated with changing direction and the subsequent physiological consequences of acceleration during running at 3 submaximal speeds. 10 male professional footballers completed four 600 m running bouts at 3 speeds (2.50, 3.25 & 4.00 m·s−1). Each bout was in the format of either: i) 3 laps of a 200 m track (CON), ii) ten 60 m shuttles (S60), iii) twenty 30 m shuttles (S30), or iv) thirty 20 m shuttles (S20). Peak heart rate (HRPEAK), blood lactate concentration (BLa) and RPE (Borg CR-10) were recorded for each bout. A single change of direction required 1.2, 1.5 and 2.0 s of acceleration at running speeds of 2.50, 3.25 and 4.00 m s−1 respectively. An increase in time spent accelerating produced a linear increase in BLa (r=0.43–0.74) and RPE (r=0.81–0.93) at all speeds. Acceleration increases linearly with change of direction frequency during submaximal shuttle running. Increased time spent accelerating elicits proportional increases in perceived exertion, BLa and HRPEAK. The current study further underlines the need to consider acceleration when quantifying training load during activities involving numerous changes of direction.


The memory colors of ten familiar, naturally occurring objects have been determined. Fifty observers chose their memory colors from an array of 931 Munsell color chips. The variability of the judgments is shown and their means are compared with the average chromaticities of the corresponding natural objects. The ten mean memory colors were all significantly different from the natural colors. Each memory color tended to be more characteristic of the dominant chromatic attribute of the object in question; grass was more green, bricks more red, etc. In most cases, saturation and lightness increased in memory.


Drawing upon studies of subnational (internal) family migration, in this paper we link international family migration to differential labour-market participation in Great Britain. We extend Kofman's fourfold categorisation of international family migration processes to develop a typology of scenarios that acknowledge the important role of the family. We match scenarios to different out-comes using a subsample of partnered migrants from the Sample of Anonymised Records (SAR) of the 1991 Census. In line with subnational family migration literature, descriptive analyses of the SAR point to a 'gender gap' between the labour-market participation of partnered men and partnered women moving into Great Britain between 1990–1991, with males twice as likely to be attached to the labour force compared with women. We contribute to debates on changing family organisation and employment returns to international migration by arguing that the magnitude of this gender gap varies across migration scenario and family structure. In this paper we stress the need for more interchange between international and subnational family-migration scholarship, and provide valuable entrees for analyses of the forthcoming microdata of the 2001 Census.


Objective : The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of zinc and magnesium supplementation on glycemic control and serum insulin in type 2 diabetic patients. Materials and Methods : In this randomized clinical trial 70 diabetic patients who referred to Yazd Diabetes Center were selected. Subjects received 500 mg/day magnesium oxide or 100 mg/day zinc sulfate randomly for 8 weeks. At the start and end of treatment period fasting blood sugar (FBS), 2 hour postprandial glucose (2-hpp), glycated hemoglobin (HbA1C) and fasting insulin level were measured. Results : Magnesium and Zinc supplementation for 8 weeks cause significantly decrease in HbA1c ( P=0.005, P=0.001).No significantly difference was observed after trial between magnesium and zinc groups in FBS (42.08 ±7.43 vs. 35.15 ± 6.52) ( P=0.97), HbA1C (1.22±0.21 vs. 1.77±0.32) ( P=0.07) and fasting serum insulin (39.81 ±7.03 vs.36.68±6.81) ( P=0.83) respectively. Conclusion : Results of this study showed that 500 mg/day magnesium oxide or 100 mg/day zinc sulfate administration for 8 weeks could improve HbA1C in type 2 diabetic patients and this effect is same in two groups. But more studies for evaluating effect of magnesium and zinc supplementation on type 2 diabetic patients were suggested.


We investigate a model in which we connect slowly time varying unconditional long-run volatility with short-run conditional volatility whose representation is given as a semi-strong GARCH(1,1) process with heavy tailed errors. We focus on robust estimation of both long-run and short-run volatilities. Our estimation is semiparametric since the long-run volatility is totally unspecified whereas the short-run conditional volatility is a parametric semi-strong GARCH(1,1) process. We propose different robust estimation methods for nonstationary and strictly stationary GARCH parameters with nonparametric long-run volatility function. Our estimation is based on a two-step LAD procedure. We establish the relevant asymptotic theory of the proposed estimators. Numerical results lend support to our theoretical results.


This article evaluates with historical brevity the attempts at political engineering by the Nigerian political elite. It argues that such attempts have left much to be desired as good governance, which places the welfare of the citizens of a country above any personal desires, has never been put in place in Nigeria since 1966. It further argues that the militarys popular slogan of coming to salvage the country is because of the gullible nature of the populace and the absence of the rule of law in Nigeria as demonstrated by the various attempts at tenure elongation by successive regimes including the civilians. The article concludes that only by entrenching nation-building goals and popular participation in the process can the quest for tenure elongation by the political elites be banished from the polity.


Campbell-Goodhart's law relates to the causal inference error whereby decision-making agents aim to influence variables which are correlated to their goal objective but do not reliably cause it. This is a well known error in Economics and Political Science but not widely labelled in Artificial Intelligence research. Through a simple example, we show how off-the-shelf deep Reinforcement Learning (RL) algorithms are not necessarily immune to this cognitive error. The off-policy learning method is tricked, whilst the on-policy method is not. The practical implication is that naive application of RL to complex real life problems can result in the same types of policy errors that humans make. Great care should be taken around understanding the causal model that underpins a solution derived from Reinforcement Learning.


Diversification patterns and faunistic turnovers of bivalves and brachiopods through the Carboniferous - Early Permian interval in the central western Argentinian basins are analyzed and compared with the global events proposed in former studies. This study reveals a generalized increase of bivalves, at familiar and generic levels, through three time intervals, i.e., Early Carboniferous (Tournaisian-Visean), Late Carboniferous (Bashkirian-Kasimovian) and Early Permian (Asselian-Sakmarian), while the brachiopod diversity seems to remain stable from the Late Carboniferous to the Early Permian. The trends recognized in the faunistic diversity appear to be closely related to the palaeoclimatic, palaeogeographic and palaeotectonic evolution at the Southwestern Gondwana margin. Highly stressing environmental changes in the Early Carboniferous, resulting fundamentally from the development of glacial conditions, may account for the lowest faunistic diversity recorded. Particular stress conditions, such as the nutrient availability, temperature and oxygen level, would have mainly affected the brachiopod faunas that evidence the lowest diversity recognized in the interval studied. At the Visean-Serpukovian boundary, the Late Palaeozoic marine record of the Precordillera shows a major break linked to a globally recognized glacial maximum, whereas an important faunistic turnover is mainly identified in the brachiopod faunas at the beginning of the Late Carboniferous. The more stable, less stressing environmental situation developed during the Late Carboniferous-Early Permian postorogenic sedimentation is also reflected by the different faunal assemblages studied. The Late Carboniferous was characterized by postglacial transgressions. During this time local rebound, a continuous increase of the diversity and an important faunal turnover, which mainly affected the brachiopod faunas, were recorded. These faunal trends may be related to the Early Permian climatic amelioration that affected the central western Argentinian basins. The subsequent Permian transgressive events, which produced new areas of potential spreading for the benthic fauna, allowed its increase and diversification, much better reflected by the bivalve assemblages.


Sports injuries are a common occurrence, and can be caused by a multitude of factors. Typically, they are classified as being either acute or chronic, and the pharmacist is in a strong position to provide advice on the best way to manage many of these injuries. Treatment approaches include both nonpharmacological and pharmacological. Topical medications are extremely useful in the management of minor sports injuries, as generally they are well tolerated, available over-the-counter and provide rapid relief.


ABSTRACT Little is known of protein expression in Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis and how this contributes to pathogenesis. In the present study, proteins from both membranes and cytosol were prepared from two strains of M. avium subsp. paratuberculosis, i.e., laboratory-adapted strain K-10 and a recent isolate, strain 187, obtained from a cow exhibiting clinical signs of Johne's disease. Sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis of cytosol and membrane proteins from K-10 and 187 showed marked differences in protein expression. Relative levels of protein expression from both M. avium subsp. paratuberculosis strains were measured by using amine-reactive isobaric tagging reagents (iTRAQ) and tandem mass spectroscopy. Protein identification and relative expression data were obtained for 874 membrane and cytosolic proteins from the M. avium subsp. paratuberculosis proteome. These data showed a number of significant differences in protein expression between strain K-10 and clinical isolate 187. Examples of proteins expressed at higher levels in clinical isolate 187 compared to strain K-10 are AtpC, RpoA, and several proteins involved in fatty acid biosynthesis. In contrast, proteins such as AhpC and several proteins involved in nitrogen metabolism were expressed at higher levels in strain K-10 compared to strain 187. These data may provide insights into the proteins whose expression is important in natural infection but are modified once M. avium subsp. paratuberculosis is adapted to laboratory cultivation. Results from these studies will provide tools for developing a better understanding of M. avium subsp. paratuberculosis infection in the host and offer potential as diagnostic reagents and vaccine candidates.


Wearable construction toolkits have shown promise in broadening participation in computing and empowering users to create personally meaningful computational designs. However, these kits present a high barrier of entry for some users, particularly young children (K-6). In this paper, we introduce MakerWear, a new wearable construction kit for children that uses a tangible, modular approach to wearable creation. We describe our participatory design process, the iterative development of MakerWear, and results from single- and multi-session workshops with 32 children (ages 5-12; M=8.3 years). Our findings reveal how children engage in wearable design, what they make (and want to make), and what challenges they face. As a secondary analysis, we also explore age-related differences.


Our understanding of maids and their condition is confined within the current discourse of domestic labor exploitation and its general assumptions. This study presents an expansion of the discussion as experienced by residents of Sitio Sibol, Bohol including past experiences of NPA (New People's Army) insurgency and counterinsurgency that partly played an instrumental role in shaping the maid's experience. Informed by ethnographic research among former and current maids and their community in Sitio Sibol, this study problematizes how the changing context in the community affects the emergence and proliferation of local domestic work. It traces back the community's history and analyzes both individual and collective experiences, attitudes, and practices as exercises of human creativity when faced with adversity and different conditions of injustice. The shared community life in the sitio established active and passive social networks; and changing political conditions shaped and illustrated the complex process of "pagpapa-maid" revealing realities of human costs usually unaccounted for.


The problem of transmit beamforming to multiple cochannel multicast groups is considered for the important special case when the channel vectors are Vandermonde. This arises when a uniform linear antenna antenna (ULA) array is used at the transmitter under far-field line-of-sight propagation conditions, as provisioned in 802.16e and related wireless backhaul scenarios. Two design approaches are pursued: (i) minimizing the total transmitted power subject to providing at least a prescribed received signal-to-interference-plus-noise-ratio (SINR) to each intended receiver; and (ii) maximizing the minimum received SINR under a total transmit power budget. Whereas these problems have been recently shown to be NP-hard, in general, it is proven here that for Vandermonde channel vectors, it is possible to recast the optimization in terms of the autocorrelation sequences of the sought beam vectors, yielding an equivalent convex reformulation. This affords efficient optimal solution using modern interior point methods. The optimal beam vectors can then be recovered using spectral factorization. Robust extensions for the case of partial channel state information, where the direction of each receiver is known to lie in an interval, are also developed. Interestingly, these also admit convex reformulation. The various optimal designs are illustrated and contrasted in a suite of pertinent numerical experiments.


Turner's (1965,1967,1968) study of Lima's squatter settlements
led to the view that uncontrolled settlements of the Third World cities
are mainly a manifestation of the desires for housing ownership by
people who are well integrated in the city and have experienced some
amount of social mobility.
In his work, Turner (1968) advanced a theoretical model of intraurban
mobility in which rural-urban migration; upward social mobility,
intra-urban mobility and the growth of spontaneous settlements are
inter-related. Within this model, migrants are classified into three
successive groups which corresponds with their level of involvement in
gainful employment namely, 'Bridgeheader' i. e. the newly arrived migrants
who are in search of employment or involved in low paid jobs, 'Consolidators'
i. e. those who have had some urban experience and are"in relatively better
paid jobs; and 'Status Seekers' i. e. the upper class of low income group.
Three housing priorities: - Location, security of tenure and quality of
housing and environment were assigned to those class of migrants.
Upward economic and social mobility from a low paid job to a better
paid jobs, is argued within this model, to be reflected in a housing
priority and expectation about living conditions. Those who move from
lower position in the social hierarchy to a higher position also move
from inner city slums to the suburbs. In other words, social mobility
necessarily entails spatial mobility within the urban. environment.
Security of tenure and improvement of the quality of housing are thus
functionally related.
Consequently, it is recommended that stimulating those spontaneous
activities as opposed to their eradication would benefit enormously
from the resourcefulness of the squatters. Legalisation of land tenure,
provision of infrastructural services and support-for local neighbourhoodorganisation
are some of the essential elements for a more healthy urban
policy.
In this study attempt is made to test Turner's model of intraurban
mobility in a regional context of West Africa. The study specifically
examines the validity of the model in relation to a secondary city of
(Jos) Nigeria, and asks whether Turner's model which is based almost
entirely on the migratory characteristics and experience of Latin America
has gone far enough in acknowledging the various dimensions of Third
-World rural-urban migration in which some migrate permanently while others
intend only a temporary migration as well as the varying types of uncontrollecl
subareas that have emerged as a result of these differences.
 In most of West Africa, Including Nigeria, rural-urban migration
tends
not only to be temporary in character but is also structured by
kinship relationships. Within this migratory context, migrants do not
strive to consolidate their stay in the city. They prefer cheap rental
accommodation, with a view to consolidating their position in the rural
home towns. Security of tenure does not therefore rank. high in their order
of priorities,
their social mobility does not lead to a spatial mobility.
Within this migratory context, the distinction between permanent and
temporary migrants has more validity and practical application than Turner's
bridgeheader - consolidator dichotomy, since bridgeheaders are likely to
remain bridgeheaders while in the city.
Adopting the proposed distinction between permanent and temporary
migrants provides a lot of insight into the ways in which migrant groups
perceive the city environment and how their perception of the city in
turn affects the development process of their settlement areas. Indeed,
varying migratory characteristics leads to varying housing demands and
housing ambitions in the city of migration. This also leads to variation
in migrants reception areas in the city and thus affords the capacity of
uncontrolled subareas to improve via self help housing. Thus, the
distinction between permanent and temporary migrants provides a lot of
insight into the understanding of why some uncontrolled settlements
might improve through self help housing and why others might not. Most
Importantly, it provides more insights into the policy dimension of the
problem.


We report near-infrared persistent luminescence and photochromism in Eu2+-Nd3+-codoped CaAl2O4 ceramics, a well-known blue persistent phosphor. After irradiation with UV light, the color of the sample body changed from white to purple. From the reflectance spectrum, the color center created by UV irradiation has a broad absorption band at 500 nm, which results in pink coloration. The purple color of the sample just after stopping UV irradiation is caused by mixing the blue persistent luminescence, due to the Eu2+:4f65d1→4f7 transition and the pink photochromic coloration. The sample also shows near-infrared persistent luminescence originating from the Nd3+:4F3/2→4IJ/2 transitions in addition to the blue persistent luminescence at 440 nm. Because of the similarity between Eu2+ and Nd3+ afterglow decay profiles, the electron traps contributing to both persistent luminescences are regarded as identical. The role of photo-oxidation, electron trapping and de-trapping are also discussed with regard to the persistent luminescence and photochromism.


Programming languages themselves have a limited number of reserved keywords and character based tokens that define the language specification. However, programmers have a rich use of natural language within their code through comments, text literals and naming entities. The programmer defined names that can be found in source code are a rich source of information to build a high level understanding of the project. The goal of this paper is to apply topic modeling to names used in over 13.6 million repositories and perceive the inferred topics. One of the problems in such a study is the occurrence of duplicate repositories not officially marked as forks (obscure forks). We show how to address it using the same identifiers which are extracted for topic modeling.
We open with a discussion on naming in source code, we then elaborate on our approach to remove exact duplicate and fuzzy duplicate repositories using Locality Sensitive Hashing on the bag-of-words model and then discuss our work on topic modeling; and finally present the results from our data analysis together with open-access to the source code, tools and datasets.


The discovery of room temperature photoluminescence in porous silicon has opened up a range of applications for this material in new areas such as optical, photodetector, photovoltaic, micromachine and sensors. For this reason there have been significant efforts in recent years directed at modification of silicon surfaces via formation of Si-C and Si-O-E (E = H, C, N) bonds on the silicon surfaces. However, research on bonding of metallorganic fragments to the silicon surface is scant. The main objectives of our work are to develop and investigate new ways of specific chemical bonding of selected metallorganic compounds to the Si surface and to prepare new types of silicon-based materials. New metallorganic composites have been developed on macro- and micro- porous silicon surfaces. The silicon surfaces have been effectively modified using inorganic and organometallic chemistry approaches. The work includes: (i) preparation and investigation of Cl-, HO-, and Cp- modified porous Si-surfaces; (ii) preparation and characterisation of iron oxide layers on porous silicon; (iii) characterization of metallorganic layers on porous silicon by FTIR, EDX and Scanning Electronic Microscopy (SEM). There are strong possibilities that those composite materials will have a wide range of applications in nano-technology and optoelectronics.


Chenopodium quinoa is an herbaceous plant that possesses green polymorphic leaves. They are traditionally consumed in America and are considered nutritive vegetables. Most vegetables are considered valuable sources of micronutrients, such as mineral, vitamins, carbohydrates and dietetic fiber; however, because they are poor in proteins, they are considered to have no energetic value. The consumption of vegetables generates a satiety sensation and favors the reduction of total calories consumed. Quinoa leaves can be consumed raw when they are ripe or steam cooked; they retain most of their vitamins and minerals. The FAO considers quinoa to be the "perfect food", and it is not only used in common diets, but it is also suitable for the unique diets of those that are vegetarian or high-performance athletes as well as those with celiac disease and diabetes. The objective of this work was to determine the nutritional value of quinoa leaves. For every test, dried and powdered quinoa leaves were used, and the following parameters were determined: total polyphenols, total flavonoids, proteins, carbohydrates, reducing sugars, water content, ash content, and raw fiber, and the flavonoids were determined by HPLC. The results obtained for the polyphenols were 131.8 ± 10.3 mg 100 g-1 and 62.07 ± 5.1 mg 100 g-1 for flavonoids, and the main compounds were gallic acid, kaempferol and catechin. The content of proteins was 11.8 ± 0.6%, the carbohydrates was 18.3 ± 0.9, the reducing sugars were 3.2 ± 0.27%, the water content was 2.8 ± 0.9%, the ash content was 1.4 ± 0.14%, and the raw fiber content was 43.7 ± 3.9%. Based on the nutritional profile and the content of polyphenols and total flavonoids, quinoa leaves can be considered an alternative for human consumption because they offer interesting potential in nutrients and antioxidant capacity, which is a dietary requirement.


Renal disturbances by coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), consisted of acute kidney injury, due to acute tubular necrosis induced by sepsis, hydration, cytokine storm syndrome, rhabdomyolysis and hypoxia. As the direct cytopathic effect of virus on various renal cells has been detected in previous studies, direct virus invasion to the renal tubular cells and interstitium or glomeruli is possible. Previous studies showed that coronavirus enters into the cells by angiotensin-converting enzyme II receptors that are extensively presented in the renal cells. Further, acute kidney injury in COVID-19 is strongly associated with higher mortality and morbidity and is an indicator for survival with Coronavirus infection. In the overall approach to patients with COVID-19 infection, special attention should be paid to control of classical risk factors of kidney injury.


A system of asymmetric cryptography based on wavefront sensing (ACWS) is proposed for the first time to our knowledge. One of the most significant features of the asymmetric cryptography is that a trapdoor one-way function is required and constructed by analogy to wavefront sensing, in which the public key may be derived from optical parameters, such as the wavelength or the focal length, while the private key may be obtained from a kind of regular point array. The ciphertext is generated by the encoded wavefront and represented with an irregular array. In such an ACWS system, the encryption key is not identical to the decryption key, which is another important feature of an asymmetric cryptographic system. The processes of asymmetric encryption and decryption are formulized mathematically and demonstrated with a set of numerical experiments.


In light of the tremendous changes that have come to the island of Borneo in recent decades, this volume takes a detailed historical look at the Borneo environment from native, colonial and national perspectives. It examines change and continuity in the economic, political and social dimensions of human-environment interactions. Reflecting the increasingly multidisciplinary nature of environmental history, the book brings together an international group of historians, anthropologists, geographers and social foresters, all looking through a historical lens at the environment in the Malaysian states of Sabah and Sarawak, and the Indonesian province of Kalimantan and Brunei. Drawing on extensive archival research and fieldwork, these ten original contributions encompass eleven centuries of history on Borneo, examining interrelated topics that include long-distance trade, conservation, land tenure, resource access, property rights, perceptions of the environment, migration, and development policy and practice.


Neural spike trains present challenges to analytical efforts due to their noisy, spiking nature. Many studies of neuroscientific and neural prosthetic importance rely on a smoothed, denoised estimate of the spike train's underlying firing rate. Current techniques to find time-varying firing rates require ad hoc choices of parameters, offer no confidence intervals on their estimates, and can obscure potentially important single trial variability. We present a new method, based on a Gaussian Process prior, for inferring probabilistically optimal estimates of firing rate functions underlying single or multiple neural spike trains. We test the performance of the method on simulated data and experimentally gathered neural spike trains, and we demonstrate improvements over conventional estimators.


This paper presents the high-level architecture (HLA) of the research project DEWI (dependable embedded wireless infrastructure). The objective of this HLA is to serve as a reference for the development of industrial wireless sensor and actuator networks (WSANs) based on the concept of the DEWI Bubble. The DEWI Bubble is defined here as a high-level abstraction of an industrial WSAN with enhanced interoperability (via standardized interfaces), technology reusability, and cross-domain development. This paper details the design criteria used to define the HLA and the organization of the infrastructure internal and external to the DEWI Bubble. The description includes the different perspectives, models or views of the architecture: the entity model, the layered model, and the functional view model (including an overview of interfaces). The HLA constitutes an extension of the ISO/IEC SNRA (sensor network reference architecture) towards the support of industrial applications. To improve interoperability with existing approaches the DEWI HLA also reuses some features from other standardized technologies and architectures. The HLA will allow networks with different industrial sensor technologies to exchange information between them or with external clients via standard interfaces, thus providing a consolidated access to sensor information of different domains. This is an important aspect for smart city applications, Big Data and internet-of-things (IoT).


We derive hydrodynamic equations for the point-spread function of an imaging system looking through atmospheric turbulence at an incoherent object. These are derived from the hydrodynamics of the index of refraction of the air. We use the path integral representation of the paraxial approximation for wave propagation through turbulence. We then study the case of a frozen turbulent refractive index field being advected past the imaging system with a constant wind and discuss the implications for optical flow estimation. We conclude by discussing possible directions for future work.


Approximately 15,000 ha of melon (Cucumis melo L.) are grown in the northeastern section of Brazil, mostly for export to Europe during the winter months. Surveys for melon vine decline diseases were carried out in farms in the municipalities of Mossoró (Rio Grande do Norte) and Quixeré (Ceará) during 2002 and 2003. Symptoms typical of vine decline were observed in several fields and included yellowing of crown leaves just prior to harvest and collapse of many of the vines. Affected plants exhibited necrotic root systems and lacked most of the secondary and tertiary feeder roots. Numerous perithecia were observed on roots which, when examined with a microscope, showed characteristic asci and ascospores of the fungus Monosporascus cannonballus Pollack & Uecker (2). Isolations were made from the crown region and primary and secondary roots of affected plants by excising 4- to 6-mm pieces that were surface sterilized for 30 to 60 s with 1.5% active chlorine solution. Seven tissue pieces from each plant part were placed on potato dextrose agar (PDA) containing 0.5 g liter-1 of streptomycin sulfate. Plates were examined daily for fungal growth for 7 days, and hyphal tips from all colonies were transferred to PDA for subsequent growth and sporulation. M. cannonballus was isolated from 50% of the root sections. All isolates produced only one ascospore per ascus. Pathogenicity of four isolates was confirmed in the greenhouse on the muskmelon cv. Temprano Rochet. Inoculum was produced in a sand-oat hulls (Avena sativa L.) medium (0.5 liter of sand, 46 g of ground oat hulls, and 37.5 ml of distilled water) and incubated at 25°C for 1 month. Colony forming units (CFU) were quantified by serial dilution using 1% hydroxyethyl cellulose. A sterilized mixture of equal portions (vol/vol) of sand and peat moss was used to fill plastic pots (17 cm in diameter), and inoculum was added to produce an inoculum concentration of 20 CFU g-1. Five melon seeds were planted in each pot and after germination, were thinned to one seedling per pot. There were five replicated pots for each treatment with an equal number of uninfested pots. Plants were evaluated for disease 45 days after sowing. Roots were exposed by carefully washing the potting mix away. All isolates of M. cannonballus tested were highly aggressive and caused severe root necrosis compared with the noninoculated control plants. M. cannonballus was reisolated from symptomatic plants, confirming Koch's postulates. Double cropping in the same fields for several years has created serious problems in Brazil, which are related to this soilborne pathogen that also causes root rot and vine decline of watermelon (Citrullus lanatus (Thunb.) Matsum. & Nakai) worldwide (1). To our knowledge this is the first report of M. cannonballus in Brazil and South America. References: (1) R. D. Martyn and M. E. Miller. Plant Dis. 80:716, 1996. (2) F. G. Pollack and F. A. Uecker. Mycologia 66:346, 1974.


Research disciplines and subdisciplines are steeped in epistemological beliefs and theoretical assumptions that guide and constrain research. These beliefs and assumptions both enable scientific inquiry and limit scientific progress. Theory and review papers tend to be a means for reproducing ideological assumptions. However, review papers can also challenge ideological assumptions by critically assessing taken-for-granted assumptions. Critical review methods are underdeveloped in the management disciplines. The information systems (IS) discipline must do more to improve the critical examination of its scientific discourse. In this paper, we present a method with guiding principles and steps for systematically conducting critical reviews of IS literature based on Habermasian strains of critical discourse analysis. We provide an empirical example of the method. The empirical example offers a critical review of behavioral information security research with a focus on employees' security behaviors.


An Introduction to Programming with Java Applets provides a clear introduction to the art of programming for the one-term course. It prepares students with the tools they need to create sophisticated programs efficiently and with ease. Boese assumes no prior programming knowledge, and begins with an introduction to computing, then gradually moves into programming, giving students the opportunity to create their own programs. The text focuses on the essentials and places more detailed information in "Advanced Concept" sections for those who would like to delve deeper into particular concepts. With numerous practice exercises and an accompanying student-learning Web site, Introduction to Programming with Java Applets is the clear choice for your introductory course!


Plastic scintillator detectors are widely used in high-energy physics. Often they are used as active neutrino target, both in long and short baseline neutrino oscillation experiments. They can provide 3D tracking with 4c coverage and calorimetry of the neutrino interaction final state combined with a very good particle identification, sub-nanosecond time resolution. Moreover, the large hydrogen content makes plastic scintillator detectors ideal for detecting neutrons. However, new experimental challenges and the need for enhanced performance require the construction of detector geometries that are complicated using the current production techniques. The solution can be given by additive manufacturing, able to quickly make plastic-based objects of any shape. The applicability of 3D-printing techniques to the manufacture of polystyrene-based scintillator will be discussed. We will report on the feasibility of 3D printing polystyrene-based scintillator with light output performances comparable with the one of standard production techniques. The latest advances on the R&D aim at combining the 3D printing of plastic scintillator with other materials such as optical reflector or absorber. The status of the R&D and the latest results will be presented.


Introduction Cautery disbudding is a painful procedure commonly performed on-farm to destroy the horn bud cells of goat kids to prevent horn growth. Disbudding is performed because horns can injure pen mates and stock people. Globally, standard practice of disbudding typically excludes the use of pain-mitigation and there are few studies investigating kid responses to disbudding and different pain-mitigation strategies. To date, pain-mitigation strategies used when disbudding kids include administration of non-steroidal anti-infl ammatory drugs (NSAIDs), local anaesthesia (LA) and general anaesthesia (GA). Meloxicam (NSAID) reduced pain-related responses in cautery-disbudded kids (Ingvast-Larsson et al. 2011). Local anaesthetics (e.g., lignocaine), however, have not shown to be affective at reducing the pain response following disbudding (Alvarez et al. 2015). General anaesthesia has been used in kids, but its effect on pain-related responses was not assessed (Ingvast-Larsson et al. 2011). The objective of this study was to evaluate the physiological response to different painmitigation strategies for cautery-disbudding in goat kids.


Background: Drilling of the bone is common to produce holes for screws and pin insertion, to fix the fractured parts for immobilization. For this purpose, we need a power drill machine. Power drills used in orthopedic surgery can be categorized into two types: electrical and battery operated. Battery-operated drills could be orthopedic drills or hardware engineering drills. Commercial orthopedic battery drills (OBDs) are very costly. However, the same purpose can be subserved by hardware/engineering battery drill (HBD or EBD), with some additional practical advantages. Purpose: The purpose of this study is to aware the orthopedic surgeons who are working at resource constraint places about the advantages of EBD which is available at a very low price and serves the same purpose. Methods: We are using these battery operated hardware/engineering drills from quite a period of time and we have immense experiences with these EBD. The present article discusses in details about both the OBD and EBD. We assessed both drills by our own practical experience and compared both drills' specifications. Research Performance Place: The present study was conducted at Amandeep Hospital, G. T. Road, Model Town, Amritsar, Punjab, India. +91-98760-02746, 9876046778, E-mail: email@example.com. It is a research institute with super specialty and multispecialty offering postgraduation courses and residency with national and international fellowships and observerships. Results: After comparing both the drills, we found that EBD is a very good substitute for OBD in orthopedic surgery in various aspects, namely availability, procurement, functionalities, servicing, and maintenance and is very cost-effective too. Conclusion: Hardware / engineering battery drills are very good and practical alternative to orthopedic drills in orthopedic surgeries. Hence, EBD is recommended for hospitals with limited resources and where treatment cost is an issue. Level of Evidence: 5.


The alteration of bones following exposure to weathering is today well known, but it is possible that burned bones do not suffer the same type of changes since their physicochemical properties are modified by combustion. A series of experiments has been carried out with the aim of better understanding these reactions. These experiments form part of a more widespread attempt to better understand the impact of taphonomic agents on burned bones in order to estimate the distortions between bone material originating from experimental combustion and the fossil material. Five experimental series resulting from the combustion of fresh cow humeri were exposed for eighteen months to weathering in a Mediterranean context. Several criteria were observed in order to highlight the impact of this exposure on the burned bones: degree of fragmentation, loss of bone mass, alteration of bone surface, influence of the degree of combustion (carbonised vs charred) and of the bone tissue (spongy vs compact) on the preservation of the material. The results of these experiments mainly show a high fragmentation of the material (the small burned bones being in the majority), associated with a reduction in bone mass. In addition, spongy and charred bones have an increased sensitivity to the action of weathering, leading to their destruction. A preferential preservation of charred compact bone is thus expected.


Executive Summary. In September 2010, the European Council discussed for the first time the European Union's (EU) strategic partnerships, a foreign policy concept that was until then unknown to most people – including EU officials. This discussion was certainly needed in these times of geopolitical upheaval. The global shift of power from the Atlantic to the Pacific forces the EU and its Member States to fundamentally rethink their foreign policy with a strong focus on great and emerging powers; otherwise the EU is at risk of falling into global irrelevance. The 2009 Copenhagen climate conference was just a foretaste of what global irrelevance could mean. The recent events in the Arab world have proved again that Europe is not at ease with contemporary challenges, including in its own neighbourhood.

To cope with the coming multipolar world, the EU should invest time and energy in its relationships with great and emerging powers, i.e. in the so-called strategic partnerships, because the more the world becomes globalised and interconnected, the more the EU will be confronted with them – a confrontation that can lead either to cooperation or competition. Given that all international actors need one another if they are to cope with issues as crucial as climate change, nuclear proliferation and sustainable development, cooperation should be privileged over competition. Current events in the Arab world – as important as they are – should not distract the EU from its vital long-term strategic interest: secure a relevant status in the coming multipolar environment dominated by great powers.

On the basis of a review of EU documents, official and informal, as well as a certain amount of interviews with European officials, this paper concludes that the EU has today, in 2011, ten strategic partnerships with third countries: Brazil, Canada, China, India, Japan, Mexico, Russia, South Africa, South Korea and the United States. However, it is not entirely clear what is the exact reasoning behind this list. Some countries (e.g. the US) are considered to be natural partners of the EU, whereas others (e.g. China and Russia) are considered simply to be too big to ignore. As for the other countries on the list, the strategic rationale is far less evident. Their inclusion sometimes seems to be more the result of political and institutional games than of a true strategic reflection, hence leading to an "accidental" list of strategic partners.

The objectives that the EU is supposed to pursue globally through its strategic partnerships are left entirely undefined. What are the EU's global interests and priorities? How can these interests and priorities be pursued? What is the role of the strategic partners (cooperation or competition) in the pursuit of these interests and priorities? The 2003 European Security Strategy remains mute on these fundamental questions, as it says more about how to do things than about what exactly to do. Strategic partnerships thus unfold as instruments empty of meaning and substance, with no clearly defined strategic direction.

Strategic partnerships are only strategic in name, for now. A historical overview of documents and debates shows the total absence of strategic rationale behind the elaboration of strategic partnerships since the very beginning, with no definition of the concept or of its fundamental objectives, and an ad hoc selection of partners. This process of a-strategic thinking led to a repetition of past failures as the EU is now facing similar problems as it was ten years ago with the Common Strategies, from which the partnerships derived, namely the difficulty to turn rhetoric into concrete policies of strategic value vis-a-vis our partners. A set of interviews with EU officials and European diplomats confirmed that strategic partnerships are to this day empty of any substance. This paper demonstrates that strategic partnerships are not so strategic when looked at up-close for a variety of reasons, including that 1) not every partner is equally strategic; 2) the EU is not cooperating with its partners on most truly strategic issues; 3) the strategic partnership has no structural or institutional impact on the relationship; 4) or, finally, the EU itself is simply not considered as a strategic partner in many cases.

This paper concludes that the recent revival of debates on strategic partnerships is a positive step forward and that a strict implementation of the important conclusions of the 2010 September European Council is now awaited. Overall, this paper recommends reflecting on the EU's global interests and priorities in search of the EU's grand strategy. True strategic partnerships, as this paper brands them, could then be regarded as (sub-)strategies of the EU vis-a-vis great and emerging powers. In addition to this general recommendation, this paper
makes several recommendations for the EU and its Member States to turn the
existing strategic partnerships into true strategic partnerships:
• Review the EU's institutional set-up, in line with the strategic nature of the
partnerships, e.g. by establishing a cell dedicated to the strategic partnerships
within the EEAS, or by developing the EU delegations in terms of size and
composition to reflect the strategic character of the relationship.
• Review the EU's internal arrangements, notably ensuring a greater coordination
between the EU and the Member States vis-a-vis strategic partners.
• Review the bilateral arrangements between the EU and its strategic partners
in order to acknowledge the strategic importance of the relationship, e.g. by
establishing comprehensive and effective strategic dialogues as well as sectoral
dialogues on security and defence, or by developing a culture of cooperation
on strategic issues. • Review the multilateral arrangements, according to the EU's preference for
effective multilateralism, e.g. by boosting coordination and conflict mediation
mechanisms within multilateral forums between the EU and its strategic
partners.


This article takes the motorway seriously as a place where the society of traffic can be found and studied. While many kinds of activities are done by drivers and passengers in parallel with driving on the motorway, such as listening to the radio, eating lunch or caring for, or being, children, I focus here on office work. Empirical material from a video-ethnography of one driver doing paperwork and overtaking a slow-moving vehicle ahead is used to examine in detail some of the practices of combining driving and office-duties in the car while in motion. Drawing on the work of Harvey Sacks, the article examines how this mobile society is naturally organized as an architectural configuration brought to life in the practices of driving in traffic. Overlooked phenomena that are orderly stable features of being mobile are analysed, such as 'overtaking', 'tailgating' and 'cruising'. Where other writers have used 'speed' to theorize the contemporary period, a brief re-specification is offered in the light of the uses, moral and otherwise, of speed within, and as made apprehensible in relation to, traffic.


This is a study of third sector organisations and organisational change resulting from European Union funding. While there is a growing body of research which shows how governmental funding can contribute to the organisational challenges that third sector organisations encounter, research on how European Union funding affects third sector organisations is limited. This thesis contributes towards closing this gap in knowledge by identifying a number of organisational changes which can be attributed to the use of European Union funding. A qualitative approach was taken to explore organisational change resulting from the use of URBAN II funding in nine third sector organisations which were studied in the context of the URBAN II programmes of Belfast, Berlin and Bristol. The conceptual framework for this study draws on organisation theory and resource dependence theory, together with concepts of co-production and multi-level governance. URBAN II funding was found to have affected organisational structures, processes, services, goals and participants, as well as the interactions of organisations with their external environment. In contrast to earlier research however, the findings from this study suggest that many of these organisational changes improved the capacity of third sector organisations to carry out their work. The cross-national comparison of the findings further showed that organisational impacts resulting from the use of URBAN II funding can vary significantly between different countries. Programme Managers were found to have played a critically important' role in enabling third sector organisations to obtain benefits from URBAN II funding. Many positive organisational changes arose from a close collaboration between Programme Managers and third sector organisations. Conversely, many negative organisational impacts were found to be due, not to the regulations associated with European funding, but primarily to the approach adopted by the Programme Managers and Local Development Partnerships towards engaging third sector organisations in programme delivery.


The fabrication of novel and optimised materials, in addition to the development of
techniques and procedures for characterisation of thin film samples continues to gain
interest in the material science/engineering research area. These new polymers have the
potential to provide improvement for existing technology, as well as avenues for new
applications in fields including organic (flexible) electronics, optical and biomedical.
The focus of this work is to develop new polymers for use in the identified applications
from environmentally friendly resources. In addition to the technological benefits of this
work, implementation of Australian resources in these fields would provide great
benefit to local industry. This philosophy led to the choice of Lavandula angustifolia
essential oil (LAEO) produced in Australia for the fabrication of the new polymers.
This thesis studies investigates the fabrication of essential oil based polymer thin films
from LAEO and some of its major individual components.

The resultant LAEO based polymer films have been characterised using a number of
techniques and instruments, including spectroscopic ellipsometry, Fourier transform
infrared spectroscopy, nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, dielectric resonator
techniques, atomic force microscope, scanning electron microscope, and contact angle.
Using these characterisation tools, the properties of the resultant polymers were defined.

The LAEO based polymers were shown to be primarily hydrocarbon based, with some
oxygen containing functional groups including ketones and hydroxyl groups. The
presence of aromatics was also confirmed which are most likely formed during the
polymerisation process. It was found that an increase in RF power resulted in a greater
loss in the monomer functional groups and was assigned to an increase in energy input
into the plasma system and an increase in substrate temperature.

Optical characterisation of the LAEO based polymers fabricated at various RF power
levels confirmed that they are optically transparent and isotropic. Refractive index
ranged from 1.530 to 1.543 at 500 nm for films fabricated using RF powers from 10 to
75 W. The optical band gap was found to decrease with increasing RF power, with 2.75
at 10 W and 2.34 at 75 W, and thus is within the range of band gap values defined for
semiconductors.

Surface images obtained at the micro- and nano-meter scales demonstrated that the
LAEO based polymers were uniform, smooth and pinhole free. The average roughness
was found to be less than a nanometer.

Stability of the polymer while in contact with various solvents was examined using
contact angle measurements. It was discovered that the polymer is very stable while in
contact with water, with contact angle ranging from mildly hydrophilic (81.93o) at 10 W
to mildly hydrophobic (91.95o) at 75 W. The surface tension components of the polymer
were derived from the contact angle data. The LAEO based polymer was found to be
monopolar in nature. Interfacial tension values were obtained for the polymer-solvent
systems and the solubility characteristics of the polymer derived. These results specified
that the polymer should resist solubilisation from the solvents explored.

Adhesion quality testing was performed on samples fabricated at various RF power
levels and on common substrate materials. The quality was found to improve with
increasing RF power, and was associated with an increase in the interfacial bonding.

LAEO based polymers exposed to ambient conditions were monitored for 1400 hours to
provide information concerning the ageing mechanisms using spectroscopic
ellipsometry and FTIR spectroscopy. The bulk of the ageing was found to occur within
the first 100 hours after deposition, with the ageing mechanism following the typical
oxidation path via the inclusion of additional hydroxyl for the higher power samples. At
10 W however, the mechanism was different, where no apparent uptake of oxygen
occurred, and instead there was a significant loss of thickness.

Thermal degradation results demonstrated that the stability of the LAEO based polymer
increased with RF power. Heating to 405oC resulted in minimal residue for all samples.
The major components of the LAEO monomer employed throughout this thesis were
identified and polymers fabricated from these precursors. Overall it was found that the
monomers with oxygen containing functional groups produced polymers with similar
characteristics to that of the LAEO based polymer. The results indicated that polymers
with similar characteristics to that of the LAEO based polymer could be fabricated from
LAEO irrespective of the composition of the monomer.

Polymer thin films were fabricated from 1,8-cineole and the properties obtained using a
number of techniques studied. This monomer can make up a significant portion of LAEO, however there was no detectable amount in the LAEO employed during this
thesis. This monomer is also known to be a major component of eucalyptus oil.

A new technique for measuring the permittivity of low permittivity thin films at
microwave frequencies was developed. This technique provided an accurate and nondestructive
characterisation tool for these types of materials which was not previously
possible.

From the characterisation data obtained, the suitability of the polymer in particular
applications was discussed. Potential applications identified include employing these
polymers in semiconductor applications, in the biomedical field as bio-reactive (LAEO
based polymer) and non-bio-reactive (1,8-cineole) coatings, and as a sacrificial material
in air gap fabrication.

Overall, during this thesis polymer thin films were successfully fabricated from LAEO
and the major components and the properties of these polymers were determined.
Additionally, a new technique for measuring the dielectric parameters of low
permittivity thin films was defined. Potential applications for these polymers have been
identified based on the characterisation data, as well as avenues for future work.


Fifty years ago, the U.S. Supreme Court handed down the most important decision in the State of Arizona's history. Arizona v. California allocated the flow of the Colorado River among the three Lower Basin states (Arizona, California, and Nevada) according to terms of the 1928 Boulder Canyon Project Act (BCPA). Arizonans rejoiced. However, Arizona's reaction seems perplexing, given that the State spent decades denouncing the BCPA. Arizona challenged the BCPA numerous times in the Supreme Court and engaged in fierce political battles to block its implementation.This Article explores this riddle by reviewing the legal and political events leading up to Arizona v. California. Ultimately, the Article concludes that the decision was a victory for Arizona because, while Arizona had engaged in its strategy of obstruction, California had steadily been using more of the Colorado River's flow. California's use eventually was well above the amount allocated to it in the BCPA -- water that would otherwise have gone to Arizona. To secure legal rights to water that California was already putting to a beneficial use, Arizona needed to convince the Supreme Court to depart from established precedent for determining interstate water disputes and ratify the notion that the federal government could and had allocated an interstate stream among states.The decision's impact on Arizona cannot be overstated. On its heels came Congressional approval of the Central Arizona Project, which allowed Phoenix and Tucson to develop into major population and economic centers. But the conflict over how to divide the River is far from over. A growing population and the uncertain yet tangible effects of climate change bring new water challenges to the Colorado River Basin.


The new SarS-CoV-2 virus is a great danger for the worldwide population since there is no known pre-immunity, no specific treatment, and no vaccine Still, the testing and tracing are the best tools to isolate the infected and prevent the spread of COVID-19 The major goals are to save lives, reduce the mortality rate, increase the survival rate of those are in severe or critical conditions, reduce the hospital stay and accelerate the recovery This review summarizes the findings on the novel coronavirus that causes COVID-19 and outlines information about symptoms, testing, disease mechanism, vascular dysfunction, immune responses, treatments, and vaccination At this time no vaccine is available to prevent COVID-19 A literature review reveals that more research is necessary to investigate the interactions between respiratory viruses, human coronaviruses, and the new SarS-CoV-2 virus in the infected population to guide the design of COVID-19 specific therapeutics and vaccines Almost every government on earth has realized that daily life cannot return to normal until citizens have built up antibodies to safeguard them from the virus Scientists and manufacturers worldwide are accelerating COVID-19 vaccine research, and pharmaceutical companies are already investing in the large-scale production of vaccines A synopsis of the most recent sources presented in this review was the starting point for several COVID-19 research projects in the Regional Cooperation for Health, Science and Technology (RECOOP HST) Association managed by Cedars-Sinai Medical Center to gain a better understanding of the COVID-19 disease © 2020 Vari S G


Breast cancer is known as the most widespread malignancy among women, categorized as a slow-growing tumor. If the diagnosis happens in the early stages, the treatment will be easier. The best way for breast cancer screening is self-examination. As per this issue, a study is carried out on the female patients who were referred to the Gynecology Clinic of Shohahdaye Kargar Hospial of Yazd. The present study is descriptive-analytical carried out on 250 female patients in the Gynecology Clinic of Shohahdaye Kargar Hospial of Yazd. The sampling was random, based on a specific set of inclusion criteria. The data gathering instrument included questionnaires with approved validity and reliability. Data analysis was performed via the use of descriptive statistic and Chi-square test. The results show that regarding the awareness and knowledge of breast self-examination, 85.5% of the subjects possess poor knowledge 6.8% were in average level, and only 6.2% enjoyed a high level of knowledge. With respect to attitude, 38.8% had positive attitude, and 61.1% and 0.1% respectively had average and negative attitude toward breast self-examination. According to the above findings, it can be concluded that awareness and attitudes regarding breast self-examination is not proper among women, and appropriate policies should be adopted accordingly.


This work proposes a competence-based approach, enriched by consensus, for deciding on team compositions, in particular, time- and quality-dependent contexts, where teams have to perform some assigned activities. This problem is very relevant for the dynamics of logistic networks whose nodes are warehouses, distribution centers, and small family businesses that deal with work orders that have to be satisfied. The approach consists of models that focus on workers' competences by using the Knowledge, Skills, and Attitudes model for workers' knowledge representation, and competence models to describe the activities to be performed. Some consensus strategies among workers are then used to obtain the correct choice of teams to assign to the various work orders. According to the concept of value co-creation, this paper proposes an original and hybrid approach, based on competences and enriched by consensus, in order to obtain and select the most "suitable" teams for the activities to be performed. This approach is tested, carefully and in depth, on the real case of a small family business inside a sophisticated logistics area, consisting of a fleet of trucks that, by transporting goods from one point to another, underpins the logistics chain inside the Campania region (Italy). These areas of logistics consider small family businesses, which manage the maintenance and repair or trucks, as highly critical nodes of the system. We show that our approach produces results similar to the decisions made by the leader of such a small family business.


The disposal of human excreta in latrines is an important step in reducing the transmission of diarrhoeal diseases. However, in latrines, flies can access the latrine contents and serve as a mechanical transmitter of diarrhoeal pathogens. Furthermore, the latrine contents can be used as a breeding site for flies, which may further contribute to disease transmission. Latrines do not all produce flies, and there are some which produce only a few, while others can produce thousands. In order to understand the role of the latrine in determining this productivity, a pilot study was conducted, in which fifty latrines were observed in and around Ifakara, Tanzania. The characteristics of the latrine superstructure, use of the latrine, and chemical characteristics of pit latrine contents were compared to the numbers of flies collected in an exit trap placed over the drop hole in the latrine. Absence of a roof was found to have a significant positive association (t=3.17, p=0.003) with the total number of flies collected, and temporary superstructures, particularly as opposed to brick superstructures (z=4.26, p<0.001), and increased total solids in pit latrines (z=2.57, p=0.01) were significantly associated with increased numbers of blowflies leaving the latrine. The number of larvae per gram was significantly associated with the village from which samples were taken, with the largest difference between two villages outside Ifakara (z=2.12, p=0.03). The effect of latrine superstructure (roof, walls) on fly production may indicate that improvements in latrine construction could result in decreases in fly populations in areas where they transmit diarrhoeal pathogens.


The article deals with the question of what kind of liability can be applied to a company board member in bankruptcy proceedings for infringement of his duties. Analysis of company board members' obligations makes it possible to evaluate a board member's actions and thereby determine, during the bankruptcy proceedings, whether the company's insolvency was caused by a grave management error by the board member in question, a deed with constituent elements of an offence, or another element and consequently apply the liability entailed by the infringement of one's obligations. According to the principles for applying civil liability, in the event of a grave management error having been committed by a board member, the bankruptcy trustee must file for compensation. If the board member has infringed his obligations but no damage has emerged, there is reason to deliberate whether reason exists to apply penal or bankruptcy liability. Infringement of a board member's duties is often also an offence for which the penal code stipulates a liability. Penal liability for a board member who has infringed his obligations follows if his deed corresponds to the constituent elements of an offence stipulated by the Penal Code and he has been proved guilty. The presumptions for application of bankruptcy liability – in the form of prohibition of business after the bankruptcy proceedings – also include the person's conviction; for prohibition on business to be applied during the bankruptcy proceedings, there must be a well‑founded suspicion of a crime.


This paper assesses the impacts of the WTO Government Procurement Agreement (GPA) on trade in both goods and services among members using a gravity model applied to a panel dataset covering 20 OECD countries over the period 1996-2008 for trade in goods and 1999-2008 for trade in services. The agreement dates from 1996 and covers 41 (mainly OECD) countries (/areas). China is now negotiating possible membership. Little has been written on the GPA which is a plurilateral agreement covering both goods and services. It mutually extends commitments only to signatories, but has commitments going beyond those in the earlier GATT procurement code. Government service markets are large, and trade in these also has spillover effects on trade in services and goods. Results suggest that GPA membership has a positive impact on trade in both goods and services between parties as well as on outward foreign affiliate service sales. The number of GPA parties has a small marginal negative effect on trade in goods. Service exports also increase slightly with more parties participating in the GPA. The growth of government procurement contracts above the threshold under the GPA also fosters service imports, exports and outward foreign affiliate sales.


We present the results of a study of e-NABLE, a distributed, collaborative volunteer effort to design and fabricate upper-limb assistive technology devices for limb-different users. Informed by interviews with 14 stakeholders in e-NABLE, including volunteers and clinicians, we discuss differences and synergies among each group with respect to motivations, skills, and perceptions of risks inherent in the project. We found that both groups are motivated to be involved in e-NABLE by the ability to use their skills to help others, and that their skill sets are complementary, but that their different perceptions of risk may result in uneven outcomes or missed expectations for end users. We offer four opportunities for design and technology to enhance the stakeholders' abilities to work together.


Binary complex of imprint ion in design ion imprinted polymer is significant for solid phase extraction. Various of the imprint degree (0.001mmol, 0.01mmol, 0.1 and 1mmol) have been prepared in polymerization. Ion imprinted polymer were prepared via bulk polymerization methods by forming binary complex Zr-Xylenol orange in 2-methoxy ethanol and copolymerizing in the presence of styrene, divinylbenzene and benzene peroxide as an initiator. Zircon ion were removed from polymer particles by leaching with HCl to leave the cavity in the polymer particles, filtering, washing, drying in an oven at 50 o C, and grinding. The polymer particles both prior to and after leaching have been characterized by Optical photo and SEM-EDS, IR. The retention capacity of polymers were found to be 4.6 mg zircon ion per gram particle in pH 6. The decrease of imprint degrees lead to pH of retention on polymer shift to pH acidity. It is also influenced on surface and volume pore, and there was no significant effect on retention capacity and pore size. Zircon-imprinted polymer has been applied to zircon ion extraction and optimum on 0.1 mmol.


Three-dimensional (3D) Pd nanoassemblies were synthesized by a facile hydrothermal procedure, in which polyallylamine hydrochloride (PAH) was simultaneously used as a cross-linking and scaffold molecule in order to construct the 3D interconnected nanoassemblies. The formation process and mechanism of the Pd nanoassemblies were investigated using temporal TEM images. XRD was used to probe their crystal structure, which showed a clear appearance of metallic nanocrystallites with high index crystal facets. XPS was conducted to study surface elemental composition, which confirmed the physical and chemical integration of Pd and PAH. Finally, the 3D Pd nanoassemblies were used as catalysts for formic acid electro-oxidation. Compared to Pd bulk produced without PAH and commercial Pd black, the Pd nanostructure assemblies towards the electro-oxidation of formic acid exhibited higher electrochemical activity. This behavior is mainly due to their porous structure, high specific surface area which offers more catalytic sites, and their sufficient cavity space which enables facile charge transport of electrochemical reactions.


Background : Behaviours around infants feeding influence both nutritive value and the detrimental effects of the infant feeding. Aim : The study aimed to determine infant feeding practices with implication to child's oral health and examine the related socio-demographic factors. Materials and Methods : A cross-sectional study among mothers of the infants who were attending RCH clinics in suburban areas of northwest Tanzania. Cluster sampling technique was used to obtain the participants and a structured questionnaire was used to interview the mothers. Frequency distributions and cross-tabulations were used for analysis and reported as proportions and identified differences between the comparative socio-demographic categories. Results : Study involved 213 mother-infant pairs; infants' mean age was 7.22 ± 3.48 months and 53.1% were female babies. Almost all (94.6 %) the infants were breastfed and 75.3% of infants under six months of age were exclusively breastfeeding. In infants age older than six months, 32.6% of mothers reported to have initiated complementary food before the baby turned six months and that sugar sweetened foods were mostly used (68.1%) complementary foods. Higher proportion of mothers who had secondary school education or beyond (43.4%) reported to have initiated complementary food before the recommended age than their counterparts. Mothers who were employed reported to mostly (74.5%) use sugar sweetened complementary foods as compared to unemployed mothers. Conclusion : Infants of this community were mostly breastfed and initiated complementary feeding earlier than recommended time. Employed mothers and those with secondary education or above tended to have unfavorably infant feeding practices than their comparative groups.


In this paper, we study the auction to allocate an indivisible good when each potential buyer has a private and independent valuation for the item and suffers a negative externality if a competitor acquires it. In that case, the outside option of each buyer is mechanism-dependent, which implies that participation is endogenous. As several works in the literature have shown, the optimal auction entails strong threats to induce full entry and maximal expected revenue. This results from the full commitment assumption, which ensures that threats are credible. We show that absent credible threats, the entry process does not lead to full participation: the equilibrium entails screening of agents in the entry stage and a trade-off between reserve prices and entry fees. Besides, we discuss the conditions under which the impossibility to use threats does not prevent the seller from ensuring a minimal screening and reaching a high expected revenue.


In the United States, bankruptcy is a federal court proceeding initiated voluntarily by a financially troubled debtor or involuntarily by the debtor's creditors. For most financially troubled businesses, the Federal Bankruptcy Code (Title 11 of the United States Code) provides two alternative avenues for relief. First, for the business that sees no prospect of being able to operate successfully in the future, there is the Chapter 7 liquidation procedure. In a Chapter 7 proceeding, the bankruptcy court appoints a trustee to close the business down, sell its assets, and turn the proceeds of sale over to the bankruptcy court for payment to the creditors. Alternatively, for the business that wants to continue operating, there is the Chapter 11 reorganization procedure. The goals of Chapter 11 are to give the debtor a temporary opportunity to reorganize the business and emerge from Chapter 11 as a viable business. In a Chapter 11 proceeding, the debtor's management normally continues to operate the business while a reorganization plan is prepared. The bankruptcy judge plays only a small role in preparing the plan. Usually the reorganization plan is drafted by the debtor, ratified by one or more creditor committees, and then voted upon by the creditors after they have been divided into classes of substantially similar claims. A class of creditors is deemed to have accepted the reorganization plan if at least two-thirds in amount and more than one-half in number of the claims that are voted are cast in favor of the plan. If all classes of creditors vote to accept the debtor's reorganization plan, it is submitted to the bankruptcy court for confirmation (official approval). Conversely, if the debtor is unable obtain creditor approval within the time limits set by the bankruptcy court, then the court will order the Chapter 11 reorganization proceeding to be converted into a Chapter 7 liquidation proceeding. In addition to the Chapter 11 procedure, the Federal Bankruptcy Code contains two other rehabilitation procedures for special types of businesses: Chapter 12 provides for the rehabilitation of family farmers, and Chapter 13 provides a streamlined reorganization procedure for individual owners of small businesses with unsecured debts of less than $100,000 and secured debts of less than $350,000.(1) Direct bankruptcy costs are the out-of-pocket expenditures associated with the bankruptcy proceeding itself, including: filing fees, lawyer fees, accountant fees, expert witness fees, trustee fees, and other out-of-pocket administrative costs. Direct bankruptcy costs are incurred in all bankruptcy proceedings, although their magnitude varies depending on the particular bankruptcy procedure selected. In general, the direct bankruptcy costs imposed by a Chapter 11 reorganization proceeding will be substantially higher than the costs imposed by a Chapter 7 liquidation proceeding. In addition to direct bankruptcy costs, bankruptcy also imposes certain indirect costs in lost opportunities (such as lost sales, lost profits, the inability to obtain credit, and lost investment opportunities). These indirect bankruptcy costs can occur both before bankruptcy as well as after, and are not limited to firms that actually file bankruptcy. Firms that have high probabilities of bankruptcy, whether they eventually file for bankruptcy protection or not, can incur indirect bankruptcy costs. Because indirect bankruptcy costs arise from lost business opportunities, they are virtually impossible to measure. Therefore, the present study does not attempt to estimate indirect bankruptcy costs; rather, its focus is on measuring the direct administrative costs associated with the Chapter 11 reorganization procedure. In recent years the Chapter 11 procedure has come under sharp criticism for the high costs and time delays it imposes on bankrupt firms (Bradley and Rosenzweig 1992). These criticisms are of particular concern with respect to small closely held firms which prior research has shown to be much less likely to emerge from Chapter 11 proceedings with confirmed reorganization plans than are large publicly traded corporations (Altman 1992). …


Abstract. As most development planning and rendering of public services happens at a place or in a space, geospatial data is required. This geospatial data is best managed through a spatial data infrastructure, which has as a key objective to share geospatial data. The collection and maintenance of geospatial data is expensive and time consuming and so the principle of "collect once – use many times" should apply. It is best to obtain the geospatial data from the authoritative source – the appointed data custodian. In South Africa the South African Spatial Data Infrastructure (SASDI) is the means to achieve the requirement for geospatial data sharing. This requires geospatial data sharing to take place between the data custodian and the user. All data custodians are expected to comply with the Spatial Data Infrastructure Act (SDI Act) in terms of geo-spatial data sharing. Currently data custodians are experiencing challenges with regard to the sharing of geospatial data. This research is based on the current ten data themes selected by the Committee for Spatial Information and the organisations identified as the data custodians for these ten data themes. The objectives are to determine whether the identified data custodians comply with the SDI Act with respect to geospatial data sharing, and if not what are the reasons for this. Through an international comparative assessment it then determines if the compliance with the SDI Act is not too onerous on the data custodians. The research concludes that there are challenges with geospatial data sharing in South Africa and that the data custodians only partially comply with the SDI Act in terms of geospatial data sharing. However, it is shown that the South African legislation is not too onerous on the data custodians.