ABSTRACT Adoption of appropriate agricultural technologies is a necessary requirement for sustainable agricultural development. This study was conducted to investigate the adoption of Kalima, a new introduced dry bean variety (Phaseolus vulgaris L.), by smallholder farmers in target rural areas in Malawi and to identify the factors that most strongly influenced farmers' willingness to adopt the variety. The main findings of this study were that Kalima was only grown by farmers who had received seed through seed multiplication groups and was not grown by farmers outside of those groups due to unavailability of seed. Farmers' gender, literacy level, and level of education influenced their willingness to adopt Kalima, as did farmers' perceptions of specific bean characteristics such as yield, pest tolerance, pest susceptibility, bean color and cooking time. For adoption to be sustainable, information about a technology should be judicious in order for farmers to form appropriate perceptions. To increase rates of adoption, the information should be delivered in a method suitable for farmers with a low literacy level.


We describe a preliminary investigation into learning a Chess player|s style from game records. The method is based on attempting to learn features of a player|s individual evaluation function using the method of temporal differences, with the aid of a conventional Chess engine architecture. Some encouraging results were obtained in learning the styles of two Chess world champions, and we report on our attempt to use the learnt styles to discriminate between the players from game records, by trying to detect who was playing white and who was playing black. We also discuss some limitations of our approach.


As a teacher-scholar, this autoethnographic is an account of my personal journey in higher education at a predominantly White university. I recount childhood experiences that led me to critical incidents experienced as a doctoral student and tenure-track professor that served as both institutional barriers encountered and catalysts for growth. I examine the manner in which I was able to navigate within the borders they created for me as an African American woman emerging scholar. The counter-narratives are grounded in critical race theory, guided by womanist epistemology, while offering insight into the ways in which marginalization is perpetuated in academia and how space was created to redefine and reclaim self within these borders. My hope is that this article will bring more exposure to the voice of African American in White academia and to add to the open dialogue that is needed with members from the center dominant group.


Since 2002, the UK's Global Threat Reduction Programme managed by the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) has provided assistance to the Republic of Kazakhstan with the decommissioning of the BN-350 sodium cooled fast reactor. Assistance has focused on non-proliferation, safety and security projects to ensure the permanent and irreversible shutdown of the reactor and the reduction of security, safety and environmental hazards, particularly those associated with the large inventory of liquid metal coolants (sodium and sodium-potassium alloy) and the presence of spent nuclear fuel (SNF). UK assistance efforts have been co-ordinated with those of the USA and have made use of the UK's experience in decommissioning its own fast reactor plants at Dounreay. The paper describes work undertaken with UK technical and funding assistance support in the following areas: • Provision of training and technical support in project management and technical topics, including assistance with completion of the BN-350 Decommissioning Plan. • Liquid metal coolant treatment projects, including immobilization of liquid products from the Sodium Processing Facility (SPF) and processing of residual sodium remaining within the drained coolant circuits. • Immobilization of highly active caesium traps, arising from sodium clean-up both during reactor operations and post-shutdown. • Operations to transfer the entire inventory of spent nuclear fuel from the reactor storage pond into dual-use storage and transport casks and then consign these casks to long-term secure storage remote from the reactor site. This activity was part of the major US-Kazakhstan SNF Storage Project. • Surveys of spent fuel route facilities to establish the absence of any significant amount of nuclear material. Key achievements in 2010 were the successful completion of residual sodium processing and completion of the SNF Storage Project. Through 2011, it is intended that the surveys of the fuel storage pond and immobilization of caesium traps will be completed, bringing the current UK assistance activities to an end before March 2012.Copyright © 2011 by ASME and Crown Copyright


The political philosopher Hannah Arendt was partly responsible for popularizing the term 'totalitarianism'. In doing so, Arendt followed a historically- grounded, analytical approach, methodically deriving the concept from the cases of Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia. This essay will argue that Arendt's conceptualization of totalitarianism is imperfect, because of some crucial methodological shortcomings in her analysis. In demonstrating this, I will briefly explicate Arendt's methodology and argument, and critique her concept in so far as it is: grounded in too few cases, the cases are dubiously linked, and the analysis is heedless of a functionalist understanding of ideology.


In the present age, cellular phones are the largest selling products in the world. Big Data Analytics is a method used for examining large and varied data, which we know as big data. Big data analytics is very useful for understanding the world of cellphone business. It is important to understand the requirements, demands, and opinions of the customer. Opinion Mining is getting more important than ever before, for performing analysis and forecasting customer behavior and preferences. This study proposes a framework about the key features of cellphones based on which, customers buy them and rate them accordingly. This research work also provides  balanced and well researched reasons as to why few companies enjoy dominance in the market, while others do not make as much of an impact.


DO YOU EVER DREAM ABOUT HAVING A SECOND LIFE? Have you ever wished that you took an alternative path in your life's journey? Well, there is good news. You can have a second life. You can create a virtual life in a virtual new world. * This is the second in a series about Web 2.0 tools and how you can use them to transform nursing education. According to the 2007 Horizon Report, the time-to-adoption for virtual world is between two and three years (1, p. 18). So, unless you are retiring within that window, you might want to learn more about the potential of virtual worlds in nursing education. Virtual Worlds When most of us think of virtual worlds, we picture video games where people shoot aliens or slay dragons, or wear helmets and data gloves to participate in a different reality. But here we are talking about the virtual worlds that exist on the Internet and make use of Web 2.0 technologies to create simulated experiences. "Virtual worlds are richly immersive and highly scalable 3D environments" (1, p. 18). The most popular are multiuser spaces where many people (avatars) interact with each other in real time (1). Virtual worlds are not just for computer geeks. Real corporations, such as BMW, American Apparel, and Coca-Cola, use them to sell products. BusinessWeek Online has a good slide show of companies using virtual worlds (http://images.businessweek.com/ss/06/11/ 1117_secondlife/index_01.htm) on a site developed in 2006. Another website, Business Communicators of Second Life[R], provides an extensive listing of uses (http://freshtakes.typepad.com/sl_commu nicators/projects/index.html). Even the National Review of Medicine is talking about Second Life (2). According to Dede, "The standard 'world to the desktop' interface is now complemented by multi-user environments in which people's avatars interact with each other, computer-based agents, and digital artifacts in a simulated context" (3). This is important because neomillennial learning styles include: "fluency in multiple media and in simulation-based virtual settings, communal learning, a balance among experiential learning, guided mentoring and collection reflection.... and co-design of learning experiences personalized to individual needs and preferences" (3). Mediated immersion is how this generation of learners will construct their knowledge (3). So, forget the idea that virtual worlds are merely games and remember that "pure virtual worlds like Second Life ... can be applied to any context" (1)--even higher education and health care. Let's start with a description of Second Life (SL). According to the homepage (www.secondlife.com/), SL "is a 3-D virtual world entirely built and owned by its residents." In this case, resident refers to an end user, who is represented in the virtual world as an avatar. In case you are not familiar with the term, an avatar is a representation of oneself in a two- or three-dimensional world. Your avatar can be a character, person, or even an animal or icon. For example, I can be a Teaching Diva with purple hair if I want, or a nurse dressed like Florence Nightingale. According to Wikipedia, SL was developed by Linden Lab and is an advanced level of social network ... where "Residents can explore, meet other Residents, socialize, participate in individual and group activities, create and trade items (virtual property) and services from one another" (4). To get an idea of what it is like to be part of SL, a YouTube video will take you on a tour of Thomson NETg (a major publisher) in Second Life at www.youtube.com/watch?v=4HYi HOmaFyk. Relationship to Learning So, why is SL important to higher education? This particular tool represents common features of the Web 2.0 movement. First, it is an immersive environment where users interact and construct knowledge. Second, it is highly dependent on user-generated content. Remember, the web is moving from a dissemination tool to one where users create and design to add value. …


Future generations of wireless networks will place great demands on the performance of radio access technology. This book describes the features of various mobile access technologies and assesses their strengths and weaknesses. In particular, it describes the underlying principles and practical implementation schemes for time division duplexing (TDD). The book begins with an overview of next generation wireless systems. It then describes the basics of duplex communication modes, interference in cellular systems, and multiple user access techniques. Focusing on TDD systems, dynamic channel assignment algorithms are discussed, as are multi-hop communications schemes, radio resource management, interference cancellation, and smart antennas. Real-world examples from UMTS, wireless LAN, and Bluetooth systems are described. The book is aimed at all those involved in the design and implementation of wireless systems, as well as at graduate students and researchers working in the area of wireless communications. For more information visit www.cambridge.org/9780521826228.


A large amount of non-processed visual information is uploaded in social networks every day. Different features can be analyzed from the images such as objects, scenes, sentiments, people's mood, color, etc. In this paper, we propose a novel method to detect, locate and classify logos in images, based on consensus. First, we present a basic logo recognition method. Second, an incremental learning algorithm is proposed to detect logos of any class by just using a synthetic image template, without the need of annotating a training set. Then, a crowdsourced solution (collaborative network) is generated within a VisualAD platform to carry out the consensus between several executions of the incremental learning method. The predictions will be the result of individual predictions from several users that improve the recognition. Finally, the principles enabling its Blockchain implementation are set and considerations on their extension to visual identity


Numerous mechanisms have been proposed to explain the island species–area relationship (ISAR), including the passive sampling effect, the habitat diversity effect, ecological drift and a group of mechanisms jointly termed environmental filtering (or abiotic selection process). However, determining which of these hypotheses underpins the ISAR in a given system remains an open and controversial question, particularly with regards to the environmental filtering. The effect of environmental filtering on the ISAR for woody plants was tested on 29 islands in a subtropical land‐bridge archipelago. Island area had a significant effect on species richness, while isolation was not found to have an effect. After controlling for the passive sampling effect and habitat diversity using a systematic sampling design, we found that a positive ISAR remained. After controlling for island area and isolation, species richness was significantly affected by environmental conditions (e.g. total phosphorus, soil depth and bulk density). When a null model was used that randomly assigned individuals to islands from the regional pool, the difference between the observed and expected richness was greater for smaller islands relative to larger islands. Synthesis. Our results point to an overlooked role of environmental filtering in driving the island species–area relationship (ISAR). Consequently, our study highlights the importance of considering deterministic process in future analyses of the ISAR.


The objective of this paper was to verify the possibility of incorporating fluid whey in mortadela. The water employed in the elaboration of mortadela was replaced in the proportions of 50, 75 and 100% by fluid whey. Sensorial characteristics (color, odor, flavor and texture), pH, color, emulsion stability of mortadela were evaluated, as well as the percentage of fat and liquid released after thermal treatment of mortadela emulsion. The addition of fluid whey did not exert significant influence on the sensorial characteristics, pH, color, emulsion stability and liquid released after the thermal treatments in mortadela. Water substitutions of 75 and 100% by fluid whey in the elaboration of mortadela promoted a lower percentage of fat released after thermal treatment. Based on the obtained results it is clear that fluid whey can be used to substitute 100% of ice used in the elaboration of mortadela, thus avoiding that exceeding fluid whey be released in the environment.


There has been an increasing interest in e-learning in teacher training at universities during the last ten years. With the developing technology, educational methods have differed as well as many other processes. Firstly, a definition on e-learning as a new approach should be given. E-learning could shortly be defined as a web-based educational system on platform with Internet, Intranet or computer access. The concept of e-learning has two main subtitles as synchronized (where a group of students and an instructor actualize an online conference meeting in a computer environment) an asynchronized (where individuals actualize self-training in computer environments). Students have access to the course contents whenever they want and communicate with their peers or teachers via communication tools such as e-mail and forums. In order the distance learning system to succeed in e-learning, the program should be planned as both synchronized and asynchronized.


Large scale ion density structures were observed by ROCSA T -1 at 630 km altitude over the South Atlantic anomaly (SAA) region during the great magnetic storm of July 15-16,2000. The observed density structures were confined within 30° in longitude east of the SAA, and co-rotated with the SAA for Over 8 hours. The magnetic anomaly density structures (MADS) observed during several successive orbits in the nighttime sector, contained density holes and density pile-ups adjacent to each other. The density holes had a density drop of one to two orders of magnitude below the ambient level and a spatial size of 800 - 1800 km along the satellite path. The density pile-ups typically spanned a spatial size of 2000 - 3000 km were characterized with a density enhancement, large density fluctuations and upward drift velocity. In contrast to density pile-ups, density holes did not exhibit noticeable density fluctuations nor upward drift velocity. A common feature of large poleward drifts was noticeable inside both density hole and pile-up structures. The ion drift measurements thus indicate that ions inside the density holes drifted away in the poleward direction rather than the upward direction. The successive observations of density holes on six orbits suggest that the density hole might be initially created near the center of SAA region and then expanded equatorward. We interpret the magnetic anomaly density pile-up to be the ionospheric F2 peak layer raised to the satellite altitude by storm enhanced eastward electric fields. It is speculated that energetic particle precipitation might have occurred in the region of magnetic anomaly density structures, increasing locally ionospheric conductivity in the E region and producing eastward polarization electric fields in the precipitation region. The combination of localized polarization electric fields and storm time electric fields at low latitudes in the night-side might be responsible for the ion drifts and the associated anomalous density structures observed by ROCSA T -1 in the F region.


SUMMARY We present a semi-analytical solution for the transient streaming potential response of an unconfined aquifer to continuous constant rate pumping. We assume that flow occurs without leakage from the unit below a transverse anisotropic aquifer and neglect flow in the unsaturated zone by treating the water-table as a moving material boundary. In the development of the solution to the streaming potential problem, we impose insulating boundary conditions at land surface and the lower boundary of the lower confining unit. We solve the problem exactly in the double Laplace–Hankel transform space and obtain the inverse transforms numerically. The solution is used to analyse transient streaming potential data collected during dipole hydraulic tests conducted at the Boise Hydrogeophysical Research Site in 2007 June. This analysis yields estimates of aquifer hydraulic parameters. The estimated hydraulic parameters, namely, hydraulic conductivity, transverse hydraulic anisotropy, specific storage and specific yield, compare well to published estimates obtained by inverting drawdown data collected at the field site.


The colonial condition in Africa has been revisited by all of the main historiographic currents of thought, from a heroizing, highly political and military history of colonization primarily considered from the colonists' standpoint, to a much more complex and rich history integrating the colonized perspective. This history has been enhanced by contributions from Postcolonial Studies and Subaltern Studies as well as from New Imperial History and perspectives opened by its global interconnected history.
 At the intersection of these issues and methods, colonial studies offers an innovative reinterpretation of various facets of colonial Africa, such as the factors and justifications for colonial expansion; conquests and colonial wars; processes of territorial appropriation and border demarcation; and the organization and control of the colonies. In these fundamentally inegalitarian societies, accommodation and social and cultural hybridization processes were also at work, as well as multiple forms of resistance or subversion that paved the way for African states to win their independence. In addition to the role played by the First and Second World Wars, the emergence of nationalist and separatist movements helps to clarify the multifaceted nature of these independences, when approached from a political as well as a cultural and social perspective, while questioning the durability of the legacy of the colonial phase in African history.


The purpose of the paper is to investigate the phenomenon of openness in relation to library development. The term openness is presented and related to library development from historical and theoretical perspectives. The paper elaborates on the differences over time on to how openness has been understood in a library setting. Historically, openness in form of the open shelves played a crucial role in developing the modern public library. The paper examines this openness-centred library policy as adopted by Danish public libraries in the beginning of the 20th century by applying the theories by Michel Foucault on discourse and power to the introduction of open shelves. Furthermore, the paper discusses current challenges facing the modern public library in coping with openness issues that follow from changes in society and advances in technology. These influences and developments are not least brought about by the boom of the internet and the advent of the post-modern globalised knowledge-based and network-organised society. Finally, the paper outlines how theoretical and strategic library development can benefit from academic considerations on the dialectics between openness and restrictedness and on the transformed meaning and significance of openness in the knowledge society. The paper concludes that openness is still of decisive importance to library development and policy and that it should be included in strategic considerations on library development.


We conducted a (U-Th)/He zircon thermochronology study of the southern part of the Idaho batholith (central Idaho, USA) to constrain cooling through ∼200 °C and exhumation of the batholith. Samples were collected adjacent to the Idaho-Oregon (IDOR) seismic transect and at localities where U-Pb zircon, geochemical, and fabric analyses were conducted. The rocks affected by the western Idaho shear zone and associated border zone suite of the batholith cooled through the closure temperature for He in zircon prior to ca. 60 Ma, before or during emplacement of the voluminous Atlanta lobe. In contrast, the Atlanta lobe (Atlanta peraluminous suite) records a relatively constant cooling rate, in which the (U-Th)/He zircon ages are systematically ∼30 m.y. younger than the U-Pb zircon ages. We interpret this data to reflect post-magmatic isobaric cooling with little or no unroofing. The only deviation from a smooth regional cooling pattern occurs near Sawtooth Valley, where samples from the Sawtooth Range on the west side of the valley show distinctly younger ages than those from the White Cloud Peaks to the east. We interpret this difference to reflect recent cooling and exhumation associated with extensional deformation. The regionally consistent pattern of cooling and hence exhumation indicates that the current exposure level of the Idaho batholith was <5 km deep (assuming a geothermal gradient of 40 °C/km) at 50 Ma during the initiation of Challis magmatism. Our data are consistent with the existence of a crustal plateau during formation of the Atlanta lobe of the Idaho batholith.


The study of the impact of Black Power Movement (BPM) activists and organizations in the 1960s through '70s has largely been confined to their role as proponents of social change; but they were also theorists of the change they sought. In The Revolution Will Not Be Theorized Errol A. Henderson explains this theoretical contribution and places it within a broader social theory of black revolution in the United States dating back to nineteenth-century black intellectuals. These include black nationalists, feminists, and anti-imperialists; activists and artists of the Harlem Renaissance; and early Cold War-era black revolutionists. The book first elaborates W. E. B. Du Bois's thesis of the "General Strike" during the Civil War, Alain Locke's thesis relating black culture to political and economic change, Harold Cruse's work on black cultural revolution, and Malcolm X's advocacy of black cultural and political revolution in the United States. Henderson then critically examines BPM revolutionists' theorizing regarding cultural and political revolution and the relationship between them in order to realize their revolutionary objectives. Focused more on importing theory from third world contexts that were dramatically different from the United States, BPM revolutionists largely ignored the theoretical template for black revolution most salient to their case, which undermined their ability to theorize a successful black revolution in the United States.


Abstract This study investigates the impacts of exporting on working conditions in Myanmar by drawing on a new firm survey. For the identification, I use the rapid opening of Myanmar to trade alongside the firm's proximity to airports and products that have generated variations in access to foreign markets. The results show that exporting has significant positive impacts on working conditions regarding fire safety, health management, and freedom of negotiation; positive insignificant effects on wages; and negative insignificant effects on working hours. I also find that exporting positively affects firm size, management practices, and the likelihood of receiving a labor audit.


Proposals to tax the compensatory portion of a service partner's return as ordinary income have gained momentum and enactment of carried interest legislation seems inevitable, driven by concerns about fairness and revenue. A leading legislative proposal (modified and reintroduced as H.R. 4213) would add new 710 to the Code. Proposed 710 is widely portrayed as taxing distributions to a covered service partner at ordinary income rates but the actual operation of the new provision is much more complex. This article argues that a distribution-based tax modeled on section 707(a)(2)(A) offers an alternative method of accomplishing the goal of section 710 -- taxing distributions to service providers as ordinary income -- while addressing the problem of deferring tax until distribution. Under a distribution-based approach, the key to proper taxation of a service partner's deferred compensation is to identify when the parties' differing tax profiles pose a risk of abuse due to undertaxation of the investment return on a service partner's deferred compensation. As long as the investment return on the deferred compensation is fully taxed (either directly or through substitute taxation), deferring ordinary income tax until distribution will not necessarily result in a loss of revenue. Bifurcating the benefits of deferral and conversion reveals that partnership profits interests are often no more advantageous, from a joint tax perspective, than other forms of partnership equity-based compensation.


The exploitation of various plant materials for the biosynthesis of nanoparticles is considered a green technology as it does not involve any harmful chemicals. The present study reports the synthesis of silver (Ag) nanoparticles from silver precursor using the powder of novel Heliotropium indicum. Water-soluble organics present in the plant materials were mainly responsible for the reduction of silver ions to nanosized Ag particles. The average sizes of the silver nanoparticles were 80 nm to 90 nm as determined through scanning electron microscopy (SEM). Energy-dispersive X-ray spectra (XRD) of silver nanoparticles revealed that the silver was in pure form. The antimicrobial effect of silver nanoparticles were compared with positive control based on inhibition zone in disk diffusion tests microbial sensitivity to nanoparticles was found to vary depending on the microbial species. All the microbial strains depict higher sensitivity to the higher concentration (30 μL) for the test sample when compared to the positive control except B3, B4 and B6. The higher (30 μL/disc) concentration of sample got greater sensitivity than (15 μL/disc) lower concentration in all the tested microorganisms. The anticancer effects of Ag nanoparticles were challenged with HeLa cancerous cells with ten different concentrations (0.6, 1.2, 2.5, 5, 7.5, 10, 15, 20, 25 and 30μg/ml). The Ag nanoparticles inhibited the growth of the cancer cells significantly, in a doseand duration dependent manner.


The current state of land use is the result of a variety of factors, caused by both biophysical and socio-economic conditions, and their interactions. Land-use features prominently in many disciplines such as geography, economics, civil engineering, architecture, city and rural planning, soil science, forest management, and so on. But the study of land-use is often limited to only one discipline. There are only a few studies where the influence of both natural and socio-economic factors on land-use is simultaneously investigated. The purpose of this study is to demonstrate the relations among land use, socio-economic variables and geophysical factors in the case study area of Kansai district, Japan. This region contains the second largest urbanized area in Japan (after the Tokyo metropolitan area), while maintaining significant paddy rice cultivation in the suburban surroundings. Here we seek to extract the crucial relationships between land use in the Kansai district and the associated factors with statistical techniques.

In general, land-use change can be separated into two levels. "Minor land-use change" is land-use change within the same economic sector. "Major land-use change" means land-use conversion from one major industry to another [Black, 1931; Wada, 1980]. For example, according to this classification, a crop change in agriculture is a minor land-use change, and land-use conversion from farmland to residential land is a major land-use change.

In this study, we focus mainly on major land-use change. A first reason is that land-use conversion usually brings about permanent change. Conversion to residential land from any other land-use, and even conversion from farmland to forest land are actually irreversible processes. The second reason is a practical one, since it is difficult to obtain the detailed land-use data that are prerequisites for within category land-use analysis.

In this paper, we first present some basic information on the case study area, describe the characteristics of the local agriculture and briefly discuss the statistical data used in the case study. The subsequent analysis consists of two parts: an analysis of the distribution of land uses and an analysis of the driving forces of land-use change.

The distribution of land use is represented by percentage of total area. We calculate the static relationships between the distribution of land uses and socio-economic and geophysical factors. We then try to elucidate whether the static relations are temporally stable, i.e. how these relationships have changed during the study period from 1970 to 1990.

For farmland and residential land we investigate what kind of socio-economic factors as well as natural conditions explain the temporal changes of these major land-use categories during the study period. Through these analyses, we extract some driving forces of land-use change in the study area.

The data set for this study was originally developed in the project "Land-use and Global Environment Change" (LU/GEC, 1995) sponsored by the National Institute for Environmental Studies, Japan.


A dual slope resistance to digital converter applicable to differential resistive sensors is presented. A dual slope digital converter is appropriately modified so that it accepts directly the resistive elements of a differential resistive sensor and provide a digital output that is linearly proportional to the physical quantity being sensed by the sensor. High accuracy is easily obtained since the output is decided only by a pair of dc reference voltages and the transformation constant of the sensor. Sensitivity analysis shows that the effect of circuit parameter variations on the output is minimal. The efficacy of the proposed scheme is clearly demonstrated by the test results obtained on a prototype.


Almost all of today's knowledge is stored in databases and thus can only be accessed with the help of domain specific query languages, strongly limiting the number of people which can access the data. In this work, we demonstrate an end-to-end trainable question answering (QA) system that allows a user to query an external NoSQL database by using natural language. A major challenge of such a system is the non-differentiability of database operations which we overcome by applying policy-based reinforcement learning. We evaluate our approach on Facebook's bAbI Movie Dialog dataset and achieve a competitive score of 84.2% compared to several benchmark models. We conclude that our approach excels with regard to real-world scenarios where knowledge resides in external databases and intermediate labels are too costly to gather for non-end-to-end trainable QA systems.


The effects of life-course, employment and labor market characteristics on the probability of pension participation and on type of pension coverage are estimated for two cohorts of working women in middle and late life, respectively. The National Longitudinal Surveys of Mature and Young Women are used to differentiate the relative importance of life course and diverse structural factors on worker pension participation and employer coverage patterns. The defined contribution plan is argued to be an indicator of the changing employment relationship which is relieving employers of pension liability and increasing workers' responsibilities for retirement saving. Probit regressions are used to estimate the relative risks for nonparticipation in any pension among these working women. Multinominal logistic models, controlling for selectivity, estimate cohort processes in workers' access to employer-provided pension types. The results reveal the relative importance for middle-aged and older women of life course and structural variables that reflect life stage and changing employment relationships. Younger cohorts appear to be relatively more vulnerable to the changing employment contract given their greater dependence on defined contribution plans and the conflict between family and market contingencies.


Treatment of intracranial aneurysms by surgical clipping carries a risk of intraoperative ischemia, caused mainly by prolonged temporary occlusion of cerebral arteries. The objective of this study was to develop a near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) technique for continuous monitoring of cerebral blood flow (CBF) during surgery. With this approach, cerebral hemodynamics prior to clipping are measured by a bolus-tracking method that uses indocyanine green as an intravascular contrast agent. The baseline hemodynamic measurements are then used to convert the continuous Hb difference (HbD) signal (HbD = oxyhemoglobin - deoxyhemoglobin) acquired during vessel occlusion to units of CBF. To validate the approach, HbD signal changes, along with the corresponding CBF changes, were measured in pigs following occlusion of the common carotid arteries or a middle cerebral artery. For both occlusion models, the predicted CBF change derived from the HbD signal strongly correlated with the measured change in CBF. Linear regression of the predicted and measured CBF changes resulted in a slope of 0.962 (R(2) = 0.909) following carotid occlusion and 0.939 (R(2) = 0.907) following middle cerebral artery occlusion. These results suggest that calibrating the HbD signal by baseline hemodynamic measurements provides a clinically feasible method of monitoring CBF changes during neurosurgery.


The proprietary nature of LCA tools and information limits widespread adoption of sustainability measures. We introduce the Open Sustainability Project(OSP), a Linked Data resource for broadening access to LCA in an effort to increase the transparency and accuracy of environmental impact assessments(2, 9).The OSP applies Free and Open Source Software(FOSS) principles and Linked Data structures to LCA standards and reporting so that communities including students, SME's and the general public can participate in the assessment and verification of sustainability practices(1,6). The highly flexible data format allows disparate data sources and assessments to be compared along an open standard compliant with ISO 14048 reporting(5, 8, 12).In addition, the OSP makes available a free database of Life Cycle Assessment data using an approach based on Linked Data and RESTful interfaces which supports the development of rich third-party applications for specific user groups and industries(7). This novel combination of linked data and web-based tools is inherently transparent so that LCA practices can be standardized, compared and verified by a broad community.The OSP is an international collaboration between academics, government and industry groups leveraging expertise in LCA, Open Data and web-based tools for sustainability(10). Our first Open Source and Open Data web sustainability tools have confirmed the potential to engage a wider audience, with over two thousand registered users, three thousand environmental assessments performed and over 330,000 page views from more than 75 countries since September 2009(3, 4, 11). The OSP aims to expand reach of LCA through a free and open Application Programming Interface(API) to support distributed development of third-party applications for sustainability assessment through the emerging metrics for social and environmental sustainability(a free LCA "App Store"). These applications are intended to disseminate LCA standards, encourage transparency in environmental reporting and leverage Collective Intelligence in the collection, publication and verification of LCA.The OSP aims to transform LCA into a collaborative process where data collection, analysis, assessment and reporting benefit from the feedback and ideas of a growing worldwide LCA community.


A Neuroscientists keep telling us that the brain produces consciousness and consciousness does not survive brain death because it ceases when brain activity ceases. Research findings on near-death-experiences during cardiac arrest contradict this widely held conviction. ey raise perplexing questions with regard to our current understanding of the relationship between consciousness and brain functions. Reports on veridical perceptions during out-of-body experiences suggest that consciousness may be experienced independently of a functioning brain and that self-consciousness may continue even aer the termination of brain activity. Data on studies of near-death-experiences could be an incentive to develop alternative theories of the body-mind relation as seen in contemporary neuroscience.


Many image-to-image translation problems are ambiguous, as a single input image may correspond to multiple possible outputs. In this work, we aim to model a \emph{distribution} of possible outputs in a conditional generative modeling setting. The ambiguity of the mapping is distilled in a low-dimensional latent vector, which can be randomly sampled at test time. A generator learns to map the given input, combined with this latent code, to the output. We explicitly encourage the connection between output and the latent code to be invertible. This helps prevent a many-to-one mapping from the latent code to the output during training, also known as the problem of mode collapse, and produces more diverse results. We explore several variants of this approach by employing different training objectives, network architectures, and methods of injecting the latent code. Our proposed method encourages bijective consistency between the latent encoding and output modes. We present a systematic comparison of our method and other variants on both perceptual realism and diversity.


After their theoretical development in the early 1990s, Financial Transmission Rights (FTRs) have been applied in restructured US electricity markets for about a decade now. Lately, FTRs have also been proposed as a potential feature of the emerging European electricity market. This paper reviews the crucial differences between FTRs and the currently implemented physical transmission rights (PTRs), and investigates the institutional and regulatory prerequisites for introducing FTRs in Europe. Also, the paper analyzes whether FTRs could be used as a means to replace existing transmission contracts (ETCs) in Europe. The paper concludes that the introduction of FTRs would imply a conceptual shift from the current self-scheduling and bilateral approach to cross-border trading in Europe, to a more central scheduling approach. The smoothest transition from PTRs to FTRs would be achieved by auctioning PTRs with a use-it-or-sell-it property and gradually phasing out their physical usage. As a prerequisite, the introduction of cross-border FTRs requires the integration of national markets through power exchanges. The resulting quasi-monopoly position of the power exchanges with respect to cross-border trading would require a tighter relationship between power exchanges and transmission system operators (TSOs) and a new regulatory approach to power exchanges, e.g., regulated fees. An introduction of regionally applied FTRs would also require a closer cooperation between national TSOs, especially with regard to the determination of a simultaneously feasible set of FTRs and a more detailed grid model reflecting the actual congestion situation. The paper argues that FTRs have not been subject to financial regulation in the past, as both their volume and their value are determined purely by the physical dispatch and network situation. Hence, any manipulation of FTRs would occur by manipulating the physical market, which is covered by energy regulation. Regarding ETCs, it is shown that FTRs can only cover their congestion cost aspect, while other ETC provisions related to transmission and energy supply can't be accounted for by FTRs. As there are no historical entitlements to offsetting crossborder congestion cost in Europe (in the absence of ETCs), FTRs would not be allocated to load scheduling entities for free, but would be auctioned off with the auction proceeds being allocated to transmission owners or transmission investors, e.g. via Auction Revenue Rights (ARRs). Finally, further research is needed to determine the extent to which financial instruments such as futures are able to replace or complement FTRs for hedging cross-border congestion risk.


The coastal sea ice in the vicinity of Davis Station, Antarctica (68* 35' S, 77* 58' E), supported a diverse microbial community which varied in composition and biomass in response to increasing insolation and temperature during the austral summer. To understand more fully the fate of photosynthetically fixed carbon in sea ice, we examined the dynamics of community composition, biomass and production in autotrophs, heterotrophic protozoa and bacteria. The microbial community inhabiting the bottom few centimeters of land fast ice differed markedly from the interior communities in taxonomic composition and biomass and in the timing and fate of production. Total microbial biomass integrated throughout the ice depth declined during the season from a mean of 1150 mg C m-2 on 17 November to 628 mg C m-2 by 22 December. This largely reflected a decrease in the biomass of the bottom ice community which was dominated by the diatom Entomoneis spp. In contrast, the biomass of the interior ice community increased during summer and was dominated by autotrophic forms <20 um in length with a small dinoflagellate, Gymnodinium sp., becoming particularly abundant. Heterotrophic protozoa, composed of mainly nanoflagellate, euglenoid and dinoflagellate taxa, contributed between 16 and 19% of the total integrated microbial biomass in the interior ice and between 1 and 11% in the bottom ice. The biomass of heterotrophic protozoa increased throughout the ice depth during summer and estimated taxon-specific net growth rates ranged between 0.168 d-1 for a heterotrophic euglenoid and 0.05 d-1 for the heterotrophic nanoflagellate population over a 23 d period. Bacterial biomass varied by several orders of magnitude between ice depths mainly due to the occurrence of an abundant population of large epiphytic bacteria attached to Entomoneis spp. in the bottom ice. However, bacterial biomass contributed a similar proportion of between 4 and 16% of the total microbial biomass in both interior and bottom ice. The biomass of unattached bacteria increased throughout the ice depth during summer and exhibited an estimated net growth rate of 0.05 d-1. These data are used to quantify autotrophic production in bottom and interior communities, to estimate the flux of carbon to heterotrophs and to illustrate the complexity of the trophic interactions in coastal sea ice.


Organisations are constantly seeking efficiency gains for their business processes in terms of time and cost. Management accounting enables detailed cost reporting of business operations for decision making purposes, although significant effort is required to gather accurate operational data. Process mining, on the other hand, may provide valuable insight into processes through analysis of events recorded in logs by IT systems, but its primary focus is not on cost implications. In this paper, a framework is proposed which aims to exploit the strengths of both fields in order to better support management decisions on cost control. This is achieved by automatically merging cost data with historical data from event logs for the purposes of monitoring, predicting, and reporting process-related costs. The on-demand generation of accurate, relevant and timely cost reports, in a style akin to reports in the area of management accounting, will also be illustrated. This is achieved through extending the open-source process mining framework ProM.


In a theoretical study of gas adsorption on carbon nanotubes (CNTs), we conduct a series of ab initio simulations for a "gas–single-wall carbon nanotube" system for gases of particular practical interest: He and NO. The obtained values of adsorption energy reveal preferable localization sites of absorbed He atoms as well as their dependency on the adsorption distances. A significant effect of NO adsorption on CNT electronic properties is demonstrated. The effect of the presence of a vacancy on the adsorption nature is analyzed. It is shown that under the influence of vacancy formation the CNT structure undergoes reconstruction that enables chemisorption of NO molecules.


The photomask is a critical element in the lithographic image transfer process from the drawn layout to the final structures on the wafer. The non-linearity of the imaging process and the related MEEF impose a tight control requirement on the photomask critical dimensions. Critical dimensions can be measured in aerial images with hardware emulation. This is a more recent complement to the standard scanning electron microscope measurement of wafers and photomasks. Aerial image measurement includes non-linear, 3-dimensional, and materials effects on imaging that cannot be observed directly by SEM measurement of the mask. Aerial image measurement excludes the processing effects of printing and etching on the wafer. This presents a unique contribution to the difficult process control and modeling tasks in mask making. In the past, aerial image measurements have been used mainly to characterize the printability of mask repair sites. Development of photomask CD characterization with the AIMSTM tool was motivated by the benefit of MEEF sensitivity and the shorter feedback loop compared to wafer exposures. This paper describes a new application that includes: an improved interface for the selection of meaningful locations using the photomask and design layout data with the CalibreTM Metrology Interface, an automated recipe generation process, an automated measurement process, and automated analysis and result reporting on a Carl Zeiss AIMSTM system.


Introduction Recently there has been much publicised debate over the 'God is dead' issue, featuring Richard Dawkins (2006), Christopher Hitchins (2007), Sam Harris (2007) and others, but at least in the social sciences this is not the nub of the 'science versus religion' issue. While overt discussion of theistic religion does have its relevance to various aspects of social science (see Thomas Friedman, 2005), a more deep-seated methodological relevance can be found in a different conception of 'faith' positions in the form of implicit a prioris or metaphysical positions inescapably embedded in contending social science perspectives. It is dispute over these a prioris that underpins disagreements between contending schools of social science thought, and it is dispute over these a priori or metaphysical positions that represents the core of the relationship between religion and social science. In economics and other social sciences there are implicit metaphysical assumptions about value relativism, historicism and the nature of man ranged alongside the more readily recognised explicit assumptions about pure competition, constant returns to scale and such like. The argument advanced in this paper is that these implicit assumptions are more important than the explicit assumptions, despite being commonly withheld from critical attention in the teaching of economics and other social sciences. Their importance is recognised, however, by a minority of economists including Myrdal (1968), Schumacher (1974), Sen (1977; 1987; 2000), Etzioni (1988), Cropsey (1955; 1960), and Nevile (1998) (Duhs, 2005; see also Lawson, 2003). Despite what might therefore be argued to be the fundamental importance of religion in this implicit metaphysical sense, courses in philosophy and economic philosophy nonetheless tend to be marginalised or scorned, rather than celebrated for their central importance in explicating the roots of, and ultimate implications of, contending social science positions. Putatively unambiguous words such as 'man', 'freedom', 'rationality' and 'equality' are used by different writers to mean different things. Social science is about human society, and as such is inescapably informed by some concept of what it is to be human, and thus by some conception of human ontology and teleology. For such reason Myrdal (1968: 26) concluded that there is an 'inevitable a priori' in all social science work, just as Cropsey (1955) concluded that 'every logic presupposes a metaphysic'. These implicit a prioris or metaphysical faith positions constitute a religion or ideological element that needs to be recognised and highlighted if the implications of social science are to be fully understood. In short, there is an inevitability about ongoing debate in the social sciences between proponents of different metaphysical views--and the practical social theories erected on them--and this is the issue on which debate turns in social science. Science has certainly not killed religion in this sense, and indeed cannot do so. The choice is not 'religion or social science', but how to recognise which religion or metaphysic is most properly installed at the root of social scientific understanding of the questions of our time. Two broad areas of illustration are chosen in this paper. In the first case, illustration is drawn from the economics literature, including from the Myrdal-Bauer dispute and subsequent Washington Consensus-Sen dispute within development economics, and from the economics-as-imperialist-science literature. It will be argued that there is much hidden metaphysics in the supposedly practical or pragmatic development economics literature. Moreover, in the case of the claim that economics is an imperialistic social science--indeed, the imperialistic social science--it will be argued that the reverse is true, since it is economics which has necessarily been colonised by one or another (implicit) political philosophy (Duhs 1982, 2005; Nevile 1998). …


The genus Batracomorphus was erected by Lewis in 1836 to contain B. irroratus, then a new species from near London. Lewis published a very detailed description of his new genus, and compared it with Iassus Germar (= Allygus atomarius F.) or Phrynomorphus Curtis (= Euscelis lineolatus Brulle); then he writes: "but the position of the antennae, ocelli, &c. evidently allies it to Bythoscopus, Germ." (= Iassus lanio F.), "from which its depressed form will at once distinguish it". The name was emendated by Agassiz to Batrachomorphus. After Lewis many authors, who were not able to see "at once" the difference, united Batrachomorphus with the genus in which they placed Iassus lanio F. Ribaut gives a more detailed account of the characters separating the two genera. From this it appears that most — if not all — oriental and australian species are to be brought to Batrachomorphus, chiefly because of the number of spines on the posterior knees. Two genera of australasian insects were described in 1906 resp. 1930, which are to be reunited with Batrachomorphus, viz., Eurinoscopus Kirkaldy and Marquardtella Schmidt. Both descriptions compare their object with the genus Bythoscopus Germar (= Iassus F.) and its type lanio L., which induced the authors to create a new genus. A comparison with the type of Batrachomorphus, however, shows that at most a few unimportant differences in the nervature of the tegmina can be traced, which are not of generic importance, the less so as the nervature is apt to considerable individual variation. Only very few species have been mentioned as occurring in New Guinea up to now. Walker mentions quite a number of "Bythoscopus" species


Melville Fuller, Chief Justice of the United States from 1888 to 1910, had a notably "self-effacing nature." Perhaps that is why he did not always push hard to correct errors about himself that appeared in published reports. In retrospect, this seems admirably modest in some contexts and disturbingly irresponsible in others. This article deals first with an example Fuller's admirable modesty, which it overcomes for the benefit of modern readers. Second, this article examines an instance of Fuller's converse irresponsibility, and suggests that the Supreme Court can and should officially correct Fuller's error.


This paper asks why so many students today seem to rely upon memorization of facts and details over critical thinking in the classroom. The paper argues that the current environment is one that privileges a scientific definition of education. This has led to a testing environment based narrowly upon methods of quantitative assessment. The paper connects this problem back to the definitions of education and knowledge of the Cartesian method of Rene Descartes. The paper further argues that recent philosophers of knowledge like Nietszche have challenged this notion of knowledge arguing for a broader qualitative form of knowledge. The author argues that history should be approached through the lens of World Views. World Views are defined as filters based upon beliefs of human nature, knowledge, and purpose. The author then provides possible methods and classes for implementing World Views positions.


This paperback edition of "A Place on the Corner" marks the twenty-fifth anniversary of Elijah Anderson's sociological classic, a study of street corner life at a local barroom/liquor store located in the ghetto on Chicago's South Side. Anderson returned night after night, month after month, to gain a deeper understanding of the people he met, vividly depicting how they created-and recreated-their local stratification system. In addition, Anderson introduces key sociological concepts, including "the extended primary group" and "being down." The new preface and appendix in this edition expand on Anderson's original work, telling the intriguing story of how he went about his field work among the men who frequented Jelly's corner.


Several scientific issues concerning the latest generation read heads for magnetic storage devices, based on CoFeB/MgO/CoFeBmagnetic tunnel junctions (MTJs) are known to be controversial, including such fundamental questions as to the behavior and the role of B in optimizing the physical properties of these devices. Quantitatively establishing the internal structures of several such devices with different annealing conditions using hard x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, we resolve these controversies and establish that the B diffusion is controlled by the capping Ta layer, though Ta is physically separated from the layer with B by several nanometers. While explaining this unusual phenomenon, we also provide insight into why the tunneling magnetoresistance (TMR) is optimized at an intermediate annealing temperature, relating it to B diffusion, coupled with our studies based on x-ray diffraction and magnetic studies.


Abstract The past two decades have seen an increasing role for the UK community and voluntary sector (CVS) in health promotion in disadvantaged areas, largely based on assumptions on the part of funders that CVS providers are better able to engage 'hard-to-reach' population groups in services than statutory providers. However, there is limited empirical research exploring CVS provider practices in this field. Using ethnographic data, this paper examines the experiences of a network of CVS providers seeking to engage residents in health-promoting community services in a disadvantaged region in the North of England. The paper shows how CVS providers engaged in apparently contradictory practices, fluctuating between an empathically informed response to complex resident circumstances and (in the context of meeting externally set targets) behavioural lifestyle approaches to health promotion. Drawing on concepts from figurational sociology, the paper explains how lifestyle drift occurs in health promotion as a result of the complex web of relations (with funders, commissioners and residents) in which CVS providers are embedded. Despite the fact that research has revealed the impact of targets on the work of the CVS before, this paper demonstrates more specifically the way in which monitoring processes within CVS contracts can draw providers into the neoliberal lifestyle discourse so prevalent in health promotion.


This project to be presented has been funded by the NSF grant entitled Database Courseware: Examples, Lab Exercises, Tests, and Animation # 0089412. Specifically, the project consisted of developing tutorials, exercises and animations to supplement the teaching of fundamental concepts of database systems which are difficult to communicate in sufficient breadth and depth in a single database course. At the same time, very little visual material/animations exist to teach databases (as opposed to algorithms, introductory programming, operating systems, math, etc.). The animations developed complement introductory database texts or DBMS products and consists of three main modules: Database Design, SQL, and Transaction Processing. There are currently over 70 programs including tutorials, animations and other exercises.


Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) in the near-infrared region has been applied to study interactions between a phenanthridine-biguanide derivative (PB) and polynucleotides. The PB molecules scatter radiation in the silver citrate colloid most intensively at concentration of 2.5 6 10−5 mol dm−3, at which they are optimally oriented towards the nanoparticles, with the phenanthridine plane placed perpendicularly to the silver surface. A band at 228 cm−1, attributed to the Ag–N stretching mode, implies that chemical mechanism, along with the electromagnetic mechanism, contributes to the total enhancement of the scattered radiation. A decrease in intensity and shifts of the biguanide-related bands in the SERS spectra of the mixtures of PB with DNA indicate binding of the small molecules with the nucleic acid. Studies with double-stranded DNA analogues reveal that the molecules of PB intercalate into the G–C base pairs by the phenanthridine system and bind within the minor groove of the A–T sequences through the biguanide substituent. Intensity decrease in the SERS spectrum of the PB/RNA mixture confirms insertion of the molecules between A–U base pairs, whereas an upward shift of the amino groups bending mode (1078 cm−1) as well as diminution of the CN stretching band at 1421 cm−1 imply hydrogen bonding of the biguanide moiety with the nucleobases. SERS spectra of the mixtures containing the single-stranded polynucleotides show that the polynucleotide secondary structure does not affect binding of PB with the polynucleotides but that affinity towards the polynucleotides depends solely on the molecular structure of the nucleic bases.


Similarity or dissimilarity between 2 individuals that have formed a pair to breed can
occur in morphology, behaviour and diet. Such patterns influence partners' cooperation when
rearing their offspring, consequently influencing reproductive success. They may confer different
benefits, depending on species and contexts. However, the extent to which breeding partners are
more similar in morphology, behaviour, and diet is poorly documented. Furthermore, the relationship
between behavioural consistency and mate choice is particularly poorly understood. To
investigate these issues, Kerguelen shags Phalacrocorax verrucosus, which are monogamous with
high mate fidelity across years, were studied. Partners were equipped with GPS and diving
behaviour loggers. Feather and blood samples were analysed for stable isotopes (δ13C, a proxy of
foraging habitat, and δ15N, a proxy of diet/trophic position). Generalized linear mixed effects models
and permutation tests were used to investigate pair similarity in morphology, foraging behaviour,
behavioural consistency, overlap in foraging areas, and diets/foraging habitats. Mates were
found not to exhibit size-assortative mating, but were more similar in foraging behaviour. They
did not show assortative or disassortative mating based on foraging behavioural consistency. Furthermore,
they followed more similar bearings and overlapped more in foraging areas. In accordance
with this, partners were more similar in δ15N. Given the lack of assortative mating by morphology,
the similarity in behaviour could be due to individuals selecting mates with similar
foraging abilities, linked with individual quality, and/or subsequently using information gained
from their partners' foraging strategies (e.g. local enhancement). This could help breeding pairs
increase their foraging efficiency and reproductive success.


Acknowledgments. Using This Book. Chapter 1. Basic Concepts in Research and Data Analysis. Chapter 2. Introduction to SAS Programs, SAS LOGs, and SAS Output. Chapter 3. Data Input. Chapter 4. Working with Variables and Observations in SAS Datasets. Chapter 5. Exploring Data with PROC MEANS, PROC FREQ, PROC PRINT, and PROC UNIVARIATE. Chapter 6. Measures of Bivariate Association. Chapter 7. Assessing Scale Reliability with Coefficient Alpha. Chapter 8. t Tests: Independent Samples and Paired Samples. Chapter 9. One-Way ANOVA with One Between-Subjects Factor. Chapter 10. Factorial ANOVA with Two Between-Subjects Factors. Chapter 11. Multivariate Analysis of Variance (MANOVA) with One Between-Subjects Factor. Chapter 12. One-Way ANOVA with One Repeat-Measures Factor. Chapter 13. Factorial ANOVA with Repeated-Measures Factors and Between-Subjects Factor. Chapter 14. Multiple Regression. Chapter 15. Principal Component Analysis. Appendix A: Choosing the Correct Statistic. Appendix B: Datasets. Appendix C: Critical Values of the F Distribution. Index.


The Oxford Handbook of Jonathan Edwards offers a state-of-the-art summary of scholarship on Edwards by a diverse, international, and interdisciplinary group of Edwards scholars, many of whom serve as global leaders in the burgeoning world of research and writing on 'America's theologian'. As an early modern clerical polymath, Edwards is of interest to historians, theologians, and literary scholars. He is also an interlocutor for contemporary clergy and philosophical theologians. All such readers—and many more—will find here an authoritative overview of Edwards' life, ministry, and writings, as well as a representative sampling of cutting-edge scholarship on Edwards from across several disciplines. The volume falls into four sections, which reflect the diversity of Edwards studies today. The first section turns to the historical Edwards and grounds him in his period and the relevant contexts that shaped his life and work. The second section balances the historical reconstruction of Edwards as a theological and philosophical thinker with explorations of his usefulness for constructive theology and the church today. In part three, the focus shifts to the different ways and contexts in which Edwards attempted to realize his ideas and ideals in his personal life, scholarship, and ministry, but also to the ways in which these historical realities stood in tension with, limited, or resisted his aspirations. The final section looks at Edwards' widening renown and influence as well as diverse appropriations. This Handbook serves as an authoritative guide for readers overwhelmed by the enormity of the multi-lingual world of Edwards studies. It will bring readers up to speed on the most important work being done and then serve them as a benchmark in the field of Edwards scholarship for decades to come.


Journalism's financial crisis has killed news organizations at an alarming rate. Most digital-born news ventures, once touted as the profession's saviors, have also been short-lived. These trends threaten the viability of public interest journalism. The crisis is especially acute in settings where a free press was not deeply entrenched to start with. One hopeful countertrend is the effort of journalists to pass on their professional values to new organizational hosts, even as the media companies that employ them die or drift away from professional principles. Our case studies in Taiwan, China, and Indonesia reveal that the normative assets of terminated or fading organizations are partially preserved or revived in new hosts. We suggest that a social movements perspective—which helpfully distinguishes between a movement and its constituent organizations—can help illuminate how professionals try to survive threats to public interest journalism during periods of abeyance. This perspective is not intended to gloss over the crisis within the news media industry, but to spotlight the drivers of the journalistic movement that require support. While


This article examines the discourses to be read in painted representations of colonial motifs (and their modes of display) in France between the mid-nineteenth and the early twentieth centuries, i.e. until the dawn—but not the completion—of decolonisation. It will analyse selected images, some of which have become emblematic as triumphant and/or enduring manifestations of colonial domination. It will question the readings and uses of such images from the time of conquest to the post-colonial era. This article's focus, however, will be less on the well-rehearsed dominant discourses than on gaps, silences, unanswered questions, misgivings and various non-dits which can be detected, on closer examination, in these works, their modes of diffusion and their reception by contemporaries. It will look for signs of ambivalence in the rendition of colonial scenes by the artists themselves (such as Vernet or Fromentin), who visited the sites of battle scenes in Algeria shortly after gruesome events had taken place. In particular, the paper will look for haunting visions of what had happened there, beyond the official, hegemonic discourse which was fashionable at the time, and which, in some cases, these artists had been commissioned to illustrate. The main argument concentrates closely on discourse and counter-discourse analysis, as well as the fluidity and the transferability of discourses across the colonial/post-colonial divide.


Brownfield redevelopment is a critical urban renewal tool that until recently has been overlooked by developers interested in less risky, pristine greenfields. Reformed legislation and public recognition of the negative effects of urban sprawl has made many investors realize the economic potential of brownfield redevelopment. This paper investigates the regulatory framework and incentives for attracting private investment in brownfield redevelopment in the greater Philadelphia area. It specifically examines three different reclamation projects and evaluates the effectiveness of their redevelopment procedures through site selection, remediation process, utilization of incentives, and impacts on the community. Through the availability of extensive incentive programs, liability and clean-up costs are no longer at the forefront of developers' concerns. The analysis finds that a successful brownfield project developer must choose a site in strategic location, have a long-term vision, and consider the input from and benefit to the surrounding community. The final analysis provides recommendations to promote economically viable brownfield program and project implementation in the future. Comments Presented to the Faculties of the University of Pennsylvania in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Environmental Studies 2007. This thesis or dissertation is available at ScholarlyCommons: https://repository.upenn.edu/mes_capstones/14 Private Investment in Brownfield Redevelopment in the Greater Philadelphia Area A Case-Study Analysis


Scotland's Future, The Scottish Government's guide to independence proposed cooperation with the Nordic Council amongst multiple external relations objectives, a continuation of references by independence supporting elites to the region that stretch decades. Closer cooperation with Norden as pronounced in the paper implies that the Nordic Council serves at least two functions, firstly, a basis for fostering a rejuvenated Council of the British Isles based on the Nordic Council framework (Qvotrup, 2009; Bogdanor, 2009), and secondly, formal political and societal union with the Nordic region (Bailes, Þorhallsson and Johnstone 2013). Both functions permeate from the rejection of Scotland's current union with rUK, and SNP rhetoric of 'independence within Europe' suggesting that senior politicians have no qualms in leaving one union for another.
Scholarly references tend to narrow on discourse linking independence to the creation of a Nordic welfare model with little attention to formal regional unification through the Nordic Council. This thesis therefore studies the independence movement's use of Norden and explores both the context and purpose of Scottish-Nordic articulations. It finds that most political groups sympathetic to independence desire cooperation with Norden but not to the detriment of future relations with rUK in the event of independence. The use of Norden is not solely a desire to replicate Nordic models of welfare as many scholars argue, but rather, Norden invokes a political and societal partner that emphasises the movement's progressive ambitions. The pursuit of Norden as a union ultimately stems from the collapse of the UK's welfare union and the damaging effects of a unitary and confined constitutional system, meaning that the political elite favour a societal and political approach to union like that of Norden and for some elites, an actual political and societal union with the region


BACKGROUND
This study was aimed to describe incidence, trends, and survival of oral and pharyngeal cancers in Khon Kaen, the province situated in the northeast of Thai-land.

METHODS
Data on oral and pharyngeal cancer cases diagnosed during 1985 - 2001 were retrieved from the population-based cancer registry of Khon Kaen. The final status of the patients was verified by database linkage and follow-up using postcards.

RESULTS
Of 1,038 cases, 62.6% were female and 37.4% were male, with a mean age of 63 years. The age-standardized incidence rate (ASR) in females (6.2 per 100 000; 95%CI 5.7-6.7) was significantly higher than in males (3.9 per 100 000; 95%CI 3.5-4.4). Annual percent changes in ASR were 1.7 in females (p<0.05), but 1.2 in males. Lip and buccal cancers were the most common sites respectively; however, the incidence of tongue cancer was increasing in the last period. Eighty five percent of all cases were diagnosed in advanced stage (stage III and IV). The overall five-year relative survival was 43.1%. We found stage distribution and survival did not change during the study period.

CONCLUSION
The considerably high incidence in female suggests a need for research on specific risk factors. Moreover, attempts should be made to detect oral cancers earlier in order to improve the outcomes of cancer control.


This Article is the result of an intense series of text and telephone exchanges among the four of us, taking place from December 2005 to April 2006. Each of us has her own project which forms the basis of her contribution to this conversation. Janet Halley is working on new rules governing wartime sexual violence in international humanitarian law, specifically the place of rape and sexual slavery in the decisions of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY). Chantal Thomas has published widely on the law of trade;1 one of her papers examines the feminist debate over the 2001 U.N. Trafficking Protocol.2 Hila Shamir and Prabha Kotiswaran have studied emergent national regimes addressing the connection between local prostitution markets and international "sex trafficking" in Holland, Sweden, and Israel (Shamir) and in India (Kotiswaran). Shamir compares legal regimes for governing sex trafficking and the related prostitution industry within national borders; Kotiswaran studies the highly local negotiations between stakeholders in the sex industry in India through aeld work in Tirupati and Kolkata. Shamir and Koti-swaran take special note of the striking but very different impact of the 2001 Protocol and the United States' Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act (the VTVPA)3 in Israel and India.


The Paris Agreement and the EU Climate and Energy Framework set ambitious but necessary targets. Reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by phasing out the technologies and infrastructures that cause fossil carbon emissions is one of today's most important challenges. In the EU, bioenergy is currently the largest renewable energy source used. Most Member States have in absolute terms increased the use of forest biomass for energy to reach their 2020 renewable energy targets. In recent years, the issue of 'carbon neutrality' has been debated with regard to the bioenergy products that are produced from forest biomass. There is no clear consensus among scientists on the issue and their messages may even appear contradictory to decision-makers and citizens. Divergence arises because scientists address the issue from different points of view, which can all be valid. It is important to find agreement on some basic principles, to inform policy makers. Guidance is also needed on how the results should be interpreted. This report provides insights into the current scientific debate on forest biomass, carbon neutrality and climate change mitigation. It draws on the science literature to give a balanced and policy-relevant synthesis, from both an EU and global perspective.


Abstract: This paper analyzes the relationship between risks to which banks are exposed, rate of non-performing loans as well as capital adequacy. The analysis was conducted among the banking sector of Bosnia and Herzegovina. For the purpose of the analysis, the International Monetary Fund data - Core Financial Indicators for the period 2008 – 2013 were used. This study differs from previous researches primarily in the fact that the case study is Bosnia and Herzegovina, where there haven't been similar studies. To analyze and evaluate the model, correlation and regression analysis were used. The paper points to those aspects which deserve further attention in order to achieve better and more efficient management of them. Results indicate the increase in risk-weighted assets and rising rates of non-performing loans as one of the component assets. At the same time the growth rate of non-performing loans leads to the growth in risk-weighted assets and therefore the bank is exposed to major risks. Higher return on assets, as an indicator of business performance and management resources and profitability, leads to capital adequacy improvement. There is a strong correlation between the rate of capital adequacy and non-performing loans and that requires further research. Results indicate that better liquidity control leads to a reduction in the rate of non-performing loans and consequently better liquidity position of banks, and thus reduction in liquidity risk. During the analysis it was found that a large proportion of non-performing loans to total loans leads to deterioration in the financial result which is further reflected in the banks' capital. When we talk about capital adequacy we come to the conclusion that the banking system in Bosnia and Herzegovina, despite all the shortcomings and problems is adequately capitalized.


ABSTRACT Chemokines play key roles in attracting immune cells to sites of infections. However, few data on chemokine expression in the gut during human infections are available. We examined expression of chemokines in intestinal tissues of AIDS patients during active Cryptosporidium infection and during resolution of such an infection. The chemokines and cytokines in cell lysates from jejunal biopsy tissues were assayed by a 22-multiplex bead immunoassay. CXCL10 (IP-10) and its receptor, CXCR3, in sections were studied by immunohistochemistry. In biopsies from AIDS patients with active cryptosporidiosis, four chemokines (CXCL10, CCL11 [eotaxin], CCL5 [RANTES], and CCL2 [monocyte chemoattractant protein 1]) and three cytokines (interleukin-1α [IL-1α], IL-10, and granulocyte colony-stimulating factor) were detected. The level of CXCL10 was significantly increased in AIDS patients with cryptosporidiosis compared to the level in AIDS patients without cryptosporidiosis or in normal volunteers (median in AIDS patients with cryptosporidiosis, 508 pg/mg protein, compared to 111 pg/mg and 72 pg/mg protein in AIDS patients without cryptosporidiosis and in normal volunteers, respectively [P < 0.05 and P < 0.005, respectively, as determined by a Mann-Whitney test]). The level of CXCL10 correlated with the parasite burden (as measured by the number of Cryptosporidium oocysts in the stools) and also with the IL-1α concentration (Pearson correlation values, 0.961 [P < 0.01] and 0.737 [P < 0.05]). As determined by immunohistochemistry, CXCL10 localized to epithelial cells at the site of infection. Following effective antiparasite and antiretroviral therapy, Cryptosporidium infections resolved, and the levels of CXCL10 decreased to normal levels. We hypothesized that CXCL10 plays an important role in the resolution of cryptosporidiosis by attracting immune effector cells to the site of infection. By contrast, in AIDS patients lacking effector cells, CXCL10 may contribute to the immunopathogenesis by recruiting inflammatory cells.


Populations at a species' northern range extent are often presented with more challenges than those in more southern regions, given that winters are generally harsher, and the reproductive season is shorter in these northern regions. Wild turkeys (Meleagris gallopavo) are near their northern range limit in Maine, and there have been no studies that have researched turkey roosting here. Wild turkeys roost in trees at night, and we predicted that roost selection would be affected by changing weather conditions, particularly during winter when temperatures are expected to be coldest. We also predicted that land cover composition would affect roost site selection due to spatial variability in food availability. We captured and GPS-tagged wild turkeys in Penobscot County, Maine, to analyze their selection for four forest attributes during roosting: tree height, basal area, softwood percentage, and distance to forest edge. We also explored the potential for wind chill, precipitation, or land cover composition, particularly human development or agricultural land, to have moderating effects on selection. We used resource selection functions, implemented as generalized linear mixed models (GLMMs), to evaluate attributes of used versus available roost sites and considered interactions between weather and land cover. We found evidence to support selection across all habitat characteristics. The effects of wind chill and precipitation on roost site selection were not supported, while land cover effects were. Our results suggested that either a factor potentially linked to land cover that we did not consider, such as predation risk, has a greater effect on selection than weather, or that wild turkeys in our study area had access to sufficient food resources to not be forced to select primarily for thermal cover when roosting.


Accumulating evidence shows how diverse physiological functions, such as metabolism, immunity, tissue homeostasis, and hematopoiesis, are intricately and profoundly intertwined at multiple levels. This brief review will present evidence from a rapidly expanding field of immunometabolism, highlighting how cells that are relevant to processes at play in determining vascular health and disease can be programmed by changes in their metabolic environment. It will focus on how such changes can be imprinted or trained, particularly through epigenetic modifications, such that adaptations driven by metabolic signals can cause persistent changes in cell function, even after the original stimulus has been corrected or removed. Recognition of these processes and elucidation of the mechanisms underlying them stand to have far-reaching implications for the diagnosis and treatment of diabetes and related metabolic states.


A nuclear heating plant is a cogeneration nuclear heating plant, which provides industrial steam for the chemical industrial park to satisfy the steam demand of enterprises. Meanwhile, the remaining capacity can be used for power generation, so as to alleviate the local power shortage. As the condensed water of the externally supplied steam is not recovered, and the freshwater source is insufficient, it is necessary to build a seawater desalination plant and a demineralized water production plant to provide a large amount of demineralized water for the heating system. According to the raw seawater quality, requirements of produced water quality and technical & economic analysis, the main treatment process flow of seawater desalination system is: air flotation tank → horizontal mechanical filter → ultrafiltration membrane → seawater reverse osmosis membrane → freshwater reverse osmosis membrane. The main treatment process flow of demineralized water production system is: cation exchanger → anion exchanger → mixed ion exchanger. Combined with the engineering practice, this paper expounds the process system design of large-scale seawater desalination and demineralized water production from the aspects of seawater desalination process comparison and selection, reverse osmosis membrane seawater desalination process system design and process equipment configuration, etc. The system improves the guarantee rate of desalinated seawater and demineralized water supply, and realizes the emission reduction of industrial wastewater, which can provide reference for the process design of large-scale seawater desalination and demineralized water production in subsequent nuclear heating projects or nuclear power projects.


Introduction Stroke is a major health problem and transient ischaemic attack (TIA) is an important risk factor for stroke. Primary prevention of stroke and TIA will have the greatest impact on reducing the burden of these conditions. Evidence-based guidelines for stroke/TIA prevention identify individuals eligible for preventative interventions in primary care. This study will investigate: (1) the proportion of strokes/TIAs with prior missed opportunities for prevention in primary care; (2) the influence of patient characteristics on missed prevention opportunities and (3) how the proportion of missed prevention opportunities has changed over time. Methods and analysis A retrospective case review will identify first-ever stroke and patients with TIA between 2000 and 2013 using anonymised electronic medical records extracted from the health improvement network (THIN) database. Four categories of missed opportunities for stroke/TIA prevention will be sought: untreated high blood pressure in patients eligible for treatment (either blood pressure ≥160/100 or ≥140/90 mm Hg in patients at high cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk); patients with atrial fibrillation with high stroke risk and no anticoagulant therapy; no lipid modifying drug therapy prescribed in patients at high CVD risk or with familial hypercholesterolaemia. The proportion of patients with each missed opportunity and multiple missed opportunities will be calculated. Mixed effect logistic regression will model the relationship between demographic and patient characteristics and missed opportunities for care; practice will be included as a random effect. Ethics and dissemination THIN data collection was approved by the NHS South East Multi-centre Research Ethics Committee (MREC) in 2003. This study was approved by the independent scientific review committee in May 2013. Dissemination of findings has the potential to change practice, improve the quality of care provided to patients and ultimately reduce the incidence of strokes and TIAs. Findings will be published in a peer-reviewed journal and disseminated at national and international conferences.


ABSTRACT Conversational agents (CAs)—frequently operationalized as chatbots—are computer systems that leverage natural language processing to engage in conversations with human users. CAs are often operationalized as chatbots which are used for many applications including technical support, customer service, and digital personal assistants. Despite their widespread use, little research to date has investigated how improving the conversational skill of a CA impacts user perceptions of the agent. To elucidate this relationship, this research uses Social Presence Theory to describe how conversational skill influences perceived social presence and ultimately anthropomorphism of a chatbot. We conducted a series of studies in which 450 participants interacted with CAs exhibiting varying levels of conversational skill. We show that people perceive a more skilled CA to be more socially present and anthropomorphic than a less skilled CA. This research advances the knowledge of computer-human interface in information systems, as CA research to date has largely focused on the technical challenges rather than the behavioral questions of how users interact with CAs.


The lifespan of people with severe mental illness (SMI) is shorter compared to the general population. This excess mortality is mainly due to physical illness. We report prevalence rates of different physical illnesses as well as important individual lifestyle choices, side effects of psychotropic treatment and disparities in health care access, utilization and provision that contribute to these poor physical health outcomes. We searched MEDLINE (1966 - August 2010) combining the MeSH terms of schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and major depressive disorder with the different MeSH terms of general physical disease categories to select pertinent reviews and additional relevant studies through cross-referencing to identify prevalence figures and factors contributing to the excess morbidity and mortality rates. Nutritional and metabolic diseases, cardiovascular diseases, viral diseases, respiratory tract diseases, musculoskeletal diseases, sexual dysfunction, pregnancy complications, stomatognathic diseases, and possibly obesity-related cancers are, compared to the general population, more prevalent among people with SMI. It seems that lifestyle as well as treatment specific factors account for much of the increased risk for most of these physical diseases. Moreover, there is sufficient evidence that people with SMI are less likely to receive standard levels of care for most of these diseases. Lifestyle factors, relatively easy to measure, are barely considered for screening; baseline testing of numerous important physical parameters is insufficiently performed. Besides modifiable lifestyle factors and side effects of psychotropic medications, access to and quality of health care remains to be improved for individuals with SMI.


A method is given for solving an optimal H2 approximation problem for SISO linear time-invariant stable systems. The method, based on constructive algebra, guarantees that the global optimum is found; it does not involve any gradient-based search, and hence avoids the usual problems of local minima. We examine mostly the case when the model order is reduced by one, and when the original system has distinct poles. This case exhibits special structure which allows us to provide a complete solution. The problem is converted into linear algebra by exhibiting a finite-dimensional basis for a certain space, and can then be solved by eigenvalue calculations, following the methods developed by Stetter and Moeller. The use of Buchberger's algorithm is avoided by writing the first-order optimality conditions in a special form, from which a Groebner basis is immediately available. Compared with our previous work the method presented here has much smaller time and memory requirements, and can therefore be applied to systems of significantly higher McMillan degree. In addition, some hypotheses which were required in the previous work have been removed. Some examples are included.


Previously, we developed a CHO cell line (CHO-OTC1-Al9) that expresses the first two enzymes in the urea cycle and exhibits a higher ammonia-removing ability and faster growth rate than a vector-controlled CHO cell line (CHO-neo-5). The current study was undertaken to develop a cell line with an ammonia-removing ability higher than the cell line developed previously. To accomplish this, CHO cell lines expressing the first three, first four, or all five enzymes of the urea cycle were constructed using a stable transfection method. Finally, the CHO-AS-16, CHO-AL-19, and CHO-Arg-11 cell lines expressing the first three, first four, and all five enzymes of the urea cycle, respectively, were selected and found to exhibit higher ammonia-removing ability than the CHO-OTC1-Al9 cell line. Among the three selected cell lines, CHO-AL-19 showed the highest ammonia-removing ability and highest cell viability at a higher cell density, with 40% and 15% lower ammonia concentration in the, culture media than that of CHO-neo-5 and CHO-OTC1-A19 cell lines, respectively. CHO-AL-19 also showed 44% and 10% higher cell viability than the CHO-neo-5 and CHO-OTC-Al9 cell lines, at a higher cell density, respectively. The ammonia concentrations in the culture media were expressed as the ammonia concentration/cell, and the CHO-AL-19 cells revealed 45-60% and 20% lower ammonia concentration/cell than the CHO-neo-5 and CHO-OTC1-Al9 cells, respectively.


CD63 is a 53-Kd lysosomal membrane glycoprotein that has been identified as a platelet activation molecule. The current study presents evidence that CD63 and Pltgp40, a platelet membrane glycoprotein identified in this laboratory, are the same molecule and that CD63/Pltgp40 is identical to the well-characterized, stage-specific melanoma-associated antigen ME491. Identity of CD63 and Pltgp40 was demonstrated by immunoprecipitation and sequential immunodepletion studies, which showed that the anti-Pltgp40 monoclonal antibody (MoAb) H5C6 and an anti-CD63 MoAb CLB/Gran 12 recognized the same 40- to 55-Kd platelet glycoprotein. In addition, the anti-CD63 MoAb specifically recognized immunoaffinity-purified Pltgp40. Amino acid sequences obtained from NH2-terminal and tryptic fragment peptides of Pltgp40 were used to generate complementary DNA (cDNA) probes using the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) technique. A 386-bp cDNA probe partially encoding CD63/Pltgp40 and a full length cDNA probe were 100% identical to the corresponding sequence of ME491. Antibodies H5C6 and CLB/Gran12 immunoprecipitated a 30- to 60-Kd heterodisperse glycoprotein from G361 melanoma cells, as had previously been reported for antibodies recognizing ME491. These data, taken together with the extensive homology recently reported between ME491, the Schistosoma mansoni membrane antigen SM23, CD37, the tumor-associated antigen CO-029, and the target of an antiproliferative antibody-1, suggest that CD63 is a member of a new family of related molecules.


The dominant large copepods Calanoides acutus and Calanus propinquus were collected south of 65°S in the Antarctic Weddell Sea in late winter/early spring (October-November) and summer (January-February), and the lipid and fatty acid/alcohol compositions of copepodite stages V and females of these suspension feeders were analyzed. The lipids of C. acufus consisted mainly of wax esters. Major fatty acids in summer were 20:1(n9), 20:5(n3), 22:6(n3), 18:4(n3), 22:1(n11) and 16:1(n7). In winter the amount of 18:4(n3) decreased considerably in both stages, as did that of20:5(n3) in females, whereas the quantity of 20:i(n9) showed a strong increase in females. During both seasons the fatty alcohols in the wax esters were strongly dominated by 20:1 (n9) and 22:1 (n11). In contrast, the hulk of the lipids of C. propinquus were triacylglycerols with the principal fatty acids 22:1(n11), 22:1(n9), 16:0, 20:5(n3) and 22:6(n3). Hence, an alternative to the paradigm of energy storage by means of wax esters, typical of C. acufus and almost all other calanoid copepods from polar and temperate oceans, was found for C. propinquus. The synthesis of these energy-rich triacylglycerols occurs via an unusual marine biochemical pathway, the elongation of the 20:1(n9) to the 22:1(n9) fatty acid. Our data show the existence of very different biochemical solutions to the problem of efficient energy storage for coping with the extreme seasonality in Antarctic waters, with short periods of food plenty interchanging with long phases of food scarcity.


The purpose of this study was to explore how technical skills taught and learned in Florida engineering and engineering technology-themed career academies fit technical skills desired by local employers in technology and manufacturing. The analysis utilized the narratives of 70 students and four teachers from career academies at four high schools and 27 industry leaders from the same geographical region of Florida. Data interpretation led to understanding that employers expressed an urgent need for technical skills using appropriate equipment and technologies, teachers were teaching students technical skills by simulating the real-world work environment, and students valued their abilities to transform their classroom project ideas into tangible products.


This paper reports a novel recurrence theory that enables us to calculate the exact joint probability density function (pdf) of the random gain and the random avalanche buildup time in avalanche photodiodes (APDs) including the effect of dead space. Such calculations reveal a strong statistical correlation between the gain and the buildup time for all widths of the multiplication region. To facilitate the calculation of the photocurrent statistics in the presence of this correlation, the impulse-response function of the APD is approximately modeled by a function of time whose prespecified shape is appropriately parameterized by two random variables: the gain and the buildup time. The evaluation of the variance of the photocurrent under this model leads to the definition of the shot-noise-equivalent bandwidth of the APD, which captures the statistical correlation between the gain and the buildup time. It is shown that the shot-noise-equivalent bandwidth in GaAs APDs is greater, by approximately 30%, than the traditional buildup-time-limited 3-dB bandwidth, which is calculated from the mean of the impulse-response function. A thorough analysis of the performance of APD-based integrate-and-dump digital receivers reveals that the strong correlation between the gain and the buildup time accentuates intersymbol interference (ISI) noise, and thus, adversely affects receiver sensitivity at high transmission rates beyond previously known limits.


In order to extend the data available for the identification of carbonyl compounds, the x-ray powder diffraction patterns of sixty-four 2,4-dinitrophenylhydrazones of aldehydes and ketones were determined. An alphabetical table includes 39 additional compounds found in the literature. A second numerical table indexes the spacing and intensities of the three strongest lines in Hanawalt groups. The complete new diffraction pattern data are available from the American Documentation Institute.