Introduction: Tendinopathy is a major medical problem associated with sports and physical activity in active people over 25 years of age. We study about the effect of PRP in the patients of chronic Tendinopathy. Methods: The patients of chronic tendinopathy come to OPD at government medical college, surat who failed medical treatment for last 3 months. After getting informed consent platelet rich plasma is prepared from patient's own blood. After giving platelet rich plasma injection, patient is advised to take rest for 3 weeks with analgesics. Physiotherapy is started after 3 weeks of injection as this is causing pain for first 3 weeks. Patients are advised to join their duty after 3 weeks of injection. All the patients were followed up in OPD at 3 weeks, 6 weeks, 3 months and 6 months. At every follow up, range of motion, visual analogue scale and functional activity score recorded. Results: The follow up shows that most of the patients do not get relief within 3 weeks after injection. Follow up shows that 16 patients out of 50 got relief within 6 weeks after injection. Result shows that 46 patients out of 50 get relief within 6 months after injection. That means 94% of patients are having relief within 6 months of injection. Conclusion: The findings of this study shows that platelet rich plasma injection under ultrasound guidance at the tendon is effective mode of treatment for patients and takes time but result in gradual decrease in symptoms.


Testing embedded software systems on the control units of vehicles is a safety-relevant task, and developing the test suites for performing the tests on test benches is time-consuming. We present the foundations and results of a case study to automate the generation of tests for control software of vehicle control units based on a specification of requirements in terms of finite state machines. This case study builds upon our previous work on generation of tests for physical systems based on relational behavior models. In order to apply the respective algorithms, the finite state machine representation is transformed into a relational model. We present the transformation, the application of the test generation algorithm to a real example, and discuss the results and some specific challenges regarding software testing.


Evaluation of potential immunity against the novel severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) coronavirus that emerged in 2019 (SARS-CoV-2) is essential for health, as well as social and economic recovery. Generation of antibody response to SARS-CoV-2 (seroconversion) may inform on acquired immunity from prior exposure, and antibodies against the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein receptor binding domain (S-RBD) are speculated to neutralize virus infection. Some serology assays rely solely on SARS-CoV-2 nucleocapsid protein (N-protein) as the antibody detection antigen; however, whether such immune responses correlate with S-RBD response and COVID-19 immunity remains unknown. Here, we generated a quantitative serological ELISA using recombinant S-RBD and N-protein for the detection of circulating antibodies in 138 serial serum samples from 30 reverse transcription PCR–confirmed, SARS-CoV-2–hospitalized patients, as well as 464 healthy and non–COVID-19 serum samples that were collected between June 2017 and June 2020. Quantitative detection of IgG antibodies against the 2 different viral proteins showed a moderate correlation. Antibodies against N-protein were detected at a rate of 3.6% in healthy and non–COVID-19 sera collected during the pandemic in 2020, whereas 1.9% of these sera were positive for S-RBD. Approximately 86% of individuals positive for S-RBD–binding antibodies exhibited neutralizing capacity, but only 74% of N-protein–positive individuals exhibited neutralizing capacity. Collectively, our studies show that detection of N-protein–binding antibodies does not always correlate with presence of S-RBD–neutralizing antibodies and caution against the extensive use of N-protein–based serology testing for determination of potential COVID-19 immunity.


Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) is a technology of location determination and data capture. An RFID based system relies on the interaction between readers (also known as interrogator) and tags (transponders). Active RFID technology is suitable for tracking costly assets or moving objects such as mobile robots. Once affixed with RFID tags, a robot can be localised. However, there is a tendency for accuracy to vary greatly as well as delay in readings. Those problems may be enlarged in real time applications. This paper provides an overview of implementing RFID in precision tracking of mobile robots. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.11591/ijra.v1i3.487


Scholarly interest in terrorism has grown dramatically since September 11. One important line of inquiry within this body of research has been the media's coverage of terrorism. Although there have been several important studies published on this topic, there has been little research examining media coverage of domestic terrorism. This study fills this gap by examining the media's coverage of terrorism in the United States from 1980 until September 10, 2001. The analysis is based on a list of terrorist‐related incidents and New York Times articles pertaining to each incident. This study documents the amount and type of coverage received by domestic terrorism incidents, and identifies the variables influencing whether an incident is covered and how much space it receives. The results indicate that most terrorism incidents receive little or no coverage in the news, but a few cases are sensationalized in the press. There are several characteristics that consistently explain which incidents are covered and receive substantial news space. Incidents with casualties, linked to domestic terrorist groups, targeting airlines, or when hijacking is used as a tactic are significantly more likely to be covered and have more articles and words written about them. This study concludes with a discussion of the policy implications of these findings for the understanding of terrorism as a social problem.


The Royal Proclamation was the first imperial constitutional instrument in Canada that brought within its fold the indigenous people, the French people of Canada, and the British. For the first time in Canada the question of the fate of the French and the aboriginal peoples in British North America was posed.I want to frame my presentation within this foundational triangular or tripartite relationship, which was laid down in the Royal Proclamation and which substantially endures to this day, although it has very much evolved since then with the emergence of a strong multicultural dimension.In discussing the impact of the Proclamation on Quebec, I will of course be talking about its impact on the people that occupied the territory before the British took over and called it "The Province of Quebec" for the very first time in 1763.These people were the aboriginal peoples who occupied their traditional land and also some reserves created under the French regime and the French people of Canada who had been in the St-Lawrence Valley since the early 17th century. Of course, the territory of New France had been much larger than the tiny Province of Quebec created by the Proclamation but the majority of French settlers did live in that part of the territory claimed by France. I will first briefly canvass the impact of the Proclamation on the French people which has not yet been addressed in detail today. I will also touch on the impact of the Proclamation on the relationship between the French people and indigenous peoples. I will then move on to its impact on indigenous peoples. Since this aspect has been extensively covered by other speakers, I will only add a few additional comments.


The right to a criminal jury trial is a constitutional disappointment. Cases almost never make it to a jury because of plea bargaining. In the few cases that do, the jury is relegated to a narrow factfinding role that denies it normative voice or the ability to serve as a meaningful check on excessive punishment.

One simple change could situate the jury where it belongs, at the center of the criminal process. The most important thing juries do in criminal cases is authorize state punishment. But today, when a jury returns a guilty verdict, it authorizes punishment without any idea of what is in store for the defendant. This principle of jury ignorance is a profound mistake. It is unmoored from history and the core function of the jury to authorize punishment. Worse, it exacerbates the criminal legal system's predilection for excessive severity.

This Article offers and defends a proposal to replace ignorant juries with informed ones, by requiring juries to be told of the statutory minimum and maximum punishment in every case before being asked to return a conviction. Informed juries would change the dynamics of criminal justice for the better. In individual cases, punishment information would make juries more careful before convicting and would sometimes lead juries to refuse to convict where punishment would be excessive and unjust. But more importantly, informed juries would provide systemic benefits. Requiring informed juries would set in motion a political feedback loop that would counteract existing incentives for legislators and prosecutors to prefer severity. In addition to being good policy, there are powerful arguments that informed juries deserve to be recognized as part of the constitutional jury-trial right.


The purpose of this thesis is to explore the methodological and empirical issues relating to the economic evaluation of minimal access surgery (MAS). Given the likely increase in the utilisation of economic analysis in this area, it is crucial to explore whether the methods of economic evaluation have limitations in the face of the particular characteristics of MAS. The comparison of abdominal hysterectomy (AH) and transcervical endometrial resection (TCRE), for the treatment of menorrhagia, is used as a vehicle to develop methods in relation to MAS. Having reviewed the literature and issues relating to the economic analysis of this group of technologies, the empirical starting point of the thesis is the assessment of the limitations of economic evaluations alongside clinical trials, using a trial comparing AH and TCRE. Three major areas of weakness are identified, and alternative ways of addressing these weaknesses are explored in the remainder of the thesis. The first area of methodological development relates to the measure of benefit used in economic evaluation of MAS. In this clinical context, it is argued that the trade-offs that exist between MAS and conventional surgery, in terms of process characteristics and outcomes, should result in an important role for patients' preferences in the construction of a benefit measure. A cost-utility analysis using the standard quality-adjusted life year (GALY) is undertaken, using trial data augmented with valuation data from a further study. The lack of consistency between individual preferences and standard QALYs suggests a major weakness with this measure of benefit. The strengths and weaknesses of an alternative measure of benefit in cost-utility analysis the ex ante healthy years equivalent (HYE) are assessed based on a further valuation study. It is shown that it is feasible to elicit ex ante HYEs from patients and that this measure of benefit exhibits some consistency with other expressions of patients' preferences. However, the HYE is likely to impose a greater measurement burden than the standard QALY. The second area of methodological development in the thesis is the analysis of the generalisability of trial-based economic evaluation, given the limitations that often exist with the external validity of trials. A framework is developed within which trial and observational data can be synthesised. This facilitates the use of sensitivity analysis to explore the robustness of base-case (trial-generated) results to alternative sources of data, which may be more representative of routine practice. The third area of methodological development stems from the importance of patients' preferences in relation to MAS. This element relates to the use of methods to model and to evaluate management strategies which use patients' preferences to determine treatment allocation. It is concluded that preference-based decision making has the potential to be costeffective in relation to TCRE and AH, and MAS applications more generally. The thesis demonstrates the importance of continued development in the detailed methods of economic evaluation.


Both on a ground of Polish legal literature and judicial decisions as far as since a long time ago a concept of an expertise has been functioning. This term was commonly used at courts and authorities to exercise investigation proceedings. Although you should pay attention onto a fact that until the Code of Penal Proceedings from 1969 was published a concept of an expertise had been a concept being not set by regulations. According to some representatives of the penal proceedings' doctrine these names are featured by a little precision because there are used for designation of various procedural acts. Especially one ought to refer to the concepts: expertise, examination, and opinion because these concepts are the most often used in science and practice. Defining a concept of an expertise one can state that it is the totality of expert's performances being made especially on order of procedural organs at using by this expert the special knowledge, which is indispensable to elucidate or decide about the problem. On a ground of the Polish science of criminalistics one can find more detailed considerations referring to the concept of an expertise as well as its handling. Here as follows, the majority of authors by an expertise understands a set of investigative acts, which requires special knowledge and for that reason being performed by an expert on order of a procedural organ as well as completed by an opinion, which could be of an evidential character in the lawsuit. In particular, to the scope of acts included into the contents of an expertise belong: − introductory analysis of material to be designed for examinations as their first stage; − acquisition of comparative material or participation of an expert in acts of procedural organs aiming to an acquisition of this material. This act should be undertaken when together with an expertise's order we will not get any comparative materials or this material is inappropriate to undertake examinations; − particular inspection of comparative material as well questioned one; − identification examinations, which are in application of defined methods, as a result of which you may establish identity or divergence among questioned and comparative material; − other examinations, especially appropriate for this domain, which had delivered special knowledge, indispensable to perform a given proceedings' act, e.g. physical and optical (absoption, luminescence) or chemical (chromatography) in performing documents' expertise in the technical framework; − investigative (specialistic) experiments, which differ from proceedings' experiments.


In this thesis, we present several searches for beyond the standard model physics in proton-proton collisions recorded by the Compact Muon Solenoid Experiment at center-of-mass energy of 8 and 13\TeV. We search for particle dark matter in events with two or more jets and missing transverse momentum at $\sqrt{s} = 8$ TeV, in this search we use the razor variables to discriminate signal from background events and thus improve the overall sensitivity of the analysis. We observe agreement between the observation and the background estimation. The interpretation of the results is carried out in the context of an effective field theory that couples the standard model quarks to the dark matter candidate. A search for anomalous production of Higgs bosons using 15.3 $\mathrm{fb}^{-1}$ of proton-proton collisions at $\sqrt{s} = 13$ TeV is also presented; this search selects events with a Higgs boson in association with jets, where the Higgs candidate decays into two photons. We also employ the razor variables ($\mathrm{M_{R}}, \mathrm{R}^{2}$) to discriminate signal from background. We observe an excess of events in one of the search bins with relatively high values of $\mathrm{M_{R}}$ and $\mathrm{R}^{2}$. The interpretation of this analysis is pair production of bottom squarks in the context of supersymmetry, this model is also presented in one of the appendices of this thesis. In the other appendix of this thesis, we present a search for new phenomena in high-mass diphoton events using 12.9 $\mathrm{fb}^{-1}$ of proton-proton collisions at $\sqrt{s} = 13$ TeV. This search observed a significant excess (3.4 standard deviations, local) with 2015 data at a diphoton invariant mass of 750 GeV, equivalent to $\approx$ 20\% of the current dataset. By repeating the search with the larger dataset collected in 2016, we found that the aforementioned excess has been greatly disfavored. Additionally, in order to confirm the robustness and correctness of the data analysis techniques used in this search, we have carried out a second -- completely independent -- analysis, which confirms the absence of an excess at a diphoton invariant mass of 750 GeV. We also present detector research and developments studies of electromagnetic calorimeters equipped with precision timing capabilities. We present several calorimeter prototypes that were tested at the Fermilab Test Beam Facility. These prototypes include LYSO-based calorimeters, tungsten-LYSO "shashlik" sampling calorimeters, micro-channel-plate sampling calorimeters, and silicon-based sampling calorimeters. The results of these studies indicate that time resolutions of the order of $\sim$ 30 ps are readily available when measuring electromagnetic showers. A discussion about the applications of precision timing in high energy physics experiments is also presented, with a particular interest in pileup rejection in the context of the high-luminosity upgrade of the Large Hadron Collider foreseen to start in 2025.


The Civil Justice Reform Act of 1990 (CJRA) was intended to reduce the expense and delay associated with federal district court litigation by requiring courts to study and adopt new procedures. The CJR.lrs gains, however, may be erased by the uncertainty surrounding its sunset provision. Professor Tobias argues that Congress or the Judicial Conference should resolve the uncertainty by proclaiming that the CJRA has expired, thus forcing districts to abrogate procedures inconsistent with the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.


Title of Dissertation: THE EFFECTS OF ANCHOR-BASED SEMANTIC PRIMING ON JUDGMENTAL ANCHORING David Paul Sleeth-Keppler, Ph.D., 2004 Dissertation Directed By: Professor Arie W. Kruglanski, Department of Psychology This dissertation proposes a unified conceptualization of a set of seemingly distinct judgmental anchoring effects (Tversky & Kahneman, 1974), including numeric effects (Wilson, Houston, Etling, & Brekke, 1996), semantic effects (e.g., Strack & Mussweiler, 1997) as well as implausible anchoring effects (e.g., Mussweiler & Strack, 2001a). These effects are viewed as special cases of a general, anchor-based, semantic priming mechanism. Specifically, during comparisons between the judgmental target and the anchor, judges are hypothesized to be primed with general semantic notions directly related to the anchor value. These anchorbased semantics, in turn, are hypothesized to mediate anchoring effects. Study 1 supported the hypothesis that anchor-based semantics may be responsible for producing anchoring effects by showing that considerations of implausible (vs. plausible) anchors are associated with higher levels of lexical activation of anchorrelated words (measured in a lexical decision task). This finding maps on to a larger anchoring effect obtained in the implausible vs. plausible anchoring condition. In study 2, participants were primed directly with anchor related words, resulting in a 'mimicked' anchoring effect. Study 3 showed that associatively activated concepts, primed via a conditional rule, produce anchoring effects when the target and dimension of the judgment change between the comparative and absolute questions. Study 4 failed to support the prediction that a target change between a comparative task and related absolute numerical estimate, involving the same content domain, inhibits anchoring. Study 5 varied the typical anchoring paradigm by holding the numerical anchor constant and varying the target of the comparative question, producing a purely semantic anchoring effect. Finally, study 6 replicated and extended the findings obtained in study 5, providing additional evidence (from a lexical decision task) that anchor-based semantic notions produce anchoring effects. General discussion focuses on distinctions between the present theory and the existing models of anchoring within the social judgment literature. THE EFFECTS OF ANCHOR-BASED SEMANTIC PRIMING ON JUDGMENTAL ANCHORING.


Affibody molecules are small proteins engineered using a nonantibody scaffold. Radiolabeled Affibody molecules are excellent imaging probes, but their application to radionuclide therapy has been prevented by high renal reabsorption. The aim of this study was to test the hypothesis that Affibody-based peptide nucleic acid (PNA)–mediated pretargeted therapy of human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2)–expressing cancer extends survival without accompanying renal toxicity. Methods: A HER2-targeting Affibody molecule ligated with an AGTCGTGATGTAGTC PNA hybridization probe (ZHER2:342-SR-HP1) was used as the primary pretargeting agent. A complementary AGTCGTGATGTAGTC PNA conjugated to the chelator DOTA and labeled with the radionuclide 177Lu (177Lu-HP2) was used as the secondary agent. The influence of different factors on pretargeting was investigated. Experimental radionuclide therapy in mice bearing SKOV-3 xenografts was performed in 6 cycles separated by 7 d. Results: Optimal tumor targeting was achieved when 16 MBq/3.5 μg (0.65 nmol) of 177Lu-HP2 was injected 16 h after injection of 100 μg (7.7 nmol) of ZHER2:342-SR-HP1. The calculated absorbed dose to tumors was 1,075 mGy/MBq, whereas the absorbed dose to kidneys was 206 mGy/MBq and the absorbed dose to blood (surrogate of bone marrow) was 4 mGy/MBq. Survival of mice was significantly longer (P < 0.05) in the treatment group (66 d) than in the control groups treated with the same amount of ZHER2:342-SR-HP1 only (37 d), the same amount and activity of 177Lu-HP2 only (32 d), or phosphate-buffered saline (37 d). Conclusion: The studied pretargeting system can deliver an absorbed dose to tumors appreciably exceeding absorbed doses to critical organs, making Affibody-based PNA-mediated pretargeted radionuclide therapy highly attractive.


Book synopsis: In 1971, President Richard M. Nixon declared drugs "public enemy number one" and waged the War on Drug after tests on returning Vietnam War veterans revealed alarming levels of heroin use. Spanning two volumes of approximately 450 articles in an A-to-Z format, the encyclopedia explores this controversial war through the lens of varied disciplines, and a full spectrum of articles explains topics from Colombian cartels and Mexican kingpins to television reportage; from "just say no" advertising to heroin production; from narco-terrorism to over $500 billion in United States government expenditure. These articles, along with a range of pedagogical elements and availablity in both print and electronic formats combine to comprise an outstanding reference source.


The direct collection of cosmic interplanetary dust in the Earth stratosphere is a unique tool for the understanding of the structure, formation and evolution of our planetary system; the collection and study of rare interstellar grains, that penetrate in terrestrial stratosphere (Grun et al., 2001), can give insights about the interaction of the Solar System and its neighbourhood, the Local Interstellar Medium.
Global atmospheric dynamics causes air masses to descent from the mesosphere to the stratosphere, in correspondence of the polar vortex (Russell et al., 1993), hence extraterrestrial particles that enter the Earth atmosphere can reach the stratosphere where they settle gravitationally.
The terrestrial stratosphere (from an altitude of 15 to 50 km) is a suitable environment where to collect extraterrestrial samples, especially the upper stratosphere, above 25-30 km of altitude: it is close to the frontier between the Earth and the space, easily reachable thanks to stratospheric balloons. In the upper stratosphere the contamination due to terrestrial material is minimum, and the concentration of cosmic particles is increased of about one million, with respect to the concentration in space.
The various populations of interstellar dust grains and interplanetary dusts, their sources and properties are described in the chapter 1.
The collection of IDPs in the range 10-100 micrometers on board NASA U2 aircrafts at an altitude of 20 km and on board stratospheric balloons has been performed in the past decades, so IDPs in this size range have been largely studied (see the chapter 2 for a brief review of sampling return experiments in stratosphere); on the other side IDPs in the sub-micron and micrometer range are poorly studied; small IDPs suffer a lower flash heating during the atmospheric entry, and moreover they are the most abundant in the size distribution.
The study of interplanetary dust particles can help to solve scientific questions not also in planetology, or in astrophysics; their study is relevant for the astrobiology and for the atmospheric sciences.
The DUSTER project (Dust in the Upper Stratosphere Tracking Experiment and Retrieval) has been designed and realized to collect refractory dust particles in the sub-micrometer and micrometer range in the upper stratosphere, with the aim to collect cosmic dust particles (Palumbo et al., 2008; Della Corte et al., 2011).
In the chapter 2 the different populations, terrestrial and extraterrestrial, of stratospheric aerosols are described.

Collected samples are then analyzed in laboratory with several techniques, using scanning electron microscope (SEM), field-emission scanning electron microscope (FESEM), energy dispersive X-rays (EDX), infrared spectroscopy (Ciucci et al., 2011), micro-Raman spectroscopy (De Angelis et al., 2011).
Transmission electron microscope (TEM) and isotopic analyses are also planned for the future.
Differently from other sampling return experiments, the DUSTER project reduces the steps of manipulation of collected samples in the laboratory; the samples are indeed analyzed at the electron microscope directly on the collection substrates.
The sampling on board stratospheric balloons is non-destructive and non-contaminant, respect to the collection on board aircrafts.

The DUSTER instrument and the various measurements and tests performed are described in the chapter 3.
In the chapter 4, the calibration of DUSTER, consisting of collection efficiency performance measurements, performed at the Cosmic Physics Laboratory of the Applied Sciences Department, ''Parthenope'' University of Naples, are described.
Finally, in the chapter 5, micro-Raman analyses on samples collected during the DUSTER-2008 flight campaign (from Svalbard Islands, Norway), are explained.
Moreover, a NI-LabVIEW tool, developed for the automatized compute of fits of numerous Raman spectra, is presented.


Generics allow programmers to design algorithms and data structures that operate in the same way regardless of the data used by abstracting over data types. Generics are useful as they improve the programmer's productivity by raising the level of abstraction, which in turn leads to reducing code duplication and uniform interfaces. However, as data on the low-level comes in different shapes and sizes, it is not a trivial job of compiler to bridge the gap between the uniform interface and the non-uniform low level implementation. Different approaches are used for generics translation and all of them can be categorized either into homogeneous or heterogeneous group. The characteristic of homogeneous translations is that all different data representations are transformed into an identical representation and use the same low-level code for this purpose. In the heterogeneous translations, code is duplicated and adapted for each incompatible data type. From a programmer's point of view, there should be no difference between a generic method or class compiled using some homogeneous or heterogeneous translation. Therefore, the programmer can combine different types of translations together on different parts of the code and the program has to be correct. But, as different generics translations are implemented in different ways, interoperation between them introduces noticeable slowdowns as values need to be converted to the foreign object's desired representation, incurring significant performance losses. In this thesis, it will be explored why slowdowns happen when different translations interact together and proposed the ways how they can interoperate more efficiently. Proposed approaches are implemented and their effectiveness is presented by benchmarking the implementation.


This article examines the field of sport for development (SFD) while considering Indigenous resurgence amidst Canada's neoliberal settler-colonial landscape. While sharing challenges encountered within their practice, program staff from the Promoting Life-skills in Aboriginal Youth program revealed high levels of constructive self-criticism and reflexivity. There are three emergent themes, the adoption of which appeared essential for transforming the sector in recognition of Indigenous resurgence: growth and pace; Indigenous agency and knowledge; and political engagement. Grounded in settler colonialism and resurgence, this paper also reflects on the field of SFD and what it would mean to decolonize the practice. The article concludes by asking if non-Indigenous scholars can study SFD by subverting the colonial status quo that is also reproduced in this research field.


The functions of prefrontal cortex remain enigmatic, especially for its anterior sectors, putatively ranging from planning to self-initiated behavior, social cognition, task switching, and memory. A predominant current theory regarding the most anterior sector, the frontopolar cortex (FPC), is that it is involved in exploring alternative courses of action, but the detailed causal mechanisms remain unknown. Here we investigated this issue using the lesion method, together with a novel model-based analysis. Eight patients with anterior prefrontal brain lesions including the FPC performed a four-armed bandit task known from neuroimaging studies to activate the FPC. Model-based analyses of learning demonstrated a selective deficit in the ability to extrapolate the most recent trend, despite an intact general ability to learn from past rewards. Whereas both brain-damaged and healthy controls used comparisons between the two most recent choice outcomes to infer trends that influenced their decision about the next choice, the group with anterior prefrontal lesions showed a complete absence of this component and instead based their choice entirely on the cumulative reward history. Given that the FPC is thought to be the most evolutionarily recent expansion of primate prefrontal cortex, we suggest that its function may reflect uniquely human adaptations to select and update models of reward contingency in dynamic environments.


Activation of the phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase (PI3K) signaling pathway is a pervasive event in tumorigenesis due to PI3K mutation and dysfunction of phosphatase and tensin homolog deleted on chromosome 10 (PTEN). Pharmacological inhibition of PI3K has resulted in variable clinical outcomes, however, raising questions regarding the possible mechanisms of unresponsiveness and resistance to treatment. WWP1 is an oncogenic HECT-type ubiquitin E3 ligase frequently amplified and mutated in multiple cancers, as well as in the germ lines of patients predisposed to cancer, and was recently found to activate PI3K signaling through PTEN inactivation. Here, we demonstrate that PTEN dissociated from the plasma membrane upon treatment with PI3K inhibitors through WWP1 activation, whereas WWP1 genetic or pharmacological inhibition restored PTEN membrane localization, synergizing with PI3K inhibitors to suppress tumor growth both in vitro and in vivo. Furthermore, we demonstrate that WWP1 inhibition attenuated hyperglycemia and the consequent insulin feedback, which is a major tumor-promoting side effect of PI3K inhibitors. Mechanistically, we found that AMPKα2 was ubiquitinated and, in turn, inhibited in its activatory phosphorylation by WWP1, whereas WWP1 inhibition facilitated AMPKα2 activity in the muscle to compensate for the reduction in glucose uptake observed upon PI3K inhibition. Thus, our identification of the cell-autonomous and systemic roles of WWP1 inhibition expands the therapeutic potential of PI3K inhibitors and reveals new avenues of combination cancer therapy.


Lennox–Gastaut syndrome (LGS) is a severe form of childhood onset epilepsy in which patients require multiple medications and may be candidates for palliative surgical intervention. In this meta‐analysis, we sought to evaluate the impact of palliative vagus nerve stimulation (VNS), corpus callosotomy (CC), and resective surgery (RS) by analyzing their impact on seizure control, antiepileptic drug (AED) usage, quality of life (QOL), behavior, cognition, prognostic factors, and complications. A systematic search of PubMed MEDLINE, Scopus, and Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews was performed to find articles that met the following criteria: (1) prospective/retrospective study with original data, (2) at least one LGS surgery patient aged less than 18 years, and (3) information on seizure frequency reduction (measured as percentage, Engel class, or qualitative comment). Seizures were analyzed quantitatively in a meta‐analysis of proportions and a random‐effects model, whereas other outcomes were analyzed qualitatively. Forty studies with 892 LGS patients met the selection criteria, with 19 reporting on CC, 17 on VNS, four on RS, two on RS + CC, one on CC + VNS, and one on deep brain stimulation. CC seizure reduction rate was 74.1% (95% confidence interval [CI] = 64.5%–83.7%), and VNS was 54.6% (95% CI = 42.9%–66.3%), which was significantly different (p < .001). RS seizure reduction was 88.9% (95% CI = 66.1%–99.7%). Many VNS patients reported alertness improvements, and most had no major complications. VNS was most effective for atonic/tonic seizures; higher stimulation settings correlated with better outcomes. CC patients reported moderate cognitive and QOL improvements; disconnection syndrome, transient weakness, and respiratory complications were noted. Greater callosotomy extent correlated with better outcomes. AED usage most often did not change after surgery. RS showed considerable QOL improvements for patients with localized seizure foci. In the reported literature, CC appeared to be more effective than VNS for seizure reduction. VNS may provide a similar or higher level of QOL improvement with lower aggregate risk of complications. Patient selection, anatomy, and seizure type will inform decision‐making.


This paper describes an exploratory extension of IIASA's world population projections for two centuries beyond their regular time horizon. IIASAs World Population Program recently published its newest 2007 projections in "Nature" (February 7, 2008) in the form of fully probabilistic projections for 13 world regions for single years of age with assumptions defined until 2080 and extended results presented up to 2100. The extensions presented here do not attempt to define uncertainty ranges for the more distant future but rather apply alternative fertility and mortality assumptions starting from the median of the probabilistic projections as well as from the upper and lower end of the 95 percent range in 2080, which is the last year for which substantive assumptions were defined in the IIASA projections. After that we apply several different fertility levels ranging from 1.0 to 2.5 children per woman, cross-classified with two alternative mortality assumptions assuming maximum life expectancies of 90 and 120 years. The results for the year 2300 range from a world population of merely 40 million to one of 56 billion. The assumptions of likely future fertility, mortality and migration trends based only on substantive reasoning can have a maximum time horizon of 30-50 years which, when explicitly accounting for uncertainty, could possibly be stretched to 70-80 years. Therefore, the extensions presented here should not be viewed as likely or even meaningful projections, but only as a sensitivity analysis of what would be the long term outcome of certain alternative assumptions.

The range of alternative fertility and mortality assumptions considered here is much broader than that of the recent UN (2004) projections to 2300 which consider 1.85 as the lowest possible long term fertility level. But similar to the UN study, a main result of our exercise is to demonstrate the great sensitivity of long term population trends to very small differences in fertility assumptions. In addition, our study shows that a world population size of around 3 billion, which several ecologists propagate as a sustainable population level, need not necessarily be reached through disastrous mortality increase - as many of them believe - but could be reached before 2300 through the benign fertility reduction to a level of around 1.7 children per woman.


Since deep neural networks may classify out-of-distribution image data into in-distribution classes with high confidence scores, this problem may cause serious or even fatal hazards in certain applications, such as autonomous vehicles and medical diagnosis. Therefore, out-of-distribution detection (also called anomaly detection or outlier detection) of image classification has become a critical issue for the successful development of neural networks. In other words, a successful neural network needs to be able to distinguish anomalous data that is significantly different from the data used in training. In this paper, we propose an efficient data augmentation network to detect out-of-distribution image data by introducing a set of common geometric operations into training and testing images. The output predicted probabilities of the augmented data are combined by an aggregation function to provide a confidence score to distinguish between in-distribution and out-of-distribution image data. Different from other approaches that use out-of-distribution image data for training networks, we only use in-distribution image data in the proposed data augmentation network. This advantage makes our approach more practical than other approaches, and can be easily applied to various neural networks to improve security in practical applications. The experimental results show that the proposed data augmentation network outperforms the state-of-the-art approaches in various datasets. In addition, pre-training techniques can be integrated into the data augmentation network to make substantial improvements to large and complex data sets. The code is available at https://www.github.com/majic0626/Data-Augmentation-Network.git.


A perceptive literary critic, a world-famous writer of witty and playful verses for children, a leading authority on children's linguistic creativity, and a highly skilled translator, Kornei Chukovsky was a complete man of letters. As benefactor to many writers including Alexander Solzhenitsyn and Joseph Brodsky, he stood for several decades at the center of the Russian literary milieu. It is no exaggeration to claim that Chukovsky knew everyone involved in shaping the course of twentieth-century Russian literature. His voluminous diary, here translated into English for the first time, begins in prerevolutionary Russia and spans nearly the entire Soviet era. It is the candid commentary of a brilliant observer who documents fifty years of Soviet literary activity and the personal predicament of the writer under a totalitarian regime. From descriptions of friendship with such major literary figures as Anna Akhmatova and Isaac Babel to accounts of the struggle with obtuse and hostile censorship, from the heartbreaking story of the death of the daughter who had inspired so many stories to candid political statements, the extraordinary diary of Kornei Chukovsky is a unique account of the twentieth-century Russian experience.


This short contribution to the Connecticut Law Review's new online supplement, CONNtemplations, offers some thoughts on status and gatekeeping in the online age of legal scholarship. Bloggers, SSRN, and online law review supplements like this one have increasingly routed around and weakened, if not undermined, the traditional gatekeepers who certified legal scholars and their scholarship. Is this a good thing? The paper proceeds by examining this question in light of a pair of opposing views and values. The first is Julius Getman's discussion of the eternal tension between elitism and egalitarianism in the life of the scholar. The second is a pair of comments on the role of blogs and other online media in legal scholarship - a positive and optimistic comment by Larry Solum, and a more pessimistic and critical view presented by Brian Leiter. Ultimately, I tend to agree with Solum's optimistic view: the online age has provided new thinkers and writers with multiple routes around the old gatekeepers, and this development should be welcomed. At the same time, I suggest candidly that many legal scholars who have benefited from blogs and other online media (including myself) have used those new media to seek certification and enhanced status from the same traditional gatekeepers that we have criticized. In Getman's terms, we have talked egalitarianism and done elitism. The old tension continues. I link this tension to a variety of broader phenomena: the insecurity of the legal academic, the legal academy's increasing fixation with rankings, and the economy of prestige.


The acquisition of tamoxifen resistance is a major therapeutic problem in breast cancer. We developed a tamoxifen-resistant MCF-7 (TRM-7) cell line to elucidate the molecular mechanisms and factors associated with acquisition of such resistance. We showed that phosphorylation of STAT3 at tyrosine 705 (Y705) and RANTES expression are increased in response to tamoxifen in human breast cancer cells. On the basis of these results, we hypothesize that upregulated STAT3 phosphorylation and RANTES may be correlated with the development of drug resistance. Here, we showed that STAT3 and RANTES contribute to the maintenance of drug resistance. STAT3 phosphorylation is constitutively retained via a RANTES autocrine loop, which in turn upregulates anti-apoptotic signals in TRM-7 cells. STAT3–RANTES autocrine signaling affected expression of anti-apoptotic BCL-2 family genes and prevented TRM-7 cells from undergoing programmed cell death by inhibiting PARP and caspase-9 cleavage. Subsequently, blockade of STAT3 and RANTES in TRM-7 cells resulted in reduction of anti-apoptotic signals, which was rescued by exogenous RANTES treatment; drug resistance was also restored. Taken together, our results suggested that STAT3–RANTES autocrine signaling is essential for maintenance of drug resistance and inhibition of programmed cell death. These mechanisms of STAT3–RANTES autocrine signaling suggest a novel strategy for management of patients with tamoxifen-resistant tumors. Mol Cancer Res; 11(1); 31–42. ©2012 AACR.


A method is proposed for simulating the sound pressure signals on a spherical microphone array in a reverberant enclosure. The method employs spherical harmonic decomposition and takes into account scattering from a solid sphere. An analysis shows that the error in the decomposition can be made arbitrarily small given a sufficient number of spherical harmonics.


We address the theory of temporal soliton switching in a planar geometry directional coupler constructed from silica and doped silica glass and operating at the central wavelength of 1.55 microm, significant for erbium-doped amplification. We formulate the field in the coupler in terms of the supermodes of the total structure and take account of the two transverse dimensions of the rectangular channels. In the case of the weak coupling between channels consistent with elimination of pulse breakup, the effect of the fields in the outer corner regions of the channels results in a switching intensity that differs significantly from that derived from coupled-mode theory on the basis of a slab model of the coupler.


We present a new database of our two-dimensional bulge–disk decompositions for 14,233 galaxies drawn from Sloan Digital Sky Survey DR12 in order to examine the properties of bulges residing in the local universe (0.005 < z < 0.05). We performed decompositions in the g and r bands by utilizing the galfit software. The bulge colors and bulge-to-total ratios are found to be sensitive to the details in the decomposition technique, and hence we hereby provide full details of our method. The g − r colors of bulges derived are almost constantly red regardless of bulge size, except for the bulges in the low bulge-to-total ratio galaxies (B/Tr ≲ 0.3). Bulges exhibit similar scaling relations to those followed by elliptical galaxies, but the bulges in galaxies with lower bulge-to-total ratios clearly show a gradually larger departure in slope from the elliptical galaxy sequence. The scatters around the scaling relations are also larger for the bulges in galaxies with lower bulge-to-total ratios. Both the departure in slopes and larger scatters likely originate from the presence of young stars. The bulges in galaxies with low bulge-to-total ratios show signs of a frosting of young stars so substantial that their luminosity-weighted Balmer-line ages are as small as 1 Gyr in some cases. While bulges seem largely similar in optical properties to elliptical galaxies, they do show clear and systematic departures as a function of bulge-to-total ratio. The stellar properties and perhaps associated formation processes of bulges seem much more diverse than those of elliptical galaxies.


Part of "The Essential Emergency Medicine Series", this book offers emergency department staff a one-stop shop for information about all aspects of imaging. With the demand for cost-effective treatment, and the plethora of imaging options, the emergency physician needs to know which test will provide the best information with the least impact on the patient. The authors present information in a systematic, user-friendly approach. Beginning with the suspected diagnosis, the clinician reviews a brief overview of the condition, usual findings, and possible lab tests. "Bedside Pearls" reflect usual findings; classic images with more pearls about the specific technique follow. Each chapter ends with the advantages and disadvantages of the various imaging modalities.


This paper examines home-range attributes of 40 greater gliders (Petauroides volans) in five patches of remnant eucalypt forest surrounded by stands of radiata pine (Pinus radiata) near Tumut in south-eastern Australia. Fixed-kernel smoothing methods were used to estimate home-range size for P. volans. For males, home-range size varied from 1.38–4.10 ha (mean = 2.6 ± 0.8 ha, n = 12) and was significantly larger (P < 0.05) than for females (1.26–2.97 ha, mean = 2.0 ± 0.6 ha, n = 11). Home-range size increased significantly with increasing patch size and reduced patch population density. Thus, small patches had more animals per unit area with smaller home ranges and greater home-range overlap. Our findings illustrate flexibility in the use of space by P. volans. Such results have not previously been reported for P. volans or any other species of arboreal marsupial. Considerable home-range overlap (at 95th percentile isopleth level) was observed between male and female P. volans. Pairs of females also exhibited home-range overlap. Males tended to maintain home ranges exclusive of other males, although some shared common areas. Contrary to the large variations observed in home-range area, core areas (50th isopleth) remained relatively constant, regardless of patch size, population density or sex. This may indicate that core areas are an essential requirement for individuals and resources they contain cannot be shared with congeners.


In this paper, we consider the problem of designing an efficient hybrid path planning algorithm to maximize the localization accuracy and to minimize the energy cost represented by the length of the trajectory taken by an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV). An urban scenario affected by a disaster is considered in this work. It is likely that victims are located in groups (e.g, collapsed buildings) and the purpose of a UAV is to explore the area and to identify people in need. For that, fast and accurate localization is required. Our developed hybrid trajectories were compared with the state-of-the-art algorithms through extensive simulations. The obtained results indicate that for the same assumptions, the proposed Hybrid G trajectory reduces the path length in average by 42%, with the increase of relative localization error only by 6%, when compared to the best performing Double-Scan trajectory. Moreover, it ensures 99% of localized nodes in the area of size 160000 m2.


This Article argues that a principled, efficient, and practical definition of corporate residence is necessary even if some form of corporate integration is adopted, and that such a definition is a key element in designing either a real worldwide or a territorial income tax system as well as a potential restraint on the inversion phenomenon. The Article proposes that the United States adopt a shareholder-based definition of corporate residence that is structured as follows:
1. A foreign corporation is a U.S. tax resident for any year if fifty percent or more of its shares, determined by vote or value, was beneficially owned by U.S. residents on the last day of the immediately preceding year (or was the average ownership for the year by U.S. residents as determined by averaging U.S. resident ownership on the last day of each quarter of the preceding year). A foreign corporation presumptively satisfies this test if any class of its shares is regularly traded in one or more U.S. public capital markets or is marketed to U.S. persons.
2. This presumption can be rebutted by the foreign corporation showing that U.S. resident beneficial ownership of its shares is below the fifty-percent threshold.
3. The presumption can be overcome in the same way by the IRS if it encounters cases where a foreign corporation that is actually foreign-owned lists a class of shares on a U.S. exchange in order to achieve U.S. resident status for tax-avoidance reasons.
This proposed shareholder-ownership test, however, would be an alternate definition; a corporation would continue to be a U.S. tax resident if it were formed under the law of a U.S. jurisdiction. Finally, this Article examines the common objections to a shareholder-based definition of corporate residence and explains why those objections are unpersuasive.


Since the terrorist attacks of September 11th, there has been an overwhelming demand
 for information about Islam, and recent events - the war in Iraq, terrorist attacks
 both failed and successful, debates throughout Europe over Islamic dress, and many
 others - have raised new questions in the minds of policymakers and the general
 public. This newly updated edition of What Everyone Needs to Know about Islam is the
 best single source for clearly presented, objective information about these new
 developments, and for answers to questions about the origin and traditions of Islam.
 Editor of The Oxford Encyclopedia of Modern Islam and The Oxford History of Islam,
 and author of The Future of Islambits
 and many other acclaimed works, John L. Esposito
 is one of America's leading authorities on Islam. This brief and readable book
 remains the first place to look for up-to-date information on the faith, customs,
 and political beliefs of the more than one billion people who call themselves
 Muslims.


Introduction United Nations (2014) predicts that the share of global urban population will increase from 50 % today to approximately 70 % by 2050. Alongside with this rapid urbanization of the human society, it is estimated that, by 2030, cities will physically expand by 1.2 million km, which is almost same size as the Republic of South Africa (Seto, Güneralp, and Hutyra 2012). While this outstanding growth of cities can contribute to more economic growth as well as mitigation of global warming by promoting law-carbon, sustainable, and climate-resilient city development (Grimm et al 2008; Rosenzweig et al 2010; Hodson & Marvin 2010; Ho et al 2013), rapid physical expansions of cities at the expense of vegetation will not only decrease CO absorption capacity of the planet but also vitiate global ecosystem services (Seto, Güneralp, and Hutyra 2012).


In Italy, enforcement proceedings are cumbersome, long, and highly ineffective. Their major shortcomings are complexity, outdated procedures, and lack of efficient compulsory measures. In spite of the recurring complaint about the odd situation of an enforcement machinery that might have worked well in the last century, but looks like an antique in contemporary society, the rules governing the enforcement of judgments have neither changed substantially since the code of civil procedure went into force in 1942, nor are they likely to be improved in the short run. Therefore, judgment-holders find it very difficult to fulfil their expectations when the debtor fails to comply with the court order voluntarily, and there is often no way to overcome the debtor's obduracy.


One perennially important question for theories of sentence comprehension is whether the human sentence processing mechanism is parallel (i.e., it simultaneously represents multiple syntactic analyses of linguistic input) or serial (i.e., it constructs only a single analysis at a time). Despite its centrality, this question has proven difficult to address for both theoretical and methodological reasons (Gibson & Pearlmutter, 2000; Lewis, 2000). In the present study, we reassess this question from a novel perspective. We investigated the well-known ambiguity advantage effect (Traxler, Pickering, & Clifton, 1998) in a speeded acceptability judgment task. We adopted a signal detection theoretic approach to these data, with the goal of determining whether speeded judgment responses were conditioned on one or multiple syntactic analyses. To link these results to incremental parsing models, we developed formal models to quantitatively evaluate how serial and parallel parsing models should impact perceived sentence acceptability in our task. Our results suggest that speeded acceptability judgments are jointly conditioned on multiple parses of the input, a finding that is overall more consistent with parallel parsing models than serial models. Our study thus provides a new, psychophysical argument for coactive parses during language comprehension. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).


In this work, we describe a Calendar Agent that uses Commonsense reasoning to generate sub-tasks based on the events that are entered by the user in the calendar. In order to generate the relevant sub-tasks of an event, we utilize ConceptNet which has 250,000 elements of commonsense knowledge. Our calendar agent recommends the best time slot for a given event based on the profile and the behavior of the user. This calendar agent was developed based on Prometheus Methodology using Prometheus Design Tool. Among the features of the calendar agent is its ability to solve timing conflict, filling in the event entry automatically based on the given information and generating sub-tasks that the user has to complete prior to the event. The calendar agent also tries to learn the behavior of the users to provide better recommendation.


The Witch Ground Graben is a NW-SE trending extensional basin in the central part of the northern North Sea, lying between the Moray Firth and the Viking Graben. NE-SW extension occurred from Triassic to Cretaceous times. Extension took place on listric normal faults along the SW margin, with downthrow to the NE, giving rise to the asymmetry of the basin. One of the principal phases of fault-controlled subsidence occurred in the Lower Cretaceous, from the Valanginian to Albian. Compilation of biostratigraphic data from this interval shows the development of an increasing number of stratigraphic breaks across the basin from SW to NE, these breaks increasing in time span also in this direction. This is a result of rotation of the subsiding fault block on the listric extensional faults. The rotation is recorded in dipmeter data, and occurred in several distinct episodes—the Triassic, the Volgian and the Valanginian to Aptian. In reconstructing a cross-section of the basin, the interpreted fault curvature is constrained by the observed rotation of bedding surfaces, and the amount of extension across the listric faults is constrained by the observed basin subsidence. A depth to décollement for the faults of 4 km below sea level and an extension across the basin of 40% are estimated.


This study investigates the development of intranets in Scottish secondary schools and within that development the role of the school librarian.

There is little written on the development of intranets in schools. There has been a lack of recent research on the role of the school librarian in the UK, and in particular there have been no studies investigating their involvement in ICT. This research adopted an interactionist approach which has been used in studying the social impact of computing (see Hiltz 1992). A grounded methodology has produced original substantive theory. Methods include a questionnaire to Scottish education authorities and semi-structured interviews with key individuals at authority level and in fifteen Scottish secondary schools.

Schools which have successfully developed their own intranets were found to have a supportive culture which enabled key individuals to work on the intranet and develop content relevant to the internal curricular needs and ethos of the school. Examples of materials on the intranet was important in encouraging further content through a snowball effect. The key individuals were defined as activators (people with the technical skills to create content), mediators (people willing to encourage, provide ideas and examples) and to a lesser extent gatherers (who collected content from school staff). A predictive model for intranet development has been produced based on these findings.

There appears to be flexibility within the role of the school librarian for individuals to take on a variety of roles. This research on intranet development found that the librarians who qualified within the last five years focussed on the intranet as a way of developing and promoting their role. Their involvement with the intranet has put school librarians in the role of intranet builder, intranet manager and content creators. Most significantly they have operated as activators and mediators in intranet development. Some librarians have broadened into network administration roles. This is increasing the difference between recently qualified librarians and longer serving school librarians. However it was found that the more recent graduates involvement with these more "technical" roles is not distancing them from their traditional areas of work. There is evidence that through these new roles, close curriculum cooperation has been achieved.


Climate Change is at just the once a social, cultural and an ecological issue. It is an environmental justice issue, an issue of economic and political domination, a consequence of clash between deregulated capitalism and the welfare of mankind deeply entrenched in a capitalist economic system based upon the persistent exploitation of natural resource for individual benefits. Poverty stricken peoples of least developed countries are the innocent victims of climate change. This article argues and identifies key ways that anthropological knowledge/lens can enrich and deepen contemporary understandings of climate change. From discussions allied to natural resource management practices it is construed that natural resource management practices are impacted from factors –political, economic (capitalism), domination, cultural, community and societal activities which are anthropogenic factors responsible for climate change calling for the equity and justice implications of climate change issues. As climate change is ecological colonialism at its fullest development-its critical scale-with sweeping social, cultural, economic and political implications, anthropological lens seek to respond to climate change at the local, regional, national, and global scales and are helpful in reflecting the understandings in application and seeking ways to pool resource with communities to assist them in addressing their climate change concerns. There are some other key contributions that anthropology can bring to understandings of climate change viz. awareness of cultural values and political relations that shape the production and interpretation of climate change knowledge, survival, power, ethics, morals, environmental costs and justice, militarism, war, intertwined crises of food, water, biodiversity loss and livelihood. Himalayan Journal of Sociology & Anthropology - Vol. VII (2016), Page: 111-140


Using an audio-only diagraming tool, sixteen pairs of sighted individuals collaborated in a workspace where they used sound as the only means to communicate with each other and to access and edit shared entity-relationship diagrams. We examined the effects of the means for delivering audio to such a workspace, headphones or speakers, on pairs' workspace awareness. Results showed that patterns of workspace awareness information exchange changed when both the means for delivering audio and collaborators' choice of working style changed. The results highlighted the need to accommodate different working styles when designing awareness support in collaborative diagramming tools, and identified the types of awareness information that should be communicated to collaborators to match the dynamics of their interactions with and through diagrams.


The late Precambrian sedimentary rocks of the Varanger Peninsula, north Norway, occur in the Tanafjord–Varangerfjord (autochthonous) and Barents Sea (allochthonous) regions. The autochthonous region includes 4-5 km of shallow water clastic sediments with subordinate carbonates and also tillites, of late Precambrian (Upper Riphean) to Tremadocian age. The allochthonous region includes about 14 km of deep and shallow water clastic sediments with subordinate carbonates, all of Precambrian age. On Varanger Peninsula these two regions are always separated by a major strike-slip tectonic disturbance, the Trollfjord–Komagelv fault. This is a single, high-angle fault in Inner Varanger Peninsula, but in the Trollfjordalen–Lille Molvik area a braided fault pattern occurs in which an early trace of the Trollfjord-Komagelv fault has been later folded and faulted. Some structural observations support strike-slip movement along the Trollfjord-Komagelv fault, while comparison with recent strike-slip fault zones suggests that the folded fault in the Trollf jordalen-Lille Molvik area represents an inactive, curved fault trace which was abandoned and subsequently tightened by (? Caledonian) folding. Stratigraphic and structural data support recent geochronological and palaeomagnetic results which suggest the geological separation of the two regions during their deposition and perhaps during their principal deformations.


1. The mechanisms underlying control of cyclic AMP responses to isoprenaline were studied in primary cultures of human airway smooth muscle cells. In these cells, isoprenaline induced concentration-related cyclic AMP formation via beta 2-adrenoceptor stimulation. 2. Prior incubation of cells with varying concentrations of isoprenaline (1-16 h), forskolin, prostaglandin E2 or a stable analogue of cyclic AMP all produced concentration-related desensitization of cyclic AMP responses to subsequent challenge with isoprenaline (maximum reduction with 1 mumol/l isoprenaline, 85% after 16 h). The desensitization induced over 2 h (44%) by a concentration of prostaglandin E2 which gave a similar rise in cyclic AMP levels to 1 mumol/l isoprenaline was significantly less (P < 0.05) than the desensitization (62%) induced over 2 h by 1 mumol/l isoprenaline itself. 3. Isoprenaline-induced desensitization of beta 2-adrenoceptor-induced cyclic AMP formation was insensitive to prior exposure of cells to dexamethasone. 4. These findings suggest that isoprenaline-induced desensitization of beta 2-adrenoceptor-induced cyclic AMP formation in primary cultures of human airway smooth muscle cells is mediated through both a cyclic AMP-dependent and probably an additional cyclic AMP-independent pathway, and that these pathways are insensitive to inhibition by glucocorticoids.


We report the extension of broadband degenerate OPO operation further into mid-infrared. A femtosecond thulium fiber laser with output centered at 2050 nm synchronously pumps a 500-μm-long crystal of orientation patterned GaAs providing broadband gain centered at 4.1 µm. We observe a pump threshold of 17 mW and output bandwidth extending from 2.6 to 6.1 µm at the -30 dB level. Average output power was 37 mW. Appropriate resonator group dispersion is a key factor for achieving degenerate operation with instantaneously broad bandwidth. The output spectrum is very sensitive to absorption and dispersion introduced by molecular species inside the OPO cavity.


The multi-reference configuration interaction (MRCI) electronic energy calculations have been carried out on the ground state (X1'Sigma') as well as three low-lying excited states (3'Sigma', 1'Pi', 3'Pi') of ZnCd dimer. Potential energy curves (PECs) are therefore generated and fitted to the analytical potential energy functions (APEFs) using the Murrel-Sorbie (MS) potential function. Based on the PECs, the vibrational levels of each state are determined by solving Schrodinger equation of nuclear motion, and corresponding spectroscopic parameters are accurately calculated using the APEFs. The present values of spectroscopic parameters including equilibrium positions and dissociation energies are compared with other theoretical reports available at present.


Understanding the complexity of approximating basic optimization problems is one of the grand challenges of theoretical computer science. In recent years, a sequence of works established that Khot's Unique Games Conjecture, if true, would settle the approximability of many of these problems, making this conjecture a central open question of the field.
The results of this thesis shed new light on the plausibility of the Unique Games Conjecture, which asserts that a certain optimization problem, called UNIQUE GAMES, is hard to approximate in a specific regime.
On the one hand, we give the first confirmation of this assertion for a restricted model of computation that captures the best known approximation algorithms. The results of this thesis also demonstrate an intimate connection between the Unique Games Conjecture and approximability of graph expansion. In particular, we show that the Unique Games Conjecture is true if the expansion of small sets in graphs is hard to approximate in a certain regime. This result gives the first sufficient condition for the truth of the conjecture based on the inapproximability of a natural combinatorial problem.
On the other hand, we develop efficient approximation algorithms for certain classes of UNIQUE GAMES instances, demonstrating that several previously proposed variants of the Unique Games Conjecture are false. Finally, we develop a subexponential-time algorithm for UNIQUE GAMES, showing that this problem is significantly easier to approximate than NP-hard problems like MAX 3-S AT, MAX 3-LIN, and LABEL COVER, which are unlikely to have subexponential-time algorithm achieving a non-trivial approximation guarantee. This algorithm also shows that the inapproximability results based on the Unique Games Conjecture do not rule out subexponential-time algorithms, opening the possibility for such algorithms for many basic optimization problems like MAX C UT and VERTEX COVER.
At the heart of our subexponential-time algorithm for Unique Games lies a novel algorithm for approximating the expansion of graphs across different scales, which might have applications beyond UNIQUE G AMES, especially in the design of divide-and-conquer algorithms.


Abstract Creative processes in architecture are traditionally dominated by the mediums of sketch and model. The contemporary landscape of burgeoning digital concepts and fabrication often dominates the making process, despite our claim that there is no 'digital design', because of the absence of iteration and interpretation within a hermeneutic cycle. The focus of this project is to investigate 'digital design' through the juxtaposition of a human driven and digitally supported creative process. The outcome is a series of objects of 'Entropy', that investigate the interaction between creative intention, digital processes, real materiality and space. Through this we simultaneously bring to centre stage the urge to control form and materiality in an automated manner, and the obfuscation of the creative process via technological error/serendipity or haptic play. This is an investigation of the post-digital future of design, of the merge between design intention/intuition, digital media, craftsmanship, experiment and object.


Background: Treating tooth decay (caries), an essential skill for dental students to learn, relies largely on tactile investigation. Most dental schools use plastic or extracted teeth to teach caries removal and cavity design. However, plastic teeth cannot replicate the 'feel' of caries, limiting the available practice exercises to manual dexterity rather than cavity design guided by pathology. Virtual haptic simulation is emerging as a viable adjunct to traditional methods, with potential to simulate dental tissues and pathology. Aim: To develop virtual haptic caries simulations, enabling students to practice the tactile and cognitive aspects of caries removal and cavity design in a controlled environment on the Moog Simodont Dental Trainer. Methods: Custom software was written to enable the creation of blocks containing unique variations of caries. Each block was produced with segment data to enable automatic marking of students' attempts. This caries block generation process enabled the creation of a large library of disparate carious models calling for a unique solution for each case. Results: A library of caries blocks was built. The blocks hold varying shape, depth and amount of caries within a simulated tooth consisting of enamel, dentine and pulp tissue. The design of the block encouraged the user to follow correct clinical protocols to treat the lesion, while preserving the maximum amount of healthy tissue. Conclusions: We present a novel haptic caries simulation encouraging correct clinical technique based on tactile sensation and realistic disease patterns. The exercises provide a safe environment for novice dental students to practice caries removal. be in caries is using excavators (c). dentinal caries be in situ and once an adequate restoration is placed. the clinical protocol (a–g) to the commonly taught preclinical method of drilling a prescribed sized cavity in a plastic tooth (h). The latter does not encourage the correct use of instruments or engender a cognitive approach to cavity design.


Food quantity and quality together determine growth rates of consumers and the utilisation efficiencies of available resources in aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems. The effect of food quality on the performance of consumers is dependent on both, its direct influence on ingestion and assimilation rates, and on the behavioural and physiological adjustments of consumers to their food environment. The main target of this thesis was to investigate the nature and scope of behavioural and physiological adjustments in consumers and assess the resulting consequences for consumers' fitness and ecosystem-wide nutrient flows.In paper I, we investigated the extent of elemental homeostasis across several taxonomic groups of planktonic herbivores. We found that adjustments in elemental ratios (C:N:P) in body tissues are an important physiological response of heterotrophic flagellates, but that in ciliates and multi-cellular organisms C:N:P ratios varied much less than in their algal prey. Hence, alternative regulatory mechanisms determine the reactions of metazoan zooplankton to decreases in food quality. In paper II, we developed a theoretical model to explore regulation in behaviour and digestive physiology of consumers to changes in the food environment. Our results demonstrate that feeding and digestion of consumers are determined by trade-offs between benefits and costs of investments in these processes. We revealed that the flexibility in consumers' behaviour and physiology had strong influences on assimilation rates and efficiencies and thereby affected growth rates and a wide range of ecosystem functions. In paper III, we investigated the scope and consequences of adjustments in feeding and assimilation rates of copepods exposed to different diets. An important finding was that consumers can use resources, which are available in surplus, to increase the uptake of a limiting nutrient. Such nutrient interconversion led to co-limitation, the simultaneous limitation of copepods by two different nutrients. Finally, in paper IV, we aimed to test the effect of food quality on population dynamics in the field. We investigated zooplankton populations in tropical soda-lakes, an environment with a surplus of planktonic food sources that thus provides an ideal setting for investigations of food quality. However, we found that the hatching of resting eggs from lake sediments was the main driver of zooplankton bloom formation resulting in non-cyclical dynamics that were not related to food quality.These findings contributed to our understanding under which circumstance and by which mechanisms food quality affects the performance of consumers. My results highlight that food quality has not only direct effects on consumers' growth but also triggers behavioral and physiological responses in consumers to maximize their fitness.


The mid-Cretaceous is widely considered the archetypal ice-free greenhouse interval in Earth history, with a thermal maximum around Cenomanian-Turonian boundary time (ca. 90 Ma). However, contemporaneous glaciations have been hypothesized based on sequence stratigraphic evidence for rapid sea-level oscillation and oxygen isotope excursions in records generated from carbonates of questionable preservation and/or of low resolution. We present new oxygen isotope records for the mid-Cenomanian Demerara Rise that are of much higher resolution than previously available, taken from both planktic and benthic foraminifers, and utilizing only extremely well preserved glassy foraminifers. Our records show no evidence of glaciation, calling into question the hypothesized ice sheets and rendering the origin of inferred rapid sea-level oscillations enigmatic. Simple mass-balance calculations demonstrate that this Cretaceous sea-level paradox is unlikely to be explained by hidden ice sheets existing below the limit of δ 18 O detection.


Synchrotron-based X-ray Tomographic Microscopy is a powerful technique for fast non-destructive, high resolution quantitative volumetric investigations on diverse samples. At the TOMCAT (TOmographic Microscopy and Coherent rAdiology experimenTs) beamline at the Swiss Light Source, synchrotron light is delivered by a 2.9 T superbend. The main optical component, a Double Crystal Multilayer Monochromator, covers an energy range between 8 and 45 keV. The standard TOMCAT detector offers field of views ranging from 0.75×0.75 mm2 up to 12.1×12.1 mm2 with a pixel size of 0.37 μm and 5.92 μm, respectively. In addition to routine measurements, which exploit the absorption contrast, the high coherence of the source also enables phase contrast tomography, implemented with two complementary techniques (Modified Transport of Intensity approach and Grating Interferometry). Typical acquisition times for a tomogram are in the order of few minutes, ensuring high throughput and allowing for semi-dynamical investigations. Raw data are automatically post-processed online and full reconstructed volumes are available shortly after a scan with minimal user intervention.


The method behind the UK Display Energy Certificate (DEC) improves the comparability of benchmarking by accounting for variations in weather and occupancy. To improve the comparability further, the incorporation of other features that are intrinsic to buildings (e.g. built form and building services) deserve exploration. This study investigates the impact of these features and explores ways to improve further comparability in benchmarking the energy performance of schools. Statistical analyses of approximately 7700 schools were performed, followed by analyses of causal factors in 465 schools in greater detail using artificial neural networks (ANNs), each designed to understand and identify the factors that have significant impact on the pattern of energy use of schools. Changes in the pattern of energy use of schools have occurred over the past four years. This fact highlights issues associated with static benchmarks. A significant difference in energy performance between primary and secondary schools meant that it was necessary to re-examine the way non-domestic buildings are classified. Factors were identified as having significant impact on the pattern of energy use. The characteristics raise new possibilities for developing sector-specific methods and improving comparability.


I. INTRODUCTION During the decade of the 1990s, foreign direct investment (FDI) undertaken by transnational corporations (TNCs) became one of the leading factors in promoting the process of economic globalization. Between 1985 and 1990 these flows averaged $142 billion on an annual basis, and during the 1991-2000 period alone they averaged $396 billion, or more than twice as much (see ECLAC 2002). The acceleration in FDI flows during the 1990s was also characterized by an increasing proportion of these funds directed to the developing nations, including the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean. Historically, most FDI flows have been sent to developed countries, but during the decade of the nineties the share of total FDI channeled to developing countries, particularly Asia and Latin America, rose from 14% in 1990 to 22% in 2000. Latin America's share of FDI flows to developing countries rose from 29% in 1995 to 40.9% in 2001, mainly confined to Argentina, Brazil, Chile, and Mexico (ECLAC 2002). The increase in net FDI flows channeled to these countries, particularly Chile, has been nothing short of spectacular when you factor in the relatively small size of Chile's economy. Between 1990 and 1994 Chile averaged FDI inflows of $1.2 billion, whereas during the 1995-99 period it raised its average almost fivefold to $5.4 billion (ECLAC 2002). During the latter period, Chile ranked only behind Brazil ($19.2 billion) and Argentina ($10.2 billion)--much larger economies--in its ability to attract net FDI inflows. The extant literature contends that in large part this has been due to Chile's relatively successful implementation of macroeconomic stabilization measures and structural reform programs. The former have insured high and sustained rates of economic growth with relatively low inflation rates since 1985, whereas the latter have taken the form of privatization and debt conversion programs, the liberalization of the tradeable sector, and the removal of overly restrictive FDI legislation concerning the repatriation of profits as well as local content and export requirements. The adoption of these fiscally prudent and structural reform policies has reassured both foreign and domestic investors in the country's commitment to market-based, outward-oriented reforms. Only time will tell if these reforms are sustainable in the long run, particularly in the wake of recent economic and financial crises that have buffeted the region. What is indisputable, however, is that FDI flows will play a strategic role not only in modernizing Chile's--and Latin America's--economy but in providing future income and employment opportunities. In view of these statements, this article analyzes the recent evolution, rationale, and major economic and institutional determinants of FDI flows to Chile. Chile was one of the earliest countries in the region to adopt and implement market-based reforms, albeit at great social and political cost. The process of economic and financial liberalization began following the military coup of 1973, and in recent years, Chile has further liberalized its FDI regime by modifying Decree Law 600 and its debt capitalization mechanism (chapter 19 of the Central Bank's Compensation of International Exchange Regulations). FDI flows in the Chilean case have historically been channeled to traditional sectors, such as mining and energy. However, during the 1990s, a significant proportion of these funds have been channeled to export-oriented manufacturing operations or to nontraditional sectors using innovative technological processes and managerial techniques. An analysis of the evolution and determinants of FDI flows to Chile during the 1990s should uncover important trends and provide valuable policy insights to government officials seeking to attract these flows to the country. The layout of the article is as follows: First, it reviews some of the major economic and institutional determinants of FDI. …


The observation of magnetic nanostructures is a highly topical field of research in recent years. Due to new developments regarding their controlled fabrication and characterization these structures play an important role for basic research as well as for applications in the area of information technology.
The focus of prior theoretical observations was mainly on the description of domain structures and domain dynamics within such nanostructures. Effects of a finite temperature were here usually
neglected. Within this dissertataion the influence of the temperature will be investigated for the case of domain walls. It will be shown, that a finite temperature leads to novel and interesting effects, like new domain wall shapes or the super-paramagnetic behaviour of a vortex core. It was not before recently that these kinds of theoretical investigations were made possible with the development of new numerical techniques. These are, e.g., the numerical solution of the
Landau-Lifshitz-Gilbert equation with Langevin dynamics, the heat bath Monte Carlo simulation with quantified time step, the implementation of the fast Fourier transformation method to implement long-range dipolar interactions, the local mean field method, and Green's function methods. In this work, all the above methods will be used to describe the dynamics and thermodynamics of domain wall structures.
For the case of domain walls dynamics it will be shown that all of the three equations for domain wall velocities which can be found in the literature (the equations after Walker, after Slonczewski and after Landau and Lifshitz) can be relevant in certain limits. Surprisingly, it is shown that for the case of vanishing damping a domain wall can still move, at the same time emitting spin waves.
Considering thermodynamics it will be shown that the magnetization component inside a transverse domain wall disappears at a temperature below the Curie temperature T_C where the magnetization component inside the domains disappears. The same effect can be observed in other domain wall structures, like, e.g. a vortex structure. In this
case the magnetization inside the vortex core disappears below T_C.
Besides this thermodynamic effect a dynamical effect exists: the vortex core shows a super-paramagnetic behaviour similar to that found
in nanoparticle. The investigation of FePt nanoparticles is also part of this dissertation. Within a collaboration with Seagate Research in Pittsburgh, PA, ab-initio calculation have been performed in order to derive and parameterize an effective spin model including an anisotropic long-range exchange interaction. The comparison of the simulation results for the thermally activated magnetization dynamics of FePt nanoparticles with the Neel-Brown model illustrates the limits of macro-spin models and underlines the importance of
atomistic calculations.


Abstract. Solar radiation is the main driver of the Earth's climate. Measuring solar radiation and analysing its interaction with clouds are essential for the understanding of the climate system. The EUMETSAT Satellite Application Facility on Climate Monitoring (CM SAF) generates satellite-based, high-quality climate data records, with a focus on the energy balance and water cycle. Here, multiple of these data records are analyzed in a common framework to assess the consistency in trends and spatio-temporal variability of surface solar radiation, top-of-atmosphere reflected solar radiation and cloud fraction. This multi-parameter analysis focuses on Europe and covers the time period from 1992 to 2015. A high correlation between these three variables has been found over Europe. An overall consistency of the climate data records reveals an increase of surface solar radiation and a decrease in top-of-atmosphere reflected radiation. In addition, those trends are confirmed by negative trends in cloud cover. This consistency documents the high quality and stability of the CM SAF climate data records, which are mostly derived independently from each other. The results of this study indicate that one of the main reasons for the positive trend in surface solar radiation since the 1990's is a decrease in cloud coverage even if an aerosol contribution cannot be completely ruled out.


The maturation of semantic web standards and associated web-based data representations like schema.org have made RDF a popular model for representing graph data and semi-structured knowledge. However, most existing SPARQL endpoint supports simple access control mechanism preventing its use for many applications. To protect the data stored in RDF stores, we describe a framework to support attribute-based-fine grained access control and explore its feasibility. We implemented a prototype of the system and used it to carry out an initial analysis on the relation between access control policies, query execution time, and size of the RDF dataset.


A team of outstanding scientists in the field of modern magnetic nanotechnologies illustrates the state of the art in several areas of advanced magneto-electronic devices, magnetic micro-electromechanical systems and high density information storage technologies. The physics and chemistry of nano-scale systems have made rapid advances and there are real prospects of translating exciting scientific findings into a new generation of processes and high technology products with a potential impact on several industrial sectors. In particular the development of nano-structured magnetic materials plays a leading role in the increasing miniaturization of devices with superior performances. The application areas considered are: i) "magneto-electronics", where the control of electron spins in magnetic hetero-structures offers new and improved functionalities in devices of integrated digital electronics. Magnetic random access memories, MRAM are among the principal applications for new non-volatile RAM with fast dynamics, toward the pico-, femto-second range. ii) "magnetic MEMS" (micro-electro-mechanical systems), which are the integration of mechanical and electro/ferromagnetic elements (micro-actuators and sensors) with conventional electronics MEMS, promise a revolution in several product categories. In fact the proposed integration enables the development of smart products, where sensors can gather information from the environment by measuring thermal, magnetic, electric, mechanical, biological chemical, optical characteristics and the electronic section processes the information and the actuator promotes the action realizing a complete control of the environment. iii) "Magnetic recording" is a leading technology in the information storage domain and the most relevant application in the field of magnetics, showing surprising continuous progress over several decades towards the limit of terabit per square inch of areal density.


The climate change on a global, regional and local scale is one of the largest problems indicated by the 21st century studies. Some of the major climate changes on the Balkan Peninsula, and in particular in Bulgaria, are related to rising temperatures and decreasing precipitation, which leads to drought and climate aridity. The present study focuses on the investigation of the climate aridity in the non-mountainous part of Southern Bulgaria in order to assess the aridity condition in temporal and spatial scale. The main investigated period is 1961-2015 and the reference periods are 1961-1990 and 1986-2015. The aridity is analysed on the basis of monthly data for air temperatures and precipitation from eight meteorological stations by calculation of De Martonne aridity index and Emberger Index. The survey shows that in all the analysed meteorological stations in Southern Bulgaria there are periods which display characteristics of the semiarid or arid climate. The aridity is well-expressed in the southwest part of Bulgaria (station Sandanski) and the western part of the Thracian lowland (station Plovdiv). Despite the aridity conditions established in the investigated region the tendencies in multiannual variability of De Martonne and Emberger indices show decreasing of aridity during the last 30 years (1986-2015) of the investigated period.


In the mid-1980s, Mosmann, Coffman, and their colleagues discovered that murine CD4+ helper T-cell clones could be distinguished by the cytokines they synthesized. The isolation of human Th1 and Th2 clones by Romagnani and coworkers in the early 1990s has led to a large number of reports on the effects of Th1 and Th2 on the human immune system. More recently, cells other than CD4+ T cells, including CD8+ T cells, monocytes, NK cells, B cells, eosinophils, mast cells, basophils, and other cells, have been shown to be capable of producing "Th1" and "Th2" cytokines. In this review, we examine the literature on human diseases, using the nomenclature of type 1 (Th1-like) and type 2 (Th2-like) cytokines, which includes all cell types producing these cytokines rather than only CD4+ T cells. Type 1 cytokines include interleukin-2 (IL-2), gamma interferon, IL-12 and tumor necrosis factor beta, while type 2 cytokines include IL-4, IL-5, IL-6, IL-10, and IL-13. In general, type 1 cytokines favor the development of a strong cellular immune response whereas type 2 cytokines favor a strong humoral immune response. Some of these type 1 and type 2 cytokines are cross-regulatory. For example, gamma interferon and IL-12 decrease the levels of type 2 cytokines whereas IL-4 and IL-10 decrease the levels of type 1 cytokines. We use this cytokine perspective to examine human diseases including infections due to viruses, bacteria, parasites, and fungi, as well as selected neoplastic, atopic, rheumatologic, autoimmune, and idiopathic-inflammatory conditions. Clinically, type 1 cytokine-predominant responses should be suspected in any delayed-type hypersensitivity-like granulomatous reactions and in infections with intracellular pathogens, whereas conditions involving hypergammaglobulinemia, increased immunoglobulin E levels, and/or eosinophilia are suggestive of type 2 cytokine-predominant conditions. If this immunologic concept is relevant to human diseases, the potential exists for novel cytokine-based therapies and novel cytokine-directed preventive vaccines for such diseases.


This article presents a multifactor arbitrage-free interest rate lattice model. The model uses a state and time dependent implied volatility function. In calibrating this function from the set of swaption prices over a range of tenors and expiration, the interest rate model can capture surface not just the perceived volatility but the distributional form, in terms of the mix of lognormal and normal distributions, and the correlations of the rates. Swaptions are actively traded in the market that reflects the market views on the yield curve stochastic movements. Interest rate models tend to fix a distributional form or the correlation matrix of the rates, and therefore, they fail to subtract the market views from the swaption prices. This article provides a model that overcomes these crucial assumptions and it can be shown to provide significant explanatory power and computational efficiency. This model interest rate process has a number of desirable properties: (1) Consistent with historical rate experiences, with a mean reversion process, non-explosive rates, and truncated low rates. (2) A binomial recombining lattice provides efficient algorithms for American options and stratified sampling in valuing path dependent securities. (3) Straightforward to specify the multi-factor model and to specify the key rate durations and key rate vegas for risk management. The model is tested in this article empirically using monthly swaption prices over a one year sample period. The results show that the model can be calibrated to the observed swaption prices quite accurately.


In recent times, there have been calls on public sector workers to increase productivity in the public sector of Ghana. This comes against the backdrop that productivity in Ghana's public sector appears to be consistently declining. While this seems to be the situation, it appears there is paucity of literature on the actual causes of productivity and how it can be improved in Ghana. Using secondary data and content analysis, this paper examines the phenomenon of low productivity in the public sector and recommends measures for improvement. Findings of the study revealed that poor remuneration systems in the public sector, political interference, and bureaucratic inertia are among the causes of low productivity in the public sector. The study recommended that public sector productivity could be enhanced through the establishment of a flexible bureaucracy, improvement in remuneration, regular monitoring and evaluation of the performance of the public sector and appointment of personnel based on merit. Political will as effective leadership are considered useful instruments to propel productivity in the public sector.


This thesis investigates the reconstruction of femininity in Britain in the post-war period (1945-1958). This is carried out through an examination of the socioeconomic and cultural formation of the period, contemporaneous cultural
commentaries, contemporary critical writing about the cinema audience, and selected British films from the period, including a detailed study of Yield to the Night (1956). The thesis utilises a range oftheoretical approaches to these issues -
film theory, feminist theory and epistemology, social and oral history, discourse theory and textual analysis. The methodological framework of the thesis reflects its feminist concerns and, in tum, engages with debates within feminist theory concerning questions of methodology and epistemology.

Accordingly, the first chapter outlines the methodological framework of the thesis as well as situating it in relation to published work in similar areas. In addition, this chapter introduces the themes of the subsequent chapters and clarifies certain key terms used throughout. The second chapter concentrates on the socio-economic and cultural formation of the period 1945-1958 and argues that this period is marked by particular discursive formations - 'Austerity', 'Affluence' and' Americanisation'. These are then discussed in relation to the ways that they are gendered and thus promote prescribed forms of femininity and womanliness. Chapter three focuses on the presentation of the period in terms of women's experiences of the time. This is achieved through an analysis of the tensions between domesticity, women's entry into the labour market and the discursive pressures on women at this time. Chapter four extends the arguments presented in the previous chapters with reference to selected films from the period - Dance Hall (1950), Turn the Key Softly (1953) and Woman in a Dressing Gown (1957), which is discussed with reference to Brief
Encounter (1945). Chapter five analyses two film publications from the period - Penguin Film Review (1946-1949) and The Picturegoer (1931-1960) - in order to establish the discursive construction of the female cinema audience. Finally, Chapter
six is an in-depth analysis of Yield to the Night (1956) with respect to critical and audience reception of the film and the issue of the construction of 'Affluent femininity.'