A pipeline system, constructed in 1997- 1998, to provide water to Redang
Island, traverses an area covered with coral reefs. Biological studies were
conducted before and following the construction to monitor changes in habitat and
biota at selected sites. Pre-construction studies consisted of conducting inventories
of predominant marine life, and evaluating sites for their sensitivity to construction,
whilst, post-construction studies involved assessment of d isturbed areas and
monitoring the pattern of re-colonization by marine life. Marine environmental
impact associated with the pipeline-crossing was monitored in the vicinity of the
Island for one year. Evidence of the pipeline impact was assessed mainly by values
concerning the abundance of zoobenthic community (including corals) and species
diversity indices. Annelids and Arthropods were the most dominant phyla numerically during both study periods, being greater in pre-construction period.
Student t-test and One-way ANOVA analyses revealed that there was no significant
differences between total abundance of sessile macroinvertebrates during pre and
post-construction periods. Student t-test revealed a significant difference between
the means of live coral coverage during pre and post-construction periods. There
was no apparent change in total number of macro-invertebrates as a result of
pipe line construct ion. Results indicated that impacts arising from marine-crossing
were short-term and non-residual.


President Obama's State of the Union address last month recognized that working women—and men—should not face hardship for taking care of their family responsibilities. Recent research by sociologists, Julie A. Kmec, Lindsey Trimble O'Connor and Scott Schieman suggests that workplaces have a long way to go before realizing the President's message. In new research, they find that working mothers perceive penalties—like feeling ignored and that they are given the worst tasks—when they adjust their work schedules after having children. They suggest that policies and practices that challenge societal assumptions about ideal work are a good starting place in attempts to realize President Obama's call to give working parents a "break."


Three-dimensional (3D) microscopy is a new and rapidly expanding area. A DualBeam system, with both a focused ion beam (FIB) column and an electron column, is a powerful instrument for imaging and sectioning microstructures to generate a full 3D sample reconstruction. When an electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD) system is attached to the DualBeam, it becomes a unique tool for making 3D crystallographic measurements on a wide variety of materials. Combining the successive removal by FIB, with sequential EBSD maps taken with the electron beam requires clear geometric considerations and a high level of automation to obtain a decent resolution in the third dimension, including positional sub-pixel re-alignment. Complete automation allows controlled sectioning and analysis of a significant volume of material without operator intervention: a process that may run continuously and automatically for many hours. Using a Nova600, a Channel 6 EBSD system and dedicated control software, Aluminium, Nickel and Steel specimens have been examined and volumes with up to 200 slices have been successfully analysed.


BACKGROUND
The prevalence of olfactory impairment increases with age and is known to be an early sign of different neurodegenerative diseases. Only few population-based studies examined the prevalence of olfactory impairment and comparisons across studies are scarce. Aim of this analysis was to compare the prevalence and determinants of normosmia across five population based studies in Germany.

METHODOLOGY
Data from five population-based, cross-sectional studies were included. They were independently conducted and used the same test system (Sniffinâ Sticks Screening 12) to measure olfactory function. This system consists of 12 odor-dispensing felt-tip pens; the task is a forced-choice selection among four alternative odors per pen. Sociodemographic information and comorbidities were assessed in face-to-face interviews. Univariate, descriptive statistics and multivariable logistic regression models stratified by study, were performed to determine risks, i.e. prevalence odds ratios, associated with olfactory function.

RESULTS
The prevalence of normosmic participants varied considerably across studies. Olfactory function was lower in men, decreased with age, and increased with higher education. Several individual comorbidities and a comorbidity index were associated with olfactory dysfunction. Recognition performance for three of the 12 pens was especially low in all studies.

CONCLUSION
Four factors, well known to describe population composition, contribute to explain differences in the prevalence of olfactory function between studies when the same test system is used. Our results indicate that comorbidities and educational level should always be considered when test systems based on smell recognition are used in population-based studies.


Given the extraordinary growth of the U.S. life settlement industry over the last decade, it is not surprising to find increased attention and scrutiny by academicians, the media and legal enforcement authorities–including, among others, state and federal securities regulatory and self-regulatory organizations. The securities laws regulators argue that investments in all forms of life settlement transactions involve the sale of securities, and that the full spectrum of securities laws applies. For the most part, they may be right. In discussing the pertinent securities-related issues surrounding life settlements, there are three fundamental questions to be addressed: 1) Does the sale of the life insurance policy to a passive investor that relies on others to conduct due diligence, price the policy, carry out the transaction, and perform follow-up services involve the sale of a "security" under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the "1933 Act")? 2) Do the "registration" requirements under the 1933 Act apply? 3) Do sales activities in connection with the sale of the life insurance policy trigger any broker-dealer registration requirements under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended (the "1934 Act")? This article concludes that the sale of the entire interest in an in-force life insurance policy to a passive investor may very well involve the sale of a security. The sale can be structured so that it is exempt from the registration requirements of state and federal laws. However, the state and federal anti-fraud provisions will apply to the transaction; and any person effecting the sale, particularly if compensated on the basis of the size of a successful sale, might be required to register with the SEC (and the applicable state) as a broker-dealer and be licensed as a security salesperson by the NASD.


This thesis examines the explanatory power of social capital theory as an aid to understanding disadvantaged socio-economic circumstances prevailing in many contemporary remote Aboriginal communities. The term 'social capital' refers to social resources that fuel human cooperation such as relationships, civic engagement, support and norms of reciprocity and trust.

There are several strands of 'social capital' theory, but it is Putnam's take that is my main focus. His 'Bowling Alone: America's Declining Social Capital' (1995) analysed the state of community relatedness in the United States. By contrast my thesis explores the extent to which a social capital framework might be useful in seeking to understand the nature of connections between Aboriginal people in remote Australia. How is social capital formed and eroded in this vastly different context?

The contemporary relevance of the thesis is that it is occurring against the backdrop of widespread concern about wellbeing and cohesion in remote communities. By seeking to explain the phenomena through a social capital analytic lens, the thesis provides a relational perspective on Aboriginal advantage and disadvantage. The focus is on the quality and nature of relationships. The significance of social capital theory is that it purports to account for "why some societies or groups work better than others, despite having comparable economic or material resources" (Cox & Caldwell, 2000: 58).

It is the development of an understanding of remote Aboriginal community disadvantage through the prism of a social capital theoretical framework that is this study's original contribution to knowledge. While the concept is not new, its application in this context is. The thesis occupies contentious intellectual territory because 'social capital' is a 'white western' concept that may have little cross-cultural applicability or resonance. Yet despite limitations, it is nevertheless argued the concept provides useful analytical insights into the functioning of remote Aboriginal communities. A perspective informed by theorising about social capital, at least as Robert Putnam understands that term, might guide strategies that make for 'stronger' (thriving and prosperous) communities


Reflexive governance offers a theoretical framework for understanding modern patterns of governance in the European Union (EU) institutions and elsewhere. It offers a learning-based approach to governance, but one which can better respond to concerns about the democratic deficit and to the fulfillment of the public interest than the currently dominant neo-institutionalist approaches. The book is composed of one general introduction and eight chapters. Chapter one introduces the concept of reflexive governance and describes the overall framework. The following chapters of the book then summarise the implications of reflexive governance in major areas of domestic, EU and global policy-making. They address in turn: Services of General Interest, Corporate Governance, Institutional Frames for Markets, Regulatory Governance, Fundamental Rights, Healthcare Services, Global Public Services and Common Goods. While the themes are diverse, the chapters are unified by their attempt to get to the heart of which concepts of governance are dominant in each field, and what their successes and failures have been: reflexive governance then emerges as one possible response to the failures of other governance models currently being relied upon by policy-makers.


The situation of women in Iran since the revolution of 1978 to 1979 has been a complex and contradictory one and is often oversimplified when looked at from abroad. (1) Many Americans get their view from Azar Nafisi's Reading Lolita in Tehran, which at best tells of one group of female students in Iran a decade and a half ago, when restrictions were far greater than they are today. Those who travel to Iran from the United States now are, on the other hand, often amazed at the freedoms of Iranian women as compared to the women in several other Middle Eastern countries. Reporting on Iranian women is complicated by its foreign policy connotations. Ever since the so-called freeing of Afghanistan's women was used as a rationale for war, some have been wary that negative reporting on Iran's women is being used as one element to justify an attack on Iran. Those who advocate such an attack often say that Iran is so seething with discontent that, if the United States were to help, such an action would result in the overthrow of the clerical regime. They cite the impressive oppositional activities of women and women's groups as one element of this scenario. Yet none of the heroic women cited by proponents of U.S. intervention favors an aggressive U.S. policy, nor do they advocate further U.S. support to those widely seen within Iran as enemies, such as ethnic separatists or the Mujahedeen-e Khalq, the violent cult that fought against Iran in the Iran--Iraq War. More sober analysts from the Right and Left think that any attack on Iran would solidify support for the government. Some opponents of American aggression go so far as to equate Reading Lolita in Tehran and other memoirs that criticize post-revolution treatment of Iranian women with advocacy of imperialist control of Iran and support for a U.S. right-wing program to overthrow the Iranian government. Such arguments are based on far-fetched postmodern criticisms, especially of Nafisi's book, that even extend to its cover photo of girls with chadors reading. However, this photo, which was not even chosen by the author, seems innocuous to most readers. Surely it is time to attempt a more balanced approach. Such an approach would recognize that fear of major U.S. interference in Iran is reasonable given the experience with the overthrow of Mohammad Mosaddeq in 1953 and recent threats and hostile activities. It would also recognize that American hostility toward Iran is driven by proponents in high places and politically influential groups rather than by those truly concerned with the issues raised by female memoir writers. The situation of women in Iran and the Muslim world is sufficiently complex that it can be portrayed in either a positive or negative way. To use an appropriate cliche the choice of facts can make the glass seem half full or half empty. Again, as with other issues, too many people make generalizations about "Islam," or "Iran," while women's status and roles have varied dramatically over time and in relation to such factors as mode of production, ethnicity and class. As a gross generalization, we can note that while the Koran, which pious Muslims see as a divine revelation to the Prophet Mohammad, contained both important reforms and some restrictions on women, the earliest Islamic practice was, on the whole, no more restrictive than other contemporary religious traditions, including Judaism and Christianity. More restrictions were added in the first centuries of Islam, when veiling and seclusion of women came to be the ideal. Some Muslim thinkers held misogynist views, and there was, as in nearly all literate societies, unequal legal treatment of men and women. On the other hand, comparison with the West was not all negative; women held their own property and often went to court to defend their rights. From the first centuries after the adoption of Islam, women's status varied, but it came to be influenced by pre-Islamic practices among the peoples of greater Syria, Iraq and Iran, including Jews and Christians, and veiling and seclusion of some urban women long pre-dated Islam in those regions. …


The present article focuses on gender differences in using some types of taboos. In this sense, it explores the world of Arab women and investigates aspects of taboos surrounding their issues and language use. In other terms, the focal point of this paper is centered on the linguistic devices that females employ to express taboos. This paper also evaluates women's discourse and the reasons that keep their lives surrounded by mystery and ambiguity. Hence, Arab females' issues and language are investigated in the light of the stereotypes Westerners have about the Islamic religious beliefs. Our study further explores the lexicon related to females' topics like virginity, menstruation, menopause and their body parts. To this vein, a thorough examination was made depending on the informants' gender, age and their sociocultural background with the support of a structured questionnaire, a focus group interview and participant observation. The findings demonstrate that Algerian females' issues are directed by the cultural norms of their society. The results also reveal that speakers resort to euphemistic strategies to speak about women's private lives, although Algerian dialects are rich in euphemistic expressions related to females' sensitive issues.


Elaborate secondary sexual traits, such as the ornamental plumage of birds, appear to be favoured by female choice because they serve as honest advertisements of male quality. Elaborate plumage is thought to be an honest signal because it is energetically expensive to produce and to carry, and it may also increase the vulnerability of males to predators. According to several recent studies, the elaborate ornamental train of male blue peafowls (Pavo cristatus) appears to be such an honest signal. In this paper, I explore another potential cost of such plumage, which is the daily time and energy investment required to maintain the plumage in good condition. Since time devoted to maintenance cannot be devoted to feeding, vigilance, or other activities, the maintenance cost of ornamental plumage should reinforce the honesty of such plumage as an advertisement of male quality. I observed free-ranging peacocks for 30 hours at the Denver Zoo in June 2002 and April 2003. Preening, scratching and dusting took up more than 99% of maintenance time. Long bouts of maintenance behaviour were performed while peacocks were resting or standing, while short bouts occurred while peacocks were walking or feeding. No maintenance behaviours were observed while peacocks displayed their trains. Peacocks spent 14.9% of their total time budget on maintenance behaviours and 7.2% on displaying their trains, and 25.2% of their total grooming time on preening their trains. Consequently, peacocks not only incur the costs of producing and carrying their trains, but they also pay an additional maintenance cost. Hypotheses concerning the indicator mechanism of ornamental plumage need to consider these additional costs, as any additional cost should make the signal even more "honest".
Keywords: Pavo cristatus, time budget, maintenance behaviour, grooming, sexual selection, indicator traits.


Asian comics are increasingly popular in the West, where comic and illustration enthusiasts prize them as objects of cultlike devotion. The growing interest in Japanese manga and Chinese manhua-broad terms that refer to cartoons, comics, and picture story books-stems equally from a desire for exotic forms of entertainment and an ever-increasing interest in the artistic, cultural, and political traditions of their originating countries. Wendy Siuyi Wong's voluminously illustrated book Hong Kong Comics examines the history of this genre from its beginnings in the early twentieth century to its most influential contemporary practitioners, and in the process traces the origin of a unique Hong Kong style. Over one thousand color manhua (each with English annotation) introduce the reader to this rich and varied form of Chinese popular culture. Wong examines a wide range of comic types, from political cartoons, to "lighthearted" humor comics, children's stories, and violent kung fu fighting works. Hong Kong Comics is the first comprehensive illustrated survey of the diverse and fascinating world of Hong Kong manhua.


In recent years, RDM has become increasingly important under the context of Open Science and Open Data. The re3data.org already has over1500 data repositories registered. Based on the practice of Peking University Open Research Data Project, this paper will discuss issues of awareness and demands of data providers and users, data policies of both institutional and funding parties, investigation and selection of data management platform, localization of OSS, and the support and collaboration within institutions such as between administrative units and data owners.
Peking University Library started planning the Open Research Data Project at the beginning of 2014. However, it seems that we lacked positive demands from the researchers, necessary institutional level policies and partners to cooperate with. After seeking support both internally and externally, and raising awareness of research data as an important format of academic output, Peking University got granted a NSFC (National Science Foundation of China) project with a part of it goes to development of Research Data Platform.
With collaboration of the Institution of Social Science Survey and University Research Administration Units and after one year's development, Peking University Open Research Data Platform launched at the end of 2015. Services provided include completed data capturing, managing and publishing, sharing and storing, DOI registration and authoritative data citing, access and copy right control mechanism, data version archiving, usage statistics, tracking and reporting, online data analysis and visualization plus digital fingerprint, Chinese and English bilingual interface. The Dataverse based platform opens fully to the academics and 2 months after its launch, 15 dataverses created including China Survey Data Archive, China Family Panel Studies, China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study, Center for Bioinformatices, PKU, Visualization and Visual Analytics Research Group PKU, etc. More and more datasets have been capturing and open to reuse and cite.


We introduce Visibly Linear Dynamic Logic (VLDL), which extends Linear Temporal Logic (LTL) by temporal operators that are guarded by visibly pushdown languages over finite words. In VLDL one can, e.g., express that a function resets a variable to its original value after its execution, even in the presence of an unbounded number of intermediate recursive calls. We prove that VLDL describes exactly the omega-visibly pushdown languages. Thus it is strictly more expressive than LTL and able to express recursive properties of programs with unbounded call stacks.

The main technical contribution of this work is a translation of VLDL into omega-visibly pushdown automata of exponential size via one-way alternating jumping automata. This translation yields exponential-time algorithms for satisfiability, validity, and model checking. We also show that visibly pushdown games with VLDL winning conditions are solvable in triply-exponential time.We prove all these problems to be complete for their respective complexity classes.


Ceramics are particularly well suited for investigating general patterns of the distribution of premodern products. Archaeometric methods, used to determine raw materials and production techniques, permit the identification of places of production. The work of the research group presented here pursues two objectives: (i) to investigate the usefulness of portable X-ray fluorescence equipment for the analysis of ceramics and (ii) to identify, interpret and study distribution areas of ceramic products in comparative prospective. The paper discusses key economic concepts, sets out the archaeometric methodology and presents initial results in the context of two examples.


Abstract As the number of non-Anglophone students studying business through the medium of English continues to increase, there is a growing interest in the potential of machine translation for helping these students with English-language writing. Language instructors recognize the futility of trying to ban the use of such tools, but they are apprehensive about their use. Academic librarians already deliver various forms of digital literacy instruction, and this article describes the design and delivery of a machine translation literacy workshop for international business students and their language instructors. Feedback was largely positive, but it may be helpful to customize future workshops for specific language groups. The target audience could also be expanded to include non-Anglophone faculty as well as students since the former are under increasing pressure to publish in English. The overall experience points to the benefit of collaboration between librarians and other experts in order to adapt to the changing needs of the campus community and to offer meaningful services and support in this period of rapid change.


The detection of chemicals such as industrial gases and chemical warfare agents is important to human health and safety. Thus, the development of chemical sensors with high sensitivity, high selectivity, and rapid detection is essential and could impact human beings in significant ways. 1-D metal oxide nanostructures with unique geometric and physical properties have been demonstrated to be important candidates as building blocks for chemical sensing applications. Chemical sensors composed of a wide range of pristine 1-D metal oxide nanostructures, such as In2O3, SnO2, ZnO, TiO2, and CuO, have been fabricated, and exhibited very good sensitivity in the detection of important industrial gases, chemical warfare agents, and human breath. In this review, we provide an overview of this chemical sensing field. Various key elements of the topics will be reviewed, including 1-D metal oxide nanostructure synthesis, electronic properties of nanowire-based FETs, and their chemical sensing behaviors. In addition, this paper provides a review of the recent development of electronic nose systems based on metal oxide nanowires, which indicate great potential for the improvement of sensing selectivity.


Sandia National Laboratories and U S Synthetic Corporation have jointly conducted a multifaceted, baseline experimental study to support the development of improved drag cutters for advanced drill bits. This study, which involved the production and laboratory testing of different nonstandard cutter lots, evaluated the influence of variations in selected design and processing parameters on cutter loads, wear, and durability in hard-rock environments. The focus was on drag-bit cutters that incorporated ultrahard PDC (Polycrystalline Diamond Compact) overlays (i.e., diamond tables) on tungsten carbide substrates. Parameter variations selected for the test cutters included changes in cutter geometry, material composition, and processing conditions. Geometric variables were the diamond-table thickness, the chamfer design for the cutter edge, and the diamond-table/substrate interface configuration. Material and processing variables for the diamond table were, respectively, the nominal diamond particle size and the pressure that was applied during cutter production. Complementary drop-impact, granite-log abrasion, linear cutting-force, and rotary drilling tests examined the response of cutters from each lot. A wide range of behavior was observed from lot to lot, and analyses of the test results assessed the relative merits of these lots, allowing identification of features contributing to improved cutter performance in hard-rock (e.g., geothermal) drilling applications.


This paper is based on the low-cost approaches and transferable techniques that were applied in a PhD reserch project on energy-related occupancy activities. The strengths of qualitative and quantitative research strategies were combined for the study of this sociotechnical research topic. Long-term field measurement was conducted for data acquisition using self-configured monitoring schemes. Case study was selected as the research approach. Building characteristics and household features in each case study group were purposefully selected to deploy same-standard monitoring schemes. Comparable monitoring results were pre-processed following identical procedures to implement the selected data analysis methods. The inspection results provided the researcher and the associated project partners with a novel perspective to interpret the difference in actual energy consumption and indoor environment within and between the case study groups. The research methodology and moitoring approach are covered in this paper that also presents the macro-scale monitoring results of energy use and indoor environment in two case study groups. The micro-scale presentation and algorithm-based examination will be covered in other academic papers. This paper demonstrates the huge potential for some commonly applied building assessment methods to be improved by objectively considering currently overlooked aspects, such as the low-tech design and construction of heavy-weight thermal mass houses and the largely varied occupancy activities. Future work reating to the comparision of actural monitoring data with simulation results is pointed out at the end of the paper.


We show that exposure to repression under dictatorship increases support for democracy and contributes to regime change when a democratic window of opportunity arises. Studying the military dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet in Chile, we exploit the fact that the predetermined location of military bases predicts local levels of civilian victimization, but is unrelated to historical political preferences. Using two-stage least squares, we show that increased exposure to repression during the dictatorship led to higher voter registration and higher opposition to Pinochet's continuation in power in the 1988 plebiscite that triggered the democratic transition. Complementary survey data confirms that individuals with greater exposure to repression during the military regime continue to have stronger preferences for democracy. However, exposure to repression does not affect election outcomes after democratization.


Disk arrays are increasingly being used in distributed computing systems, as the vehicle for providing reliable and high performance data storage. When a disk in a RAID-5 fails, data in that failed disk can still be made available through parity reconstruction by reading from the other disks. However, this poses an increased burden on the surviving disks, and if consideration is not given to this failure consequence, then the performance of the system may degrade to an unacceptable level. This paper describes techniques that will enable the disk array to maintain good performance in the event of a disk failure. After a failed disk has been repaired, its content must be reconstructed from all the associated parity groups. In RAID-5, this must be a single thread sequential process. With the techniques introduced in this paper, it is shown how this sequential process can now be broken down into multiple parallel processes distributed throughout the array, thus shortening the reconstruction time. While the techniques introduced in this paper are applied to disk arrays, they may potentially have general applications in other areas of distributed computing.<<ETX>>


Dark-grown Arabidopsis seedlings develop an apical hook by differential elongation and division of hypocotyl cells. This allows the curved hypocotyl to gently drag the apex, which is protected by the cotyledons, upwards through the soil. Several plant hormones are known to be involved in hook development, including ethylene, which causes exaggeration of the hook. We show that gibberellins (GAs) are also involved in this process. Inhibition of GA biosynthesis with paclobutrazol (PAC) prevented hook formation in wild-type (WT) seedlings and in constitutive ethylene response (ctr)1-1, a mutant that exhibits a constitutive ethylene response. In addition, a GA-deficient mutant (ga1-3) did not form an apical hook in the presence of the ethylene precursor 1-aminocyclopropane-1-carboxylate (ACC). Analysis of transgenic Arabidopsis seedlings expressing a green fluorescent protein (GFP)-repressor of ga1-3 (RGA) fusion protein suggested that ACC inhibits cell elongation in the apical hook by inhibition of GA signaling. A decreased feedback of GA possibly causes an induction of GA biosynthesis based upon the expression of genes encoding copalyl diphosphate synthase (CPS; GA1) and GA 2-oxidase (AtGA2ox1). Furthermore, expression of GASA1, a GA-response gene, suggests that differential cell elongation in the apical hook might be a result of differential GA-sensitivity.


This thesis work has been performed at Benteler Engineering Service in Gothenburg in cooperation with Benteler Aluminium System Norway AS in Raufoss. Since the requirements on a product are changed several times during a product development process in the automotive industry, the desire to develop parts faster has increased. Components with complex geometries can take a large amount of time to design and when requirements on the design are changed the CAD-model has to be remade. A model with a complex geometry, which often is exposed to changes, is the B-pillar in the car. To achieve a more time efficient process for the B-pillar, an investigation was made to see if parameterization of the CAD-model could be made to save time in the development process. The result of this has shown that if the model is supposed to be changed more than three times parameterization is something that should be considered.Different strategies for parameterization that could support the development process of the CAD-model of a B-pillar have been compared to investigate which strategy that was best suited for this project.The goal to create a CAD-model of a generic B-pillar as a showpiece where parameters control the geometry and where changes of the main dimensions can be implemented faster than in a model without parameterization, has been fulfilled.


The objective of this thesis is to search for an efficient way of utilizing solar energy in air conditioning applications. The current solar Air Conditioners (A/C)s suffer from low Coefficient of Performance (COP) and performance degradation in hot and humid climates. By investigating the possible ways of utilizing solar energy in air conditioning applications, the bottlenecks in these approaches were identified. That resulted in proposing a novel system whose subsystem synergy led to a COP higher than unity. The proposed system was found to maintain indoor comfort at a higher COP compared to the most common solar A/Cs, especially under very hot and humid climate conditions.

The novelty of the proposed A/C is to use a concentrating photovoltaic/thermal collector, which outputs thermal and electrical energy simultaneously, to drive a hybrid A/C. The performance of the hybrid A/C, which consists of a desiccant wheel, an enthalpy wheel, and a vapor compression cycle (VCC), was investigated experimentally. This work also explored the use of a new type of desiccant material, which can be regenerated with a low temperature heat source. The experimental results showed that the hybrid A/C is more effective than the standalone VCC in maintaining the indoor conditions within the comfort zone. Using the experimental data, the COP of the hybrid A/C driven by a hybrid solar collector was found to be at least double that of the current solar A/Cs. The innovative integration of its subsystems allows each subsystem to do what it can do best. That leads to lower energy consumption which helps reduce the peak electrical loads on electric utilities and reduces the consumer operating cost since less energy is purchased during the on peak periods and less solar collector area is needed.

In order for the proposed A/C to become a real alternative to conventional systems, its performance and total cost were optimized using the experimentally validated model. The results showed that for an electricity price of 0.12 $/kW-hr, the hybrid solar A/C's cumulative total cost will be less than that of a standard VCC after 17.5 years of operation.


Pastoral care is a biblical mandate to the Church to be involved in the lives of God's people. A key metaphor used by Jesus to describe his pastoral role was that of a shepherd. Thus, to be God's shepherds and instruments of healing and transformation in God's world is an imperative to all people, clergy and laity alike. The brokenness in South African society is strikingly apparent, exacerbated by the effects of exceptionally high criminal behaviour as statistics show. The demand for pastoral care and assistance with various personal problems is on the increase, with many non-church goers turning to churches for help. Also apparent in South Africa is the acute shortage of trained individuals to offer care and counselling. The task of offering care is not the sole responsibility of clergy, as all are called to be shepherds and caregivers. The importance and urgency in training church-based counselling teams cannot be overstated. More so in that we are becoming increasingly aware that not only are individuals in need of care, but whole communities are struggling with trauma and life's challenges, and often do not know whom to turn to. In pursuance of the realisation that pastoral care is the function and duty of all Christians, this article will delineate in particular an explanation of lay counselling, reasons for its importance including biblical foundations, where and how ordinary South Africans can get involved, and will propose certain models and approaches for getting started. These models will not be discussed in depth, but present an opportunity for the next. Teams for these models consist of professional counsellors, but ought not to be restricted to a select few, as all are called to this special ministry and can be trained for the task, which will include on-going supervision and mentoring. The overall purpose of this article is to highlight the urgency of training lay counsellors and some recommendations will be made how to apply it, in an attempt to be faithful to the biblical mandate and examples set by Jesus Christ.


Objective. To describe the association between type of health insurance coverage and the quality of care provided to individuals with diabetes in the United States. Data Source. The 2000 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System. Study Design. Our study cohort included individuals who reported a diagnosis of diabetes ( n 5 11,647). We performed bivariate and multivariate logistic regression analyses by age greater or less than 65 years to examine the association of health insurance coverage with diabetes-specific quality of care measures, controlling for the effects of race/ethnicity, annual income, gender, education, and insulin use. Principal Findings. Most individuals with diabetes are covered by private insurance (39 percent) or Medicare (44 percent). Among persons under the age of 65 years, 11 percent were uninsured. The uninsured were more likely to be African American or Hispanic and report low incomes. The uninsured were less likely to report annual dilated eye exams, foot examinations, or hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c) tests and less likely to perform daily blood glucose monitoring than those with private health insurance. We found few differences in quality indicators between Medicare, Medicaid, or the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) as compared with private insurance coverage. Persons who received care through the VA were more likely to report taking a diabetes education class and HbA1c testing than those covered by private insurance. Conclusions. Uninsured adults with diabetes are predominantly minority and low income and receive fewer preventive services than individuals with health insurance. Among the insured, different types of health insurance coverage appear to provide similar levels of care, except for higher rates of diabetes education and HbA1c testing at the VA.


In this paper, the number of functions realized by certain networks of two-input one-output gates are presented. Two networks are considered; one is the disjunctive network, which is characterized by the restriction that each gate output and each network input connect to exactly one gate input. The other network, the cascade, is the special case of the disjunctive networks in which each gate has at least one input which connects to a network input. For both networks, a recursion relation is derived for the number of realized switching functions dependent on exactly k variables. Both expressions have been solved by computer for k up to 15. Also, expressions are derived for the number of functions realized by cascades and disjunctive networks of two-input one-output cells, where each cell realizes any of the 16 functions on two variables.


As the atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) increases substantially, the spatial distribution of atmospheric CO2 should be considered when estimating the effects of CO2 on the carbon and water cycle coupling of terrestrial ecosystems. To evaluate this effect on future ecohydrological processes, the spatial-temporal patterns of CO2 were established over 1951 - 2099 according to the IPCC emission scenarios SRES A2 and SRES B1. Thereafter, water use efficiency (WUE) was used (i.e., Net Primary Production/Evaportranspiration) as an indicator to quantify the effects of climate change and uneven CO2 fertilization in China. We carried out several simulated experiments to estimate WUE under different future scenarios using a land process model (Integrated Biosphere Simulator, IBIS). Results indicated that the geographical distributions of averaged WUE have considerable differences under a heterogeneous atmospheric CO2 condition. Under the SRES A2 scenario, WUE decreased slightly with a 5% value in most areas of the southeastern and northwestern China during the 2050s, while decreasing by approximately 15% in southeastern China during the 2090s. During the period of the 2050s under SRES B1 scenario, the change rate of WUE was similar with that under SRES A2 scenario, but the WUE has a more moderate decreasing trend than that under the SRES A2 scenario. In all, the ecosystems in median and low latitude areas had a weakened effect on resisting extreme climate event such as drought. Conversely, the vegetation in a boreal forest had an enhanced buffering capability to tolerate drought events.


Synthetic polypeptides are of great importance in biomedical applications as they are directly modelled on natural proteins and can mimic their functions in biological systems. Thus, synthetic polypeptides display properties such as biocompatibility, biodegradability, bioavailability, bioadhesion and could find applications in drug delivery, tissue engineering, implants, therapeutics. The availability of wide range of functionality of the synthetic polypeptides arising from the vast pool of natural and non-natural amino acids has been used to modify and to impart new functionalities to the synthetic materials such as organic/inorganic nanoparticles, surfaces, synthetic polymeric architectures, films. This new class of hybrid materials with enhanced biocompatibility are advantageous over their constituent components and show promising candidature in advanced biomedical applications.
N-carboxyanhydride Ring Opening Polymerization (NCA-ROP) is a lucrative technique to synthesize polypeptides with controlled molecular weights and narrow polydispersities. Surface intiated N-carboxyanhydride ring opening polymerization (SI-NCA-ROP) by an immobilized intiator has been investigated to teather synthetic polypeptides onto the desired material surfaces. SI-NCA-ROP has been employed from silica nanoparticle surfaces to engineer synthetic polypeptide grafted smart hybrid materials capable of changing microscopic properties according to the changes in pH of the external micro- environment. These silica polypeptide hybrids have shown their applicability in pH responsive cargo release systems. Similarly, surface grafted synthetic polypeptides have been used to modify and improve dispersion properties of iron-oxide magnetic nanoparticles useful in imaging and drug delivery applications. Grafting of highly hydrophilic glycosylated polypeptides have shown improved aqueous dispersion properties of these inorganic nanoparticles useful for MRI imaging and bio-recognition. In an extended study, polypeptides comprising two amino acids have been grafted from iron oxide nanoparticle surfaces to engineer new hybrids with excellent aqueous dispersibility and siRNA vector ability. These co-polypeptide grafted nanoparticle hybrids shown to retain their bio-recognition ability besides improving aqueous dispersibilty and imparting
siRNA vectorability, which highlights their applicability as theranostics. In summary, we have presented novel polypeptide hybrid materials by SI-NCA-ROP and their advanced biomedical applications.


Introduction:Access to antiretroviral treatment (ART) has substantially improved over the past decade. In this new era of HIV as a chronic disease, the continued success of ART will depend critically on sustained high ART adherence. The objective of this review was to systematically review interventions that can improve adherence to ART, including individual-level interventions and changes to the structure of ART delivery, to inform the evidence base for the 2013 WHO consolidated antiretroviral guidelines. Design:A rapid systematic review. Methods:We conducted a rapid systematic review of the global evidence on interventions to improve adherence to ART, utilizing pre-existing systematic reviews to identify relevant research evidence complemented by screening of databases for articles published over the past 2 years on evidence from randomized controlled trials (RCTs). We searched five databases for both systematic reviews and primary RCT studies (Cochrane Library, EMBASE, MEDLINE, Web of Science, and WHO Global Health Library); we additionally searched ClinicalTrials.gov for RCT studies. We examined intervention effectiveness by different study characteristics, in particular, the specific populations who received the intervention. Results:A total of 124 studies met our selection criteria. Eighty-six studies were RCTs. More than 20 studies have tested the effectiveness of each of the following interventions, either singly or in combination with other interventions: cognitive-behavioural interventions, education, treatment supporters, directly observed therapy, and active adherence reminder devices (such as mobile phone text messages). Although there is strong evidence that all five of these interventions can significantly increase ART adherence in some settings, each intervention has also been found not to produce significant effects in several studies. Almost half (55) of the 124 studies investigated the effectiveness of combination interventions. Combination interventions tended to have effects that were similar to those of single interventions. The evidence base on interventions in key populations was weak, with the exception of interventions for people who inject drugs. Conclusion:Tested and effective adherence-enhancing interventions should be increasingly moved into implementation in routine programme and care settings, accompanied by rigorous evaluation of implementation impact and performance. Major evidence gaps on adherence-enhancing interventions remain, in particular, on the cost-effectiveness of interventions in different settings, long-term effectiveness, and effectiveness of interventions in specific populations, such as pregnant and breastfeeding women.


Monocytic sarcoma is a neoplasm of immature monocytes involving any extramedullary site such as skin. The definite diagnosis is important for adequate therapy, which is often delayed because of misdiagnosis. We report a 51-Year-old diabetic woman who presented with several erythematous itchy papules and plaques on her scalp, trunk and upper extremities during a five-month period. Clinical differential diagnoses were scleredema diabeticorum, scleromyxoma, mucinosis, eruptive histiocytosis, leprosy and sarcoidosis. Skin biopsy showed features of monocytic sarcoma. We present this case to alert dermatologists and dermatopathologists of erythematous skin lesions clinically resembling bland-looking dermatoses such as scleredema diabeticorum, scleromyxoma, mucinosis and eruptive histiocytosis, which, in rare instances, may be a presenting feature of a monoblastic leukemia with initial dermal presentation. © 2014 Iranian Society of Dermatology.


In April 2019, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) issued an Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (ANPR) on the definition of "fiduciary capacity" regarding "directed trusts." The ANPR references in particular the Uniform Directed Trust Act (UDTA) (Unif. Law Comm'n 2017). We served as the Reporter (Morley) and Chair (Sitkoff) of the drafting committee for the UDTA.

Following the UDTA, we use the term "directed trust" to refer to a trust in which the terms of the trust grant a person other than a trustee a power over some aspect of the trust's administration. As the prefatory note to the UDTA explains, "[t]here is no consistent vocabulary to describe the person other than a trustee that holds a power in a directed trust. Several terms are common in practice, including 'trust protector,' 'trust adviser,' and 'trust director.'" The same is true for the trustee in a directed trust, who may be "sometimes called an 'administrative trustee' or 'directed trustee.'" Following the UDTA, we will refer to a trustee in a directed trust as a "directed trustee," a person who is not a trustee with a power over the administration of the trust as a "trust director," and the power that a trust director holds over the administration of the trust as a "power of direction."

The hard question of law and policy raised by the proliferation of directed trusts is how to address the many complications created by giving a power of direction to a trust director, including in particular how to allocate fiduciary responsibility among a trust director and a directed trustee. The patchwork of modern state directed trust statutes, which to varying degrees has displaced the older but more consistent common law regime, has given rise to uncertainty that, in the words of the ANPR, may "make it difficult for institutions to assess and manage litigation risk and to understand OCC expectations for managing these accounts in a safe and sound manner." We are in agreement that additional OCC guidance on directed trusts could be helpful. However, we have six concerns about the way the ANPR frames the issue, which we elaborate in this comment letter.


In this study, the effect of temperature on the formation of viable but non-culturable (VBNC) pathogenic Vibrio cholerae O139 was examined. Furthermore, both the virulence and cellular protein expression of the bacterial cells under culturable, non-culturable and resuscitated states were determined. Following the incubation of bacterial cells in river water microcosms (RWM) with 0.5% NaCl at 4℃ for 35-45 days, plate counts declined to less than 1 CFU/mL; but viable counts dropped to 104-105 cells/mL during the first 2 weeks and maintained at this level till the end of incubation. However, the entry of cells into a VBNC state was not detected after the cells were cultured at either 15 or 25℃. When the 4℃-induced VBNC samples were either inoculated to a plate supplemented with H2O2-degrading compounds or shifted to 28℃, non-culturable O139 cells regained their culturability. The adhesion test showed that the number of O139 cells adhering to HeLa cells was highest in culturable cells and significantly lower in either resuscitated cells and non-culturable cells. As for the cytotoxicity test, all HeLa cells died after incubation with culturable O139 cells, whereas 32.1 ± 4.6% and 100% of target cells died after incubation with resuscitated cells for 3 and 5 hr, respectively. No difference was observed between the percentages of cell death after incubation with non-culturable cells and with sterile culture medium. When mice were challenged with culturable O139 cells, the mortality was 80%. However, all mice survived after challenge with either VBNC or resuscitated cells.


The aim of this paper is to review existing evidence on the role of renewable energies in bringing gender equity. The paper first explores the evolution of thinking on gender and energy, in particular that practitioners no longer specifically focus on women and stoves (often referred to as "household energy"). Next, the reasons why gender analysis can help those people trying to increase the dissemination of renewable energy technologies are presented. There is a brief description of the gender aspects of household energy, and how different renewable energy technologies can contribute to drudgery reduction and time saving, particularly for women. The role of women in renewable energy is analysed. The paper concludes with an analysis of lessons learnt and recommendations. However, the point has to be stressed that there is now only beginning to emerge information about gender and energy in the South, and there is very little information about the situation in the North. The data that are available are primarily in the form of case studies, mainly related to stoves programmes and rural electricity grid extension. The systematic collection of gender-disaggregated statistical data by energy ministries does not occur and it is very rare to find energy project evaluations that use gender analysis. This means that much of the analysis should be seen as only as indicative, although this does not invalidate the recommendations since many of these are linked to the general situation of women having fewer assets than men.


Abstract During the scientific revolution of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the western world began to perceive reality as, in some way, separate from the self. The kind of truth that was sought prior to Descartes differed from that generally sought afterward. Explanations of why things were as they were became less interesting, while people became preoccupied with explanations of how they happened. Nevertheless, some theologians and "natural philosophers" of eighteenth century Britain were able to blend elements of these different viewpoints, combining differing world views. John Wesley, for example, genuinely respected and eagerly utilized scientific advances and new philosophical ideas, yet he used many of the thought forms of his day to create new syntheses. Marrying empiricism and rationalism in such as way as to inspire human imagination to an understanding which cannot be attained by rational calculation or logic in and of itself, Wesley and others like him were able to preserve a place for humanity in the larger context of the universe in which humans were neither mere machines nor objects. They thus did much to avoid bifurcation between such polarities as subject versus object, faith versus reason, or teleology versus ontology. Introduction The seventeenth and eighteenth centuries constituted a period of momentous transitions in world view. These transitions have been described in various ways, often beginning with Francis Bacon (1561-1626), Rene Descartes (1596-1650), and Pierre Gassendi (1592-1655), who for many historians were among the major instigators of modernity. These three people differed greatly philosophically. For example, Descartes was a rationalist while Bacon was an empiricist. Nevertheless, each contributed to the development of certain aspects of modernity. Bacon advocated collecting observations and using experimentation in order to gain power over the forces of nature. His utilitarian understanding of natural philosophy became an important part of the mindset of the scientific revolution. He was convinced that knowledge of natural phenomena was the key to power over nature for the good of humanity. For this reason, he advocated scientific experimentation under "vexations" or controlled conditions, as opposed to merely observing nature as it takes its own course. In his New Organon, he wrote that "the secrets of nature reveal themselves more readily under the vexations of art than when they go their own way." (1) Descartes, with his famous dictum, cogito ergo sum ("I think, therefore I am"), (2) made what some postmodern interpreters feel is a false distinction between the individual and the outside world. (3) His premise that reason is the principal method of determining truth was used by others, such as Spinoza, to discredit the authority of the scriptures. (4) His insistence upon clear and distinct ideas as necessary for knowing truth seemed opposed to maintaining doctrines such as the Trinity and the Incarnation, which could not really be explained on rational grounds. Several other key theses of Descartes were of enormous consequence for subsequent thought. According to Descartes, mankind was unable to know any of God's purposes, and because man is unable to discover the purposes or ends of the creator, philosophy must exclude the search for final causes. (5) Thus, Descartes' understanding was that philosophical (scientific) explanations should be entirely mechanical, (6) with final causation totally excluded. (7) Descartes was therefore more interested in how one knows than in what one knows, and because of his influence, for philosophers from his time onward knowing, or epistemology, was considered to be prior to being, or ontology. (8) Because of its exclusion of teleological explanations, Cartesianism emphasized fact to the exclusion of value. (9) Descartes also defined matter as extension, (10) helping to pave the way for materialism. …


The main aim of this study is to investigate the performance and the pollutant emissions of a four stroke SI engine operating on different ethanol-gasoline blends (0-20%). Fuel properties of ethanol–gasoline blended were examined by the standard ASTM methods. The results showed that increasing the ethanol content in the blend fuel will decrease the heating value of the blended fuel and increase the octane number. Exhaust gas emissions were evaluated and analyzed for Unburned Hydrocarbons (UHC), Carbon Dioxide (CO 2 ), Carbon Monoxide (CO), Oxygen (O 2 ) and Oxide of Nitrogen NO x at different engine speeds and loads (1000-5000 rpm). The results revealed that using ethanol-gasoline blended fuels will marginally increase the brake power and the torque output, the brake thermal efficiency, the relative air–fuel ratio and the volumetric efficiency. Moreover, using ethanol-gasoline blends will decrease the brake specific fuel consumption, CO and HC emissions concentration. This improvement was due to the high oxygen percentage in the ethanol. However the CO 2 , NO x concentration and the exhaust gas temperature was noticed to be increased.


Black holes are like bells; once perturbed they will relax through the emission of characteristic waves. The frequency spectrum of these waves is independent of the initial perturbation and, hence, can be thought of as a `fingerprint' of the black hole. Since the 1970s scientists have considered the possibility of using these characteristic modes of oscillation to identify astrophysical black holes. With the recent detection of gravitational waves, this idea has started to turn into reality. Inspired by the black hole-fluid analogy, we demonstrate the universality of the black-hole relaxation process through the observation of characteristic modes emitted by a hydrodynamical vortex flow. The characteristic frequency spectrum is measured and agrees with theoretical predictions obtained using techniques developed for astrophysical black holes. Our findings allow for the first identification of a hydrodynamical vortex flow through its characteristic waves. The flow velocities inferred from the observed spectrum agree with a direct flow measurement. Our approach establishes a non-invasive method, applicable to vortex flows in fluids and superfluids alike, to identify the wave-current interactions and hence the effective field theories describing such systems.


Many practically important problems involve processing very large data sets, such as for web scale data mining and indexing. An efficient method to manage such problems is to use data intensive distributed programming paradigms such as MapReduce and Dryad, that allow programmers to easily parallelize the processing of large data sets where parallelism arises naturally by operating on different parts of the data. Such data intensive computing infrastructures are now deployed at scales where the resource costs, especially the energy costs of operating these infrastructures, have become a significant concern. Many opportunities exist for optimizing the energy costs for data intensive computing and this paper addresses one of them. We dynamically right size the resource allocations to the parallelized tasks such that the effective hardware configuration matches the requirements of each task. This allows our system to amortize the idle power usage of the servers across a larger amount of workload, increasing energy efficiency as well as throughput. This paper describes why such dynamic resource allocation is useful and presents the key techniques used in our solution.


In this paper, the concept of the "robust arm configuration" is expanded by using a mode-shape compensator. This compensator improves the robustness of the arm configuration where the robustness is not high enough. The compensator consists of a constant gain matrix and acceleration of each joint. The structure is simple and easy to use. The design method for this mode-shaping matrix is presented, based on the previously proposed mode-shaping algorithm. Effect upon the manipulability is also examined. It suggests that inclining of the dynamic manipulability ellipsoid's principal axes by the compensator, resulting in changing the coupling rigid body dynamics, leads to the improvement of the robustness. The validity is confirmed by a numerical example and experiments. The experiments are performed with an experimental system consisting of a two-degree-of-freedom (DOF) planar manipulator and a 1-DOF flexible base. A high bandwidth positioning is realized with the obtained compensator.


The author of the present article analyzes the legal regulation regarding the subjects responsible for the protection of public order in municipal territories with an emphasis on the collision between the activity and responsibility of the police and municipal institutions. The author suggests multiple solutions to the problem of competence delimitation in the sphere of public protection. According to the author, in municipal territories four multiple-choice forms of public order protection are possible and the right to choose the forms which would most effectively guarantee the safety of the community should belong to local government institutions. What is more, the article deals with an analysis of the organizational problems related to the implementation of the functions of public order protection and an evaluation of the prospects of the decentralization of these functions. The author presents a critical evaluation of the situation when public order protection requirements which logically derive from the interests of local residents are identified by central public administration institutions rather than local government institutions or regional-level institutions. The planning of the safe environment strategy must be based on the interests of a country's local residents; what is more, the particularities of different regions must be considered. To solve the mentioned problems two alternative public order protection strategy models are suggested. Finally, the author comes to the conclusion that local government institutions should be actively motivated to get involved in securing public safety through legal and organizational means.


As commentators have long pointed out, once established, administrative agencies are almost impossible to kill. Scaling back the authority of an agency is somewhat easier, but even retrenchment proves difficult. Given these political realities, the trajectory of the Securities and Exchange Commission ("SEC") in corporate bankruptcy is remarkable. Led by William Douglas (head of the SEC before his appointment to the Supreme Court), the New Deal reformers and their allies in Congress transformed corporate reorganization practice by enacting the Chandler Act of 1938. In addition to destroying the influence of Wall Street bankers and lawyers, the Chandler Act positioned the SEC at the heart of the reorganization process. At first, the SEC did in fact play a dominant role in bankruptcy. But over the next several decades, the SEC slowly lost its grip. The end came in 1978, when Congress ushered the SEC out of bankruptcy almost completely as part of its next major reform. This Article addresses a single question: what happened? Why did the SEC, whose oversight had been seen as crucial to investor protection, disappear from bankruptcy? Drawing from recent positive political theory on Congressional institutions, I argue that the answer to these questions lies in the initial structuring of the SEC's role. In their zeal to destroy the Wall Street banks and lawyers who had previously dominated reorganization practice, William Douglas and the other New Deal reformers strengthened the hand of two interest groups, the general bankruptcy bar and bankruptcy judges, who each had strong incentives to resist SEC oversight. Congress's enactment of the Chandler Bill, rather than a companion bill considered at the same time, further compounded the SEC's troubles by subjecting subsequent reforms to a committee (the Judiciary Committee) that is more likely to favor bankruptcy lawyers than the SEC. Although these political factors explain the SEC's near disappearance from bankruptcy, this Article concludes that the time may now be ripe for the SEC to increase its profile once again, though in a more limited way than the New Deal reformers envisioned. Many of the securities law issues that the SEC regulates, from takeovers to securities trading, now figure prominently in major corporate reorganization cases as well. Regulation by the SEC would be the best means of coordinating the treatment of these issues inside of bankruptcy and out.


Water pollution by domestic sewage is one of the critical environmental problems in the early stage of urbanization with significant growth of population. In case of Osaka metropolitan area in Japan, the pollution was significant until 1970s, while it has been improved by the development of sewage treatment systems. However, removal of nitrogen needs the advanced process therefore relatively large part of dissolved inorganic nitrogen (DIN) is usually discharged by treated sewage effluent. Besides, increase of sewage-derived pollutant loads through the combined sewage systems during rainfall events is recognized as a new problem in recent years. However, the impacts of sewage-derived loads on the water environment of river and coastal area have not been fully evaluated in previous studies. In the present research, we aimed to examine the dynamics of sewage-derived nutrients in highly urbanized coastal rivers. Study area is located on the coastal area of Osaka bay in Seto Inland Sea, western Japan. Treated sewage effluent is discharged from three sewage treatment plants (KH, SU and SA) to a river and channels. Water and sediment samples were collected and electric conductivity (EC), chlorophyll-a (Chl.-a) and dissolved oxygen concentration (DO) were measured from the discharging points to few kilometers offshore at 100-300 m intervals. Nutrients (nitrogen, phosphorus and silica), nitrogen and carbon contents and stable isotope ratios (δN and δC) of particulate organic matter (POM) and sediment, nitrogen and oxygen stable isotope ratios (δN and δO) in nitrate (NO3 ) were measured. Nitrate-nitrogen (NO3 -N) concentration were significantly high near the discharging point then it decreased to offshore suggesting that impact zone of sewage effluent is about 1 km from the discharging point. Significant NO3 -N uptake by phytoplankton as well as dilution process were suggested in the area. However, the impact zone expanded more than twofold during the rainfall event (>20mm/h). Nutrient contents were significantly high both in the sediment and pore water near the discharging points and it caused relatively high diffusion flux to overlying water. It suggests nutrient regeneration process from the sediment is the secondary loading process in the study area.


Background: The initial empirical therapy of Ventilator Associated Pneumonia (VAP) modified based on the knowledge of local microbiological data is associated with decreased morbidity and mortality. The objective was to find the incidence and risk factors associated with VAP, the implicated pathogens and their susceptibility pattern as well as to assess the final clinical outcome in VAP. Materials and Methods: This was a prospective cohort study of 107 patients taken on ventilatory support for two or more days and those not suffering from pneumonia prior were to be taken on ventilator. The study was done over a period of one year. VAP was diagnosed using clinical pulmonary infection score of >6. The mortality, incidence of VAP, frequency of different pathogens isolated, their antibiotic sensitivity pattern, duration of mechanical ventilation and duration of hospital stay were assessed. Statistical Analysis: Univariate analysis, χ2 test and paired t-test. Results: The incidence of VAP was 28.04%. Mortality in VAP group was 46.67%, while in the non-VAP group was 27.28%. High APACHE II score was associated with a high mortality rate as well as increased incidence of VAP. The most common organisms isolated from endotracheal aspirate of patients who developed VAP were Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), Klebsiella pneumoniae and Acinetobacter baumannii. Most strains of Pseudomonas (55.56%) were resistant to commonly used beta-lactam antibiotics known to be effective against Pseudomonas. All strains of Staphylococcus aureus were MRSA and most isolates of K. pneumoniae (85.71%) were extended-spectrum beta-lactamase producing. About 50% isolates of Acinetobacter were resistant to carbapenems. Mortality was highest for infections caused by A. baumannii (83.33%) and K. pneumoniae (71.42%). Conclusions: APACHE II score can be used to stratify the risk of development of VAP and overall risk of mortality. Drug-resistant strains of various organisms are an important cause of VAP in our setting.


The transmission and absorption properties of turbid media have been examined with Kubelka and Munk's theory of the optics of intensely scattering material. The equation for the optical density of such material as a function of thickness has been derived and examined experimentally. It is shown that the reflectivity and scattering coefficient can be determined absolutely without reference to a standard material from the optical-density measurements. The absorption spectra of pigments in scattering media and in clear solution have been compared. It is shown that light in passing through a turbid sample may traverse an optical path which is many times the sample thickness. The practical consequence of this increased path length is an intensification of the absorption bands of pigments in light-scattering media. The theoretical expression for this intensification has been derived and tested experimentally. Spectral effects due to the physical binding of pigment molecules to the scattering particles have also been examined.


We consider the problem of inferring the conditional independence graph (CIG) of a high-dimensional stationary multivariate Gaussian time series. In a time series graph, each component of the vector series is represented by distinct node, and associations between components are represented by edges between the corresponding nodes. We formulate the problem as one of multi-attribute graph estimation for random vectors where a vector is associated with each node of the graph. At each node, the associated random vector consists of a time series component and its delayed copies. We present an alternating direction method of multipliers (ADMM) solution to minimize a sparse-group lasso penalized negative pseudo log-likelihood objective function to estimate the precision matrix of the random vector associated with the entire multi-attribute graph. The time series CIG is then inferred from the estimated precision matrix. A theoretical analysis is provided. Numerical results illustrate the proposed approach which outperforms existing frequency-domain approaches in correctly detecting the graph edges.


A recent research trend, motivated by the massive deployment of RFID technology, looks at cryptographic protocols for securing communication between entities in which some of the parties have very limited computing capabilities. In this paper, we focus our attention on SASI, a new RFID authentication protocol, designed for providing Strong Authentication and Strong Integrity. SASI is a good representative of a family of RFID authentication protocols, referred to as Ultralightweight RFID authentication protocols. These protocols, suitable for passive Tags with limited computational power and storage, involve simple bitwise operations such as and, or, exclusive or, modular addition, and cyclic shift operations. They are efficient, fit the hardware constraints, and can be seen as an example of the above research trend. However, the main concern is the real security of these protocols, which are often supported only by apparently reasonable and intuitive arguments. The contribution we provide with this work is the following: we start by showing some weaknesses in the SASI protocol, and then, we describe how such weaknesses, through a sequence of simple steps, can be used to compute in an efficient way all secret data used for the authentication process. Specifically, we describe three attacks: 1) a desynchronization attack, through which an adversary can break the synchronization between the RFID Reader and the Tag; 2) an identity disclosure attack, through which an adversary can compute the identity of the Tag; and 3) a full disclosure attack, which enables an adversary to retrieve all secret data stored in the Tag. Then, we present some experimental results, obtained by running several tests on an implementation of the protocol, in order to evaluate the performance of the proposed attacks, which confirm that the attacks are effective and efficient. It comes out that an active adversary by interacting with a Tag more or less three hundred times, makes the authentication protocol completely useless. Finally, we close the paper with some observations. The cryptoanalysis of SASI gets some new light on the ultralightweight approach, and can also serve as a warning to researchers working on the field and tempted to apply these techniques. Indeed, the results of this work, rise serious questions regarding the limits of the ultralightweight family of protocols, and on the benefits of these ad hoc protocol design strategies and informal security analysis.


The paper analyses the concept and performance of compact UASB/TF systems in relation to configuration, use of innovative packing media and operational conditions. For the conditions tested, the UASB/TF systems had consistently complied with the Brazilian discharge standard regarding to COD, BOD and TSS parameters. However, some enhancements are still necessary in order to increase nitrification in the process. The conditions to promote nitrification in shallow TF (packed bed up to 2.50 m height) seem to be compatible with the proposed simplification in the flowsheet, which is to operate the system without secondary clarifiers.


The results of archival studies may depend on when researchers analyze data for at least two reasons: (1) databases change over time and (2) the sampling frame, in terms of the period covered, may reflect different environmental conditions. We examined these issues through the replication of Hochberg, Ljungqvist, and Lu's (2007) research on the centrality of venture capital firms and their performance. We demonstrate (1) that one can reproduce the results in the original article if one uses data downloaded at roughly the same time as the original researchers did, (2) that these results remain fairly robust to even a decade of database updating, but (3) that the results depend sensitively on the sampling frame. Centrality only has a positive relationship to fund performance during boom periods.


This paper proposes a novel hybrid-excited dual-PM machine for electric vehicle propulsion. The key is to use an integrated stator winding to replace the armature winding and the field winding in the conventional hybrid-excited machine. The stator winding is excited by ac current with dc bias, in which the ac component is used to produce the rotating armature field, while the dc bias current is used for the flux regulation. Therefore, the function of the ac and dc windings can be incorporated and realized by using just one set of winding. The torque density and flux regulating capability can be improved, and the winding configuration is also simplified. In addition, dual-PM excitation structure combines the advantage of stator-PM doubly salient machine and rotor-PM magnetic-geared machine, which can further enhance the torque capability. The operating principle and control strategy of the proposed machine are discussed. The electromagnetic performances are studied using the time-stepping finite-element method. A machine prototype is manufactured and experimental tests are conducted to verify the effectiveness of the machine design.


Throughout the centuries, every culture has had an intimate and vital connection to water. It is one of the most important elements necessary to sustain life. Civilizations have based their communities in close proximity to water systems for sustenance, cleansing, sacred ceremony and prayer, healing, play and recreation, transport, economics, irrigation of crops and livestock, and unfortunately diluting wastes and contaminants. Each culture has a different way of representing how sacred water is and assigning a unique and intimate value to it. Cultural traditions, Indigenous practices, and societal values are all interconnected in the ways people perceive and manage water throughout the world. Within the reported research project we have developed the Indigenous-knowledge-based method to evaluate water quality and describe the temporal model of water quality dynamics. The method was appropriate for the community water area of Peepeekisis and Kahkewistahaw First Nations situated around the Calling Lakes, Saskatchewan.


Golf does not inherently privilege men or women physically, yet men are much more likely to participate in golf. The authors explore the institutional(e.g., societal level) and interactional barriers to women's golf participation and uncover strategies women use to negotiate playing and persisting in golf. Guided by research on tokenism in occupations, statistical discrimination, and feminist research in the sociology of sport, the authors use 10 interviews with recreational women golfers to explore these issues. Similar to women in predominantly male occupations, the women in this study report heightened visibility and experiences with typecasting on the golf course. In addition, social closure operates in the form of unwelcoming courses; women reported feeling ignored, overlooked, or unimportant on the course. The authors discuss several strategies the women in the sample use to overcome sexism and persist in golf.


The main objective of this paper is the definition of a methodological framework for the determination, analysis and cross-evaluation of urban clusters which are formulated within wider study areas, such as administrative regions. To this end, different methods and techniques are utilised, that stem from the fields of statistics and quantitative spatial analysis. The geographical delineation of urban clusters is mainly based on different types of variables, such as the demographic characteristics of the cities, the number of public and private sector services located in them, as well as the total length of the road network in the study area. Furthermore, a comparative urban concentration indicator (UCI) is devised, which reflects the role and the relative weight of every urban area in the study region as well as its spatial influence. Both the proposed methodological framework and the UCI are applied to the region of Thessaly, Greece.


The Art of Childhood and Adolescence is composed of completely new research on the development of representational thinking from infancy through to adolescence. It makes an important contribution to the theory of children's development and to practitioners' understanding, as well as suggesting new paths of inquiry. The book draws on highly detailed longitudinal studies, conducted over 24 years (20 in London and 4 in Singapore). Line drawings and photographs are used to illustrate important concepts. Matthews, highly respected internationally, also sheds light on current debates, such as the opposition of culturally specific and universal development in children the world over.


In this work, we present the non-linear elasto-plastic phase-field model and simulation of the martensitic transformation in a polycrystalline material including the effects of grain and twin boundaries. The phase-field microelasticity theory proposed by Khachaturyan is used to perform 2D and 3D simulations of fcc → bct martensitic transformation in a Fe–0.3%C polycrystalline alloy, incorporating the effect of both coherent and incoherent boundaries. The effect of plastic accommodation is also introduced into the model, by solving a time-dependent equation, during the solid-to-solid phase transformation. It is found that the given phase-field model, with the effect of grain boundaries, not only respects the morphological features of martensite but also conforms well with the physics of the problem. Different sets of simulations are performed to validate the model and it is concluded that the given model can correctly predict the evolution of the martensitic microstructure in a polycrystal, as opposed to previous models where the effects of grain and twin boundaries are neglected.


The Postal Service started on a "death spiral," the Government Accountability Office noted in 2002, as its revenue-generating letter mail migrated to electronic channels. In response, Congress has been struggling to craft legislation that would restructure postal policy and operations. This financial deterioration jeopardizes the future of universal postal service, a prospect that rural communities find especially disquieting. Lawmakers working on postal reform recognize that universal postal service remains an ill-defined policy. This article examines universal postal service through the lens of policy history. The analysis suggests that universal postal service developed as a communication safety net to fill gaps left by other information networks. In light of this history, the article proposes that lawmakers treat universal postal service as part of a more comprehensive policy promoting universal communication service.Part I furnishes brief context, sketching the place of universal service under two postal regimes—that of the Post Office Department (1789-1971) and U.S. Postal Service (1971-present). Part II considers universal service in different communication contexts, especially telephony and broadcasting. Parts III to VI examine the several dimensions of universal postal service, discussing the origins of each policy. Specifically, Part III identifies key steps in developing a national postal infrastructure and how policymakers found ancillary purposes for it. Part IV analyzes postal rate policies, especially uniform (i.e., non-distance sensitive) postage, that facilitated the nationwide circulation of political, economic, and social information. Part V shows how targeted policies bridged the postal divide between urban and rural America. Part VI sketches relations between the government posts and the private sector's complementary and competing communication systems. Part VII offers recommendations that would treat universal postal service as a component of universal communication service.


The Department of Neurosurgery at the University of Nebraska Medical Center has grown considerably from one neurosurgeon in 1923 into a first-class department with diverse subspecialty care and innovative faculty. Founding neurosurgeon Dr. J. Jay Keegan, a student of Harvey Cushing, instituted a legacy of clinical and research excellence that he passed on to his successors. The department created a lecture series to honor Keegan's pioneering techniques and impact in the field, featuring prominent neurosurgeons from across the country. Keegan's successors, such as Dr. Lyal Leibrock, grew the department through a unique partnership with private practice. The current faculty has continued the tradition of exceptional resident training and innovative patient care.


A Ph.D. by publication comprising two of my books The Death Of Bees and Closed Doors exploring the impact of experience on creative writing practices and techniques used when writing from personal experience. The exegesis is accompanied by a reflective and critical examination aiming to analyze how authors creatively translate experience into their work.

Reflecting on my own creative process, I propose a critical inspection of the autobiographical and the personal influences that impacted the creation of various narrative personas behind The Death Of Bees and Closed Doors. Specifically, this thesis reveals the negotiation between real and fictive in order to preserve the truth. The exegesis will also look at how an experiential autoethnographic approach can raise awareness of key social and political issues through the invention of narrative derived from recognizable experiences.

In conclusion, I propose narrative persona is inextricably linked to personal experience in all my published work and this contention can be proved within the exegesis, meaningfully contributing to literary discussion regards creative techniques used by authors to translate the autobiographic in their creative work. This unique research and revelation reinvigorates the debate around the impact of creatively sharing trauma in fiction and the effect this has on the reader seeking authentic narratives reflecting a shared and universal experience.


There is far too much concern today about the conflicts of interest between people; for example, agency theory (the conflicts of interest between agents and owners) -- a favorite topic of Jensen -- and not enough attention paid to the damage caused by an individual's conflict of interest with himself or herself. We argue here that a large amount of the damage inflicted on people and organizations is caused by actions of individuals that are not in their own self interest. That is, people consistently impose costs on themselves, their loved ones, friends, associates, partners, employers and the public by actions that are not in their own self interest.In this presentation we focus on the integrity issues that cause huge problems in the lives of most individuals and to every one we come in contact with. These slides draw on the work on a new model of integrity that is available at:http://ssrn.com/abstract=920625 http://ssrn.com/abstract=1542759http://ssrn.com/abstract=1511274We present a positive model of integrity that, as we distinguish and define integrity, provides powerful access to increased performance for individuals, groups, organizations, and societies. Our model reveals the causal link between integrity and increased performance, quality of life, and value-creation for all entities, and provides individuals and organizations access to that causal link. Integrity is thus a factor of production as important as knowledge and technology, yet its major role in productivity and performance has been largely hidden or unnoticed, or even ignored by economists and others.


Free and enslaved Africans played an important role in developing a unique form of participatory Christianity in New Spain's mining towns, especially Zacatecas, San Luis Potosi, and Parral. Afro-Mexicans founded, organized, and led religious organizations, called cofradías, shaping them to their own needs and understandings of the sacred and its connections to social ties, gatherings, and celebrations. The practical goals of cofradías included helping sick members and paying for burials and funerals. Historians observe a kind of Latin American African-influenced Baroque piety in cofradías, with embodied practices concentrating on annual flagellant processions held during Holy Week, and an evolving internal gender dynamic, which suggests assimilative goals, even as cofradías strengthened Afro-Mexican communities.


We monitored developmental alterations in the morphology of dendritic spines in primary cultures of hippocampal neurons using confocal laser scanning microscopy (CLSM) and the fluorescent marker Dil. Dissociated rat hippocampal neurons were plated on polylysine-coated glass cover slips and grown in culture for 1–4 weeks. Fixed cultures were stained with Dil and visualized with the CLSM. Spine density, spine length, and diameters of spine heads and necks were measured. Some cultures were immunostained for synaptophysin and others prepared for EM analysis. In the 1–3 week cultures, 92–95% of the neurons contained spiny dendrites. Two subpopulations of spine morphologies were distinguished. At 1 week in culture, "headless" spines constituted 50% of the spine population and were equal in length to the spines with heads. At 2, 3, and 4 weeks in culture headless spines constituted a progressively smaller fraction of the population and were, on average, shorter than spines with heads. Spines with heads had narrower necks than headless spines. At 3 weeks in culture, spines were associated with synaptophysin-immunoreactive labeling, resembling synaptic terminals. At 4 weeks in culture, only 70% of the Dil-filled cells had spiny dendrites, and the density of spines decreased. Ultrastructurally, the majority of dendritic spine- like structures at 1 week resembled long filopodia without synaptic contacts. The majority of axospinous synapses were on short "stubby" spines. At 3 weeks in culture, the spines were characteristic of those seen in vivo. They contained no microtubules or polyribosomes, were filled with a characteristic, filamentous material, and formed asymmetric synapses. These studies provide the basis for further analysis of the rules governing the formation, development, and plasticity of dendritic spines under controlled, in vitro conditions.


The new peer-to-peer (P2P) technologies have impacted the film industry, which advocates sanctions against the downloading and sharing of products found on the Internet. But the economic effect of file sharing on the film industry remains difficult to determine. In this article, we ask whether file sharing networks will affect the survival or potential growth of European cinema. The steady decline in traditional film distribution channels for European productions—cinema theatres and direct sales or renting—is leading to the emergence of new distribution channels. And yet the results of the movie industry's calls—including those voiced by its European players—for stronger legislation against these same distribution channels are making their way through Europe by means of enforcement tools like HADOPI and other graduated response programs. Our hypothesis is that this offensive runs the risk of condemning a potential open distribution network and commons business model at its birth. For this, we start by clarifying the emerging global P2P phenomenon; we then stipulate what we mean by European cinema, outline its peculiar traits, and contrast it with North American cinema. Finally, we compare the consumption of European film in theatres with the availability of seeds and leechers for European cinema in P2P networks.


The western Somali Basin in the northwestern Indian Ocean is covered by thick deposits of terrigenous sediments. Seismic reflection profiles show, however, the northern and southern parts to be very different. The northern sections is a deep basin filled with thick uniformly stratified sediments. It is enclosed by the continental margin to the west and north, Chain ridge to the east, and shallow basement structure to the south. A change in depth of basement occurs along an approximately east-west line at latitude 3°30′N very near the southern end of Chain ridge. In the southern portion of the basin the basement is shallow, and, immediately south of latitude 3°30′N, it has high relief. Stratified flat-lying sediments fill the basement depressions, and isolated hills formed of basement material rise above the abyssal plain deposits. Farther to the south the abyssal plain becomes very narrow. Gabbro dredged from the southeast slope of Chain ridge has been dated by the potassium-argon method as 89.6±4.5 m.y., which should be considered a minimum age. The evidence suggests that the entire sediment sequence of the northern basin was deposited subsequent to the formation of the ridge. The thin sediment cover of the southern portion of the basin is probably no older than Tertiary.


Blogs are increasingly popular among private persons, public institutions, nongovernmental organizations and companies. While a range of communicative functions is associated with blogs in the way they are used specifically by corporations, one key area of interest is clearly public relations. This is especially pertinent to large businesses that face a significant amount of criticism in the media. As an example for such a case, this paper presents an analysis of Life at Wal-Mart , an image blog maintained by Wal-Mart Stores Inc. Following a description of corporate blogs as an emerging genre, I will outline how Life at Wal-Mart is used to further specific communicative goals of the company and what the findings indicate for a modern theory of digital genres.


For forest landscape restoration (FLR) to be sustainable and responsive to multiple developmental and environmental needs, we need dialogue and coordination among sectors, actors and institutions. FLR initiatives involve a web of multiple and diverse stakeholder groups and sectors – such as (sub) national governments, agricultural and forestry companies, research institutions, NGOs, traditional communities, landowners and companies – with diverse and often conflicting interests and priorities. This study identifies key factors related to the success and impact of ICMs for FLR and presents elements that should be considered when developing new or assessing current ICMs. It does this by using an adapted network evaluation framework, drawing on examples from five ICMs operating at different scales in Espirito Santo in Brazil, Colombia, El Salvador, the Yucatan Peninsula States in Mexico, and Peru. This  report presents a package of tools, principles and guiding questions that can be used to develop new or assess existing ICMs for FLR. This study also presents a package of tools, principles and guiding questions that can be used to develop new or assess existing ICMs for FLR.


One of the factors that affects the efficiency and lifetime of spark ignited internal combustion engine is "knock". Knock sensor is a commonly used to detect this phenomenon. However, noise, limits detection accuracy of this sensor. In this study, Empirical Mode Decomposition (EMD) method is introduced as a fully adaptive signal-based analysis. Then, based on weighting decompositions, a method for reducing knock signal noise to enhance detection accuracy of knock, has been proposed. Then, the presented method has been evaluated using recorded signals from four engine cylinders. Internal pressure of each cylinder were recorded and used as reference for knock detection. Test results verifies that knock detection accuracy improved by about 11.3%. The results of optimization method were consistent with our expectations and the weights of middle levels are higher than other levels, which means that the proposed method not only extracts the main frequencies of knock, but also assigns reasonable weights to them.


The primary purpose of this thesis was to assess the effect of knee-joint angle on the neuromechanics of maximal and explosive contractions, specifically torque and neuromuscular activation, as well as the influence of isometric resistance training (RT) on these variables and thus joint angle specificity of training adaptations. It was found that electrode location had a pronounced effect on surface electromyography (sEMG) amplitude during maximum isometric voluntary contractions (MVCs) and moderate relationship between subcutaneous tissue thickness and sEMG amplitude (R2=0.31 up to 0.38) was reduced but not consistently removed by maximal M-Wave (MMAX) normalization [up to R2= 0.16 (peak-to-peak) and R2= 0.23 (Area)]. Thus, MMAX peak-to-peak was the better normalization parameter that removed the influence of electrode location and substantially reduced the influence of subcutaneous tissue thickness. Maximal torque-angle relationship presented an inverted U shape with both, agonist (measure by two different techniques) and antagonist neuromuscular activation both differing with knee-joint angle and thus, both likely contributing to the torque-angle relationship. Absolute explosive torque-angle relationship exhibited higher torques at mid-range knee joint angles in a similar manner to maximal strength, whilst the ability to explosively express the available torque (i.e. relative to maximal strength) revealed only subtle differences between joint angles. Agonist neuromuscular activation showed increases from extended to flexed positions during both maximum and explosive contractions (at all time points; ~6% to ~34%) and evoked contractile properties presented opposite patterns with twitch torque increasing (~5% to ~30%) and octet torque decreasing (~2% to ~14%) with knee flexion. Finally, after 4 weeks of RT at a 65° knee-joint angle evidence of joint angle specificity was provided from both within-group (greater gains at 3 angles than others) and between-group evidence (greater gains at 2 angles than others) for maximal strength but not for explosive strength and neuromuscular activation. In summary, this thesis demonstrated: (1) higher strength values at middle knee-joint positions than more flexed and/or extended positions during maximal and explosive contractions; (2) how agonist neuromuscular activation contributes to the beforementioned changes in strength; (3) how muscle contractile properties contribute to the explosive strength across knee-joint angles; and finally (4) that joint angle specificity has a neural basis.


Many common diseases show wide phenotypic variation. We present a statistical method for determining whether phenotypically defined subgroups of disease cases represent different genetic pathophysiologies, in which disease-associated variants have different effect sizes in the two subgroups. Our method models the genome-wide distributions of genetic association statistics with mixture Gaussians. We apply a global test without requiring explicit identification of disease-associated variants, thus maximising power in comparison to a standard variant by variant subgroup analysis. Where evidence for genetic subgrouping is found, we present methods for post-hoc identification of the contributing genetic variants.

We demonstrate the method on a range of simulated and test datasets where expected results are already known. We investigate subgroups of type 1 diabetes (T1D) cases defined by autoantibody positivity, establishing evidence for differential genetic basis with thyroid peroxidase antibody positivity, driven generally by variants in known T1D associated regions.