A Spatial Decision Support System (SDSS) provides support for decision makers and should not be viewed as replacing human intelligence with machines. Therefore it is reasonable that decision makers are able to use a feature to analyze the provided spatial decision support in detail to crosscheck the digital support of the SDSS with their own expertise. Spatial decision support is based on risk and resource maps in a Geographic Information System (GIS) with relevant layers e.g. environmental, health and socio-economic data. Spatial fuzzy logic allows the representation of spatial properties with a value of truth in the range between 0 and 1. Decision makers can refer to the visualization of the spatial truth of single risk variables of a disease. Spatial fuzzy logic rules that support the allocation of limited resources according to risk can be evaluated with measure theory on topological spaces, which allows to visualize the applicability of this rules as well in a map. Our paper is based on the concept of a spatial fuzzy logic on topological spaces that contributes to the development of an adaptive Early Warning And Response System (EWARS) providing decision support for the current or future spatial distribution of a disease. It supports the decision maker in testing interventions based on available resources and apply risk mitigation strategies and provide guidance tailored to the geo-location of the user via mobile devices. The software component of the system would be based on open source software and the software developed during this project will also be in the open source domain, so that an open community can build on the results and tailor further work to regional or international requirements and constraints. A freely available EWARS Spatial Fuzzy Logic Demo was developed wich enables a user to visualize risk and resource maps based on individual data in several data formats.


Key messages
This brief explores Indonesia's national environment and development policy climate and whether it is conducive to operationalizing an integrated landscape approach (ILA). The findings presented here complement a parallel infobrief by Maryani et al. (2021).
We find policies and development plans such as the One Map policy, Social Forestry program, and Indonesian Sustainable Palm Oil policy embody the overarching principles of a landscape approach (i.e. multiple land uses, multi-stakeholder collaboration, etc.). However, in many cases, these well-intended policies do not translate into practice at the local scale.
Challenge areas include: identifying common concern entry points, clarifying rights and responsibilities, enhancing stakeholder capacity, meaningful engagement of multiple stakeholders, and identifying a negotiated and transparent change logic.
We suggest that a greater commitment to these principles and the adoption of a landscape approach holds potential to enhance Indonesian policy performance and ensure that policy development is more representative of national and local concerns and practices.


Generally, in Danmaku video websites, users have two types of behaviors: watching and posting Danmaku comments. However, current literature only focused on the adoption of Danmaku and seldom discussed the differences between watching and posting behaviors. To fill this gap, we design our model based on S-O-R framework and posit that a sense of virtual community (SOVC) and perceived value composed of information value and emotional value affected by information and system qualities determine the two behaviors. Data collected from 175 respondents was used to test the model. We found that 1) intention to post largely comes from SOVC and emotional value, 2) intention to watch only depends on emotional value, and 3) interactivity and information quality are related to two perceived value significantly while visual appeal only correlates with emotional value. This study provides a new perspective for further understanding of users' participation behaviors in Danmaku websites.


Spectral clustering has been a popular data clustering algorithm. This category of approaches often resort to other clustering methods, such as K-Means, to get the final cluster. The potential flaw of such common practice is that the obtained relaxed continuous spectral solution could severely deviate from the true discrete solution. In this paper, we propose to impose an additional orthonormal constraint to better approximate the optimal continuous solution to the graph cut objective functions. Such a method, called spectral rotation in literature, optimizes the spectral clustering objective functions better than K-Means, and improves the clustering accuracy. We would provide efficient algorithm to solve the new problem rigorously, which is not significantly more costly than K-Means. We also establish the connection between our method andK-Means to provide theoretical motivation of our method. Experimental results show that our algorithm consistently reaches better cut and meanwhile outperforms in clustering metrics than classic spectral clustering methods.


Public health practice has to date concerned itself mostly with environmental determinants of health and disease and has paid scant attention to genetic variations within the population. The advances brought about by genomics is changing these perceptions. Many predict that this knowledge will enable health promotion messages and disease prevention programmes to be specifically directed at susceptible individuals or at subgroups of the population, based on their genetic profile. Obviously, the integration of genomics into public health research, policy and practice will be one of the most important future challenges that our health care systems will face. In this context, Public Health Genomics (PHG), defined as the responsible and effective translation of genome-based knowledge and technologies into public policy and health services for the benefit of population health, will encounter these chances and challenges.


In order to benefit from eLearning, institutions should conduct considerable up-front analysis to assess their eLearning readiness. Studies show that there are numerous models that have been developed, however, they are used in developed counties whose eReadiness is high hence not applicable in developing countries. This paper includes a model that has been developed to assess eLearning readiness of lecturers from institutions of higher learning in Kenya. It investigates the eLearning readiness of lecturers from the University of Nairobi, and the objective was to carry out a diagnostic eLearning readiness assessment of lecturers and determine the factors that influence eLearning readiness. The questionnaires were administered to the lecturers. The results obtained indicate that an overwhelming majority are ready. In addition, the study results show that there is no significant relationship between age, gender, and level of education on eLearning readiness. The study results indicate that technological readiness is the most important factor followed by culture readiness. Most of the lecturers felt that more training on content development need to be conducted. In conclusion, the lecturers are ready for eLearning but the ICT infrastructure is not adequate enough to support the use of eLearning.


Aim Biological invasions facilitate ecosystem transformation by altering the structure and function, diversity, dominance and disturbance regimes. A classic case is the grass‐fire cycle in which grass invasion increases the frequency, scale and/or intensity of wildfires and promotes the continued invasion of invasive grasses. Despite wide acceptance of the grass‐fire cycle, questions linger about the relative roles that interspecific plant competition and fire play in ecosystem transformations. Location Sonoran Desert Arizona Upland of the Santa Catalina Mountains, Arizona, USA. Methods We measured species cover, density and saguaro (Carnegiea gigantea) size structure along gradients of Pennisetum ciliare invasion at 10 unburned/ ungrazed P. ciliare patches. Regression models quantified differences in diversity, cover and density with respect to P. ciliare cover, and residence time and a Fisher's exact test detected demographic changes in saguaro populations. Because P. ciliare may have initially invaded locations that were both more invasible and less diverse, we ran analyses with and without the plots in which initial infestations were located. Results Richness and diversity decreased with P. ciliare cover as did cover and density of most dominant species. Richness and diversity declined with increasing time since invasion, suggesting an ongoing transformation. The proportion of old-to-young Carnegiea gigantea was significantly lower in plots with dominant P. ciliare cover. Main conclusions Rich desert scrub (15‐25 species per plot) was transformed into depauperate grassland (2‐5 species per plot) within 20 years following P. ciliare invasion without changes to the fire regime. While the onset of a grass‐ fire cycle may drive ecosystem change in the later stages and larger scales of grass invasions of arid lands, competition by P. ciliare can drive small-scale transformations earlier in the invasion. Linking competition-induced transformation rates with spatially explicit models of spread may be necessary for predicting landscape-level impacts on ecosystem processes in advance of a grass‐fire cycle.


STEP-BY-STEP: A Proven, Easy-to-Follow System for Starting a Blog from Scratch You have great info to share and need a platform to reach as many people as possible? You are running a business and are looking to increase traffic to your website? You are looking to blogging as an income source? If any of this rings true, this book is for you! It will give you the tools to get started in easy-to-understand language. Plenty of pictures to illustrate each step, as well as a massive resource chapter for further training. Start Blogging Today.... Starting a WordPress blog is easy and does not require any tech knowledge or experience with web design, html, css, etc. This proven 7-Step formula will get you started quickly and efficiently. In addition, you will learn what it takes to become a successful blogger and how to best hone your skills and monetize your blog. Step #1: Web Software - What is WordPress and why do most successful bloggers use it? Step #2: Hosting - Finding a good home base for your blog Step #3: Creating your Brand - Choosing and registering your domain name Step #4: WordPress Set up: A first look at your site & features Step #5: Pick a Theme - Styling your site to awesomeness Step #6: Plugins, Mailing Lists & Google Analytics - Turning your blog into a performance ninja Step #7: Blogging & Marketing Training - Learning from the MASTERS Would You Like To Know More? Download now and start your blog today! Scroll to the top of the page and select the "buy" button.


We consider simulating quantum systems on digital quantum computers. We show that the performance of quantum simulation can be improved by simultaneously exploiting the commutativity of Hamiltonian, the sparsity of interactions, and the prior knowledge of initial state. We achieve this using Trotterization for a class of correlated electrons that encompasses various physical systems, including the plane-wave-basis electronic structure and the Fermi-Hubbard model. We estimate the simulation error by taking the transition amplitude of nested commutators of Hamiltonian terms within the η-electron manifold. We develop multiple techniques for bounding the transition amplitude and the expectation of general fermionic operators, which may be of independent interest. We show that it suffices to use O ( n η2/3 + nη ) gates to simulate electronic structure in the plane-wave basis with n spin orbitals and η electrons up to a negligible factor, improving the best previous result in second quantization while outperforming the first-quantized simulation when η = Ω ( √ n). We also obtain an improvement for simulating the Fermi-Hubbard model. We construct concrete examples for which our bounds are almost saturated, giving a nearly tight Trotterization of correlated electrons.


Roger Fry, a core member of the Bloomsbury Group, was involved with all aspects of the art market as artist, critic, curator, historian, journalist, advisor to collectors, and gallery operator. He is especially remembered as the person who introduced postimpressionist art to Britain. Reprinted in this volume are seventeen of Fry's works on commerce in art. Although he had no formal training in economics, Fry addressed the art market as a modern economist might do. It is therefore fitting that his writings receive here an original interpretation from the perspective of a modern economist, Craufurd D. Goodwin. Goodwin explores why Fry's work is both a landmark in the history of cross-disciplinary thought and a source of fresh insights into a wide range of current policy questions. The new writings included contain Fry's most important contributions to theory, history, and debates over policy as he explored the determinants of the supply of art, the demand for art, and the art market institutions that facilitate exchange. His ideas and speculations are as stimulating and provocative today as when they were written. "A fascinating selection of essays by one of the twentieth century's most thoughtful and stimulating critics. Goodwin's introduction sets the stage beautifully, providing useful links to Veblen and Keynes." --D. E. Moggridge, University of Toronto " Art and the Market uncovers new connections between aesthetics and art in the Bloomsbury Group...Goodwin adds significantly to the understanding of cultural economics in the work of Fry himself as well as J. M. Keynes and even Leonard and Virginia Woolf." --S. P. Rosenbaum, University of Toronto "All those interested in the arts and economics, and their connections, will be delighted by this collection, as will be students of Bloomsbury." --Peter Stansky, Stanford University Craufurd D. Goodwin is James B. Duke Professor of Economics, Duke University.


This paper provides an examination of both the qualities and limitations of the most salient MALL (Mobil Assisted Language Learning) applications available at the moment by assessing their features from a pedagogic point of view. Operating systems like Google's open source Android, Apple's iOS, and Microsoft's Windows 7, are getting more sophisticated all the time and now have the potential to dramatically change ESL. These devices support individual and collaborative learning and are used by methodologists, linguistic engineers and technological enterprises to develop technology which assists students to learn anytime and anywhere. As a consequence, a large amount of applications for mobile phones, tablets and i-pod players are being employed in second language learning. These applications are the object of our analysis. The underlying motivation for our investigation is the fact that, although the multifarious stimuli from a variety of channels (sound, image, interaction, etc.) are certainly appealing to learners, mobile learning applications also require the thoughtful integration of second language pedagogy. The results here presented are the starting point for the development of MALL applications for EFL teaching/learning as part of the work carried out by linguists and IT engineers within the context of the SO-CALL-ME project in Spain.


This review deals with the cellular mechanisms that transport milk constituents or the precursors of milk constituents into, out of, and across the mammary secretory cell. The various milk constituents are secreted by different intracellular routes, and these are outlined, including the paracellular pathway between interstitial fluid and milk that is present in some physiological states and in some species throughout lactation. Also considered are the in vivo and in vitro methods used to study mammary transport and secretory mechanisms. The main part of the review addresses the mechanisms responsible for uptake across the basolateral cell membrane and, in some cases, for transport into the Golgi apparatus and for movement across the apical membrane of sodium, potassium, chloride, water, phosphate, calcium, citrate, iodide, choline, carnitine, glucose, amino acids and peptides, and fatty acids. Recent work on the control of these processes, by volume-sensitive mechanisms for example, is emphasized. The review points out where future work is needed to gain an overall view of milk secretion, for example, in marsupials where milk composition changes markedly during development of the young, and particularly on the intracellular coordination of the transport processes that result in the production of milk of relatively constant composition at a particular stage of lactation in both placental and marsupial mammals.


This study investigated the size distribution of particles generated from a laser ablation process applied for the decontamination of a hot cell contaminated with radionuclides. To simulate the hot cell contamination conditions, a stainless steel 304 (STS 304) plate on which Co and Cs ions (water soluble radionuclides, WSRs) were deposited and STS 304 specimens coated with Eu2O3 and CeO2 (water insoluble radionuclides, WIRs) were prepared. The particle size distribution and concentration for each contamination condition were then measured. In addition, the filtration characteristics of the particles produced from the laser ablation processes were examined using a high efficiency air (HEPA) filter to completely remove these particles. Under the same laser ablation conditions, the particle concentrations for the water insoluble‐contaminated specimen were higher than those for the water soluble‐contaminated specimen. The mobility diameter of particles showing the highest concentration ranged from 70 to 80 nm for all tests. For the specimens contaminated with Cs ion, when a potassium salt such as KNO3 or KOH was added, the concentration of particles generated under the same fluence increased owing to a removal in the form of Cs oxide, such as Cs2O. The overall collection efficiency of the tested HEPA filter for the particles generated from the laser ablation was over 99.4% regardless of the type of contaminated specimen. Consequently, it was confirmed that a high efficiency air filter is very effective as a means to capture particles produced from the hot cell decontamination process using laser ablation technique. © 2012 American Institute of Chemical Engineers Environ Prog, 32: 649–654, 2013


In recent years, people have become increasingly attentive to light pollution influences on their eyes. In the visible spectrum, short-wave blue light with wavelength between 415 nm and 455 nm is closely related to eye light damage. This high energy blue light passes through the cornea and lens to the retina causing diseases such as dry eye, cataract, age-related macular degeneration, even stimulating the brain, inhibiting melatonin secretion, and enhancing adrenocortical hormone production, which will destroy the hormonal balance and directly affect sleep quality. Therefore, the effect of Blu-rays on ocular is becoming an important concern for the future. We describe blue light's effects on eye tissues, summarize the research on eye injury and its physical prevention and medical treatment.


The Kondo effect is one of the most studied examples of strongly correlated quantum many-body physics. Another type of strongly correlated physics that has only recently been explored in detail (and become experimentally accessible) is that of ultrastrong coupling between light and matter. Here, we study a system which we denote as"Kondo QED") that combines both phenomena, consisting of a two-impurity Anderson model ultra-strongly coupled to a single-mode cavity. While presented as an abstract model, it is relevant for a range of future hybrid cavity-QED systems. Using the hierarchical equations of motion approach we show that the ultrastrong coupling of cavity photons to the electronic states (impurity) noticeably suppresses the electronic Kondo resonance due to the destruction of many-body correlations of the Kondo cloud. We observe this transfer of correlations from the Kondo cloud to the cavity by computing the entropy and mutual information of the impurity-cavity subsystems. In addition, in the weak lead-coupling limit and at zero-bias, the model exhibits a ground-state photon accumulation effect originating entirely from counter-rotating terms in the impurity-cavity interaction. Interestingly, in the strong lead-coupling limit, this accumulation is ``Kondo-enhanced'' by new transition paths opening when increasing the hybridization to the leads. This suggests a new mechanism for the generation of real photons from virtual states. We further show that the suppression of the Kondo effect is stable under broadening of the cavity resonance as a consequence of the interaction to an external bosonic continuum. Our findings pave the way for the simultaneous control of both the Kondo QED effect and a photon accumulation effect using the ultrastrong coupling of light and matter.


The translation of climate signals into sediments is a complex and poorly understood process, and one that is likely to be inherently nonlinear. A great deal of debate concerns the mismatch between the amplitude spectrum of astronomical insolation forcing and the amplitude spectrum of climatic signals derived from geological archives. Many ancient shallow-water successions, such as peritidal carbonates, are widely suggested to show evidence for eccentricity-band forcing, despite eccentricity having a negligible affect on insolation. Instead, eccentricity manifests itself primarily as the amplitude modulator of precession, which dominates the insolation signal at low to mid latitudes. The appearance and dominance of eccentricity-band frequencies in stratigraphic data can arise, however, without the need to appeal to complex nonlinearities in the climate system or depositional environment. Instead, eccentricity frequencies will appear as a consequence of signal-driven nondeposition that results in a rectification of the precession-dominated insolation signal. Furthermore, it can be shown that this rectification effect is capable of inducing a signal-driven modulation of cycle thickness (i.e., a frequency modulation) that can lead to a similar range of cycle bundling patterns documented from ancient shallow-water successions. Numerical experiments using an astronomical insolation solution as an input signal emphasize how eccentricity can dominate climate records that have undergone only partial rectification, and that are stratigraphically complete at astronomical time scales of resolution. These experiments, supported by geological observations, thus describe a viable mechanism capable of explaining the eccentricity paradox in ancient shallow-water successions, and also emphasize how measures of stratigraphic completeness at astronomical time scales furnish no clue as to the likely fidelity of the actual climate forcing records or their spectra.


The Department of Culture Media and Sport (2002) set a national target for sport and physical activity (PA) that 70% of the population be reasonably active by 2020. However, the proportion of the population meeting these levels of activity is currently only 30% (DoH, 2004a). There is now unequivocal evidence that the UK population is becoming increasingly inactive leading to increases in premature mortality and illness and disease. There is also clear evidence that increased PA can assist in both the avoidance and management of hypokinetic disease such as CHD and type II diabetes. Part of the health strategy for the UK includes the use of interventions such as PA referral schemes (PARS). Within such schemes specific techniques such as PA counselling are increasingly popular in both community and clinical settings (Tulloch et al., 2006).The aim of the thesis was to examine the context and efficacy of PARS, the prevalence of PA counselling and the levels of competence and consistency applied within empirical studies, and finally an assessment of the efficacy of behaviour change counselling in PARS settings based on Motivational Interviewing (Miller & Rollnick, 2002).The first study provided a systematic review of PA counselling from 1995 to 2006 and examined whether a theoretical framework was applied to each study reporting a PA counselling component and if so, which theory. Furthermore, it assessed the number of studies that report the use of a treatment fidelity framework in order to ensure internal validity of the intervention as well as an assessment of competence of the interventionist. Results indicated the dominant theory to be the transtheoretical model (TTM) and in particular stages of change (a sub-component of TTM). No studies applied a treatment fidelity framework with only 2 from 25 assessing competence of the PA counselling interventionist.Prior to delivering an MI intervention, the second study followed a treatment fidelity framework and assessed the competence of the investigator in delivering MI. This applied validated tools with regards to levels of MI competency and proficiency. Results indicated that the investigator demonstrated proficiency across MI global ratings of empathy and spirit and used commensurate levels of open to closed questions and complex to simple reflections.Having assessed the competency and consistency of the MI intervention Study 3 examined the impact of MI applied to a randomly allocated patient group referred to a PARS by GP's The results of the intervention, as compared to a control group receiving traditional PARS interventions only, were equivocal. Additional measures such as patient 'readiness to change' and 'exercise motivation' were also recorded and it appears from the current study that 'pure' MI is not appropriate for those patients reporting a high level of readiness.The final study assessed the impact of a 2-day training workshop in MI to an experienced PARS officer with little or no previous counselling training. The assessment of competence was carried out using the same measure as Study 2 for comparison. The impact of the training was assessed by applying a similar design to that of Study 3. Competency tests indicated the 2-day training did not create competence and proficiency across all facets of MI though adaptations were recorded. The impact on the patient adherence rates in the PARS was similarly equivocal to the previous study.


This study examined the effects of two factors, topic familiarity and search skills, on users' query reformulation behavior in health information searching. Four hypotheses were tested. Forty five graduate students participated in our study and searched for health-related topics on our experimental retrieval system. Their search actions were recorded by a server-side log system and their demographic information were collected, including their familiarity with the topics and their major. Our results suggest that topic familiarity and search skills do not have statistically significant impact on users' selection of query reformulation types. However, participants with a higher topic familiarity tend to make less spelling errors and prefer to use specific terms or search from different aspects. Participants with better searching skills are more likely to generalize and specify their queries and make less errors. In addition, significantly fewer reformulations were observed from the participants with higher topic familiarity. This indicates participants with higher topic familiarity can complete their task with less reformulation effort. There is no significant difference on the time spent on different types of query reformulations. The findings from this study yield practical implications for designing health information retrieval systems that support query reformulation for users with different knowledge and skills.


Norms are essential to the human condition. Whether in the guise of tradition, culture, canon or rules, norms are therefore central to studies in the humanities. This book focuses on Russian language culture of the post-revolutionary and post-Soviet periods, times when norms — linguistic and otherwise — have been eagerly debated, challenged, broken and redefined. Exploring the intersections between linguistic authority and creative response, an international team of scholars examines different realms of linguistic practice (literary fiction, internet slang, literary criticism and aesthetics, writers' blogs, linguistic play) and various arenas for "talk about talk" (the classroom, blogs, the media, or the courtroom). By combining various approaches and disciplines — linguistics, literary criticism, new media studies — the book as a whole explores the multiplicity of meanings that are accorded to the notion of linguistic norms in the Russian community. The result is both a broad and a detailed picture of important trends in modern Russian language culture.


Drilling was undertaken at five sites (739-743) on ODP Leg 119 on a transect across the continental shelf of Prydz Bay, East Antarctica, to elucidate the long-term glacial history of the area and to examine the importance of the area with respect to the development of the East Antarctic ice sheet as a whole. In addition to providing a record of glaciation spanning 36 m.y. or more, Leg 119 has provided information concerning the development of a continental margin under the prolonged influence of a major ice sheet. This has allowed the development of a sedimentary model that may be applicable not only to other parts of the Antarctic continental margin, but also to northern high-latitude continental shelves.The cored glacial sedimentary record in Prydz Bay consists of three major sequences, dominated by diamictite:1. An upper flat-lying sequence that ranges in thickness from a few meters in inner and western Prydz Bay to nearly 250 m in the outer or eastern parts of the bay. The uppermost few meters consist of Holocene diatom ooze and diatomaceous mud with a minor ice-rafted component overlying diamicton and diamictite of late Miocene to Quaternary age. The diamictite is mainly massive, but stratified varieties and minor mudstone and diatomite also occur.2. An upper prograding sequence cored at Sites 739 and 743, unconformly below the flat-lying sequence. This consists of a relatively steep (4° inclination) prograding wedge with a number of discrete sedimentary packages. At Sites 739 and 743 the sequence is dominated by massive and stratified diamictite, some of which shows evidence of slumping and minor debris flowage.3. A lower, more gently inclined, prograding sequence lies unconformably below the flat-lying sequence at Site 742 and the upper prograding sequence at Site 739. This extends to the base of both sites, to 316 and 487 mbsf, respectively.It is dominated by massive, relatively clast-poor diamictite which is kaolinite-rich, light in color, and contains sporadic carbonate-cemented layers. The lower part of Site 742 includes well-stratified diamictites and very poorly sorted mudstones. The base of this site has indications of large-scale soft-sediment deformation and probably represents proximity to the base of the glacial sequence.Facies analysis of the Prydz Bay glacial sequence indicates a range of depositional environments. Massive diamictite is interpreted largely as waterlain till, deposited close to the grounding line of a floating glacier margin, although basal till and debris flow facies are also present. Weakly stratified diamictite is interpreted as having formed close to or under the floating ice margin and influenced by the input of marine diatomaceous sediment (proximal glaciomarine setting).Well-stratified diamictite has a stronger marine input, being more diatom-rich, and probably represents a proximal-distal glaciomarine sediment with the glaciogenic component being supplied by icebergs. Other facies include a variety of mudstones and diatom-rich sediments of marine origin, in which an ice-rafted component is still significant. None of the recovered sediments are devoid of a glacial influence.The overall depositional setting of the prograding sequence is one in which the grounded ice margin is situated close to the shelf edge. Progradation was achieved primarily by deposition of waterlain till. The flat-lying sequence illustrates a complex sequence of advances and retreats across the outer part of the shelf, with intermittent phases of ice loading and erosion.The glacial chronology is based largely on diatom stratigraphy, which has limited resolution. It appears that ice reached the paleoshelf break by earliest Oligocene, suggesting full-scale development of the East Antarctic ice sheet by that time. The ice sheet probably dominated the continental margin for much of Oligocene to middle Miocene time. Retreat, but not total withdrawal of the ice sheet, took place in late Miocene to mid-Pliocene time. The late Pliocene to Pleistocene was characterized by further advances across, and progradation of, the continental shelf. Holocene time has been characterized by reduced glacial conditions and a limited influence of glacial processes on sedimentation.


Black and poor students are suspended from U.S. schools at higher rates than White and nonpoor students. While the existence of these disparities has been clear, the causes of the disparities have not. We use a novel data set to examine how and where discipline disparities arise. By comparing the punishments given to Black and White (or poor and nonpoor) students who fight one another, we address a selection challenge that has kept prior studies from identifying discrimination in student discipline. We find that Black and poor students are, in fact, punished more harshly than the students with whom they fight.


The process of vesicular exocytosis is a fast, tightly regulated and Ca2+-triggered
event mediated by SNARE complex formation. Although it is known that factors like
Munc18, Munc13 and CAPS are important in setting up the SNARE core fusion machinery
in a process called priming, the underlying molecular mechanism is not well understood.
Munc13 is of critical importance in priming synaptic vesicles (SVs) for release, and SV
exocytosis in hippocampal synapses is completely shut down in the absence of Munc13-1 and
Munc13-2, whereas in the case of synaptic dense core vesicles (DCVs) the synaptic
preference of DCV release is lost. CAPS was originally identified as a factor which
reconstitutes secretion in permeabilised neuroendocrine cells, and has since been recognised
as important in regulated release of DCVs in C. elegans and large dense core vesicles
(LDCVs) in neuroendocrine chromaffin cells, as well as in SV exocytosis in neurons.
Although overexpression studies had also implicated Munc13s in LDCV release in
chromaffin cells, in this cell type no LDCV release deficit had ever been demonstrated in
their absence, and CAPSs proteins had been suggested to be the main regulators of LDCV
exocytosis. To gain a more complete picture of potential differences in the regulation of SV
and LDCV exocytosis, we investigated the role of different Munc13 isoforms in chromaffin
cell LDCV exocytosis. This study is the first to report a deficit in chromaffin cell LDCV
exocytosis in the absence of Munc13 isoforms. The ubiquitous (ub)Munc13-2 is the dominant
isoform in murine chromaffin cells, and its deletion results in reductions of 60% of the fast
burst component, of 52% of the slow burst component and of 72% of the sustained
component, which is a more drastic reduction of release than in chromaffin cells of CAPS-deficient
mice. Munc13-1 expression is low in perinatal adrenal glands, and its deletion alone
did not result in significant changes in exocytosis, however its function in LDCV release
became apparent in the absence of Munc13-2. Munc13-1 appears to mostly contribute to the
slow burst and sustained component of release. By contrast, deletion of Baiap3, another
Munc13 isoform with relatively high expression in adrenal medulla, did not lead to changes
in LDCV exocytosis and its overexpression could not rescue the release deficit of Munc13-1/2-deficient cells. The remaining Munc13 isoforms, bMunc13-2, Munc13-3 and Munc13-4
are not expressed in perinatal adrenal glands and do not contribute to LDCV exocytosis in
this cell type. Taken together, our findings show that ubMunc13-2 and Munc13-1 regulate
LDCV exocytosis in chromaffin cells. Thus, at least in mammals, both Munc13s and CAPS proteins are critical in the regulation of both SV and LDCV exocytosis in neurons as well as
in neuroendocrine cells.


This study focuses on the factors contributing to the lack of emphasis by the Kedah Department of  Zakat  (KDoZ), Malaysia on the alleviation of poverty among the rural poor through  zakat  capital assistance programmes and employment opportunities. In this study, seven research questions were outlined. A mixed-methods study was developed to answer research questions 1, 2, 3 and 4. Research questions 5, 6 and 7 were answered using qualitative data. Quantitative data was collected from questionnaire. The sample size was 406 participants from among the capable poor who can work which received annual monetary assistance. Qualitative data was generated from the interviews with KDoZ officers (n=11) and participants for the qualitative method were selected purposefully. The responses to research questions 1, 2,3 and 4 show that the majority of the respondents were not aware of the existence of SHS. Respondents' awareness towards SHS programme is significantly related with the socio-economic and  zakat  assistance characteristics which are rate of districts' collection, number of years respondents receive  zakat  and distance of respondents' house from the KDoZ office. 80% of respondents interested to apply for the SHS programme. The factors contributing to apply SHS were current  zakat  assistance, current income, economic activity, lack of motivation and constraints. Furthermore, the lack of interest in SHS was significantly related to the age of the respondents. In answering research question 5, there were 3 factors leading to this approach by the KDoZ: 1) the KDoZ faces the constraints of low  zakat collection caused by two subscales; 2) a high rate of failure among the recipients or the poor in economic activities; and 3) incompetence of members of the KDoZ committee. The answers to research question 6 were difficulties in dealing with the poor, responsibility of the state government, and the committee's lack of interest. The answers to research question 7 were factors related to politics, the committee and priority in providing financial assistance. There are 5 main findings which hindered the effective use of  zakat , which are capitalist thinking, local collection rates, avoiding the query of Sultan, a large number of committee members and limited  zakat  funds allocated for administration. Finally, recommendations were provided to overcome these problems. Several additional recommendations for future research have emerged from this study and these have been briefly outlined.


The inositol phospholipid PtdIns(3,4,5)P3 is an important signaling lipid, the effects of which are predominantly mediated by its interaction with proteins containing pleckstrin homology (PH) domains. In neutrophils and the model organism Dictyostelium discoideum, PtdIns(3,4,5)P3 plays an important role in chemotaxis. In D. discoideum, a soluble inositol polyphosphate diphosphoinositol pentakisphosphate (InsP7) was found to inhibit chemotaxis by competing for PH domains. Now Jia et al. show that in neutrophils, Ins(1,3,4,5)P4 appears to serve as the soluble competitor for PH domains and consequently negatively influences neutrophil response to the chemoattractant fMLP. Stimulation of HL60 cells, a human cell line with characteristics of neutrophils, with fMLP rapidly and transiently increased the concentration of Ins(1,3,4,5)P4, increased the activity of the enzyme that produces this inositol polyphosphate, InsP3K, and increased the association of Ins(1,3,4,5)P4 with a PH domain (using a PH domain linked to green fluorescent protein PHAkt-GFP). Application of a membrane-permeant derivative of Ins(1,3,4,5)P4 was used to artificially increase Ins(1,3,4,5)P4 concentration and, in HL60 cells, this inhibited chemoattractant-induced membrane translocation of PHAkt-GFP and phosphorylation of endogenous Akt, which is dependent on membrane association. In mouse neutrophils, artificial elevation of Ins(1,3,4,5)P4 inhibited fMLP-stimulated chemotaxis (both directed movement and speed of migration). InsP3KB was the only isoform of InsP3K detected in mouse or human neutrophils. Analysis of neutrophils from mice deficient in InsP3KB showed that responses to fMLP were augmented (higher proportion of the kinase Akt was phosphorylated, abundance of filamentous actin was increased, and superoxide production was enhanced) compared with those in wild-type cells. Furthermore, the InsP3KB-deficient cells showed enhanced chemotaxis and increased sensitivity to chemoattractant stimulation. InsP3KB-deficient mice (in a mouse peritoneal inflammation assay) or InsP3KB-deficient neutrophils (in an adoptive transfer assay) showed enhanced recruitment to the site of bacterial or inflammatory agent injection compared with that of wild-type mice or cells from the host animal. Thus, Ins(1,3,4,5)P4 appears to serve as a negative regulator of neutrophil stimulation, which may help keep the inflammatory response in check. Y. Jia, K. K. Subramanian, C. Erneux, V. Pouillon, H. Hattori, H. Jo, J. You, D. Zhu, S. Schurmans, H. R. Luo, Inositol 1,3,4,5-tetrakisphosphate negatively regulates phosphatidylinositol-3,4,5-trisphophate signaling in neutrophils. Immunity 27, 453-467 (2007). [PubMed]


Juries are deeply enshrined by the U.S. Constitution and firmly embedded in our system of justice. Thus, it is surprising that jurors do not yet have something akin to their own widely adopted bill of rights. Regrettably, this is the result of too many trial judges failing to practice WWJW — "what would jurors want" — a jury centered approach to judging. The state of Arizona, with its launch in 1993 of the Arizona Jury Project, is the pioneering jurisdiction of a more jury-centered approach. If trial judges embraced WWJW it would engender greater respect for jurors and lead to trial innovations which would significantly enhance the juror experience. These innovations would also increase the fairness of jury trials. Adopting a bill of rights for jurors improves jurors' positive experiences and feelings about trial by jury as they participate in the purest form of democracy in action. This article proposes five bill of rights that have been proven to achieve these goals. If adopted by courts and practiced by trial judges, jurors across the nation will exit courthouses as our greatest community ambassadors for the Sixth and Seventh Amendment rights to trial by jury. This is an important step to ensuring that vanishing civil jury trials are not, going, going, gone!


Internet technology offered new development to goods and service trade in easy way without geographical limit, especially in major cities, included 8% of total citizens who did buying through internet, especially college students. The trend of online shopping was not free from
crime. It also contained risk like deception, credit card hijacking (carding) and the goods bought sometimes different since the buyer didn't touch, feel or try the product in real ways. In latest day, ATM hijacking to Indonesian Banks became new phenomena. In this, buying through internet could use ATM card as online trading payment by transferring money but the students still did buying through internet and there were factors backed the decision to buy through internet.
The research was survey quantitative descriptive, the subjects were 100 college students who once did or doing online shopping. Sampling used incidental sampling. the research used questionnaire method as data collection and used interview to clarify the questionnaire answers.
Data analysis used percentage. The research purpose were to find out factors influenced students in buying through internet decision.
From the research and interview, there could be concluded that eight factors influenced college students in buying decision through internet (online shopping), group reference was 83%, trust and attitude was 53%, culture was 48%, experience was 44%, personality was 33%, selfconcept
was 23%, social class was 11%, family was 5%. Reference group was the most dominant factor influenced consumer in buying through internet decision in college students of University of Muhammadiyah Malang.


Abstract. Aerosol mass spectrometry has proved to be a powerful tool to measure submicron particulate composition with high time resolution. Factor analysis of mass spectra (MS) collected worldwide by aerosol mass spectrometer (AMS) demonstrates that submicron organic aerosol (OA) is usually composed of several major components, such as oxygenated (OOA), hydrocarbon-like (HOA), biomass burning (BBOA), and other primary OA. In order to help interpretation of component MS from factor analysis of ambient OA datasets, AMS measurements of different primary sources is required for comparison. Such work, however, has been very scarce in the literature, especially for high resolution MS (HR-MS) measurements, which performs improved characterization by separating the ions of different elemental composition at each m/z in comparison with unit mass resolution MS (UMR-MS) measurements. In this study, primary emissions from four types of Chinese cooking (CC) and six types of biomass burning (BB) were simulated systematically and measured using an Aerodyne High-Resolution Time-of-Flight AMS (HR-ToF-AMS). The MS of the CC emissions show high similarity, with m/z 41 and m/z 55 being the highest signals; the MS of the BB emissions also show high similarity, with m/z 29 and m/z 43 being the highest signals. The MS difference between the CC and BB emissions is much bigger than that between different CC (or BB) types, especially for the HR-MS. The O/C ratio of OA ranges from 0.08 to 0.13 for the CC emissions and from 0.18 to 0.26 for the BB emissions. The UMR ions of m/z 43, m/z 44, m/z 57, and m/z 60, usually used as tracers in AMS measurements, were examined for their HR-MS characteristics in the CC and BB emissions. In addition, the MS of the CC and BB emissions are also compared with component MS from factor analysis of ambient OA datasets observed in China, as well as with other AMS measurements of primary sources in the literature. The MS signatures of cooking and biomass burning emissions revealed in this study can be used as important reference for factor analysis of ambient OA datasets, especially for the relevant studies in East Asia.


Illness is a major risk to people's livelihoods in resource-poor settings, particularly where there are rising levels of chronic illness. Measures that improve access to treatment are increasingly seen as a vital form of social protection for vulnerable households, and central to the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals. International attention is also focussed on cash transfers as a strand of social protection, and on the potential complementarities between free health care and cash transfers in assisting vulnerable people to cope with illness-related shocks. South Africa provides an interesting setting to examine how households are accessing social protection measures because the government has removed some user fees, implemented hospital-level exemptions and extended cash transfers including the non-contributory pension and child support grant. This paper presents findings from household research in rural South Africa. Qualitative and quantitative methods were used to assess the links between illness-related costs and impoverishment over time, the protection effects of free health services, cash transfers and social networks, and the factors influencing access to these three forms of social protection. Different degrees of success in drawing on these resources affected capacity to cope with illnesses and made a considerable difference to whether households sustained their livelihoods, struggled or declined. Cash transfers combined well with free health care to build resilience among some households. However, households without access to at least two strands of the social protection net were impoverished by the direct and indirect costs of long-term illnesses. The implications for policies on improving the uptake and coverage of social protection measures are discussed. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.


In the present work the results of an experimental study on the inital stages of alumi-num oxidation are reported.
Despite a long-standing theoretical and experimental effort, this process still presents some puzzling characteristics. Among them, the direct, activated character of the chemi-sorption process: the initial sticking coefficient S 0 is approximately 1% for thermal mole-cules, E i = 0.025 eV, but rises to 90% at E i = 0.9 eV.
This findings are at variance with the results of recent density functional theory cal-culations, predicting near unity reaction probability, even at low E i . In an attempt to clar-ify the dynamics of the initial stages of the oxidation process, I investigated the O 2 /Al interaction by means of molecular beam and laser spectrometric techniques (resonantly enhanced multiphoton ionization - REMPI). The results of the present work, coupled to the finding of scanning tunneling microscopy investigations performed by A.J.
Komrowski and A.C. Kummel of the University of California, provide compelling evi-dence for the existence of an abstractive pathway for the dissociation of oxygen on alu-minum. The REMPI study also allowed to highlight the dependence of the abstraction coeffi-cient on both the translational and rotational energy of the incoming oxygen molecules.


Abstract. Fine-mode aerosol usually comes from anthropogenic emissions. The fine-mode aerosol optical depth (AODf) is an important parameter for estimating the particulate matter with an aerodynamic diameter little than 2.5 μm (PM2.5). Compared to the ground-based observations, AODf products from satellite remote sensing have an advantage of high spatial coverage, which is suitable for monitoring the air quality at a regional or global scale. Up to now, AODf products have been released by several sensors, such as the single-angle multi-spectral intensity sensor MODIS and multi-angle multi-spectral polarization sensor POLDER, then what're the different performances of AODf products from them? In this study, the different spatial resolution AODf products respectively from MODIS latest Collection 6.1 (C6.1, 3 and 10 km) and POLDER latest level 2 version 1.01 (L2, 18 km) were firstly compared with each other in Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei (BTH) domains. Then those products were validated against the ground-based AERosol RObotic NETwork (AERONET) measurements, where has been suffering the severe air pollution since decades ago. The comparison of yearly averaged AODf products between MODIS and POLDER shows a good consistency on the spatial distribution, the higher spatial resolution products of MODIS show more details, both low values of AODf appeared in the northwest area with small population and industry, high values appeared in the southeast area with lots of cities, industries, and large population. However, the whole yearly AODf average values of MODIS are higher than that of POLDER. The results of validation against AERONET show that the accuracy of AODf products at 865 nm from POLDER (R = 0.94, RMSE = 0.05) is high than that at 550 nm of MODIS (3 km: R = 0.69, RMSE = 0.32; 10 km: R = 0.76, RMSE = 0.3). In this study, the performance of different spatial resolutions AODf products retrieved from the intensity (MODIS 3 and 10 km) and polarized sensors (POLDER 18 km) were evaluated. Those results not only have a great significance to provide users amore appropriate choice of the AODf products in the BTH region but also display that the accuracy and spatial resolution of MODIS and POLDER AODf products need to be improved.


Background Intimate partner violence (IPV) is very high in Africa. However, information obtained from the increasing number of African studies on IPV among pregnant women has not been scientifically analyzed. This paper presents a systematic review summing up the evidence from African studies on IPV prevalence and risk factors among pregnant women. Methods A key-word defined search of various electronic databases, specific journals and reference lists on IPV prevalence and risk factors during pregnancy resulted in 19 peer-reviewed journal articles which matched our inclusion criteria. Quantitative articles about pregnant women from Africa published in English between 2000 and 2010 were reviewed. At least two reviewers assessed each paper for quality and content. We conducted meta-analysis of prevalence data and reported odds ratios of risk factors. Results The prevalence of IPV during pregnancy ranges from 2% to 57% (n = 13 studies) with meta-analysis yielding an overall prevalence of 15.23% (95% CI: 14.38 to 16.08%). After adjustment for known confounders, five studies retained significant associations between HIV and IPV during pregnancy (OR1.48–3.10). Five studies demonstrated strong evidence that a history of violence is significantly associated with IPV in pregnancy and alcohol abuse by a partner also increases a woman's chances of being abused during pregnancy (OR 2.89–11.60). Other risk factors include risky sexual behaviours, low socioeconomic status and young age. Conclusion The prevalence of IPV among pregnant women in Africa is one of the highest reported globally. The major risk factors included HIV infection, history of violence and alcohol and drug use. This evidence points to the importance of further research to both better understand IPV during pregnancy and feed into interventions in reproductive health services to prevent and minimize the impact of such violence.


I. Overview 1. Foundations of a Family Resilience Approach 2. Family Diversity and Complexity in a Changing World: Varied Challenges and Pathways in Resilience II. Key Family Processes in Resilience 3. Belief Systems: The Heart and Soul of Resilience 4. Organizational Processes: Relational and Structural Supports 5. Communication Processes: Facilitating Meaning Making, Mutual Support, and Problem Solving III. Practice Applications 6. Assessing Family Resilience: Useful Maps for Practice and Research 7. Practice Principles and Guidelines to Strengthen Family Resilience 8. Applying a Family Resilience Framework in Community-Based Services IV. Facilitating Family Resilience through Crisis, Transition, and Persistent Challenges 9. Challenges and Resilience over the Family Life Cycle: A Developmental Systems Perspective 10. Loss, Recovery, and Resilience 11. Traumatic Loss and Collective Trauma: Strengthening Family and Community Resilience 12. Serious Illness and Disabilities: Family Challenges and Resilience 13. Nurturing Resilience in Vulnerable, Multi-Stressed Families 14. Reconnection and Reconciliation: Healing Relational Wounds Appendix I. Walsh Family Resilience Questionnaire Appendix II. Developing Resilience-Based Genograms: Outline and Sample Questions Appendix III. Exploring the Spiritual Dimension in Family Life: Sources of Distress and Resources for Well-Being, Healing, and Resilience References Index


Laughing Kookaburras are the largest kingfishers in the world, and Blue-winged Kookaburras are not far behind. Their size and distinctive shape and posture make them easily recognisable; their comical and personable characters make them readily memorable. They are able to live in a wide variety of habitats, and adapt to living around humans relatively well. This cheerful familiarity has caused them to figure prominently in the psyches and folklores of all peoples who have inhabited Australia. Kookaburras live in family groups marked by the extremes of social behaviour. Whilst in the nest, chicks fight their siblings for dominance and food so aggressively that the smallest chick is often killed. In complete contrast, many adult kookaburras delay their own breeding in order to help their relatives raise young. Kookaburra: King of the Bush provides a complete overview of kookaburras and their unique place in Australian culture and natural history.


The effectiveness of thin-layer sand capping for contaminated sediment management (capping with a layer of thickness comparable to the depth of benthic interactions) is explored through experiments with laboratory-scale microcosms populated with the deposit-feeding oligochaete, Ilyodilus templetoni. Passive sampling of pore water concentrations in the microcosms using polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS)-coated fibers enabled quantification of high-resolution vertical concentration profiles that were used to infer contaminant migration rates and mechanisms. Observed concentration profiles were consistent with models that combine traditional contaminant transport processes (sorption-retarded diffusion) with bioturbation. Predictions of bioaccumulation based on contaminant pore water concentrations within the surface layer of the cap correlated well with observed bioaccumulation (correlation coefficient of 0.92). The results of this study show that thin-layer sand caps of contaminated sediments can be effective at reducing the bioaccumulation of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) provided the thickness of the cap layer exceeds the depth of organism interaction with the sediments and the pore water concentrations within the biologically active zone remain low (e.g., when molecular diffusion controls transport from the underlying sediment layer).


Every year, more than thirty-five million people from all over the world visit Las Vegas; only two million call the city home. Everyday Las Vegas takes a close look at the lives of those who live in a place the rest of the world considers exotic, even decadent. Using broad research, including interviews with more than one hundred Las Vegans, Rex Rowley - who grew up in Las Vegas - examines everyday life in a place that markets itself as an escape from mundane reality. Rowley considers such topics as why people move to Las Vegas, the nature of their work and personal lives, the impact of growth and rapid change, and interaction with the overwhelmingly touristic side of the city. He also considers the benefits and perils of living in a nonstop twenty four-hour city rich in entertainment options and easy access to gambling, drugs, and other addictions. His examination includes the previously unstudied role of neighbourhood casinos patronised by locals rather than tourists and the impact that a very mobile population has on schools, churches, and community life. Rowley considers the very different ways people perceive a place as insiders or outsiders, a dichotomy that arises when tourism is a mainstay of the local economy. His work offers insights into what Las Vegas can teach us about other cities and American culture in general. It also contributes to our understanding of how people relate to places and how the personality of a place influences the lives of people who live there.


Collegiate hookup culture advances ideas of masculinity but contradicts notions of appropriate feminine sexuality. Drawing on focus group and interview data with college students, I examine how a group of class- and race-privileged fraternity men face dilemmas as they enact a group constructed masculinity focused on sexual performance and the objectification of women. I employ a symbolic interactionist framework to illustrate how men, attentive to peer status yet anxious about the sexual stigmatization of women, draw on cultural ideas about appropriate feminine sexuality as they account for their approaches to sex and women (both with whom they interact sexually and how) along a range of intimacy—from hookups to committed relationships. I demonstrate that heterosexual interaction does not unequivocally link to masculine status and that men sometimes strive to limit the impact of casual sex or avoid it altogether.


Abstract Today's world is filled with technology resources such as cellphones, iPods, laptops and the internet. By using these technological resources, adult education ESOL teachers can improve instruction, boost learning and better prepare students for real world English use. This article examines advantages of technology use and offers examples of successful classroom implementation. Introduction Historically, technological inventions eventually require a corresponding change for classroom teachers. Quill pens evolved to fountain pens and then ballpoints. The abacus became a calculator. Typewriters were replaced by desktop computers. Each new invention has led to significant instructional shifts for educators. The 21st century calls for even greater response to and use of technology in classrooms. Many types of technology have been introduced that would have been unimaginable only a short time earlier. The iPod (200 1 ), wireless headset (2002), camera phone (2003), YouTube (2005) and iPhone (2007) are just a few examples (Bellis, n.d.). Technology resources used by many teachers for years are now being phased out. VHS and cassette tapes are following dodo birds and dinosaurs into extinction and being replaced by DVDs, CDs, iPods and the internet as new systems for playing videos and audio. This article explores the benefits of using current technology, offers suggestions for effective implementation and provides sample lessons for incorporating multiple technologies to enhance learning in adult ESOL classrooms. Benefits of Technology in Adult ESOL Classrooms New technology provides both an opportunity and an obligation for adult education ESOL teachers. Wappel (2010) puts it this way: "technology has made a huge impact on the teaching and learning of English as a Second Language in the U.S.A." She notes that teachers now have a vast array of technology resources to help students move from their native language to English. Further, Wappel (2010) contends that through the use of laptops, video cameras and especially the internet, students are making notable advances in their learning. Technology improves the quality and impact of the lessons, helping students perform better. Additionally, many students are able to enroll in regular college classes more quickly. She states that technology is a key component to the success of English language learners. Beare (1999) agrees about the power of technology in the classroom. He contends that computers provide advantages over more traditional instructional approaches. Beare notes that computers not only offer the option of listening exercises, but also the use of students' motor skills for typing, which can provide further enticement for learning. The engagement aspect of technology is another important benefit. All learners need stimulation and varied learning methods. Technology offers students the chance to "do" as they learn, using hands and minds. Clicking the mouse or typing words on the keyboard gives physical stimulation. Many online activities provide instant visual and/or verbal feedback with congratulations or corrections. Students whose instruction includes music videos are developing their listening skills. When maps, graphs, text or pictures are part of an online lesson, reading and study skills are exercised. Another notable advantage of technology use with items such as computers and iPods is that learning becomes self-paced. Students have more control over their learning. They can repeat exercises as they choose, or move on to the next items. They can determine which activities are most important to their needs and focus on those. Beare (1999) writes regarding the adult ESOL classroom, "Probably the strongest argument for the use of the computer in the classroom environment is that of student self-pacing." As an example, he notes that students using the computer for pronunciation help can record themselves and then repeat the process until they are satisfied with the results. …


An intuitively natural consistency condition for contingent plans is necessary and sufficient for a contingent plan to be rationalized by maximization of conditional expected utility. One alternative theory of choice under uncertainty, the weighted-utility theory developed by Chew Soo Hong (1983) does not entail that contingent plans will generally satisfy this condition. Another alternative theory, the minimax theory as formulated by Savage (1972), does entail the consistency condition (at least for singleton-valued plans).


G. E. Moore raised the question of whether consequentialists ought to maximize actual rather than expected value, and came down in favour of the former alternative. But rather recently Frank Jackson has presented an example which has been widely thought to clinch the case in favour of the alternative view. This article argues for a sort of compromise between these rival views, namely that while we ought to do what maximizes actual value, we ought to try to do what maximizes expected value. It is claimed that consequentialists could consistently adopt this view, though in Jackson's case they are certain that, if they try to maximize expected value, they shall most likely not maximize actual value.


The question of quality basic education in South Africa is critical to many poor households as this improves their future development and job prospects. The School Governing Bodies were established to govern schools and to ensure that quality basic education as a right is offered to those in need. This article considers the financial functional analysis of the School Governing Bodies (SGBs) in administering school funds, especially through its sub-committee on finance. The Limpopo Department of Education has published the prescripts for the management of school funds in the public schools for 2009 and 2011 respectively, in an attempt to empower the SGBs to improve the management of school funds. For the purpose of this article, schools in the rural areas of the Limpopo Province are focal point. The Primary data was collected by way of semi-structured interviews. A key finding in this investigation is that most of the SGB members are not adept with public financial management principles relevant for the schools, so that they could undertake their school financial oversight responsibilities. This lack of public finance literacy impedes the effective functioning of the SGBs in fulfilling their legislative mandate.


Broadcasting and gossiping are classical problems that have been widely studied for decades. In broadcasting, one source node wishes to send a message to every other node, while in gossiping, each node has a message that they wish to send to everyone else. Both are some of the most basic problems arising in communication networks. In this dissertation we study problems that generalize gossiping and broadcasting. For example, the source node may have several messages to broadcast or multicast. Many of the works on broadcasting in the literature are focused on homogeneous networks. The algorithms developed are more applicable to managing data on local-area networks. However, large-scale storage systems often consist of storage devices clustered over a wide-area network. Finding a suitable model and developing algorithms for broadcast that recognize the heterogeneous nature of the communication network is a significant part of this dissertation.
We also address the problem of data collection in a wide-area network, which has largely been neglected, and is likely to become more significant as the Internet becomes more embedded in everyday life. We consider a situation where large amounts of data have to be moved from several different locations to a destination. In this work, we focus on two key properties: the available bandwidth can fluctuate, and the network may not choose the best route to transfer the data between two hosts.
We focus on improving the task completion time by re-routing the data through intermediate hosts and show that under certain network conditions we can reduce the total completion time by a factor of two. This is done by developing an approach for computing coordinated data collection schedules using network flows.


Background: Measurement of mean arterial blood pressure (MABP) is feasible during neonatal transition. Objective: The objective of this study was to investigate a potential influence of MABP on the cerebral regional oxygen saturation (crSO2) in preterm and term infants during the immediate neonatal transition. Materials and Methods: Preterm and term infants were included in this observational study. The crSO2 was measured by near-infrared spectroscopy with the INVOS 5100C (Somanetics Corp., Troy, MI, USA) during the immediate neonatal transition (15 min after birth). The near-infrared spectroscopy sensor was applied to the left forehead. Furthermore, a pulse oximeter was applied to monitor arterial oxygen saturation (SpO2) and heart rate (HR). Fifteen minutes after birth, blood pressure was measured noninvasively at the left upper arm. Cerebral fraction tissue oxygen extraction (cFTOE) was calculated from SpO2 and crSO2. To investigate a potential association between crSO2/cFTOE and MABP, we performed a correlation analysis. Results: A total of 462 preterm and term infants (186/292) were included. Mean gestational age was 31.0 ± 3.5 weeks for preterm infants and 38.9 ± 0.8 weeks for full term infants. Mean birth weight was 1.591 ± 630 g in preterm infants and 3.331 ± 461 g in term infants. There was a significant negative correlation between MABP and cFTOE (ρ = -0.19, p = 0.03) in preterm infants but not in term infants (ρ = 0.05, p = 0.39). There was no significant correlation between MABP and crSO2 in either group. Conclusion: MABP has an impact on cerebral oxygenation in preterm infants. Therefore, blood pressure monitoring during the immediate neonatal transition might be relevant for improving cerebral oxygenation especially in preterm infants.


The advances in technologies of cloud computing and mobile computing enable the newly emerging mobile cloud computing paradigm. Three approaches have been proposed for mobile cloud applications: 1) extending the access to cloud services to mobile devices; 2) enabling mobile devices to work collaboratively as cloud resource providers; 3) augmenting the execution of mobile applications on portable devices using cloud resources. In this paper, we focus on the third approach in supporting mobile data stream applications. More specifically, we study the computation partitioning, which aims at optimizing the partition of a data stream application between mobile and cloud such that the application has maximum speed/throughput in processing the streaming data. To the best of our knowledge, it is the first work to study the partitioning problem for mobile data stream applications, where the optimization is placed on achieving high throughput of processing the streaming data rather than minimizing the make span of executions in other applications. We first propose a framework to provide runtime support for the dynamic partitioning and execution of the application. Different from existing works, the framework not only allows the dynamic partitioning for a single user but also supports the sharing of computation instances among multiple users in the cloud to achieve efficient utilization of the underlying cloud resources. Meanwhile, the framework has better scalability because it is designed on the elastic cloud fabrics. Based on the framework, we design a genetic algorithm to perform the optimal partition. We have conducted extensive simulations. The results show that our method can achieve more than 2X better performance over the execution without partitioning.


In those authoritarian regimes that remained resilient throughout the Arab uprisings, the ruling elites have maintained their power through protest management strategies designed to include or, more frequently, exclude certain societal groups. This paper compares the strategies and their respective target groups in Algeria and Jordan, two cases of limited protests despite which authoritarianism has remained resilient. In both countries, inclusionary strategies towards protesters were pursued only half‐heartedly. When they failed, they were subsequently replaced by exclusionary mechanisms. More successful inclusionary strategies were aimed at another target, the regime's support base. The decreasing extent of political protests can thus hardly be attributed to responsive elite behaviour. The limited use but credible threat of repression together with discourses of deterrence prevented greater mobilisation, partly by invoking negative examples of the past or neighbouring countries. However, the massive reliance on exclusionary mechanisms calls the future stability of the Arab world into question.


The purpose of this article is to identify and discuss key issues in church growth movement and the litera- ture following in its wake, which represents vital sources for the emerging discipline in practical theology of church development. The church growth movement has had a strong impact on churches around the globe. Factors such as scriptural authority, evangelism, cultural openness and relevance, pastoral leader- ship, organization, planning, vision and goals are among issues and factors discussed in the literature. Among the shortcomings of church growth thinking is an all-too-simple theoretical reasoning, a lack of causal modeling and theological issues only superficially discussed. Oftentimes, the growth is assumed to come simply by addressing a few factors. Nevertheless, several of the issues and factors that are identified and discussed have influenced subsequent work on church development.


By some calculations, Texas became a net energy importer in 1991. In that year, the BTU (or heat) value of Texas consumption of petroleum products, natural gas, propane, and renewable energy (wood, wind, and solar) exceeded the BTU value of production of these materials for the first time since oil became the fuel of choice early in this century. This marked a historic moment in some sense because of the state's traditional role as the leading oil and gas exporter to the rest of the nation. But just how important was this event?


Since the 1950s, glucocorticoids (GCs) have been the most widely employed drugs in the treatment of inflammatory and autoimmune disorders, such as multiple sclerosis (MS). Short-time application of high-dose GCs is the first line therapy for acute relapses of MS. Several clinical studies even suggest that prolonged GC pulsed therapy may slow down MS disease progression as well. However, a plethora of GC-associated side effects derived from the ubiquitous expression of the glucocorticoid receptor (GR) restricts the use of these drugs. Therefore, to assess the full potential of GCs new pharmacological formulations and more insights about their mechanisms of action are needed.
For many years, T cells were proposed to be major targets of GCs in the treatment of neuroinflammation. In contrast, the relevance of myeloid cells for GC therapy is highlighted in this doctoral thesis. Using experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE) as a mouse model of CNS autoimmunity, we directed GC therapy to the myeloid compartment by means of state-of-the-art inorganic-organic hybrid nanoparticles (IOH-NPs). Although IOH-NPs loaded with betamethasone (BNPs) modulated both T cell survival and macrophage activation in vitro, in vivo BNPs selectively targeted myeloid cells. Moreover, BNPs achieved a therapeutic efficacy comparable to free GCs in the treatment of EAE. In this study BNPs were also proposed as an alternative to circumvent GC-derived side effects, however our data did not provide conclusive information in this respect yet.
Additionally, the roles of the two different GC-responsive nuclear receptors, the GR and the mineralocorticoid receptor (MR), were investigated in myeloid cells. In this cell compartment, GCs can act either via the GR in a deactivating manner, or via the MR promoting a pro-inflammatory state. Hence, we hypothesized that altering the balance between the GR and the MR might influence the course of EAE. Indeed, mice selectively devoid of MR in myeloid cells developed a milder EAE disease course compared to their littermate controls, and presented with a lower degree of demyelination. Consistent with these results, monocytes/macrophages exhibited a M2 phenotype in both the CNS and the periphery, and the proportion of reactive microglia in the spinal cord was reduced as well. Furthermore, our experiments revealed that, in consequence of the general myeloid anti-inflammatory state, Treg cell numbers increased in secondary lymphoid organs, where cytokine release by effector T cells was consequently impaired.
Taken together, this study provides evidence of the important implications of myeloid cells in the response to GCs during autoimmune inflammation, and supports the targeted delivery to the myeloid compartment as an alternative to improve the therapeutic features of synthetic GCs.


Sometimes solving climate change seems impossibly complex, and it is hard to know what changes we all can and should make to help. This book offers hope. Drawing on the latest research, Mark Jaccard shows us how to recognize the absolutely essential actions (decarbonizing electricity and transport) and policies (regulations that phase out coal plants and gasoline vehicles, carbon tariffs). Rather than feeling paralyzed and pursuing ineffective efforts, we can all make a few key changes in our lifestyles to reduce emissions, to contribute to the urgently needed affordable energy transition in developed and developing countries. More importantly, Jaccard shows how to distinguish climate-sincere from insincere politicians and increase the chance of electing and sustaining these leaders in power. In combining the personal and the political, The Citizen's Guide to Climate Success offers a clear and simple strategic path to solving the greatest problem of our times. A PDF version of this title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core at doi.org/10.1017/9781108783453.


Abstract Understanding laptop music requires more than a new perspective on the configuration of a 'weareable computer and an audio interface' as a musical instrument for performance. It combines the strategies and traditions of electronic media-related music composition of the twentieth century, like reproductive music, electronic music, computer music and Net music in a single, digital, multi-purpose device originally designed for business and multimedia applications. Consequently, what we hear is mostly not a genuine laptop music, but one facet of the information-technological transformation of music that has been the result of the digital integration of these established traditions. This article gives an overview of the aesthetic implications of these traditions and with respect to laptop performance and musical style.


Bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS) could play a large role in meeting the 1.5C argets, but faces well-documented controversy in terms of land-use concerns, competition with food production, and cost. This study presents a bottom-up assessment of the scale at which BECCS plants – biomass pulverised combustion plants ("BECCS" in this study) and bioenergy combustion in combined heat and power plants (BE-CHP-CCS) – can be sustainably deployed to meet national carbon dioxide removal (CDR) targets, considering the use of both primary and secondary (waste-derived) biomass. This paper also presents a comprehensive, harmonised data set, which enables others to build upon this work. Land availability for biomass cultivation, processing, and conversion is quantified based on a land-use analysis, avoiding all competition with land used for food production, human habitation, and other protected areas. We find that secondary biomass sources provide a valuable supplement to primary biomass, augmenting indigenous biomass supplies. In initial phases of deployment, we observe that infrastructure is initially clustered near cities, and other sources of low cost, secondary biomass, but as CDR targets are increased and indigenous secondary biomass supplies are exhausted, infrastructure begins to move closer to potential biomass planting areas with higher yield. In minimising the cost of CDR on a cost per tonne CO2 removed basis, we find that the availability of secondary biomass, land availability, and yield are key factors that drive the cost of CDR. Importantly biomass conversion efficiency of a BECCS plant has an inverse effect on CDR costs, with less efficient plants resulting in lower costs compared to their more efficient counterparts. By consuming secondary biomass in BECCS and BE-CHP-CCS plants, the UK is able to be self-sufficient in biomass supply by utilising available indigenous biomass to remove up to 50 MtCO2 /yr, though for cost reasons, it may be preferable to import some biomass.


Familial advanced sleep phase syndrome (FASPS) is an autosomal dominant circadian rhythm variant; affected individuals are "morning larks" with a 4-hour advance of the sleep, temperature, and melatonin rhythms. Here we report localization of the FASPS gene near the telomere of chromosome 2q. A strong candidate gene (hPer2), a human homolog of the period gene in Drosophila, maps to the same locus. Affected individuals have a serine to glycine mutation within the casein kinase Iɛ(CKIɛ) binding region of hPER2, which causes hypophosphorylation by CKIɛ in vitro. Thus, a variant in human sleep behavior can be attributed to a missense mutation in a clock component, hPER2, which alters the circadian period.


This thesis examines the variety of relationships between Jews and gender in early to mid-nineteenth century British literature, focussing particularly on representations of and by Jewish women. It reconstructs the social, political and literary context in which writers produced images and narratives about Jews, and considers to what extent stereotypes were reproduced, appropriated, or challenged. In particular it examines the ways in which questions of gender were linked to ideas about religious or racial difference in the Victorian period. The study situates literary representations of Jews within the context of contemporary debates about the participation of the Jews in the life of the modern state. It also investigates the ways in which these political debates were gendered, looking in particular at the relationship between the cultural construction of femininity and English national identity. It first considers Victorian culture's obsession with Rebecca, the Jewess created in Walter Scott's influential novel Ivanhoe (1819). It examines Rebecca's refusal to convert to Christianity in the context of Scott's discussion of racial separatism and modern national unity. Evangelical writers like Annie Webb, Amelia Bristow and Mrs Brendlah were prolific literary producers, and preoccupied with converting Jewish women. Particularly during the 18'40s and 1850s, evangelical writing provided an important forum for the construction and consolidation of women's national identity. Grace Aguilar's writing was an attempt to understand Jewish identity within the terms of Victorian domestic ideology. In contrast, Celia and Marion Moss, in their historical romances, offered narratives of female heroism and national liberation, drawing on the contemporary debate about slavery. Benjamin Disraeli's construction of a "tough version of Jewish identity was a response both to the contemporary stereotype of the feminised Jew and to the debate about Jewish emancipation. It also drew on the virile ideology of the Young England movement of the 1840s.


Abstract The human metapneumovirus (hMPV) is the second leading cause globally of acute infection of the respiratory tract in children, infecting the upper and lower airways. The hMPV may induce an inappropriate Th2-type immune response, which causes severe pulmonary inflammation, leading to the obstruction of airways. Despite its severe epidemiological relevance, no vaccines are currently available for the prevention of hMPV-induced illness. In this investigation, we demonstrated that immunization of mice with the recombinant hMPV nucleoprotein (hMPV-N) mixed with the AbISCO-100 adjuvant reduced viral replication in lungs following challenge with the virus. We found that immunized mice had reduced weight loss, decreased granulocytes in the lung, an increased level of specific nucleoprotein antibodies of IgG1 and IgG2a-isotypes, and a local profile of Th1/Th17-type cytokines. Our results suggest that immunization with the hMPV-N and the AbISCO-100 adjuvant induces a reduction of viral infection and could ...


This paper provides a model of how media environments affect political polarization. We first develop a model of how media environments, characterized by their levels of accessibility and variety of content, interact with citizens' ideological views and attitudes and political motivation. We then embed it in a model of majoritarian electoral competition in which politicians react to those media-influenced views. We show how equilibrium polarization is affected by changes in the media environment, through two channels: the variety effect, whereby a decrease in media variety leads to convergence in citizens' views and hence to lower polarization; and the composition effect, whereby a lowering of barriers to media accessibility increases turnout and hence lowers polarization, since newly motivated voters are relatively more moderate. We take the model's predictions to the data, in the US context of the introduction of broadcast TV, in the 1940s and 1950s, and radio, in the 1920s and 1930s. We show that, consistent with the model's predictions, TV decreased polarization, and exposure to (network) radio was correlated with lower polarization. The evidence suggests that the variety effect was more important than the composition effect.


We analyze instruments to evaluate investment strategies as new options for co-operatives within the wheat production chain. Using a value-based management the extension of our concept, a "cooperative balanced scorecard" is discussed as we propose the further differentiation of the scorecard's financial perspective. This is a market development-driven approach as cooperatives may be regarded as commodity-price-intermediators for their members. Proposing this approach we use a simple model of conjoint-hedging in intermediating firms within agribusiness.


Every team has top performers -- people who excel at working in a team to find the right solutions in complex, difficult situations. These top performers include nurses who run hospital floors, emergency response teams, air traffic controllers, and factory line supervisors. While they may outperform the most sophisticated optimization and scheduling algorithms, they cannot often tell us how they do it. Similarly, even when a machine can do the job better than most of us, it can't explain how. In this talk I share recent work investigating effective ways to blend the unique decision-making strengths of humans and machines. I discuss the development of computational models that enable machines to efficiently infer the mental state of human teammates and thereby collaborate with people in richer, more flexible ways. Our studies demonstrate statistically significant improvements in people's performance on military, healthcare and manufacturing tasks, when aided by intelligent machine teammates.


Some of the phenomena where the "globalization" concept is applied include the internationalization of markets, globalization of culture, political hegemony of world by some states, or groups of states, the increasing power of supranational institutions, and the development of a global division of labour. A starting point to understand the global division of work is the study of how companies are re-structuring, once they are the key-actors in the decision on which work should be found and where. The "value chains" describe each step in the productive process of a final product or service. Separated units of value chains can be in the same company (in-house) or in different companies (outsourced). Similarly they can be in a same local, or in other location. Normalization of business processes, combined with digitalization of information and the development of telecommunication networks made possible the tele-mediated work. This paper presents results from the European WORKS project, where are studied Portuguese cases of firms that integrate globalized value chain, and are analized the implications on work organization models and the (new) professional structures.


Background The issue of antimicrobial resistance continues to grow worldwide, and long-term care facilities are significant reservoirs of antimicrobial-resistant organisms, in part due to high frequency of antimicrobial use. Patients with advanced dementia are particularly vulnerable to multidrug-resistant organism acquisition and antimicrobial overuse, which has negative consequences for the gut microbiome and can contribute to the selection and propagation of antimicrobial resistance genes. In this study, we longitudinally examined a group of advanced dementia patients treated with the fluoroquinolone antimicrobial levofloxacin, finding a correlation between abundance of pathogens and antimicrobial resistance genes, which we confirmed in a larger cohort of subjects with advanced dementia. Results We observed significant inter- and intra-subject heterogeneity in the composition of the microbiota of the longitudinal levofloxacin cohort, suggesting temporal instability. Within this dataset, we did not find significant impacts of levofloxacin on the diversity, composition, function, or resistome of the gut microbiota of this population. However, we were able to link the antimicrobial resistance gene burden in a sample with the relative abundance of several pathobionts – particularly Escherichia coli, Proteus mirabilis, and Enterococcus faecalis, as well as less-prevalent species including Providencia stuartii and Staphylococcus haemolyticus. Furthermore, we used metagenomic assembly and binning to demonstrate that these species had higher genomic resistance gene levels than common gut commensals, and we were able to predict antimicrobial resistance gene burden from the relative abundances of these species in a separate, larger cohort from the same population. Conclusions We found that the relative abundances of several pathobionts were correlated with and were even predictive of the level of antimicrobial resistance genes in corresponding samples, and that these species carried high levels of resistances genes in their assembled genomes. In order to test this observation, we utilized a larger metagenomics dataset from a similar population and confirmed the association between pathobiont abundance and antimicrobial resistance genes. Given the high frequency with which these species were found at high levels in this population and the underlying vulnerability to infection with multidrug resistant organisms of advanced dementia patients, attention to microbial blooms of these species may be warranted. Additionally, in this study, we were able to utilize genomic assembly from metagenomic data to more definitively associate antimicrobial resistance gene levels with specific assembled species; as this technology continues to develop, assembly could prove to be a valuable method to monitor both specific resistance genes and blooms of multidrug-resistant organisms.


Especially in tunneling, the abrasiveness of rock is an important property, which can easily be determined by several methods developed for the purpose. With this in mind, it is rather surprising that the effects of different rock types on the wear mechanisms of engineering materials have not been too widely studied. In this paper, high stress three-body abrasive tests were conducted with four different abrasives with a relatively large (2-10 mm) particle size. As test materials, three different steels and three hard metals were used. The tests clearly showed that material type has an influence on how different abrasive and material properties affect the abrasive wear mechanisms and severity. For example with hard metals, the most important property of the abrasives is their crushability, as only small abrasive particles are able to properly attack the binder phase and cause high wear rates. On the other hand, it seems that the abrasiveness of rock is not the dominating property determining the severity of wear in the current test conditions for any of the tested materials. In fact, with steels no single abrasive property could be shown to clearly govern the abrasive wear processes. In any case, when using the determined abrasiveness values in wear estimations, the contact conditions in the method used for determining the abrasiveness values should be as similar as possible with the end application.


Transcranial electrical stimulation (TES) includes methods such as transcranial direct current stimulation, transcranial random noise stimulation, and transcranial alternating current stimulation. These methods provide novel ways of enhancing human cognitive abilities for restorative purposes, or for general cognitive enhancement, by modulating neuronal activity. I discuss here the basic principles behind these methods and provide some illustrations of their efficacy in cognitive enhancement in those with typical and atypical brain function. Next, I outline some future directions for research that are have been largely neglected, such as the issue of individual differences, cognitive side effects, the efficacy of TES for use with healthy elderly populations, children with atypical development, and sports. The results observed thus far with TES as well as its future possibilities have significant implications for both basic and translational neuroscience.


A series of outcome indicators was proposed for assessing the curative aspects of health care using several diseases for which evidence suggested that death was largely avoidable provided that appropriate medical treatment could be given in time. International data were examined for those causes for which data were readily available. Time trends in mortality were compared for each of these conditions for six countries that had experienced appreciable growth in health services during 1950-80. Mortality from the heterogeneous "avoidable" causes had declined faster than mortality from all other causes in each of the six countries. Despite problems of diagnosis, reporting, and classification of diseases that may have existed among countries, making international comparisons of absolute mortality difficult, the trends of declining mortality were similar, lending credibility to the use of these causes of mortality as indices of health care within countries. Changes within countries may also have been attributable to changes in social, environmental, genetic, and diagnostic factors, which were not examined. Nevertheless, the consistency in mortality trends for this group of "amenable" diseases suggested that improvements in medical care were a factor in their rapid decline.


False discovery rate (FDR) control is important in multiple testing scenarios that are common in neuroimaging experiments, and p-values from such experiments may often arise from some discretely supported distribution or may be grouped in some way. Two situations that may lead to discretely supported distributions are when the p-values arise from Monte Carlo or permutation tests are used. Grouped p-values may occur when p-values are quantized for storage. In the neuroimaging context, grouped p-values may occur when data are stored in an integer-encoded form. We present a method for FDR control that is applicable in cases where only p-values are available for inference, and when those p-values are discretely supported or grouped. We assess our method via a comprehensive set of simulation scenarios and find that our method can outperform commonly used FDR control schemes in various cases. An implementation to a mouse imaging data set is used as an example to demonstrate the applicability of our approach.


The aim of the study was to assess the impact of management accounting practices on the decision-making process of the entity operating within the manufacturing sector using a case of Capadvise Foods and Logistics (Pvt) Ltd. The research study was based on the period from 2014 to 2017 which was majorly characterised by huge amounts of losses. Capadvise Foods experienced huge amounts of losses in spite of the existence of management accounting practices. This encouraged the researchers to seek out an in-depth insight on the impact of management accounting on decision making in light of such losses which were continually experienced. The researchers made use of questionnaires and interviews to collect qualitative and quantitative data about the opinions and attitudes of employees and management at Capadvise Foods regarding management accounting tools. The researchers found that management accounting tools contributed positively to the organisational decision making through provision, interpretation and analysis of data, enhancement in communication, relevant cost analysis and creation of budgets and forecasting. However, the researchers found that management accounting practices were compromised by technological advancement, organisational strategy, organisational factors and intensity of market competition. After analysing the results attained the researchers recommended for Capadvise Foods which include enrolling qualified management accounting staff, decision makers are allowed to make use of internal reports generated by management accountants and adoption of management accounting practices in order to allow proper and accurate decision making to take place.