At the height of the religious ferment of the 1970s, David Van Zandt studied firsthand the most vilified of the new radical religious movements--the Children of God, or the Family of Love. First feigning membership and later gaining the permission of the Family, the author lived full-time in COG colonies in England and the Netherlands. From that experience, he has produced an informed, insightful, and humane report on how COG members function in what seems at first to be a completely bizarre setting. The COG, an offshoot of the Jesus People movement of the late 1960s, was one of the first radical religious groups to be accused of "brainwashing." Led by the charismatic David Berg, known as Moses David, the group demands total commitment from its full-time members and proselytizes continuously. Until recently the COG used sex as a proselytizing tool, and it continues to encourage full sexual sharing among group members. Instead of examining the COG's ideology in the abstract, Van Zandt analyzes how its ideas are understood and used by ordinary members in their daily lives. For them the Family is its practical, day-to-day, and all-consuming activities, such as "litnessing" (the street sale of COG literature). This is a vivid eyewitness account that will fascinate anyone interested in life in modern radical communal religions, such as the Unification Church and the Hare Krishnas, as well as in other radical, Christian-based, total-commitment groups. Van Zandt's frank reflections on his near-conversion experience and on the ethics of his covert observation enrich our knowledge of doing research with such groups.Originally published in 1991.The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These paperback editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.


New technologies in data science are allowing long-term investors to bring much more rigor to their operations. In this article the authors provide empirical examples in support of these data-driven advances, demonstrating their practical applications. They use the UC Investments office as their case study and discuss how adoption of advanced data science techniques can move organizations past the current unsatisfactory state of the art and toward an unprecedented level of operational finesse. Specifically, the authors focus on a methodological innovation in fair valuation of illiquid assets that is supported by an automated, rigorous process. They test this process in a real-world setting and find, at least in this case, that these advances can enhance roll forward outputs in terms of timeliness, accuracy, and granularity. This finding has several potential impacts, not only for reporting, but also for investment, risk management, actuarial purposes, and even personal compensation of teams.


This thesis presents the theoretical framework required to apply spectrally
resolved x-ray Thomson scattering (XRTS) as a diagnostic method for warm dense
matter. In particular, the theory is generalised to allow for the description of systems
with multiple ion species where all mutual correlations are taken into account
within the new approach. Supplemented with the theory presented, XRTS is now
a promising diagnostics for high-energy-density matter containing different chemical
elements or mixtures of different materials.
The signal measured at XRTS contains the unshifted Rayleigh peak and
frequency-shifted features. The first is related to elastic scattering from electrons
co-moving with the ions whilst the second occurs due to scattering from free electrons
and excitation/ionisation events. The focus of this thesis lies on the elastic
scattering feature which requires the ion structure and the electron density around
the ion as input for the theoretical modelling. The ion structure is obtained from
quantum simulations (DFT-MD) and classical hypernetted-chain (HNC) equations.
The analysis of the DTF-MD simulation data reveals that partial ionisation yields
strong modifications of the ion-ion interactions. Similar effects are found for the
form of the electron screening cloud around an ion.
On the basis of the newly developed theory and structural models, multicomponent
effects on the XRTS signal are studied. It is shown that the Rayleigh
feature is very sensitive to the ratio of the elements in the scattering volume and
their mutual correlations. These results indicate that XRTS is well-suited to probe
the properties of complex materials and the process of mixing in the WDM regime.
The advanced theories are finally applied to experimental spectra. The procedure
allows for both extracting the basic plasma parameters and assessing the
quality of the theoretical models applied. Comparisons with several experiments
demonstrated that the non-collective regime (large scattering angle) is reasonably
well understood whereas the collective regime (small scattering angle/long wavelength
limit) still holds challenges. The collective regime is problematic as here
strong correlations and screening are highly relevant and, thus, a yet unknown description
for fully coupled quantum systems needs to be applied.


Efficient and well-maintained road systems are necessary for the economic well being of any industrialized country. Maintenance and rehabilitation of existing roads have taken priority over new construction in recent years, thus making information about the condition of road surfaces extremely important. Several methods of gathering this information have been developed worldwide; one of them is Laser Road Surface Tester (Laser RST), which was developed in Sweden in 1981. The Laser RST is a laser-based, computer-automated, non-contact road profilometer system with the ability to collect and simultaneously process data about the road surface. Variables measured include rut depth, unevenness, cracking, megatexture, rough macrotexture, fine macrotexture, crossfall, curves, and elapsed distance. Subjective evaluations are also supported, if desired. Eleven laser rangefinders (LRFs), mounted on the front of the Laser RST van, are the primary components of the data collection system. They scan the road with high-speed, high-resolution distance sampling. The signals from the lasers are sent through signal processing cards (SPCs) and then to a computer inside the van for final processing. Data is stored on floppy disk and printed by an on-board printer. The Laser RST is an extremely complex system but it is also a modular one, making troubleshooting and repair relatively easy, inexpensive, and fast. This paper discusses the various modules available. Variables measured are defined and measurement algorithms detailed. The Laser RST system can be customized to meet specific user requirements quickly and easily.


Review Article New paradigms are continuously developing in orthodontics. Paradigm shift is a fundamental change in the basic concepts and experimental practices of a scientific discipline. New idea generally experience great resistance from practitioners in the field and once the idea is accepted by various practitioners, a new paradigm begins. When this natural dentition state occurs, the face should also be in the perfect harmony and balance and the stomato-gnathic system should function ideally. All these appliances and various other modifications serve the purpose of anchorage but with some limitations like patient compliance especially with extra oral appliances and anchorage loss to some extent.


Prior research presumes that the U.S. livestock feed demand for dried distillers grains with solubles (DDGS) can accommodate the rapid growth in DDGS production. The objective of this work is to reexamine the market potential for DDGS by considering factors that limit the adoption rate of DDGS. An estimate of DDGS market size requires information about DDGS inclusion rates, animal populations, and adoption rates. The rapid expansion of the ethanol industry will saturate the dairy and hog markets for DDGS by the end of 2009, while the beef and poultry use must triple to consume all available product. One must be circumspect of these forecasts for three reasons. First, the supply of DDGS is contingent on ethanol production. If the downturn in ethanol profitability spreads, less DDGS may be available to absorb. Second, in the short run, farms capable of consuming DDGS are not likely to shift, and thus animal populations are relatively fixed. However, the DDGS inclusion rates will most likely increase from current practices. Yet it is hard to imagine the market penetration rate will reach 100 percent for any class of livestock. Finally, export markets may also consume more DDGS than expected, reducing the pressure to expand US consumption. Thus, producers and consumer of DDGS would be well advised to pay careful attention to market developments as the US DDGS continues to grow.


Closely located at the tumor suppressor locus 16q22.1, CKLF-like MARVEL transmembrane domain-containing member 3 and 4 (CMTM3 and CMTM4) encode two CMTM family proteins, which link chemokines and the transmembrane-4 superfamily. In contrast to the broad expression of both CMTM3 and CMTM4 in normal human adult tissues, only CMTM3 is silenced or down-regulated in common carcinoma (gastric, breast, nasopharyngeal, esophageal, and colon) cell lines and primary tumors. CMTM3 methylation was not detected in normal epithelial cell lines and tissues, with weak methylation present in only 5 of 35 (14%) gastric cancer adjacent normal tissues. Furthermore, immunohistochemistry showed that CMTM3 protein was absent in 12 of 35 (34%) gastric and 1 of 2 colorectal tumors, which was well correlated with its methylation status. The silencing of CMTM3 is due to aberrant promoter CpG methylation that could be reversed by pharmacologic demethylation. Ectopic expression of CMTM3 strongly suppressed the colony formation of carcinoma cell lines. In addition, CMTM3 inhibited tumor cell growth and induced apoptosis with caspase-3 activation. Thus, CMTM3 exerts tumor-suppressive functions in tumor cells, with frequent epigenetic inactivation by promoter CpG methylation in common carcinomas.


We propose an adaptive frame speech analysis scheme through dividing speech signal into stationary and dynamic region. Long frame analysis is used for stationary speech, and short frame analysis for dynamic speech. For computation convenience, the feature vector of short frame is designed to be identical to that of long frame. Two expressions are derived to represent the feature vector of short frames. Word recognition experiments on the TIMIT and NON-TIMIT with discrete Hidden Markov Model (HMM) and continuous density HMM showed that steady performance improvement could be achieved for open set testing. On the TIMIT database, adaptive frame length approach (AFL) reduces the error reduction rates from 4.47% to 11.21% and 4.54% to 9.58% for DHMM and CHMM, respectively. In the NON-TIMIT database, AFL also can reduce the error reduction rates from 1.91% to 11.55% and 2.63% to 9.5% for discrete hidden Markov model (DHMM) and continuous HMM (CHMM), respectively. These results proved the effectiveness of our proposed adaptive frame length feature extraction scheme especially for the open testing. In fact, this is a practical measurement for evaluating the performance of a speech recognition system.


We examine whether the value of active investment management can exceed its cost, and find that it can, by a substantial margin. We consider the 0.67% average cost estimate in French (2008), comparing it versus the expected value of a known active investment strategy. For a "passive" benchmark, we develop a 225 year index of monthly U.S. equity market returns, from July 1789 through June 2014. This timeframe encompasses the entire history of every U.S. exchange and includes all known periods of secondary market stock trading in the United States. We then estimate the long-run monthly returns of an active investment strategy based on an actual 11-year investment strategy. We present a new performance model extending the Treynor and Mazuy (1966) model and implement it to estimate monthly returns to the active strategy over the same 225 year period. We believe this experiment offers a good example of how the value of well-constructed active investment strategies can be worth substantially more than their cost.


In the developing nervous system the modelling of axons and their growth cones is dependent on the dynamic regulation of the Rho family of GTPases, which play a crucial role in the regulation of the actin cytoskeleton. The guidance cues controlling axon path finding, either repulsive or attractive, require the Rho GTPases to effect changes in morphology. The signalling pathways linking the guidance molecules, and their receptors, to the Rho family GTPases remain unclear. Collapsin Response Mediator Protein-2 (CRMP-2) is a neurospecific protein involved in axonal outgrowth and the semaphorin3A collapse pathway. CRMP-2 is also a Rho kinase substrate, suggesting an involvement with the Rho GTPases. To investigate this, CRMP-2 was co-expressed in the neuroblastoma cell line, N1E-115, with active and inactive GTPase mutants. Cells expressing dominant active Rac1 and CRMP-2 became contracted, normally a RhoA effect, while co-expression of dominant active RhoA and CRMP-2 resulted in a phenotype typically associated with Rac1 signalling. CRMP-2 could bind directly to RhoA and Rac1, and, to a much lesser extent, Cdc42 in an overlay assay. In vivo CRMP-2 associated with active RhoA, but immunoprecipitated with active and inactive Rac1 mutants. Cdk5 inhibitors, but not Rho-kinase inhibitors blocked semaphorin3A-induced collapse in dorsal root ganglion neurones and N1E-115. Mutation of the Cdk5 phosphorylation site in CRMP-2 also inhibited sema3A collapse, suggesting a specific role of Cdk5 and CRMP-2 in the semaphorin3A growth cone collapse pathway. These results show CRMP-2 can switch RhoA and Rac1, and may link the guidance cues to the Rho-GTPases, which define growth cone morphology through their regulation of the actin cytoskeleton. Downstream of sema3A, CRMP-2 plays a crucial role in growth cone collapse, in a pathway involving Cdk5, and possibly phosphorylation at serine 522.


In mainland China, where there exists a deeply-rooted examination culture, an assessment reform promoting the use of assessment to support teaching and learning has been carried out since 2001. After a decade, however, only a few studies have been done that focus on primary school mathematics teachers' assessment practice at the classroom level. With this background, the Improving Classroom Assessment in China (ICA-C) project, as a sequel to the ICA project in the Netherlands, was set up, which contains four studies in total. Classroom assessment, or formative assessment in the hands of teachers, is the assessment that teachers continuously do during teaching with the aim of collecting information about students' learning and make adequate instructional decisions to meet students' needs. To shed light on the current situation of Chinese primary school mathematics teachers' perception and practice of classroom assessment, we first did a review study of 266 teacher-written journal papers addressing classroom assessment and published in 2011 and 2012. Apart from revealing Chinese primary school mathematics teachers' conceptions of classroom assessment, we also investigated how these conceptions are related to the assessment guidelines as included in the latest mathematics curriculum standards released in 2011. Then, a large-scale questionnaire survey was conducted to identify different assessment profiles of teachers. For collecting data, an existing questionnaire developed in the ICA project in the Netherlands was adjusted to fit to the Chinese context. The responses of 1101 Chinese primary school mathematics teachers from 12 provinces and regions were analyzed through exploratory factor analyses and a latent class analysis. Hereafter, two studies were set up to explore the use of classroom assessment techniques (CATs) in Chinese primary school mathematics classrooms. CATs are short teacher-initiated targeted assessment activities proximate to the textbook, which teachers can use in their daily practice to make informed instructional decisions. In the third study, six female third-grade mathematics teachers from two primary schools in Nanjing were offered a series of CATs that were designed to assess their students' understanding of division. The aim of this study was to investigate Chinese primary school mathematics teachers' use of CATs. The fourth study was set up to examine what insights Chinese primary school mathematics teachers gained into their students' mathematical understanding from using CATs. In total, 25 third-grade mathematics teachers from nine schools in Nanjing were given eight CATs assessing students' understanding of multiplication. The most unexpected finding of the ICA-C project is that, although the Chinese primary school mathematics teachers generally endorsed the idea of conducting assessment for improving teaching, adapting further teaching based on the assessment information seems to be a missing piece in their picture and practice of classroom assessment. The teachers involved in our study often considered the CATs as feasible to implement in class but rather as nice teaching activities than assessment activities. Adapting a teaching plan based on assessment information seems quite challenging for them. Our findings suggest that a fundamental shift in teachers' conception of assessment is necessary before they can use assessment formatively.


Purpose: Customers' Perceptions and Attitudes are significant aspects of consumer behavior for Marketing. Such perceptions and attitudes are measured as advantages, carrying special weight for the company. Furthermore they shape beliefs strongly relating to the Service Quality, while maximizing the magnitude of customer satisfaction. This paper will explore customer behavior in the light of customers' intentions towards EService Quality, Perceived Value, Purchase and Loyalty Intentions, with the view to provide information and feedback to enterprises. Methodology: To test the research hypotheses, a survey was carried out on 302 Greek customers of 85 Greek e-shops. The data of the survey were analysed using the Implicative Statistical Analysis technique. The Similarity Diagram and the Implicative Diagram were utilized to interpret the data. The instrument used to measure customers' Loyalty in relation to E-Service Quality, is E-S-QUAL, while that measuring their perception vis-a-vis the Web Site's Performance is E-RecS-QUAL. Their attitudes with regard to Perceived Value and Loyalty Intentions were measured utilizing four 4and five 5-point likert scale questions. And Overall Perceived Quality is measured by one 5-point likert scale question. In addition, Customer Satisfaction is measured by one 5-point likert scale question. Findings: The results of the study demonstrate that all four dimensions of customers' EService Quality, namely Efficiency, Fulfillment, System Availability and Privacy do not affect Perceived Value as well as Purchase and Loyalty Intentions. In addition dimensions relating to the Web Site's Performance, namely Responsiveness, Compensation and Contact do not have a direct effect on Overall E-Service Quality. Research Limitations/Implication: The paper calls for more research on how customers Volume: 1 Issue: 1 February 2019 2 influence e-service quality and satisfaction for a Web Site's Performance and Web based services. Originality/value: The paper expands existing literature, focusing on e-shopping, while using a multi-dimensional construct to measure customers' perceptions.


This paper compares three specification-based testing criteria using Mathur and Wong's PROBSUBSUMES measure. The three criteria are specification-mutation coverage, full predicate coverage, and transition-pair coverage. A novel aspect of the work is that each criterion is encoded in a model checker, and the model checker is used first to generate test sets for each criterion and then to evaluate test sets against alternate criteria. Significantly, the use of the model checker for generation of test sets eliminates human bias from this phase of the experiment. The strengths and weaknesses of the criteria are discussed.


Cadmium (Cd) is an inorganic mineral in the earth's crust. Cadmium entry into the environment occurs through geogenic and anthropogenic sources. Industrial activities including mining, electroplating, iron and steel plants, and battery production employ Cd during their processes and often release Cd into the environment. When disseminated into soil, Cd can be detrimental to agro-ecosystems because it is relatively mobile and phytotoxic even at low concentrations. Cadmium's phytotoxicity is due to reductions in the rate of transpiration and photosynthesis and chlorophyll concentration resulting in retardation of plant growth, and an alteration in the nutrient concentration in roots and leaves. In response to Cd toxicity, plants have developed protective cellular mechanisms such as synthesis of phytochelatins and metallothioneins, metal compartmentalization in vacuoles, and the increased activity of antioxidant enzymes to neutralize Cd-induced toxicity. While these direct protective mechanisms can help alleviate Cd toxicity, other indirect mechanisms such as microelements (zinc, iron, manganese, and selenium) interfering with Cd uptake may decrease Cd concentration in plants. This comprehensive review encompasses the significance of Cd, portals of contamination and toxicity to plants, and implications for crop production. Various mitigation strategies with the beneficial effects of zinc, iron, manganese, and selenium in activating defence mechanisms against Cd stress are discussed. Furthermore, this review systematically identifies and summarises suitable strategies for mitigating Cd-induced toxicity in plants.


To explore whether an environment of weightlessness will cause damage to the reproductive system of animals, we used the tail-suspension model to simulate microgravity, and investigated the effect of microgravity on the tissue structure and function of the testis in sexually mature male rats. Forty-eight male Wistar rats weighing 200-250 g were randomly assigned to three groups (N = 16 each): control, tail traction, and tail suspension. After the rats were suspended for 7 or 14 days, morphological changes of testis were evaluated by histological and electron microscopic methods. The expression of HSP70, bax/bcl-2 and AR (androgen receptor) in testis was measured by immunohistochemistry. Obvious pathological lesions were present in the testis after the rats were suspended for 7 or 14 days. We detected overexpression of HSP70 and an increase of apoptotic cells, which may have contributed to the injury to the testis. The expression of AR, as an effector molecule in the testis, was significantly decreased in the suspended groups compared to control (P < 0.01). We also observed that, with a longer time of suspension, the aforementioned pathological damage became more serious and some pathological injury to the testis was irreversible. The results demonstrated that a short- or medium-term microgravity environment could lead to severe irreversible damage to the structure of rat testis.


Almost overnight, Google became a successful producer of high-end consumer electronics. Sure, they have been producing one of the most successful smartphone operating systems - Android, but Android-based phones lacked that cleverly integrated feeling that one experiences when working on Apple products; after all it does make perfect sense for the software vendor to have a say in the hardware development process - an holistic approach ensures for an overall good product. Mike Isaac, writing for Wired Magazine, claims that "finally, Android has a soul." I'd rather not summon the incorporeal, but I would go as far as to say that the Nexus range has a certain je ne sais quoi.


The lecture focuses on EU decision-making and institutions. In this lesson, the discussions are centred on the EU Institutions, like the European Commission, the Council of Ministers, the European Council, the European External Acton Service and the European Parliament, and how they function internally and what are the main goals and objectives that each member-state has towards them. This provides a very acute and interesting approach to all the decision-making processes that are the engine wheel of the European Union and of the EU neighbourhood in Brussels. Lecturer: Kristian Lau Nielsen. Lecture is filmed in autumn 2010.


ABSTRACT Three different biomass fuels (bark pellets, wood pellets and granulates made from hydrolysis residues) were burned under identical conditions to determine the effect of biomass type on the amount and composition of the combustion-generated particles under fixed-bed conditions. Significant differences in emissions of dust, submicron particles, and the shape of the particle number and mass size distributions were found between the different biomass fuels. For the particles that were dominated by ash elements, the particle emissions were correlated to the ash concentration in the unburned fuel. However, if the combustion condition allowed for organic particles, the "sooting" tendency of the fuel was found to become more important than the amount of ash in the fuel. Furthermore, the fuel type affects the particle emissions more than changes in reactor operating parameters.


Objective Although immunoglobulin A (IgA) is abundantly expressed in the gut and known to be an important component of mucosal barriers against luminal pathogens, its precise function remains unclear. Therefore, we tried to elucidate the effect of IgA on gut homeostasis maintenance and its mechanism. Design We generated various IgA mutant mouse lines using the CRISPR/Cas9 genome editing system. Then, we evaluated the effect on the small intestinal homeostasis, pathology, intestinal microbiota, cytokine production, and immune cell activation using intravital imaging. Results We obtained two lines, with one that contained a <50 base pair deletion in the cytoplasmic region of the IgA allele (IgA tail-mutant; IgAtm/tm) and the other that lacked the most constant region of the IgH α chain, which resulted in the deficiency of IgA production (IgA−/−). IgA−/− exhibited spontaneous inflammation in the ileum but not the other parts of the gastrointestinal tract. Associated with this, there were significantly increased lamina propria CD4+ T cells, elevated productions of IFN-γ and IL-17, increased ileal segmented filamentous bacteria and skewed intestinal microflora composition. Intravital imaging using Ca2+ biosensor showed that IgA−/− had elevated Ca2+ signalling in Peyer's patch B cells. On the other hand, IgAtm/tm seemed to be normal, suggesting that the IgA cytoplasmic tail is dispensable for the prevention of the intestinal disorder. Conclusion IgA plays an important role in the mucosal homeostasis associated with the regulation of intestinal microbiota and protection against mucosal inflammation especially in the ileum.


Essential Case Studies in Public Health: Putting Public Health into Practice is a unique compilation of twenty-one cases based on real life events and problems. Written by over forty public health faculty members and practitioners, these cases vividly illustrate how professionals across various disciplines tackle public health challenges. Covering a wide range of topics and issues from HPV vaccines as school entry requirements to implementing community-based water systems in rural Honduran communities to a mumps epidemic in Iowa, this text helps students apply a wide range of knowledge and skills relevant to public health outbreak investigation, policy analysis, regulatory decision-making and more. Suitable as a stand-alone text or as an adjunct to any introductory public health text, this collection of engaging case studies provides students with the opportunity to synthesize and apply each of the five components of the "Public Health 101" curriculum framework: the public health approach; tools of population health; disease: determinants, impacts, and interventions; healthcare and public health systems; and special areas of public health focus. Selected cases can be readily applied to courses across the curriculum.


BACKGROUND
Updated National Academy of Clinical Biochemistry (NACB) Laboratory Medicine Practice Guidelines for the use of tumor markers in the clinic have been developed.

METHODS
Published reports relevant to use of tumor markers for 5 cancer sites--testicular, prostate, colorectal, breast, and ovarian--were critically reviewed.

RESULTS
For testicular cancer, alpha-fetoprotein, human chorionic gonadotropin, and lactate dehydrogenase are recommended for diagnosis/case finding, staging, prognosis determination, recurrence detection, and therapy monitoring. alpha-Fetoprotein is also recommended for differential diagnosis of nonseminomatous and seminomatous germ cell tumors. Prostate-specific antigen (PSA) is not recommended for prostate cancer screening, but may be used for detecting disease recurrence and monitoring therapy. Free PSA measurement data are useful for distinguishing malignant from benign prostatic disease when total PSA is <10 microg/L. In colorectal cancer, carcinoembryonic antigen is recommended (with some caveats) for prognosis determination, postoperative surveillance, and therapy monitoring in advanced disease. Fecal occult blood testing may be used for screening asymptomatic adults 50 years or older. For breast cancer, estrogen and progesterone receptors are mandatory for predicting response to hormone therapy, human epidermal growth factor receptor-2 measurement is mandatory for predicting response to trastuzumab, and urokinase plasminogen activator/plasminogen activator inhibitor 1 may be used for determining prognosis in lymph node-negative patients. CA15-3/BR27-29 or carcinoembryonic antigen may be used for therapy monitoring in advanced disease. CA125 is recommended (with transvaginal ultrasound) for early detection of ovarian cancer in women at high risk for this disease. CA125 is also recommended for differential diagnosis of suspicious pelvic masses in postmenopausal women, as well as for detection of recurrence, monitoring of therapy, and determination of prognosis in women with ovarian cancer.

CONCLUSIONS
Implementation of these recommendations should encourage optimal use of tumor markers.


Interval data is the "new found" backbone of both supply-side and demand-side programs. The ability to acquire utility interval data has been available for years but mostly used by utility companies and large commercial customers for billing and settlement purposes. Data acquisition is finally becoming a common practice outside the utility company arena to where it is recognized as a valuable asset and tool and is being required by building owners, facility engineers, ESCOs/ESPs and supply-side entities so they can accurately predict savings from an energy efficiency project, help mitigate performance contract (PC) risks, be used as a tool to negotiate better electricity rates in deregulated states, etc. One important aspect of data for a supply-side program is the value of aggregating interval data across an owner's building enterprise. If the buildings reside in a deregulated state, the aggregated data can be used as a tool to negotiate a better utility rate. The importance of data for a demand-side program is being able to evaluate and assess 15-minute load profile data for anomalies in whole building consumption and identify improper start-stop sequences for mechanical systems.


The accompanying tectonic map of the Sierra Nevada of California has been compiled from both published and unpublished sources. It represents trends of plates (cleavage-, bedding-, flow-, and shear-layers), in both the metamorphic and the granitic rocks. The exposed edges of these plates combine into lanes , such as the San Andreas Rift, and curves , such as the westward hook of the southern part of the Sierra. These forms appear in all sizes down to that of the hand specimen. On this map the Sierra becomes a shift zone with principal motion horizontal shear along the lanes, and with displacement northwestward on the Pacific side. Subsidiary motion starts at inequalities in strength and creates curves in which the inner parts are thrust upward and outward toward their convex sides. The resultant motion is clockwise in horizontal section. Heat concentrated inside the curves promotes crystallization through grades of metamorphism that end with granite. The granite is found in funnel-shaped units enlarging upward to maximum surface diameters of 12 miles. As such units become frozen together, the resulting pluton grows so strong that continuing motion is forced out into the weaker material. For example, present motion is confined to the San Andreas, Walker and other lanes outside the main granite body. The heat escaping from such structures toward or to the surface is represented by ore deposits, volcanoes, and hot springs.


The purpose of this study is to isolate and identify lactic acid bacteria from elephant grass (Pennisetum purpureum) silage and examine their effect on the silage fermentation quality. Three of lactic acid bacteria strains were isolated from elephant silage and their characterization, identification, and influence on silage quality after 90 d of ensiling was studied. All three strains were Gram-positive, catalase-negative, and were grown in 6.5% NaCl and pH 4.00. Strains AZZ1, was identified as for genus pediococcus, whereas, AZZ4 and AZZ7 strains were classified as genus Lactobacillus according to the phenotype, 16S rRNA, and RecA gene analysis. Three strains were used as additives at 1.0×106 CFU/g of fresh material of elephant grass. Strain AZZ4 is found to be the most effective in improving the fermentation quality of the elephant grass silage, as indicated by a lower (P<0.0001) dry matter losses, pH value, water-soluble carbohydrates, acetic acid content, butyric acid, propionic acid and ammonia-N. However, the lactic acid content was higher (P<0.0001) compared to the control and other treatments. In conclusion, these results suggest that, for well-preserved silage, the isolates may be useful as inoculants for silage making, and could play a major role in developing silage production.


PURPOSE
Spinal radiosurgery is planned to strict tolerances. Unaccounted for dosimetric changes resulting from respiratory motion might lead to delivery of a sub-optimal plan. We examine these effects for RapidArc spine radiosurgery.

METHODS
Plans were created for three patients that received 4D-CT scans in a spinal radiosurgery set-up. A target covering a single vertebral body and pedicles was defined and the spinal canal was contoured for each patient. Plans that delivered 18 Gy to the targets were created on the free breathing scans (FB). The maximum inspiration and expiration 4D-CT phases were fused to the FB based on target and spinal canal position. The FB plans were copied onto these images and doses were calculated. Point doses, DVHs, and plan subtractions were used to evaluate plan differences. Motion was measured at fixed points on the 4D-CTs.

RESULTS
The target for case 1 was defined at T4, case two at T7, and case three at T9. For all cases the target and the spinal canal moved < 1 mm, while the skin surface moved 1-2.5 mm. For the T4 plan the aortic arch moved about 6 mm. For the T7 and T9 cases the diaphragm moved 5 mm and 12.3 mm, respectively. Point dose changes in the targets between the maximum inspiration and exhalation plans were 8.1 cGy, 69.0 cGy, and 58.1 cGy for the T4, T7, and T9 plans. Point changes in the spinal canal were 13.8 cGy, 34.0 cGy, and 34.1 cGy for the T4, T7, and T9 plans. Spinal canal DVHs changes were negligible in all cases. Changes in target coverage at doses >= 18 Gy were approximately 5% for the T7 and T9 plans.

CONCLUSION
Respiratory motion may alter the dosimetry of spinal radiosurgery plans. The clinical impact of these changes appears to be small.


This paper presents a first approach of Evaluation Engine Architecture (EEA) as proposal to support adaptive integral assessment, in the context of a virtual learning environment. The goal of our research is design an evaluation engine tool to assist in the whole assessment process within the A2UN@ project, linking that tool with the other key elements of a learning design (learning task, learning resources and learning support). The teachers would define the relation between knowledge, competencies, activities, resources and type of assessment. Providing this relation is possible obtain more accurate estimations of student's knowledge for adaptive evaluations and future recommendations. The process is supported by usage of educational standards and specifications and for an integral user modelling.


Introduction: Adolescent idiopathic scoliosis (AIS) is a spinal deformity that causes the spine to bend laterally. Patients with AIS undergo frequent X-ray examinations to monitor the progression of the deformity through the measurement of the Cobb angle, increasing the risk of developing radiation-induced cancer. The aim of this study was to investigate the use of scan projection radiograph (SPR) in computed tomography (CT) to assess AIS by quantifying radiation dose from the SPR acquisitions and comparing it to those of digital radiography (DR) and a dedicated scoliosis imaging system (EOS) and by evaluating the accuracy of Cobb angle measurements on SPR images using a bespoke validated phantom.
Methods: A dosimetry phantom representing a 10-year-old child and thermoluminescent dosimeters were used for measuring organ dose to calculate effective dose (ED) and effective risk (ER). Twenty-seven CT SPR protocols were used. A comparison was made to doses from imaging protocols using DR and the EOS system. The effectiveness of a scoliosis shawl for selected projections was also tested. To test the accuracy of Cobb angle measurements on SPR images, a scoliotic phantom was constructed and validated. Poly-methyl methacrylate (PMMA) and plaster of Paris (PoP) were used to represent human soft tissue and bone tissue, respectively, to construct a phantom exhibiting a 15° lateral curve of the spine. The phantom was validated by comparing the Hounsfield unit (HU) of its vertebrae with those of a human and an animal. Additionally, comparisons of signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) to those from a commercially available phantom were made. The angle of the curve in the phantom was measured directly to confirm that it was 15°. The constructed phantom was scanned in CT SPR mode, and the resulting images were visually evaluated against set criteria to determine their suitability for Cobb angle measurements. Those deemed of insufficient quality were excluded. Cobb angle measurements were then performed on the remaining images (n = 10) by 13 observers.
Results: EOS had the lowest ED and ER when it was used to irradiate the phantom in AP positions. Five SPR AP imaging protocols and seven PA imaging protocols delivered significantly lower radiation dose and risk than their corresponding imaging positions in DR (p < 0.05). The scoliosis shawl significantly lowered the ED and ER of SPR and DR AP imaging protocols (p < 0.05). The validation of the PoP phantom revealed that the HU of the PoP vertebrae was 628 (SD= 56), human vertebrae was 598 (SD= 79) and sheep vertebra was 605 (SD= 83). The SNR values of the two phantoms correlated strongly (r = 0.93 [(p < 0.05]). The measured scoliosis angle was 14 degrees. When the phantom was imaged using SPR, the difference between the measured Cobb angle and the known angle was, on average, –2.75° (SD = 1.46°). The agreement among the observers was good (p = 0.861, 95% CI [0.70–0.95]) and comparable to similar studies on other imaging modalities which are used for Cobb angle estimation.
Conclusion: EOS had the lowest dose. Where this technology is not available, there is a potential for organ dose (OD) reduction in AIS imaging using CT SPR compared with DR. The PoP phantom has physical characteristics (in terms of spinal deformity) and radiological characteristics (in terms of HU and SNR values) of the spine of a 10-year-old child with AIS. CT SPR images can be used for AIS assessment with the 5° margin of error that is clinically acceptable. A few SPR imaging protocols (CT4, 8 and 11) had the lower radiation risk compared with the DR and provided the most accurate Cobb angle measurements.
Implications for practice: The bespoke phantom can be used to investigate new X-ray imaging techniques and technology in the assessment of scoliosis and has utility for the optimisation of X-ray imaging techniques in 10-year-old children. Overall, the outcome is promising for patients and health providers because it provides an opportunity to reduce patient dose and achieve clinically acceptable Cobb angle measurements whilst using existing CT technology.


The paper addresses the problem of reverse engineering a function block (FB) in situations when its source code is either not available or is too complex to understand. The proposed approach builds up on a recent method for reconstructing FBs based on testing and a search-based optimization algorithm. In our work the method is augmented with candidate solution verification using the NuSMV model checker. Verification is done in a closed-loop way using a manually constructed surrogate model of the plant and environment.


The subject of the research in this article is the logic circuit of the combined finite state machine (CFSM), which combines the functions of the both FSM Mealy and Moore. In practice, such a model of control automata is used widely, but in the literature there is almost no theoretical description CFSM models and ways to optimize them. The article considers the problem of optimizing the logic of the combined finite state machine implemented in complex programmable logic devices (CPLD) basis. The CFSM circuit using programmable array logic (PAL) macrocells is implemented. The number of CPLD components, required to implement the logic of the automaton circuit, depends on the CFSM parameters and characteristics of element basis. Obviously, the reduction of necessary number of components leads to a decrease area occupied CFSM scheme in CPLD, thereby leads to reducing the hardware amount and power consumption in the circuit, and as result, increases the efficiency of the whole project. To solve the problem of CFSM optimization for a criterion of hardware expenses in this article it's proposed to use the structural features of the basis CPLD, as well as the method of pseudoequivalent states. The FSM states are defined as a pseudoequivalent, if they mark some vertices linked with the input of the same next vertex in flow-chart. The proposed method includes the following steps: forming a plurality of CFSM states; encoding of states; forming a set of classes pseudoequivalent states; formation PALer blocks and tables; implementation of the CFSM scheme in a given element basis, such as CPLD. As a result, it's possible to reduce the necessary number of PAL macro cells for implementing CFSM circuit in CPLD. The general result is a decreasing of in the total area of CFSM circuit on a chip. The advisability conditions of this method are discussed.


The discrepancy between transit's large share of local transportation resources and its generally low share of local trips has raised questions about the use of scarce transportation funds for this purpose. We use a regional transport model consistent with utility theory and calibrated for the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area to estimate the travel benefits of the local transit system to transit users and the congestion-reduction benefits to motorists. We find that (i) rail transit generates congestion-reduction benefits that exceed rail subsidies; (ii) the combined benefits of rail and bus transit easily exceed local transit subsidies generally; (iii) the lowest-income group receives a disproportionately low share of the transit benefits, both in absolute terms and as a share of total income; and (iv) for practical purposes, the scale of the current transit system is about optimal.


Abstract: "We are all human, no?" This is what I heard most often among those who had been detained, harassed, or interrogated by the secret police in China.  In the accounts of people who we usually consider to be victims, a reversal of roles is commonplace: the police, instead of being described as perpetrators, instead play the role of victims.  This article therefore asks: In what way might this imaginary reversal actually make sense? What are the concrete social conditions that have produced this strange inversion? This article begins by laying out two influential theories of the state, both of which are contrasted with more mainstream liberal-constitutional approaches: Foucault's critique of state phobia and Schmitt's conceptualization of the "total state." This article argues that neither of these theories is adequate in addressing the questions at hand.  The article then moves to a structuralist discussion of the "exchange" that happens between the police and the policed.  By examining the exchange of words and manners and gifts and favors, this article shows how exchange as a structural relation has rendered "good" police who practice generosity instead of bullying "truly and  concretely human," and how the recipient of this generosity would be a "social outcast" (not a political dissident) if he or she refuses to "help." This leads to the key questions of this essay: how can we conceptualize the relationship between the social and the political in contemporary China? And how can we re-situate the authoritarian rule of Chinese Communist Party in light of this relationship? Keywords: humanism, ideology, police, authoritarianism, politics, China


ABSTRACT With a focus on resources for learning through writing, this paper compares the interdisciplinary framings of two teacher education programmes. What are the implications of these framings and resources for students' possibilities when they write independent projects/bachelor theses? The paper presents a case study with data (interviews, texts, observations) from two different teacher education programmes. The conceptual framework stems from the Academic Literacies approach. The analysis shows that one of the programmes shapes interdisciplinarity by a "block approach" that allows students to work independently, while the other is shaped as a "bridging approach" with tight collaboration between students and tutors. The two educational programmes apply the same national regulating documents in different ways, thus creating different possibilities for students to learn and write as "independent" or "collaborative" students, respectively. The results contribute to a discussion of higher education structure and the role of writing within it.


The National Homicide Monitoring Program is Australia's only comprehensive national data collection on homicides combining incidents, victims and offenders. This report describes the 229 homicide incidents recorded by Australian state and territory police between 1 July 2015 and 30 June 2016. During this 12-month period there were 235 victims of homicide and 264 identified offenders. Males comprised 65 percent of homicide victims and 86 percent of identified offenders. The victim and offender were known to each other in 82 percent of homicide incidents recorded; a fifth of homicide incidents involved intimate partners. The homicide rate in Australia in 2015–16 was 0.95 per 100,000, the equal lowest rate recorded since 1989–90.


Although considerable research exists on consumer processing of nutrition labeling and package claims, less is known about consumer interpretation of nutrient content claims in advertising. This is important because product advertising often provides a significant first step for consumers in learning new nutrition information. Yet, unlike package claims, Nutrition Facts Panels are often not available for consumers during the processing of such advertising claims. Therefore, the authors examine the following research questions: (1) Do consumers misinterpret (i.e., overgeneralize) common nutrient content claims in advertising? If so, under what conditions does this occur? and (2) Can various types of disclosure statements remedy this problem? To address these questions, the authors interview a total of 365 primary food shoppers in three geographically dispersed malls in the United States in a between-subjects experiment. Misleading generalizations, beyond those of control ad claims, are found for general and specific nutrient content claims. Ad disclosure type, ad claim type, and nutrition knowledge all separately influence nutrient content and disease risk measures. Evaluative disclosures reduce misleading generalizations to a greater extent than do absolute or relative disclosures. The authors offer implications for public policy and food marketers.


Smallholder farmers' access to markets has traditionally been constrained by lack of market information. The desire to strengthen farmer access to market has seen the emergence of a number of projects that employ ICT tools in the provision of market information. This study assesses the conditioners of the use of ICT tools in general and mobile phones in particular by smallholder farmers for agricultural transactions. The study finds that several farmer, farm and capital endowment factors affect the use of ICT tools and mobile phones. Specifically, age, occupation, nearness to output market, number of crop enterprises, farming experience literacy and crop income explain the use of tools while gender, nearness to output market, household size, owning a phone, level of literacy, crop income and value of assets explain the intensity of use of the mobile for agricultural transaction purposes. It discusses the implications of these findings for policy.


This paper outlines the discovery of a hoard of votive bronzes from the Sacred Animal Necropolis at North Saqqara, and gives the background to the original work at the site by Professor W.B. Emery. This collection of material gives an interesting insight into the range of objects offered at the shrines of the Sacred Animal Necropolis, and gives us a glimpse of just how popular these cults were. Also, the methods used in the conservation of these bronzes are presented.


Global change affects ecosystems worldwide and has already caused a massive decline
in the world's biodiversity. As the processes behind environmental change continue at
ever-accelerating rates, this leads to a severe threat of ecosystem functioning, ecosystem
services, and, in the end, human well-being. The most prominent drivers of global
biodiversity loss are climate change, increasing nitrogen deposition, land-use change
and biotic exchange. Their correlation with species extinctions has been documented in
numerous studies some of which have identified the underlying mechanisms they
operate on. However, it still remains difficult to predict the exact effects of specific
drivers of environmental change on populations. This makes it hard to identify
particularly endangered species and to develop adequate conservation strategies.
In my thesis, I focus on small-scale effects of global-change drivers on single
individuals or populations. I use bioenergetic modelling to show how these low-level
effects scale up to higher levels of ecological organisation and influence the stability of
food-web motifs. Finally, I provide experimentally testable hypotheses on
environmental-change effects and their compensation. Throughout the research chapters
of my thesis, I study the effect of different environmental-change drivers on the stability
of different trophic motifs.
In Chapter 2, I focus on single consumer-resource interactions and how environmental
warming influences their stability. The relationship between temperature and species'
biological rates (metabolism, growth and feeding) is well-known from empirical
warming experiments. However, their interactive effects on the stability of consumer-
resource systems are still under debate. I show that warming leads to dynamic
stabilization of biomass oscillations. These results are based on an extensive literature
research about temperature scaling of metabolism, feeding rates and maximum
population size. Implementing these relationships into a generalized bioenergetic model
yields information on the dynamical consequences of the different scaling relationships.
The vast majority of possible parameter combinations predicts a dynamic stabilization
of consumer-resource interactions at the risk of predator starvation. Consequently, this is
tested in a microcosm experiment using bacterial prey (Pseudomonas fluorescens) and a
cilliate predator (Tetrahymena pyriformis). Time-series analyses of these experiments
confirmed the hypothesis of warming leading to an increased population stability while,
at the same time, undermining species diversity.
In Chapter 3, I investigate the effect of nutrient enrichment which has been reported to
induce unstable dynamics in consumer-resource systems. The resulting oscillations have
been shown to endanger species persistence in trophic systems of low complexity.
However, in more complex natural systems this effect seems to be dampened which
indicates that some intrinsic properties of complex systems prevent unstable dynamics.
Identifying these "ecosystem buffers" is crucial for our understanding of the stability of
ecosystems and an important tool for environmental and conservation biologists. Earlier
theoretical studies suggested that this stabilization might be caused by so-called "weak
interactions". However, their relevance has rarely been tested experimentally. I use
network and allometric theory for an a-priori identification of species that buffer against
externally induced instability of increased population oscillations via weak interactions.
Afterwards, the hypotheses are tested in a microcosm experiment using a soil food-web
motif. I show that large-bodied species feeding at the food web's base, so called "trophic
whales", can buffer ecosystems against unstable dynamics induced by nutrient
enrichment.
In Chapter 4, I investigate the combined effects of habitat fragmentation and nutrient
enrichment as they occur under increasing land-use intensity. Moreover, this chapter
tackles the challenges of an integrative ecological theory on how different drivers of
global change interact. I thus study the combined effects of habitat isolation and nutrient
enrichment on the stability of a tri-trophic food-chain. Therefore, I expand bioenergetic
models towards spatially explicit systems of two habitat patches using empirically-
derived allometric scaling relationships of animal migration. I find that extinctions that
occur at high levels of habitat fragmentation are caused by reduced bottom-up energy
supply. Thus, conservation activities that focus only on single species might not prevent
biodiversity loss if they ignore the respective lower trophic levels. The starvation effects
of isolation are counteracted by nutrient enrichment which increases energy fluxes
along the food chains. Thus, habitat isolation stabilizes eutrophic systems but
undermines species diversity in oligotrophic systems.
The three research chapters provide good examples of how a generalized bioenergetic
modelling approach provides an in-depth understanding and can generate testable
hypotheses on the behaviour of simple trophic systems under global change. The
general findings are combined and discussed in the Synopsis which also provides a
categorization of environmental stressors according to their respective influence on
ecosystem stability. The Synopsis elucidates the interplay of multiple environmental
stressors and how their combined effects endanger biodiversity. In an ever changing
world, our understanding of ecosystem processes and their underlying mechanisms is of
striking importance. This conceptual work will foster future research by (1) applying
general modelling tools to investigate the effects of different environmental stressors,
(2) testing the generated hypotheses in experimental systems, and (3) synthesizing the
findings according to their respective influence on systems stability. Furthermore, it will
contribute to new and well-founded conservation approaches.


Sound Symbolism in Foreign Language Phonological Acquisition The paper aims at investigating the idea of a symbolic nature of sounds and its implications for in the acquisition of foreign language phonology. Firstly, it will present an overview of universal trends in phonetic symbolism, i.e. non-arbitrary representations of a phoneme by specific semantic criteria. Secondly, the results of a preliminary study on different manifestations of sound symbolism including emotionally-loaded representations of phonemes and other synaesthetic associations shall be discussed. Finally, practical pedagogical implications of sound symbolism will be explored and a number of innovative classroom activities involving sound symbolic associations will be presented.


The NEPAD Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP) has been endorsed by African Heads of State and Governments as a vision for the restoration of agricultural growth, food security, and rural development in Africa. The program aims at stimulating agriculture-led development to alleviate poverty and hunger, and achieve sustainable food security. The creation of a union is often rationalized on grounds of moving the equilibrium toward the first best solution whenever independent policies generate spillovers. This arises as a common agenda can significantly reduce the scope of free-riding behavior among member countries. In addition, cross-border externalities arising out of higher levels of market integration entails countries to agree on policy coordination. Using a Spatial Durbin Model for panel data, the present study explores the extent and magnitude of agricultural production spillover that might validate the adoption of CAADP agenda among African countries, especially among Sub-Saharan African countries. Overall, our results suggest the presence of positive and significant agricultural production spillover. No evidence of beggar-thy-neighbor or negative spillover policies was found; on average, each country received 2.5 percent growth as a result of spillover. Finally, our results suggest that convergence dynamics is much stronger when spillover is accounted for which provides a rationale for a common agenda such as CAADP.


Phonological features allow for formal expression of sound patterns used by speakers of a language. To understand where features come from, it is worth exploring where the patterns themselves come from. In this paper, we argue that the retroflex (tongue tip up) or bunched (tongue tip down) articulation of American English /ɹ/ is speaker- and context-dependent. We provide arguments against two overt sources for these patterns, phonological patterns and perception, as well as against their being purely the result of physiology. The conclusion we come to is that these patterns are spontaneously created by the speakers in order to provide order to their articulations of the sound /ɹ/. We conjecture that if patterns arise spontaneously, so too might features.


The range sizes of sediment‐dwelling deep‐sea species are largely unknown. Such knowledge is important because a deep sea composed in large part of species with 100‐km‐scale ranges would be very different from one composed predominantly of species with 1000‐km‐scale ranges. For example, the total species richness would be much greater in the first case than in the second. As a step towards the determination of the distribution of species' range sizes in the deep sea, we asked whether harpacticoid copepods (Crustacea) on the continental rise in the northeastern Pacific had 1000‐km‐scale range sizes. We chose harpacticoids because they occur widely in deep‐sea sediments and thus are a typical deep‐sea taxon. In addition, they have no pelagic stage in their life history, so they allow a conservative test of hypotheses about species' range sizes. We used morphology and gene‐sequence data to assign individuals to species. At least 13.3% of the species we studied had 1000‐km‐scale ranges, raising the question of how these species maintain genetic continuity.


On-site electro-chlorination (OSEC) is a technology for producing sodium hypochlorite as an effective disinfectant from the electrolysis of a water and salt solution. The paper evaluates the introduction of this technology in Iraq and compares it with two traditional disinfection systems already present in the country: HTH powder and gas chlorine. This study, in conjunction with an economic evaluation, identifies the key factors that make electro-chlorination an important alternative in the context of Iraqi water treatment.


Background : Regular exercise is often presented as an effective tool to influence the psychological aspect of a human being. Recent studies show that anxiety and self-esteem are the most important psychological aspects especially in college students. This study aimed to determine the differences of anxiety and self-esteem level between students who joined and did not join regular exercise program, Pendidikan Dasar XXI Atlas Medical Pioneer (Pendas XXI AMP), in the Faculty of Medicine, Universitas Padjadjaran. Methods : A cross-sectional comparative study was carried out to 64 students who joined and did not join Pendas XXI AMP. Thirty six students (12 females and 20 males) who joined Pendas XXI AMP participated in aerobic and anaerobic exercise sessions lasting for 30 minutes per session,  three times in 5 months.  The control group was 32 students who did not join Pendas XXI AMP, with matching gender composition as the  case group (12 females and 20 males). Two questionnaires, Zung Self-Rating Anxiety Scale questionnaire and Rosenberg's Self-Esteem Scale questionnaire, were administered to both groups.  The data were analyzed using chi-square test (α=0.05). Results : : There were statistically significant differences in anxiety level (p=0.016) and self-esteem level (p=0.039) between case and control groups. The students who joined Pendas XXI AMP have lower anxiety and higher self-esteem levels. Conclusions : Planned, structured, and repeated physical activities have a positive influence in anxiety and self-esteem levels. DOI : 10.15850/amj.v2n3.517


This paper investigates the extent to which market risk, residual risk, and tail risk explain the cross-sectional dispersion in hedge fund returns. The paper introduces a comprehensive measure of systematic risk (SR) for individual hedge funds by breaking up total risk into systematic and fund-specific or residual risk components. Contrary to the popular understanding that hedge funds are market neutral, we find that systematic risk is a highly significant factor explaining the dispersion of cross-sectional returns while at the same time measures of residual risk and tail risk seem to have little explanatory power. Funds in the highest SR quintile generate 6% more average annual returns compared with funds in the lowest SR quintile. After controlling for a large set of fund characteristics and risk factors, systematic risk remains positive and highly significant, whereas the relation between residual risk and future fund returns continues to be insignificant. Hence, systematic risk is a powerful determinant of the cross-sectional differences in hedge fund returns.


Fibre tractography using diffusion tensor imaging is a promising method for estimating the pathways of white matter tracts in the human brain. The success of fibre tracking methods ultimately depends upon the accuracy of the fibre tracking algorithms and the quality of the data. Uncertainty and its representation have an important role to play in fibre tractography methods to infer useful information from real world noisy diffusion weighted data. Probabilistic fibre tracking approaches have received considerable interest recently for resolving orientational uncertainties. In this study, an average curves approach was used to investigate the impact of SNR and tensor field geometry on the accuracy of three different types of probabilistic tracking algorithms. The accuracy was assessed using simulated data and a range of tract geometries. The average curves representations were employed to represent the optimal fibre path of probabilistic tracking curves. The results are compared with streamline tracking on both simulated and in vivo data.


Atherosclerosis is now recognized as encompassing a complex inflammatory etiology, in which mediators of atherosclerotic plaque formation are induced by products of oxidized cholesterol. Wentworth et al. identify novel oxidized sterol species from atherosclerotic plaque tissue and provide evidence that these are formed by ozone-mediated oxidation of cholesterol. The two oxysterols displayed activity consistent with a pathogenic role in vivo and were present in sera of patients with severe atherosclerosis. Ozone production was detected in plaque tissue after exposure to mitogen, which suggests a direct link between immune activation and the generation of the novel oxidant and its products. P. Wentworth Jr., J. Nieva, C. Takeuchi, R. Galve, A. D. Wentworth, R. B. Dilley, G. A. DeLaria, A. Saven, B. M. Babior, K. D. Janda, A. Eschenmoser, R. A. Lerner, Evidence for ozone formation in human atherosclerotic arteries. Science 302, 1053-1056 (2003). [Abstract] [Full Text]


This paper studies the empirical performance of a widely used model of nominal rigidities: the Calvo model of sticky goods prices. We describe an extended version of this model with variable elasticity of demand of the differentiated goods and imperfect capital mobility. We find little evidence against standard versions of the model without the extensions, but the estimated frequency of price adjustment is implausible. With the extended model the estimates are more reasonable. This is especially so if the sample is split to take into account a possible change in monetary regime around 1980.


This article is chiefly concerned with Wallace Stegner's ideas of aridity as the key to the understanding of the history and culture of the American West. It first examines the arguments of some major books published in the 1980s that helped strengthen Stegner's conviction that the West was heading towards environmental disaster due to the rapidly increasing depletion of its rivers and aquifers, a projected ecological crisis that has grown even more acute at the beginning of the 21st century. The subsequent focus of this article, however, is on Stegner's predominant proposition that the abuse of the arid nature of the West – the rampant disregard of its environmental limitations – is a product of a mindset and a culture that he finds particularly Western. In the course of his analysis, Stegner sees the rootlessness that typified his own family history as a direct reflection of the transientness characteristic of the collective history of the American West, which served to hamper the evolution of a sense of place that in his view is the prerequisite for a genuine stewardship of the land.


Abstract Chronic pain is a major source of suffering. It interferes with daily functioning and often is accompanied by distress. Yet, in the International Classification of Diseases, chronic pain diagnoses are not represented systematically. The lack of appropriate codes renders accurate epidemiological investigations difficult and impedes health policy decisions regarding chronic pain such as adequate financing of access to multimodal pain management. In cooperation with the WHO, an IASP Working Group has developed a classification system that is applicable in a wide range of contexts, including pain medicine, primary care, and low-resource environments. Chronic pain is defined as pain that persists or recurs for more than 3 months. In chronic pain syndromes, pain can be the sole or a leading complaint and requires special treatment and care. In conditions such as fibromyalgia or nonspecific low-back pain, chronic pain may be conceived as a disease in its own right; in our proposal, we call this subgroup "chronic primary pain." In 6 other subgroups, pain is secondary to an underlying disease: chronic cancer-related pain, chronic neuropathic pain, chronic secondary visceral pain, chronic posttraumatic and postsurgical pain, chronic secondary headache and orofacial pain, and chronic secondary musculoskeletal pain. These conditions are summarized as "chronic secondary pain" where pain may at least initially be conceived as a symptom. Implementation of these codes in the upcoming 11th edition of International Classification of Diseases will lead to improved classification and diagnostic coding, thereby advancing the recognition of chronic pain as a health condition in its own right.


'There is no science whose value can be adequately estimated by economists and utilitarians of the lower order' Hugh Miller 1841 'It is most important that the opportunity afforded by the appointment of a new Director of the Museum of Practical Geology should not be lost for furthering the general scheme for bringing science and art to bear upon the productive industry of the Country. . . . . .as it so often happens that the person who through great difficulties, and by his own exertions has succeeded in realizing one idea, does not readily merge this in a larger one, so Mr H. De la Beche cannot be said to have extended the usefulness of his Department, but has rather counteracted the plans of the Commissioners by confining his attention to simple Geology. It becomes of the utmost importance that whoever is appointed now should be made thoroughly aware of the views of Government and accept the office with a clear understanding that he will be counted upon to work them out. He should further consider himself not in the light of a simple Geologist, but as the head of a Government educational establishment for the diffusion of Science generally as applied to productive industry.' ('Copy of a letter of Prince Albert to Lord Palmerston when my good friend the latter appointed me Director General of the Geological Survey May 1855. R. I. Murchison') Perhaps the range of attitudes has not changed all that much in the last hundred


The increasing level of serum pancreatic enzyme indicates an inflammation of exocrine pancreas, known as pancreatitis. One of the pancreatic enzymes that evaluated in pancreatitis is lipase. The aim of the study was to evaluate the correlation of increasing level of serum lipase with duration of disease and progression of diabetes in Indonesian T2D subject. Subjects were categorized according to ADA 2013 into three groups: healthy controls (n=21), prediabetes (n=12), and diabetes (n=34). The data were analyzed statistically and expressed as mean ± SD. Multivariate analysis of variance was used for showing the differences of the variables. Multiple regressions were applied for correlation studies of the variables and it was continued with Structure Equation Modelling-Generalized Structure Component Analysis (SEM-GCSA) for evaluating the coefficient contribution of each variable in Hypothetic Model. The results showed there were elevated levels of blood glucose, insulin resistance, creatinine, and serum lipase activity in T2D. The increased serum lipase activities were positively correlated with duration of diseases, plasma glucose, HbA1c level, Insulin Resistance Index, and creatinine level, but did not correlate with lipid profile (Cholesterol, Triglyceride, HDL and LDL), and insulin level in Indonesian T2D Patients. Hypothetic structural model showed that decreasing level of insulin contributed to increase insulin resistance, likewise, insulin resistance contributed positively to glucose level, and glucose level contributed to increase HbA1c level and also lipase activity, but the increasing activity of lipase was not contributed significantly to increase glucose level. So, the high serum lipase has correlation with progression of T2D


Computation and Storage in the Cloud is the first comprehensive and systematic work investigating the issue of computation and storage trade-off in the cloud in order to reduce the overall application cost. Scientific applications are usually computation and data intensive, where complex computation tasks take a long time for execution and the generated datasets are often terabytes or petabytes in size. Storing valuable generated application datasets can save their regeneration cost when they are reused, not to mention the waiting time caused by regeneration. However, the large size of the scientific datasets is a big challenge for their storage. By proposing innovative concepts, theorems and algorithms, this book will help bring the cost down dramatically for both cloud users and service providers to run computation and data intensive scientific applications in the cloud. Covers cost models and benchmarking that explain the necessary tradeoffs for both cloud providers and users Describes several novel strategies for storing application datasets in the cloud Includes real-world case studies of scientific research applications Covers cost models and benchmarking that explain the necessary tradeoffs for both cloud providers and users Describes several novel strategies for storing application datasets in the cloud Includes real-world case studies of scientific research applications


Maritime surveillance initially involves the military operational commander deciding on the areas to be searched. The aim is to detect and classify targets/ships subject to the aircraft's time-on-station constraint, namely the aircraft is restricted to no more than 12 flying hours/day. Very often, a precedence relationship exists between regions to be searched. In addition, time windows or rigid lower and upper bounds on the time the regions have to be searched are also specified. It has recently been shown by Marlow et al and the authors that the surveillance problem can be modelled as a travelling salesman problem (TSP). However, our problem is unique and distinct from the classical TSP. The time windows and precedence constraints are frequently subject to changes or revisions because of continuous intelligence updates. Previously calculated flight path can become infeasible. The solution procedure should only involve easy implementable algorithms so as to allow flight crew to readily recalculate the revised flight path, preferably in an interactive mode. This paper develops an implementable hybrid dynamic programming/heuristic algorithm for surveillance mission planning. To avoid incorporating the difficulty of time windows or precedence constraint changes in the formulation, we adopt the K best solution strategy approach. The essence is to put aside the time windows and/or the precedence constraint and compute successively more desirable solutions for the TSP until the best solution which does satisfy the change restrictions is found, namely the kth best solution.


Abstract A conceptual study is presented for a substantial upgrade of the Frascati Tokamak Upgrade (FTU) up to B = 8 T, I = 6 MA, and R [approximately equal to] 1.3 m to study burning plasma (BP) issues in deuterium plasmas operating up to an equivalent DT gain close to Q = 2 in the ELMy H-mode and to Q = 5 with an internal transport barrier (ITB). The effect of alpha particles is simulated by ~1 MeV fast 3He minority heating produced by ion cyclotron resonance heating (20 MW). Thanks to the high-density values ([approximately equal to]4 × 1020 m-3), the FT3 plasmas are characterized by short electron-ion equipartition time (60 ms in the ELMy H-mode scenario) and slowing-down time (44 ms), with respect to the energy confinement time of ~340 ms, a feature characteristic of BP experiments but not always satisfied with present tokamak devices. Advanced scenarios at 5 T with fully noninductive current drive can be investigated with a steady-state current density profile achieved in <5 s. The aim of FT3 is to prepare ITER operation and to provide a test bed for the development of the ITER auxiliary system and diagnostics. Elements of the scientific program are as follows: the investigation of energetic particle collective effects, optimization of H-mode scenarios, development of improved H-mode scenarios and scenarios with ITBs, magnetohydrodynamic and transport studies in ITER-relevant conditions, and study of edge plasma dynamics. FT3 can use all the existing facilities available in Frascati and could be constructed in ~5 yr.


Title: An assessment of the accuracy of patients' self-reporting of pregnancy together with awareness of risks to the fetus from x-ray radiation.

Background: Patients being investigated in a radiology department are exposed to ionising radiation. This radiation may be harmful to a fetus that is inadvertently exposed. Currently, female patients are asked to report if they think they are pregnant to prevent such inadvertent exposure. There has been no study previously at this centre checking the accuracy of patients' self-reporting of pregnancy. Patient's need to be informed and educated regarding the risks of exposure a fetus to ionising radiation.

Methods: A prospective study of 125 female outpatients from the ages of 18 to 42 years referred to a tertiary imaging department for investigations was conducted. The study was a questionnaire based survey comparing participants self-reporting of pregnancy with a urine pregnancy test. Participants were also questioned about awareness of risks to fetus from x-ray radiation. Additional data regarding age, previous pregnancies, certainty of date of last menstrual period and contraception was acquired.

Results: Out of a sample size of 125 participants, 119 (95.2%) were certain of not being pregnant and had negative pregnancy tests. 4 (3.2%) were certain of being pregnant and had positive pregnancy tests. 2 (1.6%) participants thought they were not pregnant with pregnancy detected by urine pregnancy test. Thus, patients' self reporting of pregnancy had a negative predictive value of 98.3%, an accuracy of 98.4%, a specificity of 100% and a sensitivity of 66.7%. Of the 125 respondents 56.8% considered x-ray radiation harmful to the fetus. Of this 56.8% (71 participants) the majority (72%) chose the first trimester as the most radiosensitive period of the pregnancy. Of this 56.8% of the sample size (71 participants), 56.4% (40 participants) chose severity category 3 and 22.5% (16 participants) chose severity category 4 when asked to grade the severity of radiation exposure to the fetus.

Conclusions: Patients' self reporting of pregnancy compares favourably with urine pregnancy testing in this sample population. Patients' self reporting has a high accuracy and a high negative predictive value. The majority of patients are aware that x-ray radiation may be harmful to the fetus, however most overestimate the risks to the fetus.


Bacterial infection increases the fecundity of female fruit fly hosts by stimulating oocyte production. Invertebrates infected with maternally transmitted intracellular bacteria of the genus Wolbachia reproduce more successfully than do uninfected individuals because the bacteria alter host reproduction by, for example, skewing sex ratios to favor females, increasing female fecundity (reproductive ability), or preventing uninfected males from successfully mating with infected females. Fast et al. report that bacteria accumulated in the germline stem cell (GSC) niche of Drosophila mauritiana infected with the Wolbachia wMau strain and caused infected females to produce more eggs than did noninfected females. In contrast, bacteria did not accumulate in the GSC niche of wMau-infected D. melanogaster, highlighting that the phenotypic effects of Wolbachia infection vary with different combinations of host species and bacterial strain. wMau infection in D. mauritiana was associated with an increase in GSC proliferation, as indicated by three different methods of marking dividing cells. The amount of bacteria present in GSCs positively correlated with the observed increase in mitotic activity. However, the increase in proliferation only accounted for about half of the observed increase in egg production; the remainder resulted from wMau-induced inhibition of apoptosis in developing germaria, which are groups of undifferentiated cells that give rise to the oocyte and to the germline-derived nurse cells and the somatic cells that support oocyte development. The mechanistic basis of these effects on proliferation and apoptosis was not determined but highlights the cellular basis of how infection leads to increased fecundity in at least one host-bacteria combination. In some host species, Wolbachia infection is considered to be symbiotic rather than parasitic, and many important insects that cause or transmit human disease harbor Wolbachia, so understanding how these infections affect host reproductive success may offer key insights into strategies for controlling populations of disease-causing insects. E. M. Fast, M. E. Toomey, K. Panaram, D. Desjardins, E. D. Kolaczyk, H. M. Frydman, Wolbachia enhance Drosophila stem cell proliferation and target the germline stem cell niche. Science 334, 990–992 (2011). [Abstract] [Full Text]


In the light of the assumptions and expectations that underlie
communicative behaviour in sermonic discourses and their
dependence on contextual inferences rather than linguistic
meanings, this paper utilizes the cooperative principles to
examine a Nigerian Christian sermon by one of the leading
preachers in Nigeria. It is found that the preacher expects the
audience to understand his message by relying on the
background or previous knowledge which they both share.
The paper argues that the fact that utterances are felicitous in
spite of the breach of cooperative principles reveals a major
weakness in Christian sermonic discourses and reinforces the
impression that they are shrouded in mystery.

Key Words: Christianity, Sermon, Religion, Pragmatics,
Co-operative Principles


Drought is the interaction between environment and water cycle in the world and affects natural environment of an area when it persists for a longer period. So, developing a suitable index to forecast the spatial and temporal distribution of drought plays an important role in the planning and management of natural resources and water resource systems. In this article, firstly, the drought concept and drought indexes were introduced and then the fuzzy neural networks and fuzzy C-mean clustering were applied to forecast drought via standardized precipitation index (SPI). The results of this research indicate that the SPI index is more capable than the other indexes such as PDSI (Palmer Drought Severity Index), PAI (Palfai Aridity Index) and etc. in drought forecasting process. Moreover, application of adaptive nero-fuzzy network accomplished by C-mean clustering has high efficiency in the drought forecasting.


The panel discussion "Eastern European Hamlets" brought together academics from the UK who are working on the appropriation of William Shakespeare's Hamlet in Eastern Europe. The event engaged with the question of how the staging of Shakespeare's Hamlet develops a socio-political potential in different cultural contexts in Eastern Europe. Bearing in mind Jan Kott's conception of Hamlet as an inherently political play expounded in his prominent essay collection Shakespeare our Contemporary (1965), the panel discussion considered dramaturgical strategies of staging Hamlet in Eastern Europe after 1989.

On the basis of an interdisciplinary discussion between literary criticism, translation studies and performance analysis the following questions shall be addressed during the discussion panel: What are the mechanisms of appropriation of Hamlet within different cultural contexts in Eastern Europe post-1989? How do such appropriation processes influence a self-understanding of Eastern Europe as the so-called 'new' Europe and how do they construct cultural identities? Does a phenomenon such as an Eastern European Hamlet exist?

With a closer look at Bulgarian, Polish, Romanian, Lithuanian, Hungarian and Yugoslav Hamlets the panel discussion offered a unique opportunity to analyse the changing dramaturgical strategies of staging Hamlet in the so-called 'new' Europe with reference to the socio-political circumstances after 1989.


The analysis of degraded DNA can be problematic. Recent advances in the identification and analysis of single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) have demonstrated the advantage of these markers over short tandem repeats (STRs) in that they only require small amplicons. However, before applying to casework, it is important to develop allele frequency databases from relevant populations. The main aim of the study is to characterize three Malaysian major ethnic groups; Malay, Chinese and Indian, using 52 autosomal SNP markers that have been identified in the SNPforID project.
Sanchez et. al., 2006 reported a multiplex of 52 SNP markers in one PCR reaction with two single base reaction (SBE) in the detection of SNPs using capillary electrophoresis (CE). The amplicons for PCR ranged from 59 bp to 115 bp. Whilst for SBE reactions ranged from 16 nt to 92 nt. In their study, full complete profile was obtained from 500 pg DNA input. The study was carried out on three major populations: African, Asian and European.

As in this study, a total of 325 Malaysian samples (109 from Malays, 107 from Chinese and 109 from Indians) were genotyped. In order to genotype the population samples reliably and robustly, four sets of 13-plex SNPs were developed. Internal validation was carried out using both genetic analyzers, ABI PRISM® 310 and 3500 Genetic Analyzer. Sensitivity and reproducibility studies demonstrated that the assays were highly sensitive, requiring as little as 30 pg of DNA. Full, complete and clear profiles were generated. Data were collected and evaluated statistically for forensic usefulness.

Across the three ethnic groups, few significant departures from HWE, at p values <0.05 were observed at 3 SNP markers in Malays, 4 SNP markers in Chinese and 9 SNP markers in Indian samples. Five markers (rs2107612, rs722098, rs2076848, rs907100 and rs1528460) in the Indians and one marker (rs1528460) in the Chinese, showed the lowest p value, that is p=0.0. However, after Bonferroni correction at p <0.00096 significant deviation(s) from HWE was observed at 1 SNP marker (code marker 26) in the Malays, 2

SNP markers (code marker 46 and 54) in the Chinese and 5 SNP markers (code marker 12, 21, 36, 38 and 54) in the Indians. In addition, a pair of loci (at code markers 3 and 53) was found to be associated in the Malays after the Bonferroni correction (at p <0.0000377).

As for forensic parameters, the combined mean match probabilities for the 52 SNPs of Malay, Chinese, and Indian were 1 in 3.9654e-19, 5.3964e-18, and 1.7459e-19, corresponding to a combined power of discrimination of >99.99999999%, respectively. Paired Fst values obtained in the study showed, as expected, that Malay group is closely related to the Chinese population, with the Indian population being more distant.


Focussed dialogue (as lived and living practices) can have a powerful role in renewing professional practice, advancing its sustainability and development as administrative and political systems colonise the practices of teachers and teacher educators. However, participating in discussion groups for many teachers, including those in academia, is often constrained by time demands, workplace structures and accountabilities. This paper reports a two year empirical case study investigating the transformative nature of dialogues experienced in one such focused discussion group. The dialogic practices of the group aimed firstly to provide a communicative space for its participants to interrogate and interpret factors which enable and constrain teaching and research practices; secondly, to critique practices as a form of collective professional learning; and thirdly, to study the educational practices of its members from within their own practice tradition. To do this it describes the nature of discussion groups. Findings reveal that creating communicative space for discussion enables professional learning and agency through critical and transformative dialogues.


It is intuitive that NLP tasks for logographic languages like Chinese should benefit from the use of the glyph information in those languages. However, due to the lack of rich pictographic evidence in glyphs and the weak generalization ability of standard computer vision models on character data, an effective way to utilize the glyph information remains to be found. In this paper, we address this gap by presenting Glyce, the glyph-vectors for Chinese character representations. We make three major innovations: (1) We use historical Chinese scripts (e.g., bronzeware script, seal script, traditional Chinese, etc) to enrich the pictographic evidence in characters; (2) We design CNN structures (called tianzege-CNN) tailored to Chinese character image processing; and (3) We use image-classification as an auxiliary task in a multi-task learning setup to increase the model's ability to generalize. We show that glyph-based models are able to consistently outperform word/char ID-based models in a wide range of Chinese NLP tasks. We are able to set new state-of-the-art results for a variety of Chinese NLP tasks, including tagging (NER, CWS, POS), sentence pair classification, single sentence classification tasks, dependency parsing, and semantic role labeling. For example, the proposed model achieves an F1 score of 80.6 on the OntoNotes dataset of NER, +1.5 over BERT; it achieves an almost perfect accuracy of 99.8\% on the Fudan corpus for text classification. Code found at this https URL.


Retinitis Pigmentosa
(RP) is an incurable inherited retinal degeneration affecting approximately 1
in 4,000 individuals globally. The aim of this dissertation was to identify
drugs that can help patients suffering from the disease. To accomplish this
goal, the zebrafish was utilized as a model for RP to perform in vivo
drug screening. The zebrafish RP model expresses a human rhodopsin transgene
which contains a premature stop codon at position 344 (Tg(rho:Hsa.RH1_Q344X)).
This zebrafish model exhibits significant rod photoreceptor degeneration
beginning at 7 days post fertilization (dpf). To assess the visual consequence
of this rod degeneration the zebrafish behavior visual motor response (VMR) was
assayed under scotopic conditions. The Q344X RP model larvae displayed a
deficit in this VMR in response to a scotopic light offset. This deficit in
behavior was utilized to perform a drug screen to identify compounds that could
ameliorate the deficient Q344X VMR. The ENZO SCREEN-WELL® REDOX library was
chosen to be screened since oxidative stress may increase RP progression in a
non-specific manner. From this library, a β-blocker,
carvedilol, was identified as a compound that improved the Q344X VMR behavior.
This drug was also able to increase rod number in the Q344X retina. Carvedilol
was shown to be capable of working directly on rods by demonstrating that the
drug can signal through the adrenergic pathway in the rod-like human Y79 cell
line. Since carvedilol is an FDA-approved drug, this
screening paradigm was utilized to screen the Selleckchem FDA-approved library
to identify more drugs that can potentially be repurposed to treat RP like
carvedilol. Additionally, this scotopic VMR assay was used to demonstrate that
it can identify behavioral deficits in the P23H RP model zebrafish (Tg(rho:Hsa.RH1_P23H)).
This dissertation work provides a potential FDA-approved drug for RP treatment
and sets the foundation for future drug screening to identify more drugs to
treat different forms of RP.


In many scenarios it is desirable to augment existing data with information acquired from an external source. For example, information from the Web can be used to fill missing values in a database or to correct errors. In many machine learning and data mining scenarios, acquiring additional feature values can lead to improved data quality and accuracy. However, there is often a cost associated with such information acquisition, and we typically need to operate under limited resources. In this thesis, I explore different aspects of Resource-bounded Information Acquisition and Learning.
The process of acquiring information from an external source involves multiple steps, such as deciding what subset of information to obtain, locating the documents that contain the required information, acquiring relevant documents, extracting the specific piece of information, and combining it with existing information to make useful decisions. The problem of Resource-bounded Information Acquisition (RBIA) involves saving resources at each stage of the information acquisition process. I explore four special cases of the RBIA problem, propose general principles for efficiently acquiring external information in real-world domains, and demonstrate their effectiveness using extensive experiments. For example, in some of these domains I show how interdependency between fields or records in the data can also be exploited to achieve cost reduction. Finally, I propose a general framework for RBIA, that takes into account the state of the database at each point of time, dynamically adapts to the results of all the steps in the acquisition process so far, as well as the properties of each step, and carries them out striving to acquire most information with least amount resources.


Using deep images from the Hyper Suprime-Cam (HSC) survey and taking advantage of its unprecedented weak lensing capabilities, we reveal a remarkably tight connection between the stellar mass distribution of massive central galaxies and their host dark matter halo mass. Massive galaxies with more extended stellar mass distributions tend to live in more massive dark matter haloes. We explain this connection with a phenomenological model that assumes, (1) a tight relation between the halo mass and the total stellar content in the halo, (2) that the fraction of in situ and ex situ mass at r <10 kpc depends on halo mass. This model provides an excellent description of the stellar mass functions (SMFs) of total stellar mass ($M_{\star }^{\mathrm{max}}$) and stellar mass within inner 10 kpc ($M_{\star }^{10}$) and also reproduces the HSC weak lensing signals of massive galaxies with different stellar mass distributions. The best-fitting model shows that halo mass varies significantly at fixed total stellar mass (as much as 0.4 dex) with a clear dependence on $M_{\star }^{10}$. Our two-parameter $M_{\star }^{\mathrm{max}}$–$M_{\star }^{10}$ description provides a more accurate picture of the galaxy–halo connection at the high-mass end than the simple stellar–halo mass relation (SHMR) and opens a new window to connect the assembly history of haloes with those of central galaxies. The model also predicts that the ex situ component dominates the mass profiles of galaxies at r < 10 kpc for log M⋆ ≥ 11.7. The code used for this paper is available online https://github.com/dr-guangtou/asap


This paper examines the impacts of service performance, corporate image and corporate social responsibility on customer loyalty in the logistics service context. The research is based on structural equation modelling applied to empirical data with 235 responses. The study confirms the fundamental importance of service performance on buyer's loyalty in logistics outsourcing relationships. It has a direct impact on loyalty as well as an indirect impact through corporate image. Corporate social responsibility, by contrast, only affects loyalty indirectly through corporate image. While statistically significant, the mediated impact of corporate social responsibility on loyalty is considerably weaker than is the impact of service performance. The impact of corporate image on loyalty is equally strong as the impact of service performance.


The design of complex underground structures in an urban environment requires in the first instance an appropriate characterization and interpretation of the ground conditions and of the mechanical behaviour of soil formations in the ground profile. With such information it is then possible to select and calibrate appropriate soil constitutive models for application in advanced numerical analysis, with the objective of predicting the induced ground movements and the potential damage to existing structures and services. This paper provides an interpretation of the site investigation data collected for the numerical analysis and design of the Ivens shaft excavation in Lisbon, Portugal. For the first time a comprehensive set of interpreted data is obtained for two of the main formations in the Lisbon area, Argilas e Calcários dos Prazeres (AP) and Areolas da Estefânia (AE), improving the understanding of their mechanical behaviour and making the data available for application in most soil constitutive frameworks. It is evident from the results that even with careful testing procedures the data may appear to be inconsistent, requiring further assumptions when deriving soil parameters. Such assumptions are discussed and emphasis is placed on the need to combine data from laboratory and field investigations.